Many factors in my life have come together to lead to the offering of a series of classes or a workshop in Berkeley this summer. I think the title was something about the relationship between Zen practice and truth and justice. So we've been discussing for about five weeks how does How does the teachings of the Buddhas and the practice of the Buddhas relate to the issue of justice and truth?

[01:07]

And part of what's affecting me to lead me to want to discuss this with you and others is on the radio and things like that, like I hear on the radio for a more just, verdant, and peaceful world. Some sponsor of public radio is dedicated to realizing a more just, verdant, and peaceful world And I hear another organization which is talking about a way of life that is spiritually fulfilling, environmentally sustainable, and socially just.

[02:20]

And then a friend gives me a book he's writing about social justice. And for him, social justice is the realization of an individual being's worth and an equitable economy and a sustainable environment and a healthy social community. And when I hear those expressions, which I hear quite frequently now, together with things I heard when I was a little boy called Truth, Justice and the American Way, now I feel like, in a way, what all these words are pointing towards, what in

[03:34]

in the teaching of the Buddha what is called Nirvana. Nirvana is peace and it is justice and it is the way the environment is sustainable. Nirvana is an equitable economy. It's the equity of the great household of all beings. So I feel that this language and the concern in our society for social justice and spiritual fulfillment and sustainable environment are a way of groping for this thing which the traditional Buddhist teaching has not called social justice or sustainable environment or equitable economy.

[04:56]

But I think that this language actually is complementary to the basic Buddhist agenda of helping all beings realize peace and joy and freedom. It seems to me the reason why we're interested in this is that it has something to do with our life. And again the Buddhist teaching is that all things are basically nirvanic. That the source of our concern for social justice, the source of our concern for a sustainable environment and equitable economics

[06:01]

is there's a source of that. And that source is the way things basically are. That things are basically in a state of nirvana. That things are basically in a state of justice. And social beings are basically in a state of justice in a state of peace. The source of justice is the source of the way we are. the way we basically are, or the way we ultimately are, is that we cannot be found.

[07:08]

We cannot be grasped. We cannot be isolated from each other. So my friend's saying that social justice is the realization of the worth of the individual. That goes with the other expression from an organization called Pachamama which talks about a life which is spiritually fulfilling. Spiritual fulfillment has something to do with individual beings realizing their worth. And people are worth something for a lot of reasons, but the fundamental worth of beings, their fundamental worth, their basic worth, is that they're nirvanic, that they're peaceful, that they're an unconstructed, unmoving radiance.

[08:29]

This is the worth of all beings. To realize that, to understand it and become that, is spiritual fulfillment. To realize this, the worth of a living being, of a human being or any living being, the worth of it, the worth of it, that which is worthy of worship, in beings is this nirvanic source that we are. And from that comes the desire for and the ability to realize a sustainable environment, equitable economy, social peace and justice comes from that source. Our yearning for it and our ability to realize it come from our basic worth.

[09:35]

And everybody has that basic worth. All humans, all plants, all animals, all things have this basic nirvanic quality at the beginning and at the end. but we can get distracted from this, of course. And when we're distracted from it, we lose our roots in it, or we get out of touch with our roots in this source, and then it's harder for us to remember social justice, to remember sustainable environment and so on. To remember our issue of spiritual fulfillment. We can get discouraged and depressed and distracted and even start blaming other people for the problem and hating people and stuff like that.

[10:43]

Part of what I've also been talking about here and other places is the proposal. I think I've been saying that when you realize, when one realizes the ultimate truth of things, then everything you do, all your actions, are understood as ceremonies. For today's talk I would say that when there's realization of justice, and not just justice in a particular case, but when there's realization of the source of justice, when there's realization that all beings are basically just,

[11:56]

are basically right. When there's realization of that, then there is realization that all action is a ceremony. A ceremony by which we manifest justice. When you realize justice, then all your actions become a ceremony of justice. My actions, if I realize justice, become a ceremony of justice. My actions are not justice. The source of my actions is justice. But if I do a ceremony of justice, I realize the justice in the ceremony.

[13:00]

But the ceremony doesn't reach the justice, doesn't reach the source. If I understand the source, I know that what I do doesn't reach the source. If I'm thinking of justice, and I realize justice, then I do something to enact it, to express it, to celebrate it. I do a ceremony. I know that nothing I can do can totally account for and grasp justice because justice is not graspable. Our basic nature, which is peaceful, economically equitable, environmentally sustainable. Our basic nature is also ungraspable.

[14:02]

Nobody can get a hold of it. Nobody owns it. Nobody can get away from it. Nobody can find it. And that basic nature inspires us to realize it in every action. It can be realized in every action once you understand it. And once you understand it, then every action is the ceremonial realization of it. But still that doesn't grasp it either. Similarly, if everything you do, or everything that I do, is a ceremony, dedicated, devoted to the realization of justice, the realization of social justice, the realization of environmental sustainability, the realization of a healthy society.

[15:06]

If everything that you do is a ceremony dedicated to that realization, then everything you do realizes it. And also, it will then lead you to understand the source of all individual beings, which again will lead to every action becoming a ceremony celebrating the source of justice. when I do something as a ceremony, I'm saying that what I'm doing right now is celebrating what I can't grasp. And what I can't grasp is, for example, one of the things I can't grasp is justice. But if in my heart I really am offering my speech, my gestures right now

[16:18]

as offerings to justice, although I can't grasp justice, these actions realize it. If I think my actions are justice, then they're not ceremonies. And they don't realize justice because justice can't be grasped by my activity. but my activity imbued with the understanding of the emptiness and ungraspability. My actions imbued with the understanding of the profundity of all of our actions. Our actions imbued with the understanding of the basic nirvanic quality of all our actions. Then our actions are ceremonies and they do immediately realize fundamental truth and justice.

[17:23]

If you don't yet understand, if I don't yet understand that all things are basically nirvanic, that nothing can be found, that nothing can be grasped in reality, If I don't yet understand that, but I make all my actions, ceremonies offered to this truth, the truth that things are fundamentally justice, offering everything I do to the realization of justice in this world, I will come to understand that truth. The truth leads to the ceremonial enactment of it and the realization of it, excuse me, the realization of truth leads to everything we do becoming a ceremony of the truth. When we understand justice that leads to everything we do becoming a ceremony of justice and the realization of justice. And when everything we do is a ceremony for the realization of justice we will come to understand

[18:34]

our worth as individual beings. We will come to be spiritually fulfilled, and from that spiritual fulfillment all of our actions will again celebrate our true worth, our true nature, and simultaneously celebrating the true nature of everyone else. So the practice of the Buddhas is that everything you do in the world of action, every thought, every story you're telling, every way you're thinking, every the way you're talking, every the way you gesture, all these things you're doing are ceremonies, realizing the basic truth. there's a song which I often sing, and in the original lyrics, the song goes, it has some words which go like this, Hush, little baby, don't you cry.

[19:52]

Hush, little baby, don't you cry. which is, I want to change that. Please, Ira Gershwin, allow me. Rest, little baby, even while you cry. Even when you're crying, rest. Rest in your nirvanic nature. Even while you cry, make your crying, don't stop your crying, make your crying a ceremony celebrating and realizing justice.

[21:02]

The place, your true home, where you're resting all the time. Make even your cries, your tears, make everything that you do celebrating justice. always rest in this unmoving true nature, in this unmoving, unconstructed stillness of our basic nirvanic, our basic just, environmentally sustainable way that we are. to live in the source and to let the source be expressed through all of our actions, to return to this source, to return to our nirvanic, fundamentally just nature, and let our actions be ceremonial expressions of it.

[22:22]

To go there and live there means you go there and live there by way of not living there. You take a stand there in perfect wisdom by way of not taking a stand there. You abide there by way of not taking an abode there. You make a commitment to justice and you protect your commitment to justice by not abiding in your commitment. By committing to justice, by committing to always dedicate your action to justice. Not my action is just, but my action is dedicated to justice.

[23:27]

and I don't abide in my dedication, in my commitment, in my action. That protects the source, or that protects the access to the source. That keeps the source fresh. Someone says, how can you work hard for justice without grasping it, without abiding in it? It's rather that if you're devoted to justice without abiding in that devotion, you'll be more fueled by and fed by and nourished by the justice which is at your heart. draw your attention, give your attention to justice every single moment of day and night.

[24:32]

Why not? Without abiding in that devotion. If you can be that way with it, you will be able to be that way with it. If you grasp it, if you try to hold on to it, if you try to hold yourself there, it will make it very difficult not to be lost. You will get burned out. You will burn your connection by grasping what cannot be grasped. Justice cannot be grasped because justice is the truth and the truth cannot be grasped. But it can be realized if you're willing to be devoted to something that you can't get a hold of. if you're being willing to be devoted to a middle path between having and not having justice. Rest, little baby.

[25:43]

Rest. Give it a rest. Give what a rest? Give grasping. Give abiding a rest. And be with your fundamental, unavoidable, only distractible justice in your heart, in every cell of your body, in every cell of everybody's body. Rest there without abiding there, without grasping there. enact it by making everything you do a ceremony celebrating justice, social justice. Make everything you do a ceremony for spiritual fulfillment, for the realization of your true nature.

[26:49]

And everything that we do is a perfectly good opportunity for that. And if you do something and you say, this is not a good opportunity, like being rude to someone, this is not a good opportunity. To have this be a ceremony for celebrating social justice. You've just realized social justice. by trying to make a ceremony out of unkindness. Trying to make a ceremony for kindness out of unkindness. By doing that you've just realized kindness. Being unkind doesn't realize kindness. Making a ceremony of kindness out of being unkind realizes kindness.

[27:51]

But kindness also by itself doesn't reach the source of kindness. But if you make a ceremony out of being kind, it reaches the source, the ungraspable source. If you have a graspable kindness, don't grasp it. pass on that one and make it a ceremony of kindness, then it realizes the fundamental kindness, which is not yours. It's not your kindness. It's not my kindness. It is our true nature. Make everything a ceremony for the realization of our true nature. Please do that. I also am trying to make every action that way.

[28:54]

I was getting out of bed recently and I was thinking actually of trying to get out of bed as a ceremony of a ceremony of truth and justice. And so it occurred to me that it would be appropriate for me to be quite aware of my body. Because partly it was going to be a physical ceremony of the body getting out of bed. So I thought, well, probably I should be aware of my body in order to do this ceremony of physically getting out of bed. There was nobody around, so my voice was quiet. It was a nonverbal ceremony. But my thinking was going on, and I was thinking, okay, now what kind of a, what's the ceremonial motion here?

[30:06]

And I thought, okay, it would probably be good for me to, like, what do you call it? They have this thing called Pilates now, so I'd like to be aware of my core, you know? So I drew my attention to my lower abdomen and was present there for this ceremony. I went to the core of my body to make this ceremony. And I thought, yeah, that would be appropriate that for every physical gesture, which is a ceremony celebrating your core nature, that you would be aware of your core, that you'd be aware of your body when you're doing physical ceremonies to celebrate your body's true nature. Why not? Why not make every action an action that you're mindful of?

[31:08]

raising my hand, why not be mindful of it? And since now that I'm here and I'm mindful, how about making this a ceremony celebrating nirvana, celebrating peace, celebrating ungraspable justice. realizing justice. Every gesture realizing justice. But I have to do the ceremony. If I don't do the ceremony of these gestures realizing justice, I miss the realization of justice. I lose my connection to my to our basic worth, our basic just nature.

[32:18]

But again, putting it positively, I want to make every action, I want to make all actions of body, speech and thinking Ceremonies for the realization of justice in the world. I want to make every action of body, speech and thinking a ceremony for the realization of the fundamental truth. Nirvana. Nirvana. peace and social justice. I commit to this. And I also understand from the ancestors that my commitment, that this commitment to this practice of making every action, of offering every action to the realization of justice,

[33:37]

will be more successful if I do not abide in this commitment, if I do not cling to it. Because this is a commitment that nothing can be grasped. So I don't grasp what I do. That opens me to not grasping reality which cannot be grasped. opening to what I do is ungraspable, I open to the ungraspable justice of this world. Ungraspable but realizable. I have a feeling all of you want to realize the fundamental truth of your life.

[34:44]

I have a feeling maybe all of you want to realize social justice and a sustainable environment and an equitable economy. I have a feeling you want that realized. A way is being offered in the midst of all your opinions, in the midst of all my opinions about what is socially just, about what is environmentally sustainable, about what is equitable economy, in the midst of all those opinions which are graspable opinions, which are graspable appearances. And they are not what they're referring to. My opinion of justice of social justice of sustainable environment of equitable economy my opinion about what a person's fundamental worth is are not those things.

[36:04]

Those are just appearances. In the midst of all these opinions and appearances I don't grasp them. I know I have my opinions about what is socially just, but I practice a way of not grasping that, of not abiding in that, as the way to realize justice, the truth of justice, and not get caught up in my opinions of justice. But in the midst of my opinions, I remember that practice, and then I make what I'm doing, including my opinions, I make my opinions of justice a ceremony of justice. My opinions are not justice. My opinions are a ceremony of justice. They're not justice. And the people who disagree with me, who have different opinions about what justice is,

[37:10]

their opinions are also just appearances and are not the truth of justice. And I don't have to change their opinions, but I need to teach them, I need to teach them, make it attractive to them to not abide in their opinions. So then the two of us, or the ten of us, who have different opinions, of truth, of justice, of sustainable environment. If we can practice this together, we can realize the truth together while we still have different opinions. We're not going to stop having different opinions about what justice is and what truth is and what the sustainable environment is. We're not going to stop. We're going to continue that. But what we can learn is this path of wisdom, of not abiding in our opinions, which is the same as learning the path of returning to the source of all of our opinions of justice, to return to justice and let the actual justice then illuminate and liberate us all from our opinions of justice.

[38:35]

with the opinions intact, people of different opinions then can live in peace and justice. The hard work is remembering constantly to offer what you're doing for this purpose with no grasping. That's hard to learn. But You only have to do it a moment at a time. So you can just try it for a moment. If it's too hard, then the next moment take a break and go back to grasping your opinions as reality. You probably won't forget how to do that. I won't either. I know how to remember to grasp what appears as reality. I'm training myself at this new way And it's always new. It's not the old new way.

[39:39]

It's the new new way. Okay. Are you all right? Ready? Get set. What do you call it? Exhale. Inhale. I'm saying exhale, but I'm actually inhaling when I'm inhaling. Inhaling. Summertime and the living is easy. Fish are jumping and the cotton is hot.

[40:42]

Your daddy's rich and your mama's good looking So rest little baby even while you cry one of these mornings you're gonna rise up singing you're gonna spread your wings and you'll take to the sky until that morning And there ain't nothin' can harm you So hush, little baby Don't even cry That's actually what it says.

[41:48]

With daddy and mammy standin' by So rest, little baby, even while you shout. Nothing can harm you with Daddy and Mammy standing by. Daddy and Mammy are your true nature. They're always standing by. Nothing can harm you with daddy and mammy. Truth and justice are always standing by. Nothing can harm you. But you've got to rest there. And nobody can rest for you. You've got to remember to do that. We have to remember to do that. Rest in your daddy and mammy true nature justice. May our intention equally extend to every being and place.

[43:03]

Okay. [...] Yes, Hugh? The word ceremony, I kind of feel it comes from the Latin of sera, C-E-R-E, from which we also get, I believe, the word sincere, also called sincere, which, what did I hear recently?

[44:14]

Sin means without. Sera, C-E-R-E, means wax. So that's something that is... without wax, I think it was Ed Brown who was using the example of the 25-year-old teacups in the kitchen. They had these massive bumps. They hadn't been waxed. They hadn't been to use an automobile metaphor. And they were showing their wonderful utility. So I wonder if the word ceremony comes from the idea of of waxing something in some sense. It seems to me ceremony can be one of those words that's kind of a tightrope word where we can say without ceremony sometimes I think could be a good thing. Just throw that out there.

[45:18]

One of the things I didn't mention earlier, which I think I find repeatedly helpful, is, you know, there's a Chinese character, which means ceremony, and it's on the cover of that book, Being Upright. And the character, the left-hand part of the character is also a character, so it's actually two characters combined to make a character. The left-hand side means justice or meaning or righteousness or moral conduct. And the left-hand side is character for person. So when you join person together with justice, you have the character for ceremony. So ceremony is the union of the person with justice. But although it's the union, the person doesn't reach, doesn't get the justice, just unites with the justice in the ceremony, in the action becoming a ceremony.

[46:34]

The action of the person realizes that which the action of the person can't reach. That's the Chinese character for ceremony. The English word for ceremony, I've tried to etymologize it, and the rumors I've heard, which I haven't been able to find, are wonderful, but I haven't been able to verify these rumors about ceremony. For example, one rumor is that the root of the word ceremony means to heal. to make whole. But that's just a rumor. And I think sincerity and ceremony are similar in the sense that the Chinese character for sincerity also means to be concentrated. that when you're sincere, you're doing something pretty much wholeheartedly. You're not doing something and giving part of your energy to something else. You're sincerely studying, you're sincerely listening, you're sincerely offering something.

[47:38]

I think so part of the meaning of sincere is that you're completely doing that. without any other agendas, you're just completely there. And that's, I think, the spirit of a ceremony, is that you're not doing the ceremony. Ceremonies have consequences, but you're not doing them to get something. You're doing them sort of in dedication to or in relationship to something, but you're not trying to get anything because Anyway, some ceremonies are about something that's much too big to get a hold of. And that's the kind of ceremonies that our practice is about. Trying to realize something enormous in our small actions to realize what we can't grasp in terms of our daily action. And that sincerity of doing the ceremony for the ceremony rather than doing the ceremony for the effects or to get something. That's very sincere, I think.

[48:40]

I think Phil and then Huma. I think there's a great distinction, but I would use it synonymously. Another thing I didn't mention today, which I think is good to mention over and over, is that in Zen practice, in Asia, Zen practice doesn't have a distinction between practice and ceremony. So the practice of sitting, the practice of bowing, the practice of studying the teachings, the practice of meeting the teacher and discussing the teachings with the teacher, the practice of working in the kitchen, the practice of caring for the temple, the practice of caring for your body, all the practices of a Zen monk And for a Zen monk, all their actions are practices. I mean, ideally, their vow is to make every action a practice.

[49:48]

But there's no distinction in Asian culture between the practices of Zen and ceremonies of Zen. But in the West, we kind of discriminate between ceremonies and practices. I think there's a distinction. But in Asia, they don't really have that distinction. So I think that when Zen was transmitted to the West, when they used the word practice, I think partly because Westerners had no problem with the word practice, like a doctor's ceremony we have a problem with. a lawyer's ceremony. But doctors practice, lawyers practice. We feel comfortable. Zen students practice. But Zen students' ceremony, I think when it was transmitted, the Zen teachers thought, avoid the word ceremony for about fifty years. Well, the fifty years is up recently. And now I think we're mature enough to realize that all we're doing in Zen really is ceremonies of Zen.

[50:50]

However, if you do these ceremonies sincerely, they completely realize the meaning of Zen or the justice or the truth or the righteousness of Zen is realized when you completely make your action ceremony. When you make your action for the sake of the truth, for the sake of justice, not to get anything Right now, what we're doing is a ceremony for the realization of justice. Period. Now we have another action. Again and again. Okay, Phil? Oma? My question was answered as you talked. Your question was answered as I talked? Now you have another one. And that is... I don't know if I can ask for help, but I think part of it is my greed.

[51:53]

So I know it's my greed that I want this wanting to, the wanting to bring everything into peace. Wanting to bring everything into peace is not the same as greed. But wanting and abiding in that want, then the wanting can turn to greed. Wanting everything to come into peace, or wanting peace to come into everything, that's a perfectly reasonable inspiration or aspiration. It's not greed. But to abide in that and try to make that graspable, then you're reaching for something that's unreasonable, because it's not graspable. I can see, this is my kind of glitch that I'm kind of stuck, is when I'm here, everything is here, but when I'm not, because of experiencing it, then this becomes uncomfortable.

[53:01]

This is like no, no, no. So somehow I want to, I want to this no, no, no's to bring it into yes. You want to bring no, no, no? You want to bring the no, no, no into yes? Okay. How do you practice? How do we practice with that? I would make, if I notice in myself some impulse or some desire, I make that, I offer that desire to the Buddha. I make that an offering, I make that a ceremony of desiring that all the yeses, all the noes become yeses. In other words, I don't abide, I don't take a stand in my desires. I don't know how to do that. I don't know how to let go of my desires and not have a stand on them.

[54:01]

If you don't know how to not take a stand, okay, That's what you think? You don't know how? It desires. I don't know how to, yeah, not to take a stand in my desire. You don't know how? Yeah. Okay. So that sense that you don't know how, don't take a stand there. Okay. All right. And make this I don't know how a ceremony. Make this I don't know how an offering. This I don't know how has been offered by, particularly it's been offered by so-called Zen students for many centuries. Zen students have offered I don't know how. But they don't just go around I don't know how and hold on to I don't know how. They offer it. This is an offering. This is an offering of me, me, Zen monk, don't know how, I offer this Zen monk who doesn't know how. And I'm over that one now. Now I move on to the next Zen monk to give away.

[55:03]

I'm always making what I am and offering a ceremony for the truth, for justice. And I don't know how it's very similar to I don't know what justice is. I have my opinions about what justice is, but those are opinions. No one knows what justice is. But everyone has the ability to realize it because it's our nature. We can realize justice. Absolutely. I have no problem that what, then what comes out is something that is our nature. What happens that we get pulled away from our nature? What pulls us away from our nature? Well, we get invited to leave our nature and go someplace else by various things.

[56:05]

They say, hey, Homa, come here. Come here, Homa. Come away from your nature. Come over here to your not nature. And you go, okay. So you take a little trip away from your nature because somebody invites you to come away. And you can say, well, how come they invite me? You say, well, because they're lonely over there away from their nature. They want you to come and join them. So then you say, hey, I'm not abiding in my nature. I'll go visit you. But then you forgot that you left just to be nice. And you say, now how do I get back? How do I get back to my nature? Get back to your nature by doing the ceremony of your nature. You're always yourself, of course. It's your nature to be who you are. But if you don't do this ceremony of being who you are, you miss it. You have to constantly do the ceremony of, oh, this is a body. I'm mindful of this body. I'm here with this body. That's one of the fundamental things of me doing the ceremony of getting out of bed, is to be in this body.

[57:07]

Now, I can get out of bed without being in my body. without noticing that. But then I'm not doing a ceremony getting out of bed. So I missed a chance of realizing the truth while getting out of bed. But when I actually make getting out of bed a ceremony of getting out of bed, the truth is there with me. I'm not alone anymore. Everybody's with me. I'm sitting out of bed for the welfare of all beings. But I have to remember the ceremony. I have to make what I'm doing a ceremony. Otherwise, I miss what I'm doing, which I'm doing. You're always yourself. You have to do this ceremony of being yourself. Otherwise, you miss yourself. you're always basically nirvanic. You have to do this ceremony of nirvana to realize that.

[58:11]

And when you say, you know, like here in the Zendo, it's a traditional thing to say, when you take your fingers, you know, and grasp the incense with your thumb and, is this the forefinger? When you grasp the incense with your thumb and forefinger and then place it in the incense bowl, it's traditional to do the ceremony of offering incense and say, do the ceremony of saying, offering incense realizes nirvana. Offering incense realizes nirvana. Unless when you put incense in, the incense is nirvanic, your fingers are nirvanic, the action is nirvanic. The fingers are just, the incense is just, and your offering is just. Which after the ceremony

[59:16]

this incense offering realizes nirvana. And it does. That's it. There's not another nirvana to realize at that time. And without doing the ceremony, people miss it. I missed it a few times myself because I didn't make that incense offering nirvanic. And also, one time I came into Zendo here and offered incense. I'd been away for a month or so on the east coast doing things. And I came in and I offered incense and I felt like I just plunged into cool, fresh water. And it was the cool, fresh water of doing something that didn't really... that was nothing. I was doing nothing again. So doing nothing is very similar to doing everything as a ceremony. doing nothing, realizing nirvana.

[60:19]

But then I'm back at Green Gulch and I forget every time, oh, nothing again, how wonderful, nothing again, how wonderful. I have to go away and get really busy and really distracted to realize how wonderful it is just to go, nirvana, nirvana, nirvana. justice, justice, justice. Would you please come and put this, would you empty this tea bowl? Yes. Would you set it down? No. Is that a ceremony of justice? Yes. Are you ready to put it down now? Yes. every action made into a ceremony to realize justice.

[61:24]

It's not my opinion that putting the tea bowl down is justice, but it might be my opinion that putting the tea bowl down is justice, but if it is, if I don't abide in it being justice, then it's a ceremony of putting the tea bowl down. Remembering that is difficult for me. It's difficult to remember that every moment. But so far I've never regretted doing it. My wife says to me, when something good happens, she sometimes says, is that because of Zazen? And I say, yes. She says, you mean the ceremony of Zazen? Yes. Everything that's good that happens in the world, in our world, is because of the ceremony of what you're doing.

[62:33]

Good is actually our basic nature, but when good manifests, it's because you make what you're doing a ceremony. Did somebody have their hand raised? Yes. Can you talk about how to maintain consistent and disciplined moral practice, ethical practice, justice-based practice and action without abiding in some sort of fixed sense of what that is? I mean, I think some said this is perhaps the content of the whole talk, but the piece that I'm struggling with is how you go about engaging in transformative work with long-term vision that doesn't rest in some sort of fixed sense of truth. Engaging in transformative work. Can you give me an example of transformative work? So environmental justice work. Okay, so give me an example of environmental justice work. A particular campaign to ask a corporation to stop using a particular kind of corporate voice.

[63:42]

So maybe you're writing a letter to a corporation? Or you're locking yourself to the front of their gates. Oh, you're locking yourself to their gates. So you're locking yourself to the gate. And basically I'm just saying, when you're locking yourself to the gate, you see that as a ceremony. That's basically. I'm doing the ceremony of locking myself to the gate. I think... Oh, go ahead. How do you... How do you determine the right action in those moments without having a sense of long-term vision? How do you determine the right action? I think that determining the right action sounds like abiding in the right action. So you think it might be good to write a letter or chain yourself to something. You think, I think this might be good. That's my opinion. But I'm a bodhisattva. So I don't abide or take a stand in chaining myself to this fence.

[64:50]

So someone can come up to me and say, it's time to unchain. And you say, really? Wow. So then you do the ceremony of unchaining. And then somebody says, maybe somebody in your own head says, it's time to chain up again. So then you chain up again. In other words, You're playful about this chaining yourself to the fence. I'm reading this book about Abraham Lincoln. He lived during a very difficult time in the history of this country. And he was at the center. Well, he was kind of responsible, together with everybody, but he definitely didn't think he wasn't responsible enough for sending hundreds of thousands of boys to their death. This is where he lived. Now people say he was working for justice and peace and freedom.

[65:53]

Right? That was what he was working for. But it was a horrible situation. And he just kept working for that. You may even disagree with him. You may not think he was a great president. But anybody who thinks he wasn't or thinks he was, anyway, he was constantly, not constantly, he was often coming from a place of good, warm humor. He was constantly coming from a place of storytelling and laughter and playfulness in the midst of this tremendous heaviness and working for unchaining people. He chained himself to the And also he was trying to hold the United States together.

[66:55]

He wanted his country to stay together. He thought it would be a good idea to hold this country with these commitments to justice as part of its united effort. So if I do something which I think is good and I'm not playful about it, I usually feel like I'm off track. I'm very fortunate because when I sometimes do things that I think are good, I'm very fortunate that people oftentimes point out to me if I'm holding on to that good thing I think I'm doing. Not everybody is so fortunate as to people find out, yeah, you're doing something good, but you seem to be holding and abiding in the goodness of what you're doing.

[68:02]

People will point that out to me because they expect not just that I might do something good, but that I would do it in a relaxed, playful, non-attached, non-abiding way. In other words, that I would do it like a bodhisattva. So again, the basic principle of bodhisattva is I vow to help all beings attain a life of sustainable, wholesome, environmental existence. And yet, although I help innumerable beings attain such a state, there's not one being who I help attain that state. Why is that? Because bodhisattvas do not hold to any idea of environmental justice, do not hold to any idea of wholesome, sustainable environment. They don't hold to that because if they did, they wouldn't be bodhisattvas. Other people, say many people, supposedly, and hold to an idea of people they're saving.

[69:08]

We might say actually they don't save those people because actually they teach those people to hold to themselves. Whereas Bodhisattva saved people by showing people not to hold to themselves. So they don't hold to themselves and to the people they're saving. So they teach people the path of wisdom which is not to take a stand in your good works. that actually makes it easier for, not easier, it makes you more enthusiastic and wholehearted of doing good works if you don't cling to them. So we're very fortunate if we're working to do good and somebody comes up to us and says, you know it's nice what you're doing, but you're totally hung up on this. You're like, you're doing a good thing, but you're not a bodhisattva, you're just a do-gooder. And you soon will cause big trouble, so please get off your high horse and come down to the earth and join the rest of us who are actually living with you. Don't be better than us with your great works. Now that you're down on the ground with us and you're not holding on to your great works anymore, please continue.

[70:15]

And you say, thank you very much. I feel much, I feel refreshed. Because now I'm just doing great works with, you know, not abiding in my idea of the great works I'm doing. And I still want to do them. In fact, I want to do them more wholeheartedly. I feel so energized by coming off the trip of doing these great works and continuing. The ultimate protection of all bodhisattva's good works is emptiness of all the good works. Bodhisattvas need understanding of the ungraspable, bottomless, topless, sideless depth of all things. They need that understanding in order to work for the welfare of beings. So whatever you're doing, make it a ceremony. Writing a letter, ceremony. Sometimes when I do calligraphy, especially on some kind of like silk or something like that, where if you make a mistake, it's kind of expensive, it's easier to do calligraphy on scrap paper.

[71:25]

It can really be ugly and no problem. But if you do calligraphy on silk on the back of somebody's robe, it's a big, you can't really redo it very well. So here you are, every stroke is going to be like big consequence. This is a big turn into a really nice calligraphy of this person. It really helps not to abide at that time. So I try to like cry into the stroke. Just let go into the stroke and let it be ugly. You know? I want to do a beautiful stroke, let it be ugly. Let it be stupid. Let it be a mistake. Don't abide in making beautiful calligraphy. So, actually, it's good to practice on scrap paper. Let it be ugly. Let it be ugly. Let it be ugly. Pretty soon you start to be relaxed, you know, and you're kind of, yeah, it's ugly, and actually it's beautiful because you let it be ugly.

[72:29]

Then put the silk there and see if you can continue. But some people can... can do that with some realms, and then you pull in justice, and they tense up. And then they try not to make a mistake. Maybe they don't. Maybe they don't make a mistake. Fine. But they're teaching, they're teaching cling, hold, abide. They're teaching the opposite of wisdom. You get to give you some feeling? Happy litter writing. Happy chaining. Yes? I don't have an example. I don't know if I did the right thing. Maybe I could have, by mistake, done the right thing. You could have done the right thing by mistake?

[73:29]

Did you say? Okay. It's good to be open to that possibility that you could have done the right thing. It's possible. Money, money, money. You went to a house, a big fancy house, and you thought money, money, money. Newly built. Newly built. Money, money, money. Helping the building industry. Stimulating the economy. And so it's $500 an hour, but she went overtime because my brain was kind of a mess.

[74:35]

I'm kidding. I'm all right. Excuse me. And so she had to get another kind of a brain scan to see why I can't sit up very long. I had to lay down all the time. Where's the next bed? There's something not forming in my brain. She figured it out. She was so smart that she charted this for every second. So to spend the last second on a blood count is really tough. So I bring her in. So I thought, well, all this conversation, yeah. But she was really a lot of love. And so, my husband and I, all of our credit cards, they know a lot about credit cards. I said, try it. So I tried it out. And I know it's been hard enough for you. So finally I said, can you do anything about the life problem? Because we'd like to get well, you know.

[75:35]

And you're doing a great job, you know, and you're a really good neurologist. But they might have problems. So finally, you know, I might get angry. The secretary was really nice. I got out of it. She didn't care about us. She just wanted money and all this. I don't want to get angry at her. So it came back. We had to do a payment plan. Every month you could pay $5,000. Oh, my God, thank you. But that was a big deal for her, because I'm paying for somebody who's on Medi-Cal. She knows I don't have any money, and what's she doing? Wow. See? I don't know if I see, but wow. But what she did was she connected us with doctors who were on Medi-Cal, who would be built in UCSF. And it was right on time to save her eyes and cancer and my mother's wound. Wonderful. Because we needed it. Great. So we're going to thank her. We're going to right away thank her for that.

[76:40]

Because for her it was a big deal. There's no pain to find. You can't walk out of that office without a credit card. Every little phone call or a little thing. She sent us to the emergency room right away. But the full emergency room, the waiting in the office was like, you've got to pay for the last session first. I said, no, it's a box. I'll give you my credit card. We'll wait. So did I do the right thing? Or rather, the right thing, the right thing was done. Amazing. Yes? My question is kind of in the same line as his, and you answered part of it. I'm stuck, and I don't even know how to ask the question, but I think what I want to ask is, You brought up a perfect example. What I was thinking was a vow, let's say like a bodhisattva vow.

[77:41]

Yes, bodhisattva, yeah. When we take this vow or we try to live a life in accordance with the precepts, and a situation arises where an opportunity to do the opposite of the precept or the opposite of the vow, maybe I'm going to take an action that's not in accordance with saving all beings, and I have an opinion about what I should do in that moment, let's say I decide not to eat a hamburger at a barbecue because I don't want to eat meat for dinner. Okay. But I'm really attached to that opinion, or I become attached to that because I've taken this vow or I believe in this precept. How do I not abide in that moment by moment? Is that a situation where having the realization is something more than maybe... Would you come here, please? There? Yeah. Would you sit down here? Okay. Here? Yeah. So what's your name? Forrest.

[78:41]

Forrest. Okay, so here we're at the barbecue, okay? Okay. And the barbecue pit is over there. Right. And there's some hamburgers on there. And I say to you, Forrest, how do you feel about eating hamburgers? And you say... Maybe not today. Maybe not today? Yeah. You think it'd be good for you not to eat any hamburgers? For today, yeah. Yeah, for today. Anyway, for right now. For right now, yeah. Right now, you don't particularly want a hamburger. Correct. And are you by any chance, do you feel any attachment to not wanting the hamburger? Yeah. You do? Yeah. What's that like? It actually can cause suffering, actually. Are you suffering right now? Possibly. You know, right now, do you feel uncomfortable sort of being attached to this not having the hamburger? No, not right now. It could be. But right now you're not attached to it. Because right now you just don't want the hamburger.

[79:42]

Yeah. And you don't want to have it because you think maybe better not to. Mm-hmm. And right now you're not attached. Okay. So this is how you can be sometimes, right? Yeah. You can just simply not want to have the hamburger because you think it's not really the cool thing to do right now for you. I see what you're saying. But you could also, you could start getting kind of like huffy and puffy about it and getting attached to that. And I might say, Forrest, can you open to the possibility of having a hamburger? And you might say, Not right now. Not right now? Not right now. Okay. So I'd say, do you feel that I'm open to you right now? Yes. Do you feel I'm open to you not being open to having a hamburger? Yes. Do you want to hear something more about me? Yes. I'm actually open to having a hamburger, but I'm like you.

[80:44]

I'm not going to have one. Okay. where neither one of us are going to have a hamburger, but I'm open to having a hamburger, and I'm open to you not being open to have the hamburger. And I actually would suggest to you, you know, with me right nearby to help you, that you just dare to open your heart to having the hamburger. Okay. Are you ready to open your heart to having a hamburger? With your guidance. Okay. Okay, go ahead. Open to it. Did you? Okay, that's all. Neither one's had the hamburger. Both of us are open to having the hamburger. We're also open to not having the hamburger. Now here come some people who are going to have the hamburger. They're eating the hamburger now. And so in some sense they're open to having the hamburger. They're eating it. You know? They may not be open to not having the hamburger.

[81:44]

So we're going to go check them out. Let's go talk to them now. So we walk over there and say, excuse me, can we talk to you about this hamburger eating thing you're doing? And they say, yeah. And you say, we want to know, you know, we're open to you having the hamburger. I just want you to know that. But we want to know if you're open to not having the hamburger. And they say, yeah. You say, well, would you please give us the hamburger? And they say, sure. And then you can say, are you open to going away now, going away from the hamburger area? So you can't have, and not coming back? They say, yeah, and they walk away. So now we've got the hamburgers. And we can set them down and be open to picking them up. Now, we went over, those people were actually eating hamburgers, but were also open to not eating hamburgers. And at that point, we felt, you know, We enjoyed being with them.

[82:45]

They're like us. They're not like the enemy. Now, what about if they weren't open to not having the hamburger? So we're open to them having the hamburger, and we're open to them not being open to not have the hamburger. And they feel that from us, and they continue to not be open to not having the hamburger, but they feel this thing from us. And that will register on their body forever. And eventually, I don't know what they're going to do about the hamburger eating, but eventually they will open. They will open. Because it is painful to be closed to this world. And it is nirvana to be open. But still, you and I may not have any hamburgers, perhaps. For a long time, we may not. It's possible. It's possible, yeah. But it's also possible that even if we don't, that we are closed to it, and that will be painful for us.

[83:46]

But it's also possible that we can be open. But I think you get the feeling? Absolutely. It's possible. So let's work on this. I think the spiritual teaching in this is ancient teaching of love our enemies, don't close to anything because then the love can't... Exactly. Or is that the expression, first you have to love your enemy in order to save them. It doesn't mean you like them. It doesn't mean you have to love injustice in order to save beings from injustice. But it's hard to love injustice. It's easy to hate it. And sometimes it's easy to like it if you agree with those people. But if we can love whatever, injustice will be realized. But it's hard to love certain situations. It's hard. That's what we have to train at.

[84:47]

Thank you. Good is good. Bad is bad. Tensing up around good, we will not understand love.

[85:56]

Tensing up around bad, we will not understand love. We have to learn to relax with good and relax with bad. Play with good and play with bad. Then we'll become liberated from good and we'll become liberated from bad. And we can show other people how to be liberated from good. Many people are totally hung up on good. And they're suffering because they're so tense and hung up and unplayful with good. it's really too bad. And, of course, many people are hung up on bad. They're hung up on bad because they're hung up on good. And they think, well, maybe since being hung up on good is so painful, I'll try bad.

[86:59]

At least I'm not hung up on good. At least I'm not self-righteous. That's a relief. So not being self-righteous and not being self-wrong-tious. Wrong-tious. Wrong-tious, yeah. Is that right? Wrong-tious? Wrong-tious? Constantly thinking of justice without abiding in it realizes it. Make every action the expression of devotion to justice and devotion to not abiding in justice.

[88:14]

which is to make every action a ceremony of justice. That's my offering.

[88:32]

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