Zen in the ordinary moments

[carinab]

There hasn't been a zen post in a little while and I could use some advice from the budoka to wake me up. The post match blues have set in. Whenever I return from a match, my life always feels a bit ordinary and somewhat dull. On occasionan the banality is overwhelming. Between all my responsibilities (kid, husband, work, house, etc), it seems my life is scheduled to the nano-second. And while I can have intent and full attention to what I am doing now and again, most times my mind complains about the task at hand. I simply can't lose myself in the color or texture of the laundry I'm folding when it's the 87th time I've done it this week.

In the micro-cosm of the match, it's easier to "lose your mind and come to your senses." The simultaneous comprehension - mind, spirit, body - of pure experience focus into realization when the buzzer goes off. In the grocery store, it's not that easy...especially with an irrate toddler in tow. I can understand (intellectual comprehension) that it is my mind and not my surroundings or my daughter that is causing my mood, it is my thoughts and expectations. However I find I buy into the attachment, the illusion of the mood, that I am that thought, and then I feel dissatisfied. The mental noise seems to get louder the more introspection I do and I long for the quiet at the range.

I remember reading in one of my philosophy books about life as suffering; if you don't get what you want,you suffer. If you get what you don't want, you suffer. Even if you get what you want, you still suffer because you can't hold on to it. Life is not suffering; it's just that sometimes I suffer it rather than enjoy it. It's a nagging feeling, like there ought to be more. Am I living, truly experiencing life or am I moving through it without purpose and intent? I had a high school teacher once tell me, "if you are bored, you must be boring." Boredom, or the lack of tolerance for the mundane, is the nonawareness of life. It's like watching a movie for the twentieth time. You think you know what comes next.

Perhaps I am simply whining because it is difficult to let go and not have expectations. I have labeled everything and no longer see it for what it is. I have only a dry concept....Ack! I need to think less about life and feel it more!

[SiG Lady]

We're all in the same boat. We have ups and we have downs. We strive, perhaps, for a calm detachment somewhere in the middle at the moments when we need it--or all the time if we can. Life is not so much about suffering as it is to realize we are here NOT to suffer........

[Bill Schwab]

carinab,

I don't often share forum posts with my wife, but I had her read yours....you've just bottled so many of my thoughts 2004 has been, without a doubt, the toughest year of my life with many new changes, things I perceived as suffering. Please keep up the awesome, inspirational posts

[carinab]

Life is what happens when you plan something else. Right when I was looking forward to another day dealing with the dull, my daughter surprised me. She came walking into my home office buck naked covered head to toe in washable marker. Giant swirls of orange, purple, green, and red tattoo her skin like a retro paisley fabric. She proudly declared, "I'm colorful." What could I do but agree with her. Instead of viewing this as yet another thing Mom has to fix, I howled with laughter and ran for the camera. Attitude shift number 993 - In the zen sense I should let go of this one too but not yet...not until I smile just a little longer in pleasure.

[SiG Lady]

"She came walking into my home office buck naked covered head to toe in washable marker."

See?... We have ups and we have downs.....

[carinab]

Ah, but in the truest sense, isn't up or a down an illusion/conclusion as they are both created by the mind? Perhaps resistance to what is and labeling something up or down causes the ups and downs? I think that's where I was going with my original post.

[Sam]

Carinab, your post is so insightful! Thank you.

Here is a concept to toy with as you are folding clothes. What if the most common illusion that the mind creates is time??

When you came back from an experience where you were largely focused in the present, it would always be a major downer for you. This would be because you are recalling the past instead of living the present. (Spiritually this is the same as being dead.) You may look forward to the next experience, but that would be an illusion as well, for it does not yet exist. Since we couldn't be in either place, we would feel empty inside.

Without time, the mind doesn't invent a bunch of troublesome crap.

Ahh, the present!

[Steve Anderson]

One of my favorite Lanny Bassham principles is this:

Wherever you are, be ALL there.

Shooting is the most important thing in life...when you're on the range.

Taking care of your daughter is the most imprtant thing in life...when you're with your daughter.

I know if I take my shooting to work, then my work will want to come to the range.

Maybe, just maybe, if we focus on doing what we're doing, we can do it so well and so efficiently that there will be more time for what we love. (whatever that is)

I also know that if I practice at all in the morning before work (live or dry) I feel like a shooter all day...

A new goal also helps focus the mind...an advance in class, a new personal best on a drill, perhaps?

SA

[Dead Buff]

In one short page my feelings and problems of the last couple of weeks have been defined and I have been shown the door to possible solutions. Thanx guys and especially carinab.

[carinab]

Coincidentally (if there is such a thing)after dropping my daughter at preschool this morning, I pulled up at a stop light behind a truck with the following license plate:

So B It

[SiG Lady]

carinab--

I wuz jut bein' funny. (Surely, though, your daughter's encounter with color was both an 'up' AND a 'down'... thereby equalizing the situation into that neutral area we sometimes seek.)

Recent license plate here, too: "LET IT B"

[Penny]

Maybe achieving a big goal leads to a little bit of post adrenaline-high let down? And folding laundry probably isn't good for much of an adrenaline rush.

It's a thread drift, but I jumped a couple trains of thought and your post reminded me of an old boss/mentor. Awesome guy who treated everybody right. He died unexpectedly, and afterwards, our building janitor, Bill, was talking about how Dr. C treated him (Bill) exactly the same way he (Dr. C) treated the department head.

That attitude brought out the best in all of us slaves, uh, I mean employees. He appreciated the little things, and complimented us for doing the little, daily, boring things right. Consequently, we all worked just a little harder, and Bill made sure we had the shiniest floors in the building. Not sure where, exactly, I'm going with this, but I think those days helped me find more pleasure in the small tasks. Still, lately I find that knowing there's another match, or some other "fun" thing coming up on the calendar, helps get me through the mundane and unpleasant stuff. Consequently, I seem to get bogged down less in the "I hate this stuff" and enjoy what I'm doing just for the sake of doing it a little bit more. Hard to be there all the time, but I think I'm getting better at it.

I dunno -- the neutral zone is not for me. I'm always willing to deal with valleys so I can really have fun on the peaks.

[Moondoggie]

"The finest relationships are those without expectations." Taught to me by a dear friend who was much, much smarter than I.

"Plan for the worst, hope for the best." Taught to me by the Marine Corps.

"All work has honor." Plato, I think.

"Whatever doesn't kill you outright only makes you stronger." Neitchze (which I probably spelled incorrectly).

"Some you win, some you lose, some get rained-out."

My very personal belief is that our existence here is intended to further our spirtulality as a result of having to deal with a physical existenence ("Life's vesisitudes", Shakespere) absent the awareness of our true spiritual nature. I could continue that thought into a whole other level of wierdness!

IPSC shooting provides the opportunity for an "average" individual to experience an altered reality that is normally associated with high level athletes, combat experience, car wrecks, etc. I. e., tunnel vision (intense focus), adreneline rush, a perception of time/spatial distortion (slow motion) and other intensely altered perceptions without external chemical influence. Small wonder the sport is "addictive", or that folks become preoccupied. I think that the recognition that our minds have capabilities that we don't use to their fullest in the course of ordinary life is a benefit of this sport.

Speaking of chemical alteration, I'm on my 3rd glass of wine and ready for some stargazing from the hot tub!

[Liota]

First. Darn! That sounds good.

Speaking of chemical alteration, I'm on my 3rd glass of wine and ready for some stargazing from the hot tub! 

Carina,

Your first post sort of reminded me of the vinegar jar. There are three monks sitting around a jar of vinegar. The first has a sour expression on his face. The second has an angry expression on his face. The third is smiling.

Liota

[sanzen]

Zen..... IS the ordinary moments. it is not limited to special or specific moments, it is the moments. each moment.

"have you finished your breakfast? then go wash your bowl."

If you are not living in the NOW, then where are you living?

[DavidA]

There hasn't been a zen post in a little while and I could use some advice from the budoka to wake me up. The post match blues have set in. Whenever I return from a match, my life always feels a bit ordinary and somewhat dull. On occasionan the banality is overwhelming. Between all my responsibilities (kid, husband, work, house, etc), it seems my life is scheduled to the nano-second. And while I can have intent and full attention to what I am doing now and again, most times my mind complains about the task at hand. I simply can't lose myself in the color or texture of the laundry I'm folding when it's the 87th time I've done it this week.

In the micro-cosm of the match, it's easier to "lose your mind and come to your senses." The simultaneous comprehension - mind, spirit, body - of pure experience focus into realization when the buzzer goes off. In the grocery store, it's not that easy...especially with an irrate toddler in tow. I can understand (intellectual comprehension) that it is my mind and not my surroundings or my daughter that is causing my mood, it is my thoughts and expectations. However I find I buy into the attachment, the illusion of the mood, that I am that thought, and then I feel dissatisfied. The mental noise seems to get louder the more introspection I do and I long for the quiet at the range.

I remember reading in one of my philosophy books about life as suffering; if you don't get what you want,you suffer. If you get what you don't want, you suffer. Even if you get what you want, you still suffer because you can't hold on to it. Life is not suffering; it's just that sometimes I suffer it rather than enjoy it. It's a nagging feeling, like there ought to be more. Am I living, truly experiencing life or am I moving through it without purpose and intent? I had a high school teacher once tell me, "if you are bored, you must be boring." Boredom, or the lack of tolerance for the mundane, is the nonawareness of life. It's like watching a movie for the twentieth time. You think you know what comes next.

Perhaps I am simply whining because it is difficult to let go and not have expectations. I have labeled everything and no longer see it for what it is. I have only a dry concept....Ack! I need to think less about life and feel it more!

It’s 2011 and I have just read this Post.

I realize the original Poster may not read this.

From: "The Tao of Physics"

Enlightenment in Zen does not mean withdrawal from the world but means, on the contrary, active participation in everyday affairs.

The Chinese masters always stressed that Ch'an, or Zen, is our daily experience, the 'everyday mind' as Ma-tsu proclaimed.

Their emphasis was on awakening in the midst of everyday affairs and they made it clear that they saw everyday life not only as the way to enlightnment but as enlightment itself.

In Zen, satori means the immediate experience of the Buddha nature of all things first and foremost among these things are the objects, affairs and people involved in everyday life, so that while it emphasizes life's practicalities, Zen is nevertheless profoundly mystical. Living entirely in the present and giving full attention to everyday affairs, one who has attained satori, experiences the wonder and mystery of life in every single act.

How wondrous this, how mysterious!

I carry fuel, I draw water.

The perfection of Zen is thus to live one's everyday life naturally and spontaneously. When Po-chang was asked to define Zen, he said, "When hungry, eat, when tired, sleep." Although this sounds simple and obvious, like so much in Zen, it is in fact quite a difficult task. To regain the naturalness of our original nature requires long training and constitutes a great spritual achievement.

Fritjof Capra

AND,

“The most powerful thing you can do to change the world,

is to change your own beliefs about the nature of life, people, reality,

to something more positive and begin to act accordingly”

Shakti Gawain.

[DavidA]

Carina,

Your first post sort of reminded me of the vinegar jar. There are three monks sitting around a jar of vinegar. The first has a sour expression on his face. The second has an angry expression on his face. The third is smiling.

Liota

This is the way I have heard the story of the vinegar jar

and explains the expressions on the faces of the monks.

This is a famous picture called the “Vinegar Tasters”.

The three monks represent Confucianism, Buddhism, and Daoism.

The jar has vinegar in it, representing life, and each philosopher is reacting to the taste.

To the Confucian, life is sour (sour expression).

To the Buddhist, life is bitter (angry expression).

To the Daoist, life is sweet (smile).