Kanho Chris continues Red Cedar's exploration of women in Zen by sharing some of her own life history as it relates to practice and being a woman in the world.
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Talk Notes
Dear friends
Last week we spoke of pirates and warriors, and I'd love to fill tonight with more of their stories. However, there is so much more ground to cover. So tonight, I’ll talk about invisible scars, the Matilda Effect, and how we can practice with all of this—this body, this time, this place, right here and now. Let me start with another Gina Puorro poem. If you're feeling a bit prude tonight, please stopper up your ears or skip the next five minutes.
You must have me confused with another woman
or another version of me
from three days
or three years
or three lovers
or three lifetimes ago
back when I still thought that grace
meant keeping my eyes closed
and my mouth shut.
You say you love me
but maybe that’s only when
there’s no one else available
to mother you.
You say you support me
but maybe that’s only when
it’s your shoulders holding up
my ankles.
I can’t hear your excuses
over the teakettle screaming
while I knit myself a sweater
from all the message threads left unanswered
and I must have forgotten when exactly it was
that I agreed to be at the bottom
of your never ending to-do list.
You may want to check your math
because three half truths + ten white lies
don’t add up to anything that
I want to hear right now
and I could fill canyons with all the things you failed to mention
but please
explain to me one more time how I’ve misinterpreted reality.
Listen.
There are ten thousand other things I could be doing
with my precious time
than wait for you to decide
if I’m worth some of yours
and while I sit here and listen to you tell me that I need too much
I’ve grown wings and claws and fangs
and fire is sparking from my tongue
with datura flowers blossoming underneath my breasts
and a supernova exploding between my thighs
and I don’t think you understand
who you’re talking to.
Listen.
I’m not your mother
and I’m not that nice
and while you weave me another story about why you’re sorry
my tea has gone cold
my patience has worn thin
my grace has dried up
your time has run out
and I’m already writing a new fairy tale
because there are kings among men
and somewhere
a court
is missing
its jester.
The cuban/french/american writer Anais Nin wrote “We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.” She also wrote “Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage.” Tonight I will continue to talk about projections and the way we see ourselves with a particular emphasis on a woman's experience. But I do want to talk honestly and clearly from a woman's point of view because the dharma must include all of our lives.
But first, I would like to talk a bit more about projections and how they impact our lives. Believe it or not this started out with a facebook post claiming that WE ARE LIVING IN A HALLUCINATION or, we are who we think we are... It referenced a study from 1980 by Kleck, R. E. & Strenta, A. (1980). Perceptions of the Impact of Negatively Valued Physical Characteristics on Social Interaction. In this talk I am leaving out all the different tests that were done to document the veracity of the findings, they do exist.
Back to the study: In 1980, researchers at Dartmouth University conducted a study investigating perception versus reality. In short, subjects were told they had either a facial scar, mild epilepsy, or a neutral condition (allergy). Facial scars and epilepsy were perceived to be negatives by the subjects, while allergies were seen as neutral. A very well-done fake scar was applied to their cheek and the study subjects saw what it looked like. Then they were sent to have casual conversations with strangers. But—right before they left—the researchers secretly removed the fake scars. The subjects met the strangers believing they were severely disfigured while, in truth, they were not.
When the subjects returned, they reported reported that the strangers showed strong signs of negative reaction such as tense posture, limited eye contact, some said they avoided looking at them or pitied them. But there was no scar. The only thing that had changed was the projection of the participants – they saw themselves as damaged and their brain found exactly what it had expected. Projection, not reality, shaped their experience.
How much of what humans see is happening objectively, how much subjectively? Let's think about this in terms of social media, let's think about this in terms of the news, in terms of the source we choose to consume the news. Nothing feeds the ego better than being a victim and being able to blame others. This study indicates that we do not perceive reality, it shows that we don't see the world as it is, it shows the world as we are. It takes memories, traumas, expectations, values, projections and paints a picture out of it. We don't see the world as it is. You see what your brain expects based on conditioning. It feels real because it is embodied, trained, experienced, expected. We feel it our bodies. And in turn, this is what we expect to see the next time, this is what we project. Everything we perceive "out there" is shaped by what has been "in here" for a long time.
I am quoting Irene Soeding: “The problem is not subjectivity. The problem is that most people believe they're objective. They wonder: Why can't people agree on simple facts anymore?" The answer is that most people can't see the facts, they are seeing what their conditioning projects into the present and future. But WE need to learn how to stop the hallucination. We need to see how we project. What scars do we believe we carry after it is long gone? What would change in your life if you stopped believing in it?
What invisible scars do women carry? As of 2021, the World Economic Forum ranks the United States 30th in terms of gender equality out of 149 countries. It was only 105 years ago that the Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution allowed women the right to vote nation-wide. In addition, the Women's Bureau of the Department of Labor was created to monitor working conditions for women in the workforce. We might say some of women's scars remain visible."Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex", was first introduced to Congress in 1923 and successfully passed both houses of Congress in 1972. However, it failed to be ratified by an adequate number of states and died in 1982. So yes, some of these scars are still visible in legislation, in statistics, and in the daily lives of women across the world.
While we are at it, here is the Matilda effect. The Matilda effect is a bias against acknowledging the achievements of women scientists and inventors whose work is attributed to their male colleagues. This phenomenon was first described by suffragist and abolitionist Matilda Joslyn Gage (1826–1898) in her essay, "Woman as Inventor" , the term Matilda effect was coined in 1993 by science historian Margaret W. Rossiter.[2][3]
An early example of the Matilda Effect was Trotula (Trota of Salerno, 12th century). She was an Italian physician and author of medical literature. After her death, her books were attributed to male authors including her husband. Hostility toward women as teachers and healers led to denial of her very existence. Monks and later male scholars confused her name for that of a man. She is not mentioned in the Dictionary of Scientific Biography. But this isn’t just something that happened to medieval physicians.
But just as powerful as the invisible scars - maybe more powerful - are the invisible scars, the internalized stories, our conditioned self. The scars inside us. The ones that shape not only how others treat us, but how we expect to be seen and treated because we are covered by scars. These are the projections that live inside us.Like the scar study participants, we walk into the world carrying old narratives. We project our fear of being unseen, unheard, undervalued—and sometimes, we find exactly that. And this is where Dharma practice becomes essential.
When I still lived in Germany, I worked in construction management. I thought I was pretty good , even fresh out of university. I'd been around construction my whole life, had my own mishaps with it, including falling from a roof, blowing up a big concrete form, nicks and dents, but I was physically really fit, and loved being one of the guys. I didn't even mind that they always ribbed me for wearing leather gloves because I protected my hands. I had great support for my first few jobs (both as a worker and as a construction manager). I was paired up with sympathetic foremen and crew chiefs, most of them having daughters my age, really good guys. I never thanked them and my dad enough for that support. I was just the little engine that thought it could and, man, I did.
But in many many other ways I carried the invisible scars. I carried them in my own body - without knowing it - for years. I grew up in a very conservative household. My mom was the traditional housewife and my dad was the boss. Mom cooked and sewed and hated risk of all forms. One of her favorite sayings was that it is better to be a coward for five minutes than to be dead for the rest of your life. She did not want my excellence – she wanted me to be invisible, obedient, good, and pretty. She wanted me to get married. She wanted grandchildren. And even though it was not the life I wanted for myself, I can't believe how deep those imprints ran and continue to run. Growing up, our family is the only life we know.
40 years later – I still carry those invisible scars, the conditioning though I would say that I strayed far away from the life my mom envisioned for me, further than she could have ever imagined at the time.
Zen master Dōgen wrote, “To carry the self forward and experience the ten thousand things is delusion. That the ten thousand things advance and experience themselves is awakening.” When we move through life with our conditioning, our old stories about ourselves - what we’re worth, how others see us, what roles we’re allowed to play and how we play them - we carry the self forward. We are living in the hallucination.
So how do we stop the hallucination? We sit. We practice. We study the mind. We learn to recognize when we are reacting to the world as we fear it is, not as it actually is. And we ask: What happens when we stop assuming we are broken? What happens when we stop apologizing for taking up space?
What happens when we turn the light inward, not to blame ourselves but to liberate ourselves from our invisible scars. For me, the process starts with identifying them, becoming intimate with the wounds. On the cushion. How can we start to work with all this? Zazen is where we meet the invisible scars. Not by analyzing them. But by making space. When we sit still, the scars speak. They may show up as tightness, restlessness, tears. That’s practice. We bow to them. We let them teach.
And we remember: Women do not need to earn a place in the Dharma world they’ve always been part of it. From Mahapajapati Gotami to Iron Grinder Liu, to the unnamed women keeping practice alive in homes, kitchens, fields, and forests—the place has always existed. Reclaiming it, remembering it, stepping into it, and not apologizing for standing there. this place is not borrowed. It’s ours.
The Dharma invites us to see clearly—not just the self, but the structures around us. We as women face obstacles such as erasure (the Matilda Effect), the projection of others as being seen as too much, too emotional, not spiritual enough, too worldly, double standards - what’s “clarity” or ambition in a man may be seen as “aggression” in a woman. Often we are conditioned to serve, support, and stay small
When we as women meet these obstacles, we can say: This too is suffering. This too is an obstacle. But obstacles do not mean defeat. In Zen practice, obstacles are the path. Just this! Remember, “when you meet an obstacle, bow to it. Then step over it.”
So I say: practice like your life depends on it, because it does. Not just yours, but the future’s.” Not by erasing womanhood, but by bringing it fully to life here and now. This world needs the full Dharma—not a disembodied, polite, linear Dharma, but the wild, earthy, scarred, sensual, courageous Dharma of women. The Dharma that makes good trouble, cooks meals, kicks some butt, raises children, bleeds, births,fights the good fight, sings, buries, and sits still in the middle of it all. This is the path.o I
Women are often told—explicitly or implicitly—that their power must be softened, their rage purified, their grief hidden to be truly “spiritual.” But practice asks us to bring the whole body-mind to the cushion.
That means bowing with anger in your chest.
That means sitting zazen in the middle of your grief.
That means practicing in the middle of your rage.
That means upholding the precepts in the middle of it all.
That means letting your power rise like a mountain, not shrink into a pebble.
So let us sit—not to fix ourselves, but to reclaim ourselves.
Not to purify away our pain, but to meet it integrate it.
This is our place in the Dharma—not borrowed, not granted. It has always been ours. Now we take our place between heaven and earth.
“Fire is sparking from my tongue,” says the poet. And the Dharma says: Let it burn. Let it burn through delusion.
