Blue

Dear Friends,

For today, we continue with Dogen (1200-1253), whose Zen poetry is a marvel of Mahayana attainment.  As so often in the work of mystical masters, he both affirms that the individual exists and persists across all levels of being, and also that the individual is not limited to the normal sense of separated, localized body and mind.  

True person manifest throughout the ten quarters of the world.

The true person is
not anyone in particular;
But, like the deep blue color
Of the limitless sky,
It is everyone, everywhere in the world.

The idea here is about our universal humanity as a living organism, and about our omnipresence.  It is a challenge.  There are people who feel alien to us, others with whom we vehemently disagree on certain points, perhaps even some who want us annihilated.  Where is the common humanity?  Discussions with our closest family and friends can reveal such deep discord, it is easy to despair.

Abstract and theoetical solutions, even when they are convincing in their way, will never give us the satisfaction of direct experience.  Yet the world calls for our participation.  We gather today to help one another open up, as the blue of a limitless sky.

with love,
Michael