Zen Retreat

Buddhist group goes on Zen retreat
Thursday, July 12, 2007

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By EVELYN SHIH
STAFF WRITER

About 20 minutes into the Zen retreat, I noticed a burning feeling in my bottom. As if, of all body parts, my bonbon were falling asleep.

It was going to be a long retreat.

I was visiting with the Heart Circle Sangha (Buddhist group) of Ridgewood. Retreats, or sesshin as they are called in the Japanese Zen tradition, are common events to this friendly Bergen group, which is saving to build its own zendo, or meditation space, for its growing membership.

This one was attended by 11 people and would last from Friday night to Sunday noon. We went home at 8 or 9 in the evening and arrived the next day in time for an 8 a.m. sitting.

Which brings me back to the numb caboose: The basic activity at a Zen retreat is sitting meditation. The practitioner sits in the cross-legged lotus position on a round cushion called a zafu. This supposedly straightens the spine and takes the pressure off the legs during meditation, although one common complaint for those new to meditation is lack of circulation in the legs.

I, however, had a more interesting problem. I was beginning to feel that I was sitting on nothing -- appropriate, perhaps, given that we were trying to attain a mental state of nothingness.

Luckily, sitting meditation was offset by walking meditation. Time-keeper Alan Seiden of Ho-Ho-Kus marked half-hour sitting sessions by striking a "case" -- a metal bowl that made a lingering, bell-like sound. He then led us as we paced down the hallway, donned shoes and went out to the back yard to circle for 10 minutes, single file. The idea was to maintain the awareness of our bodies and minds while doing a physical activity.

Zen priest Joan "Hogetsu" Hoeberichts' yard was large and well-kept, anchored by a sitting Buddha. I would notice, out of the corner of my eye, the neighbors' kids playing Whiffle ball, and I could hear a dog barking down the street. I felt the unseasonably cool wind caress my face with amazing clarity.

Intense sensual awareness is, in fact, one of the goals of a Buddhist retreat. Long periods of silent meditation are meant to cultivate a state of mind. The effect is more striking in a residential retreat, where the sangha sleeps and eats silently in the same setting for the entire length -- usually waking up at 5 a.m. for the first session.

My retreat was relatively easy and broken up by the fact that I had to drive home each day and interact with family. There were friendly whispers that rippled the veneer of silence to guide me, the newcomer; and there were other modifications in ritual that were meant to accommodate this modern American sangha. But even so, the state of awareness grew in each aspect of the days I spent there.

One obvious problem of spending long hours at Hoeberichts' house, which doubles as a zendo, is that we needed to eat. But cooking, as well as eating, became a part of the meditation.

The cooking of a full vegetarian meal was a part of something called samu, or working meditation. The idea was to cook, sweep or do garden work -- think of Zen rock gardens in Japan -- while maintaining physical and mental awareness of the task at hand. Being present in the moment was the challenge.

My assignment was to help weed the garden. I have never been a gardener, but I found myself becoming knowledgeable about the types of weeds in the yard, feeling around for their respective roots in the loose earth and pulling them out with a loving but firm tug. And when I had become perhaps a bit too attached to the plants, Seiden rang the densho -- a large brass bell -- for lunch.

This was a special retreat for the Heart Circle Sangha because the participants were trying the ceremonial monastic eating ritual oriyoki for the first time. This involved using a set of three bowls wrapped in cloth napkins along with all utensils and cleaning tools.

We chanted a sutra (Buddhist scripture) in time with the unwrapping of the bowls, the serving of the food and the eating. When the meal was finished, we passed around hot water to clean the bowls, using a spatula to scrape the scraps from our bowls, chopsticks and spoons. We tasted the cleaning water at the end -- the sutra calls it "ambrosia" -- as if not to waste anything of our meals.

I realized anew all the actions involved in eating that I usually ignore; and since it was silent, like everything else, I tasted every flavor, every texture, with intensity.

That silence was broken only three times during the retreat: once for a short lecture on oriyoki by Hoeberichts, and twice for Council. Councils are a time for verbal sharing during a retreat. Sitting in a circle, the sangha members shared confidential thoughts and feelings that occurred during meditation.

We also shared creative projects that we did in Practice of Immediacy. Introduced by Maezumi Roshi, Hoeberichts' teacher's teacher who brought his Zen lineage to America, the Practice of Immediacy involves doing something creative: a poem, a clay sculpture, a painting or woodwork. The goal was to reflect your state of mind.

I came out of the retreat, like an eager kindergartner, with a drawing, a poem and a clay rose. But I also emerged with a refreshed mind, ready to engage again with the world -- and my bonbon was all right, after all. I would live to sit again.

E-mail: shih@northjersey.com

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