“Faith is rarely where your head is at. Nor is it where your heart is at. Faith is where your ass is at! Daniel Berrigan
How many times have you wanted to give up, walk away, quit? Fashi Lao Yue tells us faith is in the ass, not in the head or the heart.
While it is wonderful to hear, “I love you,” there’s nothing quite like having someone tell you, “You changed my life.” J.J. Virgin
This essay of our dear Ming Zhen Shakya was the first essay I read by her….and believe me when I tell you, IT changed my life. Lao Yue Shakya
Our Dear Ming Zhen reminds us of the loss of Wisdom in her discovery of holy communion on the moon. Where is Wisdom? Spirituality? Today….in an ever-increasing division when news is ‘fake’ and truth is undermined would she still say bring Wisdom back?
From time immemorial students have sought out a spiritual adept for direction. In today’s question, a student wanted to know the most sought after sutras in a Chan practice. Our master, Fa Shi Yao Xin Shakya answers in a most Zen manner. See for yourself.
Fashi Lao Yue helps us understand the ever present, ever lasting spiritual work before us with a bit of help from Rumi.
“Out beyond ideas of wrong-doing and right-doing, there is a field. … When the soul lies down in that grass, the world is too full to talk about. Ideas, language, even the phrase ‘each other’ doesn’t make any sense.”
When a bird gets free it doesn’t return to the remnant on the bottom of the cage. (Rumi) Fashi Lao Yue offers a short intensive on the path of the Heart Sutra.
Avalokiteshvara while practicing deeply with the Insight that Brings Us to the Other Shore,
suddenly discovered that all of the five Skandhas are equally empty, and with this realisation he overcame all Ill-being.
Thich Nhat Hanh translation.
Ming Zhen Shakya in her essay “Connections” touches on the difference between the lower rungs of religion and the ecstatic pitch of spirituality. A helpful distinction for those on the path. You’ll be surprised by what she shares with us.
Dear Friends of the Order,
Please read the announcement of the changes at ZATMA.
Thank you.
More on: Our words matter.
In a review of Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng, Fashi Lao Yue points out the importance of revealing our truth despite the fear and face of loss. Celeste Ng’s novel is a novel with a message.
What comes out of your mouth matters! Whether you lie or exaggerate, whether your words are venomous or sweet. How you speak and what you say is a reflection of your spiritual state. And it doesn’t matter what you’re talking about….your words show you where you are on the path.
When discussing what a “master” is or can be in our tradition with Yao Xiang Shakya, in preparation before her Master Transmission, she said “I feel being a master is sinking further into the mud so the lotus may rise higher”.
Ming Zhen Shakya gave this Dharma talk on heaven and hell in 1996…..over 20 years ago. It stands the test of time.