Those who donated to our crowdfunding Indiegogo campaign last fall are getting daily e-mails this month as a thank-you and part of the May Sit. We wanted to share these with everyone, though they are a day or so later. This was the May 17 offering.

The first text in italics is from Cultivating the Empty Field by Zen Master Hongzhi, translated by Taigen Daniel Leighton with Yi Wu. The commentary following it is from one of the teachers at Dharma Rain Zen Center.

Just resting is like the great ocean accepting hundreds of streams, all absorbed into one flavor. Freely going ahead is like the great surging tides riding on the wind, all coming onto this shore together. How could they not reach into the genuine source? Haven’t you yourself established the mind that thinks up all the illusory conditions? This insight must be perfectly incorporated.

One aspect of wisdom is to know one’s own ignorance. We mistake our point of view, our understanding, for reality. Hongzhi’s great ocean has no difficulty accepting the hundreds of streams. Your point of view – your life – is a stream, appearing to flow in one direction. To a fish, the stream is a great sea. Caught up in the limited view of the self, bound in human perception, we mistake the stream for the ocean. Just for today, enjoy the ride in the water of your life, knowing that beyond the banks is a vast world of water all flowing together.