Greetings from Russell's Remnant:

I told him of failing my teacher. What should I do? He replied, "When I'm hungry, I start to eat. Do you know what I mean? Your knowledge of your insufficiency should be sufficient if you are sincere in your desire to change, and I believe you are sincere." (This opening refers to one of Russell’s disciples commenting to Russell’s Teacher, the Regent of North America, and that Teacher’s reply. A Zen reply! A hint possibly. What do Zen texts have to say about this?

Zen's discipline is largely self-discipline. It is a constant self-recollectedness, a constant awareness, a state of being at all times "mind and self-possessed." Asked how he exercised himself, a Master replied, "When I am hungry, I eat; when tired, I sleep." The reply was sharp. "That is what everybody does!" "When they eat," said the Master, "they eat, but are thinking of other things, thereby allowing themselves to be disturbed; when they sleep, they do not sleep, but dream of a thousand things." One thing at a time, in full concentration, is the mental discipline.

If you learn your Gong'an (koan) as wholeheartedly as a hen is hatching her eggs, as a cat is catching a mouse, as a hungry man is thinking of food, as a thirsty man is thinking of water, or as a baby is yearning for mother, then there will be a day when you will eventually crack the Gong'an. Patriarch's Gong'an are about 1,700. When a man is thinking of food when he is hungry, when a man is thinking of water when he is thirsty, and when a baby is looking for mother when it needs her, their motives are all sincere, because their minds are not against their own will and feeling. Without this kind of sincere mind in Chan, there can be no realization.

I have one thing to say: I sit listlessly without thought or work; spring comes and the grass becomes green of itself. "Without thought or work" means that a spiritually enlightened man gains himself from his own mind and has nothing to do. He is not tied up in knots by anything, and from the beginning does not try to work; he eats when he is hungry, sleeps when he is tired, strolls freely across green waters and blue mountains and passes easily by fishing villages or wine-selling booths. He does not mind at all whether time comes or goes, because spring still comes as usual and the grass turns green. This reminds one to return to true mind whenever a thought occurs.

This passion for the living fact accounts for that quality in the Zen masters which must seem most amazing to the Westerner: their supreme matter-of-factness. "What is the Tao (the way, the Truth)?" asks the disciple. "Your everyday mind," replies the Master; and he goes on to amplify: "When I am hungry, I eat; when tired, I sleep." The disciple is puzzled, and asks whether this is not what everybody else does, too. No, the Master replies; most people are never wholly in what they are doing; when eating, they may be absentmindedly preoccupied with a thousand different fantasies; when sleeping, they are not sleeping. The supreme mark of the thoroughly integrated man is to be without a divided mind. This matter-of-fact spirit of Zen is expressed in another paradoxical statement: "Before you have studied Zen, mountains are mountains and rivers are rivers; while you are studying it, mountains are no longer mountains and river no longer rivers; but once you have had Enlightenment, mountains are once again mountains and rivers are rivers." The stories of their arduous struggles for Enlightenment teach us that this matter-of-fact spirit of Zen masters is not a thing easily come by: they are indeed awesome figures who have crossed the mountains and rivers, floods and fires of the spirit in order to come back sole and whole to the most banal things of daily life.

The essence of the story ("The Real Miracle" in Zen Flesh, Zen Bones by Paul Reps) has Bankei, a Zen Master, preaching at temple when a Shinshu priest, who believed in salvation by repetition of the name of Buddha, became jealous of Bankei's large audience and interrupted the master with a boast that his sect's founder could stand on one side of the river with a brush and paint through the air on a canvas on the other side of the river. Then the priest asked if Bankei could do such a wonderful thing?

Bankei replied lightly, "Perhaps your fox can perform that trick, but that is not the manner of Zen. My miracle is that when I feel hungry I eat, and when I feel thirsty I drink."

If you make your mind blank, you would not be able to deal with the circumstances of daily life or be capable of observing the Zen precept - When hungry, eat. Rather, we must cultivate dispassion.

Buddhist mind training states "If you can practice even when distracted, you are well trained." Develop mindfulness. When something hits you, which is the result of unmindfulness, then suddenly that unmindfulness creates a reminder automatically. We begin to realize that we can practice in spite of our wandering thoughts.

A skilled horseman does not fall from his horse, even when he is distracted. In the same way, if you are able to take adverse conditions that suddenly develop as aids to mind training even without expressly directing your attention to do so, then you are proficient in mind training.

Let distractions bring you back to the present moment. When unexpected harm or sudden difficulties befall us, if love and compassion, rather than annoyance, come welling up in us, if uncomfortable situations can be used to advantage in our lives, that is a sign that we have accomplished something in mind training.

Develop mindfulness.