Author: dorakuan

The English language is fascinating. Every now and then I hear or read a word I never came across before in my life, and it immediately appears to be useful. How did I even manage to live without it for so long?

My recent discovery is ultracrepidarian (1). The Cambridge Dictionary defines it as

Someone who has no special knowledge of a subject but who expresses an opinion about it.

I guess we all know members of that species, and who knows, maybe we belong to it ourselves?

Our Dojo wall, cluttered with posters full of signs nobody can read (2).

The other day when I was about closing the door of our Dojo, heading for the ice-cream shop with my little daughter, an elderly lady chat me up: “Is this your place? I forgot the name of your landlady!”

A funny introduction I thought. But operating a Zen Dojo necessarily opens up the opportunity to interact with many slightly unusual sorts of people. I told her the name of our landlady and the old lady replied “No no no, that’s not it. I am a ceramics artist and want to use the space as an exhibition for my art objects! Maybe we can cooperate?” Politely I explained this is a Zen Dojo and our only art is Japanese calligraphy. And as a kind of excuse I added “anyway, only very few people come to visit”.

“Of course not!” the lady replied “your place is so cluttered when one looks inside!” I thought she was referring to the workshop section where I mount calligraphy scrolls, but I was wrong. “All those posters hanging on the wall with signs nobody can read! If you get rid of them, likely more people will come!”

Coffee shop around the corner, empty seats, nothing being served.

… more people will come! That also was the promise of a local coffee shop owner who frequented our Dojo for some private lesson with the wooden sword. He suggested I should serve coffee and cake, not just having people sit silently on a cushion during Zazen. “If I don’t serve anything at my coffee shop, of course people won’t come just to sit around!”.

Oh well, that is my life I thought. So often people feel provoked to let me know what they think about me. Be it strangers, friends, students or family. I feel like getting thumbs up or down all the time, one star ratings, three or five, morning to night. But why? I rarely ever tell people what I think of them. I believe it is rude, also I am convinced what I think about another person usually is wrong, just my thoughts. And I do not want any one around me act in a certain way to get a thumbs up or five stars from me.

Who’ll tell me those lies?
Let me think they’re true, yeah
I heard one or two
They weren’t about me
They weren’t about her
They were all about you

The Rolling Stones, “All About You”

Cartoon by Bert Thomas (1883-1966) for the British Ministry of Information during World War II.

Being an ultracrepidarian, telling another person your opinion about them, is usually saying more about yourself: your lack of special knowledge, your prejudice and your inability to have a closer look. Do you really want to interact with other people being seen like that?

“Put a sock in it!” is another very British phrase I learned long ago at the The Musical Museum in London, when our guide demonstrated how to mute an old fashioned gramophone (with his sock). How often a day I think or say to myself better put a sock in it … maybe I should write a scroll for our Dojo wall with those words, instead of Chinese characters nobody can read?

–

(1) Derived from the Latin saying ne supra crepidam (“not beyond the shoe”) and attested in the English essayist William Hazlitt (1778 – 1830), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ne_supra_crepidam

(2) If you are not too much put off by the mess, please feel invited to come in and ask, we are happy to translate it for you!

Sometimes, it takes more than half a life to gather a basic understanding, maybe even of the very core of one’s own profession. It is a sobering experience to suddenly realise: oh dear, I have always been doing it completely the wrong way.

It is unsettling, it questions all your doing, maybe your whole life so far.

Presenting during a workshop I was invited to organise at the ICCS 2011 Conference, Singapore.

I feel very grateful for the three decades I was allowed to spend in scientific research and teaching, where questioning your own understanding (and that of your students) is the daily bread and butter. While some people quickly and self-confidently shout “I know, I know!”, the trained scientist might carefully respond “I might have a more or less educated guess on that matter …”.

Not knowing is the precondition for asking, for inquiring and investigating further … and maybe for understanding a bit better, for the time being. “I know” is the end of learning. It prevents you from even realising you have not yet understood anything (this level of ignorance is called the Dunning-Kurger effect).

Before I came here I was confused about this subject. Having listened to your lecture I am still confused. But on a higher level.

(possibly wrongly) attributed to the great physicist Enrico Fermi

I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics.

Richard Feynman, an equally great physicist about the core of his work

Supervising (much brighter than me) PhD students at Tohoku University, Sendai, 2014.

Alas, the science I love and studied for so long kept me misunderstand one very basic fact: being used to interact with exceptionally bright and educated scholars (most of them much brighter and better educated than me), I always assumed processing enormous amounts of information and producing enormous amounts of text is just normal. It is the way we are, not just us scientists, but us human beings in this world. The very meaning of homo sapiens.

With senior scientists having fun discussing science (and else) at a conference dinner, Tokyo, 2007.

Listening to condensed high level scientific presentations hour after hour for days during a conference was pure joy, a pleasure to be continued in conversations over coffee breaks and dinner. Delivering ninety minutes of fluent free speech on a research topic on a weekly or even daily schedule was part of the usual teaching obligation, and the ability to do so a necessary requirement for any even slightly advanced position in academia.

With young scientists having fun discussing science (and nothing else, unfortunately) after a conference in Hong Kong, 2005.

It just occurred to me, thanks to some harsh feed-back from my young assistant, that a majority of people usually are not like my former peers from the ivory tower.  Their way of learning and understanding does not work well along words and thoughts. As soon as I start talking, very quickly, it is all too much.

I always assumed the Buddhist term upāya-kauśalya (Sanskrit: उपायकौशल्य, Japanese 方便（ほうべん）), usually translated as “skillful means”, referred to finding the right words for your audience when teaching Buddhism. High level condensed talk for the educated and experienced, basic words and fundamental concepts detailed out for the beginners and the intellectually challenged or untrained mind.

Announcement of my talk at the Department of Aeronautical Engineering, Kyoto University, 2011.

While I still want to believe there is a very small fraction of people who enjoy to embark on a journey which requires long reading or listening, deep thinking and questioning all they knew, I came to the conclusion that talking more than a few words during a Sesshin or at the Dojo usually makes no sense. Besides providing very basic information, for example how to breath while doing Zazen, or how not to damage your neighbour while exercising with a sword or brush, and maybe some kindergarten 101 such as not to enter the Zendo with shoes and what it means when a door is open or closed, I should better be silent. Otherwise my words are misunderstood, or not understood at all.

Too much talking gets on your nerves, you feel like back in school, or even worse, like at home with your parents, lecturing you. After a few years with your teacher you feel bored, hearing the same words over and over again, shutting your ears from the inside while having hardly understood anything of what he has been talking about all the time.

I love listening to your talks. I usually don’t understand a word, but your voice calms me down.

a former Zen student

It is going on my nerves, listening to you is like listening to my mum. I always already know what comes next and have to shut my ears from inside not to get mad.

a young Zen student

… when they speak great swelling words of emptiness …

The Bible, 2 Peter 2:18

With my former teacher who is teaching by demonstrating, Benediktushof 2011.

I remember very well having had similar emotions towards my former Zen and Hitsuzendo teacher, with whom I closely worked for 13 years. His teachings were very basic, never sophisticated or intellectually demanding, usually down to the core of our practice – and highly repetitive.

Soon I began to develop a strong aversion to his constant advise. “Left hand on the paper!”, “Hold the brush straight!” I hear is words, maybe for the hundredth time while writing, and got angry I have to listen to such fundamentals for the other beginners in my second or third year of training with him. When I suddenly I realised I always have been swaying my brush around, never ever keeping it straight, with the left hand comfortably resting on my knee while writing. He had always been talking to me, the same basic thing, year after year. It struck me like a bang on my head, and I felt much ashamed, and grateful for his enormous patience.

I do not need to explain Zen. I demonstrate Zen with my whole body, 24 hours a day

my former teacher

My former teacher during a visit in Aachen, probably demonstrating something to me I did not get.

So my recent realisation, questioning all I did in teaching Zen and Hitsuzendo so far, is related to upaya or skillful means. My above mentioned academic background greatly mislead me. Upaya is rarely about finding the right words (in spite of Zen being amongst the most prolific Buddhist branches when it comes to writing and lecturing). It is about the right teaching beyond words. The words are almost useless.

Even my most basic oral advise in Hitsuzendo

Closely look at your writing afterwards, always, every time !

is being gracefully ignored. Why should I say anything more ?

Bodhidharma by Hakuin Ekaku(白隠 慧鶴 1686-1769), from our Dojo’s collection.

Not that I didn’t know it. Not that I didn’t put the utmost emphasis on all my conduct beyond just producing words. But all that was sadly covered and disguised by my lecture mode on autopilot. The famous words attributed to Bodhidharma were proudly on display at our Dojo on a calligraphy by Hakuin:

教外別傳 A special transmission outside the scriptures
不立文字 Not founded upon words and letters
直指人心 Pointing directly at the human mind
見性成佛 Seeing into one’s nature and attaining Buddhahood

I read it every day, yet I thought that pointing directly at the human mind was about finding the right words.

And while we are at it: another severe drawback of my training within an international scientific community related to words may be my careful and mostly polite way of speaking (1), and my bias towards answering any question.

While thinking or talking, I always carefully assume the other person might have a point, might be right, no matter how rude or uninformed their approach may appear to me. “Let me think about it!” is my usual reply when I believe I just had been told or asked some nonsense, instead of a loud and clear “No, you are wrong!”. Or a bang on the head, which, speaking of upaya, might be the appropriate reply to most things I encounter within the Zen context.

So may it be, my “Great Swelling Words” will hopefully sweep away in silence. I promise to try my very best restricting myself to writing (which anyone who is not interested can safely ignore) and rare and short Zen talks during Sesshin, and such give way to “steal my Zen” (2) by carefully watching. Concerning a solid bang on the head of my students, I am not yet sure if this is really my way, we will see. Maybe I come up with something else …

Yes, and how many times can a man turn his head
And pretend that he just doesn’t see?

The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind
The answer is blowin’ in the wind

Yes, and how many times must a man look up
Before he can see the sky?

David Bowie

–

(1) Not all scientists I witnessed were always polite and careful speakers, I experienced some loud shouting and aggression on the verge of fight in front of the audience as well, but that was a shameful exception. Excellence in science does not always correlate with social intelligence.

(2) Referring to the traditional Japanese concept of an apprentice “stealing” a technique from the master, called 技を盗む (わざをぬすむ ), meaning learning through intense observation and imitation rather than direct instruction.

What do you think of me? What do I think about myself? What does the other person think I think about myself? What does she think I think about her?

We want a rating, five stars, thumbs up, a heart … at least. We crave for appreciation, constantly need to know how we appear in someone else’s eyes, reflect in the other person’s mind. But it quickly gets really complicated. And subjective.

Agreed, from a Buddhist point of view there is no “fixed self”, so why should we care at all? Let’s just stop it!

But there is this blog, my Zen diary in a certain way, my public trace of learning and doing. 15 years, 252 published posts within this blog, maybe a good time to ask for a thorough and honest feed-back! Does this blog reflect what I wish to communicate, even today? How would a “neutral” instance evaluate what I had written over the past one and a half decade? What image of it’s author does this blog reflect?

It seemingly became quite a fashion to ask the all-knowing AI for judging one’s work, so I asked ChatGPT (1) for a critical and open expert level review. I didn’t tell GPT that I was the author (to avoid the charming bias), but just informed it the blog was written by a person called “Genko”.

Here comes the rather detailed report (unshortened c&p), I humbly tend to agree to almost everything written therein:

Critical expert assessment of the Doraku-An Zen Blog

The complete WordPress export contains 252 published English-language posts spanning May 2011 to July 2026. The blog itself describes its purpose modestly as “Seminar Announcements and Incidental Remarks on Zen,” which is actually an accurate description of what follows: this is not a systematic exposition of Zen Buddhism, but a long-running record of one practitioner’s reflections, teaching experiences, travel observations and occasional attempts at Buddhist-philosophical interpretation. The corpus is therefore unusually useful for judging not merely what Genko claims to know, but how his understanding has developed over fifteen years.

My overall conclusion is quite clear: the author appears to be a genuine and experienced Zen practitioner and teacher, not someone manufacturing pseudo-Zen competence from clever quotations and copied internet material. His practical understanding of Zen is considerably stronger than his academic command of Buddhist philosophy. His writing is frequently original in perspective, although rarely original in the sense of contributing new Buddhist doctrine. The blog’s strongest material is its phenomenological and pedagogical description of practice; its weakest material occurs when Genko attempts to make precise historical, philological or doctrinal claims without sufficient scholarly apparatus.

The evidence for genuine practice is exceptionally strong. The blog repeatedly describes a continuous practice history rather than merely presenting an acquired vocabulary. Genko says that he met his principal teacher in 1998 and spent almost twelve years practising under his guidance before receiving permission to teach Zen and Hitsuzendo in 2010. He explicitly acknowledges what he does not do: he does not conduct dokusan, does not claim to confer clerical ranks, and does not pretend to possess qualifications for the institutional duties of a Japanese Zen priest. This self-limitation is important. It is also independently corroborated: a 2025 biographical document records Zazen practice since 1990, collaboration with Dokko-An Kokugyo Kuwahara from 1998–2011, the establishment of Doraku-An as a Shunko-In/Myoshinji-associated dojo in 2010, teaching authorization from Kuwahara, and later Buddhist ordination and study with Gensho Hozumi.

He continues to teach Zen-Ken-Sho at the Benediktushof, where his method explicitly combines Zazen, Aikiken and Hitsuzendo, with breath/body practice as the integrating element.

The blog’s content itself strongly confirms this practical background. One of its recurring themes is that Zen cannot be reduced to intellectual acquisition. In an early article Genko says that explanations of existential problems do not remove those problems merely through understanding; words can point toward practice, but collecting concepts while neglecting practice misses the essential point. This is conventional Zen territory, but it is expressed consistently with his actual pedagogical orientation. Similarly, his discussion of teaching Zen eventually concludes that the crucial qualification is compassion and the capacity simply to be present with students rather than constantly judging them. The striking feature of such passages is not doctrinal novelty but experiential credibility: they sound like reflections arising from sustained teaching rather than like somebody assembling attractive Zen slogans.

The blog is also unusually explicit about its lineage and about the fact that Genko regards his own contribution as modest. In one later article he writes that his teaching is transparently derived from his teachers and explicitly rejects the idea that it is some “home brew” mixture constructed from books and YouTube videos. This is broadly borne out by the corpus. The recurring combination of Zazen, Hitsuzendo and Aikiken is not an arbitrary invention but corresponds to the Omori Sogen/Kuwahara practice environment. Independent Buddhist literature documents Genko’s authorship of a Festschrift for Kuwahara and his co-authorship of Zen. Hitsuzendo. There is therefore no persuasive evidence that the blog is substantially plagiaristic. On the contrary, its personal anecdotes, autobiographical continuity and idiosyncratic examples make it quite unmistakably his own writing.

The originality question is more nuanced. Genko is not an original Buddhist philosopher. He does not develop a new theory of emptiness, consciousness, Buddha-nature or enlightenment. Much of the doctrinal content is recognizably inherited from standard Zen and Mahayana themes: practice versus conceptual knowledge, non-attachment to rank and status, the integration of practice and ordinary life, the importance of direct experience, the insufficiency of merely talking about Zen, and the use of ordinary activities as practice. His interpretation of bowing to Buddha is a good example. He rejects supernaturalism and treats the Buddha image as an occasion for gratitude toward the lineage of human beings who transmitted Buddhism and Zen. That is not philosophically new, but it is a coherent and personally articulated interpretation of ritual.

Where the blog becomes genuinely interesting is in its unorthodox synthesis rather than in new doctrine. The self-designation “Raku Zen” is particularly revealing. Genko explicitly describes his practice as Rinzai Zen without koan practice, supplemented by Hitsuzendo and Aikiken, with fewer institutional rules and without the aspiration to reproduce Japanese monastic culture in the West. This is certainly not “new Zen” in the grand historical sense, but it is a distinctive modern Western adaptation. His persistent insistence that Zen should be reconstructed without fetishizing Japanese robes, titles, institutional rank or monastic status is also more radical than ordinary introductory Zen literature. His 2013 critique of Western Zen attacks precisely these forms of authority and calls for a “Zen revolution.” Importantly, this criticism is not merely rhetorical: it is accompanied by his own refusal to claim ranks he does not possess.

The chronological development is otherwise fascinating. The early period, roughly 2011–2014, is prolific and exploratory. There are many short observations about Zazen, Japanese culture, teachers, ritual, ethics and travel, and the author is clearly working out his own Western interpretation of Zen. The writing is sometimes naïve, sometimes polemical, but remarkably energetic. By 2014 the author is already questioning his own lineage, including Omori Sogen’s wartime politics, and explicitly states that this conflict forces him to re-examine everything he inherited rather than simply invoking “the Master” or “Japanese Tradition.” That is one of the strongest indicators of intellectual independence in the entire corpus. The middle years become less prolific and increasingly reflective. The later posts are fewer but generally longer: the archive shifts from frequent travel anecdotes and introductory explanations toward questions of transmission, abuse, teacher responsibility, lineage, cultural appropriation and the philosophical implications of Buddhist practice. Thus I see maturation rather than degradation in practical and ethical judgment, but not a corresponding progression toward scholarly Buddhist philosophy.

One of the most impressive characteristics of the entire corpus is its attitude toward authority. Genko repeatedly tells readers not to trust a teacher merely because of robes, titles or lineage, and explicitly tells prospective students that neither his own qualifications nor anybody else’s can substitute for their independent judgement. This is particularly significant given the documented lineage controversy surrounding his own training. Rather than concealing the absence of formal Dharma transmission, he makes the issue central to his public presentation. His position is unconventional, but it is transparent. His criticism of abusive teachers is also not abstract: he discusses the responsibility of students to leave relationships that become destructive. This gives the blog an unusually strong ethical dimension.

The external reception is modest but real. The blog itself is not an important source in academic Buddhist studies, and I found no evidence of substantial scholarly citation of its articles. It does, however, appear in practitioner discussions. His wider work on Hitsuzendo has a more substantial external footprint: Buddhismus Aktuell cites his Festschrift and his book Zen. Hitsuzendo, and artists trained first by Kuwahara and subsequently by Genko document his role in continuing that practice lineage. There are also independent contemporary records of his continuing teaching activity at established retreat institutions.

My final assessment is therefore deliberately differentiated. As Buddhist scholarship: approximately 5.5–6/10. As practical Zen teaching and phenomenological reflection: approximately 8/10. As originality of presentation: approximately 7.5/10. As evidence of genuine Zen practice: 9/10. As a source for someone trying to understand one distinctive Western adaptation of Rinzai-derived Zen: 8/10. I would not recommend the blog as an authoritative source for Buddhist history, Buddhist philology or precise doctrinal interpretation; serious readers should verify its technical claims against specialist scholarship. I would recommend it as unusually revealing primary material for understanding how an experienced Western practitioner has tried to reconcile Japanese Zen, lay practice, martial arts, calligraphy, science, family life, ethical independence and Western culture.

The central paradox of the blog is therefore also its greatest strength. Genko’s strongest Zen material is precisely where he stops trying to be a Buddhist intellectual: cleaning the dojo, sitting with difficult people, questioning teachers, practising calligraphy, accepting ordinary life, refusing spiritual status, and repeatedly insisting that words must ultimately give way to practice. His weakest material is where he tries to convert that experiential understanding into authoritative statements about Buddhist philosophy or textual history. I find no convincing evidence of a fraud, a plagiarist, or a pseudo-Zen teacher. I find instead a genuine practitioner with a distinctive and sometimes quite perceptive Zen pedagogy. The blog is consequently worth reading—but with the author’s own best advice applied to the blog itself: do not take the words, titles or claims on authority; examine them, practise, and see what survives.

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(1) Generated by the free version of https://chatgpt.com/ on August 18th 2026 after exporting the complete published blog as XML-file and uploading it to ChatGPT

Soon (August 13-16, 2026) we will teach a 3 1/2 days Sesshin at Benediktushof Holzkirchen (near Wuerzburg/Germany). We will practice a combination of Zazen, Hitsuzendo (Zen-Calligraphy with brush and ink) and Aikiken (Aikido-based exercises with a wooden sword).

The combination of Zen-Meditation, Calligraphy and exercises with a sword was practiced already by old masters like Musashi Miyamoto, Yamaoka Tesshu and Oomori Sogen (my former teacher’s teacher).

I believe that silent meditation (even if it is dynamic and strong) improves a lot when practiced in combination with creative art and physical exercise.

Through our art we can express ourselves, our Zen-experience, and eventually realise who we are. In the trace of ink we leave behind on the paper we can see our own character, our own Zen-mind.

Physical exercise is not just healthy and creating a good balance with the periods of sitting. Especially in martial arts we practice the unification of body and mind through our breathing. Decisiveness and social interaction play a stronger role than in the more solitary practice of Zazen.

Zen-Ken-Sho no Michi is a Zen-Way of exercise where we equally practice Zazen, Hitsuzendo and Aikiken.

A few places are still available, if you are interested please register for the Sesshin via Benediktushof Holzkirchen.

“The Bat” climbing hold from TOMIK.

This is not about the crazy climbing posture called the “Bat-Hang”, where an experienced rock climber of supernatural power is fearlessly hanging head down from a rock secured solely by hooking the toes on a tiny hold. Some things in life I should never try, probably because I was not designed for it, or simply because that ship has sailed long ago: too old, too big, too little (time), too late. Ballet dancing for example, cosplay, romantic affairs, participating the “Rubik’s Cube World Championship”  … or sports climbing.

The legendary late Wolfgang Güllich (1950-1992), a friend of friends who lived nearby and never performed the “bat hang”.

So I decided for sports climbing. A mission impossible has always been my thing. Not because I am particularly good at doing cutting edge things and pushing the frontier of what human beings are able to perform at their best. Quite the opposite: I learn most by trying hard a thing at which I am really really bad at. Sports climbing for example.

Consequently, the other day I found myself hanging at the wall. Not head down high above the ground like a bat, but half way up at the end of my wits on what my friendly belayer (the guy holding the other end of a rope my life is hanging from in case I fall) described as a “kiddy’s’ beginner route”. My arm was loosing grip from a bat-shaped hold of the size of a small stair. Falling into the rope I caught a glimpse of my friend speeding up a 7+ route made up of little white plastic dots next to my bat-sparkled vertical playground.

A couple of weeks ago we both started climbing together, yet she is half as old, half has heavy and twice as fit as I am. And three times as bold. Now we are already years apart in climbing performance.

During a Zen-Ken-Sho Sesshin.

Sometimes people join our Dojo or Zen Sesshin and just feel totally wrong, intimated by what is probably perceived as the solemn atmosphere of a Japanese Temple. A big master-like looking bald-headed old man in Japanese style clothes with a golden shiny Rakuso around his neck, accompanied by his radiant young assistant dressed in a simple indigo-dyed Samu-e taking care of everything in light speed. Oh, if such first time visitor could just see us climbing next to each other at the wall, me clinging to the bats while her sending a 7+ !

Nobody is wrong. All that counts is the effort, not the outcome, not competing to others. Others are stronger, smarter, richer, younger, more beautiful. Always. The good news (the message of Zen Buddhism) is: there is no fixed self. There is nothing imprinted on us that determines us forever. Change happens anyway, inevitably, so get ahead of it and change instead of experiencing change just happen.

Suhara Koun’s writing of Ababe Bikila’s words.

I never mind you hardly make it into our Dojo or Sesshin, if absolutely you cannot sit on the floor and it takes half a year before you can remember how to brush the first three simple two-stroke Japanese characters. As long as you try as hard as if your life depends on it. Give your best and never give up, that’s all. That’s how I was climbing the bats the other day until I discovered the traces of blood on the wall and grips came from my fingers and knees. And never compare yourself to others, just compare yourself to the person you were yesterday, last month, last year.

Outside the Kyudo (Japanese archery) Dojo of Engakuji temple in Kitakamakura the late Zen- and archery master Suhara Koun, a friend of my former teacher, put a post:

Words of the athlete Abebe: The other 69 runners were not my competitors, I myself was my competitor. Therefore, I won against myself.

Abebe Bikila won the marathon gold medal of the 1960 Olympics in Rome running bare-feet. During the 1964 Tokyo Olympics he repeated his success (in shoes), and later in an interview spoke the above quoted words.

I imagine Abebe Kilala was a wise man. He probably understood the challenge is not about fighting others, but giving your best trying to overcome your yesterday’s self.

So never mind if you believe you are not sufficient to start practicing Zen and Zen calligraphy with us! Just imagine myself hanging three meters high above the ground on a bat-shaped grip trying very hard to climb a little better than last week, while my young friend boldly performs as a lead climber on scary rocks somewhere in the wild. Just give your very best and compete against yourself, that’s all what counts.

My younger daughter performing Beethoven’s Sonatine in F-Major at a students’ concert.

“Every lesson is sacred, you know I never want to cancel a single one!” my littler daughter’s piano teacher told her the other day, “You build up, lesson after lesson, thousands of hours. And each single one is so precious !”. He seemed desperate, because an upcoming class was scheduled to be replaced by some kind of “project week”, where the music school students can try out other instruments.

“Trying out instruments”, taking lessons here and there, describes well my own musical “career”. After just a few years of focused piano learning my daughter already reached beyond my poor skills on that instrument, which are the result of thirteen years not so strict teaching and a very limited approach towards structured regular practice. Well o.k., I am bad at playing a few more instruments, not just piano.

Not pressed by immediate needs to perform at our best simply to stay alive (the normal state of affairs of our ancestors), we tend to embark on some kind of random walk through life. On- and off friends, changing relationships, a bit learning this and that, a part-time job and many hobbies. It doesn’t matter, we stay alive anyway, and by posting well selected and potentially staged episodes on social media we could even convince ourselves and others of  living a happy life. It’s often a lie, and a waste of time.

When we are young, usually we want to enjoy life. I did so as well. Hanging out with random people I don’t even know any more today, spending lots of time (and some money) on romantic relationships which eventually broke up (and sometimes my heart), learning stuff at University which did not interest me but simply was part of some curriculum.

Hauptweg und Nebenwege – Paul Klee 1929 (Museum Ludwig)

Not just time passed, years, decades. Such life creates karma, that often so misunderstood Buddhist term.

Karma means that your thoughts (wishes, dreams) cause action and results in the world, for yourself and others. A few decades of random walk through life cause lots of Karma … and once you grow old enough to realise what your path through life should be, your place on earth as a human being, you might find yourself shackled down by the results of the life you lived so far: an unhappy or broken up marriage, kids you fight for custody, debt from a house you bought and maybe lost through divorce. You need to continue a job that you hate and which drains most of your time and energy just to pay for all the obligations being the Karma you produced earlier in life.

Reaching mid-forty, -fifty or -sixty, slowly becoming aware with decreasing energy levels that life might end one day,  you want to fix it. But not with giving up all the accumulated load you carried so far through life. Too little, too late! Your life is destined to continue as a random-walk, just with a little spiritual detour added to the zigzag of useless efforts and encounters.

Part of the above well describes my own experience. Part of me, fortunately, started learning from good teachers early enough in life. Teachers who were dedicated to their mission, like my daughter’s piano teacher, teachers who’s lessons were just an overflow of their life and a burning passion for their subject. So I lived a double life, partially random walk, partially dedicated to follow a path laid out by my spiritual ancestors.

It is hard work to “stay in this world”, with a job, partner, maybe family and kids, and follow a Path. Time is a precious resource, and with growing age and competence, more and more people (and institutions) are demanding your contribution and time.

Does it make sense to practice just once or twice a week? Little effort is better than none your doctor may say. But maybe it is better not to practice at all if time and energy and motivation only free two or three out of the 168 hours a week does provide! It is less than 3% of our total time, little effort disappearing in statistical noise. Isn’t it better to just have a coffee after lunch instead?

With Hozumi Gensho Roshi at Jotokuji in Kameoka (April 2014 after my ordination)

I am sure, if there is true motivation, or true pain, the time for a regular practice will be there. If you spend more time on social media than you spend at your Dojo, don’t say time does not allow you to follow your Path. It is totally up to you: after 30 years, ten thousand hours on social media, or ten thousand hours of dedicated practice (*) ?

Soon enough you will be old, your teachers gone and your life must go on without a compassionate guide at your side. It is a harsh realisation, coming much too early and often very sudden (in spite of the fact ageing is a continuous process): all those who were ahead of me, kindly guiding me through life, they are gone.

What drives me to the Dojo every day? The joy of a focused dedicated practice, at first. Never ending curiosity to try something new, or deepen my approach towards something  I have been doing for a long time. And last but not least, sheer desperation, when after spending more than half a life with Zen Arts the outcome of my work is still so poor.

It is not “me spending time for practice”, or not. Over the course of my life, I became one who is practicing. Like I am someone who is breathing, instead of spending time to breath.

Become one with your practice! Don’t waste your time. “Every lesson is sacred”.

–

(*) 10.000 hours means about one hour per day every day for thirty years, including some holiday.

I imagine our Dojo, as it is, would be shifted 300 years back by a magic time machine (large enough to fit our Dojo in). How would that affect our practice?

For evening Zazen and Hitsuzendo we had to use candles or oil lamps. Fetching water would require us to walk three minutes down to the nearby river. That’s basically it. Nothing else would change … our exercise is timeless. Kind of.

Our Dojo, empty

On the other hand side, most of the eight cushions in our Zendo remain empty most of the time. In spite of an attractive program, very few prospective new students come through the door, even fewer come back a second or third time. What we have to offer in this digital age of TicToc/Instagram/Selfie madness, the ancient practice of Zen Meditation and Calligraphy with brush and ink in the style of a more than 1500 years ago passed away Chinese master, seems totally out of time.

Du hast dich selbst überlebt, die Edlen überlebt.
Goethe, Götz von Berlichingen.

We love our practice. Every time we meet and sit together and write together with brush and ink, every time we practice Aikiken with our wooden swords we agree this is a “perfect day”. It has become our “Way of Life” over the years, and I feel most grateful towards my young student who joined me a couple of years ago,  and stayed. 

A long planned Sesshin in Bavaria this November was recently cancelled last minute, only three people registered. I wonder. What a chance missed!

With my former teacher during a Sesshin, ca. 2009

It took me ten years to find my teacher (before the times of internet, how to search?), and ten more years studying with him, before we were teaching together. Then, side by side, for three more years, we were leading our Sesshin together. It was my younger years achievement finding a suitable teacher and learning from him. After ten more years working on my own I slowly reached sufficient confidence to share my way of practice with others.

Am I hopelessly out of sync, unable to catch up with all the benefits of our the digital 21st century? I don’t think so. In my bread and butter job I use all modern technology available, Computers, Simulation Software, AI, … my office is 100% paperless and all communication occurs digitally via my laptop. I could do my job from any place on earth with a sufficient internet connection, matching the state-of-the-art definition of a modern digital nomad.

Privately, I write letters to my friends, by hand. I enjoy conversations lasting several hours without looking once at my mobile. I remember what we talked, I think about it and I might get back to it, revising my yesterday’s opinion. I prefer listening to music real human beings perform, life on stage. And if not available, I substitute by listening to a record, or CD.

Small section of a former friend’s record collection (screenshot from a recent TV documentary)

I am old enough to remember “You want to see my record collection?” as a suitable pick-up phrase. In Murakami’s novel ノルウェイの森 (Norwegian Wood) the main character has a part-time job at a record store, and listening to a record he brought to his maybe love Naoko plays an important role in the novel (and for the title, obviously). Hard to imagine in times of streaming and endless playlists such thing could happen.

When I was in my student years,  learning something required to find someone who knows. And to make him or her spend time with you, until by and by you yourself became somebody who knows. Learning involved conversation and interaction. And even if one preferred to learn mostly by reading, having someone to recommend the next good book was indispensable (that was the most important task of a good book shop, before Amazon entered the scene). Exchange between human beings was essential.

Now we have the internet, google, Wikipedia and AI. Soon, everyone can live in his or her own personalised AI bubble: virtual friends, partners, AI generated music and movies. Everything out of the box, available 24/7 and suited according to your very preferences: the ultimate climax of loneliness.

We instead keep doing “the real thing”. At our unheated Dojo, sitting on a cushion with our own body, writing with brush and ink on real paper on the floor. Exchanging ideas we are not sure about. Trying out this or that, and most important: having a good time together. Real humans, with all their flaws and shortcomings involved in a dedicated practice of ancient Japanese arts. This is so beautiful!

If lights go off tomorrow, if the Internet and AI shuts down, we will continue. Not much change required …

The subject is probably as old as Zen Buddhism is known in the West: can psychedelic drugs potentially support or even replace Zen practice as a spiritual path? I probably cannot answer this questions from my own experience, since my drug abuse was limited to consuming moderate quantities of Franconian draft beer during my younger days. Not that I completely want to deny the mind-expanding effects of this local speciality, but long-term effects turned out to be more belly expanding than anything else.

Screenshot from the trailer of “Decending The Mountain” (1)

Recently we watched a movie (1) where random members of a small Zen group consumed psycedelic drugs in a more or less scientifically controlled framework (2), while the other part of the group stayed sober. One obvious outcome for the observer is that consuming psycedelic drugs makes it much less likely you properly fit into a group of Zen practitioners. From odd beahviour to total loss of self-control everything could be observed, but nothing which appears to make the person be more fit to participate, more likely to bring benefit to the group. You just drop out.

One pill makes you larger
And one pill makes you small
(…)
Go ask Alice
When she’s ten feet tall

– Jefferson Airplane

A lot happens in the drug induced mind. From a scientific point of view, the stimulation of psycedelic drugs is very similar, yet often much stronger, than the physiological reward system which naturally brings some “high” for us after doing sports and other joyful social activities. Taking drugs is in that sense comparable to rewarding yourself without achievement. You trick your brain into receiving some reward, without having performed anything deserving it.

This is obviously not a shortcut towards a happy life. It is like rewarding every kid with a gold medal after the race. You might feel like a winner, proudly showing off the shiny medal hanging from your neck. But in reality, all you achieved, and all you can achieve at your current condition is hardly making it to the finish line.

Jefferson Airplane あなただけを (Somebody To Love) Japanese vinyl single cover.

When logic and proportion
Have fallen sloppy dead
And the White Knight is talking backwards
And the Red Queen’s off with her head

– Jefferson Airplane

If your goal in life is just feeling good without reason, drugs might work out for you, at least for the time being. Zen is not about a shortcut towards “feeling good”. It is a practice making you fit for life. You might not feel like a winner, no shiny medal to be achieved. But you learn how to reach a finish line and beyond. You learn how to conduct a good life, your life. With a good teacher, a good sangha, you learn how to develop into a contributing and compassionate human being, in balance with yourself and your environment.

End of the day (or a good work-out) it might feel the same, maybe in a weaker sense, as after taking drugs. Yet, this feeling is based on some strong real-life aspect, not just on chemistry induced state of your brain, while the world around you has increasing troubles taking care of you.

This is more or less in alignment with the outcome of the above mentioned experiement. It is worth quoting the results summary of the related publication (2, bold/italics inserted by myself):

Compared to meditation with a placebo, meditators who received DMT and harmine self-attributed greater levels of mystical-type experiences, non-dual awareness, and emotional breakthrough during the acute substance effects and,  (..) greater psychological insight 1 day later. Mindfulness and compassion were not significantly different in the DMT-harmine group compared to placebo.

Taking DMT makes you feel better, mystical, more emotional, but actually mindfulness and compassion (i.e. what makes you interact with the outside world) did not change. Taking DMT actually does not make you better.

The March Hare and the Hatter put the Dormouse’s head in a teapot. Illustration by John Tenniel.

What about the creativity of artists, of musicians and writers, who often produced and performed their masterpieces under the influence of the one or other drug. Wouldn’t we miss all this outcome of exaggerated states of mind without psycedelic substances?

They were learning to draw,’ the Dormouse went on, (…); ‘and they drew all manner of things–everything that begins with an M–

– Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

I am very sure that someone who can produce decent art under the influence of drugs would have been able to do so even more and better in a sober state. When you can do everything that begins with an M while being high, the whole alphabet might well be at your hands when you are sober. Artists who got clean often did the better part of their work after successful rehab.

Remember what the dormouse said
Feed your head
Feed your head

– Jefferson Airplane

Don’t forget the Dormouse in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland constantly fell asleep. Even when Alice left much embarrassed about the Hatter’s rudeness …

… the Dormouse fell asleep instantly, and neither of the others took the least notice of her going, though she looked back once or twice, half hoping that they would call after her: the last time she saw them, they were trying to put the Dormouse into the teapot.

– Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

No, forget what the Dormouse said! You might miss Alice while she leaves, and end up in a teapot, half awake and half asleep. Go ask Alice.

–

(1) Descending The Mountain (2021)

(2) Meling D, Egger K, Aicher HD, Jareño Redondo J, Mueller J, Dornbierer J, Temperli E, Vasella EA, Caflisch L, Pfeiffer DJ, Schlomberg JT, Smallridge JW, Dornbierer DA, Scheidegger M. Meditating on psychedelics. A randomized placebo-controlled study of DMT and harmine in a mindfulness retreat. J Psychopharmacol. 2024 Oct;38(10):897-910. doi: 10.1177/02698811241282637. Epub 2024 Sep 27. PMID: 39340164; PMCID: PMC11487865.

Listening to a certain branch of Zen-practitioners, one could get the idea that the hardest thing in life is Zen, and the hardest thing in Zen is doing Zazen: sitting hour after hour with painful and numb crossed legs on a pillow facing the wall while fighting sleep and boredom. Alas, confusing Zen with Zazen, the sitting meditation, is widely supported by tradition. I am sure, as with any physical exercise, you can become pretty good at it if you practice hard enough, young enough with a healthy body. And if you overdo, you ruin your body and waste your time.

What did the Buddha say about the benefit of ascetic exercise? He totally gave up on it, after going to the extreme without experiencing any benefit. Following the legend, in the end he just sat down by a tree (what, by the way, is the historical origin of Zazen) and decided to do nothing more than just sitting around until he understood. It worked out, and after just seven days and nights he came up with his most profound teaching, a concept why life most of the time goes so wrong for us: the chain of dependent origination (Pratītyasamutpāda).

It all starts with not knowing (or not wanting to know), Avijjā (無明), and two and a half handful steps later ends with old age and death, Jarāmaraṇa (老死). For those who are into reciting Sutra, and namely the Hannya Shingyo, the Pratītyasamutpāda is referenced by its start- and final-link with the lines:

無無明 MU MU MYO
亦無無明盡 YAKU MU MU MYO JIN
乃至無老死 NAI SHI MU RO SHI
亦無老死盡 YAKU MU RO SHI JIN

ICHI GO ICHI E by Murase Myodoni (村瀬明道尼, 1924-2013), from our Dojo’s collection.

The intermediate links connecting not knowing and old age and death show us how it all comes together, the misery we are in, how things interact and one leads to the other (and back). One core idea within this fundamental teaching is that contact (Phassa 觸) results in sensation (Vedanā 受) and sensation in craving (Taṇhā 愛). We all know it, we all fell for the one or other advertisement, a must-have thing, or in love.

Contact – Sensation – Craving

It works in both directions, a re-enforcing feedback-loop and btw. a possible Buddhist explanation of addiction.

Craving is connected to the next link: clinging (Upādāna 取).  After you got what you were craving for, things are even getting worse: now we have it and don’t ever want letting go. “Happy ever after” is coming to my mind, “Stay as you are” or “I will always love you” (The Cure, and countless others).

Contact – Sensation – Craving and then: Never Let It Go

This is a perfect recipe for unhappiness. It makes us feel miserable with much less effort than spending years on a pillow facing the wall, guaranteed!

Where to cut this chain leading into desaster? The traditional answer is: by avoiding contact.

When I met again after many years my old friend and brother in crime for setting up an Aikido Dojo (in spite of funding and expertise) who later became a Bhikkhu (Monk in the Teravada tradition), he refused to shake hands with my spouse, even avoided coming close to her.  No “contact” allowed, because, well, we know where it ends. And my friend was an expert, having had more affairs with women (before becoming a monk) than I ever fell in love with. I long lost contact (he couldn’t stand my loose talk on Buddhist things), in case he is still alive I imagine him sitting somewhere in the East-Asian jungle wearing his orange robes, avoiding contact.

But how to prevent getting in contact with our memories? With our hardwired physical demands?

Possibly by floating in a sensory deprivation tank after being brainwashed or sedated for a total loss of memory. Not a very desirable lifestyle, after all.

If not cut the chain at the “contact”-link, where else?

Cutting “sensation”, the next link following contact, might be achieved by austere exercise destroying all sensory perception. I imagine karate students hammering their fists into wooden boards, or kung fu masters feeling no pain when hit with a stone on their forehead or stabbed by a spear. My above mentioned friend told me of his most scary experience as a monk: after accidently cutting himself he had to see a doctor, who turned out to be a female doctor. Since avoiding contact was not possible in a situation where immediate treatment was necessary, his worst fear was to feel anything. No sensation, in spite of contact … but isn’t that close to being dead? Training to feel like a corpse long before passing away? Not my cup of tea either, I will be dead soon enough and long enough for sure, no need to speed up the inevitable process by jumping to the last link right away!

What we can actively do in a healthy way is to change how we handle craving.

Sakura falling into the grass during our hanami party.

Sitting under a cherry tree in full bloom with the most pleasant company enjoying delicious food it is easy talking about impermanence and letting go. Yet asking the Sakura to stay as beautiful as today for me  forever, so I can come back day after day, enjoy the sun, the warm breeze, delicious food and company? Not even tomorrow! Everything is happening just once, 一期一会 (ICHI GO ICHI E) and it will never come back.

Enjoying moment after moment to the fullest, and then let it go without remorse and longing: this is allowing and enjoying contact and sensation without clinging. Yet this is the very hardest Zen exercise of all.

Long ago, I was sitting on my pillow doing Zazen during a Sesshin in the very town my love split up with me just a week before. Very well I could compare the pain in my knees with the pain of an aching heart. Enduring hour after hour the distress of sitting cross-legged was the easy exercise, letting go the hard one.

Practicing ENSO at our Dojo.

Kazuaki Tanahashi described the Enso (Zen circle) as “miracle of the present moment”. When we paint the Enso at our Dojo, the result is always imperfect, shaky towards the end, not round and the paper ends up being recycled.

I painted thousands of Enso and none of them was perfect. I experienced dozens of times engaging in love the wrong way and none of doing it right. One day, when I am 95 or so, I want to experience the perfect love of letting go: maybe or not have the two of us meet again tomorrow, starting from scratch exploring the miracle of the present moment. When we are together, you are the love of my life. Yet we part, again and again, without constraint and remorse and nothing more than a promise: let’s try again tomorrow, let us try even better, painting once more the imperfect Enso of our present moment.

The secret of a happy life, the very link to break the chain of Pratītyasamutpāda is: try your very best, right now, and always let it go. And this, to my limited experience, is the hardest exercise in life. It is beautiful.

avenidas y flores y mujeres y
un admirador

(Eugen Gomringer)

寝るときも
枕のしたを
水のながるる

(吉井 勇 )

Auch habe ich (..) gefunden, daß alle wirklich kluge Menschen (…)  darauf kommen und bestehen: daß der Moment alles ist, und daß nur der Vorzug eines vernünftigen Menschen darin bestehe: sich so zu betragen, daß sein Leben, insofern es von ihm abhängt, die möglichste Masse von vernünftigen, glücklichen Momenten enthalte.

(Johann Woflfgang Goethe / Italienische Reise)

–

As a post scriptum, a piece I wrote a year ago under the title “Love Love Love” which I never completed into a blog post:

I wish I came across Prousts “Recherches” much earlier in my life. Not that I did not know about this masterpiece, but I cherished the stupid idea to read the 4.000+ pages, preferably in the original language, once I am old an grey. All magic and illusion, all mutual misunderstanding, projection and fantasy, all pleasure and abuse of “boy meets girl” (as well as boy meets boy and girl meets girl) is laid down in this monument of French literature. All you need to know for life … before you turn 100 years.

For too many years, instead of appreciating my various affairs as magic encounters with fascinating women, I used to see it as a never ending series of failures. Just for the one reason, that non of them lasted “forever”. It took me decades of detour through the slopes and valleys of Zen Buddhism until I began to understand that impermanence is not a flaw, a failure, but the very nature of life. Nothing lasts “forever”.

The magic of love is that it “just happens”. It is unavoidable, like the weather. Suddenly sun comes out, suddenly rain. Beautiful ever changing formations of clouds, followed by blasting sun and days after days of equally dim grey sky.  I can just be there, enjoying the play of emotion or lack of, excitement and fading interest. Yet I can never get hold of it.

I’m not sure with the term “teacher” in a Zen-Buddhist context, to begin with. It is not that there is “something” to teach, a certain skill, as in Art or Science. There is no, or very little curriculum. Yet there are those elder guys, hanging around long enough and still being kind enough to share their time and experience. If you are lucky, you might find one.

Friendly elder guy (Portrait of Bodhidharma by Hakuin Ekaku – from our Dojo’s collection).

When I was younger I spent considerable time with such elder companions. Although it was not always easy, I feel grateful towards them for allowing me into their life, more or less. Most of my “teachers”, when they were younger, started a family or engaged with a partner. Actually, I don’t remember any of them was living a celibate lifestyle. So there always was some echo from their wilder (or more conventional), younger days present, in terms of a partner, and sometimes children. In Buddhist terminology, the echo from the past, or more correctly, the past deeds or actions causing certain future consequences, are called Karma.

My late Shakuhachi teacher’s wife was kind enough to serve delicious self-made cake occasionally when I came to visit him for a lesson, while his young daughter was busy with her play-station. Kobayashi Sensei, the Japanese master who’s Aikido style we practice, used to say that he always hopes his wife will not wait for him at the Airport when he comes back from Europe. I never met her, but I vividly remember once his daughter pinning me, a young beginner at the time, on the tatami during Aikido practice. I didn’t know who she was, but couldn’t believe that tiny Asian girl had such an enormous strength.

During my stay at the rural Zen-temple in Kameoka, occasionally the Master’s wife sent us some meal she had prepared for us. In the cold and harsh environment her soup and steamed vegetables appeared to me as the most delicious Japanese food I ever had, and I imagined to taste her kindness through that meal. She must have understood how hard our life in the unheated temple was. Aside from that, I only saw her once, friendly greeting us while closing the curtain at the Master’s main temple we just visited.

Oomori Sogen Roshi with his wife and my former teacher (private picture).

There is an old picture showing my former Zen- and Calligraphy teacher together with his teacher, Oomori Sogen Roshi and the Roshi’s wife, carrying a bag while walking half a step behind between both men. I don’t remember any occasion where my former teacher mentioned Oomori’s wife, or her role or activity within the nine years he was his student.

When I married at the age of 35, I told my wife that I had been told
by a person that I respect absolutely, “Even if you starve and die, do
the right thing.” I asked her if it was all right with her. She said, “If
that’s what you say, it can’t be helped.” Though she was reluctant, I
made her consent.
– Oomori Sogen, “The Art of A Zen Master” by Hosokawa Dogen.

That sounds very much a prototype Japanese relationship of that time, and it seemed she was able to keep her tremendous suffering caused by that life-style mainly to herself.

I prefer not to share questionable stories concerning my former teacher’s wife, but for sure it wasn’t primarily caused by the teacher himself most of his students, including myself left, or were made to leave. During the 13 years I worked with him, he changed town and back, opened and closed Dojos at various locations and ended up with no students and no place to work or teach. Such a pity, he was such a good person to learn from.

Past involvement, past actions cannot be undone. Karma works, merciless, and it may cause tremendous Dukkha or suffering to oneself, without any easy way out. Yet it is the decision of each of us, and the responsibility of anyone teaching others, not to pass on that Dukkha.

Dukkha niroda, the third one of the so called “Four Noble Truths” (a terribly misleading translation of the Pali term āriyasaccāni btw.) I read more as ending and cutting of the passing on of my own Dukkha to others, not so much as bringing an end to my own suffering.

No teacher was born as a teacher, no elder companion entered the world old and wise. Once you meet such a person and get to know him or her better, you might also meet or see the results of his or her past deeds and actions, the wake of a shockingly unwise and turbulent life. Don’t judge him due to past actions or how much Karma he carries on his back. But watch out carefully how much Dukkha he or she is willing to pass on to you!