Bells and Incense

Daily Schedule of Truc Lam Zen Monastery:

Morning
3:15am    Wake Up Bell (3)
3:30am     Sitting Meditation Begins (Chanting Bells)
5:30am     End of Meditation, Light Exercises and Morning Cleaning (1)
6:15am     Breakfast Time (3)
7:30am     Beginning of Daily Tasks (3)
9:00am     Morning Snack
10:30am   End of Daily Tasks, Free Time (1)
11:30am   Lunch Time (3)

Afternoon & Evening
1:00pm     Afternoon Rest (3)
2:00pm     Wake Up Bell (1)
2:30pm     Sitting Meditation
4:30pm     End of Meditation (1)
6:00pm     Inviting of the Bells & Drum to Sound, Repentance Time (3)
7:30pm     Sitting Meditation Begings (Chanting Bells)
9:30pm     End of Meditation (1)
10:00pm   Sleep Time

**number in parenteses denotes the number of bells**

The monastic life is guided by the sounds of bells reasonating through the air, announcing a beginning or an end.  Three bells tells me when to begin an activity, one bell tells me to finish the activity.  When I first arrived, I was asked to change out of my shirt, jeans and shoes into a gray tunic, matching pants, and a pair of sandals.  By changing my clothes, I was entering a life dictated by 100s of years of traditions, rites and rituals; I was entering a world that lingered somewhere in between the physical and the spiritual; A world where silence is the norm, not the exception.  I followed behind saffron cloaked monks into and out of meditations and repentance sessions, often times going into temple under a heavenly blankets of stars and exiting the temple just as the sun is breaking through the mist of the lakes and mountains surrounding me.  My reflections after a week of living this lifestyle--following the rigorous schedule above--slowed me, calmed me, and allowed my mind to look inward as my eyes looked outward at God's glorious creation. The rigid schedule envoked a deep sense of spiritually in me, while simultaneously took away my sense of personal freedom--to do what I wanted, when I wanted.  I lost my freedom of access to information, being connected through the internet, the mobile phone, through talking to friends and family; I was told that personal freedoms are taken away in order to make way for my soul, buried deep beneath wants, desires and distractions, to become free.  I felt this feeling of lightness and emptiness a couple of times during meditation sessions, but it was soon dissolved by a thought entering my mind.  My parting words from a senior Zen monk is that meditation and listening to the silence of one's being is a practice that will take a life-time. 

Aside from bells being my constant guide through the day, I also noticed the smell of incese permeating the air.  During my week at the monastery, whether it be cleaning up after a meal, in meditation sessions, or sweeping up the monastery grounds, the sight of incense rising up to the air envokes a feeling of prayers being lifted up to heaven; its lingering smell served as a constant reminder that the world, our world, the world that I am going to see, is always in need of prayers.