Buddhists on Twitter -THE TWANGHA!

I wasn't planning on posting this morning. I didn't really have too much to say but I came across Jaye's post over at digitalZENDO on the benefits and detriments of twitter in relation to Buddhist practice. That, plus the fact that I am presenting to the Library Board next week on the usefullness of twitter for expanding and marketing library services led me to want to reiterate a few of Jaye's points.

The expression, "Social Media," gets kicked around a lot, but what does that really mean? For me that's simple. Community. I live in an area where I'm very far away from actual Zen centers and temples. While I'm aware of a group that sits near by, it's like "theoretical physics zen," and I'm not really in to hyper-analytical posturing. That's not Zen. That's getting lost in the dark and you might not make it back.

The above being said is my motivation for using twitter. I'm looking help expand and support my practice and that of others. My teacher is in Seattle, Washington and though I have regular conversations with he and a few of the Sangha members there, I recognize that I find it useful, to have a steady and consistent group of people that I can share practice with, supporting each other through the grinds over day-to-day life.

Beautiful! The whole point is community and epxanding our practice by sharing it with and learning from practitioners we would never have contact with otherwise. Personally, I connected with Jaye via twitter and I know that he has helped me deepen my practice and I hope that I have done the same for him. Reciprocity is what twitter is all about.

I am also fairly far away from any temples or large zendos and always appreciate the fact that I can expand and broaden my practice and get into contact with other practitioners in a fairly quick and easy manner. I am also familiar with the "academic book club" school of Buddhist practice that Jaye is alluding to and I wholeheartedly agree that it is not my cup of tea. Academic discussions are fine but I need to find people who actually sit and ritualize in their practice.

Where twitter can be a hassle and hindrance to Zen practice is there's people with what I might call "wayward," motivation. The endless marketing can be a nuisance. The over-reliance of quotes can be disappointing. I feel like if you're using a quote, tell me how you applied it to your life, so that I can learn from you. Otherwise quotes are just dead words to me.

Again, I agree for all the good out in the Buddha-twittersphere-land, there is plenty of annoying crap. I try to keep my follower and folllowing list clear of those so feel free to peruse through and find some people that share your voice. Twitter can also become a distraction. While it is nice to connect with people we should also not forget that while it is enriching to contact with people far away, there are also probably a few good-old fashioned home-practitioners close by as well.

The one big difficulty is to actually express yourself the small window that twitter provides. I enjoy myself with my quotes and retweets and try to bring a small spark of humor into what can tend towards a solemn practice.

Here is the list that Jaye provided. I follow mostly the same group and agree that these are some good Twangha-folks!

@NuclearDwight @HappiForever @Quiverymoments @InfiniteSmile @jhalifax @UpayaChaplains @MauraAura @Tobuno @Kwansahn @ZenStorm @c4chaos @mindonly @LaurieHawley @sondrafaye @christiekoehler @pixelsrzen @thinkingplace @iDharma @sharingair @PennyStinkard @thebermuda @DharmaTalks @DrumsofDharma @ZenDirtZenDust @ljikob @BuddingBuddhist @BaltimoreZen @mindsatori @EllenSka @Elfspear @dhammagirl @aquietmind @Niptuckbill @triggerwicked @MyFengShuiLife @ryderjaphy @NotOneNotTwo @BirdOnAZafu @cdashiell @MindDeep @DhammaLinks @ksclarke @seiun_hosei @holymonky @Lawrencejiko @claudia_m @Buddhism_Now @rambonie @EarthLifeShop @tomotvos @anadanewsman @RSR108 @winsloweliot @binduwiles @tricyclemag @DivineMissWhite @12stepbuddhist @NaropaU

And a few of my own...

@newzdude76@dovemck@reformed_buddha@carolann3888@slowzen @mixdgreens

@buddhasbrewing @constancenow@dhammaway @totalyogastorm @mdbdba@ogmin @duffmcduffee @lazybuddhist @Layman_Pang @gravestomper @zenbija @mujaku @buddhagirlAZ @majidrazvi @digitalzendo

I have to say that I have enjoyed the conversations I've had with other Buddhists on twitter. I get the opportunity to learn quite a bit and it gives me a taste of how others approach their practice.

Cheers,

The Worth and Worthlessness of Roshis

Wild Fox Zen produces some great posts but I loved this one. It spoke to me as a practitioner with a sangha (both online and "brick and mortar"), as a home-practitioner and as one seeking guidance. Of course by saying I loved it, I mean that I disagreed with it as much as I agreed with it.

It opens with a definition of "self-styled" Zen:

we ought to pick and choose practices that seem right to us and we ought to do practice in a way that we like and we don't need to make a commitment to go deeply into any one tradition because teachers are bums and make mistakes and so it's best to dig many shallow wells.

That is all well and good and true except for that last statement - "we don't need to make a commitment". Yes, we should mold and create our own practice. We should not be limited by what the ancients told us about their practice. We should not follow in their footsteps. It is a waste of time to mimic the masters. We need to forge our own practice and commit ourselves to it. We are the stick hits us to keep our attention. We, in the long run, are our own best teachers. All teachers make mistakes and are flawed. That does not mean that we don't learn from them. Even in one zendo with one teacher their will be as many "ways" as students sitting.

In contradiction, and imHo, all the old ways teach that a precondition to really beginning to practice Buddhadharma is to recognize that "our way" is the way of suffering and the necessary (but insufficient) first step on the path for both home leavers and home dwellers is some form of renunciation, a dropping our self-styled ideas and taking up the way of freedom.

In other words, you gotta be sick of your self to begin practice.

I believe that one's practice of Buddhism does not really start until the bottom of the pail falls out or you have some sort of epiphany. One can practice Buddhism before that event and it is a legitimate practice. However, from my own personal experience, one's practice does not deepen until they hit the bottom and get to look up. I hate to think that this sounds very "born-again" but the reason for our practice is suffering and suffering will deepen it. When our suffering (whatever that suffering may be) reaches a point where we see the stark reality of it and we truly realize the 4 noble truths then our practice is deepened. Meditation or teachings or guidance may be an aid to deepening our practice but in the end it comes from us. You can't fake this shit. It just happens.

Of course, in entering the kind of practice I'm talking about, a wise person investigates a teacher and tradition carefully for several years and if they jump in the ocean.

I think the choice of following a specific teacher or lineage is an important step in deepening one's practice but it is not a step to be taken lightly. Too many rush to teachers with the thought that practice would be meaningless without one. With or without a teacher, the person that will be deepening your practice with be YOU and you alone.

I also don't think that one teacher is all that you need. As your practice develops, evolves and matures I think that you will navigate yourself towards a teaching that is appropriate to your goals. A teacher is not a lifelong commitment - it is a pit stop in your life-long practice. I started with secular Buddhism and moved to Zen as I got older and my practice began to ripen. I expect that as it matures more it may lead me to a specific teacher and guide or to a completely different expression of the Dharma altogether.

One qualifier: especially for home-based practitioners, it isn't so simple as doing exactly what you're told, although that might be a good thing at the beginning. As a person develops practice legs, it is important that they walk on their own and to declare the truth with their own voice.

Yes! Finally someone who doesn't equate home-practice with ease. Usually if you mention that you are a home-practitioner you are recieved as a neophyte - a person with only the barest understanding of the Dharma because you are not affilliated with a teacher. For whatever reason that a home-practitioner chooses that practice - it is unfair to assume that it is less than practice with a sangha or in a monastic setting.

A home practitioner usually has difficulty in determining how and when to practice so there is an unusually long period of "trail and error". As you sculpt your practice with little or no guidance from a teacher, you discover what works and what doesn't. A teacher may be able to blaze the same trail in a shorter period of time but the home-practitioner proudly wields a machete in clumbsy swings as they begin to hew themselves a path.

Sometimes that path leads to a zendo or meditation hall or temple and sometimes it doesn't. Either way our shoes should be worn through and our machete sharp.

Cheers,

Dirty Watches and Filthy Buddha-Nature

From Zen Flesh Zen Bones:

• 29. No Water, No Moon
  
  When the nun Chiyono studied Zen she was unable to attain the fruits of meditation for a long time.
  
  At last one moonlit night she was carrying water in an old pail bound with bamboo. The bamboo broke and the bottom fell out of the pail, and at that moment Chiyono was set free.
  
  In this way I tried to save the old pail
  Since the bamboo strip was weakening and about to
  break.
  Until at last the bottom fell out.
  No more water in the pail!
  No more moon in the water!
  
  

This reminds me of my own eventual conversion to Buddhism - years of study (in a laid-back bedside table sort of manner) which led up to one explosive moment when the bottom of my pail broke and all the water ran out. That explosive part of anyone's conversion is a stressful and sometimes painful one but one that needs to occur. The reasons will differ from person to person but in the same way an addict needs to hit rock-bottom to see the top - I needed to see my world of attachment for what it was.

In Rinzai Zen this moment can be described as...

A revolutionary experience and insight capable of shattering all categories of thought and sweeping away all academic exercises and turning the world upside down...like a time bomb ticking in the depths of consciousness... [Once Born, Twice Born Zen]

This experience can not be realized until the tension, frustration, doubt and confusion in one's life hits a boiling point - a point where the vessel can no longer contain it - it is kensho or bust! In Soto Zen a less dramatic approach is taken with an...

Enjoyment of one's intrinsic Buddha-Nature...allowing this Buddha-Mind to well up and flow through all areas of one's consciousness and life. One does not begin by building up a strong sense of false and illusory ways of thinking and being, but a positive sense of fundamental well-being...[Once Born, Twice Born Zen]

Most converts fall along the spectrum of these two extremes - maybe not necessarily in Zen practice, itself - but as a gradual move from something else to Buddhism through a nurturing of the Buddha-mind or a drastic switch due to the bottom falling out.

I look at this moment as a convert's initial piece of enlightenment - a fleeting, brief glimpse of kensho as the bottom of our bucket falls out and everything rushes out leaving a husk of the former vessel. Momentarily, unable to hold anything or be filled up again. It doesn't last a long time but whether gradual or sudden we do feel a sense of the absolute at that moment of conversion...at least I did.

Mine was both sudden and gradual. A gradual and slight nurturing of the Buddha-nature (as well as the increases in tension, confusion, frustration and pain) enveloped in all of that samsaric nonsense. Hidden from view but growing slowly. However, at that moment of sudden emptying, the Buddha-nature stands very clear and apparent. But only for a moment. A convert's brief picture of enlightenment. The crack-cocaine of Buddhism.

So now that we've seen that jewel and acknowledge and take refuge in it. What do we do with it? The image of a jewel to be polished through practice somewhat goes against my sensibilities. With practice we keep that jewel bright and shiny - radiating out for the world to see. Blah! My jewel, my Buddha-mind, is dingy and tarnished with experience. Unlike a piece of jewelry, my Buddha-nature isn't for public consumption - for others to see and gawk at. It doesn't need to shine forth and glow since I already know that it is there. My wife bought me a turquoise and silver watch for my 30th birthday. It was far too expensive but my wife knew that I would need something to mark that turning point in my life.

Tradition is that a watch such as that is never cleaned or polished. It gathers the dirt and the dust of its owner and it tells a story. My watch has got bits of shale from my summer field work and specks of epoxy and glue from working in the lab. It has blood and has been broken a few times. Fixed but never cleaned. That grime tells a story of where I have been, just like the hands of a mechanic or farmer or accountant - grease and oil, dirt and much, smudges and ink.

A face well-worn from the sun and wind or smooth. It doesn't matter. My Buddha-nature sat and grew slowly, unrealized, through many mistakes and errors of my life and emerged briefly to mark its presence when my bottom fell out. I will nurture it but I refuse to clean it - Refuse to ignore and forget what brought on its appearence. My Buddha-nature will hold those scars of my youth and marks of my old age, my triumphs and my failures. Like my watch that will pass to my daughter after my time with it is done so will my Buddha-nature to the next - both with traces of Pierre Shale and blood, ink and tears, failures and successes.

Cheers,