STURGEON MOON

"Sturgeon Moon," Speedball block printing ink, art marker, and found paper on cardboard box panel.

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Today, I observed the full moon by sitting this morning with my lineage temple for a fusatsu ceremony—a time of atonement, repentance, and renewing the bodhisattva precepts/vows I'll take in less than a year.

This evening, I sat with my home temple of South Sound Zen, for one of my "better" sits, which countered last week's body shenanigans.

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Moon's voice is the bell 

calling me to the cushion— 

a body of tides

JUST OUR HEART

Just Our Heart (2026) directed by Maartje Nevejan. "Grief is love that has nowhere to go." It is the rare film that draws forth tears from me. This is one of those rare films. It's a poetic, cinematographic, meditative film that explores death, grief, loss, and transformation. It does so both gentle and firm. It does so obliquely, in "slant rhyme" as Emily Dickinson would say. It's about being open to being broken, to being cracked open, to engaging the tears that flow, and waving back at those who wave at us, with us. This is a truly beautiful work of documentary art.

It is also about the importance and need for rites of passage and rituals in our lives.

This is the August 2026 selection of the Tricycle Film Club.

HINT HINT

This guy!

Wrigley is trying to get me to sit, so that he can sit too. I told him maybe later today, after dinner.

FOCUS

Tonight was the most brutal sit I've ever experienced. Instead of a cushion, I sat in a chair, otherwise it would have been an order of magnitude worse. I didn't have to confront my thoughts or my mind, but rather my body as it slowly "unravelled" into nervous system chaos. My body walked me through internal shocks, muscles tightening and locking up, and the exquisite caresses of The Visitors (who haven't shown up recently) during a grand performance.

So my glasses on the table in front of me became a point of return when stuff got too crazy. I thought of them as me watching me. It was a technique to reset and refocus, in order that I didn't bother anyone else in the room.

I did it! I survived an hour of sitting (two 30 minute sessions) and 10 minutes of walking meditation.

BON ODORI

Bon Odori. Tacoma Buddhist Temple. 

 

Good food. Good friends. Brief worship. Dancing for the ancestors. Taiko drumming.

RAKUSU

Yin and yang. Washing, drying, and ironing fabrics for my upcoming sewing project.

ROBE of LIBERATION

"Robe of Liberation," book binding twine, permanent marker, and Montana BLACK spray paint on cardboard. 

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A record of my rakusu journey.

I purchased the fabric to start making and sewing my rakusu. This is going to be a months-long project, but the first "baby" steps have been taken.

LINEAGE

"Lineage," art marker and signature stamp on Montana BLACK spray paint on found cardboard.

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As part of my Buddhist journey toward possibly receiving the bodhisattva precepts, I'm capturing it in art. (I'm required to capture it in writing.)

This is an abstract representation of the lineage chart of buddhas and ancestors, with me at the bottom. My Troy chop mark peeks out of the spray paint haze, indistinct, which I really like.

I think my Mom's Feast Day, and reflecting on my personal lineage, helped solidify concepts that were bouncing around in my head for some time.

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lineage— 

winding blood dragon 

Buddha moon

GLOSS

I am studying the sixteen bodhisattva precepts.

In the program in which I'm enrolled, we have to write glosses on each of the precepts. "[P]ut your reflections into a gloss, usually a paragraph on each precept, though it can become a creative project, as well." So I created "dharma gates" to represent each of the precepts. 

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The Three Treasures are in blue. The Three Tenets (Pure Precepts) are in red. The Ten Mindfulness Practices are in yellow.

Marks-A-Lot permanent marker on Montana Black spray paint on cardboard. Japanese kanji on labels.

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Dharma gates are boundless; I vow to master them.

Dharmas are boundless; I vow to comprehend them.

Reality is boundless; I vow to perceive it.

 
The third of the four Bodhisattva/All-Embracing Vows, in three translations/expressions: (1) Sonoma Mountain Zen Center; (2) Kazuaki Tanahashi; (3) Upaya Zen Center.

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I don't regard my life
as insufficient.
Inside the brushwood gate
there is a moon;
there are flowers.
 
—the poet Ryōkan, translated by Kazuaki Tanahashi

THE HEART SUTRA

I finished reading The Heart Sutra: A Comprehensive Guide to the Classic of Mahayana Buddhism (2014) by Kazuaki Tanahashi. This is one of my favorite types of books: one that tackles a single subject and explores it in depth. ("Comprehensive" is in the subtitle.) Tanahashi explores the provenance of The Heart Sutra in its Sanskrit and Chinese forms, and in various translations and renderings into other languages—Japanese, Tibetan, Nepalese, English, and others. He looks at modern and recent scholarship, and provides his own translation with co-authorship by Roshi Joan Halifax. But one of the most important sections is 70 pages of examining terms and concepts in the Sanskrit and Chinese versions and explaining them in detail. This is a book I will be returning to again and again.

SITTING and SWORDS

A beautiful evening in the backyard dojo. First, swords. Then, sitting. Zen threaded through it all.

NO SELF, NO PROBLEM

"Perhaps the reason Buddhism and other spiritual traditions use metaphors so frequently is because they sidestep the gatekeeping functions of the interpretive mind."

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No Self, No Problem: How Neurobiology Is Catching Up to Buddhism (2019) by Chris Niebauer. Peek behind the Matrix of your own mind by reading this book. The short take: your left brain "interpreter" is lying to you about almost everything, as it spins story after story and keeps your non-verbal right brain enslaved. Each chapter ends with a way or two to explore and/or experience the concepts it presents. This was a fascinating and brisk read. I highly recommend it.

Checked out from the Puyallup Public Library.

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"Compassion is all about the big picture, at which the right brain excels. I would add that true compassion only occurs when we can imagine ourselves in the position of another."

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"Maybe you meditate, practice mindfulness, and feel very spiritually grounded when you do, and later the ego comes back online and is frustrated to find out that you've run out of coffee."

DANCING with UNCERTAINTY

"Dancing with Uncertainty: Buddhist Pathways to Climate Resilience" with Dr. Stephanie Kaza was an excellent presentation, hosted by Pacific Lutheran University's Religion and Environmental Studies departments for Earth Day.

It was a "slow presentation," in the spirit of the "slow food" movement—something to be savored in the company of the like-minded. Contemplative slides allowed the audience (and presenter) moments to pause between sets of ideas and concepts. And The Child pointed out that none of the images of nature were "alarmist"—no photos of strip mines or clear cuts—but rather celebratory in some sense. Perhaps images of nature on its own terms, which I found intriguing and hopeful.

This is going to stick with me for some time.

ONE-DAY SIT

Now sit steadfastly and think not-thinking. How do you think not-thinking? Beyond thinking.

—from "Fukanzazengi" by Dōgen

 

My spot of "focus" for the day, although not really "seen" for most of that time, except indistinctly.

 

I'm exhausted but in a good way, even though I mostly sat staring at a wall.

WORDLESS PROCLAMATION

Zazen is wordless proclamation.

—Nyoze Kwong, Abbot of Sonoma Mountain Zen Center

SITTING

fading temple bell
the fragrance of flowers strikes
at evening

—Bashō



Tonight's sit with South Sound Zen sangha was a good one. The weather was nice yet people still showed up. Sunset is later so there was still some light in our room, even at the end of sitting. I was asked to serve as doan: ringing bells, keeping time, and leading one chant. We chanted the Sandokai, which was new to me. I discovered the poetry of Korean poet Ko Un. My body felt good throughout the sit, and I left feeling calm.

THERE IS BEAUTY

There is beauty in this moment. 

There is beauty in this morning. 

There is beauty in the sitting. 

There is beauty in the silence. 

There is beauty in the stillness. 

There is beauty in this small dog sitting in my lap, meditating alongside me. 

There is beauty in the chanting. 

There is beauty in the flame. 

There is beauty in the incense.

KANNON

Kannon no
iraka miyari tsu
hana no kumo

—Bashō, spring 1686

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Goddess of Mercy
the temple roof overlooks
a cloud of blossoms

—trans. Jane Reichhold

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Kannon's tiled temple
roof floats far away in clouds
of cherry blossoms

—trans. Sam Hamill

AN APPROPRIATE RESPONSE

A monk asked Yunmen, “What is the teaching of a lifetime?"

Yunmen replied “An appropriate response.”

—Blue Cliff Record, case 14

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After sitting zazen this evening, my Sōtō Zen sangha, engaged the above koan with "council," a group discussion technique borrowed from the Quakers.

Thinking about the current state of the world, our society, and ourselves, we answered the question, "What is an appropriate response?" The goal was to answer quickly, briefly, and with little forethought. It was amazing to hear what bubbled forth from people's minds and bodies and lives.

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What is an appropriate response?

STORM of FORMS

Tonight's sit was a storm of forms arising from emptiness. (Except emptiness is form, and form is emptiness.)

The ticking of the clock on the wall. 

The scent of someone's sweat. 

Sirens of emergency vehicles, near and far. 

Sighs and soft exhalations. 

The chatter of my own mind. 

The humming of the heater when it was on. 

The fluctuating temperature of the room. 

The aroma of Eiheiji incense. 

The pins-and-needles burning of numb legs. 

The dripping of the leaky pipe supplying the water fountain. 

The flicker of the candle on the altar. 

The slight smell of urine on a nearby cushion or the floor. 

People talking loudly in the alley behind the building. 

The shifting of someone in a chair.

And yet: simply showing up for the present moment.