Nothing More -- Practice Period notes!

Autumn 2022 - Winter 2023

In this period our focus is on the five skandhas, referenced in the opening of The Heart Sutra. The Heart Sutra is, as the title suggests, right at the heart of Zen and Buddhist understanding. When Suzuki Roshi welcomed the hippies to sit with him in the early 1960s, this was the only text he offered them.

The Heart Sutra begins thus:

Avalokiteshvara
while practicing deeply with
the Insight that Brings Us to the Other Shore,
suddenly discovered that
all of the five Skandhas are equally empty,
and with this realisation
he overcame all Ill-being.

And the five skandhas are:

1. Form (rupa)
2. Feeling (vedana)
3. Perception (samjña)
4. Mental formations (samskaras)
5. Consciousness (vijñana)

Here are the speaker notes (discussion starters) from the time we have spent so far:

• Introduction
• Form
• Feeliing
• Perception
• Mental formations
• Consciousness

The Heart Sutra ends with the Prajnaparamita (perfection of wisdom) mantra
"Gate Gate Paragate Parasamgate Bodhi Svaha"
which the Dalai Lama translates as:
"Go, go, go beyond, go thoroughly beyond, and establish yourself in enlightenment”