Phone: 507-384-8541
Mountains and Waters Alliance – staying steady
Since I last wrote, the United States has changed. The Democrats have a new presidential candidate, a vice-presidential candidate (my Minnesota governor), and enthusiasm abounds. It’s a relief.
Buddhist practice is to keep going, whatever seems to be happening.
Also war, killing, starvation and sickness continue in Gaza; Israeli media report literal torture within Israeli prisons, but U.S. mainstream media says nothing. In Bethlehem, Combatants for Peace resists illegal settlers taking their homes – and some foreigners join them in the old tradition called accompaniment – but this time they’re shooting Americans too. https://www.dropsitenews.com/
Some voters imagine that Harris/Walz will do it differently, others don’t. Some refuse to participate in an election with no peaceful alternative, others plan to organize after the election. I don’t know how many just don’t care.
Buddhist practice is to keep going, whatever seems to be happening.
Climate catastrophe is in our faces – floods, droughts, wildfires – and it’s getting a tiny bit more attention, but most people aren’t yet ready to consider giving up their conveniences. Even when driven from their homes by floods, storms, or fires, they try to resume normalcy as much as possible.
What does practice mean, in such a situation?
I ask because I don’t know the answer. Today, even though I have a list of what practice means to me now, I’m leaving this space blank.
What does practice mean to you, now?
UPDATES
We just keep going here. We continue at the slower pace required by Shodo’s medical situation, still expecting full recovery. Summer retreats included a 
weekend Earth Apprentice retreat, in which we spent time with the white pine grove and developed a plan to turn an old shed into a small, screened zendo.
Summer classes included our regular weekly class plus a joint class at Zen Center North Shore (Massachusetts) co-taught with Joan Amaral and Catherine Gammon, both dharma sisters from Shodo’s time at San Francisco Zen Center.
Summer is in full abundance, flowers and green plants, the first tomatoes, more flowers.
UPCOMING
August sesshin will be August 16-18, almost here.
September (dates unknown) there will be a trip for wild ricing with the Honor the Earth camp at Palisade, Minnesota. October 19-20 Shodo leads a retreat in Atlanta, and Rohatsu sesshin will be here December 1-8.
Work days or weekends are not yet scheduled, but things happen along the way.
ALWAYS
We have two rooms available for residents, short or long term, please ask. (You will need outside income.)
I’ll tell you when the book finds a publisher.
Mountains and Waters Alliance – spring 2024 notes
Dear all,
Here are a few notices as we head into spring. I’m still in recovery from shoulder surgery, keeping typing to a bare minimum. This takes us through June and begins July.
Zen things:
Sunday morning dharma talks online, March 24. April 7.
Wednesday evening classes, starting April 3 and May 1: Bendowa, or “The Wholehearted Way.” Please register.
April 6, daylong retreat at Midtown Atlanta Zen, no online. For more information email here. Topic: Zen practice in challenging times: We’ll talk about fear, hope, despair, and how to practice when the world seems to be falling apart.
Land things:
April 20-21, May 17-19, July 19-21: Earth Apprentice Retreat. (donation requested, registration required)
We’re starting spring cleanup and garden projects. Volunteers are welcome. Specifically, Saturday afternoon volunteering, in the spirit of Earth apprenticeship, will start when weather and my body allow. Contact me to get on the email list for when we get started.
Things I’m going to attend that might be of interest:
March 24 (11 Central Time, after my dharma talk): free showing of the short film, The Opening, and discussion, likely with the filmmaker.
March 26, 10:30 Central Time, presentation on the Congo to a climate discussion group, by David Albert. I know him, it will be good, and email me for the link, which I don’t have yet.
May 2-11, (2 hours every morning), Virtual dharma study intensive (9-11 Central Time, 10 days) online with Shohaku Okumura. Registration required.
June 19-23, “Practicing the Way in this very moment” Zen retreat at Hokyoji (SE Minnesota) – registration required
Please look at the annual schedule for further events.
As weather is crazy, politics are frightening, and violence overseas is unthinkable, please do a few things:
Pray, or chant, or ask for help from the many living beings who make our world. We are not alone here. Even in this scary election year. Volunteer for candidates, issues, and situations that make sense to you.
If you have donations to give, please do.
I’ll mention https://bodhicitta-vihara.com/, which is literally changing the lives of girls and women in India, helping them from poverty and half-slavery to education and a workable life. Of course, sending money to https://www.unrwa.org/, the most reliable provider of food relief in this desperate situation. In the U.S., Censored News is an independent and honest news source for Red Nations news, surviving on donations for over 20 years.
I will stop here, skipping fine organizations in many tribal nations, states, and countries, because I don’t want to go on forever.
To support Mountains and Waters Alliance, I encourage you to sign up with iGive.com, but we also accept money. Everything is here: https://mountainsandwatersalliance.org/donate-support/.
Thanks for following. May your life be joyous and your heart peaceful.
With love,
Shodo
For Mountains and Waters Alliance
Mountains and Waters Alliance Feb 6, 2024: Quick updates and a statement on Gaza
Dear Friends,
I’ve had to modify my schedule because of some medical issues requiring minor surgery. Here’s a reminder of offerings for the next couple of months.
Classes:
In 2024 we’re doing a series of 3-week classes addressing core teachings. The next one begins this Wednesday, February 7, and focuses on the practice and meaning of zazen, or sitting meditation. It’s still possible to register and receive a copy of the text before we begin. Information here.
The March online class begins March 6, and focuses on core Zen teaching through the well-known Genjo Koan – “the matter at hand.”
April class begins April 3, on “Bendowa” or “The wholehearted way.”
The rest of the 2024 schedule is found here.
Talks:
Friday, February 9: It’s still possible to attend the in-person talk in Duluth, Minnesota. Information here.
Sunday, March 10, 10 am: I’m giving a dharma talk at Minnesota Zen Center, both in person and online. Information and link here. Keep clicking until you find “Sunday talk” on March 10.
Sunday March 24 is an online dharma talk at Hokyoji (also in Minnesota, and part of my Zen history). Information and link here.
Retreats:
Sesshin – a silent weekend retreat – will be March 15-17, here at the farm in southern Minnesota. Registration is essential. (Also in August)
Earth Apprentice retreats – combining spiritual relation with land and in meditation – April 19-21, May 17-19, and also July. More information later, feel free to ask.
Other land-based activities (such as work days) will be clarified as my physical recovery progresses.
Call for ceasefire in Gaza
Then I offer this call for a ceasefire in Gaza, Israel, and the Middle East. It became impossible to say nothing, so here it is.
We call for
· immediate and lasting ceasefire in the Middle East.
· Immediate release of all hostages held by Hamas or in Israeli prisons, the term hostage including anyone held without charge or with only political charges;
· A negotiated settlement providing peace, security, human rights, and dignity for all inhabitants of the region known variously as Israel or Palestine, and moving to establish the same on a long-term basis;
· A Truth and Reconcilition Commission comparable to that of South Africa after apartheid, seeking restorative justice and building a path forward, while not excluding consequences for harmful actions;
· Reparations to individuals, families, and organizations that have lost people, health, home, livelihood in this region. Reparations for events occurring elsewhere (such as the Nazi holocaust) shall be sought from those who caused them.
And a note: the history is so long and the injustices so many that rather than trying to address them, I choose simply to point toward resolution.
Deep listening offerings
In starting Mountains and Waters Alliance, I looked for a way for ordinary humans to enter the magical, liminal quality of relationship with the other beings. I assert that the other beings are conscious. In that, I join with millennia of humans who, in a variety of languages, have lived with the trees spirits and earth gnomes, talked with them, and worked together with them.
This talk from January addresses this; it’s my first spoken attempt to address this way, and I find it a good beginning. The first 40 minutes are the talk itself. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ej0Tdu0YymA
The next talks from others go deeply, each in a different direction, that add much to what I say.
David Suzuki:
This hour-long talk spins out the nature of the problem – how we live, too many of us, and the mindset – “We don’t need nature” – “We create our own habitat” – and other nonsense that brings us to this miserable state. Even though the talk is about the situation and not about solutions, the first step is to really understand the problem, and it’s good on that.
Bayo Akolomafe and Post-Activism
He speaks and writes about failure, about the cracks in reality, and about monsters. He takes us to a different place; it can be hard. Can we allow the earth to shift under our feet? Bayo invites us to a profound welcome of the movement of Life.
https://vimeo.com/750490178/41eff6db22
We’re in a time of creativity and new growth; I imagine offering a long list of resources, but it’s an overwhelming thought. So I offer these two plus my own.
There are a few events coming up at the farm; I’ll post them separately.
Love to you all,
Shodo
for Mountains and Waters Alliance
Even In War
About two days ago, a shooting war began between Russia and Ukraine. Everyone knows who is right and wrong, except me. People have sent essays and speeches, and I can add a few bits of information or links. Here is just one source of many: a talk by Vladimir Pozner. There are some common themes in these alternative voices: that Western powers promised that NATO wouldn’t expand eastward, and then it did; that Putin once wanted to join NATO and was turned down. I do not support Putin or the invasion, but the media has gotten into that cheerleading mode that I cannot join.
War is never good. Claims of innocence are always suspect, though innocence does exist in the world. What to do? Praying for peace is always a good thing; meditating for justice is also safe. That’s all I’m going to say. You’re invited to add a comment with your favorite information source.
Meanwhile, life goes on here, far from the war. It’s a little disconcerting, being aware that all our lives are in the balance and not quite sure what to do. But really, not so different from dealing with global warming, or violent racism, or most things: what can we do? Joanna Macy describes three kinds of action: holding actions, building the new future, and spiritual work. I’m mostly involved in the latter two, living in a present and working for a future spiritually based and connected with all of life.
It would be great if people who are doing things add a link or a short comment – especially about these very immediate events including the Ukraine-Russia conflict.
News at Home:
A local reporter came to do a story, and did this beautiful and wise description of what we’re doing here:
Local group uses Buddhist practices to to seek understanding
There seems to be a paywall. They told me people could generally access the article once or twice before the paywall came up, but some people are having difficulty. I am trying to arrange access.
In response to this welcome, I will offer some introductory afternoons later this year, summer or fall.
Spring 2022 Events:
- This spring, we have a 5-day sesshin March 18-22: silent sitting and walking meditation, shared meals, very simple. (Register soon please)
- On March 26, a Saturday morning, I’m giving a dharma talk “Together With All Beings: Understanding the Self” online at Heartland Zen.
- April 10, a Sunday morning, I give a talk online at Hokyoji Zen Monastery, no title yet.
- May 5-9 I will be attending the Genzo-e (teaching retreat) at Sanshin Zen Community, with my teacher Shohaku Okumura, available online.
- June 5, a Sunday morning, I give a talk online and in person at Clouds in Water Zen Community, no title.
- June 17-21 is the summer 5-day sesshin.
- Online groups continue, and are coordinated by email, newcomers welcome:
- The Gift of Fearlessness, Sundays 4:30-6 pm Central Time, weeks 1, 2, 4, and 5
- Zen study group, Wednesdays 6:30-8 pm Central Time
- Monday morning zazen – sitting meditation, Monday mornings 5:55-7 Central Time
We expect to have construction in April, dates unknown, and there will be a chance for volunteers to help – especially with moving furniture, possibly with painting and other work.
Poem
Last, I want to leave you with this poem by Wendell Berry. It’s from 1977; I can’t say it’s still true 45 years later. I still offer it.
A Vision
If we will have the wisdom to survive,
to stand like slow-growing trees
on a ruined place, renewing, enriching it,
if we will make our seasons welcome here,
asking not too much of earth or heaven,
then a long time after we are dead
the lives our lives prepare will live
here, their houses strongly placed
upon the valley sides, fields and gardens
rich in the windows. The river will run
clear, as we will never know it,
and over it, birdsong like a canopy.
On the levels of the hills will be
green meadows, stock bells in noon shade.
On the steeps where greed and ignorance cut down
the old forest, an old forest will stand,
its rich leaf-fall drifting on its roots.
The veins of forgotten springs will have opened.
Families will be singing in the fields.
In their voices they will hear a music
risen out of the ground. They will take
nothing from the ground they will not return,
whatever the grief at parting. Memory,
native to this valley, will spread over it
like a grove, and memory will grow
into legend, legend into song, song
into sacrament. The abundance of this place,
the songs of its people and its birds,
will be health and wisdom and indwelling
light. This is no paradisal dream.
Its hardship is its possibility.
Wendell Berry
Sending blessings to you. Inviting you to pray for peace, love, and joy, for justice and freedom. Inviting you to stop by the nearest old tree, or meadow, or creek, to greet them warmly, bring an offering of any kind (a song? A cookie?) and speak to them the same prayers, share with them, consider them as friends and allies.
Love,
Shodo
Personal Action: response to the IPCC Climate Report
The IPCC climate report triggered a lot of thoughts about how to get to action.
1: Getting to Political Will
Given the scale of the problem – climate change is being driven by enormous corporate, military, and government offenses, while our personal consumption has very little effect – why bother changing your own life?
This is why: so you can be ready to live without the destructiveness of fossil fuels and much more.
- If I drive a car to work and do not have another way to get there, driving that car becomes a: “need” rather than a want. This makes me an ally of fossil fuels (or lithium mining, if my car is electric) rather than an ally of the planet.
- If my children or grandchildren live thousands of miles away and I want to see them, this makes me “need” airplanes, trains, or at least cars. This makes me an ally of fossil fuels rather than an ally of the planet.
- If I heat my home with fossil fuels, without them I will freeze in winter. This makes me an ally of fossil fuels rather than an ally of the planet.
- If I heat my home with firewood cut with a chainsaw and split with a power splitter, and don’t have a backup plan for cutting and splitting, I will freeze without whatever powers them. This makes me an ally of fossil fuels (or lithium mining, if my tools are electric) rather than an ally of the planet.
- If my water comes from the city, or from a well on an electric pump, when that system fails I will have no water for drinking or bathing. Without water people die. This makes me an ally of centralized electricity systems even if they come from mining or fossil fuels that devastate the planet.
That’s enough examples. If our lives depend directly on use of fossil fuels, lithium mining, or the like, nearly all of us will protect our lives first. And our children’s immediate lives, even if we are sacrificing their futures to do it. We need to get off that dependence – every one of us – or we will not be free to interfere with the system that is plunging us into climate disaster.
That’s about it on personal lifestyle – and it’s a lot to do. Every single person who claims to be worried about climate change needs to get rid of this dependence, or they will be an enemy at crucial moments.
There is more.
2: Material Disruption
Roger Hallam, a founder of Extinction Rebellion, gave an in-your-face talk about what it takes to make change. First, effective strategy involves material disruption of the machine – political or industrial machine, that is. Protests and marches raise energy, feel good, help with networking – but they don’t interrupt the machine. Interrupting the machine actually does interrupt the machine. Like that well-known tactic of the strike. Like the Valve Turners who safely shut down the pipelines bringing Canadian oil into the U.S. Like every person who has ever blocked a road or locked themselves to a drilling rig.
When you begin resisting, the authorities call you ridiculous, terrorists, and your demands unthinkable. If you’re effective, they arrest you. At some point, they quietly begin negotiations.
Hallam suggests that 500 people in jail or 3000 arrests is what it would take (for the UK); he gave historical examples including the US Civil Rights Movement. He points out the difference between a protest and actual disruption: it’s disruption that works.
Right now in Minnesota at Line 3 (StopLine3.org) people are showing up, disrupting the drilling of the pipeline under the rivers. They’re also filing court actions, publicizing the leaks, pointing out the disastrous social consequences of man camps, pointing out the many ways the drilling is illegal, petitioning any public official who has clout, pressuring the banks that fund these projects and the insurance companies that protect them – materially interfering with the pipeline construction in every possible way.
People specialize in things they can do. Some people physically block the machinery, which gets them arrested and often abused. For each such person there are five or six support people. Some people write letters or phone their legislators.Some send money, or raise money. And everything you can imagine in between. Look at your options – and get ready to live without fossil fuel. Stop thinking electric cars will save our way of life: they won’t.
If we’re going to stop fossil fuels, we have to want to actually stop them. That means some of us have to be doing the other work, securing food, transportation, health care, education, community, shelter, and safety for after we succeed.
Hallam observes that, just like in military strategy, it works to focus on one target at a time, and be overwhelming there. Line 3 is happening now, the team is strong, and although Minnesota’s official actions are closer to its worst stereotypes than its best, it’s far from the worst place to be in jail. (Maybe it’s not possible, maybe we are strong enough to overwhelm them in multiple places at once – the point is to think strategically and work together.)
Finally, Hallam says there are practically no excuses for not getting out there.
I’ll say, about this other work, that the only people excused are the ones at the front lines or those working 80 hours a week (yes, they do that) on legal, lobbying, fundraising, and the like. The rest of us – well, do we want to be allies of the earth or allies of fossil fuels? Let’s get to work on that sustainable infrastructure called food, shelter, transportation, health care. And community.
Covid update on MWA Events
Dear Friends,
This is an update on the events calendar I sent out last month. It seems like a good idea to be more careful with the unknowns on the new Covid variants. The uncertainty of life is requiring us to pay attention.
When you register for any event, please let me know whether you are vaccinated, which seems to give considerable protection. Also let me know if you are especially vulnerable or live with vulnerable people. We did this safely twice last year, before vaccines, adjusting precautions as we went.
Online:
Wednesday evening study group continues,
currently working with Taigen Leighton’s Zen Questions. If you’d like to join, email me. More details here.
Gift of Fearlessness
specifically designed as a space to care for ourselves and each other around the challenges in today’s world. We will resume in September. Email me if you’re considering joining. We’ve been meeting Sunday evenings. Details here.
Monday morning Zazen
Mondays, 6 am Central Time, details here.
At the Farm
Workday August 14.
11-5, lunch and snacks offered. We have garden projects and building projects. I have been out of state (returned August 3), so consider what feels safe to you. Probably entirely outdoors. Details here.
Land Care Retreat: moved from August 13-16 to August 20-23:
Combines sitting meditation with outdoor work as sacred ceremony. Garden, land care, and possibly some building. Free to past volunteers. Please register – we’ll go ahead if there are three registrations by the 15th. Details and registration here.
Sesshin September 17-21
(Thursday night to Tuesday afternoon): Sitting silently together, in the zendo or outdoors. Probably cancelled, but let me know if you plan to come. We may just wait for December. Registration required; fee or work exchange. Details and registration here.
October 9, 11-5: Transplanting day
We have raspberries to prune and move, rhubarb to divide and plant, possibly hazelnut bushes, strawberries, and who knows what else.
All the workdays are Saturday but could be extended on request. All come with a great lunch, free camping and so forth for those who stay extra – and probably veggies or plants if you would like some to take home.
December 1-8: Rohatsu Sesshin:
This will definitely happen, but possibly online.
Seven days of silent meditation, honoring the enlightenment of Dogen (founder of Soto Zen). A very quiet kind of adventure. Requires registration plus fee or work exchange. If you have not done sesshin here, we’ll need to talk first.
And in the world:
The construction, the protests, and the arrests continue at Line 3 in northern Minnesota. A central information 
source is http://stopline3.org. They are asking people to come now, but there’s plenty of other support to offer, especially contacting your legislators, the governor, and the President.
I don’t need to tell you about wildfires, floods, heat waves, disasters, and deaths continuing. We live in difficult times. Please take heart. (Note The Gift of Fearlessness group as a space to hold this .)
With love,
Shodo
Notes from the Treaty People Gathering
Over 2000 people gathered in northern Minnesota June 5-8 to protect land, water, and treaty rights against Enbridge Energy’s Line 3. Over 200 of us were arrested in the process, and hundreds stayed at Camp Fire Light, at the place where Enbridge plans to drill under the Mississippi River near its very beginning. Now the center of action is at Red Lake Treaty Camp, where drilling seems imminent.
The most important thing I have to offer here is comments on the importance of treaty rights, a paradigm-changing teaching from attorneys Frank Bibeau and Joe Plumer. I’ll follow that with a brief outline from the Treaty People Gathering, action steps, a personal report from a friend who risked arrest, and a million links if you want to go farther. For background information, you can read the first two paragraphs on each of these: https://www.stopline3.org/issues/ and https://www.stopline3.org/chronicles
We are all treaty people
It’s important to understand treaty rights and what they mean. The bold comments are direct statements from Frank and Joe in the Sunday morning training.
We have to understand current events in terms of the treaties.
They said it so clearly that I finally understood.
Those treaties were made between the ancestors of indigenous people and the ancestors of the white people.
Even though my personal ancestors arrived much later, I too am a treaty person.
We are all governed by the many treaties made on this land, by our mutual ancestors. This is a shared history, white and indigenous, and it binds us together.
The whites did not understand the indigenous relationship with the land. They assumed that tribes owned land, and could sign it over.
Right off this tells you something was wrong with them. Owning land? Well, they also thought they could own people. Now they pretend not to own people, and they are very confused when we talk about land as a being with its own rights, its own existence, as everyone used to know.
Whites also did not seem to understand the meaning of a treaty. In a treaty, the two parties are separate and remain separate. Neither acquires the right to dominate the other. Another problem is the white understanding that the only thing reliable is what’s on paper, even though they were making agreements with people who had no history of writing and sometimes did not speak English. One such treaty is expressed in a wampum belt, showing two bands extending side by side, never crossing over, separate and equal. This is how treaties are.
For many decades, whites didn’t even honor their own version of the treaties, reneging on promises such as food and supplies, leading to disputes such as the Dakota War of 1862. The current dis-honoring involves the right to hunt, fish, and gather – what good are those rights if the waters are poisoned, the fish dead, the forests paved? No tribe agreed to have its lands destroyed.
Treaties are the supreme law of the land, above the Constitution. They cannot be changed without agreement of both parties.
If a bully can make an agreement and ignore it, there is no international law, no community of respect, and no protection against the force of the strongest weapon in the hands of the most brutal invader. Respecting treaties is essential.
For those who want to go deeper, this link has a detailed discussion of treaties in the Great Lakes area, rights, history, and common misunderstandings: http://glifwc.org/publications/pdf/2018TreatyRights.pdf
As I listen to the attorneys talk about treaty rights, I sense something going on that I can’t quite name. It feels like being on the edge of a cliff, needing just a slight push to go over. After – the right to mine, drill, and destroy ends, and the power of bullies gives way to the power of relationship. Human communities and inter-species communities are able to make our way.
Frank Bibeau says, “Every time Line 3 gets closer to happening, it pushes our treaty rights closer to the front, and now we’ve gotten to that place with the litigation starting with the Corps of Engineers.” (https://grist.org/food/line-3-pipeline-protests-enbridge-wild-rice-treaty-rights/ )
The matter of indigenous people being arrested for trespassing – on land that was stolen from their ancestors historically, that is supposed to be public land, and that was turned over to a private corporation with only token concern for the damage they will do – it shows how everything is wrong-side-up. The matter of using helicopter and sonic booms (can cause permanent physical and mental damage)
We stand at a turning point in history. And the whole world is watching. (The international press was visibly present.)
And now some stories from that weekend and after.
The gathering
Most of us arrived Saturday, either at the main camp or the MNIPL camp (Minnesota Interfaith Power and Light). The main camp had a welcoming ceremony Saturday afternoon, while at the MNIPL camp a dozen people were making signs and others helped us all find our cabins or tent spots. After a Gandhi Mahal dinner we (MNIPL) gathered on the beach for talks, prayer circle, and an end-the-Sabbath ceremony.
Sunday was a long day of training at the main camp – and was hot, dry, and more hot.
We were divided into three groups: red, yellow, and green. Red meant you planned to get arrested. Yellow meant willing to be arrested. Green meant staying as safe as possible, understanding there are no guarantees. After the morning speakers, each group received its own training.
The action:
Very early on Monday, about half of us went to the pumping station. That’s described in Ann’s report below. MNIPL hosted a prayer circle at a different location, then most of us went on to the bridge – the main action spot, a road crossing of the tiny Mississippi. The red group headed for the planned pipeline crossing (near Mississipi headwaters) and stayed there. The yellow group chalked on the bridge: “President Biden, Honor the Treaties, Stop Line 3.” The green group marched, chanted, listened to speakers, chanted some more, and waited for news. It was hot. Teams brought water and snacks.
Mid-afternoon the leaders announced that we had no arrests here, and that work was stopped at the pumping station for a whole day. The red group began building Camp Fire Light. The rest of us dispersed – many to take a dip in the Mississippi Headwaters at Lake Itasca. Back at camp, we relaxed, recovered, heard of the first hundred arrests, and eventually had a closing circle. Night brought the gift of a cooling thunderstorm.
The next week:
From Monday to Monday was a long ceremony at Camp Fire Light. Then, Sheriff Darin Halverson came to carry out Enbridge’s eviction notice. After peaceful negotiations, the protestors left as a procession with drums and singing. Here’s a writing about that from Tuesday night:
from Neo Gabo Benais: “The right to have ceremony under the treaties protection was honored by a county sheriff… The Northern lights task force [coordinated police response to protests]… was quick to mobilize and try to take over the easement but the sheriff held them off for 3 days. …the sheriff honored our treaties and let us have ceremony and leave in peace with zero arrests…. we ended up with 50 people choosing citations to fight for our treaties as we demand to be seen in federal court. 
Now that’s how you fight the black snake, together. Everyone left this action energized and not traumatized. Everyone is waiting for the next one. Howah!!!! Miigwech!!!”
Also Monday, June 15, a court decided in favor of Enbridge continuing to build. The dissent from Judge Reyes was priceless:
‘This case is about substitution. Substituting supply for demand. Substituting ‘shippers’ for ‘refineries.’ Substituting ‘pipeline capacity’ for ‘crude oil.’ Substituting conclusory, unsupported demand assumptions for reviewable ‘long-range energy demand forecasts.’ And substituting an agency’s will for its judgment.’
What you can do:
from https://treatypeoplegathering.com/:
- Call President Biden: 888-724-8946. Say: “President Biden must honor the treaties and protect our climate by stopping the Line 3 tar sands pipeline now.”
- Donate to the bail fund for over 200 water protectors arrested last week: https://treatypeoplegathering.com/donate Help get them out of jail.
- Join. Now it’s Red Lake Treaty camp, drilling on the Red Lake River just started today. The State has authorized 5 million gallons of water for this, during a drought. Learn more at the Rise Coalition Facebook page where you can also ask for more information.
- More at https://welcomewaterprotectors.com/.
I’ll end this with a first-person account from the action at the pumping station. Ann Schulman writes about her own experience.
Water. Healing. Helicopters.
Dozens of people had been in the field all morning, dragging logs, dead trees, and rocks, onto the road and digging ditches. About eight of us, mostly Seniors, were sitting on a slab of concrete thirty yards away and drinking water in the shade of some metal structure. It was hot, over 90 degrees and none of us were inclined towards heavy lifting.
A helicopter, somebody said that it was ICE (probably so), had been flying over the area for a while and kicking up a lot of dust. After a time, people had trickled away from the field. Not everyone. Three people (that I could see) were still in it when the helicopter began a vertical decent directly onto their heads. I panicked. Didn’t the pilot see that there were people underneath him? How could he be landing? It wasn’t an empty field! I stood up and saw two figures run off to the right, somebody said that it was a woman and a girl. But a male figure disappeared in a cloud of dust beneath the helicopter. Where was he? I fought the sand and dirt blowing into my face to keep my eyes on the disappeared person. After three or four brutal seconds, a running figure darted from the haze with a helicopter a body length from the top of his head.
As I watched this person run, I remembered an image from the movie The Fog of War. Only this wasn’t a war, or a war zone. It was a peaceful protest with over a thousand civilians at the Enbridge pump house site.
My friends shook their heads in disgust. They had had enough. Machines flying into human beings, who are protecting the water through peaceful protest was way more than they wanted to see. I was too frozen inside from what had happened to notice that it was time for me to go too. My eyes had become irritated and swollen and had begun to water. And water. And water.
The next day my friends drove my car the four hours back to St. Paul, while I scheduled an emergency appointment. The closest eye clinic that could see me on such short notice was another forty-five minutes away.
The doctor asked how the dust and sand had blown into my face. I said, “It was a helicopter.” She stared for a second, not quite comprehending. “You got too close to a helicopter?” she asked. “No,” I answered. “A helicopter got too close to me. “ I added. “It was a Line 3 protest.”
She remained silent, turned her back, and typed into the computer.
Maybe she knew how dirty tar sands are. Maybe she understood about Tribal Sovereignty and genocide and wild rice, maybe she knew that the modified pipeline would cross under the headlands of the Mississippi twice, under twenty two rivers, and over two hundred bodies of water on indigenous land before arriving on the shore of Lake Superior. Probably she understood that spills happen regularly from these pipelines and the Great Lakes and world might not recover. Maybe the silence that I found deafening was actually compliance with a clinic rule about not getting involved?
“Its irritation, not abrasion,” she said after the exam. “Use water drops four times a day.”
Water. Healing. Helicopters.
Mní wičhóni
Water is Life.
Minnesota, Life, Death, a Call for Support
I wanted to post spring flowers and updates on the garden. But too much is happening here.
I was following the processes at Line 3, the not-yet-approved pipeline that is being built rapidly anyway, to take tar sands oil through Minnesota to a Wisconsin refinery for export. Indigenous-led resistance is meeting harsh police action, paid for by Enbridge. (It’s like a cash cow for the local police.) If you want to make one phone call, or do more, here’s the link for information. (The simplest action is a call to President Biden)
And I hosted some activists for a couple of weeks after their arrests, while they quarantined for the Covid that eventually two of them had. They were ultra-cautious about contagion, extremely respectful, volunteered some labor. I learned just a little about how much work it is to be arrested, and the lives of those who make it their primary calling. Sonja Birthisel, Johnny Sanchez (taking the photo), Leif Taranta, Cody Pajic, Julie Macuga, Darius Jordan (not in picture).
Remember George Floyd, killed May 25, 2020? The next day’s peaceful memorial march was met by police brutality (and right-wing violence) and a worldwide summer of protests followed, including a lot of property damage and continuing police brutality. Next week the jury on the Derek Chauvin trial (he killed George Floyd, in Minneapolis) will receive final instructions and produce a verdict. Officials prepared for the trial and protests by erecting barricades and calling in extra forces.
It never stops. Last Sunday in Brooklyn Center (a Minneapolis suburb) Daunte Wright was shot in what should have been a routine traffic stop. This four-minute video shows a peaceful and spiritual march two days later. Every day there were protests at the police station, and on Friday with hundreds of people.
The next morning, Louie Tran says on Facebook “to my white friends who still don’t get it”
“Can’t sleep because of what happened in BC last night.
- Police kettling protesters swiftly causing panic and chaos like a blitzkrieg
- Police using chemical warfare, rubber bullets and flash bang stun grenades on protesters, medics and the press
- Police driving their vehicles quickly through streets where protesters are running because they caused the panic.
- Surrounding a church that was providing safe sanctuary for the protester community. (Tried to get a warrant to entree but was denied)
- Macing a photojournalist in the face, tackling him down and pushing his head to the dirt and ripped his Press credential off throwing out to the ground. This was shortly after a Federal District judge granted a temporary restraining order against the State Troopers from harassing, arresting and physically assaulting the press.
- Detaining the Press/Media and taking photos of their credentials, IDs and face before letting them go.
- Arresting medics [Apparently prioritizing medics in arrests]
Please make a phone call or several. I would think that out-of-state calls would have extra impact as they recognize it’s a national issue. It doesn’t take long, you’ll probably talk to a machine. Here:
- Gov Walz 800-657-3717 (answering machine takes message)
- Att. Gen Keith Ellison 651-296-3353 (M-F 8-4:30 only; no email found)
- Sheriff Hutchinson 612-348-3744 (not taking calls as of Sunday noon)
- Mayor Mike Elliot of Brooklyn Center 612-460-1765 (mailbox full as of Sunday noon, try Monday?)
- Ilhan Omar 612-333-1272 MN Representative for that district (no mailbox, try later)
- Tina Smith 651-221-1016 MN Senator (mailbox full Sunday noon, try Monday)
- Amy Klobuchar 888-224-9043 MN Senator (answering machine takes message)
So there we are. I’m remembering a long-ago spring that included tulips by the sidewalk and a nuclear power plant (Three-Mile Island) at risk of melting down – and what would we do to be safe? This spring feels the same. I’m not directly in danger, but this mentally ill society, this white supremacist society endangers all of us.
Be well, be at peace, and quietly consider your own contribution 
to the well-being of the planet.
You’re already doing something – acknowledge yourself for it,
and if you want to do more, please do.
With love,
Shodo
MWA March 27, 2021 – Sorrow, shock, new life
As we weary of the pandemic and look forward to spring – forgive my rambling. And note the recording and the events at the bottom of the page.
A gunman has shot and killed ten people in a supermarket in Boulder, Colorado. Less than a week earlier a gunman shot and killed eight people in massage parlors in Atlanta. Now, the state of Georgia has passed a draconian voter suppression law, and yesterday arrested a Black legislator for knocking on a door so she could witness the governor’s photo op. In Washington DC The US Senate cannot organize itself to stop minority rule (the filibuster). The Voting Rights Act is moving strictly on partisan lines, because Republicans admit they can’t win an election honestly.
The State of Minnesota has seated a jury for the trial of Derek Chauvin, who was filmed killing George Floyd, which started enormous protests, some violence, and became the occasion for more violence by police against protesters and journalists. The State has invested enormous sums in policing, fencing.
Official violence continues against people resisting Line 3 in northern Minnesota; sheriff departments are raking in the cash as Enbridge makes the mandated payments for pipeline “protection.” Line 3 is in court again and there’s some hope of legal victory. At Thacker Pass, the protest against lithium mining enters its third month of calling environmentalists to account along with mining companies.
Geneen Marie Haugen writes “I am stunned each time another hideous event exposes human depravity or psychosis or indifference for the lives of others. Every time, I (perhaps foolishly) anticipate some kind of collective awakening. …My belly aches with longing to mend what has gone awry, if only I could identify it. I want to be able to say, ‘Here is a way.’
Me too.
I’m reading a book called They Thought They Were Free: the Germans, 1933-45. The stories of ordinary individuals who joined the Nazi party are chilling; the way they manipulate truth and memory is uncomfortably familiar. But here is a comment from the author’s academic friend about his own choices. On taking the loyalty oath, “That day the world was lost, and it was I who lost it.” Although it had enabled him to hide fugitives and save lives, he said “If I had refused to take the oath in 1935, it would have meant that thousands and thousands like me, all over Germany, were refusing to take it. Their refusal would have heartened millions. Thus the regime would have been overthrown.” He speaks about not being ready, not having enough faith that he might make a difference, and so he took the easier path.
We know people who took the harder path. Daniel Ellsberg escaped life in prison (unlike Reality Winner, Chelsea Manning, Julian Assange, and even Edward Snowden in exile). Others have paid a different kind of price: Peter Norman, Australian runner supporting Carlos and Smith’s 1968 Olympic protest, lost his career and more – depression, alcoholism, and painkiller addiction after an injury. In 2000 he had no regret for standing up. Hugh Thompson, after stopping his soldiers from participating in the My Lai massacre, “was denounced as a traitor, and spent much of his life suffering from depression, PTSD, and nightmares.” And young Sophie Scholl and her brother Hans were executed by the Nazis. “Such a fine, sunny day, and I have to go.”
What is appropriate action? What does each of us do, in a time when things are so ? And then how do we become the people who can take the risk? When I walked along the KXL route in 2013, there was no way to predict what the results would be – and it is still not possible to say what we contributed to the eventual protection of the land. But doing it made me alive. It was hard. Afterward it was hard to go back to ordinary life. Mountains and Waters Alliance, here on the farm and writing online, feels more mundane. But if I abandoned it, I would no longer feel alive.
Spring is in the air; amid the ruins of authorized violence and voter suppression, life renews. Line 3 protests with sacred ceremony mixed with arrests and legal battles. Buddhist Justice Reporter looks deeply at the Derrick Chauvin trial. Protect Thacker Pass asks hard questions and confronts the self-deception of the environmental movement. Part of the great upswelling on behalf of the earth and our humanity, Mountains and Waters Alliance asks us to become allies with forests, mountains, and rivers instead of trying to be gods.
It’s a frightening time. So always is labor and birth. Be alive.
Announcements:
Here’s a recording of a dharma talk called “Refuge,” given at Red Clay Sangha in Atlanta. Here’s a link for a talk Sunday morning, March 28, also called “Refuge.”
Partial re- opening:
The months of April through June will be a work-practice period at MWA; come for what time you can, join us in zazen and in work. Covid safety continues as a priority,including quarantining in place, limited numbers, etc. In May we do construction, the first step toward solarizing the house. Meditation retreats and work retreats follow through the year; online groups, classes, and zazen continue.
Take heart. Something is rising. We are part of it, we are alive.
With love,
Shodo-
On the insurrection – and the new Reichstag Fire
Yesterday armed white supremacists stormed the Capitol to stop the certification of electoral college votes.
Washington police, well skilled in crowd control, offered no advance resistance; things were allowed to escalate beyond control. After fact-checking: It may or may not be true that police opened barricades to let in the mob; one police posed for selfies with an invader.
Only one invader was killed, while fourteen police were wounded. Rather than arresting the invaders, tasing, teargassing, firehosing, or shooting them as they would with peaceful protesters of color, they gently pressured them to leave after hours of vandalism. Of course they didn’t want to create martyrs. They could have done much better. The Right is blaming the whole thing on Antifa.
And most of the worst public officials and politicians abandoned Trump at the last, along with several of his staff resigning. I expect the man will be removed, one way or another.
“Choose Democracy” calls it a failed coup attempt: the structures held. The fact that judges denied all of the efforts to overturn the vote by legal maneuvers, that the National Guard finally was called and that the process continued in Congress – they rank these as essential.
Van Jones says the question is whether this is an end or a beginning: the end of something bad, or the beginning of something worse. Our collective actions will decide that. Choose Democracy does not recommend public rallies at this time, while the supremacists are so volatile.
Here is my largest worry now:
I found myself relieved when the police finally showed up. Learning from history: Hitler suspended civil liberties after the Reichstag Fire provided an excuse – and there’s some evidence that the Reichstag Fire was set or encouraged by Nazis. Let us not allow this to be our Reichstag Fire, in which we encourage Pence toward draconian measures which will later be used everywhere. (Civil liberties were never restored during the Nazi Regime.) We need to keep this in mind as we move forward.
Crisis is opportunity. Might this be a time of turning toward a humane society? As the inherent violence in the status quo is so very visible – coming from people who sincerely believe they are launching the next American Revolution – may we begin to dismantle its foundations in hate, in the illusion of being masters of the world, in juvenile insistence on getting what we want no matter what cost to others? (Seen: “Your health is not more important than my liberty” – seriously, about masks.) May we begin? And how?
I don’t know a lot. I’m sure of a few things: Arguing with neighbors and family will not help; presenting information will not help because they won’t believe it. Being human with those you already know might help. Being human and kind with all of those we are close to, with our families and friends, with co-workers for change, will surely help; look for what you can praise rather than what to criticize. Be the resourced one, not the panicked one. Take care of yourself with rest, meditation, physical care. Support your body with protein and vegetables, not sugar and alcohol. Ask for kindness from each other, especially when panic, rage, or distrust try to take over. And pray, meditate, and again. Whether you pray with tobacco, incense, holy water, movement, song, or just words, pray. We are not alone. The key mistake of the culture that once walked away from an authoritarian God-image was to choose itself as replacement god. We are not gods, and we don’t have to be. Every living thing supports us. Let us go home, return to our family among trees and grasses, mountains and streams, seek help from them.
We need to learn this. Pandemics and climate change are waiting in the wings, and will require even more of us. Find the still place deep within, and nourish it with all you have. Practice.
“Not-knowing is most intimate”
The year called 2020 will probably be remembered for a long time for its hardship. May our descendants know it also as a key point in the Great Turning. We don’t know yet.
We may recognize the feelings of William Butler Yeats when he wrote in 1919 after The Great War (WWI) ended, while his Ireland home was still in turmoil, while the future was unknown:
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
It seems now, as 2021 begins, that the center is holding; yet there is still no certainty. I expect Biden and Harris to be sworn in and a new administration to begin the task of re-establishing a level of stability. But we can’t be sure about all those Americans who are waving guns, threatening or shooting people in the name of liberty, calling themselves militia – or sometimes police. We don’t know what’s happened to the mood of the country. And we don’t yet know whether the Senate will change hands, and whether the change of power will be peaceful. Not knowing.
We have both a vaccine and a new strain of the virus. Tired as we are of lockdowns and deaths, it’s not over. We don’t know when. Nor when another might arise, because industrial civilization continues to create the situations that give rise to these dangerous beings. Not knowing.
Meanwhile, racism is in the open. The insistence on destroying the planet for profit is revealed. And years of resistance costing lives and dollars begin to be rewarded in court, and by banks and investors dropping fossil fuel projects, and by mainstream news and the general public learning to say the words. It was hard but necessary. Much more not-knowing ahead.
Of course it’s hard. I’d like to be as naive as when I was a child, but the world is not secure. It never was, except in the minds of privileged people who didn’t know their lives were based on enslavement and death of others.
So my hope for a return from near-anarchy is balanced by certainty that the old “normal” is not good enough; that old ways of thinking will take us back to inequality, death, and climate change. That the Industrial Growth Society (Joanna Macy 2009) must end. Whatever it takes.
To those who lost loved ones, or health, or jobs, or small businesses, or their homes – I apologize for what may sound uncaring. We don’t know what comes next, or who will yet lose what. Our actions create the world. If we are willing to throw away a single life, those actions will lead back to what we are hoping to escape.
Mountains and Waters Alliance
Everything has changed. An “Introduction to Zen” weekend retreat turned into an online class that still meets weekly. The “Gift of Fearlessness” group, originally a response to the pandemic, continues to meet, supporting each other as we face what we cannot know. We’ve had online zazen (now only Mondays) and two in-person retreats in this spacious place – “land care” and Zen sesshin. People are donating, and some volunteers have come in spite of the pandemic. Today we have several inches of snow, glittering in the sunlight. It’s been a good time for quiet, and for working on the book.
Plans for this coming year are necessarily uncertain. But here is a rough outline. It includes some things happening elsewhere, that I recommend and plan to attend.
Online, single events
Thursday, January 7, “The New Ecosattva Path” talk by David Loy. 5:30-7:30 Central Time, at Zen Center North Shore in Massachusetts: The link is on that page, and they request registration and donation.
January 10: online talk at Sanshin Zen Community, topic “Embrace and sustain all beings”. Zazen 8:10, talk 9:10 Central Time. Look here for the link.
February 20: one-day retreat with Red Clay Sangha in Atlanta – topic “Refuge.” Register here.
February 21: dharma talk with Red Clay Sangha in Atlanta. Sitting starts 8 am or after; talk begins 9:30 Central Time. Information and link is here.
Online, ongoing:
Wednesday evenings 6:30-8 “Introduction to Zen” class, about 6-7 participants, studying Okumura’s Living by Vow. We’ll finish the book by spring, and then make a decision. (Ask to be added to the email list.)
Sunday evenings 4:30-5:45 “The Gift of Fearlessness” reading and discussing various offerings, related to current events. (Ask to be added to the email list.)
Third Sunday evening 6:00-8 Heart Sutra, advanced class, taught by Luca Valentino with assistance from Shodo. (by invitation only)
In person, dates uncertain:
Maple sugaring – tapping trees and boiling sap – early spring (February – April, depending on weather)
Construction – late spring/summer – making the building more sustainable. There may be volunteer opportunities connected with this.
Fall work weekend, probably in October – harvest, land care, firewood, or as needed
Sewing retreat – probably in 2021 – for people preparing to receive the Buddhist precepts
In person, planned dates:
April 16-20: land care retreat, or just work time – buckthorn management, part 1 – cutting
April-May (weather dependent): buckthorn management, part 2 – burning, with professional supervision
May 13-23: Shodo away studying – covid-dependent
June 18-22: sesshin (limited to 5 people, or online, covid-dependent)
July 16-20: Shodo will be on private retreat
August 13-16: land care retreat – specifics to be determined
September 17-21: sesshin (limited to 5 people, or online, covid-dependent)
November 11-22: Shodo away studying – covid-dependent
December 1-8: Rohatsu sesshin: Hope we can be indoors and sit together peacefully.
Not-knowing is most intimate. As we make our way through what we hope will be a public health recovery and a return to stable though still corporate governance , we are surfing on unknowable waves. Those of us who are not hungry or being shot at, it is ours to move carefully, with respect for those who are at great risk. Never in my life have I felt less sure of what will come next, except maybe that time when my bicycle went out of control going downhill.
This is what Zen master Dizang was addressing when he said “not-knowing is most intimate.” It’s a way of life, highly recommended. Yet, when forced into it, simply admitting it is so can help us make our way.
With love,
Shodo Spring
Turning – the year and the world
As I write, we are already in the longest night. Winter solstice officially happens this year at 4:03 am, Central Time, Monday, December 21.
We are also in a worldwide crisis, and a national crisis here in the United States, the likes of which have not been seen for a very long time. It’s not only the unbelievable actions of the President. Not only the pandemic killing hundreds of thousands of people and the impoverishment of millions. There is also an environmental crisis that is not going away, and climate change is galloping right along. The Biden election is supposed to be a return to normal, with a few improvements. To many of us, it’s doubtful whether we’ll ever return – or that we should. We need a new and different normal, for the benefit of all life on earth.
Some of us intend to find a way of life that belongs to the natural world instead of battling it. This will be a huge change in the ways that we live. Convenience can no longer be a priority. We, of course, mostly don’t know how to forage for food or any other activities of living without our massive industries. Yet people have lived this way before, and generally preferred it. And some of us are re-membering, re-learning, or learning new.
Just now, it also feels like something is moving on another level. Three examples in four weeks: “Federal land manager pulls plug on Utah tar sand lease” because a contractor in their own office had a conflict of interest – which they’d ignored for at least ten years. Alaska’s Pebble Mine was finally denied a permit by the Army Corps of Engineers. An offshore oil drilling project in the Arctic was stopped by the U.S. Court of Appeals. I begin to expect the end of Minnesota’s Line 3 project too, while dozens of people are freezing and praying to block it. (Here’s a link for Line 3 resistance.)
Solstice is always a time for making change. This beautiful essay by Sarah Sunshine Manning of the NDN Collective invites us to it as a blessing.
This year, there’s something extra beyond the annual tradition. This year, we’re invited to set intentions for the coming twenty years. The Saturn-Jupiter conjunction is here, will influence the whole day Monday, focused at 12:18 pm Central Time. scary times. Imagine creating the next twenty years.
Reflect on how the country, the world, the state, your local community and family, might be in 2040, if blessed by the full power of our love and intention, our joining with every conscious being – whether that be plants, animals, spirits, rivers, mountains – or one divine being of your own belief. Take some quiet time, whatever you can, and offer your prayer, your ceremony, your sacred fire, your sacred intention, and give your own heart to creating that way.
Then follow those intentions and prayers with actions. All of us. Together let us create the new world.
With love,
Shodo Spring
Hold the Center
Dear Friends,
These are tumultuous times. We may think we have come through the storm. We may think the storm is just beginning as a certain man and his supporters resist the election results.
If neither of those happens, there is still this:
The Democratic Party is still committed to corporate profits and willing to destroy both our lives (especially BIPOC lives) and the whole planet in exchange. Or perhaps they are committed to losing – since they now push to abandon the very issues (Medicare for All) that won districts for their advocates. That is the beginning of a rant; I’ll refrain.
We are at a beginning.
As I was moving mulch in the garden, this morning before the rain and cold arrive, I thought that these meditation verses might be relevant for our dealings with the political world and the transition. From Sawyer Hitchcock, who lived and worked here for two weeks.
For weeding: Together with all beings, may we open the ground for new life.
For pruning: Together with all beings, may life return to the roots.
For building a path: Together with all beings, may we open the way for new life.
And mine, for clearing invasive plants: Together with all beings, may you return to your true home.
For my European settler-colonist people, regardless of how long we’ve been here, I wish this specifically: together with all beings, may we return to our true home. Wherever that may be – but there is this: for as long as European settlers have been on this continent, we have collectively treated it as a colony to exploit rather than as a home to embrace. I think we treated Europe that way too, and – knowing something of Europe’s indigenous peoples – I wonder when that began and why it prevailed. So my wish means “May we recognize that our true home is on this earth, may we stop discounting it as a short interruption on the road to heaven, may we be willing to belong here, may we finally join the family of life.” And may we make amends.
And here are these beautiful words of encouragement, from Clarissa Pinkola Estes (via Facebook), and St. Paul’s letter to the Corinthians (via Clarissa):
As you can dear souls, Hold the Center and Be Peace. Whatever outcomes, there will be much work to be done, to either prevent more wreckage, or to dive into the wreck and retrieve the treasures and repair them.
That is where Undiminishable Love and Inextinguishable Light flow: to within one’s reach, to prevent further wreckage of matters dear; to dive and retrieve the treasures within your reach, and to help to mend those you bring up held close to your heart.
Just this tiny storycito. In letter to Corinthians, a small village of people long ago, was writ something that is usually translated as ‘we will all be changed,’ [by the upheaval].
But that’s not quite what it actually says in the original ancient language. First of all, that quote leaves out the salient words that preceded it. They are these:
‘Listen! I am telling you a mystery. We will not all fall asleep but we will all be changed.’
That is what the translation into English says. But/and here is what it actually says in the ancient words carefully considered:
‘Behold this, you, see this! I am showing you an initiation [musterion] that comes from standing in silence within your holy nature.’
[in other words, clear instruction is being given to us to shed the old and step into a new strong reality of strength and vision. It’s saying wake up! you are in the midst of an initiation; you will not be the same after this…stand in a centered holy silence –more precise instruction about how to live the holy way on a day to day basis ]
Furthermore it says, with attention to the actual meanings of the old words:
‘we will not all slumber, that is, decrease in power, seem as though dead [koimao]… Rather
‘moreover, we will in a whole way, make things different [as a result of being passed through initiation]’
Id like to offer these ancient instructions to you as the place to stand to hold the Center. Your Center, and the Center of the World Tree. You see how this fits or you, this standing in holy silence, each of you being a customized job.
Steady she goes. Easy does it.
We are together.
Blessings to you all in this time. Together with all beings, may we open the ground for new life.
with love,
Shodo
A meditation for strong negative emotions
Here’s something to do
“When I sit zazen, feelings of anger and even rage come up. What can I do?” was the question. I didn’t have an answer, but a response came anyway, from the depths of Buddhist tradition. Because so many of us have this situation, I’m offering it here now.
There’s a practice called tonglen, from Tibetan Buddhism. There are many ways to describe it. Its basis is the act of taking in negativity, allowing it to enter and purify your heart, and sending out pure loving and healing energy. Here is a more detailed description:
Sit comfortably; settle your physical body and let your breathing become steady. Bring your attention to the event, person, or emotion that troubles you. It could be a matter of injustice in the world, something that affects you personally, a person or group in pain, or your own inability to calm down. Beginning, it’s easier to begin with something outside yourself, something specific, especially an individual person.
Let yourself be aware of their distress. With every inbreath, breathe it into your heart. You might imagine it as an ugly or dark cloud, a poisonous gas, an acrid smoke, extreme heat – whatever is unpleasant to you. Bring it toward your heart, staying objective and just observing.
Allow this toxic thing to penetrate your heart and cleanse it. You might imagine there is a thick shield around your heart, that requires a very strong acid to penetrate. Or visualize the heart itself as clogged, rigid, thick, dead. As if you were using a powerful cleaning substance, bring the smoke in and let it dissolve the hindrances, making your heart clear again, open and flexible.
Breathing out, let this clear and open heart send a beautiful light, clear, cool, radiant, out and toward the original object. Imagine that it has the power to actually heal the situation or person.
Do this as long as you like. It won’t be instant; your first breath may barely begin the process, and the first exhale may seem puny. Just let it come a little farther in each time. Let the poison be the medicine. You will learn that your heart has the ability to transform negativity into healing and life.
Personal note
After describing this process in the class, I realized how desperately I need to do it myself. For a while now, it will be my core practice for daily sitting meditation and occasional other times. Whatever comes into my mind can be a focus. Now, along with chanting for people and causes, I’m sending tonglen. To this land where I live: it feels like a living being underneath my body; on my way to sleep I felt its presence and sent this embrace. To a friend. To the places of wildfires, and the places of floods, to the humans, animals, insects, plants, soil-dwellers, soils and rocks and mountains and streams and air impacted by those natural disasters whether caused naturally or not. To the people facing prison for environmental activism. To the Mi’kmaw people in Nova Scotia as they resist violent attacks by white lobster organizations. To Gretchen Whitmore, and to the “Wolverine Watchmen” who attempted to kidnap her. To immigrant children held in cages. Personally hardest – a certain neighbor who has harmed me and probably will again.
It’s harder to do this practice with the perpetrators of violence. It’s a beneficial practice anyway. In the past I’ve said to people criticizing those wo do evil, “Would you want to live in that mind?” They never would. Yet it’s more comfortable to divide the world, to divide human beings into good and bad, right and wrong, our people and the enemy. And when we make that division, hate wins.
I say that very carefully. To suggest that the perpetrators are still human, probably acting from trauma, seems to offer permission for them to do their harm. No. Definitely not. When we look at someone acting clearly out of hate, or worse for simple profit, we are looking at someone severely damaged by this culture. The damage may come through obvious trauma in their family, through societal conditioning in grade school, or from subtle conditioning of an insane, wetiko social culture.
Wetiko is a Cree word that means cannibal monsters that devour everything, and that make others be like them. It’s a mental illness set loose in Europe centuries ago; my ancestors had to adapt, submit or join. Those who joined the best became the rulers of our (white people, industrial civilization, capitalist) culture.
Doing something in politics
Just briefly, I want to encourage you to vote, and to get engaged in activities that support people to vote and to protect the vote. Here’s a website with a lot of information: https://paceebene.org/election-action
People are doing things to get out the vote, to protect voters from intimidation, and to make sure votes are counted. Afterward, there is probably work to do for peace, for protection, and to protect the election results. You can find that at this information too.
Very small things can help. You can help safely. Please do something.
Here at Mountains and Waters
The idea of a “management team” has come up and I’m looking for a few people who’d like to do a little more. The team would get together with me occasionally to make detailed decisions.
For example, I’d love some folks to think with me about the 2021 schedule, and help me write a budget .
Some of the team would take on ongoing roles – something you would enjoy doing for a few hours per month, or sporadically for projects. Here’s a list.
- bookkeeping/accounting/office help (help me pull things together for the professional accountant)
- help guide the Sunday group (choosing readings/topics, thinking together about how it goes)
- website help (this is already taken, thanks)
- help create a new brochure for when the pandemic is over (writing and/or graphic arts skills)
- other outreach kinds of things such as social media, or other communications such as local Buddhist centers
- outreach specifically for farm volunteering and events
If you are tempted, please call or email me, and we can talk. I won’t pressure. I’d love your help.
Prayers and a poem
We are in a perilous time as a country, and as a world. The pandemic combined with climate change combined with serious economic hardships for many of us – and the polarization, open violence and open white supremacy, the signs of pending fascism – let us practice calm, let us offer prayers and chanting and kindness in every way we can. Do not despair.
The meditation offered above is one possibility. Loving-kindness meditation, if you do that, is another. And here is a poem I love, offering a way to be, regardless of the times.
“what if our religion was each other,
if our practice was our life,
if prayer, our words.
what if the temple was the earth,
if forests were our church,
if holy water—the rivers, lakes, and oceans.
what if meditation was our relationships,
if the teacher was life,
if wisdom was self-knowledge,
if love was the center of our being.”
—ganga white
Please be well and care for each other.
Love,
Shodo