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HENG CH’AU: June 2, 1977. In the last two weeks or so some drastic and powerful things have been going on inside. At first I noticed my t’ai chi was much stronger, like every pore and corner of my body was charged with almost too much juice to contain. Then I went through a couple of days where sexual desire was running wild. I felt like fifteen or sixteen years old. Every sight and sound was a potential threat. Even though I could see what was happening the pulsing yearning was still hard to control because so much came so fast and I felt it hormonally, like an animal instinct. Finally I got some leverage on this runaway energy.
In the last week my sitting meditation is more concentrated; less distracted. When I sit and fix on the tip of my nose a wave of warmth spreads from my waist and hips (inside though) up my spine and throughout my body. Any pain or discomfort disappears. I feel light and at ease, aglow. Regardless of how cold or hot it is I feel comfortable in light clothes. After sitting I feel as if I had just taken a hot bath--refreshed but not hot or heavy or dull.
This morning waves of anger and edginess hit. I was really irritable, almost like pre-flu skin sensitivity, only emotionally as well.
Patience, patience, got to have patience, don’t get angry, Swo pe he.
This low follows an incredible high energy peak last night where I literally felt like I was nine years old again—boundless light energy without afflictions of sexual desire, adult worries, cares, and attachments. Just got to hang on and let it go where it goes. Don’t be moved. The only thing true is hard work and patience.
Where does the energy outflow go? Waiting patiently waiting for the slow kiln inside to transmute this new energy. To woman and pastry shops it goes, checking out the sugarland. To anger and short temper (hurry up kiln I am about to explode). Cross it over, don’t spill it. Patiently sweating it out at a foundry in the oven! We both feel like we are smelting a pure substance in a super hot furnace in a small room--all around the furnace are open barrels of gun powder. One mistake, broken rule, too serious a slip and boom!
Three straight days of diarrhea and hot pavement, bad smog and more Jesus converters. (The one this A.M. kept shoving his crucifix into our face "See this, see this?") All little tests it seems. Now we are in Santa Monica nearer the beach. "Really nice there…smooth sailing." And yet we are both just fine. Nothing to be happy about or sad about either. No reason to get angry or impatient. No cause for doubts or enthusiasm. Three steps, one bow. Through the picket line of construction workers, three steps, one bow, three steps, one bow.
Orange Juice Bomb
We usually eat promptly at 11:30 A.M., but for some reason today we decided to eat later and instead use the time to contact the Santa Monica police and let them know about three steps, one bow. We pulled into the police parking lot, got out, and closed the door. As the door closed…Boom! There was an explosion and I saw the curtains shake. We looked inside. Orange juice was dripping and running all over and the half gallon glass bottle it came in was scattered about the van in jagged hunks and splinters.
The bottle was in a box we always set right between us when eating and the time of the explosion? We looked at Heng Sure’s watch. 11:32 A.M. The force of the explosion and the glass projectiles would have left two bloody bhishus or taken something more serious like an eye or major artery.
Tonight our Verse of Admonishment will have a special reality to it:
The day has already passed, life is shorter. Like fish in an evaporating pond what joy is there in this?
Great assembly: take heed, be vigorous. As if your head depended on it. Be mindful of
impermanence and never lax for an instant.
The Flies Get in During certain weeks of the hot, muggy dog-days of summer in Wisconsin the flies and mosquitoes get pretty thick. Screen doors and windows are essential. But they are useless if left open. Running in and out all day and night, we kids were pretty thoughtless of cause of effect and so always left the door and windows open. My mother would yell, "Close the door behind you or the flies will get in." We never listened. At night harassed by all manner of bugs and sometimes bats, we would holler and cry. All my mother would say is "Not much good closing the barn door after the horse is gone."
Yesterday afternoon I couldn’t seem to keep my doors closed. All my energy and concentration was going out mostly at one particular gigantic billboard with an attractive woman serving a cool drink. This is what’s known as outflows (letting your light leek out, moving away from the Buddha nature within). So I said, "You got to stop this. For this next hour all you are going to look t is the back of Heng Sure’s shoes. This is it. Plug your leek. Shut the door."
I was good for awhile and then without even noticing caught myself looking at the billboard again. Right at that moment a car pulled alongside with one of the meanest, baddest men in it I’ve run across. He was carved and tattooed on his face and sneering a sick smile. The door left open, the flies were in. My stomach tried to hide and right then I understood the principle my mother tried to get across: what you create you must endure; leave your doors open and you are vulnerable to the outside. Live by the Way and there’s no hole for death to enter.