Myoho Harris, Rev. Master

This article is taken from a talk of the same name that was part of the May issue of the Dharma Reflections From The Place of Peace, CD series. It is offered in gratitude for the life and training of Reverend Master Teigan Stevens, who died recently.The ‘just walking’ described here refers to a person’s steady, natural pace, and should not be mistaken for the slower, more precise walking of kinhin, which is done between meditation periods.

After hearing that Reverend Master Teigan had died, I made offerings at the altar, then sat down to quietly reflect, and be with him. What came to mind was a memory from the 1970s, when I was a young novice at Shasta Abbey, where he and I trained together under Reverend Master Jiyu. It was the end of a long hot day. I was walking up the cloister, feeling stressed and anxious, when I saw Reverend Teigan (this was before he had been named as a Master) ahead of me. He was in work clothes, covered in sawdust from cutting firewood, and had his trusty dog, Tiger, by his side. The pair of them were walking in such a calm and steady way. The sight of him, so contained and complete within the meditative movement of ‘just walking’, entered into me. I noticed his feet steadily connecting with the ground, body and mind together in harmony; fully present, at ease with himself and the world. I let my eyes rest upon the gentle sway of his back muscles, and, as he ‘just walked’, the stillness within him touched the core of stillness within me, calling it forth, and calming my churning mind.

Buddha bows to Buddha and Buddha recognises Buddha, in so many simple, yet profound ways. We never know when help will come, only that it will.

Quietly, because he did not know that I was there, I brought the rhythm of my steps into harmony with his and ‘just walked’ with him. All the stress fell away, and I too became calm and still. By the time he reached the house where he lived, and turned off the cloister, I felt like a different person.

Ever since then I have never failed to find that ‘just walking’ is a direct way of ‘returning unto the source’. If the mind becomes restless, or drifts off, we gently bring it back to the steady motion of walking, so our body is not in one place and our thoughts are somewhere else. This draws body and mind together, stilling and harmonising the physical heart and lungs, enabling the mind to rest in that innermost place; it is both physically and mentally helpful, and aids contemplation.

When we rush around, we create tension that stresses body and mind, hindering our ability to be still. If we are too slow and lethargic, then we create a dullness that is negative and clouds the mind.

To find our natural pace is to walk the razor’s edge of training, which is the Middle Way. When our pace is activity that flows from stillness, then it will be effortless, and will improve the quality of our life. Although we only sit in formal meditation for part of the day, if we follow the practice, and ‘just walk’, as we go about our daily business, we never have to leave our inner sitting place, because every step we take, will be our home. ¹

The Buddha said we should be as a lamp unto the world, and on that day Reverend Master Teigan was showing how we become that lamp, when we live in an unselfconscious way, from our original purity. It is how we are that matters, how our feet touch the ground, how our eyes rest upon what we see, how we handle objects and treat others, how we move, and the place our words come from when we speak. The simplest of everyday actions can convey and teach so much, because they become as Buddha’s touch, calling us back to (spiritual) life, by reconnecting us to the source of our unchanging pure essence.

There are many examples of this in the Buddhist scriptures.

We are told that the Buddha carried his bowl in such a way, that seeing him inspired another to take up the robe.

There is an account of how a young man, who had been rather wild and often in trouble, helped the great poet monk, Reverend Ryokan, to put on his sandals. Kneeling at Ryokan’s feet, and being so physically close to him, the youth felt the ‘goodness’, the purity of the man, and it awoke the seed of goodness within him. It made him want to be a better person, and he changed his ways. Just as when I encountered that same ‘goodness’ and purity of movement in Reverend Teigan, it inspired me to change the way in which I walked.

In training, emphasis is put upon doing what is ‘good’ to do. What is the best that can be done, what is in keeping with the Precepts and the living Dharma of the moment. This has the same source as the deepest form of human goodness. I am not talking about being a ‘do-gooder’, or of thinking of oneself as ‘a good person’, or of trying to be good, but of selflessness, and the tender quality of stillness that manifests when someone lives, in an unselfconscious way, from that pure essence, with no thought of personal identity, desire or achievement. This is a precious thing, and when I encounter such a person, the way they are tells me a great deal about Buddhism.

As young monks we were told that the highest form of training is to ‘just live’. This is expressed by the line from Rules for Meditation that states, “To live by Zen is the same² as to live an ordinary daily life”. When training is so natural to a person, that the ordinary activities of their daily life become the life of Buddha manifesting in this world, then all beings benefit, including those yet to be born. That day, I felt a tender understanding for myself flow in through my eyes, as they rested upon his back. It was a beautiful example of how selfless training helps others, all by itself.

Reverend Teigan did not need to know that I was behind him that day, because he was not ‘just walking’ to help me, or to teach anyone anything. He walked that way because it was the fruit of many years of training, and it came naturally to him. When someone lives in this unselfconscious way, from the purity of their original essence (Buddha Nature), then that essence ‘speaks’ through them, catching our attention, and giving us direction. It sings Its own song, and those who are ready to hear, respond. This has a beneficial effect, not only upon them, but also upon the one within whom it flows, bringing them contentment, and an inner sense of clean spaciousness, for which we are so grateful.

Many years later, when we were both seniors, Reverend Master Teigan visited Britain, and I invited him to co-lead a retreat with me here, at The Place of Peace. During his stay, I talked to him about that day at Shasta, and said how much it had helped me. Saying nothing, he looked at me and smiled, in the same steady and contained way as he had ‘just walked’. There was no self-consciousness, no ego, just a smile. I smiled too and, once again, two became one within the completeness of the Great Mystery.

Walking with Reverend Master Teigan that day is a memory that has never left me. It is said that a picture conveys more than a thousand words, and there I was, being shown stillness within activity and activity within stillness, in the most direct way, by personal experience.

As the years passed, I have found how profound is the teaching that comes from ‘just walking’. In opening ourselves to the depth of teaching that Buddhism has to offer, we sometimes mistake intellectual fascination and interest for profound insight, and miss, or dismiss, the depth of knowing, the quality of being, that can come from something as simple as ‘just walking’, because it does not intrigue, or give us anything to ‘figure out’. What it does, is enable the restless, ever-thinking mind, to cease. It silently fills us with an inner knowing that we can trust, and give ourselves to, in full surrender, so we are not bound by the constraints of a mind that is lost and alone, disconnected from its source.

Abiding in, or merging with, the purity of unselfconscious trust (for there is no separation between what we are, and that trust), we no longer find a need to fill the spacious stillness of inner reflection with our own ideas and strategies. When we discover the chasm of difference between taking Refuge in Buddha (meditation), and trying to be our own refuge, it changes us. We become an open receptacle, ready to receive whatever the Master in the Heart brings; we become one who can be taught. This is what ‘just walking’ helps make possible, and I thank Reverend Master Teigan for unknowingly introducing me to it that day.

Notes

1. 1. The words, “every step we take will be our home” come from a quote by Great Master Dōgen:

But do not ask me where I am going,

As I travel in this limitless world,

Where every step I take is my home.

 Heine, Steven. Zen Poetry of Dōgen: Verses from the Mountain of Eternal Peace, reprint edition (Dharma Communications Press, September 25, 2005).

2. 2. The italics are the author’s own.

This article is available only as part of the Summer 2020 Journal of the Order of Buddhist Contemplatives.  

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