Vows

With palms together,
Good Morning Everyone,

Vows are inside out. We don't take a vow, we manifest a vow already there deep within us. Like a seed planted by the Infinite, life's various twists and turns till the soil around it, water it, offer it light and warmth, and there...it opens to our view.
I have manifested only a few vows in my life. A vow to serve and protect the United States. A vow to follow the ways of Torah. A vow to be a partner to My Little Honey. And a set of Bodhisattva vows. I like to think these are consonant and not discordant.

It is so: the core vow is that of waking up. Being present, and seeing with a clear mind, resolves all illusion of conflict as conflict can only occur in a deluded mind, a mind divided.

I experience buddha-mind in every moment. We are beings united without separation, yet there is you, and there is me. The golden net is our heart. It is our heart-mind, "shin", that is the source of all vows. Understand, in Zen, heart and mind are not two, but one. This Heart-Mind is the essential nature of the Infinite

As we step into the world this morning, may we step with the light of our own seeds come to full bloom.