Big Mind: Does Size Really Matter?

A little while back during one of our Dogen study sessions, the notion of size came up, as in Big Self and Big Mind.

It seemed to miss whatever point we were working on at the time, a way of disparaging the small and aggrandizing the big. So I challenged the group to point to a classical source that used that notion. I really couldn’t think of anything and nobody else could either.

I might have used the Jewel Mirror Samadhi to erode the significance of Big, “So minute it enters where there is no gap, so vast it transcends dimension.”

Or Terri Clark, “Size doesn’t matter anyway,” in her hit Country single, “

Girls Lie Too” (you have to wait for the line and I grant that a lot of the song doesn’t harmonize with my point…and I probably quote her just a bit too much…).

Anyway, how about you? Can you quote a saying from the sutras or commentaries in support of “Big Self” or “Big Mind?”

Shortly after the session, I had one of those “Homer Simpson’s Big Da” moments, remembering Maha (Great) Yana (Vehicle) and a Bigger Da when Dogen’s Three Minds (Joyful, Elder or Parental, and Great Minds) bubbled up from “

Instructions for the Cook.”

About Daishin (Great or Big or Magnanimous Mind) he writes:

So-called great mind is, in its spirit, like a great mountain or a great sea: it has no partiality and no factionalism. Lifting an ounce, it does not consider it light; hefting a stone, it does not consider it heavy. Being drawn by the voices of spring, it does not wander into the swamp of spring. Although it sees the colors of autumn, it has nothing whatsoever of the spirit of autumn. It contrasts the four seasons against the backdrop of a single vista. It views pennyweights and ounces [of silver] within the context of a single system of measurement.

“Great Mind” here is a simile where the characteristic shared by a big mountain or a vast sea and the great mind is that they all allow everything to come and go without attachment within a single immeasurable, impartial system of measurement.

How can this be applied?

This summer I’ve been out walking Bodhi more during the times that my neighbors are around (if you want to meet your neighbors, get a dog) and have had some good talks. And Bodhi has gotten to play more with other dogs, including his best friend, pictured above.

In my personal, Zen and education worlds I tend to hang out either with the liberal, well-educated and spiritually-oriented or teachers and tough, mostly African-American teens. The neighbors I talk with most are white, working-class, middle-age (and beyond) men. We share deep concerns about where the USA is going, seeing most trend lines as leading to big trouble. Tens of trillions in debt, for example.

What does Dogen’s Great Mind have to do with this?

Well, for one thing, if we open to all the possibilities like a great mountain and fully accept responsibility for where we’re really at, the virtues of small and simple would become obvious, me thinks. A truly meaningful life (and finding affection for one’s life) for an individual or a county has little to do with the size of our empire, military, economy, house, car/truck, spiritual experience, etc.

According to the happiness researchers, beyond about $10,000 income, connections with self and others and meaning are much more significant.

Comments on this welcome.