Appreciate Your Life

　　By Maezumi Roshi

　　The pitfall is always within yourself. This very body and mind is the Way. You are complete to begin with. There is no gap, but you think there is.

　　How do you answer when someone asks you, "Why do you practice

　　"

　　In the Genjo Koan, Dogen Zenji says:

　　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 dharmas.

　　To be enlightened by the ten thousand dharmas is to free one”s body and mind and those of others.

　　The word narau, or "study," is more like "to repeat something over and over and over." We could also say "to learn," but not necessarily to learn something new. Perhaps an even better word would be practice. To practice the Buddha Way is to practice oneself, or just live life. This seemingly repetitive process is nothing but one”s own life.

　　Our practice is much more than acquiring some kind of knowledge; instead, the implication of practice is doing over and over and over and over. In a way that is what we do in zazen. Of course, our zazen is not just learning something over and over; rather, as Dogen Zenji says, it is realization itself. In other words, do not separate practice and realization. We do not practice for the sake of realization; realization is already here. Each of us has some realization, one person more, one person less. When you do zazen meditation day after day, time after time, moment after moment, you are manifesting yourself as that realization. Repeat what you know by merging your life into what you know, or what you have studied, and do this over and over and over again.

　　Dogen Zenji says, "To study the Buddha Way is to study oneself." How do we study ourselves

　　 How do we practice ourselves

　　 I say "we," but it is always singular. My life! Your life! The Buddha dharma, the One Body, is completely my life, completely your life. Shakyamuni Buddha himself found this out. That is why he said: "How wonderful! I and everyone in the universe is enlightened." Not just I, but everyone. That is what I means; I means everyone. But knowing this is not enough. That is why the words learn or study are not quite sufficient. They do not convey this sense of over and over and over. In other words, minute after minute, how do we live our life as the One Body, or the One Body as our life

　　 No more, no less.

　　Dogen Zenji said, "To study the self is to forget the self." When the Buddha dharma and my life are separate, when I do not see that my life is the One Body, that is a delusion. When I see that they are together, that is the so-called enlightened life, or the genjo koan. Genjo Koan is the name of one of the writings of Dogen Zenji. We translate it as Manifesting Absolute Reality. In other words, absolute reality manifests as one”s own life.

　　How do we work with this koan

　　 By realizing and living our life as the Buddha dharma, as the enlightened life. By not talking about enlightenment as if it is something outside our own life. Even talking about delusion or enlightenment is already a kind of delusion. The same can be said for studying koans or for doing shikantaza [resting in a state of pure attention, without a supporting technique such as following or counting the breath]. When we set anything up as the object, as something outside ourselves, right there we are conditioned by it. It does not matter how fine the object is, the result is the same. It is a deluded view, a kind of ego trip because in one way or another the ego is involved. It is very easy to be trapped there.

　　How can you forget the self

　　 Dogen Zenji says, "To forget the self is to be enlightened by the ten thousand dharmas." To be enlightened, to be confirmed, or to be verified by the ten thousand dharmas simply means to …

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