Soon after I walked out of dokusan last night, I realized the right response to the koan I’d just gotten “80% right” (as Josh put it as he suggested I sit with the koan a bit longer).

 

This often happens:  I present a koan that isn’t yet ripe – or, rather, I’m not ripe with the koan – and then it ripens and falls from the tree moments after I’ve left the dokusan room.

 

I woke up for a moment last night thinking about this.  Half-awake, half-asleep, I thought:  I wish I could go back to that koan and that meeting.

 

Then, immediately, another thought:  Always a koan.  Always a meeting.