Ob poslušanju posnetka japonskih zenovskih manter me prešine: ‘Ti mladi fantje, ki jih prepevajo, niso pri stvari’. Ne prepevajo radostno, tam so iz istega razloga kot so naši mladi v šoli… ker morajo biti! Zanje se odločajo njihovi starši. Vstati morajo ob petih, monotono ponavljati težka dolga besedila v jeziku, ki ga ne razumejo in bog ne daj, da bi se kdo zmotil. Ne oni, ne naši otroci nimajo možnosti, da bi srčno pristopali k početju. Prisila odvzame radost tudi najpomenljivejšim opravilom.
Ni bilo vedno tako! Prepevanje manter bi lahko bila ekstaza duha, duhovno hranjenje, posvetitev življenja. Tudi radost do učenja je naravna, je nujna za plavanje s tokom življenja… ki je z ‘obveznostjo’ postala odpor zbanaliziran na vnos podatkov, ki jih življenje ‘ne razume’. Kakšno razliko naredi ohranitev duhovne dediščine početja! Kadar je ohranjena skozi prakso predhodnikov, jo potomci brez poučevanja prevzamejo nase. Kadar je pozabljena, od duha početja ostane le forma, ki pušča za seboj praznost in nesmiselnost početja.
Izvornost je eter obnašanja… ko se nam od prijetnosti oči dvignejo k višku, dih pa poglobi in upočasni kot pri vonjanju dišeče cvetlice. Izvornega pomena vseh stvari se ne moremo naučiti, lahko ga le negujemo z ustvarjanjem pravih pogojev in njegovim udejanjanjem. Očetje zenovskih otrok bi duha svojega početja lahko prenesli na podmladek z navdušenjem in ekstazo, ki bi pritegnila otroke k temu opravilu brez besed in ne bi mogli reči, da le ponavljajo zgodovino. Kjer je navdušenje, je vedno prisotna izvirnost, ki početje poosebi in naredi enkratnega. Ker pa so bili sami tudi prisiljeni v ‘nadaljevanje tradicije’, nimajo samoniklega povoda za to početje in prisiljujejo naprej.
Vztrajanje v tem je strahopetno. Oče ve, kaj s tem dela svojemu otroku, saj je bil sam deležen iste brez pomenske represije. Do svojega 40+ leta je že moral začutiti praznost ohranjanja forme tradicije. Pogumen je, kdor sledi tej iskrenosti, četudi še ne pozna druge poti! Nekoč je bila ‘ta tradicija’ morda samonikla in je služila dvigovanju duha. Danes vse manj! Zveznost duhovne dediščine je že dolgo prekinjena… a ni pozabljena. Skriva se v srcih molčečih, ki jo tiho živijo.
Mladi zenopvski menihi in naši mladi bi imeli ‘dovolj dobre’ pogoje za oživitev prvotnega duha vseh stvari, če bi jih le ljubili t.j. jim dovoljevali njih same in jih ne posiljevali s svojo ‘tradicijo’. Tudi nam je bila ta tradicija vsiljena s strani naših staršev, ki so bili vanjo enako posiljeni. Kaj ni to videti neizvirno, ponavljajoče, neživljenjsko, preživelo? Priznajmo zmoto in postali bomo zmagovalci s tem, ko bomo prazno tradicijo nehali prenašati na otroke in jim dovolili samoniklost, ki bo življenjsko koristnost naravno zaživela. Prepričani ste lahko, da so otroci ‘bolje opremljeni’ za oživitev prvotnosti kot vi… dovolimo jim.
Sledi / Next: Prvotnost (2/2) – Ustvarjanje pogojev // Originality – Creating conditions (2/2)
Listening to a clip of Japanese Zen mantras, it strikes me, ‘These young guys who sing them are not there at all’. They don’t sing happily, they are there for the same reason our young people are in school… because they have to be! Parents decide for them. They have to get up at five, monotonously repeating heavy long texts in a language they don’t understand, and God forbid anyone makes a mistake. Neither they nor our children have the opportunity to take a heartfelt approach to doing so. Coercion takes away the joy of even the most important tasks.
It wasn’t always like that! Singing mantras could be an ecstasy of the spirit, a spiritual nourishment, a consecration of life. Even the joy of learning is natural, it is necessary for swimming with the flow of life… which with ‘obligation’ has become a resistance banalized to the input of data that life ‘does not understand’. What a difference it makes preservation of spiritual heritage of doing! When preserved through the practice of predecessors, descendants take it upon themselves without teaching. When it is forgotten, only the form remains, leaving behind the emptiness and meaninglessness of doing.
Originality is the ether of behavior… like when our eyes turn from the pleasure, and the breath deepens and slows down as when smelling a fragrant flower. We cannot learn the original meaning of all things, we can only nurture it by creating the right conditions and putting it into practice. The fathers of Zen children could pass on the spirit of their doings to the offspring with enthusiasm and ecstasy, that would draw the children to this task without words and they could not say that they are merely repeating history. Where there is enthusiasm, there is also originality, that personifies the doing and makes it unique. However, since fathers have been forced to ‘continue the tradition’, they have no spontaneous reason to do so and are forcing their children too.
Persistence in this is cowardly. The father knows what he is doing to his child with this, as he himself has received the same meaningless repression. By his 40+ years, he must have already felt the emptiness of preserving only the form of tradition. Brave is the one who follows this sincerity, even if he does not yet know the other way! Once upon a time, ‘this tradition’ may have been self-chosen and it served to lift the spirits. Les and less today! The spiritual heritage has long been gone… but not forgotten. It hides in the hearts of the silent who live it quietly.
Young zen monks and our young would have ‘good enough’ conditions to revive the original spirit of all things if we only loved them. If we only allowed them to be children and did not force them with our ‘tradition’. This tradition was also imposed on us by our parents, who were equally forced into it. Doesn’t this look unoriginal, repetitive, lifeless? Let us acknowledge the mistake and we will become winners by ceasing to pass on the empty tradition to children and allowing them a spontaneity that will bring childlike originality to life naturally. You can be sure that children are ‘better equipped’ to revive originality than you… let them.
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