Owl. Owl. Reminder. Reminder. If you do not want me to touch your precious body in the zendo to make postural suggestions, let me know or let Aul know and I won't. Otherwise, I might go around the Zendo and check your posture and make some suggestions. Some people request that. And speaking of precious bodies, the other day in the Zendo, Fred kind of fell over and hit his head on the meal board.

[01:25]

Is that right? You don't know. But anyway, I heard you did. They told me about that. Yeah. So there's a story that Fred fell over and hit his head on the meal board. And then I heard... May I tell Steri I heard from you? Yes. I heard that when he woke up there were three angels there with him. It's quite true. Huh? Yes. Did you say it's true? Well, yes, they were. Is that true or is that a story that you told me? It's a story. Yeah. But you had a story that there were three angels. I believe it. And you believe that story, that there were three angels with him, and one of them was holding him in close embrace and kissing his cheeks. Yes. And so this happens sometimes.

[02:26]

The angels come and hold you and kiss your cheeks. And that happened right after a disaster. This is the way that the angels responded to the disaster of Fred, you know, unceremonially putting his head on the meal board. But it was unceremonial because he was unconscious. Ordinarily, he puts his head ceremonially on the meal board. It doesn't mean I'm conscious. If you're not conscious, it doesn't count as a ceremonial meal. That's true. So anyway, we have the proposal that there is this thing we call zazen, Or anyway, we call it Zazen. And when we say Zazen, in some situations we mean the practice of the Buddhas.

[03:39]

And in the state of Zazen, many wonderful things are going on. Like for example, the evening bee breeze caresses the trees tenderly. The trembling trees embrace the trees, embrace the breeze tenderly. Everything is working harmoniously, supporting everything else. and everything is enlightening everything else and liberating everything else. This is the Dharma realm of Zazen, which is described, for example, in many places, in many scriptures, but in Dogen's writings it's described in the Bendo Ho, Bendo Wa,

[04:46]

And so the Buddhists have this great way of practice and its characteristic or its standard or its criterion is called self-fulfilling samadhi. And this self-fulfilling samadhi is the way all things come forth to realize you and how you give yourself to all beings generously. by which together with all other beings they realize themselves. In this realm the entire sky turns into enlightenment and the whole earth realizes the Buddha way. And that's called Zazen. And then after Dogen describes at some length this inconceivable, unstoppable, ceaseless, miraculous unfolding of the Dharma throughout the entire world with no hindrance and all being saved and free, he says, all this, however, does not appear within perception because it is unconstructedness and stillness.

[06:01]

So this zazen is unconstructedness and stillness. And Rachel came up day before yesterday and asked, well, how is unconstructed? Well, she said, no, she said, what did you say? What is practice? I said, why is that a practice? First of all, you said, what is practice, right? No. I said, why? is this, why are you calling the enlightenment of the Buddhas a practice? Oh, oh, why am I calling the enlightenment of the Buddhas a practice? And then I said, and I said, I don't know what I said, but anyway, at some point, she backed me into a corner and I said that, she said, what's the practice? And I said, the practice is unconstructedness and stillness. That's the practice. The practice is immediate Realization. The practice is immediate realization. The practice is immediate enlightenment. That's what the practice is. The practice is enlightenment.

[07:08]

The practice is... And what's enlightenment? Enlightenment's the way you're helping me and I'm helping you. And you're helping each other. Enlightenment is the activity, activity by which we are helping each other. and being helped by each other. Enlightenment is our ability and activity of practice, of helping each other. It's an activity and it's a state. And it's called the self-fulfilling samadhi. It's called Zazen. And it's unconstructed and it's not moving. It's still. The way we're helping each other happens in stillness. There's movement, but then as soon as I arrive in my new position, I arrive there by your kindness. And as I arrive, I administer great kindness to all beings without moving.

[08:10]

My stillness, my presence, My presence, my actual presence is due to you. My ability to be still is an activity which is supported by you. And my stillness which is supported by you supports you. That's enlightenment and that's the practice. The practice is unconstructedness and stillness. and it is inconceivable, and it does not appear within perception. In other words, it's not one of the perceptions. It's not separate from perception because it is the unconstructed stillness in which all the different perceptions are helping each other and enlightening each other. So that's Zazen. That's immediate realization.

[09:12]

That is the practice of the Buddha and the practice of the bodhisattvas. That's the practice. And then there's also another kind of zazen, which some people call my zazen. And I think it's okay to call this other kind of Zazen, my Zazen. Zazen, and the other end, the Buddha Zazen, you can also call my Zazen if you want to too, but it doesn't mean the Zazen that you're doing by yourself. But you can have a Zazen that in a sense is your particular contribution to the great Zazen. But that's really kind of like my ceremony of Zazen. The ceremony of Zazen. And as I mentioned to you quite a few times, and as I wrote a little article in what is called Warm Smiles from Cold Mountain, it's an article called The Ceremony of Zazen.

[10:20]

And most of the translations of Fukan Zazengi are translated as Universal Encouragements for the Practice of Zazen. But there's a character there that they don't translate called Ceremony. This character. I forgot how to write it. I'm going to recite this. It's sort of like that. This character means ceremony. And it's in the text, but they don't translate it. They don't say ceremony. You could also say procedure or something like that, or formality or rite or ritual.

[11:28]

What's described there is a ritual, a ceremony for doing Zazen. It's a ceremony called Zazen. And this character is on the cover of Being Upright, that character. And today I'd like to just talk about that. There's a relationship, which I mentioned before, between the actual practice and your conceivable your story that you're living in about practice, the story of you and me and the Zendo and the ceremonies we're doing to celebrate the real unimpeded, inconceivable, universal working of the Buddha mind, the ceremony we do to celebrate that is very important.

[12:33]

And so we practice that. And that ceremony is related to the other thing. And there's a Chinese expression for it called kano doko. And kan means request or offering or appeal. And No means response. So our zazen is an appeal or a request and then there's a response to our request. And the response is the activity of the Buddha mind. And doko means the place where the crossing of paths.

[13:39]

So where the path of the practice of the Buddha crosses with the ceremony of our effort. of our little storied world where we go and sit in the zendo and offer incense and have a body which is separate from other bodies in which we practice ceremonially with. That practice, where it intersects with the Buddhist practice, that's where the practice lives. So the merit of zazen, the merit of the ceremony, isn't just that we do the ceremony, and we do it hopefully skillfully, that we sit upright skillfully and with attention. It isn't just that.

[14:41]

It's when that, it's how and when and where that practice we're doing connects with the practice of all Buddhas and Bodhisattvas and all beings. That point of contact is where the practice is actually realized. And that's for sitting meditation, the practice of sitting meditation. the ceremony of Zazen. But it's also for ceremonies like receiving precepts. So maybe you go to a ceremony and you perform a ceremony with others to receive the Bodhisattva precepts. And so you say, I go for refuge in Buddha. You think that. Your mental karma is to think of it, your physical karma is to think of it, your vocal karma is to say it.

[15:49]

that request, that appeal, when it crosses with the actuality of the precepts. That's where the ceremony actually works. It isn't just you and me saying, I take refuge in Buddha. It's you and me saying, I take refuge in Buddha and actually meeting, like face to face, meeting all the Buddhas. That's where the practice actually lives. And we need the Buddhas to appear in the world to get us to do the ceremony so we can meet them. The Kano-doko, the meeting, the crossing the paths of appeal and response for a student and teacher or an unenlightened and enlightened. This concept is very big in Chinese Buddhism and it's, I think, very big for Dogen.

[17:01]

But it does appear in Indian texts too, like, for example, the Samdhi Nirmacana Sutra. Towards the end, talking about the Buddha and the different bodies of Buddha, Manjushri Bodhisattva asked the Buddha, Bhagavan, how is it that the Nirmanakaya are known to come from the Tathagata so that sentient beings can generate merit through viewing, hearing, and revering them? And Manjushri, the Buddha says, the Nirmanakaya comes forth due to the intense observing of due to intensely observing the Tathagatas and also because the Nirmanakaya is the blessing of the Tathagatas. When we think of Buddha, Buddha comes. And the way Buddha comes is called the Nirmanakaya Buddha.

[18:05]

When we think of the Dharmakaya Buddha, when we practice the ceremony of inviting the Dharmakaya Buddha to come, the Dharmakaya Buddha does come, but also the Dharmakaya Buddha does come as the Nirmanakaya Buddha so that we can orient our energy towards the Dharmakaya Buddha. And the Dharmakaya Buddha is the zazen of the Buddhas. It is the immediate enlightenment which is the practice of the Buddhas. Once again, it makes sense to me that our mind doesn't understand stillness as an activity. Sometimes we do, like if somebody's standing up, like just standing up straight.

[19:07]

We sometimes say, in yoga, mountain pose, right? The mountain pose, standing up. Sometimes people can see, oh yeah, that's an action. Just standing still, upright, on the earth. That's an action. Even though you're not moving, it's an action. Can you see that? Or to sit, like I'm out, unmoving, in the moment. You're not moving. It's an action. And there's an intention there too, probably, or maybe. I am intending to stand upright or sit upright. So there's a mental intention and a physical intention, mental and physical karma. And I also am being quiet. So we have body, speech, and mind in the form of sitting or standing upright. It's an activity and it's unmoving. And it's a ceremony to celebrate the unmoving, unconstructed, immediate realization.

[20:13]

It directly indicates great wisdom and compassion. Great wisdom and compassion are unconstructedness and stillness. and not permanent in the sense of, you know, not stuck there. So the world changes and you have a new, brand new unconstructedness, a brand fresh unconstructedness and stillness. And then another one. And another one. infinite emergencies of immediate enlightenment. And that's the practice. And it's not moving. And it's in the stillness is full of unlimited compassion. And

[21:24]

It is inconceivable. It is inconceivable. And it is not recognized. And that which can be recognized is not realization itself. So there is recognition. There is recognition of the truth. That does happen. It does happen. It does happen. It does happen. And I'll talk to you more about that besides what I'm going to say now. I'll talk to you more. I intend to bring up the case of the national teachers teaching about the national teachers teaching of insentient beings. It refers to this. But just now I want to say that there is the issue of some beings and these beings are called saints. Saints. And I think that refers to, you know, for example, arhats. These are beings who actually do see the truth, do grasp the truth.

[22:33]

But the truth they grasp is an existential, is an experience. But the Buddha's wisdom is not the saint's grasp of the truth. The Buddha's wisdom is the actual state of us helping each other. And that's not something that's recognized. It's actually the practice of us helping each other. That's the Buddha's wisdom and the Buddha's compassion. So it's the difference between an experience, like an experience of the world, or the truth of the world, and that's one, and the other is the world of truth. The actual body of truth and the experience of the body of truth, or the recognition of the body of truth. So the recognition of the body of truth is not the body of truth itself.

[23:39]

the recognition of the Buddha's body and the thinking about the Buddha's body and the understanding of Buddha's body is not the Buddha's body. So Zazen is the Buddha body. And we do a ceremony to celebrate that quite frequently. Like we do a ceremony of me being present, or me trying to be present, or me remembering about being present, and thinking about being present, and maybe kind of like feeling present, and maybe like feeling good about feeling present, and maybe feeling an intention to practice being present some more. In other words, to practice the ceremony of being present. I'm always present. You're always present. but you're not always practicing the ceremony of being present.

[24:44]

Some of you aren't always, anyway. I'm not always practicing the ceremony of being present. And when I don't practice the ceremony of being present, I don't understand that I'm present. Because I'm doing some other ceremony which I don't even know, I don't even realize, it's the ceremony of being distracted. I'm not distracted, I actually am present, but I'm not doing the ceremony of being present. So we must, and the word for ceremony is person. The radical on the left side of the character means person, the radical on the right side means truth or meaning. You have to line the person up with the truth by ceremony. and it's hard to make everything a ceremony. As some of you probably have noticed since the class two days ago, if you tried to make every step you took a celebration of the Buddha, if you tried to give every step you took as a gift to all Buddhas, you probably noticed

[26:08]

that it was difficult to do it every single step. Did anybody try that and notice that? Yeah, some people tried it. I tried it. There were some steps that I took and I didn't make them gifts to Buddha. I missed. But there is a Bodhisattva vow in the scriptures, Samantabhadra's vows, to make every step you take a gift. to make every action a body, a gift. If you raise your hand, fine. But it's also a gift to Buddha. If you rub your face, if you scratch your cheek, fine. But there is a vow which Samantabhadra put into the world, which is, every time you move, every bodily posture make that a gift to all Buddhas, make that an homage to all Buddhas, make that praise to all Buddhas.

[27:18]

Truly, it's not that easy to do it every single moment, but there's a vow of the great Bodhisattva to live that way, to make every action an homage to Buddha. And also in the Ehe Koso Hotsugaman, there is a practice called confession and repentance, which will melt away the root of distraction from making every action a gift to all Buddhas. So you confess, oh, I missed that one. I spoke. But I didn't make that a gift to all Buddhas. You can even send a donation to somebody, but not notice as you send it that you made a gift.

[28:21]

You can give somebody a gift, you know, and they say thanks, and you hardly even notice that they said thank you. Rather than say, oh, I'm now giving this person a gift. In the Zendo, you know, people say sometimes when they hear about making offerings, sometimes people say, why don't we do that in Zen? They say, well, we do. Before every meal in the Zendo, well, not everyone, breakfast and lunch, somebody comes in and makes an offering to Buddha. They make offering of food to Buddha. But the people don't necessarily notice, hey, we're making an offering to Buddha right now. Do you ever miss that when they're doing that? Do you ever like not join and say, ooh, here we go, giving Buddha a gift. Even the soku who's making the offering, the head server as they come in to make the offering, they may not even be thinking. It's possible. Their consciousness may not even be there. I am now going to, I want to, and I'm going to offer food to Buddha. They may not be thinking that. They may not be enjoying that they're actually

[29:30]

expressing Samantabhadra's vow. Does that make sense? But they might be. They can be. And we all can join that every moment. And we also can miss it quite frequently and then confess and repent, I'm not in the swing of it. I'm... Okay. Now here we go. A gift to Buddhas. Gift to Buddhas. Here we go. All right. Suzuki Roshi's teachers, his two main teachers, I would say, are his first teacher, his teacher whom he became the successor of, Gyoku-jun So-on Daisho, and another teacher who he studied with after his first teacher died, named Kishizawa Iyan Roshi.

[30:48]

And Kishizawa Iyan Roshi lived fairly near to Suzuki Roshi in Shizuoka province, in a town right near the town Suzuki Roshi lived in. And we went to Japan a few years ago and went to visit Kishizawa Roshi's temple. So Suzuki Roshi studied with him until he came to America. As a matter of fact, I should say, he studied with him and when Kishizawa Iyan died is right before Suzuki Roshi came to America. I think I think that was one of the reasons why he was ready to come, is that his second teacher had died. And Kishizawa Roshi was a disciple of Nishihari Bokusan, another important Zen teacher. And one time Nishihari Bokusan said to Kishizawa Iyan, he said, I don't know, something like, it's just in Japanese he said it, right?

[31:56]

You are not my disciple. And, you know, Kisar Iyan thought he was his disciple. He was, you know, working pretty hard trying to be a disciple of this teacher. And he said, well, what leads you to say that, teacher? And he said, you bow to me in Doksan or you bow to me in the Zendo, but when I'm coming out of the bathroom or when I'm lounging around, you don't bow to me. therefore you're not my disciple." In other words, you should bow to me every time you see me. In other words, every meeting should be a ceremony of meeting the Buddha.

[33:06]

Not that I'm Buddha, but it's a ceremony of meeting Buddha because everybody you meet is when you meet someone, that's making an offering to Buddha. When you see someone that's praising Buddha, that's paying homage to Buddha. Every action of seeing, hearing, thinking, talking, every action. And if you don't do that, you're not my disciple, he says. So once again, standing upright, still and quiet is an action and it could be a ceremony to celebrate unconstructedness and stillness. And that ceremony, when done wholeheartedly, that ceremony connects with and crosses the path with the actuality of unconstructedness and stillness.

[34:11]

And when you do it wholeheartedly, when you learn over years of practice to do these ceremonies wholeheartedly, then you will realize completely this immediate realization. And so we talked a little bit about that too, that it takes many years of doing the ceremony of zazen or the ceremony of making offerings, or the ceremony of standing, or the ceremony of walking, the ceremony of meeting someone. It takes a long time to do these ceremonies with each other in such a way that there's just a ceremony. There's no you doing it anymore. After many years of you doing it, [...] and noticing that extra part, that extra thing, The time comes when the you doing it drops away and there's just the practice. Then the fullness of the practice is open.

[35:17]

You're open to the fullness of the practice. And you're no longer hindering it with the distraction of you doing it, of you doing the ceremony. So there's kind of a phase here of... sort of reconstructing your life and then deconstructing your life and then reconstructing your life. So reconstructing your life by paying attention to your life, paying attention to your action. So we're already active all day long We're all active. I don't see anybody that's not active. We're active. We're karmically engaged. So then there's a reconstruction of this karmic life, a reconstruction which is to start paying attention to the action.

[36:27]

So the last practice period here, there's lots of emphasis on paying attention to karma. Just paying attention to your karma is a major, is a huge reconstruction of your life. Now it's not just that you're living your life. You're watching yourself act. You're monitoring your actions. You're giving close attention to your actions. You're giving gracious attention to your actions. And so that's a big reconstruction. That's a new kind of life. And then also as you give your attention to your actions, your actions evolve positively under that gracious attention. So that's another way that your life gets reconstructed. Or you can say you're reconstructing your life story because karma is your life story.

[37:33]

And so you change your life story from a life story to a life story which is now being observed. So now you have a new life story called, I'm observing my life story. And as you watch your life story, your life story evolves positively. Up to a point where you start to feel like angels are around you all the time, kissing your cheeks. Which is not that bad, right Fred? But that's not the full reconstruction. That reconstruction gets you ready for deconstruction. Not destruction, but deconstruction. Which is that you realize that you really can't find your story at a certain point. because there's no you having a story.

[38:34]

There's a story but there's nobody to find the story. The story is empty of any inherent existence. Or another way to put it is you can't tell whose story is who. You know, everybody else's story is your story. And your story is not really your story anymore. It's just a story. So your story is deconstructed. You realize the emptiness of your story And then you're free of your story. Before that, your story is getting better and better, and your caregiving abilities are getting better and better. And then finally, you're liberated from your story by realizing its insubstantiality, ungraspability, bottomlessness, toplessness, and so on. then it is completely the case that the ceremony you're doing is exactly the same as the Zazen of the Buddhas.

[39:42]

You're not doing the ceremony in that limited way only. You realize the emptiness of the limited form of your ceremony. So then you realize completely the ceremony of zazen, and you continue, however, to do the ceremony, and in that way you're continually, now you're continuing the reconstruction, but it's after the deconstruction. After our class the other day, I went back over to Cloud Hall and went into room, what's my room number?

[40:53]

One. I went into room one and I was looking at the bookcase and I thought, how can we ever have another class? I mean, what more is there to say? I mean, I thought, let's just practice for the rest of, not have any classes anymore. I have nothing more to say. I really felt like that. Wow. And I didn't talk that long for me. And I do feel that way. But at the same time, not at the same time, then a little bit later I was in the Zendo and it was lunchtime. And these servers came in. You know, and... The Buddha came in the room with these servers.

[42:02]

These servers brought the Buddha into the room. These people came in to serve us and they were so beautiful. Did you see them? They were so beautiful. Unconstructedness and stillness every step of the way just flowed into the room. Step by step, they were making offerings to all Buddhas. Step by step, the practice was there. So I thought, well, maybe we could have another class. There is more to talk about. What are we talking about? The practice. I don't know if the servers were enjoying their service of us as much as we were enjoying them serving us. But we were letting them serve us too.

[43:04]

We were letting them be beautiful servers. They couldn't have done that if we weren't there. It wouldn't have been the same if they came into Empty Zendo. But it was what it was and it was so moving to see this beautiful ceremony. And that ceremony is a place where that ceremony meets with the actuality of the Buddha's practice. And that place is realized in a wholeheartedness which it seems like we get very close to quite frequently around here when we're doing these ceremonies. And another thing that struck me is that Part of the reason, part of the causal condition of me seeing this beautiful, seeing the beauty of these limited human expressions, to see these limited human expressions somehow weren't just, I mean, that they were connected to unlimited expression.

[44:15]

that just walking into a room with human feet and carrying a pot is as beautiful as any ballet. But part of the causal conditions for that was that I'd been talking my head off about how beautiful the world is when you're in the mode of giving and receiving. So by talking about this for an hour or so, then you go in the Zendo and you open to it. So your karma or my karma is to talk about, which means I think about making offerings to Buddhas. I talk to you about making offerings to Buddhas and then there's a little bit of a chance that if I go in the Zendo, I will think about

[45:18]

We, I, are making offerings. This is offering to Buddha, this practice here. This person is making an offering to Buddha. This person is making an offering to Buddha. This person... When you see people doing that, it's very... Well, it's like... It's worth the trouble. And not only that, but then it helps us be ready to deal with the next disaster. And sure enough, next time somebody falls, probably angels will come forth because they've been practicing giving on their seat. So when somebody needs help, they get off their seat and they help the person and they kiss the person, if the person needs a kiss. This is, you know, this is the practice, the ceremony which gets us ready for the actual practice. and which is never separate from the practice, but if we don't do the ceremony, the ceremonies, and if we don't think about them, if we don't connect our thinking and our posture and our voice to the ceremonies, we might miss a few opportunities of beauty and inspiration and courage and fearlessness in the face of moment by moment disasters.

[46:50]

Disasters are coming. Troubles are coming. There may be trouble ahead. There is going to be trouble ahead, unless we die right now. But then... So, there is trouble ahead. So let's be ready for it. And I feel like, yeah, we've got to practice to be ready for it. So when the trouble comes, we meet it with stillness, which means, you know, we accept our position of standing or sitting. We're upright in that position of standing or sitting or walking or reclining or whatever.

[47:53]

We're right there. And we're gentle and tender with what comes, and flexible, and peaceful, and harmonious, and honest. And then we'll see that this is the Buddha coming, this is the Dharma coming, this is the Sangha coming. This is the practice. And another reason why perhaps we can have another class this January is that you may have something you'd like to say, even though I have nothing more to say.

[48:56]

You are invited to give feedback. Hello. Hello. Kurt Elaine. That's French. Yeah. French Idaho. Goodwill. Sometimes I imagine that this practice of, say, standing as an offering to the Buddha,

[50:06]

and always remembering that as that ceremony, sometimes I imagine that is somehow somewhat dissonant with the practice of just standing. And I mean, I know sometimes I just imagine this. And so I'm hoping that you might say something about that dissonance. Yeah, I think other Zen students have mentioned this too, that You hear in Zen, you know, when you're standing, just stand. When you're sitting, just sit. And the Buddha taught that too. You know, in the seen, there will be just the seen. In the heard, there will be just the heard. So if you're standing, you're just standing. Okay? So if you hear that teaching and then you practice that way, okay, you're practicing the Buddha's teaching. But I'm emphasizing or pointing out something that may not be obvious, is that when the Buddha gives you a teaching like, just sit, or just stand, and when you actually do that practice, you have just, that's the way to make an offering to Buddha.

[51:23]

So one of the main, there's many gifts to give to Buddha, like food's great, you know, Incense, candles, flowers, temples, gardens, robes, all kinds of different, many, many kinds of lights. Those are all good offerings to Buddhas. But the supreme, incomparable offering to Buddha is Dharma practice. So when the Buddha and the Buddha's disciples have transmitted to us just sit, And when we practice just sitting, we have just done what is their favorite gift. That's it, that's their favorite gift. Now, you might notice, you don't have to, people don't necessarily notice this, that's why I'm saying this, you might notice, oh, I am now doing what my teacher suggested, and I would like to give, now I would like to give the thing I'm doing which my teacher suggested, I would like to give this to my teacher.

[52:29]

it increases the joy. It fills out the picture. You say, you didn't think of this by yourself. Somebody told you this. And then you love this person so much that you did what they told you. And they were very happy that you did it because they loved you and they wanted you to do it so you'd be happy and now you're doing it. And they say, and now I'm going to continue to do this partly because I love you and I want to repay your kindness of giving me this practice. When I got ordained, The day I got ordained, I said to Suzuki Roshi's wife, what can I give Suzuki Roshi as a gift to express my gratitude for ordination? She said, your practice. That's right out of the sutras. And your practice is not just you just sitting or just standing or just cutting vegetables. That is your practice. And those are wonderful gifts. But even if you don't think you're giving it, the Buddha is very happy that you're doing what the Buddha instructed you to do. But you would be more intimate with the Buddha if you realized that actually you're making the Buddha happy, that you have a relationship with the Buddha.

[53:40]

It isn't just the Buddha said, Brandon, just stand, and you stood. It's also that when you did, the Buddha felt like you heard her and responded to her, and she's happy. And you look and you see that there's a tear running down her cheek, and she loves you, and she's going to kiss you on the cheek. There's a relationship. It doesn't just come to you and stop and you do it. It resonates back and forth and back and forth. That you make the Buddha successful at her work by doing her instructions. And giving your practice to the Buddha makes you realize that and then also helps you then, that supports you then to do the practice of just standing there or just sitting there more. And there's other practices, too, which are Dharma practices which are offerings to Buddha. For example, taking on other people's suffering is a Dharma practice which is a great gift to Buddhas. Being of service to all beings is a Dharma practice which is a gift to Buddhas.

[54:43]

Doing all the practices that Buddhas have done is a gift to Buddhas. And so on. There's seven kinds of Dharma gifts to Buddhas. But each one, when you're doing them, they're perfectly good practices, but also make them gifts, because the Buddha is the one who told you about doing them. Now, of course, as you know, when you teach children to do something, and they learn it, and you see them learn it, it's a great joy, right? And a lot of times, after they learn it, they're so happy to learn it, they don't necessarily think, thanks for teaching me that. They don't necessarily think that. The moment I taught my daughter to ride a bicycle, she didn't really turn around and say thanks. Years later you realize, oh my God, they taught me that, when you grow up.

[55:44]

So part of maturing is not only that you receive the teachings and practice them, which is great, but you start to realize that somebody taught you this and you want to repay them. by continuing the practice and committing to continue this practice. And you're starting to become more mature in the practice. So this giving practice is to bring your practice to maturity. So if I'm chopping carrots and I'm aware that I'm doing it wholeheartedly, I'm aware that I'm doing it wholeheartedly, and I'm aware that this understanding of the ceremony has been given to me by teacher, by Buddha, by everyone, and so I'm giving it away. You're giving it away, yes. What's that? You're not only doing this, but you're also giving this practice away.

[56:44]

And particularly, you're also giving the merit of this practice away. You're giving the practice away and the merit of it away. And if a distractive or discursive thought comes, a random thought comes in my head, and I'm suddenly practicing distraction, and I notice it. The other day you talked about, well, then you give that thought away. Can that ever be a distraction from wholeheartedly cutting a carrot and giving the cutting of the carrot away? I think so, yeah. I think distraction is possible at any time. but the practice of giving that distracted thought away. Yeah, that's the practice of confession and repentance, which at the end of it he says, this practice of confession and repentance with the Buddhas. So you're not practicing by yourself, you're practicing with the Buddhas. So yeah, I'm just standing here, but I'm standing here with all the Buddhas.

[57:48]

And I actually wouldn't be standing, I wouldn't be practicing Zen if it weren't for all the Buddhas and Zen masters. That's why I'm practicing. So I'm practicing Zen with all of them and to not notice that is just missing what's going on. And what we have in Zen is we have rooms more or less packed with people sitting together so that the people in the room will understand that you do not practice by yourself. Because you can kind of see that you're not practicing by yourself when there's a lot of people in the room with you, right? And you have to do that for quite a few years before you understand that when there's nobody in the room, you're still practicing with a lot of people. And these Zen masters who are sitting up in the mountains by themselves, they're allowed to do that because they know that they're surrounded by innumerable beings. And they're just waiting for the humans to come up and sit with them. So you need to practice in a group so that you can see that you're practicing in a group.

[58:54]

I said in a group, but you need to practice in a group so that you can see that your practice is group practice. So I mentioned that before too. Someone said to me, well, I'll just tell the short version of the story. She said, well, then it's really important to practice in a group. And I said, yes, it is. But it's not that you practice in a group, but you practice in a group so that you can realize that the practice is the practice of the group. It's a group practice. It's not your practice. So you do your practice in a group so you can realize the group practice. So when you're cutting vegetables, someday you will understand that you're always practicing together with everyone when you're cutting the vegetables. You're meeting face-to-face with Buddhas while you're cutting vegetables. So it's natural to say, would you like some vegetables? And then when you forget, if you're like, if you just imagine you're cutting vegetables and across the counter was a Buddha, a Nirmanakaya Buddha, or three,

[60:10]

You and three Buddhas cutting vegetables. And you think, this is pretty easy to concentrate today. Actually, it's kind of hard to think of certain things which I sometimes do think about. I'm not going to think about them right now. And then suddenly, miraculously, you think of some petty thought with three Buddhas across the counter. You know, like, Why did they make me cut carrots? I wanted to make soup today. And, you know, wow, I'm thinking like this with three Buddhas across the counter? Wow, that is amazing. And it can happen. It can happen because every petty thought you've ever had, there were several Buddhas across the counter when you had it. So then, in this scenario, they're standing across this and you say, I just wanted to say to you, folks, that I just had this amazing petty thought.

[61:13]

And I don't feel so good about it. I feel like I actually should just be enjoying being with you guys. I'm just so happy to be with you and cutting vegetables with you, you know. Okay. You know. So I felt a little sorrow that I kind of like have a chance to be with Buddhas, but actually rather spend time thinking about, you know, my position in the kitchen or something, my relative status among the other people, you know, and how much longer I have to do this job when I actually could just be sitting here enjoying the presence of Buddhas. So then when you see that, you feel kind of, kind of sorrowful. And then before the Buddhas, you come back to the wonderful work of cutting vegetables with all Buddhas and making your... and just doing it, yeah, undistracted. But then when you're distracted, by revealing and disclosing our lack of faith and practice before the Buddha melts away the root of transgressing from what?

[62:23]

From the wholehearted ceremony which celebrates the practice. So there's lots of opportunities to reveal and disclose a lack of faith and practice before the Buddhas. But this is the pure and simple color of true practice, the true mind of faith, the true body of faith. And Buddhas all have confessed, have done the practice of confession. It isn't that they didn't do it and we're supposed to do it. They did it. They did it far more than we have yet done it. And we have lots more confessions to do But that's the practice, the pure and simple color of it. I've noticed when I look at this construction, in the intersection, this kanodoko, I'm understanding that the ceremonial zazen is aligning with the nirmanakaya, but I also notice that I start thinking that the ceremonial zazen is a means to an end.

[63:46]

A means to an end. An end, right. And when that construct comes up in my mind, I start having this gaining idea, so that if I'm trying to practice awareness of each moment, it's with this idea that I'm going to get to Yom Kippur. And it's troubling me that I'm stuck in that. Yeah, and that feeling of being troubled is repentance. And to sort of like, I don't know, in some way or another say, okay guys, you know, I'm feeling kind of, I mean, I'm actually involved in this old Zen story of being caught by gaining idea. I confess it. I feel troubled by it. And now I'm going to go back to the practice. And you just do that over and over. until gradually more and more you're doing the practice and there's not much gaining idea because it's been gradually burned out by innumerable occasions of noticing that, I was actually trying to, I actually was trying to get something out of the period of Zazen.

[65:04]

You know? Or at least for part of the period of Zazen I was actually trying to get something. And you know, and maybe I'm amazed, dash, embarrassed, just unkind of a little bit, not quite feeling like, yes, this is the way for me. The way for me is actually just to do it. That's my understanding of the way the Buddhas do the practice. And I missed it, so I feel kind of bad about it, and that's enough. And you can also say it out loud to another human being like you're doing right now. And they can listen to you and say, yeah, that's the practice. Under such circumstances, the practice is confection and feeling a little troubled or a little sorrow or discomfort. You didn't come here to get involved in gaining idea, even though once you got here you did get into it.

[66:06]

You came here because of stories about people who were free of it. Well, how do we look at models of people who are free of it? Like the other day when you gave us the example of the tea master, I think, and somebody who could manifest many styles but port with no story. So that image excited me. It's something I aspire to immediately. But then that's an aspiration. That's a model. How do you hold a model like that without making that a gaining concept? Well, one way is if you have any way of seeing that there is a gaining concept, get that out in the open. Get that out in the open. Get that out in the open. Get all the different ways that you can see that you could see something wonderful as a gain. Get all the ways that you would see that as something to get. Get them out in the open. These are the slight infractions around the practice of trying to get something or avoid something.

[67:17]

Get them out in the open, get them out in the open, get them out in the open. And that gradually clears the ground. There's no way to actually get a hold of not getting a hold of anything. But there is a way to observe getting a hold of something. And just get all those out there, and those, and you'll realize eventually the emptiness of those, and then you'll realize that you can't grasp anything. So that's again, the principle is get all your graspings out in the open, and you'll realize, have opportunity to realize there's no way to grasp. But just to hear that is not enough. You need to sort of like hear it, that there's nothing to grasp, and then notice all your grasping, and notice all your grasping, and gradually see, yeah, actually, there really is no evidence for this. But you have to get lots of evidence, apparent evidence out there, and look at it to find out that it doesn't hold up.

[68:19]

Thank you. So if I'm up here talking to you like I am now, how do I make that a ceremony? Do you wish this conversation we're having right now to be an offering to all Buddhas? I do wish that, but I don't know if I can do it. You don't know if you can do what? Make it an offering. No, just wanting it to be offering. Just say, you know, like you could also make, just say, I'm here to talk to you. I'm at your disposal. Sometimes people say, I'm here, I'm at your disposal. I give myself to you. To you or to all Buddhas? I'm just saying, you know how you sometimes go to somebody and you say, I'm at your disposal.

[69:26]

You know, I'm here to serve you. That's a gesture of generosity. You're giving yourself to the person for some time anyway. So you haven't yet really done anything other than that, but that's a gift already. You've given yourself. So similarly, if you wish for your standing here, your standing posture, if you wish for this karma of standing to be a gift to Buddhas, that's already a gift to Buddhas. And it's a gift of mind, because in your heart and mind you want that to be. It's a gift of your body and it's also a gift of your speech. So right now it has been accomplished. It's actually fairly easy to accomplish making offerings because you are, in reality, always making offerings. That's the reality. Reality is we are serving the Buddhas because serving the Buddhas means serving all the beings that we're supporting. We are supporting all beings. Serving Buddha is a short version of that. So when you practice, when you do the practice of giving, of saying my standing posture, this walking is a gift to Buddha, when you think that, you join the reality of it.

[70:40]

But it isn't that you make it a gift. It's that you join the gift-giving that's going on by the ceremony. So the practice of that is just to keep wanting to give it as a gift. She said the practice of that is just to keep wanting. To give it as a gift. To want to give your action. The wanting... The wanting is your karma at the moment, your intention. So in that case, your wanting to give a gift lines up with the activity of gift-giving. So the gift-giving isn't just your karma. Because if your gift-giving was just your karma, then if your karma was turned off, if your karma wasn't the karma of gift-giving, then the gift-giving would stop. But the gift-giving is reality. You are giving yourself. You can't help it. So the thing is to think about giving, and the thinking about giving is the ceremony. You could say the ceremony of Zazen, but you could say also the ceremony of giving, the ceremony of offering.

[71:46]

Zazen is reality. Giving is reality. So these practices are ceremonies to interact with reality. So the actual giving you don't do by yourself. We help you give yourself. But you can do the practice of the ceremony by thinking, I would like to make my body right now in this posture a gift to all Buddhas. So you think. That means your karma lines up with the ceremony, with the giving, and then it becomes a ceremony of giving. Is giving your karma the same as confessing it? giving your karma. No, it's making your karma giving. You can give your intention. If I have a good intention, I could also make that a gift. But I also have an intention of giving. So then my karma of thinking is lined up with giving.

[72:49]

But also, you can also, if you happen to notice a petty thought in your mind, like a thought of of trying to get something for yourself, you say, oh, there's a thought of me trying to get something for myself, okay? So I'll make that a gift. I treat it like a flower on the hill. Although that thought is not about being generous. I make the ungenerous thought a gift. So you recover from pettiness with generosity. Now, if you have a generous thought, then you're doing the ceremony of generosity. Your karma, your thought, is now enacting generosity towards all beings or Buddhas. But you would offer that to... Yeah, you can offer your offering. You can make an offering and you can also offer your offering. You can double this stuff and triple this stuff.

[73:53]

That's like offering your practice. Yeah, you can have a practice which you offer and you can also offer the practice of giving. That's fine to keep doubling it. To make it bigger, you know, just keep multiplying and pretty soon it just takes over and you're just like inundated with generosity. And actually we can survive such an overwhelming wave of generosity. Because we are actually doing, that's where we actually are living right now. I'd like to offer you my practice. Thank you. I receive it gratefully. People who want to come up can just come up. You don't have to raise your hand, you can just come up. Like this? Yeah, like this, just come up.

[74:54]

I've been stuck on an idea of a story. Anyway, just get that out of the way, my confession. And two things have happened in the past few days that I've been thinking about a lot, and I wonder, I'd like some feedback, because I wonder if in effect they were a delusion or a little glimpse of maybe the way things might be that you would like us to give to you. Okay. The first one, I'm going to say both of them, so I can, you know, not get distracted by thinking maybe you should wait until you hear the other one. The first story was I was on cabin crew in Tassajara for six months, and I thought if I ever make another bed, I'm going to throw up. But I'm here on the guest house program, and I'm making beds. So I find that...

[76:00]

Sometimes I'm making the bed, and it's just a fight. You know, the sheet's not going here. I like to line them up. It's just a fight. But then all of a sudden I realized, I'll just work with the sheet. You know, and the sheet, there it went on the bed. It was on the bed straight. And I felt like I was the same as the sheet, like the sheet and I, which is an inanimate object. Yeah. you know, we were actually working together. And then I thought, well, we talk about all sentient beings and the universe, and, well, sheets are in the universe, too. You know, it's not the whole universe and not sheets. So that was a really neat feeling. And so I want to do it again, which is a gaining idea, and this just never ends. But the second one, which I really mean, this, the second one was, Phil and I and several people the other day with the storm were clearing the drains, or trying to clear the drains, and I had a rake, and I was like, oh, my God, it was so heavy and struggling, but I really wanted to clear them because I was thinking, well, a stream really wants to go downhill, you know?

[77:16]

Probably doesn't mind getting stuck, but it gets really excited because it gathers momentum as it goes downhill. And I turned the rake just a bit, and I worked with the stream, and it was way easier because... it was using the springs, almost joy, because I think the water doing that is a joyful thing, and it cleared it. So is that, are those delusions? Am I imagining that the sheet is, and I don't know where it ends. And I don't know, I want to continue finding things like that. These are two stories I heard. Yeah. Okay. And the stories are actually stories about reality. Mm-hmm. but the stories are not the reality they're about. And if you think that the story that you just told us about this wonderful intimacy you have with sheets, you're right. I totally agree with you. It's true that you are intimate with sheets and that they and you together realize the Buddha way.

[78:19]

That is true. But the story I just told and the story you told the wonderful story you told, which was kind of good for you, I think. It was a wholesome story. That story is still karma. It's not the actuality of this inconceivable relationship you have with sheets. Right. Sorry? Yes, it's what? Is it a delusion? It's a story. And if you think that that actually is a relationship, if you think your story is actually a relationship with the sheets... then you'd be deluded. For example, you have a son. And you have a story that you have a son. You do have a son. So the story you have about that you have a son is true. You do have a son. But your story of having a son is not the actuality of having a son. You kind of lose me there, but I think that I really... Your actual relationship with your son is not your story of it.

[79:22]

Yeah, one's real and one's what I'm making of it. One's real and one's what your mind is making of it. He makes something else out of it. Yeah. Done. Yeah. And what he makes up about it is based on the actual relationship. You do have a relationship. You do give life to each other. He gives you motherhood. You give him sonhood. and you give each other this wonderful intimate relationship, and you have a story about this relationship, but your story is not the relationship. Right. His story isn't either. That's right. If you think your story is the relationship, then that's a delusion. So when you tell a story like this, What I hear you saying is this is a very wholesome story about my relationship with sheets and a very encouraging story.

[80:26]

It makes me want to watch my relationship with sheets. So that's a wholesome story. That's a reconstruction of your life. Right. Because you're watching your storytelling now. If you would believe the story... then that would be deluded. If you believed that the story was something more than a story. But you seem to be somewhat aware that this was a story, although when I said it was, there was a little adjustment there I saw. Well, because that seems to take away from the excitement. Yeah, so maybe it does. Maybe it calms you down a little bit. It makes it not quite as exciting. But I like being happy. I want to make it bad again. Yeah, yeah. It was magic, I guess. There's another story. So to stay on the fact that you're a karmic being, you know, not to lose track of this karma going on is good. And you are doing that.

[81:30]

Kind of on the right track. Yeah. Thank you very much. I do offer that back to you. Could I add a dimension to your story? When I got to the Wheelwright Center and then I got in bed, I felt that an angel made that. There was an aroma, there was a feeling that it was so warm and so wonderful. And I said, thank you, whoever it was who made that. That's important, isn't it? I mean, because you're telling me. Yeah, it was very important to me. Thank you very much. Thank you. So Speaking of relationships I

[82:34]

we are in a relationship with the world. And if being aware of this relationship, you make all of your actions gifts, then what you're doing... Can I say something? Sure. We are in relationship with the world and we are aware of it. But we tell a story about our relationship with the world, and that story we tell about our relationship with the world is a kind of curtain that hangs between us and our relationship with the world. And that curtain, that construction, is our karma, and we do that. we have to study the curtain, the construction, in order to realize the actual relationship. And part of the reconstruction is to notice what our mind is constructing. And for example, to construct ceremonies is quite helpful to help us keep in touch with the constructed nature of what we're seeing, which is superimposed upon our actual relationship with the world.

[83:52]

And is that the purpose of receiving the precepts, to take that as a way, a type of ceremony, so to speak? Yes. Understanding that? Or is there more to the precepts? Because you can make your gifts, everything you do, and your story, recognizable story, everything, you can do that without receiving precepts. You can make that connection, you can bridge that awareness of the true zazen without precepts, without adhering to a certain morality. You can study your karma without any commitment to a particular ethical teaching or moral teaching. So why the precepts? Well, before you get there, but... But when you decide to, if you decided and felt it would be a good idea to observe your karma, you would in fact be doing what the precepts tell you to do, even though you've never heard of them.

[84:59]

The precepts are basically telling you to look at your karma. So in doing the practice you were essentially following the precepts? The more you watch your karma, the more you come into alignment with the ceremony of following the precepts. Because you're doing a ceremony of observing your conduct. And the more you watch your conduct, the more you will see the precepts. Until finally you'll see the precepts in their reality. You'll see that the precepts are reality, and then you realize the Buddha way. But you don't have to hear about the precepts if you're willing to look at your karma. But in fact, to draw your attention to your karma without saying anything about sixteen precepts or fifty precepts or forty-eight precepts, when you start paying attention to your karma, you're actually doing the same thing that someone who has received precepts and committed to them as doing, they're doing the same thing.

[86:05]

But they're more structured and formal than you are. So they're not external? Precepts are not external? They're not something to be taken on. They're a natural. You can take them on. If you want to, you can take them on. Just like you can have a backpack. But you don't need a backpack. You can just have a backpack. You study your back by asking people to tell you what it looks like. Well, I'm very much interested in that. I want to talk to you more about that. Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. I'd like to enact a ceremony of confession and feedback. Could you hear? No. I'd like to enact a ceremony of confession and feedback.

[87:08]

If I may. A short while ago, it seems like a long time ago now, you gave me a request to fully receive and acknowledge gifts of speech, for example, before responding. And I've noticed a couple of instances where I failed to do that. and I'd like to tell you about them, and if you have some feedback for me about them. And these are small ones. There are probably some big ones that I've completely missed, but these are small ones. Once was a couple of days ago when the power was still out. In the morning meeting, I had very little news to offer because there was no communication with the outside world. And you said, is that all? And I said, yes. And you said, well, you can go now, which was quite unprecedented because usually we just sit there in silence.

[88:15]

And I didn't fully receive or acknowledge that statement. I just left. And if I had fully received and acknowledged it, I might have said something about how shocking it was to be sent away, because that's what it felt like. But I only noticed that after I was out of the room. And the second one was... maybe night before last, maybe last night, night before last, I was bringing Rozzy home, and I thought she wasn't particularly dirty because it wasn't so wet. Usually, that's her little feet, the mud wiped off when I bring her home. And you asked me, you offered me the request to always check her feet before she comes in. And instead of fully receiving the request and... acknowledging that that was slightly different from doing it when I think she needs it, I just responded, well, I didn't think she needed it.

[89:19]

And actually, it's a different request, that it's important to check her even when she may not need it, when it's possible. And I didn't notice that until after the fact. And it actually has quite a bit to do with her training as well as with whether she needs her feet wiped off or not. So those are the two instances that I've noticed times. And if you have any feedback, I'm happy. I appreciate that you're committed to this practice and observing it. Okay. Thank you. Welcome. Thank you. I'd like to ask, does the idea of surrender

[90:27]

Is the idea of surrender helpful in working on the relationship of the ceremony of zazen to zazen? Yeah. I think surrendering to the ceremony, in other words, well, yeah, surrender to the ceremony would be realized, for example, when you did the ceremony with no gaining idea. See, like you join your palms and bow and that's it. There's no like trying to get something out of that. And I think quite a few times when you do that, maybe you do. But like if your teacher said to you, you're not my disciple because you don't bow to me. and then you bowed, then that bow might be something more like, well, now I'm going to try to get discipleship by bowing. So sometimes we do do the forms, but we don't have enough energy in them to realize it to some gaining idea.

[91:38]

So that's part of the reason for, like, sometimes you have a gaining idea, but there's not enough intensity to notice it. Is it like a surrendering to not knowing? Well, you could say surrendering to not knowing, but I think would also be willing to accept not knowing. You're surrendering, actually, your resistance to not knowing, probably. You're surrendering maybe having something to hold on to in the face of something which can't be grasped. like your actual relationship with someone, right? You can't grasp it. So you have this story about your relationship, like I'm your friend and you're my friend. I have that story as something to hold on to in the face of an ungraspable relationship, a relationship that's too big to grasp.

[92:43]

So I have a little story about our relationship, or a big story, and then I hold on to that to deal with the awesomeness of the actuality of our relationship. And so if I feel that, like, oh yeah, I have this little story about my relationship with Laurie, I accept I'm human and I have that. actually, if I intensify my relationship with you, I may be able to see, oh yeah, I'm actually maybe holding on to that actually. I mean, I have it, but I'm actually like holding on to it. So maybe I'll just kind of give it away. And then as I give it away, I start to feel a little scared of the unknown dimensions of our relationship. So let me say, can I have that story back, please? Please? Sure, here, have it back. Okay. And now I'm ready to give it away again.

[93:46]

So I put the story up on the altar, the story of our relationship, I give it to the Buddha. And now I'm just here with you and I almost don't quite have a story yet. Or it's a little bit less graspable and I feel a little bit more open to you beyond my story of you. So I'm kind of surrendering my story in the ceremony of meeting you. And things are getting more intense that way. And then we can actually use ceremonies to open up to the intensity of the relationship, and then we start to notice the things we're holding onto to deal with the intensity, and then we can kind of make them into offerings. Or you might say, throw them onto the fire of the relationship. Surrendering them. Surrendering them, making them gifts, similar. Until finally we're just, we can do something together, like a ceremony or a dance. Somehow we're doing it without knowing who each other are.

[94:50]

And then we start to open up to the inconceivable relationship that we've always had. Sounds good. But not easy. It requires attention and courage and relaxation and balance and all those things in order to give away things we're holding on to that we don't really need to hold on to. And be patient with the fact that we do have these things and are trying to hold on. Be patient with ourselves and others. Welcome. Welcome. I'd like to ask two different questions. One is to go back in more detail on the question that Brandon was bringing up.

[95:52]

And I'm wondering if you're, so he was, my understanding of the question was the understanding of what it is to say just chopped carrots or to just, the meaning of that, just. And so understanding that the mind is not blank, that there is consciousness, conscious activity going on. is the offering or the intention for that to be an offering, are you recommending that that is continuous thinking of that or having that as the intention and then dropping it and just concentrating on the physical activity? Did you hear her question?

[96:54]

Did you hear it? She said, one part I wondered particularly, did you hear what she said, are you recommending it continuous thinking and then dropping it? So do you actually think, I, like do you actually think, I'm sitting here or I'm cutting vegetables, this is an offering to Buddha, this is an offering to Buddha, do you actually think that? And I'm saying, yes, actually think it. Because if you don't think it, you're thinking something else. Like you're thinking, I'm cutting carrots. You're doing some karma anyway. So now line your karma up with, I'm cutting carrots, yes. And this carrot cutting is an offering to the Buddha. And of course it's an offering to the Sangha. Because it's carrots for the Sangha. And it's offering to the Dharma. So this is offering to the triple treasure and actually think it. Because if you don't think that, you're thinking something else. Like you're thinking, I'm cutting the carrots for the Tenzo.

[97:59]

Or I'm cutting carrots for my uncle. Or I'm cutting carrots for myself. Or I'm cutting carrots just so pretty soon I can go do something else. You are thinking something. Or you might be paying attention to the tension in your hand or your bodily posture. So I'm aware there's tension in my hand. and this awareness of tension in my hand, this is a gift to Buddha. Awareness of my posture, when I'm sitting in the zendo, I'm aware of my posture. My awareness of my posture is not just awareness of my posture, it's awareness of my posture as a gift to Buddha. I pay attention to my posture as a gift to you. I watch my posture when I'm moving in the zendo as a gift to you people. When I offer incense, I'm very careful about the way I do it, as a gift to you. I'm not just offering to Buddhas, I'm also offering to you. I'm not just offering to you, I'm also offering to Buddhas. And I'm also thinking that this incense offering realizes nirvana. I think that. I say chants to myself, precept incense, samadhi incense, nirvana incense, this offering pervades the dharmadhatu like bright clouds, like bright light, like cloud forms.

[99:12]

Now I offer to inexhaustible Buddhas, bodhisattvas and arhats to increase their dharma bliss. Incense offering realizes nirvana. I think that. If I don't think that, I think something else, like I think... This bowl is in the wrong place. The bowl is in the wrong place? Or I thought the other day, I thought, this bowl is really beautifully cleaned. I thought, wow, it's so beautiful, it's so clean, and now I'm putting this incense right in the middle of it. It was so lovely. Another time, I was traveling New York for a month and doing fundraising for Zen Center, and I came back to Green Gulch and went in the Zendo and offered incense, and I put the incense in, and I said, how lovely to come and finally do nothing. Okay. Because it's like in New York, it was like I was having all these meetings to get money for Zen Center, right? But now I'm just offering incense, but this isn't to get anything. This is a gift. But my practice was not good.

[100:15]

I didn't realize I was fundraising to help those people. I didn't realize that my fundraising was giving to Buddha. I thought it was something else. And that was not happy for me to be thinking that I was fundraising, that I was trying to get money for Zen Center. That's not a happy trip. That's a trip like... Let me go back to Green Gulch and do nothing and make offerings to Buddha. Now I realize if I want to do fundraising, I should do it as a gift to Buddha. While talking to the people about these projects, I should do this as a gift to Buddha, as offering to Buddha. as I'm aware of my posture in the chair talking to these people. Yes, that's a good thing to do. It's a ceremony called being aware of my posture, my physical posture. And my physical posture is an offering to Buddha. But also, it's not just you think, I want to make offerings to Buddha. Make offerings of what you're doing now as an offering to Buddha. Not just like, I would like to make my action offering to Buddha.

[101:17]

This action this hand gesture, these words, this posture. And of course, if I think this posture is an offering to Buddha, then I probably think, well, maybe I'll offer upright posture to Buddha rather than a slouched posture. Maybe that would be a little nicer posture to offer to Buddha. So when you make your posture an offering to Buddha, you aren't just trying to make yourself perfect. You're just trying to make a nicer gift. You're wrapping it nicely. Moment by moment, you're not getting tired. Oh, I've got to keep this posture up. Oh, it gets so tiring to make this posture upright. But rather, I want to give this gift over and over, this good posture to Buddha and all Buddhas, all Buddhas, all Bodhisattvas. I give you my best posture. And I give all other Zen students my best posture at this moment. And that's actually, I do that in the Zen talk some of the time. I'm trying to offer you my best posture. But I also do it when I go to the Mill Valley Community Center.

[102:20]

I try to have good posture when I'm walking around the gym. And people come over and ask me, you know, how to get to Zen Center, because they see the posture. They're inspired when they see somebody who's doing that, and doing that is an offering to beings. I actually think that. Now, is it possible to do it without thinking? Is it possible to... Yeah. You can give gifts without thinking it. Okay? Because you do give gifts even if you don't think you're giving gifts. The thing is, what is your karma? What's your karma doing while you're giving gifts? You're giving gifts. What's your karma doing? Is your karma trying to get something? Okay, fine. Bring that karma over here and put it on to giving. Make your thinking thinking about giving. And also make your thinking thinking about making worship of Buddha and praise of Buddha.

[103:25]

And also make your karma confessing your shortcomings. Make your karma appreciating the merits of others. Make your karma asking Buddha to stay in the world. Make your karma asking Buddhists to teach. Make your karma and so on. Make your thinking all good dharmas. Otherwise it's going to be some other kind of thinking. Yeah. Is the fact that you're already, that the reality is that giving is already happening, is that no Buddha nature? He said, is the fact that giving is reality, is that Buddha nature? Is that no Buddha nature? Yes. That's emptiness. The fact that you're already giving is emptiness.

[104:29]

Emptiness is generous. So you mentioned that there's this reconstruction of our thinking and then a deconstruction. And it sounds like it's a particular reconstruction. And is it that's in the form of offering, thinking of offering? And is it that that particular reconstruction is more conducive or in a line with the subsequent deconstruction? Well, let's say with the reconstruction first. In fact, you're reconstructing your world, your life story all the time by new stories. But it's kind of like the same, it's basically the same type of program which is a construction of stories which have consequence of causing more construction of stories.

[105:39]

But the real, the change or the kind of revolution is to start paying attention to the construction process. So that's a reconstruction which is a really kind of a different, qualitatively different life And so to switch from constructing your life by your mental activity to now being aware of the construction of your life by your mental activity, that's a big change. And that causes a positive evolution both in your observation of the construction process plus also the constructions evolve differently. And this accumulates to a point where you can tolerate opening to the deconstruction of this process. It sounds like you're talking about not just paying attention but to make this particular reconstruction of offering. Maybe what you mean is by paying attention? This is part of how to pay attention.

[106:45]

So I'm saying pay attention, but then as I get into it, I tell you more about how to pay attention. So the way you pay attention is, first of all, you're very tender and gentle and flexible with the construction. And then you're peaceful and harmonious with the construction. And then you're honest about the construction. And then you're upright with the construction. So that way of being with the construction is, in short, you might say, is be generous with it or gracious with it. Really let it be. Don't try to, you know, it's got a construction and like don't try to mess with the construction. Okay, like just honor the construction. Give it a big field. Almost like paying attention is giving. Mature attention, trained, cultivated attention, all attention is giving. But as your attention becomes more and more gracious, your attention starts to accord with reality, which is giving. Giving includes receiving.

[107:45]

Unattached attention. Unattached attention, yeah. Unattached, which also enacts graciousness, and graciousness enacts receiving and giving. So it's a self-fulfilling samadhi in that kind of attention. And then the Buddha shows up and says, can I have your constructions, please? Here, I'll give you back emptiness. The Buddha then elucidates emptiness to you. And then now you're free of the construction process. Could you even say that deconstruction is like the ultimate giving? Yeah. It's a culmination of giving. And then... Now, then you go back again to constructing. Because now you can go back and participate in world formation from the deconstructed position. So you can help build the Buddha worlds, the Buddha lands from that position.

[108:51]

Before that, you were participating in it but not fully aware. Now you're fully aware of it, so now you can work to build it. And you do the same things, the Buddha did the same ceremonies before and after enlightenment. And he says in some early scriptures and later scriptures, he says, you may observe me doing the same rituals that I used to do before. And you might think I'm sort of hung up on these rituals, but I'm not. I just do them just to help people. And also I like to. Right. Whatever way you want. It seems there's a sort of a sense in the giving and that process that when I sit down to give my posture,

[109:54]

to the Buddhas, it's like, all right, fine. Before I wasn't giving my posture, and now I'm going to give my posture. And this is a gift, and it's like a chunk of gift. So here's my offering. I disagree. You may think that way, but I want to point out that that's just your way of thinking. That's not true. That's the problem I'm having. It's a case. I might think that, but really it's that I wasn't doing the ceremony of giving before now. Now I'm doing the ceremony of giving. Now I'm at your disposal, Buddha. If you want me to sit, I happen to be sitting. I'll continue. If you want me to get up, let me know by ringing bells. So now I'm doing the ceremony of giving my life and my posture to Buddha. A few moments ago, I wasn't doing the ceremony. But I was giving then, too. It's just I wasn't doing the ceremony, so I didn't get it. And I was thinking that I was sitting zazen to get enlightened or something.

[110:57]

I was thinking I was doing zazen, but I wasn't actually doing the ceremony. That's what I was saying, the shoha I had trouble with. And the next moment, you cannot do the ceremony again. Right after you did the ceremony, the next moment you can forget, and then you miss it. So we have to line our karma up, we have to line our action up with the theory. The theory is what? That we're doing this together with Buddha. We're not doing this practice by ourself. Buddhas are here in the world practicing with us. Okay? That's the proposal of the Lotus Sutra. The Buddhists are with you all the time. That's the theory. That's the teaching. When you say, okay, if you're here, I give myself to you, then you ceremonially enact and manifest that teaching. If you don't manifest it, the sutra is saying they're still with you

[111:59]

The Buddhas are with all the Buddhists, and they're also with all the Muslims, and the Buddhas are with everybody. They're with all the, what was it? Sheets. They're with the banana slugs. They're with everything. But the beings who don't do the ceremony do not realize it, even though they demonstrate it. So the mountains have no distraction from practicing with the Buddhas, so they teach us the Buddha way. But they don't have karma, so they don't have to line their karma up with their relationship with the Buddhas. But we have karma, and if we don't line our karma up with our relationship with Buddha, we think our karma is saying some other kind of relationship. Like, I'm not making... This isn't an offering to Buddha, this is like an offering to Reb, you know? Well, I missed something there. That break is what was disturbing me. Yeah.

[113:00]

Because I just see that if there is that break, what happens before, what happens afterward, it's all fragmented very hard. Yeah, and that's what you confess. You confess that break, that fragmentation, that discomfort, and you confess it before the Buddhas, if possible. I was thinking of the little doorknob going into the dining room. Yeah, right. And it's always hanging out there. Yeah. And it's always waiting. Yes. And so you come along and it says, Hi, I'm here. Yeah. It's an amazing doorknob. Yeah. We're practicing with that guy. Thank you. Thank you. And he's a cabinetmaker. He could fix that, but he didn't. He's just, you know, being friends with it. I'll get a sign. Yeah, right. So please forgive him if somebody asks him to fix that and he fixes it in the form of making it not so...

[114:08]

Jiggly. Is that enough for today? It's 11. That's a nice hour to stop. What was the sentence with disposal? What's the sentence with disposal? It was a word with disposal. It was a whole sentence. I didn't catch it. I'm at your disposal. I'm at your disposal. I'm at your disposal. In other words, I'm here to serve you. I'm sitting Zazen. I'm here to serve you. I'll serve you in this posture if you will accept my offering of my effort to sit here. And again, and again, and again. If you want me to do something else, ring a bell, and then I'll probably offer you walking meditation or perhaps a trip to the bathroom. And so when we go to the bathroom, okay, maybe next time we meet we can talk about what do you do when you get to the bathroom. Potential equally extends to every being and place.

[115:19]

With the true merit of God's way.

[115:22]

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