I've always been aware of the traps of blogging and since I've decided to blog about my Zen practice, I have to be even more careful. I don't know anything about what I'm doing besides what I've learnt from books, various temples, and my experience of sitting. Also, the effects of sitting are often subtle, often limited to the sit and the time immediately after, and sometimes are barely noticeable but for the will to stay balanced rather than give in to thoughts and old habits.
Sometimes, however, it's like everything changes...
When I blog about loving sitting in the sun, or the feeling of the spaces in-between thoughts, that feeling doesn't stop me from being really irritated when I miss a putt a golf. But when I miss a putt at golf and start to get irritated, I remember those spaces and don't get too carried away. But sometimes the feeling isn't different at all - just a will to not let it bother me!
It feels like a tight-rope sometimes. I don't remember who said it or even if someone did say it, but there's not much distance between being balanced and not-balanced, in my experience. I can write all this stuff about how lovely the moon is and then become so nervous when I meet an old friend, that I barely remember a moon even exists!
I guess Zazen practice is just that. And as you make little baby-steps, it feels good. And I write about those and they encourage me onwards.
