Do little

This post about Zen is by a guy on the internet who tries his best to type think nonthinking. Please enjoy any amusing bits and gather what is helpful for your own journey.

Talking to all the animals

Try to be mindful,
and let things take their natural course.

Then your mind will become still
in any surroundings
like a clear forest pool.

All kinds of wonderful, rare animals
will come to drink at the pool,
and you will clearly see
the nature of all things.

You will see many strange and
wonderful things come and go,
but you will be still.

This is the happiness of the Buddha.

Mindfulness, Achaan Chah

Dr. Dolittle had a talent for talking to all the animals. Can Zen teach us to talk to all things by listening very carefully, doing very little?

I spend a not insignificant amount of time with a noisy head. Thought chasing coffee, thought chasing cakes, thought chasing antacid. Thought that I should be working more, thought that I should be working less. Thought chasing thought after thought after thought, sometimes splitting into branches that branch yet again.

When does this end, where do I find rest?

Stop motion animation

Finding rest is tricky, you may end up doing very much to try and find it, searching for it everywhere. The problem is that, once you’ve found it, wouldn’t it be just so fragile, so easy to lose again? What is the point of finding a peace that leaves you constantly scrambling for it again. This is no peace.

“When you strive to gain quiescence by stopping motion,
The quiescence thus gained is ever in motion;
As long as you tarry in the dualism,
How can you realize oneness?”

– On believing in mind, Shinjin-no-mei (The Manual of Zen Buddhism)

There I went and stepped in it, peace, no peace. Success, no success. This is dualism. This is why you feel like you constantly have to be running to find peace.

Does meditation make you feel refreshed and more ready for the outside world? Sure. Thinking about it this way though, is this stable? Do you know you can always trust in it, can you even trust it while you meditate. If you feel like this, you are trapped in dualism, also if you don’t and you think you aren’t trapped in dualism. Thinking about dualism or not dualism isn’t the point. That is dualistic too.

The point is the wall in front and the gentle feeling of hands against each other, breath, muscles aching slightly. Getting distracted by a thought about the shopping list and it slowly recedes on its own. It is the taste of an orange. It is hearing a gripping story. It is hearing a boring story. Someone is telling me a story.

Clarity through the storm

We do need to meditate, it is just we usually don’t see its real point from the beginning, so we meditate with some idea of gaining something (maybe exactly because we feel vulnerable and lacking).

Instead, we must find a clear forest pool. Not for ourselves, but for the myriad strange and wonderful creatures around us. This is realized when we are a strange and wonderful creature among others. A wild and wondrous menagerie, around a pool. Bird song, rustling of leaves, flute playing. We realize that we were never not Calm.

Put aside this paradox for the moment. It may be difficult for you to experience this viscerally right now, but there they are, the myriad animals. The screen you are looking at, the colours around you, the feeling of pressure below from being seated or standing.

The sound of the subway train? The taste of coffee? Music? Maybe the thought of music? The thought of getting this? The feeling of I-ness watching.

All of the beasts of the world, untamed and yet gentle, come to drink at the pool. It is tempting to chase off the ones you don’t like, but then they may just become aggressive and territorial. Instead, watch them drink their fill, and leave of their own accord. Don’t see the watching as a chore, it is already done for you, this is compassion. You may find yourself drinking at the pool, and receding into the forest. What remains?

Amongst many, you drink, you recede, you drink again. The pool is always here, that is important when you feel hopeless. The pool is nowhere to be found, that is important when you are overconfident. There is no need for hopelessness or confidence, but treat them with a light touch. The pool simply lets them drink, and then they recede of their own accord. Where do they go? What is left behind? What happens when even approaching and receding disappear into the depths of the forest as well?

Epilogue

We meditate because our small selves, buffeted by winds, need the calm and discipline (though they in some sense do not). The clear forest pool has always been there, though the strange and wonderful creatures come and go.

This is our challenge, learn something you have always known so deeply that it is as imperceptible as yeast leavening dough. Not remembering has become normal. As Bernard Jaffee says in I Heart Huckabees: “We have to learn to see the blanket truth, all of the time.”

Dr. Dolittle had a talent for talking to all the animals. So do we, in a sense. The trick is to do very little, and let the small and wonderful creatures, all we sense around us, including our thoughts and feelings, speak for themselves. Careful listening is the lion’s share of good conversation.

Reality is a conversation worth paying attention to.