date: Mon Jan 13 06:50:02 UTC 2025
subj: sunday ZEN and relax
auth: bbsing
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^ Sunday ZEN, and just a relax day ^
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I woke up a lot earlier that I would have liked to but I wanted
to get to the Zen monastery in time for the morning meditation.
Its my second time going to meditation in person, and third time
in my life. Not a lot of people there, but the focus isn't about
how many people go, but rather the quality of the time spent.
I'm not sure I'm even supposed to make a judgement about
anything Zen, its against the teachings, but I'm new and I still
have my ideas about things. I believe the amount of people
involved in an activity or concept allows some level of
sustainment for the activity/concept. After all when everyone
leaves a town the town dies, even if only a single person
remain, the town is still dead. Now a Zen monastery can be
sustained by a single person, but things people make need
people.
This mornings sitting meditation (Zazen) was harder than last
week for me. I got more rest the night before, but I was less
comfortable for some reason. Sitting felt like it lasted longer,
and I was more concerned how I was sitting. I felt unbalanced. My
mind was drifting more on self conciousness vs breathing, so it
took more work to let go. I re-adjusted to half lotus, and
things felt natural to me. Something to work on outside of the
Zendo.
For a moment I was able to let go and just breath. The tea was a
bit better this day.
After tea, and light conversation I made it home, and ate
breakfast, then felt sleepy. I thought why not just have a rest
day? I know I never get back a day that passes by, but I have to
work tomorrow and what is wrong with have a day to rest. I work
five days a week and cook and do chores after work so why not
this day just let it go and not jump into chores. I had to tell
myself its OK to do this, otherwise I just feel bad about not
wanting to BE PRODUCTIVE. Is it some sickness I have from
working so many years in corporate land? Or that and the fact
that I have a lot of things that need doing?
I road my bike 28 miles yesterday in part to be productive with
my fitness. With fitness there is no rest day for older
adults.
The beginner stage of Zen says to let go of the three poisons,
Greed, hate, delusions. Is my desire not to work today greed?
Are my rationalizations that I am allowed to rest delusions?
Well ... I wanted to take a nap and ignore the cold outside. So
I told my wife and she and went in for a 11:30 am nap. I laid in
bed for a moment and thought I have to accept this without
judgement. I did so, then fell asleep, and it was great! :)
The rest of the day I just relaxed until the evening, then I did
a chores one of which I really wanted to do, clean the bath tub,
the other vacuum. So topping of a relaxing day with something
productive made the day nice.
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I learned in Zen, the age of rationalization which we are in
leads us to submit to logic and rationalization. Most of us most
of the time use rationalization reasoning and logic to justify
our decisions after we've made them. This supports the ego and
leads us to delusion (one of the three roots to evil).
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We all must be in a delusion most of our life.
Take a nap, but getting to sleep for work the next day might
not be worth being tired on a work day.
