Month: May 2015

Week 7: More Practice Period

The Evening Gatha is read at the end of the evening service, to close out the day.  We file in to the zendo an hour before, quiet conversations slowly drifting to silence as we gather.  We sit twenty-five minutes of zazen, do ten minutes of slow walking (kinhin), spend twenty-five more minutes on the cushion, then chant the four vows three times.  It is dark outside, with the light in the temple muted, giving the sit a hazy feeling.  This sit is quiet, but it is a different sort of quiet than other times of the day.  It’s not the crisp sort of sit we do first thing in the morning, everyone fresh from a good night’s sleep and clear with first light.  No, at this hour we are tired from the day, and the zendo seems to fill with a relaxed and subdued quiet.  Then, out of the fading of our last chants, the cantor’s voice fills the room:

Let me respectfully remind you…
Life and Death are of Supreme Importance…
Life is short,
Time passes quickly, 
Let us awaken, 
Awaken, 
Take heed…
Do not squander this life.
It is Saturday morning, the third day of retreat, and I am up early, my body not quite shifted to Mountain Time.  A knock on the door, it is my neighbor reminding me of the eclipse.  We stand in the yard, clay sand with sage and mesquite shrubs, and watch the white moon slowly thin as it hangs over the dimly lit town.  “This is why they used to sacrifice virgins” one of us mutters once only a thin sliver of red remains.  “Do not squander this life.”
DSCN2091Two days later we have the afternoon off.  I am curled up  in the courtyard, on a blanket in the grass, basking in the sun.  The wind rustles the leaves above me, finches chirp and flutter around, the occasional car drives past along the road on the other side of the house.  Then an odd noise, similar to the cell-phone water drop I would hear at work, but at short, steady intervals.  I look up to see a crow flapping deeply to gain speed and altitude, the wake of it’s wings creating the sound.  “Do not squander this life.”
Two days later we are again in the courtyard.  Nature Boy* (who bears an uncanny resemblance to Michelangelo’s David) is watering the trees.  “Want to see something beautiful?”  The next thing we know a brown garter snake is winding in his hands, its red tongue flicking at us with the same curiosity we have for it.  Then it is on the ground, almost levitating above the grass in perfect S-es as it seeks shelter in nearby rocks.  “Do not squander this life.”
The theme for the second week seemed to be practicing in the body.  Our morning schedule stayed relatively the same:  zazen, service, soji, breakfast, a short break, then samu, more sitting and lunch; but in the afternoon, instead of more samu as we had done the week before, we went on group walks along trails in the surrounding hills.  And when I say ‘hills’, I mean the foothills of the Sangre de Cristos, the southern stretch of the Rockies, that rise to nine-ish thousand feet just east of Santa Fe.  (The Zen Center is at 7,400 feet.)
DSCN1633The first day I went out with the ‘advanced’ group, mostly because I had done the ‘moderate’ group trail the day before.  We headed out along the river (six feet wide and two feet deep where we crossed), along Upper Canyon Road to a trail that wandered along a dry stream bed that wound between two hills.  Until this point I had kept the pack in sight, but with me huffing and puffing (already?) they were quickly out of sight.  Soon the trail wound sharply up the west face of the canyon.  Then, a flat open spot with a small stretch of the river and the houses along it were in clear view below.  After a short break I continue up.  I pace myself, still smarting from Tsankawi, and as the trail twists back towards the canyon I stop to catch my breath.  Suddenly, a flock of towhees erupt from a thicket of piñon and fly as one down the hill.  “Do not squander this life.”
DSCN2161The second day I do the ‘puppy’ trail (my word), along the well cultivated trails at the local Audubon Center.  (One of the center’s residents is Dutch; imagine his surprise when advised we would be walking at the ‘Auto-Bahn’.)  But the next I was back with the advanced group, this time to the east, along the trails towards Castle Rock.  This is the day I start to get my trail legs again; I huff and I puff up the steep inclines, stopping frequently to catch my breath (and take a good look at the beauty around me) but each time I am able to continue.  After an hour I reach a point that offers a clear view to the west: not only Santa Fe, but also the white hangars at Los Alamos and the fire scarred mountains along the western horizon.  “Do not squander this life.”
The speaker for the second weekend was John Dunne.  Small in stature, and likely to go unnoticed in a crowd, he is an incredibly intelligent man.  He spent close to ten years studying with lamas and Rinpoches both in the States and abroad, and is well versed in Tibetan culture and teachings.   He also has acquired many of their affects: rapid clipped speech interrupted by long pauses for consideration, a melodic cavorting tone, and the Yoda-like laugh I have found to be almost ubiquitous amongst Tibetan scholars.  His lectures speak to the dualistic nature of mind, the construction of I and another, us and the other, that there is an inner narrative but also an inner someone to hear it.  One segment focussed on our mental construction of the world (what he calls reification or ’storifying’), and all the biases (anchoring, confirmation bias, inattention blindness, bandwagon effect) that come with it.  I found this segment fascinating; I have spent my time during and since grad school studying these processes with respect to aircrew and maintenance decision-making, and while I have found dharma teachings useful when applied to these domains, I had not thought to explore them on the cushion.  “Do not squander this life.” The afternoon is spent on methods to deconstruct our constructions (de-reification).
On Sunday afternoon we had council, checking in one last time before the big event: sesshin, five days of silent practice.  Could I do it?  Or will I crack?  Stay Tuned for the next Episode of the Dharma Hobo….

🙂

Week 6: Spring Practice Period

Spring Practice Period began, for me, on a frantic note.  I had previously agreed to peer review some conference papers with a deadline well in to the agreed-to electronics ‘vacation’.   Somehow during the itinerant travels of previous weeks this had slipped my mind.  Wednesday, originally planned as a rest day, was spent reading and commenting on papers.  Fortunately the topics were interesting: physical markers of cognitive red line, man-machine trust during urban search and rescue, and the adaptation of task analysis tools for the design of semi-automated long-haul road transport vehicles.  (Okay, interesting to me.)  I finished with fifteen minutes to spare, and scurried to the zendo for the opening dharma talk. Not an auspicious beginning, I agree.

So what is a practice period?  Well, many faiths share the practice of withdrawal from the world.  This is true for Buddhism as well, most notably individuals who withdraw to study alone on a mountain or in a cave.  Practice period is similar, but done as a group, an extension of the tradition where an abbot gathers nomadic monks in one location during the rainy season for deeper study and to strengthen the ties within the community.  Some Zen Centers have adopted an austere model for practice period – long intervals of work or meditation to deepen practice.  I was fortunate, in this case the Zen Center was coming out of an intensive schedule of back-to-back retreats so the Vice-Abbot had designed the schedule to help the residents recuperate.  I was one of three guests who would be with the residents for the full nineteen day interval.
Our days began with the wake-up bell, one of the residents passing outside each door ringing a chime.  Then it was down to the temple for morning service.  The zendo is dark, barely lit, and after three bells, the vice-abbot circles the zendo.  We each do a bow as he passes us on our cushions, all while chanting the Verse of Atonement.  Then, forty minutes of zazen, a silent still meditation, followed by blessing of the altar, recitation of the Heart Sutra in Japanese and English, many bows, and the morning greeting.  After an interval of temple cleaning (to thank her for hosting us) it is off to breakfast.  If I have not mentioned it before, the food here is fabulous, lovingly crafted by the residents (with an assist from a local chef during larger groups) as part of their work practice.  Breakfast varies: some days granola, creamed coconut or pecans, with yogurts and jams; or eggs, scrambled, sometimes with peppers and herbs from the garden, with potatoes; one day a bagel bar; another build-your-own crepes.  The morning, through the end of breakfast (with the exception of your temple cleaning assignment), is in silence.
After a short break we return to the zendo for samu, or work practice.  In the Zen tradition, samu is an extension of meditation, taking the mindfulness you generate on the cushion out in to the world.  We received one of three assignments: kitchen, housekeeping, or grounds; and it is normal to cycle through each of the departments during a longer stay.  The week before I had been in the kitchen, where I learned the proper way to cut carrots and other veg.  For the first few days this interval I was outside, pulling weeds from the garden.  During the second week, I was re-assigned to housekeeping, where it was discovered I have a gift for vacuuming and detailing corners.  (Who knew?)  I have been in housekeeping ever since.  The practice during samu is to maintain functional silence, a silence broken only for necessary instructions or cautions.  If nothing else was scheduled, we would continue our samu practice after lunch.
Practice periods provide the opportunity to dwell on a single text, or sutra.  The sutra selected for this retreat was the Satipattana Sutra, translated as The Four Foundations of Mindfulness.  This text encourages you to increase your awareness observing the body in the body, the feelings in the feelings, the mind in the mind (how the mind works), and objects of mind in objects of mind (thoughts we attach to).  I normally read it during the late afternoon, in the sun, in the courtyard during personal practice time before heading in for a shower.  Before dinner there was more meditation, then dinner, then the evening service (even more meditation and the evening gatha).  Local sangha members would frequently join us for zazen, and it was interesting to feel how different energies affected a ‘sit’ – often when we were tired a visitor would settle us down, and vise versa.

During the first few days of the practice period we explored the text: with an opening dharma talk, a seminar the following morning for questions, and ‘council’, and roundtables to talk about our experiences working with the text.   On Friday we were joined by other guests for a weekend retreat.
DSCN2133DSCN2121The bulk of this retreat was a hike at Tsankawi, an abandoned first nations settlement that is the southern peninsula ‘living museum’ section of the Bandalier National Forest.  I would love to be able to tell you I had a fabulous time exploring the trails worn in the soft rock leading to and between the cave dwellings along the walls of the mesa.  Unfortunately this was the day altitude sickness kicked in, my usual happy-and-everything-sounds-like-a-good-idea reaction replaced with dizziness and narrowed vision, not the best combo on a trail with sections of sheer drop-off to one side.  I did manage the entire loop, including the cliff ladders up the south part of the trail (a feat in itself).  I also had fun exploring the plants, ruins, and pottery shards on the mesa.  On the bright side, when I got back and checked my camera I was encouraged to find that despite my discomfort I’d captured some fabulous images of the day.
The first Monday and Tuesday were rest days, and rest I did.  On Monday it was warm; I curled up on a blanket in the sun, ‘studying’ the sutra (if absorbing it while using it as a pillow counts) and watching the birds.  On Tuesday I rested some more, and also went for a slow mosey along the Two Dams reservoir trail.  Rest turned out to be a good choice: the second segment of the practice period was focussed on physical activity.  More on that next time.
As always, photos and back issues are available at www.hollybrunelle.com. A copy of the sutra (if you are interested) is available here:  http://www.wisdompubs.org/landing/satipatthana-sutta .  The translation we studied was a little different (mostly organization); this was the closest I could find.
Until next time!