NEW CH'AN FORUM No. 12 Autumn 1995 Dharma Adviser The Venerable Chan Master Dr. Sheng-Yen Teacher Dr. John Crook (Ch'uan-Teng Chien-Ti) Editors John McGowan Peter Howard ( Copyright 1995 by Bristol Chan Group, UK, uploaded with permission. May not be quoted for commercial purposes. Anyone wishing to quote for non-commercial purposes may seek permission from the editors: jmcg@biols.susx.ac.uk or 100540.3662@compuserve.com AWARENESS IN EVERYDAY LIFE In our last two issues we have started to consider the subject of lay Zen. These discussions have taken in Zen and social action, the place of the Dharma in modern society and problems with the master/ disciple relationship. In this edition we focus on the role of Buddhism in the day to day life of lay practitioners. Central to the question of what part Zen may play in our everyday lives is the role of awareness. In this issue the means of achieving such awareness and mindfulness are addressed in two very different ways. Firstly, James Crowden contemplates the meditative qualities of agricultural labour and the way in which even hard work may end up with just being. In our second piece on this theme Sue Blackmore considers the ways in which attention to everyday activities may transform them making the often difficult (and sometimes annoying) problem of reducing vexations simple and natural. Also in this edition we reproduce a lecture by Shifu in which he discusses the relationship between master and disciple. Many readers may find this article of relevance to the issues raised in Stuart Lachs' discussion (in issue 10) of recent problems in American Zen centres and to the question of just what the role of the teacher should be Zen practice. In addition to these features the current issue contains reflections on the Chan retreat led by Shifu in June 1995, a report on the progress of the new Chan Hall and a proposal for a fellowship of Chan practitioners based around the community feeling already created by regular retreats at Maenllwyd. As usual we include poems, a selection of retreat reports which (in this issue these particularly focus on awareness) and details of small meditation groups around the country which are affiliated to the Bristol Chan group. We also include information on a more extensive than usual retreat programme in Mid-Wales and the Mendips as well as details of retreats in New York. As always we are grateful to receive submissions for the New Chan Forum. These may take the form of articles, photos, retreat reports, poems or letters. At this time however we are particularly interested in drawings. Further information on the NCF and the addresses to which you can send submissions and comments are given on the back page. BETWEEN MASTER AND DISCIPLE: NEITHER ANGER NOR LOVE. Master Sheng-yen - 1 A practitioner should not feel proud if a master thinks highly of her, wishes to accept her, and shows affection for her. If he or she is driven away by the master, the disciple should feel no hatred. Similarly the master should not feel proud even if surrounded by many followers. Nor should there be unhappiness if all the practitioners leave. Maintaining such an attitude of equanimity is not easy. An ordinary person will find it difficult to be impartial when he considers his own merits; he will be reluctant to see his faults for what they are or he may be apt to run down his genuine good points. Although they appear different, self-deprecation and pride are really the same thing. Self-deprecation stems from a feeling of insecurity or worthlessness. The difficulties of modern Western life often provoke such feelings. The insecurity can have a negative effect if it leads you to conclude; "What can a person like me accomplish? I can't do anything." But insecurity may also be positive. It may lead you to strive towards your goals, attain well being in life, gain self-respect. Then you may feel: "What I have done was not easy. Others are not as good as I because they cannot match my outstanding achievements!" Of course this is pride. Spiritual masters can also be proud. A master might say to himself, if not exactly to others; "I have practised for many years and have sat with many great masters. Now I have reached my ultimate attainment. But these disciples of mine have not reached that state. They are far from my level of attainment. You all have a long way to go to catch up with me." Sometimes a Chan master acts like a dictator. But this is not necessarily proof that he is proud. The question is what does he feel inside himself. His aloofness may have something to teach you so do not be too quick to judge. Once upon a time a woman asked me, "Shifu, have you had any problems recently?" I said, "As far as I am concerned there are no problems." "Ah!" said the woman. "As soon as I saw you I knew you were proud. There are always problems. Unless you have them you cannot see what they are. How can you say you never have problems?" I had to explain my attitude. If I set about doing something the obstacles I encounter do not appear as problems to me. If something cannot be accomplished, I do not waste my time trying to do it. If something can be accomplished then it is a matter of discovering how. In neither case is there a problem. Is this pride? To witness pride in another you must look closely at the individuals motivation. Suppose as many people came to the Chan Centre as attend meetings of the Hare Krishna or TM centres. I might say; "Formerly I could not compete with these groups but now I am catching up with them." Certainly this is pride arising from feelings of competition. But there is nothing here to compete about. Some people are taller or shorter than you are, that is all. Some people are certainly more beautiful and cleverer than you are. That is all. No problem. Learn not to compare yourself with other people. Of course there are differences but you should neither feel put down nor proud because of them. You get on with your thing. However, suppose you have a dog. It will be happy if you praise it. If you give it a scolding; -"You greedy, lazy, nasty dog!" - you might spoil his whole day. People are not so different, so reflect on what you say to them. Self-respect and helping others to a natural confidence are activities to be cultivated in Chan training. Self-respect is a sign that your faith in the method is getting stronger. With practice you begin to see things that others may miss and from this springs compassion. A practitioner will feel that all persons deserve compassion and will try to behave in a helpful, sharing way without generating antagonism. A master's duty is to teach his or her followers to practice so that they may leave their state of ignorance. Yet, the more people are attracted, the heavier the teacher may feel the weight of such responsibility and the greater a sense of mission. The teacher will try many methods, some of them mistakes perhaps, some of them certainly confronting to your ego. Can you take it and learn from the master's attitude? A disciple must do his or her own work but should neither be proud of that, thinking the master is lucky to have him around, nor feel any success is due solely to the teacher and therefore nothing to do with him. A practitioner should be reverent to the master, dedicating himself or herself unconditionally to the way. The attitude appropriate to a disciple is not that appropriate to a master. Do not be confused about this. A NEW CH'AN HALL: MASTER SHENG YEN AND THE RETREAT OF JUNE 1995 John Crook Shifu came to Britain again this June to lead his third retreat at the Maenllwyd. Ever since January three teams of builders had laboured in all weathers to complete the new Chan Hall in time. The main building was ready for use two days before the retreat. The old barn, reborn in its new guise, positively shone for the occasion, the pine trees on the hill peeping down through the end windows and the sun often beaming in through the open doors. Shifu told us he may not be able to visit us again since he is very busy in Taiwan developing the new monastic university on Dharma Drum Mountain. He took care therefore to instruct us deeply. He taught at three levels. Firstly, he was concerned to show us both the correct way and the right attitude with which to practice Silent Illumination. Secondly, he spoke often of the way of conduct in the world: the practical ethics of the Dharma. Thirdly, he went deeply into the profound texts of Hung Chih Cheng Chueh ( twelfth century), literally retranslating them together with Ming Yee, to reveal the great subtleties of insight which they contain. Perhaps not all participants could follow him here, but we all gained a glimpse of the depths of the Dharma in the mind of a great teacher. Shifu left us with tangible marks of his visit also, a portrait by Ros Cuthbert perhaps destined for the interview room, some beautiful calligraphy of a verse by Hung Chih, and his own poem, read to us in Mandarin and then translated by Ming Yee - the inauguration verse for the Chan Hall. Birds are chattering, sheep are baaing Streams sparkle, mountains spirited, Cool and refreshing, self at ease Everyday is a good day! Transmitting the light, spreading the Dharma Vast ocean, vacant skies. Mind illumined, self-nature realised, Everyone is Buddha! Even in this English version the delicate balance of these matching verses comes over. There is great depth here as well as the Dharma joy which so beautifully reflected the happy occasion and the clarity of mind that many participants experienced on this retreat. The verse will be an inspiration and I have already given a "teisho" on it to the Chan Group in Bristol. In many ways it conveys the silently illuminating vision of Hung Chih which inspired us all so much during this retreat. We thank Shifu, Guo Gu Sse and Ming Yee Wang for having come and very much trust they will be back again. In the meantime we have our own work to do. In June the long Welsh evenings only slowly give way to night. As the Celtic twilight faded and the last 'Boards' of the day sounded in the yard we could all experience: Half moon rising and one lone star Evening fades in the green valley. Birds fall silent, sheep are settling down, One lamp shines in the Master's room. THE QUESTION OF LAY ZEN: AGAIN... In our last number we began a serious examination of the issue of lay Zen by looking at the sociological and cultural determinants of the arrival of the Dharma in the West and its future possibilities. Heavy stuff? Maybe - but important to consider as we begin this enquiry. In this issue we turn to something more direct and personal - awareness. Both our contributors are pointing to something essential: namely that practice extends far beyond the cushion. Sometimes on a Wednesday evening a practitioner says to me, "Oh, I am sorry, John, I've hardly had time for half an hour's sitting all this week!" This reveals a severe misconception. First of all, it is none of my business whether you practise or not.- it's up to you. Secondly, Zen is hardly a matter of a half an hour on a cushion here, there or anywhere. The question is what has been your awareness off the cushion, in the everyday. It is the everyday that counts. This is where awareness is so important. The essence of Chan is being present: the feeling of presence is the gift of Chan. Absence is when the mind is preoccupied elsewhere, split off from its actuality in the living moment - like the office worker who cannot let go of her job on returning home. Most of us are busy people, lay persons without the luxury of a Buddhist opus dei sitting at regular monastic intervals on our cushions. Monastics have this luxury - which is why they pay for it in other ways! But everyone, all lay practitioners, can actualise the present moment in their lives. In that actualisation comes insight. Yet, because of obsession with our concerns, many of us do not find that easy. Indeed for some it is almost impossible. Such is the power of karma and the need for training. In the following discussion James Crowden shows how focused attention in a task of manual labour can be a blessing, bringing the mind to the sharp point of presence. As he says, it is the everyday equivalent of practice in the Zendo. He also shows how on relaxation, riding the trailer home, the benediction comes. For a lay practitioner this can be enough: it replicates in the every day what may be seen on retreats. And when such a practitioner does go on a retreat maybe he can enter it straight away - unless of course he thinks he ought to meditate! Sue Blackmore never misses the opportunity to experiment and she has discovered something simple and profoundly useful. All it needs is attention! Yet this is a very precise sort of attention; to what is, all of it, now. Not some of it under some kind of evaluation. All of it - now. Sue's exploration is searching and I hope it suggests ways of experimentation in your own lives. Indeed to attend is the beginning of wisdom - the wisdom of the empty moment full of presence. Do you recall the ancient story of Bodhidharma and that unfortunate Emperor? When the Emperor asked for the essence of Zen, Bodhidharma replied "Attention". The Emperor didn't get it. "Yes of course" he must have remarked, "Attention is important but what is the Essence of Zen?" Bodhidharma gently replied, "It is attention itself Your Majesty." But the Emperor still felt there must be something else and repeated his question for the third time. Bodhidharma, never one to waste his time, shouted at the Emperor, "ATTENTION ATTENTION ATTENTION." Sustain your awareness in the Everyday. That is Chan training. Don't waste your time thinking about it. John Crook MIND IN AGRICULTURE James Crowden To work the land or to gain one's living from the land is 99 % hard work and, in the history of Man, the shift from hunting and gathering to settled agriculture was perhaps the most important change in our whole structure and way of thinking. Without agriculture where would the monasteries be? To sustain such a complex there must be a stable local economy or at least a trade route nearby. The very foundations of Chan or Tibetan monasteries are in the soil in both senses of the word. Even the slightly decadent atmosphere of Oxbridge owes far more to agriculture than the dons are likely to admit; they tend to keep the extent of their estates a secret. Bookwork then rests on sweat; and so in a sense does the whole body of monks, some working the soil, some not. But here I am not concerned with the sociological or economic links between Buddhism and the soil, but rather to look at it on the plane of emptiness for here the peasant and the monk are on equal terms, the peasant, indeed, even having a slight advantage. Was not Hui Neng a woodcutter? Is there not a marvellous picture of him tearing up a scroll in total disregard of the written word? As a woodcutter had he not a major experience of "cutting through"? Marpa was ploughing his fields when Milarepa came looking for him and mistook him for a peasant - which I suppose he was. Then there is archery and the whole range of Japanese skills with weaponry and flowers which put hunting under a different perspective. In the stories of enlightenment is it not true that insight often happens during the simplest of tasks, like carrying water or dropping a cup of tea? Here we have the province of Zen, or rather the provenance. What is it about these so called simple tasks that can help the mind? How is it they can shape not just the mind but a whole style of living? What really matters is personal experience, and here I can offer a few illustrations of events that have changed my own life and how a lay Zen lifestyle can emerge and perhaps evolve in the modern world. Take something as simple as sheep. Herein lies a whole bundle of truths that affect the mind in various ways. Take lambing for instance; here you have a great responsibility maybe for as many as 1500 sheep on a 12 hour night shift seven days a week. This may go on for two months if you do two lambing farms one after another. At night you are on your own and have to be highly alert. You must be capable of noticing the slightest oddity of shift in temperament not just in yourself but in the sheep. You often pick up things without thinking. You are in that state by yourself for twelve hours a night. It is the nearest thing to a Zen sesshin. You are being paid to meditate and there are gaps sometimes of several hours, walking meditation, sitting meditation. The sheep themselves are in that cud-chewing frame of mind anyway - let alone the whole 'birth' thing. What about shearing? That's a mighty fine skill to have acquired for it can only be done with a free and open mind. The rhythm of shearing good sheep is wonderful and your mind is someplace else. The sheep respond to you and even smell fear or hassle in your sweat. Half the secret of shearing lies in having a good open, mind and then the sheep wont play up. One friend, a Dorset farmer cum scrap dealer, once said to me out of the blue, "You really know when you are shearing when you forget you are shearing!" Pure Zen. Many of the people I have worked with, like woodmen and hurdle-makers who lead raw independent lives, have a great understanding of lay Zen without necessarily the words to express it - but they hand it on in the same way. Rustic wisdom. Take using a chain saw; a highly dangerous weapon but in the right hands it has a rhythm and a deftness of using a sword in combat. There is a point at which IT takes over and you can fell a tree and cut it up without thinking. One woodman with whom I worked remarked in a moment of reflection just after sharpening his saw "This sound we make with our chain-saws- where does it go to?" Where indeed? Then there is cider making, building up a "cheese", getting it square, straight and vertical, sometimes the boards go on just like that... and even when you distil the spirit there comes a point when the still is set up right and it comes out perfectly. With almost every natural physical task there is a right way of doing things in that particular environment and this is what peasant societies have been perfecting over the last 6000 years. It is only those that try to manipulate the social system that fail to understand it. Of course in agriculture there has been the question of over-work, degrading conditions and impoverishment that goes with an exploited peasant class. But this is the fault of the social system, not of the work itself. Farming is indeed hard work and there is a theory in anthropology that some of the worlds hunter-gathers were not necessarily forerunners of settled or even shifting agriculture, but people who chose to return to a nomadic way of life as a preference or necessity after crop failure or soil impoverishment. These ways of being lead to different states of mind. The farmer is tight, always guarding his land and his surpluses, static and vulnerable whereas the nomad is fluid with the problem of keeping his mobile flocks together. So it is with manual work. There are those that stay put and those that move around. I think the ideal is a middle path of having about four or five key skills, some static and some that move you around. The times of the year determine when is which. Often in the gaps that occur between jobs there is time to reflect and do other things such as gardening or writing. I often have to wait for a rainy day to set pen to paper. But this is perfectly natural and the more I am in touch with the environment the more natural my life becomes. Manual and physical labour is such an important part of monastic Zen life precisely because being a monk in a monastery is a highly unnatural way of living. Many monks started out as children growing up in peasant families. In the Christian tradition you only have to look at the role of sheep in the Cistercian monasteries to see this. But they became rich and wealth is always the enemy. When this happens there comes a time when the role of the spiritual mind gets out of balance with the day to day activity of the general population This leads on to the question of emptiness. What is there to say? Nothing much... except perhaps that out of emptiness in manual labour come your most interesting thoughts and emotional realisations, often in the gaps between jobs or bouts of work when you are most at home with yourself. What better after a hard day's work than riding back up the hill through the woods on top of a trailer of wood, just sitting, just watching, just being? That feeling lasts for quite a while, until of course you enter the pub or wolf down your supper. The skill is in keeping that empty feeling. I have talked enough. Time to go back to the woods. Hard graft this living by one's hands The spinning blade, the invisible teeth Only inches away, the haze blurred and humming The singing bird, forever pushing into the sawbench Log after log, ton after ton, week after week, Endless cordwood, neatly stacked. Hard graft this living by one's hands The handle of the axe descending Time after time, the sudden crack As the grain splits and yields its inner fragrance Naked and sappy, a mountain of sawdust And not a jot does the eye's grasp wander. Only at dusk does the silence return to the forest Quivering and vital as men go home Returning to the firelight, a sense of knowing Of having been there before...... Here is where we come to when we stop. Searching and striving These are foreigners then. The password is no word at all. - 2 PAYING ATTENTION Susan Blackmore The question of lay Zen may appear difficult but it has a blindingly simple answer. Pay attention! Paying Attention is part of every practice that I know of, whether watching the breath, repeating the Buddha's name or practising bare awareness or mindfulness. My own practice is little more than just paying attention, greatly illuminated, especially in the early years, by John's magic instructions "Let it through. Let it be. Let it go." If the answer is so simple why do we need to write about it? I would say it is not only simple but also extraordinarily difficult. Zen or Chan seem at first to make outrageous demands. I remember my reaction when I first met the idea of giving up desire - what? What on earth would be the point of living without desire? Or having no preferences! How could a sophisticated, well-educated Westerner living in the 1990s seriously contemplate having no preferences? And if you do take it seriously what do you get for your pains? Zen offers no safe heaven to go to if you practice hard and do it well, no saviour to comfort and forgive you if you get it wrong and no promise of personal survival to make it all worthwhile - quite the opposite. It even claims that "you" are not the important, permanent, persisting creature you thought you were. As far as Zen is concerned, you really don't matter very much at all. Life is suffering and the only way out of that seems to be to give up the very things that made it just about bearable in the first place. Great! I don't see it that way now. It seems to me now that Chan offers a well structured and fantastically clever set of ways to cut right through the illusions that create all our pain and confusion. The empty promises are terrifying but real. The techniques do work. There is no need of false Gods or of false comforts. As the mind begins to reveal its own nature the falling away of desires and preferences and even of self really is OK in an ordinary everyday life. Is there anything specially hard about our 90s Western life? I doubt it. I imagine the resistance to Buddhist ideas and the clinging to everything that seems to make life fun is just the same wherever and whenever you live. Perhaps we have specially sophisticated ways of avoiding looking at our own minds. Perhaps our psychology even makes it worse by giving us what appear to be more rational and scientific ideas of the mind. Perhaps by having so many possessions and such busy lives we make it harder, but I doubt that there is any really fundamental difference. Chan just is hard and the mind fights against it. But if we get on with it, it offers a way that is as appropriate for us as it has ever been for any human beings. It seems to me that this transformation can come about by the simple expedient of paying attention. I would like to take the opportunity to explain what I mean. Which practice? Chan offers some very simple practices. On a recent retreat John offered us a quick review of one approach. We began by paying attention to the breath, after an hour or two we went on to incorporate all feelings and bodily sensations, then we added sight and finally we paid attention to all thoughts as well. In the end there is a sense of sitting in a silent space which is full of all these things. None grabs the attention any more than the other. All come and go in the great space without leaving any trace. There is fullness, richness and empty silence. All this comes about by paying attention equally to everything. Instead of one's attention being grabbed by anything and everything and the mind instantly shutting down onto whatever shrieks loudest, the attention is freed. Practice at paying attention means not longer being at the mercy of the grabbers of attention. But this is only one kind of practice. Why this one? Is it the best? Are all others somehow wrong? And why and how did I choose this one? Was it just luck that I got the right one first time? No. I don't think so. I used to worry that there were so many practices but I don't worry now. Within reason I don't think it matters much. Some years ago I was asked to review a book called "Waking Up". It was all about a method based on the teachings of Gurdjieff. The practice involved constant self-observation, separating the "owner of the cart" or observer, from the driver and the horse. I thought this stupid. After all there is no self and no observer, no driver and certainly no ultimate owner of the metaphorical carriage. I wanted to argue against this divisive approach. Yet I felt that I could not do so fairly without at least trying the practice. So I decided to give it six weeks, instead of my usual meditation, and note the results. It was long enough. What began as a method of creating great structures, separation and mental objects very soon, by persistently paying attention this way, gave way to the dissolution of there very structures, leading to the same place, paying attention. This took away some of my arrogance and confusion about which is the best method. Attention to What? To what does one pay attention? This is a similar question but we can look at it in a slightly different way. Try it and find out. If you choose something to attend to there is always the implied question "why this?". If you ignore this problem, choosing anything for any reason and persisting, the object of attention is sooner or later seen for what it is, ever changing, impermanent, a part of everything else. Alternatively, you can refuse to choose and pay attention equally to everything. All the myriad mental contents come and go and are seen to be fleeting and interconnected, ever arising and falling away. The result seems to be the same whether you begin by paying attention to just one idea or to all. One strategy which I have found very useful in ordinary life is to tackle any problem by paying attention to everything equally as I would in meditation. It is hard, though not impossible, to do this continuously. An easier, and very useful, trick is to do it whenever the attention is dragged away by something. Other tricks I have used are always to do it on the toilet, or whenever I feel upset or every time I see a certain object. I don't think it matters much what tricks you use as long as they remind you just to pay attention. Here is an example. I was walking along the road one day when I saw a man walking in front of me, going where I was going. I didn't like the look of him, even from the back, and began to elaborate nasty thoughts about him. I could have gone on doing so or, more likely, have gone into self-recriminations for being so horrid. Instead something reminded me to pay attention - opening myself to the whole passing scene. There was lots to attend to - the trivial ever-changing thoughts, the emotions they stirred up, the buildings passing, feet walking, golden squishy autumn leaves on the wet pavement glistening in the light of the street lamps. I paid attention to all of them without singling any out. The thoughts and judgements dissolved and everything was clear. It felt like dropping into the present; a peaceful ever-changing present that is, after-all, always available in any moment of everyday life. The nasty thoughts did not survive the light of attention. Who Pays Attention? I have said that "I" paid attention but this might be misleading. When paying attention the self can come under the same scrutiny as everything else. This way it too is seen to be ever-changing and impermanent. With non-discrimination, or paying attention, it too dissolves. This is odd. It feels odd; feeling but no-one feeling. It may feel odd, at least at first, but we may be encouraged by the fact that it sounds much like some of the things the Buddha said about there being actions but no-one who acts. Who then is paying attention? I would say that the ordinary constructed or imagined self is not - but the whole organism is. It is hard to drop the self this way. Yet the simple intention, to pay attention to all, will do it. This raises some awful questions for living our lives. Without a solid self for the centre of our universe how do we get on with everyday life? How do we think, make decisions, take actions, plan the future or feel emotions? In my experience all these questions take care of themselves in just paying attention. I shall deal with each of these in turn because I think they are crucial to the changes that Zen brings about in everyday life. Thinking. If thoughts dissolve on paying attention, how can we carry on all the thinking needed for everyday life? Surely I need all this frantic thought don't I? How can I possibly get the children off to school, get myself to work, give that lecture, write that paper, go to that meeting, do that television programme, remember those letters, collect the children again, cook their supper, tidy the house, remember the note to the milkman, get to bed - all without thinking. I am sure some thinking is needed to plan and execute such complexities. However, the more I paid attention to my thoughts the more of them appear to be completely pointless and unnecessary - it is no great loss when they are gone. In fact the necessary ones are few and far between and do survive attention. A thought such as "we need some more washing up liquid. I'll write it on the list" or "I'll promised to ring so-and-so. I'll do it after six o'clock" can pass through in a fraction of a second and lead to actions, leaving barely a ripple. "I" is just another passing impermanent feature coming into being and disappearing again. Remarkably little time is needed for such thoughts. Instead of a constant overload of rambling thoughts there can be vast open spaces with the occasional thought passing on its way in the light of attention. Paying attention in this way does not make useful thought impossible. Indeed it seems to enhance it by clearing the mind of all the masses of utterly useless thoughts. The trouble is that some courage is required to let go of all the familiar garbage. However, with paying attention it just gets easier as time goes by. Patterns of thought that once seemed indispensable to one's existence can soon be let go of with relief. Something similar is so of decision making. Making Decisions. The Buddha's ideas on self have some terrifying implications for decision making. I look at it this way. If there is no solid, permanent, or persistent self then "I" cannot really be making the decisions. This sounds ridiculous. All my life I have struggled to take the right decision, to make the right choice. I have agonised more about this than anything else in life. What do I want of my career? Should I apply for that job? Shall I get married? Do I want children? Was this all illusion? The implication of everything I have said so far seems to be that I shouldn't fool myself into thinking I decide anything. Really? Is this really what Chan means? Yes, really. I have gone about this in two ways, by intellectualising about it and persuading myself that this has to be so, and by paying attention. When paying attention I see decisions have to be made but "I" no longer agonise over them. In the present moment all those agonies of indecision are just more thoughts amongst all the others. When paying attention equally to everything there is no self making a choice. If decisions are to be made "I" am not making them, the whole organism is, indeed the whole universe really is, of which this body is just a part. Suppose I have to decide whether to go to a meeting or not. The simple fact is that either I will or won't go. Paying attention is hard work. It will include considering the factors involved, the cost, the need to get a baby-sitter, the comfort of sitting at home instead and so on. The necessary thinking goes on but it need not take up much mental space. Sooner or later the decision is made. Presumably it depends on a whole host of factors both internal to me and external, from my past experience and the present situation, both conscious and unconscious. It is really ludicrous to say that "I" make it independently. So by paying attention, it gets made one way or the other. At the meeting, or at home, paying attention goes on, to the continuing, peaceful, ever-changing, present moment. It goes on afterwards too. Regret doesn't seem to get a look in. When the present is fully attended to all those might-have-beens lose their power and are seen for the chimera they are. Also, without the worry of possibly regretting any outcome, making decisions is less painful. Let me give a simpler example - the first in which I noticed what was happening. I used to have two possible routes home, the main road and the prettier but slower lanes. As I drove up to the traffic lights I was often torn by indecisiveness. How could I rationally decide? Which would I enjoy most? Which would be best? Actually it really didn't matter much but this only made it worse. As my practice went on I suddenly realised one day that I didn't have to decide. If I just kept paying attention I would drive one way or the other. I certainly never went straight on into the bollards or bang into another car. And whichever way I went was fine. It wasn't, after all, such an important decision. As time went on I found that more and more decisions were like this. It brought a great sense of freedom to let so many decisions alone. It sounds paradoxical, making decisions and yet not making them myself. Yet in my experience giving up making decisions leads to becoming more decisive. It is the dithering and fear that is gone. Decisions have to be made because nothing stands still. They are better made in the light of attention and without the illusion of a self who is making them. Taking Action? People may complain that the Zen way appears passive or inactive. It is not. Paying attention to the present is the same when the present is sitting at the wall, hanging out the washing or running to catch the train. Attention does not stop action. It is only the actor who dies. This seems frightening in prospect but in actuality is fine. In the light of attention much of the agonising and preplanning of actions dissolves away. It even seems as though the actions themselves are more direct and appropriate. Somehow, from somewhere, more energy for life and activity seems to appear. The person who pays attention just seems to be more alive and more, not less able to act. Planning the Future. How can you plan the future while only paying attention to the present moment? This used to bother me greatly. Would I have to give up my career plans, thinking about my next book, even planning to do things with my children? I once met Baba Ram Dass and asked him "How can I be in the present moment when I'm trying to work out whether to accept that job or not?", "Where else could you possibly be?" he infuriatingly replied. Years later his answer seems quite appropriate. The few thoughts needed to weigh up that choice are present and then gone, part of the ever-changing present. While paying attention "I" am not swept up in a tide of useless speculation, wishing, regretting, or pretending. With practice it seems to me that planning the future takes remarkably little time and effort. It hardly disturbs a clear and attentive mind. Minding and Feeling. In talking about paying attention and decision making I have almost implied that it doesn't matter what the outcome is. In paying attention to the present moment, any present moment is OK. So does one entirely have to give up having preferences and just accept what is, completely passively? Does one stop having positive and negative emotions or minding about anything? For this seems incompatible with everyday life. I think the answer is that it isn't like that. I woke up yesterday morning feeling awful - lethargic and down. I might have ignored this and struggled on, convincing myself that I was really happy. After all, in our culture it is almost required that good people are happy all the time. Paying attention made the pain, slight though it was, at once both obvious and unimportant. It was very short lived. Paying attention has an odd effect on emotions. Nearly ten years ago a Tibetan Buddhist, Ngagpa Chogyam, told me about "staring into the face of arising emotions". I first tried this a few days later when a neighbour pulled up almost all my runner bean plants and I was angry. Staring into the anger was just that - a great fire that raged up with an almost visible face and sank quickly away again. I told me neighbour how I felt and he apologised. There was nothing more to be done. By paying attention the emotions had not been ignored, indeed it was more obvious and immediate than ever, but it was also gone without trace. The real difference was the loss of all that extra trouble - the thoughts about the emotions, rejecting them or feeling guilty about them, encouraging them, wallowing in them or running from them. None of that. It was just anger, brief, effective and gone. There is a tricky paradox here that has caused me some trouble but ultimately becomes clear. This is, that it is easy to abuse the practice by using it to let go of emotions that are actually needed. For a long time I stayed in a relationship that had gone badly wrong. I tried to accept the emotions and use meditation to cope with them. I tried to "not mind" whatever happened. The result was that I got more and more unhappy. The answer is not to try to do anything, certainly not blindly to accept or to ignore emotions. Paying attention may appear superficially to have the same effect - for you do not mind emotions so much when they are clearly experienced in a great open space. Nevertheless, there are positive emotions and negative ones and there is nothing wrong with that. It is human nature. The difference is this. When not paying attention, being distracted by every passing thought, there is constant turmoil, turning things over, bewildered by agonies of indecision. Am I a bad person for feeling this way? Should I do this or that? Is it my fault? Could I have done better? Paying attention there is just the pain, or the delight, or the anguish, or the joy. Appropriate action follows without further effort. I have a long way to go with this one. It seems to me to be the hardest of them all at the moment. But still, paying attention seems to be the way to live fully the emotional ups and downs of life without getting swept away or imprisoned by them. Having and Not Wanting. It is many years since I first heard of the outrageous idea of being without desire. It seemed awful - truly lifeless and pointless. How could anyone be human and alive and fun and happy if they had no desires? Also how could they own things? Wouldn't it be impossible to own an dishwasher and a thousand books, a new CD player and a fax machine, a nice garden and an electric lawnmower without desiring them? I can understand the monastic route, giving up all ownership as a way of dealing with desire - but it is not the way for lay Zen practitioners. We often do have dishwashers and fax machines, gardens and cordless hedge trimmers. I recently began to learn a new trick as far as desires are concerned. I fell in love. It was wonderful and exciting and full of delight and happiness and pleasure. But my new lover lived a long way away and I was often without him. I longed for him. I wanted him. I paid attention to this and what did I find? Of course I found that all these desires were just more mental contents, just other thoughts and feeling to add to the many in that great space. There were aches in the region of my heart, twitches in my limbs, an emptiness and yearning between my legs, an insatiable desire to write letters to him. But they were all just more of the same - all part of the feelings, sounds, sights, and thoughts to be attended to equally. This completely transformed the desires. They did not go away. I did not lose desire for my lover but neither did I need gratification right now. Instead of feeling that unless I saw him now I had to be unhappy, I just found myself sitting with desire. It was fine. Even this whooping great longing was just another ever changing moment. The same is so for all desires. I want another helping of chocolate pudding. In fact there either will or won't be enough left for me. The desire will or won't be gratified. Whether it happens one way or the other I will go on paying attention either to the full tummy, yucky with the chocolate or the slightly emptier one with only one helping. Either way will be fine. The funny thing about paying attention is how everything really seems to be fine whether the desires are fulfilled or not. Gradually this approach to desires transforms them. They don't go away but they stop driving you. It is as though, simply by paying attention, they lose their force. And you don't feel less alive but more so. Altruism and Compassion. Are we supposed to be altruistic and "good"? I don't even know what it means to be altruistic. When selves are empty and ephemeral how can one self act in the interests of another? Yet what good is all this practice if we don't become better people? This may be really radical but I think we have to drop the idea of ever becoming better, or more altruistic or less selfish. All such desire is self-centred. Again I turn to paying attention. If I walk through the college car park preoccupied with frets and worries of my own I probably won't see one of my students, leaning on her car looking tearful. On the other hand, if I am there, paying attention, the mind is clear and spacious. There are only cars and dead leaves, grey sky and a chill wind. I see a face. Without concerns of my own I feel the pain in that face. Without even thinking "what shall I do?" I am asking "You OK?" No. She is sobbing on my shoulder. If I don't have time to stay I shall have to leave. If I do I can stay and listen. No need for agonising or judging the actions. They did themselves. Is this compassion? I don't think it is altruism. It seems to me that in dropping self concern through paying attention, compassion, or feeling with others, seems to arise spontaneously - as though it is the natural way to be when it isn't obscured by all that junk. Being Different and Being the Same. I have talked a lot about transformation and change. Paying attention changes you. you are no longer the same. There are paradoxes lying here too. It is easy to set out and think "I want to be different. I want to be a better, more compassionate person. I want to be a good Buddhist." but this won't work. It aims to make "me" a better person. Yet if I am not a persisting thing at all them this is clearly ridiculous. It just boosts the craving self and increases rather than decreases desire. Paying attention circumvents all this. It is done right now. It is not planned for the future or referred to anywhere else. It is paying attention right not to whatever right now is. That is all. Any transformation that occurs takes care of itself. This is why it is so terrifying for there is truly nothing to hang onto. There is only the present and it is already gone. However, paradoxically, it is also the way to losing fear. With practice at paying attention comes the confidence that there is always a now to attend to. All pasts and futures are mental constructions. If I think about them they become thoughts in attention. If I don't think, they do not exist. When all present moments are bearable, when there are no obstructions to thought because I have learned to pay attention to everything, then there really need be no fear. Any "now" that the world throws at me will be fine. This confidence means you can be more open to others and less concerned for self. There is no need to want to be a better person or to try terribly hard to do good things for others. Indeed this would only be feeding the opposites of good and bad, and as we are reminded by that little scrap of paper in the wall at Maenllwyd, "When the opposites arise, the Buddha mind is lost". Paying attention means being right now there is someone needs you. I suspect this is a surer way to compassionate action than any amount of wanting to do good. And here I stop for I become less sure. There appear to be myriad complexities here which can easily confuse me if I try to think them through. I have based what I have said on my own limited practice and I really don't know what there is to be learned next. I can only say that it seems to me that paying attention, as we are taught in Chan, is worth all the hard work and worth all the terror it inspires. Paying attention is the hardest thing I know of, yet it is not even me who does it. For when there is really clear attention there is no self there. Yet there is no incompatibility between this teaching and living our complex Western lives. Chan is an inspiration for living and I am deeply grateful for having come across it. For now I will just carry on paying attention for I suspect there is nothing else to be done. POEMS Sonata They said not a word The visitor, the host and the white chrysanthemum. The Old Pond A frog jumped in Plop! What? ...the listener who listens in the snow, and nothing himself Beholds nothing that is not there, and nothing that is. What is? What th'? What that?What? What th'? s,is,is,is,is,is,is,is,is And I am. And I am that. Neither and both and that. But What is it? What is is, and I am This. What is is and I am that. This is. What is? That is! What is!? What is is neither and both this and that. That both am, am That and I,I, and neither and and is,is,is,is,is,is,is,is,is, Th'what? What that? What the? What? Kwatz!! Awake Attend Await The I in the it The it in the I. Now it is whole and All will be well and all will be well and all manner of thing will be well. Enough! Or too much. Roger Green DAD 1. You carry me on your shoulders through the dark and explain to me the stars. The owl in the old oak calls in the night. You chuckle, joyful in that mysterious bird. One day you received a stuffed fox and, to everyone's horror, set it up in the hall. You wanted to put tiny light bulbs in its eyes and make it see. Later the owl came to sit above the grandfather clock striking the hours with its hoots. When I was six and staying at the big house, the Blue Room I remember, you came and slept in the great bed next to mine. Before dawn I lay awake a little sick or something, you took me into your sheets and together we watched the light come. Dawn, never so mysterious, never again so filled with rapture, your explanations of the rising sun, the globe that spun, the east-west meaning, time and openings of day and night revolvings. When the sun came striking the gauze curtains and filtering into the room I was one with the planet's turning lying in your arms. 2. Long after the uncertainties began I still went to church with you. It seemed there was nothing else to do and anyway there was love. Stumbling hesitatingly through the Creed one day I heard you say "- in so far as it can be believed " and my heart leapt letting go all fears of losing love, thrilling me with the vast courage of that great doubt. I sang the hymns so high into the rafters I think the tiles moved. JHC 25.12. 93 The following poem was written by Martin Tebbs during the Chan retreat with Master Sheng-yen at Maenllwyd in June 1995. The last line refers the woolly socks given to Shifu by two Polish students who attended the retreat (Eds.) Silent Illumination Today everything is different, Everything the same. How is it different? In a cloudless sky the swallows glide effortlessly, leaving no trace; Young lambs call and call. How is it the same? Insects murmur among the sycamore flowers; The master stands by the Chan hall door; He is radiantly happy- Even the Buddhas do not have such wonderful woollen socks! RETREAT REPORTS We are grateful to retreat participants for writing so honestly about their experiences on retreat. This gives us valuable help in understanding the retreat process. These reports also provide some insight into the difficulties and benefits of attending a retreat. We continue to publish these accounts anonymously. We regret that we are unable to publish everything that we receive. NO SUCCESS, NO FAILURE Chan Retreat, New York, November-December 1994. I came to the New York retreat unsure of what to expect. Earlier retreats at Maenllwyd had afforded powerful experiences and insight into dilemmas. In the back of my mind however I began to feel that in some way I was beginning to second guess the retreat process and was becoming too familiar with John's centre in Wales. I wanted to embark on a retreat with no idea of where I might come out at the end and with no comforting familiar surroundings. In the months before the retreat I had neglected sitting meditation. Firstly on the pretext of being busy with my Phd thesis and then as the result of physical pain resulting from a back injury. I feel I had drifted quite far from a second original motivation to go on the retreat which was to try and explore prolonged meditation. In this sense therefore I felt ill prepared for the retreat. By the end of day one my legs hurt very badly. "Is there any one in physical pain" Shifu asked at the first evenings talk. I raised my hand. "Where?" "All over!" "I don't think all over." said Shifu pointing to his nose. "OK, not all over." I conceded. "Not yet!" replied Shifu, not entirely reassuringly. The second day was a nightmare. By the end of every sitting session I felt like screaming at the timekeeper to ring the bell. All day long I was fighting pain. On one level it seemed important to do this even though I was beginning to realise that the pain was connected to my back injury. I felt that, from a habit of behaviour going deep into my past, I might be in some way using the pain as an excuse to drop out. In many ways I felt back in the school room or at home and ending up ill to be allowed to have my opinion about what I should do. In the last sitting of the afternoon I tried as hard as I could to sit properly and master the pain, to break down physical resistances and be comfortable with my own body. However, I had to stretch out my legs. At this point I felt complete dejection. Shifu walked past and stopped to ask if I was in pain. I nodded feeling that I had let everyone down by not being adequately prepared. This feeling persisted until the following morning at breakfast when Shifu made a seemingly passing remark. "If you really are too sore to sit" he said, "just stretch out your legs". After finishing my chores I thought about this again and burst into tears. Suddenly it was as if I was feeling the weight of many struggles. It seemed that, with that one comment, Shifu just said "Its OK, you don't have to struggle". I hope I can live in this way a bit more in future and put down the necessity of being strong all the time. This emotional outburst and the knowledge that I could stretch my legs or even, it transpired, ask for a chair, eased my pain considerably. Nonetheless, later that afternoon, and even with a chair, my legs and back were too sore to go on. I was filled with some trepidation when I walked up the hall towards Shifu to tell him this. Though I felt tremendous relief, I also wanted to crawl into a hole and have no-one talk to me. However next thing I was upstairs with Shifu, the other monks and a couple of my fellow retreatants all gravely discussing my condition. Shame complete I thought: to fail in front of everyone! I continued to stay at the centre though with strict instructions to lie flat on my back. Though I had come all the way from Britain to lie in bed in silence, I nonetheless stopped tying to meditate in this position. In some way renouncing struggle seemed to imply just letting go of such attempts. Maybe I'm just making excuses but I really felt like being kind to myself. I felt that in some way I had lost a direction for my meditation and just wanted to rest. After some thought, on the last night of the retreat I decided to go to the sharing of experiences. I was very glad of this as it afforded me the opportunity to thank the Sangha, to feel part of the retreat and to feel as if my retreat experiences were not worthless (come to think of it how could any experience be worthless). As Shifu said to me during my interview, pain and failure are just as much practice as anything else. I can see this in terms of previous experiences in Zen but am still struggling to make sense of my own physical pain and sense of failure from this retreat. I do have a feeling of regret that in some way the retreat was a wasted opportunity as I could have done so much more. However, I did what I did and maybe its not so bad. I have also realised that both during the retreat and since I may have come across a direction for meditation; something I think I was in danger of loosing. I think that I was starting to seek a particular sort of experience at Maenllwyd. In this sense I suppose I have achieved one of my aims; having a retreat where what I learned was completely unpredictable. In some way this has brought me back to the beginners mind. As so often happens to me in Chan, now I feel I can really start. BLACK SLUGS - ONE HERE - ONE THERE Chan Retreat, Maenllwyd, June 1995. This was the first occasion I had been at the Maenllwyd and from the start it had a magical feel to it - like entering a different time and space. Coming up the track to the house and its surroundings was just like entering a live jewel. At this time of year the place was brimful of bird sound, lambs, insects and wind in the trees. All these and the environment were, as I was to discover, to take part in the retreat - sitting, sleeping, eating, meditating along with us with no separation.......... I concentrated my energies on absorbing Master Sheng-yen's incomparable presentation of Silent Illumination, teachings, texts, commentary and the infra-structure that goes with practice. He very carefully and precisely set out a whole transmission for us in a way that impressed me deeply. He obviously wants to plant these teachings in England before it is too late for him to do so directly. Only now is it coming home to me how privileged we all were. Curiously I had wanted to ask about this particular practice as I had been practising Dzogchen Trekchod for a while and it seemed to me that the methods are essentially similar. He also presented what for me is the nub of practice - direct contemplation. For many years, even prior to my interest in taking up serious practice, I have felt that certain experiences that occurred to me spontaneously and very regularly were just this - a seeing into suchness; direct contemplation. I had not appreciated that these were what Zen is largely about for their ordinariness seemed not to match the notions I found in Zen books; hard sitting, explosive satori, fireworks and expectations. I thought Zen must be someplace else although underneath I always "knew it" to be right here somehow. Through time and through attendance at retreats these experiences have deepened and become more stable, often continuous for periods of time. There has also developed a kind of feel for how to allow it to happen. Methodless method. My understanding was that this 'moment' cannot be got through meditation. Meditation just provides a possibility of it happening - one could sit correctly for a thousand years and never see. There has to be illumination as well as silence and it cannot be made to happen. But for Buddhism to make sense it needs to happen if the work of cultivation is to be effective. Coming off the Zen ride takes the anxiety out of meditation practice and allows a humorous appraisal of the ego, its tricks and spiritual aspirations. What I needed to know for sure was whether I was on the right track or seriously deluded. I needed to have confirmation by someone who also "saw". Communication with Shifu in interview was difficult - a language and cultural problem I suspect. Yet he said to me, "Keep beginner's mind - is safest". Other interviews put my craving mind to rest - knowing I was perfectly healthy! With beginners mind everything is always new, fresh and perceived with an exquisite intimacy. All things are unique - gesturing 'thus' with nobody in the way. What was very clear to me this time though was that nothing has to happen for this to be so. It is always already the way things are. I have felt that the duality of I versus that or this had to shift or collapse before 'this' could appear and I have often tried to effect this shift. It's unnecessary. There is no state of duality. Reality simply dawns spontaneously given attention. All very ordinary and nothing special, as the Masters keep insisting. And yet extraordinary! Among the wet grasses Dharma guardians hold wide the gates of suchness. Black slugs- one here one there. ............................. ON AN EMPTY HILL - NOT A RETREAT REPORT Walking across the hillside the fresh spring sunlight warmed the skin, the distant fir woods glistened and a pair of buzzards were playing in the sky. "Funny!" he said to himself, "I am not here." There were the feet, two of them, his feet, steadily pacing through the grasses; looking down he could see his coat collar and the binoculars hanging from their strap. Lifting his hand he observed the veins against pale skin. "Life, but not my life. Where am I?" Where his head should have been there was a kind of vacant space though which the wind blew and in which the buzzards called, an open feeling, an absence of boundaries, no horizon. "Unbound!" he thought, remembering words he had read. "Where am I?" The question floated off, becoming curiously irrelevant. Of course there he was walking across the hillside but this body had become merely a vehicle for a kind of awareness. That was unmistakably so. "I'm thinking." he thought. Indeed, softly, in a disinterested manner, the awareness was describing itself; back of the head stuff, back burner, barely simmering but quite clear, precise, accurate. This awareness seemed quite distinct from the body that was its vehicle. "No identification." the thought muttered. "You are not identifying yourself." Laughter. Indeed there was a sort of absence allowing an illumination of sky, buzzards and distant woods so that they almost shone. "It's the awareness that shines," the thought said. "You are not contaminating yourself. You have gotten out of the way." "What is it?" the question floated free. Outwards - there was the freshness of the spring afternoon. Inwards - there was this curious absence. "I am not here." he repeated, puzzling. "If I am not here," the thought continued, "then what is here?" "IT is here" "What is IT?" "Shut up! You are an idiot probing too much into this privacy. Don't be so bloody intrusive." IT had gone. He took a deep breath and repeated his mantra several times. A sort of swirling, a drawing back of curtains, a coming up of the lights. IT was back. Above the now motionless legs, the body leaning on the gate, the landscape glowed inside a serenity. The observer came and went remembering only the moment he came on stage. Observer, not self, disinterested commentator. That was it - a curious disinterestedness in which pure beauty swam. Inside that disinterest the usual preoccupation with himself, those endless evaluations, endless questions about past, present and future, the three times of hell, the iterative foggy self-referencing of all experience, all that had fallen away. He had not done it. It had come about there in the spring sunshine. He had discovered he had only nothing to worry about. "A pompous old prat I may be but right now in this head there isn't anything. Something, me for instance, only appears when I put it there. What is this like?" What is it like to be a bat? What is it like to be a cat? What is it like to be me? An image in a mirror, no substance. The mirror itself, reflecting, containing - well- nothing. A holograph hanging in space, illuminating processes but nothing there. Look I put my hand through it. The buzzards turned above, a pigeon shot like an arrow across the blue. Large clouds backlit by the sun. Mountains shining in the mind. "Everything is here yet in this observation there is - well- nothing. The mystery moves in its own time through the mind of the brain of the body. Not a nothing them. Look I kick the stones of the wall. There is feeling. Do not ask too much. Here is the suchness. Only relate. Stay in the relating without thought or the non-otherness of this suchness will disappear and you will be back in the gluey world of your dualistic preoccupations. And soon it will be time to do just that. Time for tea." He drove home reflectively, slower than usual. People looked kind of innocent. He was almost embarrassed by his feeling of affection for all of them. Even the adder he had nearly trodden upon now shone with its own particular and menacing glory. At St Cuthbert's Swallet the brook drops out of the sun, down that dark hole, rushing into the bowels of the earth. Images these, symbols; a well, darkness and light, depth, moon and sun. They hang in awareness as time in the sky. What is it? Continue........... Hung Chih Cheng Chueh said: Our house is a single field, clean, vast, lustrous, clearly self-illuminating. When the spirit is vacant without conditions, when awareness is serene without cogitation, then Buddhas and ancestors appear and disappear transforming the world. Amid living beings is the original place of nirvana. How amazing it is that all people have this but cannot polish it into bright clarity. One remembrance of illumination can break through - the dust of kalpas. Radiant and clear - solitary glory is preserved as the merging of sameness and difference - becoming the entire creation's mother. All appearances are merely this fields shadows. Truly embody this reality.3 A FELLOWSHIP OF WESTERN CH'AN PRACTITIONERS? The time seems ripe to put a suggestion to the readers of New Chan Forum that has been germinating for some time. Practitioners have often remarked that they would like some form of community based on their experience of retreats at the Maenllwyd with which they could feel closer identification. There are indeed now many people who have come and continue to come to the Maenllwyd regularly for that mixture of insight, peace of mind and companionship that the practice of intensive retreat provides. Furthermore, on our mountain pilgrimages and on convivial occasions at Rickford there has been a real sense of a community of common purpose reflected in the retreat reports of a number of participants. I therefore propose the formation of a charitable institution of simple form to be called something like "The Fellowship of Western Chan Practitioners". This would have the function of arranging and managing a pattern of retreats and sociable events designed to meet the needs I have just described. The advantage of such a procedure would also be the formalisation of the practice of retreat and a network of practitioners in close mutual contact able to meet conveniently at a number of centres where we already have small groups; Swindon, Manchester, Edinburgh, Cardiff and supportive of regular training at Maenllwyd. There are also financial and administrative conveniences (as well perhaps as some difficulties to be looked into) in having charitable status. Basically membership fees (small) and retreat bookings (standard) would be paid centrally and used to fund the hire of Maenllwyd and the services of the Teacher, Cook and sometimes a Guestmaster. We may also be in the position to support local groups and events of a different nature from those we run at present - solitary retreats, longer term communal events, mini-conferences, teaching, pilgrimages, support of parallel organisations in the Mahayana etc. The "spiritual" direction would remain as it has been, focusing on the teaching approach of Master Sheng-yen and his lineage with additional supportive training in Tibetan Mahamudra and introductory Western Zen Retreats. This pattern could be developed in several ways. We would create an advisory body from our membership, perhaps with two or so external advisors, which would consider the views of trainees and their needs, possible developments and, in specified instances, challenge the mode of teaching should it be felt that any mistake was being made. Behind this creation is the question concerning the role of lay monastic practice in the modern world and our work on this should be thought of as an experiment. We have not only the Asian models to guide us but also the long tradition of Western spirituality and monasticism in relation to lay practice. The core of Zen training is to be found in intensive retreat, a tradition from which major personal discoveries can be taken out into the world. This is a key position of the Maenllwyd perspective. Here then is the outline of my proposal. It seems a natural way forward after the inauguration of the new Chan Hall at Maenllwyd and the establishment of an effective teaching pattern there. I want to make clear however that it is not my intention to create a vast organisation; merely to improve the efficacy and value to individuals of the system we have already created. Retreats will not change their form or atmosphere nor grow into meetings unwieldy because of numbers. In any case the severity of the training will see to that! I would welcome responses from anyone who feels they would like to join in such an adventure. Please indicate whether you would like to commit yourself to membership should we decide to proceed. Please respond soon. I would welcome opinions and look forward to reporting back. Needless to say, if there is insufficient interest, things will continue as they already quite happily are. John Crook (Ch'uan Teng Chien Ti) PROGRAMME AND EVENTS Groups BRISTOL MEDITATION EVENINGS The Bristol Chan Group continues to meet on Wednesday evenings 7.30pm until 10.00pm at the Iyengar Yoga Centre, Denmark Place, Gloucester Rd., Bristol. The present term runs from September 20th until December 6th 1995. John will be giving talks on the Yogins of Ladakh drawn from his forthcoming book with James Low. John will also be available occasionally for personal interviews. CARDIFF GROUP Eddy Street runs the Cardiff group which meets on the last Tuesday of every month at 19 Velindre Rd., Cardiff CF4 7JE. For further details contact Eddy on 01222 691146. SWINDON GROUP This group currently meets on Monday evenings. For details contact John Senior on 01793 771297 or Dave Horsley on 01793 487402. MANCHESTER GROUP Simon Child is organising a group in the North West. This group is currently meeting on Friday evenings. For further details contact Simon on 0161 761 1945. EDINBURGH GROUP Frank Tait is currently running meditation classes on Wednesday nights. He is also organising an occasional (at present) sitting group which is meeting for the first time on October 15th 1995. For further details contact Frank on 0131 229 2472. DHARMA STUDY GROUP Tim Paine is co-ordinating this group running in Bristol this Autumn. Contact him for more details on 0117 924 5332. Retreats RETREATS WITH SHI-FU Chan Centre New York For information about retreats in New York contact: Chan Meditation Centre, Institute of Chung Hwa Buddhist Culture, 90-56 Corona Ave., Elmhurst, New York 11373, USA Tel. 001 718 592 0717 Be sure to apply early for all retreats as they are often over-subscribed RICKFORD For details of future retreats at the Mendip Painting Centre contact Ros Cuthbert (01934 842970), Caroline Paine (0117 924 5332) or James Monks (0117 957 1727). EDINBURGH Frank Tait will be organising a one-day retreat in Edinburgh in November. For further details contact him on the number given above. RETREAT PROGRAMME AT MAENLLWYD John Crook will be running a programme of retreats at Maenllwyd, a remote hill cottage in mid-Wales. There will be four types of retreat: Western Zen which mixes meditation with periods of creative mutual questioning and is open to everyone; Chan, which is for those dedicated to training in Zen; Mahamudra, an introduction to the mahamudra system of Tibetan meditation; and Exploring the Dharma, for people wishing to explore the central themes of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition. Additionally John will be running a Chan teaching retreat entitled "Calming Minds - Raising Doubt" with an emphasis on exploring central Mahayana ideas in depth. As well as John's retreats we are happy to announce the visit of Reb Anderson, Abbot of the San Francisco Zen centres Green Gulch Farm and Tassajara to run a six day Soto Zen retreat at Maenllwyd. This retreat entitled "Timeless Questions" provides an opportunity to experience Zen as practised in the Shunryu Suzuki tradition with guidance from a leading American teacher. Western Zen Retreats: Jan 4th - 9th 1996 Calming Minds - Raising Doubt: March 13th - 20th 1996 Chan Retreat: Easter Weekend, April 3rd - 10th 1996 Mahamudra: Dates to be arranged. Contact John. Timeless Questions - A Soto Zen retreat with Reb Anderson: May 20th - 26th 1996 Exploring the Dharma: * June 13th - 18th 1996 * This retreat will probably be followed by an optional mountain pilgrimage "Kailash in Wales". For further information on any of these retreats contact Dr. John Crook, Winterhead Hill Farm, Shipham, Winscombe, Avon BS25 1RS (Tel. 01934 842231). COMPLETING THE CH'AN HALL: AN APPEAL The new Chan Hall was complete enough to be inaugurated by Master Sheng-Yen last June. As the first purpose built building for meditative Chan retreat in Britain we can be proud of this achievement. To purchase the barn and get it to its current state as a functioning zendo John has already spent £45,000, a level of investment it will be impossible to continue. To finish the refurbishment three things are needed: -the construction of a toilet/ shower room extension including two composting toilets and two showers -the construction of a library/ reading room. -the installation of plumbing, floorings and fittings The estimated cost of this work will be about £15,000. How can you help? John has proposed two means of raising the remaining funds 1. A straight donation indicating (if you wish) the items to which you want to contribute. 2. A prepayment against future retreats. If you prepay £100 then you may attend three retreats with a 33% reduction on the cost at application. Cheques to: Maenllwyd Chan Hall Conversion Scheme: John Crook Please state preference 1 or 2 as above if you wish to make a donation. ABOUT THE NEW CH'AN FORUM Please send articles, poems, letters for or comments on the New Chan Forum to John Crook (address given on p. 27) or John McGowan (Experimental Psychology, Biology Building, University of Sussex, Falmer, Brighton BN1 9QG). Articles are welcome on disk (we can take both IBM PC and Apple Macintosh documents). Emailed articles can also be sent to John McGowan at jmcg@biols.susx.ac.uk. Please send drawings, photographs an slides (all of which can be copied and returned) as well as subscription requests, payments and changes of address to Peter Howard, 22 Butts Rd., Chiseldon, Wilts., SN4 0NW (Tel. 01793 740659). Please also contact Peter if you have any delivery problems. Under the terms of the DATA PROTECTION ACT we would like to remind regular recipients of the NCF that their name and address are held in a personal computer database for the sole purpose of producing a mailing/ contact list. Anyone not wishing to have their details stored or used in this way, or who no longer wishes to receive the NCF, should contact Peter Howard as above. 1Lecture to the Chan Centre, New York July 29th 1984. Chan Newsletter No 43. Feb. 1984. Edited with permission. JHC. 2Poem extracts from : J. Crowden. 1991 Blood, Earth and Medicine. Parnett Press, Martock. 3Leighton, D. and Yi Wu.1991.Cultivating the Empty Field.The Silent Illumination of Zen Master Hongshi. North Point Press.S Francisco. p32. ?? New Chan Forum No. 12 Autumn 1995 1