Happy New Year and May All Conditions Be Favorable

May all conditions be favorable!

So ends our dedication at the end of “Wake-The-Heck-Up Morning Zazen” and the recitation of the Heart Sutra. The full last passage goes like this:

“We pray for the flourishing of the true dharma, harmony among all nations, earth-sustaining human actions, tranquility within the sangha, and that all conditions may be favorable.”

This is my prayer for the New Year.

What? You might ask. Pray for all conditions to be favorable when we know darn well that they won’t be?

Yes. On the one hand, this is the spirit of our bodhisattva practice – to dream the impossible dream. And on the other hand, this “favorable” is the favorable that’s beyond the favorable and unfavorable.

If you’d like to hear more about this, click here for the iTunes podcast (or here for the talk at the Great Tides Zen website) of the recent talk I gave on this theme.

If you’d like to be involved in the study of the favorable beyond favorable and unfavorable, you are welcome to join the Vine of Obstacles: Online Support for Zen Training.

Happy new year and may all conditions be favorable!