Events

Upcoming Events

One Continuous Mistake
Friday, April 10 to Sunday, April 12

In ‘Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind’, Suzuki Roshi speaks of “Shoshaku jushaku”, translated as ‘to succeed wrong with wrong’ or as ‘one continuous mistake’. He was trying to console his students who felt they were failing at their Zen practice, explaining that a Zen master’s life could be described as “so many years of one continuous mistake”.

This was not a statement about being incompetent, a self-accusation many of us carry internally, but a recognition that the process we’re involved in is a continuous process of trying, failing and trying again, where judgment around success or failure, and any self-denigration thrown into the mix, are obstacles to finding the true Freedom we want. 

The desire for a mistake-free life and/or the desire to not be caught making a mistake reveals the egoic-self clinging to the delusion of a perfect or idealized version of human life.

What needs to be truly accepted and internalized by each of us is the understanding that making mistakes is the path to wholeness, the street lights illuminating the road along which we are finding our way, bit by bit, and essential to “finding ourselves out”.

In our community, the teachings of Zen (the way of consciousness), are beautifully and integrally interwoven with the teachings of the Way of the Heart (the Way of self-transcending Love). Not two!! Making mistakes, both unavoidable in our humanness and necessary to our self-transcendence, brought consciously to the path, will evoke tenderness and compassion for ourself and others, and will soften us into the vulnerability we need to deeply connect to the Great Heart of Existence itself. 

We will explore the theme One Continuous Mistake through a variety of ways including movement, group sharing, creativity, disowned parts. These weekends always include space to socialize and have fun in the Heart Field, to deepen relationships or to make new ones. 

Email: Danielle sacred_dance@yahoo.ca or Sharon slh2614way@gmail.com