Yun Men’s The Body Exposed, The Golden WindFrom talks given by Roshi Eve Myonen Marko on November 17 and December 4, 2012.
A monk asked Yun Men, “How is it when the tree withers and the leaves fall?”
Yun Men said, “Body exposed in the golden wind.”
A few weeks ago I unpacked from my trip to Europe and found a sheet of names. It was the names of people who’d died at Auschwitz/Birkenau, listing also their dates of birth, where they came from, their tattoo numbers, and their dates of death. These, of course, were only those who were registered and worked at the camp, not the countless others who went straight to their deaths. I remembered that during the Auschwitz retreat I’d been given this extra page and hadn’t read the names out loud as we usually do there; instead I’d brought it home with me. So the next morning, after my meditation, I read the names on it out loud and have kept the page on my home altar ever since.
As I read the names that morning I saw the lives of people; how each name was an entire world, with homes, families, daily rituals, and all the activity of life. I saw the white paper they were printed on, the space between the words and the lines, the margins on the sides, on top and the bottom, the white beneath the black print, and I realized the space not just contained their lives but was also the essence of their lives.
As my voice chanted their names it felt like it was chanting everything: their voices, the voices of those around them, the sounds of their life and death, and the silence that was there, too. It helped me appreciate again the practice of listening to people as they speak, listening as deeply as possible in order to hear everything. That, I think, is Kannon’s practice.
The important thing is to realize that everything in life is not only contained in silence, but is silence itself. When we sit, we experience the basic nature of our mind, its quiet, undisturbed quality, its awareness that may be with object or without, but unattached. It’s not something that a teacher gives you, it’s something we always had and continue to have, only it’s hidden by our attachments.
Yesterday I had various unpleasant interactions and I could see my mind beginning to go crazy. When that happens, I become a source of craziness to others. I could see my behavior bringing on doubts and anxiety in others. Seeing that was so important to me. I didn’t judge, I just noticed—and then changed my behavior.
Life will do whatever it does. Seeing the true nature of things and events doesn’t mean we don’t act. We act, only without confusion.
That’s part of what simplifying life is all about for me. Most of our fight is to change the wording on the paper. If we could only rewrite our lives, and then rewrite some more, and some more, things would be fine. Only they won’t. What we can do is strengthen our relationship to this white, this oneness, this space which contains everything and manifests in everything. How do we see that it’s all one thing—the birth, the death, the rebirth, again the death, insanity, suffering, humanity, and even the confusion about all these things? How do we let go and find refuge in the mystery, even serve it rather than fight it?
A monk asked Yun Men, “How is it when the tree withers and the leaves fall?”
Yun Men said, “Body exposed in the golden wind.”
The monk asks, What happens when you’ve let go of concepts and ideas, words and letters? What is the practice of not being attached to this result or that outcome, to this opinion or that “truth”? When we let go and let go and let go, now what?
Since the time of the Buddha, hasn’t that been the basic practice? And when we have done that and done that, what is our life then? Is it blissful, or at the very least happy? Isn’t it finally free of suffering and pain?
Yun Men answered: Body exposed in the golden wind.
Full exposure, as though we’re naked in the winds of life, letting everything in and everything out.
For me, the golden wind evokes autumn. I just turned 63 and had eye surgery. My husband turns 74 next month. Between us we have some eight decades of sitting practice. So what now, you might ask? Don’t you have answers after practicing for so long? No, I have total exposure.
Trungpa Rinpoche often spoke of living life on the razor’s edge, feeling sharply every aspect, happy or sad. He said that that’s what being fully alive meant. If there is irritation in an eye that was operated on, feel that. Don’t turn irritation into irritability. It’s the golden wind that blows everywhere and nowhere.
A monk asked Yun Men, “How is it when the tree withers and the leaves fall?”
Yun Men said, “Body exposed in the golden wind.”
A few weeks ago I unpacked from my trip to Europe and found a sheet of names. It was the names of people who’d died at Auschwitz/Birkenau, listing also their dates of birth, where they came from, their tattoo numbers, and their dates of death. These, of course, were only those who were registered and worked at the camp, not the countless others who went straight to their deaths. I remembered that during the Auschwitz retreat I’d been given this extra page and hadn’t read the names out loud as we usually do there; instead I’d brought it home with me. So the next morning, after my meditation, I read the names on it out loud and have kept the page on my home altar ever since.
As I read the names that morning I saw the lives of people; how each name was an entire world, with homes, families, daily rituals, and all the activity of life. I saw the white paper they were printed on, the space between the words and the lines, the margins on the sides, on top and the bottom, the white beneath the black print, and I realized the space not just contained their lives but was also the essence of their lives.
As my voice chanted their names it felt like it was chanting everything: their voices, the voices of those around them, the sounds of their life and death, and the silence that was there, too. It helped me appreciate again the practice of listening to people as they speak, listening as deeply as possible in order to hear everything. That, I think, is Kannon’s practice.
The important thing is to realize that everything in life is not only contained in silence, but is silence itself. When we sit, we experience the basic nature of our mind, its quiet, undisturbed quality, its awareness that may be with object or without, but unattached. It’s not something that a teacher gives you, it’s something we always had and continue to have, only it’s hidden by our attachments.
Yesterday I had various unpleasant interactions and I could see my mind beginning to go crazy. When that happens, I become a source of craziness to others. I could see my behavior bringing on doubts and anxiety in others. Seeing that was so important to me. I didn’t judge, I just noticed—and then changed my behavior.
Life will do whatever it does. Seeing the true nature of things and events doesn’t mean we don’t act. We act, only without confusion.
That’s part of what simplifying life is all about for me. Most of our fight is to change the wording on the paper. If we could only rewrite our lives, and then rewrite some more, and some more, things would be fine. Only they won’t. What we can do is strengthen our relationship to this white, this oneness, this space which contains everything and manifests in everything. How do we see that it’s all one thing—the birth, the death, the rebirth, again the death, insanity, suffering, humanity, and even the confusion about all these things? How do we let go and find refuge in the mystery, even serve it rather than fight it?
A monk asked Yun Men, “How is it when the tree withers and the leaves fall?”
Yun Men said, “Body exposed in the golden wind.”
The monk asks, What happens when you’ve let go of concepts and ideas, words and letters? What is the practice of not being attached to this result or that outcome, to this opinion or that “truth”? When we let go and let go and let go, now what?
Since the time of the Buddha, hasn’t that been the basic practice? And when we have done that and done that, what is our life then? Is it blissful, or at the very least happy? Isn’t it finally free of suffering and pain?
Yun Men answered: Body exposed in the golden wind.
Full exposure, as though we’re naked in the winds of life, letting everything in and everything out.
For me, the golden wind evokes autumn. I just turned 63 and had eye surgery. My husband turns 74 next month. Between us we have some eight decades of sitting practice. So what now, you might ask? Don’t you have answers after practicing for so long? No, I have total exposure.
Trungpa Rinpoche often spoke of living life on the razor’s edge, feeling sharply every aspect, happy or sad. He said that that’s what being fully alive meant. If there is irritation in an eye that was operated on, feel that. Don’t turn irritation into irritability. It’s the golden wind that blows everywhere and nowhere.