The Journey into Silence | Zen Meditation

Every journey into silence begins where it is loudest and darkest.

The whole world is burning, where do you want to hide? (Zen proverb)

By the whole world we mean one's own body and mind, and from birth to death these burn incessantly. How and where can you hide now? Every Zen master needs this question as a guide to meditation. We often try to act outside in order to achieve the silence we long for. Or we look for meditation techniques to calm the mind and distract ourselves so we don't have to think anymore. But the storm of time and transience rages eternally and unstoppably.

The journey into silence begins and ends with the true self

My Zen master used to say that our family tradition is simple: church is found in one's mind and God is found in one's self. This traditional and original teaching of self-cultivation has long been forgotten by many in the East and long lost in the West. This is how we move away from our true self and fall into the identification of the body and the mind. But as soon as you identify with one, you have to fight against the other because body and mind are opposites. This fight (body against mind and vice versa) means a fight against oneself and causes great damage. So we must be forever young and strong, mentally healthy and without mistakes. A hopeless undertaking.

Meditation means taking on the greatest possible responsibility

How do I get back to my original face, my self? I have a mind and a body, but I am not. And so I can use these two in a complementary way to create a dialogue between body and mind. This dialogue is expressed in harmony and wisdom. This self-cultivation also creates a healing process. What is divided is brought together again. When people come to Honora Zen Monastery I ask what they mean by meditation. Most often they mean sitting in silence for hours without thinking. However, sitting quietly (not thoughtlessly at all) is only the monastic form of monks and nuns. This idea is dangerous because it excludes everything else. Why don't you think of meditation as simply playing, learning and showing the world to your children? Or the conversations with your wife or husband? Meditation always means wiping your own front door, examining life and death, your body and mind again and again, so that you can come back to yourself.

Where do I belong? Self-glorification or self-realization?

In a time when it's almost all about making me feel good, we celebrate self-glorification. And we can no longer distinguish between pain and suffering, compassion and pity. We are stressed, exhausted and get sick. We do not find recovery and recovery in sleep. When we fall from the self, the ego takes over and we are caught in the tyranny of self-glorification. Divided from the self, we go into battle and the battlefield of mind against body, woman against man, guest against host, parents against children, state against individual.

Ultimately, everyone wants to know, “Where do I belong?” This question begins when one becomes aware of one's transience. Self-confidence arises with this existential question because it causes the contrast between life and death to arise in the heart. Where do I belong? With this meditation we provoke and demand the wisdom that understands the opposites as a dialogue and heals us.

As a Zen monk, I often perform weddings and funerals. I ask the question at every ceremony. At a wedding a family is created, at a funeral part of it disappears. Something arises and something passes, in both cases we have to find out where we belong.

Self-Realization - Silence

Meditation means sacrificing the ego so that the self can be realized. Meditation means finding out whether you really need what you want and whether you want what you need. Meditation means wisdom. Meditation means being the eye in the tornado. Meditation means to seek the silence within yourself, within and to act externally.

Responsibility and Wisdom

Meditation is not about feeling good and having the most extraordinary experiences possible. The ego naturally chases these addictive and happy things like a small child chases the sugar rush. We as parents guide children towards self-cultivation and self-discipline. But the closer you get to yourself, the more difficult it becomes to see the self. So in meditation we constantly see our own confusing, endless and intimate thoughts. This is difficult to endure because we like to identify with it.

A fatal fallacy in contemplation and meditation is that you try to stop thinking because thoughts create problems. No thoughts, no problems. The job of the body and mind is to provide information for wisdom. But when wisdom doesn't know what to do or where it wants to go, it can't sort out all the information and chaos takes over. Our own judgment becomes weaker and weaker and we are completely overwhelmed. Meditation means strengthening your own judgment.

If we know where we belong or want to be, then we can classify and use all the information from feelings, emotions and thoughts. So our wisdom should lead and guide us through meditation from the tyranny of self-glorification to the promised self-realization so that we can take the greatest possible responsibility for our own lives. Where do I belong now? With one foot in chaos and the other in order! In this way, our own wisdom can be exhausted and we are truly fulfilled and satisfied. The journey ends where it began, at the beginning. The whole world is burning, where do you want to hide now?

I would have the following answer to this question: The fire phoenix has long since risen from the ashes and shows off its bright plumage.