Why You Should Find Beauty In Every Face
On choosing your focus, perceiving brightness, and what it means to stay human
Right now, it is the night before I have told myself I will send out an email blast. I am faced with a flashing cursor, a white screen and nothing I want to write.
I am at a so-called standing desk with an electric motor in it that makes it go up and down. I push the button and the motor makes it go down and I’m sitting now. So I guess, in this moment, it’s not a standing desk but a sitting desk.
I’m in a basement room at Cambridge Zen Center in Massachusetts. I have been itinerant for a couple of years now, since my daughter Bella left home.
As part of my travels, I often come and live at Cambridge Zen Center as a resident teacher. I also spent a month in Canada and time in Long Island and New York City and Big Sur and Korea recently.
Finding the Thread
And… in typing all that, I decided what I want to tell you about.
Last weekend I presided over a big ceremony, including about 100 people at Providence Zen Center, the head temple of my tradition, which is the Kwan Um School Of Zen.
In the ceremony, people made various kinds of vows. Also, I got to give many of the ceremony participants Buddhist names (kind of like confirmation names in Christianity).
I named these people things like Bright Dragon and Bright Dharma and Bright Jewel and Bright Vow. Everyone who makes their vows at the same ceremony gets the same first name–their family name–and then an individual second name.
All the celebrants in this ceremony are now part of the “Bright” family.
I got to choose the name of the family–Bright–and all of the second names. I chose Bright because of the shared spirit I felt among the group. I chose their second names according to an aspect of the spirit I saw in each of them individually.
Vows That Aren’t Just Words
Each of the ceremony participants stepped forward and made their vows which were:
I vow to abstain from taking life.
I vow to abstain from taking things not given.
I vow to abstain from misconduct done in lust.
I vow to abstain from lying.
I vow to abstain from intoxicants, taken to induce heedlessness.
Years ago, I would have thought that all sounded like a bunch of pious bullshit. But not now.
What I perceived, standing at the table in the front of the Buddha in the Dharma room, as each person came forward to receive their name and their certificate, was a bunch of beautiful, sincere spirits willing to commit to being fully human.
These people were committing to not to taking the shortcuts through life that sometimes give short-term pleasure and relief from pain.
To not end liveliness, even when it opposed their will. To tell the truth, even when it inconvenienced them. To not take from others, even when they felt lack. To enjoy lust, sure, but not when it hurt another. To not try to escape through intoxication.
In other words, these people were vowing to be fully and completely human. To live from open hearts.
What We Choose to See
I loved getting to stand at the front of the room and look into their beautiful eyes and faces while they came forward. I felt so humbled and honored.
There is so much that can confuse me in the world right now. But…
The world becomes what you focus on, and if you focus on what gives you energy then you have power to help yourself and others.
(You can read more about it in my recent post ↓)
What you focus on creates your world
So many of us are walking around drained—by our own thoughts. We don’t mean to be. But the inner stories we believe, the mental loops we replay, the judgments we cling to? They cost us real energy. This short teaching is about choosing the thoughts that
Let’s talk
What helps you remember your humanity? What vow are you willing to make—even quietly, just for today?
I’d love to hear your thoughts. Comment below or hit reply.
In my case, in this moment, I choose to sit at my up-and-down desk with the electric motor and focus on these people vowing to uphold their humanity. And to tell you about it.
Take a moment. Think of their open faces. Think of their pure intentions.
Honestly, isn’t there so much beauty in life? Doesn’t it help you to focus on that?
Love,
Colin
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Thank you for sharing Colin, always appreciate how you translate and relate Zen to everyday life 🙏🏽