June 20, 2025 • 49 mins
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What happens when anger fuels our actions? Can something traditionally viewed as poison ever become medicine? These questions form the heart of a profound meditation on emotion, motivation, and clarity.
Starting with a thoughtful listener question about anger's place in both spiritual practice and social movements, this episode takes us on a nuanced journey through the Zen perspective on emotional states. We carefully distinguish between inwardly-directed frustration that motivates spiritual growth and outwardly-projected anger that inevitably clouds judgment.
The metaphor of fire runs throughout – anger, like flame, can quickly transform from a controlled burn into an indiscriminate wildfire that consumes everything in its path. When we're caught in anger's grip, our ears close even as our mouths open wider, creating a fundamental barrier to understanding. This contradiction makes anger a dubious tool for positive transformation, despite its cultural celebration as necessary for change.
Instead, we explore the surprising power of alternatives: clarity, understanding, and especially compassion. Contrary to popular misconception, compassion isn't weakness but tremendous strength. It allows us to oppose harmful actions while recognizing the Buddha-nature present in all beings – even those we most strongly disagree with. This recognition forms the foundation of Zen ethics and offers a pathway to effective action without internal corruption.
Whether you're wrestling with your own emotional responses or questioning how to create meaningful change in a divided world, this episode offers wisdom that challenges conventional thinking while honoring our full humanity. Join us for this exploration of what truly burns brighter than anger – and how it might transform both ourselves and our world.
Dr. Ruben Lambert can be found at wisdomspring.com
Ven. MyongAhn Sunim can be found at soshimsa.org
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Hello, this is Nicolas Sotomayor, first time
caller, long time listener.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
You are listening to the World Through Zen Eyes and
hopefully back to anotherepisode of the World Through Zen
Eyes podcast.
I am Myung An Sunim, flyingsolo.
Dr Lambert was besieged bylife's responsibilities and so
(00:59):
he couldn't make it today.
Couldn't make it today.
It's then just you and I andthe possibly I don't know what
(01:29):
to call the meanderings.
I like to think of it sort of amaze, if you will.
No string or breadcrumbs tofollow out, but a maze Perhaps
the sort of classical view ofthe brain, with its sort of
tunnels, if you will, twistingand turning and flowing this and
(01:49):
that way.
Nonetheless, meandering, I dowant to share a email from a
listener that, of course, offerspraises for the podcast.
(02:11):
This isn't to say I wouldn'tshare an email or a fan mail
that doesn't applaud Booing.
Emails, too, would be shared Ifimpactful, meaningful and
(02:36):
useful.
So this is both a praise and aquestion.
That's why I think it's a goodthing to do here.
Good afternoon, sunim.
Hope you are keepingcomfortably indoors on this
(02:56):
rainy, rainy Saturday I wantedto share how much I enjoyed and
learned from the two-part serieson karma.
The episode on reincarnation wasmind-bending, and then I heard
the two about karma.
These episodes become only moreprescient and engaging.
(03:19):
We are all better for it.
Thank you Well, thank you Well,thank you, yeah, thank you.
A question I've had that mightwork for an episode is on the
topic of anger.
Anger is one of the threepoisons that perpetuates
(03:43):
suffering.
However, it is also afundamental emotion, one of the
primary colors of emotion, ifyou will.
What is the place of thisemotion in a Zen context?
Anger can be very destructive,obviously, but channeled
(04:03):
constructively, can also be apowerful component to effecting
transformation and necessarypositive change.
Consider the Civil RightsMovement or the American War for
Independence, the RevolutionaryWar.
Channeled anger is a big partof the American identity.
(04:24):
As an example, I took part in amass protest today that was
fueled, in significant part, inanger over the current policies
at play in this country.
The protest was peaceful andconstructive, but it was driven
in large part by a need toexpress collective outrage and
(04:47):
anger over troublinggovernmental policy changes.
Where is the balance?
Anger is often viewed as astrong motivator, and how does
it factor in the context of Zen?
Tangentially, but possiblyrelated, is the fifth precept
(05:09):
refrain from intoxication.
A lay view on this precept isthat about the consumption of
altering substances, ie alcohol,etc.
However, one can also be justas easily quote-unquote
intoxicated with rage, anger,pride, ego, ignorance or desire
(05:30):
or greed.
What are ways we mightinterpret intoxication?
These podcasts offer such anabundant and overflowing banquet
of food for thought, anabundant and overflowing banquet
of food for thought.
Thank you for the continuedefforts of both you, your part,
(05:54):
and Dr Lambert, for continuingto make these amazing and
enlightening episodes week afterweek.
Many thanks.
Well, it's a beautiful andtruly thank you.
You know I call these kind ofreceipts karma receipts, when
(06:15):
people tell me that somethingsaid or done had played a role,
a meaningful role.
It's not that we obviously seekout some praise and accolades
(06:44):
on account of vocation, of amonkhood.
One's own journey through thespiritual growth can be well.
(07:06):
It is at times arduous and ofcourse, in the Mahayana, in the
Zen sort of perspective, theidea is that we are doing this
motivated by the Bodhisattvaprinciple, doing this motivated
(07:28):
by the bodhisattva principle,and so we are to transform the
hardship that we may beundergoing into a necessary
alchemy process of whatessentially is the lotus rising
from the mud kind of situation.
But nonetheless, it's nice,let's say.
(07:53):
It's nice to see or hear thatyour life ripples and echoes
into lives of others and thatyour vocation, that of a monk in
this case, is meaningful and,yeah, so a karmic receipt, if
(08:17):
you will.
So thank you for that.
I am going to keep the name ofthe email or the writer of the
email, the author, in disclosedon account of that.
(08:37):
I'm not entirely sure if thiswas meant to be sort of
presented in that way, butonwards we go.
So anger yes, there is a commonview on anger as a possibility
of transforming it into aconstructive kind of
(08:59):
motivational energy.
I'm very cautious, and there'sa sort of dubious element to
this.
For one.
What it would require is such afine discernment of oneself and
(09:24):
the colors and the flavors ofone's emotional state.
To where is the boundary ofanger as destructive or impeding
becoming constructive andmotivational?
(09:49):
It's a very delicate thing andas such, then it's a hard one.
It's a hard one I'd like tothink of it as the internal, or
(10:13):
the self-directed, and theexternally directed perhaps.
And we have to really considerthe nuanced possibilities here,
consider the nuancedpossibilities here.
So the email mentions anger asone of the three poisons, the
(10:35):
fundamental teachings in Zen,the poison of greed, anger and
ignorance.
And what we know of poisonsright, is that it's the dosage
how much is poisonous.
So we have to set that kind ofaside, have that there as a kind
(10:57):
of backdrop, if you will.
How does one know when one hassort of ingested, if you will,
sufficient amount of the thingto render it poisonous?
And so we have precepts andthings that govern us.
(11:21):
And in the case of the preceptmentioned in the email, namely
the one of intoxication andrightly so, we could say the
intoxication can be intoxicationwith power and pride and ego
and anger and outrage, etc, etc.
The precepts in this case arereferring to just the simple.
(11:48):
Really we could say more,focusing on the simplicity of it
, namely the intoxication viasubstances that then cloud the
perception.
So the intoxication via anger,let's say, is the internal or
(12:19):
the mind is already clouded.
That ergo the intoxication,mind is already clouded that,
ergo the intoxication.
So there the physical elementof intoxication that then
results in, let's say, in thecase of alcohol for example, for
the thinning of the blood, theswelling of the veins, the brain
(12:41):
swelling, the essential kind ofwe could say oxygen starvation
of the brain type of thing thatthen results in the cognitive
processes being hindered andclouded, warped and twisted, etc
(13:04):
.
After all, murders have beencommitted out of anger.
So there's these easier kind ofwell, if you murder somebody
out of anger, you've goneoverboard.
The Not PopgGyong Sutra, Ibelieve.
(13:30):
Yes, pop-hwa-gyong, one of thesutras, yeah, pop-hwa-gyong
Sutra, I believe.
It lists the ill effects ofanger on so many levels and we
(13:54):
view anger as this sort ofraging fire, indiscriminate
raging fire that scorches andburns through the seed of good
fortune, and therefore it's adangerous emotion to toy with.
(14:16):
I had mentioned that, perhaps away to looking, because we do
have anger, if you will, as amotivational element within Zen
philosophy.
We call it Bunbyul, I meanBunshim, I'm sorry, but what it
(14:50):
essentially is is a more, wecould say, anger but frustration
thing of that nature.
But it really is, is pointedand directed on at oneself and
it's not angry with oneself inthat typical use of the word.
Essentially, what it is is tosay, for example, let's say, the
(15:13):
Buddha practiced meditation andreached enlightenment.
He strove and drove and pursuedthe goal and he accomplished it
.
He was a human being, I am ahuman being, he breathed, I
(15:42):
breathe, he ate, I ate, etc.
Etc.
Etc.
So if all of these elements ina sense are alike and the same,
how come I still haven't reachedenlightenment?
How come I haven't practiceddiligently enough or
sufficiently enough, or whateveryou want to call it?
How come that person did it andI haven't yet done it?
(16:04):
That's the sort ofself-frustration as a
motivational element.
It doesn't cloud the mind isthe big factor here.
Outwardly pointed anger warpsthe perception, it twists the
(16:35):
mind, it skews everything to theone side of the spectrum.
It's sort of eye for an eye.
(17:00):
It's sort of eye for an eye, theactions of others fueled by
their of the other, opposingside, angry at those people,
based on one's own anger, one'sown perception, one's own
(17:21):
viewpoint, the right and wrongelement here, we could say from
the Zen perspective, from thepure Zen perspective, is a
preference, it's a personalviewpoint, and so if operated,
and if we operate out of theprinciple of emotional anger and
(17:43):
outrage, it is merely theperception we want to give off.
It's an act that shows theemotional kind of challenge of
the masses.
But if, say, the anger of theother side, whatever that side
(18:12):
is, is expressed and then weexpress anger in return, then
essentially what we are are thesame.
We are anger against anger.
Clarity must be maintained ifchange is to be brought.
(18:33):
The theater of anger is a tool.
The theater of protest is atool.
The theater of these externalexpressions are a tool.
They are essentially what drumsare to war.
The drums rattle and shake theinside of the person, excite the
(19:00):
body to action, but it's themotivation to action and
therefore then the action musthave a clarity in it.
It can't be clouded by anemotional state that then warps
(19:22):
our perception.
It must be well-constructed ifit's going to be constructive,
well constructed if it's goingto be constructive.
And so clarity is what we areessentially within Zen, always
(19:50):
after.
We are essentially within Zen,always after.
We are after clarity.
We're trying to stay away fromthe things that cloud the mind,
the sort of cataract ofemotional overwhelming states.
(20:13):
And this isn't to say again thatwe are to be some emotionally
castrated eunuchs.
That's not the goal, that's notthe point.
After all, emotions are part oflife.
They are there to inform, theyare there to sort of a feedback
loop, but they are informed byour perspectives also.
(20:40):
So they are informed by ourentrenched viewpoints, and so
what we are pursuing is clarity.
The frustration or the anger, ina sense, is a, like I said, a
(21:05):
punsim, which is a kind ofself-motivating element to
pursue clarity.
So it's almost a sort ofstrange dynamic there.
I'm going to say I'm angry thatI get angry, kind of right, and
(21:30):
in that sentence I get angrythat I got angry so that I can
no longer be engulfed in theflames of anger.
So the inner or theself-directed anger, if you will
(21:58):
, for the lack of a better word,an outwardly directed anger,
are of different qualities.
We are following thebodhisattva path, after all, and
the bodhisattva path is thepath of compassion and
understanding.
(22:18):
And this is such a difficultthing frequently because yes
there are things that one can beoutraged over.
There are wrongs, in a sense,and and terrible things, and
there are going-ons and theusual thought then is something
(22:39):
akin to well, if I'm not enraged, then I am passive.
Right, rage in and of itself,anger in and of itself, is
(23:00):
nothing, it's the actions, it's.
The real impact is in thethings that we do.
So there's a difference betweensitting and sort of brewing and
stewing in one's frustrationsand outrage and anger and these
things, and actually doingsomething.
(23:23):
And this is where that nuancecomes into play.
If we are just sitting andstewing and brewing and getting
ourselves all kinds of worked up, we are damaging ourselves
physically, psychologically,emotionally, spiritually.
(23:44):
How then are we to considerthis sort of militant approach
to it?
The militaries of all the worldstructure their day-to-day
activities very precisely.
(24:05):
The military wakes up at acertain time, goes to sleep at a
certain time, eats at a certaintimes.
The sayings are kind of you goto the bathroom and you sleep
when you're told, and it's truein a sense, there's a rhythm
that is created and the rhythmcreation is intended to create a
(24:32):
strong, healthy soldier.
That's the underlying reasoningand dynamic why we go to sleep
at a certain time, why you wakeup at a certain time, why you
eat when it's time to eat, whyyou train and do this and this
and this, why To make a bettersoldier, to make a better
(24:55):
warrior.
And if the anger element, theoutrage element, is damaging,
then one cannot be a betterwarrior for the good, let's say,
one cannot be fit to do thework if the mind is clouded by
(25:24):
anger and its perspective.
And we say that we use it as amotivation.
But if you consider other tasksin our lives that we do and
accomplish and do well, we do itout of an understanding of the
(25:47):
need.
I mean one could go to workangry every single day and get
it done and say, well, you know,I get angry, so I'm motivated
to sit, you know, in a cubicle,kind of thing.
Right, and so anger is not theonly motivator, but it is and
(26:09):
this isn't to say that the emailsuggests it to be the only way,
but it is one of the strongeremotions and, naturally speaking
, then it is one of theimpactful and governing emotions
(26:35):
that can very quickly andthat's the other element very
quickly rising is fire that justbursts.
Frequently, not always.
Sometimes it starts small andsmoldering and progressively,
(26:58):
progressively, turns into thishuge raging wildfire.
But it is quick to rise,generally speaking, and as such
it also then has a tendency todissipate, unless it becomes
(27:23):
destructive.
So that's the element of it,that's the nuance of it, it's
quick to rise of it.
That's the nuance of it.
It's quick to rise, it starts,and then, chances are, it either
dissipates very quickly or itcontinues to devour everything
indiscriminately in its wake.
(27:43):
And this is the problematicelement of anger.
Does one have truly the abilityto do a sort of controlled burn
or can it, as it frequentlydoes, turn into a raging
(28:09):
wildfire, gets out of hand?
You know you want to burn athing, but then a spark jumps
onto the thing that is not partof the thing you want to burn
and innocence gets caught in it,our innocence, frequently, the
(28:32):
innocence of others, theinnocent lives, the innocent
bystander, the innocent thing,etc.
Etc.
And so there was a protest,mentioned in the email and the
uh, the peacefulness of it,right, and, and we know, we know
(28:58):
sort of Gandhi's uh, such agraha and and the peaceful,
peaceful resistance and andthings of that nature as a, as a
tool used.
Its motivation, however, wasnot anger.
(29:24):
So, yes, having emotions is anatural, it is the spectrum of
life, it is the spectrum of, ofthe, the breath of emotion.
And if we don't experience orif we suppress one or the other,
that is also an unhealthy wayof existing right.
So when emotion rises and weare not wakeful to it again, in
(29:50):
Zen, frequently we talk of thiswakefulness and if we're not
wakeful to it, if we're notaware and awake of the emotion,
(30:14):
the wind, you know, the river,as the Popgugyong Sutra speaks
of a sleeping village swept inthe middle of the night by a
flood, if we are not wakefulwhich is a challenging thing to
(30:35):
be continuously, but we train it, that's the call, that's the
point.
But if we are not wakeful, thenwe are susceptible to being
swept by the flood.
And if the emotions give a riseand we don't catch it and we
(31:00):
don't recognize it and we don'tcontrol it and hold it and
balance it, then, knowing whenwhat was meant to be a
motivational energy or reallyit's something that we think of,
post right, the anger comes, weuse it and then we dub it as oh
(31:26):
, I'm angry because you know themotivational thing.
So there's a kind of a strangeorder of things.
What comes first, what comessecond, which again makes it so
(31:48):
much more challenging.
Was it anger that motivated, orwas it motivation that then
said, anger was the motivator?
Was it understanding that movedme to join a protest, let's say
?
Or was it a whatever?
So it's a.
(32:10):
It's a slippery slope.
I would say, alternatively,understanding, and again we
could go on and perhaps must goon.
Just what do we mean byunderstanding?
(32:30):
It's words we play with andthey have traps and trap doors
and booby traps and things blowup and pop out of the walls and
it's a sort of whimsical thing.
Words, because if we say youknow better than to be angry is
to understand, then it seemsthat what is suggested because
(32:56):
it frequently is the connotationthat to understand means to be
okay with that thing, and that's, of course, not what
understanding means.
Right To understand.
If I have a disease,understanding it means I
(33:18):
understand the mechanism, theprocess, the this and that.
Let's say, if something goes onand I understand why and how
and its sort of underpinningsand the mechanism of it, I
understand it.
It doesn't equate to I'm finewith it.
I understand it.
Therefore, I'm fine with it.
What it makes me is be able tomore efficiently deal with it On
(33:52):
the account of understanding,not on the account of emotional
upheaval.
Understanding makes the thingclear.
Understanding, if I understandwhy someone does something, if I
understand what is the possiblemechanism in their mind that
(34:16):
makes them act and say and dothings, the underpinning,
underlying karma of that person.
If I understand that, then Iknow how to have a conversation,
then I know how to beproductive, then I know how to
(34:40):
arrive, hopefully, at aresolution.
Anger is not an understandingemotion.
Anger is entrenchment.
Simultaneously, as anger flowsout of our mouth, the ears close
(35:03):
.
Usually what happens is we arejust yelling out and the roar of
the voice of anger drowns outour ability to hear anything.
And this is the dynamic elementand this is the, the mechanism
by which innocent bystanders andand I don't mean necessarily in
(35:27):
protest settings, I mean in ourfamily lives and things of that
nature it's a person, a child,a spouse, whatever, a dog, a cat
get barked at by an angryperson having done nothing.
And then we have oh, I'm sorry,I lost my temper because
(35:54):
usually being something so far,far away from the innocent ones.
And so anger is not anunderstanding emotion.
Anger is not an understandingemotion.
It then to be used to arrive atan understanding seems, like I
(36:18):
said at the beginning, perhaps alittle dubious.
We must be cautious of it, asit is, with all emotions, a good
way to think of them.
Like I said, it's not that weare trying to be sort of
(36:40):
emotional eunuch, kind ofcastrated and just a blah.
That's sort of a psychopathic,and just the blah, that's sort
of a psychopathic.
I mean, dr Lambert isn't herebut I would ask whether it seems
to be that it's a DSM, part ofthe DSM definition of a
(37:06):
psychopath, maybe the inabilityto feel emotion, in a sense.
So that's not what we're after,absolutely not.
But what we are after isknowing the dosage of our
emotional state and this isacross the board.
(37:28):
We've talked about patience inone of these episodes and the
usual yin to the yang, the um tothe yang of the patience is
anger.
But we've talked about the morerefined meaning of patience and
(37:48):
patience towards nature,patience towards time, patience
towards joy develop the sasangmedicine principles and the
oriental medicine principles andthe five element theories that
(38:14):
place emotional states withinthe context of medicinal
practice, that certain emotionsare damaging to certain organs,
that certain emotions or theamount of said emotion.
Maybe it's a better way to putit, as Ijeoma put it letting the
(38:46):
emotion run amok.
It's equivalent to sort ofstabbing yourself in the ojang,
the five viscera.
So this idea of emotionalstates.
The question then is how muchEmotion?
Yes, how much.
How much joy?
(39:08):
How much joy?
And again from sort of from thesatsang medicine principles,
joy.
Then there's sort ofoverjoyedness, that then, if you
continue down the path of joywithout balancing it, without
(39:28):
controlling it, without withoutunderstanding it, then we could
end up sort of mania.
I frequently, when speaking ofsaid thing, bring up this thing
that's kind of burnt into mymind of a certain university,
(39:48):
and we see this time and timeagain where a football team or
whatever, what have you, wins aI don't know championships or
whatever those things are called, and it wins it.
And in joyous celebrationthere's a riot.
In joyous celebration they seta couch on fire.
In joyous celebration they seta couch on fire, and joy is
(40:08):
celebration.
That's joy.
It's got the same family as joy, but it isn't joy, not at that
stage.
It isn't Psychosis, if you will.
And so when thinking of emotion,always, I think a good way to
(40:31):
consider is how much, how mucham I in, how deep am I in?
How much is enough?
And in terms of motivation,clarity and understanding and
compassion are also powerfullymotivating elements, more
(40:58):
powerfully than anger, on theaccount that there's a clarity
of perception, even if just thatone element is what we want to
highlight, that there's aclarity of perception.
And if we have the clarity, ifwe have the understanding, and
(41:22):
then we could see the path.
If we are bloodshed fury, wecannot see the path.
If we are bloodshed fury, wecannot see the path.
The smoke of anger fillseverywhere and we cannot see it.
The raging fire fillseverywhere and we cannot see the
path.
We don't know which way to go.
(41:42):
We don't know which way issafety.
We're sort of surrounded andengulfed and then this kind of
blinded swinging ensues.
Compassion, on the other hand,also has a benefit over anger,
(42:03):
in the sense that we do notbecome like.
This is in context of someconflict, one side and another
side and if one person is angryand the other person doesn't
(42:25):
like their anger and becomesangry at the other angry person,
then what we end up is alike.
We end up both alike in ouranger, and so we would rather
have a compassionate approachand again, compassion is not
(42:50):
frailty, it is not weakness, itis not sort of being a pushover.
This is the trick and theproblem with these words.
In the Chonsugyong SutraChonsugyong, the Thousand Eyes
Sutra there is a line thatspeaks of the Bodhisattva of
(43:16):
Compassion, kwanseumbosal KyesuKwanum Debiju and essentially
what it follows is that we bowbefore the Bodhisattva of
compassion and there's, if youwill, almost a warning we bow
(43:41):
before the Bodhisattva ofcompassion, in a sense.
Why?
Because of the compassion, yeah, but we also are in a sense
warned of the power ofcompassion.
We are warned to not simplyfocus on, you know, when, the
(44:08):
artistic expression of KwanzaaMbosal, of the Bodhisattva of
Compassion, whether it's inrenderings and paintings and
sculpture and statues, it's a,you know, sort of gentleness,
right, there's a motherly energyabout it, right, and it's sort
of compassion.
So there's a beauty andgentleness and tenderness and
(44:30):
that kind of thing.
But that's not the whole thing,that's not the only thing.
There's a power, prodigious,prodigious power, in compassion.
When done right, done right,compassion is a powerful force
(45:00):
and it's a powerful force thatkeeps our heart pure.
This is the big element.
Anger against anger, onebecomes like one's enemy.
One must see the other one asan enemy and this is, and this
(45:22):
is the opposing.
Let's say I'm opposing someviewpoint, I'm opposing some
side, and I start out of apurity.
But if anger and those thingsare what motivates, then it's
(45:42):
very easy to become impure inone's intention, in one's action
.
So the powerful, powerfulmotivation of compassion has
(46:07):
that element that othermotivational sort of principles
don't have, namely that it keepsour heart pure, because we
never venture into tramplingonto the hearts of other human
(46:33):
beings, because that's the otherthing we have to consider.
No matter what the other personis, there is a Buddha nature
there.
No matter what the other personis, they have their own traumas
and scars and viewpoints.
Within a context of whatever,what have you?
It's a complex thing, butbeneath the complexity of it,
(46:55):
beneath the ignorance of it,beneath the greed of it, beneath
the selfishness of it, beneaththe anger of it, beneath the
whatever of it, is a Buddhanature.
That is to say, in as much as Iam striving to reach mine and
(47:19):
excavate mine and clear themirror of the mind, if you will.
If this was not true, if thiswas not the case, that then
somebody could be rotten so tothe core, then the principle of
(47:41):
me attempting to find myBuddhahood, attempting to find
my own Buddha nature iscancelled out, because then they
and I are a different species.
They're not human and I'm nothuman.
(48:02):
If one can and another onecannot, we are not the same
being, but the truth is that weare.
We are the same.
Underneath it all, we are thesame.
The differences, the uniqueness, the discrepancies, the
(48:25):
conflicts or the connections,whatever, are more superficial,
and so compassion can be a verypowerful motivator, is a very
powerful motivator.
(48:46):
It has a clarity about it andit keeps our heart safe.
Thank you so very much.
I'm Myung An Sunim.
Until the next time, take careof yourselves and each other.
Hello, this is Nicolas Sotomayor, first time
caller, long time listener.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
You are listening to the World Through Zen Eyes and
hopefully back to anotherepisode of the World Through Zen
Eyes podcast.
I am Myung An Sunim, flyingsolo.
Dr Lambert was besieged bylife's responsibilities and so
(00:59):
he couldn't make it today.
Couldn't make it today.
It's then just you and I andthe possibly I don't know what
(01:29):
to call the meanderings.
I like to think of it sort of amaze, if you will.
No string or breadcrumbs tofollow out, but a maze Perhaps
the sort of classical view ofthe brain, with its sort of
tunnels, if you will, twistingand turning and flowing this and
(01:49):
that way.
Nonetheless, meandering, I dowant to share a email from a
listener that, of course, offerspraises for the podcast.
(02:11):
This isn't to say I wouldn'tshare an email or a fan mail
that doesn't applaud Booing.
Emails, too, would be shared Ifimpactful, meaningful and
(02:36):
useful.
So this is both a praise and aquestion.
That's why I think it's a goodthing to do here.
Good afternoon, sunim.
Hope you are keepingcomfortably indoors on this
(02:56):
rainy, rainy Saturday I wantedto share how much I enjoyed and
learned from the two-part serieson karma.
The episode on reincarnation wasmind-bending, and then I heard
the two about karma.
These episodes become only moreprescient and engaging.
(03:19):
We are all better for it.
Thank you Well, thank you Well,thank you, yeah, thank you.
A question I've had that mightwork for an episode is on the
topic of anger.
Anger is one of the threepoisons that perpetuates
(03:43):
suffering.
However, it is also afundamental emotion, one of the
primary colors of emotion, ifyou will.
What is the place of thisemotion in a Zen context?
Anger can be very destructive,obviously, but channeled
(04:03):
constructively, can also be apowerful component to effecting
transformation and necessarypositive change.
Consider the Civil RightsMovement or the American War for
Independence, the RevolutionaryWar.
Channeled anger is a big partof the American identity.
(04:24):
As an example, I took part in amass protest today that was
fueled, in significant part, inanger over the current policies
at play in this country.
The protest was peaceful andconstructive, but it was driven
in large part by a need toexpress collective outrage and
(04:47):
anger over troublinggovernmental policy changes.
Where is the balance?
Anger is often viewed as astrong motivator, and how does
it factor in the context of Zen?
Tangentially, but possiblyrelated, is the fifth precept
(05:09):
refrain from intoxication.
A lay view on this precept isthat about the consumption of
altering substances, ie alcohol,etc.
However, one can also be justas easily quote-unquote
intoxicated with rage, anger,pride, ego, ignorance or desire
(05:30):
or greed.
What are ways we mightinterpret intoxication?
These podcasts offer such anabundant and overflowing banquet
of food for thought, anabundant and overflowing banquet
of food for thought.
Thank you for the continuedefforts of both you, your part,
(05:54):
and Dr Lambert, for continuingto make these amazing and
enlightening episodes week afterweek.
Many thanks.
Well, it's a beautiful andtruly thank you.
You know I call these kind ofreceipts karma receipts, when
(06:15):
people tell me that somethingsaid or done had played a role,
a meaningful role.
It's not that we obviously seekout some praise and accolades
(06:44):
on account of vocation, of amonkhood.
One's own journey through thespiritual growth can be well.
(07:06):
It is at times arduous and ofcourse, in the Mahayana, in the
Zen sort of perspective, theidea is that we are doing this
motivated by the Bodhisattvaprinciple, doing this motivated
(07:28):
by the bodhisattva principle,and so we are to transform the
hardship that we may beundergoing into a necessary
alchemy process of whatessentially is the lotus rising
from the mud kind of situation.
But nonetheless, it's nice,let's say.
(07:53):
It's nice to see or hear thatyour life ripples and echoes
into lives of others and thatyour vocation, that of a monk in
this case, is meaningful and,yeah, so a karmic receipt, if
(08:17):
you will.
So thank you for that.
I am going to keep the name ofthe email or the writer of the
email, the author, in disclosedon account of that.
(08:37):
I'm not entirely sure if thiswas meant to be sort of
presented in that way, butonwards we go.
So anger yes, there is a commonview on anger as a possibility
of transforming it into aconstructive kind of
(08:59):
motivational energy.
I'm very cautious, and there'sa sort of dubious element to
this.
For one.
What it would require is such afine discernment of oneself and
(09:24):
the colors and the flavors ofone's emotional state.
To where is the boundary ofanger as destructive or impeding
becoming constructive andmotivational?
(09:49):
It's a very delicate thing andas such, then it's a hard one.
It's a hard one I'd like tothink of it as the internal, or
(10:13):
the self-directed, and theexternally directed perhaps.
And we have to really considerthe nuanced possibilities here,
consider the nuancedpossibilities here.
So the email mentions anger asone of the three poisons, the
(10:35):
fundamental teachings in Zen,the poison of greed, anger and
ignorance.
And what we know of poisonsright, is that it's the dosage
how much is poisonous.
So we have to set that kind ofaside, have that there as a kind
(10:57):
of backdrop, if you will.
How does one know when one hassort of ingested, if you will,
sufficient amount of the thingto render it poisonous?
And so we have precepts andthings that govern us.
(11:21):
And in the case of the preceptmentioned in the email, namely
the one of intoxication andrightly so, we could say the
intoxication can be intoxicationwith power and pride and ego
and anger and outrage, etc, etc.
The precepts in this case arereferring to just the simple.
(11:48):
Really we could say more,focusing on the simplicity of it
, namely the intoxication viasubstances that then cloud the
perception.
So the intoxication via anger,let's say, is the internal or
(12:19):
the mind is already clouded.
That ergo the intoxication,mind is already clouded that,
ergo the intoxication.
So there the physical elementof intoxication that then
results in, let's say, in thecase of alcohol for example, for
the thinning of the blood, theswelling of the veins, the brain
(12:41):
swelling, the essential kind ofwe could say oxygen starvation
of the brain type of thing thatthen results in the cognitive
processes being hindered andclouded, warped and twisted, etc
(13:04):
.
After all, murders have beencommitted out of anger.
So there's these easier kind ofwell, if you murder somebody
out of anger, you've goneoverboard.
The Not PopgGyong Sutra, Ibelieve.
(13:30):
Yes, pop-hwa-gyong, one of thesutras, yeah, pop-hwa-gyong
Sutra, I believe.
It lists the ill effects ofanger on so many levels and we
(13:54):
view anger as this sort ofraging fire, indiscriminate
raging fire that scorches andburns through the seed of good
fortune, and therefore it's adangerous emotion to toy with.
(14:16):
I had mentioned that, perhaps away to looking, because we do
have anger, if you will, as amotivational element within Zen
philosophy.
We call it Bunbyul, I meanBunshim, I'm sorry, but what it
(14:50):
essentially is is a more, wecould say, anger but frustration
thing of that nature.
But it really is, is pointedand directed on at oneself and
it's not angry with oneself inthat typical use of the word.
Essentially, what it is is tosay, for example, let's say, the
(15:13):
Buddha practiced meditation andreached enlightenment.
He strove and drove and pursuedthe goal and he accomplished it
.
He was a human being, I am ahuman being, he breathed, I
(15:42):
breathe, he ate, I ate, etc.
Etc.
Etc.
So if all of these elements ina sense are alike and the same,
how come I still haven't reachedenlightenment?
How come I haven't practiceddiligently enough or
sufficiently enough, or whateveryou want to call it?
How come that person did it andI haven't yet done it?
(16:04):
That's the sort ofself-frustration as a
motivational element.
It doesn't cloud the mind isthe big factor here.
Outwardly pointed anger warpsthe perception, it twists the
(16:35):
mind, it skews everything to theone side of the spectrum.
It's sort of eye for an eye.
(17:00):
It's sort of eye for an eye, theactions of others fueled by
their of the other, opposingside, angry at those people,
based on one's own anger, one'sown perception, one's own
(17:21):
viewpoint, the right and wrongelement here, we could say from
the Zen perspective, from thepure Zen perspective, is a
preference, it's a personalviewpoint, and so if operated,
and if we operate out of theprinciple of emotional anger and
(17:43):
outrage, it is merely theperception we want to give off.
It's an act that shows theemotional kind of challenge of
the masses.
But if, say, the anger of theother side, whatever that side
(18:12):
is, is expressed and then weexpress anger in return, then
essentially what we are are thesame.
We are anger against anger.
Clarity must be maintained ifchange is to be brought.
(18:33):
The theater of anger is a tool.
The theater of protest is atool.
The theater of these externalexpressions are a tool.
They are essentially what drumsare to war.
The drums rattle and shake theinside of the person, excite the
(19:00):
body to action, but it's themotivation to action and
therefore then the action musthave a clarity in it.
It can't be clouded by anemotional state that then warps
(19:22):
our perception.
It must be well-constructed ifit's going to be constructive,
well constructed if it's goingto be constructive.
And so clarity is what we areessentially within Zen, always
(19:50):
after.
We are essentially within Zen,always after.
We are after clarity.
We're trying to stay away fromthe things that cloud the mind,
the sort of cataract ofemotional overwhelming states.
(20:13):
And this isn't to say again thatwe are to be some emotionally
castrated eunuchs.
That's not the goal, that's notthe point.
After all, emotions are part oflife.
They are there to inform, theyare there to sort of a feedback
loop, but they are informed byour perspectives also.
(20:40):
So they are informed by ourentrenched viewpoints, and so
what we are pursuing is clarity.
The frustration or the anger, ina sense, is a, like I said, a
(21:05):
punsim, which is a kind ofself-motivating element to
pursue clarity.
So it's almost a sort ofstrange dynamic there.
I'm going to say I'm angry thatI get angry, kind of right, and
(21:30):
in that sentence I get angrythat I got angry so that I can
no longer be engulfed in theflames of anger.
So the inner or theself-directed anger, if you will
(21:58):
, for the lack of a better word,an outwardly directed anger,
are of different qualities.
We are following thebodhisattva path, after all, and
the bodhisattva path is thepath of compassion and
understanding.
(22:18):
And this is such a difficultthing frequently because yes
there are things that one can beoutraged over.
There are wrongs, in a sense,and and terrible things, and
there are going-ons and theusual thought then is something
(22:39):
akin to well, if I'm not enraged, then I am passive.
Right, rage in and of itself,anger in and of itself, is
(23:00):
nothing, it's the actions, it's.
The real impact is in thethings that we do.
So there's a difference betweensitting and sort of brewing and
stewing in one's frustrationsand outrage and anger and these
things, and actually doingsomething.
(23:23):
And this is where that nuancecomes into play.
If we are just sitting andstewing and brewing and getting
ourselves all kinds of worked up, we are damaging ourselves
physically, psychologically,emotionally, spiritually.
(23:44):
How then are we to considerthis sort of militant approach
to it?
The militaries of all the worldstructure their day-to-day
activities very precisely.
(24:05):
The military wakes up at acertain time, goes to sleep at a
certain time, eats at a certaintimes.
The sayings are kind of you goto the bathroom and you sleep
when you're told, and it's truein a sense, there's a rhythm
that is created and the rhythmcreation is intended to create a
(24:32):
strong, healthy soldier.
That's the underlying reasoningand dynamic why we go to sleep
at a certain time, why you wakeup at a certain time, why you
eat when it's time to eat, whyyou train and do this and this
and this, why To make a bettersoldier, to make a better
(24:55):
warrior.
And if the anger element, theoutrage element, is damaging,
then one cannot be a betterwarrior for the good, let's say,
one cannot be fit to do thework if the mind is clouded by
(25:24):
anger and its perspective.
And we say that we use it as amotivation.
But if you consider other tasksin our lives that we do and
accomplish and do well, we do itout of an understanding of the
(25:47):
need.
I mean one could go to workangry every single day and get
it done and say, well, you know,I get angry, so I'm motivated
to sit, you know, in a cubicle,kind of thing.
Right, and so anger is not theonly motivator, but it is and
(26:09):
this isn't to say that the emailsuggests it to be the only way,
but it is one of the strongeremotions and, naturally speaking
, then it is one of theimpactful and governing emotions
(26:35):
that can very quickly andthat's the other element very
quickly rising is fire that justbursts.
Frequently, not always.
Sometimes it starts small andsmoldering and progressively,
(26:58):
progressively, turns into thishuge raging wildfire.
But it is quick to rise,generally speaking, and as such
it also then has a tendency todissipate, unless it becomes
(27:23):
destructive.
So that's the element of it,that's the nuance of it, it's
quick to rise of it.
That's the nuance of it.
It's quick to rise, it starts,and then, chances are, it either
dissipates very quickly or itcontinues to devour everything
indiscriminately in its wake.
(27:43):
And this is the problematicelement of anger.
Does one have truly the abilityto do a sort of controlled burn
or can it, as it frequentlydoes, turn into a raging
(28:09):
wildfire, gets out of hand?
You know you want to burn athing, but then a spark jumps
onto the thing that is not partof the thing you want to burn
and innocence gets caught in it,our innocence, frequently, the
(28:32):
innocence of others, theinnocent lives, the innocent
bystander, the innocent thing,etc.
Etc.
And so there was a protest,mentioned in the email and the
uh, the peacefulness of it,right, and, and we know, we know
(28:58):
sort of Gandhi's uh, such agraha and and the peaceful,
peaceful resistance and andthings of that nature as a, as a
tool used.
Its motivation, however, wasnot anger.
(29:24):
So, yes, having emotions is anatural, it is the spectrum of
life, it is the spectrum of, ofthe, the breath of emotion.
And if we don't experience orif we suppress one or the other,
that is also an unhealthy wayof existing right.
So when emotion rises and weare not wakeful to it again, in
(29:50):
Zen, frequently we talk of thiswakefulness and if we're not
wakeful to it, if we're notaware and awake of the emotion,
(30:14):
the wind, you know, the river,as the Popgugyong Sutra speaks
of a sleeping village swept inthe middle of the night by a
flood, if we are not wakefulwhich is a challenging thing to
(30:35):
be continuously, but we train it, that's the call, that's the
point.
But if we are not wakeful, thenwe are susceptible to being
swept by the flood.
And if the emotions give a riseand we don't catch it and we
(31:00):
don't recognize it and we don'tcontrol it and hold it and
balance it, then, knowing whenwhat was meant to be a
motivational energy or reallyit's something that we think of,
post right, the anger comes, weuse it and then we dub it as oh
(31:26):
, I'm angry because you know themotivational thing.
So there's a kind of a strangeorder of things.
What comes first, what comessecond, which again makes it so
(31:48):
much more challenging.
Was it anger that motivated, orwas it motivation that then
said, anger was the motivator?
Was it understanding that movedme to join a protest, let's say
?
Or was it a whatever?
So it's a.
(32:10):
It's a slippery slope.
I would say, alternatively,understanding, and again we
could go on and perhaps must goon.
Just what do we mean byunderstanding?
(32:30):
It's words we play with andthey have traps and trap doors
and booby traps and things blowup and pop out of the walls and
it's a sort of whimsical thing.
Words, because if we say youknow better than to be angry is
to understand, then it seemsthat what is suggested because
(32:56):
it frequently is the connotationthat to understand means to be
okay with that thing, and that's, of course, not what
understanding means.
Right To understand.
If I have a disease,understanding it means I
(33:18):
understand the mechanism, theprocess, the this and that.
Let's say, if something goes onand I understand why and how
and its sort of underpinningsand the mechanism of it, I
understand it.
It doesn't equate to I'm finewith it.
I understand it.
Therefore, I'm fine with it.
What it makes me is be able tomore efficiently deal with it On
(33:52):
the account of understanding,not on the account of emotional
upheaval.
Understanding makes the thingclear.
Understanding, if I understandwhy someone does something, if I
understand what is the possiblemechanism in their mind that
(34:16):
makes them act and say and dothings, the underpinning,
underlying karma of that person.
If I understand that, then Iknow how to have a conversation,
then I know how to beproductive, then I know how to
(34:40):
arrive, hopefully, at aresolution.
Anger is not an understandingemotion.
Anger is entrenchment.
Simultaneously, as anger flowsout of our mouth, the ears close
(35:03):
.
Usually what happens is we arejust yelling out and the roar of
the voice of anger drowns outour ability to hear anything.
And this is the dynamic elementand this is the, the mechanism
by which innocent bystanders andand I don't mean necessarily in
(35:27):
protest settings, I mean in ourfamily lives and things of that
nature it's a person, a child,a spouse, whatever, a dog, a cat
get barked at by an angryperson having done nothing.
And then we have oh, I'm sorry,I lost my temper because
(35:54):
usually being something so far,far away from the innocent ones.
And so anger is not anunderstanding emotion.
Anger is not an understandingemotion.
It then to be used to arrive atan understanding seems, like I
(36:18):
said at the beginning, perhaps alittle dubious.
We must be cautious of it, asit is, with all emotions, a good
way to think of them.
Like I said, it's not that weare trying to be sort of
(36:40):
emotional eunuch, kind ofcastrated and just a blah.
That's sort of a psychopathic,and just the blah, that's sort
of a psychopathic.
I mean, dr Lambert isn't herebut I would ask whether it seems
to be that it's a DSM, part ofthe DSM definition of a
(37:06):
psychopath, maybe the inabilityto feel emotion, in a sense.
So that's not what we're after,absolutely not.
But what we are after isknowing the dosage of our
emotional state and this isacross the board.
(37:28):
We've talked about patience inone of these episodes and the
usual yin to the yang, the um tothe yang of the patience is
anger.
But we've talked about the morerefined meaning of patience and
(37:48):
patience towards nature,patience towards time, patience
towards joy develop the sasangmedicine principles and the
oriental medicine principles andthe five element theories that
(38:14):
place emotional states withinthe context of medicinal
practice, that certain emotionsare damaging to certain organs,
that certain emotions or theamount of said emotion.
Maybe it's a better way to putit, as Ijeoma put it letting the
(38:46):
emotion run amok.
It's equivalent to sort ofstabbing yourself in the ojang,
the five viscera.
So this idea of emotionalstates.
The question then is how muchEmotion?
Yes, how much.
How much joy?
(39:08):
How much joy?
And again from sort of from thesatsang medicine principles,
joy.
Then there's sort ofoverjoyedness, that then, if you
continue down the path of joywithout balancing it, without
(39:28):
controlling it, without withoutunderstanding it, then we could
end up sort of mania.
I frequently, when speaking ofsaid thing, bring up this thing
that's kind of burnt into mymind of a certain university,
(39:48):
and we see this time and timeagain where a football team or
whatever, what have you, wins aI don't know championships or
whatever those things are called, and it wins it.
And in joyous celebrationthere's a riot.
In joyous celebration they seta couch on fire.
In joyous celebration they seta couch on fire, and joy is
(40:08):
celebration.
That's joy.
It's got the same family as joy, but it isn't joy, not at that
stage.
It isn't Psychosis, if you will.
And so when thinking of emotion,always, I think a good way to
(40:31):
consider is how much, how mucham I in, how deep am I in?
How much is enough?
And in terms of motivation,clarity and understanding and
compassion are also powerfullymotivating elements, more
(40:58):
powerfully than anger, on theaccount that there's a clarity
of perception, even if just thatone element is what we want to
highlight, that there's aclarity of perception.
And if we have the clarity, ifwe have the understanding, and
(41:22):
then we could see the path.
If we are bloodshed fury, wecannot see the path.
If we are bloodshed fury, wecannot see the path.
The smoke of anger fillseverywhere and we cannot see it.
The raging fire fillseverywhere and we cannot see the
path.
We don't know which way to go.
(41:42):
We don't know which way issafety.
We're sort of surrounded andengulfed and then this kind of
blinded swinging ensues.
Compassion, on the other hand,also has a benefit over anger,
(42:03):
in the sense that we do notbecome like.
This is in context of someconflict, one side and another
side and if one person is angryand the other person doesn't
(42:25):
like their anger and becomesangry at the other angry person,
then what we end up is alike.
We end up both alike in ouranger, and so we would rather
have a compassionate approachand again, compassion is not
(42:50):
frailty, it is not weakness, itis not sort of being a pushover.
This is the trick and theproblem with these words.
In the Chonsugyong SutraChonsugyong, the Thousand Eyes
Sutra there is a line thatspeaks of the Bodhisattva of
(43:16):
Compassion, kwanseumbosal KyesuKwanum Debiju and essentially
what it follows is that we bowbefore the Bodhisattva of
compassion and there's, if youwill, almost a warning we bow
(43:41):
before the Bodhisattva ofcompassion, in a sense.
Why?
Because of the compassion, yeah, but we also are in a sense
warned of the power ofcompassion.
We are warned to not simplyfocus on, you know, when, the
(44:08):
artistic expression of KwanzaaMbosal, of the Bodhisattva of
Compassion, whether it's inrenderings and paintings and
sculpture and statues, it's a,you know, sort of gentleness,
right, there's a motherly energyabout it, right, and it's sort
of compassion.
So there's a beauty andgentleness and tenderness and
(44:30):
that kind of thing.
But that's not the whole thing,that's not the only thing.
There's a power, prodigious,prodigious power, in compassion.
When done right, done right,compassion is a powerful force
(45:00):
and it's a powerful force thatkeeps our heart pure.
This is the big element.
Anger against anger, onebecomes like one's enemy.
One must see the other one asan enemy and this is, and this
(45:22):
is the opposing.
Let's say I'm opposing someviewpoint, I'm opposing some
side, and I start out of apurity.
But if anger and those thingsare what motivates, then it's
(45:42):
very easy to become impure inone's intention, in one's action
.
So the powerful, powerfulmotivation of compassion has
(46:07):
that element that othermotivational sort of principles
don't have, namely that it keepsour heart pure, because we
never venture into tramplingonto the hearts of other human
(46:33):
beings, because that's the otherthing we have to consider.
No matter what the other personis, there is a Buddha nature
there.
No matter what the other personis, they have their own traumas
and scars and viewpoints.
Within a context of whatever,what have you?
It's a complex thing, butbeneath the complexity of it,
(46:55):
beneath the ignorance of it,beneath the greed of it, beneath
the selfishness of it, beneaththe anger of it, beneath the
whatever of it, is a Buddhanature.
That is to say, in as much as Iam striving to reach mine and
(47:19):
excavate mine and clear themirror of the mind, if you will.
If this was not true, if thiswas not the case, that then
somebody could be rotten so tothe core, then the principle of
(47:41):
me attempting to find myBuddhahood, attempting to find
my own Buddha nature iscancelled out, because then they
and I are a different species.
They're not human and I'm nothuman.
(48:02):
If one can and another onecannot, we are not the same
being, but the truth is that weare.
We are the same.
Underneath it all, we are thesame.
The differences, the uniqueness, the discrepancies, the
(48:25):
conflicts or the connections,whatever, are more superficial,
and so compassion can be a verypowerful motivator, is a very
powerful motivator.
(48:46):
It has a clarity about it andit keeps our heart safe.
Thank you so very much.
I'm Myung An Sunim.
Until the next time, take careof yourselves and each other.
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