Jun Po Roshi on Zen, Non-Dual Realization, and Living It

Without the receptive mind present, there is no ground on which an ego can build itself. Whatever the feeling or the sensing happens to be, it cannot occur apart from the clarity of that open mind. Non-dual realization makes no case for good or bad. It is simply non-dual. It is the plain truth of life as it keeps unfolding. This is what Buddha pointed to again and again: everything is burning, everything is on fire, everything interacts and burns. And once that is seen, the question becomes whether it comes and goes. It does not. Then another question arrives: what do you have to do to carry this into the rest of your life? That is the step that follows once you have come this far. You choose. You either keep choosing your egocentric values, or you choose this reality.

Erik asked what moves a person to choose that reality. Jun Po answered that it begins with insight, but insight alone is not the finish. Once you have had it, you still have to choose it, because it does not simply install itself. The shift is in perspective, from a self at the center to Buddha at the center. And when things arise, as they do, you hold the integrity of the witness through all of it.

Toward the close of the conversation, Erik thanked him for walking through the process and asked whether anything remained unsaid that he wanted people to hear. Jun Po framed it as liberation and freedom. If he was able to reach it, so can others, and reaching it changes a life beyond question. The transformation does not stop at the private self. It moves outward into the vow to free all beings, so you become involved with the world through compassion. Relationships start to work. Nothing shakes you the way it once did, and the whole of your life takes on a different quality.

He mentioned that the practice holds five training elements. The first he called sacred stewardship within arm's reach: everything you touch and everything you stand in conscious relationship with. What you buy, what you eat, how you relate to family, friends, and parents. The question is whether you meet all of it from that depth of compassion, understanding, and responsibility. The first element, in other words, is the realization itself and the way it remakes your life.

Erik thanked him again and said it had been a genuine pleasure to hear him speak about Zen and what Zen is becoming. He noted this was Jun Po Roshi of Mondo Zen and confirmed the website, mondozen.org. Jun Po closed by reminding everyone that each person walks a particular path, so keep going on yours. If Zen is not the thing that fits you, keep looking, keep searching, because what you need is there for you.