The flowing river never stops
This morning, I tried to write my blog, but any ideas didn’t occur to me.
Then, I went out and took a walk to the Tenryu River. It was a little cloudy and cold. Watching the flowing river, the famous opening passage of Hojyoki written above came to my mind. It is a universal truth as his following saying,”So it is with man and all his dwelling places here on earth.”
H?j?ki ( literally “square-j? record”) is an important and popular short work of the early Kamakura period (1185?1333) in Japan by Kamo no Ch?mei. Written in 1212, the work depicts the Buddhist concept of impermanence (muj?) through the description of various disasters such as earthquake, famine, whirlwind and conflagration that befall the people of the capital city Kyoto. The author Ch?mei, who in his early career worked as court poet and was also an accomplished player of the biwa and koto, became a Buddhist monk in his fifties and moved farther and farther into the mountains, eventually living in a 10-foot square hut located at Mt. Hino. Ch?mei based his small hut, and much of his philosophical outlook, on the accounts of the Indian sage Vimalak?rti from the Vimalak?rti S?tra.
―From Wikipedia
Recently here in Hamamatsu City, many houses were pulled down and the ground became a vacant space or parking lots.
I, becoming an old monk, sometimes remember the deceased with fondness. In the past few years, my master Oi Saidan Roshi, dharma brother Ryo-san, and my mother passed away.
The representatives of supporters group of Syoko-ji and old monks of neighboring temples, who had helped me from the beginning of my walks as Syoko-ji Osyo also all went to their rest.
Knowing the impermanence of the world and the fragility of human life, every morning, I appreciate the present of the day and renew my will to live mindfully and joyfully.
Therefore, I got started a simple morning habit of writing down the schedule and theme of the day. After a little stretching, qigong, and zazen, I think about one day schedule and theme in front of a piece of white Japanese paper and write it down with a writing brush.
This habit is becoming a morning ritual for me to live every day directly connecting with the cosmic life.
SNS