Author: Chong Go Sunim

Here’s the conclusion to Admonitions to Beginners. It’s quite nice on its own, but since this text has been posted over several months, I’ve gone ahead and added a summary of the Venerable Ya-un’s major points. While these were originally intended for monastics, I think there’s a lot here that would benefit all practitioners. What really strikes me about these admonitions is there emphasis on seizing the day, Don’t miss this chance!   

 
The moon rises and sets,
urging old age to come. 
The sun comes and goes,
hurrying time along. 
Fame and possessions
are like the morning dew,
hardship and prosperity
like wisps of smoke in the evening.
I most sincerely hope that you will practice self-cultivation,
become a Buddha without delay, 
and save all beings. 
In this life if you ignore these words,
without a doubt, regrets will fill your next life.

 
My own true self!

Being born as a human being is rare as a blind tortoise rising from the depths of the ocean and putting it’s head through the hole in a wooden yoke that’s floating on the waves. Will you spend your entire life indulging in laziness?! Will you ignore spiritual cultivation?! It’s difficult to be born as a human being and so much harder to meet the Buddha-dharma.

If you lose this opportunity, then even though a thousand kalpas pass, it will be difficult to have a human body and meet the Buddha-dharma. Therefore, you should take these ten admonitions seriously and practice diligently, without stepping back. Realize true enlightenment without delay and save all beings.

My hope is that you will overcome the sea of birth and death so that you will be able to save all beings, not for the sake of your own benefit. From the beginningless past up until your present life, while being reborn and dying as one of the four types of lives, you have always depended upon your parents. Over that immense time, the number of beings that were your parents is beyond imagining. If you reflect upon this, you will realize that among the beings of the six realms, there is not one who was not once your mother or father, your brother or sister, your son or daughter.

These beings have fallen into evil states, and day and night experience unimaginable suffering. If you don’t save them, how much longer will they have to suffer? Thinking about this, I’m filled with sorrow. It’s as if my heart is being ripped out.

My most ardent hope is that you soon develop all-penetrating wisdom and attain great, unlimited spiritual power and every kind of skillful means. I pray that with this you will become a pillar of wisdom that saves all beings lost on the rough seas, that you save all of the confused beings who are lost in the mountains of greed.

Don’t you know that all of the Buddhas and Patriarchs of the past were once ordinary people like us? They were worthy people and so are you. You just don’t practice, it’s not that you don’t have the ability.

There is a saying, The Way doesn’t turn its back on people, people themselves turn their back on the Way. Also, If one determines to achieve the Way, then the Way naturally comes to meet them. This is so true, so true.

As long as you maintain firm belief, how could you not awaken to your inherent nature and become a Buddha? I swear now before the Three Treasures that I have cautioned you on every single point. If you deliberately violate these, while knowing that your actions are wrong, you will fall into hell while still alive. How can you not be careful about these points?!

 
 
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Summary of Ya-un’s Ten Cautions

1. Refrain from extravagant clothes and food.
2. Don’t be stingy with your possessions, and don’t covet what belongs to others.
3. Refrain from unnecessary speech and travel.
4. Associate with virtuous friends and avoid evil people.
5. Don’t sleep outside the fixed hours for sleeping.
6. Don’t feel that you are superior to other, and don’t look down upon others. (Also, don’t feel that you are equal to others or less than others.)

7. Always maintain a proper attitude towards sex and wealth.
8. Do not associate with worldly people, and so become an object of scorn.
9. Do not criticize others.
10. Always maintain an undiscriminating mind, even among others.

Today over at Somewhere in Dhamma, Joseph talked about the fact that he often knows what something isn’t, but doesn’t necessary know what it is.

I suppose that’s the difficulty with most things: we know what we don’t want, but it’s hard moving towards something that we aren’t used to experiencing.

Daehaeng Sunim often told people to learn what causes flowers to bloom, and then create those conditions for your own tree. In the same way, I guess we have to do a lot of research and meditation to figure out what we do want, and then apply it.

If we behave like rich people, eventually we’ll be rich. If we follow the habits of a poor person, before long we’ll be poor. If I want to be skinny, then even though I’m not now, if I follow those habits, my weight will go down.  If you want to be a better parent/friend/spouse then read like crazy and figure out what behaviors and ways of thinking you need to bring into your life.

 Likewise, if I follow the behaviours of an enlightened person, then eventually I’ll get there, too.  In fact, a lot of the talk about precepts in the sutras isn’t “Don’t do…,” so much as “A Bodhisattva or wise person doesn’t do….”

In Bodhidharma’s Two Entrances and Four Practices, he says exactly this. If you can’t just to go straight in and perceive the fundamental, then make your behaviors and thought habits in line with the fundamental. He goes on to give the four practices:

1. Forgiving injury – know that nothing arises without cause, and that the cause of this too lies with ones own behavior.

2. Following conditions – (I think) this means not getting caught up in the things that arise and disappear in our lives, because these are all conditioned, and thus have only temporary existences.

3. Not seeking – letting go of things as they go, not fearing things that come, and in general making an effort to not get caught up in desires and attachments. The opposite is a life lived in pursuit of desire, of always chasing the next thing, of constantly being focused on accumulation.

4. the practice of according with the Dharma.  I think this is referring to living in accord with the fundamental non-duality of all. Thus, this one is described as the perfection of giving, where one is free of stinginess.  Daehaeng Sunim often reminds us that it isn’t our money, or even our children, rather we are just taking care of them for the benefit of the whole.

A common thread I see in these is the idea to always view things positively.  This may seem a bit simple, but it’s incredibly powerful. Sometimes it’s a struggle to view things in a positive light, but this has an almost infinite power to free my own heart.

On the one hand moving forward towards this unknown really is like taking a step off a hundred foot bamboo pole, or swallowing the Yellow River in a gulp. And yet… We still have to read and study to help with the worldly things that we don’t know.  But from time to time we have to entrust what we’re doing to this fundamental thing that’s greater than “I”.

I’ve been thinking a lot about Marcus’ last post on interfaith dialogue, and sometimes, I think all dialogue is interfaith.  All dialogue is people (or beings) trying to reach out and understand the other.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 In Korea there’s a saying, “East question, west answer”, that it, the question and the answer are coming from completely different directions.

 
  
  
 
  
In working on translations with Korean speakers, this comes up a lot. But if I let go of everything, what I think I know and what I think I don’t, little by little I begin to understand where the other is coming from. 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
For practitioners, there’s no such thing as a new year,
yet from time to time,
it’s worthwhile to reflect upon how
we can meet the demands of the world this body lives in
and to think about how we can go forward with wisdom and generosity.

 
The birth of this body is not our birth.
Our birth starts with this fundamental mind,
which has existed before our flesh.
Whether something arises from others,
or arises from within,
knowing that it is all being done by this Buddha-essence
is the foundation of spiritual practice.

 
If you use your body with a little care and concern
you won’t end up ruining this temporary house of yours.
Likewise, if we make just a small change in how we use our minds,
we can cure even the Earth.
Then, even when you think you’re doing something for yourself,
it actually ends up benefiting others.
Everyone and every thing are all working together,
so if you can help people live accordingly,
you’ll bring harmony, laughter, and love to your entire family.

 
Be sincere!
If you’re sincere, steadfast, and genuine,
there’s no reason for our life to be overly difficult.
Be wise, peaceful, and positive in your thinking.
This life lasts for only a season,
don’t be stupid in how you spend it.
 
 
If you would truly learn the teachings of the Buddha,
empty yourself while remaining upright,
remain upright while emptying yourself,
and harmoniously gather everything together in one place.
This is our true path.

      — Daehaeng Kun Sunim
 
 
 
 
 
copyright 2011, the Hanmaum Seonwon Foundation

“O monks, if people knew, as I know, the result of giving and sharing, they would not eat without having given, nor would they allow the stain of stinginess to obsess them and take root in their minds. 

 Even if it were their last morsel, their last mouthful, they would not eat without having shared it, if there were someone to share it with. 
 
But, monks, as people do not know, as I know, the result of giving and sharing, they eat without having given, and the stain of stinginess obsesses them and takes root in their minds.”

(It 26; 18–19)

Quote:  This great quote comes from “In the Buddha’s Words:  An Anthology of Discourses from the Pali Canon” edited by Bhikkhu Bodhi, p 169. 

This post arose from an online conversation with Barry at Ox Herding, about criticism, and the need to speak up.  Generally, criticizing others isn’t something helpful to our practice, yet when is it necessary to speak out?  When do we speak up? When is this the healthier choice?

Barry:  I have violated the “precept” of speaking about others so many times and usually have come to regret my speech.

Zen Master Seung Sahn used to say that the mouth is “the number one problem gate” and all available evidence supports this, at least in my case.

At the same time, there are times when we must speak out about the behaviors of others. I think about Eido Shimano in this context and the decades of silence that enabled the ongoing abuse of his students.

What if Aitken Roshi had spoken out in the late 1960s rather than in the last year of his life? How might that speech, had it occurred four decades ago, have helped?

In recent years, when confronted with some troubling behavior or speech, I’ve tried to examine my own troubling behaviors and words. If I can see how such actions arise within myself, then I can also see clearly how they arise in others. Then I might speak out. (But it’s hit and miss!)

Chong Go Sunim: I can see enough of my own faults to realize that, (in general) I definitely have no business going on about others’ behavior. That said, there are still times when it’s necessary to have the “hard conversation” with someone, when I have discuss something really unpleasant or uncomfortable.

I’ve heard of companies that have a “no gossip” policy, where they actually will fire someone who keeps it up. There, they define “gossip” as complaints/criticisms “given” to someone who has no power to do anything about them. I think there is something to this that helps separate the “bitch session” from the “hard conversation”. In the second it actually is my job to do something about it.

I can kind of imagine some of what’s involved with situations like the one with Shimano. I’d guess that a lot of practitioners (in other places) who only heard glimpses of the problem didn’t say anything because they felt that the people best able to actually solve this problem were the ones at that temple. I think this may have played a big role in the silence; plus, as outsiders they may have also felt uncertain about what exactly was going on.

On the one hand, it seems like that situation is continuing because the people in the middle of it choose to let it continue. So what’s my responsibility? As near as I can tell, it is to people new to Buddhism who might actually believe those kinds of behavior are “enlightened” or some kind of “non-dual wisdom” or even crap like “Asian culture.”

I kind of feel for Aitken Roshi, I’ll bet he really regretted not having had the guy deported back in 1964. Aitken Roshi seems to have been an honest and sincere person who was thrown for a loop when confronted for the first time with Shimano’s behavior. At the time, it didn’t fit the traditional “call the police” model for despicable behavior. And he’d probably never encountered anyone like that before. I’m pretty sure that Aitken unconsciously tried to deal with Shimano in the way Aitken normally treated people, as if they were basically honest and sincere. But this model doesn’t work with a compulsive behavior. I don’t think honest people react well, or decisively, to these situations until they’ve been burned once or twice. Until then, it’s something they never really imagined or had a need to think through.

I’ve learned the hard way just how corrosive criticizing and complaining about others can be. I’m sure there are things that are more damaging to us spiritually, but criticizing and analyzing other’s faults has to be near the top of the list.

No matter whether you hear good things or bad things, do not let yourself be affected by them. Being praised when you lack virtue is truly shameful, while having your faults shown to you is a wonderful thing. If you are happy to see your faults, then you will surely correct them, while if you are ashamed of your lack of virtue, then this will spur you on to practice more diligently.
 
 

Don’t speak of other people’s faults, because eventually it will return and harm you. If you hear harsh speech or rumors directed towards someone else, look upon that as if someone was slandering your parents. Your criticism of someone else today will become criticism of you tomorrow. All things are impermanent, so whether you are criticized or praised, there is nothing to be happy or upset about.
 

                           Talking about the things that others have done,
                         “This was right,” 
                         “That was wrong,”
                          from morning until night.
                         At last spending the entire night
                         deep in the haze of slumber.
                         If a monk lives like this,
                         how will he repay
                         all of the donations he has received?
                         Escaping from the three worlds will be
                         truly difficult.

This is the eighth of Ya-un’s admonitions: Don’t lounge about in the realms of desire. It’s also a caution for monastics to remember why they originally became a monk or nun, and to not end up living like an ordinary lay person.

The person who renounces the desires of their heart is called a practitioner. Not longing for the worldly life is called leaving home. Having ended desire and left the mundane world behind, how could you possibly associate and amuse yourself with lay people? To miss and yearn for the mundane world is called “intense craving,” which has always been incompatible with the path.

When longing and attachment arises, the determination to achieve the way begins to fade. Therefore, cut off all longing and attachment and never look back. If you do not want to betray the reason you left home(to became a monk or nun), then you should go to an outstanding temple and uncover the profound meaning. If you go forward with your robe and bowl, and dissolve all worldly desires, without any concern for hunger or safety, then your practice will automatically deepen.

                 Even good actions done for yourself or others
                 are the cause of the cycle of birth and death.
                Among the pine trees and arrowroot vines,
                the light of the moon illuminates all.
                Diligently enter the true meditation of the Patriarchs.

— Here’s another of the questions that Daehaeng Kun Sunim was asked. It’s quite nice because she clearly emphasizes where the focus of where our practice needs to be. I’ve highlighted a few of the really important points.
 
 
I’m trying to become a more spiritual person, and would like to know about spiritual practice and sitting meditation. 

Just physically sitting down is not the way to practice Zen, because spiritual practice is done through your mind, not through your body.  In this age, when people’s lives are so busy, our living itself– eating, working, driving, loving, sleeping – should all become practicing Zen. If sitting meditation were the only way to know your fundamental mind, there could be no more practice once you stood up.

A long time ago, when Ma-tsu was sitting in meditation, Zen master Huai-jang saw him, picked up a piece of roof tile, and began to polish it. Ma-tsu asked, “Why are you polishing a tile?” Huai-jang replied, “I’m polishing it into a mirror.” (In that age, mirrors were made out of polished bronze.)  Huai-jang then asked Ma-tsu why he was sitting there.  Ma-tsu answered, “I’m trying to become a Buddha.”  Huai-jang replied, “Then, you shouldn’t stand up, you shouldn’t eat, and you shouldn’t go to the toilet!  Otherwise, your practice will stop as soon as you move your body!” Ma-tsu awakened as soon as he heard this. The Buddha also tried practicing through his body for six years, but then realized that practice should be done through mind.

What is spiritual practice? What is Zen? It’s having faith in your foundation, and entrusting everything to it and observing the results — while living your normal daily life.  Have you noticed what happens after a car accident?  The drivers stand around arguing about whose fault it was.  No matter whose fault it was, the drivers were the cause, not the cars.

Likewise, our fundamental mind, not our body, is the source of our every word and deed. Your fundamental mind is the driver; it can take care of every thing and guide you in your daily life.  In other words, the driver is taking care of every thing and resolving every problem in your life, so entrust everything to your fundamental mind and live smoothly.

Who makes you think, talk, and move? You may think it is obvious: “I do.”  But is that “I” the one that caused you to be born into this world?  Is that “I” responsible for your birth and death? W hat is responsible for the birth and death of every other being in this world? It is not the sense of “I” that you tend to think of as yourself. It is your true self, which is doing everything.  When you realize this truth, you can leave behind thoughts like “He did that to me,” “I’m doing…,” “I did…,” “I deserve….”  By the way, always view things positively.  If you keep interpreting things negatively or always criticize and blame others, this will lower your own spiritual level.

When you live with faith in your true self, which is taking care of every thing in your life, then your life itself becomes practicing Zen. You can practice while sitting, or if you are busy, you can practice while working or driving, and you can even practice while lying down: all of this is practicing Zen. Sitting meditation, standing meditation, lying- down meditation, and working meditation are not different.

No matter what you do in your daily life, if you believe in your true self, and entrust everything to it, you are practicing meditation. There is nothing in life that is not the cultivation of mind. So you should not think that practicing Zen and learning Buddhism are separate from your daily life.  Not ever!

Entrust all things to your true self. Then your daily life itself becomes practicing Zen. In everything you undertake, you should trust your true self to solve the problems you face and know that only it can lead you in the right direction.  This is the way to develop unwavering faith, to direct your attention inwardly, and to take refuge in your true self. If the thoughts of “I,” “me,” and “mine” die at every moment, then even though you do not sit down, everything you do becomes practicing meditation. 
 

 Here in Korea, the Buddhists take the Christmas holidays in good spirit, and when talking about Jesus, occasionally say Yesu Bosalnim: The Bodhisattva Jesus.

The general feeling is that there are a lot of teachings by Jesus that one couldn’t go wrong with. It may not be the direct path to enlightenment and Nirvana, but if one did his or her best to apply them, one would certainly become a blessing for those around them. 

Nor would they have to worry too much about what would happen to them after death. For kindness will naturally be attracted to kindness, generosity to generosity. If your mind/heart is broad and generous, it will naturally be drawn to such places and people. Unfortunately, if it’s cold and narrow, that’s the sort of place that will also feel most like home.

So the efforts we make are never in vain. Nothing is ever wasted. 

Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.  For everyone who asks receives; those who seek find; and to those who knock, the door will be opened. (Matthew 7: 7-8)

 
 
  Merry Christmas and a happy New Year from everyone at Wake Up and Laugh! 
 
 
 
 Images: These actually started out as Christmas cards. The top one is from Japan, by way of Marcus, and the second is by an artist living in Thailand, Nancy Chandler (www.nancychandler.net)