Jpaan has it's own facebook/myspace -like website called Mixi. And there's  communities and groups you can join, just as with fb/ms. I've found one that describes my feeling exactly: It's name is でも生きています - "...but, I'm alive"

No matter what we might want, how hard it might be, well, we're still alive, and while being still alive, we should make that moment worth living. Just hang on there for a bit longer. And that's what I'm doing - hanging and trying to keep my head together between the elation, depression, panic and a complete "f*ck this all". I was just yesterday evening talking with a friend and she commented to me how completely I had changed since mid-May when we had been talking about love - how sure I had been about everything. Now she told me it was like talking to someone completely different. But, I've decided just to hang in there and do nothing - besides there are absolutely no signs that I migh stand the slightest chance, so...

Gah. Stupid me. But hey, I'm still alive. Better just to concentrate on my books, I know they love me, or something... Who needs guys anyways?

I really thought I'd left this already behind after the fight with panic attacks induced by my spiritual wonderings, but now we're again in the beginning.

I'm just feeling like nothing makes any sense. There's no deeper meaning in anything I'm doing at the moment, and I just don't know why I should care. And yet I do care, but the things I care aren't the things I'm supposed to care about.

I just feel completely lost, once again, not sure about anything.

And something is whispering in my ear that I'm too lucky to be entitled to this feeling. Outwardly everything is in order, so why should I be feeling like this? I should behave like a normal person and just go on about things happy and content, and not wonder about things like meaning of life and relationships.

And at the same time I just can't understand why EVERYONE isn't feeling like this? Is there something wrong with me or them? I can't feel the feelings I'm supposed to, while at the same moment feeling many many things I'm not supposed to, and no, I'm NOT only referring to the last post - that's only a part of it. Maybe I'm just f*cked up, because that would certainly explain many many things...

Why is life so difficult? Or should I ask myself, why am I making my life this difficult?

Should I just shut my feelings down, regarding all things, and go on living as everyone else supposes I should do? Or what? But if I do, am I being true to myself? And if I'm not even true to myself, what purpose is there in living in the first place, if you can't do it fully?

Ok, here's something very personal but I need to get this out.

I'm stupid. I did the one thing I never ever shouldn't have done, and I'm twisting the knife in the wound again and again.

I'm like a love-struck teenager.

Once again there's the part of me that can kind of see what's happening and gives a running commentary on my thoughts (usually by either snide remarks or big-sisterly advice), and then there's the part that just keeps sighing, watching his picture and loves the feeling it makes in the pit of my stomach - while at the same time wanting to hit her head in a brick wall for being stupid enough to fall for this.

It could all have gone away, if I hadn't spent the whole night yesterday talking about it with a friend who just kept encouraging me and adding logs to the fires... And I'm still mostly thinking that this will go away, sooner or later, first of all because I'm leaving the country in 3 weeks, because I have a boyfriend of 5years waiting for me, and because I'm not even sure if the object of mmy infatuation is even interested in me in THAT way. And he's someone I most certainly don't want to lose as a friend for too hasty actions.

F*ck. And his good looks don't help at all (not to mention his other good qualities). Nor the fact that I haven't seen my boyfriend in 6 months. Am I desperate (or pathetic) or what? There's the feeling that there might be something there, while at the same time my reason keeps telling me that there certainly couldn't be and my emotions, sunk to the level of a 13y.o. girl first time in love, are overreacting more about things than what there actually is.

And all the while this inner dialogue is going inside my head I'm staring at his picture. Sad, I know... But I just can't help it. Feedback would be nice, could someone just kick some sense in my thick skull?

Something very unusual happened last night - or should I say this morning. I came home around 5am after a night out. Now, I know everyone will be just rolling their eyes and thinking that I really REALLY don't have a life since this doesn't happen more often, but who cares. The point is that I did do it yesterday and it was one of the best nights out I've ever had.

It all started with two bottles of sake, one small and one a bit bigger, Toyama Kôen and a thunderstorm. Never seen such lightnings in nature... I had promised to take a friend out for her birthday (which will be in August, but who cares?) and show her the Bôzu Bar, given of course that I'd be able to find it. Before going there, though, we had decided to get rid of 2 bottles of sake gotten as presents - sake is the ideal conversational drink and one just can't drink it alone, even less drink a bottle of it. So, to Toyama we go, and were kept happy with our bottles until 10.30pm while watching lightnings, bats and cute dogs. There were some annoying students and their singing practise included, but we didn't let it bother us too much - just spoke louder. *g* After having gotten rid of the sake (Otsukaresama!) the real adventure of finding Arakichô could begin...

And finding it was actually more easy than I would have thought. And finding the bar too. I must have been a scout or something in my previous life... *g* More sake ensued, with 2 bottles given as presents (now we must do the whole Toyama episode again - not that I complain), and the conversations got really interesting even with our level of japanese.

I just have this feeling of things like my return date picking up speed and getting nearer and nearer, and the nearer they come, the more things I have the possibility to do. For example, only last month I really started to do all kinds of things with the people from the zazenkai - like the tea ceremony for example. Now that I only have only 3 weeks left I get to know people who, on top of being great as company could be of so much use to in my research. *sigh* Why didn't I meet these people half a year ago?

And, for some strange reason Fugu-sensei had forgotten to mention that the all-too-adorable bôzu of the Bôzu has been to Komazawa. Why, oh why are my sensei such prime examples of the head-in-the-clouds scholar? Now, would I have known this beforehand... But there is nothing nicer than trying to isshôkenmei explain your weird interests in japanese to a good-looking guy, who not only listens to you and understands what you're trying to say (or fakes understanding so convincingly that I don't actually care whether it was real or not *g*), but also takes part in what's usually a monologue from your part making it to a conversation, and even agreeing with you. Oh, I could bask in that feeling for... *g* Ok, I promise I'll behave now.

Well, we got some new phone numbers, mixi IDs, set up a date for a visit to a Jôdoshin temple and some promises of introductions... A night's job well done. And let's not forget the sake we have to drown sooner or later. *g*

Q: Is Zen a religion?

A: Yes.

This is a question I come across more often than I would have thought. Actually, I don't think I've ever thought about whether or not zen is a religion before I heard the question for the first time. For me zen has always been a religion among the others, a branch of buddhism among other branches of buddhism.

In fact, I don't see a single reason why zen wouldn't be a religion. Just because you can take the ideology of a religion and practise it without its religious aspects doesn't somehow erase the original product. Just because you could live by christian ethics without actually belonging to a denomination or believing in God doesn't make christianity any less a religion. And that, I think (ooh, she thinks! Scary!) is what has happened to zen - particularly in the west.

I'm all for the "treat others as you'd like to be treated yourself" and "don't kill" and whatnot, basic civilized rules that are laid out in the book known as the Bible. I can pretty much say that I live by these rules, but I'm not a big fan of the religious stuff, believing to God and Jesus and resurrection and sins. But I'm happy to take this "Golden Rule"-thing and use it to make my life better. Am I a christian believer? Nope. Can I say that just because I use christian ethics in a non-religious way, christianity is not a religion? No.

Zazen, a.k.a. "zen meditation" (a term that it is a bit misleading in some cases, but let's deal with that later), can be a valuable tool for anyone. You don't need to be buddhist, even less zen buddhist, to practise zazen and enjoy its good effects. Doing zazen doesn't make you a zen buddhist either, no more than the act of going to the church makes one a christian. You might get peace of mind from hearing a mass or saying the prayers with rest of people there, but that still won't necessarily make you a christian. The same thing with zen philosophy - if you get something out of it, good for you. If you can incorporate it to your own life and situation, even better. But don't for gods' sake come to tell me that just because YOU might not think zen is YOUR religion, that it isn't a religion at all!

First of all, zen is a type of buddhism, and buddhism is, at least when I last checked, one of the major world religions. Ergo, zen = buddhism = religion. All the zen schools draw their roots to a buddhist monk called Bodhidharma, Daruma in japanese, who brought his variant of buddhism to China in the 5th c. and who emphasised inner enlightenment, transmission without reliance on words and meditation as the most important practise. Humans being what they are the school split into several branches first in China, and then some of these were transmitted to Japan - the biggest schools being Rinzai and Sôtô. The importance of this dharma lineage is shown for example in the Sôtô practise of chanting all the names in your own lineage from Shakamuni (Shakyamuni) to the head of your own monastery each morning. I've seen the list of names and it's no mean feat to memorize them all...

And secondly, doing zazen and using the "zen way of thinking" (whatever that might be) to be able to cope better with your everyday problems is just fine, but that's actually not zen at all. And from now on I'll speak of Sôtô zen, since that's the school I know something about. There's a special reason for zazen, and it's not to make your life easier (though that might also happen). We do zazen because that's when we literally become buddhas. Zazen, when properly done, is not a way to enlightenment, it IS enlightenment. 一分座れば一分仏, sit for one minute and you're a buddha for one minute. Those who recognize something religious in this way of thinking raise your hands? Maybe something, mm ... I don't know ... supernatural? I mean, suddenly turning to a buddha and all? And no, this ISN'T a metaphor. Suddenly there's all these thing's to believe in: First of all, you must believe that story about Buddha, suffering and enlightenment. And as if that wasn't enough, you must believe that we all have the same ability (and need) for the said enlightenment, and that it's possible by following the principles laid out by Dôgen zenji, basically by sitting facing a wall. Which part here doesn't look like "religion"? (Although I admit that getting up voluntarily at 4.45am just to be able to sit for 40min facing a wall, being hit with a stick and then cleaning the temple grounds without getting paid sounds somewhat more like a cult than a religion... *g*)

So, Sôtô zen has validity both as a religious tradition and organization, and there's religious beliefs behind it all. And what's more important, there are believers - a religion without followers would indeed be a useless thing. And as long as these three can be found, I'm of the opinion that zen is a religion.