I appreciate people keeping me informed about not being able to come to class sometimes. Quite a few people are not here tonight. They all told me about, almost everyone told me about the reason for not being here. And last week I was looking at the group and I was wondering where Paul Winokur was. A couple days later I was told that he had a bicycle accident and that he was in critical condition. And then I heard The doctors didn't think he would live.

[01:04]

And then he had said that he didn't want to be kept on life support. He was on life support from about the time of our class up till Sunday. And on Sunday the family, his family, discontinued the life support and he died. His wife is Tracy Apple who's also in this class and she was in New York last week so they called her in New York and she came back so we have lost one of our members and we have lost a wonderful Zen student and a loving father and husband and quiet yet very deep and mindful person.

[02:25]

And tonight the family's having a small memorial ceremony. Otherwise Tracy said she would be here in class. So hopefully she'll be here next week to sit with us and practice with us. She had eight years with him, which were the happiest times of her life, because he was such a good partner. And so, of course, now she's appropriately grief-stricken. But I'd say she's doing quite well. Tracy has asked for a memorial service at Green Gulch, and so we'll have one, but we haven't determined the time.

[04:23]

And if you want to know the time, if you want to attend, if you want to either attend or just know about the time, you could find out through Green Gulch, just through the office, or you can find out through my website. And maybe the yoga room will also know the time, so it'll probably be next week sometime in the evening. Perhaps we could do something here, too, next week, if Tracy's here. Once a Zen teacher asked his student to prepare his bath.

[06:04]

And after the bath was prepared, he tried to get in, but the water was too hot. So he asked the student to bring cold water and add it to the bath. which the student did repeatedly until the water was getting tolerable. And at that point, the teacher said, that's enough. Don't put any more cold water in. And he got into the bath. And then the student threw away the water that he didn't use and set the bucket upside down. When the teacher saw that, he yelled at the student and said something like,

[07:16]

You had no use, so you threw it away. But you could have taken the water out in the garden and fed it to the trees or to the other plants in the garden. in this way you can use the water, each drop of water can give life. So we should not waste one drop of water. So I pray that we will not waste one drop of water. We'll use every opportunity to give life.

[08:26]

This is one way we... kindness of people like Paul. not to waste it, not to waste anything, to use every opportunity for practice without expecting anything. Is there anything you want to express at this time?

[11:02]

Anyone? Can we have an address? An address? See how . I hesitate to give you Tracy's cell phone number or her home phone number because she may not respond to all your calls.

[12:22]

Okay. And... Also, if you contact my assistant, Reb's assistant at zcsf.org, she can give you information also. We can ask Tracy if there's any particular suggestion from her. I believe it's sfzc, isn't it? Oh, sorry, sfzc, you're right. All right.

[13:27]

The practice of the Buddha is the Buddha. Buddha is the practice of Buddha. Enlightenment is the practice of enlightenment. It is the practice of the silent bond among all beings, enlightened, unenlightened, animate and inanimate, conscious and non-conscious. practices to be absorbed in this process of how we're supporting, how we're mutually supporting each other.

[15:57]

In the realm of life and death, we support each other. and the way we support each other is how the realm of life and death is ungraspable. And in the ungraspability of life and death, no life and death can be found. There's only the light of this silent bond among all of us. So this is a text on the Buddha's meditation.

[19:37]

May we chant it together? Now all ancestors and all Buddhas who uphold Buddha, Dharma, have made it the truth, enlightenment, sit upright, practicing self-fulfilling samadhi to attain enlightenment, and it is trying to follow this way. It was done so because teachers and disciples first transmitted the method as the essence of the teaching. It is said that this directly transmitted, straightforward Buddha Dharma, surpassable of the unsurpassable, from the first time you meet a master without engaging in incense offering, repentance or reading scriptures, you should undoubtedly sit and thus drop away body and mind,

[20:44]

For a moment you express the Buddha's seal and the three actions by sitting upright in samadhi of the Buddha's seal and the entire sky turns into enlightenment. All the targeters of resource increase their dharma bliss and renew their magnificence. Furthermore, all beings in the ten directions and the six realms, including the three lower realms that once obtained, realize the state of realization and manifest the original face at this time. Awakening myriad objects, partake of the Buddha body, and sitting upright under the Bodhi tree, you immediately leap beyond Awakening at this time is unsurpassably great. profound wisdom, ultimate and unconditioned, because such broad awakening resonates back to you.

[21:48]

You will in zazen, unmistakably, drop away body and mind, cutting off the various defiled thoughts from the past. Realize Buddha activity at innumerable practice places of Buddha Tathagatas everywhere. Engage in Buddha activity. Those who receive the benefit by wind and water caused by them are inconceivably helped by the Buddha's guidance, unthinkable and awake intimately to themselves. Those who receive these water and fire benefits, this guidance based Awakening, live with you and speak with you will obtain endless Buddha virtue and will unroll widely inside and outside university, endless, unremitting, unthinkable, unnameable Buddha Dharma.

[22:57]

...because of his unconstructedness and stillness, immediate realization. Practice and realization were two things as it appears to ordinary person, recognized separately, but what can be met with recognition is not realization itself. Realization is not reached by a deluded mind, because realization is not reached by a deluded mind. Stillness, mind, and object merge in realization and go beyond enlightenment. Stillness is a state of self-fulfilling samadhi without disturbing. Removing a particle, Buddha's great activity, the incomparably profound and subtle teaching, trees and lands which are embraced by this teaching together radiate a great light, found the inconceivable profound dharma, grass, trees and walls, teaching for all beings, people as well as sages, nay, in accord, discussed in dharma for the sake of grass, trees and walls,

[24:10]

I'm self-awakening and awakening others invariably holds the mark of realization with nothing lacking. It's tested without ceasing for a moment. This being so, the zazen of even one person at one moment cores with all things and fully resonates through all time. future and present of the limitless universe. This zazen carries the bliss of each moment. Zazen is equally wholeness of practice, equally wholeness of practice. Practice while sitting is like a hammer striking emptiness. Before and after its exquisite peel permeates everywhere. It can be limited to this moment. Manifest original practice from the original face. It's possible to measure even if all the Buddhas attend directions as innumerable as the sands of the Ganges.

[25:13]

The Buddhas try to measure the merit of one person's zazen. They will fully comprehend it. Pass those back up here, please. Damn. So this is a description of how we are resonating with each other and giving each other life and illuminating each other.

[26:38]

the part I wanted to draw attention to is in the middle of the text where it says, after describing this mutually enlightening process in which we live, but which we are yet fully realizing, and part of the reason why it's difficult to realize this is that we're used to realizing things that we perceive or conceive of. And it says, after describing this process of illuminating each other, it says, all this, however, does not appear within perception because it is unconstructedness in stillness. It is immediate realization. this enlightenment is actually a cognition.

[27:49]

It actually is a perception. But this perception does not appear within perception. Like we're having the perception that we're in this room together, that we're ourselves and people are others and but the way we're not separate from it does not appear within our perceptions. It is another kind of perception. It's a perception that's not mixed with our perception. And as I mentioned earlier, in the cracks of openings of our perception. The light of this enlightened perception can shine into our perceptions.

[29:02]

It doesn't mix with them. It's not like another thing that we perceive. It is the nature of our of our relationship with all beings. And the relationship with all beings is actually a cognition. But it's a cognition that cannot be recognized. It can't be recognized. It is an immediate cognition. It is unconstructed-ness in stillness. Yes.

[30:03]

Unconstructedness and stillness to me means emptiness or the original. Does that appear to a deluded mind or does it not appear to a deluded mind? It does not appear to a deluded mind. then the deluded mind must believe that there is the unconstructedness all around, inside and outside. So some natural belief rather than an experience. Or is the belief an experience? Yeah, the belief could be an experience.

[31:12]

It would be, yeah, it would be like, it would be a perception about another perception. But it wouldn't be actually perceiving that perception. It would be perceiving some idea you have. of that perception. If you believe that that perception is possible, even if you didn't really think that you were perceiving it, you're only believing what you've heard. So strictly speaking, that would be a conceptual cognition. And you could believe that that was possible if you had a practice in such a way that you would enter the actual cognition, which cannot be reached by a deluded mind. And the way of entering by not seeking, by giving up discrimination, even while discrimination is going on, to give it up,

[32:36]

to find a way to practice the same with everything, which is, again, not seeking anything. To find a way to practice the same with life, with good and evil. And in all cases, practice the same would also mean having no expectations in any case. That would be another thing which you as being the way to enter. But you could believe in it, but not practice it. you probably couldn't practice it without believing it, except by some, it seemed like, very unlikely accident that you would maybe occasionally not expect anything and be treating discriminations equally.

[33:57]

If that could happen, by that practice you could enter, but the likelihood of that happening enough to actually be established in that samadhi seem, I never heard of it. So we sort of need to believe in the practice in order to realize the state which is the same as that practice. As the practice becomes more and more concentrated, the practice becomes more and more selfless as we become more and more concentrated on not expecting, the concentration becomes more selfless, or the selflessness becomes more concentrated. And when it's fully concentrated selflessness, we've realized the state which is how we selflessly are supporting each other.

[35:04]

Selflessly in this case means not in any limited, graspable way do we have a self. So that you could believe that such a thing was possible, and then you could believe in a practice. And as the practice gets stronger, the belief gets stronger, and as the belief gets stronger, the practice gets stronger. However, there's some verification of the practice too, which means also some realization even before it's completely realized. Thank you. Welcome. The cognition that is without recognition Is that because it's a union with that which is perceived with cognition, that there's no distinction between the knower and the known?

[36:19]

That fusion that makes recognition impossible, that means it's not recognition, it's a union of it? Where there's a collapsing of the knower and the known into one entity? Well, it does say here subject and object merge in realization. And I have a problem with the term merging there. We also have the expression the merging of sameness and difference. But I don't really feel like there's any less difference than there usually is.

[37:25]

It's just there's less sense that the difference can be grasped or that there's actual substantial separation between things. Is the cognition a universal? that we wake up to rather than our own cognition of the undescribable bond. Again, you can say that the cognition is something you wake up to, but cognition is awakeness. Because if you say awakened to, it sounds like something's awakened to the cognition. So then it sounds like the cognition is recognized by the awakened one. It seems that the consciousness is not possessed by an individual. It's an awakeness that It's one, it's universal.

[38:27]

It's not possessed by an individual, right. But it can illuminate an individual. And the individual that's illuminated is called an enlightened person. But the thing that's illuminating them doesn't belong to them. It's not something that's happening to them. It sounds... It's the way they're connected to everyone. It sounds similar to Jung's collective unconscious, that there's this great... that we always are all sustained by and participate in, and dropping the illusions allows us to realize that which we always are already. Dropping the illusions allows us to realize How we are already, yes. And realizing how we are already helps us be free of our delusions.

[39:28]

I find that a little frightening, the news of this death. It seems easier to think, well, that's not me someday, but it's not me, you know. But it is me. The people that die in Iraq, that's me. I'm them and they're me. dropping the illusion of the separate self is terrifying, in a way, because it means we're open to all that suffering and that death, because that's us, that's each of us. That scares me. Mm-hmm. Yeah. time with this, you will become less and less afraid of this. But it is, the implications are initially, as you start to realize the implications of this, it would be frightening before you become really intimate with it.

[40:42]

So there is a period, a pretty long period, of developing intimacy with this. Because there are potentially frightening implications. I don't mean to... I necessarily want to avoid it. I'm just saying that I can feel that fear there, and I just want to say, well, there it is, and kind of be with it. In a way, it's a good sign that that can be felt. In a way, it's a good sign, yeah. It shows you're getting closer. but still somewhat distant. Still a little bit of separation. But a little bit's enough for there to be fear. And if you're far enough away, then you don't feel afraid.

[41:46]

If you feel very far away, you don't feel afraid. Did we talk about vulnerability last week in this class? You don't remember? So Jerry was, what Jerry was talking about, it seems like he was getting in touch with some vulnerability. Experimenting with being present without expectation and without attaching to discriminations

[42:55]

may be another way to talk about how to open to our vulnerability, open to letting this light in, not expecting to get it, not expecting to get it, not expecting to get it. but not expecting, opens to it. But it also opens to possibly being aware of how we can be hurt, how we can lose things, how we can lose whatever we have, whatever we seem to have, whatever we seem to have been given, So again, we've been given this moment.

[44:28]

We're vulnerable to also wasting the moment. Take your time.

[46:27]

Take your time. I kind of have a question, but it keeps on disappearing because I'm not used to the form you teach. You know, I heard you saying to someone at the end of class that you think that we're going the way of the realists. So, of course, that was the definition of the realist. So I could get in contact with, you know, what the lecture was supposed to be about. But then I realized he probably didn't want to be a realist. He wanted to be Maja Mika instead. And, you know, from the point of co-emergence, without application of posting Heart of compassion. Of whating? Or just compassion. Did you say poisting? Yeah, I mean, or, you know... What does poisting mean?

[47:30]

It means like the image of, you know, of psychic relationship, you know, like that. And then you were talking about... empty mind not being attached to good or bad. then it just realized, I just realized that the word compassion, I mean, as a Buddha, if you're compassionate, I mean, which, you know, and then that would be on the side of lightness, light instead of darkness, and I was thinking that compassion was kind of a key where it would manifest through your koshas and integration Did you say cautious?

[48:31]

Of your energy bodies, you know, like the Buddha's energy bodies, mental, physical, etheric, and... cosmic body, you know, because it's really kind of different because I've been reading a lot of Tibetan stuff. Actually, I was counting them last week. There were 20 of them that were related to Mahayana, the vehicle. and intermixing the energy body. And then your lecture seems so much different because when I look at you, I can see colors, you know, and then like a silent sound or something, and it's from a place of being really quiet in comparison of studying, you know, a text source or something like that.

[49:39]

And then so I was just thinking that I always forget, you get into the text, but then it's just the idea of compassion. But then again, you can be attached to compassion too, right? I mean... I mean, of course, it probably wouldn't be a bad thing, but, you know, so it just got a little confusing that there's, you know, just sitting in emptiness and then I'm afraid to say anything because, you know, but then there's light and dark, you know, when you teach about compassion. which is really good. But the point was I was just thinking about the mixing of the energies and how it's so different because you don't really talk about how it goes from north to south. And then it mixes with the universal body and bodies, because I know that's not the way the Zen people do it.

[50:52]

And so... But we don't want to be attacked. Yeah. Yeah. Right. So I don't really know what the question is. Well, I'm glad you overcame your fear of speaking. Yeah, because every time I see you, the question disappears. Compassion. Thanks. Yeah, one... There was a Buddhist scholar who actually taught for a little while at Berkeley. And I met my wife in one of his classes. His name was Edward Kansa. And he said that one kind of like sketch that he made was that the Tibetan monks sit in meditation and they say mantras to Avalokiteshvara, to the bodhisattva of compassion.

[51:59]

...visualizations of the bodhisattva of compassion. And by these visualizations and these mantras, they're praying that this compassion will manifest in their body. And he said, in the Soto Zen people, they sit and don't say anything or visualize anything. And in their silent, non-visioning state, they're also inviting this compassion to come into their bodies. So it is a different style, a style beyond meditation and beyond recitation to invite the same presence of compassion into the body. just two different styles for different types of people, different types of beings to invite this compassion into our body, to give our body over for the realization of compassion.

[53:12]

But that doesn't mean that we In Zen we don't talk and it doesn't mean that the Tibetan practitioner doesn't sit quietly. It's just that we don't talk to get anything when we talk. We don't talk to keep anything, which comes down sometimes to just not talking, to just being quiet because no words reach the place where this compassion comes from. So you can enter the silent bond silently or you can enter the silent bond with sound, with words. You can talk yourself into the silence or you can silently immediately enter.

[54:19]

And once you've talked yourself into the silent, you can express this place silently. And once you've silently entered, you can express this place verbally. So it's a different approach to approaching the same silent bond where the compassion actually is functioning already. And we're just trying to let it in and also realize that every moment is an opportunity for that. No drop of water is not important. One drop was good, actually.

[55:32]

There was just one. And that's fine. It was good. No more? No, thanks. I wanted just one. It was kind of a big one, actually. Maybe there's one more. No? Anything else coming up? You said that we have this moment and you said that opens the possibility of wasting it and I felt

[56:34]

Well, if we have this moment, wasting isn't wasting. It's an idea. It's a story. Wasting is an idea, yeah. It's a story. So if we really have this moment, there's a way. Well, actually, this moment is being given to us, and there really is no wasting. And yet, if we tell the story that we're not appreciating this moment, then we will fall into the story. And that's how it will be for us. We'll be in that story. Now, that story is not the end of the story. We can recover from that story. but if we don't appreciate the moment, we're vulnerable to being hurt by the story that we wasted it.

[57:37]

Somebody, if you're in that story, then you're vulnerable to the story that you wasted the meeting, that you didn't appreciate the person. Really, you did, but since you're in the story of not paying attention to them, And then you get the story of, I wasted the meeting and I didn't respect them, I didn't appreciate them. Really, you did, so you've got to be careful of the story that you don't. But sometimes the story about wasting is helpful because it's like a reminder. Yeah, sometimes the person feels, the person's in a story, that what's happening is not important. that what's happening isn't a gift that they just received, that they're in that story.

[58:42]

And for someone to point out to them that they're in that story and that they're missing the opportunity of their life because they're in the story of this isn't important and they can throw this water away, it's sometimes helpful to notice that. This person, by the way, this person changed his name to one drop of water. Taiki Sui he changed his name to, one drop of water. It was very important teaching for him. We cannot waste any water but if we don't appreciate that it seems like we do waste it. So we live in a deluded world of wasting opportunities, of wasting our life because we don't meditate on our life. Or we don't meditate on our life cannot be wasted.

[59:46]

And cannot means it's impossible, but also means must not. We shouldn't fall into that we're... that we're not appreciating the gift of the moment. Of course... But if we have the dream that we don't, then we need a teaching to give up that dream. It's not a reality, but we have to give up the unreality of wasting. So then we say, don't waste time. In Zen we say, don't waste time. Boom, boom, boom, don't waste time. This life is fleeting. Don't waste it. Of course we don't. We don't waste it. So that's why we're told, don't waste it. so you don't think that you could waste it. And then somehow you realize that you're not wasting it, and you feel really happy that you're not wasting this moment.

[60:50]

And you're not being inattentive or unappreciative to you when you feel like you are wasting it, even though it's not true. So being inattentive and unappreciative and ungrateful, being in that story tends to push us into the story of, I wasted my life. I didn't say thank you to my wife. I didn't say thank you to my children. I didn't say thank you to my parents. I wasted it. Well, that's not true, but you don't want to get into that story, so say thank you every moment. Say welcome. welcome enlightenment, welcome enlightenment. And the more you do that, the more you fall into the trap of wasting your life. But maybe to get with the program, sometimes somebody says, don't waste your time. Don't do what you can't do. Don't waste the life which you cannot waste.

[61:56]

Don't waste a moment that you cannot So don't do what you can't do. You can't waste time, so don't waste time. In other words, really appreciate each moment and make that practice steady. May that practice be steady. May we be really concentrated in the practice of realizing that we don't waste one drop of water, even while we're pouring quite a lot of drops every moment as we pour the water.

[63:03]

We don't waste any of them and we really appreciate all those wonderful drops. Same with tears and blood and time. I want to share this fortune I was up in the cookie. It says, Love is the affinity which links and draws together the elements of the world. I thought that sounded a lot like what you've been saying.

[64:12]

Love is the affinity which links and draws together the elements of the world. So I was curious about where it came from. So I Googled it, of course. It's a quote from Teilhard de Chardin. Now he ended up in a fortune company. I never know. Thanks. But that was said to be love, but the, what do you call it, I've been saying that that's enlightenment. But enlightenment is with the caveat that it's ungraspable. The elements, maybe you think you can grasp the elements, but the link, what is the link and what else?

[65:16]

The affinity, you can't grasp the affinity. You can't grasp the linkage. So it's a love, but it's a love, it's actually an ungraspability that is love. So otherwise we reify, substantialize it, and then we miss it, because it's not a substantial thing. Of course we don't miss it, but when we dream that it's substantial, we feel like we miss it. Oh, hi.

[67:39]

I just wanted to say something real quick. Yeah, go ahead. I really liked your idea about common bond. I was walking by the river, and I just, like you said, affinity with nature, I just felt like, oh, it's just so heavy coming at me, you know. And I also like the motion in the water. But anyway, it really felt thick. It was just... And all the other concepts you've been talking about. It's really nice. Just the total bottom without non-discursive thought. Because I see that's your point of view. I finally see what you're teaching.

[68:55]

Congratulations. My story, what I understand now is there's presence and there's a story. And when there's no presence, there's only story. By the way, no presence is a story. There really is presence. But when there's a story about there being no presence, then it seems like there's just a story and it seems like there's no presence, because there's a story of no presence plus the rest of the story.

[69:59]

But there could be a story which includes that there's presence. which there is. Right. Awareness of awareness. Yeah. And in that presence can help you study the story. Right. Yes. That's the story. Now the practice, another story. I understand that as a concept. Yeah, if you sit here until I have that presence of the story, until I'm just in the presence of the conscious, I can be there. That's where we communicate. Like in meditation, what I'm doing in some way is... The ceremony of trying to go toward presence. The thing is, when I say trying to go, then you have time. So that's why it's hard to... Ceremonies often use time.

[71:05]

Yeah, and that's another concept. Yeah, but you use the concept of time to have a ceremony. In our tradition, you have a ceremony about something that's... Right, right. But you do the ceremony in time. Right. Because otherwise you have trouble... As a temporal being, you have trouble entering. A practice is not caught by time unless you take time into account and say, I'm going to sit for... So that ceremony, you have to have that ceremony which has that time to get in touch with what the time doesn't reach. Right, the time is part of the presence. So, I have the gateway, it's always to talk to the ceremony. Because you were at one time, I was trying to see the intention.

[72:11]

But I said, I had to be present to be able to see, because now I just see it's a concept. I see it. I'm just telling a story about a story, not that story. So until I'm there, it's just... The ceremony of trying to get there. That's what I am doing. But don't do the ceremony of trying to get there. Do the ceremony of not trying to get anything. Do a ceremony of not trying to get anything. That's the story I want to get. And remember then, I'm using the ceremony of not getting anything. knowing that the ceremony is not reaching the actual place of not getting anything. But remembering those two together opens you to realize the actual ceremony is the front gate to.

[73:24]

And the ceremony, when I said, I don't want to get in, that's the story I'm telling. I don't want to get in. Yeah. So it's really, that's what happens. There's only, when I don't get in, there's no concept of this presence. There's the concept of this. It's not so much there's no concept, but you're not caught by it. You're not caught by it, right. But you have to have it. to realize that you're not caught by it. It doesn't catch anything. You have to see that. You have to see that, but you need to have the concept there in order to see that the concept doesn't reach. The concept of, for example, non-discrimination doesn't reach non-discrimination, but you need that in order to realize non-discrimination. And I think that's where you were saying it's like impermanence in those conditions. Yeah. It's in that place where you cannot reach and understand.

[74:29]

We need a teaching of impermanence to realize impermanence. That's the hard part, because you need a story to move beyond. And we do have stories, so that's not really a problem to have stories. It's just a question of how to use them to not be caught by them, to not be stuck in them. but we already have stories and we're stuck in them usually. To find a way to work with the stories so we won't be caught. And the only way to work with the story is to be not in the story. To be what? The only way to work with the story is to be in the present. Right, be present. and learn about it, study it. And that's what you said, that's what Adam did. Yeah. Learn about the story.

[75:31]

And learn about all stories, not just some, but every one. Learn how to study every story with the same respect and the same appreciation. Like, study every person. Doesn't mean you like everybody. Doesn't mean you don't like everybody. It means you love everybody. You study everybody. You try to learn about everybody. Learn about every story. Then you become free of stories when you can study every story the same. Full attention to every story. That shows you're free of the story. Because usually we're caught by stories, we only want to study some stories. Or we only want to pay attention to some stories. So we dedicate any virtue and merit of this evening to our great abiding friend, Paul Winnicott.

[76:39]

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