The following excerpts are taken from letters written to Cerpok Sensei from Zazen practitioners, martial arts students, and lecture attendees. We hope you enjoy them!
As I was practicing Zazen tonight a small zygote of a thought began tugging incessantly at my mind. I tried to push it out and focus on my koan, but try as I might, that thought continued to seep into all areas of my subconscious. I finally decided to let the thought emerge and then let it go. What followed hit me with such immense clarity and exuberance that I could practically visualize my emotions. It was so exciting I fairly leaped up and danced around my room!
The thought was this, complicated to explain...it may be more accurate to say I felt it all at once rather than thought it out as I have tried to describe herein, but here goes: In dealing with trials and tribulations presented by my everyday life, I strive to keep all the lessons we have discussed ever constant and pervasive in the forefront of my mind. These lessons are such a constant now that they are slowly, ever so slowly, beginning to become automatic.
While slowing implanting themselves as second nature, my reactions to being knocked off balance are becoming less erratic and severe. I have already seen vast improvement to my knee jerk reactions to life as it "happens" to me. I am more conscious of the root of my emotions and my attempts to transform them into positive opportunities for growth. Of special importance to me is my effort to yield because I have strength.
The crux, the pinnacle, the creme-de-la-creme of my little epiphany settled on this exact thought....As I become brutally honest with myself, my insignificance in the big picture and, yet, my power as a creature filled with peace and love and of vitality...the walls of the paradox slowly flicker, fade and then eventually dissolve...and I am left wide eyed and staring, in a metaphorical sense, as if on the edge of cliff, gazing out at the edge of the horizon without a single obstruction, able to see in all directions at once and never once overwhelmed by all that lays before me. I am slowing my mind to grasp each moment and savor it before moving on to the next and then the next and then the next. None of these moments ever completely defining me, but all of them making up my story, my tapestry of experience and of personal growth and self exploration/introspection/renovation. In essence, I am finding peace, Sensei. Real honest to god inner peace. And that is such a humbling power. Humble power...an amazingly real dichotomy. I realize I am just on the tip of the iceberg with this feeling and am so excited to delve deeper, to find more facets of this wonderful world that is "understanding."
Yes I am sitting daily : ) you know the session Sunday was great. The
subject desire fit so well with my thoughts lately... I know with
everyone it touched in a different way but of course meant good sense
to me... Thank you very much for your time.. Individually making a
huge difference on many people...
I hope that my donation helps, but I know that it won't help as much as you've helped me over the past eight months. I appreciate so much all you've done for me--the time you've spent and the e-mails, and the instruction. I'm sure you are thanked often, but really.....thank you. I am very lucky to have you as a teacher.
I find that when I feel myself surge and lean towards frustration and/or anger over a situation, I simply remind myself that I need to let go of my ego and "it is what it is." Then I am so happy and calm and (gasp) feeling less judgmental! It's a great feeling. So much stress dissipates! People probably think I'm on drugs.
Also, was at the dentist today and the hygienist was scraping away at my teeth, hurting me terribly. I tried to do Zazen breathing and focused on my feet (so my head was tilted down) and put my hands in the correct position. I was laying on my back and not seated, so a very rudimentary, clumsy version of Zazen. However, it was the first time I tried to do it outside of just sitting as I'm supposed to. It actually helped take the pain away :) Is it okay to use it like that?
Three days a week I can be found working with a trainer (I still have thirty-five {OK, forty} lbs. I need to lose.) Today my trainer was on vacation and not one to favor a day off, left me a workout routine complete with detailed instructions. "Run at an incline of 6 in intervals of 1:00 on, 20 seconds off" for one half hour at 4.4 mph" "GREAT", I thought, because I'm not much of a runner.
But then I tried something. As I was huffing away thinking about running, I decided to simply relax, and breathe. I kid you not, for about twenty seconds (that is all I could maintain without screwing it up by thinking about it) I wasn't running, I just "was." I could breath, and the fatigue left my legs and my lungs. I was just there. Now, that twenty or so second was really very special and being the selfish person I am, I would like more of it.
So, I'm going to continue to relax and breathe, and just be. I thought I could only relax when resting. Amazing. I wonder what I'll learn next.
I have been practicing Zazen daily and am feeling much more comfortable and able to concentrate on nothing but my posture and breathing. I have to say, it's challenging. I am constantly thinking about my never-ending "to do" list all day, so channeling my mind on nothingness is difficult. But, I am finding that those few precious moments where I get to let it all go are so rewarding and peaceful! I look forward to it all day!
Regarding my lesson this week on ego: I find the hardest time for me to let go of my ego is when I am dealing with other ego-maniacal people. I find that when I sense their ego welling, as I try to help them in their cases, I feel angry that they don't defer to my expertise and training, so I react defensively. My ego then swells to match or attempt to beat theirs and it becomes a nice p***ing match. I am left frustrated and exhausted and often times resentful.
Well, yesterday I got thrown in with this crazy, high maintenance client for whom nothing is ever good enough. He can always find something to complain about and I think he instigates conflict just for kicks. My boss had me talk to him because he has hit a brick wall with the guy and is tired of trying to explain things to him since nothing ever sticks.
So, I thought for a while before I went in to the meeting about the conversations you and I have had regarding expectations and ego to see how I could practice those concepts in this situation. I decided to eradicate all my expectations that this guy would drive me crazy... I also decided I would swallow my ego, let him have some room in the conversation to explore things that I really don't want to talk about (they all do this unfortunately...they want to tell you every bad thing that people have done to them and how unfair it is and how they want to sue, etc) and not shut him down, admit when I didn't know the answer to his question instead of feeding him typical lawyer double-speak bull? and just admit if I am wrong about something. It worked.
I went in with a smile and just actively listened. I found myself going through the whole thing without judging him, which was a new feeling for me. Typically I size up my clients in about five minutes and that sort of biases how I treat them the rest of the time. I felt energetic and content when I left the meeting, rather than frustrated and tired. I gave him my advice and when he challenged about 200 years of solid jurisprudence, rather than give him a lecture, I smiled again and said that us lawyers can always be wrong and perhaps we are sometimes. That made him happy and he said, ?Well, no, I don't think you're wrong, I'm just saying....?
Oh I got this little gleeful feeling in my tummy because I remembered how you described this exact situation. The guy ended up leaving very happy and said I was the first lawyer to ever really listen to him and calm him down and make him feel like he was involved in his case, rather than having everything told to him.
Oh and about effortless. In my martial arts class last night, Sempei was working through techniques and was allowed to work with any of us she wanted to work with. For one list of joint-locks she worked with me. She flowed through them and I was submitting fairly quickly compared to another student, who several weeks earlier had partnered up with me to do the same list. He is bigger and stronger than Sempei, but she had a much easier time of "getting in to the stronger position" as you put it. But it seemed very effortless on her part.
On spec, that might look like the difference between one person wearing a brown belt and one person wearing an orange belt. But in light of my Koan and in light of our discussions I think it might actually have more to do with yielding and giving. It's odd, it seems so the opposite of everything I thought I knew about strength.
I know many have thanked you, so let me add to the list. Thanks for taking the time to communicate with me. I'll do my fifteen minutes, keep breathing and really work on letting go of ineffective living. That and making people laugh. Nothing makes me happier than making people laugh. It is rumored that when Michelangelo was asked "How did you know when the statue of David was complete," he responded: "I simply chipped away everything that wasn't David." I always loved that. Get rid of all that does not matter and you might be left with that which does.
I wanted to drop you a quick note to thank you for the time you spent with us this past week. I really enjoyed meeting you and found the lecture on Wednesday to be very, how shall I phrase it, eye opening. With due respect, I am sure that there are some people who take in lectures and are convinced (ego?) that their way is still better. In itself that would have to constitute ineffective living not because your way is better (though I suspect it might be a great deal better than a way one that dismisses ideas out of hand) but because they would be dismissing it out of ego, not out of having tried breathing, being cattle dung, understanding the concept of master etc....
...is also the upcoming president of the Arizona branch of the American College of Physicians-it would be great to have you come and speak to some of us "Western Medicine" docs and enlighten not only us, but perhaps some of our patients.
I walked in thinking that I knew what you would expect from me, and cattle dung had never entered the equation. Even my buddy at work, when he asked me how my lesson had gone, was surprised when I muttered something like, "Well, I walked in with expectations, and walked out having learned about cattle dung." He looked at me in an odd way and then went back to his breakfast. Thank you.
Someone was mocking my study of martial arts the other day. They were being small about it and I didn't pay them much mind but it mildly annoyed me. I felt like saying: "Hey, come on down to the dojo and do a workout with us." But, I'm not 4, so I resisted and just sort of walked away. But if I had tried to "pick them up" and convince them, it would have been a heavy load. Their issues, their ineffectiveness would have weighed on me, plus it would have been my ineffective living/lifting that made me think that I needed to make them see something my way in the first place.
So, perhaps what this all comes down to is that the only one that can really be living ineffectively is me. My expectations of others, my wishing they would or would not do something or behave in a certain way.....whatever the issue, it seems to me that they only become heavy when I try to lift. Maybe I should yield more than I lift........???
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