how to cook your life

I saw a great documentary this weekend, available on streaming video through Netflix (and, no, they didn't pay me to say that, though I would gladly accept remuneration if were ever offered).  The film is called How to Cook Your Life.  It's the story of a Zen chef. 

Yes, there actually is such a thing. 

They practice principles like functional silence (ah, in my dreams), present awareness, meditation, and the three minds (joyful mind, big mind and kind mind) while--you guessed it--cooking delicious food for Buddhist monks, students, and pretty much anyone else who might be curious. 

Most Zen chefs are also teachers.  Not just to their kitchen staff, but to curious adventurers looking to add vitality to their lives through the culinary arts.  Old, young, seasoned chefs, and novices are invited to attend cooking classes and retreats at Buddhist centers around the world. 

While cooking, Chef likens what happens in the kitchen to so many universals of the broader human condition: suffering, disappointment, trying to please, wastefullness, distraction, man's search for perfection, service, patience, and acceptance.  Chef talks about making bread by hand, listening to the dough, be aware of how it feels in one's hand, knowing that the final loaf, warm and crunchy, will bring joy to someone.  He talks about making an offering to the Buddha.  He talks about how it took him twenty years to figure out what that offering meant.  The Buddha doesn't taste, smell, or enjoy the loaf.  He doesn't say, "Thank you."  He doesn't critique.  He simply accepts what is placed before him and is content, joyful at the sincerity of the offering desite--or perhaps because of--its imperfection.

Chef talks about how his life came into focus as he was able to focus his heart, mind, and hands on what really meant something.  Years of pushing back, pushing down, moving too fast left him with an ache in his soul.  Once he was able to make out the longing of his heart, he was able to slow down and appreciate his own vitality, his own usefulness.  He was able to feel with his hands, smell with his nose, see with his eyes, and taste with his tongue.  He began to understand what his teacher had said to him, "There are no mysteries in the universe."  It is all right here, right now.

I have an anxious mind.  I lose moments, hours, days to worry about the future.  Sometimes, it sits in my stomach like lead.  Today, I made bread.  While I made it, my thoughts were on nothing but the moment.  I saw with my eyes, felt with my hands, smelled with my nose, and tasted with my tongue.  When my mind wandered, I made note, and then came back to my senses, to the present, to what is real right here and now. 

And it felt... No.  I felt amazing.