Wednesday January 5, 2022 Aliso Creek Beach about 11 am. I just experienced a moment of "goen".
When experiencing a zen moment, the feeling is instant, you “know” without knowing that something is unfolding. It comes with a growing sentience, a sensation like wading into the Pacific Ocean on a bright blue sky day. Later, zen moments will trigger epiphanies: intuitive perceptions of the essential nature of life, with a sudden understanding of something in a new or very clear way.
Over the following days, the epiphanies begin to fall like cherry blossoms in a Shibuya breeze.
In Japan, when a middle breeze rises, it lifts cherry blossom petals from thousands of trees to float hundreds of feet over those of us walking below. When we see this as a pink “snowfall”, we are experiencing a zen moment.
I just had such an epiphany. Were it given a name it would be called: Baba, Goen, and the Zen of life.
Had it not been for the very recent passing of Baba, I would not have had this particular zen moment. Through her grandchildren, the meaning of her life will continue to reverberate every year, like falling cherry blossoms.
to be continued...
