Shundo David Haye – Zen Priest

‘No practice just for yourself. To take care of the zendo is practice. To take care of your own kitchen is practice. We understand practice in that way. How you take care of your kitchen is how you sit. Even though you sit, you have many problems: drowsiness, pain in your legs, and you have to take care of your breathing, and your posture should always be straight.

There are many things to take care of, in your practice. We are not just sitting on a cushion [laughs] sleeping. We are taking care of everything. Just as you take care of your family, your children. That is real practice.’ (from the Suzuki Roshi Archive)

I talked about this passage in the Thursday evening Zen Center sitting and discussion group last week. It comes from an interesting recording – less a dharma talk, more something that sounds like Suzuki Roshi and some students having gone to the mall in Japantown, right around the corner from where Sokoji and Zen Center were at the time (sometime in 1968), to have a discussion. Just before this passage, there is a strong admonition not to practise alone – which I infer to mean not to box off your practice from the rest of your life, and family, as he goes on to say here.