‘Twas A Good Night at Zen

I would like to give a big thanks to Mathew, Janine and Henry, and Anne. With the start of ‘summer,’ I’ve found myself helping out by covering other meetings and missing out on my Zen time this month. By next week things should be more or less back to normal, but this particular night seemed to be full of teachings for me.

First off, let me apologize to Janine, I was unable to keep Henry entertained/distracted, and I assume that you did not even get your interview started, or if you did, it went on for all of 30 seconds before you realized I was not up to the task of caring for the mini-humans. I do fear that this is largely my fault. Some of you may have noticed that I tend to be a bit on the quite side. In general, this does not seem to work well with the mini-humans, they tend to gravitate towards the more boisterous ones in the crowd. A notable exception has been Adi, who has actually spoken to me and addressed me by name. Let’s be honest, this is still difficult for me, so Mat, for our next interview, the question has appeared.

This evening, I did learn that some formalities have changed. I had never ‘led’ a meditation practice before with more than one other person present, and learned some formalities that have changed since my return. I think I was also extended the opportunity to get some moktak coaching, thus far, I have only done it twice, with only me in the room, so some coaching would be nice so I don’t butcher it if there is more than one.

And finally, in my mind (hahaha, lol) the biggest thing was the kung-an (koan) I was given. I have to admit, it has been a long ass time since one has stumped me as good as this one has. This actually makes me wonder, does this particular kung-an reflect a ‘major’ karma for me? Hell, it’s probably just a regular karma for me. I guess I’ve become used to ‘seeing/feeling’ the ‘proper’ answer, or at least close enough to it that it can be worked out in a couple more interviews (of course when you don’t request them, you typically have plenty of time to meditate on them). This one, from the outset, has been like staring at a blank wall. It is always interesting when someone offers you something you did knot know about yourself, along with the challenge to figure it out. The funny thing about kung-an’s, is that the ‘answer’ is always so simple and obvious, I think the term “Face Palm” fits quite nicely.