On Thursday, April 14, St. Valentine's Day, 2005, I sent an email to the master and copies to Irene, the junior ino, and to my friends Jane and Edward, the temple's two most senior students.
"I won't be attending the sesshin this weekend," I wrote the master.
I informed him that I would let Irene know and I assured him that at his request Edward or Jane would agree to fill in for me as ino at the two-day sesshin which concluded the winter practice period.
"I resign as ino," I announced in my email.
I explained to the master that his private confidences to me about other temple members followed by his puzzling reprimands to me about my gossiping had confused me.
"I also resign as vice president of the board."
I told the master that I would so inform Edward, the president of the board of directors.
"Your responses to my journal," I explained to the master, "have hurt me and confused me."
In short—
"I don't understand them."
My letter was not long.
"Yet you have taught me much," I concluded. "I am very grateful. I have no doubt that your intention towards me has been and still is good and that your only purpose has been and is as you say to wake me up and to get me to see things as they really are. I just need time to reflect on what has transpired between us this practice period."
That was it.
I signed off—"with deep affection and profound regret."
The end.
I had an errand to run.
I climbed into my pickup and backed out of my driveway, I drove up Pratt to 52nd Street and turned right on Maple, I merged onto Radial Highway, negotiated the slight jog left and the slight jog right back onto Maple, and then I idled through downtown Benson on my way to the post office and then to Baker's for the week's groceries.
My window open, the wind in my hair, I felt only a few moments of freedom and relief.
I would have to meet with the master in an exit interview, I knew, just as Ryan had, and I did not want to sever my ties to the master and to the temple forever. I just wanted to step back and rest and let myself reflect upon this situation. Whether the master would permit me to reduce my involvement at the temple and yet continue to attend and participate only occasionally I did not know.
That I would have to find out.
By the time I returned home with my groceries and checked my email I had already received a reply from my dearest sangha friend Edward.
"Obviously this isn't an easy thing for you to do. Of course, I don't know what happened. But I think I can guess—the master pushed hard against one of your more firmly held beliefs."
I wondered.
"I think that's what happens in most cases when serious students quit."
I wondered.
Was this what had happened to me?
What belief?
That I felt fortunate, fulfilled, and unafraid?
That I was happy?
The master had demanded that I admit feeling what at the time I did not feel and, when I said so, the master had mocked me and accused me of dishonesty and cowardice. When I suggested that his responses were abusive, the master had denied any validity to my allegation and had intensified his attack upon me.
"You give the master credit for good intentions," Edward said. "I'm glad you recognize that."
I had no doubt.
"In some cases there is disenchantment with the teacher when the student realizes the teacher is not infallible," Edward explained.
No.
This was different.
"I wish there were some way to bring my friends back to practice with us," Edward added.
Yes.
I felt that way.
"There is mutual bestowal from buddha to buddha and from ancestor to ancestor."
Edward asked if I remembered that line from Ryaku Fusatsu.
I did not.
"Mutual," Edward stressed. "The master is learning from us, too."
I wondered.
"We are learning from each other all at the same time," Edward concluded.
I wondered.
"I hope you will continue to be a friend and a teacher to me."
I would try.
It seemed only minutes more before the master responded.
"This is not a good way to handle things," the master wrote. "This is not a good course of action either for you or for the sangha, which you will be leaving in a difficult position."
The master continued.
"You need to come in and talk with me about the things you are dealing with instead of bailing out. Reflecting on things is just more buzzing around in your head. You need to continue to sit and to practice here in the middle of your turmoil and push through it."
To submit.
"It is an especially bad decision not to sit sesshin this weekend."
Hmm.
So I needed to continue to subject myself to demands that I confess feelings that I did not feel?
Thank you—
No!
The master continued.
"I can't accept your resignation either as ino or as board member until you come in and speak to me about it. You wear a rakusu that I gave you in the lay initiation ceremony. Please honor it and the relationship between teacher and student by coming in tomorrow afternoon and we will talk."
The master asked that I bring my journal entries with his comments.
"We will speak about the things that have hurt and confused you and that you do not understand."
I replied immediately.
I said that I could meet at the time I had previously scheduled to prepare the temple for the sesshin but that I had no interest in parsing either the entries in my journal or his comments on them.
"Been there, done that," I added. "It leads nowhere."
I tried to end on a positive note.
"You've been a wonderful friend to me," I wrote. "That won't change."
When I told my wife that I had quit the temple and would not attend the sesshin but that I had agreed to meet with the master in private about my decision she simply, airily, dismissed my resignation out of hand.
"Oh, you'll go to sesshin," Ruth said. "He'll talk you out of it."
"No, he won't!" I exclaimed. "I'm not going to go!"
Ruth laughed.
"Of course you will!" she insisted.
"No, I will not!" I exclaimed again. "I've made up my mind!"
She laughed.
"You will."
"No!"
"You will."
"I won't!"
"You will."
"No!"
No, I had made up my mind!
Enough!
I walked down the hall to the office. I sat down at the computer. There I listed the statements that I wanted to make and the questions that I wanted to ask and did not want to forget.
I wrote and revised.
Master:
1 My "turmoil," the main "thing I'm dealing with," is how you speak and write to me.
2 Until I understand its purpose I will not subject myself further to your verbal abuse.
3 How is it possible for me to express anything other than my point of view?
4 When you confide in me are you my friend or my teacher?
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