Flowers Fall

[alan.r]

Hello Treeleaf,

I haven’t written here in some time, though I occasionally check in and read posts. Since having a baby, there have been necessary changes, reduction in things like the internet (and thus, Treeleaf), as well as sitting, writing, and sleeping. I want to share a little experience, though, which may be helpful to others and has been part of my practice lately.

I’ve been studying Genjokoan often. These words in particular:

“Flowers fall even though we love them; weeds grow even though we dislike them. Conveying oneself toward all things to carry out practice-enlightenment is delusion. All things coming and carrying out practice-enlightenment through the self is realization.”

There’s been a lot joy in my life recently. A new baby girl, a healthy family, a decent job, some success in my writing life, and yet the year for many others was extremely difficult. And at some point during the year, I found myself overwhelmed by what I perceived as negative things occurring. Negative things concerning the climate, race, gender, inequalities of all kinds, terror, bigotry. Somehow, my focus on these things crept into my own life. As I teacher, I spent a summer at home with a new baby and wife, writing and changing diapers, and then I went back to work in the fall, and living with whatever personalities I encountered there, whether pleasant or not, with things I read in the news that were unpleasant, with any number of factors, I repeatedly began to feel that all I wanted was to be at home with the new baby and my wife (who wasn’t back at work yet). So, I was dissatisfied in a low-level way because I wasn’t where I wanted to be (not in metaphorical sense at all; quite literal!). At the same time, when I was home, I wasn’t sitting as much. I was playing with the baby or changing diapers or feeding her or doing whatever chores needed done at the house – it was and is a joy. Yet, I didn’t have the time to sit, and frankly, whereas I once sat both morning and evening, and sometimes in the afternoon, now I was only sitting in the morning, because I was exhausted by 8pm and just wanted to get into bed, read a book, sleep. So, over some time, along with feeling I didn’t want to be at work and would rather be at home, didn’t want to live in world where terrible cruelty occurs and now with a baby in that world (a very clear fear), I also began to feel that I wasn’t practicing well. I was being lazy. I was looking for comfort and ease, wanting those things. I wanted to feel good about things and sought to do this, I wanted to be awake and aware, but only of the good things, and did so at the expense of trying to ignore the parts of my life I was dissatisfied by. I was compartmentalizing my life: this part at home is good, but my zen is bad, and at work and all the ugliness out in the world is bad, too, I don’t want it.

I was more confused, in all likelihood, than the above really depicts. This is how I see it only upon reflection, and while true, it’s also simplified, a little too black and white, but close enough. Also, I don’t want to make it seem like things were so terrible. They weren’t, and my difficulties, I know, are a small, small part of the pain of all the suffering in the world, but there was clear confusion, clear dissatisfaction, which I feel is worth sharing.

So: the main point of this is that one day we brought the baby to work, and it was as though what was dark became light (to use a serious cliché). I saw my separating of things. In that moment with the baby smiling and meeting colleagues, it became clear that work was also home. I saw that I had been conveying myself toward all things. When going out into the world, I was trying to pick and choose. Looking for the flowers, and trying to push away the weeds. The moment the baby was at work, it was clear that work was home, the ugly things in the world were home, home was home, the cushion was home, the street, my commute, all of it home: I’d forgotten.

This reminded me of a larger part of practice: this is the work, both on and off the cushion. To look closely. To work with my delusion. What are the places in my life that I try to ignore because I don’t like them, and what are the places I seek out because I want more of them? Can I sit with my mind behaving like that? Can I allow my seeking and avoiding mind to just sit? That is the work. Sit with my avoidance and my seeking, and let them sink away. Then home is everywhere. Then all things carry out practice-enlightenment through this little body and mind. Then this little body and mind can be there for the world, for others, for all others, and for all the others that are not other at all. I’ll end by saying that at 7 months old, our little girl is happy, and happy to let me sit twice a day now, and I thank her for reminding this tangled mind that home is right here.

Happy new year (I hope to be posting a little more again).

Gassho,
Alan
Sattoday

[Kyotai]

Wonderfully said Allan. This resonated with me, having spent some time on parental leave myself.

Gassho, Kyotai
ST

Sent from my SGH-I337M using Tapatalk

[Shugen]

Thank you Alan.

Gassho,

Shugen

sattoday

[Jundo]

Hi Alan,

I know that, by career, you are a writer. You write stories.

You have replaced one story that you told yourself about your life with a happier, more centered and peaceful story. Most sentient beings do not realize how much of our experience of life is a self-created story of meaning and interpretation and value judgments that we impose on circumstances. Part of our practice is to realize the fact of our doing so, and to learn how to drop the thoughts or replace them with thoughts more healthful and beneficial. The old story seems rather negative, discouraged and "Dukkha" dissatisfied. You were not only "conveying yourself toward things", but were judging them a bit darkly and letting them weigh on you.

Congratulations. You are still telling yourself a story about your life, but it seems like a better one. The baby is a good teacher. You can still work to fix the world, or be a good father, with a better attitude.

I recommend this book to folks, by Zen Teacher David Loy (whose other book we will be reading here soon). It is not a "Zen book" per say, but it is.

The World Is Made of Stories (Wisdom Publications, 2010).
http://www.wisdompubs.org/book/world-made-stories

A review ...


From the cradle on, we are reminded that “the world is made of stories,” as the poet Gary Snyder once wrote. Now the teacher and Buddhist scholar David Loy has borrowed Snyder’s observation as the title of his latest—and arguably most provocative— book.

Much of what we take as culture and civilization, Loy tells us, consists of stories— personal, societal, and mythical narratives that we create as evidence of our existence. “A story is an account of something,” he observes, and the “foundational story” is that of the self. Our deepest fear is that we are insubstantial, shadowy, unreal. And so we fashion a very human world of stories—myth, history, fantasy, romance, horror, and quest—in an endless, creative, and ultimately impossible effort to locate the ground of what the Buddha demonstrated is groundless. “Stories are not just stories,” Loy asserts. “They teach us what is real, what is valuable, and what is possible. Without stories there is no way to engage with the world because there is no world, and no one to engage with it because there is no self.”

And therein lies a conundrum, a koan. “Storying” is how we make the world— no way around it—and how we grapple with that haunting sense of lack we feel.

...

“A Storied Life,” the second section, explores the dynamic relation of story and identity, personal and social. “Stories give my life the plot that endows it with meaning,” Loy writes. In what is the most essentially “Buddhist” section of the book, he asks the inevitable question: “Am I the storyteller or the storytold . . . or both?” If there’s a dynamic relationship between identity and story, then it follows that we have multiple identities that change— rapidly or glacially—as our stories change. We have choices, Loy asserts:

One meaning of freedom is the opportunity to act out the story I identify with. Another freedom is the ability to change stories and my role within them. I move from scripted character to co-author of my own life. A third type of freedom results from understanding how stories construct and constrict my possibilities.

https://tricycle.org/magazine/am-i-storyteller-or-story-or-both/

In any case, fatherhood is a lovely story.

Gassho, Jundo

SatToday

[Sekishi]

I recommend this book to folks, by Zen Teacher David Loy (whose other book we will be reading here soon). It is not a "Zen book" per say, but it is.

The World Is Made of Stories (Wisdom Publications, 2010).
http://www.wisdompubs.org/book/world-made-stories


I second this recommendation. A really good read for all sentient beings (who can read).

Deep bows,
Sekishi

#sattoday

[Sekishi]

Hi Alan,

Thank you for sharing.

I spent a few years as a stay-at-home father (and even now our homeschooled son is sitting 4 week away from me doing his work while I do mine), and the experiences of that are an integral part of any "understanding" I have of the world (that includes my stories about how things unfold). I read the following poem (another story!) a few months ago and it took my breath away. I thought I would share with all of you as a sort of meditation on parenting, post-Ango practice, a new-year, a new-moment sort of thing.

Good Bones
By Maggie Smith

Life is short, though I keep this from my children.
Life is short, and I’ve shortened mine
in a thousand delicious, ill-advised ways,
a thousand deliciously ill-advised ways
I’ll keep from my children. The world is at least
fifty percent terrible, and that’s a conservative
estimate, though I keep this from my children.
For every bird there is a stone thrown at a bird.
For every loved child, a child broken, bagged,
sunk in a lake. Life is short and the world
is at least half terrible, and for every kind
stranger, there is one who would break you,
though I keep this from my children. I am trying
to sell them the world. Any decent realtor,
walking you through a real shithole, chirps on
about good bones: This place could be beautiful,
right? You could make this place beautiful.

This is Samsara, and at one level it will NEVER be beautiful. But Nirvana and Samsara co-exist, so at another level it already IS beautiful. And yet for our children, for the children of others, and ultimately for all sentient beings, we try to make this "real shithole" a little better, while knowing that the whole beautiful mess has "good bones" (Buddha-nature! Dharmakaya!).

Deep bows,
Sekishi

#sattoday

[Geika]

Sekishi, lovely poem you posted.

Gassho, sat today

[Risho]

Thank you Alan! gassho2 From a selfish perspective I've really missed your posts, but it sounds like you literally have your hands full.

Gassho

Rish
-sattoday

[Jyukatsu]

Thank you for sharing Sekishi, it is a beautiful poem.

Gassho,

Marina
sat today

[alan.r]

Thank you all, and thank you Jundo, in particular. You see right through me: stories are the way I view the world; our mind is a story. One translation of the first line of the dhammapada is "Our life is shaped by our mind; we become what we think."

Hi Risho and Geika and Shugen and Kyotai. Nice seeing you all again.

I look forward to the book. Thank you for the recommendation, Jundo and Sekishi. Great poem, too.

Gassho,
Alan
sat today

[Geika]

Nice seeing you again, too, Alan.

Gassho, sat today

[Jundo]

The world is at least
fifty percent terrible, and that’s a conservative
estimate, though I keep this from my children.
For every bird there is a stone thrown at a bird.
For every loved child, a child broken, bagged,
sunk in a lake. Life is short and the world
is at least half terrible, and for every kind
stranger, there is one who would break you,
though I keep this from my children.



अनर्थक (anarthaka). That means BULLSHIT! in Sanskrit. [evil]

My main objection to this poem: The figure "fifty percent terrible, and that's a conservative estimate" is completely artificial, unnecessarily pessimistic and just wrong ... even when seen by the eyes of a skeptical, news and commentary reading, plague/war/famine/violence aware, had relatives die in the Holocaust, statistic examining, "life is suffering" Buddhist like me. That is a self-imposed story, not a scientific number. Where does it come from but somebody's "pulled out of their nose" assessment? A more balanced and factual assessment is helpful to treating the real disease.

I would take it merely as poetic license, except so many folks these days really feal so.

Our current 24-hour "if it bleeds, it leads" news cycle is contributing to this modern ignorance. For example, there are approximately 38 million commercial airline flights each year worldwide. If one flight crashes every few months, the news focuses on that with total attention, screaming headlines, graphic images and endless repetition (as their ratings benefit). One never hears a story on the news, "ALERT, THIS JUST BREAKING: TODAY, MILLIONS OF PASSENGERS FLEW THROUGH THE SKY AND LANDED SAFELY, GETTING TO WHERE THEY WERE GOING WITHOUT INCIDENT. NOTHING HAPPENED!!" The ordinary or "good" or uneventful is not reported. Likewise, millions of children went to schools today in the West without contact with violence, in New York City millions of people were untouched by crime, here in Japan most of us in my town get on with our very normal lives despite the leaky nuclear reaction 100 miles from here. There is one poor person murdered per day average in New York City, which means that 8.4 MILLION people have nothing to fear in New York City each day. The poem says, "For every loved child, a child broken, bagged, sunk in a lake," yet In 2008, there were 1,494 child homicides in the United States (LINK (https://web.archive.org/web/20100819101712/http://www.fbi.gov:80/ucr/cius2008/offenses/expanded_information/data/shrtable_02.html)) amid a population of 75,000,000 children in the United States. While even one death is tragic and to be mourned, we also need to really understand the situation, causes and solutions.

(Terrorists know how to play this: They plant a bomb on a bus and kill some innocent people, grab all the headlines, terrorize millions of people with the aid of our news media and politicians who are more than happy to make ratings and "political capital" out of stirring up public emotions about the event for their own benefits, maybe sell some "cheese-wiz" advertisements or get some terrified votes. My Israeli friend who grew up in Tel Aviv with daily terrorism had a great line. He said, "You know what you do if a terrorist blows up a bus you were about to take? Take the next bus.")

I just came from India where there is terrible poverty, oppression of women and minorities, lack of education and diseases, and people who must struggle to survive ... and you know what? People seemed to me, looking at faces, about as happy or miserable, laughing and crying, at about the same rate as folks in the prosperous suburbs of Chicago.

People are all messed up ... ignorant ... about the realities of life. So many more people die on highways driving to anti-nuclear rallies than from all the nuclear energy accidents combined ... more people die from falls from step ladders than from all the shark attacks in the world. (Each year 300 deaths in the U.S. alone that are caused by falls from ladders LINK (https://www.nachi.org/ladder-safety.htm), and one shark fatality in the U.S. every two years LINK (http://natgeotv.com/ca/human-shark-bait/facts)) Yet, do people fear sharks or ladders? Does the Discovery Channel have "Ladder Week" during ratings sweeps?

My point: Most people go through their lives each day and nothing happens. The statistics are overwhelmingly far far from "half and that's conservative". However, if you tell yourself a story, and believe the media and politicians ... the sky is falling.

Now, for the families and people on the crashed plane, murdered, caught in a terrorist incident, fallen from a ladder or eaten by a shark ... it is a tragedy! It is so sad! Please do not think me callous. We honor and remember these people, feel the sorrow of those left behind, and we must do EVERYTHING AND ANYTHING we can to make our planes and ladders safer, reduce crime and prevent terrorism for the future. Even one case of child abuse is unpardonable, a horror. We must continue to work to reduce or eliminate poverty and disease in this world, so that all people have the basics of food, shelter, education, healthcare and safety that all human beings should enjoy. We need to eliminate nuclear weapons (I live in target range of North Korea!) and fight global warming. It is simply that we can work for such goals without either wearing unrealistic "rose colored glasses" or unnecessarily dark colored glasses too.

The Buddha said "life is suffering." But he, and the later Mahayana and Zen Masters who followed him found, if not a small "c" cure, a "BIG C" Cure. It is true. (If the Buddha had only taught "life is suffering", without some solution being developed, then what would be the point of Zen Buddhism? [scared])

What Buddha and the Zen Masters found is a way to see through it all ... to a realm without birth and death, measures of time, up and down and planes to crash (for no place to go). However, this world of "Samsara" (the world of daily life, birth and death and planes which land and planes which crash we live in) will always be messed up. The Zen Masters simply taught us to realize that both are not apart. There is absolutely nothing in need of fixing in this world (from the "Big C" perspective) ... and we can never fix everything in this world (from the "little c" cure perspective) ... but let us work diligently to try to fix and cure what we can. We can truly work to make this planet we live on nicer for all the residents if we keep trying.

Anyway ... is the glass half empty? Is the glass half full? Will the water in the glass drown you (probably not)? Will it give you cancer (some statistical chance)? The Buddha found a way to see through the clear glass to an "Emptiness" which is a Fullness beyond all full or empty, life death and thirst.

Nonetheless, even as statistical realists, and without the "fifty percent", we can work for a world in which all have clean water in this world.

Got my point?

Gassho, Jundo

SatToday

[Geika]

I perceived that the premise of the poem was to raise a child to see the glass as half full despite all the pessimism... I might have read it wrong.

Gassho, sat today

[Sekishi]

Nonetheless, even as statistical realists, and without the "fifty percent", we can work for a world in which all have clean water in this world.


Agreed. Sort of. When I originally read this poem aloud to my wife and son I said more or less the same thing to them as you just said. I think it went like this "For every total asshat you meet, there are 99 kind and caring individuals."

However, over the past few months, I've given it a second (and third, and forth) thought, and to play devil's advocate, I offer this counter-argument (which I'm not sure I buy, but it is worth thinking about, and is a motivation to be more involved and engaged in the world): the world is indeed "fifty percent terrible", but it is not evenly distributed.

I am a moderately healthy middle class white cis male living in a temperate part of the US. The world around me is pretty darn nice. If I was born somewhere else, or into a different family, or with a different color skin, etc. the world would around me would seem very different. If we look through the eyes of others, the world starts to look very different. How does it look as any member of an underprivileged race, class, or gender? How does it look as a refugee? How does it look as a convict? If we allow ourselves to peek through the eyes of non-human sentient beings... How does it look as a boiler hen, a beef cow, or a hog?



Got my point?


Yes. But regardless of the mathematical percentage of relative terribleness and goodness in the world, I think the underlying tension highlighted by the poem is still one I struggle with as a parent every day. When my child was young and excited about cars, did I tell him that 1.25 million people die each year in automotive accidents?

No, I wanted him to think that this place could be beautiful.

When my child was young and got all fired about about insects, did I tell him that 3 million people (mostly children) die each year from mosquito borne illness?

No, I wanted him to think that this place could be beautiful.

Closer to home, when our children are young and take an interest in Buddhism, do we tell them about old age, sickness, and death, and about the three marks of existence?

No, we want them to think that this place could be beautiful.

My son is a teenager now, and although we did our very best to be extremely honest with him about the nature of the world, it is painful to see the innocence fade. Of course for him to grow into a responsible young man, I know he must leave innocence aside. But as a parent it still hurts to watch.

So that poem (for me) captured one of the most poignant aspects of parenting in a clear and simple way.

It also points to the very heart of practice for me: This is Samsara, it is an unmitigated disaster, but is simultaneously perfect just as it is. So we sit and let go of labels like "unmitigated disaster" and "perfect just as it is", and then get up and go to work to make it a little better.

But thats just like my opinion man.

Gassho,
Sekishi


P.S. Sources:
http://www.who.int/gho/road_safety/mortality/number_text/en/
http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,665039,00.html

[Geika]

That's how I took it, Sekishi: hopeful.

I also understand Jundo's perspective.

It's just a poem.

Gassho, sat today

[Jundo]

Hi Sekishi,

In a country in which half the people voted a guy into office because they are angry and terrified and victimized about something (and most of the rest seem pretty upset and scared and feeling oppressed about something too) ... the ideas expressed in the poem may be a very dangerous attitude. People need to calm down. Examine the world a bit more realistically.

Are there problems in this world or in our own towns that need to be addressed? For sure! TERRIBLE problems. But the fear and misguided attention is actually causing us to do LESS, to become jaded or to run away, and to focus on the wrong things. America has decided to turn away from aiding the world out of their own fear and frustration, to drop bombs out of revenge and short-sightedness rather than dealing with the real social and political causes of terrorism, to want to build walls on our borders and put on lists anyone with a Koran, to run to the doctor afraid they have whatever disease they see on a pharmaceutical commercial. We fear sharks, not ladders.

We are a society that bans all "trick or treating" at Halloween because of a long disproved rumor about poison candy.

http://www.snopes.com/horrors/poison/halloween.asp

Is poverty and disease in Africa a terrible problem, a 100% tragedy for those involved? YES! But what deals better with the situation? This kind of media generated panic and misinformation campaign in America ...

America’s Ebola Panic


Politicians and pundits called for the immediate cessation of flights from the affected countries in order to “keep America safe.” Even scientists joined the fear game, suggesting that Ebola might “go airborne.” Schools told children of workers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention who had been deployed to Africa to stay home from school. Individuals who had spent time anywhere in Africa (even thousands of miles from the outbreaks) were regarded with suspicion and ordered to self-quarantine. A poll of Americans in mid-October of 2014 showed that two-thirds were concerned about a widespread Ebola outbreak in the U.S. [despite it never having been that kind of disease]

A year later, none of the panicked predictions have come true. The outbreak has slowed significantly in West Africa. Fewer than 10 new cases per week have been reported since July 2015, and Liberia was declared Ebola-free in early September. The U.S. hasn’t seen an active Ebola case in more than five months, after 10 cases were treated in 2014. Only two of those, nurses Vinson and Pham, were acquired in the U.S. The others were infected elsewhere, with all but Duncan purposely brought to the U.S. for treatment. An additional patient was brought into the U.S. in March 2015 and released in April. He was the sole U.S. Ebola patient in 2015.
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/medical_examiner/2015/10/ebola_panic_anniversary_predictions_of_a_u_s_epide mic_didn_t_come_true.html

... or actually working for an effective way to deal with the problem. An overlooked story just this week, as we are more concerned with what shoes Kanye is wearing ...

Ebola vaccine gives 100% protection, study finds
http://edition.cnn.com/2016/12/22/health/ebola-vaccine-study/

Oh, and let me not get started on how all the folks in the prosperous West are victims of some injustice or wrong these days, looking for a lawyer to sue somebody, without a sense of history or the actual conditions of society or actual understanding of both their own personal responsibility for many of their problems ... I will save that for another day.

This attitude, even if we try to "hide" it from our children like you and the poem describe, is what gets passed on and infects our children. They learn it from us, and from the TV and "fake news" filled Facebook. So, we have the next generation ... not infected with Ebola ... but infected with the same fear and victimization and hopelessness and anger that will lead to an even worse demagogue being elected next time.

We need to effectively deal with problems, understand the true situation and actual dangers ... not run around like the scared, victimized, self-deluded beings that we often seem to be instead, chased by imagined demons.

Gassho, J

SatToday

[Jundo]

When my child was young and got all fired about about insects, did I tell him that 3 million people (mostly children) die each year from mosquito borne illness?

No, I wanted him to think that this place could be beautiful.

The world is beautiful. It is also sometimes very ugly. As they grow older, we should all teach our children to think realistically about the actual dangers in the world. Otherwise, he or she will be afraid of sharks, not ladders. (In fact, he or she should learn not to disproportionatly fear either).

By the way, your numbers are wrong, although even a single death is a tragedy ...


In 2015, there were an estimated 438 000 malaria deaths (range 236 000–635 000) worldwide.

...

Between 2000 and 2015, malaria incidence rates (new malaria cases) fell by 37% globally, and by 42% in Africa. During this same period, malaria mortality rates fell by 60% globally and by 66% in the African Region.

Other regions have achieved impressive reductions in their malaria burden. Since 2000, the malaria mortality rate declined by 72% in the Region of the Americas, by 65% in the Western Pacific Region, by 64% in the Eastern Mediterranean Region, and by 49% in the South-East Asia Region. For the first time, the European Region reported zero indigenous cases of malaria in 2015.

Children under five are particularly susceptible to malaria illness, infection and death. In 2015, malaria killed an estimated 306 000 under-fives globally, including 292 000 children in the African Region. Between 2000 and 2015, the mortality rate among children under five fell by 65% worldwide and by 71% in Africa.

http://www.who.int/malaria/media/world-malaria-report-2015/en/


Now, it is our misguided fear and focus on the wrong things that prevent us from seeing the actual picture and possible solutions.

What should we do? Perhaps, we should spend more on foreign aid, education and health care, raising education and economic levels in regions to prevent that.

What prevents this? Probably that we are concerned instead about vaccinations leading to autism, building walls to keep out Mexican migrants and terrorists, sharks and serial killers (incredibly rare except on cable TV) and Ebola in Brooklyn. So, we become jaded, focus on the wrong fears and problems, elect a guy who will reduce foreign aid as we head to the mall to buy new shoes to forget the troubles instead. As we educate our children in the wrong things, with the wrong perspective on problems, we help insure that the problems will continue into their generation.

Miseducating our children is also a form of child abuse. (Same if you don't vaccinate one's kids)

The world is beautiful. Sometimes ugly. Often not ugly as much as we assume, or in the way and places we think. Also, something Beautiful transcends all worldly beautiful and ugly.

Gassho, J

SatToday

[Jishin]

अनर्थक (anarthaka). That means BULLSHIT! in Sanskrit. [evil]

My main objection to this poem: The figure "fifty percent terrible, and that's a conservative estimate" is [B]completely artificial, unnecessarily pessimistic and just wrong ... even when seen by the eyes of a skeptical, news and commentary reading, plague/war/famine/violence aware, had relatives die in the Holocaust, statistic examining, "life is suffering" Buddhist like me.

Hi Jundo,

When I read this it just sounded like for every negative form uttered a positive form is created out of nothing. If I call a bamboo tall that means there must be a short bamboo out there according to my mind. That's all.

That said, I work with sick people all day and my perception of life can be a little distorted negatively in that I can extrapolate it to the general population.

Thank you for writing a balanced view so that I can use it in my day to day life.

Gasho, Jishin, _/st\_

[Jundo]

Pardon my rant on this.

But with the Inauguration looming close of someone likely selected out of fears real and imagined (more the latter), anger and resentments, a frustrated sense of entitlement, personal feelings of being oppressed and victimized and the like, I feel the need to speak out loudly. I will more in the coming months.

The President-Elect's opponents are often not much better, by the way, expressing other fears sometimes real but often questionable, resentments and feelings of oppression and victimization. It is largely a false story, a disease plaguing Westerners on the right, middle and left these days in surprisingly similar ways.

The words of the poem seemed to convey many of those exaggerated fears.

Gassho, Jundo

SatToday, beyond all sense of fear, anger, victimization and entitlement

[Jishin]

Pardon my rant on this.



I hear you loud and clear. Maybe I am to mellow today after a good-nights sleep last night. My wife will go protest with 200,000 other women in Washington day after the inauguration. My family is vigilant and not complacent about all that is going on for we know all too well that the best predictor of the future is the past.

Thank you for being vocal about this.

Gassho, Jishin, ST

[Kyotai]

Thank you Jundo and all who have formed this discussion. It is sometimes difficult to take a step back from ones own situation, outlook..and look at the big picture. Sometimes it is easier to jump on the more popular wave of pessimism. Something we should guard against.

Years ago at my home, my father was speaking to a friend of mine, who is a retired police officer. They had both worked for many years in a remote northern community with the local population.

My dad had remarked, "There are so many wonderful people in that community.."

The retired officer replied, " Is that so? It is unfortunate I never got to meet any of them.."

My father worked with artists and farmers, the officer worked with criminals. Who's perspective was correct?

Let us sit, so that we are not caught up in dualistic absolutes.

Gassho, Kyotai
ST

[RichardH]

It is always fraught with sensitivities talking about how we raise our children. So this is just speaking for myself. Both my wife and I have been practicing Buddhists since we met, so it isn't "a thing" anymore, and our son, William, has been raised in a home where the ABC' s of the Buddhist way are the common sense.

He knows that everything, inside and out, is impermanent, and that just as you don't dance to get to the end of the song, the timeless joy of life is found in the dancing itself. He was taught that there was no promise ever made by anyone or anything that the world would be a certain way, and he was asked the question.... "The world is going well or going badly compared to what....exactly?" We have our visions and we work for them, but we have no grounds to call life unfair.

He was never shielded from either beauty or horror, because whatever is "out there" is "in here" and he was told he is vast inside. He was taught over and over again, that no matter where he is and whatever condition he is in, he is always at home, and that it is impossible for him not to always be at home. He was taught to be loving... like most people he just is.... and to forgive, and move on, and let go. He has been encouraged to live the flames of lust-for-life and have passion for engagement, creativity, and work, even though all achievements are a "dream", a dewdrop, a flash of lightning.

He loves this world, worries for it, has his wishes dreams for it. But I feel he also knows that within and beyond it, all manner of things are well.

Gassho
Daizan
Sat today

[alan.r]

The fifty percent is tongue-in-cheek. A poet joke. It is also metaphorical. A "conservative estimate" is another joke (a pun) on the notion of conservative points of view and estimating reality (how can one make an estimation of reality - even a conservative one? It's a joke). The easy black and white of the poem (the idea that for every kind person, there is one who will end you) is not meant to be some "truth" about reality, but merely a clear (if hyperbolic) state of the speaker's mind: that they are keeping certain "real" things (forget fifty percent) from their children in order to sugar coat reality. It's not that half the world is terrible; it's that the speaker feels they are keeping half of reality locked away from their child (the negative side - the fifty percent is a metaphor for the "dark/negative" side of life). Because the speaker has hidden these realities, the speaker feels as though they're a realtor, some cheap realtor, selling something not really real. The poem has a self-deprecating humor - the speaker knows they are failing in some way, though they are doing it out of love for their child. This is what breaks the reader's heart: we can see the failure.

But here's another child poem I quite like, and was recently the subject of a podcast at Zen Mountain Monastery:

Sleeping Faces
by Robert Bly

Tonight the first fall rain washes away my sly distance.
I have decided to blame no one for my life.
This water falls like a great privacy.
Letters sink into the desk,
The desk sinks away, leaving an intelligence
Slowly learning to talk of its own suffering.
The muttering of thunder is a gift
That reverberates in the roof of the mouth.
Another gift is a child’s face in a dark room
I see as I check the house during the storm.
My life is a blessing, a triumph, a car racing through the rain.

Gassho,
Alan
sattoday

[Jundo]

Thank you, Alan. Perhaps I am over-sensitive to signs of people in this world being over-sensitive these days.

I do believe that the problem (of people complaining of too many problems!) is real and very serious, however.

Gassho, Jundo

[alan.r]

I do believe that the problem (of people complaining of too many problems!) is real and very serious, however.



Yes: complete agreement with you on this. It's often a way people make their lives more certain: having this "problem" and being "offended in this or that way" gives people the feeling that they can control their lives. It makes people feel they "are someone" when they are offended, outraged, feel they're treated unfairly - frankly, it makes people feel important. It's a narrative of self-importance, based on wanting one's life to be "perfect." I think it's frightening to give up one's "problems," because for many people, that's how they define themselves.

That being said, there are real injustices and ugly things in this world, which need our compassion (Beings are numberless, I vow to save them), but as you say, there is also wholeness that transcends beautiful and ugly, good and bad.

Gassho,
Alan
sattoday

[RichardH]

That being said, there are real injustices and ugly things in this world, which need our compassion (Beings are numberless, I vow to save them), but as you say, there is also wholeness that transcends beautiful and ugly, good and bad.



Of course we must take action, remove the arrow, with compassion, do our best to end injustice...

At the same time this sentence is worth a lifetime of deep investigation, every word... "there are real injustices and ugly things in this world"

Blabbed enough in an already wordy thread... Deep bows

Daizan
Sat today

[alan.r]

At the same time this sentence is worth a lifetime of deep investigation, every word... "there are real injustices and ugly things in this world"



Thank you, Daizan. There is investigation, there is sitting, both of which are forms of the backward/inward step, and there is bringing that sitting and that investigation into the world, which is the forward/outward step (not two). This is how I see the forward step, which has its root in the backward step:

May I be a guard for all those who are protector-less,

A guide for those who journey on the road.
May I be a boat, a raft, a bridge,
For all those who wish to cross the water.


For all those ailing in the world,

Until their every sickness has been healed,

May I myself become for them

The doctor, the nurse, the medicine itself.
-Shantideva

Gassho,
Alan
sattoday

[Jakuden]

Thank you all for this thread, it is a wonderful perspective-stretching discussion.

Daizan, I wish I had raised my children from an early age with the perspective you have given your son. I think I threw myself into "making the world perfect," especially for my older daughter, with every ounce of my energy and love for her. I hid all the "bad" and tried to make everything "good." Of course, the quotation marks are because they were my perceptions, not the real world, and I feel remorse because I think this upbringing has caused her more pain as a teenager... she has a perfectionist personality, and has a difficult time dealing with the "bad" in the world, including her own and others' imperfections. My husband is the opposite of what I was, he tends to be pessimistic and to relish complaining about every little thing, so she has no sense of balance. This reinforces the need to choose the Middle Way in parenting, and not emphasize either what we perceive as the bad or the good--but instead how others feel and how to help them.

And I did get that sense from the poem--there was a "guilty pleasure" element to it, how the author knew that what he was doing was somehow not right but does it anyway, that sense of conflict in a parent--thank you Alan and Sekishi for the eloquent discussion about that!

I can't say I quite understand the delineation between where activism is needed and where there is "over-sensitivity" to problems (especially what could be perceived as "first-world problems,") but perhaps that comes with time, like any other Koan. It is interesting to hear the different perspectives on that.

Gassho,
Jakuden
SatToday

[Myosha]

Much Ado About Nothing (thanks Billy S.!)

Hello,

If Trump collects a Cabinet as a 'Team of Rivals' á la President Lincoln it'll be OK (anyways).

If not, two terms max. As a convict friend opines: "Can do that standing on your head."

Or not.^^


Gassho
Myosha
sat today

[FaithMoon]

Regarding the epidemic of feeling entitled and resentful: I think one thing that is different nowadays is the ubiquity of TV (and other "new" media) and how it is targeted to specific psychographic groups. People in first world countries watch an awful lot of tv and there is enough choice that one can watch only what conforms to ones world view. This niche-casting of entertainment and news is a new wrinkle in world consciousness. We Buddhists maybe don't buy into the narrow world view being sold to us (but maybe we do?), but not sure what will keep the general population on an even keel with so much control in the hands of the programmers, marketeers, and salesmen politicians with their own agendas. Sure we can be outraged, but what is the Buddhist response to these developments? Do we "just sit" and hope for the best?

Faith-Moon
st

[Jundo]

I can't say I quite understand the delineation between where activism is needed and where there is "over-sensitivity" to problems (especially what could be perceived as "first-world problems,") but perhaps that comes with time, like any other Koan. It is interesting to hear the different perspectives on that.



It is the difference between (a) identifying a real, and specific problem like malaria or world hunger or one's own actual cancer or local homelessness in your town and developing collective and workable solutions to try to improve the problem (b) getting worked up about imagined or exaggerated problems like being a hypochondriac constantly worried about non-existent cancer, the possibility of personally being a victim of an air crash or terrorist attack or serial killer, or the possibility of one child's school being the location of a hostage situation despite the statistical rarity.

We are creating a world in which (both left and right) we are forgetting to focus and act on (a) because we are worried too much about (b).

We have college degrees, but somehow are weak in critical thinking. We are creating a world in which we pass this mindset of misdirected fears and ignorance onto the next generation.

I know that we all do this to some extent (I do it too. I practice Zen to combat my worry-wart Woody Allen inside).

Gassho, Jundo

SatToday

[Jundo]

I wrote most of this to someone. It is about the "Zen Teachers" job in my book, and to anyone who might think I am saying to simply ignore all the suffering in the world, or that life is just always beautiful. Baloney.

------------------

Do you actually think that I don't know that there are terrible, tragic things in this world ... babies dying and war and hunger? Of course, this is terrible for the victims and all who love them. We mourn them, we cry with them, we try to act to relieve their suffering.

Sorry, but I think my "Zen Teacher" job description is to try to punch a hole in peoples' only looking at things one way. All suffering is the enemy, and the solution is not only (1) to fight and do charity to end the actual babies dying and war and hunger (it is our duty to work in this world to make it better). It is also for me to teach people that (2) suffering is an illusion and there is also a realm with no birth and death, anger and taking, fear lack and need. We encounter this Buddha Realm Wholeness in Zazen. (1) and (2) are "not one, not two" as we say, which means that they interfuse as one beyond one.

Believe it or not, we can learn how to (1) work hard to fix terrible problems in the world while also simultaneously (2) knowing the total Peace where there are no problems to fix, and trying to introduce others to this awareness too. We can do all that while yet living in this messy world. Yes, that is Satori. This is living our Bodhisattva Vow.

But that is not all:

It is also my role, I feel, to show people that (3) their day-to-day heads are largely self-created garbage dumps filled with self-created stories they tell themselves about what is to be feared, who is the enemy, how their life is lacking, where they need to be in life to be a "success", what is a real "problem" in their lives, what is really "important" in life and what not, all accompanied by excess or unjustified emotional reactions not merited by situations, etc. etc. For example, if being chased by an actual tiger, feeling fear and running is probably justified. On the other hand, worrying obsessively about a cancer you may or may not get years from now is less justified, and fearing sharks or ladders or dying in an airplane crash or from a nuclear reactor even less so (I am still keeping one eye on North Korea :) ). Working for goals in life and to create something positive in the world by one's hands is a great thing, but to wrap yourself and strangle yourself in a career to "keep up with the Joneses" and buy a new pair of shoes like Kanye ... well, likely not. Fighting hunger in Africa is a good and realistic thing, while being afraid that terrorists lurk behind every school bus with a bomb ... and being so worked up about terrorists that we need to build walls and cut off aid to Africa and scare our children who pick up our vibe about all this ... well, this is uniformed, uneducated ignorance and harmful to the world.

The poem about a parent trying to protect a child was lovely, but contained many one sided self-created fictions and perspectives on seeing life that left out (2) and (3). My job to point that out. We truly protect our children for the next generation when we teach them (1) (2) and (3) togethor.

Gassho, J

SatToday

[Jakuden]

Thank you Jundo. It follows that the student's job then is to sit with it all as it arises... and observe what is useless or harmful fiction of the mind, and what really warrants action, even though nothing needs fixing.
Gassho
Jakuden
SatToday


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[Jundo]

Thank you Jundo. It follows that the student's job then is to sit with it all as it arises... and observe what is useless or harmful fiction of the mind, and what really warrants action, even though nothing needs fixing.
Gassho
Jakuden
SatToday


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:encouragement:

[Jundo]

ANNOUNCEMENT: TREELEAF WILL BE CLOSED DURING THE COMING WEEK AS I HEAD FOR MY BUNKER ...

U.S., allies warn of "new level of threat" from North Korea


U.S., allies warn of "new level of threat" from North Korea ... Japanese Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Shinsuke Sugiyama said that North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs represent a “new level of threat.”

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/north-korea-weapons-nuclear-tests-qualitative-improvement-us-asia/

Japan has put its military on alert for a possible North Korean ballistic missile launch, national and international media said.

The Tokyo government ordered naval destroyers and anti-ballistic missile Patriot batteries to be ready to shoot down any projectile heading for Japan, state broadcaster NHK said.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/05/japan-alert-north-korea-missile-launch-160530111346108.html



More likely is, while crossing the street reading this on my smartphone, I will be hit by a bus!

Gassho, J

SatToday

[Makkusu]

Thank you for sharing your thoughts and the discussion. The whole media topic is a huge one, I see so many people being sad and pessimistic because "2016 was the worst year ever and the world is going to come to an end soon." They may be right, but in retrospective, we have one big picture of a year whereas right now we only see the bad things. And thank you Jundo for your eye-opening thoughts on this.

Gassho, Max
#s@today

[Toun]

It seems like it's so very easy to dwell on the negative events of our world that we tend to overlook the fact that there is also a lot of good things happening. People in many places are making a difference.

http://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/news/world/

Gassho
Mike
Sat2day

[Kyotai]

Thank you Mike. That is quite a list. I would encourage others to check this out as well.

Gassho, Kyotai
ST


It seems like it's so very easy to dwell on the negative events of our world that we tend to overlook the fact that there is also a lot of good things happening. People in many places are making a difference.

http://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/news/world/

Gassho
Mike
Sat2day

[Myosha]

It seems like it's so very easy to dwell on the negative events of our world that we tend to overlook the fact that there is also a lot of good things happening. People in many places are making a difference.

http://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/news/world/

Gassho
Mike
Sat2day

Hello,

Thank you for the link.

Distinction is good fun and another illusion.

Merry new New.


Gassho
Myosha
sat today

[Makkusu]

There is actually a subreddit with good news only. It's called uplifting news IIRC. :)

[Kyonin]

Hi all,

The universe is not dark. It's not light. It's not all depressing and it's not all anything we want to label it with.

It's just the universe flowing and being itself and we are just a part of it.

These days we are living some pretty tough days in my country and I am under fire because, despite of all the darkness, I simply can't fix my attention on that since there is also marvelous things around me and around all living things.

If we keep silent and quiet the mental stories, we can simply be with it all. We flow. We adapt. And we serve and tend all living beings around us.

But I'm a simple man with a tiny fish brain that can't look past that.

Gassho,

Kyonin
#SatToday

[Enjaku]

Thanks Alan and everyone for this interesting thread.
Jundo - deepest thanks for this...


Most sentient beings do not realize how much of our experience of life is a self-created story of meaning and interpretation and value judgments that we impose on circumstances.

I read this sat in a garden in Sri Lanka. I was feeling happy, grateful for another day in the garden, my wife was sad to be leaving the garden so soon. I asked myself the question, "what is the garden in this moment beyond our experience of the garden in this moment?". Many things un-clicked... I'm sure it will pass.. but I feel grateful for this moment of doubt / insight / serenity.

Gassho,
Alex
Sat

[pinoybuddhist]

Nothing to add except I have read everything here, and will likely reread everything.

[emoji1431]Rafael
Sat today


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