IndieZen Monthly No. 1 by IndieZen Monthly

IndieZen Monthly

January, 2014 No. 1

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Table of Contents Intolerance, Zen & Culture….……………………………………………………………3 Bones of the Buddha.…………………………………………………………..…...…….6 Tolerating Our Own Experiences..………………………………………..….………8 Enso Table Talk………………………………………………………………....…………10 Pragmatic Rebirth..……………………………………………………………....………..17 Does Intolerance have a Cure?.……………………………………………….………21 No Fault, No Others……………………………………………………………….……..25 Names & Terminology…………………………………………………………….……..29 References…………………………………………………………………………………….31 Copyright…………………………………………………………………………...…………32

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Intolerance, Zen & Culture Topic editorial John Pendall

â&#x20AC;&#x153;I read the news today, oh boy!â&#x20AC;? sang John Lennon in 1967. Whether we turn on the TV or radio, pick up a newspaper or research how to make poached eggs on the internet; reminders of intolerance stand before us as nude as an exhibitionist. We could point the finger at the media for being profoundly pessimistic, but the media only is what culture made it. We and culture exist in a state of co-dependence. Culture influences us, be we also influence culture. After all, what is culture besides the exchange of ideas, customs and norms from one generation to another (Matsumoto & Juang, 2013)? The message depends on the messenger. Intolerance permeates our culture, but not just our culture. We could almost say that culture itself breeds intolerance. The moment we place a label on ourselves, weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re placing a label on others. Culture acts on how we perceive others. It influences whether we accept or reject someone. It influences whether we live in peace with someone or rage against them. Culture will never dissolve, nor should it. As long as one person lives on this planet, there will be culture; there will be categorization and differentiation. Yet we can decide whether we see our culture as an absolute or as another piece of the whole. We can decide whether we see cultures as superior and inferior or as equals.

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Intolerance isn’t just rooted in culture; it’s rooted in psychology. The intolerance we have for Miley Cyrus songs is the same intolerance we have for our neighbor who mows his lawn every day. It’s the same intolerance we have for our partner as they grind their teeth in bed. It’s the same intolerance we have for people from a different political party, social class or culture. Intolerance is intolerance. In the western industrialized world, we have the habit of attributing actions to people rather than circumstances. We attribute Miley Cyrus’s awful music to her being an awful person, rather than the fans who are buying it. We attribute our neighbor mowing his lawn to him being an ass, when really he’s depressed, and that’s his sole source of enjoyment in life. We attribute terrorism and gang violence to Islamist fanatics and blacks, rather than the social and economic pressures that they’re living under. Many Asian cultures use a circumstantial attribution style (Myers, 2010). This style fits well with Zen practice. Thanks to interdependence and constant change, we cannot take anything out of its context. We can’t say that one thing is inherently righteous and another inherently awful. We can’t say that anything is inherently anything, and we can’t take one piece out of the whole. This doesn’t mean that we should tolerate violence or injustice, but we should see them for what they are… our own features. Like computers, we may all run different operating systems, but we all have the same basic parts that function in relatively the same way. Who’s to say that we wouldn’t be in a gang if we were brought up the same way and in the same environment as gang members? Who’s to say we wouldn’t be waging Jihad right now if we were brought up the same way and in the same environment as Jihadists?

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Who we are is largely incidental, we could very easily be anyone else. We’re born with a set of inherited temperaments (Berger, 2011), but most of our personality is due to experience. Experiences that are largely influenced by our culture. Tolerance can rise as we practice and realize that we all share the same basic Buddha nature. This nature isn’t dependent upon culture. This doesn’t mean we should allow a cop to brutalize someone, or allow someone to rob a store. This means we can act toward holding police accountable and helping the poor. There’s no need to get angry about injustice or violence. Anger is what conditions injustice and violence. We can stand up for justice and peace, rather than standing against injustice and hatred. We can turn off the Miley Cyrus song rather than railing against its existence. We can remember that our neighbor isn’t going to be mowing his lawn for an eternity. We can disagree with someone’s political stance while accepting who they are and respecting that they have a stance… even if it isn’t ours. We can be thankful that we have a significant other at all, even if they do grind their teeth. We can turn off our TVs and look around and see that things aren’t quite as terrible as they’re portrayed. There are more non-murders than murders each day, more people who aren’t in gangs than in them, more honest cops than brutal ones and more faithful Muslims than fanatics. We can also be thankful that all of our neighbors don’t mow their lawns each day. If we want to rid the world of intolerance, we must first rid ourselves of intolerance. When we do that, the good news becomes quite clear. About the Author John Pendall is a practicing Zen Buddhist, musician, writer, minister and psychology student. He’s interested in many osophies, -onomies and –ologies and lives in rural Illinois between two cornfields.

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Bones of the Buddha Daniel Sharpenburg

Once Ikkyu

was staying in a temple. The night was very cold and there were three wooden Buddhas in the temple, so he burned one Buddha to warm himself. The priest in charge of the temple woke up and noticed that something was going on, so he looked to see what Ikkyu was up to. 1

The Buddha statue was burning and Ikkyu was sitting there warming his hands over the fire. The priest got angry. He said, “What are you doing?! Are you a madman? I thought you to be a Buddhist monk, that’s why I allowed you stay in the temple. You have done the most sacrilegious act!” Ikkyu said, “But the Buddha within me was feeling very cold. So it was a question whether to sacrifice the living Buddha to the wooden one, or to sacrifice the wooden one to the living one. I chose the living one.” The priest was so angry that he couldn’t listen. He shouted, “You are a madman! You simply get out of here! You have burned the Buddha.” So Ikkyu started to poke the burned Buddha with a stick. There were ashes, the Buddha was almost consumed by the fire. The priest asked, “What are you doing?” Ikkyu said, “I am trying to find the bones of the Buddha.” So the priest laughed and said, “You are either a fool or a madman, and you are absolutely mad! You cannot find the bones there, because it is just a wooden Buddha. Ikkyu laughed and said, “Then bring the other two. The night is still very cold and the morning is still far away. I haven’t burned the Buddha. I’ve burned a wooden statue… and you call ME the crazy one!”

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What can we take from this? Is it just a funny story? Maybe… I think it represents iconoclasm. The priest is, in a sense, worshiping this Buddha statue. We shouldn’t worship anything really, but we especially shouldn’t be attached to an icon. When we give a statue of the Buddha that much respect, we are doing what the Buddha said not to do. He said that the Dharma2 is what really matters, not him. The teaching matters more than the teacher, and we need to keep that in mind while we’re walking the Path. About the Author Daniel Sharpenberg is an authorized Zen teacher in the Ch’an Guild of Huineng, in the lineage of Ch’an Master Xu Yun. He has studied and continues to study in various Buddhist traditions. He developed a meditation program for children at the Rime Buddhist Center in Kansas City.

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Tolerating Our Own Experiences Topic column Robert Epstein

In Buddhism, we talk a lot about acceptance, patience and compassion; making space for what exists in others and trying to reach out past negativity to make a positive connection. Part of that is taking a more positive attitude towards oneself and accepting our own experience. Yet as hard as it can be to accept and maintain positive energy toward others, it can be even harder not to judge, dislike and punish ourselves. We all have bad habits and tendencies that we know much more intimately than others. Maybe we lose our temper and then regret it; maybe we're disorganized or don't make enough money. Maybe we think we're too childish and ought to grow up. Being able to tolerate who we really are on the personality level and "be with" what actually exists is a great and important skill. Positive change never takes place while we're at war with ourselves. When negative emotions and thoughts arise, we need to be able to tolerate them in order to give them the space to be processed or released. When we judge our own tendencies or actions in a negative way, we need to be able to step back and accept and forgive our own flaws. It's not an easy thing to do, but when we're able to look at ourselves sympathetically and take in both the admirable and the difficult aspects of our personalities as a unified yet ever-changing wholeâ&#x20AC;Ś things start to open up and find balance. The great "immeasurables" from Theravadan3 Buddhism are a great list of attributes that we can offer to ourselves, as well as to others, in the face of the imperfections we encounter in both:

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 Dana – Generosity of spirit, as well as material generosity.  Metta – Loving-kindness that takes a loving and sympathetic approach to all living beings despite their shortcomings.  Karuna – Compassion, which looks sympathetically on the suffering of others and is moved to alleviate as much suffering as possible for all beings.  Mudita – Sympathetic joy, my personal favorite. To be able to feel happiness at another’s success is a sure sign of true openness and a relaxed, secure sense of oneself. We can also have “sympathetic joy” for our own successes. One who is able to congratulate others often cannot themselves take compliments or feel good about their own accomplishments. It’s important to have healthy self-efficacy, which isn’t the same thing as pride.  Upekkha – Equanimity. To maintain equanimity in the face of other’s shifting moods and behavior is very important. Otherwise, we are thrown off center all the time by people and events outside of our control. It’s also important to maintain balance in the face of our own upsets, mistakes and thwarted expectations of ourselves. To expect life to take unexpected turns, and to be ready to tolerate those unexpected changes at each moment, is the great skill of equanimity and a great gift to self and others (not two). About the Author Some think that Robert Epstein has TOO eclectic a background. He’s studied and/or taught T’ai Chi, Taoist standing meditation, the Sedona Method, Iyengar yoga, deep tissue massage, inner light meditation, hypnotherapy, briefly met Chogyam Trungpa and more things than this page can hold. He’s currently once again into Ch’an and Zen Buddhism and exploring Hua Tou meditation. If hearing that list made you dizzy, think of how Robert must feel!

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Enso Table Talk John, Ana, Vic, Daniel, Lee Robert, Rain, Melissa, Michael & Steve

JOHN: Welcome everyone to our first enso table talk. The enso is a Japanese symbol for unity, wholeness and emptiness4 that’s often seen in relation to Zen. These discussions involve any of the writers here at IZ Weekly who are interested in participating. Guess I’ll get the ball rolling… What is tolerance to you? ANA: To me, tolerance is having three nationalities and three religions and atheism in the family, and no one arguing which is right or better. Intolerance comes down to fear, and fear is the strongest emotion in my opinion. VIC: Yes, and fear is also John showing up in a Zendo in a miniskirt. Dogma also breeds intolerance, and dualistic thought makes hypocrites. That is why we practice zazen. JOHN: Hey Vic! That was a social psychology experiment! At least, that’s the story I’m sticking with. DANEIL: In the context of the Dharma, tolerance is recognizing that there are many ways to practice Buddhism. Zen Master Ikkyu said, “Many paths lead from the foot of the mountain, but at the peak we all gaze at the single moon.” JOHN: Do you think that this applies to people who don’t practice the Dharma as well? Nishijima5 once said that there are many ways to “enlightenment,” but that Zen is the easiest path. That says something about how difficult it is to uncover our fundamental nature!

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DANIEL: I think so. I have a friend who practices Advaita Vedanta6, and when we have discussions it’s sometimes a little difficult to even determine the differences between our beliefs. There are probably several paths like this outside of Buddhism. VIC: Isn’t intolerance conformity in this context when applied to society? At the individual level, isn’t it an unwillingness to grow? LEE: Tolerance is what you do with frustration… when you remember to do it. Equanimity ROBERT: If you are absolutely certain that you are right about something, and can still open the door to hear someone else’s opposing perspective… that’s a good example of tolerance. Tolerance opens up what you think you already know, and allows you to entertain something that is, “other,” and accept it into your world. Tolerance is also a close cousin of equanimity, because the ability to allow new twists and turns in life allows you to stay centered, even while things keep changing. JOHN: It does seem that equanimity and tolerance are closely related. Do you think that patience can cultivate tolerance? Does the anger we feel while stuck in traffic have the same root as the hatred people have for those who are different than them? RAIN: I love sitting in traffic… more Led Zeppelin time. Traffic is great, especially when I’m getting paid by the hour. ROBERT: That’s cheating! Anger and Ego VIC: Intolerance is a sense of being threatened on some level. That’s aversion. ROBERT: I think that the anger at being stuck in traffic and the anger at people who are different than us, are at least somewhat related… maybe

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not totally. It’s an interesting question. I do think that patience is probably helpful in both. In the latter, there might have to be a willingness to go beyond what you think is acceptable too. VIC: The traffic thing is ego. “You’re preventing me from getting where I want to go, or menacing me with your vehicle.” Also related to control, which is also my ego… my concept. MELISSA: The Middle Way7 Vic, the Middle Way… MICHAEL: The ego is a normal function… Well it should be. JOHN: Then we have to ponder the difference between tolerating something and being exploited or coerced. Can we tolerate someone being cantankerous because they’re having a bad day, but not tolerate them verbally abusing you? At what point do we stand up and say, “No!” Basically, should we tolerate intolerance? Story Time ROBERT: Buddha said that when Rajah of Kalinga, in a jealous rage cut up his body into pieces while he was still alive, that no anger arose in him; even in that lifetime he had, “Already given up any notion of a self, a being or an entity,” so there was no reason for the anger to arise. That is tolerance! Maybe the conclusion is that to really be tolerant, there has to be a transparent or empty self. This doesn’t mean you can’t take appropriate or compassionate action. Just because you are tolerant on your own behalf doesn’t mean you can’t still help to end suffering around you, or even within you. You just do what is required without judgment. MELISSA: May it be so. VIC: No self, no problem. JOHN: I doubt I’d be as calm if someone was dismembering me. I wonder if his response would be different if he saw someone else being dismembered? Sure, there’s no inherent self nor others, but that’s no

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antidote for physical pains. Living to serve, it’d be obligatory to step in and say, “Hey, could you, ya know, maybe stop dismembering that dude?” Yeah, there’s tolerance because there’s intolerance, just like there’s poverty because there’s wealth and vice versa. Could we say then that, from an “enlightened” perspective that really there’s neither tolerance nor intolerance? MELISSA: Maybe. Not being enlightened, I’m choosing tolerance over intolerance. ROBERT: If we try to stop a murderer from murdering again, that can’t be a bad thing, right? So tolerance has a limit? I think the answer (I think) is that one can stop the intolerable while remaining tolerant within (like the Buddha when we getting turned into cold cuts). On a certain level, we have to be unmoved personally by that which is abhorrent, even though we may act against it, and in that way we maintain equanimity while doing what is needed. Otherwise, we’re just eternally swinging again between attachment and aversion, and there’s no way out. VIC: I can’t tolerate it… here it comes… “We should have tolerance in our intolerance, and intolerance in our tolerance.” Or just go with the flow. Water can be tolerant. “No view,” is probably the most tolerant view. As fast as you can conceptualize tolerance, there is intolerance also. ROBERT: Is that so? I think it’s time for another Hakuin8 story. JOHN: Tell me a story! Tell me a story! VIC: A beautiful Japanese girl whose parents owned a food store lived near Hakuin. One day, without any warning, her parents discovered she was pregnant. This made her parents angry. She would not confess who the man was, but after much harassment, at last named Hakuin. In great anger, the parents went to the master. “Is that so?” was all he could say. After the child was born, it was brought to Hakuin. By this time, he had lost his reputation, which did not trouble him. He took very good care of the child. He obtained mil from his

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neighbors and everything else the child needed. A year later, the girl could stand it no longer. She told her parents the truth that the real father of the child was a young man who worked in the fish market. The mother and father at once went to Hakuin to ask forgiveness, to apologize at length, and to get the child back. Hakuin willingly yielded the child, saying only, “Is that so?” STEVE: Damn, I’m away for an hour or three and look how the conversation shapes up! A question on tolerance seems to illicit the traumatic experiences of intolerance that we have experienced. JOHN: That’s how duality goes. Ya get one, you get one and are reminded of the other I suppose. Morality STEVE: I would say that it is only our individual interests that make ethics and morality problematic. They, in turn, are only problematic when we buy into the delusional cultural conditioning that we’ve all been subjected to; which tells us that we live in a dog-eat-dog world and that our survival and success, therefore, requires that we dominate and exploit everyone and everything else. JOHN: Morality is a foundation of practice. Either as a result, or as a guide along the way. Really, practicing Zen equates to following the Noble Eightfold Path, which is all about morality, ethics and values. Appropriate speech, compassionate action etc. Then there are the six paramitas9 we develop along the way which also culminate into a holistic, moral perspective. Patience, wisdom and kindness are all characteristics of tolerance. Tolerance, Conformity, Hippies & Nonsense RAIN: Tolerance is the acceptance of and abiding with nonsense. It also includes the same toward that which one does not agree with, condone, or plain old “like” which is not necessarily “nonsense.” Tolerance and nonnonsense is endless, without ego drawing the cards from the deck.

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Tolerance of nonsense ends where ass kicking begins (figuratively of course). VIC: Well, the counter-culture became intolerant of intolerance and lost equanimity also. As did the Japanese in SF, leading to demands for a married priest. Shunryu Suzuki10 fit the bill. JOHN: Well, the misuse of psychedelic probably didn’t help either. Pic of High School Hippie John  VIC: Conformity is security. I remember as my views began to change how insecure I felt. Most people wouldn’t be able to relate to me. Luckily I found some Zen geeks on Facebook. Free love scared some people. “Lock up your daughters, get your gun.” JOHN: Even Shunryu spoke a bit against the attachment to, “Love! Love Love!” In that context, we could say that, attachment to any idea, even a beneficial idea, results in intolerance. Hippies hated squares. They were suspicious of anyone who didn’t tune in, turn on and drop out. VIC: Hippies feared narcs. He said we didn’t know what love is. So did Krishnamurti11. Pointed out, as I did, that the concept of possessing another person, such as in marriage, leads to jealousy and envy and see how intolerant some Zen students become. Threating a holy institution. The Three Poisons JOHN: What of the Three Poisons12? Is it by tolerating their presence in us that we stumble upon the three wholesome qualities? RAIN: Tolerating their presence? You’d be best to embrace their presence fully and be gracious for the poisons! No Buddha has ever become a Buddha except by living with the Three Poisons and nourishing his or her self on pure Dharma. Beyond the Three Poisons, there is no other Buddha-nature13.

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STEVE: Greed is confused compassion. Anger is confused love. Delusion is confused wisdom. Just a matter of bringing them back into sync. Conclusion ROBERT: I would look at tolerance as a way of going through things, not keeping them the same. So we “tolerate” the arising of anger in order to process it instead of suppressing it. It doesn’t mean we keep it, but we don’t proliferate and blame the anger or blame ourselves. We don’t suppress the anger and do all kinds of other things to make it worse. We “tolerate” it so we can look at it and get to the root of it. We can’t work with something that we can’t tolerate experiencing. Same with others. We don’t “tolerate” bad behavior in the sense of accepting it the way it is, but we have to tolerate it long enough to engage with it and see what the real cause is. What is the real solution? Where tolerance is pure tolerance and we don’t change something, is when people just have different ways of doing things; or they do things that we react to badly. So, can I tolerate my wife putting my wet towel under another towel so it doesn’t get dry? Grrr…. But it’s something I can let go of, I don’t have to get upset over it. I can “tolerate” it. Can I tolerate being late for work because of the traffic jam? That’s something I can’t change. Do I have a tantrum or do I tolerate it? If someone is a meat-eater and I’m a vegetarian, can I tolerate the fact that they are different than me? Maybe to some extent I will not tolerate it, but to the extent I can’t change it I either breathe with it or fall into the three poisons. VIC: Yes. Don’t hold on or push it away. Just be with it.

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Pragmatic Rebirth John Pendall

Rebirth isn’t what you think it is. Well, it might be, but who would know? We’d forget after we were reborn! In vintage Buddhism, rebirth involves six different realms: hell (which is selfexplanatory really), hungry ghosts (little dudes with mouths too small to satisfy their hunger), animal, human, asura (jealous gods) and devas (blissful gods). Unlike reincarnation, the self or soul isn’t what’s reborn into these realms. It’s the mindstream17 that carries on, pushed forward by a current of Karma. The mindstream takes on a whole new set of form, sense judgments, categorization, mental representations and consciousness with each incarnation. So, it’s us but not us, just as right now we’re us and not us. The six worlds are usually taken as a metaphor in Zen… if they’re even taken at all. Odds are, we dwell in all of the realms at different times in life. Sometimes we’re joyous and blissful like devas. Other times we’re in hell, living in misery. Sometimes we’re hungry ghosts who are never quite satisfied with anything. Rebirth and Karma also take on new meanings in Zen. Instead of thinking about a distant and unknowable future life, we focus on rebirth and Karma in this life. We are constantly changing on all possible levels. Since I wrote that sentence, the particles that compose my body are in different places. Some even left entirely when I exhaled, and others joined the fun when I inhaled. Cells have died and been born. Blood pressure and oxygen levels are different, so my body is always changing.

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How I feel and judge things is always changing. A moment ago I was fine, but now an unpleasant draft is making me feel chilly. I label this feeling, “chilliness,” so how I categorize things is also always changing. Occasionally the cold makes me think of Christmas and happy memories of family gatherings. Other times it makes me think of shoveling snow and being stranded in a ditch. So how experiences are represented are always changing. Since all these factors are constantly changing, the consciousness that they compose is always changing. This consciousness is what we tend to call the self. This means that with each movement, breath, sensation, perception and thought I am a new person. We are constantly born, aging, dying and reborn. This is rebirth in Zen. What I just described are called the Five Skandhas or aggregates: Form, sensation, perception, volition and consciousness. These are the elements that compose what we call the self. They are each dependent on one another. If they aren’t all present, there can be no sense of a separate self at all. So each moment, it is these aggregates that are reborn. Their new state is determined by the actions of the aggregates that came before them. If I’m hammering a nail while crafting what would be a very structurally unsound shelf, and my aim is off then I’m going to hit my finger. That’s Karma in action. The aggregates that were present while lifting the hammer are different than the aggregates that arise after I pummel my poor finger. While raising the hammer my finger was unblemished; I felt neither pain nor pleasure; I perceived the wood, the nail and my intact finger; I was

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thinking about how the skin is the largest organ of the body and all these elements were folded neatly into consciousness. Yet this set of aggregates isn’t paying attention. They’ve drifted off from the task at hand. So, I whack the hell out of my finger. Who’s the one that suffers? Not the me that miscalculated. It’s the me who lowered the hammer. All of a sudden there’s a new John. One with a black and blue finger; throbbing pain; perceiving the damage; I shout and swear and think about how stupid I am and about how hammers should have proximity sensors; all of these elements are strewn about in consciousness. This clearly isn’t the same person that was standing there a moment ago. This person is filled with anger, frustration and has a tarnished selfconcept. This is my rebirth into hell, and my Karmic negligence bearing fruit. But, what’s the point of all this? What use is this realization of rebirth and Karma? From what I’ve seen, many people are willing to move the earth for people they care about, yet they don’t give themselves the same courtesy. Either that or we say screw everybody else and just focus on ourselves. This realization makes it possible for us to take care of ourselves in the same way we do others. When we do something healthy (or at least not unhealthy), are mindful and learn something new… we aren’t doing this for ourselves. We’re doing it for other people… our future selves. Likewise, if we treat people like garbage… well we’re harming not only other people, but our future selves. Eventually, we’ll be alone and friendless. Or, at the very least, our final thought before dying will be, “Man, I was an ass!” which is accompanied by our final feeling… regret. Who wants to end life like that? Who wants to spend their days being hated and alone? Karma could be seen as simple cause and effect, but really it’s more about our mental states. Hitting my finger wasn’t really

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the Karma… it was my unpleasant anger and distorted self-image that was the Karma. Anger brought about by habitual reactions to things. Everything we do has consequences. Every action has a reaction. We aren’t immune to the laws of physics… they’re what formed us after all. The effect can sometimes come immediately after the cause, or sometimes years after. Finally, this realization can help us see ourselves differently. We aren’t islands. We aren’t isolated and permanent beings. Our lives are dynamic and interdependent with everything else. We affect everything and are affected by everything. What we call the self is the mindstream, the ever changing aggregates being pushed on by Karma. This allows us to not be so serious. It makes us wonder, “Why be afraid? Why be offended? Why get angry when I bang my thumb?” Even that’s all just surface, friends. We aren’t just waxing philosophical here. Rebirth, Karma, the Skandhas, constant change and interdependence are to be experienced firsthand. These actualizations are the path to Buddhahood, meaning the path to Wholeness and Awareness. The path to seeing our true nature and uncovering our Real Self, which is none other than the Buddha, and the Buddha is none other than our own minds free of BS. Yet we have to be at least a little grateful for the BS. Without it, there’d be no Buddhahood.

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Does Intolerance have a Cure? Topic Colum Michael Aldridge

Jacqui had bought a lovely bottle of red, one that she knew John loved. When Jacque arrived home, she expected that John would have a meal ready. She was hoping for the lasagna that he was especially good at. John was on a sabbatical and had taken over the cooking. Jacque had been working hard to earn the money for the household while he pursued his studies. John had been studying the genetics of language, and he had made some new discoveries in his research and tonight, in his excitement, he had forgotten about dinner. Jacque was not happy; she was angry that there was no dinner, and the romantic time she was looking forward to was gone. “If you said you were going to do something, then you should do it.” In her mind, there were no excuses. Suddenly she felt tired. The dinner she was looking forward to faded, and she had a glass of the wine she’d bought and went to bed. The roots of intolerance lie in the idea that there is a separate self that needs to be reassured, aggrandized in its own separation. Unwilling to accept views, beliefs, or behaviour that differ from its own, it is like a wave upon the sea that needs to be reassured that it is a better wave than the other waves. More precisely, it is founded in the view that we are nothing other than our conscious attention, i.e., whatever it is that we are focusing on, a mind that sees problems that need to be fixed. When you see yourself as your attention, your mind becomes rigid and error seeking, a mind that refuses to accept things as they are. A

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failure to accept oneself, and hence the universe the way it is, is a miserable life. It is a life where one is continually striving to make oneself better, without even knowing who you are. As Dharma students, we know that there is neither a wave nor no wave. No wave separate from the ocean. Yet we perceive a wave. In the same way, we tend to perceive each other as separate individuals, failing to see that each person is a manifestation of the ocean of humanity, and the ocean of consciousness. Inadequately, we use words like dependent co-arising to try and describe this. The point is the same. We arise together, depending on each other. What then is tolerance, when each individual is as you are, a coming forth of all consciousness? Does intolerance need to be cured? It doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t. Nothing needs to change because everything is changing. Anything that is rigid and inflexible will not last, but then neither will anything that is flexible either. The only issue at hand is that intolerance makes you unhappy. It drains your energy. It sucks the joy out of you. It is a dis-ease precisely because an intolerant person is not at ease. The cure for intolerance is the Middle Way7 itself. Yet it seems that there is more direct approach to dealing with intolerance, and itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s rooted in the four sublime states (loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy and equanimity). These four states bring you into connection, into relation with other beings. What is even more important about these four sublime states is that they make you very happy. An intolerant person is an unhappy one. Metta Bhavana (cultivation of loving-kindness), is both a Mahayana20 and a Theravadan3 practice founded in positive intention towards all

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beings… starting with oneself. You may recall the story of a couple who sought the Buddha’s advice on self-love. “You can search throughout the entire universe for someone who is more deserving of your love and affection than you are yourself, and that person is not to be found anywhere. You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.” Intolerance is a failure to appreciate another being as they are and a failure to accept yourself as you are. In the view of dependent co-arising, we are all here together. There is no wave apart from the sea. Intolerance is one wave holding the view that another wave should not be expressing itself the way it is. It is a failure to appreciate the qualities inherent in the other person and a failure to see that intolerance is your own experience. The truth is that that person is the whole universe acting as your teacher. Sympathetic joy is its cure. The cultivation of equanimity (upekkha) also happens to be the final of the six paramitas9. Bodhidharma26 remarks that, “By purifying your seix senses of the dust of sensation, the paramitas ferry you across the River of Affliction to the Shore of Enlightenment.” Intolerance is a reaction to the world of form. Equanimity is its cure. Intolerance lies within the mind; it is attachment to an idea. In this sense Zen practice is itself the cure for intolerance. So, what use are the sublime states in dealing with intolerance? As Buddha himself is reported to have said, “What a person considers and reflects upon for a long time, to that his mind will bend and incline.” Joy and flexibility are the cure for intolerance. Buddha included Right Action as one of the aspects of the Path. More recently we have discovered that just as the mind impacts the body, the body impacts the mind. If you want to be happy, smile. If you want to be depressed, frown. If you want to be flexible maybe yoga is a good practice.

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“Practicing the Immeasurable Mind of Love extinguishes anger in the hearts of living beings. Practicing the Immeasurable Mind of Compassion extinguishes all sorrows and anxieties in the hearts of living beings. Practicing the Immeasurable Mind of Joy extinguishes sadness and joylessness in the hearts of living beings. Practicing the Immeasurable Mind of Equanimity extinguishes hatred, aversion and attachment in the hearts of all living beings.” – Nagarjuna

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No Fault, No Others Topic Column Ron Stevenson

Dogen

wrote: “Do not be concerned with the faults of other person… Buddha prohibited unwholesome actions, but did not tell us to hate those who practice unwholesome actions.” Dudjom Jigdral Yeshe Dorje15 wrote similarly in one of his most influential works – A Vajra16 Potem. While the second line is the subject of this article, its logic is best appreciated as part of a whole of the path of Buddhism, and so, it’s in the IndieZen blog at http://izweekly.blogspot.com/2014/12/vajra.html. 14

The Great Effortess Certainty “Grant your blessing that I have no wish to see the faults of others,” is an aspirational prayer or chant, which seeks self-awareness. As shown in the blog, it is part of the path of self-awareness, that which winds down to the final verse: “Grant your blessing that I gain the great effortless certainty.” The great effortless certainty can be contrasted with a certainty that is built upon an edifice of logic. Logic itself is a tool, but one whose abuses are worth observing. One of the most egregious of these is circular logic, which is logic that is constructed upon a root assumption that is accepted as truth rather than proven through rigorous analysis. What we tend to seek is small certainty; the certainty that our biases are, in fact, real so that we may then eliminate the cognitive dissonance that comes from questioning inconvenient inconsistencies. Circular logic is often used to scapegoat other cultures, such as how Sam Harris18 ignores much of the Quran and Middle Eastern culture to turn them into a straw man for Americans to beat relentlessly.

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The Embedded Premise of Self vs. Other Circular logic is required to make one-sided rationalizations. Intolerance requires elaborate justification and complex logic; logic complex enough to defend against its circular nature. A scapegoat is created as a caricature, a simplified stereotype. Circular logic is what proceeds from an embedded premise. When we focus on others’ faults, what we’re doing is reacting to an image of that person that is effectively distorted to begin with. This means that all of our subsequent judgments will then be colored by antipathy. Contrarily, our embedded premise when it comes to ourselves is one of complete sympathy. Most people have a self-serving bias (Myers, 2010) to some degree. To the extent that we do accomplish some small step toward being better than others, we are prideful paragons of virtue. Rather than look upon others who succeed with, “sympathetic joy,” we rationalize that they are merely, “overcompensating,” for their flaws. At the bottom of this is the inability to assess our faults exactly as we would with others. We are essentially good, while others are essentially vile. In Buddhism, this is called “avidya” (ignorance). In psychology, it’s called the fundamental attribution error (Myers, 2010). It indicates that our perceptions of things are colored by the embedded premise that we bring to bear, and the big daddy of them all is the sense of separation between self and other. Grant Your Blessing to See My Own Faults The beginning verses of the Dhammapada19 deal with this tendency to fault others. Pointing to the flaws in others and using these as a means for contention against the world is an ancient habit of ours. Ahimsa24 turns this around on its head. It is the intention not to harm others – something very much advanced. To

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focus on the intention to be of value to others and not to cause them suffering is basic respect. But where can such respect be found in the mind? From whence does this rise? How is it that the Bodhisattva25 knows the underlying unity of all life? Mahayana20 Buddhists take the Bodhisattva vows21 to Awaken for the sake of all sentient beings. In particular, Bodhisattvas promise to practice the six perfections9 in order to fulfill their Bodhicitta22 aim of attaining enlightenment for the sake of all beings. In short, Bodhicitta arises from the practice of looking within, and dealing with our delusions and projections, and perfecting ourselves for the sake of others. In practice, this means finding a way to turn the glare of enmity back on ourselves, and to see the origin of the contention as arising within ourselves. There are various practices for this, but Zen being relatively simple, goes for the path of self-examination of the mindstream17. It seems simplistic, but it is powerful. Grant Your Blessing that Wholesome Thoughts Arise Deep From Within In immersed meditation and mindfulness*, the true nature of mind emerges. It is here that the illusion of self vs. other is experienced firsthand. In other words, it is through a change in focus and modality of thought that we can become more objective and equanimous. A new study suggests that mindfulness reduces our split second assumptions based on superficial differences in people (Suttie, 2014). The study uses the Implicit Assumption Test (IAT). The IAT measures how quickly people associate negative or positive words like “bad” or “good” with photos. The photos are of people representing different social groups such as African Americans or the disabled. Results showed that

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mindfulness decreased the automatic bias against African Americans and the elderly. Mindfulness interrupts the link between past experiences and impulsive responses, but the value of meditation is much greater; wholesome thoughts arise from deep within. In meditation, we see past the illusion of an inherent self. We hang our criticisms and projections on this illusions. Flipping the Switch When we seek to assign blame out there, it is an indication that we are working from a state of mind that is deluded, and the medicine for that is just to change our state of mind. We are familiar with the contentious mind, ensconced in dukkha23. Indeed there is no end to our troubles when we are working from this state of mind. What the IAT experiments shows is that these patterns can be interrupted. The subtle methods of disciplining the mind to work from spontaneity and equanimity are the most efficient means of flipping that switch. They are the basic components of our practice: reading, chanting, always being mindful, and entering into deeper states. Through these practices, in our daily interaction with the world and others, we realize that the four immeasurables transform our understanding. We may respond to our world in truly objective, equanimous, compassionate and wise ways. In this way, we can turn from ideologies of hate toward more functional modes of Awareness that cultivate empathy in human relationships. About the Author Ron Stevenson is a Dharma renegade, Tibetan Buddhism, Zen and with Korean Won Buddhists (having lived in Korea). He believes them to all be aspects of the same practice.

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Names & Terminology 1

Ikkyu Sojun – 15th century eccentric Japanese Zen monk, abbot and poet.

Dharma – Scripture, Truth, natural laws, Buddha’s teachings.

Theravada – Branch of Buddhism which focuses on early teachings.

Emptiness – Interdependent and impermanent nature of things.

Gudo Wafu Nishijima – Japanese Zen priest and teacher. Died in 2014.

Advaita Vedanta – School of Vedic philosophy.

Middle Way – Noble Eightfold Path, non-extremes. “Neither this nor that,” and, “this and that,” reasoning.

Hakuin Ekaku – 18th century Rinzai Zen teacher and writer.

Six Paramitas – Giving, virtue, patience, dedication, concentration, wisdom.

Shunryu Suzuki – 20th century Zen monk, writer and teacher. Founded first Zen center outside of Asia (San Francisco Zen Center).

Jiddu Krishnamurti – 20th century Indian philosopher, writer and poet.

Three Poisons – Attachment/greed, aversion/hatred, ignorance/delusion.

Buddha-nature – Potential all beings have for Buddhahood, universal essence of all things.

Dogen Zenji – 13th century Japanese Zen teacher and writer.

Dudjom Jigdral Yeshe Dorje – 20th century Tibetan Buddhist, head of the Nyingma lineage.

Vajra – Sanskrit for diamond. In Buddhism, often symbolizes indestructible and firmness. Representative of Vajrayana school of Buddhism 16

Mindstream – Moment-to-moment continuum of awareness. What many mistake as a personal and permanent essence.

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Sam Harris – Author, philosopher, neuroscientist.

Dhammapada – Buddhist scripture; collection of sayings from Buddha.

Mahayana – Branch of Buddhism; Zen is a sect of Mahayana.

Bodhisattva Vow – “I vow to save all sentient beings, though beings numberless. I vow to transform all delusion, though delusions inexhaustible. I vow to perceive reality, though reality is boundless. I vow to attain the Enlightened Way, a Way non-attainable.

Bodhicitta – Awakening Mind that strives for enlightenment and to end the suffering all beings.

Dukkha – Mental suffering, dissatisfaction.

Ahimsa – To cause no injury in words, thoughts or deeds

Bodhisattva – Enlightened being. Cultivates Bodhicitta for the benefit of all.

Bodhidharma – 5th century Buddhist teacher and monk. Often considered the founder of Zen Buddhism.

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References Action Institute Power Blog (n.d.). Got Tolerance? Retrieved from http://blog.action.org/archives/67401-homeschooled-studentspolitically-tolerant.html/got-tolerance Berger, K. S. (2011). The developing person through the life span (8th ed.). New York, NY: Worth Publishers Birth Picture (n.d.). Retrieved from http://scienceclarified.com Cmaritis, H. (n.d.). Buddha (Snow). Retrieved from http://www.artflakes.com/en/products/buddha-snow Matsumoto, D., & Juang, L. (2013). Culture and psychology (5th ed.). Cengage Learning Myers, D. G. (2010). Social psychology (10th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Suttie, J. (2014). Can mindfulness help reduce racism? Berkeley Greater Good Science Center. Retrieved from http://greatergood.berkeley. edu/article/item/can_mindfulness_help_reduce_racism Shadow, K. (2013). Muditia â&#x20AC;&#x201C; The practice of sympathetic joy. Lightworkers. Retrieved from http://lightworkers.org/wisdom/ knight-shadow/181416/mudita-practice-sympathetic-joy Tumblr (n.d.). Take a cue, spread a meme, be a Buddha. Retrieved from http://www.schmemes.tumblr.com Vajra Picture (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.chinabuddhismencyclopedia.com

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