{"id":209,"date":"2011-01-01T09:13:34","date_gmt":"2011-01-01T09:13:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/mindfulnessmatters\/2011\/01\/new-years-eve-zen-style.html"},"modified":"2011-01-01T09:13:34","modified_gmt":"2011-01-01T09:13:34","slug":"new-years-eve-zen-style","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/mindfulnessmatters\/2011\/01\/new-years-eve-zen-style.html","title":{"rendered":"New Year&#8217;s Eve &#8212; Zen Style"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"mt-enclosure mt-enclosure-image\"><a href=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/mindfulnessmatters\/newyearseve.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"newyearseve.jpg\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/96\/import\/assets_c\/2011\/01\/newyearseve-thumb-350x262-20617.jpg\" width=\"350\" height=\"262\" class=\"mt-image-left\" style=\"float: left;margin: 0 20px 20px 0\" \/><\/a><\/span>I celebrated the New Year Zen style at a small Zen temple in a rural corner of Vermont. The evening consisted of meditation (zazen) starting at 5 PM. It&#8217;s always a good idea to start with meditation to settle into the form and intention of being awake (or at least aspiring in that direction).&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Following zazen, we were asked to reflect on the previous year, month-by-month, writing down events that stood out in memory. And as we wrote these events down we were also asked to look for patterns &#8212; things that reflected events, feelings, and behaviors that were skillful; that led to good outcomes for ourselves and others. Likewise, we looked at events, feelings, and behaviors that represented patterns that were not so skillful &#8212; that led to poor outcomes for ourselves and others. For the New Year, we make an intention to maximize the former and minimize the latter. Once completed we purified the folded slips of paper in incense and then took them out to the fire pit and one by one placed these papers in the fire, burning them in the flames of intention.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>A little party followed. After the social gather, more zazen. At 10:13, 108 minutes before midnight, a bell-ringing ceremony began. Each participant had a bell to ring and at the dawn of minute each of the bells would be rung in sequences (this took about 30 seconds). The purpose is to mark time and to reveal the subjective nature of time. The entire evening is a meditation on time and our relationship to it. The sounds emanating into the dark night were ethereal and dynamic, like a minimalist composition. At midnight all the bells were rung at once.&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Then out to the fire pit once again where the Heart Sutra was chanted with great vigor, joy, and volume. The sounds of Heart Sutra mingled in the air with more conventional revelers shooting of fireworks and hopping and and hollering.&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Then another party! This time, traditional noodles with tempura. It&#8217;s hard to believe how such a simple bowl of noodles with shitakes, seaweed, and some fritters could taste so good, but it did!<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>To add to the excitement, it started to rain on this balmy night and iced the roads. So driving home was a continuation of zazen practice &#8212; being awake, being fearless, being safe.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>While New Year&#8217;s Eve may be an auspicious time to reflect on the past year, you can do the exercise described any time. Do it today and place your written down reflections in the fire of becoming and dissolving.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Enjoy this first day of the New Year.&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div><\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I celebrated the New Year Zen style at a small Zen temple in a rural corner of Vermont. The evening consisted of meditation (zazen) starting at 5 PM. It&#8217;s always a good idea to start with meditation to settle into the form and intention of being awake (or at least aspiring in that direction).&nbsp; Following&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":268,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,4,8,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-209","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-buddha-101","category-buddha-beat","category-mindful-living","category-mindfulnesss"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>New Year&#039;s Eve - Zen Style - Mindfulness Matters<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/mindfulnessmatters\/2011\/01\/new-years-eve-zen-style.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"New Year&#039;s Eve - Zen Style - Mindfulness Matters\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I celebrated the New Year Zen style at a small Zen temple in a rural corner of Vermont. The evening consisted of meditation (zazen) starting at 5 PM. It&#8217;s always a good idea to start with meditation to settle into the form and intention of being awake (or at least aspiring in that direction).&nbsp; Following&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/mindfulnessmatters\/2011\/01\/new-years-eve-zen-style.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Mindfulness Matters\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-01-01T09:13:34+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/mindfulnessmatters\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2011\/01\/newyearseve-thumb-350x262-20617.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Dr. Arnie Kozak\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"New Year's Eve - Zen Style - Mindfulness Matters","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/mindfulnessmatters\/2011\/01\/new-years-eve-zen-style.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"New Year's Eve - Zen Style - Mindfulness Matters","og_description":"I celebrated the New Year Zen style at a small Zen temple in a rural corner of Vermont. The evening consisted of meditation (zazen) starting at 5 PM. 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Dr. Kozak's ability to translate ancient healing traditions into pragmatic applications suitable for modern lifestyles through the use of metaphors have made him a strong voice in healthcare and business. Beginning with a journey to India in the 80\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s where he took the Bodhisattva vows from His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Arnie Dr. Kozak began his lifelong practice in mindfulness meditation. Intent on finding a way to bring the practical healing attributes of mindfulness he began incorporating these techniques in his private practice. In 2002 Dr. Kozak created Exquisite Mind in Burlington, Vermont as a vehicle that could expand his wisdom to larger audiences beyond individual psychotherapy to professionals and corporations, health care providers, public groups and, most recently with Exquisite Mind Golf, amateur and professional golfers. His award-winning new book, Wild Chickens and Petty Tyrants: 108 Metaphors for Mindfulness (Wisdom Publications, 2009) is a thoughtful, funny, and inspiring translation of mindfulness practice through the inventive use of metaphor applicable to our daily lives. In addition to his work with Exquisite Mind, Arnie Kozak, Ph.D., Licensed Psychologist\u00e2\u20ac\u201dDoctorate has been a Lecturer in Psychology at the University of Vermont and is a Clinical Instructor in Psychiatry and Medicine, University of Vermont College of Medicine. He has studied and practiced clinical psychology, meditation, and yoga for more than 25 years. He has studied with several meditation masters, including S. N. Goenka, Larry Rosenberg, Gurumayi Chidvilasananda, and His Holiness the Dalai Lama. After receiving his bachelors degree with honors from Tufts University, he was awarded a Presidential Fellowship to get his Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University at Buffalo. He completed his training as a Psychological Fellow at the Harvard Medical School. Prior to founding the Exquisite Mind in 2002, Arnie worked ten years in the private sector for the PKC Corporation consulting on mental health content for this revolutionary software company.","sameAs":["http:\/\/exquisitemind.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/mindfulnessmatters\/author\/akozak"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/mindfulnessmatters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/mindfulnessmatters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/mindfulnessmatters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/mindfulnessmatters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/268"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/mindfulnessmatters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=209"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/mindfulnessmatters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/mindfulnessmatters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/mindfulnessmatters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/mindfulnessmatters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}