Category: Bright Dawn Buddhism

Attend to All & Each: A Dharma Talk

Posted on by Christopher in amida buddha, Bright Dawn, Bright Dawn Buddhism, Uncategorized

Dharma Talk
Salt Lake Buddhist Fellowship
Christopher Kakuyo Sensei
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As I develop the content for our Certified Dharma Teacher course, I’ve been reflecting on what makes our fellowship unique. While many of us find inspiration in the Pure Land tradition and its teachers, we are not Shin Buddhists or any other traditional Pure Land Buddhist Sangha—nor do we claim to be. The Dobokai Movement within Shin Buddhism has significantly influenced us, yet we remain a trans-sectarian community rather than a Pure Land sangha. So, what exactly are we?

We are a fellowship of seekers exploring the Way of the Buddha. Together, we find meaning in the symbols and myths of the Pure Land. This is particularly true for the mythopoetic and archetypal figure of Buddha Amida, who represents boundless light and life. Amida embraces everything and everyone just as they are, reflecting the heart of the phrase “come as you are.”

I also want to address those who lean more toward a secular perspective—our differences may not be as significant as they seem. In many meaningful ways, science and poetry, religion, and philosophy are not at odds with each other; they are simply different languages we use to explore what it means to be human. For today’s dharma talk,
I want to start with a poem I wrote that we recite each Sunday before our chanting. Here is the poem:

Come as you are
Is the call of Buddha
Just as you are
Namu Amida Butsu
Is the invitation we give
To ourselves
To others
To all Living Beings
To the totality of our lives, just as we are.
So come, come as you are,
Attend to all and each
Namu Amida Butsu
Stop torturing yourself
With all those made-up stories
Of who you think you are
and aren’t, regardless
of who you are or
are not
Regardless
Of what you have done or
left undone
and enter the gate of boundless compassion
Namu Amida Butsu.

My writing of this poem aims to convey the significance of Namu Amida Butsu — or the nembutsu — for us and our community. I am attempting to take something from a very different place and time, Medieval Japan, and infuse its meaning and healing power in a way that resonates with our lives today.

Like much of art, poetry serves as a form of translation, an effort to articulate the inexpressible, something that transcends concept and language but exists in the heartbeat, pulse, and breath.

Over the past few months, we have explored some of the teachings contained in these verses. We will revisit them repeatedly from various perspectives at different times. Just as an open field or a hidden canyon reveals its secrets to those willing to be still in changing light, so too do the teachings of the Buddha. We examine the same teachings through the evolving context of our lives, uncovering new truths. As Gyomay Kubose Sensei has said, “truth is forever revealing itself in all forms and phases of life.”

Today I want to focus mainly on one verse from the poem,

So come as you are,
Attend to all and each
Namu Amida Butsu.

Let’s focus on the idea of “Attending to all and each.” I want to discuss this theme today.

At the heart of these words lies the essence of what we do after accepting Amida’s invitation, which we can translate as “come as we are.” We must tend to ourselves as part of the whole and recognize others as part of that whole. This is a fundamental teaching of Buddhism: spiritual friendships are essential to our journey. The refuge of the sangha, which is the third jewel of Buddhism, encompasses this entire path. We rely on one another to awaken.

One aspect that draws me to the traditional story of Amida Buddha, the archetypal figure of boundless compassion, is the theme of interdependence.

The mythic Amida Buddha makes a series of vows at the beginning of his bodhisattva career to help all beings attain supreme enlightenment. His compassion is so vast that he pledges not to achieve enlightenment and become a Buddha if even one living being does not awaken.

I cherish this story because it beautifully illustrates how we are all interconnected. To put it plainly: our awakening is dependent on one another. Amida Buddha’s enlightenment depends on our awakening. We need each other to truly wake up.

To further express this idea, I want to share a poem by Saichi, a myokonin from the Shin tradition. Myokonin were often uneducated and straightforward individuals who could convey profound spiritual truths through their words. Saichi, a carver of wooden shoes and a poet, refers to Amida Buddha as Namu Amidabutsu, and for him, there was no distinction between the two names. This poem captures the essence of our discussion.

I’m so happy, I’m so-o happy,
I’m so happy, I’m so-o happy.
Namu Amidabutsu , Namu Amidabutsu,
Namuamidabu comes to Saichi’s rescue,
Saichi rescues Namuamidabu.
That’s something else, don’t you think?

I love how Saichi and Amida rescue one another – there is no hierarchy – only interdependence. The natural outflow of this understanding of interdependence is the attending to all and each. As Emerson has written, “All are needed by each one.” So what does it mean to attend to one another and ourselves?

The English word attend comes from the 14th-century French entendre—to pay attention to stretch toward something or someone, take care of, attend, and be present with or for. At the heart of attending and tending is attention—presence.

The reciprocal invitation to “come as we are” must be more than words. When we respond to the call of Namu Amida Butsu, we extend that same invitation to ourselves, others, and our entire lives, just as they are. We demonstrate our commitment to this invitation through our presence, by showing the courage to engage repeatedly in our lives and in the lives of others. We must be willing to reveal our front and back sides, listening deeply to ourselves and others without judgment. Through this simple act, we support one another.

By accepting this reciprocal invitation and showing up, we express our aspiration to pay attention to what life is right now, in the present moment, rather than wasting energy on how life should be. By embracing all aspects of our lives as they are—including our wounds, which interact with one another—and being there for one another, we can discover the Buddha in our everyday existence. This includes attending to our joy, love, and the aspiration for healing and wholeness, as well as recognizing the many ways these elements manifest. By accepting the invitation to come just as we are, we support another person just as they are. We attend to each other amidst the ever-changing and uniquely intricate process of becoming who we are.

What makes this possible? Something about the way we hold space, the acceptance and compassion we have longed for, unfolds the intricate layers of who we believe we are. These simple words—” come as you are”—carry profound meaning. When we accept this invitation, we experience an opening, a softening of boundaries, and a natural freedom that comes from learning to let go of shame and the belief that we need to be someone other than ourselves to be loved.

This opening, this attentiveness and care for one another, reflects the essence of who we are—our innate Buddha-nature, which emerges from the phrase “come as you are – Namu Amida Butsu.” Here lies the healing energy of nembutsu. In this welcoming space, revealed by the invitation, we find the opportunity to become ourselves in each moment—an awakening, a ripening.

As the poet Rilke expressed,

“All becoming has needed me.”
My looking ripens things, and they
come toward me to meet and be met.”

Our attention, intention, and presence are essential for growth and transformation. They enable us to meet one another as we truly are, rather than through the distorted lens of societal narratives and borrowed stories that have shaped our identities.

So why do we need the Buddha’s invitation to “come as you are”? Many of us seek this reassurance; we need the Buddhas to tell us that it’s okay to be ignorant, wounded, and beautifully imperfect. It is amidst our ordinariness that we find our awakening. As Koyo Kubose Sensei writes, “Every spiritual journey begins in the dark.” In responding to this call, we can release all the narratives about who we are or are not, who we believe we should be, and the burdens of our past actions or inactions.

At the core of everything is this invitation; in a practical sense, anything can serve as a teacher, a bodhisattva. Even darkness and challenges can become Buddhas, guiding us toward awakening. Our complicated lives can also be gifts that lead to enlightenment. We have heard the call, and our initial steps may be tentative and prolonged. The first step is to accept, nurture, and embrace our lives just as they are. However, this acceptance is not passive; it is the opposite.

This form of acceptance does not excuse apathy, nihilism, or harmful behavior. It does not justify an abuser’s actions. Instead, it may involve a heart-wrenching realization that my partner is abusive and that I need to leave, or that I am a perpetrator and need to seek help.

The hardest part is accepting our wounded selves. Whatever we are running from inside needs our attention, intention, and presence; it longs for our compassion. This invitation creates a space where I can nurture my darker and wounded sides, knowing that I am embraced and will never be abandoned just as I am. Because of this understanding, we can finally address what needs attention and begin to embrace our inner wholeness.

Carl Jung once said, “I would rather be whole than good.” This sentiment embodies what it means to reach the Pure Land. We do not go to the Pure Land because we are good; rather, we go because we are whole—whole in the compassion of Amida Buddha. The Pure Land represents all of us gathering in an open field, a place beyond the concepts of good and evil, as described in one of Rumi’s poems. The Pure Land exists beyond these judgments.

As D.T. Suzuki wrote,

“As far as Amida is concerned, he is all love; there is no thought in him of punishing anybody. Such discriminative judgments do not exist within him. He is like the sun in this respect, shining on both the unjust and the just. A sinner comes to the Pure Land with all their sins, or rather, they leave them behind in the world where they belong. When they arrive in the Pure Land, they stand in their nakedness, free from sinful burdens. Karma does not pursue them into the Pure Land.”

When we attend to ourselves and others, we take the journey into all the places we have hidden our suffering and woundedness from view and bring it as an offering to the Buddhas. This tending to one another is not so much a needing someone to go with you or of you needing to go with someone, but it is the knowledge that someone is there, without judgment, waiting for you to return with open arms.

This acceptance leads us toward wholeness, healing, and awakening. As Gyomay Kubose Sensei has taught, acceptance is transcendence; it grants us freedom. This journey toward acceptance is our pilgrimage. I resonate with the words of Philip Chircop:

“On our pilgrimage toward wholeness, in a gentle act of hospitality, we are challenged and invited to name and welcome all the bruised and broken pieces of our marvelous and beautiful story. In the process, we gradually integrate all the different voices within us that compete for attention, learning to love from the unity of voices that we are.”

However, I want to add a word of caution. Many of us were raised, intentionally or unintentionally, to be caretakers. As caretakers, we must be vigilant because we often have a tendency to prioritize others’ feelings while neglecting our own. As Dr. Margaret Paul teaches, avoiding our feelings is a way of avoiding responsibility for them, as we attempt to fill the void of our self-abandonment.

Coming as we are is the first step on our pilgrimage toward wholeness; it is the invitation from Buddha and all Buddhas. By responding to the call of Namu Amida Butsu—come as we are—we begin to cultivate our attention and capacity for presence. Namu Amida Butsu is a call to be truly alive.

At times, I find myself on autopilot, forgetting that I am living a life. This is where regular meditation practice proves beneficial. Cultivating our intention and capacity to be present helps us avoid living merely on the surface of things. As essayist Maria Popova has written, to fully experience life’s journey, we must befriend our attention. Befriending our attention requires intention. However, simple attention is not sufficient. Much of our habitual attention often does not focus on what truly needs healing. Typically, our default attention is not intentional but rather habitual and unconscious, serving a narrative we tell ourselves.

In his book *Naikan*, Gregg Kretch writes: “How often is our attention wasted on judging, criticizing, and correcting others while we neglect to examine and learn from our own lives?” We often use our attention to justify or validate our own narratives. The type of attention we are discussing is intentional, self-reflective, honest, humble, and straightforward—yet not self-centered or self-absorbed. Kretch further states: “Our attention is our life. Shifting our attention opens us to reality and reveals what has always been there.” The process of shifting our habitual attention toward intention and presence is at the core of what we mean by attending and tending. A crucial aspect of this is developing the capacity to hold space within paradox.

Andrew McAlister explores this concept in one of his essays, discussing the coexistence of our woundedness, shame, and self-loathing alongside our essential goodness. Embracing ourselves as we are allows us to hold both of these experiences at the same time.
He writes,

“Something deep in us says we are not good, that we don’t deserve to be good. And yet, the more we practice attending to the depths of us, the more our already given goodness is lavished upon us.
As attention on the mantra (ours would be namu Amida butsu (added)) is deepened, clarified, and focused (thanks to a regular practice) the paradox that woundedness and essential goodness experienced together becomes, over time, resolved.”

This quote reminds me of these lines,

So stop torturing yourself
with all those made-up stories
of who you think you are
and are not, regardless of who
you are or are not, regardless
of what you have done
or have left undone
and enter the gate of boundless compassion.

Come as you are is an invitation for us to tend the garden of our hearts in the refuge of the dharma and the sangha and the boundless compassion of Amida Buddha.

I appreciate this from Jack Kornfield,

“You have in you the seeds of great compassion, the seeds of wisdom and care for others. Meditation then is not to make some special experience, but it is to learn how to tend the garden of the heart and to water the seeds of kindness and presence in your own heart.” 

Namu Amida Butsu.

Let us attend to each other
to our lives.
to all of life,
as it is, as you are
Right here
Right now.
I find such great joy in this.

I want to close with this poem from Saichi.

How fine!
The whole world and vastness of space is Buddha!
And I am in it–

“Namu-Amida-Butsu!”
“

Vesak Day – 2018 Dharma Talk

Posted on by Christopher in amida buddha, Bright Dawn Buddhism, Bright Dawn Way Of Oneness, Buddhism, dharma glimpse, dharma talks, salt lake buddhist, salt lake city buddhist fellowship, Uncategorized

by Kakuyo Sensei,

I would like to welcome everyone to our Hanamatsuri festival today, which is also called Vesak day – where Buddhist of many traditions celebrate the Buddhas appearance into the world – but not just his appearance –

The Buddha was once asked: Are you a god?” “No,” he replied. “Are you a reincarnation of god?” “No,” he replied. “Are you a wizard, then?” “No.” “Well, are you just a man?” “No.” “So what are you?” They asked, being very perplexed at answers. The Buddha simply replied: “I am awake.”

Today we are not only celebrating his birth but also celebrating his awakening and not just his awakening but also his passing away – indeed we are celebrating the whole life of the man we call Buddha – the awakened one.

Together we celebrate the amazing birth of the Buddha, and we are also celebrating our own miraculous birth – the very fact that we are alive is a precious gift – in a meaningful way Vesak day is also a celebration of our miraculous birth -we celebrate the fact of being alive – We celebrate knowing that the Buddha’s birth, and our birth and our awakenings are mutually dependent.

Some may wonder why we celebrate when we do – And I don’t think that it is by accident that Vesak is in the spring – I love the spring –

So -in our front yard is this stick of a peach tree – We planted it late in the season last year, and I was wondering just a week ago if it was even alive, just standing there in its naked stick-ness and then on Wednesday Linnea pointed out its new shy dress of flowers!  Then after that, I started noticing all the flowering trees at the end of our street – how did I not notice them before –

Now no one has any idea of when Shakyamuni was actually born– April or August is unimportant – Vesak is celebrated during Spring allowing nature to be a teacher – to be a poet – During Spring the natural world awakens from its winter sleeping – and the Buddha coming into the world is like the world waking up – many of us understand this, we who were sleepwalking before we found the teachings of the Buddha –  the first exuberant blossoms of spring waking from within the peach tree remind  us of the possibility of our awakening.

This day is also a day to reflect on the miracle of birth itself – we are grateful for the birth of the Buddha and our precious birth – Each of our individual  lives are utterly unique and unrepeatable, and today we can reflect on this fact how precious life is and not just a life to endure, but through the Buddha’s example and teaching  – an “awakened” life be lived in gratitude and joy.

In the Buddhist tradition, our human birth is seen as precious, more valuable than any treasure.   In the Chiggala Sutra, the Buddha speaks of the chances of being born a human being. Those chances, he observes, are infinitesimally small. They are comparable to those of a blind tortoise swimming in an ocean as large as the planet, where an ox’s yoke is afloat on the waves. Every one hundred years, the tortoise surfaces. The chances of being born human are no better than those of the tortoise surfacing with his head in the yoke. Human birth is extremely rare and therefore most precious.

So to put into modern terms instead of an Ox Yoke, let’s say a life preserver – so what are the chances –that our turtle could do just that? Actually, someone has figured that one out – a Dr.  Ali Banazir took the size of all the oceans and the size of the opening of a life preserver and calculated the odds and calculate that they would be about 1 in 7 trillion – and this scenario the ocean is still as glass and there are no winds blowing our life preserver.

Dr. Benazir did not stop there. He wondered about each of us; what were the odds of just our parent’s meeting (I will post the math on our FB page).  To be concise, he found that the odds of your parents just meeting was 1 / 20,000.  Talking to one another is another 1 in 10 and wanting to talk again is also 1 in 10. So the probability of them liking each other enough to have children is about 1 in 400 million – not stopping there, the chance that one sperm carrying ½ of your DNA and that one egg carrying the other half meeting and go to full term…that number is 1 in 400 quadrillions!  But hold on – if we go back in time to all of your ancestors which are about 150,000 generations all with about the same odds that you had to be born – the number works out to be about the 400 Quadrillion number raised to the 150,000 power – that number is a ten followed by 2,640,000 zeros. Think about that for a moment.  All that has happened for us to be here- and we complain about traffic or our neighbor, we worry needlessly about this or that – we try hard to seem special.  You already are. Ten followed by 2,600.00 zeros!

From this simple example of probability, we can see the Buddha’s teachings of interdependence, of all the causes and conditions that have conspired to make you and I – we can see from this what a rare and wonderful gift our births are.  When this really sinks in then we may even ask ourselves the same question Mary Oliver asks in her poem

“The Summer Day,” when she writes,

“what is it you plan to do / with your one wild and precious life?”

Vesak Day is a good day to ask ourselves this very question –  “what is it you plan to do / with your one wild and precious life?”

Rev. Shelley Fisher of the Reno Buddhist Temple has written:

“Realizing this we can see that our birth is truly a rare and wonderful gift. We have a deep obligation to live this life in mindfulness and Joy and compassion.

So what has finding the dharma mean to you and your life?

All of the events that we contemplate on Vesak day – the Buddha’s birth, awakening, and death all of these events are linked to the Buddha’s message, they are all connected to the result of Shakyamuni Buddha’s search to know himself, and by so doing know each of us.  Tara Brach writes that we learn from each of these events that   “We each have the potential to realize and live from an awakened heart and mind.”  –

And when this happens; we all become Buddha, when we are awakened to our own Buddha nature.

We all become Buddhas – a good question could be what does that mean in an everyday sense?  I want to share a quote that I shared at our last Vesak celebration. That gives us one possible answer that might just ring true for you.  It was written by one of the head priests at the Stone Creek Zen Center = Dojin – she writes the following,

“And today is as good a day as any to deeply thank this person for what he brought to the world. But, today of all days is also a great day to really think about what a Buddha is because what a Buddha is, is not limited to one person.  What Buddha really is, is a moment whenever great wisdom and compassion come together in this world in a thought, or action, in-kind word, a moment of selfless generosity, and helps to free up this world. That’s what Buddha is. What Buddha showing up in this world really is, is when any one of us, or anyone else in this world suddenly remembers how precious we are, and how important all the beings and things around us are, and how we are all so closely connected, and we act or speak or even think from that place.”

 

Washing the Buddha

We are now going to participate in the washing of the Buddha – a tradition practiced on Hanamatsuri – on Vesak day for over a thousand years by Buddhists all over the world. Those who would like to are welcome – there is no expectation that you do. We wash the baby Buddha as a welcoming into our lives and as a representation of the washing away the dust from our eyes, washing away our ignorance to reveal our innate Buddha-nature to give birth to the Buddha within each of us – and to turn our hearts to all sentient beings.

 How to wash the Buddha

How is it done?  First, we approach the table and bow. Then we take the ladle and pour the water over the Buddha three times – representing the washing away of all that which obscures our awareness of our innate Buddha-nature. The first time we say to ourselves, May I eliminate harmful thoughts – the second, may I practice kindness to all beings – and then lastly, may I help awaken all living beings.  Then bow and silently say Namu Amida Butsu.

I will ring the bell three times once – after the last ring you may stand a walk slowly to the table with the water and the Infant Buddha and begin – the rest of us will recite THE Hanamatsuri Aspiration handed out earlier –

Ring the bell three times

Closing

I want to close with the words of Rev Fisher again,

“We celebrate the Buddha’s birthday today.  We remember to be grateful for all that he has taught us – grateful to be born human – this wonderful unrepeatable life, grateful for showing us that we are all connected to each other, grateful to know that we all are born with Buddha nature, and grateful for Amida’s Vow reaching out to all of us, no matter how troubled, no matter how happy – that we may find Joy in life.

 

Namu Amida Butsu.

Dharma Glimpses from Bright Dawn.

Posted on by Christopher in Bright Dawn Buddhism, Bright Dawn Lay Ministry, Bright Dawn Way Of Oneness, Buddhism, Buddhist practice, dharma glimpse, dharma talks, Uncategorized

Dharma Glimpses are short dharma teachings  from Bright Dawn Lay Ministers.

Here are some podcasts from Bright Dawn Way of Oneness podcast page.

Faust my Dharma Teacher.

Listening to the Dharma 

Buddhism and Gender Equality

Who are you?

And here are some more Dharma Glimpses in written format on our Bright Dawn Blog.

 

Naturalness

Bodhisattvas and Buddhas

Peaceful Heart

Invisible Cemetery

New Bright Dawn Blog

Posted on by Christopher in Bright Dawn Buddhism, Bright Dawn Lay Ministry, Bright Dawn Way Of Oneness, Buddhism, Buddhist practice, dharma talks, salt lake buddhist, salt lake city buddhist fellowship, Uncategorized

Hello everyone,

Check out our the new Bright Dawn Lay Minister blog to get your weekly dose of dharma.

Bright Dawn Blog

Ku Yo – Offerings to all the Buddhas

Posted on by Christopher in amida buddha, Bright Dawn Buddhism, Bright Dawn Lay Ministry, Bright Dawn Way Of Oneness, Buddhism, buddhist fellowship, nembutsu, salt lake buddhist, salt lake city buddhist fellowship, Uncategorized

“ Ku Yo, making an offering is a very important virtue in the Buddha’s Way…Ku Yo is done in relation to someone who is more worthy than oneself…to do Ku Yo is one way of expressing profound gratitude and nourishment for the very source of our gratitude…it is an honor to do Ku Yo.” – Gyomay Kubose

 

The concept of Ku Yo resonates with me. To make offerings to all the Buddhas is something that brought me back to Buddhism, after being away for a while. I have no idea of why this is what brought me back. If I look at my history, one would think that this is what would drive me away instead of drawing me nearer. Recently I was re-reading the Shorter Pure Land Sutra about how one of the practices in the Pure Land being was to make offerings to countless Buddhas of other Buddha lands. In Sukhavati, it rains Mandarava blossoms all the time, and those flowers are gathered up and then offered to numerous Buddhas across the universe. Along with other meditative or Bodhisattva practices, there is also the practice of Ku Yo. I love that fact that the offering to the Buddhas is not something that is rare but something that is continuously unfolding. I like to think of the flowers as a representation of the compassion and practice of those living in the Pure Land; the flowers raining from the sky represent the fruit of practice and awakening. As Mark Healsmith has written, “The flower is a wonderful exemplar of the uniqueness yet interconnectedness of all life “ and makes the offering of them an expression of the interconnectedness of all life and “profound gratitude, for the very source of our gratitude.”

The other reason why Ku Yo resonates with me is it is something that I have been contemplating. I have been thinking about Ku Yo in the frame of the “Way of Gratitude” and some of the barriers that impede our cultivation of it. I have been thinking about the role of humility and gratitude and how humility is one of its prerequisites. I think, at times, we struggle with gratitude because we struggle with humility. As I have been thinking about this and asking others, I found that for many of us we struggle with humility because we have not experienced it, only its unhealthy sibling; Shame. In humility we are open, we are ready to learn, we show both sides of the leaf. With shame, we close our self off from the outside world and bury our leaf in the darkest hole. In this state of mind when we see someone with boundless compassion or great practice we do not see it as something we can learn from, but they become a source of further comparison and a deepening shame of our failures. That which could give us hope and insight into our Buddha Nature only becomes a testament to our failures. Gratitude gets choked off in the darkness. Humility, on the other hand, opens us up to awe and the acceptance of our limitation, it frees us to “keep going” without the burden of judgment and shame.

As Gyomay writes, Ku Yo practice is being done in relation to someone or something that is more worthy than oneself. More worthy than me? A part of us does not like such a statement. Here is where many of us live in a paradox. In our shame we feel unworthy and yet we bristle at the idea of someone being more worthy than us? Why is this concept so challenging for some of us? Maybe it is because we have inherited the karma of “rugged individualism” and a misplaced meaning of “equality”? In opening services at our Sangha, we recite lines from the opening they use at Plum Village Sangha in France. One of the lines says, “may we be free from the “equality complex””, to remind ourselves that there are things greater than ourselves, like the three refuges for example; the Dharma, The Sangha and the Buddha. I am grateful that there are things in this world greater than me! I feel a sympathetic joy and gratitude to those I make offerings to. I think that Ku Yo is the fruit of “sincerely seeking the true life” (46) There is no Ku Yo without “true life” and no true life without “Ku Yo”, they “co-arise”. Offerings to the Buddha inspire us to become Buddhas, they come from the heart, there is no ego in it.” (46) all the time realizing that what bows and is bowed to are the same.

I have great appreciation for the more psychological and secular forms of Buddhism and they have been companions with me on my journey. At the same time I appreciate the idea of something greater than my small ego-self, a point of reference that elicits awe, a devotional expression within samsaric dualism, that works dynamically through poetry, metaphor and experience to dissolve all dualisms into the great ocean of compassion.

The Grace of Oneness

Posted on by Christopher in amida buddha, Bright Dawn Buddhism, Bright Dawn Lay Ministry, Bright Dawn Way Of Oneness, Buddhism, buddhist fellowship, Buddhist practice, dharma talks, NASBA, Pure Land, Refuge, salt lake buddhist, salt lake city buddhist fellowship, Shin Buddhism, The Pureland, Uncategorized

“ This realization of oneness. It involves the highest type of communication and respect.  IF your life is realized in the this sense…you would see that the whole world supports you.  You exist because others; everything supports your life.  This totality, this oneness evokes a gratitude and a great joy beyond explanation.” Gyomay Kubose

 

We live a life immersed in grace;  the grace of being supported by all things at all times. We are supported by the solar system, by the sun that continually lights our world and drives the processes that help the earth to give us air to breath, water to drink and food to eat, that helps us to see, We are supported by the smallest things, to the largest. We are supported by microbes and bees that help create the food we eat, and by all the trees that help us breathe.   The bees give us grace every day, the trees give us grace, and there is also the grace given by our ancestors down through long passages of time; so much grace given that is still within in us now.  We are all interdependent and existent in this very moment.  In the midst of our diversity and interdependence we can come to direct realization of Oneness and by doing so we can communicate our respect and gratitude for them, for all of life, for all the gifts which in oneness we have received  and which are unmerited.

 

For me, namu amida butsu is an expression of this oneness and grace, an expression of Buddha-nature.  The Oneness that Gyomay Sensei is writing about in the above quote, is for me personified as Amida Buddha.  Because of Oneness I exist and therefore I exist because of namu amida butsu. This is how I understand the idea among some teachers, that  the nembutsu is simply an expression of gratitude for all that Amida Buddha has done for us. My practice of chanting the nembutsu is a form of the highest form of  communication and respect. Through this practice I cultivate a recognition / realization of Oneness, and all that Oneness does for me every day, and this brings forth the fruit and joy of gratitude.

 

This has tied into something that I have been thinking about  and that is gratitude, gratitude as a form of awakening.  A few years ago I had an experience in the midst of great suffering, where something shifted and I was overwhelmed with an intense gratitude for everything I had experienced and everyone I have ever known, even for just a moment.  I spent hours going through my email list sending out heart felt thank yous to everyone on. I think even companies whose email list I was part of even got a thank you and I am sure a few who received the emails, shook their heads. I called friends, I reached out to as many as I could to share my gratitude for their very existence.   In this space of gratitude, I wept and I laughed.  It was confusing at first because of the amount of tears that fell.  I remember thinking why am crying so hard?  I am  not sad so why am I crying? I realized that for me this is how deep and profound gratitude expresses itself.  Later on, this experience also helped to me realize that for many years I had seen “love” as the highest emotion, the goal of religious practice.  I have had experiences of profound love for all things,  where I loved even the street sign that I was standing under, and yet that night I experienced something even more expansive and sublime than “love”;  I experienced an unbounded gratitude. Writing this now and remembering what it was like, the lines from last week’s report are even more profound  “ We should always be ready to die, able to say, “thank you for everything”.  In some ways, that is what I experienced that night, the “thank you for everything” and remembering it helps me to understand what Gyomay Sensei was teaching.

 

I like what Jeff Wilson,  a Jodo Shin minister has written,  “in Shin Buddhism our main focus is the practice of gratitude. We practice simply to give thanks for what we have received. It’s a small shift in one’s perspective, but when pursued, it can be transformative.”  This came home to me the other night when I was holding my little boy in my arms, he was cuddled against my chest and I was just feeling him breathe and thinking how much I loved him and I just repeated thank you, thank you, thank you and the love I was feeling already, expanded exponentially and was enfolded into an ever expanding gratitude.  I think the cultivation of  gratitude is an important practice because it acts as a catalyst that can expand positive states of consciousness. Cultivating gratitude, by recognizing  and by expressing it, manifests more gratitude and deepens our awareness of Oneness.

 

Namu amida butsu

Namu amida butsu

Namu amida butsu

 

May it be so.

The Three Hardest Words.

Posted on by Christopher in Bright Dawn Buddhism, Bright Dawn Lay Ministry, Bright Dawn Way Of Oneness, Buddhism, salt lake buddhist, Uncategorized

I don’t know.

From a young age  many of us are afraid to be someone  who doesn’t know. Maybe we are afraid to be seen as dumb and therefore unacceptable,  so we wing it and hope the other person doesn’t see that we actually don’t have a clue. This is not just anecdotal, studies have shown that when children are giving unanswerable questions, they makeup answers, to seem like they know rather than to be found not knowing.  This habit sticks with as we grow up, for some of us they become the three hardest words to say.   We all know that feeling; usually half way through, when we realize we really have no clue what we are saying and how much easier it would have to simply say, “ I don’t know”. Instead we find ourselves five years old again, dancing around with our made up answers, again  hoping no one will notice.

To act as a “knower”  is fraught with challenges and pitfalls. Deciding that we know this is the way it is.”….. has a tendency to close us off to a myriad of other possibilities.  We become fixed in our ideas and perceptions, our world gets smaller and smaller.  Another problem with knowing and being afraid of not knowing, is we can never really be confident that what we know is reality. To paraphrase Mark Twain. “…they think they know something that just ain’t so.”

To be clear, the knowing I am referring to is not confusion or paralyzing doubt and it is not knowing in opposition to not knowing as in not knowing the capital of Nebraska, or  even a set of propositions such as the four noble truths.  When I say “I don’t know” I am talking the spirit of openness and curiosity a “I don’t know! Let’s find out!” or  “Let’s keep going and see what happens,” it is the not knowing of faith.  Suzuki Roshi wrote in Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind, “With beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert mind there are few.”  Beginner’s mind is the essence of not knowing”.  For those trapped in “knowing” the vista is limited, the questions are answered, all is settled, the world is fixed, but in the end, the light at the end of the tunnel is not more knowledge but the Dukkha Express and it is coming fast.

So how can we cultivate the non-dual spirit of “I don’t know”?  The first thing is to simply being willing to not know, to let go of the knowing.  I have found the world is lighter when I am free of having to know, I am more patient, less stressed, open. Here are two concrete things we can do to cultivate the not knowing.

First there is a  good practice suggested by Buddhist teacher, Gil Fronsdal, is to attach  “I don’t know” to as many thoughts as possible. For example, when thoughts arise like, this is good or this is bad or I can’t handle this; these become, I don’t know if this is good or I don’t know if this is bad or I don’t know if I can’t handle this.  As he says,  “the phrase “I don’t know” questions the authority of everything we think.”  It allows us to be free of fixed ideas, it can create curiosity and allows an openness to creativity.”  He goes on to say that this simple phrase can help us challenge tightly held beliefs and can  “pull the rug out from under our most cherished beliefs.”   Not knowing opens the world to us, it makes a way for us to be compassionate, patient, kind, honest and help cultivate equanimity.

The last thing that we can do to  cultivate the essence of “I don’t know”  is bowing.  James Ishmael Ford has written about not knowing and how it relates to the act of bowing.

“Don’t know. Not knowing. That is the ancient spiritual practice of bowing in a nutshell…The bow, I suggest, can open our hearts, can take us places we never dreamed of, to a palpable, transformative, endless world of possibility called not knowing. This is what I really want to underscore: this not knowing has endless creative possibilities, to throw in another metaphor, one or two simply aren’t enough for this place, this moment when we surrender to not knowing, when we bow to life: we discover a well that apparently is bottomless, bubbling with life-giving waters.”

I raise my hands in gassho and bow to each of you.

I would like to close with the words of Zen teacher of the 9th century, Dizang, “not knowing is most intimate.”

Namu Amida Butsu.