“It’s only the ego that wants to surrender the ego; the real meaning of surrender does not involve anything external. It means to surrender to your true nature.”

-Enza Vita

Practice Meetings

Friday Apr 3, 7:00pm

This Week’s Koan

Book of Serenity #35
“Rakuho’s Obeisance”

Rakuho came to Kassan and without bowing stood facing him. Kassan said, “A chicken dwells in the phoenix nest. It’s not of the same class. Go away.”

Rakuho said, “I have come from far away, hearing much about you. Please, Master, I beg you to guide me.”

Kassan said, “Before my eyes there is no you, and here there is no old monk.”

Rakuho shouted, “Kaatz!”

Kassan said, “Stop it, stop it. Don’t be so careless and hasty. Clouds and the moon are the same; valleys and mountains are different from each other. It is not difficult to cut off the tongues of the people under heaven. But how can you make a tongueless person speak?”

Rakuho said nothing. Kassan hit him. With this, Rakuho started to obey Kassan.

“In the midst of darkness, he alone sees the dawn; in the midst of the soundless, he alone hears harmony.”

-Zhuangzi

Practice Meetings

Friday Mar 27, 7:00pm

This Week’s Koan

Book of Serenity #98
“Most Intimate”

A monk asked Tôzan, “Among the three bodies of Buddha, what body does not degenerate into numbers?”

Tôzan said, “I am always most intimate with it.”

“May you listen to the voice within the beat even when you are tired. When you feel yourself breaking down, may you break open instead. May every experience in life be a door that opens your heart, expands your understanding, and leads you to freedom. If you are weary, may you be aroused by passion and purpose. If you are blameful and bitter, may you be sweetened by hope and humor.

If you are frightened, may you be emboldened by a big consciousness far wiser than your fear. If you are lonely, may you find love, may you find friendship. If you are lost, may you understand that we are all lost, and still we are guided—by Strange Angels and Sleeping Giants, by our better and kinder natures, by the vibrant voice within the beat. May you follow that voice, for This is the way—the hero’s journey, the life worth living, the reason we are here.”

-Elizabeth Lesser

Practice Meetings

Friday Mar 20, 7:00pm

This Week’s Koan

Book of Serenity #94
“Tozan is Unwell”

Tôzan was unwell. A monk asked, “Your Reverence is unwell. Is there anyone who does not become ill?”

Tôzan said, “There is.”

The monk said, “Does the one who does not get ill take care of Your Reverence?”

Tôzan said, “The old monk is properly taking care of that one.”

The monk said, “How about when your Reverence takes care of that one?”

Tôzan said, “Then the old monk does not see that there is illness.”

“If you are involved with the intensity of crescendo situations, with the intensity of tragedy, you might begin to see the humor of these situations as well. As in music, when we hear the crescendo building, suddenly if the music stops, we begin to hear the silence as part of the music.”

-Chogyam Trungpa

Practice Meetings

Friday Mar 13, 7:00pm

This Week’s Koan

Book of Serenity #89
“Place of No Grass”

Tôzan instructed the assembly and said, “At the beginning of autumn and the end of summer, you, brothers, are departing east and west. But you should go directly to the place of no grass over ten thousand miles.”

And again he said, “How will you go to the place of no grass over ten thousand miles?”

Sekisô said, “When you go out of the gate, there is grass!”

Taiyô said, “I would say: Even if you don’t go out of the gate, grass is abundant everywhere.'”

“Once again, we are reminded that awakening, or enlightenment is not the property of Buddhism, any more than Truth is the property of Christianity. Neither the Buddha nor the Christ belongs exclusively to the communities that were founded in their names. They belong to all people of goodwill, all who are attentive to the secret which lives in the depths of their breath and their consciousness.”

-Jean-Yves Lloup

Practice Meetings

Friday Mar 6, 7:00pm

This Week’s Koan

Book of Serenity #56
“The White Rabbit”

When Uncle Misshi and Tôzan were walking together, they saw a white rabbit run by in front of them.

Misshi said, “How swift!” Tôzan said, “In what way?”

Misshi said, “It is just like a person in white clothes being venerated as a prime minister.”

Tôzan said, “You are such an elderly and respectable man, and still you say something like that?”

Misshi said, “Then how about you?”

Tôzan said, “A noble of an ancient house is temporarily fallen into poverty.”

I shall no longer be instructed by the Yoga Veda or the Aharva Veda, or the ascetics, or any other doctrine whatsoever. I shall learn from myself, be a pupil of myself; I shall get to know myself, the mystery of Siddhartha.” He looked around as if he were seeing the world for the first time.

Hermann Hesse, Siddhartha

Practice Meetings

Friday Feb 27, 7:00pm

This Week’s Koan

Book of Serenity #49
“Tozan and the Memorial Service”

When Tôzan held a memorial service for Ungan before his portrait, he mentioned the episode with the portrait.

A monk came forward and asked, “When Ungan said, ‘Just this!’ what did that mean?”

Tôzan said, “At that time, I almost misunderstood my master’s meaning.”

The monk said, “I wonder whether or not Ungan really knew that IT is.”

Tôzan said, “If he did not know that it is, how could he say like that? If he knew that it is, how did he dare say like that?”

The truth knocks on the door and you say, “Go away, I’m looking for the truth,” and so it goes away. Puzzling.

Robert M. Pirsig

Practice Meetings

Friday Feb 20, 7:00pm

This Week’s Koan

Blue Cliff Record #43
“Dongshan’s Cold & Heat”

A monk asked  Dongshan: “So, how avoid the coming of the winter cold and summer heat?”

Shan said. “Why not turn to the place without cold and heat?”

The monk said, “So, what is the place without cold and heat?”

Shan said, “In the cold time, the cold kills the preceptor; in the burning time, the burning kills the preceptor.”

Learning to let go should be learned before learning to get. Life should be touched, not strangled. You’ve got to relax, let it happen at times, and at others move forward with it.

-Ray Bradbury

Practice Meetings

Friday Feb 13, 7:00pm

This Week’s Koan

Gateless Gate #3
“Juzhi’s One Finger”

Whenever Gutei Oshõ was asked about Zen, he simply raised his finger.

Once a visitor asked Gutei’s boy attendant, “What does your master teach?”

The boy too raised his finger.

Hearing of this, Gutei cut off the boy’s finger with a knife.

The boy, screaming with pain, began to run away.

Gutei called to him, and when he turned around, Gutei raised his finger.

The boy suddenly became enlightened.

When Gutei was about to pass away, he said to his assembled monks, “I obtained one-finger Zen from Tenryû and used it all my life but still did not exhaust it.”

When he had finished saying this, he entered into eternal Nirvana.

Mumon’s Comment

The enlightenment of Gutei and of the boy does not depend on the finger.

If you understand this, Tenryû, Gutei, the boy, and you yourself are all run through with one skewer.

You don’t need to justify your love, you don’t need to explain your love, you just need to practice your love. Practice creates the master.

-Miguel Ruiz

Practice Meetings

Friday Feb 6, 7:00pm

This Week’s Koan

Book of Serenity #84, Blue Cliff Record #19 
“Juzhi’s One Finger”

Venerable Juzhi, whenever he was questioned, simply stood up one finger.

Xuedou’s Ode:

I am profoundly fond of old Juzhi for being one who draws out the teachings.

The universe comes in emptiness, more than that who exists?

Again and again, he has faced toward the blue sea and dropped down driftwood

On the waves in the night to join in welcoming blind turtles.

The mere fact of enlightenment does not mean that all of one’s impulses are suddenly perfect, but rather that one sees more accurately how one should live.

– Harada Roshi

Practice Meetings

Friday Jan 30, 7:00pm

This Week’s Koan

Gateless Gate #5
“Man Up a Tree”

Kyõgen Oshõ said, “It is like a man up in a tree hanging from a branch with his mouth; his hands grasp no bough, his feet rest on no limb.

Someone appears under the tree and asks him, ‘What is the meaning of Bodhidharma’s coming from the West?’ If he does not answer, he fails to respond to the question. If he does answer, he will lose his life.

What would you do in such a situation?”

Mumon’s Verse

Even if your eloquence flows like a river, it is of no avail.

Though you can expound the whole of Buddhist literature, it is of no use.

If you solve this problem, you will give life to the way that has been dead until this moment and destroy the way that has been alive up to now.

Otherwise you must wait for Maitreya Buddha and ask him.