Grand Illinois Trail: Day 1

Tuesday

Sitting in a camp site on the banks of the Illinois River across from the town of Marseilles, pronounced by those worldly Illinoisans as Mar-sale. I reserved the site online last week, and managed to pick the worst site i have ever stayed in. It was in full sun when I got here and stayed in full sun until a little after 7:00. There was nothing to do and nowhere to hide.

Rode 44.3 miles today and it took me 5 and a half hours. Pretty slow ride, even though some of that was breaks. Ran into two bridges that were closed, which meant in both cases that i had to backtrack and invent a detour. Then a section of the trail was closed so i had to do it once again.

I was tired when i got here. The sun just beat it out of me today. And tomorrow may be the longest day of the entire 10-day trip, at around 70 miles. I’m looking forward to the time out on the trails but i know that distance is going to be brutal for me. Told them i wouldn’t arrive at the campground until late afternoon.

The Cicadas are out in full force here and it’s going to be a loud night. Not much more i can think of to say tonight. Sitting in the sun all day has really messed up my brain. I’ll try to think of something to talk about tomorrow.

Book Review: Walking In Circles

Todd Wassel sent me a copy of his book Walking In Circles and asked for a review. I am pleased to offer that and let people know that it is a wonderful read.

The two book subtitles tell you up front what to expect: Finding Happiness In Lost Japan and A Shikoku Memoir. I assume the Lost Japan part is a riff on Alex Kerr's very, very good book of the same name. But, it is a good addition here because in so many ways Shikoku does represent that rural part of Japan that is disappearing in so many other parts of Japan. He also tells us with the title that this is a memoir, and not a detailed travel guide. So, if you are looking for details of the temples or the trail, this isn't the book for you.

What Todd has given us is an accounting of his nojuku (camping out) trip around the henro trail in 2005. He brought to the walk two things that most readers won't: this was his second walk so he knew what to expect and he is fluent in Japanese, having previously lived on the main island for six years. While neither of these are requirements for the walk, it will mean that your experience will be different.

There are as many reasons to walk the henro trail as there are people who attempt it. Todd tells us at the beginning of the book that his mission was to "figure out what I wanted to be when I grew up." And whenever you meet someone who approaches a walk such as this with that mission a smile should spread across your face because missions like that are notoriously hard to accomplish. As Todd also admits at the beginning of the book, though, "It never occurred to me that I was asking the wrong question."

It is almost impossible to predict what your experience is going to be when you walk the henro trail, or any pilgrimage for that matter. The henro trail occupies a space that is neither your normal secular world nor the strictly spiritual world you would find living in a temple or monastery. As Todd writes points out:

"In Japan there is a very thin line between the [secular and the profane].

"The Shikoku pilgrimage is a good example of this. It is much more than just a collection of roads and paths. It is a gateway to a life cut off from everyday society but grounded in a physical landscape. Pilgrims occupy a unique space. We travel over and through a world stained by all the excesses and pettiness of human existence, but also through a world filled with spiritual value and meaning. This [torii] gate sitting between the tides of salvation and depravity was a reminder that you can't have one without the other."

To enter each of the Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines you encounter along your walk you must pass through a gate: a sanmon or niōmon at the temples or a torii at shrines. On one side of the gate is the secular and mundane world, immediately on the other, the sacred. Throughout the book Todd makes it clear that the distance between these two worlds can be amazingly small and that more often that not, they are entwined.

As Todd came to realize between Temples 12 and 13, each and every henro (pilgrim) walks at a different pace. There is no correct pace, there is no better or worse pace, there is only the pace that you need to walk to ensure you make it around the island in good health and in the time you have allotted for your pilgrimage. You will inevitably meet many interesting people during your walk, and you may want to walk the entire trail with them, but if they are stronger/weaker than you, healthier/in more pain than you, or on a different schedule you are going to have to separate and walk your own pilgrimages. Which means that at times you are going to have to walk alone, even if you don't particularly want to. As he says: "Relationships are like that on the pilgrimage—intense and over quickly."

And as there is no correct, better, worse, or otherwise pace, there is no better, worse, or otherwise way to do any part of the pilgrimage. We are each different, we approach it differently, and we will walk the trail differently.

"Rather than pushing my physical limits, muy challenge was becoming apparent—to control my ego and stop comparing myself with others. I needed to stop trying to gain something that I could measure, compare, and feel proud of. Instead, I needed to release that part of me that judges, competes, and criticizes in an attempt to be the 'best'."

Another reason that each henro will have a different experience is that the people we each meet along the trail will obviously be different. Different people, in different settings and situations ensures that no two of us will have the same experiences; similar, yes, but never the same. Todd gives us another fabulous lesson in pointing out that no matter what we think, you can not judge a book by its cover. You meet someone and are absolutely convinced that you know the type of person he/she is, their personality, their generosity, and everything else about them.....and, wham, in the blink of an eye they say or do something and you realize you were completely wrong, in every aspect. It brought a huge smile of remembrance of my times in this trap when he had to point out on one occasion: "He didn't strike me as the overly generous type. It turned out that I couldn't read a person at all." It also brought a nod of recognition when he pointed out on one occasion as he decided to walk alone: "I enjoyed talking to him, but we just had very different views."

Having never camped out while walking this pilgrimage myself, i can understand, but not relate to many of the experiences that Todd had during his walk. His schedule was too short, forcing him to walk more kilometers each day than his feet could tolerate, he struggled many a night to find somewhere to sleep out of the rain, he often found it hard to find food and something to drink, and since he walked during the summer, the heat and humidity were always an issue.

"Some days don't go well, no matter how hard you try and how well you plan."

"[T]he path doesn't care how you feel."

"Where to sleep is probably the most important decision walking henro face, and the availability of decent places sets each day's pace and destination."

But if you can learn to ignore the hardships you encounter, or, more accurately, learn to accept them as simply part of your experience, you enter a different world as you progress around the island.

"On long walks you become a part of the environment and notice things that others, who live in the area but pass by in cars, might ignore every day.""

"When you discover the world on foot, everything you used to know in life changes. You no longer think in terms of time spent traveling but in distance covered."

"Time slows down and life becomes simplified to its bare essentials: water, food, shelter, and companionship."

"Days of the week mean nothing, and time is dependent on the sun, not the mechanics of man. The world becomes a bigger place, and your life but a speck in the infinite universe."

If you are planning to camp out as you walk the henro trail this is a great read: introducing you to the culture of Japan, the types of people you may meet, the types of places you will find to sleep, and how to handle food and drink procurement along the way. If you are staying in minshuku and ryokan each night this won't teach you much that can be used to plan your walk, but, it is still a wonderful introduction to the world of being a henro.

I thoroughly enjoyed the book and highly recommend it to all past, present, and future henro.

Running On Empty

When PBS was on Shikoku filming the video OHenro segment of Sacred Journeys, i was hired to get them around and take care of the day-to-day logistics. I still remember their telling me when we first talked about the project that in their opinion suffering was a requirement of doing pilgrimage successfully. It seemed that they believe suffering was the most important tool in a pilgrim's quiver if he/she hoped to find answers to whatever questions they brought to the trail.

I didn't see any sense in getting into discussions of Buddhist philosophy at the time so simply told them that i thought that idea was wrong, that they misunderstood pilgrimage, at least how it applied here on Shikoku. In the end, though, my words changed nothing as it was clear throughout the project that they continued to believe in the value of seeking out suffering as a method of purifying yourself.

I wonder how many other people bring this idea to the henro trail? I also wish i could convince people that it is absolutely not true and save them some time and effort in finding this out for themselves.

The Heart Sutra makes this clear from the very opening lines. As the sutra begins, we find Kanjizai (Kannon Bodhisattva) in a deep state of meditation when he realizes that the five aggregates are empty. If we understood nothing of the Heart Sutra beyond this, but could see this as intuitively and as clearly as Kanjizai saw it, then our paths would be nearing an end. Even without a lot of practice, a great many people can see the truth of the emptiness of the "external" world. It doesn't take a lot of time or a lot of mental effort to see the truth of impermanence, non-self, and suffering with relation to the world "out there."

Moving internally, it isn't even all that difficult to come to an understanding that this thing i call me is impermanent, has no intrinsic self-being, and causes suffering. Everyone knows on some level that who they are today is not who they were when they were children and infants. We grow and change from second to second, throughout our lives, and our beliefs, ideas, and emotions have caused us countless hours of suffering over the years.

Taking one more step backwards, though, bothers a lot of people. The majority of people don't even see any need to do it. I was walking part of the trail with a friend one year when the subject came up and after i got out about one sentence my friend cut me off and asked why in the world anyone would even want to go down that path? I changed the subject and he never even blinked an eye; he followed the new subject line and never even hinted that he saw that i hadn't answered his question. For people like this, those so firmly established in the normal material world, taking that backwards step is so counter intuitive that it doesn't even register as a valid line of reasoning. Of course the world as i see it exists. Of course i am this body and mind. Of course i change, but there is an "I" that is me.

Then some of those people learn about Buddhism and the five skandhas, and this gives them something new to hold onto as they give up their previous notion of a permanent "I." I may not be permanent, but certainly the five skandhas are. I mean, the Buddha said it himself, it's right there in the sutras — we are made of the five skandhas.

And it is right here, at the hardest step to take in the backwards direction, that the Heart Sutra begins. Yes, i know that's what he said, and in one sense it is true, but in the deepest of meditations, at the pinacle of wisdom, Kanjizai tells us that even the five skandhas are empty, that even these do not exist in-and-of themselves, that they are impermanent, and as untrue as everything else.

And what happens when he realizes this? He passes beyond all suffering and discontent. It doesn't say that he realizes that he can ignore them, that he can bear them with dignity, that he can work through them; it says that he passes beyond them. He sees them as non-existant, he sees them as the mirages that they are.

In other words, as you take your first steps on the henro michi, you are beginning with the understanding that not only do you not have to look for suffering to be successful on this walk, but that suffering does not exist. If you are looking for suffering you are looking in the wrong direction. It's as if you arrive on the trial with a new map and compass and as you try to orient your map to make sure it aligns with what you are looking at you lay your compass on it, but put south to the top in the capsule. When you do that you guarantee right from your very first move that you are looking at the world upside down.

As you bow at the sanmon of Temple One and take your first steps inside, do so with the firm conviction that not only is your superficial personality empty, everything about you is empty. In the world of absolute reality that you will be investigating during this walk there is no you. That may not make sense yet, but accept that coming to understand this is the purpose of walking the henro trail as a pilgrimage. Everything else in the sutra is an added bonus. Kanjizai tells you right up front, right in the opening words everything you need to know: Even the five skandhas are empty. There is no You. And when you get it, there is no suffering or discontent to be found anywhere. They don't exist either.

Nehan no Dōjō (v1)

And finally, the last 20 year rememberance...

Nehan no Dōjō
The Dōjō of Nirvana
(Temples 66 to 88)

If you find yourself spending any time as you enter this last prefecture thinking about nehan and whether or not you're about there, then you had better just get on a bus, go back to Temple 1, and start all over again.

Remember those blisters back in the first few weeks? Nehan. Remember those freezing mornings in Tokushima-ken? Nehan. Remember those trucks that almost ran you off the road? Or, those long, polluted, and noisy tunnels you had to walk through? Nehan. By the same token, you were also there when you visited with that wonderful minshuku owner late into the night over tea, and when that lady on the side of the road gave you oranges as settai, and when that man offered you a ride while it was raining, and when that shop owner didn't charge you for the ramen you had for lunch. Nehan, nehan, and more nehan. Stop searching and wondering. Stop trying to put it in a place. Stop trying to make it something.

Kagawa Prefecture has been three prefectures in one for me on several occasions. As i enter the prefecture on the way down from Temple 66, it is exciting — i'm finally nearing the end; i'm about to succeed in this huge goal. Then on the other hand, as i leave Temple 87, it starts to sink in that at the next temple this journey will be over. Yes, of course i have to walk back to Temple 1 to complete the circle, but the journey to all 88 temples will very soon be finished.

Finally, during the day and a half walk back to Temple 1, all becomes intensely quiet inside. Even more quiet than on the best days on the rest of the walk. I attribute this to the fact that that planning, organizing, and comparing corner of my mind no longer has a job to do; temporarily it is completely out of a job, so it simply shuts down; goes to sleep. And my world gets very beautifully quiet. There's nothing i need to plan, nothing i need to prepare for, nothing i need to think about or analyze, no schedule to look at, no maps to pour over, no temples to get to. There is absolutely nothing to do except walk and my body can do that on autopilot.

This is a beautiful way to be. I find it more alluring than 'being' on my zafu. On the cushion, life is reduced to nothing more than Life, Being in its most basic aspect. But in my hiking boots i can find that same place, while at the same time being fully aware that i am alive, fully aware that that part of me called Dave (or Lao Bendan, if you will) isn't an accidental afterthought — he is also a part of who i am.

I think that is the lesson i want people to take away from this fourth dōjō: This search for emptiness that we will look at as we make the turn at Temple 1 and begin again doesn't mean, or entail, giving up that personality that brought you to the island in the first place. In other places i have talked about tucking that personality in your back pocket as you begin the walk, not throwing it away, or leaving it behind. You'll need that personality to function as you make your way around the island, you'll need that personality to successfully interact with everyone you meet. But, you can easily pull it out of your back pocket whenever you need it, and then stick it back in when you are done using it.

When we get back to Temple 1, take some time to celebrate, grab a cold beer at dinner wherever you spend the night. Revel your peers and hosts with stories of everything you've done and seen while doing the walk. Enjoy the accomplishment. Then get a good nights sleep.

But keep in mind everything we talked about as we made the first circuit. This is a walk of the mind. In fact, what we just finished could be called Mind Control 101; now we move up to Mind Control 201. This is a walk where we are learning to control our mind and how we use it. Is the thinking, labeling, judging mind relentlessly spinning, churning out useless nonsense? Or, have you learned to notice what it is up to and made some progress in letting it settle down. Letting it settle into stillness.

As we make that final final stretch back to the starting point, take some time to look inside. Pull that ego out of your back pocket and look long and hard at it. Is it something permanent, always abiding? Or, is it something that only comes into existence when you act, think, or speak? And if you perform no actions (doing, thinking, or speaking) is that ego anywhere to be found? If you look long and hard enough you will see that with no actions there is nothing you can call a mind, and with no mind, there is no ego, no you anywhere to be found.

That doesn't mean you'll disappear, or fall over dead, but it does mean that the you that brought you here isn't the you that has to do this walk. Once you see that, stick it back in your pocket, smile at the sun, and head down the trail.

World Cup 2019

Another good win today vs Mexico. Go USWNT!!

Bodai no Dōjō (v1)

Oh boy (rubbing my hands together excitedly)....now we're talking 'pilgrimage.' 😀 Here's what i thought about 20 years ago as i entered the third prefecture.

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Bodai no Dōjō
The Dōjō of Enligntenment
(Temples 40 to 65)

Half way. You have now passed Cape Ashizuri and find yourself on the southwest coast and heading northward — heading home. From here on each day will bring you closer to your destination and not further away from your starting point.

Then again, aren't your starting point and destination one and the same? You may realize that there is no difference when you stop analyzing and forget the labels that you attached when you set off on day 1. And while we're at it, is there any difference between today in the Dōjō of Enlightenment and yesterday in the Dōjō of Religious Discipline? Today? Yesterday? Now? Then? Birth? Death? Those pesky labels.

Today it's sunny. Tomorrow, rain. One day you walk with a monk. Another day you walk with an irrational woman. One day you're happy. Another day you're angry. Ahhh... life on the henro trail.

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This afternoon i was at my local golden arches drinking a cup of coffee when i met a guy that had tattoos from the crown of his head, across all four sides of his head, both arms and hands, and i assume all the way down to his feet. Even the whites of his eyes had been tattooed black. It was amazing.

I struck up a conversation with him and told him of the time i met a yakuza in a public bath at a hotel on the henro trail. I tell the story frequently for some reason. As i always point out, the hardest part of the conversation was just getting over the idea that i was standing there talking to a butt naked guy about the tattoos all over his body. He had a full body suit tattoo, with the only untattooed parts of his body being above the neck, and below the wrists and ankles. Once i got over the nervousness about talking to the guy, he turned out to be quite interesting, and eager to describe his "works of art." As was the guy i talked to today.

This really has nothing to do with my thoughts on entering the third prefecture on the henro trail, but after talking to him it did seem appropriate to mention it. People like the man i met today are so very easily labeled and relegated to good or bad categories, depending on your views of tattoos. Earlier in my life i would have done it as well. But if you sit and wonder about that process of categorization and how unconsciously it's done, it should make you stop and think about everything else in your life that you label and categorize for no useful purpose; it's done unconsciously and habitually, faster than a blink of an eye, without you ever knowing that you did it.

If you did your job while walking through Kōchi Prefecture over that past couple of weeks, you've spent a great deal of time learning to notice what it means to be alive. You've spent increasing amounts of time outside of your head, outside of that incessant steam of thoughts you're used to living in. You've begun to spend more and more time noticing what's going on around you as you walk — in more and more detail. And, you've begun to notice how your mind works, how it takes in sensory input, how it chooses what inputs to notice and which to ignore, how it chooses to interact with those inputs, and how it pieces all of this into what you would call "experiences."

The beauty of walking the henro trail is that your life slows down to the same speed as your fingernails grow. And as your life slows down, your thinking slows down, giving you the chance to notice more of the individual thoughts that float past the back of your eyeballs and through your brain.

Then, with greater levels of attention, and greater ability to notice individual thoughts as they come and go, you finally get to the point where you might get to see yourself attach labels to the sensory inputs almost as soon as they come in, long, long before your mind has a chance to actively and consciously process what you just perceived. And when you reach that stage, WOW. That's just about all i can say. Wow. Did i just do that? Did i just label that guy with the tattoos after having only seen him a half a thought ago? Did i just label that driver who splashed water on me as she drove past? Did i just label this entire day based on that one first raindrop?

And here's the kicker, the worst of them all....Did i just label myself as a (your choice of word) for having done that again?

Wow. Did you see that? Did you see yourself completely change reality with one thought? So simply done. No effort required. Talk about God power.

That's your homework as we spend the next couple of weeks walking through Ehime Prefecture. It's my least favorite section of the walk and i know i have to fight the labeling process each and every step as i walk through. But, while you walk notice your abuse of your superpowers, your ability to change reality, completely and utterly change the entire world with each successive thought and label. Learn to spot it as it happens. Learn to reverse it when you can. Learn to stop the process if possible.

This is terribly hard work, i'm not suggesting it is easy. But it is doable, and with time it does get easier. And as you get better at it you will slowly start to notice changes in your reality, in how reality appears to you, in how reality manifests. With work, with constant, persistent, and never ending practice, the person who steps into the next prefecture in a few weeks will not be the same person who enters Ehime Prefecture today.

That should make you smile and dance a little jig in happiness. Just knowing that you are powerful enough to change reality should send shivers up your spine.

Have fun.

Shūgyō no Dōjō (v1)

As we enter Kōchi Prefecture, i remind myself of what i wrote twenty years ago:

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Shūgyō no Dōjō
The Dōjō of Religious Discipline
(Temples 24 to 39)

By now, whether you intended it or not, you are awake. By the time you reach the border of Kōchi Prefecture you are aware that something is happening to you. You are more aware of what you are doing. More aware of the people you are meeting. More aware of living. Not just existing, not just being. But living. And this awareness is probably making a difference in your life.

The Dōjō of Religious Discipline. It is a little hard to imagine what the holy men and women of old went through as they walked this trail if you stay in a warm and dry room every night. If you are guaranteed dinner each night and breakfast each morning. It is hard to imagine as you put on the high-tech rain suit each time the rain starts to fall. Hard to imagine as you stop in another coffee shop just to get out of the weather or cold.

But, even with all of the luxury it is possible to discipline yourself. Some important and interesting changes have occurred in your mind as you walked from temple to temple over the past week. By now you realize that you are alive. Maybe you have come to realize that, just like there is more to this pilgrimage than just walking from temple to temple, there is more to life than just getting from day to day. Being alive isn't what life is about — living is what life is about.

You now have an entire prefecture to walk through while you contemplate this, and several weeks to reinforce what you have realized.

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Practice. Like it or not, everything in life comes down to this one simple truth — if you want to get good at something you have to practice. If you want to master something you have to practice that something A LOT. And Buddhism is no different. It's not good enough to simply read book after book about Buddhism. It's not good enough to simply go listen to teachers babble on about the subject. The books and teachers can only tell you about their experience of the path and pass on what their teachers told them.

But to actually walk the path, to actually make your life the path, to someday come to the understanding that your life is nothing but the path......then you need to practice. You need the Dōjō of Religious Discipline.

It doesn't matter if you start with the Buddhist Precepts, the Yoga Yamas and Niyamas, or any other school's admonitions, but by this point of our walk we understand that we are not isolated individuals, moving around the island encapsulated in shells that no one can penetrate. We are part and parcel of everyone we meet and everything we see. Our pilgrimage isn't just the physical walk around the island, but that plus all the experiences we have from moment to moment, with everyone we meet day after day. And to facilitate the smoothness of our constant interactions with this whole, we practice non-violence, truthfulness, and the other admonitions.

We now see that just existing was never a satisfying way to lead a life. Living is what this game is about. Even if you lock yourself in a monastery and meditate half of every day, your main goal is still living. If you think enlightenment or liberations is other than that, then, well,......i hope you have a huge store of good zafu, because you're going to be sitting there for a long time until you figure it out. Living is the activity we are trying to perfect, not sitting.

There is one quote in Minoru Kiyota's Shingon Buddhism that i have always loved. At first blush it seems too simple to even highlight, so obvious that you read right over it without a single notice. But when completely understood and integrated, it changes the way you practice. "...[W]e must remind ourselves that though practice...specifically refers to the practice to eliminate one's own klesa, the elimination of klesa (e.g. hate) cannot be accomplished only through a realization of a new conceptual horizon (e.g. non-hate). Mental state does indeed shape action but action in turn shapes mental state. The perfection of a state of non-hate requires not only the elimination of the notion of hate but also the practice of non-hate."
(my underline)

That's what this prefecture is for: advancing past the intellectual ideas about our practice and into the non-intellectual arena of practice itself. This means working with the mind, and as we spend more and more time coming to an understanding of what our mind is and how it works, there will come a day when the buddha-state will manifest itself in your life.

Hosshin No Dōjō (v1)

Standing in front of Temple 1 for the very first time it’s difficult to imagine what you are getting yourself into as you contemplate your plans to walk all day, every day, for the next month and a half. Try as you might, if you've never been here before it is almost impossible to know what this will be like.

To simplify the process, try wrapping your head around only the first prefecture and the first 23 temples, leaving all the others until you get to Temple 23 in a little over a week.

Regarding the first prefecture, this is what i wrote when i first put this web site together 20 years ago…

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Hosshin No Dōjō
The Dōjō of Awakening Faith

The first step of a four-step process — the awakening of faith. Some henro are devout Buddhists and for them having faith is a given. There is nothing to awaken. Other henro consider Buddhism an integral part of their culture but may have no religious leanings. For these henro, faith may be something that needs to be shaken awake, but it won't take much effort as the faith is already there, lying dormant just below the surface of their everyday superficial lives.

Then there are henro like myself. Buddhism isn't a part of my culture. I was raised in a country where Buddhism is considered different, where not believing in God is considered just about as bad as not believing in Money. For us outsiders, this first step is a look inside. A time to ask 'Awakening the faith in what?’

Are the next 1,400 km about faith in Kōbō Daishi? Or, about faith in ourselves. Faith in our ability to complete what we are about to start? Faith in our ability to persist and endure? Faith in our ability to open up enough to learn from the island, the temples, the people, and the experience as we walk day after day for the next several months?

I wish they had simply called this province the Dōjō of Awakening. This is the key, in my opinion. Simply being awake. Most of us aren't when we first get here. And, you can't proceed to the second step until you have at least awakened. Awakened to the possibility of doing something different. Awakened to the possibility of learning something different. Awakened to the possibility of possibilities.

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I still think this is a reasonable way to look at what you are about to undertake — if this is your first time around the island. As we'll see by the time we get back here again for our second time around, though, this will only be like dipping your toes in the water. With a little more investigation, we'll see that the water is really much deeper than we think.

So, you’ve already visited Temple 1, your first attempt at the routine at the Hondō and Daishidō is under your belt and your first stamp is in your nōkyōchō.

Let's set out, keeping in mind that right now, our goal is to open ourselves to the possibilities of what may unfold for us as we walk. We may have very fixed ideas about what we are attempting to do, what we think we will find, what we think our daily experiences will be like; but with these first steps, remind yourself that you don't really know. What you think you know are only assumptions; only thoughts based on nothing more that you past, the history you bring with you to the trail. As we take these first steps, let all of that go, let all of that fall to the wayside. Accept that the possibilities are endless. As your first step hits the ground after passing back out through the salmon of Temple 1, say aloud, "I don't know what is coming, but i am open to everything."

Speaking of the Henro.....

It's been a long time since i have taken the time to write anything. A very long time. I thought i was going to write about my walk of the Camino de Santiago, but as it progressed i found that i didn't really have anything to say. Seems that i have that problem a lot lately.

But, i recently realized that i have a hole in my Shikoku website and it's glaring enough that i think it needs filling. That hole is in my comments on the Heart Sutra. Near the end of my comments i mention walking the Heart Sutra trail, as opposed to walking the physical henro trail. But i never tell anyone what that actually means to me.

All those years ago, when i first wrote those words, i kinda, sorta, just assumed that it was clear what i was thinking. Without putting much thought into it, i guess i assumed that if you had read all the way to the end without falling asleep or completely losing interest in what i was saying, that you would be on the same page as me and know what i was trying to get across. Now i'm not so sure.

Or, maybe what i'm really wondering, am i sure that i know what i wanted to say? I have this amorphous feeling that i know what i meant, but if someone approached me and asked me to give them the "elevator speech" version of what a Heart Sutra pilgrimage would entail.....i know i couldn't do it. Of course a lot of words could be poured out and spread around, but a short, concise, "here's what i mean" type of explanation would most likely not be seen.

Since i have to add something to the web site to fill this gap, i think i'm going to try and flesh out my ideas here on the blog over the next few weeks or months and then, once i'm convinced i have something that i can live with, cut, copy, paste, and edit what i need over to the site with a link from the bottom of the Heart Sutra comments.

Admittedly i have no idea how i want to approach this. So, i think what i will do is to walk the trail with you repeatedly, around and around, prefecture-by-prefecture, adding and subtracting with each successive passage through each prefecture until i get some semblance of clarity.

Of course the first passage will simply be a reiteration of the standard names of the prefectures: Hosshin no Dōjō, The Dōjō of Awakening Faith; Shūgyō no Dōjō, The Dōjō of Practice; etc.

Then i know that i need to add the Kongōkai Mandala and how i see the pilgrimage as a physical manifestation of its teachings. Which, by necessity brings in the Five Buddhas and the Five Wisdoms.

And, again of course, the Six Paramitas also have to be included as they are just as much a part of this as anything above. Anything else? At this point i don't know. I'd like to keep it to no more than that because i'm not trying to write anything that someone could point to and say he's trying to be serious.

I want to keep this relatively simple — here's what it means to walk the pilgrimage with your day-to-day life focused on the Heart Sutra. Here's what you should do, here's what you should keep in mind, here's what you should work on, and there's your goal.

Wish me luck.

Pamplona

Saturday, 5/12

Three days completed. Thursday to Roncevellas in the rain; Friday to Zubiri under beautiful cloudless skies; Today into Pamplona under cold, overcast, and windy skies with two bouts of heavy rain and sprinkles on snd off throughout the day.

It’s been interesting to see the exact same people on and off during the day as we all stop for breaks at different times and then recross paths as we or they get started again. And then at night, when i get to the albergue, each night the same people show up in about the same order. Looks like i have a new family.

I had intended to walk 5 km past Pamplona today but the person i was walking with had a sore ankle and was walking very slowly. By the time we arrived, given the time and the weather, i decided to stop here as well. I can’t jump ahead of schedule tomorrow because it’s already a 25 km day as is. Will try again on Monday, maybe.

The scenery here is stunningly beautiful. Incredibly so. We walk from valley to valley with small villages dotting the hills. It seems, though, that the Spanish only allow one village per valley. The houses are all the same—white walls and orange tiled roofs. Cows, horses, and sheep are everywhere. Todays fields, though, gave way to acres and acres, entire valleys full, of barley.

You hear almost every language out here on the trail, but in the wave of people i’m riding with, those that set out on Thursday morning, the is a huge number of Koreans.

Last night an elderly Korean man decided that i should know how the Korean’s write. So he came over to where i was reading and showed me how to write and pronounce the 24 characters in the Korean alphabet. Then after showing me how to write “Camino de Santiago” and “David,” the lesson was finished.

The people you meet who run the bar/restaurants where we find food, or the markets where we buy fruit, and in the albergues where we sleep are wonderful people. You could imagine them getting tired of hundreds of thousands of people trekking through their towns and streets but i have yet to meet anyone without a smile on their face, a greeting on their lips, and a seeming happiness to see you.

The Camino is nothing like the Heno on Shikoku. Not even close. Here there is an actual trail, built for, set aside, and used only by pilgrims. So far there have been almost no excursions out onto roads. On Shikoku that is where you spend 90% of your time. Here i'm spending $25-$30 per day, in Shikoku that doesn’t even pay for half of your nightly lodging.

The Henro and the Camino aren’t just two different animals, they’re completely different species.

St. Jean Pied de Port

Finally arrived in St. Jean Pied de Port. I pictured a small town but it is far from it. Maybe it’s not a big place but it is full to the brim with people. People everywhere. People walking, people shopping, people eating and drinking, people just hanging around. People of every size, shape, nationality, and apparent ability.

And the excitement. It hangs in the air like incense, or the smell of burnt popcorn hanging everywhere at the carnival.

Went to the pilgrim office to get my first pilgrim stamp in my Camino stamp book, and the women seemed so excited to see me and start me on my journey that she gave me her tube of toothpaste with enough left inside for at least 3-4 days. She wanted to save me the trek across town to the supermarche to buy some—even though i went anyway (without telling her).

Weather forecast is saying that i will be walking in the rain tomorrow. :-)

The woman who checked me in tonight tells me that the albergue where i intend to spend tomorrow night (in Roncevalles) sleeps about 180 people. They accept 60 advance reservations, with the remaining 120 beds going first-come first-serve. So, if i want a bed, i have to be inside the first 120 people arriving in town. Otherwise, the next town is another hour walk down the road.

She also said it takes between 7 & 8 hours to get there, but she did it in 6.5 two years ago. I have no idea what to expect. I’m no slouch, but have no concept what my competition is, this being the night before seeing anyone else on the road.

Hemingway’s Bulls

Moving at light speed
On a Pamplona-bound train
Mind in overdrive

Two immediate thoughts as i relax in my Pamplona hotel room.

Between Madrid and Pamplona there is more graffiti than i have ever seen. On the train ride north, if there was a flat surface, i saw it covered in graffiti. No just having some graffiti on it, covered with it. I am amazed at the amount. On bridges, stores, other buildings, walls around houses, apartments. You name it.

No one told me everything would be written in Spanish and that’s what everyone would speak! :-)

Right now, my problem is, every time i open my mouth, Japanese comes out. I don’t seem to have the ability to stop it. Even the Spanish i do know is pushed aside. Apparently my brain is saying that since I’m in a foreign country it must be time to use Japanese. I sure hope this goes away in the next few days!

Itchy Feet

In Toronto eh
Waiting for flight to Madrid
Feet getting itchy

Planting Blossoms

Step step walk walk step
Walking the path of practice
No nature no seed

Only One Pilgrim

There's a very nice story in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad. A man has reached his later years in life and decided that it was time to relinquish his belongings and become a sanyasi. So, he went to his two wives and told them that he was leaving and that he intended to split his wealth between the two of them.

When he told one of his wives, Maitreyi, she surprised him by asking if gaining this wealth would allow her to go beyond death. In fact, would obtaining all the wealth in the world allow her to accomplish that?

Of course not, Yajnavalka responded. Money can not buy immortality.

Then why are you offering me your wealth, Maitreyi asked? I'd rather that you tell me the way to immortality.

How exciting would this be for one of us reading this? You go to your significant other and offer them money or something material, expecting a smile to take over their eyes as they dream aloud of what they might do with it or what they might be able to buy. And they surprise you by asking you, instead, to tell them the Truth about life and the way beyond death. Wow. What a partner to have!

Anyhow, Yajnavalka goes on to point out to Maitreyi that a wife loves her husband, not for who or what he is, but for the Self within him. That self that gives him life; that self that is who he really is. Likewise, a husband loves his wife, not for who she is, but for the Self that lives within her.

The same is said for our love of our children. People's love for all the other people in society. Animals. The universe. Everything. True love comes about not because of anything particular about the apparent other in our relationships, but because Love in us recognizes itself in that apparent other.

But, through meditation and a constant study of ourselves, we can come to see that we are not who we think we are. We are that ever-present, eternal awareness that gives life to you, me, and everything else. That eternal awareness dissolves our sense of separateness as our perceived mutual consciousness becomes clear.

When you see that one consciousness that manifests through everybody, your mistaken sense of a separate physical identity drops off. Dissolves into nothing. As Yanjavalka tells Maitreyi, once you see this, you know you have never been born and will never die.

As I walk the Camino over the next month, I hope to see that awareness in the eyes of everyone I meet. I hope to see that in Truth, there is only one pilgrim walking the Way of Saint James, even though it seems to manifest as many, many separate people.

Be Here Now

Someone i know told a group of us that she had had a mild breakthrough recently. Like a great many people, she had for a long time tried to live the “Be Here Now” mantra, but always took that to mean that the goal was to be wherever you happened to be at the moment. If you were at the theater, be in the theater, don’t be anywhere else. If you are in a yoga class, be in that yoga class, on your mat, nowhere else. If you are at work, be there and nowhere else.

Then, the other day she realized that it meant more than that. It could also mean that one was supposed to mentally be here and now no matter the emotions at that time, no matter the feelings at that time. If angry, be here and now with that anger. Don’t try and run away from it. If stressed out, be here and now with that stress. Don’t try and cover it up, don’t run to comforting distractions. Realize that whatever is happening, is happening for a reason. Stay with it and find the lesson.

It’s not my place so i didn’t say anything, but wanted to tell her that there is an even subtler level to that well-worn mantra. What i take as the true meaning is to go through, and then past both of the above meanings, settle onto your meditation cushion, and let go of that person you think you are. Let go of Dave, let go of male, white, American, yogi, runner, henro, zen practitioner —- let go of everything, of every story you have about yourself.

Let go of it all and simply be nothing other than “here and now.” This does not mean “you” should be "something." You shouldn't be anything. At this stage the “you” you project to the rest of the world has disappeared. The “you” that interacts with all the other people in the world, is no longer sitting on your cushion. The world is no more. Your cushion is no more. All that exists is “here and now.” Your original nature; what you truly are. Be that!

If you sit as here and now often enough, long enough, consistently enough, you slowly come to understand what that means. You slowly begin to see that this here and now is not something. It is not nothing either. It is nothing more and nothing less than “Is.” It is nothing more or less than “Being.” Not something or someone being something or someone, simply Being in all its unconditioned and unmanifest glory.

When You relaxes, lets go, and surrenders to Being, and there is no longer someone sitting on a cushion, but only Being simply being, here and now, in the non-existent eternity that this is...then you understand what it means to “Be Here Now.”

Then, and this is the important step, the practice becomes to take this off the cushion and out into daily life. Can you see that You are a fake, only an actor and that Being is being Being at all times, in all places, no matter what you are doing, no matter where you are doing it. Being is always here and now; there is nowhere else it can be, there is no other time available.

When this becomes the way you live your life, when this becomes the way life manifests though who you thought you were, liberation is not far away.

Wishing you all success. Be here now and nothing else.

Morning Snacks

It seems as if the new battleground in the worlds ongoing culture wars is the idea of Cultural Appropriation. Or is that Cultural Misappropriation? It's one of the stupidest ideas that I have ever heard of. People who try and make this argument are either idiots or have zero ability to think logically. (There, said it...)

In my bit of appropriating different cultures, i'll point out this wonderful similarity between Buddhism and Vedanta. It comes from my having just started to read Chinmayananda's commentary on the Isa Upanishad, also known as the Isavasyopanishad. The opening Peace Invocation goes like this:

That is Whole,
This is Whole,
From the Whole, the Whole becomes manifest.
From the Whole, when the Whole is negated,
What remains is again the Whole.

From my cushion, that reads just like the lines many of us love from the Heart Sutra:

Form is not different from emptiness.
Emptiness is not different from form.
Form is exactly emptiness.
Emptiness is exactly form.

"That is Whole." Emptiness is everything. And nothing. Emptiness Is. "That" is Brahman, the unmanifest Whole. Everything (and yet, nothing). All encompassing. Pure potential, out of which everything manifests.

"This is Whole." Everything in the manifest world, all of manifest existence, is Emptiness.

"From the Whole, the Whole becomes manifest." Everything manifests out of Emptiness. Everything we see, smell, taste, touch, fee, and think; everything we perceive as existing; all of it is Emptiness manifesting as plurality.

"From the Whole, when the Whole is negated, what remains is again the Whole." You can't negate Emptiness. Emptiness is what Is. When the world comes to an end, Emptiness still remains. Nothing remains, but this nothingness is Emptiness in it's original and ever continuing unmanifest form.

As a Buddhist, I have long accepted (believed?) that there is no soul; no inherent piece of me that is, was, and always will be "Me," and allows me to be me again when I am reborn. But, to be honest, no one knows one way or the other. Is there a soul? Or not? Different people have different beliefs, and that is all you can say. No one has the one and only correct answer.

That's why I love the Upanishads. If you read past the belief in an atman, an imperishable, ever existing soul, and look to the top of the Vedantan hierarchy, where you find Brahman, the scenery is amazingly beautiful. Seeing Brahman is like seeing that perfect sunrise from that special mountain peak, just as it crests the horizon and begins to shed it's light on your world. Seeing Emptiness in all of the world's manifestations can bring shivers to your spine and tears to your eyes.

And then, just to appropriate a little more, i'm taking these Vedantan and Buddhist viewpoints to the pilgrim's trail in Spain. A Christian pilgrimage. All my gear is spread around the living room floor for a final round of elimination before it all goes in my pack and I leave for the Camino de Santiago on Monday. Less than a week. :-)

Live Meditation

Walking pilgrimage
Requires proper training
Meditate daily

Meditate daily
Both on and off the cushion
Live meditation

Live meditation
Collect moments of silence
Walk with these treasures

Raging Bull

Raging bulls rampage
Running fast out of control
Calm your pilgrim mind

Less than two weeks...

Stepping Into Nowhere

No-thought on my mind
Being silent heading home
Pilgrimage beckons