It’s important to understand that the spiritual life and the religious life are two different things.

The Spiritual Life

The spiritual life is always an interior life. It is a universally known, protracted series of ecstasies and ecstatic visions, experienced during the state of meditation. By definition, then, there is no ego consciousness involved in any of the experiences.

The spiritual life is not contrived in any way.

Although it exists in potential form in every human being, as a pupa in a little chromosomal cocoon; many people will never see it emerge in its butterfly splendor. Not every human being gets to experience mystical transcendence, and those who do rarely care to discuss it.

Since it is beyond the ken of ego-consciousness, it must be experienced to be understood. Worse, not only do people fail to understand what they are told, they have a peculiar resistance to the information and will not hesitate to dismiss the narrative as fanciful, absurd, and even heretical.

The Religious Life

The religious life, regardless of any spiritual experience, is exterior to the point of advertising itself: parochial schools; distinctive temples; ceremonies and festivities; the raiment of hierarchical rank; garments and adornments that identify the laymen as a follower of the religion – prayer beads, special headdresses, and jewelry that displays a symbol associated with the religion. Prayers – openly said at meals, at the ringing of the Angelus or to the call of the Muezzim – also indicate the individual’s religious affiliation. Genetic endowment is irrelevant except as it indicates family relationship. People tend to follow the religion into which they are born.

The spiritual life, then, being independent of cultural organization, has a commonality which renders it approachable from any religious base. Since visionary experiences vary little among the world’s cultures, it is as if the characters, plot, and setting constitute a drama that can be translated into any language.

 

Written by Ming Zhen Shakya in collaboration with Master Yin Zhao Shakya & Fa Jun Shakya, Assault on the Summit. Zatma, Order of Hsu Yun. Painting of Ming Zhen Shakya by Fa Ming Shakya of the Order of Hsu Yun in Romania. We are grateful for both teachings.

I Looked Too Hard for Things That Aren’t There

by Yin Kai Shakya, Zen Buddhist Priest Order of Hsu Yun

‘Avalokiteshvara
while practicing deeply with
the Insight that Brings Us to the Other Shore,
suddenly discovered that
all of the five Skandhas are equally empty,
and with this realization
he overcame all ill-being.’

‘Listen Sariputra,
this Body itself is Emptiness
and Emptiness itself is this Body.
This Body is not other than Emptiness
and Emptiness is not other than this Body.
The same is true of Feelings,
Perceptions, Mental Formations,
and Consciousness.’
-The Heart Sutra Thich Nhat Hanh

The greatest thing the late Ming Zhen Shakya taught me was the importance of living in a productive, fulfilling way in daily life. This teaching helped me overcome my tendency to cling to metaphysical thinking. Eventually it became the vehicle for my ongoing awakening. I owe her a tremendous debt of gratitude for it!

Like so many others, I “looked too hard for things that aren’t there” not only in my spiritual practice, but also in life. And after finding nothing, I abandoned the superfluous “looking” altogether. Allow me to illustrate with several antidotes from my daily life.

At Work

I had a challenging day at work. It was one of those days where there were several things on my To-Do list. While working diligently to complete every last item on the list, in a timely and efficient manner, my boss, without warning, calls and tells me to drop everything immediately.

The Executive VP needs something done and he needs it to be done now!
You know what I mean, an urgent request with an alarming deadline followed by the inevitable question, ‘can you make this happen before the end of the day?’ My answer? Well, my answer is always yes, maybe a bit quixotic but still a yes. It comes from my desire to do my best and to do it on time.

And heaven, by god I soldiered through it and delivered the goods with enough time left over for my boss to review the work. Before he handed it off to the executives he made sure that human beings would actually be able to decipher it.

Voila! It was on time and it worked. Yahoo!

At Home

By the end of the day when good-old Miller Time came around, I went outside, sat down in one of our big, plastic Adirondack chairs on the porch, cracked-open a cold one, and watched my dog frolic in the yard.

Sure, it was a challenging day, with unreasonable deadlines, but I got the job done and enjoyed the feeling of accomplishment. As I sat outside in my chair, watching my dog chase the squirrels that are forever zigzagging and whizzing by her, I thought, I worked hard today. We can pay the rent, and am enjoying a rest in my backyard where I imagined my twins to come will play. I felt good.

When Miller Time was over, I went back inside to cook gumbo for me and my wife, and our two babies who are growing inside her tummy. That took me from feeling good, to feeling great (it always does).

On Facebook®

After dinner my wife and I retired to the living room sofa, to relax and catch-up on what we’d missed on Facebook® while we were both at work.

That’s when I went from feeling great to feeling like I wanted to choke people.
A friend of mine had posted a link to an article on Vice.com, entitled “Millennials On Spirit Quests Are Ruining Everything About Ayahuasca” and it caught my eye as I scrolled-through my newsfeed. I should’ve just chuckled and continued on, but I didn’t. Nope. Like a jackass, I clicked on it and started reading. I won’t go too deeply into the details of the article here, I’ll just give the premise and leave it at that-

Apparently, upwardly-mobile young adults who feel unfulfilled in their lives are traveling to South America to hang out with Native Peoples and drink the hallucinogenic brew Ayahuasca, with the hopes of having spiritual visions. This, in-turn, has brought a lot of unwanted attention to the afore-mentioned Native Peoples, and such attention is becoming a threat to their culture.

Like Cain, the anger rose up, and from that anger I formulated a comment which I left on my friend’s post. It read something like this-

“What’s this vision quest bullshit? Really? These people need a vision quest? What sheer stupidity! Let me tell you something. There is nothing, nothing more to life than working hard, raising your family right, exercising, and fly fishing (or whatever task you prefer to master). If you’re looking for anything more out of life than that you’re a rube, because it doesn’t exist. Period. Full-stop.”

Ugh! I know, the less a man makes declarative statements the less likely he is to look foolish in retrospect. But as no one fully understands the workings of karma I was blessed with an experience while washing the dishes not long after I’d posted the comment.

In the Kitchen Holy Place

It’s no accident that I enjoy spending time in the kitchen, cooking and cleaning. I suppose I could be described as “Old School” in the sense that yes, I believe the old adage that “a man’s home is his castle,” but I take it to include my wife and my forthcoming twins. I do my very best to make it our castle. But there’s one stipulation: The kitchen is where my best Dharma work is done. This translates into the kitchen is my holy place.

It’s where everything is cooked up, eaten, washed, dried and put into place. It’s a place of refuge where my consciousness is cooked, chewed, washed, dried and put straight. It’s a mortar and pestle where cause and effect, karma, and the whole universe are ground down and changed in the ordinariness of cooking, eating, and cleaning.

Everything is fine, there.

Those words came to me, after I finished doing the dishes, while I stood there looking at the clean countertops and the empty sink, which all seemed to glow in absolute perfection in the evening sunlight which beamed through my kitchen window. I knew the sink wasn’t perfect because I washed all the dishes that were in there, and the countertop wasn’t perfect because I wiped it clean.

I saw they were perfect because washing the dishes washed me off, and wiping-off the countertop wiped me clean.

I stood there, giddy…giggling as the experience occurred.

My consciousness, indeed, me, arises just the same as dirty dishes arise from cooking and serving dinner. And for some ineffable reason, this realization makes me suffer less, and gives me a deeply-abiding peace and joyfulness unlike
anything I’ve ever felt.

Zen, lovely in its inherent simplicity, gives everything in the here-and-now to experience this joy. The beloved Heart Sutra is a lens to contemplate and follow the Eight-Fold Path in a life in-which to practice.

What more is needed?

Nothing.

Equanimity comes from the experience of keenly discerning that without dirty dishes and dirty countertops, a clean kitchen cannot exist, and if your kitchen is clean, sooner or later the need to eat, along with literally everything else, contributes to the arising of a dirty kitchen.

It’s life… and it’s all fine… this not looking for things that aren’t there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not Yet Still Life
By Yao Xiang Shakya

It began when the U.S. election polls suggested a visible drift upward towards selecting the most unlikely candidate for President; when the drift was confirmed in his conversations amongst his white male friends, John Robert Parker, a tall, dark, spindly man, decided it was time to move.

He had been watching the shifts for months seeing his bright hopes for change turn from small daubs of white into stronger, darkening colors of gray only to disappear into whiteout black. The shifts and drifts disheartened him and led to unprofitable outrage whenever he listened to the news.

It’s dismal. He thought, not recognizing his thoughts were subject to countless influences most of which were beyond his control. One thought, however, seemed to be outside the effect of these varying drifts leaving John Robert Parker with a more pleasing magnetism of great vigor.

‘I am moving.’

These three words seemed to make him stand up in an unfamiliar robust style. He seemed to be less swayed by the shifts and drifts and became more attuned and alert to the just noticeable differences between the washed out whites to dead stump black.

I am moving was a charm like no other. He’d often say it as a sworn statement. I am moving. It invigorated him. Right in the moment, in front of the array of the visible drifts, he’d at least think it, if not state it as a convincing truth of the future, ‘I am moving.’

The fact that he never began to pack or even look for a place to go didn’t seem to diminish the power of his assertion. It seemed the words in the face of the drifts touched some new unimaginable awareness within him. It was indescribable. ‘I am moving,’ was an affirmation that went beyond packing up and leaving town.

Anytime he heard an update on the polling numbers or hear friends count the days until their candidate won the election, John Robert affirmed ‘I am moving.’ Not once did these three words fail to lift his spirits even though he was out of work at the time. ‘I am moving’ saved him from the drifts as well as the doom of being unemployed and low on cash. In some absurd logic, the two exposures made perfect sense.

His friends, however, were eager to remind him he was known to be more of a short term worker and not one for the slogging routine required to secure a full time position. Whenever they pointed his history out to him, his belief in the power of saying ‘I am moving’ increased. Nothing seemed to overshadow the ability for it to save him from his previous dive into dismal despair. It became more and more meaningful to John Robert Parker to the point he thought he should share it with others. But before anyone got wind of his plans to preach the salvation value of ‘I am moving’ he heard on the news the following broadcast.

“Several super-sized jumbo jets suddenly lost altitude and are reported missing. There are reports the planes have crashed near the airport. We are waiting for confirmation.”

After hearing this news and during the time when everything went dark he forgot about his plans to save others. He looked out his window from his street level apartment for some sign. In the very near distance, along the horizon he saw what looked like soft shoots and funnels rising upward across the heavens.

In his calculation of time and space he estimated where the planes came down. I’m close…real close. The crash sites are close. Waiting in the dark seemed unacceptable. He set out on foot to locate the remains of the alleged fallen planes.

Without power the city was dark and silent except he heard the recurring sounds of sirens in the distance moving away from where he estimated the crash site was. With passing interest he wondered, Where are they going? But he dropped the thought of the others and turned in the direction of what he believed was the way to the shoots and funnels he saw from his apartment window.

After some time on foot he stopped and stood with his back to everyone and took a self portrait silhouette pose. He stood alone on a dirt mound facing the shimmering bright and darker shafts of light. Facing this display he lost all interest in the power of his three words, ‘I am moving.’

He leaned his spindly body weight to one side in a small effort to make some difference. It was all too much for him. It made him know he was unimportant. But what is? He screamed his new three words again and again.

But what is?

He felt lost, small…helpless by the enormity of it. He was brought up to see his shortness. He tried to encourage himself. He’d look and look again. Maybe he missed something? Maybe…just maybe there was more to it than the eye can see? He shifted his weight to the other leg. Again…no difference. He made an effort to stand erect and face what was there. His arms hung by his side. He sniffed the air into his tiny nostrils. He closed his eyes. He opened them. It was still there. He considered removing his clothes but shivered at the thought. He asked in his small silent voice, But what is?

It’s big, I tell you…real big, an unimaginable size. The blues, and grays, and blacks and whites, all of meteoric magnitude. And I tell you…I was just this far…this hairsbreadth distance from…I tell you I could touch it from where I stood. I was that close.

John Robert Parker raised his hand holding his thumb against the soft part of his index finger in a feeble attempt to show how close he was to seeing what it is.

The spiritual life is for you and others. It’s not owned by anyone, it is for you and me and everyone else. It’s not a secret—not something hidden. It’s not meant to stay hidden. It is there to be found, right under your nose.

But you might have a big blockhead in the way of finding what is there.

You see…

Spiritual life is to forget yourself and to make the Beloved the center of your heart.

How do you forget the self and make the Beloved the center of your heart?
Study yourself…then…forget yourself…then…everything comes to awaken you.
Put your mind on things above. Don’t stray off.
Take off your bag of goods from your back and empty it.

Here is a wonderful story that makes it clear how we go after the scents and smells and shapes of the ego and stray rather than stay with the Beloved. It is the story of Meghiya, a young aspiring monk who was given the task of staying with the Beloved morning, noon and night. His job was to sit beside the Beloved and just hang out there. Hard to imagine his good fortune going sour, but this young monk, like most of us, are wobbly disciples who are easily duped by cravings and ignorance. You see Meghiya was with the Beloved right where he was ….BUT…he wanted to go down by the water where he thought it would be nicer.

We are Meghiya, not in the literal sense of sitting by the mangroves in robes, barefooted and bald, but in the spiritual sense of being given an opportunity to be with the Beloved morning, noon and night…BUT…we want to go and get something we think is nicer.

We are wobbly disciples easily duped by cravings and ignorance.

The Truth is that the Beloved is present within our being, but we, like Meghiya go wandering off after a little while in search of something better that we believe will satisfy our craving for holiness (wholeness). We wander away and when we do, we suffer.

Dukkha, the pali word for dissatisfaction (suffering) refers to the axle hole of a wheel on an ox-driven cart as not being even or well-fitted to the axle. And when it is not fitted properly the ride becomes bumpy and the bumpiness leads to samsara or wandering in search of something else to properly fit the hole so the axle fits and the ride is smooth.

When we feel out of whack and off kilter we begin to desire something to make the ride better. Instead of looking at the desire we go after something to satisfy the desire.

Instead of studying the self to forget the self, we forget that our desires blind us (ignorance) to our cravings. When we begin to see how we get lost in dukkha and wander (samsara) away in search of satisfaction, we need not get discouraged. The Beloved is there, we’ve not been abandoned, but we have wandered off. There is dukkha and samsara but not failure. We followed some scheme of fabrications and got lost, and need to come back.

Turning around and coming back is part of practice. And it requires effort and strong determination sometimes more than when you first began to practice.

It helps to have tasted the Truth of the Beloved even if it is a little morsel of the Truth. We remember the taste of sugar, something sweet like chocolate and can even begin to salivate when we think of delicious chocolate. It is the same with the Beloved. If you have tasted the Truth even a little bit and recall it then it will help you make the effort to return.

How long does it take?

It takes as long as it takes.

Don’t give up.

Keep your nose to the ground and study yourself…then…forget yourself…let everything come to awaken.

Good luck.

 

From Ming Zhen Shakya…

I really don’t want to be remembered, because I don’t think I’ve done anything to be remembered for. I’d just like to die alone without others anxiously clustering round me being kind and loving, and taking down final words.

I’d like to be alone, and I’d like to be as much as possible forgotten.

I can see nothing in myself to admire. I can see the greatness of God to admire: I wouldn’t mind that being remembered: that God was so infinitely good to me, and right from the start, made me aware of what He was.

But that could make people wish that they’d had that too, whereas He comes to them in a completely different way.

No, I think best just to let me fall into the dust and go to Him.

 

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The above piece was written by Sister Wendy Beckett, a British Hermit & Consecrated Virgin. I read this piece to Ming Zhen Shakya while she was in hospice. Ming Zhen thought it said all that she would say as her last message on ZATMA and asked that it be posted after her death. Ming Zhen Shakya died last night, November 2016.

 

 

 

 

There is nothing I own,
Or will ever own.

Yet I reach out,
Convinced that I can,
Then wanting more.

On the prairie,
In the nearby wood,
The hard, black legged tick perches
Atop a single blade of grass.

It extends and opens its front legs wide,
Wanting and waiting to grasp a passerby.

This behavior is called questing.
It reflects an all consuming search.

The grasp of the tick brings disease
To the object of it desire
And often destruction to itself.

In my silence yesterday,
I saw myself perched on a stem,
My arms outstretched,
Wanting more.
More affirmation
More adoration,
More control.
More time.
More…..

My outstretched hands were not empty.
When I wait and want,
I often offer an exchange
Sometimes it is benign,
Sometimes it causes harm.
It always serves me first.

Why do I give in order to own that which I cannot?
Why the desire to own
Instead of embracing and examining
The joy of belonging?

Zhong Fen li Bao yu Di