Introduction to Zen Training

In zazen, the mind and body are unified like that of a swordsman facing an opponent or a cat ready to pounce on a rat.
Zazen consists in awakening us to our own essence so as to secure and express our True Selves in everyday conduct.

Why Do Zazen

Those who practice may experience something remarkable as a passing side effect of their training.
At times, we may shrink back from the pain of living and despair at the uncertainties of life.
To give life to one’s True Self sufficiently in all the affairs of daily life and to practice living as a human being.

The Aim of Zazen

What is universally valid in itself is abstract and conceptual and cannot be real and concrete.
Enlightened to the one-sided truth that the ego is empty and has no real substance.
Enlightened by the realization that the ego and the Dharma are both empty.
The realization that subject and object, ego and the surrounding environment are all void.
Experiencing the Absolute, realizing the Absolute, and acting out the Absolute in our daily affairs.
Zen is the shortcut to knowing one’s True Self.
Thinking that the form of Buddha lies outside zazen and searching for it by means of zazen is misdirected, like wildly striking the cart instead of whipping the ox when the oxcart stops moving.
Za (sitting) means to not give rise to thoughts (no dualism) under any circumstance. Zen (meditation) means to see your original nature and not become confused.
There is no delusion one must cast away, and no enlightenment one must acquire.
When True Self manifests in daily life, this is called Zen.
The discipline consists of three kinds: the first is said to be the body exercising the Way without the mind attendant on it; the second is said to be the mind investigating the Way without the body accompanying it; the third is said to be conducting oneself according to the Way with both mind and body realizing it.
Unless the mind is simultaneously concentrated and unified with vigorous energy and dynamism, we cannot claim to be practicing Zen.
To seek for some target outside of oneself is not the true meaning of zazen.
Zazen has no purpose other than zazen. Zazen is not the means of attaining any goal other than Zazen.

How To Sit In Zen Meditation

Seating the body; regulating the breath; stabilizing the mind.
Awaken your compassionate mind with a deep longing to save all sentient beings.
Put strength in the area slightly above your coccyx, push the lower abdomen slightly forward as if you were straightening your hips.
The main point is to gently bite with the molars so that the teeth are in light contact with each other together and touch the roof of the mouth just behind your teeth with the tip of the tongue.
Lower the eyes to a fixed position on the floor approximately three feet ahead. The eyes should be half-closed, neither seeing nor not seeing anything.
While it may seem easier to unite your spirit with your eyes closed, that would become detached zazen and not living zazen. If we remain quiet with our eyes closed like stagnant water, we will never be useful to society.

Things To Pay Attention To During Meditation

Laugh when we are supposed to laugh and cry when we are supposed to cry in accord with the principle of moderation so that we may express ourselves with propriety.
As for the images and sounds which arise during meditation, they are all right if they do not give rise to dualistic thought and if they do not cause thoughts to follow.
Do not pile thoughts up and let them grow, do not attach yourself to them, and they will have to disappear.
What is wrong is to retain thoughts and let them grow, to become attached to various thoughts one after another.
‘As long as we have minds, we cannot help thinking of various things one after another. It is not right, however, to let one thought follow another endlessly and permit ourselves to develop those thoughts. What is worse still is to be annoyed by them and to pay attention to them. As soon as random thoughts arise we should say, “There they are again.”‘
If disturbing thoughts and fantasies want to arise, I will let them arise. I am as free as ever to count my breaths and concentrate on my koan.
As long as you are conscious of your wish to be empty, you will never succeed in becoming empty.
We should remember that by being well integrated with any matter or thing, we will naturally come to be liberated from our attachment to them.
As for the koan of mu originally presented by Joshu, we should apply ourselves to it with all our strength at every drawing of our breath until we no longer know whether mu is us or we are mu.
The ascetic mind grows out of one’s attachment to the body and, like all attachments, this is rejected by Buddhists.
In order to measure time, an incense stick is better than a watch or a clock.
If possible, we should sit as often as we can every day. We must find ways to sit in the intervals of our work or while riding buses and trains on our way to and from work in addition to sitting once a day before going to bed.
It is advisable to take part in one week’s sesshin in a Zen dojo at least once or twice a year.
Continue training long and steadily.
The way to be liberated from suffering is to be quickly absorbed into it.
Our everyday life itself must be guided by Zen principles. It is essential to strive for the workings of Zen Mind in our everyday activities.
If we sit earnestly, free from any disturbing things and thoughts, we become one with zazen. There is no room left for anything to intrude between zazen and us.
Don’t pick up tea leaves, but practice zazen. Don’t read sutras, but practice zazen. Don’t clean the house, but practice zazen.
Our everyday life, filled with noise and lively activities of people, must be the most convenient dojo to practice Zen in movement.
Sit hard and sit a great deal.
Kensho, therefore, means nothing other than the rediscovery of our temporarily concealed Buddha natures.

Physiological Effects

Practitioners of zazen to seek nothing external to it. It is certainly correct to seek nothing except zazen.
It helped me remain well composed even in moments of my encounter with various enemies and rascals.
It is the custom of Zen to make use of anything at any time as material for training.
Running after our goals endlessly, our own footing becomes less and less secure moment by moment.
Don’t look afar. The subject of your purpose is here.
The infinite pursuit of objects outside ourselves thus leads us to no end in our vain longing for joy and peace of mind.
Think of it as having come to Hell in order to inspect its facilities for the purpose of improving them.
The basic principle of Mahayana Zen Buddhism: “To save others first before saving ourselves.”

Zazen Wasan (A Song of Zen)

Between ice and water there should be no essential difference. However, externally speaking, water is flexible, flows freely, and becomes square or round in form according to the shape of its container, whereas ice is rigid and fixed in form. Water and ice are thus very different.
There is no fish that examines water before swimming in it, and there is no bird that inspects the sky before flying across it. The oneness of birds and sky, and fish and water. This is true of both human beings and the Way.
Just like the rice cakes painted in a picture, intellectually conceived principles are not capable of satisfying our hunger.
Thus, the realization of our own true self-nature does not mean the acquisition of hitherto unknown knowledge of ourselves, but the renunciation of the hardened mass of delusion called our egos which we have borne so tenaciously up until now until we could hardly stand its weight.

Added 2024-02-06.