0:00

The path is about going

0:02

deeper, and it's about integrating

0:04

what we realize in these experiences.

0:06

It's like a whole new life can open up. Welcome

0:17

to the one you feed Throughout

0:19

time. Great thinkers have recognized the

0:21

importance of the thoughts we have. Quotes

0:23

like garbage in, garbage out,

0:26

or you are what you think ring

0:28

true. And yet for many of

0:30

us, our thoughts don't strengthen or empower

0:32

us. We tend toward negativity, self

0:35

pity, jealousy, or fear.

0:38

We see what we don't have instead of what we

0:40

do. We think things that hold us

0:42

back and dampen our spirit. But

0:44

it's not just about thinking our

0:46

actions matter. It takes conscious,

0:48

consistent and creative effort to make

0:51

a life worth living. This podcast

0:53

is about how other people keep themselves moving

0:55

in the right direction, how they feed

0:58

their good wolf. Hello

1:13

everyone. Just a reminder that all the extra

1:15

support we're providing during this time

1:17

is available at when you Feed dot net

1:19

slash help. The free group coaching

1:22

each week has been a wonderful way to meet

1:24

so many of you, and we're forming a really special

1:26

community there, so i'd encourage

1:28

you to check it out. Recordings that the

1:30

sessions are also available, and you can

1:32

get all the details at when you feed dot

1:35

net slash help. Secondly,

1:37

keeping a good perspective is more important

1:39

than ever right now, and I recorded

1:42

a video teaching about three types of

1:44

perspective and the three things that all

1:46

unhappy people hold onto. You

1:48

can get free access to that at

1:51

spiritual habits dot

1:53

net. Thanks

1:55

for joining us. Our guest on this episode

1:57

is Henry Shookman, a poet, writer,

2:00

and associate zen Master who lives

2:02

in New Mexico, where he teaches at

2:04

Mountain Cloud Zen Center. He's

2:06

published eight books to date of fiction,

2:08

poetry, and non fiction, and writes

2:11

regularly for Tricycle, The New York Times

2:13

and other publications. In this episode,

2:16

Eric and Henry discuss his beautifully written

2:18

book One Blade of Grass, Finding

2:20

the Old Road of the Heart, a Zen Memoir.

2:24

Hi, Henry, welcome to the show. Eric, Thank

2:26

you so much for having me. I am really

2:28

happy to have you on. We're going to discuss your

2:30

wonderful book called One Blade of Grass,

2:33

Finding the Old Road of the Heart as

2:35

Zen memoir in a moment.

2:37

But let's start like we always do with the parable.

2:40

There's a grandfather who's talking with his grandson.

2:42

He says, in life, there are two wolves inside

2:44

of us that are always at battle. One

2:47

is a good wolf, which represents things like

2:49

kindness and bravery and love, and

2:52

the other is a bad wolf, which represents

2:54

things like greed and hatred and fear.

2:56

And the grandson stops and he thinks about it for a

2:58

second, and he looks up at his grand fire. He says, well,

3:00

grandfather, which one wins? And

3:02

the grandfather says that the one you feed.

3:06

So I'd like to start off by asking you what that

3:08

parable means to you in your life and in

3:10

the work that you do. It resonates very

3:12

strongly with me, and I feel that there

3:14

have certainly been times in my life

3:17

when I could sort of say I

3:19

wasn't really feeding the right wolf, you

3:21

know, when I got into places of

3:24

despair and nihilism,

3:26

and especially in my early

3:28

adulthood. For me, you

3:30

know, it was learning really

3:33

to begin to realize

3:36

that there were choices, deep

3:39

choices one could make about how

3:41

one lived one's life, how one experienced

3:44

one's life. It began for

3:46

me in my mid twenties, early

3:48

to mid twenties in a real way,

3:50

when I first took up meditation,

3:53

it was then that I realized I

3:55

didn't have to be entirely

3:57

driven by the

4:00

forces that seemed to have

4:02

been mostly driving me, especially

4:05

in my early adulthood, which were which

4:07

were really around, you know, anxiety

4:10

and stress and craving for

4:13

acknowledgement, and and I

4:15

had a lot of ambition in my early life.

4:17

I was trying to be a writer from my

4:20

mid teens actually, and

4:22

all of it had led to a

4:24

pretty unhappy life. And

4:27

the moment I started meditating, meaning

4:30

that on a daily basis, I was being

4:32

still for a chunk of time each

4:35

day, it was as if the

4:37

dial on my nervous system could

4:39

turn down, and it was. It stopped

4:42

being so hyper active and

4:44

so kind of overloaded and running

4:47

so hot and hard. And

4:49

as my nervous system settled

4:51

down, I just

4:54

started to realize that there was space

4:57

to make choices, to make

4:59

decisions is not out

5:01

of impulse and a sense of need,

5:04

but more out of well real

5:06

choice. And you know, gradually,

5:09

as my practice sort of evolved and

5:11

went on, and I got into Zen and

5:13

other kinds of Buddhism as well, in time, you

5:16

know, I realized when I hear that parable

5:18

now it's like for me,

5:20

it's kind of describing practice because

5:22

it says one wolf is about

5:25

love and bravery,

5:27

and the other is about greed and

5:29

hatred. And in

5:32

the Buddhist view, all of us

5:34

have work known as the three poisons,

5:37

which are greed and hatred or

5:39

desire and aversion or desire

5:41

and ill will and delusion,

5:44

three poisons. And to start practicing

5:47

is to start recognizing them

5:50

and to cease to be under

5:52

their enchantment, under

5:54

their spell. And so

5:58

when I hear the parable, you know, to me, I

6:01

want to say, yeah,

6:03

absolutely, feeding

6:05

the wolf, that that is

6:07

about growth and capacity

6:09

and space and love, you

6:11

know, always turning away the greater

6:14

love is. But at the same

6:16

time, I kind of almost want to say,

6:18

it's wise to make some kind

6:20

of allowance for the other wolfings, like

6:23

like, you know, something in me says

6:26

it's good to know that I

6:28

can slip into those old habits

6:31

and that there they're not

6:34

banished exactly, it's more that they're

6:36

allowed for. I didn't know whether

6:39

that makes any sense. You know, I

6:41

had wrestled with negative side

6:44

quite a bit in the course of my journey, and

6:46

I feel that it's I don't really want to banish

6:48

it, and that hasn't worked so well as understanding

6:52

it, acknowledging it and allowing

6:54

for it and giving it some kind of space

6:57

but not letting it take over totally

6:59

makes sense. Two things there. I think

7:02

obviously there's stuff to be learned from

7:04

these so called negative emotions right

7:07

there, coming from something for some reason,

7:09

so there's something to be learned. And then secondly, I

7:12

think what you said we're so important is that when

7:14

we just feel bad about ourselves for having

7:16

them, we just compound all the problems. Yes,

7:19

exactly exactly, and it's

7:21

I've found that in my journey

7:23

being able to see

7:27

that underneath a

7:30

lot of that negativity I wrestled

7:32

with an early life, there were just some

7:34

some wounds. You know, there's some basic

7:37

pains and grieves, griefs

7:40

and things that somehow I

7:42

had missed in growing up. And you

7:44

know there's stories about that I certainly

7:47

have worked with in therapy.

7:49

But you know that to be able to open

7:52

to what is painful for

7:54

me, it's been part of my journey into greater

7:57

wholeness and greater well being. Other

8:00

than sort of banishing pain, learning

8:03

how to open up to it and sort of be

8:05

with it and offer it some kind of

8:08

space that's proven

8:10

to be a wiser path of

8:13

growth and healing for me. Yeah,

8:15

I agree completely. One of the things

8:18

in your story that I resonated kind of

8:20

throughout it was you

8:22

you talked about since early on in

8:25

life you had mild, low

8:27

grade sort of depression dysthemia.

8:29

Is that how you pronounce it? Yeah, I've

8:31

heard it. Yeah, just thymia.

8:34

Yeah. Yeah, you know that you've had

8:36

that, and and it was your companion

8:38

for a long time, even as you journeyed

8:41

deeper into your spiritual life, even as you had

8:44

some pretty profound awakening

8:46

and opening experiences. And

8:48

that describes me pretty well. I've had some

8:51

some tremendous opening and awakening

8:53

experiences and to find myself,

8:55

you know, a little bit later like, Oh,

8:58

there's my old friend again, low

9:01

grade depression. Here he is hanging around.

9:03

And I just thought we could talk about that a little

9:05

bit because I really resonated

9:07

a lot with it. And I think that

9:10

that was part of your story that I kept really resoning

9:12

with which you kept growing spiritually and

9:14

yet didn't make everything better.

9:16

And I don't think your message is like, oh, you hit

9:19

a point where it all goes away, but you

9:21

do have a message of a certain

9:23

peace eventually coming. For me,

9:25

it was like a kind of a see saw

9:28

for a long time really between you

9:30

know, really finding deep, deep peace

9:33

and a great sort of intrinsic love in

9:35

every moment, you know at times, and

9:37

then just being sort

9:39

of triggered right back into old

9:42

contraction, into depression

9:44

or mild depression, and you know, it's

9:46

the same old habits. But

9:48

there was a point in my I

9:50

would say it was my long training

9:53

under under certain Zend teachers,

9:56

you know, who were very kind of patient

9:58

and kind with me, And I mean it's a moment

10:00

in time when on a retreat,

10:02

actually I just had a really you know,

10:04

for me, it was a very deep experience

10:06

where just everything, really everything

10:08

just sort of fell away and there wasn't

10:11

anything left. And instead of it

10:13

being like really

10:15

a nihilistic kind of experience, it

10:17

was the exact opposite. It was the

10:19

cure for all nihilism, I felt.

10:22

And after it, everything

10:25

sort of came back in a new way

10:27

in a and like there was nothing

10:29

more precious than this moment, whatever it

10:31

might be. And that

10:34

was over twelve years ago now, and

10:37

really something has been different

10:39

since then. It's not that I

10:41

perfectly blessed and marvelous or anything

10:43

like that, but you can I still have habits

10:46

that I wish I didn't have, you know, but

10:48

it has been really different. It's

10:50

a real different orientation kicked

10:53

in where I just didn't get

10:55

so caught by my sense

10:57

of me. You know, I couldn't sort of

11:00

say that it's vanished entirely

11:02

forever, you know. I think it still

11:04

comes back at times, and but it's

11:06

not a problem, you know. And I

11:09

haven't had depression

11:11

like I used to in quite

11:14

a long time, not really

11:16

since that moment. And I'm

11:18

not claiming any great, you

11:20

know, achievements spiritually

11:22

or anything. It's just that things

11:25

have been remarkably easier

11:28

and in a way that I never would have expected.

11:30

You know. I always thought, basically, no

11:32

matter what others may sort

11:35

of find on this path, I'm

11:37

not cut out for that. You

11:39

know. I can do a certain amount, I can get

11:41

a certain way down a path of

11:43

spiritual growth, but I'm always

11:45

going to get knocked back by my by

11:48

my psychology. You know, it's never going to really

11:51

relinquish its hold. But I was

11:53

wrong. There was something

11:56

really unexpected did happen.

11:59

And again, I don't want to make

12:01

it sound like I'm claiming, you

12:03

know, some exalted status or anything

12:05

at all, And it's certainly not like I'm

12:08

you know, my my wife knows you know perfectly

12:10

well that I can, I can get a bit down,

12:12

I can get a bit grumpy, but

12:15

it's so much less of a problem,

12:18

right, And I guess my question for you would

12:20

be, you'd had several

12:22

of these sort of you know, in Zen

12:25

calmed Kenchow moments, right, these big awakenings

12:28

where even your sense of self did fall

12:30

away, but then it seems to you

12:32

know, it seems to sort of come back and reconstitute

12:35

itself in a in a more durable

12:38

form. Do you think it was the fact that as

12:40

you matured in your Zen practice, you

12:42

had a better container for those

12:44

things and that you were better able to

12:47

take those experiences and integrate them

12:49

and live them. Or was there something about the

12:51

depth of that other experience that was

12:54

deeper and more final. I'm kind of curious

12:56

what you attribute to that sort of that turning

12:59

point, because you've had are pretty profound

13:01

awakening experiences. But that's a great

13:03

question. I'm honored that you would even ask it. But

13:06

I think the answer is both that definitely

13:09

the container was being expanded

13:12

and made healthier through my

13:14

training and a lot of I mean that

13:16

really all goes down to my teachers who

13:19

who were just you know, really wise

13:21

and kind and patient with me. So

13:23

I think there was really as

13:25

the container, let's say,

13:28

you know, was more and more ready, you know,

13:30

it allowed actually possibly I'd

13:33

say it allowed for something deeper to happen.

13:35

You know, letting go thoroughly is really

13:37

sort of difficult for us. I think

13:40

when I was nineteen, actually

13:42

I had a sort of random awakening experience

13:45

out of nowhere, without any

13:47

interest in that kind of thing. I wasn't I

13:50

wasn't into spirituality at all. I was

13:52

like a I'd grown up in Oxford, England,

13:55

son of academics, and I

13:57

was, you know, I was I was all set to be an academic

13:59

my self is anything. And then suddenly

14:02

I just had this random moment of utter

14:05

union with the world and it was it

14:08

was the most beautiful thing that had ever happened to me,

14:10

and it came out of nowhere, and it

14:12

was a profound sense that I

14:14

was just inseparable from the

14:16

fabric of the universe really

14:19

was was what it felt like, and that the

14:21

whole of creation was sort of immediately

14:23

present right in the moment where

14:26

I was. It was all me, and I was all

14:28

it and and there was no separation

14:31

of any kind anywhere sort of thing was what it felt

14:33

like. But when it and then it sort of

14:35

faded, and I walked around and kind

14:37

of blissed for a few weeks.

14:39

And actually I was away from home at the time, and I went

14:42

home. This is when I was nineteen, and

14:44

within half an hour of walking into my

14:46

dad's house, I was broken.

14:49

I was just a wreck. I had a very in

14:52

some ways, you know, very privileged culturally

14:54

privileged, you know, childhood with

14:57

my parents both being at the heart

14:59

of the university and all that. But it

15:01

had also been difficult because we had a really

15:03

difficult divorce situation when

15:05

I was young, and I've had really bad exema

15:08

from the age of six months, you

15:10

know, right the way through childhood. And so

15:12

when I came home at that time

15:14

after this opening, I was really

15:17

open and all the

15:19

unhappiness of my childhood that

15:21

I had kind of fended off and found

15:25

ways not to feel in order

15:27

to function as a child. It

15:30

all just sort of landed on top

15:32

of me then, and I had a kind of breakdown.

15:35

Actually at the time, I thought, oh, no,

15:37

this is kind of the end of the world. Whatever is going

15:39

on is a disaster. When I look back

15:41

on it, I realized, well, no, this was the

15:43

other side. This was like got

15:46

to reckon with the wounds and

15:48

to only be sort

15:51

of having a great expansive

15:53

moment. I mean, that's lovely and wonderful

15:56

and some ways, you know, there's some deep

15:58

truth in that kind of experience.

16:01

But to have that without in

16:04

my own case anyway, also learning

16:07

how to be with my

16:09

pain and wounds and

16:12

you know, and and grow in that way

16:14

as well, you know, it was it just

16:16

somehow in in my biography I

16:18

had to do both in a way. What

16:20

happened then was like the back

16:23

and forth between oceanic

16:25

expansiveness that i'd sometimes taste, especially

16:28

when I started training in Zen, and

16:31

you know, real contracted anxiety

16:33

and pain and depression, which I had

16:35

also experienced. And finally,

16:38

I think, you know, through different kinds of

16:40

work, not just meditation

16:43

by the way, you know, dreamwork and

16:45

other kinds of therapy and a lot of yoga,

16:47

and things. I think it all helped

16:50

reach a point where I could let go more thoroughly

16:53

of the whole system, is

16:55

what it felt like, and no longer

16:57

needing to sort of go back and forth. Really

17:00

in the same way I've heard it

17:02

referenced by Ken Wilber, there's waking

17:04

up, but there's also growing up and cleaning up.

17:07

There's more to a well lived, robust

17:09

life than just awakening the experiences.

17:12

There's a lot of other stuff we have to work our way through.

17:14

At least that's been my experience. I agree

17:17

there are people, like you know, one

17:19

or two of my teachers who don't

17:22

seem to have needed to go through

17:25

so much on the healing side. But

17:27

I think they just had happier childhoods.

17:29

Actually it could be. I think

17:31

some people are more damaged than others. That's just a

17:34

reality. Yes, I think so too.

17:36

And at a certain point I had this notion

17:39

that, you know, maybe people

17:41

who are real deep seekers are

17:43

more damaged. They're carrying more trauma,

17:46

they're more traumatized, and that's what makes them

17:48

one this grand liberation of awakening.

17:51

But actually I don't believe that anymore. I

17:53

think because the people I see you know my

17:55

colleagues in the world of meditation

17:58

and awakening. You know, there's m who

18:00

just didn't seem to have the same kind

18:02

of need for so much healing

18:05

work. I don't know. I guess we're all different

18:07

and it's hard to lay down rules, but

18:10

it seems smart to acknowledge

18:12

that, like you said, that we're

18:14

multidimensional. We've got different facets

18:16

and different aspects, and to only work

18:18

on one, like you know, this sort

18:21

of deep kind of spirituality, it

18:23

might be an unbalanced thing for

18:26

some of us. In

18:54

your epilogue you try to sort of summarize

18:56

the book in a number of points, and

18:58

that was the second point. You said, some of us are

19:00

going to need other kinds of help along with meditation,

19:03

and the more that those different approaches

19:05

understand and respect one another, the better. So

19:08

that might lead me just maybe to go to three

19:10

because I think some of these points were a good

19:12

summation of things. And the third point

19:15

you said, one common misunderstanding of meditation

19:17

in the West is that it's an individual

19:19

undertaking. I fell for that

19:22

and fell foul of it. In fact,

19:24

it's collaborative and relational at least

19:26

if you want to make real progress. Could

19:28

you share a little bit more about that and why

19:30

that's the case? Okay, thank you. I

19:33

mean I would say, like in my early years

19:35

as a meditator, you know, basically

19:37

I was kind of given instructions and told

19:39

to go and do them, and I did it primarily

19:42

alone. I had a couple of friends who also

19:45

did that kind of meditation. It was TM,

19:47

by the way, which was really popular

19:50

back in you know, late eighties in London.

19:52

It was more or less the only kind around. I

19:55

did it in the late eighties myself in Columbus,

19:57

Ohio, of all places, I still can't believe one

19:59

exist did. There was a t M teacher in Colomazile.

20:03

Well, they were tremendously successful,

20:05

you know, Urishi my house really

20:07

was brilliant to sort of marketing and

20:10

giving it a great image. And so

20:13

yeah, it was the first big form

20:15

of meditation in the West that really got scaled

20:17

up to a high degree, I think. But

20:20

once I stumbled into

20:22

Zen. And by the way, the reason I got into

20:24

Zen was that I recognized

20:27

that it understood, you know, that

20:29

random moment I mentioned when I was nineteen years

20:32

old. I knew when I read some

20:34

some Zen writings I just

20:36

could sense that it understood

20:38

what I had experienced then, and

20:41

luckily enough, I think I was right. But

20:43

once I got into Zen in a serious

20:46

way, I kind of got the sense that you're

20:48

supposed to have a teacher the way I had

20:50

grown up, In the character I had, I just

20:52

didn't really trust anybody, not

20:54

really, and I certainly didn't trust

20:56

some trumped up would be spiritual

20:59

teacher, you know, Zen or otherwise.

21:02

So I wasn't prepared to entrust

21:04

myself to a teacher. So I'd

21:06

go and do a lot of retreats, and I went to lots

21:08

of different centers of different kinds

21:10

of meditation actually, and you know, I'd

21:12

listened to the teachers talks, you know, they'd

21:15

resonate to some degree or not. But

21:17

the idea of actually becoming

21:20

a student, it just I

21:22

was too independent, and you know, I

21:25

I just didn't trust people enough. And and

21:27

I had a career by then as a writer. I

21:29

was you know, I was lucky in that regard. I got to work

21:32

as a writer full time from

21:34

fairly early in my life. And there

21:36

was a reason I had a career like that, which

21:39

was that I just wasn't prepared to

21:41

put myself under somebody else's authority

21:43

if I could avoid it, and so I

21:46

couldn't. I couldn't see my way to having a

21:48

teacher until finally, somehow

21:51

I was just kind of ready and met

21:53

a wonderful teacher actually funny

21:55

enough, in my hometown and started studying

21:57

in a serious way with him. And that was when

22:00

suddenly the whole thing just went

22:02

into a whole different gear because

22:04

I realized, Man, it's not just about

22:06

meditating. There's a path here.

22:09

You know, things can happen whatever I

22:11

have been experienced by then, and by way of the

22:13

occasional I think by then maybe

22:15

a couple of strong sort of

22:17

awakening or opening experiences that

22:19

was in a way only the start. Like what

22:22

what this teacher John, he

22:24

was called John Gayner. What he represented

22:27

was that those were like doorways,

22:30

and beyond them there's a path, and

22:32

the path is about going

22:34

deeper, and it's about integrating

22:37

what we realize in these experiences,

22:39

and you know, it's like a whole new life can

22:41

open up. It's just sort of having

22:44

the experiences is only step one

22:46

kind of thing, and that that path

22:48

couldn't be embarked on without a guide.

22:51

And you know that. That was a huge

22:53

thing for me to first of all, to realize that and

22:55

second to realize that I wanted it. That

22:57

was like a huge kind of crumbling

23:00

of defenses in my psyche

23:02

in a beautiful way to open up

23:04

the Wow, somebody might help

23:06

me in this way. That matters

23:08

so much to me. But but I've never known where

23:10

to turn. Really, it was. It was an

23:13

awesome or I'd known where to turn, but

23:15

not turned wholeheartedly enough. And

23:17

suddenly to realize that I could, it

23:19

was a wonderful thing. It was. It was really

23:22

like scales of

23:24

armor falling off my heart. And

23:27

so the teacher was a big part. How

23:29

important was the community around the teacher for

23:31

you early on? Well, that took me longer

23:33

to realize, actually, because

23:36

I was definitely not somebody who

23:39

sort of terribly light institutions.

23:41

You know, My my main experience with

23:43

them was in education, and I

23:45

was kind of rebellious, you know. I grew up admiring

23:49

Peter Tosh and Shake of Aura, and

23:51

most institutions were things that ought to be

23:53

torn down as far as I was concerned. So

23:56

even when I went to a zenda, which is a pretty

23:58

radical kind of institute in the West,

24:01

at least in those days. Even then,

24:03

I didn't really think of it as a home,

24:06

you know. I thought of somehow something

24:08

intrinsically threatening about

24:10

any institution almost,

24:12

you know. And and gradually,

24:14

gradually I just got softened

24:17

by sitting with people. I

24:19

think it was mostly just sitting in a

24:21

lot of company of other people, being

24:23

silent in the room. I think it just kind

24:26

of taught me that I had had human

24:28

beings wrong. Whatever assumptions

24:31

and feelings and attitudes had

24:33

had a long time unconsciously

24:36

and maybe also consciously towards

24:39

others, they were pretty much

24:41

all wrong. And sitting in silence

24:43

with others, I think was the

24:46

thing that allowed me to open

24:48

that up. And I started a just

24:50

sort of fall in love with not

24:53

exactly literally, but you know, kind of feel

24:55

like I was falling in love with with with the room, with

24:57

the people in the room. It's a beautiful

25:00

d And I think that's kind of been me most of

25:02

my life. I've been like, I'll figure this out, I'll

25:04

read about it, I'll meditate, I'll do all this stuff.

25:06

And it's been in the last you know,

25:08

several years where I've really went a I

25:10

think it's time to pick a path, pick

25:12

a community, like try and ground myself

25:15

and stop being the lone wolf in that regard.

25:18

Yes, that's a phrase I think I used in my

25:20

book here and there I was like a snarling lone

25:22

wolf. Then the wolf again, yeah,

25:25

yeah, that's the bad wolf, the loner. Yeah,

25:28

the wolf. Yeah, thinks it's got to do it

25:30

alone and must do it alone, and

25:32

and everybody else is like keep

25:34

them at your distance. You know. This is

25:36

something else that resonated throughout your book. You

25:38

said. Fourth, While for some it may be

25:40

helpful to find a live in community, we

25:43

don't have to do that. And further,

25:46

we don't have to go

25:48

to a community that that is very

25:50

non Western. It doesn't have to

25:52

be These teachings don't have to be presented as exotic.

25:55

That we can be a lay person, a

25:57

person in the world and work

26:00

within our cultural trappings to some

26:02

degree. Yeah, I feel that quite

26:05

strongly. I think that we have that choice

26:08

that, you know, from my point of view,

26:10

sort of like the deep teachings of

26:12

Zen. They don't have to

26:14

be conveyed in robes

26:17

with a lot of ritual. You

26:20

know, I actually happen to have pretty short

26:22

hair, but you don't really have to have a shaved head,

26:24

you know. And really

26:28

the deep teachings are about what

26:30

we humans are and

26:32

how we could best live, or how

26:35

we can live good and helpful lives,

26:37

and how we can tame are

26:41

harmful impulses, and

26:43

and how we can grow in hopefully

26:46

in wisdom of different kinds, you

26:48

know, one kind of wisdom being how

26:51

to live less harmfully

26:53

to ourselves and to others, how to love

26:55

ourselves and others more, and another

26:57

kind of wisdom being this more

27:00

like deep experiential openings

27:03

to the nature of the present

27:05

moment that you know, on one level,

27:08

this present moment is just as it appears.

27:10

There's you know, things in front of us, like

27:12

right now, there's a computer screen, and Eric's

27:14

on the other end of the line, and I know it's Henry sitting

27:16

here in the sitting room in his home

27:18

and salafe, and there's a little wind

27:20

outside and the bare

27:23

early spring trees are stirring slightly

27:25

in the classes, you know, and all that's just

27:27

as it is. But at the same time,

27:29

there's an infinite expanse

27:32

right here, you know, and there's a boundlessness

27:35

that's utterly beautiful there's

27:37

a level of total intimacy

27:39

that you know, even in an ordinary moment,

27:41

if we're open to it, we can sense that,

27:44

you know, we're just part of it. We're

27:46

we're part of one hole which

27:49

is presenting itself in just this way,

27:51

just now, and you know, that's

27:53

always available. It's always right

27:55

here and right now and

27:58

learning I mean, the train, and

28:01

I would call that another level of wisdom, so

28:03

to speak. We are humbled by

28:05

it because it's just awesome to be part

28:08

of one enormous reality,

28:11

you know, and we're inextricably

28:13

part of it. It's it's an amazing thing to realize

28:16

and too sense, to have the kind of

28:18

training that can allow us, first of all,

28:20

to discover that for ourselves. I

28:22

think that's an incredible thing. But then

28:24

to go on, you know, and it's

28:26

not that easy, I would say for most of us, but

28:29

you know, hopefully eventually just be

28:31

able to sort of sense it, you

28:34

know, maybe not all the time, but often, and

28:37

you know, whenever we kind of remember to oh,

28:40

yes, you know, just coming back

28:42

and realizing this is here, this

28:44

is you know, this this whole is

28:47

here right now and all

28:49

is one and you know, but it's also

28:52

just each thing exactly as it is, and I

28:54

find that just so beautiful, and it fills

28:57

my heart with love whenever

28:59

I remember, you know, and to

29:02

have the possibility of

29:05

growing in those kinds of ways just

29:09

doesn't seem to me to need elaborate

29:12

foreign costumes or

29:14

elaborate foreign rituals. It

29:16

just doesn't seem necessary to

29:18

me. I know that there are other

29:21

forms of Buddhism in the West that are much

29:23

more traditional and follow you

29:25

know, the customs and the litages

29:28

of Asian forms, and

29:30

I respect that deeply. I'm

29:33

personally, I'm just glad that that's

29:35

not the only way.

30:06

Something you just were saying reminded

30:09

me of a couple of lines you wrote, and I did want to

30:11

get a couple of lines of the book in because you're

30:13

such a beautiful writer. You said, you're talking

30:15

about training as a lay

30:17

person or a person who doesn't join the monastery. Say,

30:19

it's not like a monastery. This kind of training.

30:22

Life goes on. You have to keep making

30:24

sense of the ordinary daily grind, but

30:27

the training starts to infiltrate normal

30:29

life, and odd moments of joy and minor

30:32

revelation fall on us as

30:34

we pushed the toddler on the swing, or

30:36

step off a cold street into a warm

30:38

shop, or get into the car and listen

30:41

to the choking to the starter motor. Everyday

30:43

sights and sounds start to hit us in a more

30:45

immediate way, and we meet them with appreciation.

30:49

Well, I'm glad I said that

30:54

that. Yeah, yeah, I could

30:56

pull out hundreds of these, but this

30:59

is a good pivot point because you're also

31:01

a poet, and you are interested in poetry

31:03

from from very early on, and

31:05

you talk a little bit about why zen and poetry

31:08

have such a close affinity with

31:10

each other. Yeah, you know, and

31:12

I think that bit you just read speaks

31:15

to that. Thank you, because it is. It

31:17

seems to me it is about cherishing

31:20

the every day, cherishing the normal,

31:22

like a moment. Ago is talking pretty sort of cosmically

31:25

about the you know, the vast, boundless moment

31:27

or whatever. But actually, however

31:30

cosmic it may be, it's showing

31:32

up as just this table

31:34

cloth just as it is, you

31:36

know, and the lamb and

31:39

the folded sweater and the

31:41

water bottle, you know, and each

31:43

thing is so precious. So

31:45

this level of appreciation, maybe, you

31:48

know, we could call that another facet

31:50

of wisdom to be able to appreciate

31:53

our life in the moment, and

31:56

that means I think, well, that's so amplified

31:59

when we see that all

32:01

things are just sort of freely arising

32:04

in one great boundlessness. It's

32:06

it's so beautiful. And you

32:09

know, we don't have to have maybe open

32:11

up to that boundlessness to even just

32:13

get the sense that whatever arises,

32:16

we know it's going to pass away, and

32:19

it's therefore so precious.

32:21

And two be

32:24

able though, to be encouraged

32:26

to find beauty

32:29

in the most ordinary things

32:32

is definitely part of the Zen tradition.

32:35

It's one of the reasons I love it. Other

32:37

forms of Buddhism maybe have less concerned

32:40

with externals, you know, they're

32:42

more about internal experience. But

32:44

then really loves

32:47

to turn the lens outward and

32:50

to explore our relationship with the world

32:52

and to see the world as our ultimate teacher,

32:55

because in the sense, you know, at the

32:57

deepest level, it's it's part of us. It is

33:00

us, you know, in a sense, I

33:02

don't want to sound too spooky to the listeners, but

33:05

there's a level where we can discover that, you know,

33:07

in awakening experience and

33:09

so on, but even without that,

33:11

just to sense the

33:13

wonder of the ordinary,

33:15

Like if you just think, if you just look at a

33:17

you know, something simple like a glass of water,

33:21

whether you know, maybe standing in a

33:23

bar of sunlight coming through an open

33:25

window, what an amazing thing

33:27

it is to take a step?

33:30

Well, actually, that's a really amazing

33:32

thing. You know. There's one famous Zen

33:36

story where a zen master

33:38

is walking with some some other kind

33:40

of practitioner who's

33:42

maybe sort of more like a sort of magical

33:44

practitioner, and they come to a river and this other

33:47

practitioner just walks across it.

33:50

You know, he can walk on water, and

33:53

and there zen practitioner

33:55

wades across the river, and

33:58

it said something like, you know, you school,

34:00

if I had known you could do that, I'd never have walked

34:02

all this way with you. Like, there's

34:04

something sort of wrong

34:07

with valuing

34:10

superhuman powers because

34:13

it distracts us from the miracle

34:16

of this moment just as it is.

34:18

You know that actually we should really be appreciating

34:21

the miracle of just being able to sit here

34:23

and chat. One of the things that draws

34:26

me to Zend the most is that I'm always

34:29

pointed back to my immediate experience

34:31

like I don't have to be somewhere else.

34:33

I don't have to go somewhere else, I don't have to do something.

34:35

It's always pointing me back, like it's

34:38

right here, right here, right

34:40

here, right over and over and over

34:42

and and for someone who spent a lot of

34:44

his life thinking that it was always

34:47

somewhere else, it's a great constant

34:49

reminder. No, it's right here. It's

34:53

really good for me. Yeah, I'm sure it's

34:55

good for all of us, you know. And

34:59

I think that's you sort of talked about. That's what poetry

35:01

does, right. Poetry is is the

35:04

practice of really paying

35:06

very close attention exactly. I'm

35:08

so. I was going to come around to that. I forgot exactly.

35:11

Poetry has that in common,

35:13

you know, that real close attention

35:17

and being able to render

35:19

it in hopefully beautiful speech,

35:22

you know, beautiful words. You know, similar

35:24

probably to somebody who

35:26

draws. You know, an artist who draws,

35:28

and they're just giving so much attention

35:31

to you know, the medium

35:34

they're working in and to what they're

35:36

seeing, you know, and whether

35:38

it's you know, in the mind or in the

35:40

imagination or in front of them, if

35:42

it's representational art, that

35:45

kind of deep attentiveness. When

35:47

that expresses itself on

35:49

the page, you know, whether it's a like I

35:51

said, whether it's an art, visual

35:53

art, or poetry or even great

35:56

prose. You know, when that kind

35:58

of attentiveness is expressed, I

36:00

think we can't help responding

36:03

to it. You know, our hearts

36:06

are touched by it, and we it wakes

36:08

up in us our own capacity

36:11

to be that attentive and

36:13

to appreciate what

36:16

is before us. So I think that's one of

36:18

the functions of art is that it it sort

36:20

of opens our hearts and our eyes to

36:22

our own life, you know, a

36:25

good great Yeah, great art sort of centers

36:27

us back in the middle of our own life

36:30

where we can appreciate it more

36:32

fully. And so does meditation

36:34

practice for sure. So the other

36:36

thing I wanted to talk about was there

36:38

was a point in your life where

36:41

you know, you felt like your marriage was a little bit

36:43

in trouble, you were feeling drawn

36:45

in other directions, And I just

36:47

want to read what you wrote. I really love this

36:49

because it's it's something that comes up in my mind

36:52

a lot. Also, And you said self help gurus

36:54

might say get on with it, do what you want. You

36:56

don't live forever, you know, basically encouraging

36:58

you, like, chase whatever it is you want, chase your

37:01

your dreams. But Zen said, wait a

37:03

minute, check out who is calling the shots,

37:06

Who is the tyrant declaring what

37:08

must and must not be, what we

37:10

must and must not do. See the

37:12

bigger picture, who else is involved,

37:15

who has the most at stake? And will

37:17

this situation lead to more suffering

37:20

all told or less? And I

37:22

just love that idea, because I do think

37:24

in the self helped world, which is a world

37:26

I sort of travel in this show, is in that area.

37:29

There's a lot of that sense. It's

37:31

a There's another phrase that that irks

37:33

me a lot that I hear often, which is like, let

37:35

go of what's not serving you, as if the

37:38

point of everything is to serve us. And I love

37:40

that you sort of pivoted here and and

37:42

Zen said slow down and and be

37:45

more present and think more deeply, and and

37:47

it turned out to be the right thing

37:49

for you. You're still, as far as I can, as far

37:51

as I know at least the end of the memoir, still a very

37:53

happily married man. But I just thought

37:55

it was really fascinating the process you went

37:58

through there. Yes, yes, thanks for bringing

38:00

that up. I mean, I do feel that there's

38:03

discovery that we can make

38:06

in you know, deep spiritual

38:09

or contemplative training, that

38:12

our sense of self

38:15

is actually an illusion. That

38:18

it's not that you know, we're not somebody.

38:20

We you know, we are, and I'm Henry

38:23

born and such and such a time, living in such and such

38:25

a place, doing certain things. But

38:28

the sense of me that

38:30

is a kind of like a certain sort of

38:32

contraction in that I sense

38:35

in the middle of my being somehow,

38:37

some kind of core or kernel or nugget

38:40

that is the me that I've always

38:42

been. If we go

38:44

deep in meditation and really examine

38:47

it, we find that it's not

38:49

really there. It just appears

38:51

to be and so feels like it

38:54

is. So with

38:56

that in mind, when

38:59

we serve ourselves, we're

39:02

probably likely serving

39:04

in a sense of the wrong thing, because

39:07

it's not really there to be to

39:09

be served in the way we thought, if you see

39:12

what I mean. But I think it's a tricky

39:14

point actually because because

39:16

at the same time, I really think a

39:19

lot of us in the West need more

39:22

self love. So it

39:24

sounds contradictory, but it's

39:26

really not. It's just that there are

39:28

sort of different levels of

39:31

growth and different levels of love.

39:33

And on one level, loving

39:36

ourselves is

39:38

sort of learning to deeply accept

39:40

ourselves. And that doesn't

39:43

mean just really nearly doing

39:45

whatever we want and trying to gratify

39:48

all our winds and desires. It doesn't

39:50

mean that at all. It means discovering

39:53

that there's a place within where

39:56

we're really at home with ourselves,

39:59

and if we act from

40:01

there, it's so much easier

40:03

to act in loving and helpful ways.

40:06

And actually when we're not there,

40:08

when we don't know how to be there, we're

40:10

much more likely to be

40:13

driven by impulses and desires

40:15

that are only really there to try to fill

40:18

the whole because we're not in the middle,

40:20

you know. So there's a place for really

40:23

coming home to ourselves and learning

40:26

self love and self compassion. But

40:29

there's also a place for discovering

40:32

that our sense of self

40:35

has been very, very limited, and

40:37

that you know, we belong in

40:39

a much greater way to a much greater hole,

40:42

and and that too is a source

40:44

of I would sort of in sense, even

40:46

deeper love that we can open up

40:48

to. So if we're stuck

40:51

in the mindset that kind of trying

40:53

to make ourselves feel okay

40:56

by managing what we

40:58

get and what we don't get. We

41:01

really are going to have a harder

41:03

time in both those projects,

41:06

because, you know, coming home to ourselves

41:08

and just being all right

41:11

and peaceful and content

41:14

just being me, that's

41:17

a big, beautiful thing to find

41:19

we can do in itself. And then

41:22

you know, if we're curious about

41:24

this sort of deeper discoveries of who am

41:26

I and what is this world and what is this life that

41:29

these deep contemplative paths offer, then

41:32

we may find, wow, I'm not

41:34

even what I thought I was. Instead,

41:37

I'm part of a much

41:39

greater whole. You know that that

41:41

that's even more marvelous to discover, you

41:44

know, And neither of them

41:46

is going to be helped by

41:49

a life that is driven by trying

41:52

to gratify

41:54

some imagined self.

41:57

I think the tricky part, of course, is sometimes

41:59

are side conditions should be changed.

42:01

You know, sometimes we do need to change our outside conditions,

42:04

and sometimes we need to change our inside

42:06

conditions. And I think that's what can be

42:08

tricky. But I think that I hear a

42:10

lot of encouragement, a lot of what feels

42:12

spiritual to me these days, which is very much

42:15

feels like the spiritual imperative that's

42:17

being given is please yourself, and and I

42:19

just I'm just not sure that's really

42:21

the message, the right message,

42:26

and your point, what is self

42:28

anyway? That that is that that is the deeper

42:30

obvious question they're wakening is driving

42:32

at Yes, that's right, and you're

42:35

absolutely right to bring up, you know, like

42:37

sometimes we're in situations that are that are

42:39

abusive or that are really harmful

42:41

and not wholesome at all, and and something

42:44

needs to change externally. I totally

42:46

agree with that, and I'm sorry that I didn't

42:48

mean to suggest that that's not

42:50

the case, that it's only about

42:53

sort of deep inward discovery. I

42:55

think you're absolutely right, and in fact,

42:57

you know, again this is another

42:59

thing ace of where we really want

43:02

practice to be manifesting

43:05

in the way we live. You know that if it's

43:07

not being expressed in a wholesome

43:09

life that is wholesome meaning

43:11

really harmless to others

43:14

and to self, If it's not being expressed

43:16

in that way, you know, well, we

43:18

we just keep working at it, and you

43:21

know, we acknowledge it may take a lot

43:23

of work, and it takes a lot of practice and

43:25

we're not really seeking to get it perfect. We're

43:27

just doing the best we can and hopefully

43:30

getting a little better and being

43:32

more and more helpful and more and more fulfilled

43:34

along the way. Totally agree. I think that's

43:37

a great place for us to wrap

43:39

up on that beautiful idea. You and I are going to

43:42

talk some more in the post show conversation

43:44

about working with Cohen's, which is

43:46

a fascinating subject and one

43:49

close to my heart. So listeners, you can get access

43:51

to the post show conversations, add

43:53

free episodes, and all kinds of other good stuff

43:55

at one you feed, dot net, slash

43:58

Join Henry Thay, thank you

44:00

so much for coming on. I can't

44:02

recommend your book highly enough

44:04

to listeners. It's a beautiful, beautiful

44:07

read, and it's one of my favorites I've

44:09

read in quite some time. So very wonderful,

44:11

and thank you for your time. Well, thank you

44:13

Eric so much. I'm really honored to be

44:16

on the show. I'm very grateful for this chance

44:18

to connect with you and learn all the

44:20

listeners, and thank you so so much. Thank

44:22

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44:39

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