Let me expand a bit on what I said above ...
Unfortunately, that is also the exact moment so many newcomers to Zen head right for the door ... seeking the next shiny thing that promises a quick dose of pleasure and spiritual entertainment!
Buddhism is the Middle Way ... not an ascetic practice of intentional physical abuse and extreme denial, not a practice of extreme pleasure and hedonism. However, life sometimes is hard, not as we wish it to be.
So, one of the greatest revelations in my life came during the 3rd or 4th day of a 10 day Sesshin at Japanese monastery. Basically, I hate Sesshin ... they take me away from my family, my life, my favorite tv shows! I hate to get up in the morning at 4am in the winter, I hate to wash floors, I hate that my legs hurt sometimes! I hate the boredom of the silence, without even a book or other things to read.
But it was on the 3rd or 4th day of a Sesshin that I found an inner switch, a button to push in my own mind, where I could instantly turn "
I hate sitting and the food, this is yuck!" into "
this is very peaceful, this is alright, this is fine here." (The reason I describe it as a switch is that, when found, one can even play with it ... jumping back and forth between "yuck" and "alright" as if at a flip.). Now, I flip that switch many many times in life ... in all the unpleasant situations of life, great and small (
most recently, just yesterday, during one of my least favorite and rather painful parts of my annual "where the sun don't shine" health check! ) The "I ... I ... I" gets very small, sometimes drops away.
Now, our 2-day retreat is short but, sometime in that 2 days ... in a quiet, still room without entertainment ... folks are going to hit the "boring" or "I want to be elsewhere" or "my leg hurts" or "I don't like this" moment ...
... and I hope they find the switch.
Gassho, J