Brooklyn Zen Center

Please take care, and practice this song, this Samadhi song, for the welfare of this world. And listen to the teachings that you working on this Samadhi yourself is transforming beings. We are not doing this just to transform our self, were doing it to transform all beings. But working on our self in this way, transforms beings.

Reflections on Resistance and Pipeline 3: a share by Yoko Ohashi and Koan Anne Brink

Our being in the world –  and our karmic orientations in everything that is happening – is what makes the world around us what it is.

In order to get free in this human life we have to meet these parts that are really broken at times. They are not broken out of hatred. They are broken out of a lack of love.

Practice is taking that step time and time again and slamming again and again into the reality that the world is not built for me, around me, by me alone. That my story is just that – a story. And that there is a reality that I am a part of, that other beings are a part of, and would not happen without all of us.

Sometimes that Buddha ancestral connection is represented between a teacher and a student – which Dogen talks a lot about – but it can be represented by our relationship to the Buddhas and ancestors we don’t see right in front of us, that we know came before us. And so we speak to them about what it is we wish to renounce and what is we wish to manifest, and we ask for their support.

We sit together, and in that sitting together we carry our individual practice. But also there is no distinction among us, we are sitting together. And together we are actually supporting each other’s practice. We are not sitting in a cave by yourself, we are sitting right next to each other. It’s lovely, I saw that during this last period of zazen. This is the tradition we have been given. So we have to continue to do this and recognize we are all in this together. And recognize that the practice of open upright sitting and open upright mind is what we are learning to carry forth into the world.

To live by vow. To live by not your conditioned mind, but to live with intention. Beyond the little selflessness. To live by vow, is to live as the universe. This is practice realization.

When we come together and sit, then we are supporting each other. And this is a interesting practice, to think that the person sitting next to me is practicing dying. And that when someone is stuck — we use that word when someone is stuck in their conditioning — that part of that stuckness is the fear of dying. It is a fear of actually letting go of, a fear of grieving, it’s a fear of falling into the swirl of the unknown. And so hopefully if we do that a great compassion will arise for those who are stuck in their conditioning. Because who wants to die?

The Bodhisattva path is a counterintuitive approach. It’s a method to help us let go of this obsession over ourselves. This is very different from our usual mode of operation, if you think about it. That is why it feels counterintuitive, and it can take a really long time for us to really understand and to get into it. We are very much conditioned by the world around us, by the opposite way of being.

In the way of the Buddha, karma is always in the background. It’s like the little key that unlocks all these teachings. When you kind of understand that, as I’m sure many of you do, when we understand that karma is such an important teaching, it unlocks all these teachings. This is the teaching of karma.

This darkness, this mystery of who we are, and how we are together, and how we are being influenced all the time, is to be honored and to be listened to, and is necessary for our wholeness.

When we work on ourselves deeply enough, when we really are in touch with our own fundamental openness of heart, which really is there, the love that we have for ourselves and other people comes from a place of unconditioned openness. That is what you feel, tremendous gratitude – for every single person. And when you meet them, you are meeting yourself. You are meeting a mystery that we both are. If you can walk with another person to that place for the both of you – it’s a tremendous gift. It’s not easy, it’s not guaranteed, and it’s a lot of work. And this is what we do in practice

When we talk about karma, it’s a way of talking about causality or cause and effects, specifically in human life, in human moral life. It’s the effect we cause on the world through our intentions – through our volition, through our will. And the Buddha was clear that when we are looking at the effects we are having, we have to pay attention not just to our actions, but we have to pay attention to our intention behind it.

[We can think of] these arising traumas, these beings as I like to think of them, as survival strategies of our ancestors. So fear, anxiety, anger, rage, or joy – these are blood memories. And we all have them, we all carry them. And if we can open them up, see and work with them, we can transform them; we can see what the wisdom is there for us.

In whatever way Buddhas are directing their attention, their abiding and dwelling happens there.

I think that this gender work is very important for us, it’s a real big doorway, and very deep.

I would suggest a mind that is awake, and that settles, and that finds love, joy, and ease in precariousness, so that we can be with each other, and love each other, and support each other. In very real, concrete meaningful ways.

How do we work through our pain, through our numbness? How do we regain a sense of aliveness?

We really need human beings that are devoted to the difficult spiritual path required to release the full light of love into the world.

We can cultivate this sense of great expansive unconditioned love. That allows us to meet the difficulty in life without turning away and without getting caught.

For me the most powerful things the vows do are because of their impossible nature — they are humbling. They have a kind of leveling effect. In the face of this impossible vow, I’m one person in a community. So there is an aspect of confession in that vow, of acknowledging our humanness and our limited view. So there is a humbling and tenderizing effect of the vow, that enables us to open up to the functioning of the universe, we actually open up to possibility. We become tender in the face of new possibilities, our imagination is liberated.

We are training ourselves – in our bodies, in our minds, through the practice, through the teachings – to make it more likely that in a moment of suffering, in a moment of threat, that we will be able to have an intention to, and maybe some sort of capacity to respond to courageous connection, instead of tightening into separation and division.

This is our practice, the practice of love, the practice of intimacy. That’s why we offer a relationship with a teacher, and we offer sangha, so we can work this way with each other.

We deeply desire to be in accord with the natural functioning of life, with dependent co-arising, with the way things interact and support each other, without these false senses of separation. That is what our heart and our lives desire in the deepest sense.

Sometimes you sit down – or I sit down – because there is fear. But that is still a fearless choice to face your fear, to understand your fear. Bodhisattva can have fear, but does not live from fear. Fear is not the source of Bodhisattva activity.

The Bodhisattva vow of living for the liberation of all beings, even before my own, to raise up in the heart the liberation of all beings — this is the most powerful interrupter and lover of karma. This vow turns everything toward karma.

In the sensation of the low-grade heartbreak there is gratitude, appreciation, grief and sadness. How can I cultivate the space in my life for a low-grade heartache, that I think is necessary to engage in Bodhisattvic activity? It’s an uplifting grief that sustains us and that can keep us in the game.

Everything you do is an opportunity. Everything you say, every gesture you make, every thought that arises in your mind. All of those are opportunities – each one is an opportunity to take care of this Samadhi that has been given to you.

The Samadhi is the teaching of Suchness. The Samadhi is intimate communion. The Samadhi is Buddhas and Ancestors. Buddhas and ancestors are the Samadhi. Buddhas and Ancestors are that teaching. Buddhas and Ancestors are intimate communion. Bodhisattvas want to live in that intimate communion, they want to be Buddhas and Ancestors, they want to be the teaching of Suchness. Because that is what they understand is the way to help people. They work on that in their own practice. Which they understand is how you help other people.

The beings who have this wish and commitment – to realize perfect understanding for the welfare of all beings – when those beings enter into Samadhi, their vow goes with them. So in that sense, the Bodhisattva Samadhi (or what I would call zazen) – I consider the zazen that I am recommending and encouraging is Bodhisattva Samadhi. And that Bodhisattva Samadhi, that zazen, is a vow. It’s an open, relaxed, buoyant, undistracted vow: to gather the entire ocean of Buddha’s teachings, for the welfare of all beings.

The focus of the Bodhisattva Samadhi is the Bodhisattva wish, the Bodhisattva aspiration: to make Buddhas for the welfare of the world. And then there is that aspiration, you can also, in a sense, vow and commit to that aspiration. So the aspiration, and the commitment of the aspiration, is at the center of the Bodhisattva Samadhi.

The BZC audio dharma talks are offered free of charge and made possible by the donations we receive. If you would like to support BZC, please visit the “Giving” section of our website.

The BZC audio dharma talks are offered free of charge and made possible by the donations we receive. If you would like to support BZC, please visit the “Giving” section of our website.

The BZC audio dharma talks are offered free of charge and made possible by the donations we receive. If you would like to support BZC, please visit the “Giving” section of our website.

The BZC audio dharma talks are offered free of charge and made possible by the donations we receive. If you would like to support BZC, please visit the “Giving” section of our website.

The BZC audio dharma talks are offered free of charge and made possible by the donations we receive. If you would like to support BZC, please visit the “Giving” section of our website.

This teaching [of impermanence] thrusts us into realization. Most of us may think of impermanence as something that is solid for a while and then it decays and goes away. We think of impermanence as a kind of temporary permanence. But it isn’t.

There’s always been suffering in the world – nothing new. But these days, I think, we are given the gift to notice it more. We also have the gift of noting that pretty much everybody in the world is kind of suffering right now. There always are, but we don’t notice it. And now we have this gift to feel connected. We have the opportunity to actually, everyday, be with the suffering of people everywhere. The BZC audio dharma is available free of charge and made possible by the donations we receive. You can donate to BZC here. Thank you!

I would like to mention a practice I learned from Dr. T. (a professor at Union Theological Seminary), that he termed the “hospitality of receiving.” […] In this practice, it is possible to meet one another with an attitude of openness and humility, as opposed to a colonialist mode of domination or appropriation. […] That act of receiving is also an act of hospitality – it is actually a gift. The BZC audio dharma is available free of charge and made possible by the donations we receive. You can donate to BZC here. Thank you!

Along with dukkha and the dust of our delusion, there is love and kindness, compassion, joy and equanimity. And this is where our Zen practice really begins.

How can we become a community that fosters awakening to these systems of harm, in our bodies and between us? I want to understand how we can go beyond a fragile superficial harmony in our community to be a better community, to be truly anti-racist. To tear apart what we have to tear apart, to take responsibility for what we have to take responsibility – a loving responsibility, a loving accountability that listens and it’s humble and it’s disciplined and apologizes. And tries again, even though we don’t know what we are doing. Because we don’t know what we are doing.  

One day you may be serving food. One day you may be ringing a bell. It’s all the same. It’s all about doing that practice together with intention and with, dare we say, love. And it’s about getting in each other’s way. And it’s about knowing when to move. And knowing when to say the appropriate thing, when to correct. When to accept correction.

I have hope because I think the virus has actually caught our attention. I have hope because it has stopped us in our tracks. I have hope that maybe this time we will rethink our relationship to the Earth, to this living miracle. […] That maybe we can live in gratitude for this gift of life.    

I have been thinking about waking up in the morning and going to sleep at night. It’s my first vow of the day to liberate all beings and it’s my last thought at the end of the day to vow to liberate all beings? And can I try to encourage that in myself? […] Because we know the suffering of the world and we are moved to respond to it.  

Buddha activity is a pivotal activity. The pivotal activity of Buddhas can be called zazen. […] It’s the way Buddha or Great Awakening is pivoting with all living beings.

We are being called to compassion. Everybody is calling us to compassion. All the phenomena within our own mind are calling for compassion.  

Letting go – real letting go – is letting go that doesn’t abandon the pain. It’s being there completely with it and, through that complete compassion with it, pain is released, without being abandoned, or exiled or tampered with. Compassion respects pain, right now, the way it is. It lets it be. It doesn’t touch it, it doesn’t turn away, it’s right there.

Buddha activity is accepting that this conversation may never end, the conversation with evil. It isn’t just accepting it. It’s accepting working with it, it’s accepting responding to it appropriately.

We are a very small circle of water. We are not complete. The truth or liberation comes from all the truth manifesting, just like the plum trees – southern branch and northern branch. As they are. As we all are.