The Way of The Warrior
June 12, 2022
Some of the old Zen masters are said to have attained to supreme Enlightenment after the practice of Meditation for one week,
some for one day, some for a score of years, and some for a few months.
The practice of Meditation, however, is not simply a means for Enlightenment (as is usually supposed) but also it is the enjoyment of Nirvana, or the beatitude of Zen.
It is a matter, of course, that we have to fully understand the doctrine of Zen, and that we have to go through the mental training particular to Zen in order to be enlightened.
The first step in the mental training
is to become The Master of external things.
He who is addicted to worldly pleasures,
however learned or ignorant he may be,
however high or low his social position may be,
is a servant to mere things.
He cannot adapt the external world to his own end,
but he adapts himself to it.
He is constantly employed and ordered and driven by sensual objects.
Instead of taking possession of wealth,
he is possessed by wealth.
Instead of drinking liquors,
he is swallowed up by his liquors.
Balls and music bid him to run mad.
Games & shows order him not to stay at home.
Houses, furniture, pictures, watches, chains, hats,
bonnets, rings, bracelets, shoes, – in short, everything
has a word to command him.
How can such a person be The Master of things?
To Ju Na-Kae says:
“There is a great jail,
not a jail for criminals,
that contains the world in it.
Fame, gain, pride, and bigotry
form its four walls.
Those who are confined in it
fall a prey to sorrow,
and sigh for ever.”
To be the ruler of things
we have first to shut up all our senses,
and turn the currents of thoughts inward,
and see ourselves as the centre of the world,
and meditate that we are the beings of highest intelligence;
that Buddha never puts us at the mercy of natural forces;
that the earth is in our possession;
that everything on earth is to be made use of for our noble ends;
that fire, water, air, grass, trees, rivers, hills, thunder,
cloud, stars, the moon, the sun, are at our command;
that we are the law-givers of the natural phenomena;
that we are the makers of the phenomenal world;
that it is we that appoint a mission through life,
and determine the fate of man.
~ Kaiten Nukariya, The Training of the Mind and Practice of Meditation
