Processing in Zen

“You deal with your shit in Zen by sitting with it. By breathing right into it. You don’t try to ignore it with pleasant thoughts or lofty ideas, and you don’t try to bury it with solutions. You deal with it, you work with it, one breath at a time. You hold it right there, in your hara, or breathing center. You don’t try to breathe it out; you don’t try to breathe it in. You keep it suspended in your diaphragm like a burning-hot coin. Your problems won’t change; only you can change. That’s the point.”

Shozan Jack Haubner. “Zen Confidential. Confessions of a Wayward Monk.” Shambhala, Boston, 2013.