BREAKING THROUGH THE BLUE SKY
by
Sensei Ogui
We don’t like suffering in our lives. We say that it is bad, that it causes us a lot of pain and trouble. Yet, it helps us, like the dirty bottom of a pond that helps the lotus flower to go beyond the dirt and become beautiful; like a cow shit, which smells and looks bad to us, and yet helps us to produce a beautiful garden that we may enjoy.
One cloudy, rainy day I was to fly on an airplane from Cleveland to San Francisco. As I waited in line to get my boarding pass, I heard people around me say, “It doesn’t look so good. I hope we have a good flight,” and, “I hope our flight does not get in trouble.”
As we took off, we flew up into the rain clouds. I feel the nervousness of the people sitting around me as we look out the windows of the plane into the thick gray clouds.
Suddenly, the plane broke through the top of the clouds and into a beautiful, clear blue sky. It was so wonderful! The blue sky was vast, like it would never end. I feel the tension of the people around me subside.
A thought came into my mind, the blue sky has been there all the time! The blue sky had not disappeared just because I could not see it as I drove to the airport and as the plane flew through the dark clouds. To see the blue sky, we had to break through some dark clouds. The blue sky had always been there.
I think of our life like this. In order to see the vast, limitless, endless blue sky of our true nature, we have to break through the gray clouds that are in our lives. As we live our lives, we need to go through and through and through! The true nature of our life is this huge blue sky, but we don’t see it. We spent lots of time worrying about the clouds instead of going through them. I think we can use our worries and cares to help us break through to the blue sky of our true nature.
In the so-called Buddhist tradition, the lotus flower is a symbol of enlightenment. The lotus flower is like a waterlily; it grows out of the dirty material at the bottom of the pond, and yet produces a beautiful flower that floats on top of the water. Many pictures of Shakyamuni Buddha show him sitting on top of the lotus flower. He became enlightened by breaking through the suffering of his life until he became one with the blue sky, realizing his true nature of becoming a Buddha, an enlightened one.
We don’t like suffering in our lives. We say that it is bad, that it causes us a lot of pain and trouble. Yet, it helps us, like the dirty bottom of a pond that helps the lotus flower to go beyond the dirt and become beautiful; like a cow shit, which smells and looks bad to us, and yet helps us to produce a beautiful garden that we may enjoy.
There is no doubt about it, the blue sky is always there. If you look up when the skies completely filled with dark clouds, you will see a blue sky, but it is there. So go beyond the clouds and break through, break through. Go through and through and through and you will enjoy the blue sky!
Excerpt in gratitude from: Sensei Ogui Zen Shin Talks. Compiled and edited by Mary K. Gove. Cleveland, Zen Shin Buddhist Publications, 1998.
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