It was put to me that Zen is simply "going with the flow". Which I might consider an overly generalized American take on Buddhism, also the Practice is associated with mysticism. Neither take is accurate, and possibly even completely wrong. Actually, my use of the word Zen is technically wrong, my practice is more fundamentalistic, although I am still somewhere within the Mahayana school, but it also stems from my study of very early Buddhist practices. Zen has become something of a slang word that comprehensively means focused, empty, or peaceful, in a more general way than those same attributes are sought after through meditation. Zazen is in actuality a full body practice, that is in some ways unlike meditation, which focuses on the mind. The posture is a primary ingredient (full lotus posture is emphasized) and the point is to calm the mind and body as a single holistic thing. Going with the flow doesn't involve the same type of practice, it is more natural to go with the flow, where meditation has taught me to rise above said "flow" or what is known as Samsara (that snake in the grass). Siddhartha denied being a savior or a god, only admitting to being "Awake"
I broke from a denominational approach to the practice after extensive reading, and other study, of Tibetan Buddhism, and furthermore as I stepped back a couple of steps, I realized that when I investigated policy of local Zen Temples. I disagreed enough to go it alone. I have nothing against organized religious orders, as my Christian belief system is specifically Missouri Synod Lutheran. And I believe Martin Luther was more of a fundamentalist than modern protestants would like us to think. Being radical toward the Roman Catholic Church during the renaissance was a lot different than having an opposing view of another Christian denomination would be today.
It might be difficult to understand what I mean by that which is normal for humans in general and how being mindful goes against natural thought. One word: desire. Desire is not just craving something one cannot have, but also to avoid what one is afraid of. Not meaning afraid as in needing to have an immediate response to a real or perceived threat, but as wanting an escape from an eventual fact. Such as wanting privacy and comfort over public speaking, or desiring continuing life over the inevitability of death. I do not mean the seeking of eternal life as a reward from Jesus Christ, I mean living on as a lich or a vampire might, on this earth in one's own decaying flesh.
". . . It's about being dead inside," Kiki Lee said, "about refusal to enjoy life on life's terms . . . "
"Where I come from? It's a long thin thread, across an ocean, down a river of red. Now that the living out number the dead . . . Here come the quick, there go the dead . . . Speak my language" from the song Speak My Language, by Laurie Anderson. From the album Bright Red: Released October 25, 1994: Warner Bros.: Producers Brian Eno, Laurie Anderson
"Why do you pray to Buddha?" someone may ask. Well, as formerly mentioned, Buddha himself did not claim godhood, but only to have a more astute point of view from the use of meditation, clean living, and steadfast, earnest mindfulness. Dharma. Also it comes to mind that some Buddhist subdivisions believe that there are more than one buddha, or similarly, in Bodhisattvas, or an enlightened being willing to muck around in the dirty Samsara, instead of going to sweet home Nirvana, and take a reality check to the extent that they can continue their use of compassion to help those who are still suffering from desire. It may take several lifetimes but, hey, the regular man be a'sufferin'. There are exceptions to the Buddhist belief in a generalized afterlife i.e. Nirvana, as opposed to a paradise. There are two schools of Pure Land Buddhism one known as Jodo the other, Joho Shinshu (True Pure Land) wherein the practitioner believes in a savior like Buddha, Amida, is worshiped and revered, and devotion to Amida Buddha will take them to a heavenly afterworld known as The Pure Land.
"How can you be a drug addict and practice Buddhism?" someone else may ask. As the person that suggested going with the flow more accurately stated that I wandered off the "path". I got lost in an oak tree forest, nestled in the loess bluffs. The shadowy way stood ahead, I ran through debris of rotten trees that had fallen. The air was grey and smelled of slimy mold spores and fungus; also there were several wrathful deities that tore inward, past my flesh and scraped . . . bit . . . dragged at my soul. I stumbled down a hill, scraping knee and elbow, rolling through a patch of nettles. I stood up and caught my breath and found my mindful center and I saw an animal path with barely a broken twig crossing my way out. The path had always been there.
The scene shifts as I walk into an imaginary graveyard with two characters of my own creation . . .
Kiki Lee is built the quite the opposite of Valentine, both in proportions and physical strength, but Kiki seems almost sickly most of the time because she is surrounded by an aura of self-doubt, unsure of herself in a very general way, when she finds her resolve she holds fast, but resolve hid from Kiki in the shadows and was hard to muster. Valentine can be calculatingly confident but not overly so. Kiki Lee was not even her given name, she had stolen Kiki from the writing of William S. Burroughs, and made her last name that of his pseudonym, William Lee.
This is the way the way the night broke into a fallen arch of despair, full of the empty Zen whispers of a thousand buddhas hiding behind trees ready to slip out from under parked cars. I could not tear my eyes away from Kiki Lee's approach and my pulse rate spiked at the thought of her from behind, her body, chunky in a good way, and sweat was clinging to he skin under her heavy leather motorcycle jacket, despite the cold November air, the kind of weather she hated but she could not stand the idea of going to her home in the desert. Las Vegas would put out no welcome mats, to her that town was an empty wasteland, like the grave yard she was plodding through.
There she was surrounded by decaying stones and the smell of freshly shoveled earth; As if to welcome her with the process and inevitability of sweet Death. The only sounds available to Kiki were the the sound of possible, broken footsteps, rustling like the sound of her own breathing and the squeaks from her antique jacket. She felt as if she was in a horror movie as the cold full moon cast a predawn blue-grey light that was spreading shadows of empty hate behind tombstones and trees that looked like Death's hands fingers, devoid of leaves. A place where Buddha would fear to tread.
There was no point about caring about the past, or anything anymore, caring was a thing of Kiki's lost past . . . her attitude said much, as I stared like a fool at her well endowed cleavage like a fool. Her attitude would have said "My eyes are up here", if she actually cared. No mind, a sudden joint lit in her hand, as if by a magical current. At least I did not see Val hand it to her. The green smell encompassed Kiki's burgeoning head buzz warmth, enlarging the soul cage sentiment
Lust, even the kind I have for a fictional person of my own machinations, is a stumbling block from freeing myself from desire, and also a constantly easy way to escape writers block. Kiki, professedly, met Valentine and I at the cemetery as a deus ex machina. Sex, although not as much as drugs, is one of the stronger holds that Samsara has on me. Not to say that wanting sex, enjoying sex and using it to produce smaller versions of ourselves is a bad thing. What I mean is referred to is good old fashion lust. Simply put. "You done got put, now . . ."
Kiki had come to meet her newest friend Valentine in the green pastures of unturned grave plots, where they exchanged joke, tokes, and hugs . . . and bitter cold. This had happened in a time loop called chapter eight, repeating this interchange in the words written on a page years ago, but this is the first time I was there with them, as far as Valentine was concerned I had a long history with her and she has been programmed to accept this without questioning, even though she has no recollection of it. She just knows that we are friends from back in the day. Kiki Lee is meeting me for the first time because I cannot rewrite her, deep down she has a stubborn will and I am unable to change her characteristics and personality. If Val did remember when we met it would be to odd to even seem real anyway, she came to me in a dream with her full name, Valeria Maria Contessa Garcia.
I am not going to go into Buddha's origin story, like in almost every Spiderman reboot, there has to be a scene showing Peter crying over his uncles dead body, who whispers with his last breath, "With great power comes great responsibility . . ." Buddha is basically Spiderman without a radioactive spider bite. He saw someone die and he took great responsibility for his position of power. "It's about being dead inside," Kiki said, "about refusal to enjoy life on life's terms . . . "
Kiki was not such the heavy thinker. She was unable to converse very long without using cliches, "Let's sit in the graveyard again," So we put on our coats and walked out the back door. Val and Kiki bundled up in leather, cotton, denim, and me in a heavy trench coat . . . dabbed in a little polyester and polyvinyl . . . The cemetery was close, and it only took us two paved streets, and a short overgrown path to get there. It was a vast, country boneyard filled with many secluded areas. We slipped into one such spot, which was overgrown with dead weeds and there was a fat, bench-like oak root jutting out of the ground, washed out of short steep slope. The tombstones nearby had been sandblasted by time, and lack of care, until names and dates had been washed and bleached away. The true eternity of impermanence won over the dream of eternal life in monument stone.
Accepting impermanence is at the core of Buddhism, this may be what seems to be "going with the flow", but acceptance and giving in are two different things. Meditation, which is vital to that core has to be a daily action of inaction to nestle deep into The Practice. I do not use a mantra anymore, although using a repetitive phrase is fairly effective for many people, especially novices. I just listen to the world, which sounds simple enough, but even without intrusive thoughts that I have due to OCD, it is hard to put gaps between thoughts into one's constantly working mind, and impossible to completely clear the mind. Like I said, Having a focal point, such as an important spiritual or inspirational passage to repeat, or a mantra, is a good exercise. After some time, generally measured in years, usually several to many. Letting go of the watchwords I have used seemed to make finding that mindful clearing somewhat easier because I am focusing on sounds around me without naming them. Using a mantra had become clunky for me since I tended to look into what the words meant and not allowing gaps to occur as a natural conclusion to repetition. I had to replay that last song because I blanked out while listening to the chorus. I usually do not spill a drink when I have forgotten that I am carrying it.
Valentine, Kiki and myself could hear the echoing whine and clatter of a freight train across the valley in which our town sits. It seemed a lonely, but also lively in contrast to the granite monuments amongst which we sat. Not using a looped phrase to meditate can be likened to a freight train, some of the boxcars are full, some are empty. The goal of meditation is not to stop thinking, but to extend the number of empty cars between those that are full. Actually listening to a train in real life can be used as a meditation exercise as well. I usually practice meditation with my eyes closed, but sometimes mixing it up and observing things, and trying not to attach the word labels. The grass was green in that cemetery, and most of it cleanly mowed, and the ground where we sat was warm despite the late November chill in the air.
The mind of the past is ungraspable, The mind of the present is ungraspable, the mind of the future is ungraspable, which mind's thirst do you want to quench (paraphrased from a Zen koan) "What d'ya wanna drink?" Valentine asked Kiki and I, "I'm buy'n" So we took another brief walk to an all-night gas station.
The ungraspable past intertwined with the ungraspable future, the twenty-first century fell in a giant chunk of years, distortions in time made it speed up and slow down, but there exists only the moment, amber time photographs that burst unsequentionally in our minds with nothing else but fading memories, like sepia pictures taken over a hundred years ago, with an actual camera, thrust fast forward turning into dust.
. . . Nothing but dust . . . dust that swirled in attics and basements, cosmic dust that coalesced into nebulae, eventually becoming stars that collapsed, sucking everything into itself, even light.
. . . both forms of Buddhism [Pure Land and Zen] are important in Japan and Japanese culture, for together, they offer two different ways – the path of the heart and the path of the head – to the same goal.686Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDCc5GnwqEd
By DAVID WATTS BARTON japanology.org/2017/05/zen-buddhism-v-pure-land-buddhism)
Text about Pure Land Buddhism was referenced from buddhanet.net686Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrrdo6uW0s5
686Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiqjbYNYR1Z
