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http:// --> Ashland, Oregon HOME Valley & State Sports Nation & World Opinion/Editorial Classifieds Business Columnists Obituaries Weather Archive Hot Topics Forum Photo Gallery Past Readers Polls Revels Etcetera Backpage O-Zone Special Sections Real Estate Guide Menu Guide Shakespeare Subscribe Contact Us Rate Card Place an Ad Online Games Movie Preview October 7, 2006 Holding onto the beginner's mind The infinitely charming Buddhist scholar, Shunryu Suzuki speaks of the spiritual concept of beginner's mind in his wonderful book, "Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind." "In Japan we have a phrase, Shoshin, which means "beginner's mind.' The goal of practice is always to keep our beginner's mind. Suppose you recite the Prajna Paramita Sutra only once. It might be a very good recitation. But what would happen if you recited it twice, three times, four times or more? You might easily lose your original attitude towards it. The same thing will happen in your other Zen practices. For a while you will keep your beginner's mind, but if you continue to practice one, two, three years or more, although you may improve some, you are liable to lose the limitless meaning of original mind. In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities. In the experts there are few." This is a crucial truth for Ashland. I remember my first month here. I was eating at the old Andre's restaurant — remember it? The only place you could get something as American as sliced turkey with gravy. Anyway, I passed two men, retired now, who were really power brokers in this town at the time. One of them looked right at me with extreme purpose in his eyes and said, "You don't know this yet, Scott, but everyone who moves to Ashland is an expert." I laughed but neither thought it funny, and now I understand. Most of the real doers in this town moved here from somewhere else, probably recently, and they often know a better way to do most anything. They are, after all, experts. Expertise. It's a two-edged razor blade. Give me a fresh face to work alongside any day. "In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities. In the experts there are few." I've been smitten by this idea for a decade now. It seems to me to be the key to living an authentic life — one that is lived with intention and that strives to open itself to the world in a fresh way, every day. It also seems to me that perhaps the best discipline to cultivate a beginner's mind would be the writing of poetry. Poetry, if it's about anything, it's about seeing things with new eyes. The poet, Jane Hirschfield, a practicing Buddhist has said, that writing poems gives her "an additional sense organ, or a new language — a way to know the world with a deeper, suppler, more vivid intelligence and heart." Perhaps you already know, Jane Hirschfield will be in town this Monday, Oct. 9. She will be reading at the Mountain Avenue Theater at Ashland High School. Her poetry strikes me as more essential than that of any other I know. She knows and values the difference between expertise and teachableness. Her poems get at what e.e. cummings called "the deep down things." Take a look at this one on loss: "Nothing lasts" — how bitterly the thought attends each loss. "Nothing lasts" — a promise also of consolation Grief and hope The skipping rope's two ends, Twin daughters of impatience. One wears a dress of wool, the other cotton. Such a simple poem, but I find the observation to be apt, fresh and one that will likely follow me through many losses. Perhaps it may even console me, if I let it. Jane Hirschfield sees things I haven't noticed, but once she makes me aware of them, there they are just as they always have been. Look at this observation: Balance is noticed most when almost failed of - In an elephant's delicate wavering On her circus stool, for instance, Or that moment When a ladder starts to tip or steadies back. Like all truly good poetry, Jane Hirschfield's poetry can be steadying. In a tipy time like this one we need her vision. No, what we need are her eyes. Scott Dalgarno is pastor of Ashland's First Presbyterian Church. Leave a Comment: Advertisement: Advertisement: Paid Advertising Inkjet Printers Student Loans Water Filter Helzberg Diamonds Mortgage Calculator Security Systems Advertisement: Copyright © 2006 Ashland Daily Tidings and Ottaway Newspapers. All Rights Reserved.