Space Mountain

When we are not sure, we are alive. - Graham Greene in the zen Calendar (August 3, 2007).

Day 266. Multiple Peak Experiences!! (that's the most sexual thing I've ever printed on my blog, which may explain why I have only 22 followers - Gassho to each and every one of you - after eight months. ) Peak Experience #1 was spending time on the Tassahara Zen Mountain Center web site and Lo! and Behold! Finding downloads of many of the chants I did while sitting with my teacher, Frank. I just spent half an hour chanting my favorites, including the Heart Sutra and Maka Hanya Hara Mita. Peak Experience #2: While on the same site, I downloaded the application for a work/study program during the summer of 2011. I hope to spend about 10 days working at Tassahara, studying Zen, and sitting zazen. Peak Experience #3: I have been surfing sites on Trinidad in preparation for a trip with my friend Lorene (her mother is a native and we graciously volunteered to escort her to her homeland). There is a killer mountain bike outfit on Topago, the sister island to Trinidad. I must finish the blog/sit year prior to this trip, because if the mountain biking is, in Reality, as good as the posted pictures, I will probably stay! Peak Experience #4: A wonderful comment on the blog from a couple of days ago. Gassho, Delbertino, and thank you for sharing your thoughts. Comments on the blog are a precious gift to me.

Whew. If I was a smoker, I might need a cigarette about now. I'll sip my chamomile tea instead. I've always thought it tastes like dirt, yet I really like it. Probably acquired a taste for it from all the trail I eat while mountain biking. For some reason I haven't the foggiest idea of what I originally intended to write about this evening. Something about sitting zazen. Yeah. That narrows it down.

While keeping my mind on my mind (a very odd thing we Buddhists do), I've noticed that I spend much less time "brain blogging" during the day. I think this is a result of a concentrated effort to dwell in the here-and-now. This has always come easily for me during work with clients, because I love engaging in therapy. It is intrinsically absorbing. Lately there are other areas of my life during which I am able to stay in the moment more frequently: When I chop vegetables, I chop; when I'm in Pilates class, I do Pilates; when I walk with Chylene, I'm fully present with her; when I drive, I actually operate my vehicle, so as not to be a dumbass (partially due to fear of return karma after blogging on the subject!) When I sit down to blog, it is then that I blog. My blogging radar (bloggar?) remains ever vigilant because material is Everywhere; however, I seem better able to rein in my blog-o-mania during times my attention is best focused elsewhere. Like on the car in front of me.

My sitting practice continues to astound and perplex me. It's like Space Mountain at Disneyland: You're in for a wild ride, and you can't see where it is taking you. Which always made Space Mountain one of my favorite attractions. A roller coaster is much more exhilarating when you can't anticipate the ups and downs, twists and turns. It keeps you in the moment. You can't prepare for what comes next; you just have to trust that the coaster stays on the track and takes you where you need to go. During any one ride, you can love it, hate it, fear it, enjoy it, want it to be over, and want to stay on forever. If you're like me, you keep going back to ride it again. Over and over. The thrill is never completely gone.

I thought I had more to say, but I reread the last paragraph and realized I inadvertently described a perfect metaphor for my practice. So I'm headed for the cushion. Or a ride on Space Mountain. Same thing.

Gassho,
CycleBuddhaDoc