03 October 2012

Going Filterless

A sangha member and good friend said to me recently that he has stopped trying to pass everything through what the called "the Zen filter."  He said that until now he would take anything he thought about doing, see whether it squared with "practice" or "Zen," and, if it seemed to, he went through with it, and if it seemed not to, he didn't.  He said that now he just acts, with the usual amount of reflection and consideration of course, but without making anything "Zen" about it.

Good for him!  I remember when I came to the same point myself – how freeing it was, how so thoroughly matter-of-course it was that I wondered why I hadn't stumbled upon it sooner.

That's the rub, though, isn't it?  Anyone who practices comes in with a certain level of expectation, a certain set of assumptions, a vision of what a "Zen life" must/could be.  But, if practice is doing at all what it's supposed to, the day has to come when all of that just gets dropped.  Then things begin to roll!  The vast heaven of boundless samādhi reveals itself when it is no longer "the vast heaven of boundless samādhi," awakening becomes possible in the absence of "awakening," etc. 

That dropping is the last act the small self needs to do.  That's it!  But oh how hard it is to believe that at the outset.  How very, very hard...

No comments:

Post a Comment