Letting Your Opinions Fly Like Birds

We humans tend to cherish our opinions. Sometimes, we'll do anything to either protect them or make them known in the world. It can get so bad that people will destroy relationships and even kill each other over their differences.

It doesn't have to be this way.

"If you wish to see the truth,
then hold no opinions for or against anything."

"Trust in Mind" (Xinxinming), Zen Master Seng Ts'an

Having no opinions at all about anything is the opposite of being strongly opinionated. And on the surface, it appears that these lines are directing us to have no opinions. Which really isn't a much better position.

However, that's not what the poet is advocating here.

Take a look at those first words - "If you wish to see the truth." How often do you truly wish to see the truth? And how often do you do anything in your power to turn away from it?

This line seems to point at the choice that's required of each of us in every moment to want to see the truth. We have to aim ourselves in the right direction. Or, more accurately, allow ourselves to be aimed in the right direction by life itself. If we're too busy being obstructionists, or propping up arguments about ourselves and others, there's no room for the truth to seep in.

In the second part of the line, the word "hold" stands out. Recently, I was in a conversation about politics, and felt myself holding tightly to my particular opinion. I noticed how that tightness manifested in my shoulders and lower back, and how the guy I was talking with seemed to be mirroring me - tightening around his own opinion. So, I decided to pull back, and let go of the point I was trying to make. We continued to talk, and I fairly quickly experienced an uncoiling of that tightness as breath calmed, and my need to be right diminished.

This letting go didn't mean I gave up what I thought and went along with his view. It meant that I stopped trying to control the outcome of the conversation, and allowed our differences to be present in the same space.

How can you treat all opinions like this? Let them be birds, floating across the mind's landscape: accessible, able to be conveyed, but also free to pass on through at any time. If you do so, it's more likely that whatever truth contained within will be able to come forth and shine.

One Way to Let Go of Your Attachment to an Identity

Photo credit: clarita from morguefile.com

I originally wrote this post a few years ago, but find it's message still very relevant. Enjoy!

I walked into a coffee shop I hang out at a bit in downtown St. Paul. Among the folks in there was what I've come to term "the family." Over the last ten years or so, I've found myself in the company of this couple and their increasing number of children on dozens of occasions.

The scene is always the same. The children, in various states of unkemptness, run wild, while the man, older and dominant in a quiet sort of way, pontificates to his younger wife about some Bible passage. He frequently takes shots at all organized churches, and includes them among Satan's work. Meanwhile, for a long time, I wondered if the children were even getting home schooled, given how little they seemed to be able to read, write, or interact socially.

So, there they were doing there thing today. I sat down, and the guy sitting behind me starts leaving a message on the phone about a Bible study session. For a moment, I thought "Man, you're surrounded," then let it drop.

Over the years, I've struggled to not run a litany of judgments through my mind about that couple and their kids. Until a month ago, I'd never said a single word to any of them. Then the wife turned to me, as I was working on a blog post, and said "Aren't you that guy who goes to that Buddhist place?" I said I was and she looked at me, paused, and then said "I always found it funny that people would worship a guy who isn't a God." I smiled because it probably is funny from the outside, what we Buddhists are doing.

I'd forgotten that exchange this morning as I sat down and opened my laptop. As the couple gathered their children and started to leave, I was reading a post on someone else's blog. For some reason, I looked up just as the wife said "I'm wondering if ..." (short pause) "if you'd ever consider being challenged on you views?" Now, in the past, I probably would have been interested in such a debate. To prove that I could stand up as a Buddhist, even if the discussion went nowhere. However, as she said those words, I just thought "Life's too short for this." So, instead of engaging, I just said "I don't think it would be worth our time." And she nodded, stepped back, and said "Everyone has free will." And walked out.

The guy behind me, who was reading a passage in the Book of Romans (he'd said as much in the phone message he left), says "Do you know that woman?"

"Barely," I said, not knowing how else to explain this odd connection we'd had over the years.

"What was that all about?" he said. And I sat for a moment, wondering if telling him what it was about would just open up the same issue I had just cut off.

"We could have a long discussion about it, but it probably wouldn't be worth it."

He laughed a little at that, and said something about how that had been an odd exchange between her and I. I agreed, and then he went back to his Bible, and I to my blog. Which is where I am now, no less worn for wear.

"Throwing Away" the Oppressions of Old

In his commentary on Dogen's Genjokoan, Hakuun Yasutani writes:

What is essential is to throw away one's own views and oneself. To throw away all one's acquired affectations, which are the knowledge and experience accumulated since birth, to become a pure white sheet of paper, and to bring oneself in accord with the teachings of the buddhas and ancestors.

What is this business of "throwing away"? It's not about rejecting yourself, nor is it about getting rid of something, although maybe there will be a dissipation of certain things. Take the heaviness that accompanies everything that "I" hold on to, cling to as my own. You can't throw that away. When you've gotten tired of gripping tightly to whatever it is you're fixed to, the air will simply leak out, like from a tire, until it is empty and "gone."

Let's move into the garden for a moment. When a plant dies, it's body decays and goes back into the soil, providing nourishment for the next generation of plants - that is, if we allow it to do so. How often do we rip out "weeds," bag them up, and send them with the trash to wherever it is the trash is going? It's all a little too tidy right here for the time being, and yet the stuff has to go somewhere. This is not just about the garden; this is your life too! The words "throwing away" may not be the best translation, at least for us in the "West." Neither is the word "pure" maybe, which plays right into that desire to keep everything neat and clean at all costs, forgetting that the lotus blooms out of the mud, not out of sterile soil.

It's essential to let go of that which has passed, that which is, in the relative world, dead. If the tomato plant has birthed its fruit and withered, nothing I can do will bring it back. And if I try to hang on, I end up missing its current suchness, what it is right now: a decaying body ready to break back into the soil.

I'd like to apply all of this to our society. Today is December 21st, 2012. A day numerous people have claimed big things for. Apocalyptic things. Grand spiritual prophecy things. It's almost over, and nothing of the sort has clearly come to pass.

And yet, perhaps it's more like the tire of our old culture is draining. The grip on things like capitalism, colonialism, and various forms of oppression are slowly weakening. Slowly being "thrown away" by folks who spent lifetimes accumulating them.

May you all be well this Solstice day.

A Thought on Trust in Mind

I pulled out Zen Master Seng Ts'an's dharma poem "Trust in Mind" (Xinxinming) again. Here's a line that caught me:

"If you wish to see the truth,
then hold no opinions for or against anything."

"Trust in Mind" (Xinxinming), Zen Master Seng Ts'an

Take a look at those first words - "If you wish to see the truth." How often do you truly wish to see the truth? And how often do you do anything in your power to turn away from it?

This line seems to point at the choice that's required of each of us in every moment to want to see the truth. We have to aim ourselves in the right direction - or, more accurately, allow ourselves to be aimed in the right direction by life itself. If we're too busy being obstructionists, propping up sham arguments about ourselves and others, there's no room for the truth to seep in.

In the second part of the line, the word "hold" stands out. Recently, I was in a conversation about politics, and felt myself holding tightly to my particular opinion. I noticed how that tightness manifested in my shoulders and lower back, and how the guy I was talking with seemed to be mirroring me - tightening around his own opinion. So, I decided to pull back, and let go of the point I was trying to make. We continued to talk, and I fairly quickly experienced an uncoiling of that tightness as breath calmed, and my need to be right diminished.

How to treat all opinions like this? Let them be birds, floating across the mind's landscape: accessible, able to be conveyed, but also free to pass on through at any time.

Grasping to Let Go

I have heard many times others teaching that grasping at things is, according to Buddhism, the cause of suffering. In the Sandokai, a staple teaching in many Zen sanghas, there is even the line Grasping at things is surely delusion. I can imagine many of you have a negative view of grasping as it occurs in your life. You'd like to diminish it's power over you, or maybe even destroy grasping all together. Last Sunday, our head teacher introduced a koan I had heard once before, and I found myself grasping for some kind of understanding of it. It befuddled me completely. But really, none of us need a koan to feel the intensity, stickiness, and icky feeling of grasping. Food. Sex. Comfort. Ease. I've grasped for all of those. I can imagine you have too.

Grasping is an interesting word. A noun and an adjective, it has several related, but not exactly similar meanings.

In adjective form, it points to desiring to acquire, to excessive wanting of wealth and/or material possessions.

In noun form, there are the following meanings:

1. gripping something tightly with one's hands

2. the activity of managing or exerting control over something

3. understanding with difficulty or after some difficulty

Other than noun definition number three, which maybe resonates with how many Buddhist practitioners experience their lives and practice out there, grasping sounds like trouble. however, I came across the following teaching from the Alagaddupama Sutta that speaks of grasping in a different manner, suggesting that we need to learn how to grasp rightly in order to awaken in this life.

Here is the Buddha speaking to a group a monks:

"Suppose there were a man needing a water-snake, seeking a water-snake, wandering in search of a water-snake. He would see a large water-snake and grasp it by the coils or by the tail. The water-snake, turning around, would bite him on the hand, on the arm, or on one of his limbs, and from that cause he would suffer death or death-like suffering. Why is that? Because of the wrong-graspedness of the water-snake. In the same way, there is the case where some worthless men study the Dhamma... Having studied the Dhamma, they don't ascertain the meaning of those Dhammas with their discernment. Not having ascertained the meaning of those Dhammas with their discernment, they don't come to an agreement through pondering. They study the Dhamma both for attacking others and for defending themselves in debate. They don't reach the goal for which [people] study the Dhamma. Their wrong grasp of those Dhammas will lead to their long-term harm & suffering. Why is that? Because of the wrong-graspedness of the Dhammas.

"But then there is the case where some clansmen study the Dhamma... Having studied the Dhamma, they ascertain the meaning of those Dhammas with their discernment. Having ascertained the meaning of those Dhammas with their discernment, they come to an agreement through pondering. They don't study the Dhamma either for attacking others or for defending themselves in debate. They reach the goal for which people study the Dhamma. Their right grasp of those Dhammas will lead to their long-term welfare & happiness. Why is that? Because of the right-graspedness of the Dhammas.

"Suppose there were a man needing a water-snake, seeking a water-snake, wandering in search of a water-snake. He would see a large water-snake and pin it down firmly with a cleft stick. Having pinned it down firmly with a forked stick, he would grasp it firmly by the neck. Then no matter how much the water-snake might wrap its coils around his hand, his arm, or any of his limbs, he would not from that cause suffer death or death-like suffering. Why is that? Because of the right-graspedness of the water-snake. In the same way, there is the case where some clansmen study the Dhamma... Having studied the Dhamma, they ascertain the meaning of those Dhammas with their discernment. Having ascertained the meaning of those Dhammas with their discernment, they come to an agreement through pondering. They don't study the Dhamma either for attacking others or for defending themselves in debate. They reach the goal for which people study the Dhamma. Their right grasp of those Dhammas will lead to their long-term welfare & happiness. Why is that? Because of the right-graspedness of the Dhammas. [6]

The sutra goes on to introduce the famous simile of the raft, the view that we ride the dharma across the river and then, not needing it anymore, we can let it go.

Translator Thanissaro Bhikkhu writes:

Many a casual reader has concluded from the simile of the raft simply that the Dhamma is to be let go. In fact, one major Mahayana text — the Diamond Sutra — interprets the raft simile as meaning that one has to let go of the raft in order to cross the river. However, the simile of the water-snake makes the point that the Dhamma has to be grasped; the trick lies in grasping it properly. When this point is then applied to the raft simile, the implication is clear: One has to hold onto the raft properly in order to cross the river. Only when one has reached the safety of the further shore can one let go.

It's interesting: in studying the Diamond Sutra with my sangha recently, I never got the sense it was saying we had to let go in the way he says. Maybe I missed it; that's certainly a possibility.

Anyway, for those of us who are practicing or are influenced by Zen, I think it's really easy to read the teachings of the Zen ancestors and conclude that a line like "grasping at things is surely delusion" is the definitive teaching to live one's life by.

Well, as Suzuki Roshi said, "Not Always So."

So, let's look at a rather mundane example of this. You want comfort, right. You want to feel that everything is not only ok, but that it feels "good" somehow. Now, think about it. If you immediately leap to "I shouldn't grasp," then you might be bypassing the opportunity to fully understand what comfort looks like, feels like, tastes like. In other words, you might abandoned the raft before you cross the river, and because you have let go too early, you end up drowning in suffering and confusion later.

Here's the thing: grasping is delusion. And yet it's only through our delusions that we awaken and are liberated. Right?

So, I believe the Buddha is trying to tell us not to shun, bypass, abandon the stories of our lives too early. We have to have patience in other words, something I sometimes do well, and other times not so much.

I've read a lot of stuff about staying with the appearing, intensifying, and disappearing of emotions in the body. A lot of "western" convert Buddhists take these teachings to heart, myself included.

And yet, life is more than emotions, and Buddhist practice is more than just refraining from everything that causes suffering.

In fact, it might be that we have to do a lot of sloppy grasping in order to learn to grasp rightly so that we can let go. Sounds crazy, doesn't it?

In What or Where do You Take Refuge?

Katie from over at the blog Kloncke has been doing a series of really engaging posts over at the feminist blog Feministe. Her current post asks the question "Where do you take refuge?" She begins with the Three Treasures of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, but then, given the diversity of her audience over there, extends refuge into more everyday things like dancing, spending time with a pet or a good friend, things like this.

Here's a little more of her post to consider:

Hopefully, our refuge will not be a means of escaping our suffering, but of engaging it from a different angle, which aids the process of letting go. Sue Nhim described this release beautifully just today on an earlier thread here:

this states so clearly what I have been feeling for the past few months, where before I denied that harm was done to me and yet I suffered, and then I accepted that I was harmed and still suffered, and now I understand that just because I was harmed/ damaged doesn’t mean that I have to suffer and hold on to my anxiety and anger, I can just let that go. It doesn’t negate the fact that I was harmed or mean that I should just ignore it, but it happened and what I can do to win is to not suffer and go on, wiser happier better. My mom calls it a state of grace, all I know is that it doesn’t hurt to go outside anymore.

So where do you take refuge? What are your best tools for letting go of suffering?

I can imagine many of us would quickly respond something like "Oh, I take refuge in the three treasures. Or I take refuge in my meditation practice." These are true for me. And yet I'm interested in what you all might have to add to those two. Or what Katie's questions mean to you.