Question
Hello Master Kosen,
An immense doubt about my practice has overtaken me. It creates great anxiety: the fear of giving up, of perhaps making a mistake. I do not feel capable of getting beyond this doubt... how can I get beyond it?
Isabelle
Master Kosen’s answer
Doubt is an excellent way to practice. You must doubt everything, including doubt itself. This is Joshu's famous MU.
If you practice mushotoku: "mu" = no.
And "shotoku" = obtaining, profit, growth, reaching a goal.
Mu is even stronger than "no": mu, not even negation itself.
Who cares if Zen is useless? Who cares if monks are pathetic in their old, patched, shit-colored robes?
You doubt your practice? Thank goodness! You are afraid of giving up!
But there is nothing to give up. You can leave without regret, as your own master. After 50 years of zazen practice, I still sometimes practice zazen in hell, just as when I began. Nothing has changed, no progress, and when I leave the dojo, I give thanks inwardly for the true happiness of having had, once again today, my master Deshimaru's permission to sit in his true dojo and practice there facing myself.
Kosen