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HENG CH’AU: May 21, 1977. Camped by small park in a well-to-do black exclusive neighborhood. Huge stately houses.
Dreamed of Kuo Chou last night. He was very excited, a glowing bright-eyed boy joining us on Three Steps, One Bow. But just as we were ready to go Kuo Tsai showed up with another woman. She and Dave had many agreements and commitments that Dave had forgotten about. In any event, he suddenly became bent, wrinkled, and lost his spark. I’ve had two or three dreams about Kuo Chou like this. Some affinities there…
“Children remembered, but only a few
and down they forgot as up they grew.”
e.e. cummings I wonder how many people here in this neighborhood, in L.A., in most of urban America, remember--remember how family with uncles, aunts, grandparents nearby and close; to grow some or all of your food; to can, eat together, say goodnight and wake up to the same reality every day. Who remembers? The divorce rate in California is higher than the marriage rate. Child abuse and neglect is off the wall and the walls are covered with graffiti and vandalized by kids who can’t articulate their sufferings. The family is key and Heng Sure and I are every day being bombarded with the results of a people who traded their keys for self and a few dollars.
Basically kids gravitate to the truth. The street gangs, early sexual clinging, clutching relationships, drugs, child prostitution, alcohol owes its rise in no small part to the failure of the family to do its job--to tend the sprouts--to meet the basic needs.
So now Buddhism is seen as “Disgraceful, disgusting in America.” Right! This is a time when the false has become true and the true is seen as false. My own family, roots, and the small family farm in the Midwest keep me going at times like these, and Buddhism, true cultivation of Buddhism is just the fruit of those roots. I hope I don’t ever forget that.
P.S. More people would feel free to leave home, if the family gave them what they needed. They wouldn’t have to attach to husbands, wives, kids, jobs, clubs, etc. to fill the holes.
The fire in my body is under better control since sitting Ch’an again. We try to sit two hours a day. T’ai chi and standing meditation have improved too. They are more powerfull--like a waterfall--than I’ve ever experienced. It must have something to do with bowing and leaving home; nothing else has changed much.
Heng Sure is doing t’ai chi every morning even though it’s really hard, especially at the beginning of the day when it’s cold and dark outside. We are getting along--no fighting, no anger. That makes tight quarters and tight situations a lot easier. It also does not leave a hole for our energy to run out.
Our concentration is getting sharper and stronger. I can’t explain it too well in words, but just in that concentration, just by focused mindful action, incredible clarity, ease, balance, and “seeing” are coming forth. What a wonderful chance: bitter practices, Gold Mountain, Three Steps, One Bow. I have so much to repay.
Sat. a. m.. The streets are deserted, just smog lingering from last night. People always look so yin and wasted on weekend mornings. What is it about "having fun' "going'out and doing something" that leaves people so flat and vacant after?
Line from song by Incredible String Band:
"I used to follow happiness I used to follow pleasure
But I found a door behind my mind And that's the greater treasure."
Bowing and moving this a.m. I can't remember feeling so peaceful. My feet barely touched the ground. I don't weigh any less but my mind feels a lot lighter.
Heng Sure looks so natural and at home bowing down this cement ford of banks and corporations -- a tiny speck in a flowing robe -- somehow he stands out, doesn't get buried or submerged like everything else. This is the Triple Jewel in America -- not Heng Sure and me but the Sangha according and not moving, not moving and according with conditions. Ancient, modern, dated and now, it doesn't matter as long as the source is cultivated, penetrated, kept alive through practice. Then the true and orthodox will be healthy. So even though people look askance, in the long run, all people seek the truth.
They won't be tricked or sold short. It's only a question of time, sincerity, and true practice, This is where the Moonies and Krishna's miss the boat. Their practice doesn't penetrate through to their own true nature, the source, so they underestimate and compassionlessly try to "convert" others. "No one saves us but ourselves; Buddhas only show the way." How is it the Way if you don't walk it?
Ordinary people don't know to look within. But having looked long and hard outside without finding what they ultimately seek, some are, even if reluctantly or defiantly, beginning to return the light. One can only "go West" so long. Eventually there is nowhere left to go. This is no clearer than here in L.A. We'll all get to the heart of this sick body together, eventually. So it's important to keep the proper Dharma, the medicine?antidote, safe and available. The way to make it safe is by turning the light around??by cleaning up our own act. We must renounce the "self" through hard work and patience. All these people are watching??watching with fear and a little hope.
I just don't have my rap down. I can't seem to make people wonder and understand what the Sino American Buddhist Association is all about. There's a right time and place to say the right thing. Mostly I discover it after the people have gone. This a .m. a carful of sincere questions from a family. They wanted to know about Heng Sure's and my personal background. That's not the point, but it's hard to talk to a larger issue without seeming to pitch and expound. That's because of no wisdom. Anyway, after I walked away and started bowing I realized the handout release would have been just the thing. So swallowing some doubts about proselytizing I ran back and slipped them one.
God bless the grass that grows in the cracks. They roll the concrete over it and try to keep it back But the concrete gets tired of what it has to do It breaks and it buckles and the grass grows through God bless the grass. -- Pete Seeger
Who looks best on a Saturday morning? The kids and the grass. "how can you pick up what's true if you don't put down what's false?" If you didn't mess with anything in L.A. (just leave everything be, still) in a short time the grass and natural environment would reclaim break through the cement and smog. So too with myself and the cement I put around my true nature.
Offerings: pen filler, lunch, three log books.
Group karma and upside-downness: In L.A. people are starting to buy drinking water -- the tap eater isn't palatable. "Only five or ten cents a gallon..." says one upasika.
"We saw it at the supermarket for ten cents a half gallon." says a monk.
"Oh'. It's going up. Better go out and stock up. Next month gas will be $1.00 a gallon." In L.A. gas is as important as blood. It's going to be a hot, angry summer in L.A. for people who can't afford gas or water. "Pretty soon you'll have to buy air." Ha, ha, weak laughter. How far can you drive down the wrong road before you admit you're lost? California, here we come... "The answer my friend, is blowing in the ‘within.’"
Buy a new hard now and Jim White Ford will throw in free??get this??a free 20-gallon tank of Rocky Mt. Springtime Air Oxygen and a month's supply of Bottoms Up pure spring water. Is that a deal, or not?
In a thousand ways in everything we see -- within and without -- the Dharma speaks. "I guess I won't be able to shower everyday anymore," adds the upasika. Connection! Cause and effect.
Saturday PM. Hot, real hot. Bowing on black cement is like bowing in a frying pan. For all the ants I burned with a magnifying glass as a kid…
On weekends when the streets are empty, it becomes quite unreal out there. We could be bowing through the Arabian Desert for all I know. Two laypeople rode the bus out to find us and give us some apples, honey, and crackers. They were so alive and refreshing. We had just finished a particularly hot stretch.
More and more the journey goes within. We get less and less moved??bothered by horns, hoots and conditions. Actually it feels cool, even though it's scorching.
A strange zombie character appeared from somewhere and pressed close to drone, "What can you tell me about religion?" All I could tell him was my little rap about Three Steps, One Bow. After I thought about it I realized I could have said, "I can't tell you anything but I know someone who could answer every question and tell you anything you want to know."
“Who?"
"You. Cultivate morality and concentration and you will find your answers." Simple. Always too late, Kuo T'ing (Heng Ch'au).
Question: "What are you doing?"
Answer: "Who is doing the asking? Answer that and you'll know what we're doing."
Removing false thoughts and afflictions, enter the Avatamsaka sea.
The pure source Boundless, beyond words
Limitless, without measure
No you or me??only thus.
Watch your holes
Plug the leaks
Let ii swell
Wave and water
Disturbed and pure
Afflicted and awake
A single thought.
Almost every pay phone and toilet in L.A. so far has the sign "Out of Order." So true. Upside down. No order, no harmony. Soon The airports and roads to L.A. will be blocked with signs reading "Out of Order." 90% of America's T.V. and movies are made here -- "Out of Order." "Out of Order." "When the universe of a billion worlds is contemplated in stillness, one sees that bad karma has welled up and filled it all." -- Master Hua. "Out of Order."