Zazen is a request from the depths of our mind

Last weekend, fifteen persons or so came to discover Zen practice. On the first day, after sitting in zazen, a person decided to leave: “I haven’t come to sit.” But Zen is nothing but zazen. No one can be forced to practice zazen. Kodo Sawaki wrote: “Zazen is a request from the depths of our mind.”

If you don’t hear this request, of course you can’t sit in zazen. Zazen is a request from our mind. We all have a request for peace deep down. Don’t be like a young mouse running all over the place, always looking for something. Don’t be like a sheep on a dump chewing all that he finds. Meet the request of the mind, attain peace of mind.

In zazen don’t catch hold of everything that appears to consciousness. Let things appear, let things disappear, without moving. Maintain a stately posture, don’t rest on any motive.

Already in the last century, Kodo Sawaki used to say: “Ours is a very sad era when you see human beings, madmen, ready to press a button and start a nuclear war.”

In a desire for peace, human beings decided last week to squander tremendous amounts to each have their own military arsenal.

Attaining peace is a request from the depths of our mind. Just sit down, just sit, without paying attention to what appears to consciousness, without paying attention to what disappears from consciousness.

Consciousness is like a mirror. Forms appear and disappear by themselves on the mirror. There is nothing to do, no even trying to clean the mirror. Forms by themselves, images by themselves disappear. It’s up to us to not leave them on the mirror.

Just a silent coincidence and nothing is lacking.

Taiun JP Faure, April 2022