By: Bob Zeglovitch
It is sometimes helpful to step outside one’s tradition in order to more clearly understand the tradition. I find that this is sometimes the case in Zen—either to read a description of practice that is consistent with Zen but put in different language, or to see a clear contrast in practices within the broader field of Buddhist meditation. An instance of the former is Tilopa’s Six Words of Advice (also referred to as Tilopa’s Six Nails), which we have been introduced to in our last couple of sessions at Just Show Up. These directions for meditation practice from the Tibetan Mahamudra tradition, for me, resonate strongly with the practice of just sitting/shikantaza as presented by Dogen. Many commentators note the similarities between Mahamudra and Soto Zen practice.
Tilopa was an Indian Buddhist monk in the tantric Tibetan Kagyu lineage, who lived from 988 to 1069. He was a “mahasiddha” (great adept) and the teacher of Naropa, another famed master in this lineage. Tilopa’s Six Words are also sometimes referred to as The Six Yogas of Naropa. The most direct translation (which in Tibetan consisted of just six words) is:
Don’t recall.
Don’t imagine.
Don’t think.
Don’t examine.
Don’t control.
Rest.
Ken McLeod, a modern practitioner and translator, has come up with a slightly longer and more fleshed out translation:
Let go of what has passed.
Let go of what may come.
Let go of what is happening now.
Don’t try to figure anything out.
Don’t try to make anything happen.
Relax, right now, and rest.
Both of these translations have their virtues and we may resonate with one over the other. The first is more pithy. It also has a more directed sense, which may feel restrictive or a bit harsh, or in the alternative could provide just the right feeling of firm boundary for one’s practice. The latter feels a bit more relaxed and permissive in tone, although the substance is essentially the same. I’d like to tweak it just a bit and for the fourth and fifth lines, suggest the following alternative phrasing in case it fits for you: “Let go of trying to figure anything out” and “Let go of trying to make anything happen.” This feels even a bit softer and has the advantage of the repetition of the “let go” instruction throughout. After one becomes familiar with the detail of the instructions, they could all be collapsed into the simpler instruction to “let go and relax”—or even just “relax.” This doesn’t mean, of course, to relax like you might by going into a light trance in a hot tub, or getting sleepy on the couch. Instead, it is the relaxation that naturally flows from and is in accord with the other instructions, which embody non-grasping. Coming at this from a different direction, I suppose one could start with the gesture of relaxing, which in turn is consistent with letting go of past, future, present, figuring things out, and making things happen or getting somewhere in our meditation.
These instructions have the flavor of non-doing and non-striving that is also present in Dogen’s Fukanzazengi. “Don’t try to figure anything out” harmonizes with “[y]ou should cease from practice based on intellectual understanding, pursuing words and following after speech…”. I’m also reminded here of the following sentences: “ Do not think good or bad. Do not administer pros and cons. Cease all the movements of the conscious mind, the gauging of all thoughts and views.” Tilopa’s “don’t try to make anything happen” harmonizes with Dogen’s “[h]ave no design on becoming a buddha.” The injunction to relax, or rest, squares with Dogen’s statement that the zazen that he is speaking of “is simply the dharma-gate of repose and bliss…”. While there may not be direct comparisons to the three lines advising one to let go of past, future and present, that instruction is certainly consistent with the “just sitting” style, where we drop likes and dislikes and practice simply being in the posture and vitally awake.
Tilopa directs: “don’t think.” Dogen’s pointer is to practice “non-thinking”, or thinking of not-thinking. My tentative sense is that these are likely in accord, and that the heart of the instruction here is not to banish all thought, but rather to relax the grip of thinking and to let go of our engagement with it. This theme has been discussed in earlier posts in relation to Dogen’s Fukanzazengi.
One last observation—I am struck by the instruction to let go of what is happening now. So often in modern mindfulness teachings we are taught to attend to the “present moment”, or to just “be right here, right now.” What is refreshing about Tilopa’s instruction is that it acknowledges that once you feel that you are in or with the present moment’s experience, it has slipped through your fingers and is changed, gone. This highlights a way in which modern mindfulness teachings may be encouraging some delusion. Tilopa encourages us to practice without any pretense of finding or noting the present. This relieves us of the need to try to grasp at what is essentially ungraspable. It doesn’t mean that we won’t have perceptions of what seems to be happening right now, but instead that we can let that perception or experience just fall away as it is naturally doing in any event.