About Soto Zen

The Soto Zen tradition is based on the simple practise of "just sitting", learning how to rest in the stillness that exists within the chaos of our lives. Through being still and observing the patterns of our thoughts and emotions, then letting go of our clinging to them, we can learn how to deeply keep the Buddhist precepts. We can stop doing harm, we can do what is good to do, and thereby do good for all beings.

To help us live from the heart of compassion, love and wisdom we undertake to stop killing, stealing, coveting, and saying what isn't true. We see how our infatuation with emotional idealism is a form of intoxication and that indulging in alcohol and recreational drugs fogs our mind and our ability to act in a compassionate manner.

We learn how to respect others instead of just being proud of ourselves and our actions, how to foster a generous attitude, spiritually and materially, to stop indulging in anger and to respect and acknowledge the Buddha within ourselves and in all beings.

Through meditation we learn what true wisdom is, being an expression of a compassionate heart. We can develop the humility of checking our understanding with those who have trained longer than us, enabling us to have advice on how to deepen that understanding. Everyone makes mistakes and when the precepts are taken seriously they provide a way of checking that our actions are expressing the truth.