So, with these glasses on I can see you better, but I can't see my papers. So, maybe I'll do it like this. I have a problem. I have several problems. One problem I have is that a lot of what I'd like to say to you tonight, really I feel should be whispered in each of your ears, but since there's so many people in the room I have to speak almost in a shout, so it's a kind of a little bit of a conflict for me. So, although you may feel like I'm shouting at you, I don't mean it that way. I'm just saying it so you can hear me.

[01:03]

And the other problem I have is that although I really don't have anything to say, once I look at what I plan to say it would take a long time, and I don't want to keep you up late. So, I have a problem stopping on time. Well, not on time, but I have this problem stopping, period, and so Tina's going to tell me when I should stop, right? She likes to go to bed early, so I'll probably be fairly short. Well, as you know, we're here now, and some of us are having kind of a hard time in this world, so I guess the first thing I'd like to say is please make yourself comfortable. I hope you can be comfortable in this world, and I know that that's not so easy a lot of

[02:11]

the time, and some of the things I'm going to say may make things even more uncomfortable for you, but I really hope you can find a way to be comfortable with what I present, even though I think it might remind you of some difficulties in your life. We have a workshop this week, and I asked the people in the workshop what their motivation for coming here was, and I listened to them, and they have a wide variety of motivations, but a fairly common thread that I heard was something like they were interested in learning about meditating on the relationship between self and other, between self and nature.

[03:19]

Some of them were interested in finding a new way to see the relationship between themselves and the rest of the world, themselves and the mountains and the rivers. In meditation in this room, in walking in the mountains, and in having breakfast. Others said that they wanted to study and discuss and look at the relationship between spirituality and nature, or spirit and nature, and several of them said that they wanted to escape and have a good time. These things may sound contradictory, but if they do, I think that's really characteristic of our life. I also talked to the new students here, and listened to what they were interested in,

[04:33]

and I heard similar concerns from them. They mentioned more often suffering, and wanting to help people be free of suffering. In that sense, they're a little bit more hardcore than the people in the workshop. But I feel that the people I talked to, this is my groping for what to say to you that might be appropriate to your concerns, which fortunately turns out to be very similar to what I wanted to talk about before I heard what you said. Perhaps I didn't hear you, and I'm just kidding myself. But I guess what I'd like to say, for starters, is that the fundamental problem, the fundamental

[05:46]

cause of suffering in human life is, I propose to you, is the belief, not just the perception, but the perception and the belief in the reality of the perception that we are separated, that self and other are really, truly separated. We perceive this because of the way our mind works, because of the way our perceptual processes function, and we also believe that this is real. And this belief that the self can be grasped separately from other selves, other beings, this is a fundamental problem, the root source of our misery, and not just our misery now,

[06:50]

but our basically infinite and unstopping, unremitting, ceaseless, and virtually unstoppable misery. And not only that, but from this place we cause problems to other people. What's required here is to recognize the pain, recognize the cause of the pain, and then to find a path which relates to things, which relates to self and other, in a way which is absolutely, completely incomparable with this habit of believing in our separation. Of finding a path which is basically a way which is the total reversal of this habit of self-cleaning,

[07:59]

which is a total reversal, and which is freedom from this belief in our separation. And we just happen to have that path right here. Right here. All the Buddhas and all the ancestors who uphold the Buddha Dharma, who uphold the way to become free from self-cleaning, have made the true path to enlightenment sitting upright in the midst of self-fulfilling awareness. This is the path that they all have practiced.

[09:06]

All the Buddhas and ancestors in the lineage leading to this temple have done this practice of sitting upright in the midst of self-joyousness awareness. So, this week, as usual, I would like to talk about this practice, which is called, for short, Zen. And I would like to talk about what this upright sitting is, and I would also like to talk about what this self-fulfilling awareness is. I'd like to talk about and help you understand how sitting upright

[10:10]

is the path of reversing this tendency of self-cleaning, and how the self-fulfilling awareness then shows the path of full enactment of this uprightness and this selflessness. And again, I won't be able to cover much of that tonight, but I'll start tonight. So, what is uprightness? The Buddha said to his disciples,

[11:15]

Disciple, thus must you train yourself. In the scene, there will be just the scene. In the heard, there will be just the heard. In the imagined, there will be just the imagined. And in the cognized, there will be just the cognized. That is how, my friend, you must train yourself. Now, my dear, when in the scene, there is just the scene,

[12:25]

when in the scene, there will be to you just the scene, and when in the heard, there will be to you just the heard, and when in the imagined, there will be to you just the imagined, and when in the cognized, there will be to you just the cognized, then, my friend, you will not identify yourself with it. When you do not identify yourself with it, you will not locate yourself therein. When you do not locate yourself therein, it follows that you will have no here or there or in between. You will have no self or other or in between.

[13:52]

And this will be the end of suffering. This practice of thusness is a path which is incompatible with holding the idea of an independent self. To practice this way requires that you just practice this way and that you give up everything else. You can't practice this way a little bit and expect it to be this way. However, if you give yourself completely to this, even for a short time, this will mean the end of suffering for you and for the entire world.

[14:54]

This is what I think is meant by uprightness. This is what's meant by not leaning to the right or the left or forward or backwards. If you don't practice like this, or if you practice this way a little, there's still going to be a large scale of suffering

[16:05]

and real problems. Even if you practice this way a lot, but not completely, there's still going to be big, painful problems. It's even said sometimes that if you keep so much as the letter A in your mind, you'll go to hell as fast as an arrow shot. This uprightness, one way to talk about this uprightness,

[17:14]

is that it means that you respond to everything the same way. But that doesn't mean you respond to everything the same. When the wind blows from the west, well, it depends on which direction you're facing, but anyway, if the wind blows from the west in this valley and you're facing north, your left cheek will feel cooler than your right cheek, probably. And then if the wind blows from the east, it'll be the reverse. So, when the situation changes, of course, your response is different.

[18:16]

But in both cases, uprightness is the way that's the same in both cases. When you get insulted, you crinkle and crunch and feel pain. When you get complimented, you feel maybe warm and perhaps embarrassed. It's the difference. But in both cases, the feeling is thus. The fact is always thus. So, no matter what happens, all day long, you can use it, rather than it using you.

[19:21]

In the subtle round mouth of the pivot, the spiritual work turns. No matter what happens, you just turn. The turning is always the same. It always is the same. Turning, turning, turning, according to circumstances. You always turn according to circumstances. You never turn any other way. You're always the same. And you always turn in a different way, according to different circumstances, and the circumstances are always different, so you turn in a different way. But always the way you turn is the way you turn, and it's always the same. Everything is like that.

[20:56]

The Buddha gave teachings, as I just said to you, and these were written down in scriptures, and his disciples read them, many of his disciples read them, and one of his disciples was once asked why he didn't read scriptures. His name was Prajnatara, and a king asked him, an Indian king asked him, why don't you read scriptures? And Prajnatara said, This poor wayfarer, when breathing in, does not dwell in the realm of body, mind. When breathing out, does not get entangled, does not get involved in myriad circumstances. I always reiterate this scripture,

[22:20]

one hundred, one thousand, one million scrolls. Sitting upright and breathing, walking upright and breathing all day long, breathing and being upright. And this is the scripture that this Zen ancestor always recited. Just breathing and being upright, breathing and not dwelling in body and mind, breathing and not getting entangled,

[23:24]

not getting involved in myriad circumstances. This was his scripture, this was his scripture, this was his scripture, this was his practice, this was his uprightness. Sitting and breathing in this way, sitting upright, the spiritual work turned in the subtle round mouth of the pivot and constantly released him from self-clinging. This was his path which was incompatible, which was the reversal of his self-clinging. He is our ancestor. This is the way he saw Buddha.

[24:48]

Shakyamuni Buddha. Shakyamuni Buddha said, those who practice all virtues are upright and gentle. Those who practice all virtues are upright and flexible will see me, now, here, teaching the Dharma. Practicing all virtues means to enter the mud in order to help those who are mired in it. It means getting dirty in order to help. It means entering the water

[26:18]

to save those who are drowned. It means to breathe in and breathe out. It means to feel your breath. Being upright is what I've been talking about and being gentle or flexible is that you have no fixed idea of what uprightness means. Always rediscovering what it means to not lean right or left, forward or backward. If you can enter this body and mind without dwelling in it, if you can enter this breathing without getting involved in it,

[27:22]

you will see the Buddha here, now, teaching the Dharma. Shall I talk longer? Is that enough? No, not the time. Is that enough? Or should I stop? What do you think? No, no, you. You want to go to sleep? Okay. Shh. Well, maybe if I talked about you,

[28:36]

you'd have an easier time to stay awake. Pajñātāra had a disciple and his disciple's name was Bodhidharma. Now, Pajñātāra asked Bodhidharma, what is paramount? Bodhidharma said, self and other is paramount. Today I mentioned to the people in this workshop that if you... Some people, we keep far enough away from us, we create a sense of distance and a buffer between ourselves that's big enough

[29:37]

so that what they do doesn't bother us much. Well, I mean, especially small things, like... I don't know what. Like the way they drive. Especially if they drive, you know, basically they keep on the road or something. But if you go for a ride with somebody that you have just met and you're going from one place to another and you know the way you usually go and you know the way you usually think is best, then if they do it differently from the way you usually think, you think, well, that's interesting. Kind of weird that they're going this way. But, you know, what is it? Vive la différence? It takes all kinds to make up the world. This is interesting. Anyway, you're probably pretty good-natured about it. And why are you good-natured about it?

[30:39]

Because, I propose to you, because this person is basically nobody to you. You don't give a whatever about them. They are like not, you know, of concern to you. So you can enjoy the way they drive pretty easily. But now you ride with your spouse or your son or your mother and if they do something a little different from you, it might irritate you. Get my thought? It might irritate you. Ah, quite a bit. And you might even say something to them about like, please don't turn here. Go up to the next corner and turn left. Because if you turn here, I'm going to get irritated. Angry spouse or whatever might actually develop some phobia

[31:43]

to you driving in a way you don't like. And they might say, is it okay if I turn here? I propose to you that the reason why these, why these things bother you is because you feel pretty close to the person. Almost, you almost feel like, sort of a little bit like, you're getting close to feeling like they're almost you. You dare to let the distance between you and that other person get kind of, the separation, you let it get kind of thin, you let the buffer get kind of thin, and then sometimes it's almost like they're you. And if you do something different from what you're used to doing, like if your liver goes left when you go right, you get obsessed. It's a big deal to you. It's a big deal to you, maybe, to have your liver be an inch over to the right

[32:45]

from where it usually is. Like when certain people watch me eat, like when I eat in this room in a formal situation, I'm quite a little gentleman. I follow very closely the ancient etiquette, and some people even think I have very good manners. I think Stephen told me that one time, he said, your oreo looks so nice, my eating bowls in this room, they look so nice, he says they're all so clean. Well, there's reasons for that. But anyway, when I eat at restaurants sometimes, my manners are, you know, not necessarily equally, what? Refined. And when certain people watch me,

[33:46]

like for example, when my wife watches me, if my behavior is not refined, she sometimes gets upset. And she tells herself, he's not me, he's not me. The other people at the table maybe think, he's a pig, but it doesn't bother him. But for her, it bothers her. Or my daughter gets bothered. Why do they get bothered? That's a minor thing, right? But even a minor thing, when you're close to somebody, can be quite irritating. So someone in the workshop said, what should we do about this irritation? And even she asked, well, should we like, when we feel that, should we increase the buffer? And I wouldn't say, no, you shouldn't increase the buffer, because maybe sometimes, just to be practical, you should increase the buffer.

[34:47]

So you don't have to be bothered by what the person does. On the other hand, if you are already bothered and irritated, then the thing to do with it, first of all, is before you get angry, practice patience with it as much as possible. If you're already irritated, try to be upright with the irritation. Try to find the dead, which is actually the living center of that moment of irritation. But then if you manage to survive the irritation without saying something really rough or cruel to the person who turned left at a different place than you like to, then the question is, now should you create a distance between yourself and this person, so that you don't get so, you know, excited, so wrought up,

[35:52]

so, you know, what, wild, in response to what they're doing. And again, I don't say, no, you shouldn't create the buffer. If you have to create the buffer, go ahead, create it. It's up to you. But that's really just more, it's just a temporary practical decision. It really doesn't bear on the issue of this practice. The patience does. The patience protects you from blowing the whole thing. But the actual practice is to make yourself comfortable, make yourself comfortable with the irritation and don't mess around with the buffers. Don't try to, don't try to increase the buffer, don't try to decrease the buffer. That's what I would recommend. If you just sit upright,

[36:54]

with your breathing, the buffers, one by one, will get thinner and thinner and thinner until they get to be very thin and very subtle. And then you're getting down to the basic workings of human delusion. Then you're feeling the pain, which is universal to human perceptual process. The pain of dualistic thinking. And actually we feel that with every person we meet. But because we numb ourselves and delude ourselves and kid ourselves, we say, this person doesn't really bother me. They're not me. You know? I'm not gonna let them get to me.

[37:55]

I don't have time to care about this person too. There's only about two or three people I can get this much upset about. Well, again, if that's your practical decision, fine. But if you sit upright, eventually, everybody will bug you. Everybody. Because everybody does right now bug you. Because it's painful to be separated from anybody. Meantime, any kinds of manipulation you do, you know, I have nothing to say about it really. All I would say is if you sit upright, in the midst of this awareness, you will gradually, simply, stop maintaining this distance. And you'll get down to a very subtle separation. That will be maintained

[38:59]

forever. And that will forever be subtly painful. But a subtle pain that happens every moment can get to you. You know the Chinese, what is it, Chinese water torture? They do one, you lay somebody down, you drop, do a drop on them, drop, drop. Is that how it goes? Drop, one drop at a time on the chest or something or on the forehead? Not so bad once, not so bad twice, but hundreds and hundreds and thousands of times, for some reason or other, it's more debilitating than, you know, some big ugly guy coming over and slugging you every few minutes with a baseball bat. Because it relates to this fundamental alienation which most of us and most of our society doesn't have the guts to feel.

[40:02]

Most of our society is apathetic about this. That's the response to this irritation. Apathy, boredom, and zillions of kinds of distractions. I'm not saying stick your nose in the pain. I'm not saying find somebody who makes you miserable. I'm not saying cut down the buffer. I'm just saying if you sit upright in the middle of the mud, in the middle of your breath, and you're flexible and gentle, you will feel this and you will see it. And then again, if you sit upright, you will be able to make yourself comfortable with this pain. And your awareness of its subtlety will increase until you can see exactly the cause of all your suffering. And when you sit with that and let that be, just let it be the way it is. Let it be the way you see.

[41:04]

Let it be the way you hear. Let it be the way you imagine. Let it be the way you cognize. If you can let it just be like that and not identify with it, not be you looking at it even, just let it be that way. This will be the end of suffering. But it says you have to let it be just that. It can't be like that and you. It can't be the hearing and you. It can't be the seeing and you. It can't be the cognizing and you. It can't be the imagining and you. There has to be just the imagining. Just let it be.

[42:15]

. May our intention equally penetrate every being and place. With the true merit of Buddha's wish, may we be able to

[43:26]

attain the ultimate May we be able to attain the ultimate Buddhho, Buddhho, Sevangyo Beings are numberless. I am proud to say them. Evolutions are inexhaustible. I am proud to thank them. Dharma gates are boundless. I vow to enter them. Buddha's way is unsurpassable. I vow to become it. . [...]

[44:37]

. . . As I said last night, I don't really know in detail the motivations and aspirations of each of you. I know the aspirations of some of you. And the teaching that I am offering this week

[45:56]

is the teaching about the practice which all the Buddhas and all the ancestors have made as the true path to awakening. So, this teaching is about the true path to awakening, but I don't know if each of you actually is aspiring to the awakening of a Buddha. So, if that's not your aspiration, in a way I'm sorry, I apologize to be giving a teaching which is aligned with that aspiration. So, I'm going to continue to

[47:00]

offer offer this and if this doesn't, if you don't pay homage or if you don't align yourself with the aspiration of the Buddhas and the ancestors, then maybe you can just listen in, sort of eavesdrop on the talks at a Zen monastery and the aspiration of Buddhas is to attain enlightenment in order to enlighten all living beings. The Buddhas are just concerned and just appear in the world or Buddha appears in the world in order to enlighten all beings. This is an infinite infinite aspiration.

[48:04]

It is an aspiration of infinite scope, of unlimited scope and the practice which the Buddhas have made the true path to this universal liberation of all beings, the path that they have put forth is to sit upright in the midst of self-fulfilling awareness. Okay? So, I talked last night about uprightness and I talked today about uprightness and I'll talk a little bit tonight about uprightness

[49:07]

and then maybe I can get into this awareness of self-fulfillment or self-joyousness also tonight. Uprightness. The ancients couldn't help but give rise to the forced name quote, the fundamental lot. They couldn't help, they couldn't resist, they couldn't hold back coming up with this forced name, this rather abstract name, the fundamental lot. They probably shouldn't have come up with it but they couldn't help themselves, they thought it was so cute. The fundamental lot. In other words, your lot. The hand that is dealt to you

[50:10]

by the universe every moment. The body and mind that you receive to use every moment. This is your fundamental lot. As Jack Nicholson said in a movie where he played the part of the devil, they deal the hands from upstairs but down here we play the odds. He had his way of playing the odds, I don't know what it was, but the way of playing the odds in uprightness is just simply to put your hand down, just play what's dealt to you, that's it. Don't draw any more cards, don't do anything fancy.

[51:11]

Is there such a thing as straight poker where you just get dealt a hand and that's what you play? Just straight poker. Anyway, fundamental lot is kind of a big word but they also sometimes say pines are straight, brambles are kinky, herons are white, and ravens are black. Pines are straight, brambles are kinky, that's uprightness. Brambles are kinky, they don't try to straighten out. Your karma is kinky, and it's ancient, we should confess it. The long do not have excess, the short are not lacking.

[52:13]

Therefore, duck's legs are short, but they'll be miserable if you add to them. Though crane's legs are long, they'll be quite unhappy if you cut them down. If you want to avoid misery, please rely on your fundamental lot. Please rely on your own lot. Play that hand that you have been dealt in this moment and now in this one, play it to the hilt. Don't ask for another hand, just sit with it and realize its radiance in and of itself. Okay, so you get dealt four or five cards?

[53:20]

You get dealt five cards, but you can only get four aces, I guess. That's a pretty good hand, right? Can you see that that's pretty radiant? Or imagine, what is it? A royal flush. Can you feel the radiance of a royal flush? But how about getting a hand that has none of a kind? Would that be like a two, a three, a four, a five? No, you couldn't have that. If you had a two, a three, a four, a five, and a six, you'd be in trouble, right? You'd have it straight. How about a two, a three, a four, a five, and a jack? Can you see the radiance of that hand? Can you take that hand and put it down,

[54:22]

like a Zen master, and say, Here's my hand, and I'm not going to bet anything on it. This is uprightness. You get a hand like that, and you can't even imagine, hardly, having a better one. You think, ooh, what a beautiful hand. Look at all those nice little numbers and those little hearts and diamonds and spades and clubs, ooh. How cute. And even look at the backside, nice designs. This is called being childlike. Having the ability to imagine, to imagine not having an imagination. Did I tell you the story about Marlon Brando?

[55:25]

No? Well, should I? So when he was an acting student, the teacher assigned them, the teacher assigned them, they're method actors, right? The teacher said, Okay, imagine you students are chickens, and you're in a chicken coop, and you're on your roost. The chickens sit on the roost, or perches. What do they sit on, decks? Perches? Make up your mind. Wire cages? No, no, no, this is the old days. Anyway, the chickens are in the chicken coop, they're sitting on their perches, and then the acting teacher says, Imagine that you get the word that there's atomic bombs going to be set off fairly near to the chicken coop. Please do what you think the chickens would do. So all the students did what they thought the chickens would do. And what did Marlon do?

[56:28]

He just sat there. Like a chicken. He couldn't imagine doing anything else but just sitting there. This is uprightness. Did I tell you the story about Suzuki Roshi? I told you that one, didn't I? The one about where he, the teacher fed the students, he and his fellow monks, there were about six of them, the teacher fed them rotten daikon. Did you hear that story? You did? Some of you didn't? You didn't hear it, anyone? You did hear it. You want to hear it again, right? So his teacher, his dear teacher, gives him and his friends rotten daikons to eat. So after he serves it, he leaves. And when he's gone, the students cleverly bury the daikons. Now this teacher,

[57:30]

I don't know a word about this teacher, but anyway, maybe he could tell when he came back that they weren't sick. So he started looking for where are the daikons. And sure enough, he found them and dug them up and told them to eat them, wash them and cook them again and eat them. So they ate them. And after that, Suzuki Roshi said he understood something about daikons or something. And then not too long time after that, all the other monks that he was practicing with ran away. They ran away from this teacher. They probably also understood something about daikons. They ran away. And Suzuki Roshi said, I would have run away too, but I didn't know I could. This stupidity is what founded Buddhism in America. That's why we're all here practicing.

[58:32]

Because he was dumb enough, he was stupid enough not to know how to run away from his allotment. In order to be upright, you have to be stupid enough not to be able to act on your cleverness of thinking you could be something other than yourself. Can you be that stupid? Buddhas can be that stupid. And because they're stupid enough to be themselves, they're also stupid enough to open up to other people and other people's suffering. And therefore they're stupid enough to be compassionate. They're stupid enough to be bothered by everybody's problems because they're stupid enough to be bothered by their own. But it's not that they're stupid enough to be bothered by their own like they think, okay, I'll accept my problems. It's more fundamental than that. They can't even imagine getting away from their problems.

[59:34]

Because they can't imagine getting away from their problems, they understand their problems. Because they understand their problems, they understand that their problems are not problems. And therefore they're liberated from all their problems. And also they show other people that they will be liberated from their problems When they don't run away from their problems, and they'll understand their problems, and they'll understand that their problems are not problems. Problems are not problems. Problems are there to help you understand that problems are not problems. But if you try to hand in your problems for some other problems, you will never understand that. You understand a little bit maybe, because I just told you that, so I say, but you won't really understand it like in your cells, until you accept your cells as they are now.

[60:37]

This kind of acceptance of your body and mind, which comes in a painful package sometimes, which is a rotten daikon, or living with a monstrous teacher, this kind of allotment and accepting it is called sitting upright. This sitting upright is about half, or anyway part, of the true path to enlightenment of all the Buddhas, of the true path to liberating all beings from suffering. The other half is called the self-fulfilling Samadhi. So I promised I'm going to end really early, so what time is it now?

[61:45]

Whoa! 9.10, so I got 20 more minutes. All Buddha ancestors who uphold the Buddha Dharma have made it the true path to enlightenment to sit upright, practicing in the midst of self-fulfilling awareness. Those who attained enlightenment in India and China and Japan and America and Czechoslovakia all followed this way. It was done so because teachers and disciples personally transmitted this excellent method as the essence of the teaching. I'm going to skip a paragraph and go on to when even for a moment you express the Buddha seal in the three actions by sitting upright in this awareness,

[62:49]

in this self-joyousness awareness. The whole phenomenal world becomes the Buddha's seal and the entire sky turns into enlightenment. Practicing uprightness for a duck to have short legs and a crane to have long legs, you will be able to understand what it means to express the Buddha's seal in the three actions. Three actions are body, your postures that you make moment after moment, speech, the sounds you make or don't make, and your thoughts.

[63:51]

The postures you make, the sounds you make with your voice and the things you think are phenomenal events. When the Buddha's seal is expressed in your voice, in your posture, in your breathing, in your thinking, when it's expressed in your personal karma, your personal actions in these three dimensions, then this Buddha's seal is also impressed or expressed by the entire phenomenal world. This is the self-fulfilling

[64:55]

or self-joyousness awareness. When you express the Buddha's seal, which also can be translated as Buddha mudra. The word mudra means seal or a ring or a circle. This is a mudra. It's also a chicken. It's a mudra. See? See the circle? That's a mudra. This is a mudra. It's really a mudra. Here's another mudra. Here's a mudra. See that mudra?

[65:57]

It's a mudra. I'm a mudra. You're a mudra. What's Buddha's mudra? What's Buddha's mudra? Buddha's mudra is uprightness. Buddha's mudra is uprightness. Buddha's mudra is light. Uprightness is light. Everything by being what it is is radiance. That hand, that none of a kind hand, that is radiant by being that hand and for no other reason. Buddha's face is light. Buddha's face is uprightness. When that uprightness

[67:00]

is impressed on your voice, when speaking with this uprightness, when thinking with this uprightness, when making postures with this uprightness, that's when you put the Buddha mudra on your three actions, on your karma, on your life. No matter what phenomenal expression is coming through you, the uprightness of it is always there. Expressing the Buddha mudra, the awakened mudra in your voice and thought and posture is not something you do. It's not something you do.

[68:01]

It is the actual shape, it is the actual color of what you're doing already. Still, do you appreciate that? Do you understand that? Are you willing to be short? Are you willing to be tall? Do you appreciate your height? Do you appreciate your hand? Do you appreciate your thought? Do you appreciate your voice? Do you appreciate your posture? As it is, without being smart enough to think of anything other than that. Do you? If you do, then you appreciate Buddha's mudra being impressed on your body, speech and thought. And at that time, the entire phenomenal world is also,

[69:03]

becomes the Buddha mudra. How it is that when you realize this radiance, this uprightness in everything you do, how it is that that then, at that moment, simultaneously makes the entire phenomenal world also be impressed by that, that understanding is the self-fulfilling awareness. The self-joyousness awareness. Because self-fulfilling is when not only are you willing to be yourself, not only do you accept that you can't be anybody but yourself, but you also, but you understand that everything else joins this and because everything else joins this, this fulfills yourself. The self you are

[70:04]

that you're willing to be is not really your true self. The hand you've dealt is not really your true self, but it is the self that you phenomenally receive. And if you're willing to be this limited, phenomenal being, then you understand that you are complimented by the entire phenomenal world in direct response to your willingness to be this. Like a seal. A seal, like a seal of approval or like, you know, when they have a letter in the old days when they have a letter and they'll close the envelope and they put some like red grease or wax on the envelope, hot, warm wax and then you take a seal and put the seal on the hot wax and press the seal down in the wax and the seal

[71:06]

makes a seal. But is the seal the thing you use to make the impression in the wax or is the seal the impression made in the wax? Well, it's both, isn't it? They call the thing you use a seal and they call the mark that's made in the wax or on the paper, they call that a seal too. It's like that. That shape of uprightness on your posture and your breathing and your mind and your voice, it, it touches the rest of the world. It impresses itself on everything else and the shape of the seal is the mirror image,

[72:09]

is the opposite in a sense of the shape that's made in the in the wax, right? Just like the shape of the phenomenal world is the mirror image, the uprightness of the phenomenal world is the mirror image of the uprightness of your body, speech and mind. It's not the same, but they seal each other. And before the seal touches the wax, it's not really a seal. It's just a block of wood or something. It could be a seal, but it's not a really functioning seal until it touches the wax and makes the mark. And when it does that, you can't tell which the seal is. And it also comes from the other direction. The shape in the wax

[73:15]

makes the seal a functioning seal. Time is getting short. But if I try to add to it, the ducks will be unhappy. Okay. Can you say suchness instead of uprightness? Can you say suchness instead of uprightness? Tentatively?

[74:20]

Okay. I reserve the right to change my mind. In my seven remaining minutes, I don't know quite what to do here. Somehow I feel like my little example of the seal and the wax didn't work very well. Sometimes these things don't work. Sometimes the, you know, this, this, this, what do you call it, this example is an example of I'm trying, I'm not upright enough, for it to impress itself on you and have it turn you into Buddha's mudra too. And I haven't been successful. So, I'm going to try another one. Excuse me, but this is using my own name as an example.

[75:23]

Suzuki Roshi gave me this name. It's, the name is Tenshin Zenki. And Tenshin, Ten means heaven and shin means truth. So literally, it means heavenly truth. But that's not what it means. When he gave it to me, he said, your name will be Tenshin and that means Reb is Reb. And it's funny because I mean, I knew that Reb was Reb too, but when he said that, I thought, hey, he really understands me. Funny. But that's what Tenshin means. It means Reb is Reb, it means Steve is Steve, it means Wendy is Wendy. It means Duck's legs are short. It means Reb's legs are short. But, sometimes Reb actually wishes his legs were long. But anyway, that's part of Reb

[76:24]

and Reb is Reb. That's what Tenshin means. It means a childlike, naive understanding. You say, a child, who's this? And they say, Charlie. Superficial, unprofound, straightforward, phenomenal life. Again, this stupidity. Not able to imagine that you're something other than yourself. That's Tenshin. That's uprightness. That's just sitting alone in the forest. And Zenki, Zen means complete and ki means energy or opportunity or function. So it means total function.

[77:24]

Ki also can mean a machine. It's the total machine or the machine of totality. The cosmic machine. Another translation of it is total dynamic function. Another translation is the whole works. The whole works means colloquially it means everything. In standard English it means that the whole, the whole, the cosmos, the world, works. Where does the cosmos work? It works all over but it also works at each location it works through each thing. When you let yourself be yourself that is the cosmos. That is the totality of life working through you. It is because the total universe is working

[78:26]

through you or is working by you and by me right now. It is because of that that you have no choice. You've got everything in a sense against you being anything but yourself. You've got everything working for you being you and everything stopping you from being anything different. That's the whole works. That's the whole works. That's it. You simply being you is the whole works. That's the true path to awakening which all the Buddhas who uphold the Dharma have used. That is sitting alone

[79:27]

for eons in the forest. Again sitting alone for eons means sitting completely alone for a moment. The eons are a way to convey how thoroughly you sit still in this moment. Sitting all one for eons in the world in the mountains in the forest. Thus they united with the way. By uniting with the way means they put the Buddha seal the Buddha mudra on their body, speech and mind. And then they used the mountains and the rivers for words. And they used the rain and the wind for tongue. In other words

[80:27]

the Buddha seal being impressed on your body the entire phenomenal world reflects it. And the functioning of the whole world reflects it. So please make yourself comfortable sitting upright in the midst of the awareness that the mountains and rivers are your words and the wind and the rain is your tongue. It's the tongue

[81:31]

and the words of your upright sitting. I now end on time. I and placed with true merit of Buddha's way. Cue the opening Beings are numbness. I vow to save them.

[82:51]

Illusions are inexhaustible. I vow to end them. Ghanai's are helpless. I vow to measure them. The world is quaking. It's unsurpassable. I vow to become it.

[83:17]

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