A lesson I learned talking about zazen with a monk during sanzen. Zazen is not a linear process of empty mind or single pointed awareness. It is a cycle of both; you focus on a single point until your mind empties. But it won't stay empty and as thoughts arise again, you go back to single pointed focus. Rinse and repeat.
Good evening Jack, a very good video and very good explanation! Thank you very much! A little note from my side I think that it is essentially too, to having no goals when you are in Zazen, for example „i must become enlightened“. Sorry for my english but i hope you now what i mean. 🙏💡
Joke aside - I very much appreciate that "doing of not doing" that I think you were highlighting. I'm coming out this from the lens of Soto Zen and skewed a bit by Shinzen Young talking about his Do Nothing technique. Also - I appreciate hearing the notion of "100%" and the zero from your teacher. Thank you.
18:42 It doesn’t take much to zero out, to eliminate that thinking mind. You just have to put it into something other than itself … make it make relationship with the world outside of you. ❤
A meditation method I've heard attributed to Bodhidharma: The peacock feather method. Imagine the colors of the feather of a peacock. Focus on all the colours until they eventually blend together and fall away. Essentially, focus and awareness on all until they eventually fall away to emptiness.
Thank you. I wanted to see the connection between this and skateboarding, lol. I also happened to notice whenever I was immersed in a task completely I stopped having so many problems, or rather my problems became smaller. I feel like that's why people do it, skating, I mean? Yea man.
Long story but I opened up your latest beautiful haiku and read it to the camera in that very woods, will post that footage next or the week after. Thank you.
Thanks, you made me laugh with the horse and the woman and the lunatic ants n the brain…. Good that you speak from the moment it seem easy but I can see there is a lot of meditation behind your authenticity!
This is great! Listening to you is easy. Gratitude for your attitude and manifesting as a cool dude. Maybe bring a cube of sugar or an apple next time into the woods in anticipation of further adventures meeting the wood sprite and/or her steed?
The mind Is a tricky thing. I found myself typing this long comment and asking a question. Only to discover it was a complete overthink in of itself. I love exploring theories and playing with ideas, but man those ideas sometimes become concepts and develop into a part of my identity and bingo.. Im stuck again. Appreciate the video and it's a really timely reminder for me. Get out of the head and into the world around us is a good one.
Thank You. A lot of this resonated with my experience and cleared some confusion/doubt about how I was practicing and where I have gone wrong. Thank you for your videos!
Thank you for all you do and all you explain on your channel. several years then practitioner here who is primarily self-taught. yet someone like yourself ties together the loose ends I have on how to incorporate everyday Zen living into my life. Keep doing what you're doing as you're helping myself and probably thousands of others. I don't have a Sangha near me but I'm constantly reading books, articles and listening to podcasts and TH-cam talks like yourself on Zen Buddhism. Forever fully chopping wood and carrying the water here.
Im so good at doing nothing its crippling. I guess im thinking of the thought of "oh shit i neglected to do anything. Everything is falling apart" At least i have a new zen confidential video to watch 😅❤
I think my dad was my first zen teacher. At about 4 or 5yo he taught me how to identify and root out all the weeds in the yard. So I spent a couple weeks doing weed eradication. He kept telling me focus only on the weeds. Later, when I got into martial arts, the joke was Gung Fu isn't for real fights, it's just "moving meditation". This was true. I would get so focused on my body's movement that I COULDN'T think of anything else. Do you think there is a connection between Zen and what people refer to as the "flow state"
"When the mind is held one-pointedly...if a subtle thought were produced discerning whether it remains on the object or not, or whether there is dullness or agitation, there wouldn't be non-thought. On the other hand...this kind of thought is not a thought as such, it is knowing or cognizance similar to vipashyana and therefore it ought to be produced." - Ngawang Kunga Tenzin (from, "The Royal Seal of Mahamudra" Vol. One, trans. by Gerardo Abboud)
It is Amazon that had the AmaZen booth. This was a telephone booth with a chair, mindfulness classes on the computer, a singing bowel bell, and a miniature rock garden. Which you could use during your breaks.
Now retired but as a former workplace union rep I think AmaZen booths and mindfulness classes won't do much to defend pay, terms and conditions and pension scheme.
i was taught (from 3pillars of zen i think) that you simply focus on the physical act of sitting and make your posture as perfect as possible, when a thought comes up you just put your attention back on making your physical posture as perfect as possible. after awhile of doing this, going back and forth between thought and focusing on my posture i start feeling very spacious and it then becomes far easier to stay focused on posture and thought comes up less.
TNH is famous for "coming back to the body". Every 15 minutes a bell will ring in the monastery and what ever you are doing, bring your mind back to the body. I think there are 3 states of the mind 1. Day dreaming where thoughts come and go 2. Thinking and concentration on a task completely 3. Mind aware of the body and its surroundings without any thoughts or any thinking
Thank you. Couple questions; I have also heard it said that the mind secretes thoughts like the liver secretes bile. Trying to control your liver is pointless. So could the paying of attention come from another place besides everyday mind? And; I find my self lost in playing music easily (i play improvised music for a living), but it requires many levels of thought, maybe not everyday thought but still lots of energy going on in there… can that manifest nothing even though the mind is full of (non linguistic) thought?
Good question! The paying of attention… I don't know where it comes from. If I start getting too speculative, I loose the thread. . . . In the deepest moments of truest connection, where there is not an agenda, or an aim, or goal, or put it like this: the agenda or aim or goal completely dissolves, the self is gone, and then a new self and a new world arises. That's what I was taught. So there are layers of mind operating and working, the body, the brain, doing its thing. That's not really what I'm talking about here. I'm talking about losing the self.
@@zenconfidential25 hey thanks. Also the liver doesn’t make bile whoops. We get the point; the racing mind is only the surface layer of mind and we should notice that.
A lesson I learned talking about zazen with a monk during sanzen. Zazen is not a linear process of empty mind or single pointed awareness. It is a cycle of both; you focus on a single point until your mind empties. But it won't stay empty and as thoughts arise again, you go back to single pointed focus. Rinse and repeat.
Yes that's perfect, rinse and repeat. Thirty minutes. Ding! The bell rings.
Good evening Jack,
a very good video and very good explanation! Thank you very much!
A little note from my side I think that it is essentially too, to having no goals when you are in Zazen, for example „i must become enlightened“.
Sorry for my english but i hope you now what i mean.
🙏💡
Good point! I understand what you’re saying, and it makes sense, thank you. It’s a great angle and insight.
If you say "Zazen" three times, a horse lady appears with a horse.
Joke aside - I very much appreciate that "doing of not doing" that I think you were highlighting. I'm coming out this from the lens of Soto Zen and skewed a bit by Shinzen Young talking about his Do Nothing technique.
Also - I appreciate hearing the notion of "100%" and the zero from your teacher. Thank you.
Thank you Andrew. I never heard of Shinzen's Do Nothing techinique. Sounds interesting??
@@zenconfidential25 It's definitely interesting. And, it'll be what Soto folks expect from Shikantaza
Yes all the follow up you vis you can tolerate making.
Prater Park looks more untouched and natural than I would've thought usual for an urban park.
Thanks for your thoughts
Thanks for watching! It's a nice big park, yes. Urban but untouched in many ways, with deer and other animals.
Very helpful reminders, thank you.
Thanks for saying so.
18:42 It doesn’t take much to zero out, to eliminate that thinking mind. You just have to put it into something other than itself … make it make relationship with the world outside of you. ❤
Thank you Marc.
A meditation method I've heard attributed to Bodhidharma: The peacock feather method. Imagine the colors of the feather of a peacock. Focus on all the colours until they eventually blend together and fall away.
Essentially, focus and awareness on all until they eventually fall away to emptiness.
Wonderful!
Thank you. I wanted to see the connection between this and skateboarding, lol. I also happened to notice whenever I was immersed in a task completely I stopped having so many problems, or rather my problems became smaller. I feel like that's why people do it, skating, I mean? Yea man.
That’s actually a fascinating point. There’s a very clear link between certain states that are similar to samadhi and surfing or skateboarding.
thinking in the woods--
the horse
stops and stares
Long story but I opened up your latest beautiful haiku and read it to the camera in that very woods, will post that footage next or the week after. Thank you.
@@zenconfidential25 Wow - i'm honored🙏
Thanks, you made me laugh with the horse and the woman and the lunatic ants n the brain…. Good that you speak from the moment it seem easy but I can see there is a lot of meditation behind your authenticity!
Thank you Viki it's always wonderful to hear from you 😁
Good video.
I like the way you express yourself.
From the guts baby!
✌
I appreciate that! Thank you.
Great video. I'm really glad Brad Warner recommended your channel.
Welcome aboard! thank you.
This is great! Listening to you is easy. Gratitude for your attitude and manifesting as a cool dude. Maybe bring a cube of sugar or an apple next time into the woods in anticipation of further adventures meeting the wood sprite and/or her steed?
That’s a good idea! Never enter a forest in Vienna without a cube of sugar and an apple for the many horses that still rule the city!
The mind Is a tricky thing. I found myself typing this long comment and asking a question. Only to discover it was a complete overthink in of itself. I love exploring theories and playing with ideas, but man those ideas sometimes become concepts and develop into a part of my identity and bingo.. Im stuck again. Appreciate the video and it's a really timely reminder for me. Get out of the head and into the world around us is a good one.
Thank you, my friend. There is that famous quote, Sorry for the long letter, but I didn't have time to write a short one.
This was hilarious! Thank you!
You're so welcome!
Thank You. A lot of this resonated with my experience and cleared some confusion/doubt about how I was practicing and where I have gone wrong. Thank you for your videos!
Thank you, my friend, have a good sit this evening!
'I may button it up if I feel modest at some point"
not even finished saying this already buttons it up
"apparently I'm modest now" 🤣
A girl's gotta cover herself!! ;)
Looking forward to reading your new novel.
Please let us know when it is available to purchase!
thank you, and believe me, I will let you know!!
Thank you for all you do and all you explain on your channel. several years then practitioner here who is primarily self-taught. yet someone like yourself ties together the loose ends I have on how to incorporate everyday Zen living into my life. Keep doing what you're doing as you're helping myself and probably thousands of others. I don't have a Sangha near me but I'm constantly reading books, articles and listening to podcasts and TH-cam talks like yourself on Zen Buddhism. Forever fully chopping wood and carrying the water here.
Thank you my friend, I'm so glad you're on board!!
I might send this to people who are confused about what mindfulness/meditation is actually about.
Hopefully they won’t be even more confused when they’re done viewing it!
great reminders and insight here! thanks.
My pleasure! thank you Nina-san!
Im so good at doing nothing its crippling.
I guess im thinking of the thought of "oh shit i neglected to do anything. Everything is falling apart"
At least i have a new zen confidential video to watch 😅❤
There's doing nothing...and then there's "doing nothing." ;)
I think my dad was my first zen teacher. At about 4 or 5yo he taught me how to identify and root out all the weeds in the yard. So I spent a couple weeks doing weed eradication. He kept telling me focus only on the weeds.
Later, when I got into martial arts, the joke was Gung Fu isn't for real fights, it's just "moving meditation". This was true. I would get so focused on my body's movement that I COULDN'T think of anything else.
Do you think there is a connection between Zen and what people refer to as the "flow state"
I think there is, and yet there is a difference. Thank you. I've been thinking for a long time about how to address that one.
"When the mind is held one-pointedly...if a subtle thought were produced discerning whether it remains on the object or not, or whether there is dullness or agitation, there wouldn't be non-thought. On the other hand...this kind of thought is not a thought as such, it is knowing or cognizance similar to vipashyana and therefore it ought to be produced." - Ngawang Kunga Tenzin (from, "The Royal Seal of Mahamudra" Vol. One, trans. by Gerardo Abboud)
Thank you.
You're welcome!
It is Amazon that had the AmaZen booth. This was a telephone booth with a chair, mindfulness classes on the computer, a singing bowel bell, and a miniature rock garden. Which you could use during your breaks.
Hmm interesting. Thanks Amazon! How about a living wage booth!!
Now retired but as a former workplace union rep I think AmaZen booths and mindfulness classes won't do much to defend pay, terms and conditions and pension scheme.
Yup!
Great video. Really needed a reminder and you delivered
That’s nice to hear, thank you.
i was taught (from 3pillars of zen i think) that you simply focus on the physical act of sitting and make your posture as perfect as possible, when a thought comes up you just put your attention back on making your physical posture as perfect as possible. after awhile of doing this, going back and forth between thought and focusing on my posture i start feeling very spacious and it then becomes far easier to stay focused on posture and thought comes up less.
Beautiful, thank you.
Thank you :)
Any advice/expirience about giving yourself to negativ thoughts and/or emotions? Stay with the body and senses and not the mental stuff?
I thn that last sentence is a good idea. Stay with the breath, the body. That approach often helps me when I'm in a negative mental/emotional spiral.
TNH is famous for "coming back to the body". Every 15 minutes a bell will ring in the monastery and what ever you are doing, bring your mind back to the body. I think there are 3 states of the mind 1. Day dreaming where thoughts come and go 2. Thinking and concentration on a task completely 3. Mind aware of the body and its surroundings without any thoughts or any thinking
I like that, thank you.
YeS
Tricky creatures - wood nymphs.
I know! But so attractive…
that hevage is so demure, so mindful 😂
I do my best. Hevage is a big part of any dharma podcasters image! ;)
@@zenconfidential25 yes, you must keep up appearances...
Check shinzen Young doing nothing meditation video
I will do so, thanks!
Thank you. Couple questions; I have also heard it said that the mind secretes thoughts like the liver secretes bile. Trying to control your liver is pointless. So could the paying of attention come from another place besides everyday mind?
And; I find my self lost in playing music easily (i play improvised music for a living), but it requires many levels of thought, maybe not everyday thought but still lots of energy going on in there… can that manifest nothing even though the mind is full of (non linguistic) thought?
Good question! The paying of attention… I don't know where it comes from. If I start getting too speculative, I loose the thread. . . . In the deepest moments of truest connection, where there is not an agenda, or an aim, or goal, or put it like this: the agenda or aim or goal completely dissolves, the self is gone, and then a new self and a new world arises. That's what I was taught. So there are layers of mind operating and working, the body, the brain, doing its thing. That's not really what I'm talking about here. I'm talking about losing the self.
@@zenconfidential25 hey thanks. Also the liver doesn’t make bile whoops. We get the point; the racing mind is only the surface layer of mind and we should notice that.
who is steve kreiger ?
My alter ego! I.e. me.
what's your book about
Which one? Latest completed work is a folktale from the future...
Maybe the horse woman is the dharma!
You're right!! I should have done prostrations!!! ;)