One-Day Retreat on July 18

Our new website is working pretty well, and future blogs and announcements will be posted there.

Click here for detailed information on our first retreat, taking place on Saturday, July 18. We hope to see you there!

Website under construction

A website for our group is now under construction. You can actually view it live by clicking here.

It will have some additional features and be more useful for outreach to the community, so -- why not? It's one of these free web services, so it is a little clunky to edit, but for a basic website to introduce ourselves to folks (and to provide you all with a handy calendar so that you can see what we're up to), it's not bad.

Summer Retreat

We will soon be scheduling retreats for this summer and for this fall.

These retreats will be open for everyone, not just the regular participants in our group. For those needing instruction in sitting meditation, an early orientation will be available.

The summer retreat will be at the St. Augustine Anglican Church in Deming, and the fall retreat will very likely be at a private retreat center a few miles south of town.

Watch this space for updates.

Zen Group Takes A Hike

John, a participant in our Zen group and a local author, led a short hike out near the Mimbres Valley above an old mine on a gorgeous Saturday morning with clear views of the mountains all around us.

We would like to do more like this, and anyone from the group is welcome to join us. For now, please enjoy these photos from our walk.

A Group Photo?

Hwa Gye Sah is a temple in Korea that has a special relationship with the Kwan Um School of Zen, and those who practice in the tradition of Zen Master Seung Sahn.

Their website is adding some stories about American Zen groups, including ours. I have already written the story for them (it will appear in English and Korean on their website) and provided some pictures of our space. They have asked for a group picture as well.

So at one of our upcoming meetings, I might try to gather us up for a little group photo. Nothing special or formal, just a picture of smiling meditating people in our space, to appear only on this Korean website (and maybe our blog, too?).

We're still going strong on Wednesday evenings and Sunday mornings. Drop in and sit with us!

Your Contributions

Thanks to your contributions, some useful supplies are on their way.

Any day now, more chanting books will be delivered.

Coming soon: small support cushions to tuck under our zafus or knees.

Also on the list: a meditation bench for those who would like to sit in the seiza (kneeling) position.

It has been warm, but not unbearable. We are going to try out more than one method for cooling that space, and if need be we will adjust our schedule to take advantage of cooler times.

As Big As The Whole Universe

From a talk at Cambridge Zen Center on July 29, 1993.


Question: How does Zen practicing take away karma?

Zen Master Seung Sahn: Zen practice does not take away karma. If you practice Zen, your karma becomes clear. If you are not practicing, your karma controls you. But if you are practicing, you control your karma. So your karma becomes clear. Good karma, bad karma, whatever karma you have becomes clear; then only help other people. That's the point. Sometimes when a person first starts practicing Zen we talk about "taking away karma," but those are only teaching words. Bodhisattvas have bodhisattva karma. Karma means mind action. So, karma controls me, or I control my karma and help other people. These two are different, but same karma.

Q: Bodhisattva karma is helping people?

ZMSS: Of course.

Q: But first we have to help ourselves, right?

ZMSS: Myself?

Q: To get a center.

ZMSS: Where is your center?

Q: Talking to you.

ZMSS: That is not your center. If you make "my center," then you will have a problem. Our minds are always going around and around ... seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching, thinking. We see something and think, "I like that. I don't like that." If your mind is moving then you are not clear, because you have "my" opinion.

So, take this "around and around mind" and put it inside. At first keep your center here (points to lower belly). If you have a strong center, then your mind is not moving and your opinion disappears. If your mind is not moving, then you see clearly, hear clearly, smell clearly, taste clearly, touch clearly, and think clearly. Then everything becomes clear.

If you keep your center here at first (points to lower belly) then your center will become bigger, bigger, bigger ... as big as the whole universe. The name of this is Buddha. So if you want to understand the name of the Buddha, keep a mind which is clear like space. Clear like space has no center. The universe and you are already one. So there is no life and death. But if you only keep your center here (points to lower belly), then one day your body will disappear and your center will also disappear. Then you have a problem (laughs).

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Zen Master Seung Sahn (1927-2004) was the founder of the Kwan Um School of Zen.