I thought the title of this talk would be Pain, Posture, and the Salmon. Can you hear OK? All right? No? That a little louder? Pain, Posture, and the Salmon. So how many people know about this salmon? How many people don't know about this salmon? Oh, okay. So... I've been inspired by the image of... I've been inspired by a salmon, particularly the female salmon, The males also work hard, but the females don't eat after they have their eggs, I guess, starting to develop.

[01:06]

Their body goes to support the eggs and they don't eat and they just use their energy for growing the eggs and swimming. So it's really kind of a wholehearted practice that they have. And I thought of this salmon right nearby here, that we actually have salmon nearby us right now. And they're swimming up the stream right down at the base of our valley, trying to go upstream in this winter waterland, winter water wonderland that we have here. And I thought of the salmon, particularly this salmon I heard a story about. She's swimming through mere woods and she was in a pool and then she tried to jump up over a little waterfall, about a two-foot waterfall, and she couldn't make it. And then she swam around more in the pool, studied the situation, practiced there in the pool, which by the way was murky.

[02:12]

because of the water, the rain, bringing some silt, some runoff into the pool. So the murkiness, if it's not bad, is a characteristic of being in a situation where salmon actually have developed along this coast, that they live in the rainy parts of the coast where there's streams and rain. That's where they grew up. So the murkiness is a natural situation for the salmon, and the flow of the water is a natural situation, and that they're going against the flow has a great deal to do with the preservation of their species. And in Zen practice, it's very much like that, that in Zen practice we go against the flow of the river. We don't go with the flow. And we recognize that the water is murky. So we're in a situation of going against the flow of murky water.

[03:18]

Usually the way in life is you go with the flow of murky water and you think it's clear. Zen students realize that they're going against the flow of their ancient twisted karma. They're going against the flow of tremendous habit strength established from beginningless time. And that the medium they're flowing in is their own consciousness. And human beings only have murky consciousness. They have no other kind of consciousness. Case 37 of the Book of Serenity. All sentient beings only have karmic consciousness. Boundless. There's no place it doesn't reach for us. There's no situation where it's not manifesting, except, you know, technically speaking, certain states of...

[04:20]

certain yogic trances and states of sickness and so on, but I won't go into that. Not important. The point is that basically it's boundless for ordinary human life. It's unclear and there's no deep down place where it's clear. And it's flowing. And usually people go with it and they think it's clear. In other words, they think this consciousness, which is actually an unclear consciousness, they think it's truth. It's what you know. What you know is this murky, flowing water of your own mind. And most people think it's true. So they think, oh, that's my... They think. They look in the water and they say, oh, there's my enemy. And that's true. So let's kill him. Or, oh, that's good. And that's true. So we do that. And anybody who doesn't want to do that is wrong. This is the way people most of the time operate.

[05:24]

But no matter whether you operate that way or not, what you're looking at is your own murky perceptions. Now, some people look in there and say, oh, there's my enemy. In other words, I think that's my enemy. But since I'm looking through murky water, maybe it's not my enemy. Maybe it's God. Maybe it's God. Or they look through the water and they say, oh, that's God. But actually, I just think that's God. Maybe that's not God. Maybe that's my enemy. Matter of fact, that happens to people quite a bit, that they look and they think it's God. And it's not that much that it's their enemy, but it's their enemy that they think it's God. Because when they think it's God, they say, I'll do anything for you, sweetheart. And then a few days later, they realize it's not God, and then they really feel upset. Anyway, this female salmon, I don't know if she thinks that murky water is reality or not, but whether she does or not, she basically is going upstream.

[06:35]

And again, you also shouldn't say, oh, this is not true because it's murky. Just, this is all I've got is this water. As Guishan, the great master Guishan said, all I've got is karmic consciousness, boundless and unclear, with no fundamental to rely on, and I should turn around and go backwards through this flow. Going forward in the flow is to take it as real and base your life on your own thinking. Going backwards is called non-thinking and takes you to the source of your thinking. At the source of your thinking, It's not that the thinking gets clear. It's that there isn't any. But it isn't that it stops, like it evaporates. It isn't like there isn't any thinking. It's that you see to the source of thinking. You see to the source of all your thoughts. All your dark, murky thoughts.

[07:39]

You see the source of it. And the source of all your thoughts is nobody knows. Nobody knows what it is. They call it light. in the sutras. They call it the light of Buddha's wisdom. When you see this light, which you can't see with your eyes, but when you realize this light, you know, you're free of suffering, your heart opens, you feel endlessly compassionate and grateful, and your anxiety drops away and stuff like that. That's where this salmon's going back to, to the source, to the light of our deluded mind. So I thought that I liked that image of this salmon. Now, I don't really, I can't read salmon's mind, so, you know, I don't know actually what's going on.

[08:40]

Maybe she's sitting in there saying all kinds of, maybe she's complaining and saying, blah, blah, blah. You know, why is it raining, you know? Why is this waterfall so high? Who made this water murky? Or, this water is clear but I can't see and what's wrong? I need glasses. I don't know what she's doing. But I kind of feel like she doesn't have the energy to complain. She doesn't have the luxury of sitting around complaining and that kind of thing. I think she has to use all her energy to swim. Otherwise... she might not make it. And some don't make it. Now, maybe those are the complainers. I don't know. But I think over the centuries, the complainers didn't make it. I don't think the salmon thinks that she has an alternative. Like, I can go back down to the beach for a while or maybe not do it this year.

[09:43]

I don't think she thinks that. I think... I think there's something about her that knows that she has no alternative, that she has to keep going on her path. If you think you have an alternative to Zen practice, or to anything, if you think you have an alternative, then you're going to complain. You're going to argue. And since you think you have alternatives, you're going to have really good arguments. Let's have better food. Let's have less food. Let's have more food. Let's warm the zendo up. Let's cool the zendo off. Let's have more periods. Let's have less periods. Let's have a different teacher. Let's have different students. Let's have better students. Let's have better teachers. We will think things like that if we think we have an alternative to this student and this teacher and this zendo and this air and this water, blah, blah, blah, right?

[10:47]

And most people think they have an alternative. They're going with the flow. And going with the flow is to think you have an alternative. And there's a strong habit to think you have an alternative and to complain. And also, when you think you have an alternative, that's just another perfectly good thought in the murky water. But again, we believe that we have an alternative. We actually believe that we can do something other than this. I mean, we think it's true. So then again, it reinforces our complaining mind and our manipulative mind that's trying to promote the ups and prevent the downs. Now, if you know you don't have an alternative, you just simply go forward. If you know, if you understand that you have no alternative, you just go straight ahead and you stop trying to promote the ups and prevent the downs.

[11:59]

You just do your work. I think the salmon, I don't know what the salmon actually is thinking, but I think the salmon, when I look at her, when I think of her, I see her as not thinking of any alternatives, only doing one thing, swimming upstream. That's what I see. Maybe that's not what she's doing. Maybe I'm projecting this, my understanding or practice onto her, but I feel that's the way it is with her. So I like to have, for this practice period, an image of nature to go with our classical Zen images. Now the nice thing about images of nature is that they're images of nature and that they clearly, if you study them, you can see that they include, the salmon includes the whole ecology of her world. She includes the mountains, the waters, the trees,

[13:01]

the direction of the flow, the time of the season, her eggs, everything is included in this one activity. The whole thing is tied together. And her activity is not the activity of salmon. Because if you take away one element, almost any element you take away from that watershed, One thing you mess around with down there, and the salmon won't be there. So when the salmon's there, you know you have mountains, waters, trees, a certain amount of murkiness. You know you have gravel. You know you have a certain chemistry in the water, and on and on. Millions and millions and trillions and incalculable number of ingredients are there for that salmon to be there. So the salmon's not the salmon. The salmon's the whole world. And if you study it, you see that. So it's good to have that natural image to go with our Zen stories.

[14:07]

The advantage of Zen stories is they're, of course, just the same, that it takes a whole ecological system to produce a Zen teacher and a Zen student. But they talk, and they speak Chinese, which we translate into English, so we can hear what's going on inside their mind. And so what do we hear? So again, just by coincidence, we have this wonderful story, Case 41 from the Book of Serenity. We just happen to be on that number, which goes perfectly with this salmon, I feel. It's about an old Zen master, full of eggs, going upstream to, you know, spew the last of his, you know, last of his fruit on the world he's about to die and he wants to help his students who are still there with him and he says there's one thing I want to talk to you about I have one thing and I want to ask you about it okay he says if this is so

[15:25]

then you put a head on top of your head. If this is not so, then you cut your head off, seeking your life. This is kind of a funny way to talk. And so in our class, we're trying to figure out what's he talking about. And what I say is not what he's talking about, but what I say is what, in the murky water that I'm swimming in, is what I kind of think he might be talking about. You can think lots of other stuff, too, about what he's talking about. This is just to give you some foothold in working with his instruction. His concern. This is his ultimate concern. His ultimate concern is what? It's if this is so, then you put a head on top of your head. Now, that's not his ultimate concern. He uses that expression to indicate his ultimate concern.

[16:29]

He says, if this is so, then you're putting a head on top of your head. In other words, if you get into this is so kind of mind, then you're adding a head on top of your head. You don't have to add a head on top of your head. One head is enough. As a matter of fact, one head is almost too much. So when you hear that, when you get the word from the teacher that adding a head is not necessary and that one head is plenty and maybe too much, then you might think, well, I think I'll cut this one off. If this is so, it's too much, well, then let's switch over to it's not so. It's the Zen teacher showing the way of life, right? Right? Don't add a head on top of your head, they say. Don't add something to yourself. You're enough as it is. And you say, okay, I won't add anything. I won't say this is so. I'll say it's not so. But then in your attempt to practice, you're cutting your head off.

[17:35]

It's okay to set your head aside or forget about it, but don't cut it off. That won't work either. So to say this is so... adds too much. You don't have to go around and say, this is so to things. It's enough that they're there already. You don't have to say, this is not so to things. That's going too far. To say that things exist is exaggeration. It's an insult to things in the form of exaggeration. To say that they don't exist is an insult by underestimation. Both ways are wrong. He uses those expressions to indicate what's most important to him. And what's most important to him is too important to say it's so or not so. It's too subtle and wonderful. It's called, in the case of salmon, swimming upstream full of eggs. In his case, it's called turning the mind around, reversing it, and looking back

[18:46]

at the nature of your mind and seeing your true self, illuminating your true self. That's his concern, and he uses these expressions to hint at it. Like I said the other day, you know, I was talking to someone about, you know, people who are absolutely sure about what's right, you know, Like I mentioned, some people outside of Planned Parenthood clinics who are sure that Jesus is opposed to abortions. They absolutely know it, for sure. And I said to this woman, you know, for me, in spiritual practice, you do not need to be absolutely sure about things. Because, again, we're in murky water, and if you're absolutely sure in murky water, you're in trouble. It's enough to think, well, I think, whatever, you know, abortions are not good or abortions are okay sometimes or blah, blah, blah.

[19:55]

It's okay to think that. And she said, well, don't you have to be absolutely sure that murder's bad? I said, do you have to be absolutely sure? Isn't it enough that you think it's bad? Isn't that sufficient? Do you have to be sure? Do you think you'll, like, forget if you aren't sure? It's when you are insecure about what you think, insecure that what you think is true, that you then say, it is absolutely true. That's called putting a head on top of your head. You don't have to approve of what you think. Approving of what you think is putting a head on top of your head. It can be enough that you think such and such. and also admitting that you think what you think is true. It's not that it is true, but you think it's true. And disapproving is not necessary either.

[20:58]

So another way to say it is, instead of this is so or this is not so, is to say approving this and disapproving this. Approving this adds a head on top of this. approving your posture, approving your practice, puts a head on top of your head. Now what I'm going to say, I'm going to say something now and you might think somebody's approving of something, so be careful. When you study something, when you study something, I'll just say when you study something, like if you're in a pond, you know, swimming around in a pond, or if you're a Zen teacher about to die and you're teaching your students, when you study things and you study them thoroughly, well, then everywhere you go,

[22:12]

You'll notice examples of what you're studying. Everywhere you go, we'll be studying. Like we say, a fish swims in water. And no matter how far the fish swims, it never runs out of water. Do you ever see a fish run out of water? They swim and then they get to the edge of the pond, but then they just turn a little bit and there's more water to the left, or they go up and there's more water up. They don't run out of water. Basically, they don't run out of water, especially the fish in the big water. A fish swims in the water, or a fish swims in the ocean. It actually says water, but a fish swims in the water. But no matter how far it swims, it never runs out of water. If a fish leaves the water, it will die at once. You should know that water is life to the fish.

[23:24]

And also the fish is life. And then after saying that, Dogen Zenji said, the same is true of humans or practice and so on. This example applies to other things too, this thing about fish living in some water and never running out of water. You're going to understand what I'm talking about eventually. I know. I can tell. So I remember when my daughter was learning to speak English or Chinese, like when she got to dog, she got to the word dog. So when she saw a dog, she would say, dog.

[24:29]

And we'd be driving down the car in the street. and she'd look out the window actually I wouldn't even know necessarily she was looking out the window but suddenly she would say dog but there was no dog in the car as far as I knew and I looked out in the street I didn't see a dog in the street but there was a dog in a pet store and then there was a dog on the purse of a lady walking by and then there was a dog on a billboard and then there was a dog in somebody else's car and then there was a dog in the street She basically, she wasn't saying dog, like dog, [...] but basically it was like dog, and a little while would go by and it'd be dog. She saw dogs almost, you know, everywhere. Now there was some, of course, space on both sides of the dog when she saw the dog, but you'd be surprised how many dogs she discovered when she was studying dogs.

[25:33]

Now I'm studying salmon. I'm studying fish, and I see fish everywhere. When she was studying airplanes, she studied them in both English and Chinese, and the Chinese word for airplane is feiji, which means flying machine. And again, you know, there's no airplane in the car, but she'd see airplanes when we were riding in the car. There'd be airplanes in books. There'd be airplanes out the window. There'd be airplanes, airplanes, airplanes while riding in the car. And one time we were sitting in our house, in her room. I don't know what we were doing, but anyway, she said, no, no, we weren't in the house, I don't think. I don't know, I think we're in the car again. And she said, Feiji. And I said, I looked and I couldn't see. And I looked out the window and I couldn't see. And I said, where? And she said, And I looked up in the sky, in a clear blue sky.

[26:39]

And there was the tiniest little dot, way, way, way, way, like, I don't know, 50,000 feet in the air. There was this tiny little speck. And I looked, and it was a feiji. You know? So now I see fish everywhere. Some fish I see that I knew before. I see fish in all the scriptures. I see fish in all the newspapers. I see them in all the books, all the magazines. So when you study fish, you see fish everywhere. When you study a colon like this Case 41, I see Case 41 now everywhere. It's not that I have such good eyes. Actually, I'm in a murky pool. But in the murky pool, suddenly, I see, you know, Lupu running around in this murky pool. Everywhere I go, I see Lupu, Lupu, Lupu. I see a dying Zen master everywhere.

[27:41]

I see a dying Zen master here, as me. I see myself dying. I see a dying Zen master there. Everywhere I go, I see... these two old fish. So here's one example, okay? There's these two fish in an aquarium or a fishbowl, right? They have aquariums, right? Aquariums can have various things in it, but fishbowls definitely have fish in them, right? So these two fish in a fishbowl, and one fish says to the other one, I've made arrangements to be flushed down the toilet. Do you understand, Ana?

[28:54]

It's somewhat of an American joke. In America now, everybody's making arrangements of how they're going to be buried. and so on. They do it ahead of time because you don't want your family to decide because they might put you on life support systems or something, right? So this fish says, I've arranged to not be put on life support systems and be flushed down the toilet. That's the kind of background of that story. It's kind of an American thing these days. And these were American, these were New Yorker fish. So then, you know, I just see this, right? So then I see another one. I open a book. Boom. And it's a book of all books. What book is it? Zen Mind Beginner's Mind. I open it up and there's a cartoon. Which may not be in your book. It's a cartoon and it has a fish standing next to an empty fishbowl. This fish has gotten out of the fishbowl and is standing next to the fishbowl with a kind of wicked look on his face.

[29:55]

He's got his hand on the on the handle of a water faucet. And the water faucet is pouring out, and he's standing at the edge of the sink, of course, because that's where the water faucets are. And the water faucet is causing an overflow of water from the sink. So there's this waterfall there. The fish has jumped out of its container and created a waterfall. Wickedly creating a big mess in the bathroom. And then I thought, I looked at that and I thought, hey, you know what? When we're in that pond, we get bored with the pond. We get bored swimming around, so we create a waterfall. There really isn't a waterfall. There really isn't a waterfall you have to jump up over.

[30:59]

But because we get bored swimming around the pond, we imagine that there's some big waterfall we have to jump up over. You see, if we feel trapped in our little bowl, we jump out and we wickedly create some big challenge to pay back the world which has made us be this trapped thing. That was my interpretation of that cartoon. You can have another one. Certainly we all agree this is a wicked fish who wants to make a mess. Then I see another cartoon. This one is another one that I have to explain to the people visiting from other countries who don't know about American gangsters. So I think maybe in the 1930s, the American gangsters also got bored and devised various interesting ways of killing each other. They would, of course, shoot each other with guns and hit... Well, I won't go into all the ways they killed themselves.

[32:03]

But they had lots of ways of killing themselves. But one of the cute ways they had was they would take each other out on boats in the water, and then they would put their enemies, the people who they thought were their enemies, right, And they thought a lot of people were their enemies, and they really believed it. So, of course, they killed them. So they would put their enemies' feet in little tubs of cement. And then the cement would harden, and they called these shoes, cement shoes. Okay? And they would put on these cement shoes, and then they would push the person into the water with these cement shoes on. Okay? Are you following this? Is that clear? And then they would say, we're sending Carl to sleep with the fishes. Right? Send Carl. And sometimes they would just say, take Jamie for a sleep with the fishes.

[33:05]

And that meant put cement on his feet or whatever. In Chicago, they would put it on the head. Anyway, so this cartoon is, it's a cartoon of a fish with his feet, a fish with his feet stuck in Styrofoam. So it says, this is Carl with Styrofoam shoes sent to sleep with the humans. Do you understand? He's going up out of the water to sleep with the humans. Because if a fish leaves the water, she will die at once. Of course, actually, they can jump up for a little while over waterfalls, but that's it. They have to either go into the next realm or go back into the water. They can't hang out outside the water for long, otherwise they go to sleep with the humans. This is just a few examples.

[34:15]

There are many more. You will see signs of these fishes. If you hang out with me, you're going to see a lot of fishes. And now people are giving me articles about fishes. So now I'm going to start reading articles about salmon and stuff like that. So it's going to be a lot of fish, fish stories, because we're studying fish. That happens. That happens. This is so many examples of this kind of thing. How silly, you know. What is real study? And you wouldn't think, well, Zen is like to see cartoons about fish all over the place. That's not studying Zen, is it? Well, no, it's not. If you say that seeing these cartoons and studying these cartoons and talking to people about these cartoons, that that's Zen, then what is that?

[35:20]

What's that an example of? Huh? What? It's a head on top of your head. You don't have to say that. We don't have to say that what I'm talking about here is Zen. We don't have to say that looking, seeing cartoons is Zen and seeing fish cartoons everywhere, that that's Zen. You don't have to say that. In fact, if you do say that, it's okay to say that, but you're just going too far to say that's Zen. You're just adding a head on top. You don't have to approve this discussion of fish or airplanes. Also, there's a tendency, the other tendency is, well, this is not Zen to come to a Zen center and this guy's talking about all these fish cartoons. That's not Zen. Well, that's not true. That's called disapproval. That's called cutting your head off, cutting my head off for talking about these, you know. Zen master taken out in the backyard and head cut off by students because he told too many fish stories.

[36:22]

They finally said, this is not Zen. This is crazy. You should not be talking this much about fish, especially salmon. Students rebel. They are sure. They're sure. This is not Zen. Students complain. They think they have alternative to teacher teaching about fish. Let's hear about regular Zen. Let's hear about, I don't know what. Let's hear of a Zen story. Okay, here's a Zen story. To approve is too much. To disapprove is too much. Or are you just saying that to protect yourself? Yeah, that's right, I am. I am saying that to protect myself. I'm saying that to protect myself, to protect all of us, to keep us away from those extremes. That's why I'm saying it. And that's why I bring up the story of the salmon, because if you watch the salmon, watch how she behaves, it will help you protect yourself from extremes.

[37:31]

So I said about posture and pain, all right? So to follow through on that, although I've been going on for quite a long time, posture and pain. If you have a posture, you might have some pain. Now, if you have pain, I don't know if you necessarily would have a posture. But people who work on their posture usually notice at some point some pain. So what I'd like to recommend is that you apply the behavior of the salmon and the teaching of Lu Pu to your posture and your pain. So when you're sitting in this murky world of karmic consciousness, oh and by the way, one more time, if a fish leaves the water it will die at once. If you leave the water of deluded, discriminating, foggy consciousness.

[38:43]

If you leave that water, you will die at once. Humans swim in karmic consciousness. Humans swim in confusion. If you leave that confusion, you will die at once. No matter how far you swim, you never run out of confusion. know that confusion is life to humans. Karmic consciousness is life to humans. So anyway, swimming in this karmic consciousness, all right? Now, you have a body appears. A body appears to you. Breath appears to you. Thoughts appear to you. The thought of a body appears to you. some idea of your body, some concept of your body. You have a concept of your body. My body is cute. My body is fat. My body is not her body. My body is not his body. My body is tall.

[39:44]

My body is short. My body is warped. My body is straight. My body is bent. My body blah, blah, blah, blah, blah about my body. These are thinking, these are thoughts, these are concepts of our body, and they happen. They appear to living humans. Have you noticed? And then paint. And we have ritual practices. where if you do these practices, if you practice these rituals, like sitting with your legs crossed and your back, you know, as straight as you can make it according to your idea of what straight is, you sit there. And if you actually sit there and don't like think too fast while you're sitting there, if you don't run around too much while you're sitting there, you start to slow down in a sense.

[40:51]

Or rather, you start to catch up with yourself so you don't get ahead of yourself. And you kind of like slow down. And you start to notice things. Like you notice that you're angry. Or you notice that you have pain. And sometimes people think the reason why they have pain is because they're sitting. I don't think so. I think when you sit still, you notice that you're in pain. There is a big pain Big, big, big, big, big pain. And sometimes something happens and we take, you know, our crust, our guard all shield that we hold up against that pain and we, the little opening in it, and we see into the pain. And sometimes if you look into that little crack, if you look straight in, you see some pain. But if you look a little bit from the other, if you lean a little bit, you can see actually it goes over a little bit to the other side and goes a little bit to the other side.

[42:00]

And without even opening the hole too big, you can see that actually there's quite a bit back there. And sometimes it opens up real wide and you see this is a big pain. The pain that most people feel when they're sitting in meditation over the years can oftentimes get bigger. Sometimes people say, do you still have pain after sitting for many years? Yes. Do you have like the same pain as before? Well, yes. But you get more skillful at handling it. And also you have other pains that you didn't have before. Your pain gets bigger the more you sit. Not that your pain gets bigger, but you open up to a bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger pain. But you don't open up, hopefully, too far ahead of your capacity to sit still in the pain. My experience is, if I can sit still with a little pain, then my reward is more pain.

[43:02]

If I can sit still with more pain, then my reward is more pain. If I can sit still with more pain, then my reward is more pain. The longer I sit still, the more pain I get opened up to. If I start wiggling around, the pain starts closing back down. Or stays the same, doesn't grow. Because the system says, you know, this guy can't handle anymore. And generally speaking, even in social situations, if somebody's sitting calmly, people naturally run over and dump, you know, problems on the person. And if the person does well, they dump more and say, hey, come on, let's gift it. He's doing well. He's thriving on it. They love it. They love to see patience practiced. It's very encouraging. Can she take this? And the whole universe is like that. Water rushing down, buffeting the salmon to promote the species, to promote the practice of patience.

[44:05]

Now, how do you sit still in the middle of this having a posture? Or in a posture that might be in pain. Either way, how do you sit still there? How do you practice uprightness with a posture? How do you practice uprightness with pain? Well, basically, you don't get ahead of it. Don't get ahead of it and don't shrink back from it. Don't approve it. Don't disapprove it. Don't say, my posture is fine. Don't say, my posture is not fine. Don't even say, this is my posture or this isn't my posture or this is the posture I should have or this is the posture I shouldn't have.

[45:10]

Don't approve your pain. Don't disapprove your pain. Just let your pain be your pain. And not even your pain. Let the pain be the pain. And not even let the pain be the pain, but let the pain where it is be the pain where it is. Not just general pain, but pain in the knee, pain in the foot, pain in the back, pain in the wherever. That pain. Let that pain be that pain. That pain is the pain of that part of the body. And the whole body is helping that part of the body have that pain. And that part of the body having that pain is exactly what that body needs. part has to work with at that time. It doesn't need any approval or disapproval from the approver and disapprover. It doesn't need it. So uprightness is to balance between forward and backwards, right and left.

[46:35]

It's to balance between approval and disapproval. It's not leaning into approval or disapproval, but it's disapproval. And you can see that it's a kind of leaning. It's a bias. Noticing that bias intimates. what is it called, refers to, refers back to uprightness. And you can feel in your mind, you can maybe feel how you lean into approval, how it's a kind of leaning. It's too much. Rather than, oh, that's a woman with blue pants on. I approve her. You can feel the difference. You can notice the difference between there's a woman and I approve her. It's a leaning approach. then back off of that approval a little bit and notice what that's like. Now you might, as you back off, you might swing over into, well, if I can't approve her, I can disapprove her. And notice how that's a bias.

[47:38]

And notice how there's something ineffable, something inconceivable, an inconceivable practice, which is also an inconceivable liberation. From complaining. Two ways of complaining, basically. I approve it is one way to complain, and I don't approve it is another way to complain. There's many variations on the theme, but basically, that's it. When you pull away from these biases, you have nothing. You have no way to tell that you're doing the practice. The practice is inconceivable. And yet, it's not like you don't have a body anymore. You do. You still have a body. And it's just the body.

[48:41]

However, we can't stand that for very long because we think you have an alternative to having just a body. The inconceivable is that pain is pain. That's the inconceivable. That's all the inconceivable can say about pain is that it's pain. It has nothing more to say. And it doesn't even say that. The fact that pain is pain is inconceivable. You can't get a hold of the fact that pain is pain. You can't get a hold of the path where you don't approve or disapprove. And that's called balanced state of mind. That's uprightness. And that's how to be with your pain. That's when you have a pain. To be upright with it is that it's just pain. Okay? And when your pain is just your pain, you have been cured of sentiments. Usually when we have pain, we have some sentiments around it, like...

[49:45]

Ooh, now I'm really practicing Buddhism. I'm a great ascetic. Now, the pain I have is like more than anybody... I've got more pain than anybody in the room, and I'm sitting here with it. Now I'm really cooking. This is called a sentiment. You like pain. Now, most people don't have that. Most people have, I'm in pain, there's something wrong with me. There's something wrong with Zen. There's something wrong with this organization. There's something sick here. This is a sentiment in relationship to pain. Do you understand? That's a sentiment. Normal human sentiment. Or I'm in pleasure. You sit there like if you're in pain and you sit for a while. Suddenly a great bliss comes over you and you say, whoa, now. Now this is really good. That pain was not bad because that made me feel like I was practicing, but now I have bliss. Now I know I'm really practicing. This is what I've been waiting for. This is what they told me would happen.

[50:46]

This is what I've been practicing for. This is called sentimental compassion or sentimental practice. When your pain is just your pain and your pleasure is just your pleasure, really, then you're cured of your sentiments. Like now, the kitchen workers are leaving, and that's painful for me to see them go. But I'm going to let them go. Go ahead, leave. And I try to have good cheer about it, you know, not like, I hate you for leaving. If I hate them for leaving because it's painful to see them go, then I'm hooked in my sentiment. Now, in fact, when they leave, it is painful for me to see them go. I do not like it. But there's no alternative. They're gone. That's it. That's the kind of place we have here, is that they can't go to the end of the lecture because they have to go make lunch.

[51:50]

This is such a stupid organization that we care more about lunch than hearing the great words of a fish. I can get into that. that's that's possible but the point is before i get into that it hurts for me to see them go it hurts i don't know why i did but it did i didn't like it but it can just be that pain and drop it don't get into like you know they're just using going to the kitchen as an excuse you know don't get into that just it it hurts when they leave And now here they're coming back in. It feels good. Don't get into, well, that's good. Or, you know, they're coming back because blah, blah, blah, blah. Don't get into that. Just pleasure. Pain. Pleasure. Pain. [...] That's it. Bang. My body is knocked against the rock wall of the pool.

[52:52]

Bang. Bang. I'm tired. I can barely stay awake. Bang, bang, bang. Pain, that's it. Pleasure, bang, bang. Pleasure, pleasure, pleasure. Boom, boom, boom. That's it. That's it. Not adding, not subtracting. Not putting your head on top, not cutting your head off. That's uprightness. And when you are upright, when you don't add anything to the pain, you have no way to tell that you're not. You're not into it. Well, I did it. I didn't add anything. No. You just don't. It's just that. However, when you're upright, you can stand to be upright. You don't need these additional things happening. The sound of the rain is just the sound of the rain.

[53:59]

I don't approve it or disapprove it. But there's a strong river which can slip into approving or disapproving the sound of the rain. If you're a farmer or a truck driver, you might say, this is enough. If you're sitting in a meditation hall on a Saturday afternoon, you might say, I like the sound of the rain. The mind has trouble not veering into one or the other, but it's okay if it veers off if you notice it. You protect your practice. You protect the life of yourself and other beings by noticing these mistakes. If you notice them, it's okay. You're back on track.

[55:03]

Now the way I am right now is that I have unfortunately a lot more to say than I've been able to say. A lot more examples of how to work with your posture and your pain and your breathing. so it's hard for me to stop but if I go on I think it's too much so I think I should stop but I don't want you to stop hearing the instruction of the salmon and I want you to keep hearing Lupu's instruction about how to walk down the middle way between approval and disapproval.

[56:42]

Can you hear it? Say yes so I can stop, please. A woman named Suzanne helped me name our totem, our salmon.

[58:17]

So I'm naming the salmon Suzanne. And here's a song about Suzanne. OK? See what I mean? It just, wherever you go, when you're studying salmon, you run into salmon. Even find good names for her. Suzanne takes you down to her place near the river. You can hear the boats go by. You can spend the nights beside her And you know that she's half crazy. But that's why you want to be there. And she feeds you tea and oranges that come all the way from China.

[59:26]

Oh God, this poem is about our salmon. She came all the way from China. You know that? And just when you mean to tell her that you have no love to give her she gets you on her wavelength and she lets the river answer. And you've always been her lover. And you know you want to travel with her. And you want to travel blind. And you know That she can trust you. And you've watched her perfect body. And you've touched her perfect body with your mind. And Jesus was a sailor when he walked upon the water and he spent a long time watching from his lonely wooden tower.

[60:53]

And when he knew for certain only drowning men could see him, he said all women will be sailors then until the sea shall free them. But he himself was broken long before the sky would open. Forsaken, almost human, he sank beneath the wisdom. He sank beneath your wisdom like a stone. In our intention...

[61:39]

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