Lost Coin Notes
March 22, 2011
 
The fall Lost Coin retreat is planned for October  6th through 10th in Northern California (Thursday through Monday).
There may also be a one day retreat in San Francisco in late spring or summer.
 
To understand the essence of Buddhism – whatever form it is in – is to forget the self – that is the application and power. Sitting is a practice of forgetting the self. The samurai had to forget the self and just become a fighting machine. When the tea masters made tea – they just became the process of making the tea. Doen thinks that Maizumi Roshi was an English literature major. He would talk about Shakespeare – how Shakespeare could take on any character. Darwin observed that the species that can adapt that survives. Adaptability is the same as forgetting the self.
 
We actually forget the self all the time. If someone walks from one point the other – we see someone in a black jacket, a plate of cheese, our own foot – the mind becomes the thing focused on – the self was never localized. We all have a beautiful mind that reflects anything you put in front of it. To see that reality, we work on the koan Mu – it has never been any other way – we just need to realize it. Your mind naturally becomes the object. It happens all the time – but we won’t go all the way with it.
 
There is a trantric practice that is the quickest way to realization – but dangerous. The practice actually visualizes a deity and forgets the self to be the deity. In a modern sense – if a runner images themselves as a great runner it will change them. All the practices - being the breath, Mu, etc., those are exercise to forget the self.  In koan study you forget the self and become a grain of sand, ship etc.
 
Student question – how is that different than I AM?
 
I AM – stops conditioning right away and is good for action.
 
Forgetting the self – the mind of no abode – not localized – doesn’t settle anywhere – expansive oceanic - doesn’t mean it isn’t focused – as you forget the self more and more, things become more fuzzy – you look at a tree and don’t know what it is or life or death.   When you empty your mind that space gets filled with everything.   In forgetting the self you see the absolute and that is the road to freedom.
 
Practice them both
 
Doen is writing a story about a guy in Mexico  - he has to  become the characters to write about them –that is the power of the Way.
 
Doen has dated women who transformed themselves i to goddesses of love. People can step into that loving role in the early parts of a relationship – what does it? The participants like it enough to get into it. Or playing a good game of tennis – one can step into it – be in the zone – the name for it in athletics. We all always in the zone - but we are not willing to be in the zone. If you sit sit, stand stand, just don’t wobble. For whatever you d o– put your whole self into it – that is the method of Zen – to be the thing.
 
It happens all the time, and those that are modeling excellence are doing it all the time – the best athletes are doing it. This experience may come earlier to those who have trained to be athletes or musician– those folks are “trained” vs. if you have a more intellectual approach. But software engineers, once they get it, can engineer wonderful things.             
 
Making Love with Light by Daido Lori, combines photography with poetry. The style of photography – is to become the objects. He gets so close to rocks you forget what they are.