My practice is in a challenging place. There was this place I called "dormant", suggesting some subterranean life somewhere. Now it's full-on, undeniable "boring." A dry, irritable place. Desert metaphors do not do justice, for in deserts, there are potentially dangerous creatures, and those are interesting.
One of the more recent expressions of this boredom is suddenly becoming enamored with another credential; flirting with the idea of getting into a counseling-related program which includes dream work, and art, and archetype study. A 2-year training program, which I suppose I would be doing on top of the 3-year Buddhist study and leadership program several of us lay practitioners have just started with Hogen called Sanghakai.
I sat down to blog about all this, and then realized a beautiful Portland spring evening was slipping away. So I went out and took a walk to our new Temple (not yet open for business, but soon), which takes about an hour at a gentle pace.
The world offers its sights, sounds of baseball games, dogs, and traffic, the smells of people's dinner cooking and laundry drying, and just feeling the sidewalk underfoot.
There are two kitties in the above photo!
5 comments:
beautiful! thank you!
How wonderful, this collection of photographs on your walk -- loved the one with the two lions, I mean kitties.
Daido Loori told a funny story about Eido Shimano, decades ago and long before his scandals erupted, giving a public Zen lecture and being asked about boredom. He responded by making the audience explain to him what boredom was, to much hilarity. It's an interesting exercise. I ask, what is it about boredom that causes me to suffer?
Thanks guys, for reading. It is funny to try to "find" boredom -- what exactly it's made of. This seems like a few spoonfuls of self-indulgence and / or self-pity... self self self!
Terriffic photos - definitely not boring!
Thank you David -- indeed, I'm all "bored" in the midst of a heavenly realm!
Post a Comment