zenjones

One of my practice period intensifiers was a short meditation period in the evening. I think I’ve committed to this for five years running and never made it through the first week.

I’ve changed it to the Daily Review, which Ezra talks about in his book Being Zen. At the end of the day, I get in bed, and I go over my day in my mind. It’s a little tricky to stay on track–my mind wants to examine things in more depth, judge, blame, all the usual stuff. But I catch myself and soldier on to the end of the day. Then I think of the things I was grateful for, and the things I feel remorse for.

And just like the book says, the more I do this, the more I notice things I’m grateful for during the day. And I also notice things I feel remorse for right away.

Last night I noticed that I’m grateful for the situation I was born into–this period in time, this social class, this place. I’m grateful for my healthy genes, and for my husband’s sense of humor, for Annie’s haikus and Susan’s story about the birds on the lake. I’m grateful for this practice and all the people who sit with me in the group, and talk about their experience, so I can be aware of my reactions.

I feel remorse that I didn’t talk to my neighbors as they moved out, and now I’ll never have a chance.

Today, my menu item was “Be aware of attachment to outcome.” Every time the message popped up on my computer or lit up my phone, I was attached to an outcome. But the reminder made me aware, and once I was aware, it was pretty easy to give up the attachment. Much easier than giving up judging or blaming.

People in my way!
I feel like shoving them – but
is it worth the view?

Yes, I’m having one of those days full of lovely practice gifts.

Inspired by VLR’s post yesterday. Blaming has angles. I’m a self-blamer, for instance. When I read the Blaming post I immediately wondered if I were among the “blameworthy,” even though it wasn’t really possible (or was it?).  Then last night I discovered that Billy Jack had eaten my favorite sweater. My husband’s fault – it happened on his watch. My fault – shouldn’t have left it on the bed. Dog’s fault? Anyway:

dog chewed my sweater
it’s his fault; it’s my fault; it’s
something that happened

Perfect day to notice how I blame others. It was pretty comical, really. Something unexpected would happen, there’d be a miscommunication, I’d make a mistake, and zhoop! I’d be blaming the nearest warm body.

But today, having it be my practice period intensification, I was aware of it most of the times I did it. So I noticed that even after I noticed it, and said, Look what you are doing, I kept coming back and trying to blame someone else for the same event, the same thing I’d just caught myself doing minutes ago.

I also noticed that I want to be angry; I think I crave that juicy self-righteous sensation. It distracts me from feelings of unworthiness (as does blame). I think I’m going to make my concentration tomorrow be to notice those feelings of unworthiness. I don’t hold out a lot of hope that I will; I’m too fast on the draw of my gun of distraction.

always rewinding
internal conversations
oh whoops – life’s erased

paranoia rings
true when fear unencumbered
runs rings around you

Having a thought that I’m not a very good thought-labeler. Hey! I just did it! Okay, having a thought that I’m not that bad of a thought-labeler.

It is just so interesting to me the strength of my desire to be elsewhere. Anywhere else but where I am. In the morning I look-forward to sitting. And then I set down and say my practice intention and take a breath or two and suddenly I am looking-forward to waking my husband up! How does that happen?

We have a new-ish student in our zen group. During sharing he recounts how hard he is working to be present. He sounds amazed that he can’t do it—can’t be present all the time. During sharing, we don’t have cross-talk. It is a time to talk about your own experience of practice. But it is all I can do not to say, “I’ve been doing this every day for 15 years and I am still only present for a tiny part of any day!”

I’ve been thinking about a recent talk by Ezra on refraining from expressing negative emotions vs. repressing them–a common issue for sure, but one I never felt applied to me until, like, last week, when I suddenly found myself overcome by hitherto unregistered resentment and angst. Perfect for the month ahead of intensified practice, and for my first blogging foray.

One of my “practice intensifiers” is to write a practice-related haiku each day. Another practice thing I like is controlled (or not) exposure to discomfort. This forum is perfect for combining these two things: I can post my haiku here and at the same time create the discomfort of public exposure and fear of ridicule and judgment for writing bad poetry. Isn’t the Internet great?

(piranha submerged
swims undetected) what, pray,
floats on the surface?

My expectation was that I’d be all zen-like, present, and with a little Buddha smile on. My overall practice concentration is thought-labeling, to help me be aware of my gap, which I consider to be my unwillingness to sit with fear. I revert to anger, and that has never done me any good.

I haven’t been zen-like today. I’ve been cranky and defensive and suspicious and many other un-zen behaviors. I try to be aware, but you know? Self-righteousness is a lot more fun.

Last night I explained our practice’s thoughts about fear, starting with Ezra’s great article in Tricycle, to my husband. He is not a  Zen practitioner, but he is a good listener. Certainly when I was done I felt like I had it all goin’ on. I understood how my conditioned fears transformed into thoughts and sensations which made me uncomfortable, so I got mad, and blamed him. It seemed so obvious, so easy to be aware of.

But by this morning I was all wound up again. He said some innocuous thing which I could somehow interpret as dangerous or insulting, and I reacted with anger, and sheesh.

So now I am practice with guilt and self-judgement. There’s always something useful for practice. Period.

I’m surprised that this reminder does not bother me. I usually find references to god unendurable. But for some reason this works for me. It works like nothing else to remind me that everyone is my path.

Take for instance last week’s trip to the bank. I have several accounts at Bank of the West in my town. I opened the first account when I moved here 8 years ago, and I have a couple savings accounts, two business accounts, and my husband also has accounts there. For at least 5 of the last 8 years I have come in weekly to deposit checks from my business. At various times I have had over $100K deposited here.

It has never once happened that any employee of the bank has gone out of their way to smooth the way for a transfer or to help me have something happen faster. Last week I had a small check from a new client written to my new company. I didn’t yet have the paperwork from the state to open a business account. Any other bank would have let me deposit it in my personal account; I had asked several other people if their bank would do this and they said yes. In fact, I have had other banks do that exact thing.

But I knew that this bank wouldn’t. Yet, I seemed to want to get angry, I seemed spoiling for a fight. And Kathy, the account manager who most often shook her head and said in her high whispery voice, “No, we can’t do that,” was going to help me. I’d been hoping for Joan, who at least had a sense of humor about these things, but I was going to get Kathy. And as I sat and waited (25 minutes, 28 minutes…) I seethed. And then I thought, What does it mean to see the face of god in Kathy? And instantly a smile stretched my face. Kathy as the face of god was a lesson in patience, in expectations, in self-righteousness, in judgement. Ohmigod, she was the perfect lesson. It had to be the face of god, because it was so perfect.

So eventually Kathy came and got me (I didn’t notice how long I’d waited–I was so tickled by this “face of god” thing—looking around at the old gent, and at the young teller who had learned her lesson well and told me “no” at least 5 times—all the face of god!) and I asked her and she shook her head as if I was asking her to open her cash drawer and give me all the dough, and make it quick.

And the next day my paperwork came through, and I went back to my bank, and Kathy opened my new business account for me. It took at least an hour… but I smiled through the whole thing. Bank of the West is the face of god.