84. Don’t Know Is Quite Simple: Only Don’t Know

Greetings to all during this holiday season.

This week’s blog is drawn from two sources.
The first is a poem from my life long friend David Mott who was the founder of the
New Haven Zen Center in the Kwan Um School of Zen.

Unknown unknowns.
Isn’t that what we all live?
Assuming that it’s known
When it really isn’t.
And what is “it”?
How does “it” encompass
All of what is lived?
How can it be understood
By our little minds when even
Contemplating the totality
So far, there’s so much
Forgotten or gone unseen
Through the back alleys of
Our unconscious or worse,
Our ignorance.
And what about our dreams
In the night?
Hanging out with people
We’ve never met
As if they’re old friends
Doing things we don’t know how,
Speaking languages we’ve never learned.
Who’s the fiction writer
Of these stories?
While I sit in the familiar
Surroundings of my home
Not knowing
Where the hell I am.
And this is not even
Dementia
Because I do know where I am
Though it’s all skin deep.
And that’s a problem.

The second comes from my root teacher Zen Master Seung Sahn in
Dropping Ashes On The Buddha

“Your mind is like the sea. When the wind comes, there are very big waves. When
the wind dies down, the waves become smaller and smaller, until finally the wind
disappears altogether and the sea is like a clear mirror. Then the mountains and
trees and all things are reflected on the surface of the sea. There are many
thought waves now in your mind. But if you continue to practice Don’t Know mind
this thinking will become gradually smaller, until finally your mind will always be
clear. When the mind becomes clear, it is like a mirror: red comes and the mirror
is red; yellow comes and the mirror is yellow; a mountain comes and the mirror is
a mountain. Your mind is the mountain; the mountain is your mind. They are not
two. So it is very important not to be attached either to thinking or to not thinking.
You mustn’t be upset by anything that goes on in your mind. Only don’t worry and
keep Don’t Know mind.”