Study Hall

A last offering from Dogen's Genjo Koan, Three Commentaries - Uchiyama Roshi's look at the final paragraph of the fascicle, which starts:

"Zen master Baoche of Mount Mayu was fanning himself. A monk approached and said, 'Master, the nature of wind is permanent and there is no place it does not reach. Why, then do you fan yourself?' 'Although you understand that the nature of wind is permanent;' Baoche replied, 'you do not understand the meaning of its reaching everywhere.' 'What is the meaning of its reaching everywhere?' asked the monk again. The master just kept fanning himself. The monk bowed deeply."

"This is a very simple story that we can understand without much explanation. Although the wind-nature is ever present in heaven and earth, if we don't use a fan, the wind is not actualized. If we don't use a fan, we don't have wind.
I would like to use another example. We human beings can be physically alive precisely because we breathe a breath each moment, right now, right here. If we think that because we breathed a lot in the past, we don't need to breathe right now, we will die. In the same way, if we think that because we practised a lot and attained enlightenment in the past, we don't need to practise anymore, such enlightenment is already dead.
Living enlightenment is the same as breathing each moment; we arouse bodhi-mind, moment by moment, billions of times, and practice right now and right here. This is called shusho-ichinyo (practice and verification are one) or shojo-no-shu (practice/enlightenment. This is the way life is."