Mark Foote

Do you have a title on the book?

It's fascinating, to hear voices on Dao Bums I haven't heard in years. Call me a sentimental fool, but it's great to know folks are still alive and still open to sharing. The twelfth-century Chinese teacher Foyan spoke of two sicknesses in Zen: In my school, there are only two kinds of sickness. One is to go looking for a donkey riding on the donkey. The other is to be unwilling to dismount once having mounted the donkey. … Once you have recognized the donkey, to mount it and be unwilling to dismount is the sickness that is most difficult to treat. I tell you that you need not mount the donkey; you are the donkey! (“Instant Zen: Waking Up in the Present”, tr T. Cleary, Shambala p 4) Some of us have found ourselves mounted on the donkey before we knew how to ride--I think I can say that. ... I'd like to take a walk But not around the block I really got some news I met a man from Mars He picked up on my guitars And played me a traveling song And when we got on ship He brought out something for the trip And said, "It's old but it's good" Like any other primitive would (Neil Young, "Ride My LLama")

dupe, sorry.

I will recommend Cheng Man-Ch'ing's "Thirteen Chapters" to you. That got away from me. The cat wants attention! Energy flows where attention goes, but what you are doing is the first part of koun Franz's advice here, and the second is what I referred to earlier: Okay… So, have your hands in the cosmic mudra, palms up, thumbs touching, and there’s this common instruction: place your mind here. Different people interpret this differently. Some people will say this means to place your attention here, meaning to keep your attention on your hands. It’s a way of turning the lens to where you are in space so that you’re not looking out here and out here and out here. It’s the positive version, perhaps, of ‘navel gazing’. The other way to understand this is to literally place your mind where your hands are–to relocate mind (let’s not say your mind) to your centre of gravity, so that mind is operating from a place other than your brain. Some traditions take this very seriously, this idea of moving your consciousness around the body. I wouldn’t recommend dedicating your life to it, but as an experiment, I recommend trying it, sitting in this posture and trying to feel what it’s like to let your mind, to let the base of your consciousness, move away from your head. One thing you’ll find, or that I have found, at least, is that you can’t will it to happen, because you’re willing it from your head. To the extent that you can do it, it’s an act of letting go–and a fascinating one. ( “No Struggle [Zazen Yojinki, Part 6]”, by Koun Franz, from the “Nyoho Zen” site https://nyoho.com/2018/09/15/no-struggle-zazen-yojinki-part-6/) An easier way to experience letting the base of consciousness move away from the head is in falling asleep: … Just before I fall asleep, my awareness can move very readily, and my sense of where I am tends to move with it. This is also true when I am waking up, although it can be harder to recognize (I tend to live through my eyes in the daytime, and associate my sense of place with them). … when I realize my physical sense of location in space, and realize it as it occurs from one moment to the next, then I wake up or fall asleep as appropriate. (Waking Up and Falling Asleep) As you mentioned there is something special about the early morning hours, the state of mind/body after a few hours of sleep that makes this practice very conducive to working.” --humbleone, “The Dao Bums”, 2012

Twelfth-century Chinese teacher Foyan spoke of two sicknesses in Zen: In my school, there are only two kinds of sickness. One is to go looking for a donkey riding on the donkey. The other is to be unwilling to dismount once having mounted the donkey. … Once you have recognized the donkey, to mount it and be unwilling to dismount is the sickness that is most difficult to treat. I tell you that you need not mount the donkey; you are the donkey! (“Instant Zen: Waking Up in the Present”, tr T. Cleary, Shambala p 4) From a piece I'm writing: Shunryu Suzuki spoke about the difference between “preparatory practice” and “shikantaza”, or “just sitting”: But usually in counting breathing or following breathing, you feel as if you are doing something, you know-- you are following breathing, and you are counting breathing. This is, you know, why counting breathing or following breathing practice is, you know, for us it is some preparation-- preparatory practice for shikantaza because for most people it is rather difficult to sit, you know, just to sit. (70-02-22: The Background of Shikantaza, “question and answer) Suzuki said that directing attention to the movement of breath (“following breathing… counting breathing”) has the feeling of “doing something”, and that “doing something” makes such practice only preparatory. Although attention can be directed to the movement of breath, necessity in the movement of breath can also direct attention, as I wrote previously: There can… come a moment when the movement of breath necessitates the placement of attention at a certain location in the body, or at a series of locations, with the ability to remain awake as the location of attention shifts retained through the exercise of presence. (Common Ground) There’s a frailty in the structure of the lower spine, and the movement of breath can place the point of awareness in such a fashion as to engage a mechanism of support for the spine, often in stages (see A Way of Living). It's that mechanism of support that is the power in the martial arts, if you ask me. Directing attention to the LDT, preparatory practice. Attention placed at the LDT out of necessity in the movement of breath, human nature some of the time, given a presence of mind. Activity of the body purely by virtue of the location of attention--when “doing something” has ceased, and there is “not one particle of the body” that cannot receive the placement of attention. Attempting to act by virtue of the location of attention all the time--refusal to dismount.

"And these few precepts in thy memory See thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue, Nor any unproportioned thought his act. Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar. Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel; But do not dull thy palm with entertainment Of each new-hatch’d, unfledged comrade. Beware Of entrance to a quarrel, but being in, Bear’t that the opposed may beware of thee. Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice; Take each man’s censure, but reserve thy judgment. Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, But not express’d in fancy; rich, not gaudy; For the apparel oft proclaims the man, And they in France of the best rank and station Are of a most select and generous chief in that. Neither a borrower nor a lender be; For loan oft loses both itself and friend, And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry. This above all: to thine ownself be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man." Poor Polonius--he needed some advice about staying out from behind curtains.

i feex him up:

I have simplified the simpler, for the sake of all concerned!

Plural pronouns also no good!

I myself try to use only the pronoun "I", if a pronoun must be used. What I find is, that to do so I have to write things I didn't already know, before I wrote them. Take a look--is there a loss of personal significance, whenever the other pronouns are used? Why then expect that someone else will find significance? There are others who should know better, here on Dao Bums--they continue to write as though only for the benefit of others. What's a mother to do!

An excellent question! Have you tried just sitting? A little bit about that, from a piece I'm working on: But usually in counting breathing or following breathing, you feel as if you are doing something, you know-- you are following breathing, and you are counting breathing. This is, you know, why counting breathing or following breathing practice is, you know, for us it is some preparation-- preparatory practice for shikantaza because for most people it is rather difficult to sit, you know, just to sit. (Shunryu Suzuki, 70-02-22: The Background of Shikantaza, “question and answer") Suzuki said that directing attention to the movement of breath (“following breathing… counting breathing”) has the feeling of “doing something”, and that “doing something” makes such practice only preparatory. Although attention can be directed to the movement of breath, necessity in the movement of breath can also direct attention: There can… come a moment when the movement of breath necessitates the placement of attention at a certain location in the body, or at a series of locations, with the ability to remain awake as the location of attention shifts retained through the exercise of presence. (Common Ground) There’s a frailty in the structure of the lower spine, and the movement of breath can place the point of awareness in such a fashion as to engage a mechanism of support for the spine, often in stages (see A Way of Living). And here's a starter kit for you, from Zen teacher koun Franz, who is currently an editor of "Lion's Roar": Okay… So, have your hands in the cosmic mudra, palms up, thumbs touching, and there’s this common instruction: place your mind here. Different people interpret this differently. Some people will say this means to place your attention here, meaning to keep your attention on your hands. It’s a way of turning the lens to where you are in space so that you’re not looking out here and out here and out here. It’s the positive version, perhaps, of ‘navel gazing’. The other way to understand this is to literally place your mind where your hands are–to relocate mind (let’s not say your mind) to your centre of gravity, so that mind is operating from a place other than your brain. Some traditions take this very seriously, this idea of moving your consciousness around the body. I wouldn’t recommend dedicating your life to it, but as an experiment, I recommend trying it, sitting in this posture and trying to feel what it’s like to let your mind, to let the base of your consciousness, move away from your head. One thing you’ll find, or that I have found, at least, is that you can’t will it to happen, because you’re willing it from your head. To the extent that you can do it, it’s an act of letting go–and a fascinating one. (“No Struggle [Zazen Yojinki, Part 6]”, by Koun Franz, from the “Nyoho Zen” site https://nyoho.com/2018/09/15/no-struggle-zazen-yojinki-part-6/) And one more, from Shunryu Suzuki: Sometimes when you think that you are doing zazen with an imperturbable mind, you ignore the body, but it is also necessary to have the opposite understanding at the same time. Your body is practicing zazen in imperturbability while your mind is moving. (“Whole-Body Zazen”, lecture by Shunryu Suzuki at Tassajara, June 28, 1970 [edited by Bill Redican], from cuke.com) All that, to "just sit". And that's just the cultivate and integrate side of things... for the "apply", I think thelerner said it well!

What we like to do here at Dao Bums is throw 'em in the scuppers with the long hose on 'em...

and the king's English battalion rode to Scotland mispronouncing lionn mispronouncing lionn --money talks, their thirst for beer quenched like fire in rain

For me, it's not for feeling. It's an intellectual concept. If I wanted to feel something, I would probably do something else. Regarding the anchor, well, I've mentioned it. Not explicitly in those terms, but it's there. When fish swim in the water, no matter how much they swim the water does not come to an end. When birds fly in the sky, no matter how much they fly, the sky does not come to an end. However, though fish and birds have never been apart from the water and the air, when the need is great the function is great; when the need is small the function is small. Likewise, it is not that at every moment they are not acting fully, not that they do not turn and move freely everywhere, but if a bird leaves the air, immediately it dies; if a fish leaves the water, immediately it dies. We should realize that because of water there is life. We should realize that because of air there is life. Because there are birds there is life; because there are fish there is life. Life is the bird and life is the fish. Besides this we could proceed further. It is just the same with practice and enlightenment and the lives of people. So, if there were a bird or fish that wanted to go through the sky or the water only after thoroughly investigating its limits, he would not attain his way nor find his place in the water or in the sky. If one attains this place, these daily activities manifest absolute reality. If one attains this Way, these daily activities are manifest absolute reality. This Way, this place, is neither large nor small, neither self nor other, has neither existed previously nor is just now manifesting, and thus it is just as it is. (“Genjo Koan”, Dogen; tr. Paul Jaffe) Mayu, Zen master Baoche, was fanning himself. A monk approached and said, “Master, the nature of wind is permanent and there is no place it does not reach. Why, then, do you fan yourself?” “Although you understand that the nature of the wind is permanent,” Mayu replied, “you do not understand the meaning of its reaching everywhere.” “What is the meaning of its reaching everywhere?” asked the monk again. Mayu just kept fanning himself. ("Genjo Koan", Dogen; tr Tanahashi) I'm with Dogen: if you want to go through Dao Bums only after thoroughly investigating absolute reality, then you will need scissors, you will need construction paper, you will need white glue:

I don't know, Daniel. The concepts are fun, but limited without an anchor. Do you feel absolute literal infinity moving your arm, when you lift a cup of coffee or tea to your lips? My idea is to let the theory of everything slide, and work on the pieces. That's all I"m saying.

or they'll lock you up, those mula bandhas--stay clear avoid the deep end

I know I'm just shoveling in the gap, here. Nevertheless. The classic literature of Tai Chi appears to identify the ligaments of the body as a source of activity. The literature describes three levels in the development of “ch’i”, a word that literally translates as “breath” but in practice is taken to refer to a fundamental energy of the body, and each of the three levels has three stages. The stages of the first level are: “… relaxing the ligaments from the shoulder to the wrist”; “from the hip joint to the heel”; “from the sacrum to the headtop”. (“Three Levels” from “Cheng Tzu’s Thirteen Treatises on Ta’i Chi Chuan”, Cheng Man Ch’ing, trans. Benjamin Pang Jeng Lo and Martin Inn, p 77-78) Unlike the contraction and relaxation of muscles, the stretch and resile of ligaments can’t be voluntarily controlled. The muscles across the joints can, however, be relaxed in such a way as to allow the natural stretch and resile of ligaments–that would seem to be the meaning of the advice to “relax the ligaments”. The stages of the second level are: “sinking ch’i to the tan t’ien” (a point below and behind the navel); “the ch’i reaches the arms and legs”; “the ch’i moves through the sacrum (wei lu) to the top of the head (ni wan)”. (ibid) Tai Ch’i master Cheng Man Ch’ing advised that the ch’i will collect at the tan-t’ien until it overflows into the tailbone and transits to the top of the head, but he warned against any attempt to force the flow. Omori Sogen cautioned similarly: … It may be the least trouble to say as a general precaution that strength should be allowed to come to fullness naturally as one becomes proficient in sitting. We should sit so that our energy increases of itself and brims over instead of putting physical pressure on the lower abdomen by force. (“An Introduction to Zen Training: A Translation of Sanzen Nyumon”, Omori Sogen, tr. Dogen Hosokawa and Roy Yoshimoto, Tuttle Publishing, p 59) I would posit that the patterns in the development of ch’i reflect involuntary activity of the body generated in the stretch of ligaments. There is, in addition, a possible mechanism of support for the spine from the displacement of the fascia behind the spine, a displacement that can be effected by pressure generated in the abdominal cavity and that may quite possibly depend on a push on the fascia behind the sacrum by the bulk of the extensor muscles, as they contract (see my Kinesthesiology of Fascial Support). The final level in the development of ch’i concerns “chin”. According to the classics, “chin comes from the ligaments”. The three stages of the final level are: “t’ing chin, listening to or feeling strength”; “comprehension of chin”; “omnipotence”. (“Three Levels” from “Cheng Tzu’s Thirteen Treatises on Ta’i Chi Chuan”, Cheng Man Ch’ing, trans. Benjamin Pang Jeng Lo and Martin Inn, p 77-78) Another translator rendered the last stage above as “perfect clarity” (“Master Cheng’s Thirteen Chapters on T’ai-Chi Ch’uan”, Douglas Wile, p 57). In my estimation, “perfect clarity” is “the pureness of (one’s) mind” that Gautama associated with “the cessation of inbreathing and outbreathing” in the fourth concentration. The Tai Chi classics emphasize relaxation. For me, calm is also required with regard to the stretch of ligaments, if “automatic movement” is to be realized. The stretch of a ligament prior to strain is small (6%), and I would say that automatic movement is only initiated at the edge of the range. Cheng Man Ch’ing mentioned a Chinese description of seated meditation, “straighten the chest and sit precariously” (ibid p 21)–I think that also speaks to the necessity of calm. In my experience, “automatic” activity in the movement of breath can at times depend on the relaxation of particular muscle groups and the exercise of calm with regard to the stretch of particular ligaments. I believe that a pattern in the circulation of “automatic” activity can develop, especially when a bent-knee posture or carriage is maintained over a period of time. “Automatic” activity in the movement of breath also follows as one “lays hold of one-pointedness”, but in order to “lay hold”, carriage of the weight of the body must fall to the ligaments and volitive activity in the body must be relinquished. (A Way of Living)

Shunryu Suzuki: To enjoy our life-- complicated life, difficult life-- without ignoring it, and without being caught by it. Without suffer from it. The sacred literature of the world is peppered with references to absolute literal infinity, to "actual infinity". I'm suggesting constructed, potential infinity in that same literature is more useful to me, in finding the kind of enjoyment Suzuki is talking about. But you got that awhile back, and I got that you believe in "absolute literal infinity" and think it's marvelous stuff. Why not bottle it? Ha ha! Never a case of projectile vomiting on the part of any monkey, with Schmidlap's Miracle Elixir (TM)!

Jack the monkey had an upset stomach during filming. Picture: Elliot Marks/Disney Kaya Scodelario said the monkey’s puking was ‘hilarious’. Picture: Disney via AP “He had a very tiny stomach and when we were filming on the boat he would just projectile vomit in the middle of scenes, which I found hilarious.”

I took a class on left-brain/right-brain stuff from the local university extension, back in the '70's. The instructor told of a study made on indigenous south-seas navigators, who could navigate between islands over the horizon on a cloudy night. He said that when asked to explain how they did it, they offered gibberish (or what the scientists believed was gibberish). I would say that people assume that because someone has some mastery, their explanation of mastery in general must be true. In other words, many masters of spiritual traditions don't rely enough on books and other practitioner's experience, when it comes to communication. Additionally, there can perhaps be some benefit for all of us, if the science in the Eastern traditions can be reconciled with the science in the West to whatever extent possible, and a cogent framework developed. And everybody has to start somewhere--how do you describe that? If you are going to fall, you know, from, for instance, from the tree to the ground, the moment you, you know, leave the branch you lose your function of the body. But if you don’t, you know, there is a pretty long time before you reach to the ground. And there may be some branch, you know. So you can catch the branch or you can do something. But because you lose function of your body, you know [laughs], before you reach to the ground, you may lose your conscious[ness]. (“To Actually Practice Selflessness”, August Sesshin Lecture Wednesday, August 6, 1969, San Francisco, http://shunryusuzuki2.com/detail1?ID=281) “You can catch the branch”: you can lay hold of one-pointedness of mind, if you can remain conscious when “the bottom falls out of the bucket”. The bucket-bottom gives out all the time in falling asleep: … Just before I fall asleep, my awareness can move very readily, and my sense of where I am tends to move with it. This is also true when I am waking up, although it can be harder to recognize (I tend to live through my eyes in the daytime, and associate my sense of place with them). … when I realize my physical sense of location in space, and realize it as it occurs from one moment to the next, then I wake up or fall asleep as appropriate. (Waking Up and Falling Asleep) As you mentioned there is something special about the early morning hours, the state of mind/body after a few hours of sleep that makes this practice very conducive to working.” --humbleone, “The Dao Bums”, Feb. 2012 (from an upcoming post on my site)

I resemble that remark! Seriously, I think you give monastics too much credit, and lay practitioners not enough, there. But I would say that... And now, a musical interlude:

It's enough to make a fella seasick.

On the heads of pins, you know.

https://zenmudra.com/230919-Pirates-very-interesting.mp4 Daniel, I think I have a general idea of your use of terms, and I read most of the article on Liebnitz (see video above). I don't think we're close enough in definitions to really specify how many angels, so I'm abandoning ship. That's what pirates do, in the end... ha ha.