Dōgen’s Uji: Stop Waiting to Practice

In this episode of Awakening Streams, Sensei Michael Brunner takes up Eihei Dōgen’s Uji (“Being-Time”) and asks what the teaching actually demands of us in practice. Rather than treating Uji as an abstract philosophy of time, Brunner turns toward one of the habits that most often separates us from our lives: waiting for better conditions before we fully participate.

Drawing on Søren Kierkegaard’s image of a chess piece that “cannot be moved,” the talk explores the way longing, aversion, and karmic conjecture convince us that something else must change first. We wait for another person to change, for fear to disappear, for money to arrive, for the mind to become quiet, or for life to finally take the shape we think it should have. In the meantime, we stop practicing with what is here and begin negotiating with it.

The construction of One River Zen’s new zendo becomes a concrete expression of Dōgen’s teaching. The unfinished walls, exposed electrical boxes, drywall dust, frustration, uncertainty, and work itself are not interruptions to practice. They are the Dharma position in which practice is occurring. “The wires are Uji. The drywall dust is Uji.” If we cannot practice here, a finished room will simply become a more attractive place in which to postpone our lives.

Brunner then connects Uji with the practical work of meeting anger, fear, uncertainty, and resistance directly. What has appeared is the field of practice. The task is not to indulge what arises or pretend that every state is wise or desirable, but to witness what is present, include it, take responsibility for what is being created through it, and ask what compassionate activity is possible now.

The talk also develops One River Zen’s Three Transformative Touchstones: Maintain Wonder, Include Everything, and Allow Compassion to Flow. These are presented not as abstract principles, but as ways of resisting the impulse to crystallize experience, exclude unwanted conditions, and postpone compassionate engagement until circumstances become more favorable.

Ultimately, the question is not whether some outside force will move us to a better square on the chessboard. The question is whether we can fully inhabit the square on which we already stand. The whole board is moving as Uji. This body, this work, this fear, this unfinished room, and this life are the Dharma positions through which practice becomes alive.

In this episode:

• Dōgen’s Uji and the meaning of Being-Time
• Why we postpone practice
• Kierkegaard’s “unmovable” chess piece
• Longing, aversion, and karmic conjecture
• The unfinished zendo as a Dharma position
• Full exertion and “burning oneself up” in practice
• Ango as practice now, not later
• Maintain Wonder, Include Everything, Allow Compassion to Flow
• Fear and anger as fields of practice
• Responsibility, compassionate activity, and Avalokiteśvara
• Why we do not need another life before fully taking up this one

Read Sensei Michael Brunner’s complete 25-part commentary on Dōgen’s Uji:https://oneriverzen.org/uji-dogen

Learn more about One River Zen:https://oneriverzen.org

🪷 Awakening Streams: The One River Zen PodcastTeachings and reflections with Sensei Michael Brunner (Sōen) of One River Zen Center, 121 E Prospect St, Ottawa IL 61350.

🌐 Learn more & join practice: https://www.oneriverzen.org🎧 Listen to more episodes: Awakening Streams Podcast🙏 Support the Sangha: https://www.oneriverzen.org/donate

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