Birth, Old Age, Disease and Death

There never seems to be lack of opportunities for talking about old age, disease and death. They are all around and with that birth/life, an endless cycle. Down at the river more baby ducklings. Ten the other day scooting across the surface of the water, today six. Were the other four up-river or down the otters gullet! They do say there is an otter abroad in these parts. Something so charming about otters. If you like ’em here’s one caught on camera on Shetland.

Lee over at Future Health 2020 has gone into remission after six months of chemo having been diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma almost six months ago. I’d mentioned Lee’s positive outlook to his health situation in a post titled Sustained Intention back in April.

Dave of Holding no bough has been pondering on the ‘black dog’. Depression it is said is anger spread thin. Anyway he invited his ‘demon’ to tea and over stayed his welcome somewhat but not without providing some interesting insights. I believe we come out of unity in order that the very unity of which we are might see itself. Nice one Dave.

As you might guess from recent posts I’ve been thinking about death for a reason. When Somebody Dies, just published on Field of Merit site, has me talking about the death process and meditation. It is a merit post.

A good monastic friend turns the big seven o tomorrow and every good wish and congratulations to him. Seventy is no age at all when once it would have been old age.

Worry is?

Nothing is ever black or white!
Nothing is ever black or white!

Worry is
negative visualisation.

And perhaps because nothing in life is ever black or white the tendency is to mentally and emotionally swing between black and white and all the in-between subtle colorations. All fodder for, most often, negative visualisation.

When you think about it why on earth would one visualise ones life negatively? There is a choice.

Fake Quote

Bogus quote
Somebody went to the trouble of writing to the Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama to check the origin of the quote. That just goes to show me I’d better check the true origin of quotes before publishing. Fake Buddha Quotes is a good site to refer too before quoting the Buddha.

Within and Beyond Opposites

This first verse from the *Shushogi just keeps coming into my mind this evening. Here it is:

Shushogi
Introduction (The Reason for Training).
The most important question for all Buddhists is how to understand birth and death completely for then, should you be able to find the Buddha within birth and death, they both vanish. All you have to do is realise that birth and death, as such, should not be avoided and they will cease to exist for then, if you can understand that birth and death are Nirvana itself, there is not only no necessity to avoid them but also nothing to search for that is called Nirvana. The understanding of the above breaks the chains that bind one to birth and death therefore this problem, which is the greatest in all Buddhism, must be completely understood.

….how to understand birth and death completely, you could say understand life and death. This is a huge question isn’t it.

It is common to fear death. We are alive on this planet and there is a lot of livin’ to do and even though future life is unknown at least one knows eventually one will know! When the light goes out on life we are in the dark! And we don’t ever know when that will be. But this is no way to live is it. That’s locked into time going from the white light of youth, through the misty middle days to the advancing dusk. Then night.

How about actively choosing life as a way to go? To be fully present, not swinging between half-asleep or over-awake to the detriment? Perhaps this is the how to of the understanding of life (birth) and death Zen Master Dogen is urging us to get to grips with. Simply put, to simply live within and beyond the opposites, all opposites.

*The Shushogi is a compilation of Great Master Dogen’s ideas, put together by the Soto Zen school in Japan early in the last century. It was created as an introduction to Dogen and as a means of communicating ideas fundamental to Soto Zen practice. The whole of the Shushogi can be found on the Order’s website.

Unconditional Trust/Faith – Balancing on a Moonbeam

Full moon over a campsite in France.
Full moon over a campsite in France.

Going on
Always going on.

We say
‘go deeper’ however
what does that mean?
Actually?

Living is conditional
personal –
trust/faith is
unconditional.

Bit-like-
balancing-
on-a-
moonbeam!

Going
deeper?
Transforming
lives without number.

Going on
Always going on.

Thanks to Miles for the photograph and for the opportunity to wax poetic!