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That Is Not Your Mind!: Zen Reflections on the Surangama Sutra
Viewed through the lens of psychology and neuroscience, a classic Zen sutra becomes a springboard for exploring sensory experiences and realizing freedom.
What does it mean to be liberated through one’s sensory life? In That Is Not Your Mind! Zen teacher Robert Rosenbaum explores this question by taking readers on a step-by-step journey through the Surangama Sutra. This Chinese Mahayana sutra is known for its emphasis on practicing with the senses (sight, sound, taste, smell, touch, and the Buddhist “sixth sense” of mind or cognition), as well as its teachings on the necessity of basic ethical commitments, like not killing or stealing, to support the development of one’s meditation practice and insight.
Rosenbaum interweaves passages from the sutra with contemporary insights from neuroscience and psychology, illustrating the usefulness of the text with anecdotes from his life and his forty years of teaching experience. In addition to learning about a sutra that played an important role in the creation of Chinese Chan and Japanese Zen Buddhism, readers are guided through meditations and other practices derived from the sutra’s teachings, such as hearing meditations (awareness of sound, awareness of silence, turning hearing inwards) and centering meditations (basic centering as well as centering on compassion).
"One of the most difficult aspects of Buddhist practice is wrapping our minds around how every moment is both a deceptive seeming and also a true gateway to awakening," writes Rosenbaum. "Nothing is hidden, but there is an infinite field we cannot see."
What does it mean to be liberated through one’s sensory life? In That Is Not Your Mind! Zen teacher Robert Rosenbaum explores this question by taking readers on a step-by-step journey through the Surangama Sutra. This Chinese Mahayana sutra is known for its emphasis on practicing with the senses (sight, sound, taste, smell, touch, and the Buddhist “sixth sense” of mind or cognition), as well as its teachings on the necessity of basic ethical commitments, like not killing or stealing, to support the development of one’s meditation practice and insight.
Rosenbaum interweaves passages from the sutra with contemporary insights from neuroscience and psychology, illustrating the usefulness of the text with anecdotes from his life and his forty years of teaching experience. In addition to learning about a sutra that played an important role in the creation of Chinese Chan and Japanese Zen Buddhism, readers are guided through meditations and other practices derived from the sutra’s teachings, such as hearing meditations (awareness of sound, awareness of silence, turning hearing inwards) and centering meditations (basic centering as well as centering on compassion).
"One of the most difficult aspects of Buddhist practice is wrapping our minds around how every moment is both a deceptive seeming and also a true gateway to awakening," writes Rosenbaum. "Nothing is hidden, but there is an infinite field we cannot see."
320 pages, Paperback
Published September 8, 2022
11 people are currently reading
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About the author
Robert Rosenbaum
5 books22 followersRobert Rosenbaum, Ph.D. is a clinical neuropsychologist and psychotherapist in the San Francisco Bay area, a Zen practice leader and senior teacher of Dayan Qigong, and a mountaineer. He brings a lifetime of practice to the moment-by-moment harmonization of body, mind, and spirit.
Bob began Zen practice in 1971; since 1988 he has practiced at the Berkeley Zen Center in the Soto Zen lineage of Shunryū Suzuki. Bob's dharma name is Meiko Onzen ("Clear Mirror, Calm Sitting"). In 2007 he was shuso (head student) for the practice period there. He was given lay entrustment by his teacher, Sojun Mel Weitsman, in 2010 and has since been active in the Lay Zen Teachers' Association of North America. (website: www.LZTA.org)
Bob received authorization to teach Dayan ("Wild Goose") Qigong in 1999 from Master Hui Liu of the Wen Wu School in the tradition of Grandmaster Yang Mei Jun. Bob regularly teaches qigong at the Wen Wu school and the American College of Traditional Chinese Medicine. Ten years ago he began the first qigong program to Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Oakland; since then it has spread to many other medical centers.
In order to devote himself full time to Zen and Qigong practice, Bob recently retired from 25 years in Kaiser Permanente Medical Centers, working in the Departments of Psychiatry, Behavioral Medicine, and Neurology. While there he served as chief psychologist and as the head of assessment services. As a psychotherapist he specialized in brief therapy and, with Moshe Talmon and Michael Hoyt, did research on single session interventions. In Behavioral Medicine he developed a mindfulness-based program for patients with chronic pain. Bob initiated training programs in neuropsychology, hypnosis, and brief psychotherapy and held grants researching dementia and adult attention deficit disorder.
Bob is the author of numerous journal articles and the book Zen and the Heart of Psychotherapy. His most recent book, Walking the Way: 81 Zen Encounters with the Tao Te Ching will be published by Wisdom Press in Spring 2013.
Bob has been a Fulbright Professor at the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuroscience in Bangalore, India; director of the psychology doctoral program at the California Institute of Integral Studies; and was active in the Society for the Exploration of Psychotherapy Integration. He has given presentations and workshops around the world, including in Nepal, India, Australia, Japan, Europe and South America.
Bob has been a lifelong avid backpacker in the Sierras and Cascades. Since 2000, Bob has spent one or two months each year in the Himalayas. He assisted his friend, Robin Boustead, in the development of portions of the Great Himalaya Trail across Nepal and India. Bob is the proud father of two grown daughters who are enthusiastic climbers, lovers of the outdoors, and committed to social justice.
Bob sees the sitting meditation of zazen and the moving meditation of qigong as two complementary expressions which mutually reinforce the natural practice of the Way in ordinary, everyday activity. Psychology and neurobiology can help inform this practice, but neither explain nor constrain it:. The brain is not the mind and (as Zen Master Dogen teaches us), the mind is not the I; our bodies-and-minds are the universe, one bright pearl.
Bob began Zen practice in 1971; since 1988 he has practiced at the Berkeley Zen Center in the Soto Zen lineage of Shunryū Suzuki. Bob's dharma name is Meiko Onzen ("Clear Mirror, Calm Sitting"). In 2007 he was shuso (head student) for the practice period there. He was given lay entrustment by his teacher, Sojun Mel Weitsman, in 2010 and has since been active in the Lay Zen Teachers' Association of North America. (website: www.LZTA.org)
Bob received authorization to teach Dayan ("Wild Goose") Qigong in 1999 from Master Hui Liu of the Wen Wu School in the tradition of Grandmaster Yang Mei Jun. Bob regularly teaches qigong at the Wen Wu school and the American College of Traditional Chinese Medicine. Ten years ago he began the first qigong program to Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Oakland; since then it has spread to many other medical centers.
In order to devote himself full time to Zen and Qigong practice, Bob recently retired from 25 years in Kaiser Permanente Medical Centers, working in the Departments of Psychiatry, Behavioral Medicine, and Neurology. While there he served as chief psychologist and as the head of assessment services. As a psychotherapist he specialized in brief therapy and, with Moshe Talmon and Michael Hoyt, did research on single session interventions. In Behavioral Medicine he developed a mindfulness-based program for patients with chronic pain. Bob initiated training programs in neuropsychology, hypnosis, and brief psychotherapy and held grants researching dementia and adult attention deficit disorder.
Bob is the author of numerous journal articles and the book Zen and the Heart of Psychotherapy. His most recent book, Walking the Way: 81 Zen Encounters with the Tao Te Ching will be published by Wisdom Press in Spring 2013.
Bob has been a Fulbright Professor at the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuroscience in Bangalore, India; director of the psychology doctoral program at the California Institute of Integral Studies; and was active in the Society for the Exploration of Psychotherapy Integration. He has given presentations and workshops around the world, including in Nepal, India, Australia, Japan, Europe and South America.
Bob has been a lifelong avid backpacker in the Sierras and Cascades. Since 2000, Bob has spent one or two months each year in the Himalayas. He assisted his friend, Robin Boustead, in the development of portions of the Great Himalaya Trail across Nepal and India. Bob is the proud father of two grown daughters who are enthusiastic climbers, lovers of the outdoors, and committed to social justice.
Bob sees the sitting meditation of zazen and the moving meditation of qigong as two complementary expressions which mutually reinforce the natural practice of the Way in ordinary, everyday activity. Psychology and neurobiology can help inform this practice, but neither explain nor constrain it:. The brain is not the mind and (as Zen Master Dogen teaches us), the mind is not the I; our bodies-and-minds are the universe, one bright pearl.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
May 17, 2023
I read this book with a Buddhist study group, and we chose this book because it looked like an interesting blend of sutra study (a controversial one at that) and psychology. Overall we were disappointed that there was not a whole lot more quoting from the sutra itself. The author is astonishingly well-read, bringing in quotes from a great many sources (the Tao Te Ching is particularly prominent). The subtitle is "reflections", which is a fair description - he studied the sutra, and what he wrote down is a heavily "digested" commentary on what he saw in it, what he thought was important. I would have preferred more sutra, less rumination on the author's thoughts.
However there were chapters I enjoyed very much, and difficult concepts he shined a light on. The way he took a bird's-eye view of the whole sutra in the last chapter was particularly helpful.
I think this would be a good book for someone relatively new to Buddhist texts, who isn't used to engaging with the challenging language of someone who lived 2500 years ago in a wildly different culture. Rosenbaum would be a helpful guide for a first dip into Buddhist sutras.
However there were chapters I enjoyed very much, and difficult concepts he shined a light on. The way he took a bird's-eye view of the whole sutra in the last chapter was particularly helpful.
I think this would be a good book for someone relatively new to Buddhist texts, who isn't used to engaging with the challenging language of someone who lived 2500 years ago in a wildly different culture. Rosenbaum would be a helpful guide for a first dip into Buddhist sutras.
November 22, 2022
This is not a book about the sutra, but about Rosenbaum teaching Zen precepts.
I would prefer a book that gives the sutra and then the “reflections” rather than a book that tells me “about” the sutra and what I should learn from it.
The texts sing on their own, but you would not know that from this book.
I would prefer a book that gives the sutra and then the “reflections” rather than a book that tells me “about” the sutra and what I should learn from it.
The texts sing on their own, but you would not know that from this book.
March 8, 2023
a lively exploration of a challenging Buddhist text
Robert Rosenbaum draws on his experience as a scientist and a Zen teacher for a lively exploration of a challenging Buddhist text.
Robert Rosenbaum draws on his experience as a scientist and a Zen teacher for a lively exploration of a challenging Buddhist text.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews