In
very poetic language below, using many Buddhist images, Master Dogen is
expressing a taste of the deep inter-connection of all the world and
all beings.
Well, recently someone in our Sangha wrote
of a similar taste, but expressed in modern, ordinary language. Don't
let the "daily life" packaging, and references to "e-mail" "the tv"
"applesause" and the "kitchen floor" make it seem less. I find each
expressing something that is not two ... (Thank you, K) ...
So, as I'm sitting here typing this message, trying to concentrate on
what I'm feeling and to translate that feeling into words, I, my
computer, my office, my feelings, my mind working, and the words I hear
in my head are all a part of something whole which would not be whole
without any of those things. And, when I get an email from work with
some task for me to complete, and that email distracts me, and
irritation arises, and the sound of my kids watching TV too loud and
banging around upstairs distracts me, and irritation arises, the chime
of that arriving email, my kids, the sound of the TV, the sound of the
banging, my own mind which constructs distraction and irritation, all
are a part of something whole which would not be whole without any of
those things. And that something whole would be whole with or without
any of those things, and it will still be whole one millisecond later
when conditions have changed. And while all of those things are
interdependent, as the irritation is dependent on the distraction which
is dependent on the sound of the arriving email which is dependent on
the person who sent the email etc etc, yet these things are all a part
of something whole which includes everything, indeed IS everything?
As
I was standing in my kitchen eating a bowl of cinnamon applesauce
staring at the counter and the barstools and the tile floor, thinking
"How is this barstool me?", a dropping of thinking and a widening of
awareness led to a view of that single moment where me standing there
in my kitchen eating a bowl of cinnamon applesauce staring at the
counter and the barstools and the tile floor was one complete
unhindered whole that contained all elements, and my conception of "me"
was just another barstool, so to speak, and the reality was the
totality of everything at once, outside of time or place or frame of
reference.
_____________________________
When one displays the buddha
mudra with one's whole body and mind, sitting upright in this samadhi even for
a short time, everything in the entire dharma world becomes buddha mudra, and
all space in the universe completely becomes enlightenment.Therefore, it
enables buddha-tathagatas to increase the dharma joy of their own original
grounds and renew the adornment of the way of awakening. Simultaneously, all
living beings of the dharma world in the ten directions and six realms become
clear and pure in body and mind, realize great emancipation, and their own
original face appears. At that time, all things together awaken to supreme
enlightenment and utilize the buddha-body, immediately go beyond the culmination
of awakening, and sit upright under the kingly bodhi tree. At the same time,
they turn the incomparable, great dharma wheel and begin expressing ultimate
and unfabricated profound prajna.
From:Talk on the Wholehearted Practice of the Way -
Kosho Uchiyama (with Shohaku Okumura, Taigen Daniel Leighton)
(remember: recording ends soon after the beginning bells;
a sitting time of 20 to 35 minutes is recommended)
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This page contains a single entry by Jundo published on April 9, 2009 2:27 PM.
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