Awakening in the Butcher Shop | Koshin Paley Ellison

“The circumstance of having a life of practice doesn't change it. We have to be endlessly humbled and endlessly receptive. And what a joy! That, to me, is the joy of practice: to be endlessly receptive to being changed by whatever kind of meat you're getting.”On the 26th day of NYZC's summer practice period, Koshin Paley Ellison shares a teaching from another classic tale from Zen Flesh, Zen Bones: When Banzan walked through a market, he overheard a customer demand the best piece of meat. The butcher replied: “Everything in my shop is the best. You cannot find here any piece of meat that is not the best.” The story concludes with: “At these words Banzan became enlightened.”How can we realize that whatever life is presenting to us right now, including what we don't like, what makes us reactive, what we've been struggling with for fifty years, is the best piece? Is complete?Koshin shares his own recent difficulties with rage and impatience with a relationship he's had for many years. He knows the teaching intellectually but feels completely reactive anyway. Because understanding the dharma in your head is not the same as living it in your body.But ultimately, the practice isn't about eliminating pain. Instead, we are encouraged to meet life with its many aspects and not add stories on top of it. We inquire and soften into each moment and ask: what is the teaching for me in this? And to find, again and again, the strange joy of being endlessly receptive to being changed.