Illness

Wedneday night late. Ill just drop some notes. Regular WEdnesday night meeting S and J came and sat.

After Zazen, we discussed the koan "Illness and medicine relate to one another.  All the world is medicine.  Who am I?"  It was a koan we used for the short series  last year, but it was new to the group.

Interesting discussion though.  The format was that everyone would say something that they noticed and we would go twice around the group. Questions were welcome but not comments. 

So, what I noticed was that if all the world is medicine, then even the parts we thing are  illness are also medicine.  You "cure" them by stopping considering them as problems, or illness.   The thoughts created the illness. When that dropped away, everything was well.  Medicine then, was anything that helps you break out of that fantasy that there is something wrong.  I noticed that if you stop looking at death as an illness, then its just a natural part of life.  
 J noticed that she had a hard time believing that all the world was medicine.   She thought it was easier to think that maybe the whole world was illness.  S got stuck with medicine.  Not health, but a promise of a cure.  By thinking that you needed curing, you created an illness.

Later, on a moment of grandiose inspiration, I asked the group to turn right, and ask the person there "What is your illness?" and for that person to answer immediately with what came up. 

Lack of caring,
confusion,
arrogance,
rage,

Then we changed it, and asked, "what is wrong with you?"  since to me, that's what is going on, that we are  imagining that we are deficient and need curing.

I'm inarticulate,
I laugh too much,
I am insecure,
I act in evil ways,

Finally, I asked "how will meditation cure you?", another interesting fantasy we cary with us:

Attetntion to my intent
calm my thoughts,

I am forgetting more than I am recalliny, but thanks J and S, jumping in whole heartedly.  It was an amazing discussion and I learned  a lot from you all.