On Shunning the Body

I grew up in a culture ashamed of the body. When I was a child, when there was sexual intimacy on television, it was immediately switched off. It was “filth” and “dirt.” This was not just my parents—it was the culture in Ireland at the time. We were outwardly devout and pious, but privately a whole misogynistic value system was imprisoning unmarried mothers in so-called Magdalene Laundries, using them as virtual slave labor and taking away their children for adoption. There was widespread but hidden abuse of children, by both church and state, and an active cover-up and shielding of the perpetrators by the Catholic Church hierarchy. As sex and the body were shunned publicly, a sick relationship with the body festered in a private and suppressed space. The place I grew up in was a place with no acknowledged homosexuality, no available contraception, no divorce (no matter what the marital circumstances), and no abortion (no matter how the pregnancy came about and no matter if the pregnancy was a threat to the mother’s life). The human suffering that resulted from this hatred of the body is incalculable.

What is true of my Irish Catholic upbringing is true for many others—Christian and otherwise. In a theology where the world is a “dirty” or “fallen” place, the body will inevitably be viewed as undesirable and a barrier to spiritual growth. The price of this theology is a whole spectrum of psychological problems. It manifests as an unhealthy attitude toward sex and the material world in general. It is a theology that made its way into our universities and education system, which emphasize cerebral and academic pursuits, with little to no emphasis on our physical health. In school, I could spend many hours in sedentary learning, but little to no time in physical activity. The mind and the spirit were valued much higher than the human body. For this reason, many of us are alienated from our bodies. We neglect them by rarely exercising and by eating and drinking too much. Many of our anxieties and problems result from not finding a balance in life, where we take care of, nurture, and value our bodies. If we listen to our body, we will see that it is a great teacher.

When a student is new to meditation, a great exercise is to scan the physical body, simply bringing the attention to each part of the body in turn, seeing what kind of sensations are to be found there. This is a grounding and centering exercise. It is important to understand that meditation is not another cerebral activity, where we sit motionless in denial of the body, analyzing the content of our consciousness. This is not it at all. Meditation is a profoundly physical activity. As we witness the ever-changing contents of our heart and mind, we also witness the shifting and changing feelings and sensations of the body while in the meditation posture. To be attentive to the posture is the foundation of practice. Regardless of whether we are sitting in one of the cross-legged positions or sitting in a chair, we take on the posture of Buddha and seat ourselves on “the diamond throne of awakening.”

We may start by scanning the body, then maybe we can bring our attention to the natural rhythm of our breath. This focused attention, or mindfulness, was taught over two-and-a-half thousand years ago by the historical Buddha in the Anapanasati Sutta (MN 118), as well as in other teachings. It establishes samatha, or calmness in the mind, which is where all meditative practice must begin. It is a practice based on the reality of our physicality as beings. When we breathe, our whole body expands and contracts with each inhalation and exhalation. If you look at someone close to you breathing, you will see their shoulders rise, their chest and stomach rise and fall; you will see the exact rhythm of life flowing through them. As oxygen enters and leaves their body, they are breathing into themselves what the external world has to offer. The oxygen made by distant trees and plants sustains them. The wind that blows across oceans keeps their body vital and alive. It is miraculous, this human body, this breath that we take for granted. If we look at it again with the awakened eye of Buddha, we will see the miracle that it is.

It is important to remember that the body is also beautiful and precious, as well as subject to transiency and decay—maybe even because it is subject to transiency and decay.

In the Buddhist tradition also, too often the body has been seen as something undesirable and dirty. So often in the Buddhist scriptures the transiency of life is emphasized to such a degree that the body is rejected or shunned. In some Buddhist traditions, there is the practice of visualizing the body as something unsavory and prone to decay. There is the practice of meditating in charnel grounds, where bodies are left above ground to putrefy and decompose. While these meditative exercises have a deep value in some traditional approaches to Buddhist training, they may also lead to a morbid negativity regarding the physical body if overemphasized or indulged in too much. It is important to remember that the body is also beautiful and precious, as well as subject to transiency and decay—maybe even because it is subject to transiency and decay.

Shakespeare’s Hamlet saw the world and humanity as nothing but dust. He was a man disenchanted with the world, sick in his mind. And yet he observed, “What a piece of work is a man! How noble in reason, how infinite in faculty! In form and moving how express and admirable! In action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god! The beauty of the world.” But despite this beauty, all Hamlet could see in this play was the death mask behind the soft loveliness of the human face—culminating in the death and destruction that ultimately leads to the play’s tragic end.

It is the same hatred of beauty that sees misguided religion turn its back on the bounty of this beautiful world. In love with death, or the world hereafter, such corruption of religion hates life and everything to do with life. Women and children have most often been the victims of this life-loathing view. It is a view of the world that most often masquerades as piety. But, in truth, it offends against all that’s good in the world.

There is a great and instructive Zen teaching story that is apt here. It was first written down in 1283 by the Japanese monk Mujū Dōkyō, in his book of Zen parables, the Shasekishū (Collection of Stone and Sand).

Once, two monks were traveling the countryside on foot. One monk was young and fanatical; the other monk was old and experienced. On their journey, they came to a rushing river that they needed to cross to continue on to their destination. As they were about to wade across, they noticed a young woman was hesitantly considering crossing the river as well. However, she was slight in build and the danger of crossing the river was more considerable for her. She noticed the monks were looking her way. “Can either of you venerable monks help me across the river?” she asked. The monks looked at each other. They were in a bit of a fix, as they had both taken monastic vows never to touch a woman. Then, suddenly, with no further hesitation, the older monk offered to take the woman across the river on his back. She agreed, and he carried her across. Then the two monks, having crossed the river themselves, continued on their journey.

For a good hour after this incident there was silence between the monks. The young monk was bothered by the whole episode. Eventually he challenged the older monk. “We have taken monastic vows not to touch women, and yet you carried that woman across the river on your back,” he said disapprovingly. The old monk was unconcerned with his disapproval. He responded, “I carried that woman for less than a minute; but an hour later, you are still carrying her.” The young monk made no response.

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© 2025 by Myozan Ian Kilroy, Do Not Try to Become a Buddha: Practicing Zen Right Where You Are. Reprinted by arrangement with Wisdom Publications.