Trust, Realization, and Self in the Soto Zen Practice

The practice of Sōtō Zen is a practice of encounter and realization, an intimate path in which the self and its relationship to all beings are transformed. This poses challenges to anyone who takes it up, challenges that call us to understand the elements that make possible a deep engagement with the practice. Of these elements, trust is central--a well-founded trust in the teachings, in one's capacity to realize them with others, and ultimately in dynamic reality itself. Dōgen states that "To study the Buddha Way is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be authenticated by the myriad things." Studying and forgetting the self is not leaping over the self--it is full engagement with all aspects of our being, bravely looking at how we ourselves, others, and the world interact, and supporting what makes realization possible.