Why We Need the Precepts

In a book entitled Zen at War, and in an article entitled Zen Holy War (from which I draw in this essay), Brian Victoria and Josh Baran recount how military victories in Korea, Russia, and China inflated Japan’s national pride and how, during that era, many Zen leaders perverted the Dharma to support blind nationalism and war. Japan's military campaigns were catastrophic, including the massacre of Nanking where Japanese soldiers brutally raped, mutilated, tortured, and murdered "as many as 350,000 Chinese civilians" (Baran). 

The authors share numerous accounts of Japanese Zen teachers encouraging Bushido, ostensibly a "Zen" approach to battle that was most famously exemplified by Samurai and Kamikaze pilots. Shaku Soen (1859-1919), who is still venerated in Japan as a great Zen Master, argued that since everything was emptiness, war and peace were identical. This “pernicious oneness” denies moral responsibility. Soen considered any opposition to war “a product of egotism” but was blind to the egotistical, nationalistic distinctions between "us" and "them" that he used to justify war. 

Unfortunately, Soen was not alone in his perversion of the Dharma for nationalistic purposes. Daiun Sogaku Harada (1870-1961), one of Living Vow Zen's ancestral teachers, equated meditation in battle with the "highest wisdom of enlightenment." Sawaki Kodo (1880-1965), another influential Soto Zen teacher, bragged about how he and his comrades had "gorged ourselves on killing people." Later, he wrote, “Whether one kills or does not kill, the precept forbidding killing is preserved.” When Colonel Aizawa Saburo was being tried for murdering another general in 1935, he borrowed Zen language and testified, “I was in an absolute sphere, so there was neither affirmation nor negation, neither good nor evil” (Baran).

How could Zen teachers who are bound by the precepts (ethical vows) espouse violence and the abdication of conscience? They may have feared to speak against war, but their vocal support suggests that they were actually swept up in a nationalistic wave. They thus shared distorted Dharma to deny the ethical concerns of war. They argued that “if killing is done without thinking and without discriminating right from wrong, in an empty state that they call no-mind or no-self, then the act is an expression of enlightenment” (Baran). These nihilistic descriptions of enlightenment may have served nationalistic purposes, but they completely missed the mark.

If we conceptualize enlightenment as the eradication of ethical thought or as a separate realm of absolute equality that erases distinctions, we get lost in a hell realm that we imagine is heaven. We can unconsciously get lost in ideas, especially ideas about enlightenment, emptiness, and the absolute. For example, we might attach to the phrase “no thought” in the Heart Sutra and try to stop thinking. We might even come to interpret the Heart Sutra’s “no” to mean that nothing actually exists, and our actions are thus without consequences. Should we identify emptiness with such nihilistic views, killing would indeed become meaningless.

But emptiness is not nonexistence. The most important line in the Heart Sutra states that emptiness is exactly form. From the perspective of time, this means that everything is changing, not nonexistent. Forms are just empty of fixed, intrinsic essences.

When it comes to suffering, this is a relief. We need not project permanence into pain. Sometimes, healing just means loosening our subtle identification with suffering. We can notice the sense of self that arises with the thought, “I am suffering,” and we can “open the hand of thought.” Avoid projecting thinghood into pain, and see through the notion that an abiding self is solely responsible, and our burden is lightened.

Still, in noticing that suffering has no fixed essence, we do not mean that it does not exist. Sometimes our practice is to remove the causes of suffering, and we can only do this when we diagnose its causes. When Buddha stepped on a thorn, he cried out in pain. A compassionate response would be to remove the thorn (and offer him sandals). 

Awakening also does not mean acting without thinking. Thinking allows us to distinguish war from peace so we can cultivate peace. We do, however, sometimes mistake our thoughts for reality and get lost in conceptions, cutting ourselves off from the vivid intimacy of life like a driver who looks only at a map and never sees the open road. But we don’t need to throw out the map. Our practice is not to repress thoughts but to recognize thinking as thinking. “On each flash of thought, a lotus flower blooms.”

Neither should we believe that emptiness means nonexistence. Emptiness points to the way that all forms are dependent arisings born out of changing causes and conditions. When we chant “no ear” in the Heart Sutra, it means there can be no hearing without the sound we hear, and those sounds are always changing.

Similarly, we say there is no self, but it would be clearer to say there is no separate, unchanging self. This is medicine to treat burdensome identifications with fleeting senses of self and to acknowledge that there are infinite causes and conditions that enable every aspect of life. The self is made of nonself elements and is not the first or only cause of anything. Even to take a single step requires the existence of the air we breathe and the entire earth beneath our feet. We must go beyond the teaching of no self to see that our lives are dependent arisings. We are the air we breathe. Poison the air and earth, and we poison ourselves. Harm anyone, and we harm ourselves. Care for all beings, and we care for ourselves. Therefore, do not kill. Appreciate this life before you as your own.

Our interwovenness is the root of compassion. The Heart Sutra is recited by Avalokiteshvara, the Bodhisattva of Compassion, who weeps for all beings who suffer in this world. True insight into emptiness deepens our compassion for all beings as we realize just how interwoven, vulnerable, and mutually responsible we are. Genuine insight into the emptiness of phenomena does not undermine the precepts but deepens our commitment to them. 

And, the teachings of dependent origination are essentially medicine to liberate us from the positivism and nihilism which feed harmful, dualistic thought formations. If we hold too tightly to the teachings of dependent origination, we can get lost in a finger pointing to the moon when the great matter is illumination. We are invited to open beyond all the teachings and enter into the living mystery. This does not mean discarding the precepts. We can let them also point the way to liberation from greed, anger, and ignorance but without attaching to them in a fundamentalist way. Practice includes and opens us beyond all ideas.

Most fundamentally, Buddhist practice is about alleviating suffering, and the precepts are guardrails to wake us when we contribute to suffering. The precepts give voice to our conscience. The precepts reconnect us with compassionate awareness. They may be the deepest expression of enlightened behavior.

For me, one of the key lessons from studying Zen teachers in this period in Japan’s history is that none of us are above making terrible mistakes, even those who have practiced deeply. We've seen American Zen teachers misuse sex and cause grave harm in their sanghas. Anyone can get swept up in desires and the currents of our times. Sometimes we need the precepts to help us swim upstream.

Zen: Actualizing the Noble Eightfold Path

The ancient Chinese Zen master Lin Chi once told a monk, "If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him." Though easily misinterpreted, such startling statements are intended to wake us up. Still, as iconoclastic as many Zen teachers may appear, Zen practices actually have their roots in Buddha's original teachings.

Buddhism is comprised of many different lists — the two truths, the three refuges, the four noble truths, the five aggregates, the six paramitas, the seven factors of awakening, the noble eightfold path, and so on. It’s helpful to know that each teaching in Buddhism contains all the other teachings because ultimately, they all have their source in meditation, and they all point toward the salvific quality of reality, just as it is. 

Still, there are a few Buddhist teachings that are foundational. The four noble truths explain that life includes suffering, suffering has causes, suffering ends, and there is an eightfold path of practice to alleviate suffering. The noble eightfold path is the heart of Buddha’s teachings.

Today, I’d like to explore how the eightfold path is deeply woven into the Zen tradition, even if it is not always explicitly named. The key guidances of the eightfold path manifest in Living Vow Zen's sutras, vows, and practices. To practice Zen is to embody and actualize the noble eightfold path.

The elements of the eightfold path are: right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, right concentration, right thought, and right understanding (or insight). The eightfold path includes three aspects of Buddhist training: ethical conduct, meditation, and wisdom (Walpola Sri Rahula). These three aspects are interwoven: ethical conduct is inspired by the wisdom that we are deeply interconnected, which we clearly see for ourselves in meditation. 

Yet we can also explore each aspect of the eightfold path separately. There are 3 ethical commitments in the eightfold path: right speech, right action, and right livelihood. In the Zen tradition, we find our ethical guidelines most explicitly stated in our bodhisattva precepts, and four of our sixteen vows specifically address right speech because it is so important. In those four precepts, we state:

I vow to take up the Way of Not Speaking Falsely.

I vow to take up the Way of Not Finding Fault with Others.
I vow to take up the Way of Not Elevating Myself at the Expense of Others.
I vow to take up the Way of Not Defaming the Three Treasures.

Right action is another ethical commitment in the eightfold path that "aims to promote moral, honorable, and peaceful conduct, encouraging us to abstain from destroying life, from stealing, from dishonest dealings, from illegitimate sexual intercourse, and encouraging us to help others to lead ethical and peaceful lives" (Walpola Sri Rahula).  Though in Living Vow we avoid using the term "illegitimate" regarding sexual intercourse, Zen's bodhisattva precepts offer corresponding guidelines for ethical behavior:

I vow to take up the Way of Not killing.

I vow to take up the Way of Not Stealing.
I vow to take up the Way of Not Misusing Sex.
I vow to take up the Way of Not Intoxicating Mind and Body.
I vow to take up the Way of Not Sparing the Dharma Assets (meaning, in part, that we vow to be of benefit by sharing the dharma, as appropriate, with those who are suffering).

Right livelihood, the third ethical commitment of the eightfold path, means that "we should abstain from making our living through any profession that brings harm to others, such as trading in arms and lethal weapons, intoxicating drinks or poisons, killing animals, or cheating, and we should earn our living in a profession which is honorable, blameless, and innocent of harm to others" (Walpola Sri Rahula). In our Zen tradition, as mentioned above, we vow in our precepts to avoid killing and intoxicants, and a deep reading of these precepts suggests that we should do all we can to promote life and avoid any activity that leads to the taking of life, such as selling arms or intoxicants. In our precepts, we also vow to cease from evil and to practice good, including in our professions.

The second aspect of the eightfold path is meditation, in which three other guidances are offered: right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration.

Traditionally, right effort is “the energetic will to prevent evil and unwholesome states of mind from arising, and to get rid of such evil and unwholesome states that have already arisen, and also to produce, to cause to arise, good, and wholesome states of mind not yet arisen, and to develop and bring to perfection the good and wholesome states of mind already present” (Walpola Sri Rahula). In Living Vow Zen, we remind ourselves of this guidance during every sutra service when we recite our Gatha of Atonement, in which we state, “All evil karma ever created by me since of old, on account of my beginningless greed, anger, and ignorance born of my body, mouth, and thought, I vow to atone for it all.” This chant, followed by meditation in our services, helps to illuminate these painful states of mind — the "three poisons" of greed, anger, and ignorance. In my tradition, we do not try to prevent such states from ever arising. Such a practice can lack compassion, be repressive, and lead to spiritual bypasses of appropriate feelings. However, in meditation, we consciously decide not to fuel or act on these painful states when they arise. Instead, we sit still and bear witness to their arising and their dissolution, revealing that we need not be enslaved by such mind states. 

Additionally, in our bodhisattva precepts, we say, “I vow to take up the Way of Not Harboring Ill Will.” We notice ill will arise in us, then we let it go rather than investing in it. By no longer adding fuel to the flames of division and by allowing the three poisons to arise and dissolve rather than acting impulsively on them, we open beyond these painful states to our inherent interconnection with all beings, resulting in a deepening sense of compassion and care. Having paused to realign with our vows, we can often take more skillful and less harmful action to address injustices and alleviate suffering. Of course, being human, sometimes we make mistakes. One thousand mistakes, ten thousand mistakes. So we also practice atoning and renewing our vows. This is how we actualize our compassionate true nature.

Which leads us to the second guidance in meditation, right mindfulness, which is to be diligently aware of the body, sensations, feelings, the mind, and all things. In other words, we practice awareness of life, just as it is. In this practice, we see that all things come and go, even senses of self. Everything dissolves into what is. In the deepest sense, this and all of the practices of the 8-fold path reveal that there is no destination for practice other than where we are.

The third and last guidance of meditation within the eightfold path is right concentration. In Zen practice, to cultivate concentration, we begin with counting the breath. We may find that feelings and thoughts naturally settle during this practice, but we do not explicitly aim to silence our minds, for doing so is buying into yet another idea that simply leads us away from realizing the true nature of what is present. It can also foster a belief in a fixed self that needs to be eradicated when there is no fixed self to begin with. So we do not aim to be anything and instead notice the ever-changing constellation of processes that we used to identify as an unchanging self. As concentration naturally develops, we might open our awareness to noticing the sensations of the body, ideas that come and go, shapeshifting feelings, and the dance of life around us. We call this expansive practice “shikantaza,” where we simply notice whatever is present. This practice cultivates a profound equanimity that does not depend on the content of our hearts, minds, or experience. This is liberation in the deepest sense.

The remaining two guidances of the eightfold path, namely right thought and right understanding, constitute the aspect of wisdom. Right thought suggests thoughts of love and compassion, which extend to all beings. In the Zen tradition, we cultivate this sense of care in our bodhisattva precepts when we “vow to save all beings.” We remind ourselves of this vow every time we recite our four bodhisattva vows at the end of every service. We also dedicate our practice during sutra services to those who suffer. This is how we practice in the realm of relative truth.

Finally, right understanding, the last guidance of the eightfold path, is the profound realization of the exact equality of emptiness and form, ending all suffering and distress (Heart Sutra). This understanding is the highest wisdom which sees the ultimate reality. According to Buddhism there are two sorts of understanding. What we generally call understanding is knowledge, an accumulated memory, an intellectual grasping of a subject according to certain given data, or “knowing accordingly” (Walpola Sri Rahula). I refer to this as the “relative truth.” It is important but not profound, and when we attach to particular ideas and mind-states, we project selfhood into things and lose the deeper insight of emptiness. Deep understanding is opening beyond names and labels (without excluding them). It is intimacy with beings exactly as they are. In meditation practice, we learn to relate with all ideas and compass points as provisional (meaning, they too are empty of intrinsic essence), and we practice opening beyond ideas to realize whatever is in a more intimate way. Trungpa calls this intimacy “compassion-compassion." Beyond self and other, this inherent intimacy with all beings is the deep source of compassion for all beings, without exception.

As you can see, though we do not necessarily cite the eightfold path very often in Zen, it is deeply woven into our liturgy, vows, practices, and teachings. I’ve only scratched the surface of the many ways the eightfold path manifests in Living Vow Zen. To practice Zen is to walk Buddha's noble eightfold path, and to walk the eightfold path is to vigorously abide in the destination we seek right here, right now.

Announcing Living Vow Zen

I am happy to announce a new Zen collective called Living Vow Zen, a group of Zen practice groups (sanghas) with lineage roots in Japanese Soto, the Harada-Yasutani koan curriculum, and Korean Seon. 

We are comprised of three practice groups: Shining Window Sangha, Henry David Thoreau Sangha ("Hank"), and Morning Star Zen Sangha. Bob Waldinger and I are the founding teachers.

Why Living Vow Zen?

According to mythology, in a previous life, the one who would become Buddha reflected that, were he to practice diligently, he could free himself from Samsara in that very lifetime. But rather than practice for his liberation alone, he decided that it would be better to delay his liberation to train for many lifetimes so that he could guide others across the river of suffering to the farther shore.

In his final incarnation, Shakyamuni Buddha was born into nobility and great wealth, but he again renounced that place of comfort when he saw that others in the world were suffering. Once more he vowed to attain enlightenment so that he might conquer suffering not only for himself but for all beings.

Upon awakening, Buddha was true to his vow. He returned to his sangha that he might share with them his teachings. Because of his generosity, Buddha’s awakening reverberates to this day, and it is in the spirit of his living vow that we practice not only for our own awakening but to alleviate suffering in the world. Those of us in Living Vow Zen aim to embody the Mahayana Way by cultivating compassion and wisdom for the sake of all beings. 

All who come and practice even a few times with Morning Star, Shining Window, or Hank may consider themselves part of our sangha, and everyone's participation is valued and appreciated. Everyone is welcome in our inclusive Zen community. 

Compassion for Delusions

What follows is a lightly edited transcript of a talk I offered to Morning Star Zen Sangha on January 3, 2018.

In the last meditation period, I was reflecting a little bit on what I was going to talk about, and I thought I would call this talk, “compassion for delusions.” I love that beautiful poem called, “The Ship of Compassion,” by Miaoshi, from a book called Zen Women. She writes, “Words are inherently empty, and yet still I am fond of brush and ink. My mind like ashes after the fire, and yet still I am tied to the world.” There is a kind of samadhi, the cessation of dualistic notions, that we can practice, and yet still I am fond of brush and ink, fond of words and language and thoughts that come. Still I am tied to this world. Still I find myself caring about things. I'm not the stereotypical hermit Zen monk, but a priest who commits to the bodhisattva vow to help heal this suffering world. 

And really, these "two" orientations toward samadhi and saving all beings are not contradictory. For me this practice of sitting is really one of integration, so I have a story I want to read to you. I mentioned before that I was reading this book called Thousand Peaks about Koreans Zen which is one of the tributary streams of our of our Boundless Way Zen lineage. I received transmission from David Rynick who received transmission from George Bowman who received transmission from Seung Sahn. Seung Sahn generously shared his Korean tradition in the United States. So I found myself quite curious, since this is one of the streams of our lineage, to learn more about this Korean heritage, and one does find a slightly different emphasis, or I should say a little bit more of a willingness to acknowledge a samadhi practice that we don't talk too much about in Boundless Way Zen. 

Samadhi is a practice that we fall into. One might deeply unify with the sensation of the breath till even the breath falls away. One might open beyond all thought and unify with the vastness. But there are shadows to cultivating a samadhi practice. One of the shadows is that we can get very attached to ideas of samadhi, and our attachment makes us suffer. Any experience that is different from our idea of samadhi may feel unsatisfying, but life is always changing. We can become more concerned with our own mental state than with everyone's well-being. We become "state-chasers," consumed with desire for our next "fix." We may lose touch with compassion, and our practice can become selfish and cold. 

There’s a wonderful koan in which Manjushri, the bodhisattva of wisdom, cannot awaken a woman from a deep, deep samadhi. Buddha’s and bodhisattvas are called to help, and none of them can awaken her. They have to get the bodhisattva of delusive wisdom, who resides in a hell realm, to come snap her out of samadhi to engage her in life again. So we actually need our delusions, we need our thoughts, to exist and take action in this world. Otherwise, we would starve. And we would abandon those we love. 

So for me, practice is about integration. Here's a story that I think helps illustrate this this kind of practice where we can both cultivate some capacity with prajna, with the sword of wisdom that recognizes delusion as delusion, but also that does not abandon the heart of compassion, the heart of care. There's a story of a teacher in the Korean lineage named Won Hyo (from the book Dropping Ashes on the Buddha). One evening as Won Hyo was crossing the desert, he stopped at a small patch of green where there were few trees and some water and went to sleep. Toward midnight he awoke thirsty. It was pitch dark. He groped along on all fours searching for water. At last his hand touched a cup on the ground. He picked it up and drank. Ah, how delicious. Then he bowed deeply in gratitude to Buddha for the gift of water. The next morning when Won Hyo woke, he saw beside him what he had taken for a cup during the night. It was a shattered skull, blood-caked and with shreds of flesh still stuck to the cheekbones. Strange insects crawled or floated on the surface of the filthy rain water inside it. Won Hyo looked at the skull and felt a great wave of nausea. He opened his mouth. As soon as the vomit poured out, his mind opened and he understood. Last night, since he hadn't seen and hadn't thought, the water was delicious. This morning, seeing and thinking had made him vomit. Ah, he said to himself, thinking makes good and bad, life and death. Without thinking, there is no Universe, no Buddha, no dharma. All is one, and this one is empty. There was no need now to find a master. Wan Hyo already understood life and death. What more was there to learn. So he turned and started back across the desert to Korea." 

He was on his way to China to find a great teacher and instead he found a skull. And the skull taught him about thinking. So this is no small insight that Won Hyo had here. What follows it is a kind of arrogance, a sense of “now I've got it all figured out,” and he doesn't at all! But he has had a taste of awakening. He suddenly recognized thoughts as thoughts rather than seeing them as the nature of reality in and of itself. Life and death simply as ideas, good and bad, right and wrong, our most dearly held delusions, he saw them simply as thoughts. This was profoundly liberating. 

You have probably had this experience before. There is great power in seeing mind states as mind states, in seeing thoughts as thoughts. Sometimes just naming them is enough. It's a skillful means. 

The other day I was feeling ashamed about something that's happening in my family life related to my son, a parenting issue, and I felt like a horrible father. I got on my phone between classes and I texted a good friend and I said, "I am so ashamed right now." So powerful to simply name what has arisen as a mind state and recognize it as a mind state. There is a kind of liberation in that. 

It's hard to describe but when you’re sitting on the cushion and you can do nothing about it, sometimes when you recognize a mind-state as a mind-state, you realize that it's not reality. It's something that is arisen as a set of thoughts and feelings that have taken possession of the heart-mind, that have created a kind of small world for us. Sometimes naming that is enough. It just begins to evolve. Just noticing, just paying attention, everything goes its own way. Everything is intrinsically impermanent, empty, without fixed nature, and everything exists in the fabric of the whole universe. When we name these claustrophobic mind states, sometimes they just open up and we see, this is a mind-state. Sometimes they evaporate, like what happened here to our ancestor Won Hyo. The mind-state utterly evaporated. Great clarity! Suddenly, pure presence, the skull neither good or bad, just the sound of water. 

This is the liberating truth that he woke to in that moment, the falling away of mind and body, the falling away of differentiation, the falling away of good and bad. A kind of existence before thought. 

Now to get stuck to this mind state of "beyond good and bad" is just another mind state. It’s a hell-cave. Like for the woman stuck in samadhi, nothing can happen from this place. We are of no service to the world. It is of course quite compelling. There is a part of me that has the stereotypical mountain monk in him, the hermit, the one who wants to go find a cave in the mountains just like so many of these teachers, to go tuck myself away and practice in nature, no more worrying about the struggles of society. This is the recluse, the practice of the arhat, where practice is not concerned with saving all beings or with engaging in the world but simply concerned with one's own personal salvation.

Awakening to the true nature of reality is a kind of liberation. When we taste it we feel that freedom. We may find ourselves feeling somewhat attached to it and abandon the search for a teacher, abandon care about the suffering in the world as we simply want to give it up. 

But our ancestral teacher goes on. After his return to Sila, Won Hyo’s activities became more and more unorthodox, and the following encounter happened. “There was a very famous monk in Sila, a little old man with a wisp of beard and skin like a crumpled paper bag. Barefoot and in tattered clothes, he walks through the town ringing his bell, calling ‘dae on, dae on, dae, on.’”  It means great peace and happens to be David Rynick’s given Buddhist name. “‘Dee on, don't think. Dea on, like this. Dae on, rest mind. Dae on, dae on,’ he called. Won Hyo heard of him and one day hiked to the mountain cave where the monk lived. From a distance he could hear the sound of extraordinary lovely chanting echoing through the valleys, but when he arrived at the cave he found the master sitting beside a dead fawn weeping. Won Hyo was dumbfounded. How could an enlightened being be either happy or sad since in the state of Nirvana there is nothing to be happy or sad about and no one to be happy or sad? He stood speechless for a while and then asked the master why he was weeping. The master explained, he had come upon the fawn after its mother had been killed by hunters. It was very hungry, so he had gone into town to beg for milk since he knew that no one would give milk for an animal. He said it was for his son. ‘A monk with a son? What a dirty old man,’ people thought, but someone gave him a little milk. He had continued this way for a month begging enough to keep the animal alive, then the scandal became too great and no one would help. He had been wandering for 3 days now in search of milk. At last he had found some, but when he returned to his cave the fawn was already dead. ‘You don't understand,’ said the master. ‘My mind and the fawn’s mind are the same. It was very hungry. I want milk. I want milk. Now it is dead. Its mind is my mind. That is why I am weeping. I want milk.’ Won Hyo began to understand how great a bodhisattva the master was. When all creatures were happy, he was happy. When all creatures were sad, he was sad. Wan Hyo said to him, ‘please teach me.'"

I find that to be a very moving story. Won Hyo was open enough to see this great compassionate, awakened heart, a manifestation of non-duality. He saw that love and care and the suffering that accompany them are manifestations of the Dharma, manifestations of non-duality, manifestations of emptiness. Even this mountain monk was filled with love and care. 

So actually, in my view, this represents an integration of samadhi with the heart of compassion. It is actually a ripening of samadhi, samadhi without bounds, samadhi without limits, not simply the samadhi of attachment to peacefulness, but the samadhi of oneness with all beings, the samadhi of interwovenness with this world! We are this world. And this is true whether we are thinking or not. So there is no need to get rid of thoughts. Just wake up! 

We do not exist separately. Our hearts and minds are literally made of this world. Sometimes “what is” manifests as peace: dae on. Sometimes “what is” manifests as great sorrow, as great care, as great delusion. Our practice is not to attain a particular state of mind and reside in it permanently. Our practice is to keep turning toward whatever is. 

When we have moments of great peace, we can appreciate and celebrate the vastness, the great emptiness of our being. Sometimes what appears to us is a starving fawn, great love, and great sadness, and in these moments, this too is the presence of emptiness, of non-duality, of awakening, of our interwoven nature, impermanent and yet manifesting. 

Our job is not to find any fixed mind-state but to continue turning toward whatever is with an open heart. In this way we will find ourselves sometimes called to a practice of silence and peace. Sometimes we need that peace. We need to find a places in our lives where we can recover our strength, be in touch with that part of ourselves that is just nurtured and fed by the simple presence of the sound of heat pulsing through a building, to just receive those moments when they come with great gratitude.

And sometimes the world needs us. It needs us to give back. Nurtured from our practice, called by the world, we get off the cushion and go begging, begging for milk. Whatever little thing we can do. 

Practicing Zen with Depression

All kinds of studies point to the health benefits of meditation, and as a Zen Buddhist priest, I am not surprised. I have long found meditation to be a healing salve. 

Once we taste the fruits of meditation, it can be tempting for spiritual seekers to imagine that it will save us from all forms of suffering, including sadness, anxiety, and mental illness. Using meditation to avoid pain is commonly referred to as "spiritual bypass." But we suffer more when meditation inevitably fails to relieve all pain because we feel like we must be doing it wrong. On top of feeling depressed, we end up feeling like failures in our spiritual traditions. 

But it is not a flaw of practice to feel pain. A few years after his enlightenment, Eihei Dogen, the founder of Soto Zen, may have suffered from "a depression that had been building up through... the dark times he was going through" (Zen Buddhism: A History, Japan, Heinrich Dumoulin, p.62). Hakuin's autobiographical accounts describe awakenings followed by intense periods of suffering, including feeling "abnormally weak and timid, shrinking and fear­ful in whatever I did. I felt totally drained, physically and mentally exhausted.... My eyes watered constantly" (Zen Sickness). Zen teacher Reigetsu Susan Moon has also written extensively about her struggles with depression. And like my mother before me, I’ve experienced dysthymia for stretches of my life. This darkness sometimes feels like a cave of grief. If you are a Zen practitioner who suffers, you are not alone.

I am a Soto Zen priest in Dogen's line, and the emphasized practice in our tradition is a meditation practice called shikantaza. In shikantaza, we sit still, stop talking, and pay attention to whatever arises. Shikantaza, or silent illumination, allows us to open our hearts to life just as it is and recognize our intimacy with all beings, including our pain. Rather than avoid, we turn toward whatever is arising and open our hearts to things as they are. Acceptance of our condition gives birth to compassion. This is no small thing. 

But a complete Zen practice also includes mindfully using skillful means to alleviate suffering in ourselves and in the world. The practices of opening our hearts to things as they are and taking action to improve things may seem contradictory, but they are actually complementary. Bearing witness and practicing skillful means are like the foot before and the foot behind in walking, and a complete Zen practice includes both.

Bearing witness

 

In Zen practice, the first step is to see what is present. From this perspective, whatever arises is a dharma gate. As James Ford writes, "We are completely subject to the vicissitudes of our lives. Zen is not an escape hatch from this. This is the field of enlightenment." Rumi writes, "Every morning a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor... invite them in."

Just acknowledging pain can be a relief. Giving ourselves and others permission to be exactly as we are in any given moment is the heart of compassion and opens the door for us to respond with loving kindness. It also invites more openness and curiosity about our experience. 

If depression is severe, it may be counter-productive to meditate. It may be necessary to seek medical attention and postpone practice until symptoms are reduced.* But in my experience, meditating has been beneficial. 

 

In meditation, without trying to control our experience, we compassionately attend whatever arises as a dharma gate, as an opportunity to comprehend the true nature of phenomena. In nondualistic compassion, beyond "is" and "is not," the emptiness of phenomena is revealed. 

As we pay attention, we first might notice our thoughts. For example, we might think that our situation is hopeless and that life is meaningless. Especially while depressed, our thoughts often become sticky as shameful senses of self arise. We may think, "I am a failure," identifying with our feelings. Meditation brings this subtle identification with feeling states into awareness. 

Curiosity helps release our identification with thoughts. We do not need to manipulate the content of our thoughts while meditating. In paying attention without investing in or pushing away anything, we see that even painful thoughts and senses of self come and go. We notice the space between thoughts and begin to recognize thoughts as thoughts rather than as the absolute truth, and this opens up some space between the brain and the skull. "Opening the hand of thought" allows new possibilities to arise. 

For example, we may diagnose ourselves as depressed, but what is depression? Thinking that we already know the answer can exacerbate our suffering. We may think of depression as a static "thing" or mental state that cannot shift or change, especially when we identify with it. One practice is to drop the hwadu, "what is this?" into our meditation and look beyond our thoughts into the sensations of our body for what is actually present. 

We'll likely notice a set of feelings that we associate with depression, but it is important to keep paying attention. For me, one sensation is something like a slowly shape-shifting, dark cloud in my brain. This thick fog pressures and heats my skull. There can also be a heaviness in my heart, hollowness in my gut, and pressure behind my eyes, like I might cry at any moment. But with close attention at the cellular level, I see that sensations keep changing moment after moment. The way I'd describe my experience one second is not exactly the same the next. In opening awareness and seeing that thoughts and even senses of self are ever-changing, we can viscerally experience that depression has no fixed essence. Everything changes. Depression is not a constant expression of some underlying, permanent self. When we are suffering, recognizing impermanence is a relief. 

While sitting upright in the midst of depression, we may also be relieved to see that the fog of melancholia is interpenetrated by the sensory world. Depression is not a solid barrier. It is murky but “translucent.” It is not a wall separating us from the world, but we only comprehend this by looking into that which we hate: the darkness. In actually looking, the landscape of life also emerges, like faint moonlight through clouds. It might be the sensation of the breath, a birdsong, the sound of rain, or a honking truck that opens our awareness. 

Sometimes we describe this openness as "creating a bigger container," but we do not actually create this container. It already exists. We just notice what is already present. Though our narratives tell us otherwise, our inner life is inseparable from the wider landscape of this sensory world. There is only an imaginary line between inside and outside, between self and other, and our intimacy with all beings is no small comfort. Even when we think we are alone, we are held by the boundless universe, and the universe resides in our hearts. 

 

As the koan says, "the clearly enlightened person falls into a well." Falling is an opportunity to awaken again. Everything is changing before our very eyes, there is nothing that we can possess forever, and falling releases us from our attachments, the very ones that have made us suffer again and again. While falling, we can open our eyes to the way things are in this very moment of descent and maybe even pluck a strawberry on the way down.

But there is also the deep, dark depth of a well. And though we may surrender, stay curious, and even appreciate the suchness of cold stone walls, sometimes depression feels relentless. The persistence of depression is not an indicator of a failed practice. While wide awake, we can be trapped in a well! In such circumstances, we may need to do more than meditate to take care of ourselves. When hungry, we eat. When tired, we sleep. When depressed, we employ skillful means to alleviate suffering. This too may be part of an awakened life.

 

Practicing skillful means

 

For me, when depression arises, it is helpful to bow, to accept the guest who is with me in the moment, and to offer a compassionate response. Though it may feel like my fault, I remind myself that nobody is at fault. There is no first cause. This is just how it is, the result of causes and conditions beyond counting. 

 

In these moments, faith sustains me -- faith that even depression is without fixed essence, faith that all things change, and faith in something bigger than my limited karmic self. We don't only save all beings but are saved by all beings. The universe is always holding us compassionately, and we are manifestations of its infinite presence. Like Buddha during the night before his enlightenment, we can touch the earth and feel it supporting us, moment after moment, even in our darkest hours. We can even cry out to this universe to save us, and in the moment of our cry, the universe responds, and the cry itself is the voice of Buddha. 

 

We should not pretend that meditating will cure medical illnesses. It would be absurd to tell someone suffering with diabetes or cancer that meditating would cure them. I would not even suggest that someone suffering from a dehydration headache should meditate to make it go away. The compassionate response is to offer a glass of water. To practice skillful means is to alleviate the causes and conditions that give rise to suffering. This means being aware of our symptoms in part through meditation and mindfully trying remedies to reduce our suffering. 

Depression may have multiple causes, one of which may be biological. In such circumstances, medication may be an important part of treatment. Other skillful means may include taking "opposite action" -- doing therapeutically advised activities even though we may not want to, such as exercising, seeing a therapist, joining sangha-mates to sit or drink tea, and asking for help when hurting. For me, a combination of meditation, exercise, sleep hygiene, counseling, and light-therapy offered some relief. Rather than view these activities as in opposition to some image of "pure" Zen practice, I consider them part of my practice. 

 

Though means vary, depression is treatable. Each of us is different, but through our ongoing attention, we learn which remedies work best. Caring for depression is a compassionate practice that cultivates insight, patience, responsiveness, and loving kindness. As we continue to practice meditation and skillful means, we find that our sense of interconnectedness and compassion naturally extend to all beings with whom we intimately share this life. Caring for depression is nothing to be ashamed of. It is a powerful way to manifest our bodhisattva vow to save all beings. 

 

*Please note that clinical depression is a medical condition. This article is not intended to provide or replace treatment for those who may suffer from clinical depression or other forms of mental illness. If you are in need of help, you can call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255) to access free, 24/7 confidential service for people in suicidal crisis or emotional distress, or those around them. The Lifeline provides support, information, and local resources. You can also text the Crisis Text Line at 741-741 for free 24/7 support with a trained crisis counselor right away. 

Freedom

Diamond shards tap the glass,

and wind whistles through cracks

in the window panes.

I resentfully pull on my boots

to shovel snow.

I call my 9 year old son,

"want to help me?"

"No thanks," he says,

wandering to his room 

to draw a treehouse

build an electric circuit

read Captain Underpants.

I wish I were so free.

But as I zip my puff daddy coat,

my father with his crooked back

steps forth from the darkened room where he sat,

looks into my eyes 

for the first time this visit and says,

"Son, I wish I could join you,"

then turns back into the dark.

I open the door and step into the night.

The snow slants across the streetlights 

and stings my cheeks.

Lightning flashes in the sky,

and thunder rumbles through the darkness.

I carve paths in the snow,

reveling in how

white clouds of powder fly

like angels.

Why We Need a Spiritual Revolution

When we align with our Buddha-nature, we can appreciate our life, just as it is. Our Buddha-nature, or true nature, is amazing beyond description. The word “Buddha-nature” is a pointer to the nondual realization that we are not separate from the universe.

When we lose touch with our Buddha-nature, we are driven by craving in ways that cause ourselves and others endless suffering. To realize our true nature is one way to weaken a cycle of consumerism and exploitation that causes terrible harm and that will otherwise likely be our demise.

There's a difference between needing to have our basic needs met, which our society can and should do for all, and craving -- which is driven by a persistent sense of inadequacy and longing. I just finished reading David Loy's Ecodharma: Buddhist Teachings for the Ecological Crisis. He reminds us that a cause of this persistent craving is our underlying awareness that we are ever-changing, mortal beings. We long for stability and security, and what we find is impermanence. 

Change and loss is to be expected, but we are surprised every time we face a problem and imagine that we should be able to attain a kind of homeostasis that includes no problems or losses. We fix our leaky roof and think, finally, the house is all set, and the next month, a pipe bursts. We want to feel healthy, but suddenly we get sick. We want our family and friends to be permanent fixtures in our lives, but then we get in an argument, or even more painfully, a loved one dies. Life is actually "problem" after "problem" and loss after loss. The end of our problems is death, which sometimes feels like the biggest problem of all.

One way we deal with this instability is that we try to turn our sense of self into an impenetrable fortress that will not have to suffer change. We may hope to attain some kind of greatness that will define us forever, like the nearly-immortal Achilles in the Iliad. As a young man, I threw myself into training in rowing. Along the way my teams won multiple national and international championships. Interestingly, even at the time, these victories felt hollow because some part of me knew that I am not those victories. I momentarily felt like a winner, but then I lost a race and felt like a loser. 

What I actually loved was the rowing itself, but I never expected it to be a permanent state. Winner, loser... these are senses of self that arise and disappear, just like each moment in our lives. There is no permanent self to be attained, only one sense of self after another, ever evolving based on causes and conditions. Deep down we know this, yet we keep competing with one another for the ultimate victory, chasing after shadows. 

This vacillating sense of self-satisfaction and dissatisfaction leads us to try to create a permanent sense of satisfaction in other ways. One of the most damaging is our desire to accrue wealth. We imagine that if we can stockpile enough resources, we can purchase the fairy tale ending, "they lived happily ever after." For this "American dream," we commit grave harms. Human beings have enslaved one another, displaced indigenous peoples, colonized nations, and stolen and pillaged land for its "resources." We exploit one another and the earth to attain our personal goals. 

Within the United States today, those who are poor (often people of color) continue to suffer environmental injustices as they are forced to live in toxic environments, such as near coal plants that provide energy that is largely consumed by the privileged. This inequity is unfair, and it is incumbent upon those of us with privilege to rectify it. 

But the human appetite for consumption appears insatiable. Every two years, human beings chop down enough trees to cover all of Spain, and an area totaling 22.5 million football fields is desertified every year due to unsustainable, but changeable, agricultural practices. We are connected by an umbilical cord to Mother Earth who sustains our lives, and if we destroy her, we destroy ourselves.

The scientific consensus is that we are reaching critical tipping points in the amount of carbon in the atmosphere. The arctic permafrost is beginning to melt, releasing methane into the atmosphere, which traps more heat and causes even greater temperature increases than CO2. If this happens on a grand scale (which is likely to happen within the next hundred years if we don't change course), the average global temperature could rise 6 degrees Celsius in as short a period as 15 years. The result would be devastating, including mass desertification, plagues, biodiversity collapse, and the end of human civilization. It could mean the end of all life on this little blue planet. We truly are in this together.

Unfortunately, we seem to be too driven by our craving for permanent states of satisfaction to pause long enough to really take in what we are doing to our planet and to one another. We keep feeding the hungry beast of consumerism in hopes of overcoming our "problems."

But the real problem is the hope to escape our problems through consumption. No matter how much wealth we accrue, this deep sense of inadequacy persists because all of us will still get sick, grow old, die, and lose everyone we love. So we spin the wheel of suffering faster and faster, trying to get ahead. We are actually just digging our own graves, and in the meantime, we forget to appreciate our lives. 

Insanity is sometimes defined as doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. Might it be time for us to try something different? 

What we need if we hope to survive as a species is nothing less than a spiritual revolution. We have this remarkable human capacity to recognize the inherent beauty of our lives, instability and all. In Buddhism, we call this inherent beauty our Buddha-nature. 

Ultimately, our Buddha-nature is nothing other than ourselves as we are in this very moment -- the very thing we so often think is inadequate. For me, it is the sensation of my legs resting on the cushion, laptop perched on my lap, breath entering and exiting my lungs, crickets singing in the trees, and cars whooshing along the street. But it is not the concept of these things as separate beings. It is the actual presence of all of these "activities" that make up "my" boundless nature. 

Really this boundlessness is not mine. Buddha-nature belongs to the universe, and we are ephemeral manifestations. 

Our Buddha-nature also includes our "problems," such as a broken heart when someone we love dies. If, rather than trying to avoid such sorrow, I hold it compassionately, like an ocean holding a wave, grief simply arises and falls, revealing its own beauty. 

It turns out there was nothing to fear. "Impermanence" is just this ever-evolving moment. There is something reliable after all. 

Our boundless Buddha-nature is nothing other than things as they are, moment after moment, and when we turn toward this, appreciation and gratitude arise as we feel the intimacy of all beings residing in our hearts. 

We can realize our Buddha-nature by meditating. This realization is transformative. We find in this realization that we are not actually separate from the world. Like grief, separate senses of self may arise like waves in the ocean, but we are also the entire ocean. We are made of the earth and sky, and we will return to them when we die. During our lives, the earth lives in our bodies, the sky in our lungs. We are deeply interwoven with all of creation. In this realization, we find the very joy, connectedness, love, and gratitude we previously sought through egoistic and materialistic pursuits. 

There is nothing we need to do to attain our Buddha-nature. It is already manifesting. But we may need to practice meditation with a group and teacher to realize it. Our true nature reveals itself to us when we are quiet, sit still, and pay attention. Bit by bit, we learn to appreciate this in activity as well. Then we no longer crave to possess more and more of the world; it offers itself to us each and every moment.

As we realize just how intimately interconnected we are with all beings, here we find the love that inspires us to care for all of creation. The air in the sky inhabits my lungs. May it be pure! The rain falling from the sky fills my glass. May it be clean! And I am part of this world, always contributing to its evolution. May I be of benefit! In this way, realization of our Buddha-nature inspires us to care for all beings.