• Deep Spring Temple: 124 Willow Ridge Road Sewickley, PA 15143 (map)
• Mattress Factory: 505 Jacksonia Way Pittsburgh, PA 15212 (directions)
  
• Zen Friends: 4836 Ellsworth Avenue Pittsburgh, PA 15213 (map)
  

• Buddhist Studies Class: Saturdays, April 3, 10 & 17; 8:30am-10:00am
• This is a continuation of the series that began in January.
• Everyone is welcome to join this class as we continue our way through the Song of the Precious Mirror Samadhi, which we chant every other morning as part of our morning service.
• Download a copy of the text for the class. It is an 84-page Adobe PDF and 6MB in size.
• Free to pledging members. All others: $50 for the series of six classes.

• Buddha's Birthday: Sunday, April 4; 9:00am-noon
  • This celebration of the Buddha's birthday features a special ceremony where a representation of the Buddha as a baby is bathed in sweet tea.
  • This is observed on April 8th each year in Japan.
    
  • An open discussion of Zen practice follows the ceremony.

• Work Day: Saturday, April 10; 10:00am - 4:30pm (following class)
  
  • Please join us for morning Zazen and breakfast beginning at 5:30am.
  • Work on the temple grounds to welcome Spring and warmer weather begins at 10:00am.
  • There will be a variety of work for all who would like to pitch in and any help throughout the day will be greatly appreciated.
    
  • An informal vegetarian lunch will be provided.
  • Please email Kyoki to let her know when you will join us so we can plan accordingly: kyoki@deepspringzen.org.

• Zen Drawing/Zen Seeing Class: Saturday, April 24; 8:30am-4:30pm
  • Sangha member and graphic designer Dan Kendgia will lead this one day class that will include a brief introduction to Zen meditation followed by drawing and seeing Instruction. The day will focus on a specific technique of line drawing which connects our eyes and our hands as we relearn how to see.
  • The class is open to all; no previous experience with meditation or art is required.
  • A vegetarian lunch will be provided.
  • Drawing tools will be supplied. Suggested donation: $50. Click to register.
    

• Precept Renewal (Ryaku Fusatsu): Tuesday, April 27; 6:00-7:00pm
  • This evening of the full moon ceremony offers practitioners an opportunity to renew their commitment to the sixteen Bodhisattva precepts. All are welcome to attend!
  • Read more about Ryaku Fusatsu here.

• Wednesday evening zazen; 6:00pm-7:15pm. Friends Meeting House (map).

• Tuesday morning zazen; 7:00am-7:40pm. Mattress Factory (map).

Last month I wrote about the difficulties that arise with mind when we first receive instructions for zazen (Zen meditation). I suggested that if we are able to take a good posture, allow thoughts, sensations, and emotions to arise, and then to let them go, we might just notice the space that exists between these thoughts. Noticing this, perhaps curiosity might arise as to what is actually happening with mind. Very deliberately, without any explanation of why, the Zen teacher gives the new student a process to explore what it means to be a human being. This month I would like to look at the intention a Zen teacher might have for asking a student to sit zazen in the first place.

None of us has to go very far to run into people who are really struggling with their lives. Job loss, divorce, death of a loved one, and so many of life's difficulties can give rise to depression, anxiety, and anger. How many of us chase after the fancy car, the better house, the younger spouse? We have spent a lifetime of pushing away what we don't want and greedily seeking out the things we just have to have. Next time you make a major purchase, watch the mind justify why you need it. And then notice how long the euphoria of the new purchase lasts before reality sets in and we need something else. We are addicted to entertaining ourselves. The Zen teacher knows that the best way to understand that mind is to sit quietly and just let mind work all by itself. Since you and your mind are not separate, you experience your own nature-the nature of greed, of anger, of fear and of course, the nature of joy and peace too. We just might "wake-up"; in fact, the act of sitting zazen is waking up.

What does it mean to "wake-up"? One could define this as fully engaging¹ in the present moment bringing both compassion and wisdom to bear. By "fully engaging" we drop the concept of an other than self, and we drop the concept of a self that is separate from the activity at hand.² "Compassion" means sympathy for the suffering of others, often including a desire to help. "Wisdom" would mean that we are not creating the sense of "other" in this activity. Thus, waking up has something to do with a complete entering into this moment³, bringing an inherent wisdom of interconnectedness⁴, a deep understanding of why we suffer with our lives, and the absolute intention for the well-being of all concerned. As human beings we cut the world into pieces-trees, spouse, earth, food, enemy, friend. As awakening human beings we are experiencing the world without doing this! Fortunately, there are no fixed or permanent states of mind such as delusion, greed, anger, fear, or depression. Alas, the mind of awakening is also not fixed or permanent. Thus, it behooves us to continually aspire to waking up moment-to-moment.⁵

The role of the Zen teacher then, is to teach awakening. It is only the awakening mind that ends the suffering in life. The primary teaching methodology is by displaying one's own understanding, but a Zen teacher has some other tools in her (his) tool belt as well. We'll look at some of those next month.

1. I use the participle of the verb "engage" to create a sense of dynamic activity

2. Dogen, the thirteenth century Japanese monk responsible for introducing Soto Zen Buddhism to Japan, called this "body-mind dropped away". Current medical and psychological models are now talking about training in "mindfulness". If we only bring "mindfulness" to the activity at hand, we could very mindfully kill human beings, kick dogs, and smack our children. Wisdom and compassion must also be included.
   

3. It is important to understand that "moment" here is not referring to a point in time but rather is the activity at hand or a dynamic functioning. Awakened activity is not bound by our sensory inputs or a limited conceptualization of time and space.

4. "Interconnectedness" is seeing the entire universe as one body. Different parts of our universe-body might have different aptitudes and activities, but all parts are required for existence. Our hand doesn't exist separately from our lungs.
   

5. If we are all interconnected and functioning as one body, who is it that wakes up? Could delusive mind and awakening mind, both be part of Mind and if so, to what are we aspiring?

• Please check out the latest edition of Prairie Wind Online, the quarterly newsletter offered by Abbot Rev. Nonin Chowaney.
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