Fukan-Zazengi 7: The Realisation Will Not Be Televised!


Fukan-Zazengi continues with its section of short, pithy directions for practicing zazen...


Cast aside all involvements. Give the myriad things a rest. 


I was brought up in the 1970s and 80s and, like a lot of people in the west maybe, am one of the 'TV generations' - the gogglebox was always on in the corner of the living room, whether we were actively watching it or not. It was like it provided a constant low-level background of half-heard conversation, incidental drama, unimportant information, and (most importantly) distraction.

'Distraction from what?' I ask myself. Well, from each other, and from the self, from the uncomfortable, knowing silences where what is unsaid between us might quietly start demanding to be said and heard, or at least consciously thought, and where the feelings of dis-ease, loneliness, emptiness and the longing for the something-that-we-don't-quite-know-that-we-want-or-need come to the fore.

In short, we may often be inclined to crowd out our days with details, objects, odd jobs, 'information', irrelevant drama and all manner of sundry bullshit so as to avoid 'turning the light around' and seeing honestly what's going on in our body-mind. This can eventually drive us quite mad, or at least make us disconnected from our selves.

In zazen we just stop doing that and allow all the 'stuff' we strive to distract ourselves from to unfold on its own terms.

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