Think of not thinking. Think of not yet thinking. Think of the unborn. And how do you think of not thinking? How do you think of not yet thinking? How do you think of the unborn? Non-thinking. This is the essential art of the Bodhisattva Samadhi.

[01:01]

This is instruction in how to enter into the Bodhisattva Samadhi. This isn't the whole of the Bodhisattva Samadhi. There are many, all these virtues which the Sutra tells us about are far beyond this entry, but this is a way for us to verify that we're doing our part to live in this Samadhi. Now, when I think of saying, think of the not yet arisen thinking, or not yet thinking, I don't mean that the not yet arisen thinking is any more not thinking than the other phases of thinking.

[02:15]

So another way to say this would be, after settling, after relaxing into a steady, unmoving, sitting position, think of emptiness. Think of the emptiness of thinking. Think of the emptiness of mind. Settle into the understanding that mind is fundamentally empty. All activities arising from mind are fundamentally empty.

[03:20]

Settle into an unmoving contemplation of emptiness. The Bodhisattva's realization is emptiness. Those who wish to live for the welfare of the whole world, their realization, their understanding is emptiness. Their heart is compassion, their understanding is emptiness. So they think of emptiness, in other words, they think about how thinking is not thinking, and therefore we call it thinking. In this way, one can enter the heroic stride Samadhi, and in the heroic stride Samadhi,

[04:41]

the Bodhisattva's Samadhi elicits emptiness from every meeting. And because of this emptiness, the realization of this emptiness, the Samadhi person can respond freely and spontaneously and appropriately. Not reusing thinking, but using the understanding of emptiness to respond well. A person who is firmly established, in other words, in Samadhi, with regard to the emptiness of all things,

[05:46]

can see straight into people's hearts. And seeing straight into people's hearts is realization of Buddhadharma. You are not it. It actually is you. You are not this heart. This is another heart. This other heart is actually you. From this vision, the appropriate response comes forth effortlessly, accurately, without any deliberation. The Bodhisattva plays in this Samadhi in a beneficial way for all beings.

[06:48]

So we talk about being able to follow our thought, and wherever it goes, be awake. And offering a meditation on the different details of each thought is a way to verify that we are present and awake with each thought. And it's a way to verify and look carefully at the thought, so that we can contemplate the emptiness of every part of the thought and verify our understanding of emptiness. And then extend that understanding to everything, including emptiness. It too is empty.

[07:51]

Emptiness is not emptiness. Therefore we call it emptiness. Part of, in my heart, I've told you, I feel kind of like a little uncomfortable telling you about such a, well, you can say advanced or ultimate practice. Even to start this practice, even to be able to notice one's thoughts clearly, not to mention all the different phases of it, requires quite a bit of devotion to settling with everything that happens and calming down so that we can see clearly, and then examine. And then after examining, it takes quite a bit of devotion to be fluent

[09:01]

with this very intense process of mind, and again to be awake each moment, and with all the different turns of each moment, and then the turns with between moments, or among moments, never moving, always awake. Quite a bit of training there, of the mind. And then to be able to investigate and thoroughly analyze these appearances and find that there's no stand that we can take in regard to them and realize their emptiness. This is quite a project. But then I noticed that Dogen Zenji says in the Fukanza Zengi, which is called the ceremony,

[10:03]

or the recommendations for the ceremony of sitting meditation for everyone. Fu means universal or general, and that can be understood as, this is not an instruction just for the most advanced bodhisattvas, this is an instruction for everybody that wants to be a bodhisattva. This is not just an instruction for monks or professional yogis, it's a suggestion for everybody. So in the spirit of giving instruction to advanced yogis, certainly this practice is appropriate for advanced yogis, but giving it to all people who want to practice the Mahayana, who want to realize emptiness for the welfare of all beings,

[11:09]

there it is, he's giving this instruction, which I see as the way to enter, the essential art of entering into the Mahayana Samadhi. So this soothes my concern that I shouldn't mention something so much to the point of the Mahayana, because it's so difficult. But I again mention that it is difficult, and we have to be very steady, and part of the practice of heroic effort, part of the practice of energy, the paramita of energy and courage and effort, part of it is to not try something that's too advanced. So although you're hearing about this teaching,

[12:10]

don't go too fast. When you hear about this mountain of Samadhi range, be careful every step of the way, check your footing, don't be in a rush, even though you aspire to climb the whole thing, step by step. What is it? Pick, step, pick, step. You know, when you're climbing a mountain with a climbing stick, get the stick in the ground and then take a step, so you have like one foot and one stick in the ground. So like all the time have both feet on the ground, have two feet on the ground, as you climb the difficult terrain. Satsang with Mooji

[13:35]

Satsang with Mooji So we're trying, we're getting ready, we're settling into readiness to meditate on emptiness, to see that mind is fundamentally unborn. Hearing this, it sounds pretty clear. Is there anything more I need to say now? Yes? This teaching sounds challenging and very beautiful.

[14:46]

It sounds challenging and beautiful? However, if you apply it to action and your interaction with other people, it's like falling, it's allowing yourself to fall into some kind of an abyss. You might hurt people. Until you have mastered it, you can do all the wrong things. Yes, until you've mastered this samadhi, you can do all the wrong things. So, that's why, you know, that's why we do all the wrong things. So until you've mastered this samadhi, you can do all the wrong things. All of them. You can do all of them.

[15:48]

All of them. All you got to do is just dial in the conditions and you'll do the wrong thing. Wrong everything. I can do anything wrong as long as I have not mastered or this samadhi has not mastered me. That's right. So, that's the case. But once the samadhi is mastered, and part of mastering the samadhi, by the way, is kind of like, is dropping off body and mind, is falling. Part of mastering the samadhi is giving up worrying about yourself. That's part of how you enter the samadhi. So the falling part happens in the realization of the samadhi. Once the samadhi is realized,

[16:52]

the proposal is being made that the samadhi will put everything in perfect order. All things will be put in perfect order by this firm settling into realization of emptiness, which includes no grasping of emptiness, a realization with no grasping even of the unborn, empty, pure nature of mind. Buddha nature will use this realization to respond appropriately in all situations without recourse to grasping thoughts. But until we realize this samadhi, we're going to keep grasping thoughts, and when we're grasping thoughts, sometimes we do okay, as you see. Sometimes people do really nicely, like this practice period is going really nicely, I think,

[17:57]

but some of the people in this practice period are grasping thoughts, like, I'm a server, I'm serving, I'm passing the gomashio, I'm operating my orioke equipment. People are grasping at that stuff, I feel. It's happening. It sounds they're confessing it. But, because the ingredients that we have are practice period participants, oriokes, zafus, zabutans, zendos, you know, no drugs or alcohol, we've got these ingredients, so put those ingredients together and things aren't so bad. Things are going kind of nicely. But if we change the ingredients, then the clinging can really cause trouble. But we've got nice ingredients, so things are going pretty well, even though there's still some grasping in our community here. But if there wasn't grasping, if we could change the circumstances,

[18:58]

you know, like, drugs and alcohol could be sitting next to every gomashio dish. And everybody would know what to do with them, you know? Freedom! You know? Freedom! You don't have to, like, yikes! A girl! A boy! Yikes! Skin! Flesh, bones and marrow, yes? Did you have your hand raised? Yeah, I wondered, you've mentioned several times your concern about going too fast, although that seems impossible in this practice, but that's another plot. What's behind your concern? I start getting this feeling like... Well, I think, as I said, part of the practice of enthusiasm or courageous effort

[20:01]

is to have the courage to not try something too advanced, and also have the courage to give up something that's too easy and to do the appropriate action. So, if someone offers a practice which is too advanced for some people, he wants to be careful that they understand what it might look like for it to be too advanced. So, for example... Huh? What might it look like? Well, for example, if we're not yet calm, then we, generally speaking, won't be very successful at, like, contemplating the nature of the object. So, if we're watching our mind and relaxing with it and calming with it, our mind becomes calm, buoyant, bright, clear, joyful, flexible, then that mind can then turn and look at the object which we've been relaxing with and can examine it without, you know,

[21:03]

accurately, can see clearly. But if we try to look at what's happening before we're somewhat calm, we just get more upset and our view is all shaky and we don't really learn anything. We don't learn much. Or sometimes we learn a little and sometimes we make big mistakes. So, like, we can look at our opinion of someone, some negative opinion we have of ourself or someone else. If we're not relaxed with that, we might think it's true. So then we get really upset. So, that would be... Sometimes insight work is too advanced for some people. They just need to calm down more. So we need to understand what is too advanced and then not try it. But still it's good to know, I think, what the different possibilities are in the practice so that when the time comes we can open to that and give up the practice which we've been doing, which is now, in a sense,

[22:04]

we've done it long enough. So giving up what we've done long enough and not starting what is too soon, that's my concern. I think all of us, someday, are going to be ready for this, you know, this great samadhi to really enter it, but, you know, to verify that we're in it. We're already in it, but to verify and understand that we're in it, that's my concern. Does that make sense? It does? Oh, good. You didn't completely answer the question. Was there some aspect that you'd like to bring up? It had to do with if there's any harm that can happen. Is there any harm? Waste of time, which, of course, there is no such thing, but anyway, waste of time. Well, there's two things. One is waste of time in the sense that you could be doing something that would be more appropriate instead of trying something too advanced. The other is, I guess, that some people could get really upset,

[23:06]

you know, analyzing their mind, and upset, and think that that was enlightenment, upset. Like, you know, this is really it, you know, rather than, well, actually you should be relaxing with that, not grasping that. So that's kind of harmful and also sort of a waste of time. That's my concern. Did I answer your question completely? Wow, great. Yes, yes, yes. You're pointing at someone? Alyssa? Is your name Alyssa? Yes. Is it your birthday? Yes. Okay. You're pointing at Daniel? Was he pointing at you? Daniel? I had a question. In my meditation, it appears that the grasping has kind of died down, and I had this feeling,

[24:10]

as you described it, kind of a lightness and energy and buoyancy, and very close attention, and then I started to be overwhelmed by a vast variety of much more subtle arisings. They weren't really thoughts, but sensations, sounds, very subtle things, but they happened with such continuous, or so continuous, so many that I felt kind of overwhelmed by it. And so the only way to get across seems to be to voluntarily slip back into this person's thoughts. So I wasn't sure how I should approach this. I think that was too much, that the amount of... Okay, so this seems to be a question about what we call shamatha, and a number of people

[25:13]

have had the same experience during this practice period. So when we relax with what's happening, sometimes our reward is that more starts happening, and then sometimes we can't relax with that, because it seems like it's going to overwhelm us, so then we say, no, I can't relax with this. So then you might think, well, maybe some discursive thought will calm it down. And in fact, you can use discursive thought to try to calm your mind down. You can do that. Discursive thought can be used to create kind of a closet, like you can say, that wave is not going to hurt me, and that can be postponed two weeks, and that wave is really totally not going to hurt me either, but for some other reason. So you talk to this stuff, and it seems like it backs off.

[26:13]

But then that talking also creates a kind of lack of calm. You're losing your calm by talking to it. So you don't feel overwhelmed, but you're reversing, you know, you're actually, when you relax, when you look inward and look at the relaxed way of dealing with things, you're going in the opposite direction of our usual way of grasping. And part of what happens is when you relax and you open up, more vitality starts flowing, you start feeling more awake, and then you have more to deal with, and if you can relax with that, then you're relaxing in a more energetic field, so then you not only have relaxation and calm, but you have this light and buoyancy, and so it isn't just calm, you have more energies flowing too. But sometimes as the energy starts flowing, then the meditator says, Whoa, I can't relax with this, and then, so then you're like stopping the shamatha meditation,

[27:19]

and you're going back to like trying to control your thoughts again. So to calm down is just, for me, I feel like calming down for most people means they stop trying to control what's happening, and if you stop trying to control what's happening, you calm down, and then it's almost like the world says, Oh, you're not going to try to control what's happening, huh? Well, how about this? You're not going to try to control this? And you kind of go, Well, no. Okay, well, how about this? Well, no. And pretty soon it's like you're fully alive and you're not trying to control it, and that's shamatha. You know, you're like, all your energy is flowing pretty much, except for the, you know, the blockages due to deep misconceptions, your basic available energy is flowing as well as it can prior to insight. So it's basically the same practice, but sometimes we feel like,

[28:20]

you know, it's just too much, and then we back off and resort to trying to control again. Now, a more appropriate time to use discursive thought, actually, which is also a backing off of the meditation, but is more appropriate, is when you get too sleepy, when you don't get the reward of lots of energy flowing, but rather you get the sleepiness, not due to lack of energy, but due to your own thoughts of complacency and success. That kind of sleepiness needs a little discursive thought, like, you know, we have more work to do here, and stuff like that, you know. You know, it would be really nice, we'd all appreciate it if you would, like, snap out of this complacency and really be awake. Please be awake, it would be wonderful, really be wonderful if you would not only be relaxed and at ease and calm, but also awake.

[29:22]

So that's a little bit of discursive thought, but it's for somebody who's getting sleepy, for the person if he's overwhelmed, I would just encourage him to try to relax with that too. And if you feel like you need discursive thought, well, no, I'm not going to try to talk you out of it too much, but I will try to talk you out of it. You know, make a deal, you know, like, you know, I'll give you a dollar if you don't, or something. Okay? Does that make sense? Okay. Yes? There's a row here. Jackie Esmay, right? Oh no, Alyssa, you just wanted to get him over there, is that right? Okay. So it's like Jackie Esmay, Angelica, and then over to the side here. This is kind of a dull area here. Yes? I found that in my meditation practice a couple of nights ago, I was in such pain, bodily pain.

[30:24]

It was the last period. And I was grasping this pain so intensely, it just like really overtook, took my whole entire being. Can you hear her? She had a lot of pain and she was grasping the pain, and when she grasped the pain, it took over her whole being. Yes, it was just like this incredible weight that I was carrying. Yes. And it got so heavy that I just like all of a sudden dropped it. It was like, drop it. And I have Maya to thank for that one time she told me to just drop it. I find that in my... I find that sometimes in my meditation practice it really helps to just say drop it. Drop it. Great. So grasping so much

[31:25]

can't be so bad because sometimes it gets so much that you have no option. Right. Grasping is not so bad. And it's not really better to drop grasping. It's just lighter. It's just lighter and it's just freer and it's just Buddha. But it's not better. Grasping is cool. It offers the opportunity to not grasp, which is the practice. It's more better. It's not really better. It's just the practice of meditation, whereas grasping is just our normal habit. And it's wonderful that we have this habit because then we can have Zen centers to help people, you know, give up their habits. But it's not exactly better after they give up their habits because, you know, that endangers the welfare of the Zen center because maybe nobody will be here anymore. Like I was going to go to Minnesota to retreat, but it's been canceled because last time I was there I enlightened everybody

[32:27]

so they don't want to come back. Nobody wants to come. Yes, ma'am? It seems like whatever you do, whatever you say, it seems like you're not really doing it. It's just like there's a thought that arises by some kind of stimulus and I feel this contact, I feel, then it seems like almost responding or reacting to it, not necessarily I do it, but it is a response that's going on. Yes. So whatever you do, whatever you say, that seems like you're actually not doing anything. Yes, it does. It makes sense to me, but the people in the back couldn't hear you, so it probably doesn't make sense to them, right? You couldn't hear that, could you? No. So it doesn't make sense to you, does it? But it does make sense to you

[33:27]

that you couldn't hear her, right? That's one problem. We need a microphone for the people who are asking questions. Sorry. But anyway. Yes? If you speak louder than the people, talk backwards. Right. Unless you're really calm, like, you know, I don't know what, if you're riding on a surfboard, I like surfboards, I like surfboard example because no surfers are trying to get the ocean to be calm. Well, I shouldn't say no surfers. Some surfers surfboard in swimming pools, I suppose. But most surfers who are in the ocean, they like to have waves.

[34:28]

They travel to where the water is not smooth. They don't try to calm the water, they try to ride it. So it takes a long time to stand up on a surfboard for most people. Some people have not yet been able to do it. But if you can stand up on a surfboard, okay, that's pretty good. But to be able to, like, on the surfboard have a tea party and to notice the beginning of the pouring of the water into the teacup, you know, and when the water actually hits the teacup and when the teacup's full and then when you drink the teacup and when the teacup's empty, that kind of takes a lot of concentration. You've got to be a really skillful surfer. Not to mention if the waves are really big in combination with the tea party, that's what it's like. It's like you're in a full-fledged life. You've got a full life, lots is happening, stuff's going all over the place, you're trying to learn how to stay upright and awake in it. And you feel, after a while,

[35:30]

you feel like, whoa, I'm, wow, I'm kind of like, yeah, you're actually staying on the board, you know, and then actually you start to relax. By relaxing, you can stay and you can't stay on the board if you're tense. You've got to relax and move. So finally, you're actually kind of calm with it. And then you can have a tea party. Then you can like write poems and, you know, express yourself very clearly. But it's hard, so you have to get really calm before you can deal with a full-fledged, you're full-fledged, vivid, living mind. Yes, it is difficult to be that calm, to get to the place of being that calm. Actually, being that calm is not difficult, it's very joyful and easy once you're there. But we have to train quite a bit to not tense up around pain and pleasure and gaining ideas and... So I was wondering

[36:31]

more about I don't feel uncomfortable with all these thoughts, but I cannot do a four-step meditation and would I then grab one of these thoughts and try to concentrate on where it ended and then... No, I think you should be more calm before you try this meditation on the four phases of thought. I think you should... I would suggest to you that you come and tell me when you think you're calm enough to start that practice. In the meantime, you can be open all the time to having a flash of understanding that mind is unborn. That's fine. But you don't look for it, you're actually just dealing with what's happening in a relaxed, non-involved way. So no matter what comes, colors, sounds, smells, tastes, touch, tangibles, all kinds of ideas and views, whatever comes to you, you're not getting involved with it, you're calming down. When you're really calm, you can naturally like look to see at what's happening.

[37:34]

But I wouldn't try to take on this thing until you feel really calm. If you think you're calm enough, come and tell me about it. Sounds like you're not. Yeah? I didn't follow that you can do what? Yeah. You can do it, but I'm saying give up discursive thought first. So, if you've given up discursive thought, then you can analyze discursive thought. So, please tell me about how you've given up discursive thought. Show me. Show me. And then when you can give up discursive thought, you're ready to analyze the discursive thought. So it isn't that there's like we were talking about yesterday, it isn't that there's no trains of thought, it's that you've given up the trains. If you can give up the trains, then all the trains can be coordinated very nicely, and they won't be smashing into each other

[38:35]

anymore. But first of all, can you really give up your favorite trains? And if you can, then you're calm, and if you really can give them up and you're calm, then you can analyze the four phases of your trains, if that's what's happening. Does that make sense? Okay, but do the four steps that I have, when I say discursive thought in my mind, then I can go back to the meditation of looking for the aim of the thought? No, no. I said, first of all, give up discursive thought. That's the first step. That's the samadhi. The first kind of samadhi is give up discursive thought. Have you given up discursive thought? Yeah, in that moment when I did that, when I did that phase, then I realized the same thing Daniel was talking about. In that moment, yeah, okay, in that moment, but I'm not talking about just one moment, I'm talking about that you're well established

[39:36]

in giving up discursive thought. That it's like, you know, you're like, you're like, hey, I missed giving up discursive thought here. I mean, like, that's what I'm into these days, like give up discursive thought. And I, you know, and I'm feeling, and I'm not just giving it up, but I feel different now. I'm very relaxed, buoyant, light, all that stuff's going on. My body and mind have changed as a result of giving up discursive thought. Not just one moment of it. Now, let's look at this discursive thought and see what it is. Okay? So I think it sounds like you need a little bit more giving up, you need to be more well established in the samadhi of giving up discursive thought is one basic definition of samadhi. Not grasping discursive thought. But it doesn't mean there isn't any, it just means you don't hook on to it. And when you're steady in that, and well established in that, then we can look at what is the

[40:37]

discursive thought? What does, you know, for example, what are the four phases of it? Okay? Let's see, and then I think Patty and Jill and Dennis and Jonathan Is that okay? We have some more questions? Patty? So, when I'm sitting in zazen and not thinking and there's seems to be not thinking, not thinking, not thinking and awareness of thoughts not arising it seems like, it seems to me like there's there's not a mind but there's no mind and then when I feel a thought when I feel the arising of a thought it seems like there's a like a mental facility for a thought to arise or for a concept to formulate and then yesterday

[41:38]

you said that when we think the mind that hasn't arisen doesn't exist is the root of our delusion. Yeah. Could you talk a little more about about that? Yeah. She said yesterday I said something about if you could see if you could actually feel like you're contemplating for example if you can contemplate an ordinary full-fledged thought well if you're contemplating that that's an arisen thought. So most people don't think arisen thoughts don't exist. Right? To think that an arisen thought doesn't exist is contradiction. Some people might think that but that's not the main problem. The main problem is that the unarisen thought is considered to be non-existent. So the world of samsara

[42:39]

is the world where things arise and cease. The world of nirvana things are unborn they un-arise there's no arising. But in a sense because nirvana is un-arisen we think there's no nirvana. We ignore nirvana. In other words we ignore the un-arisen aspect of things. We think that when something hasn't arisen that it doesn't exist. We only count arisen things as existing. And that bias is a kind of ignoring the un-arisen quality of things. But things have an un-arisen quality ultimately. Ultimately things are nirvanic quiet un-arisen unborn ultimately. That's the way they actually are. They're not it's only superficially that they're jumping around going hey I'm gone now I'm up now I'm down. They do that too.

[43:40]

And the reason why they do that is because we they don't really do that we see them that way because that's useful to us as animals to see how things jump up and go away. Although it's useful it's also painful. Whereas the un-arisen quality of things is calming and joyful but we ignore it. We're sort of our habit is to ignore the un-arisen quality and actually think it doesn't exist. If it's not going to stand up and shout I say it's not here. So that's one definition of root. And I think it's our self clean that makes us feel like if something's not going to arise it's nothing for me. Of course it's no use to me. Re-arisen things are useful some of them I don't like

[44:40]

but anyway they're useful. This is the way things are which is not useful it's just liberating. So there is we do have that tendency when we see something that's un-arisen we think it's the same as something that doesn't exist and also we have a tendency to think that something that's perished doesn't exist too. So those are the two sides that we feel like well and people have trouble even understanding how they would contemplate it. Now you seem to be able to contemplate it but a lot of people have trouble contemplating something that they think is non-existent. So that's why I think it's kind of funny that it's like we ignore Nirvana because it's so peaceful. And a lot of people when they think about peace they think well that wouldn't be very interesting. You know, no football games no arguments but it turns out that it's not so bad.

[45:41]

That there's lots of life there and lots of bliss and also coming from there that realization of the emptiness of the unborn and the emptiness of the about to be born and the emptiness of the born and the emptiness of the perished coming from that understanding that something that something that is unborn also doesn't perish. If it's empty, if mind is empty why say that why talk about it existing if it's empty? Because it appears to exist and we need to bring our vision of the appearance of things to the place where we can see that the appearance is ungraspable that there's no way that the appearance is an illusion. Or it's not yeah, it's an illusion but it's an illusion that's appearing. There is the appearance of things that don't exist.

[46:43]

There's appearances of something that actually isn't there anymore than just the appearance. All there is is appearance and we think there's something more to it than the appearance and therefore we don't know how to behave properly because we're using the appearances which we think are more than appearances to negotiate our way. So, if we can understand the emptiness of the appearances or that the appearances are just that then the bodhisattva is more effective. Then they can respect everything and everybody and care about everything with equal devotion. Dennis? Last year I remember you saying something like for those of us anyway who have a hard time letting go of things particularly letting go and leaving alone that maybe the

[47:45]

thing to do is to hold on so tight that you actually break whatever it is that you're holding on to metaphorically breaking it. But that if you can't let it go just hold on tighter. Do you still stand by that? Yeah, it sounds pretty good. But I don't mean so much to break the thing but to break the grip. To exhaust your gripping. To grip and grip and grip until you can't grip anymore. So that reminds me of that story of the you know archery teacher who said just pull the bow and hold it until the bowstring goes. You know this is the way we usually are actually we're holding things like that. If you just can settle with that you'll notice someday the string will go. And for some people they pull it and it seems to go soon. It goes

[48:48]

not I release it. He said the bowstring goes of itself. You don't release it just it'll be like going through your fingers. But you got to hold it there. And sometimes some people have to hold it for a really long time before it goes without them releasing it. But to get really exhausted but some people might go in the archery class and say it's already released see you later. You know they never pulled a string. And they go on to study tea ceremony or something. Or you know be a business person. Because they can already see the bowstring has already been released I'm not going to pull it. But once it's pulled you're pulling it and this is the normal situation. Now how's it going to go without you letting it go? But it seems it happens. That's the people's experience they hold it for years and finally it goes. And then they're initiated into then they can start shooting arrows. Because I should say

[49:50]

then they start shooting arrows cross that out. It's like then the arrow shooting can start. And like you know they shoot in the dark, right? Can't even see the target. They just stand there until the bowstring goes and the arrow goes off. That's the practice. And of course it hits the target perfectly, right? Which means I don't know where it hits the target. Yeah, I think that's still good practice. And that's sort of like what a lot of people think Zen is. I get these people to work grasp very hard for enlightenment until they all just sort of flop on the ground. And they're sort of like their face is on the ground and they go oh, I get it. Wow. But that's not the way we usually do it here although people do sort of spontaneously fall into that. St. Jonathan?

[50:53]

Okay. Jill? I've had some sort of horrifying way thoughts come up from trying to be calm. And also a popular Christmas song has been sung. Not everyone's telling me the name of it but it's lodged in other people's minds. Is what was going on at the beginning? I mean, it's not quite as deep as that but yeah, it sounds like that. Like being exposed to repetitive songs. Like overwhelmed by repetitive songs. No. I've got to make up another repetitive song to stop that repetitive song. This is the normal way we do it. We try to we have this song to stop that song. And hopefully this song won't stick.

[51:56]

It'll just get the other one to go away and then I'll be kind of like phew. But if you relax, you know, you may be totally inhabited by a Christmas song. And a lot of Jewish people hate that. Christmas song? God dang it! Who's responsible for this? All the Christians of course! But the Bodhisattva is not afraid of a repetitive like Bodhisattva can go and work at Santa Land, you know. And like, oh, a Christmas song! Wow! Somebody else says, that's been going on all day. Okay. Some form of elves

[52:59]

back there. Yes? I guess I'm thinking that because our minds become more buoyant in life, that's pleasant. Is that what might help us become, motivate us to want to save all beings? No, that doesn't necessarily motivate us to want to save all beings. But it might let that thought come up and let that one overwhelm you. I think the motivation to save all beings is more like suffering. And then compassion. Suffering, feeling suffering, and noticing that other people are suffering and that their suffering is probably like yours and wanting them to be free. That situation seems to be the situation in which, you know, we want to be Bodhisattvas.

[53:59]

And then this practice of tranquility helps us be happy enough to do this work, which is sometimes difficult. So, Bodhisattvas come to play with miserable people. They happily suffer with them. But they don't bring more misery to the miserable people. They don't go in there and say, boy, this is really bad, you know, oh my god, oh no, I'm so sorry, I'm here with you, I wish I could get away from you, you know. Maybe they do that as a joke sometimes. Some of the people who are saying that to you are Bodhisattvas, you know, just kidding you. They're just sort of like reflecting you, like, they come and say, oh boy, this is really bad, let's get out of here, let's escape this world, you know. And then you start, you wake up, oh, I see, that's the problem, I've been trying to escape. But basically, this stabilization is so you can be willing to face

[55:00]

more, in a more intimate, you can become more intimate with things when you feel more relaxed and buoyant. And the happiness and ease of it makes it possible for you to get intimate with pain and anxiety and the objects around pain and anxiety. You can get intimate with them with this relaxed, this mind which is saying, okay, I'll be a servant to this meditation. It doesn't really, like, make you want to help people necessarily. So a lot of people do have this kind of meditation, but they aren't, they don't want, they don't necessarily want to be bodhisattvas. But some of those people then meet a Buddha, and then they kind of think, that's the way I want to be, I want to be like that. And then, totally, and then it's awakened. Like,

[56:03]

I told you, some people have told me over the years that they don't know if they want to be a bodhisattva. In some cases, then, it's a question about whether they should receive the bodhisattva precepts. Because maybe they should receive precepts which are for, like, just Buddhists who wish personal liberation. So, if, you know, you could receive the Buddhist precepts with the intention of taking refuge in Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha for the sake of personal liberation. And you could receive precepts, very similar precepts, with the motivation of attaining personal liberation. So you might not want to receive bodhisattva initiation with these precepts. And someone asked me, well, when you received the precepts, were you thinking that you wanted to be a bodhisattva? And I thought, well, you know, I didn't really think of that. I really didn't have this bodhisattva idea down. The word bodhisattva was not very big to me when I first came. For me, the word was zen.

[57:03]

I was into zen and zen masters. This bodhisattva thing was like, hmm, Mahayana Buddhism, hmm, Buddha, hmm. To me it was like zen masters, bald people, you know, in black robes, scuttling through the mud, you know, carrying pretty ladies across the river with no attachment. That's what I thought was cool. I didn't think of them as bodhisattvas. So then, for me, it was not that I wanted to be a bodhisattva, it's that I wanted to be like my teacher. I wanted to be like those zen monks. I found out later, sort of, I mean, I sort of knew, but I found out more and more that these people were bodhisattvas. So in fact, I did want to be a bodhisattva, but I didn't call it that. When I received those precepts, it was just part of becoming like my teacher, who I think he wanted to be a bodhisattva. But I don't know if he thought of it that way when he was ordained. I just wanted to be like that zen teacher.

[58:05]

I wanted to do that zen thing. And then I find out, oh, that's Mahayana Buddhism? Oh. And what's the point of Mahayana Buddhism? Realizing emptiness. Oh. Okay. Let's do it. Is that enough for today? I mean, I know there's more questions, but, you know, we've been having really long lectures. Not lectures, not lectures. I stopped a long time ago, right? But the questions can go on all morning. I know Jonathan. I know Jonathan, but should we stop before Jonathan or after Jonathan? After. Jonathan. They want to hear from you. I think you said that the realization of emptiness as being empty makes it so that we can call it emptiness

[59:08]

again or something like that. Well, yeah. That makes it so you can really call it emptiness. That's true emptiness. Emptiness is not, that's not graspable. And also that's not dreamed of being grasped. Then that's a real fully realization of emptiness. That's truly, you know, the mind of no abode. It doesn't even abide in emptiness. What is emptiness before that? What is emptiness before that? Before what? Before realization of it? It's always beyond itself. That's the way it always is. It's always not, emptiness is always not any self. It's always the way things are. But we need this language. We need the word. Emptiness.

[60:10]

It seems like that, again, those who realize emptiness, which is non-dual and inexpressible, those who realize it, talk. They are right, you know. They come out with verbal designations to relate to people who are caught by verbal designations. So those people can be oriented properly towards meditation on emptiness. So they draw their attention to form, which they're familiar with, and they tell them how to be with form so that emptiness will come up and say hi. And then they teach them what to do when they see emptiness. Don't grasp it. And then they realize emptiness and then they start talking too. And they make these conventional designations which are just arisen from combinations of mental formations, mental constructions. So they don't really exist, but they put them together so that people

[61:11]

can be oriented properly. So they stop ignoring nirvana. They stop sort of like they stop ignoring their self-cleaning. They turn around and they notice their self-cleaning. They notice their grasping and they relax with that and then they become more and more educated as to reality. But they they need these verbal designations like emptiness, form, let go, don't move, be compassionate. All these words get to give them a little stimuli for them to somehow be dragged into this bodhisattva path by all this kindness in the form of blabber. Is there such a word as blabber? It's a verb, though, right? Huh? It's both a noun and a verb? Pardon?

[62:13]

Is it in the dictionary? Blabber? Blease? Fuck. Mick? Yes? It's over. They are in touch and ...

[62:37]

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