Dharma Discourse by Geoffrey Shugen Arnold, Sensei

In this talk, Shugen Sensei continues the teachings about the stages along the path. The 5th stage of the Ox Herding Pictures illustrates the practitioner’s struggles at taming the ox. Our typical ideas on struggling and taming are not helpful on this path. If we continue to use the same strategies, we’ll continue to create the same suffering. What’s a skillful way to wrestle? How does the practitioner balance equanimity with things as they are with the injunction to tame our desires?  Moreover, how do we practice acceptance, while seeing our nonacceptance.

The koan in this talk is “Dongshan’s No Grass,” case 89 of the Book of Serenity. This discourse was given at Zen Center of NYC on May 4th,  2013.