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March 12, 1979
Sausalito, California
Venerable Master,
It seems like we've covered miles in the space of a single thought. Bow down and beneath my feet is the wind-swept sand of Pacifica. Stand up and behind me the orange towers of the Bay Bridge disappear below the hills of Marin. We've nearly reached the foot of Mt. Tamalpais. Once across the ridge, we'll be on Highway One all the way north until we turn east to the City of Ten Thousand Buddhas. Truly as the Sutra says, "The three periods of time are level and equal."
As we have often heard,
When you can concentrate,
then it is magical.
When you are scatted,
then there is nothing.
I realized today on Bridgeway Drive in Sausalito that all the different kinds of work that people do, cultivating the Buddha's Way is the job that requires more concentration than any other. To really concentrate takes everything I've got and then some. Bowing on the highway helps concentration tremendously because we get instant response to our false thoughts these days. It's uncanny.
For instance, the mystery of the car horns is still at work. Since the trip began, every time my mind wanders into thoughts of self, what I've done, or plan to do--every time I get involved in my surroundings--it seems that I'll hear a car horn on the instant of the thought. It's spooky. When I really concentrate on the bowing method and don't scatter my thoughts, the road is completely silent and still. It works this ways every day. It can't be coincidence.
It gets even more specific. In San Francisco last month I put on my glasses for the afternoon's bowing up Point Lobos Avenue outside the Seal Rock Inn. I had this false thought: "It will be fun to see people's expressions for a change." Not recognizing this as a step down the road to scattered concentration, I let it dwell in my mind.
Two bows later an unusual-looking woman walked by. Nothing about her appearance fit together. She could have been put together in a hurry by a committee. She looked like a rush-job at the people plant. From lopsided beehive hairdo to her yellow tennis shoes, she was very strange.
She said in a mechanical voice, "Watch your eyes. Be careful you don't pick up lots of germs off the street," and she walked on by towards the Cliff House.
I understood immediately that it was not okay for me to leak light out my eyes, chasing forms and shapes. I took off my glasses and went back to work at concentrating on the method.
So that my mind does not dote on the
pleasures of the world,
Nor is it stained by attachment to what
is practiced,
I want to concentrate my mind to receive
and uphold
The Dharma taught by all the Buddhas.
-- Avatamsaka
A cultivator must concentrate like a diamond cutter: The mind is that hard and that bright. It shines light from every polished facet. Concentrate like a hockey goalie: desire and bad habits fly from all directions like a hard rubber puck. Concentrate like a bomb-defusing expert: let an angry or selfish thought dwell and you can lose your nose to a speeding can of Pepsi, and I nearly did in Pacifica.
Concentrate like a lion-tamer: don't allow fear or doubt to impede your moves or tarnish your will. Concentrate like a harbor pilot: You know where the shallows and the rocks are in your nature. Guide your Prajna boat safely through the channel.
Concentrate like a mountain climber: follow the pitons and footprints of climbers who have made the safe ascent before you. Concentrate like a brain surgeon: get right in to the stuff of the mind, pull out the diseased parts without harming the healthy parts.
Concentrate like a soldier behind the lines: the self doesn't like being told to drop dead. You've got to trick it and subdue it without a direct confrontation. Fighting with the mind makes everyone lose.
Concentrate like a Buddha: relaxed, patient, courageous, unsurpassed in strength and kindness. Concentrate like a cultivator:
One who takes the Buddha's state as his own
And concentrates his mind without rest--
That person will get to see Buddhas
Equal in number to his thoughts.
-- Avatamsaka
Disciple Kuo Chen
(Heng Sure)
bows in respect