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Daily Zen has been a contemplative haven for online visitors since 1998 offering a unique blend of Eastern quotes for each day of the year, Zen-inspired e-cards, and a meditation room where at any moment a visitor may be meditating with any one of our companion Wayfarers each day. The Journal, called On the Way, is published once a month and this podcast has been created to turn those Journals into an auditory experience allowing listeners to contemplate its ideas in another way.
138 Episodes
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The simplicity of this piece, the clarity of expression gives a kind of accessibility that is refreshing and brings a breath of fresh air to our journey. Who has not felt the balm of compassion?
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I often marvel at how contemporary the ancient writings sound. You can see how students of all ages fell into the same pitfalls of practice we do. Teachers always seem to talk about students of “today” not having the same intensity or commitment to difficult practice.
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Sometimes we are given too much to know what to do with it…sometimes we are given so little, we sit bewildered if we are proceeding “correctly.”
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The “worthies of former times” sacrificed to attain their true insights; it involved more than just hearing and parroting a teacher’s words. They turned their own inner light onto the great matter at hand.
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Ah, to be able to sit and discourse with someone like Muso! Suddenly everything is crystal clear…the traps we set for ourselves, the spirited way we manage to fool ourselves, and the limited great insights we have.
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The response is down-to-earth and understandable for any of us. To stay on track and not get overwhelmed by the illusions that surround us involves a lifetime of commitment.
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Waking up is a great phrase to illustrate realization. In the beginning of practice when we are first learning meditation, and in some schools, the other techniques that have been used over time, it is easy to feel like what we seek is far away from where we currently are.
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Here we have several very different examples of Foyan’s skill as a teacher. The crystal clear teaching poem on sitting meditation juxtaposed with the conversational skill he has in communicating with his students.
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Reading this piece is like standing under a plum tree with blossoms falling all around you, the fragrance enveloping your senses, and feeling connected with much more. Remember the last time the fragrance wafted into your consciousness?
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This is a teaching vast in scope, covering the beginning, middle, and end of practice. Stunning to see the dates of the writing and to feel a deep connection with something so ancient/contemporary!
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While the tone of Hongzhi’s Practice Instructions is lyrical and evocative, surpassing the ordinary “instructions,” this is a voice rarely heard in a teaching hall and is immediately transporting.
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This discussion between sudden enlightenment and gradual cultivation has gone on for centuries. So we are not alone in our own confusion about these principles. This is a very clear description of the need for both.
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Naturally, we have thoughts that come up almost continuously at times. The ability to let them go and make room for an openness that is constantly responsive to the ever-changing is an integral part of a life of practice.
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Bodhidharma’s teaching is essentially very sparse and simple: “Behold the mind.” Doesn’t allow a lot of distracting philosophical points, just brings us back to awareness and turning the attention inwards.
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There are sutras like the Heart Sutra that are chanted in temples and are a part of practice handed down from long years ago. For those of us who don’t have a temple to attend or a teacher to train with, we seek out forms and practices that sustain us.
1One of the most famous Zen tales is the story of how an illiterate woodcutter came to inherit the robe and bowl of the 5th Patriarch. After delivering his load of firewood one day, he heard a customer reciting the Diamond Sutra.
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Many times we have read or heard the stories of Buddha's life and enlightenment. Returning to his first teaching upon awakening, we come in contact with the ground and source of Buddhism. The root from which the many branches developed over the years that followed.
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He is not talking about a philosophy of license, anything goes in the name of the ego; when he refers to a lack of faith in ourselves, it would be easy to misunderstand. Those of us who have grown up around the “century of the self” as the West has fallen prey to thanks to marketing, have to pause and wonder, really, what is he talking about?
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For many of us living life “autonomously,” not listening to what others say can feel a bit ungrounded until one has practiced enough to have gained some life experience of cause and effect. Life experience itself is a great teacher, and Nature a more subtle teacher.
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Many of us were introduced to meditating by breath counting at first, then moved into simply watching the breath, and then, at some point, even that fell away. There are many techniques used to focus and settle the mind and body. As “introductory” as breath counting seems, it is a very powerful way to enter the present moment.
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