A. You can’t hide it.
Commentary:
Why don’t you recognise it while revealing it at every moment?
Don’t seek it and it will show itself.
©Boo Ahm
All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway
Tag: practice
Q140. What should I do when I encounter a question during practice or when reading something about Zen?
A. First of all, never try to satisfy your curiosity about Zen or enlightenment by reading books. When you hit upon a question during practice or when reading books concerning Zen, don’t depend on books for the answer to your question. The books will present you with new questions, which will lead you to read more books and they will pose yet more questions. This will be endless. That is like trying to meet your hunger with pictures of food. You can not reach the final goal through reading books any more than you can satisfy your hunger by looking at pictures of food.
When you encounter a question beyond your understanding, ask yourself the question rather than consult another book. It might take some time, but you will never fail to get the right answer from yourself. So, ancient Masters would say that reading for a day is not as valuable as practising for an hour.
Remember that Buddha attained enlightenment not by reading books but by practice. When he was asked by his disciples on his deathbed how they should practice after he passed away, he replied, “You should practice depending on the lantern of yourself and the Dharma”.
©Boo Ahm
All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway
Q139. Do you think that all kinds of meditation can lead to enlightenment like the saying, ‘All roads lead to Rome’?
A. It is true that all roads lead to Rome. However, why have most people who have tried to reach Rome failed to do so? Even if we take the right road but go in the wrong direction we will never get to Rome. Only when we take the right road in the right direction can we reach Rome. If we go in the wrong direction, then the harder we try the further we will get from Rome.
Which road we should take doesn’t matter since all roads lead to Rome. However, in order to take the right road in the right direction, we should first of all know exactly where we are. The most important and the first thing to do in order to reach your destination, is to find out where you are standing when you are lost in a strange place. When you can realise your location, then your destination, Rome will reveal itself.
©Boo Ahm
All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway
Q136. What do you think of praying to God or Buddha?
A. We can see a lot of people not only pray to them but also offer plenty of money to temples or churches as a token of their faith in Buddha or God, while ignoring many suffering people who are in need. People want to make a deal with God or Buddha, just like they may bribe public officials to do something they want to be done. In brief, they take advantage of their prayer to Buddha or God as a means to satisfy and justify their greed and hypocrisy.
It is said that God or Buddha is love itself, compassion itself and justice itself and that he is so almighty that he can fulfill our prayers. Why are so many starving in the world and why do endless wars break out and disasters befall people at this time while so many clergymen, priests and monks are praying all around the world? Why does a charitable God who says, “Love your neighbour as yourself” always seem to side with rich, strong countries or people? Why have so many countries been engaged in wars throughout history in the name of religion?
I don’t think that prayer itself is bad. However, why do these things happen in spite of so much prayer by so many people around the world? It is because they don’t know whom they pray to or worship because they don’t know themselves and therefore they do not know who is praying. They also don’t know how to worship or pray because they don’t know whom they worship or pray to. Therefore, they commit brutal carnage while speaking of Jesus’s love with their mouths, and spend an untold sum of money on producing weapons while saying their prayers.
I never discourage you from praying, but encourage you to pray in the right way. In order to pray in the right way, you should know at least who prays to whom. When you don’t know this, trying to find out who prays to whom it is a true prayer.
©Boo Ahm
All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway
Q131. Do we have to keep practising to maintain the final goal after reaching it?
A. Would you try to reach the universe even while knowing that you are part of it? Once you realise the fact that you cannot escape being part of the universe whatever you may do, why should you keep struggling to reach the universe? Likewise, once you reach the final goal, you don’t have to make any effort to maintain or stay in it because you can’t escape from it; you are the goal itself. Instead, you may well pity and help those who strive to reach the final goal to realise that they are already there.
There are people who insist that we should continue to practice even after reaching the final goal. They believe that we will fall back to what we were if we do not continue practicing. In fact, we can no more return after reaching the final goal than a hatched chicken can go back into its egg. Once we reach the final goal, we will even feel that all the effort made was useless because we will realise that we were like a man struggling to reach his home while sitting in his living-room. If someone makes even a little effort to reach or stay in the universe, it shows that he still doesn’t know what the universe is. Likewise, if someone makes an effort to maintain or stay in the final goal, that is evidence that he is still blind to what the final goal is.
Though medicine is essential to a patient,
It is of no use to him any more once he gets well.
©Boo Ahm
All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway
Q130. I’ve got some pain in my spine after more than ten years of meditation practice. Should I continue to practise in the same way?
A. Zen meditation is not about training our physical body; sitting upright for a long time is one of the most harmful postures to your backbone. Sitting upright can be a good posture for making strong concentration, but it is not a must. What is most essential is how to focus on your question. You can take a walk, sit leaning against something, or even lie on your back or side as long as you can make good concentration on your question. Despite having practised diligently, with good posture over a long period, you can’t be said to have practiced Zen meditation if you don’t have any change or new experience through strong concentration.
Don’t overwork yourself (your body) in the name of meditation practice.
Would you hit the horse or the cart when you want to move the cart?
You should hit the horse. Of course, sometimes you can hit the cart to make a sound that can give a spur to the horse. However, hitting the cart to the extent that it is broken, or out of order has nothing to do with your main purpose of moving the cart. That is not moving it but destroying it.
©Boo Ahm
All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway
Q127. Can I reach the final goal in a year if I focus all my attention to practising Zen?
A. Who could say, “No”? However, the fact is that no one knows how long it will take. Be determined but don’t be impatient. Impatience can cause attachment, which can raise side effects. The harder you try to reach it, when you are impatient, the farther you can get away from it. Watering a flowering plant twice as much as usual doesn’t make it grow and bloom twice as fast as usual; rather it can damage its root. Likewise, a hen, however hard it incubates its eggs, can’t shorten the period of incubation and move the hatching time a few days forward. You should be patient enough to wait for the time to grow ripe. If you get lost in your practice, you will reach the stage where you become indifferent even to the final goal. That is a sign of your being close to the final goal.
If you tune the string of a violin too loosely, it doesn’t make a sound.
If you tune it too tightly, it breaks.
Only when you tune it properly does it make a beautiful sound.
©Boo Ahm
All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway
Q115. Should I stop going to church and praying to God in order to practice Zen meditation?
A. I never discourage anyone from doing anything. Whatever you do is up to you. I am only asking you to try to realise who or what does it when you do something. You very often don’t know what you are doing since you don’t know who is doing it. How could you get your thing done well when not knowing who is doing what?
I never ask you stop going to church or praying to God but encourage you to know what leads your body to church when you go to church and what makes your body pray when you pray to God.
Just ask yourself what is making your body do what you do, whatever you may do.
©Boo Ahm
All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway
Q104. Sometimes angels appear during my practice. Am I practising in the wrong way? What shall I do?
A. There are times like that. I am sure that you are not wide awake to your question during the experience. Some people say that they see beautiful angels or even the Buddha and Jesus Christ, some say they see their late parents or grandparents, some say that they see their previous lives, and others say they see ghosts or monsters as if having a nightmare. Do remember that everything you experience during your practice is nothing but an illusion whether fantastic or terrible. When you experience something beautiful you have never experienced in your life before, you are apt to feel attracted by it. They are only the actions of your emotions hidden in your sub-consciousness. If you feel attached to great figures like the Buddha or Jesus and scared of the terrible figures, you are fooled by illusions. Leave them alone and focus on your question, and they will disappear by themselves.
©Boo Ahm
All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway
Q95. What does ‘enjoy being still’ mean?
A. Most people think it means to enjoy sitting still with our mind focused on something like our breath or Zen question during the meditation practice. Of course we can have such a feeling during the practice, and the stillness we feel during the practice will grow deeper and deeper along with it. That is a very essential process which we go through in order to reach the final goal. However, that is not the stillness mentioned in Zen meditation because as soon as we stop the practice, the stillness breaks and we come back into the noisy world. The stillness that can be enjoyed only during practice is of no practical use in our life. The purpose of Zen meditation is not to change only a given part of our life at a given time, but to change our whole life. In other words, the stillness we pursue is not temporary but permanent stillness, which we can feel only when, after removing all illusions, we realise the whole universe is still all the time regardless of whether we practice or not. Then our life is always still and peaceful, and we can enjoy stillness all the time even in a busy street or a crowded market place.
If I were asked what stillness is, I would say,
“Ten volcanos erupt at the same time.”
©Boo Ahm
All writing ©Boo Ahm. All images ©Simon Hathaway
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