Zen Mind

Zen Mind


Studying the Way (Part III)

August 27, 2021

This talk continues to explore Dogen's statement, "To study the Buddha Way is to study the self, to study the self is to forget the self, to forget the self is to be actualized by the 10,000 things." This talk uses the teaching of the five skandhas (form, feeling, perception, conditioning, and consciousness) to explore studying the self as being intimate with one's own experience. Suzuki Roshi says that in the experience of breathing in and breathing out, when you say "I breathe," the "I" is extra. Similarly, we can study how the "I" is extra in our material existence, in our feeling, perception, habit structures, and thinking consciousness. When we "forget the self" in this way, how does that change the way we respond to circumstances?