I’m really not a morning person, but just after 6am in the darkness of my living room, I found myself watching a Zen master live on Zoom. He was talking directly to a group of 40 of us. Covid lockdown had struck again in London, and as Zen students across the UK and Europe, we were attending one of the first online intensive Zen retreats in the UK.
The gruelling long hours — 6am to 11pm — were similar to in-person Zen retreats. The difference was that it felt like heaven to sleep in my own bed at the end of the day, eat my usual food, and not wait in line to have a shower.
The online retreat was led by Rinzai Zen Master Julian Daizan Skinner, who founded Zenways in London after returning from temple training in Japan thirteen years ago. Historically Rinzai is known as the “warrior school”, whereas Soto Zen is known as the “farmers’ school”. Needless to say, I fantasised about joining the Rinzai school — it sounded cooler. But Zenways didn’t exist when I first started out, so my very first stop years ago was the Soto Zen monastery Throssel Hole, near Newcastle, instead.
Removing all our usual external support in order to see our “true nature” comes as a shock, and is something that is only recommended for people who have been relatively mentally well and balanced for some time. It’s the mental equivalent of training for a marathon: you wouldn’t want to do it straight after surgery, check with your doctor first, and don’t attempt to go straight from couch potato to running for hours every day.
On that first retreat years ago, I just sat still with the emptiness that my Zen practice had created, and eventually, oh so slowly, good things started to grow. Patience. Connection. Love, without any needs or qualifiers. Confidence. The work was far from done, but at least I’d learned how to walk.
The online retreat two weeks ago was run very differently. In Rinzai, meditators face each other rather than the wall (just as well, since it was on Zoom.) They also have “koans”: questions that you almost take between your teeth like a dog with a bone, and don’t let go of until you know – really know – the answer. Zen Master Daizan has adapted the practice even further, and integrated traditional Zen with an intensive two-person dialogue style invented by Charles Berner.
So that’s how I found myself facing a long series of complete strangers for nine hours a day, on Zoom in my living room over a long weekend. As an introvert, especially, it’s probably one of the strangest things I’ve ever done (and I’ve done some strange things). But the miracle of it was that it felt completely natural — enjoyable even, a relief from the loneliness of Covid isolation.
If I’d imagined that “farmer’s Zen” would be easy-going, Throssel Hole proved me wrong. The long and busy daily schedule is set up to leave no time for self-indulgence or daydreaming. Hours of meditation and formal ceremonies were interspersed with kitchen work, garden work, housework, scripture studying and formal talks. At the time most of us slept on the floor of the shared Ceremony Hall, which ensured that there was no opportunity to retreat into any private space.
At Throssel Hole, when I told one of the masters that I struggled with the lack of privacy, he told me to be curious about that. What did privacy mean to me? Why was it so important? Senior practitioners get a bit more free time, but as a beginner I was encouraged to let go of all the things that I’d imagined I “needed”: journalling, long hours in bed, privacy, hugs. I felt bereft and as if an empty chasm was opening up to swallow me whole.
The unwelcome sensation reminded me partly of depression, which I’d been diagnosed with years before, though I hadn’t experienced for a long time. But this time was different. I was older and immersed in an experienced and supportive community. Everyone around me had walked this path too. “Just keep walking”, they said. “You’re on the right path.”
In each pair one person would listen wordlessly, and the other talk uninterrupted, for five minutes; then we would switch over. After forty minutes we would do the same thing over again, but with a different person. I chose the beginner’s koan “Who am I?” and followed it doggedly like a plumbline.
It was incredible to spend my days listening to people pouring their beautiful hearts out, without judging them or feeling that I had to say something. And it was equally incredible to feel heard. I expected to feel horribly self-conscious or embarrassed, but the non-judgmental attitude that Daizan had fostered stopped that from happening.
It’s hard to describe what happened next. It wasn’t the massive bolt of lightning insight, that I expected after having read too many stories about Rinzai Zen. Just as with my old Soto farmer’s practice, gradually I felt like my consciousness was entering a stream, taking a clear and positive direction, but to an unknown place. Come Monday morning it was as if my soul had drunk a double espresso, stretched out its legs in the sun, and looked forward to whatever was going to happen next. Like I said, impossible to describe — you’ll have to try it yourself.
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Mia Livingston is a Zen Buddhist therapist and writer who is training in Research Psychology. Her work has been featured in TEDx, The Guardian, BBC Radio and as editor to the Buddhist Society.
