Back to Square One: I take refuge in the Buddha

I finished writing about the precepts, but am and will be a beginner forever. Since I did the first six precepts in groups of three (what was I thinking?) I'm going back and doing them one at a time. Even then, I will not be doing them justice.

Finished my taxes today. They will be sent to my uncle (Sam) in Washington  tomorrow. With a nice little electronic check (if those things have size). And the attic is ready for the insulators. Yea! That was a nasty job. I lost 1.5 lbs this am raising some decking and moving some stuff around.

Then went to a class tonight about time... a totally confusing subject. Maybe not any more confusing than anything else, but still enough to bewilder anyone. Anyone, that is, except those lucky creatures who have no time to consider time.

So what does it mean to take refuge in the Buddha? Who is/was the Buddha? If we believe the story, he was driven to figure things out. And his discovery was that his authority was his experience that he both trusted and disavowed as only an illusion. The Buddha is the part of us that is real. If one were not to take refuge in the Buddha, we'd have to take refuge in delusions. Taking refuge, for me, is attempting to brush aside the dust and see what is really there.

Experience the intimacy of things; Do not defile the three treasures

What I like about Robert Frost is that I learn about his life when I read his poems. I know what he did when he wrote "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening."

I have two deadlines: finish taxes by tomorrow at 4:45 pm to go to my new accountant, and finish preparing the attic for insulation by 10 am on Friday. In the meantime, the work on our yard continues, day after day, week after week, month after month. Maybe tomorrow it will be done if no more irrigation values explode. Sometimes I'd make art about all these grand life struggles, but no, I'm still at it trying to live with these Buddhist Precepts.

"Experience the intimacy of things" confused me. Did he really mean "intimacy?" I asked one of my teachers and she said that Buddhists associate intimacy with enlightenment. This actually confused me further, because it didn't seem to fit the second part of precept "do not defile..." Then I found this wonderful article about Buddhist intimacy. I loved this line, "This is true intimacy, handling all beings as if they were ourselves." And, of course, in Buddhism, all beings includes everything.

So while eating dinner (a great dinner expect I wondered if the chickens were well treated who generously gave me their eggs) I read the article (a Buddhist no-no) and then decided I would do the dishes while my wife was watching TV. And I would treat the dishes as if they were my eyeballs (which Dogen said is the way you should treat every grain of rice). Anyway, other than a few gently moves, like quietly setting the frying pan in the sink to wash it, I don't think I passed the test.

I take it that "do not defile the three treasures (buddha, teachings, sangha)" is kind of like "do not use the lord's name in vain." And we do that when we treat things with less than the respect that we'd treat our eyeballs, or, as the Zen teacher Reb Anderson would say, "...as if it is your mother's face."

One more thing. Even though I've now gone through the sixteen precepts, I don't pretend to understand them. The first six I did three at a time. My plan for the next six days is to do one of the first six at a time.  After that, maybe I'll give it all up for lent.

Actualize Harmony; Do not be angry

What is interesting is the apparent duality of harmony. Harmony is between two or more things, isn't it? So this precept make us responsible for harmony. Does it mean we have to fix us to harmonize with the other? And yet, we are one. Does that make harmony impossible?

Saturday the priest talked about how zazen (sitting) was both good for nothing and everything. It sure helps me to keep from being angry. I probably should be angry because we have a situation with a contractor at our house that has been going on too long and beyond budget. But I'm not angry. Maybe a little at myself for various mistakes I made. But we are getting close to this chapter in our life being over... I think. Maybe tomorrow. And then I can work on actualizing harmony.

Give Generously, Do not be Withholding

Open ur heart and ur pockets.

Some give at the office, but not at home. Some give for merit. Some give their money but not their heart. Some can't give, even to themselves. Some can give to others, but not themselves.

What did the ancient monks give? Their bowl would dry up if they didn't teach, so I'm not sure we can call their teaching a gift. And the peasants who'd share their food with the monks did so for teachings. Was that generosity?

Some give because people will think less of them if they don't.

One time, in college, I wanted something to happen, so I took five dollars and put it into a donation box in the church. Then the good thing happened... so I went back and got my five dollars. How many years of damnation will that earn me?

Another time, in Mexico City, I saw a begging woman with a little child. The child, like so many poor kids in Mexico, had an older face but a very small (malnutrition) body. What did the mother do after she accepted a gift from a passerby? She went into the nearby church and gave the money to the offering box.

My parents were very generous with their hearts and time. They would work hard to help people in need. But they weren't very generous giving money away. I suppose I'm pretty much the same.

The part of the precept that is particularly challenging is "do not be withholding." It merges with compassion, doesn't it? How do I open my heart to others?

Realize self and other as one: Do not elevate the self and blame others

This is a tough one. I certainly feel one with everyone when we are getting along... when the seas are smooth. But when I want this and you want that... that makes it tougher. And so I try sometimes to fix you (one way of elevating self) and we separate further. Yes, a tough one.

In my quest for the quick fix, I heard a few days about about "radical honesty" and then read about it again tonight. So I asked my wife if we could be honest, and she said it is not very nurturing and just an excuse to be mean.

The part I don't understand is the assumption of the honesty folks that they know the truth. What they are being honest about is their perceived perceptions, which is many steps away from how things are. The most honest statement to my ears is "I don't know."

Blanton (got his Ph.D from UT in Austin) says that you'll acquire intimacy from the honesty. Buddhists talk of three conditions for skillful communication: right time, truth, and said in the right way. That is not radical honesty. It is carefully crafting what you say in a compassionate (helpful) way.

Once one realizes that we aren't separate, then our words need to change when we try to communicate. For example, "I hate you" implies that I hate myself. If we are interconnected, then, if anything, we'd want to elevate the other... so that we can ride on one another's shoulders.

What would Buddha do?

My sister Gail sent me a WWBD hat as a congradulations for my jukai ceremony.

Which led me to think about WWBD rather than do taxes (I did a little more today) or write about a precept.

According to Wikopedia, WWJD (what would Jesus do) came first from the 1890s, and then reappeared in the 1990s. Now, many are asking, what would Milton Friedman do (or say) about the seemingly "proof" that the free market will not work and that more regulation would have saved the country from the recent collapse.

I'm fascinated how we take heros ((Buddha or Jesus (or Friedman)) and try to anticipate how they'd react to current events. These were all very independent men who went against much that was "assumed and dismissed" in their day. They sacrificed greatly to leave their religion (for Friedman, the economic status quo) and strike out into new territory (for Friedman, it actually was old 19th century territory).

In any case, these were fresh thinkers who took nothing for granted. Buddha told people not to believe him because he said it, but rather they should believe his teaching because they found it to be true.

When I go to the office at the zen center and hear talk about strategic planning, development, multiple levels of membership, etc. I wonder whether the Buddha would have had any part of this. Or did he do all that in his own way?

In college I read  The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius who wrote that we should live each moment as if it represented our whole life (my words after 43 years) and we could be judged by that moment. Perhaps the Buddha lived that life? I think I know one thing that the Buddha would do... like Aurelius, he wouldn't diminish any moment as being trivial. He would treat everything with utmost respect. And he wouldn't honk his horn when the car in front of him was driving a little slow.

Buddhist non-Politics

Kate made some observations about Buddhists being reluctant to be political. Most of the ones I know were pretty gung ho for Obama, but some of the more seasoned ones were more equanimous than that.

I remember the renzai priest a few weeks ago telling me that equanimity + discernment=action. I had mentioned this in an earlier blog. Buddhists don't want to leap to one side of the fence or another. Their goal is not to be right, but rather to save all sentient beings—and they will act when given that opportunity.

I remember a story that my St. Louis teacher told me about his teacher. They were driving on a country road, and came upon a fruit and vegetable outdoor market. His teacher was crazy about peaches so he looked at the peaches that two different guys were selling. It was odd to my teacher that they were similar peaches but priced differently. His teacher (probably as close to a holy man as you'll find in America) bought some peaches from each salesman. They got back in the car and my teacher finally blurted out, "why did you buy the more expensive peaches when you could have bought more of the cheaper ones?" The priest answered, "both have to make a living." Some would say that the higher price salesman were ripping us off, and the lower price salesmen was undercutting the competition (and consequently causing hardship to the farmer). Framing is such an interesting endeavor. To the priest, these salesman were more than his brothers. They were part of the whole as he was.

Tomorrow... back to the precepts... and the taxes.