What's next?

Recently, I've been thinking about what direction to take in my practice of Zen Buddhism. Having practiced for the last few years and been through ups and downs in my practice, I know this is where I belong.

I started exploring Buddhism when I was 17. I wasn't really sure why, but at that time I was starting to dislike my Catholic faith (even though I still went to church). It wasn't until I was in the military did I notice how much compassion I had for not only other humans, but for all living things. Around the age of 20 or 21, I finally broke away from my Catholic faith when I discovered a lot of intolerance in churches outside the one I grew up attending. I started reading more about Buddhism, mostly books by the Dalai Lama, and began meditating more. I started meditating in highschool, but didn't do it that often. After a few months I was sitting once or more a day. Over the next few years, I realized that my meditation had really changed my life. I wasn't angry all the time. My opinions didn't matter as much. I was more comfortable with letting thigs be instead of trying to control them. However, my practice was missing something: other people!

After moving from the suburbs to midtown Sacramento, I began exploring Buddhist groups in my area. I first attended a Tibetan group (the bulk of my reading was Tibetan Buddhism). Anyhoo, I wasn't happy with this - it felt more like people worship than Buddhism. Nice group, but it wasn't my thing. Later, I started attending a non-denominational group which brought teachers from all traditions. This was perfect. After awhile, I started getting more interested in Zen. I felt like it helped explain life in a more logical sense. It removed "me" from the equation and put humans in the context of nature (at least that's what I was getting). So I decided to seek out the local Zen Center and see what it was about.

The first time I went to Iron Bell Zendo, I was a little surprised and felt uneasy. I almost just left but decided that I should just stay and give it one shot. Meditation was different (I had never faced the wall before...and it was really dark) and there was also a ceremony that followed the sitting. We all stood around the room with these books and someone was ringing bells and people were chanting. I was screaming upstairs "OH MY GOD - CATHOLIC CHURCH!" Needless to say, I didn't return to IBZ (at least for now).

I attended all the traditions and wasn't really satisfied with any of them. I considered completely giving up on religion for good. Buddhism was my last effort - I was tired of all the dogmatic western religions that tried to control my life. I went home to Ohio to visit my parents that summer. I attended church with my mother to make her happy (she still wasn't pleased with my decision to split from Rome). As I was sitting in mass not paying attention to any of what was being said and just watching everyone say their magic words and change the positions of their hands, I felt at home. Growing up Catholic, you become part of a culture. I missed this part of my life. I didn't believe in the religion at all anymore, but I missed the community and the rituals: they had played such an important role in my life growing up. I decided to give the Zen stuff another try. The next time I went, I told myself to just stick it out - it would all come naturally in a few weeks, which it did.

After attending Iron Bell for a little over a year, I knew this was how I needed to live my life. Practicing Zen is the only way the big picture made sense. I wanted to make this official, so I decided to inquire about taking the 16 Buddhist Precepts - a Jukai Ceremony. A Jukai is kinda like a lay-ordination/welcome to the Buddhist community thing. You make a robe out of scraps of cloth (took me about 8 months) and practice with a teacher during the process. I studied with Myo Lahey, the practice leader at Iron Bell and at the Hartford St Zen Center in the Castro District of San Francisco. Taking the precepts was more of an acknowledgement of what I had discovered rather than receiving something. I always break them, which is the best part because I'm able to see how my actions effect everything and everyone around me. Anyway, I received my little robe back (called a rakusu - sounds like rocket suit!) and a new name - Sho Jo (means true samadhi or true nature of the mind/concentration/realization...hey! That's the blog name!).

So now what the hell am I supposed to do? I'm planning to go down the path of full priest ordination...maybe teach one day, who knows. I have decided to become a disciple in the Clear Mind Zen group. CMZ is a little more my speed than the San Francisco Zen Center (what I'm with now). I have no hard feelings towards SFZC, don't get me wrong. I found my spiritual home because of them and the wealth of Dharma teachers is amazing. They also do many wonderful things for the community. SFZC is just a little too big for my liking.

Not sure why I decided to write this, but I did!

_/\_

I should really write on this thing.