Strange Zen
How strange and unfathomable the human mind is…
Today I have been reminded of a period of time several years ago, of a series of incidents. It was during a particularly intense time of zazen practice. I seemed to be mentally “tuning in” to practically everyone I knew and I became aware that they were having either deep spiritual thoughts/questions or some sort of emotional crisis.
To give an instance…
One night I found myself waking up several times as if someone was desperately trying to contact me. It felt quite disturbing, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on exactly what it was. I had not recalled a dream.
At one point I looked at the clock, it was 2.35am. Eventually I drifted back off to sleep.
Next morning when I checked my answer-machine, there had been a call at exactly 2.35am. It was a friend who has recently experienced a painful separation and had been in quite an agitated state throughout the night, and was desperate to talk with me and been muttering over and over, “Come on Derek, pick up! Pick up!”
When I spoke to my friend later, everything was more or less OK but I said a visit to the Doctor would probably be in order as he told me that had been experiencing some quite intense physical pains. Fortunately, they turned out to be psychosomatic.
Do I believe that some sort of telepathy had occurred?
Taking it from my Zen point of view, yes and no. I tend to look more to the experience of what happened. My waking-up in the early hours had coincided with a cry for help at the exact same time I was being phoned. Had I tuned into it? I don’t know. Again in Zen, “not knowing” is the path to be on. Two coinciding events are what happened.
In another incident at that same period of time, I can remember that a blogger friend seemed to be thinking along the exact same lines I had been and had blogged about something very similar that had happened to him.
A belief of these series of incidents would be that I had indeed, been tuning in to other minds. My experience though, is that there had been nothing more than coincidences, that I had judged to be weird and wonderful. My ego-mind wanted to add the concept of all sorts of wonderful powers my mind possesses. In Zen my aim is to transcend the ego and just look at what is.
What does it all mean?
To me, it doesn’t mean anything. It just simply IS
These incidents have come and now years later, they have gone. If they happen again to that intensity, it would be fascinating, but right here and now, in 2008 they have passed… I have accepted them and moved on. At the time I remember it was difficult to let go of such events and did so very reluctantly. That much, I will give to my ego 
I need to take care not to form beliefs and add long narratives to incidents just to satisfy my ego. The would be most un-Zen like of me…
