Six chapters from Many Ways, Middle Way, No Way--a Guide to Meditation, Spiritual Awakening and Fun published by the Neon Buddha press. Available for $18

INTRODUCTION

The Hindus typically divide life into three stages: the youth, the householder, and finally upon retirement from a busy family life, the spiritual seeker. My generation, in its enthusiastic discovery of eastern mysticism and meditation, often reversed this progression.    This was certainly true in my case. In my twenties I lived the life of a wandering pilgrim, staying at various monasteries and ashrams in India, Japan and in the U.S.A. In my thirties I retired from monkhood into the 'back to the land' lifestyle; I settled on a few acres in the California Sierras, built a house and grew my own vegetables, working at teaching and various odd jobs. At forty, my life took another turn; my father, who was getting on in years, offered me his business, "Playmates of Hollywood." If it was anything else I might have demurred, but I couldn't quite resist the prospect of owning "the world's largest lingerie store." I boarded up the cabin, headed down to L.A. and finally threw myself into an engaged life in our society.
   At this point, I called on a Sufi Sheik. I asked him, "What does it mean? Why am I going into business?" Reshad looked deep into my eyes and poured more than words into my heart: "You are going into business to give love to your customers. You may think that money and merchandise are changing hands, but that is not the important exchange. When someone leaves your store, they must feel absolutely content, like they have had a wonderful meal at the house of a most gracious host, as if they had been served hors d'oeuvres, wines, entrees, aperitifs, desserts--they should leave feeling that every possible consideration had been made to leave nothing unsatisfied."
   Then I went to my old Zen teacher Sasaki Roshi and asked him the same question. I got the same sort of answer, "The store is your temple. It is the center of the universe. When you know this and love being there, the customer will also love being there."
My third guru in these matters was my father. Along with the keys to the store, he offered me a piece of unexpected advice; "The business of business is to forget business." Although he had never studied Buddhism, my father had a sort of natural Zen about him. Perhaps more from a simple desire for health and peace of mind than for any spiritual motivation, he recognized the challenge of being able to go home and get a good nights sleep, no matter how things were going at the store.
   The longer I studied meditation, the deeper my respect for the Hindu view of life's stages. I observed repeatedly that just going off into seclusion doesn't seem to help anyone too much in the long run. At least in the west, meditation usually needs to be practiced as part of an engaged and active life in our society to be really effective in transforming us into an open, compassionate, and wise person. After we have learned the basics of sitting, the challenge of deepening our understanding arises from living the dharma with honesty and an open and generous heart that connects with life and people. And in not avoiding but welcoming and investigating situations that arouse our insecurity. If we live this way, our meditation will be profound and joyful, regardless of the particular practice.
   Non-separation is the bottom line and real challenge of meditation; continually letting go of our boundaries and experiencing everything and especially everyone as a part of ourselves. The broader we can extend our embrace of non-separation, the deeper our enlightenment. Of course, in a cave, because there is no one, there is not much opportunity. We might also finally feel limited living in some spiritual community where everyone is quiet, soft and pretty much has the same gentle aspirations as ourselves. It seems that my whole generation is arriving at this conclusion. People seem to be leaving the sequestered lives and moving out into the world. We can best realize the depths of our divinity by exploring the breadth of our humanity in numerous settings. In my case, leaving the ashram and landing in a lingerie store, I had a few hard bumps, and more often, a few good laughs. It seemed a journey worth re-telling. I hope you'll find it so.

THE MIDDLE WAY

 

      In America today, we find ourselves in a unique situation of having access to information on traditions of meditation from an unprecedented broad range of cultures and historical periods. The various traditions that have been transplanted to the West are studying and learning from each other. A Western style mysticism, that is a synthesis of many eastern schools, is slowly and inevitably evolving.
     This book is my humble effort to contribute towards this synthesis. It is also a spiritual autobiography of sorts. I have often digressed at the milestones and turning points of my spiritual evolution. As my journey has been typical of America's pilgrimage to encounter eastern mysticism, I can only hope that the reader will find this account to be relevant and rewarding.
Studying the various traditional schools, we will see that they sometimes teach practices that might seem to be contradictory to each other. With today's broad perspective of access to information, we can find a middle way that includes what is best and most relevant for us from many traditions, while discarding the aspects that are not as useful for our particular times.
     And we can avoid the sectarian narrow-mindedness that has often plagued the world's spiritual traditions. We can see that seemingly contradictory approaches--ways describing and practicing the meditational path--that have been characteristic of different traditions, are often paths leading to the same mountain top. One way may not necessarily be superior to another, but each may compliment the other.
The Buddha called the spiritual path 'the middle way;' this might as easily be translated as 'the balanced way,' 'paradoxical way,' or 'way of complementary dichotomies.' A life of spiritual practice often seems like a balancing act between seemingly opposed but actually complementary tendencies. As our life and practice unfolds, sometimes it is appropriate to emphasize one approach or another. As conditions change over days or years, our practice may re-balance itself with more emphasis on a complementary approach.

     We begin with a brief survey of some of these 'complementary dichotomies.' Most of them are elaborated on in later chapters.

     Doubt/ Faith. Some traditions, such as the Rinzai School of Zen, emphasize arousing a great doubt--emptying our minds of its solidified certainties as to who we are and what the world is. In Tibetan Buddhism, a practice of great faith, the word for such radical doubt does not even exist. Actually either way will bring us to the same truth--that we are not this little body that comes and goes, but are the illimitable and deathless source of all things. Some traditions emphasize a broad approach; Korean Zen Master Sung Sah Nimh says that the way requires "great faith, great doubt and great courage."
     Gradual/ Sudden Enlightenment. Zen Buddhists have been sparring over this issue for 1500 years and it's one of the main fissures that have separated the Rinzai and Soto schools of Zen. Today, looking at the broad vista of the world's mystical traditions, we can see that it's a pointless debate. One may have gradually deepening sudden enlightenments. Beyond sudden or gradual is the endless realization of the fact that we are all already enlightened. Gradually and suddenly we realize this--over and over, deeper and deeper. Perhaps there is no final enlightenment. "You won't discover the limits of the soul, however far you go."--Heraclitus.
    Effort/ Grace. Sometimes Grace is immediate and at other times it seems like great effort is required. With deepening practice, the line between the two becomes less certain; questions like "Who's effort is it?" arise. Seeming effort may have been Grace after all. When he was a young Zen student, Robert Aitken one day became obsessed with the question, "Is effort necessary?" He spent two days searching Tokyo for his teacher, Soen-Nakagawa Roshi, who, when finally cornered and queried in a restaurant would only respond back with wide eyes and mouth agape, "Effort? effort? effort?"
    Bliss/ Healing. Some teachers and traditions encourage us to experience bliss and it is true that through meditation we will increasingly experience bliss as the nature of our consciousness and being. Other approaches, however, dwell more on healing--describing meditation as acknowledging, feeling and purifying our fears and psychological injuries. A balanced approach recognizes and embraces both our bliss and our contractions as they arise in the course of deepening practice.
    Concentration/ Observation. Some traditions encourage us to make great concentrative efforts--setting the mind up like a stone wall to block out all obstructive and distracting thoughts. In other approaches we just observe the body sensations, thoughts and feelings as they arise, without trying to change or exclude anything.
    Form/ Formless. Some approaches emphasize meditation as mindful awareness of what's in front of us in the world of form. Other ways emphasize experiencing our dissolving in the formless world of the pure energy field. These really go hand in hand. The deeper we learn to go into the formless, the more the world of form seems to manifest on some mysterious and sacred altar. We feel the fullness of the formless as the ocean/cradle creating and blessing all form. And conversely, the more habitually we are present to the world of form, the more we experience it as inseparable from the formless source-ocean.
    Lovingkindness/ Non-dualism. Generating feelings of lovingkindness towards self, other people and the whole world is emphasized in some practices. Pure non-dual approaches emphasize cutting thorough all dualistic concepts of separate self and others, in order to directly experience the all-pervading non-dual consciousness. However, no one can stay in that state perpetually; as we learn to experience the non-dual, feelings of lovingkindness inevitably begin to permeate our lives and meditations.
    Devotional/ Impersonal. Some people may be drawn to focus their meditations on a form of deity devotion (Jesus, Buddha, Mother, etc.) Others choose to directly dissolve in pure awareness. Either way, the embrace becomes more intimate as we let go of the past and future and allow the mind to rest in the present moment.
Feminine, receptive/ Masculine, arousing. The Buddha described meditation as similar to tuning a string: not too loose, not too tight. Sometimes we may need to be balanced towards being softer, quieter and receptive. Other times we may need a more arousing, energizing and masculine energy in our practice. Some pathways predominantly tilt towards one energy or another--i.e. Rinzai Zen is well known for its rather macho proto-samurai style, while the Soto Zen style is quiet and softer.
    Simplicity/ Tantric activity. Some approaches promote a life-style that is rather reclusive and removed from activities. Others are more Tantric--they believe that we grow through throwing ourselves into the distractions and difficulties of an active life in the world. We all have periods of our life when we have to live on one side or another of this coin. We slowly learn to balance our lives to a level of simplicity or complexity best suited to our gifts and needs.
    Indulgence/ Asceticism. When the Buddha used the phrase 'middle way,' he was usually refering to a spiritual life that was well balanced between these two extremes. This is one of the most difficult paradoxes, that people on the spiritual path are always trying to understand and resolve. Some teachers recommend total indulgence. The underlying idea is that one cannot find complete liberation unless one has 'used up one's karma,'--i.e. lived out and satisfied all of one's latent desires. Of course, the ascetics would claim that a life lived as a total hedonistic spree, rather than eliminating karma, will just create more of it--and a very self-centered sort of spiritual aspirant.
    Withdrawal/ Engagement. Sometimes we are full enough that we have a lot to give and can devote our life to engaged good works --spiritual, social, political and environmental causes. Also, for many, this life of service may be a way of practicing and of becoming full. For other people, and at other times, we may need to withdraw into ourselves.
    Enthusiasm/ Resistance. Sometimes our practice is full of joy, openness and easy grace; the presence is immediate and imminent. We naturally have great enthusiasm for it. At other times we're just not in the mood--tired, restless, afraid or grouchy. As our sitting matures we give in less to our mood swings and judgments of good or bad. We just do it. We understand that we are surrendering to a process infinitely greater than our limited intellect can understand. Who knows? Periods of difficult practice may be more beneficial than easy ones.

    Aachan Cha, a great Thai master, described meditation practice as like going down a road with ditches off the shoulder on either side: "Sometimes I see a student going way off to the left--I say, 'watch out, head right.' Other times they're far to the right, I give a warning--'head left.'" At times, as our lives and practices unfold, it is necessary and appropriate to go off for a while to the left or right. It is also helpful to know that there is a balanced middle that we may wish to eventually return to, and in many cases, not get too far away from.

 

JUST SIT HERE

If you have time to chatter read books
If you have time to read Walk into mountain, desert and ocean
If you have time to walk sing songs and dance
If you have time to dance Sit quietly, you Happy Lucky Idiot

                                                    --Nanao Sasaki

    Dear faithful reader, if you've persevered this far, I hope by now that you are interested in giving meditation a try. So it's time to talk shop, about the nuts and bolts of sitting: exactly what to do with your eyes, mouth, bones, etc.

EYES.

     When you are really sitting you won't know or care if your eyes are open, closed or half-closed.                                               --Maezumi Roshi.

     Most Zen teachers recommend keeping the eyes half-open during meditation. Hindu yogis and Vipassaniis usually meditate with the eyes closed. Dzogchen and a few Zen sects recommend meditating with the eyes wide open. Looking at the plethora of prescriptions, one reaches the Maezumi Roshi conclusion: it's nothing to get too concerned about one way or the other. However, experienced meditators find some advantages in learning to adjust the eyes at various stages of practice. As meditation ripens one may sometimes experience waves of bliss-energy spontaneously rising up into the head. When this happens, the eyes will want to naturally close; it's fine to let them do this. At other times, however, when meditating with the eyes closed one may experience excessive mind-wandering, sluggishness and sleepiness; then it is good to sit with the eyes wide open. Also if one is feeling physical or psychological pain, fear or panic, sitting with the eyes open is often calming. If one is in a busy place with a lot of distracting movement, of course it's good to close the eyes. I find that experienced meditators often sit with their eyes open or half-opened. As one's meditation matures, it increasingly is broad, expansive and all inclusive--everything is part of it. Somehow, sitting with the eyes open gives one more to include in this broad dissolving and helps to open it even more. But it is best not to be too rigid; try all of these eye-positions, eventually you will like to meditate in all of them.

MOUTH-- Rinzai Zennies usually sit with a determined and strong sort of grimace. Thich Nhat Hanh teaches that one should meditate with a half-smile. Other schools say just relax. Some say tongue against the upper palate, others softly against the teeth, etc. etc. The same plethora of prescriptions leads us to a similar conclusion--just do what comes naturally and don't worry or think about it too much. Really, innumerable moods come over one in meditation--perhaps the mouth should just reflect these moods. A few Dzogchen teachers recommend meditating with the mouth wide open. I like this style and often sit this way. Combined with wide open and bulging eyes, it's the stunned and in a state of shock approach. You are too full and flabbergasted to know much of anything or to do much thinking. The balloon of nothingness has blown you up. With each breath, the 'you can't understand' balloon is blowing you up, the breath of mystery is breathing you. Please try this sometimes. But keep in mind that the open- mouth style developed in the mosquito and insect free Tibetan highlands. You wouldn't want to try it at a swampy Japanese Zen temple.

HANDS--We find the same rampant variations of style. Zen adepts rest the left palm on the right: with the thumbs lightly touching each other, the hands form a big circle. At some Zen temples the meditation instructions are just to put your mind in that big circle and to become it. This is an excellent approach to meditation. Vipassaniis usually just rest one palm lightly on the other. Hindus often rest the hands on the knees. Again, the point is to understand that none of these ways are essential for good meditation. Find something that feels comfortable to you and then forget your hands.

LEGS--Unfortunately for the beginning meditator, legs are often not so easily forgotten. This is the body part that often takes some stretching and adjusting, especially for westerners. There is of course the option of meditating in a chair. This might be fine; many a famous meditator, because of various bodily injuries, was never able to sit cross-legged. The most notable was Hui-Neng, the founder of Zen. He was a peasant wood-cutter, who attained a spontaneous deep enlightenment when he happened to pass someone who was reciting a Buddhist Sutra. Because of a bad knee he was never able to sit cross-legged. He joined a monastery, got a job working in the kitchen and went on to become the famous Sixth Chinese Patriarch. The Hui-Nengs, however, are the great exceptions. It really depends on one's aspiration and needs. If they are not more than sitting an occasional short period for some relaxation and stress relief, then sitting in a chair is fine. But for the serious and committed, where meditation is conceived of as a means for the transformation of one's whole life, then learning to sit in a comfortable cross-legged position is extremely helpful. At this level of commitment, one will eventually want to sit periodic multi-day retreats. Here is where cross-legged sitting has a great advantage; it is much easier on the back. Sitting for a few days in a chair is likely to result in chronic back-ache and fatigue. Also, meditators almost inevitably find that a deep concentration, focus and power comes most easily with cross-legged sitting. If you can stretch your legs to a good half-lotus position--one foot resting on the opposite thigh--this is best; it will give you excellent stability and support. The 'Burmese' style, with one leg tucked into the crotch and the other leg tucked right in front of it on the mat, is also fine. The most important point for cross-legged sitting is to have your knees resting on the mat, i.e. not up in the air ala American Indian style. Again, there is nothing wrong with the knees up for a period or two, but for long-haul meditation, i.e. multi-day retreats, if your knees are up, your back is probably going to become sore and tired. To get the knees on the ground, you'll want to sit with your butt raised up on some cushions. The height of the cushions varies with different bodies and leg positions. Usually sitting in Burmese requires a higher cushion than in a half-lotus. Another excellent option is 'seiza' style, kneeling with the butt resting on the ankles. A bench or cushions are often used to aide sitting seiza. At Japanese Zen temples, the women usually sit seiza style, while the men rarely do. This may be do to the fact that sitting seiza will occasionally cause the penis to fall asleep, a rather unpleasant non-sensation, even for Zen monks. However this is rare and no reason to avoid sitting seiza; maybe it's happened to me a couple of times in hundreds or thousands of seiza sitting periods. And just as with any other limb, mercifully, complete circulation quickly returns.

BACK--Back-aches are a major problem for beginning meditators. Yet, the experienced meditator often finds that a good sit can cure a tired and aching back. It is important to find a balance between keeping the back erect and straight and yet not too rigid and stiff. One sits as if a string is pulling one up at the top and rear of the skull, right above the spinal column, so that the chin is tucked in a little. There should be some tension, power and strength in the lower torso. Although erect and with the spine comfortably stretched out, the upper body, chest, neck, shoulders and head should be relaxed and soft. Stretching out the spine in this way acts as a relief for tight and pinched nerves and muscles. Eventually one may experience healing light, what the Hindus call Kundalini energy, circulating up and down the spine during meditation. At this point back aches often just get wiped out during sitting. Learning how to sit with a comfortable back usually requires some experimentation and fine-tuning. If the back is aching, try sticking out the chest or letting it sink in a little, leaning foreword or back, rounding or lengthening the lower back, etc. With time, each meditator finds the comfortable positions that will work best for him or her.

FIND YOUR SEAT--It often takes up to a year or two for new meditators to 'find their seat'--i.e. be able to sit for moderate periods, say a few days retreat, in relative comfort. This takes endless resilience and experimentation--trying various leg positions, cushion sizes, etc. Many new meditators take up hatha-yoga. This is an excellent aid to opening up the legs and pelvis and preparing the body for comfortable meditation. Gradually one learns what works and can just forget the body for increasing periods of time.

LYING DOWN--Since the Don't Worry Zendo is run in a rather easy- going and informal style, people sometimes show up who want to meditate while lying down. I always have to convince them that lying down really won't get them very far. Meditation is a balance between the receptive, relaxing, softening and opening feminine energies and the active, asserting and penetrating masculine energies. Both are necessary and require their compliment. There is a strength of will-power and concentration that arises while sitting that just does not develop while lying down. If one has sat up for a few good meditation periods, than it might be OK to take a break with some lying down meditation and one might then experience a deep peace and letting go. However, if someone exclusively does lying down meditation, usually they'll just fall asleep or off into day-dreams and mind wandering. (There are, of course, exceptions to every rule. In this case, sick people often have very deep lying-down meditation.)

WHEN, WHERE, HOW LONG--In most schools and traditions, early morning is the preferred time for meditation. The mind and the environment are clearest then and most free of distractions. When I lived in a Japanese Zen monastery, depending on whether the day's work in the fields or begging rounds had been over-exhausting, there might or might not have been a few periods of evening meditation. But regardless, there was always a solid few hours of morning meditation. Looking at different traditions, one can find everything from twenty minutes to an hour for the average or prescribed meditation period length. There is no rule; experiment and find a sitting period that feels appropriate for you. If your sitting is always easy and you never come up against any psychological or emotional pain, panic or resistance, then try sitting for a longer period. It does not hurt to push your limits a little, but not so much that you become discouraged. You don't want to get stuck in a macho, samurai mentality; short periods can also be extremely valuable. There is also the 'keep them guessing style.' At Ryutakuji, a Japanese Zen monastery that I practiced at, the periods there were usually about 35 or 40 minutes. During sesshins however, once a day there would be a period where the time-keeper would pretty much throw away his watch. It might last up to an hour and a half. Talk about panic, Ryutakuji translates as 'temple of the swamp-dragon.' When there was no bell after forty or so minutes, I could palpably feel that the dragon was on the loose--prowling in my panic-stricken belly.
    For a meditation timer, I recommend a watch with an on-the-hour time signal. They are reliable, portable and relatively cheap. Usually whenever I start, I just sit till the beep. Sometimes the periods are short and sometimes longer; I don't get attached to any particular length. If I have the time for more meditation, I take a break and then sit on till the next beep. There are many possibilities for how to spend the breaks between sitting periods. At home I usually like to do ten or fifteen minutes of yoga stretches. One can also have a cup of tea, read a text, lie down, dance, step outside for a walk and some fresh air, etc. I've always had sort of a love-hate feeling towards kinhin, the formal single-file walking meditation that is done in Zen temples between sitting periods. Part of me really enjoys kinhin and finds it very peaceful. My anarchistic half rebels at its sort of regimented and militaristic style. Knowing something of the history of the relation between Japanese militarism and the Zen establishment, one might especially feel this way. Basically, the Zen monks got into step in the kinhin line and kept marching--right up to the waiting kamikaze planes. Not a great advertisement for overly organized and regimented practice.
     It is helpful to have a special place: a room, a niche, or corner of a room that is put aside just for meditation and study. Keep this place scrupulously clean and dusted. Set up a little altar with a candle, incense, a plant, fruit or fresh flowers, some sacred objects and images. If there is room, set up cushions for a few people: voila--you have a zendo. This space will acquire a purified vibration that can really help your practice. Just going there will calm and focus an agitated mind. On the other hand, if your quarters are tight, don't let a lack of space discourage your practice. It will just be more cozy and intimate. Innumerable well-known yogis and roshis just get up in the morning and sit on their beds.
    In my life, I often feel that I'm living a balance between being a monk and being an artist and poet. If I go too far in one direction, I usually re-balance it by retreating back the opposite way. On the one hand, I value the persistent routine of a regular schedule. I know this is essential for deepening practice and I usually live my life in this manner. I also, however, guard against getting in a rut. I like to leave room for the unknown, the unexpected and spontaneous. Sometimes people that go off the deep-end become meditation nerds: rather narrow-minded, claustrophobic and uninterested in life. This is a big mistake; we all grow through living a full and involved life, as well as through sitting. Rather than always going to bed at a regular hour so that I can get up for early sitting, some evenings I stay up late-- for a long middle of the night walk, or to read, write, talk, see a movie, play, music, or whatever. Often I set up a little mini-schedule for myself. I put three or four days aside for early morning practice. I try to make it fun, playful and challenging. Sometimes each morning I get up an hour earlier, till by the last morning I'm up by three and really have a morning mini-retreat. Sometimes I coordinate the final day with the full or new moon. If I get lazy or distracted half-way through, it's not the end of the world. I just start on a new mini-schedule--maybe altered a bit. Then I might take a few days and stay up late. Work, family and living situations change. I can think back to periods of my life when I sat in the mid-mornings, afternoons, evenings or would get up in the middle of the night. The main thing is to be resilient and relentless; if one schedule gets stale or the conditions of your life change, then alter it to something else. Try anything and everything; but be like a tough and scrappy fighter, who keeps coming back over and over. There need be no hard and fast rule, except that through all the vagaries of life to keep a commitment to some sitting, at some time and place, no matter where or when.

Come, come, whoever you are. Wanderer, worshipper, lover of leaving,
It doesn't matter, ours is not a caravan of despair.
Come, come even if you have broken your vows a thousand times.
Come, come yet again, come.
                       --Rumi

Sometimes people claim that they don't need to do sitting meditation because they are "meditating all the time throughout their daily lives." This sounds good and there may be something to it. Continual mindfulness is certainly the ideal of practice. But there is a fallacy that such claims overlook. For most of us, to touch that deepest place of stillness and silence it is necessary to put some time aside that is free of all the usual distractions of our busy and active lives. Then we might be able to carry that still center with us through the day.

SILENCE. Through the book I use many words to describe the indescribable reality that we are all made of. A perennial favorite of mystics of all stripes is --'silence.' At the core of our being and of all being is a place of deeply peaceful silence and stillness. The consciousness to whom all thoughts are occurring and that is hearing all sounds is actually this one delicious melting love-silence. The great classical composers have a way of expressing the utter stillness and simplicity that we can find through meditation. Some of my favorite musical moments are in theme and variation movements; towards the end of the variations the composer suddenly eliminates all ornamentation and complexity and reduces the theme to its simplest harmonic structure, returning to an even deeper simplicity than the opening theme. Listen to the second movement of the Schumann A Major string quartet, the last movement of the Brahms B flat Major quartet. In bare-boned simplicity and unadorned stillness time stands still, the heart breaks open and melts. Our minds are usually like the embellished and ornamented earlier variations. Our inner-dialogue and conversation never stops. The feverish brain never lets things just be, but is always adding something. We never just sit and experience the silence of a room, but we are always filling the room with our inner dialogue. When we learn to turn off our inner dialogue and really experience silence, we are amazed. For the first time we really see the room we are sitting in; it is utterly peaceful, alive, beautiful and part of us.

All the evil in men comes from one thing and one thing alone, their inability to rest in a room.                                                                 --Blaise Pascal

    As our practice ripens, this peaceful silence grows deeper and vaster; the world appears from and disappears into it. When we learn to turn down the volume, we experience that our mind is like a huge and awe-inspiring cathedral. Its silence is not an absence, but is alive and breathing and radiating the love that creates all things.

No particular thought can be mind's natural state, only silence. Not the idea of silence, but silence itself. When the mind is in its natural state, it reverts to silence spontaneously after every experience or, rather, every experience happens against the background of silence...If you do not disturb this quiet and stay in it, you find that it is permeated with a light and a love you have never known; and yet you recognize it at once as your own nature.                                    --Nisargadatta

Your mind will become still in any surroundings, like a clear forest pool. All kinds of wonderful, rare animals will come and drink at the pool and you will clearly see the nature of all things. You will see many strange and wonderful things come and go, but you will be still. This is the happiness of the Buddha.                                                --Aachan Cha

One of the signs of God-realization is joy. There is absolutely no hesitancy in such a person, who is like an ocean in joyous waves. But deep beneath the surface, there is profound silence and peace....Consider the honeybee, which at first buzzes loudly while circling a flower, but finally settles in silence deep within the core of the fragrant blossom.                            --Ramakrishna

     All the changes of our life become a celebration when we have stilled our minds and touched our hidden treasure---the depths of silence that creates us and everything.

MANY WAYS, NO WAY

A monk asked Baso, "What is Buddha?"

Baso said, "This very mind is Buddha."
Later another monk asked Baso, "What is Buddha?"
Baso replied: "Not mind, not Buddha."

This sort of dialogue is a Zen specialty. Buddha, not-Buddha, Mind, not-Mind--it does not matter what you call it, because you cannot call it anything. If you give it a name you may think you really know something that can be put into words.

This whole book may read like one of these stories; the totally rationally-minded reader may find it to be a slippery mass of contradictions. I may be accused of 108 transgressions of logic and every variety of solipsism. The truth is that the meditational experience is beyond any technique or description--when you attempt one, such infractions are inevitable.

The first flowering of Zen which occurred during the Tang Dynasty (600-900 C.E.) in China was one of the golden ages of meditation. The dialogues of the Tang masters are still fascinating reading today. However, one rarely finds instructions on meditative techniques in the discourses of these masters. Some scholars have mistakenly drawn the conclusion that the Tang Zen masters did not really go in for much meditation. Nothing could be further from the truth. Actually 'Zen' is a Japanese transliteration derived from the Sanskrit word 'Dhyana,' which means-- meditation. The Zen school literally means the Buddhist sect whose members have gone meditation crazy: i.e.--the heavy-duty meditators.

BUT the great Tang masters knew that meditation was beyond all techniques. They knew that descriptions of doing it this way or that way was for beginners; one could not really teach someone how to meditate, but could just inspire and challenge them to do it for themselves.

A few years ago someone climbed into the mountains of Central China. Deep in the mountains he found one of the few remaining hermit masters and asked him how he taught dharma. Master Te-Ch'eng replied:

I teach all sorts of odds and ends. You name it. Whatever seems to fit. A little of this, a little of that. This is what practice is all about. You can't practice just one kind of dharma. That's a mistake. The Dharma isn't one sided. You have to practice Zen. If you don't you'll never break through delusions. And you've got to practice the precepts. If you don't, your life will be a mess. And you've got to practice pure land. If you don't you'll never get any help from the Buddha. You have to practice all dharmas.

The approach I've taken in this book has been something like this--the everything but the kitchen sink style. The enigmatic Tang dynasty masters were great in their day, but this is the 20th century--people want explanations. So I've enumerated many techniques and ways to describe meditation; we can use all of them. But they lead to beyond all techniques--to no technique. This is where real meditation begins.

I'm reminded of the old Hindu story of the blind men and the elephant. One blind man feels the trunk and says that the elephant is like a snake. Another feels the leg and says it's like a tree trunk. The third feels the tail, it's like a rope, etc. Trying to understand meditation is something like this. It's different for each person and even to one person, it can change day by day or minute by minute. We are always entering through a slightly different door and seeing a new facet of the beautiful mind-jewel. The words and metaphors with which we attempt to understand or explain it are all afterthoughts to the actual experience.

In every chapter I basically say the same thing, just from slightly varying points of view. It is unsayable, but if we fill ourselves with enough of these points of view, eventually it's like painting ourselves into a corner or tying ourselves down with rope--there is no escape. In whatever direction the ego turns, it is confronted with its extinction. Wherever the mind turns it experiences that it is not separate but is an indivisible part of the ocean of consciousness.

Some people compare entering the spiritual path to engaging in a war. We must realize that we are not skirmishing with some rag-tag irregulars; the ego is no pushover, it is a crack SS panzer division--insidious, tenacious and resourceful. We need every possible weapon--artillery, tanks, infantry, air power.

The many approaches to meditation that I've described in these pages have all worked for me. I can't tell you what is best and will work for you; please experiment and try some, a few or all of them. The most important thing is just to sit, you will begin to hear your inner guide and your own unique path will unfold.

Here is how Rumi, the great 13th century Sufi poet, says it. In a famous poem he puts these words into God's mouth as God is speaking to Moses:

I have given each being a separate and unique
way of seeing and knowing and saying that knowledge. What seems wrong to you is right for him.
What is poison to one is honey to someone else.
Purity and impurity, sloth and diligence in worship, these mean nothing to me. I am apart from all that.
Ways of worshipping are not to be ranked
as better or worse than one another.
Hindus do Hindu things,
The Dravidian Muslims in India do what they do.
It's all praise, and it's all right.
It's not me that's glorified in acts of worship.
It's the worshipers! I don't hear the words they say.
I look inside at the humility.
That broken-open lowliness is the reality, not the language!
Forget phraseology. I want burning, burning.
Be friends with your burning.
Burn up your thinking and your forms of expression!
Moses, those who pay attention
to ways of behaving and speaking are one sort.
Lovers who burn are another.

In other words, no particular techniques matters nearly as much as our perseverance, our dedication, our loosening around our attachments and the depths of our longing to experience reality. People at first think that some new style of meditation is going to miraculously put them in some 'high' state. With some maturity, they give up such spiritual day-dreams.

If one lives one's life in an honest, unattached, open-hearted and courageous way, going towards rather than running away from pain and difficulties, one's meditation will be vast and intimate, regardless of any technique. Otherwise, any meditation will largely be a waste of time. The main value it might have is that it will seem useless and exhausting, eventually prompting one to live a more generous life style.

Someone recently came to the Don't Worry Zendo selling a line of teas. After a sales spiel she assured me that the teas are also an excellent aid for meditation and can almost guarantee me a deep and peaceful practice. I told her that in that case it was very important that I not buy them. I was only interested in meditation reflecting and being a mirror to my life and relationships.

Actually, contrary to much popular opinion, meditation was not at the top of the Buddha's list. His first pronouncement, the four noble truths, said, in essence, that attachments cause suffering. Somewhere down the list of his next teachings, the eightfold path, he brought in meditation. After writing and enticing you to buy this long tract on meditation, I am far from wishing to say that meditation is not an extremely precious tool. It has been a great blessing of my life. Unfortunately, many people who take up meditation do not relate it to the rest of their lives and use it to isolate themselves, rather than deepen their connection to their world. In this chapter of summation and tieing up loose ends, I want to re-emphasize what has been a recurrent theme: in a life lived with an open heart, meditation will unfold with great ease and blessings. Great effort or concern with various techniques will hardly be necessary.

When one first takes up meditation, some definite practice is often helpful. Every practice, however, eventually opens vast energy and uses itself up: leads to the realization that right here and now this very mind is perfect bliss, creating all things in harmony and oneness. Practice leads to non-practice. It is not necessary, or even possible to know, do or reach for anything. Just stop doing.

Sometimes, however, one does wish for some words to describe 'non-practice' and the descriptions often sound something like a practice. You could call these 'practiceless practices.' They are somewhere on the border--the last and most ineffable, ungraspable and indescribable 'non-techniques' that more definite techniques ultimately lead to; the last outposts on the edge of--love, oblivion, God, oneness, that might sound like a doing something. The non-practices are all really just one, but can be described variously. Since they have largely been the subject of this book, a brief review would seem to be in order.

1. Silence. Usually we first become aware of the absolute tyranny of our chronically cluttered mind. Then we might experience some moments of silence. In that moment our separate self delusion disappears and our real unlimited self, which is always present but usually hidden by the thought barrage, shines and includes all things.

2. Doubt/not knowing. Everything we think we know--our bodies, the world, time, space--are actually a subjective fix due to patterns of energy striking through our particular senses and cerebral cortex. We radically investigate this question and discount everything that is not absolutely certain. We sit in the embrace of what remains.

3. Faith in this moment. We sit with faith and affirmation that we are everything. We experience our very mind and space as identical, creating everything in a warm and alive oneness.

4. Non-doing/surrender. Not waiting or looking for anything. We sit with deep faith and affirmation that this very mind, right here and now is perfect Grace, God Guru.

5. Inquiry. Everything we think we are or have--body, feelings, language--is a gift from a vaster, deeper matrix of allowing. Infinite seeming coincidences in the past and present have created the setting in which we think we are doing something. The more we investigate the question 'Who am I,' we discover that the separate self is an elusive and disappearing character.

6. Metta. Feeling the presence and wishing to share the blessing with people we are sitting with in body and/or heart.

It is often possible to jump start to no-practice at the inception of one's meditation career. This 'no way' is actually the most direct way. Any technique or practice involves you in the idea that you need to do something to get somewhere. No way practice is actually de- programming us from this delusion. What may at first be a practice of faith is confirmed as the energy opens. At the Don't Worry Zendo we have two 'pith instructions' that we often read after sittings. They say it all best.

Stay open and quiet that is all.
What you seek is so near you
that there is no place for a way
--Nisargadatta

Do not look for God,
look for the one looking for God.
But why look at all?
God is not lost,
God is right here,
closer than your own breath.
--Rumi

One of the first books that I ever read on eastern religion was the 60's classic, Erich Fromm's Zen and Psychoanalysis. Fromm pointed out that the eastern mind accepts A and B, while the westerner's logical instincts are to see things in life as A or B. You could call this the rational mind's OR disease. I don't think there has ever been one idea that I read anywhere that has been more central to my life. I recommend the A & B mentality in life, meditation and especially, reading this book. Otherwise, as I said earlier, you might just see it as a mass of contradictions. Applying this personally, my practice is both A,B,C,D, no practice and none of the above. Many times when I first sit down or if the mind is wandering or lazy, I'll return to some practice for a while: breath, 'this,' feeling of space, whose the 'me' here, etc. Usually, with some grace, it gets used up in practiceless practice and no-practice. There is no contradiction.

I recently saw a brochure for Buddhist center offering a course entitled, 'Mastering meditation.' In the brochure was an urgent appeal for funds with a dire warning that unless they were forthcoming the 'place is going to go broke.' I was not at all surprised. Actually, the truth of empty non-duality obliterates our ability to say anything except rather non-assertions like, there is neither you or other, doing or non-doing, mastering or mastered. Still, since we begin our meditation career 99% tilted towards the delusion of doing something, it is best to rebalance this delusion by stressing the complementary opposite. A more helpful and perhaps lucrative brochure might have been headlined 'Mastered by meditation.' The truth is, it will only happen through grace and surrender. Besides, trying to master meditation is an excellent prescription for a nervous breakdown.

Soen-Nakagawa Roshi said, "To practice Zen, you must think the unthinkable." Thinking the unthinkable is not something that can be described or taught in six easy steps. It will happen when all of your being is fully engaged in a wild wrestling match with the whole universe. Which is greater--you or the universe? Once 'non-practice' ripens, it does not matter what you think you are doing or trying to do. When you have gone beyond all methods, when you don't know what you are doing or who you are--you are no longer doing meditation, but meditation is doing you. The whole universe is meditating through you„the victorious loser of your wrestling match.

Here is Rainer Maria Rilke's description of losing the wrestling match with the universe:

What we choose to fight is so tiny!
What fights with us is so great!
If only we would let ourselves be dominated
as things do by some immense storm,
we would become strong too, and not need names.

When we win it's with small things,
and the triumph itself makes us small.
'What is extraordinary and eternal
does not want to be bent by us.
I mean the Angel who appeared
to the wrestlers of the Old Testament:
when the wrestlers' sinews
grew long like metal strings,
he felt them under his fingers
like chords of deep music.

Whoever was beaten by this Angel
(who often simply declined the fight)
went away proud and strengthened
and great from that harsh hand,
that kneaded him as if to change his shape.
Winning does not tempt that man.
This is how he grows: by being defeated, decisively,
by constantly greater beings.

Nisargadatta, makes the same point with fewer but less poetic words:

When overpowered by the wide expanse which is without beginning, end or middle, there is the realization of non-dual bliss.

Our mind is not separate and enclosed, but is this very space that includes everything that comes and goes. The 'wide expanse' is always right here, it is the very nature of consciousness; we are already and always it. As we learn this over and over, the wrestling match turns into a joyous and easy surrender.

WALKING MEDITATION

Walking is used in a number of ways in meditation practice. Many traditions use it as a break to stretch the legs between sitting periods. The Zen style is to walk around the Zendo in a single file. Vipassana meditators take a small area and walk back and forth individually. Don't Worriers often take a casual stroll in the garden. Any sitting practice can be continued during walking meditation. If someone is feeling especially restless, walking meditation can be an excellent alternative to sitting and will often help to calm and center them.

There is also 'out in the world' walking meditation: leaving the meditation hall behind and practicing walking as a meditation to appreciate the beauty of the world that we are a part of. You could call this the 'Thich Nhat Hanh' style of walking meditation. It is the subject of the rest of this chapter.

Thich Nhat Hanh has been one of the most influential and highly respected Asian teachers to come to the West in the last few decades. He is a Vietnamese master who lives in France and has visited America regularly and taught many hugely attended retreats here. Popularizing walking meditation has been one of his greatest influences. At first people who went to his retreats were surprised that they did as much or more walking than sitting. By now they are used to it, and the walking craze has spread to many other meditation centers.

When you've cultivated walking meditation, it can be an invaluable ally in your life. There have been innumerable times when I've felt tense, exhausted or upset about something; I say to myself, "I'll go for a walk, just for a few blocks." After a few blocks, I've left my weariness and distress behind; I decide to go on for a few more blocks. By then I'm refreshed with increased energy. A few more blocks and I feel great and just want to keep on walking.

The important thing is to keep the mind from running rampant in its habitual past, future and planning modes--i.e. step by step to keep your mind right here. Thich Nhat Hanh gives excellent walking meditation instructions in his wonderful book, "The Long Road Turns to Joy." Here is a brief summary.

First find a rhythm that coordinates the natural pace of your breathing and steps. This gives the mind something to focus on and keeps it present. The rhythm you adopt will depend on the terrain, your physical condition and if you have to get somewhere. (This is not entirely disallowed--if there is a time limit and definite destination you can up the pace and still have wonderful walking meditation.) It can be in-breath--left foot, out-breath--right foot: in- breath--left foot, out-breath--right foot. Or in-breath--left, right, out-breath--left, right: in-breath--left right, out-breath--left, right. Or in, out--left, in, out--right: in, out--left, in, out--right, etc.

After a while the strict attention to the coordination of breath and steps can be loosened. The most important thing is to remain aware of the in-breath and out-breath. If you forget the breath, your mind will almost inevitably wander off. Going back to it will keep you present in the moment. Fortunately, after a while staying with the breath becomes habitual.

It is also important to allow your body to relax. After a while you will feel that you have something like a baby's body: loose, soft and supple. It is easy to spot a walking meditator; the arms are the giveaway. They hang so loosely that you can almost see any tension dissipating away through them. Also, the low center of gravity seems to be almost rooted in the earth. Great old Chinese Tai-Chi masters usually have this soft and grounded baby's body. An excellent way to learn walking meditation is to locate such a master, hang out at his school, follow him around and imitate his walk. My strongest memory of Soen Roshi is not anything he said, but just the way he walked. This is indescribable, but he seemed to be part of the earth--perfectly poised, at peace and absolutely not going anywhere.

To remind you to stay right here in this moment, you can also coordinate a mantra with your breath and steps. Thich Nhat Hanh suggests a number of them, here are a few:

Just this moment, wonderful moment.
Just this moment, perfect moment.
Just this moment, only moment.
Of course, as you advance in walking meditation, you will find yourself making up your own mantras.

A walk in the rain forest is a walk into the mind of God.

These are the words with which Birute Galdikas, the orangutan lady of Borneo, often greets visitors to her forest station. But really the rain forest is everywhere--in Manhattan, the Sierras, a seashore or country road. There is one key to entering the 'Mind of God' wherever you are; you have to know and experience that you are not going anywhere. Rather than getting somewhere as fast as possible, you have to get to nowhere as slow as possible. Unfortunately, I have found that this is usually very difficult or impossible for most Americans to do. They are going somewhere and they're in a rush to get there. But if you are busy going somewhere, then you are not really anywhere.

Among my non-initiated friends I am considered to be one of the world's truly slow walkers; fortunately after one or two outings, most of them will never walk with me again. Good riddance says the confirmed and stubborn slow-motion walking meditator.

John Muir said that even walking two hundred yards an hour was going way too fast. Gary Snyder stretches the point farther, he claims that all walking is too fast; it's better to get down on hands and knees and crawl. Then you might slow down enough to really see what's going on. At this point you are ready for the 'Buddhist Olympics'--in each race the last person across the finish line wins. I.E.--to begin to take it all in, one has to severely slow down.

Walking meditation is a wonderful way to open the door to the numinous world. A friend of mine says that when walking she "falls apart in a cloud of love." I like that a lot, but it won't happen if you're set on arriving somewhere. Shinzen's saying is a good walking mantra:

Turn to the left side, paradise of the left side,
Turn to the right side, paradise of the right side.

or the Navaho prayer:

Beauty walking with me,
Beauty before me,
Beauty behind me,
Beauty besides me.
Beauty walking with me.

If you see someone walking with their head hanging down, they are usually off in their thoughts. To really be present, the eyes should be wide open and focused towards the horizon.

Now that we are near the end of this book, I can tell you the real truth. It isn't exactly that meditation is worthless, let's just say that it's second best. As I've reiterated more than a few times on these pages, its not so difficult to learn to experience what we really are: that our true being is the all-permeating love source. And there is nothing wrong with the cushion; it's OK--for starters. BUT it's much more fun to experience the love source out in our big, fascinating and beautiful world.

Really, when we learn to walk with open eyes and heart, with each step, with each turn of our heads, we enter and are blessed by a new paradise--beautiful and alive and intimate with our heart. When we experience the subtler levels of walking meditation, we are no longer this body moving through the world. we are the vast space of creation itself, the mystery that contains the myriad things, all transforming at every step.

BACKWARDS WALKING

For most people the limited little-body/self idea dies hard. Fortunately, there is one ally, backwards walking, that can quickly short-circuit our ingrained going-somewhere mentality and render the deeper subtleties easily accessible. In the usual forward-facing mode, the future and where we are going are out-in-front and separate from us, visibly beckoning. It is only natural to always be psychologically leaning ahead of ourselves, in anticipation of where we are going and in a rush to get there. With backwards walking our whole emotional tone transforms. When we are always leaving rather than arriving, it is much easier to get into the non-separation mentality. We are not going anywhere, but are in a dance with everything; we are part of the world and creating it.

Here are a few of the advantages of backwards walking.

1. Surprise. Backwards walking is an excellent exercise for living totally in the moment. The unexpected object can most easily grab your attention and allow us to drop our usual self-centered ruminations. With each step, we never know what is awaiting us. Because there is no preparation for anything, one has no choice but to give one's self completely to everything.

Surprise has been the perpetual Zen specialty. The old masters were always waiting for just the right moment. A perfectly timed nose pull or door slam can sometimes precipitate an enlightenment experience. Of course with backwards walking everything surprises you full blown. It is true that every once in a while you may walk into something. To avoid spinal injuries inveterate backward walkers often wear a padded backpack as a bumper.

2. Slow down. Backwards walking is the only way that can get many people to slow down; if they continue the usual rushing, they'll only end up in a nervous fit. The body and nervous system just have to relax. The truth is that we are not going anywhere at all. However far or fast we go, we are actually always and only right here. The first step is with the body, then it may be possible to topple our mental delusion that we are going somewhere. We'll finally take it all in; stop at the oleander and watch the lady bug crawling up the papyrus stem.

3. Saying good-by. The last moment is when we really see things; the last bite is the most delicious; we truly love our departing friend. With backwards walking every moment is the last moment. The truth is that we are always saying good-by to everything. Walking backwards, waving good-by rather than hello, we naturally become aware of this usually repressed truth. We enter a more poignant and gentle world. Our life becomes a loving letting go and farewell. When we don't think, 'Oh it will always be there,' then we really look at and appreciate things. It won't always be there, this is the first and last time.

4. Faith. As with meditation, or any other challenge, backwards walking may bring up insecurity and fear. When we allow ourselves to feel, investigate and defuse our defenses, we become more permeable, porous and malleable to the universe. Each step is an act of faith.

5. Guidance. At fifty and beyond, one begins to look back at life and see the patterns. We know somehow that it all fits, that we've always been led by some mysterious guidance. With backwards walking, since we're always looking back at where we've been, something similar happens and we know we've been led all along.

6. Interbeing. The unenlightened person thinks that they are in the world,
the enlightened knows that the world is in them.
--Nisargadatta

Forward or backwards, this is my favorite walking koan. Each step, just being vast, we begin to know that our true self is this mysterious allowing energy that all things exist within. When we slowdown everything is moving at different speeds in multi-dimensional, multi-layered depths. Putting one foot in front of the other, the whole world moves. It is obvious that we are creating the world; it takes its birth within our vast being.

7. For communion, backwards walking can't be beat. You're not just another walker out on the street, but the neighborhood's backwards walker. Other walkers won't just pass you by without a greeting. Everyone will know you, and you'll know everyone.

It's true, if you take up backwards walking you will undeniably be distinct in the neighborhood. Around my house, the slow motion walking was bad enough, now I'm the backwards walker. You might want to dream up some excuse so that the neighbors won't think that you are nuts: a rare knee joint disease or some neurological disorder that necessitates backwards walking. I can only assure you that although I haven't converted the neighbors, they do eventually get used to it. Hopefully with time, the benefits will become more widely known and accepted and we won't need excuses.

And more people than you might think will understand what you are up to. I was out backwards walking on a recent afternoon when two Thai or Vietnamese little old ladies passed me by. They looked at me quizzically and asked in a thick accent, 'Why you walking that way?' I stammered something like, 'I like it better, go slower, look at things more, not in a rush.' A big smile lit up both of their faces as they exclaimed in unison, 'OH Buddha!'

I sometimes think people should mostly do backwards walking, at least for a few years, to re-balance the foreword walking delusive conditioning that we are actually going somewhere.

THE LINGERIE ZEN SECT
     
     Over the last few years, Tantra seems to be sweeping the Western World. There are workshops everywhere and shelves of books are available at the local bookstore. Even His Holiness the Dalai Lama has gotten in the act.

The best meditation for Westerners may be hugging.
                                   --The Dalai Lama

      Tantra means not retreating from an active and involved life in society; in the difficulties and lessons of a full life, we'll find the best teachers and learn to open to the deepest energy. Of course, these days given the nature of our society, unless we're born a reincarnated saint this usually means being sexually active and probably, obsessed. Sex itself is actually neutral. It can be exploitative and destructive or it can be a path to divinity. If it is part of a spiritual path, we can learn to expand sexual energy to cosmic energy. Through love for a particular person we can learn to love all people. Many excellent books are available on tantra and there is no need for me to elaborate. For more detailed explanations, I refer you to them. However, there is one tantric sect which I can humbly lay claim to being the founder of. Since I am also the chief, and as far as I know, sole priest, theoretician and propagator, a detailed exposition of the principles and practices of the Lingerie Zen Sect would seem appropriate here. The following pages are some excerpts from a recent article I wrote on the subject.

MONK QUITS MONASTERY TO RUN WORLD'S LARGEST LINGERIE STORE
NEW SECT OF LINGERIE ZEN IS FOUNDED ON HOLLYWOOD BLVD.

      Freud claimed that wish-fulfillment was the basis of all of our dreams. The great enlightened Masters carry this thesis to the extreme; not only our dreams, but our whole world is created by our desires. From the enlightened point of view this world is a wish-fulfilling dream that we are all creating and sharing together.
     The first and most basic teaching of the Buddha is that our suffering and delusion all flow from our desires. Similarly, Ramakrishna would endlessly look at his disciples, laugh, shake his finger and say "Women and Gold, Women and Gold." His point is that our desires basically reduce themselves to sex and power.
      I have no special experience in dealing with power, so I will leave that discussion for others. Through some perverse fate, however, I seem to have been chosen as a specialist on sexual desire. Whether or not my soul has been irreversibly damaged through running a lingerie store for a dozen years, I have had more than a little exposure to this most pervasive ingredient of human nature. So I will share a few thoughts on the subject.
      People often find it strange that I own a lingerie store and am also a student and teacher of meditation. They sometimes inquire whether these dual careers are not the cause of great conflicts and inner turmoil in my life. I am always quick to assure them that the exact opposite is the case. Over the years I have learned to not be embarrassed by my trade and even proud of it.
      At first this was far from the case. When I took over Playmates I was in my Vipassana phase. Typically, a retreat ends with a sharing circle. You finally get to meet the people whom you have grown to feel close to through sitting quietly with them for ten days. Everyone tells who they are, what they do, etc. The Vipassana crowd is generally quite distinguished: teachers, artists, writers, psychologists. I would always feel like climbing out the closest window before revealing myself as a brassiere and panty salesman. When my turn came I would try to evade the subject: talk about the weather, the last retreat, a few irrelevant jokes and hope no one would notice.
      But eventually they always did. Inevitably someone would ask, well I never got just what you do back there in Hollywood. Word would spread like wildfire. And what do you know, rather than being ostracized, I was suddenly a celebrity. Everyone wants to trade with me: art, counciling, books for lingerie. They will all visit me and go shopping when they pass through LA. Come and see them wherever they are. And what, I'm not carrying; bring a few panties along next time.
     I've generally always found the same reality out in the Dharma world as in my store: sexual preoccupation. From the novice sweeping the Zendo steps to the Rimpoche, from the Roshi to the cooks, this subject is usually never too far from anyone's mind. So, for 99.9% of us mortals it will do absolutely no good to try to avoid or evade it. Rather we should embrace it. And, I've got to admit, the best place to do this is in a lingerie store.
     Over the past two and a half millennia, as Buddhism has spread across borders, it has typically merged with the indigenous cultures to form new schools. In Tibet it incorporated the native Bon Shamanism and the unique forms of Tibetan Buddhism emerged; in China a blending of Buddhism and Taoism produced Chan and in Japan a synthesis with Shinto produced Zen. As a student of meditation, for many years I have been contemplating what new forms will emerge in the West--a Christian Buddhism?, a psychological Buddhism?, an entrepreneurial, capitalistic Buddhism?
     Fifteen years ago, I inherited Playmates of Hollywood, 'the world's largest lingerie store.' I got my first hints of another possible form the new Western Buddhism might take when I attended meetings of the 'Lingerie Club,' a Southern California organization of lingerie store owners and manufacturers. Expecting a rather seedy crowd, I was amazed to discover that lingerie people are grossly misapprehended. Most of the side conversations were about going on retreats, the temples and churches that people attended, types of prayers and meditations, etc. I started asking myself if there was some connection between lingerie and meditation. Is it possible that spending one's days in a lingerie store naturally softens one, opens one to be receptive to the feminine side, to intimacy with the mother? Is sex actually the dominant religion in the West, that Buddhism is going to have to accommodate and incorporate?
     Since a lingerie store had, so to speak, fallen into my lap, these seemed to be questions worth pursuing. I opened a meditation hall above the store where several nights a week we have meditation practice. People often come early and shop for lingerie. It's partially a question of arousing energy: tell me a better way than to come in with your sweetheart and try on a few teddies then go through the bra and panty racks.
     The most basic practice for turning the sexual energy towards divine union is, of course, prolonged and meditative intercourse, hugging, etc., i.e.--two partners. But if you're single or indisposed for whatever reasons, the Lingerie Zen approach is very effective--hang out in a lingerie store, the sexual energy is naturally aroused. Then, when you go upstairs to meditate, that energy will transform and strengthen your practice. And having the meditation hall handy and on the premises, avoids the often fatal tantric mis-fire.
     Some people have the mistaken idea that one should absolutely endeavor to avoid sexual thoughts and fantasies while meditating. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Actually, a few sexual fantasies can be very helpful in deepening your practice. If they are running rampant in your brain, there is probably not much you can do about it anyway. Just persevere in your meditation; the particular obsessive thoughts will eventually pass away as the energy that came with them remains and intensifies the meditation. I can say from personal experience that if you happen to be in the lingerie business this is certainly true. For the seasoned meditating lingerie store owner, to tell you the truth, it sometimes seems a that a few sexual thoughts are the doorway to a radiant and all encompassing meditation.
     Usually when we try to focus we find our minds are scattered all over the place. At the Playmates Zendo we've already awoken from the usual totally unconscious scattered mind and narrowed our awareness to one area. From this starting point it's not so difficult to dissolve the separate mind in the formless universal mind.
     I invite you to take a comparison test. Go to a 'straight' meditation hall and then come to the Playmates lingerie meditation hall (above the store on Tuesday and Thursday evenings). In one of them you'll find half the meditators falling asleep and in the other everyone is wide awake. Need I tell you which is which? The question is, why have meditators ignored lingerie stores for the last 2,000 years? I don't know, maybe it's a conspiracy of the sleepy heads. But at last the Lingerie Sect has released the sexual energy to be used for enlightenment.
     Of course, a few monks and nuns have been doing a little hanky-panky in the back room over the millenniums. And pederasty has been rampant in some traditions. But by and large, the tantric power of sex has been largely ignored until the advent of the Lingerie Movement.
     Before sessions, all meditators get a fifteen percent discount. This might not seem like much, but these days when you add all the expenses of a business-- payroll, rent, insurance, energy-- you're lucky if there's a five percent profit left. With a fifteen percent discount you could say that Lingerie Zen pretty much pays meditators.
     When I inherited the store from my dad, he had a policy of giving a discount to all strippers. Of course, since about half of our customers are strippers, it took me over a year to get out of debt. If a real lot of meditators start coming it could threaten the business again. But since I'm determined to continue the experiment of Lingerie Zen--I'll have to take that chance.
     A pet peeve of mine is the public's continuing misperception and vilification of lingerie store owners. I look like a nice guy, so when I'm in my store, people don't usually believe I own it. They expect some sleezoid, gangster type with a cigar and pin stripe suit. I have to show them my business card and get employees to verify that I'm me. This reflects that America still hasn't outgrown her Puritan roots; in the depths of our psyche, we still think of sex as sinful and evil. When we finally recognize sex as Goddess's greatest gift to humankind, as the front door and high road to experience our divine nature, then lingerie store owners will finally be recognized as the priests and priestesses of the coming millennium.
     Between lingerie browsing and going upstairs to meditate, we have a period for discussing the spiritual path and practice. I wouldn't want to say that people have been wasting their time in ashrams and desert monasteries for millennia, but there is certainly no better place to hold these 'dharma' discussions than in a lingerie store. I will explain why.
     There are endless metaphors used to attempt to describe the rapturous experience of absorption as the separate identity/ego dissolves. Among the most common are speaking of regression to the innocent child, and even earlier to the love and sustenance of the mother's breast, and still earlier to the peaceful, boundaryless world of the womb.
     Gathering within "L.A.'s best brassiere department" (L.A. Weekly), it is only natural to contemplate that with each breath the Goddess sustains us. We are taking precious sips at the Universal Mother's bosom. In meditation one often regresses to a deep feeling of returning to the nipple-- the whole world seems warm, nubby, grainy, soft and familiar. This state simply overcomes us sitting in the immense brassiere dept. And as soon as we are ready to plunge even deeper--we head for the panty racks.
     Here, with each breath, each mind thought, we let go and open; we become as a little baby who knows nothing, is seeing the world for the first time. In this state the world is filled with luminescence and wonder. We are in the Goddess's all-embracing warm and comforting womb. Everything seems to be a part of ourselves and everywhere we are at the sacred altar of the Goddess.
     The Hindus describe this experience as the rising of the Goddess Kundalini up the backbone. In truth, the human backbone is the love clitoris of the Goddess. It is in constant orgasmic union with mind/consciousness and the created world of form. This may sound far fetched, but it is not as difficult to experience as you might think. And somehow, sitting amid gold and silver sequin g-strings it's a little easier to open to the Goddess-womb's infinite light.
     But we still go deeper to prepare ourselves for the evening's meditation; we head to the negligee department. Here we find the essence of lingerie, of the Goddess, and of our life --MYSTERY. In spiritual practices we ask, what are we doing here? What is this world? This this? Are we really here? Is this all some being's dream? Indeed the Native-American word for the supreme is just--mystery. Wandering among endless racks and aisles of flowing night gowns, teddies, cover-ups, peignoir-sets and negligees, our hearts are propelled ever deeper into the realms of revelation and mystery.
     People often ask me if a new order is being created at Playmates. I don't know how to determine this, but a new sect of monks and nuns will usually have its own particular habits and robes. And in fact at Playmates we have developed the devotional brassiere, a device which rapidly accelerates the revelation of the adept's particular devotional affinities. Basically we have produced a complete line of bras with the appropriate incantations and meditations for each. You wear a different bra each week. One week you might wear a Shiva bra and meditate on death. Shiva represents your ego's death that necessarily precedes your rebirth in pure spirit. If these sorts of revelations occur while wearing a Shiva bra, then you know you are a Shaivite. Paint the stripes across your forehead and wear your bra proudly.
     Wearing a Hanuman bra you contemplate lightness, mirth and the comic absurdity of our idea of a separate self. You grieve at the endless pain this causes and yet are able to embrace it. In a Ganesha bra you contemplate gratitude for life as an overflowing fountain of fullness and blessing; In a Jesus bra--love, sacrifice and compassion; in Lakshmi--the mother of sustenance; in Buddha--the peace of understanding of interdependence, and on and on. After a while it will be clear which bra is right for you: in one or another you'll drown in waves of bliss-energy. That deity is calling you.
     Maybe we should produce a line of devotional jocks for the men, but at this point in the evolution of Lingerie Zen, a man just sits between two women in the appropriate bras. Are you a Ram devotee? Sit between two women wearing Ram bras--the proof is in what works, and it does. You'll know if Ram is writing R A M on your forehead. Also, no one is stopping anyone from cross-dressing--if the gent is so inclined.
     Of course we don't want to monopolize this important discovery to Hollywood Blvd. If you live far from the Playmates Zendo, just send us your size and preference. We'd like to see devotional bras in meditation halls across the land. $108 gets you your bra and appropriate meditational instructions and prayers. This may seem expensive but wait until you receive your bra: they are highly decorated and costly to produce--tassels, rhinestones, crystals, the works. Believe me, at $108 I'm not getting rich on them.
     After a while, you'll probably want to start wearing your devotional bra out. They're little wearable, walking altars. Everywhere you go people will stop and want to light incense in front of you. You will be blessed and you will bless. Can you conceive of the change in the tone of social intercourse in our country if half of us wore devotional brassieres? At last, we would become a nation of compassion, generosity and love.
     The question of desire lies at the heart of our dilemma. The world of separation in time and form is a dream created by our desires. And yet our very being is the fulfillment of our truest desire. This deepest desire will inevitably prevail, but when we are in their grips, our passing desires seem far from trivial. We just have to sort them out. To accelerate this process, sitting with them is far better than avoiding them. A lingerie store is certainly the best place to do this.
     Here is a test I offer to anyone. Enter your typical Zendo: a room full of people straining at the gut to hold back the usual cascade of their disruptive thoughts. Let out a loud,"Bras and panties for sale." I guarantee you, if the sitting is restored at all, it will take at least two hours before the pandemonium settles. The question is, what are these people doing in a dark hall? Why aren't they meditating in a lingerie store?
    This brings up the subject of male Dharma teachers. It seems that most males, even the most respected Dharma teachers, given some power, respect, and the incumbent opportunities, just can't resist the temptations of sexual dalliances with their students. The frequency of teachers getting involved in improprieties with their students is notorious. What to do about this has become a major quandary for the emerging Western Dharma community.
     A few of the most radical feminists have called for a complete ban on all male teachers. They claim that to counter-balance the last millennia of mostly all male teachers, for at least the next few centuries, all dharma teachers should be female. To tell you the truth, if you look at the sordid record, this doesn't seem like such a bad idea.
     There is, however, an obvious alternative to such drastic measures: internship in a sleazy lingerie store like Playmates. Let them work it out in a more appropriate setting. If your sangha is troubled by a teacher who can't keep his hands off the goods, send him to Playmates for a year or two apprenticeship. He'll be returned chastised and pure--or such an incorrigible derelict that you'll know never to let him back in the door.
     The truth is one can only use up one's sexual obsessions by embracing and living through them, not by avoiding them. When that Karma is finished, the world will let you know in no uncertain terms. Being a lingerie store owner and my personal obsessions having reached mega-proportions, this was true in my case. As a supplier of erotic dancers, I always had to keep up with the latest fashions and, to tell you the truth, I got hooked on strip joints. After a few years frequenting these places I finally wondered, is the thrill is gone or is there still a lingering itch of lechery.
     A few years ago I was passing through Vegas, home of America's most famous strip clubs. I figured I'd go get a Vegas style lap dance and see if it meant anything to me. When I entered the club I was immediately attracted to one woman. After talking a while, I told her that I teach meditation. She suddenly started crying and told me that she had been praying to God to meet someone to teach her to meditate. I knew immediately that my lap dancing days were over. We had a nice time meditating together and I don't think I ever need to go back to any strip clubs.    
      I have no desire to limit Lingerie Zen to Playmates. If you're around L.A., we welcome you. If you live in Georgia or New Jersey I urge you--go to your local lingerie store, light a stick of incense and ask if they'd mind if you sat in and meditated. You might be pleasantly surprised with a new friend. One store/meditation hall is enough for me, but I would love to see Lingerie Zendos spread across America. If you already practice meditation at some center, be it Hindu, Zen, Vipassana, Tibetan or whatever, please talk to the other meditators, board of directors and/or the abbot. Suggest that you would like to keep a rack of lingerie in a corner of the meditation room, or a few negligees displayed on the walls for a trial period. I can promise you that after a few weeks they'll want two or three racks. Being dedicated to seeing the Lingerie Movement spread throughout America, I am willing to supply the lingerie and racks at wholesale prices to all meditation centers. Please contact me at Playmates, Hollywood, CA.
     Only the Goddess knows what's next here at Playmates. Lingerie Zen is still in its infancy; we are always expanding our experimentation in the two fields of our expertise--lingerie and meditation. Broader vistas and deeper realizations ever loom on the horizon. In a few years I hope to look back and have a good laugh at the primitive state of today's Lingerie Zen. The field is wide open. Anyone who wants to participate in these vital developments--just come up to Hollywood Blvd. on meditation nights. I'll see you here.

MYSTICS' ALL-TIME HIT PARADE

     Some people may find the previous chapters a little twisted. They may seem more like derelectics and delusion than dialectics of delusion. A few balancing chapters are certainly due. Spiritual inspiration can be found in many places besides the dark corners of our culture and psyche. If our eyes are open we will find dharmic truth in all of the circumstances of our lives, the wholesome as well as the possibly warped. There are, however, certain circumstances that most clearly mirror and easily remind us of the deepest truth of our hearts. These special times and places comprise the metaphors that mystics of all traditions have used repeatedly in their attempts to describe the nature of spiritual truth. They are something like a mystics all-time hit parade: the settings which best describe spiritual reality and in which that reality can be most easily experienced. They have been the outer symbols for inner truth that mystics have referred to over and over through out the millennium.
     Below, we will take a pilgrimage through various stops along the all-time hit parade. They have been the 'special entrees' of my life, the settings in which the heart and mind most easily resonate in response to outer circumstances. A major benefit of any pilgrimage is that we usually bring our opened awareness home with us. A change of perspective reminds us to appreciate our ordinary mind and circumstances as being extraordinary; what we thought were our drab and boring surroundings are as fascinating and awe-inspiring as wherever we've been. The hit parade may be God's gift to remind us that number one is actually in front of us right now.

THE OCEAN. Over the millennium, mystics of all schools are endlessly describing reality as an ocean--a love ocean, awareness ocean, bliss ocean, etc. In truth, we are always playing the edge of this ocean. We get excited at the water ocean because it is the closest that the material realm comes to approximating the vast and limitless quality of our true nature. It reminds us, perhaps at an unconscious level, that we are equally immense. On my days off, more often than not I find myself heading towards Santa Monica or Venice; I wander the boardwalk or sit down somewhere on the beach. By the water all things seem to resonate with the ocean's unlimited energy; everyone and everything--kids, birds, waves, clouds-- are animated with an extra charge of excitement and adventure.
     The rest of creation may give us a delusion of stability and permanence. At the ocean the mask is off; it is in endless transformation. Moment to moment before our eyes, smooth glass turns to frothy foam to thundering breakers. At some level of consciousness we know that this is the truth of our life as well. Meditation and the surf have a similar effect. They are something like a scrub brush, endlessly peeling away at our outer layers. In both cases, the urge to immersion is irresistible. The next one may always be the big breaker. The ocean and the waves is the number one metaphor that every mystic worth his salt has used to describe spiritual truth. The waves, as ourselves, may momentarily appear to be separate. Calm the winds of our rampant thoughts and we experience our true vast ocean/one awareness being.

An Ode to the Ocean

Up and down the beach, the little squeals.
There is no preparation for a child's first sight of the ocean.
The first forays at returning are received so roughly and gently.
If they are fortunate they never get over it.

Because it is always after us, we have no choice
and will return again and again.
On boards and tubes, from boats and piers,
we are addicted and can't stop throwing ourselves in.
From terraces, ocean-view lots,
from boats, piers, boardwalks,
we feast our eyes and become wild like the waves.
It is where we reveal, unveil and leave our inhibitions.
Even the normally restrained can't resist
a game of tag or dance by the waves.
We chase and are chased
and love to ride the edge of it,
but it will always turn and takes us for a toss.
It wants to pull everything in
and leave us with unknown treasures at our feet.
This is an actual preview of the real truth.

Ocean doesn't know Latino, Black,
Japanese, man, woman.
Ocean welcomes all,
doesn't care surfer or going to a formal ball.
On the wet sand, we all go barefoot,
by the waves we all get soaked.

Because the same giant/tiny force
that sits on the turning of the waves
is the familiar thing that turns the breath
and sits on the ventricles of the heart.
.Because between the waves
in the shallows where everything stops,
this breath is also taken.
Because this heart flood
has created a body to go swimming.
That is all.

     The ocean's salutary effect on the human psyche is not just my poetic fancy but can be empirically verified. A visit to the ocean is certainly LA's best bet for a day's measure of sanity. The Venice boardwalk is the city's most hopeful interracial urban experience; Blacks, Whites, Latinos and Asians are usually all mixing with good feeling and some friendly openness.
     The ocean's hit parade status also stands the test of history. The cultures that have been especially marked by periods of great creativity, as well as by tolerance, open-mindedness, democracy, receptivity to new ideas, lack of chronic military aggression and genocides, etc., have usually been located on peninsulas or islands--i.e. with the highest proportion of ocean shorelines to land mass. Holland, England, Italy, Greece, Scandinavian countries most immediately come to mind. It seems that exposure to the ocean has been the most accessible way for most peoples to be reminded of their vast true nature. I am certain that within a few centuries there will be peacefully organized mass population transits in order to assure that all inland populations get their share of ocean awareness resonance.

FRUIT PICKING. Mystics are always using the metaphor of fruit picking to describe spiritual practice. In both cases, when it is ready you only need to give a gentle tap and the most delicious gem will fall right into your hands. There is the story of the Zen initiate who asked the master how long it would take him to attain enlightenment. 'Ten years.' 'No I am impatient and cannot wait that long, I will try extra hard.' 'In that case twenty years.' 'No, I will work day and night.' 'In that case thirty years.' etc. In both the orchard and meditation hall, some patience and surrendering to a process that has its own schedule for ripening is required. In the summer, I am often seized by a fruit picking frenzy. After I've worked the trees in my backyard, I take my picking stick on a walk through the Beverly Hills alleys (for easy pickings on overhanging trees) or head up to pick-it-yourself orchards outside of Ojai. The buckets appear at various friends, relatives, meditation halls and at Playmates of Hollywood. This body becomes inhabited by a compulsive picker who won't let go until the branches are bare. Fruit picking must resonate a deep truth in my being.
     The ripe fruit is a perfect expression of the nature of our mind: a luscious explosion of soft and juicy fullness hidden inside of a seemingly hard and arid exterior. In meditation we need only to quiet our minds in order to experience our true nature as unlimited and vast intimacy and tenderness. A piece of fruit also requires a little meditative effort to be fully appreciated. Unfortunately most of us have been desensitized by corporate tree farm. In the supermarket, piled high by the bushels, the individual fruit loses its luster. Eating under a real tree, we are not dissociated from the full cycles of nature. The fruit that falls off the branch and into our hand with the slightest touch is a little shining jeweled sun. Bursting with sunlight and wet with delicious sweetness, it is a symbol and reminder of our true self and will give us a smile and full heart as well as a full belly.

FLOWER VIEWING. You are not far from nature's most obvious, sacred and perfect altar. Probably not just one, but thousands of such altars are within a few steps of your front door. The best meditation I've ever found is just studying the shrine at the heart of every flower. Each will readily show you the nature of your heart and mind. On flower meditation walks, I carry a few magnifying lenses--a 2x, 4x and a 10x--to help me enter deep into the flower's heart altar. Magnification opens whole universes in even the at first seemingly most humble flower. Each magnification level reveals a new realm of beauty and smaller creatures partaking of it. Beyond a 10x, the flower transforms to a rush of vibrant energy.
     Personally, I can't figure out why the streets are not filled with lens carrying monks and nuns. In deep meditation we experience that we actually are a flower; our very being is a radiating source of intimate love, beauty, tenderness and gentle grace. Looking deeply into a flower's inner sanctum is one of the best meditations to remind us of our self- nature. Every rose wants to make us proclaim that it is the most beautiful thing we've ever seen. We resist the odious business of comparisons, but the truth is that our instincts are accurate. Every flower is the sweet darling of an evolutionary beauty contest and has evolved to win the bee's attentions over the neighboring flowers. Each seems that God is shining a sacred spotlight just on it.

A hand lantern,
just enough light for one flower.
A Peony, OH!
       --Shiki

     Flower meditation may also deepen our feelings of gratitude. Every flower is in an immediate and silent communion with the four elements. We often forget that without sunlight, earth, water, air we also could not exist for a moment. With a flower it is too obvious--we are reminded of our own interbeing and inter-dependence with all of nature.
     Every flower is performing an exquisite ballet. Although some varieties hide it behind a curtain of petals, there is always a mating dance of stamen and pistil. If the Board of Review studied flowers closely, preferably with a viewing lens, most could not get a G or even PG 13 rating. NC 17 at the best, but many flowers would be restricted viewing. Of course genetic engineering will likely eventually eliminate the unseemly sexual dance that permeates all of nature. For now a 10x lens still reveals flowers moist with the messy stickiness of new life.

From fetus to little old lady,
samsara's all here
on the stalk of a snapdragon.
              --Yonni

Before its about to blossom
petals unfold,
zinnia stops and smiles.

JEWELS. The Bodhi Tree bookstore in West Hollywood is surrounded by L.A.'s 'spiritual neighborhood.' There are a few cafes, tea stalls and Eastern art emporiums, but especially there are crystal and gem shops proliferating in almost every direction. L.A.'s adepts are not the first to obsess upon the gem as the expression of enlightened consciousness, mystics have been doing this since the first hermit emerged from his cave. The jewel is a perfect expression for the awareness that is revealed through meditation practice. In both cases something precious beyond description is hidden at first but revealed when either the surrounding rock and dirt or excessive mental chatter is cleared away. Most of the adjectives used to describe a beautiful gem apply equally well to the self-nature of awakened awareness; many-faceted, lustrous, brilliant, subtle, mysterious, ungraspable, beyond either hard or soft, hot or cool. In deep meditation, one experiences that one's own awareness is an ever transforming gem; it is always revealing subtler luster, new facets and doorways for deeper absorption.

'OFF THE BEATEN PATH.' I recently drove up to N. California to pay a last visit to an old dharma friend and teacher who was dying of cancer. When it was finally time to depart for L.A., his last words to me were, "Take Highway 394." In case the reader is not familiar with California, Highway 394 cannot be found on any map, because it does not exist; Chuck was offering me the perennial mystics' exhortation--to go wild. We are all familiar with political, economic and social radicalism. 'Going wild' is what I would call spiritual radicalism; questioning all of our familiar and comfortable certainties to explore unknown and uncharted emotional and mental territories. Spiritual radicalism means breaking the rules and not being bound by the rote and ossified routines which infiltrate even the most hallowed of the various spiritual paths. For me, it is experiencing real spirituality, which is sort of a love insanity--and not being afraid to allow my life to be a fresh, spontaneous, eccentric, honest and maybe sometimes a little dangerous and foolish expression of it.                           Undoubtedly, here I can make no prescription; everyone has to find their own unique ways of going 'off the beaten path.' However, the book must go on, so I share one of my favorites--which is to take the phrase quite literally. In the past few years I have become an addict to slow driving meditation on the back roads of Western America. As summer approaches, I prepare an annual ritual: detarp the convertible pick-up truck, put a pad in the bed, recruit a few friends to share the driving and plot a route across back roads of the West. Past fifty one begins to contemplate the perfect setting of one's demise: maybe at the place of one's greatest happiness. I want to die on a back road, looking up at a starry sky from the bed of my pick-up truck. Till then, I try to get someone to do the slow driving while I sit in the bed, embraced by passing beauty.
     Every culture has its preferred beauty sharing communions: Japanese tea ceremonies under the cherry blossoms, French side-walk cafes, Russian winter sled rides, etc. Back roads pick-up truck touring parties is a natural for America. This book will have served its purpose if it does nothing more than present the reader with that possibility. I'm sure its time will come.

Doin the Back Roads.

Going nowhere on Colorado Plateau,
broken down in Navaholand.
Day and night in bed of Toyota pickup.
God, get me in the middle of nowhere,
no state park, no service provided,
just me and any anonymous landscape.
The interstate is slip it in fast
and get it over with. The back road,
God, this is making love the slow way.
Hardly anyone from Vegas to the Escalante,
just nature appreciating itself
with a few innocent bystanders.
She is the immaculate artist
and will produce exactly what you need
to fall in love with.
She only asks you to slow down and look around.

    Since I commute between a Northern and a Southern California home, people are always asking me things like, "Can you make the trip in eight hours." They're often a little surprised when I answer something like, "Only thirty-six hours this time."

Find the dirt road passes on county maps.
Twenty MPH on back roads
through almond orchards and family dairies.
'Pavement ends,' in pot holes and dust clouds
through potato and cotton fields.
An adventure driving to L.A. on the back roads.

Westley, Patterson, Dos Palos
are just names from the Interstate.
On the back roads, I'm an honorary citizen.
Need to clean the windshield again,
an excuse to stop at every little town.

Rusted Klee boxcars on a RR siding.
Barns from a Manet pallet.
Brancusi silos, cathedral silos, organ pipe silos.
Farmhouses on loan from the Met.
Everything is art comes right before
everything is God.

Giotto orchards,
Dark mother mystery orchards.
A wave that you'll never forget.
All the people you should have gotten to know
and must have been old friends from somewhere.

Old barns.
Red, green, yellow.
Thank God for faded paint.

It's never really satisfying in L.A,
but along the back road passing through Mendota
a Taco Bell is a complete experience.

Tomato harvest season.
Panoche road between Gustine and Mendota.
The loaded semis lined up on the roads
in front of the processing plants
waiting to disgorge their tomatoes.
Before its ketchup, V-8 or marinara,
stewing tomatoes aroma essence
enwreathing the countryside for miles.
Fries or burgers seem so impure.
Let me just sit here and breath deep by the road.

Lower San Juaquin valley slipping by.
Broken down barns and chicken coups,
rusty tractors sinking into abandoned fields.
Even on the back roads
things are moving too fast.
This highway is the edge of longing.
At least I can contemplate
the things I could fall in love with.

Old barn, windmill, row of autumn poplars,
field of tan alfalfa stubble.
From any direction it's a pretty picture.
I stop to write poem.
Why go 80 and see nothing when at 40
you can make love with every old shanty town.
When you go slow things are abandoned.
You might even try it your self.

TWELVE THOUSAND FEET. Using the phrase 'getting high' as an expression for expanded consciousness may be a remnant from the drug culture days or may reflect the popularity of Kundalini Yoga, which describes meditation as energy rising up the spinal column. As deep meditation obliterates any idea of high or low, on one level this is a rather gross description; everything is just being--beyond any direction or dimension. On the other hand, there is something to it and the best way that I've found to get high is to just--get high. I have an additional summer rite besides doing the back roads: wandering high up into some mountains. At about 12,000 feet, one passes through a mystical doorway. Suddenly one is as on another planet; a beautiful vista spreads out in every direction. Every tiny clump of grass is an exquisite bouquet. Every rock or pebble part of Divinely arranged rock gardens.

At twelve thousand feet,
in wildflower fields I grow tipsy.
Columbines and Penstemons
are more than good friends.
Waving in the wind, reaching for the sun,
in their silence and patience
I find my true mind.
I talk to a Daisy,
it answers back
and I write silly poems.

At twelve thousand feet,
an unknown purple flower bouquet.
I graze my cheek on it,
share it with blue-winged moths
and mountain lady bugs,
shiver in the wind with it
and bundle it up
so I can kiss it all at once.
We just met and I don't know its name.
Someday I'd like to try it like that with a person.

At twelve thousand feet,
fields of purple shooting-stars
waving gaily in the breeze.
A fitting audience for a stream
coming off the slopes of Mt. Haekel.
You deserve a Wordsworth poem,
all you get is an Attie.

At twelve thousand feet,
I get dizzy.
I wander around with five or six mentalities
and a bump of freedom.
Too weak to do anything
but sit still and vow to love more.

TREES. Walking around Los Angeles is something like wandering through an arboreal world's fair. With every few steps, one passes trees and fauna that originate in all parts of the world. Every tree is surrounded by an aura of its birth place. If we are open and still, it will take us back there with it. People are always complaining about being in Los Angeles. I tell them its not that bad. Slow down and look up the trunk and through the branches of the closest tree. Right now you are viewing a timeless scene. Forget everything else and not only could you be, but you actually are Adam or Eve in a Garden of Eden.

Sunlight filtering through green translucent canopy
and a slow steady stream of leaves spiraling down upon me.
Eucalyptus, just like me,
makes such a goddamn mess
and also sometimes so smooth and shiny.
Spread my limbs under grove of giant spotted gums.
The loves of a thousand lifetimes all meet here.
I Remember these dear friends
and want more of them.
Put Australia on my travel list.

    Sometimes just contemplating a tree won't do. One's heart craves a more intimate contact. We want to lose ourselves and become the tree. Here one arrives at the next stage of tree meditation.

An Ode to the Climbers

Tree climbers-- reassert yourselves.
Serious practitioners haven't been heard from
since the days of John Muir.
It's time to revive the long neglected art.

Tree climbing is graceful as gymnastics,
builds muscles tighter than weights
and limbers you like a Yogi.
Tree climbing's a ballet of dexterity,
coordination and perception.
You're a Baryshnikov,
Morton Fig's your Dame Fontaine.
Why ruin your knees jogging,
spend a fortune joining the health club
and wreck your nerves driving there--
plenty of trees within a block.
Why broken legs football,
sprained ankle baseball,
wrecked wrist basketball?
Save on medical bills--
fresh air and aromatic inhalation cures colds,
congestion, backache, palsy, heart tremors.

Tree climbers are prepared for any situation.
Want to get away from the crowds?
No need for Bahamas or Tahiti,
just go up, up, up-- believe me, no one's there.
Want a cheap date? Just say, 'Let's go tree climbing.'
You'll find out right away if she's your type.
Stuck with a non-stop talker who's giving you a headache?
Head for the nearest Pittosporum--
one quick lift and you're free.
Want to meet people, find new friends?
Drop a sweater, handkerchief or pen.
They won't pass you by-- glad to stop and help.
Tell a story, what you've seen today.
They'll never forget you--
under that tree, always look up for you.
Want to be of service? You're the neighborhood crime alert,
lost dog patrol, directions adviser, shopping guide, gossip dispenser.
Looking for your love?
Best first date and romantic too.
Pick a breezy full moon night--
got to hold on to each other,
better than slow dancing-- try it.

Want to be a poet?
There are poems waiting at every branch;
"In an autumn Laurel,
I wish a fond farewell
To my departing leaf friends."
"Swaying in a winter Pine,
'Don't fall, I promise
I'll water you all summer.' "
In Ashes and Oaks, hundreds of poems are waiting.
I'm not greedy, glad to share them with you.

And for meditators--
no need fancy cushions and hall rentals.
You won't fall asleep, no wondering mind--
quick way to Enlightenment.
And best, When you arrive back on the ground,
you can't help but place your palms together,
look up at the branches, leaves and sky,
and have a moment of prayer and thanks
to your friend who lifted, supported
and returned you so gently.
Because in the swaying branches,
for a moment, you didn't know if the breeze
was the tree's breath or your own.
And when the winds came
and blew away the leaves,
for a moment,
you blew away with them.

THE LIGHT. 'Jyota se Jyota se Jyota jagao.' This is a popular Hindu mantra. It means, 'You are the light of the light of the light,' or 'All the lights we see in the material universe are just little rays from the limitless light which radiates from the heart of each of our beings.' One way or another, people are always describing spiritual reality as 'the light.' The movie projector, after the ocean and waves, is the twentieth century's runner-up spiritual metaphor; both in the theater and in our lives, we get lost in the projected shadows but forget the light that makes it all possible. You could describe meditation as nothing more than returning to the place where we are 'plugged-in' before the electricity does all of its separate little jobs.

MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT.

When I go to sleep in the evening, I die and when I awaken in the morning I am reborn.                                                 --Gandhi

    Sometimes, in the middle of the night, you might get caught between the two. You and things are both not real and more than real. Maybe for this reason, besides sunset, almost all mystical traditions observe the middle of the night as the preferred time to commune with the divine. Sufis do the dervish spin; Zen monks hold full moon meditations by their rock gardens; Hindus call to Shiva by the banks of the Ganges. Anabaptists believed that Jesus would return between midnight and two AM, so they had to be awake to await him. Westerners undoubtedly will evolve their own unique ways of observing all-night vigils.
    My personal preferences is vending machine courtyards. My favorite is an outdoor courtyard on the UCLA campus. Through the night they sit in a circle, humming, purring and whispering in some sort of primal chorus. Effusing a subliminal glow, with the proper supplication they dispense warmth and nourishment to the solitary sojourner. I sometimes feel the Celtic spirits called back and hovering near. Admiring Druids, praising the monolith arrangements as they once did at Stonhenge, invite the night wanderer to join in their meditation. I wonder if in some past life I tended stone temples in Ancient Greece. Perhaps I haunt this place because it bears the closest resemblance I can find today to the old temples.
    If you don't live near UCLA and your local campus does not have an outdoor monolithic vending circle, have no regrets but try walking meditation in an all night supermarket. Suchness in a pyramid of Spam or Tide boxes; this is the discovery of the pop artists. Somehow, when it is just you and the night, the aisle of Pepsi cartons will shine all the brighter.

    Besides the above inspiring circumstances, there are also certain classes of people that are on the Mystics All Time Hit Parade. This is the compliment for such dialectical teachers as the talk-shockers, rude waiters etc. found in the previous chapter. Number one on every list is saints, enlightened masters, gurus, etc. In almost every spiritual guide ever written, no matter what the tradition, this is at the top of the list. Everyone who has ever written anything on spirituality has said that keeping the company of enlightened, spiritually advanced people is the sine qua non of spiritual life--as important or more important than meditation, precepts, good works.
    There is one other class of people, however, whose company is equally beneficial to keep--cute people. Cuteness manifests in people whose existence is still half in the formless world: little children and old people--one coming from it the other going into it. Nature has made them cute so that the people who are more grounded in the material world will want to take care of them. Fortunately it's a two-way deal; if you hang out with cute people they will pull you to the formless world with them. In some states of elevated consciousness, you know that everything has half of its existence in the formless world; what the cute people make explicit you see everywhere--the whole world is cute.

An Ode to Cuteness.

At a fountain plaza in the center of Munich
I take my seat all day
watch the city get wet and splattered.
As things pass in the spray--they're cute.
Cigarette holding goatees, garbage collector professor,
hard-on boys, chicken ladies with fragile bones,
European gentlemen so dignified cute--
especially because they don't know it.
I don't know why cuteness was created,
a sub-variety of love and equally miraculous.
Any group of nuns walking across the plaza,
the way small dogs struggle to keep up,
people who don't want to have a good time,
people having a good time--
all the same in the splattering spray.

The tough guys in cool shades,
sullen, watching the girls,
part of her beauty and they don't know it.
I can't help it--they're cute.
Three and four year olds,
just not aware of that little body,
tip-toeing through hollow air.
At five or six they go to the edge
and may jump right in.
By twelve they push and throw each other
or threaten to.
Yes, we're all God's children
or at least step-children, grand-children,
nieces or cousins,
related in some way in the spray.

Three year olds have a way of sneaking up on things.
They'll settle first for just a look,
then a run around the fountain.
They make me wonder,
'What if the world wasn't inhabited by cute people?'

All these little jokes
are just excuses to laugh at the big joke,
this one enormous heart devouring the universe.
As things disappear--they're cute.

This solitary traveler feels like someone
who's snuck in and peeking at the world.
Days keeping alone to this smiling heart.
I want to talk to everyone but hardly say a word--
just latch on to passing backbones.
I am in love with the human backbone
and the masks that God puts on it.
By this fountain in central Munich-- they're all cute.

    If this book becomes a best seller and I get rich, I'm going to buy a little acreage somewhere adjacent to the Pacific Ocean. There I will dedicate the Mystics All-Time Hit Parade Gardens. Everything will be there. A beach with meditation verandahs. Fruit orchards and flower gardens: picking poles and viewing lenses provided. A gem and crystal pavilion. Tree pathways with devious directions and vanishing trails; people will get lost in overgrown jungles and wild thickets. The gardens will be open all hours; people will be especially welcomed at sunrise, sunset and for midnight communions amid monolithic arrangements of vending machines. Cuteness badges will be awarded to all visitors.
    Is the hit parade complete? You might ask: what about rivers, street cars and trolleys, deserts and tundra, helicopters, elevators, rain forests and blades of grass, bays and islands, microscopes and telescopes? You've guessed it, the list is a fake. Wherever you are, you're surrounded by the hit parade. You can find some reasons to stick almost anything on the list. But I needed to write something. Please make your own hit parade.

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