We typically think of the path of enlightenment as a movement from dwelling within a realm of delusion, pain, and suffering to a realm that is free. We may think of enlightenment as something we don’t yet have but will obtain with realization. When the monastic sent by Ho-shang Mi asks, “Right in this very moment, are you dependent upon enlightenment?” he is asking, Is enlightenment something apart from you? Is it outside? What is it?

But how, in the realm of the absolute, do we rely upon something that has no form? How do we rely upon something that is timeless? How can we rely upon anything when there’s not a single thing that has permanence, that is solid and fixed? If we realize the emptiness of past, present, and future, how then do we also understand the evolution of realization within our lives as practitioners?

Realizing the true nature of self allows us to live our lives within that understanding. And because of this, because that is no absence of enlightenment, in all moments and in all circumstances that e is falling to the ground, and there is using the ground to stand. There is meeting an impenetrable barrier, and there’s leaping free of that barrier. There is studying the self and forgetting the self, there is holding on, and there is letting go. There is giving up, and there is taking the next step. There is resilience.

~Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Roshi

when the in between places linger within us……

inquiry for today~   and from this place of sweet questions- find your place…..

essential virtue

Learn to take the

backward step that turns

the light and shines

it inward. Body and mind

of themselves will drop

away, and your original

face will manifest.

~Eihei Dogen