“The real miracle isn’t to walk on water. The real miracle is to walk right here on Earth” according to Vietnamese Zen teacher Thich Nhat Hanh. In this episode a short guided meditation is followed by a teaching, emphasizing shifting from busyness to being more focused, engaged, and spacious. The practice of spaciousnes is essential in today’s complex world. The Zen puzzler is based on a traditional Zen koan — Is the flag moving, the wind moving, or is it your mind that is moving?

 

 

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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

[00:00:00] Marc Lesser: Welcome to ZenBones: Ancient Wisdom For Modern Times, this is Marc Lesser. Why ZenBones? Our world is in crisis and ever shifting and now more than ever, more wisdom, clarity and courage are essential, especially in the world of work, business and leadership.

In today’s episode we explore the topic of, The World is its Own Magic. This comes from a quote in the book, Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind by Zen Teacher Shunryu Suzuki. We start with a short guided meditation on this theme of seeing the world both as ordinary and leaning in and feeling the mystery and magic of our world. Following the meditation, I do a short talk on this topic of the world is its own magic and the power of just being present. Following the talk, I do a Zen puzzler. Today’s Zen puzzler is a famous Zen koan where two monks are arguing about a flag that’s moving or is the wind moving and a Zen teacher comes along and says, “No, it’s your mind that’s moving.” I hope you enjoy today’s episode, The World is its Own Magic.

Let’s do a few minutes of meditation practice or stopping, pausing. Just whatever’s been happening in your day, to pause and bring your attention now to being here. Starting with the breath, starting with the body, arriving, pausing. Something ordinary and magical about our ability to do this, the ability to stop, reflect to experience your experience right now. Again, just taking a few minutes and you can sit longer than my guiding here.

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The approach of curiosity, bringing a sense of curiosity to the breath, to the body and to our experience. What is it like to stop and pause? What is it like to be here? As much as possible, letting go of our usual judgements, our concerns about the past, our planning for the future, letting go of the to-do lists. One way to do that is to bring attention. Bring attention to the breath, bringing attention to the body. With each exhale a little bit more relaxed and alert and letting go. Letting go of the ordinary day-to-day activities and seeing what it’s like to be here.

I’ve been turning this quote by Zen teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh, that the real miracle isn’t to walk on water. The real miracle is to walk right here on Earth. This is the magic of the miracle of being present here. Opening our hearts, opening our minds and allowing our experience. No need to try and change anything. Checking in with the body, checking in with the breath, and noticing a thinking mind, letting our thoughts come and let them go. Checking in with our hearts, our feelings, our deepest sense of what brings us here right now.

What is it like to be here? What is it like to be alive? Taking the board off of our shoulder, the board that keeps us in a more narrow, explainable everyday world. What is it like when we remove the board and open to what’s possible, open to our full experience, our intuition, our imagination and our presence of being fully here, fully alive right now in this moment?

Keeping it simple. Keeping it simple, breathing in and breathing out, the real miracle. The real miracle is to walk right here. The real miracle is to be present, curious, kind, here, alive in this moment, appreciating everything.

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Thank you for your attention. Please feel free to continue sitting as long as you would like. I’m going to, with the next breath, come back here. Thank you very much.

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The world is its own magic. This is one of my favorite quotes from Vietnamese Zen teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh, where he says, “The real miracle isn’t to walk on water. The real miracle is to walk right here on Earth.” Thich Nhat Hanh died fairly recently leaving a legacy of what he called engaged buddhism. The practice of seeing reality, the practice of keeping our hearts open and the effort and practice of helping to heal and make the world a better place.

The practice, the miracle to walk right here on Earth is central to our work, to our leadership and all parts of our lives. It takes practice to keep coming back to this moment, this place and the people who are right in front of us without getting distracted by our phones, our social media and our relentless to-do list. Last week I led an in-person mindful leadership workshop for a group of about 50 leaders in the healthcare industry. They had all traveled to San Francisco from across the United States for a company retreat.

As I was preparing to lead the morning session, there was a good deal of buzz in the room about a magic show that they’d all been attending the night before. It was called The Magic Patio. When I heard about this magic event, it sounded really interesting. Then little by little I began feeling more nervous and a little bit daunted by the idea of my mindfulness session following a magic show. Mindful leadership seemed a little bit dull compared to this magic show. I wondered what was I going to do to engage this audience? As I stood up in front of the group to start this mindfulness session, I surprised myself and I looked around and I said, “Well, I’m a magician too.” Then I shared the Thich Nhat Hanh quote about the real miracle being to walk right here on Earth.

As I did this, I deeply felt the magic of just being present and alive in that room with that group of curious and open-minded business leaders. During the workshop we addressed the challenge of busyness, and how busy we’ve all become, especially in this 24/7 always-on business environment. I suggested to the group an alternative way of not being constantly busy and instead to practice being more focused, engaged, and spacious. Focused on what we’re doing right now in this moment, letting go of ruminating about the past and worrying about the future. Wholeheartedly engaged with what matters most and spacious exploring what it feels like to be satisfied and open, feeling the spaciousness in the physical room, as well as the spaciousness with our breath and body.

This led me to share another one of my favorite quotes, and this one is by Shunryu Suzuki from Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind, where he says, “The world is its own magic.” I asked the people in the room, who were in this mindful leadership workshop, to focus on the magic of being here alive in that room in this moment and it turned out to be an amazing and magical session in its own right. Right now, can you appreciate the magic of being here alive right now? Can you appreciate and practice being a little bit more focused, engaged, and spacious?

To help convey just what a miracle it is walking here on Earth right now I’d like to share a beautiful poem by Mary Oliver called, When I Am Among the Trees. When I’m Among the trees, especially the willows and the honey locust, equally the beach, the oaks, and the pines, they give off such hints of gladness. I would almost say that they save me, and daily. I’m so distant from the hope of myself, in which I have goodness, and discernment and never hurry through the world but walk slowly, and bow often. Around me, the trees stir in their leaves and call out, “Stay a while.” The light flows from their branches. And they call again, “It’s simple,” they say, “and you too have come into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled with light, and to shine.” Please, in your daily life, remember, the world is its own magic, and the real miracle is to walk right here on Earth. Thank you.

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Welcome to the Zen Bones puzzler where I will regularly be presenting a story or a Zen koan, or a poem. Something to contemplate, to think about, a story that has purpose. It’s about developing greater insight and reflection. Not so much for a solution, but as a way to support your practice, a kind of meditation in daily life.

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Today’s Zen puzzler is a somewhat famous Zen story in which two monks are arguing. One of them says, as he’s looking at a flag blowing in the wind, one says, “It’s the flag moving,” and the other one says, “No, it’s the wind that’s moving.” The Zen teacher comes along and cuts right through this argument and says, “It’s your mind that is moving.” Of course, it’s interesting, I think, just to spend some time reflecting on this without– Again, our minds tend to go right toward wanting to get it right, or the answer. Is it the flag? Is it the wind? Of course, the wind is moving and the flag is moving but the teacher is suggesting, seeing this issue, this flag and wind, through another lens.

In some way through the lens of that the world is mysterious and magical, and that there’s something sacred and amazing about our minds and about our perception and how we create our worlds. How everything is balanced through our perceptions, through how we see the world, through our body and mind. These monks are a bit caught, I think, in their own narrow worlds of ego wanting to be right.

In some way, Zen practice is seeing the world through a wider lens, through a much wider, deeper perspective through the world of seeing and living in the ordinary world. We do all have to live in this ordinary world of flags moving and wind moving. We should know the flag and the wind, we should study them really well, and at the same time, to be incredibly curious about the world that is more mysterious, the world of birth and life and death.

I think of, early on in the book Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind, Shunryu Suzuki says that if you think that when you die this is the end of your life, this is wrong understanding. Then he says, “If you think when you die this isn’t the end of your life, this is also wrong understanding.” It’s the teaching about, that we do live in a dualistic world, but it’s opening up to the world of non-duality, the world that is beyond our usual sense around birth and death.

I think this is a similar teaching, a similar Zen koan, Zen puzzler here about the flag and the mind which are dualistic ways of looking at ourselves and looking at the world, and the Zen teacher here, the mind is moving, the mind is moving, let go of the dualistic approach, open up to the more mysterious and magical approach, it’s your mind that’s moving. One way to work with this in a practical way is to stay with the statement, your mind is moving, your mind is moving, and see how that feels during your meditation. Or any time you’re feeling overwhelmed, or frustrated, or judgmental, or critical you might come back to this statement. It’s your mind, it’s your mind that’s moving, it’s your mind that is creating the world. I hope you can enjoy and appreciate this week’s Zen puzzler. Thank you very much.

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Listen in each week for interviews, teachings, and guided meditations. You’ll receive supportive tools for creating more meaningful work and mindfulness practices to develop yourself to influence your organization and to help change the world. Thank you for listening.

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