Shikantaza

But it's all with the same spirit of just experiencing what it is to be.

Now, I might be biased to you being a lineage holder in the Zen tradition, but I think that the practice of satsang, and particularly in many ways the way Dogen developed it into Shikantaza, really embodies what it is to just be.

You look at all the different aspects of it.

You're sitting still.

One thing I'd be curious to get your perspective on is sort of, and I think about this sort of in the modern age, this idea of how much are we staying firmly in the traditional lineage versus like open source dharma? And I think there's different variations within that, right? So there are people who are very, they're somewhere in between, right? They're firmly in a lineage, but They're drawing in some other practices.

For example, some modern Zen teachers have looked at other traditions and realize, oh, we're kind of just doing Shikantaza or just Shikantaza and koans.

And it would actually be really skillful to bring in some kind of four immeasurable practices, right? From Theravada or from Vajrayana.

To me, I think that can be very skillful.

Zazen is the gateway to Buddhism.

Dogen taught that Zen practice, such as Shikantanza, is not a tool used to acquire something else, like enlightenment, status, or a better state of mind.

Dogen believed that practice and enlightenment are not two separate steps where you practice now to get enlightened later.

Sitting in Zazen is the actualization of Buddha nature itself, right here and now, without waiting for a future payoff.

Thank you.

Let's see, when on that fifth type, right? That reminds me most of, I think, what Domio refers to as Shikantaza.

And one of the things that helped me when I was trying to constantly think about, well, how do I do this Shikantaza? I run into the same issues you run into.

It's like, I don't think we can be without a goal.

I mean, why am I doing this? Why am I trying this in the first place? Why am I even doing this, right? And something that Domiya said, I think on a podcast was like, the goal is goallessness.

Thinking of the Day of the Dead, they set out favorite foods of past loved ones that they make, and we make these lanterns and we light incense, and our practice is very much for them.

And I was thinking about something, again, that Rich Riley mentioned to me that he heard from his teacher, his Rinpoche teacher, that in their Dzogchen practice, which is the kind of meditation they practice, which is very similar to Shikantaza, it's this very pure open awareness, very little instruction, just being fully present.

And the idea, as I remember it, was something like if you, just a moment of that open awareness, even just a flash of it, residing in that even momentarily is worth more than anything else you can give.

Being in that open state generates the greatest merit.

The great teacher Sekito, seven hundred to seven ninety, expressed shikantaza in the following way.

Even if I were, for example, to sink into delusion for eternity, I swear I would not seek the salvation of the saints.

Is there a Buddha or a hell in Shikantaza? There is only concentrated, single-minded sitting.

What a truly majestic expression Sekito used to describe this.

In Buddhism, sitting with this kind of spiritual energy is called right effort.

We meet our pettiness and unsatiable tendencies in Zazen.

So Shikantaza or this just sitting is meeting everything.

So of course, it includes habit, tendencies, self-obsession, torment, unconscious pain and trauma.

It's not the whole thing.

Right effort must be based on a true understanding of our traditional practice.

I think I should probably stop, right? So we can do some Shikantaza.

I'll finish this soon.

Enjoying it? Okay, let's do some Shikantaza.

Of course, my voice only has...

I can hear Devi Ma's mind going, you have to stop.

You do get occasional question or occasional inquiry, or you might find some Theravada teachers that have, like, an interest in that.

But it's not predominant, nor is the sort of awareness style practices that you then find in a more mature form, like later into the Tibetan Buddhist tradition in Mahamudra or in Zazen and Shikantaza or Dzogchen.

Like these practices where you're just being, there's like no technique, no form, just awareness.

Again, you can find examples of it in early Buddhism for sure, but it's just not-- doesn't seem to be emphasized in the same way.