Being Upright: Zen Meditation and Bodhisattva Precepts (Zen Meditation and the Bodhisattva Precepts)

by Reb Anderson

Sexual greed is powerful, because at its root is this deep pain of separation.

We will do almost anything, grab onto anyone, if we feel it will help close the painful gap and heal the wound.

Acting out sexual greed is actually a form of stealing, sexual stealing.

always in touch with the fact that we are sexual beings, neither identifying with nor distancing ourselves from our sexuality, then we gradually become intimate with it.

Cold disdain for another’s humanness is fundamentally cold disdain for your own humanness.

Sometimes it is helpful and necessary to draw a line. The monk in the preceding story drew a line, but it is not clear that his action came from a warm heart or even that he intended to be helpful.

Intimacy with your sexuality is the ultimate

fulfillment of the bodhisattva precept of no sexual greed.

Intimacy with sexuality means that there is a deep understanding of no separation...

using sexuality to purify...

share the mudra of joining the palms (gassho) in prayer,

In the practice of the bodhisattva precepts, our ultimate concern is for the welfare of all beings. We therefore extend the meaning of “not lying” to include “not speaking in a false or harmful way, or standing by in silence when others speak in a false or harmful way.”

samma does not mean “right” as opposed to “wrong.” It means “right” in the sense of being “comprehensive” or “complete.”

For many of us, conscious and unconscious lying, intentional deceit, and lies of omission constitute an immense field of delusion and confusion throughout the interpersonal relations of our daily lives.

lying and deceit are inextricably involved when there is inappropriate sexual behavior or substance abuse.

The hallmark of abusive and addictive behavior is that we feel that we have to lie about

it.

You may withhold information not for helpful reasons, but because you are afraid of what will happen to you: you may lose the person or provoke his or her anger. For example, if Dad is an alcoholic, the family may pretend that he’s not, because if they bring it up, he may physically abuse them.

The primary harm to yourself of not telling the truth is that after a while you forget that you are lying, and your mind becomes deluded and confused.

when members of the sangha speak falsely or act in a way that encourages others to use false speech, it brings about a deterioration of trust among people in the community and undermines the practice of liberation.

favor harmony

at the expense of complete honesty

Unable to see a way toward any beneficial response, I kept this terrible secret to myself for a long time. Now I see that I was a coward. Keeping this information to myself was false speech: I lied by omission. I let my concerns for myself and for the harmony and dignity of the community stop me from speaking what should have been spoken.

I realized that my opposition would be tantamount to asking some board members to act in a way that violated their own sense of integrity.

anything we ingest, inhale, or inject into our system without reverence for all life becomes an intoxicant.

Innocence

is to not touch things at all. Innocence is not even to think of another color.

using individual effort to try to control our behavior is itself a violation of the ultimate meaning of the precept, because it is akin to manipulating our experience.

Not drinking does not necessarily mean not having the impulse to drink.

Admitting an impulse is different from trying to control yourself.

Saying “I’m an alcoholic” really means “I’m not in control of myself, and I’m not going to get control of mys...

“the great brightness” of your being. In this great brightness, nothing can be brought in. Being upright with this great brightness, you have no desire to bring something in.

This bodhisattva precept is about liberating all other beings from addiction to improvement before oneself.

Doing something to try to improve yourself is not this bodhisattva precept.

Trying to improve others is not this bodhisattva precept. This precept is about liberating self and others from self-concern.

It is precisely about not using anything to improve anybody, and using everyt...

Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind: Informal

Talks on Zen Meditation and Practice;

When bodhisattvas receive the precepts they pray that all beings will come and join in receiving the precepts. I don’t want to practice by myself: I want everybody else to practice, even after I’m dead.

When you refuse to pay close and loving attention to addicts and issues of addiction, you render yourself subject to addiction.

We need to acknowledge that beyond the harm that comes to the individual user of intoxicants, there is a concomitant disaster that puts the entire world at risk.

can you speak not with the intention of dividing people but with the intention of uniting people?

In Zen when we say, “Go away,” it means, “Come back with a new and more true self.”

It is a challenging coldness, encouraging them

to go beyond their well-establish...

the living dharma constantly transcends itself; the treasury of truth is constantly destroyed and always refreshed.

Confucius says, “When I see virtue in another, I vow to emulate it. When I see evil in another,

look at myself.”

leave that to fools to criticize. My job is to praise.”

A bodhisattva does not talk about other peoples’ shortcomings. He or she talks intimately with people who have shortcomings.