Encouraging Words

Nominated for the Tricycle Prize for Outstanding Contribution to Buddhism in America—a collection of short talks and essays from a renowned meditation teacher.

"The inspiration that guided monks and nuns in ancient times is our own deepest incentive as we establish our practice in a world that desperately needs new forms of kinship and love."
—Robert Aitken

In this inspiring collection, you will find a series of talks and essays that Aitken Rashi has offered his students at meditation retreats during the past two decades. They are arranged according to themes central to all spiritual seekers—attention, emptiness, coming and going, diligence, death and the afterlife, the sacred self, and the moral path. Aitken provides guidance on pursuing religious practice in a lay context, “re-casting the Dharma to include women, jobs, and family.” He also charts his own quest to develop a set of moral codes in keeping with Buddhism's basic precepts and honoring the enormous ethical challenges faced in the twentieth century.Acknowledgments xiii
Introduction xv
 
WORDS IN THE DŌJŌ
Introduction 1
The First Night 6
Coming Home 9
The World Does Zazen 11
Emptiness 14
Condition 17
The Single Point 22
Carry Your Practice Lightly 24
Attention 27
Coming and Going 30
Patience 33
The Sacred Self 35
Becoming Settled 38
Switch Back to Mu 40
Diligence 43
The Dark Night 48
Simple and Clear 51
Like a Dream 53
The Last Night 54
Afterword 56
Notes 57
 
WORDS FROM THE RŌSHI
Introduction 63
The Middle Way 65
Using the Self 68
Ordinary Mind Is the Tao 73
Cycles and Stages 79
The Moral Path 76
Dreams and Archetypes 94
Impermanence 105
The Lay Sangha 107
Kōan Study and Its Implications 118
Integrity and Nobility 123
The Net of Indra 127
Nonviolence within the Zendō and Outside 131
About Practice 136
Death and the Afterlife 147
Notes 148
 
THE SYLLABUS
Introduction 157
Lattice of the Dharma 161
Wu-men kuan: Case I
The Zen Buddhist Sutra Book 168
   The Gāthās 170
   The Sutras and a Dhāranī 172
   The Dedications and the Evening Message 180
   Mealtime Sutras 185
   The Jukai Ceremony 189
      Rōshi’s Introduction 189
      The Three Vows of Refuge 190
      The Three Pure Precepts 191
      The Ten Grave Precepts 191
      Verse of the Rakusu 194
      Dedication 195
The Sesshin 197
   Daily Schedule 197
   Leadership 198
   The Three Essentials 200
Dōjō Percussion Instruments 202
 
A Glossary of Buddhist Terms and Usages 205
An Annotated Bibliography 224“Aitken's title says it all. Encouraging Words will appeal to both beginning and advanced Zen lay students who seek to integrate their spiritual practice into everyday life. Curious readers will be rewarded, too. Here is a teacher both wise and practical in equal measure.”
—Ronn Ronck, Honolulu AdvertiserROBERT AITKEN (1917–2010) was first introduced to Zen in a Japanese internment camp during World War II. R. H. Blyth, author of Zen in English Literature, was imprisoned in the same camp, and in this setting Aitken began the first of several apprenticeships. After the war, Aitken often returned to Japan to study. He became friends with Daisetz T. Suzuki and studied with Nakagawa Sūen Rōshi and Yasutani Haku’un Rōshi. In 1959 he and his wife, Anne, established the Diamond Sangha, a Zen Buddhist society with headquarters in Hawaii. Aitken was given the title Rōshi and was authorized to teach by Yamada Kōun Rōshi in 1974; he received full transmission from Yamada Rūshi in 1985.from THE FIRST NIGHT
 
Students gather for sesshin in the late afternoon the day before sesshin formally begins. They unpack, make their beds, and assemble for a work meeting. After a circle of self-introduction, sesshin jobs are assigned and explained. Newcomers are given orientation to mealtime procedures and a supper follows. At 7:00 p.m. there is one period of zazen, followed by opening remarks from the Rōshi. Dōjō leaders summarize the sesshin procedures, there is a brief period of zazen and a short sutra, and at 9:00 the students retire.
 
We begin our sesshin tomorrow morning at four o’clock, and continue for seven days. It is like a dream, one that is repeated each month, and is repeated elsewhere as people gather for sesshin in many places and on many occasions. We sit in this dream with other students from all over the world. It is a dream of the other as no other than myself, of all time as this time now, of every place as this very Bodhi seat. The whole universe musters itself and concentrates together in sesshin—the birds, the rain, the cicadas. The circumstances are ideal. All the sesshin arrangements are settled. Everything is settled. You can forget your ordinary concerns.
 
I was reflecting as I unpacked my suitcase this evening that all of us bring baggage to sesshin. I want to unpack all of my baggage and put it away, and I urge you to put away your stuff too. When you forget yourself and are united with your task, that is your liberation. If there is a milestone of realization on the path, well and good, but it is in the continued practice of uniting with your work that you turn the wheel of the Dharma for yourself, for the Sangha, and for the world. As Dōgen Zenji said, “Zazen is itself enlightenment.”
 
Someone asked me, “What attitude should I hold in zazen?” I replied, “a naïve attitude,” If you feel comfortable and compatible with your teacher and your Sangha, then the time has come to just do it.
 
At the outset of each sesshin, Yasutani Haku’un Rōshi used to announce the three rules of sesshin: no talking, no looking around, and no social greetings. These rules are grounded in the complete silence of the mind, where there is full and complete communication with all sisters and brothers. Practice your Mu there, in that pure harmony.
 
The word “sesshin” is an ambiguous term with three intimately related meanings: “to touch the mind, to receive the mind, to convey the mind.”
 
To touch the mind is to touch that which is not born and does not die; it does not come or go, and is always at rest. It is infinite emptiness—empty infinity—the vast and fathomless Dharma which you have vowed to understand.
 
To receive the mind is to be open with all your senses to instruction. Someone coughs, a window squeaks, a gecko cries, cars on the freeway hum in the distance, the bell rings, the clappers go crack!—these are instructive expressions of the mind, as the sound of a stone striking a stalk of bamboo instructed Hsiang-yen.
 
Finally, you convey the mind by the upmost integrity which you present in your manner, as you stand, sit, eat, and lie down with settled dignity, composure, and recollection—as the Buddha himself or herself. You are the teacher of us all and of yourself.
 
You also convey the mind by containing your actions. In this way you will not distract yourself or other, and you will offer space for everyone to evolve. When I was in Japanese monasteries, I noticed that the monks had a particular style of walking. There was almost no sound. You can apply this kind of care to opening the door, to eating, and so on. Contain yourself, contain Mus, and in this way you will convey the mind.