Daily Dharma

Stream of Thoughts

We tend to be particularly unaware that we are thinking virtually all the time. The incessant stream of thoughts flowing through our minds leaves us very little respite for inner quiet. And we leave precious little room for ourselves anyway just to be, without having to run around doing things all the time. Our actions are all too frequently driven rather than undertaken in awareness, driven by those perfectly ordinary thoughts and impulses that run through the mind like a coursing river, if not a waterfall. We get caught up in the torrent and it winds up submerging our lives as it carries us to places we may not wish to go and may not even realize we are headed for.

Meditation means learning how to get out of this current, sit by its bank and listen to it, learn from it, and then use its energies to guide us rather than to tyrannize us. This process doesn’t magically happen by itself. It takes energy. We call the effort to cultivate our ability to be in the present moment “practice” or “meditation practice.”

-- Jon Kabat-Zinn, Wherever You Go, There You Are

From Everyday Mind, a Tricycle book edited by Jean Smith

The "incessant stream of thoughts" does indeed drive my actions now. Since my thoughts tend to not only race but diverge onto multiple paths my actions tend to be few (the thoughts overwhelm me into inaction it often seems) and they tend to be uninformed by reality. In other words. I tend to say and sometimes do things that are not based on what is actually happening in my world. An example would by my misinterpretation of what someone has said to me so that I react in a defensive or aggressive manner. If I had either not given my interpretation of whatever the person had said any credence without checking to see if that is what they really meant, the resulting reaction from that person would not be so angry and confused.

My practice now consists of random moments of following my breath, reading books on Zen or related matter and the care of plants. These are good but not substitutes for a daily zazen routine. I want to go to my old pattern of two 30 minute sittings a day plus study and work practice (mindfulness in my actions).

Zazen

[It is not intended] that we get rid of all delusion, fantasies, or thoughts that come into our heads during zazen. Yet, if we go about pursuing these thoughts, we are sitting in the zazen posture thinking, and not doing zazen. Trying to get rid of our thoughts is just another form of fantasy. Zazen, understood as mind being innately one with all phenomena, is a means of seeing all things from the foundation of pure life, wherein we give up both pursuing thought and trying to chase it away. Then we see everything that arises as the scenery of our lives. We let arise whatever arises and allow to fall away whatever falls away.

Drop all relationships, set aside all activities. Do not think about what is good or evil, and do not try to judge right from wrong. Do not try to control perceptions or conscious awareness, nor attempt to figure out your feelings, ideas, or viewpoints. Let go of the the idea of trying to become a Buddha as well.
Dogen Zenji, Fukanzazengi

Kosho Uchiyama, The Tenzo Kyokun and Shikantaza

Doesn't each moment ask for the presentation of our life? Each time we can waste our time asking a different question, or we can "just practice." It is the study of what moves in moving, and what is still in stillness. --Bonnie Myotai Treace, "Will You Sit With Me?

This is from Triccyle's Daily Dharma. I am starting this blog by using quotes that I find useful and helpful in my practice.

So, to sit in Zazen is to sit and allow the stream of thoughts that are always present to just be - neither trying to stop them or following them to a "logical conclusion". To detach and watch out thoughts as we put our attention on our posture and our breath. I find it most difficult to not judge things as right or wrong. My process for now seems to be to catch myself judging things as good or bad and then moving on. Just noting that I am doing it. I can only have faith that, at some point, the judging will fall away.

There is always (or seems to be) two steps in my awareness during zazen and during daily life. I "do" and "act" in the world and then I note in thoughts what I have done. Along with the thoughts come feelings of course. so even when I am "just doing" (siting, breathing, walking) I notice that I am noticing that I am doing it and often judge it as a good or bad thing. Again, I assume this will fall away at it has in the past. Maybe this is something to bring up to Rubin.