From Dragonfly Magazine

The Heart Sutra is the most famous of all Buddhist teachings (sutras). It describes some fundamental truths that are applicable regardless of your spiritual path. It also manages to convey this truth with an incredibly small amount of words. The full text can fit on a single page. This article will give an overview and interpretation of the Heart Sutra, but can by no means cover the full depth of its message. My own understanding of the text changes with time and experience, as it should, so by the time you read this, I might understand it differently. This is not to say that my interpretation here is worthless, rather it represents a particular stage in my understanding that hopefully will be of some use to you. However, grasping the truths of the Heart Sutra is not just an intellectual matter; it requires developing spiritual insight through it. To do this, Buddhist and Tao practitioners cultivate a relationship with the text that includes recitation (chanting), deep contemplation (meditating), and using it to interpret the deeper meaning of life experiences. Fully understanding the truths that the Heart Sutra describes could take lifetimes and I am still quite new to it intellectually and spiritually, but I will share what I know and how it inspires me.


Xin Jing

“The Heart Sutra” in Mandarin is called the Xin Jing. It is helpful to think of the “Heart” in “The Heart Sutra” in terms of the Mandarin translation of xin (pronounced “sheen”). Xin represents not only the emotions and attitudes typically associated in the West with the heart, but also the workings of the mind. The sutra helps explain the impact of our heart/mind on our collective and personal experiences of reality, and it helps us learn how to train our heart/mind to align itself with the deepest core of our being. Through this insight, we can see through illusions and find our “calling,” a deeper meaning and purpose.

Living with integrity to this deeper meaning, we ultimately become active participants in the positive evolution of the world around us. To put it another way, we learn how to manifest the Tao, or God’s will, in the world by learning to transcend the internal obstacles that block our truest spiritual intuition.

In Tao philosophy, xin is the connection between our spirit and our physical body. It is the gatekeeper. Our heart/mind determines to what degree our spirit will guide our actions. Think of the spirit as a light at the bottom of a pool of water, and our xin as the water in the pool. When the water is clean and calm, the light shines through undistorted. When our hearts and minds are clear and calm, the spirit, which is tied to the ultimate harmony of Tao, can inform our day-to-day lives. When spirit, heart/mind, and body are aligned, it amounts to a rewiring of our instincts and intuition to a higher purpose that serves not only the needs of our individual selves, but also the needs of the Universe as a whole.

Furthermore, when our personal trinity of spirit, xin, and body is in harmony, each serves the others: body serves spirit and xin, spirit nourishes the body and xin, xin sustains the connection between the other two. When xin does not sustain the connection, and spirit is removed from the equation, the fundamental needs of the body (food, sleep, sex, etc.) and xin (security, intimacy, self-esteem, etc.) can become pathological. This is because the needs of the body and xin cannot satisfy our deeper nature on their own, so in an attempt to achieve the authentic fulfillment that can only be achieved with a harmonization of all three, we seek more than what we need. This in turn spreads the imbalance we have within to the world around us. So, if our xin is not calm and clear and therefore blocking or distorting the guidance of the spirit, our lives can manifest more suffering and strife than harmony and healing.

Therefore, xin plays a very powerful role. There has been a lot of theorizing about the effect of intention (a facet of xin) itself on the physical world, whether by affecting the behavior of subatomic particles, or through collective consciousness, or through positive thinking to achieve physical health, or through its effects on the enigmatic energy fields of Qi (chi). Whatever impact it has on those levels, it is easy enough to see the effects of xin on the material world without additional theorizing. Xin can inspire the hand to become a fist and hit someone, or to pull the trigger of a gun, or to press the button that releases the atomic bomb. Alternatively, xin can direct the hand to serve others, to create solutions, to spread compassion. When xin is aligned with the spirit, an individual can display a transcendent intuition of how best to serve the manifest world.

Another important aspect of xin is free will. Free will, in this case, means that it is up to us to align our intention with the higher purpose of the spirit. We can choose whether or not to be in harmony with Tao. No higher being will force this decision upon us. It is our responsibility, and the Heart Sutra is a tool to help us realize and act on that responsibility.


Prajna Paramita

The first few words in the English translation are quite significant: “After intensive practice of Prajna Paramita…”

Prajna is a Sanskrit word meaning ultimate wisdom, as opposed to conventional wisdom which is attained through the accumulation of knowledge. In Buddhist philosophy, Prajna is the wisdom of a Buddha, which is latent in us all, the ability to see things as they really are. In terms of Tao, Prajna is the kind of wisdom that can be attained through achieving enough clarity to form a deep connection with Tao and being able to flow with it effortlessly.

Paramita is also a Sanskrit term used for practices that help you get to the next level of enlightenment. The word itself means “going to the other shore.”

Prajna Paramita is the same as what is referred to as “cultivating Tao.” To cultivate Tao means to take action towards the “other shore” of wisdom and clarity wherein we establish a deep connection with our “True Self.” Our True Self is our essential and unique role within the grand scheme of the universe, what we would call Tao. When we align our lives with this transcendent wisdom (Prajna), our deeper unique purpose begins to unfold, because we have become an active participant in our spiritual evolution. Putting this higher level of wisdom into practice can transform the nature of our experience of life. The beauty of the world becomes deeper and broader, our compassion reaches further, our relationships become more meaningful, our challenges become more rewarding, and our contributions become more profoundly important. Furthermore, our joys become more purely joyful and our sorrows are tempered with understanding. If we were living our life inside a TV, putting Prajna Paramita into practice would turn up the “brightness” and “contrast” settings, and a vaster spectrum of vivid colors would begin to surround us.


“After intensive practice of Prajna Paramita…”

So, this translation of the Heart Sutra starts off with what is essentially a disclaimer. From the beginning it is telling us that the level of wisdom that is described by Bodhisattva Avalokita in the rest of the Sutra can only be truly understood after intensive practice. Paradoxically, this means that we must try to live according to a wisdom that will remain beyond our comprehension unless we put it into practice. This actually is not that foreign of a concept, in Christian terms, this could be described as acting on faith. Faith, in this case, is faith that applying the Bodhisattva’s wisdom in our lives will lead us to a deeper connection with our True Self. There can be no proof or guarantee of success unless we take action and experience the truth for ourselves. We have to take the leap.

1. Substance or Form - This means the forms of the material world in the objective sense.

2. Sensation or Feeling - This is the work of the five senses picking up on the world around us.

3. Perception or Discernment – This is when the signals sent to the brain from the five senses are processed, filtered, and interpreted.

4. Will, Impulse, or Ego – This is where desires linger and emotions grow. This is where the majority of our decisions are made.

5. Consciousness – This does not mean consciousness in the normal sense, because it encompasses all levels of our individual consciousness, including those that we are not aware of. This aggregate is what differentiates us spiritually from anything or anyone else. This differentiation is deepened by actions that generate karma. To use the “light at the bottom of a pool” analogy, karmic actions are those that create more ripples in the water, further distorting the light of the spirit. These actions further separate us from our True Self or spirit and alienate us from God and the unity of Tao. This separation manifests in our life circumstances or behavioral patterns. From a material point of view, it can seem positive, you become rich and famous, or negative, you become an angry alcoholic. Either way the circumstances can create more obstacles to realizing unity with Tao. It reinforces your separation. Karma affects the “emptiness” of all Five Aggregates, but the separation itself is the “consciousness” aggregate. It is the shadow that is cast when we separate from the unity of Tao.


The Five Aggregates are Empty?

So, let’s imagine what it might mean for the true state of the Five Aggregates to be “empty.”

Substance – The subject of the emptiness of physical form could and does fill books. Some argue that modern physics such as quantum mechanics and Einstein’s famous equation E=mc2 question the very nature of physical form, suggesting that matter is mostly empty space and particles which are at some level denser forms of energy, and that on some level this energy is tied in with the energy of intention, which then connects xin with matter itself. Whether or not this is true or whether it supports “substance is emptiness” is definitely debatable. Considering the frequently distorted nature of the other aggregates, the emptiness or fullness of the material world seems beyond my unenlightened ability to judge anyway, so let’s continue…

Sensation – Sensation is limited to the five senses, which are dependent upon the physical body. So, for example, we cannot see what’s going on in the next room, we cannot hear what dogs hear, and so on. To understand the emptiness of the Sensation aggregate, we need to recognize the limitations of the five senses. Not only are they limited in the scope of the information that they retrieve, but also in the accuracy of that information (optical illusions, for example). Therefore, the information about the world around us that we gather through the five senses can be at best limited, and at worst entirely inaccurate. Recognizing this, we can approach the world with more humility and perhaps shift our focus to a deeper spiritual interaction.

Perception – When the Perception aggregate is empty, we let go of our prejudices. Our minds are not filtering reality to fit preconceived notions. Therefore we will see things more clearly for what they are, making better use of the senses available to us.

Will/Ego - When the Will/Ego is empty, we become less concerned with our small selves (the physical form and the identity we have built to inhabit it). We become free from desires that can lead to overwhelmingly negative emotions (fear, jealousy, anger, etc.), and therefore we become able to apply our discipline toward any goal more easily. When we no longer identify ourselves with the ego, a lot of self-imposed limitations go away. We can then identify with the universe on a larger scale and act as an integral part of it.

Consciousness - When the Consciousness aggregate is empty, we have rid ourselves of our karma. The water in our pool is clear and calm and the light can shine unimpeded through it. Another way of looking at this is that a pole that points directly at the sun will cast no shadow, if it points somewhere else, a shadow appears. When we are truly aligned with Tao, the consciousness that separates us becomes empty. At that point, we are capable of what the Tao Te Ching refers to as wu wei, or “non-action”, because we are no longer acting as an integral part of the universe, we simply are; it no longer requires conscious effort on our part because the separation is no longer there. Our role as an integral part of the universe might still include action, but without conscious effort to determine the wisdom or necessity of the action. When we practice Prajna Paramita intensively, we begin to experience glimpses of this experience which gives us faith to continue persevering.

"The way to a man's heart is through his stomach." This old saying holds true for both sexes I believe. It has typically been interpreted to mean that if you want a man to love you, fix him good food. My experience with cooking has made me think of this phrase in a new way. Through food preparation, we are sharing what's in our heart with the hearts of others. When our hearts are compassionate and mindful, cooking becomes a means of cultivating these qualities in ourselves and spreading nourishing energy to others. This is a lesson I learned and experienced through vegetarian cooking classes that my Tao teacher held.

My local Tao community was beginning to grow, and together we were learning just how important it is physically and spiritually to be vegetarian. Not only is being vegetarian a good way to prevent diseases and chronic health problems, but it also allows us to practice compassion with every food choice we make. Choosing to show compassion for animals with every meal helps create a more fruitful environment for positive self-development. I will leave more detailed explanations of the benefits of vegetarianism to other articles. Suffice it to say that we wanted to be vegetarians, but that being a healthy vegetarian meant more than eating cheese pizza and microwave bean burritos everyday. We wanted to be able to get the nutrients we needed, avoid chemicals and pesticides in food when we could, and explore the dietary principles in traditional Chinese medicine. We were lucky to have a local Tao teacher with many years of professional cooking experience and a broad knowledge of traditional Chinese medicine, so we convinced him to give us cooking lessons.

We gathered a small group of students: some practicing Tao, others not, some vegetarians, some vegans, and some people who ate meat. We met every other week and were taught two dishes per class. We learned where to find and how to prepare Chinese vegetables and meat substitutes. We were introduced to various types of tea and learned about their therapeutic properties. Our teacher included nutritional advice and suggestions for students who suffered from allergies or other problems.

Traditional Chinese Medicine and Cooking

He taught us about the principles of Traditional Chinese Medicine and how it applies to food. Two central concepts to Traditional Chinese Medicine are Qi (chi) and the Five Element theory. Qi is the pervasive energy that sustains life and vitality in its various forms, and Five Element theory is a philosophical system that illustrates the relationships between different elements of various systems. Different foods are classified by their element and by their effect on the Qi, and this is taken into consideration when cooking.

For example, one application of the Five Element Theory is in the balance of flavors. The five flavors according to the Five Elements are sour (wood element), bitter (fire element), sweet (earth element), pungent (metal element), and salty (water element). One of the methods by which to create really nourishing meals is by balancing these flavors, either within the same dish or in the combination of dishes within a meal. One dish that required attention to balance was the ever-popular General Tso's Tofu. Learning to find the proper balance between the soy sauce (salty), sugar (sweet), vinegar (sour), and chili pepper (pungent) was not an easy task. Our teacher acknowledged this difficulty but did not provide exact measurements to recreate his own recipe; instead, he left it to us to learn the art of balance for ourselves. This tactic was very frustrating at first, but I know now that it has made me a much better cook. It forced me to build up my own instincts for combining ingredients and spices, allowing me to successfully improvise more often. Now, I frequently find myself following the Five Elements instinctually in my cooking, with delicious and nourishing results.

Another application of the Five Elements is by color. The five colors are green (wood), red (fire), yellow (earth), white (metal), and black (water). Along with combining and balancing the five flavors, combining and balancing the five colors is a way of ensuring a wider range of nutrients are present in a meal. Our teacher taught us that nature gave us hints to guide us to the foods that will nourish us. The hints can be present in the flavor, color, scent, or even the shape of the fruit, vegetable, or nut. Thousands of years before the advent of modern nutrition, humans could find clues to what foods would nourish them by these naturally occurring properties. The organs of the body are classified by the Five Elements in this way: liver (wood), heart/blood (fire), stomach (earth), lungs (metal), and kidneys (water), and when someone is suffering from a deficiency with one of these organs, foods with associated properties can be prescribed to assist with alleviating the condition. For example, long before the discovery of vitamin C and its ability to help the blood absorb iron, red fruits and vegetables were suggested for blood-related deficiencies by virtue of their common element, fire. It turns out that many red fruits and vegetables are high in vitamin C: tomatoes, oranges (falls into the "red" category as well), strawberries, raspberries, carrots, and so on. Of course, not all red food has the same properties, and frequently the means by which certain foods fortify certain organs is through the characteristics of its Qi, which is, for the most part, clinically immeasurable and therefore not necessarily supported by Western science. Regardless of its validation by Western science, following my teacher's advice to strive for a variety of (naturally occurring) colors in a meal is both healthy and aesthetically pleasing.

Here is a short list of ingredients that were featured in the class and were recommended for their healthful properties.

Ginger is commonly found in Asian foods. It is good for awakening the appetite, lessening nausea, and fighting off colds. Our teacher recommended drinking ginger tea in the morning. Fresh ginger can be boiled in water for 5-10 minutes to make a great tea (you can add brown sugar if the ginger taste is too strong).

Daikon radish is a long white radish used extensively in Japan and China. It helps with digestion, particularly if you have eaten too much (as I frequently did at these classes). Our teacher would serve daikon raw, cut into strips, with hoisin sauce for dipping. Daikon is also delicious in vegetable sushi and in soups and stews. It is good to eat in the evening.

Shiitake mushrooms were featured in many of the dishes we learned. They are energizing and good for the immune system. These mushrooms are recommended for people with diabetes, high blood pressure, and cancer. Our teacher would use dried shiitakes, clean them, soak them in water for about 30 minutes, and squeeze the water out before slicing and stir-frying them. He always encouraged us not to waste anything, so he would tell us to save the water in which we rehydrated the mushrooms and use it in our soups and stir-fries. This turned out to be a delicious idea. Water used for blanching vegetables was also saved and used in this way.

Pu'erh/Chrysanthemum Tea is a combination of two complimentary teas. Pu'erh tea (named after the region in which it is harvested) is sometimes labeled as "Dieter's tea" because it aids in digesting fatty foods, reducing cholesterol, and detoxifying the body. Chrysanthemum tea is made from boiling dried chrysanthemum flowers. It has a light, sweet flavor and has a cooling effect on the body. It is prescribed to improve vision and to strengthen the liver and lungs.

Cooking With Love

Perhaps the most important ingredient our teacher recommended was love. In anything we do, if we can keep a calm heart full of love and compassion, the results will be much better. This is why many people claim that their mother's home-cooked meals are always the best. They can sense the care that went into the preparation and be nourished by it. What is in their mother's heart is shared through the food to the heart of her children. Though this rang true to me when I learned it, when I began to pay attention to the effect of our teacher's food on the students, the truth of this dynamic became quite clear. The food was delicious, that much was easily true, but the effect on the students was more profound than just a reaction to tasty food. As the classes went on, the students would smile more warmly, talk more frequently, become more animated, stay long after the class was over, and even their faces showed a healthier glow.

Learning to cook became more of a collective experience. We shared our experiences of trying out the recipes at home and learned from each other's mistakes. We took "field trips" to Asian grocery stores and often got groceries for classmates who couldn't make it. We invited each other over to cook together or try out each other's cooking. This was quite a different social setting for me. For years most of my social settings were centered around drinking alcohol, usually to the point of drunkenness. It was quite new for me to have a social experience focused on something that was healthy for the body, mind, and spirit. Cooking a delicious vegetarian meal for my friends was clearly a better way to connect with them than was buying them a round of beers.

I was living alone at the time, so I would try my best at home to hone my cooking skills so that I could reach a point where I could invite others over to eat. I was prone to making mistakes. For example, my first attempt of General Tso's Tofu came out more like General Tso's Jell-O because I hadn't learned the proper amount of corn starch to use. Despite my various mistakes along the way, my kitchen gradually became transformed into a spiritual center of my living space. Uncluttered with the heavy energy of unhealthy food and meat, it became a space where my heart's intention could take a nourishing material form. I also noticed, and have experienced since, that the act of cooking vegetarian food in my living space is akin to stoking the fires of the hearth. Energetically, the living space develops a warm glow the more often I cook there.

Food Exchange

Long after I had taken those cooking classes I wanted to create a similar experience where we could share the benefits of cooking vegetarian food. I had noticed that the most difficult time for a healthy meal was lunch. Like many people, I work roughly nine to five and eat my lunch away from home every weekday. Eating out is expensive and tends to be far less healthy than anything I would cook at home. Making lunch every morning before I leave for work is a good habit that has always eluded me. So with the help of my Tao community we came up with a solution. We decided to meet every Sunday to exchange food we had cooked. It was basically a potluck except that the food was to be eaten after the event. Each participant cooked a large amount of one dish, split it up into portions (usually in Tupperware containers, hence these food exchanges were nicknamed "Tupperware Parties") for all the other participants to take home with them and eat over the course of the following week. We used scheduled online invitations to keep track of who was coming every week and what they were making. We shared recipes, nutritional advice, and cooking tips. Everyone involved ended up saving money, learning more, eating healthier, meeting more people, and sharing in the energy we cultivated together.

These experiences have shown me the power of a spiritual practice in something as seemingly mundane as cooking. I owe a great deal of my personal growth to these experiences with cooking and sharing vegetarian food with others. I have been able to discover new ways of approaching food, nutrition, and even socializing with people. My depth of appreciation and awareness has increased as well as my physical health. I extend my thanks to Young Suen, our cooking teacher, for taking the time to teach us.

One of the great things about the information age is that with just a bit of effort, you can be continually learning amazing new things and exposing yourself to intriguing new ideas.   So much great information is readily available in multiple media.  This became particularly clear to me when I signed up for Ken Wilber's site IntegralNaked.org.   I did not know much about integral philosophy, but I was impressed by the wide array of people featured in it.  Also, my friend Gabriel continually bugged me to sign up for it (thanks, G). So, I paid the $10 and loaded up my iPod with the recorded discussions that are available for download.   Soon my head was teeming with new ideas and perspectives. 

After a while I found it hard to find people to talk to about all this new stuff I was learning.  At the same time, it dawned on me that surely other people are also learning great new things on a frequent basis.  An idea germinated to have a weekly event to get together with my friends and share what we have been separately learning, to put each other on the same page, so we can then deepen and enhance our knowledge and understanding of these subjects through discussion.  Then I began to realize what an amazing tool we had at our disposal: Zaadz. 

Thanks to Zaadz, the original idea grew to include not only my existing group of friends, but also a "community of seekers and conscious entrepreneurs" throughout the Washington DC Metro area:  Using pods to connect to local Zaadzsters, Jacqui and I invite amazing new people to come over on Thursday nights and share a topic they know reasonably well with us.  To keep it informal, the guest speaker doesn't need to be an expert, but needs to know enough to give a 45-or-so minute presentation that we can follow up with questions and discussion.  We provide a meeting space, vegetarian dinners, and a somewhat-guaranteed interested audience; they provide the expertise and the fresh new ideas.   Thus was born what I stubbornly called "Deep Thoughts Thursday" (stubbornly because no one else approved of the title). 

It took me a little while to realize the degree to which we were bringing the stated purpose of Zaadz to life in our small way.   Last week listening to Lisa teach us about socially responsible investing and the week before learning the tenets of Evolutionary Enlightenment from Steve, I was just struck by the thought "THIS IS SO COOL!"   There's magic and beauty in bringing people together and learning from each other in this fresh, grassroots way.  You feel the excitement of building the momentum of change.  There might be only a few people there, and we might only be covering a few of a billion possible topics, but the feeling I've gotten from it is that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.  By collectively exercising our desire to learn from and to connect with each other on a broader and broader scale, it feels to me that we are not only contributing to the momentum ourselves, but also tapping into a momentum that's already there and waiting for us. 

I've understood the mission of Zaadz from when I first heard of it, but it wasn't until we took the initiative and took it offline that its power became fully evident to me.   I encourage other Zaadzsters to start using Zaadz as a tool, take it offline, meet face to face, and start sharing.   I wonder why we hadn't done this sooner.   We're hosting our first Zaadz party this coming Saturday and I cannot wait to see what it will be like.