Retreat Mind

At our last retreat one of our sangha members literally moaned in our ending circle talk and said ,"This doesn't feel spiritual! This is torture!" Everyone in the circle laughed hard because each of us were dealing with aching knees and backs and bottoms. We all knew EXACTLY what he was talking about! Not to mention the torture of sitting moment after moment watching your mind make things up over and over again and struggling each time to bring it back to the breath or the mantra or the great question. And yet..........when the retreat is over and freedom of movement returns there is a quality to our lives that is different - more spacious and full of gratitude for each other and for our practice. We find ourselves open and quiet - truly clear mirrors for this world. I'm always struck by the loving, grateful attitude each person displays at the end of a retreat. In spite of the physical pain, retreats are worth every moment.

Sangha

Zen Master Seung Sahn taught that this "don't know" mind is the same for everyone. When one is not thinking than your don't know mind and my don't know mind and the don't know mind of all things in the universe are the same. I read a quote the other day - "I am like that. You are like that. All this is like that. And that's all there is." Makes me laugh for the truth of it. And yet, when I look around the dharma room, I see all these people with different likes and dislikes, different tastes, different voices, some male, some female, some happy, some sad. Oh - so many differences! Where did all that come from? Zen Buddhism teaches that we make our world. We make our likes and dislikes. We make happy and sad and good and bad. We make a world of opposites and opposition. Each of us are born with karma that sees and reacts to this world in different ways. We make these differences. But these differences are not part of our true nature. Our true nature is the same, person to person, and is the nature of all "that." Seeing beyond our differences means reaching into the heart of the great work of life and death.