by Gwen Juvenal (Shoka Itsuro)
Welcome to the celebration!
For something vital, something extraordinary is happening right here and now.
And its fragrance fills this room.
Perhaps you noticed it during meditation.
Perhaps you’ve noticed it before and simply called it by another name.
This fragrance is here now.
Not reserved for after we finally solve all of our problems.
Not after we heal every wound.
And whether we realize it or not, we are already participating in this beautiful fragrance here and now.
What Are We Doing?
Every Sunday we offer incense.
As we do, we say it represents our transcending of individual selfishness and ego to join the oneness of life.
Then we take refuge together, saying that we entrust ourselves to the oneness of life.
[pause]
Today I would like to explore what it means to entrust ourselves to the oneness of life.
Shinjin and Transcending Selfishness and Ego
In Pure Land Buddhism, which our Sangha is inspired by, this entrusting is often called Shinjin.
Shinjin is often translated as true entrusting, true heart, or awakened trust.
In Nobuo Haneda’s book Dharma Breeze, he describes what Shinran experienced which brought about this idea of Shinjin.
He says:
“When Shinran met his teacher and encountered the power of the innermost aspiration, he found the way. He started to live his life powerfully and creatively, being permeated by this power.”
I have found myself returning to those words:
“The power of innermost aspiration.”
What is that?
We have many aspirations.
We want security.
We want comfort.
We want success.
We want recognition.
We want relief from suffering.
We want things to be different than they are.
But what is the innermost aspiration?
What lies beneath all of those?
What lies beneath our fears?
Beneath our striving?
Beneath the stories we tell ourselves about who we are?
Something happened for Shinran when he encountered that aspiration.
Something powerful enough that it changed the direction of his life.
Later he says that it was so tremendous that the fact that he still had passions and limitations was no hindrance to living the dynamic and creative life of a bodhisattva.
I find that deeply encouraging, because he expresses how this self, which his teacher Dogen had emphasized as something one should study, but then also forget, was no longer a hindrance for Shinran.
Dogen famously wrote:
“To study the Buddha Way is to study the self.
To study the self is to forget the self.
To forget the self is to be enlightened by the spirit that is one with the ten thousand things.”
I’ve always found that both beautiful and puzzling.
Because when I first hear “study the self,” I’m right on it.
But then he says to study the self is to “forget the self.”
How can that be?
The more I try, the more I seem to remain occupied with myself, or in denial, I turn away from the self, not acknowledging the experience and creating further suffering.
It seems the thing that is trying to do this task is the very thing that is being asked to relax, let go, and lose its grip.
Haneda shares something beautiful to expand this understanding.
He writes:
“If you intentionally attempt to forget yourself or your happiness, you will not be able to do so. But if you encounter something more powerful than yourself, something more important than your happiness, then you will be able to forget yourself and your happiness.”
Haneda says it is the spirit of the Bodhisattva.
Nothing else can make us forget the self.
King Ajatasattu and the Tree
This brings us to a king named Ajatasattu.
Haneda tells the story of King Ajatasattu.
Ajatasattu had done terrible things.
Driven by ambition and fear, he killed his own father in order to take the throne.
He nearly caused the death of his mother as well.
As the years passed, he became increasingly troubled by what he had done.
The weight of it followed him.
The pain followed him.
His attention became fixed on finding a way out.
Finding liberation.
Finding salvation.
Finding relief.
In many ways, he became consumed by the burden he carried.
Eventually he was encouraged to go and meet Shakyamuni Buddha.
As he approached, he heard stories about the Buddha and his teachings.
Then he encountered him directly.
He encountered someone whose life had become an expression of compassion for all beings.
Someone whose concern was not limited to his own liberation.
Someone whose life had become an expression of the Bodhisattva vow.
Experiencing the contrast between his closed mind of self-interest and fixation and one who was concerned with the welfare of all sentient beings awakened him.
Something shifted.
Haneda writes:
“The king compares his old self to an Aranda tree, a tree with the worst odor, and his new Shinjin self to a candana tree, a tree with the most exquisite fragrance. He said, ‘Now for the first time, I see a candana tree growing from an Aranda seed.'”
A candana tree growing from an Aranda seed.
I’ve found myself returning to that image again and again.
Not a different seed.
The same seed.
This was the arising of Shinjin.
True entrusting.
True heart.
Awakened trust.
I relate to the king.
Because I know what it is like to become occupied with something.
A fear.
A regret.
A wound.
A story.
Something that seems to define me.
And yet when I sit with the image of the seed, I find myself wondering:
What if the thing I am fixated upon is not the whole story?
What if it is something more like a shell?
Real.
Protective.
Necessary.
But not the whole seed.
Because it is not the shell that grows.
It is the life within the seed that breaks open from the shell and reaches for the water.
That reaches for the light.
That opens and meets the world.
And the seed does not do this alone.
The earth supports it.
The rain nourishes it.
The sunlight reaches it.
Life participates in its becoming.
The Seed Reflection
I’d like to invite you into a reflection.
Bring to mind something you have carried for a long time.
A burden.
A fear.
A regret.
A wound.
A story that seems to define you.
Now imagine yourself as a seed.
Held in the earth.
Not alone.
Held.
Feel the shell around the seed.
This shell has served a purpose.
And now notice something else.
The earth surrounding you.
The moisture.
The warmth.
The life already present.
Thich Nhat Hanh writes:
“I entrust myself to Earth.
Earth entrusts herself to me.
I entrust myself to Buddha.
Buddha entrusts herself to me.”
Feel those words.
Feel the earth holding the seed.
Feel the water surrounding it.
Feel the warmth reaching it.
Can you feel all that has been supporting it?
The soil.
The water.
The warmth.
The unseen life moving all around it.
The Bodhisattva presence.
The great compassion that asks for nothing and gives itself completely.
And if today you do not wish to be the seed, be the earth.
Be the water.
Be the warmth.
Be the sunlight.
Be the conditions that help another seed open.
“I entrust myself to the oneness of life.”
Let those words settle.
And now notice what begins to soften.
The shell softens.
The seed opens.
And something begins to move.
What moves first?
The root?
The shoot?
Notice.
Can you feel the root stretching?
What is it reaching for?
Can it smell the cool water beneath the earth?
Can it sense nourishment?
Can it feel life calling to it?
Notice how naturally it reaches.
No one teaches it.
No one commands it.
Something within it already knows.
And perhaps at the same moment another movement begins.
A reaching toward warmth.
Toward light.
Toward open sky.
The seed opening both downward and upward.
Receiving.
Offering.
Receiving.
Offering.
The roots are here.
The trunk is here.
The branches are here.
The leaves are here.
The fragrance is here.
Can you feel it?
The life that offers shade is here.
The life that nourishes others is here.
The life that scatters seeds beyond itself is here.
Not somewhere else.
Not someday.
Here.
The Gift and Celebration
Haneda writes:
“Amida-Butsu or Amida Buddha is great compassion that calls all lost and delusory beings to itself. When fully grounded in such a compassion, one’s flowering as a true, real and sincere person takes place naturally and spontaneously.”
I wonder if this is what King Ajatasattu discovered.
“Now for the first time, I see a candana tree growing from an Aranda seed.”
The seed opens.
Its roots find the water.
Its branches reach toward the light.
Its fragrance enters the world.
This is why I began by welcoming you to a celebration.
Because something beautiful is happening.
Life is reaching toward life.
The root reaches for water.
The branch reaches for sunlight.
The heart reaches toward compassion.
Take a breath.
Can you smell it?
The fragrance is here.
The fragrance of entrusting ourselves to the oneness of life.
The fragrance of countless conditions supporting one another.
The fragrance of life expressing itself through each of us.
And so I find myself returning once again to Dogen’s words:
“To study the Buddha Way is to study the self.
To study the self is to forget the self.
To forget the self is to be enlightened by the ten thousand things.”
- After our reflection together, what do those words mean to you?
- If you could put words to your innermost aspiration, what would it be?
Thank you for being part of the celebration.
The seed opens.
And its fragrance enters the world.
Everyday Nembutsu 