Annual Solitary Retreat Journal Record 2010
A Solitary Retreat & Journal Records
Michael Rinaldini, January, 2010
1/23/2010 Saturday
Annual Solitary Retreat: Sonoma Mountain Zen Center, Santa Rosa, California
I arrived at SMZC at around 4:30pm. After checking in with the Guest Master, I emptied the car of all my things. After un-packing, I re-arranged the room and sat down to officially start the retreat. It was slightly after 6pm.
7:45pm
What is the value of retreat?
Drinking a fresh cup of puerh tea with a homemade chocolate chip cookie.
1/24/10 Sunday
9:15am
Reciting scriptures.
I’ve had my breakfast, made the bed. Some things just don’t change.
Reading Scripture on Clarity and Stillness:
I see the passage, “Although we can call this’realizing the Dao,’ In truth there is nothing to attain.”
This passage is another reference to how the zuowang view appears in Daoist scripture. There is nothing to attain. We are already in possession of the Dao. The Dao is so close we don’t recognize or realize it.
Yinfu Jing
What is the single source of greed?
12:12pm
I just returned from the yurt where I practiced circle walking qigong. I did a lot of stretching before the qigong. My leg muscles have been very tight lately, and especially my left hamstring muscles are tight and sore. I saw on YouTube the other day a video comparing dynamic stretches with stationary stretches. Their point was that static stretching actually produce more harm than good. I did some of both.
Sitting in my cabin now, writing, and listening to the rain on the tin roof. Leafless trees surround the cabin, many of them are covered in a rich green moss.
I sit quietly and listen. There is a silence beneath the surface of the rain. I have to stop my writing to hear it.
I re-read what I wrote earlier – “what is the single source of greed?”
1pm
I’m having a simple lunch in my cabin. It looks like there was some kind of lunch meeting in the main house and kitchen. I am having a fresh cup of puerh tea with it. It feels so good, that warm mellow flavor.
1:30pm
Taoist Mysteries and Magic, John Blofeld, pg. 122
“Stillness in the heart of movement is the secret of all power.”
6pm
Faith Mind Sutra
“One clear moment within,
Illumines the emptiness before you.”
Here is a reference to the sudden breakthrough of seeing clearly the nature of things. “One clear moment” sounds like the experience of cracking through the illusory surface of things. Using the word “moment” implies that this is a sudden appearance, an event which happens, and then one is able to directly experience “emptiness.”
Faith Mind Sutra, again:
“To abide in this world, Just say, Not Two. Not Two includes everything, excluding nothing.”
Preceeding this passage the scripture says, “No effort is made. Furthermore, when the mind makes no effort, thinking can take no root and that is the true Dharma world where there is no self or other.” This is the zuowang view. And we abide in this view by saying, Not Two. So it appears that saying Not Two is identical to the zuowang method. The method of forgetting – making no preferences, no choices, and so on.
In other words, through the practice of forgetting one realizes that there are Not Two things in the entire universe. We forget the distinctions of the ten thousand things. They are of one essence as the scripture says.
Saying Not Two opens ourselves to the “moment” beyond “time and space” where nothing exists and yet “enlightened beings everywhere all return to the Source.”
These reflections came to me as I recited the scriptures on Sunday night.
What is the value of retreat?
The answer is becoming clearer as my busy thinking mind calms down a little, and it steps aside to allow insights to emerge. And that is the value of retreat, to allow the insight-mind to come forth. The Neiye scripture would say, that the heart-mind within the heart-mind can come forth through the quieting practices of retreat.
1/25/2010 Monday
Last night I read from, To Live As Long As Heaven And Earth, A translation and study of Ge Hong’s Traditions of Divine Transcendents, by Robert Ford Campany.
This selection is on Master Guang cheng who was an immortal “in ancient times.” He was a teacher to the Yellow Thearch (Yellow Emperor). Master Guang was different from other immortals that Ge Hong collected in his Traditions in that Guangcheng’s main cultivation method was that of quiet sitting meditation. Below are sections of a poem he wrote for the Yellow Emperor who wanted to follow the way.
The essence of the ultimate Way
Is dark and obscure.
It involves no seeing, no hearing,
But only embracing your spirit in quietude.
Your body will then correct itself.
Take care of what is within, and close yourself
To what is without.
Know much, and you will suffer decay.
As for myself, I abide where Heaven and Earth,
Yin and yang are one,
So as to settle where they harmonize.
That is why I have reached the age of
One thousand two hundred years.
I will compare my light with that of the sun and moon,
I will last as long as Heaven and Earth.
When humankind has completely perished,
I alone will remain.
Commentator Campany compares Master Guangcheng’s “quieting, stilling practice” to what is found in the texts of the Neiye (Inward Training). He says Harold Roth refers to this sort of practice as ‘apophatic.’ [ Original Tao, Harold Roth. One attends primarily to mind and spirit, limiting sensory stimulation and emotion and knowledge, and having done so, one’s body “corrects itself.” Pg 160 Traditions. ]
Why is this story relevant to us now? For one, it points to quiet sitting meditation as a Daoist practice since very ancient times. And secondly, another point, of particular importance when on retreat, is his statement, “Take care of what is within, and close yourself to what is without.”
I sense one of the things this passage addresses is that when one is on retreat, there are still temptations to distract us. We can go to a beautiful retreat center, or some kind of cabin, and simply enjoy ourselves to no end by just being in nature. We can spend all day hiking in the woods, or walking on the beaches, and feel really refreshed and relaxed. But have we served our purpose of going within? Of quieting the sense-doors and returning to tranquility which is not influenced by likes, dislikes, beauty or ugliness. Are we still not stuck in the dualities of heaven and earth?
Chapter 47 in the Daode jing comes to mind:
Without going out your door,
You can know the whole world.
Without looking out your window,
You can know the Way of Heaven.
Sages therefore know without traveling
Name (understand) without seeing
And succeed without trying.
One of the commentaries in Red Pine’s DDJ translation says, “Without traveling means to know without depending on previous or external experience.” Another commentator suggests that the Dao cannot be found through “form.”
1:10pm
I just finished lunch with some of the residents of the zen center, including the head Roshi. It was nice to finally have a regular meal, instead of the weekend do-it-yourself leftovers from the refrigerator. See, here it is again, the mind that makes preferences.
1:49pm
A little rest, and now it’s time to go for a short walk and then onto the large yurt for qigong.
3:20pm
Just returned from the yurt where I had a good circle walking qigong. And I just made a fresh cup of brick puerh tea. It is a young tea but my tea supplier says the leaves are potent because the trees are very old, and they have a lot of qi. Hold it a minute, let me taste this cup ………… Ah, very nice puerh. Just what I needed on this raining afternoon, again.
My circle walking was very productive. I walked very slow, very alert and very aware. I felt every movement throughout my body. As I recited Not Two as I walked, I was aware of the internal voice – pushing and pushing itself to be heard. I finally gave up on the Not Two and started asking or saying, Not Self. This shut it up for awhile, but it was still there.
I went through all the eight arm postures. Sometimes, the circle was as big as the room, and other times it was only 4-5 feet across. And on at least one occasion, I just spun around a center point. There were a few instances of walking when my whole attention was on my hands, and everything else spun into a dizzying blur.
In those moments, there was no self, no chatter, just spinning.
4:30pm
Reading Blofeld’s Taoist Mysteries and Magic. This book rocks. How’s that for slang! I keep finding sections in it that explain exactly what I’m trying to say. On pg 128, he clarifies what I was writing about earlier on closing the senses, turning off the thinking, roaming mind and instead focus on “inner stillness and keen unwavering awareness.” I’ll start from the top:
“The venerable Lao-tzu’s directions for achieving tranquility also emphasize the need to stem the flow of thought, to cultivate keen awareness that is free from an object, for this is what is meant by the knowledge or knowing that does not know.”
Other points he makes:
“concentrate the vital force, but gently, like a baby, to polish the mirror of the mind and get rid of the ‘stain.’ By ‘stain’ he means, clinging to objects of perception.
And for the method of arriving at a state of stillness, he says, block the orifices, close the gates, blunt the sharpness, unravel the knots, dim the brightness, and so on.
“Be like a bright mirror that takes in all , but clings to nothing.”
Do a retreat! Walk in the great woods, the beautiful beaches. But don’t stop there. Go deeply into Not Two until you see directly all these objects of perception as manifestations of the formless Dao. Let your awareness be free from any limitations of the small mind so you may perceive the “heart of our being.” Let the beauty of nature draw you in, but don’t stop prematurely, less you miss the way of Heaven and Earth.
6pm
Everything that is not Not Two forget !
The above seems like the perfect integration of zuowang and Not Two.
9:55pm
Again I return to this statement in Mysteries and Magic, pg 122,
“Stillness in the heart of movement is the secret of all power.” Blofeld is talking about warrior or martial arts power, but it equally applies to qigong power.
When I practice qigong in a state of quietness and stillness, it is entirely different than when teaching or times when I may be distracted. This afternoon as the stillness enwrapped me, I could sense with awareness the interconnectedness of everything going on. I felt the cold in my hands, the bounce of the yurt floor, the twisting of my body, the strain in my arms, and on and on. And what I sensed the most was the stillness. The stillness which is identical to awareness. You can’t really separate the two.
1/26/10 Tuesday
What is the Way of Tea – Cha Dao ?
Let the tea cool down so that when you drink it, the lips and mouth don’t have to jerk back from the heat. This way when the tea enters the mouth, it is in harmony with you already.
10:15am
I am reciting the Neiye this morning. This text is indeed a jewel for us all to study. It contains the entire Daoist path. There are too many points to make right now. All I can say is study this text. It covers the range of our practice from eating and excessive thinking to balance and alignment, to stillness and returning to our innate nature. It mentions the importance of moving qi through the body, and it encourages “solitude” to find inner happiness.
The text finishes wonderfully, #26:
The numinous qi resides within the heart-mind.
When the heart-mind holds to stillness,
The Dao will naturally come to settle.
1/27/10 Wednesday
My retreat was interrupted today because of a health concern. I felt the need to return home to take care of it. For the next two days, I stayed home from work, took care of my health issue, and returned to my meditation room as much as possible.
The Collected Songs of Cold Mountain, translated by Bill Porter has a wonderful introduction by John Blofeld. In this next section, I will blend my comments with Blofeld’s on the Daoist world view.
“To those familiar with Taoist teachings, it meant the invisible, formless matrix that gives rise to the endless succession of forms which are no more apart from or different from the matrix than waves are apart from or different from the sea.” Pg 21
Comment: Blofeld’s use of the term “matrix” is opposite to how I apply it in describing the invisible, formless Dao and its hiddenness behind the veil of illusion, I call the matrix. And it doesn’t matter how you call it. We both refer to the Dao in its ultimate state which is clouded from our eyes.
“The use of a term meaning ‘way’ to describe the vast, unfathomable reality of which every form is but a transient manifestation has very subtle implications, pointing to the non-dual nature of reality; for, if reality is in fact no-dual, then the source, the way to the goal, the wayfarer, and the goal are all indivisible from one another.” Pg 21
Comment: In meditation, as in life, everything is part of this non-dual reality. Even when meditating, whatever one experiences is not separate from the Dao. In the zuowang view and method, it is all non-dual and thus the method of saying, Not Two, creates the experience of undifferentiated unity. We just need to bring awareness to this experience, otherwise we are lost.
“What this means in practice is that one seeks to attain to a state of intuitive understanding in which the unity of ‘I’ and ‘other’ is experienced as vividly as the heat of fire or the coldness of ice.” Pg 22
Comment: This is the importance of the awakening experience, sudden or gradual, as long as one’s ego-sense is dissolved into non-dual reality.
“Thus realization of the identity of one’s true nature and the true nature of the Tao leads to acceptance of health and illness, gain and loss, up and down, life and death as being equally essential to the natural functioning of things, and therefore in no way to be deplored.” Pg 22
Comment: This is the stumbling block for most people. Realizing how these highs and lows and other opposite relationships are just part of the process of the Dao manifesting itself in a myriad of ways. What keeps us isolated in dual experiences? I say it is our lack of “cracking the illusory matrix.” Until we experience the unity of our self with the universal Dao self, we’ll forever be tossed by life’s ups and downs.
Comment: This is an intuitive experience that would liberate one forever. That is how Blofeld describes the experience I call, cracking the matrix, or the zen path calls, kensho, awakening experience.
Comment: Yes, prior to full realization, the path is difficult. The path is subject to much disappointment, frustrations and set-backs. Every cold, flu or anxiety, or misbehavior on our part, along the way makes us doubt whether we are doing the right thing. We still don’t have the benefit of full realization to see all these things as just the ups and downs of the Way, and not distinct from the Way.
“You see how enviable is the lot of people who have realized the Tao ! Nothing can upset them. Youth passes – so does spring. Old age comes – so do winter’s lovely snowscapes. I’m bursting with energy, so I’ll jog or climb Mount Hua. I’m too ill to move, so I’ll enjoy my warm bed and meditate. My wife loves me; O what joys behind hibiscus curtains! My wife has left me; how peaceful it is now.” Pg 30
Comment: It sounds so wonderful to be able to experience life on such a deep level. Yes, this may be our goal, yet, right now, we might not fully realize it, but we can take solace in what was said earlier “the source, the way to the goal, the wayfarer, and the goal are all indivisible from one another.”
“Well, as you can see, realization is intoxicating, but to reach a point at which you feel the Tao pulsing in your veins and recognize the Pole Star as no less a part of you than your arms and legs – ha-ha-ha- that is quite difficult.” Pg 30
Comment: Maybe that is why when I go outside at night and look up at the stars, I yearn to return home to my place in the celestial heavens. I do feel the stars and space more me than I do this limited body/mind.
“What does all this amount to? You (the Tao) go to some mountain or forest (the Tao) to follow the path (Tao) that leads to realizing (Tao-ing) the Tao! It sounds crazy, but it’s wonderful.” Pg 33
Comment: It seems like I can’t do anything but this. It does feel like destiny.
“ … for the Tao is most easily found when laughter comes spontaneously and one is comfortably realized. Strain, tension, solemnity will blind you to its lovely radiance.” Pg 33
Comment: yes, yes, and yes …. ha-ha-ha, ho-ho-ho …
Shifu Michael Rinaldini, (Li Chang Dao) is a Qigong Teacher, a 22nd generation Longmen Dragon Gate Daoist priest, and founder of American Dragon Gate Lineage. He is a Level IV Certified Qigong Teacher of the National Qigong Association, and a Certified Bagua Xundao Gong Qigong Teacher by Master Wan Su Jian, Beijing, China. He offers a Qigong Certification Program for Advanced Trainings, and a Daoist priest training for those seriously committed to the Daoist way. www.dragongateqigong.com
