CULTIVATING FREEDOM“with” PAIN IN SITTING

 by Gigen Victoria Austin

 “Bleah.”

A resident of Beginner’s Mind Temple in San Francisco has lived with GI issues in long sittings since he moved in several months ago. When he sits more than two periods of zazen, his digestion slows down. His hiatal hernia, usually dormant, worsens to active gastritis. Even in a one day sitting, though he feels an urgent need for relief; his body cannot take care of itself.

As we discussed his zazen practice, several other issues came up. First, he is tight around the hips from the prolonged standing that is part of his daily schedule. Second, in zazen his arm hurts. Third, because he cooks breakfast once a week and has two other zendo positions, he gets to sit in his regular place about twice a week. The change makes it difficult for him to settle.

In our review, though, because GI issues came up again and again, we decided to focus our attention there. He had already repeatedly tried to solve the problem with endurance, thinking he might be able to free himself “from” the pain. However, this approach had not worked. GI issues are physiological and hernias most commonly do not heal on their own. So we asked ourselves, “How about freedom ‘with’ the pain? How can a person with GI issues relieve the pain, develop stability and ease, and take care of the body so that body and mind could settle in peace and harmony?

How to read this article: This is a record of how one practitioner deepened his stability and ease by accepting and responding to somatic messages that might otherwise have gone unheeded. It is not intended as a prescription for people with GI issues. I offer this for us as colleagues on the teaching path to explore freedom “with” rather than “from” physical pain.

Process: During our half hour session, we explored three steps and stages:

• Relieve the pain
• Discern several postures of stability and ease, to empower the practitioner with alternative ways of doing zazen
• Spread the benefit to the whole body and mind

Relieving the pain:

First we explored how the posture and the pain interacted in the posture the practitioner had been using: Burmese (Siddhasana) on a zafu with knees down. I observed the distance between his hips and his ribs, and developed a couple of hypotheses:

• In Burmese posture (Siddhasana), due to the wide position of the legs, the posture is very stable side to side. However, it is relatively unstable front to back, and there is downward pressure in the lower body due to the sides of the body becoming stable and short. Could these factors be creating pressure in this practitioner’s gut, leading to pain and physiological impacts in long sitting? What if he were to sit in ways that give height to the trunk?
• The GI issue is the main problem we are studying today. What if we simply propped the other problem areas so as not to create pain? Then we could focus on our main theme.

Stability and ease: 

“Yeah !”

We had identified the width of the leg position in Siddhasana as a likely major factor in this practitioner’s pain during sesshin. Our next task was to develop a toolbox of noble postures to use in future sittings. I was suggesting that he might be on the lookout for levels of fatigue in sesshin that made his side body get shorter, and alternate postures in which his side body remains tall. That could help him build a sense of nourishment, stability and ease in his sesshin practice.  Here is what we discovered:

Spreading the benefit:

Now that we had figured out several ways for this practitioner to find stability and ease in seated meditation, we could discuss what might happen next in meditation. Most importantly, if the GI system had stability and space in sitting, it could work better. This is one way to support internal peace and harmony without denial or forcing.

The GI system nourishes us and eliminates waste. When it is working well, we have a sense of ease. In addition, it functions as a physiological brain and support for our emotional stability. That is why our practice emphasizes the hara.

The Buddha taught four noble postures: standing, walking, sitting, and lying down. This is how we studied postures in which this practitioner nourish and support GI-friendly posture and breathing, giving contemplative benefit to his hara throughout the day:

In the Fukanzazengi, Dōgen taught, “The zazen I speak of is not learning meditation. It is simply the Dharma gate of repose and bliss, the practice-realization of totally culminated enlightenment. It is the manifestation of ultimate reality. Traps and snares can never reach it. Once its heart is grasped, you are like the dragon when he gains the water, like the tiger when she enters the mountain.”

In the West, how do we serve and cultivate practitioners from all walks of life, with all their different body types, conditions, and needs? How do we acknowledge and support people who may not come to us physically or physiologically prepared to practice freedom “from” — but must practice freedom “with” — the conditions they live with every day?

I offer my observations to the community and invite your reflection and response. Thanks for your willingness to read this record, and together to consider how we can spread the message that our practice is a universal gate.

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Thanks to Juan Carlos Chotocruz for your willingness to share your practice, and to Parsa Nowruzi for your joy and participation.  Thanks to Monica Miller for photos

Siddhasana, knees down

Wide legged posture stabilizes and shortens the side trunk between hips and lower ribs.

Chair sitting, zafu under buttocks to raise hips slightly above knees.

Narrow-legged position and sitting bone support lengthens side trunk to give more room in the hara.

His happiness inspired a friend.

A second practitioners saw the first practitioner’s relief, tried chair sitting with support, and understood.

Another approach: supporting the arms

Supporting the arms gave enough leverage that his side trunk became taller, even with legs wide in Siddhasana.

Simple cross-legged pose with leg support

A slightly narrower position with support between ankles and shins increased the height and openness of his hara. The sensitive balance from placing buttock bones on the diagonal edges of a support cushion freed his breath and gave him a sense of freedom.

Seiza with support for shins and hands

The greatest GI relief came when we adaptively propped Seiza for ankle stiffness and hand pain, putting his weight on the whole shinbone rather than the knees, and using the weight of the palms to help his thigh bones to descend.

Walking practice

Step by step, maintaining height and ease between hips and ribs.

Standing practice

To practice finding room in the hara in standing, he balanced on footprints and fingertips, lightly pulling the wall downwards to build inner uplift and ease.

Kinhin, adaptive arm position

To keep the main focus on uprightness and ease in the hara, we removed the distraction of numbness in the arms by using a walking meditation variation taught by Thich Nhat Hanh.

Standing meditation

The noble posture of standing zazen, with support and inner balance from light contact between the fingertips and a hip-height chair back.

Deepening silence in kinhin

In kinhin, many people anticipate forward motion with eyes, head or feet. When the hara is stable and comfortable, we have room to deepen our inner silence by allowing the hara to lead.