Dharma Library

In the yard, after the rain, every step makes mud. Why do I hate the squelching?

Mixed-up youth, far-out experiences. I first read about Zen, as a 15-year-old in 1966, in Alan Watts' "The Way of Zen". I was immediately attracted by the sense of the Zen masters knowing something that was wonderful yet ordinary in that it was always present. From that time, for perhaps 7 years, I read much about…

On retreat with Shifu many people have had encounters with him that must have surprised them. Shifu, too, encounters people who surprise him! The outcome of such meetings is often valuable. Sometimes when you meet a Buddha on the road it might be worthwhile seeing what he has to say before you kill him! At the beginning of a new Millennium let us see what happens when you bump into a Master. Of…

Not many of us have to endure for years the disappearance of a loved one. To discover that the loss was due to horrendous murder is even rarer. Yet, in places like Kosovo or Kurdistan this experience is something of a commonplace. The anger, indeed fury, can reach out to strike down whoever or whatever is deemed responsible. Justice is not always easy to be done. Killing is easier. So the cycle…

Twenty-four of us talked about ourselves, why we had come and our hopes for the coming week. 'Coming home' was a theme for many. My struggles on three previous Shifu-led retreats made it feel more like school camp. My hopes were to learn more about off-cushion practice and the second stage of Silent Illumination, to avoid my usual frustration and despair ... and to lose some weight.

My first sit…

I felt an immense sense of fear and trepidation when I sent my cheque in for my first WZR. Previous to this my record at sitting was about 12 minutes, during which I would usually get terribly restless and my ankles would hurt due to the amount of sport I have played. On the other side I had spent years devouring books on Buddhism and quite a few other ‘isms’ too. My father had always been…

In NCF 18 Eric Johns described how he set out to discover the Buddha Way by visiting Bill Pickard at Mousehole in Cornwall where there was a small group living under his instruction in Soto Zen. During the subsequent years of Eric's training as a monk (Sik Hin Lic) in Hong Kong, Korea and Japan, Bill sustained a flow of letters to him, acting very much as an older spiritual counsellor to a young…

John Senior has sent us two short contributions arising from his practice. The first is "an attempt to extract the essence of the Diamond Sutra in a form which I can read back to myself before meditation. I find its reference to familiar things like gifts, teachings, happiness, particles of dust and the universe give it perhaps more richness than the profound but often abstract Heart Sutra." The…

Mahamudra Retreat February 1999, my Retreat Report

My practice at home had been going well. I had read 'The Yogins of Ladakh' shortly after it was published and had enjoyed it very much. I particularly found Tipun's Notebook revealing. Often I have found the words we use not useful for me in working out where I am in terms of practice (a karmic problem). But somehow the Notebook approached the…

I arrived at Maenllwyd, in the deepest despair I have ever known - the 'dark night of my soul'. Having been to an Introductory Chan Retreat a few months previously, I had some dim awareness that this was a place where I could safely be, that is, be allowed to be, in that dark night.

And indeed, I was in a place, and with people, who accepted my existence well before I could.

I had spoken to…

This article is reprinted from Chan Magazine. Fall 1998, p32-35. Based on several lectures by Shih Fu, edited by Dan Stevenson, adapted for NCF by John Crook.

The Chinese term for practising Chan is ts'an-ch'an, which means to investigate, engage, or dig into (ts'an) the heart or living enlightenment of the Chan tradition. It is often said in Chan that the door to Chan is "no door," that the…