The authentic practice-realization of Zen meditation has nothing to do with transcending, withdrawing, or detaching from the real, everyday world. Quite the contrary, it is an intentional process, continuously deepened and refined, of active engagement and participation with the everyday world. Indeed, for Dogen, the everyday world is created and experienced in and through the reciprocal interaction of nature and mind. That is to say, nature (the material world) and mind are equal constituents of what we experience as “the everyday world.” This is one reason for Dogen’s criticism of Daie (though often distorted and exaggerated by sectarian rivalry); privileging “mind” over “nature” reveals a failure to appreciate their nonduality. Thus Dogen rages against Daie’s instruction to “discard” mind and nature:

Thus, Daie, your ‘attaining the Way’ does not attain the Way, and when it is time to go beyond attaining the Way, you are unable to do so. You stumble your way through both the times of attaining and the times of going beyond attaining. As you would have it, Daie, since mind and nature form a duality, we ought to discard them. This is your little attempt to explain ‘mind’, an effort that can only explain one-hundred-thousand-millionth of it! (Shobogenzo, Sesshin-sessho, Hubert Nearman)

While it could be argued that Dogen’s criticism fails to account for the context of Daie’s expression, this is beside the point. Dogen is simply making use of Daie’s expression to highlight a fact; it is not a personal attack on Daie the man, which should go without saying, but often does not. The point Dogen is attempting to highlight is that human beings are neither mere puppets, formed and animated by nature (or some other outside force), nor a “spiritual essence” inhabiting or animating the inert (dead) matter of nature; they are mind-nature (body-mind). As humans, “we fashion” the world while, simultaneously, the world (myriad things) “advances and confirms the self” (fashions us). Aware of this truth, Buddhas cultivate and utilize their “fashioning” skills; unaware of this truth, ordinary beings passively submit to haphazard “fashioning.” Just as it is the religious zealot’s own ignorance that is revealed by his contempt for others, so detached, passive approaches to life reveal one’s ignorance of their own true nature.

Although some may make the mistake of thinking that the mind is beyond the three worlds, this is totally impossible. The spaces of inside, outside, and in between, as well as the times of beginning, middle, and end—all are encompassed by the threefold world. The threefold world is just what is seen as the threefold world. And what is viewed as something beyond the threefold world is a misperception of the threefold world. The threefold world is viewed by some as ‘an old nesting place’ whereas others may see it as ‘a new item’. ‘Old nests’ and ‘new items’ are but different views of the same threefold world. This is why our Great Master Shakyamuni Buddha once said, “It is best to see the threefold world as the threefold world.” What is looked at in this way is what the threefold world really is, and this threefold world is just as we perceive it to be… There is the threefold world that is left behind and there is the threefold world of the here and now. This is the mutual meeting of a marionette with a marionette…  We all innately have the ability to make the threefold world be the vehicle for the arising of our spiritual intention, our practice and training, our realizing enlightenment, and our experiencing nirvana. (Shobogenzo, Sangai Yuishin, Hubert Nearman)