Dharma Rain Character

Still Point

Newsletter of Dharma Rain Zen Center

Portland, Oregon

Volume XXIX Number 1

January-February 2004

 



By Jiko Tisdale

In October, a small group of people were recognized for completing the seminary program after three years of study. The group of six who finished in October did not receive any special authorization or rank for their work. While finishing seminary is, in the long view, a necessary part of becoming a priest, lay teacher or instructor in our line, it does not in itself confer authority; most people in the seminary program are there for reasons of personal enrichment and understanding. Still, we felt that some recognition was in order. In the spirit of passing on what is learned, each graduate gave a brief talk describing their experience, and each received a certificate noting their completion of the program.

For months, we had wondered what to give the graduates. I liked the idea of a small tiara and a bouquet, but found little support for this. Instead, I went to a trophy store and perused a catalog of certificates, badges and pins honoring all kinds of things. The jaunty "graduate" pin with its traditional cap caught my eye, as did the bowling and golf trophies, the "Happy Retirement" plaques and the Number One Boss tie tacks. All seemed appropriate to some degree. But instead I chose an elegant, if generic, scroll-lined "Certificate of Achievement." I ordered twenty, in the expectation that many more people will be finishing seminary down the road.

At home, a few hours after the graduation ceremony, I noticed that I had somehow bought Certificates of Appreciation instead of Achievement. I don't know if I chose these in the first place or the store made a mistake - either way, it seems a happy accident. I had a good laugh and then thought a while about the differences between achievement and appreciation.

We are conditioned toward achievement - accomplishing visible success in the world of work, family, material wealth, critical recognition, or some other field. Achievement requires at least some level of visibility. And achievement is never about now or here: once reached, a goal ceases to be real and a new goal must take its place. Achievement is always about the future, another place, another time - it is always a fantasy. Whatever satisfaction we feel in our achievements is fleeting, because achievement is primarily an act - a verb, a doing.

On the other hand, appreciation can take place in a completely solitary and anonymous way. It is good shared, and good alone. Appreciation is about right now, right here; it can't be about anything else. How differently it feels to start out the day thinking about what you will appreciate instead of what you will achieve.

I had chosen as my graduation talk to speak about how often during the three years of seminary I had considered our need for recognition - for recognition of our achievements, our worth, our correctness, our learning. As students, we long for affirmation from our teachers and our peers - some proof that we are on the right track, making progress, going somewhere. Even in a seminary class, competition, jealousy, envy and shame can occur as we measure ourselves against each other and against the understood ideal. We may understand how meaningless these feelings are and still find ourselves caught up in the same hopes and fears that plague us in high school and office politics.

As teachers and instructors, we aren't free from the need for affirmation. We need our students to respond, we need to know that we are helping in some way, making sense of something, being of use. We need the feedback of relationship even to exist as teachers. And teachers are not immune from the same feelings of envy and shame that everyone else experiences.

We are all just people, and that means we are all of us looking to each other for affirmation of the self we feel ourselves to be. We know how imperfect we are and secretly believe we will not be accepted. We long for praise, love, a sense of belonging and safety and worth. This is what we most dearly hope to achieve, and it is essentially a lonely business, as fleeting as any other accomplishment.

Sometimes this longing to be affirmed is deeply delusional. It is a longing based in the belief of a separate, closed self - a self set off from others, defined by its characteristics. Such things as our appearance, accomplishments and personality are all we have to offer the world, it seems all we have to offer in exchange for self-worth. In a thousand different ways, we try to charm, confound and excite the world. We use our bodies, our ideas, jokes, insights, strength, vulnerability, skill and anything else we can think of to conjure up this affirmation from those around us. It is delusional because it is based in the mistaken belief that "I" and "you" are separate - that "I" and "you" can even be located. It is also deluded because love and acceptance based on these false and ever-changing characteristics will sooner or later prove to be false and changeable, too.

But sometimes this longing is just what it is, an unguarded and intimate expression of our loneliness - the loneliness that is so much more than bone deep, that loneliness which comes from our inexpressible knowledge that we are not complete by ourselves, we are not whole, we are not done. We know something is missing, something is needed, but we don't know what it is, where to find it, where even to look. Sometimes, in reaching out of this place to others, we are telling a vital truth about ourselves. "Look at me, naked - I am in need. I am not whole. Can you reach me here?"

There is another kind of affirmation - it is that given to all beings by all Buddhas, the affirmation that we will awaken. "I give affirmation to them all: 'You will attain anuttara-samyak-sambodhi,'" speaks Shakyamuni in the Lotus Sutra. The Sutra is explicit in stating that this really means you: you, you, you, me, all of us, human and deity and demon and devil. Dogen quotes this part of the sutra in his fascicle Juki, which means, literally, "to give affirmation," and he writes:

"This state is described: 'Clear, clear are the hundred weeds; clear, clear is the will of the Buddhist patriarchs.' So is there any Buddhist patriarch who is other than the hundred weeds? And how could the hundred weeds be other than I and you?"

This is so hard for us to believe. It is hard for me to believe. We are so deeply unsure of ourselves. No matter where we look, there is nothing on which to hold, nothing we can depend upon, no place to grab and say, "This is it! This makes me whole." There is nothing we can achieve in life that will fill this need to be whole, that will still the restless dissatisfaction that marks human form. Yet, sitting still, with patience and persistence, we catch a glimmer. We catch sight of something. All we have to do is turn toward it, and say, "yes". We need to say yes with complete appreciation for our condition, whatever it is, wherever we find ourselves, without regard to what others think or say. We only need to totally appreciate our lives, right now. There is nothing more we need to do but this.


by Kyogen Carlson

Note: This article is reconstructed from Dharma Talks given by Kyogen sensei at an intensive retreat in February 1988. The subject of the retreat was Uji by Dogen Zenji, one of the more interesting and profound chapters of his Shobogenzo. What is presented here is not a translation of Uji, but rather Kyogen's sense of the work, which was offered at the retreat in conjunction with reading a translation. Excellent versions in English can by found in Shobogenzo: Zen Essays by Dogen, translated by Thomas Cleary; Moon in a Dewdrop: Writings of Zen Master Dogen, edited by Kazuaki Tanahash; and Selling Water by the River: A Manual of Zen Training , by Roshi Jiyu-Kennett. If what you read here piques your interest, we recommend reading one of these direct translations. -ed

Introduction
Imagine that you hold in your hand a ripe, round plum. It is fully ripe, and subtly fragrant. It has been sitting on a window sill in the sun, so it feels warm in your hand. You sink your teeth into it, and its juice fills your mouth. It is sweet, with the slightly tart and astringent quality of a good plum. This very moment is just like this. Give the present moment full attention, no matter what it holds — how complete it is. Every moment truly is just like this. When we are aware of it, how full life is.

Every moment is complete - just as it is - totally - timelessly. Every moment already possesses both a "before" and an "after." Just as one ripe, round plum is perfect now, yet contains unlimited future potential. It is perfect now, yet holds within itself the story of the whole universe. Eons of change, growth, evolution, put this ripe, round plum into your hand. From its seed the future bursts forth. The distant, unimaginable past, and the limitless future are fully present in one ripe, round plum.

This very moment is one ripe, round, plum. This very moment is past, present, and future. This very moment is Uji.

Uji Existence, Time
It was Yakusan who said, "To stand upon the highest peak is existence-time; to plumb the very depths is existence-time; to have three heads and eight arms, and to struggle in a wrathful land* is existence-time; to know the perfection of Buddha is existence-time; everyday life and everyday things are existence- time; the whole earth and the limitless sky are existence-time."

Every moment, whether transcendent or mundane, whether we are in heaven or in hell, standing on mountain peaks or plumbing the depths, is woven into the one fabric of Uji; existence-time. Since all is time, time is expressed in all things, and they become, as it were, its ornamentation.

To know this we must focus fully on this day, right before us. We will see that the time we call "past," of being three headed and eight armed, struggling in a wrathful land, is of one suchness with right now. This means that your anger of yesterday is part of the reality of today. Although we have not yet measured this present day, we still think of it as a period of twenty-four hours. Because the flowing of time leaves signs of its moving we do not doubt its existence, yet we fail to understand its meaning. When not in the habit of profound insight, we doubt all things of which we do not yet have a full understanding. Because of this, our present doubts contradict our former doubts, and will be out of harmony with our future doubts. But even doubt itself is only a part of time.

Outside this mind, doubting or not, no other world exists. "Mind," "world," and "doubts" are all woven into one fabric of time, and this we call Uji. Therefore, all things must be regarded as time itself, in one great unhindered relationship, one with the other. Because of this, doubt, confusion, anger, folly, and grief exist harmoniously with the way-seeking mind, and practice and enlightenment arise naturally. To realize this fully, understand clearly that upon this earth many things appear, and many forms of grass exist. Yet each thing that appears, and each form of grass is in no way separate from the whole earth. It is from this viewpoint that true practice arises, for then we understand that just one thing appears, and one form of grass remains. Still, in this life, myriad forms appear. At times we recognize this wonderful variety of appearance as the ornamentation of one thing. But at other times we do not see this. Then there are times when the one form is seen fully, and all distinctions vanish. And again, sometimes this is not so. All this is as it should be. After all, seeing and not seeing, knowing and not knowing, are each part of the fabric of time; Uji. Because there is only time of this description, Uji is all existence. Every appearance and form of grass is Uji; all existences and all worlds are Uji; and all are fully present right now. After all, how could there be any existence or world apart from time?

When we don't reflect deeply, we consider the flowing of time by thinking, "At some other time I was three headed and eight armed, struggling in a wrathful land. At still another time, the perfect body of Buddha appeared." Like traveling from place to place, crossing mountains and rivers, we think we leave time behind. So we say, "Even though those mountains and rivers may still exist, I have passed them, and now reside in this lordly mansion." But there is far more to it than this. For when crossing mountains and rivers, not only I myself am present, but so also is time. "I" am here and now. Time and I are one. Since time includes arriving and departing, eternal now includes the time the mountain is climbed. Therefore, I myself am eternal now, and this too is Uji. Within Uji the limitless past is engulfed, and from it unlimited future flows forth.

Seekers of Truth - know this well. Having three heads and eight arms, struggling in a wrathful land, is the time of yesterday. Knowing Buddha's perfect form is the time of today. This too is Eternal Now. But what we say are yesterday and today are one and the same thing, just as when looking at mountains we see many peaks with only one glance. Time itself never departs, for the time of yesterday exists today in the fabric of existence- time. Yesterday appears to be elsewhere, but is actually here and now.

The perfect body of Buddha, sixteen feet tall standing, eight feet high when sitting, which is the time of today, is also one with the whole fabric of time. Know it as here and now, just like pines and bamboo, earth and sky; for they are all existence- time; Uji; now.

We feel Uji as flowing, but it does not pass away. If time were merely to pass away, you would be separate from time. Existence, time, Uji - flows. It flows from today to tomorrow. It flows from today to yesterday, it flows from yesterday to today, from today to today, from tomorrow to tomorrow. It is as if you were sweeping your gaze over one continuous fabric of time. This we call Uji. So past time and present time do not accumulate, and future time does not deplete. Still, do not think of time as fixed. The teachers of the past are all one with the fabric of time. Their essence fills this time and place, here and now. Self and other are time, as are practice, enlightenment, and returning to the world like the lotus untouched by water. But should we hold a deluded view, we will see the world as deluded. To do so, however, does not change the Truth of existence. The pain of our delusions is the working of Truth itself, and leads us to seek enlightenment. So if we think we are not already one with existence-time, we will believe the Buddha is separate from us. Then we will try to free ourselves from the very fact of being the golden Body of Buddha. Yet even in this dire strait, we are still one with the fabric of time; Uji.

The hours of twelve and one come in regular succession, and the pattern of life goes on, all as a part of existence-time. Heavenly deities enlighten the world, as do wrathful figures with three heads and eight arms, while Buddhas do the same with their sixteen foot high golden bodies. If one can transcend motion and rest, the world can be fully entered. Practice and enlightenment manifest as daily life when stillness is found in action, and action is found in stillness. The signs of becoming Buddha are revealed in the beginning, middle, and end; or searching, attaining, going on; and all are existence-time. What else could be called True Buddhahood? There is nothing more than the careful study of existence-time, which is always right before you.

Still, delusion is delusion, so beware of fascination with half of existence-time. Some delight in the hundred grasses and myriad things - while others eschew them for the one form, one grass, one taste. Even the Truth incorrectly seen, however, is part of existence-time. If you cling to the idea of time as passing, then practice, enlightenment, seeking, attaining, and going on are all separate things. Buddhas and ancestors are separate from you. What is more, wisdom and enlightenment, like delusion and folly, are merely "things" that arise and fall in the passing of time. If you want to know your original face, realize that time is one and undivided; it comes from no other place and does not depart. It simply flows, as Uji.

Free of all craving, existence-time manifests itself. The kings of heaven and their servants are not apart from the flowing of existence-time, and all beings, whether on land or in the sea, come forth from it. Existence-time gives rise to all things good and evil, and their arising is the process of time, nothing whatsoever being apart from it. It is wrong to think the flowing of Uji moves from west to east in the manner of a storm. The flow of words neither moves nor stands still. This is an example of Uji. Seasons too, are the same as this. Spring arises even as winter wanes, but neither comes from - nor goes to - any other place. Uji perfects the Way in the time of Spring, just as it does in Winter. So it is not correct to think of Uji as continuity, like passing through many lives and many worlds. It is so much more profound than that.

When advised by Sekito, Yakusan visited Baso and said "I have studied nearly all the teachings of the Three Categories. Why did the Great Patriarch come from the West?" "There are times when I raise the eyebrows and blink the eyes of old Shakyamuni," Baso replied, "and there are times when I do not do so. To do so at times is good. Not to do so at times is also good. What do you think?" Yakusan was immediately enlightened and said, "When I was in Sekito's temple, I was like a mosquito trying to bite an iron bull."

Baso was saying something quite different from what most others say, since the raising of the eyebrows is to stand on the mountain peak, and to blink the eye is to know the ocean depths. The mountain peak and the ocean depths are not separate from your own existence. If you would raise the eyebrow and blink the eye of old Shakyamuni, you must first know the mountain and ocean from your own experience. Both raising the eyebrow and blinking the eye, and not doing so, are your own existence right now. Do you see? Raising the eyebrow and blinking, and not doing so are both part of existence-time. Correctly understood, both are of perfect use. Because of this, the Transmission from mind to mind is possible, and Shakyamuni appears in the everyday world of today.

Shuzan's disciple, Sekken Kisei, once said to the monks in training, "There are times when intention matches circumstances, and times when it does not; there are times when action matches circumstances, and times when it does not. There are times when both intention and action match circumstances, and times when neither do so." This means intention, action, and circumstances are all existence-time. Both matching and not matching are existence-time. When intention and action are adequate, there is something still left undone. When intention and action are inadequate, it is, in many ways, already complete. Do you not see? Both are part of the fabric of time; existence, flow; Uji.

Adequacy obscures the Truth when we get wrapped up in adequacy. Inadequacy obscures the Truth when we get wrapped up in that. But even obscuring the Truth is only one moment in time. Being hindered, we understand hindrance, so hindrance is hindered by hindrance. The koan of everyday life is just as this. In time you will know it from your own experience. These things have been said by the teachers of old, but still it is good to repeat them today. Intentions and actions that go half-way are part of existence- time. Those that reach even less than half-way are part of existence-time. Practice and study with all your might, but understand this well. Beginning - Middle - End - each are already one with the fabric of time. You hold them in your hand right now, but your own experience is still up to you.

Apology
Another may be able to speak for Great Master Dogen, but I certainly would not presume to do so. Dogen's Uji affected me for many years, and what appears here is merely my own vibrating in response to his teaching. For any confusion I may create by offering these words, I apologize deeply. - Kyogen

* This refers to the realm of the Titan Asuras, or "fighting demons." They are sometimes depicted as having three heads and eight arms, and they live in a realm of struggle and strife. Being "three headed and eight armed" means to be in a state of struggle and strife. back

 

November 2003

Present:Gyokuko Carlson, Kyogen Carlson, Jeanette Ryan, Gary Oshiro, Kisei Martin, Kei'un Clardy, Genko Rainwater, Erin Luthy, Shisei Niski, Absent: Dosho VanSant.

The meeting began shortly after 7 pm.

1) Formal Approval of the Minutes from the Annual Retreat
The minutes of the Sept 18 meeting were approved unanimously.

2) No members brought issues to the Board at this meeting.

3) Treasurer's Report
Gary distributed detailed Income & Expense reports illustrating the January-through-September numbers from 2001 to this year. At present we're roughly $12k in the red. Income is down by $6k from last year, expenses down by $17k. Our overall cash position is OK.

4) Operations Report
The stairs up from the basement on the west side of the Dharma House need more headroom to meet the requirements of the occupancy permit. Gyokuko reports that the only workable solution is to extend the stairs to the west. This project will wait until Spring. The Dharma House kitchen work is on hold until January. Kyogen notes that the plumbing replacement project has resulted in better water pressure and quality throughout the house. The Zendo roof is another looming, non-trivial project - another slow leak has apparently developed.

5) Calendar Committee
Spring term classes, both open and Seminary, are planned. The intended public Calendar Committee in the Fall didn't happen, so Kyogen would like to do that in the Spring, in the context of the Spring Sangha Forum.

6) Review of Proposed Changes to By-laws
The new Bylaws needed to be adopted prior to the December Board Elections. Sections 7.2 and 7.3 were discussed and revised. Shisei will email a cleanly-formatted copy to the Board, and a final copy will be placed in the office. A motion to accept the revised Bylaws passed unanimously.

7) Board Elections
Several recruits for the two open positions have declined. Hongaku has agreed to throw his rakhusu into the ring, and other members will be approached soon. Genko will draft a "voter's pamphlet" right away, and ballots will be mailed in December.

8) Other Items
Residency The new residency application and interview process has been working well, with some new residents moved in and others on line to do so in the near future. New questions have arisen around the issue of caring for ill residents. It was noted that the Sanga Support Network is a resource already in place, but it may be that further discussion in the matter is warranted.

Storage Kyogen noted that storage in our buildings could be better utilized. He raised the possibility of renting a storage space for miscellaneous "stuff" that is infrequently used.

Committee Reports Genko asked why Board members aren't receiving reports from the Calendar and Operations committees. The committee members present agreed to start emailing them to the full Board.

Next Meeting:
Thursday, January 22nd, 7 pm at the Sangha House. The meeting adjourned at 9:15 pm. Respectfully Submitted, Joe Shisei Niski, Secretary .

 

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The newsletter is put together in the first week of every other month. Submissions are very welcome: short or long articles, which can be on any point of practice, including travel, research or personal experience; descriptions of events we've had; the occasional poem or drawing.

Send your items to: newsletter@dharma-rain.org, or by regular mail, or drop it off in the newsletter slot in the Center house office.

 

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STILL POINT edit of 27 December 2003

Edited for archive on June 30, 2004
Dharma Rain Zen Center Newsletter
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Volume XXIX Number 1 January-February 2004
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