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.

Zen Flow

Here are a few lines from Master Sengcan's dharma poem "Trust in Mind" (Xinxinming).

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

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 in my opinion. As in hold tightly. Sometimes death grip tightly.

When I first read this line, I thought it meant don't have any opinions about anything. Which reminds me of a former sangha member who ran for Mayor several years ago. He went door to door talking to people about his campaign. When they'd ask him what he stood for, he said "I don't have an agenda, other than what the people tell me." When they'd press further about specific plans, he'd say "I don't have any fixed plans. I'm listening to the people first." Needless to say, he didn't get many votes.

In some ways, it was kind of amazing that he went into the community offering to be a mirror for the rest of us. Politicians always claim to represent "everyone," but they never do. Primarily because it's impossible, but also because the vast majority of them are beholden in some manner or another to special interest elites. Whatever mirroring of everyday folks they do is mostly extra, carrots in exchange for votes and/or doing something to appease their uneasy consciences.

Anyway, one of the themes I see in Master Sengcan's poem is flow. Being able to flow in the absolute and relative realms. Not getting caught by either emptiness or concrete things and experiences.

So, having opinions, even strong ones, isn't the issue. But is there flow and openness? Are you able to enter into situations, express yourself clearly, do what needs to be done, and then move on?

Of course "moving on" sometimes involves repetition or slight revision. Conversations about race and racism tend to be like that for example. But even there, in the heat of all that karmic collective muck, you can find spaciousness. Not easy, but it's possible.

"With a single stroke we are freed from bondage;
Nothing clings to us and we hold to nothing.
All is empty, clear, self-illuminating..."

What is the single stroke? What is the truth of this moment? We don't need to withhold ourselves to be mirrors for each other.

For the Love of Zen Diamonds

"All existence is like a dream, a phantasm, a reflection. Even though you are seeing it and touching it, it has no actual substance. I'll give you a concrete example. An electric news screen ... When you look at it from afar, it certainly seems like those letters are flowing, but when you go up close and look at it, it is just some light bulbs going on and off, and there is not a single flowing letter." Hakuun Yasutani, on Dogen's Genjokoan.

The first sentence in the quote is a reference to the final words of the Diamond Sutra, also known as the Diamond that Cuts Through Illusion Sutra. Among other things, it's a deep calling to wake up to the impermanence of this life, and to cut through the view that you, and everything else, has a solid, unchanging self.

Think of how a diamond can cut glass, how strong it is after all those years in the earth being formed. And then, think of using your mind like a diamond whenever a story arises about something in your life, anything really - but especially those stories that hook you into troubling places. You know, the ones that go something like "I did X, and so I'm a terrible person" or "I did Y, so I'm the best person ever." Or some other variation. It doesn't even need to be about yourself particularly. Many of us have strong stories about politics, or religion, or some other topic. You can use your diamond mind on those too, cutting through the muck to express the heart of the matter.

In the same chapter of Yasutani's commentary, he writes "One must realize that in a single day one passes through this change about six and half billion times." In other words, there is constant arising and falling away of life - and every label we put on whatever is happening can't capture it.

But this doesn't mean words are useless, that there's no meaning, and that we should just give up because it's all impermanent anyway. No, we need to think, to speak, to act, to live.

The commentary above is calling us to develop a continuous openness to our lives and the world around us. To drop off our seemingly endless efforts to find and claim some sustainable bit of solid ground.

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.