Call of the Han

The han is a wooden block which is located outside the meditation hall. It is struck approximately 10 minutes prior to a meditation period. I have always had a love/hate relationship with this particular instrument. When I was the one behind the striking mallet I loved it. When I had to endure the often ear-splitting crack of it, and I was late, tired, frustrated, or wanting to get that 'one more minute' of work done on some project of the moment I simply abhored that sound.

Somehow, despite my best ego-will, that sound has gotten into my blood and bones. I miss it when I do not hear it here at home. Somewhere along the Way it ceased to be a marker of time and became a call, an invitation, from the Eternal to drop the worldly ways and mind, to come back to our true home, our place of rest.

In the end, that very invitation is beyond sound and we learn to hearken and respond to it with the Eye that hears and the ears that See.