Dharma Life
October-November, 2002
A Publication of the Missouri Zen Center
220 Spring Avenue
Webster Groves, MO 63119
314) 961-6138

Visit us on the web at www.MissouriZenCenter.org 
Events for October and November
• Board meeting, Sunday, October 27, following samu
• Mindfulness Day, Sunday, October 13, noon
• Energy efficiency workday, Saturday, November 2, 9am
• Bread Baking, Saturday mornings in October & November 
• Tree Planting, October (watch for announcements)

Board Seeks Suggestions
The executive board of the Missouri Zen Center is discussing ways to attract new members. If you have any suggestions or ideas, please contact Ando at amcmast@seistl.com, or 314-731-1971.

Support the Zen Center by Baking Bread

Our last fundraising event of the year, the preparation and sale of delicious baked goods for the end of the year holidays, will begin soon. A small committee is considering ways to make our baking and packaging operations more efficient. We expect that the changes will make it easier for members and friends to participate. By working together, we step off the hundred-foot pole. We support our Zen Center so it can continue to support all beings.
Bread baking will replace Saturday morning discussions (following 8 am zazen) now through at least mid November.  Please come help out around 9 am Saturdays. Watch for more information on the listserv, at the Zen Center and on our website. 

Energy Efficiency Workday, November 2
Another way to step off the hundred-foot pole and put our practice into action is to reduce energy usage at the Zen Center. We are holding a workday for our members and friends to participate in a number of activities not requiring specialized knowledge or equipment. These may include insulating the hot water pipes from the boiler and domestic hot water tanks, adding insulation to the domestic hot water tank, adding faucet aerators to the kitchen and bathroom faucets, caulking and sealing large holes and cracks, and weatherstripping windows and doors.
Please join us on Saturday, November 2 after the morning sitting to participate in the workday. Besides helping to reduce the Zen Center’s energy use and its contribution to global warming, we will be reducing the Zen Center’s utility expenses and learning how to perform these activities so we can do them at our homes. And who knows – maybe we’ll eat lunch together afterward!

Mindfulness Day 2002: Awakened Living
Each Fall St. Louis-area Buddhists and other spiritual seekers come together to celebrate Mindfulness Day, celebrating the Way of Awakened Living taught by the Buddha.
Sponsored by the Buddhist Council of Greater St. Louis, this year’s Mindfulness Day will be held on Sunday, October 13th, from 12:30 pm to 5:00 pm, at the Thai Buddhist Temple, 890 Lindsay Lane, Florissant, MO. The event is free and open to the public.
Founded in 1999, the Buddhist Council of Greater St. Louis consists of 12 local Buddhist groups that meet monthly to discuss secular and spiritual issues and to organize year-round activities. The Council is comprised of the Hikoshin Ryu Buddhist Group, MABA Buddhist Monastery, Missouri Zen Center, Sravasti Abbey at Liberation Park, St. Louis Insight Meditation Group, Sri Lankan Buddhist Group, Thai Buddhist Temple, Do Ngak Choling & Kagyu Droden Kunchab Tibetan Buddhist groups, Vietnamese Buddhist Association of St. Louis, Vietnamese Dharma Study Group, and Vipassana Buddhist Church.

Mindfulness Day Schedule of Events
Sunday, October 13, 2002
	12:30 PM	Homage to the Triple Gem by Buddhist Monks
	12:35 PM	Opening Remarks by Rev. Ho Bang
	12:50 PM	Mindfulness amidst the Evolving World by Dr. Kongsak Tanphaichitr
	1:20 PM	Mindfulness & Society: Suffering & Peace by Ven. Santikaro Bhikkhu	
	1:50 PM	Awareness: Environmental Issue by Ando
	2:20 PM	Refreshment	
	2:40 PM	Wakefulness in Everyday Life by Ven. Jiru	
	3:00 PM	Buddhist Story Telling by various Buddhist Groups
	3:30 PM	Panel Discussion: Questions & Answers
	4:30 PM	Meditation - Various Techniques: Hands-on Experience
Directions:  From I-270. go North on Lindbergh Blvd. for 1.5 miles, passing Washington Street. Turn Left onto Lindsay Lane, and go 0.5 miles. Temple located on the South side at 890 Lindsay Lane.

Plant Trees This Fall
It’s fall, and that means time to plant trees. The soil is still warm but the air is cool, allowing for good growth of roots before winter settles in. Trees absorb carbon dioxide, the major greenhouse gas. They cool with their shade, encourage rain through their transpiration, fertilize the soil with their leaves, provide habitat for other plants and animals, and delight us with their beauty. If you can, plant at least one tree this fall.
If you don’t have land to plant trees on, then join the tree-planting efforts on public lands that have been organized by the Interfaith Partnership. As soon as we know the dates, times, and places, we will publicize them at the Zen Center, on our listserv, and on our web site. We have been part of this effort from the beginning and hope to have as many members and friends participate as possible.

The Dharma in Detention
Ed. note: this was sent to MZC’s listserv by Herb Medley.
Dear Dharma Brothers & Sisters,
Last night, at our regular Thursday night meditation session with the detainees at the St. Louis County Juvenile Detention Center, we were privileged to have our sensei, Dr. Rosan Yoshida, both lead and lecture.
At first we understood that there would be some problem about allowing Rosan to speak at the center because he had not yet been processed and certified via their application and review procedure. However I was most pleasantly surprised, that our sensei, arriving almost at the last minute, was indeed able to conduct the entire [session].
The girls were absolutely enthralled by him and he was able to command their undivided attention much better than any of us had in the past with remarkably less fidgeting on the part of the girls. Except for me, with my crampy old back and knees, doing most of the fidgeting.
Rosan began with an in depth explanation of proper sitting posture, proper breathing and proper mental state by concentrating on the breath. He then doaned with a guided meditation period. Last [he gave a] lecture on Dharma. [T]here was intermittent mutual eruptions of giggling as Rosan compared Coca-Cola and chocolate (objects that the girls said they really liked) to desire and greed.
The girls wanted to know all kinds of things about Japan. They asked how to say this and that in Japanese. Finally after one of the girls [was unable] to articulate the Japanese words for, “I love you,” Rosan said, “It’s okay, you don’t have to say anything if you just smile.”  By the end of our session there was no one who was not smiling (even the staff supervisors). I’m sure that the girls will have special memories of last night long after they leave the correctional system.
In Dharma - Om shanti,
Herb

New Brothers and Sister in the Dharma
Congratulations to Garyo, formerly known as Gertraud Wild; Jimu, formerly known as Jim Neuner; and Garyu, formerly known as Greg Gieber, who each took lay ordination on September 15. They all vowed to observe sixteen precepts. This is one way to step off the hundred-foot pole.

Living The Global Ethic: Reducing Your Contribution to Global Warming
Part 1: Knowing What Your Contribution Is
by Kuryo
This article begins a series on ways we can step off the hundred-foot pole and put our practice into action. The first few articles of the series will focus on reducing our households’ contribution to global warming. The information comes from Rocky Mountain Institute’s excellent “Cool Citizens: Everyday Solutions to Climate Change” documents. You can view and download these documents from Rocky Mountain Institute’s website, www.rmi.org
The Cool Citizens document “Household Solutions Brief” is the place to begin your plan to lower your greenhouse gas emissions. The document shows you how to calculate the amount of carbon dioxide (abbreviated CO2), the gas that is the major contributor to global warming, generated each year from your use of electricity, natural gas, propane, kerosene, fuel oil, and wood. 
Between now and the next issue, you can calculate your household’s greenhouse gas emissions for the past year. To do this, you’ll need the receipts for the electricity and fossil fuels that your household consumed during that time, and you’ll need the emissions estimate worksheet from “Household Solutions”. You can download the latter from www.rmi.org/sitepages/pid173.php (if you don’t have Web access, contact me at 314-355-3505 or put a note in my box at the Zen Center and I will get you a copy).
Both Laclede Gas and AmerenUE have the information you need on the part of the bill you retain. Add up the therms of natural gas you used as shown on each Laclede bill for the past year. It is given in the middle left portion of your receipt in the column labelled “therms”. Just below that, check to see if the usage was actual or estimated for each bill. If you have estimated bills, at some point during the year Laclede makes an actual reading to adjust for your actual use. Your bill for that month will include any amount added or subtracted to get an actual usage for the past year. You may want to use that bill as the end of your “year” and go from 12 months earlier to then to get your baseline natural gas usage. Add up the kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity used from each AmerenUE bill for the past year. It’s given in the column labelled “use” in the upper part of the left side of your receipt. Again, check if the usage was actual or estimated and if an adjustment for actual use was made at some point. For fuel oil, propane, and kerosene, look for the gallons you used on your receipts for the past year and add these. For wood, look for the cords of wood you used on your receipts and add these. If you didn’t keep your receipts, start to do so this month and try my suggestions in the next issue to make it easy to keep track of your fuel usage. You can designate the upcoming year as your baseline year.
Once you have added up your fuel use for each type of fuel for the past year, you can fill out the emissions estimate worksheet to get your household’s estimated carbon dioxide emissions for the last year. Because AmerenUE uses more coal than the national average to generate our electricity, you need to use a larger factor to multiply your total kilowatt-hours by than is given on the sheet. I found the correct factor in a link given in the documents. In the middle of the row headed Electricity, in place of 1.43 lbs [of CO2] per kWh consumed, cross out 1.43 and write 1.97 to account for AmerenUE’s higher than average CO2 emissions for each kWh of electricity generated. Otherwise all the factors in the middle of each row remain as shown. 
At the beginning of each row, write down the total amount of that fuel used which you calculated from your receipts. Multiply by the number in the middle of the row to get  the pounds of carbon dioxide (CO2) emitted by using that fuel. Finally, add up the pounds of CO2 for each type of fuel you used to get total pounds of CO2 emitted in the past year from your household.
If you used any kerosene, please note in the kerosene row that the kWh written just past the blank space should be gallons, and you will write the total gallons you used in that space. The rest of the row is correct.
To illustrate, here is Meiku’s and my fuel consumption and CO2 emissions for 2001. We used a total of 2,568 kWh of electricity, 578 therms of natural gas, and none of the other fuels.  Our results are as follows.
Electricity: 2,568 kWh times 1.97 lbs per kWh consumed equals 5,059 lbs CO2/yr
Natural gas: 578 therms times 11.71 lbs CO2 per therm equals 6,768 lbs CO2/yr
Adding 5,059 and 6,768 gives our total carbon dioxide emissions as 11,827 pounds in 2001. Compare this to our total CO2 emissions for 1990 of 20,759 pounds. The reduction of nearly half in our 2001 emissions shows the effects of taking some of the actions mentioned in the “Household Solutions Brief” report during the past several years. The average residential carbon dioxide emission is 26,028 pounds in a year, according to the report. While our emissions look low compared to average, note that the house we lived in then was only 900 square feet. The emissions estimate worksheet offers a way to estimate your emissions for the year knowing only the square footage of your household and assuming it has the characteristics of an “average” household as defined in the report. Making that calculation gives an estimate of 10,260 pounds of CO2 emitted in a year. Just to get our emissions to average for a house the size of ours required several changes.
Another action to take between now and the next issue is to plant at least two trees. Trees use carbon dioxide the way we use oxygen, so if we can reduce our fossil fuel consumption enough and plant enough trees, we can reach net zero carbon emissions. The report suggests planting at least two trees each year from now through 2012. Fall is the ideal time to plant trees in St. Louis. Please see the tree-planting article elsewhere in this issue for information on planting trees on public land – you can count any trees you plant in those events against your emissions!
If you are having trouble with any of the calculations, come to the Zen Center on our energy efficiency workday, Saturday, November 2, and I will help you (bring your receipts if you have them). If you can’t be there that day, contact me. Next issue we’ll discuss keeping records of your energy use and planning your energy reduction strategy. Until then, happy calculating and tree planting!

E-mail Discussion List (listserv)
To subscribe to the Missouri Zen Center’s e-mail discussion list, send an e-mail message to <majordomo@joethejuggler.com>, leave the subject field blank and in the message body type “subscribe mzc”. You will then receive a confirmation message (including instructions on how to unsubscribe). Please only subscribe the e-mail address of individuals.

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Rosan’s Dharma Talks transcribed by Ando:

LIVE DHARMA LIFE!

Dharma means form, norm and the way of life. The life way (religion) must be based on the norms of forms (phenomena). The norm of all forms is the law of Dependent Origination, i.e., all phenomena are dependently originated on causes and conditions. Anyone can see and use it in solving any problems.
For harmonious and happy life, we must be awakened to this law (mechanism and means), act properly (organize and orientate) and appreciate fully (universally and unconditionally). The life way must advance from selfishness to holiness (whole and wholesom).
In the limitless life, we must continuously endeavor for aspiration (for awakened life), action (in constant practice), (unsurpassed) awakening and unconditioned peace. This is the dharma life with the dharma eye and the dharma bliss open and obligatory for everyone in the unified dharma world.

Dharma life is good in the beginning, in the middle and in the end, for anyone, anytime, anywhere with truth, beauty and goodness. Selfish life is indeed sinful (separated) suffering for anyone, anytime, anywhere, individually, socially, ecologically. So, everyone have a good day, everyday, everywhere!
Stepping From the Dark Dungeon (given August, 2001)

Since yesterday, we had a long-expected, compassionate rain, and all plants, insects, and animals enjoyed this. When we sit, opening the windows, you can sense it.
Unless you come here, not staying in bed, shut in the house, you won’t experience it.
The Buddha said, “If you have the house, you have the leak, without houses, no more leaks.” Then you find compassionate rain, sun, air, and earth, all the life forms interpenetrated in abundance - abundance of beauty and life.
But only humans complain about a little more rain, or less rain, sunshine, too much water, flooding. Then, we start to manipulate. Then, we have all kinds of mental and physical fabrications. We become busy, running in the treadmill and live in the dark dungeon of the devil. Why do only humans have attachment, aversion, and delusion and disturb and disrupt this great, vast total system? Just because we do not step forward from this dark dungeon, we are confined in the dungeon, bound with our own ropes.
That’s why we need to stop running on the treadmill, step off of it and sit and see the vast world, the abundance of life, and live and let live the full potential of the Limitless Life.