Self and Ox Forgotten ~ Max Gimblett

The Japan Society in New York is sponsoring an exhibit of the Ten Oxherding Pictures from October 1st through January 16th and will be on view concurrently with the “Sound of One Hand Clapping:  Paintings and Calligraphy of Zen Master Hakuin” [described by myself earlier here]. 

The pictures and associated poems represent, especially in the Zen tradition, the stages a practitioner takes as she stumbles towards enlightenment.  The mind as represented by the Ox is fumbled after by a bumbling but budding practitioner that grows on the path as the pictures proceed.  The pictures were originally drawn by Chan master Kuoan Shiyuan during the 12th century and have been the inspiration for many modern renditions and contemporary interpretations.  

The exhibit will feature a collaboration of two internationally known artists, Max Gimblett and Lewis Hyde.  The pictures are sumi in style but largely abstract in form and shockingly loud in presentation.  While the original Ox Herding pictures relied upon the mundane images of hunting down an Ox to describe finding enlightenment, Gimblett and Hyde rely more on dramatic emotion and expression to portray the struggle of practice and the seething turbulence present in the deluded mind.  A wonderful focus and inspiring pieces of work.  For some more info on Hyde’s translations of the pictures go here. 

In addition, there will be a lecture on the 13th of October (an auspicious day for myself as it is my rebirthday) by artist Lewis Hyde and psychiatrist Mark Epstein on the interface between Buddhism and psychotherapy.  With moderator James Shaheen, Editor of Tricycle, this lecture will be an interesting one and one that I am sorry to miss.  [more details here] 

In the spirit of interpreting the pictures, the following is my own humble explanation.  From a person still searching the great plains for an elusive Ox, I think I look forward to the time when I can ride that bastard home. 

In the first picture “Seeking the Ox” we are just setting foot on the spiritual path ahead of us and are blissfully unaware of what the ox is or how it can be found.  With all the horizon around us we scan constantly for anything but the resulting task can only result in frustration while still living in a world of illusion. 

In the second picture “Finding the tracks” our intrepid searcher has ceased scanning the horizon and has begun to look within.  While the ox still eludes us, we find tracks ,scat and the occasional broken twig to alert us of his presence.  I liken it to the first solemn or flippant adventure into zazen where still clueless we begin to search in the right direction. 

KATSU! The third picture “First Glimpse of the Ox” represents our first experiencial view of the Mind.  Clouds open up briefly and we see the open sky but the cloud quickly close and the ox runs back into the weeds.  Upon retrospection it could have just been a daydream or a bit of indigestion. 

The fourth picture “Catching the Ox” represents the ability to view our past thoughts and patterns of thought as delusional.  We now understand and realize the ox but the ox is still wild and unruly.  Unwilling to be grasped, the ox still stamps the ground and pulls at the tether.  The strength of the ox becomes more appearant. 

“Taming the the Ox” represents the practitioner becoming more and more at ease with his own true nature.  Practice is still not a thing of ease but the ox has become tolerant and tame to the tethers that we place upon it.  It no longer runs free in the weeds but follows us with bowed head and red eyes. 

In the 6th picture “Riding the Ox Home”, the animal is finally completely tamed.  Advanced and persistant practice has removed the need of rope and tether.  Both ox and man move together with ease but the delusion of a seperate ox and practitioner still exists. 

“Ox Forgotten, Self Alone” represents the moment where ox and practitioner become one.  With duality transcended and awareness present, the practitioner is free to continue pracitce without constant attachment to concepts and worldly things. 

In “Both Ox and Self Forgotten” no picture is represented since at this point shunyata (emptiness) is realized.  Both the searcher and the ox were realized as one but now even that conception is dropped.  This is satori.  This is liberation.  Nothing worth experiencing when everything is already experienced. 

In the 9th picture “Return to the source” we are back at the beginning but no ox, no practitioner and no active searching.  Everything is calm, fluid and impermanent.  But it doesn’t matter.  It sets the stage for a new practitioner to wander out and peer into the horizon dutifully searching for the ox. 

I like to think of the final picture, “Entering the Marketplace with Helping Hands” as a return to life.  A return to the mundane.  A lifetime of searching that can stretch years or moments all for the understanding that each moment can encapsulate all of the Ox Herding pictures.  Each moment a search, a catch and a release.  But once released we return to guide down the same path.

After years of visiting Japan for Zen Buddhist training, Robert Aitken and his wife Anne Hopkins Aitken founded the Diamond Sangha in 1959 by inviting friends to join them for zazen in their living room in East Oahu, near Koko Head. Shortly thereafter, they purchased a house in Manoa which became known as the Koko An Zendo. Initially, Diamond Sangha students received guidance and training from masters of the Sanbo Kyodan (Harada-Yasutani-Yamada lineage) and other respected teachers and Zen masters from Japan.

Robert Aitken received permission to teach in 1974, and dharma transmission in 1985 from Yamada Koun Roshi. During the nineteen seventies and eighties, many students found refuge with Roshi and Anne at the Maui Zendo, while Honolulu students continued to practice and live at the Koko An Zendo. Roshi traveled regularly to Australia and other practice centers around the world during these years, and today there are Diamond Sangha centers in North and South America, Europe, Australia and New Zealand founded by students and Aitken Roshi or his dharma heirs.

Aitken Roshi’s “Taking the Path of Zen” helped me find a path to practice that was both accessible and kind.  His actions and strivings have benefitted me in more way than I can really express.  From his book “Miniatures of a Zen Master”

Old age ain’t no place for sissies.  Yes, that’s true.  One must cope with a range of afflictions  from incontinence to macular degeneration, not to mention peripheral neuropathy, strokes and cancer – and memory loss!  Yet I don’t mourn my loss youth.  What a confused mess I was! What time I wasted!  All in all, I am really quite comfortable in these last years. Pass the marmalade.

Kawase Hasui was one of the most prolific shin hanga artists of the early 20th century. Known for his landscapes, he designed hundreds of woodblock prints of temples, cityscapes and geological forms from all around Japan.  Several characters are present in Kawase’s works; the weather, buildings and occasional passersby each have a unique personality.

While not an art collector by any means, it seems that many of Kawase’s wood blocks were destroyed in Tokyo’s Great Fire and Earthquake of September 1, 1923 which makes any prints before that event relatively rare and rather collectable.  A few of this prints will be purchased for my sitting room once I rob a bank.

The shin hanga (新版画^?, lit. “new prints”) art movement in early 20th century Japan, during the Taishō and Shōwa periods, revitalized traditional ukiyo-e art which had its roots in the Edo and Meiji periods (17th–19th century). It maintained the traditional ukiyo-e collaborative system (hanmoto system) where the artist, carver, printer, and publisher engaged in division of labor, as opposed to the sōsaku hanga (creative prints) movement which advocated the principles of “self-drawn” (jiga), “self-carved” (jikoku) and “self-printed” (jizuri), according to which the artist, with the desire of expressing the self, is the sole creator of art.

The term shin hanga was coined in 1915 by Watanabe Shōzaburō (1885-1962), the most important publisher of shin hanga, with the aim of differentiating shin hanga from the commercial mass art that ukiyo-e had been, though it was driven largely by exports to the United States. The movement flourished from around 1915 to 1942, though it resumed briefly from 1946 through the 1950s. Inspired by European Impressionism, the artists incorporated Western elements such as the effects of light and the expression of individual moods, but focused on strictly traditional themes of landscapes (fukeiga), famous places (meishō), beautiful women (bijinga), kabuki actors (yakusha-e), and birds and flowers (kachōga). [via Wikipedia]

It is an old story ~ A practitioner wishes to meditate regularly but either can’t (or doesn’t want to) find the time to do it consistently. The limiting factor can be geographic, physical or mental reasons that prevent them from attending a larger, “proper” sangha.  For my situation, I am stuck between lack of time, massive leftover guilt from my Catholic upbringing and too few local resources to tap.  While my local grassroots Soto Zen sitting group is accommodating, it is still difficult to find time away from family needs and duties to attend regularly.  It becomes a mental battle between the want to practice with a group, my innate guilt for leaving for a time that may be better used and my want to spend some quality time with family.  The ropes tug back and forth.

So, except for some special occasions, my practice is a home-practice.  Which means that the motivation and diligence is squarely in my novice hands, slave to the ebb and sway of work, visiting family, depression and dogs…But luckily, after some trial and error, I was able to come up with a routine that I can stick to, and thought that it would be a good enough time to share a bit of it with the hope of benefiting those in a similar situation.

First, set up everything the night before.  I am a morning person and rarely sleep past 6 AM and it is easier for me to stick to a morning meditation schedule and not an evening one.  But even a the brisk hour of 5 AM, I am still limited in time and discovered that my largest hurdle was laziness in setting up cushions/mats and altar that early in the morning. So I set out everything (mats, cushion, clothes etc), prepare incense and have an online digital timer ready to go the night before.  It has become a part of my meditation routine to include some ritual the night before.

Take a second to set an alarm for 10-15 minutes earlier than your planned sitting time but not so much that you will get caught up in some other task.  Oh my! Dishes need  washing and there is a hamper full of clothes, a litter box full of shit … posts need crafting and hair needs setting.  Since it is easy to become distracted with other bits of living I sit as soon as I come out of the bathroom.  The morning is fresh and my mind is not racing with the myriad of tasks for the day.  This is the best time.

I hate affirmations but…maybe a little something to get into the mood just as you wake up.  Something quick that will get you motivated. Perhaps a blog?  My personal favorites are John Daido Roshi’s ”Invoking Reality“, Richard Baker Roshi’s ”Minatures of a Zen Master“, Pema Chodron’s “Start Where You Are“, Master Cheng Yen’s “Jing Si Aphorisms” or I just run to Access to Insight and click on “Random Sutta”

Take it seriously and don’t consider it *just* meditation.  We are rotting from the first moment we are conceived.  Nothing slows down the process but this practice may help us deal with it.  I dedicate my practice to anyone that needs it.  Metta to my daughter.  Thoughts to my friends that are feeling the bite of samsara.  The dedication that by beginning to realize myself I can act in benefit for all other sentient beings.  Yeah, its lofty but it *is* that important. 

Laugh and loosen up.  In all this seriousness there is humor.  Sometimes it just won’t happen, accept it.  The dog will need to go out or you will get bum-rushed by a toddler.  All those sentient beings understand that you have a life too and that it affects your practice.  Strive but not to the point of self-defeat.

Start out small and build up rather than go for broke and beat your head against the zendo wall.  I started with 10 minutes and moved up to 15 and then to 25.  That is the peak of what I can do with my current situation and I am ok with that.  Purists will tell you that anything under 45 minutes is a waste of time.  Meditation is never a waste of time.  Any moment spent in the process of realizing yourself is time well spent.

Find a substitution for meditation.  There are times that sitting is out of the question for whatever reason and I have a back up activity.  In lieu of seated meditation I engage in walking meditation up and down a few blocks, yoga or try to do 108 prostrations.  I even had 108 push-ups as a possible replacement when I needed to get in a work-out and had too much energy to sit.  Often, I walk in the morning when meditation isn’t fitting into the schedule.  I walk either silently or listening to a liturgy (Soto, Seon or Shingon) recording.  Dharma talks didn’t work as well since I tended to focus more on the words than on the breathing and walking. 

Practice is more than just meditation.  Some simply don’t like meditation or can’t make it work.  Find a different practice.  There are plenty of Dharma doors that can be opened…they all lead to the same place.

Meditation is a process and not a goal.  Expecting a revelation on the first sit is like expecting to hit a home-run against a major league pitcher the first time you hold a bat.  Yeah, there is a slight chance but let’s be realistic, you are sitting against a trained and capable foe ~ your self.  And the most devious weapon in its repertoire is the idea that there is a “right” meditation versus a “wrong” meditation.  Rather, any moment of self-reflection is of benefit both to you and to those around you.  Don’t expect a good sit or a bad sit.  It is all the same.  When tired, we will have snatches of daydreams drift in an out of consciousness.  When stressed we will mull over problems and puzzles from work.  When angry we will seeth over the causes of our anger.   None of these things negate our meditation.  Just don’t let them dominate.

Meditation won’t make me happy.  It won’t.  It is simply not the purpose of meditation to make us happy.  What it will do is make you more receptive to being happy, content and compassionate in your daily life.  It isn’t a magical elixir that will solve all your problems or make your life a sea of bliss.  Just as brushing your teeth will prevent rot; meditation will prevent the corrosive nature of samsara from rusting your glimmer.  It ain’t much but it will keep you focused on how attentive you are through the day.  How equitable you are to family, friends and complete strangers.  How steeped our actions are in anger or in compassion.  How calmly we handle stress and strain.  How quickly are we to levy blame onto others or ourselves.

Our practice isn’t simply how we sit - It’s how we live our life.  It is the act of meditation that provides a template of how to express the subtle nature of the Dharma.  But that template is useless if not applied to our everyday life.

Net Khai, 37, faces up to a year in jail after being charged with “producing and distributing pornographic images” by Phnom Penh Municipal Court, prosecutor Ek Chheng Huot told AFP.

He was arrested at his pagoda in the Cambodian capital on Saturday over allegations that he secretly taped the women pouring sacred water over themselves in a pagoda bathroom, said police chief Touch Naruth.

Net Khai was arrested after a victim approached police and said that video clips showing the naked women had been shared among people via their mobile phones in recent weeks.

He was subsequently stripped of his religious status.

“He has filmed hundreds of women since 2008. They came to the monk to be blessed with holy water, but they were secretly filmed,” Touch Naruth told AFP. “His act affects other monks and Buddhism and seriously harms our tradition,” he said, adding that Net Khai had confessed to his crimes.

Police said they were looking for the man’s accomplices. [source]

Hardly surprising.  This sort of abuse has been happening since the Tukogawa Era in Japan according to Duncan Ryuken Williams in his book “The Other Side of Zen: A Social History of Soto Zen” where he describes a little know three-year abusive affair an ordained Soto Zen abbott had with a householder.  The abbott held some power over the householder by promising to properly register the family with the authorities in return for sexual favors.  Otherwise he would not register the family; causing severe social and monetary complications.

The affair was found out, the abbot confronted, the wife divorced and subsequently disgraced.  After attempting suicide and threatening the abbot, the wife petitioned the father temple to restore her good name in light of the behavior of the abbot.

The Four Noble Truths

The first (and arguably the most important) sermon taught by the Buddha concerns the four noble truths. The core of any Buddhist’s belief structure and any practitioner’s practice finds its heart within these four simple but deep statements. 

The first noble truth is that life is frustrating and painful. Even moments where we may be happy, the world around us is suffering. The quickest path to compassion is to understand the first noble truth. We, all of us, are subjected to old age, sickness and death.

The second noble truth is that suffering has a cause. Suffering exists because we constantly struggle to survive, cling and define ourselves by things that are impermanent. Like trying to grasp and hold onto water; it is ultimately futile. The more we struggle to grasp impermanent things in a world constantly in flux, the more painful is our existence. It isn’t the actual experiences that cause suffering, it’s our attachment and clinging to those experiences. It isn’t the food that causes the stomach pangs, it’s the hunger.

The third noble truth is that the cause of suffering can be ended through non-attachment. By realizing and working to cease the clinging to sensual things our struggle becomes unnecessary.  We can form relationships with our spouse, children and friends without wishing them to things that they were in the past or expecting them to be in the future. This, to a Buddhist, is living in the moment. Simple engagement with the moment leads to simple pleasure.

The fourth noble truth shows one how to achieve that non-attachment. The Buddha outlines the path a practitioner can take to end the cause of suffering called the Eightfold Path. The first two points of the path (Right View and Right Intention) operate through the cultivation of wisdom, the third through fifth points (Right Speech, Right Action and Right Livelihood) are concerned with the cultivation of proper ethical conduct while the sixth through eighth points (Right Effort, Right Mindfulness and Right Concentration) have most to do with mental development. 

Nirvana

“Upon a heap of rubbish in the road-side ditch blooms a lotus, fragrant and pleasing”—The Buddha from The Dhammapadda

Our goal is the nirvana of cessation. The cessation of anger, ignorance and jealousy while cultivating compassion, wisdom and mindfulness.  The greatest surprise perhaps is that nirvana always existed for us. Once we remove the clutter and wipe away the dingy film of the skandhas this begins to become clear. This achievement can be made by any practitioner that follows that path.  What you actually identify yourself is of little concern. The Buddha’s teachings are open to everyone to apply to their daily life and are not the sole provenance of monks and meditation masters, Buddhists or renunciants; it is always open, at some level, to those that are open to and willing to embrace change.  It is the conclusion of a life spent juggling great doubt, great faith and great striving.

Cheers,

John

Part 1  A Simple Life: Buddhist Basics ~ Intro

Part 2 A Simple Life: Buddhist Basics ~ Suffering  

Part 3 A Simple Life: Buddhist Basics ~ Impermanence

Part 4 A Simple Life: Buddhist Basics ~ Egolessness

Part 5: A Simple Life: Buddhist Basics ~ The Five Skandhas

The Five Skandhas

“Form does not differ from emptiness, emptiness does not differ from form, form is itself emptiness, emptiness itself form; sensations, perceptions, formations and consciousness are also like this.”— Heart Sutra

Egolessness can come as quite a shock to those starting on the path. The ego, as defined by the Buddha, is a bundle of temporary combinations of mental events grouped into five categories, called skandhas. This differs greatly from most Hindu or Christian concepts where there is a constant “anchor” of an immortal soul that weathers the storm of impermanence like a rock. Meanwhile, from a Buddhist standpoint we are the storm. We constantly changing and altering. What we constitute as “I” is really just bundles of forms that take shape like clouds in a windy sky.

The five Skandhas are 1) Form—The eyes, ears, tongue body and mind 2) Sensations—The raw data that is derived from sight, sound, smell, taste, touch and thought, 3) Perception—The classification of those sensations, 4) Mental Formations—Actions linked to thought such as greed, anger and ignorance or wisdom, compassion and enlightenment, lastly 5) Consciousness—Our awareness of the previous four skandhas.

Bottom line is that viewing the world through these skandhas leads to suffering and pain. The reality defined by these bundles of perceptions is false and transient. These bundles of forces are like a the spinning ferocity of a hurricane.  There is no static point anywhere.  Even the “eye” of the storm, the moment of quiescence, is in a constant state of change.  The point of contact of all those swirling chaotic forces has no structure of its own.  Others call it a permanate soul; I call it the still of storm and it ain’t forever but it may be just for this moment.

 Cheers,

John

Part 1  A Simple Life: Buddhist Basics ~ Intro

Part 2 A Simple Life: Buddhist Basics ~ Suffering  

Part 3 A Simple Life: Buddhist Basics ~ Impermanence

Part 4 A Simple Life: Buddhist Basics ~ Egolessness

Egolessness

“Talking about food will not get rid of hunger.”—Hui-Neng

Easily the most misunderstood of the Buddhist concepts is the idea of egolessness or anatman. In Hindu as well as Judeo-Christian tradition there is a steady belief in the persistent nature of an individual’s soul. Throughout the impermanence of the human body, the fleeting nature of the mind as well as the mutable character of the consciousness; the soul continues to exist in some form in either an afterlife or reborn in a new body. Buddhism pushes the envelope a step further by supposing that the soul itself is a creation of our delusions—a fiction.

The existence of an immortal self is a comforting thought but ultimately unrealistic and does little toward alleviating the suffering of the human condition. It serves to scratch only the most superficial surface of our suffering by displacing a portion of the human concern over old age, sickness and death. Even the hope of an immortal self is a craving as well. This craving causes clinging which, in turn, leads to suffering.

The sense of “self” is really just the causal process that leads from one form to another. Just as when the illusion of movement in a movie is shattered when looking at the reel, image by image; the illusion of a self is destroyed when states are linked together causally. These states can be combinations of feelings, perceptions, dispositions, consciousness and body sensations. These are the five skandhas described next ~ the movie of our life. Again, it may seem nihilistic, but the Buddha taught that once these skandhas were understood to be empty and the illusion of “self” dissipated we experience something that is not subject to life and death, something that is free of samsara—The cycle of birth and death. That is what the Buddha realized through his introspection.

Cheers,

John

Part 1  A Simple Life: Buddhist Basics ~ Intro

Part 2 A Simple Life: Buddhist Basics ~ Suffering  

Part 3 A Simple Life: Buddhist Basics ~ Impermanence

Impermanence

“This existence of ours is as transient as autumn clouds. To watch the birth and death of beings is like looking at the movements of a dance. A lifetime is a flash of lightning in the sky. Rushing by, like a torrent down a steep mountain.”—The Buddha

We mistakenly and painfully attempt to make a lasting relationship with the objects and people around us.  Things that are constantly changing around us we cling to and try to apply some amount of permanence. We interact with our teenage daughter while still attached to the image of the child or infant that she once was. We are angry that our spouse isn’t the same person they were when we met when that person didn’t exist the day after they first met (or may have never existed, being just a perception). We graduate college with the hope that the freedom and independence in that sheltered environment will continue into the working world. We want the freedom of our young adult days to continue even after the advent of our first child.  We want permanence.

But we are creating a world for ourselves that simply doesn’t exist. When that false world doesn’t meet our expectations we experience pain and cause others to experience it as well. That feeling is impermanence and it hurts. By accepting that the world is constantly changing around us we can focus on the root of the problem – clinging to these false realities.

Through introspection, impermanence emerges as an all-pervading essence marking everything around us. We might attribute an eternal principle, or higher self to explain this, but even that action is made up of temporary thoughts and concepts. Just look at how your own conception of “God” has changed from your childhood to now! Our concepts of a metaphysical world are speculative constructs that may or may not exist. Thus clinging to these invented securities lead to even more suffering and pain (although we call it “faith”). These concepts are created to make us feel more secure in our own permanence – to cement our being with the world. Once again, we feel anxious, even at the peak of our religious practice. It is only when we completely abandon clinging to these beliefs (but not necessarily dropping them entirely) that we feel any relief and can alleviate the suffering of others.

Many Zen masters, after achieving this realization, burnt their sutras (written works attributed to the followers of the historical Buddha) and kicked over the statue of Buddha. Even the Buddha is impermanent. This isn’t a call to reject our beliefs but to not cling to them. I believe in the words of the Buddha but I do not cling to that belief.  Attributing permanence to concepts is as useful as providing a blanket to a drowning man.

Cheers,

John

Part 1  A Simple Life: Buddhist Basics ~ Intro

Part 2 A Simple Life: Buddhist Basics ~ Suffering