Often say and read the expression, just wholeheartedly sit and thus drop away body and mind. Or just wholeheartedly sit and body and mind drops off and the original face manifests. So I propose, you know, a parallel between that teaching and the teaching of, for example, a Mahayana scripture called the Samdhi Nirmacana Sutra. And I would equate sitting and

[01:06]

body and mind with what we call the imputational character of a phenomenon. And I would call the original face the other dependent character of all phenomena. And I would call the reality character of phenomena, which is the absence of the imputation, I would call it the absence of body-mind in the original face. When we wholeheartedly... Yeah, here's another parallel.

[02:20]

To learn to put away is to learn the self. To learn the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be enlightened by all things and body and mind themselves drop away. Actually body and mind of self and other drop away. So in that case, in place of wholeheartedly sit and body and mind drop away, we say study the self. And when you study the self and forget the self, that's wholehearted study of the self. When you study the self and forget the self, body and mind drop away. And then you're enlightened by everything.

[03:23]

So there it is. You can see Zen teaching of, for example, not the Zen teaching, the the buddha-dharma of Dogen Zenji and the buddha-dharma of whoever wrote the Samdhi Nirmacana Surtra. And the disciples of the Samdhi Nirmacana Surtra, I think, have similar, pretty much the same practices, the same buddha-dharma as Dogen, but spoken up differently. The the body-mind. The body-mind that you're aware of, that you know about, is the computational character.

[04:31]

It's the fantasy character of your body and mind. Your body and mind that you know about, if you wholeheartedly engage it in sitting, that body and mind will drop away and it will reveal the original face of your body and mind. And then that original face, body and mind, will enlighten you. In the, in the Sandhya Nirmacana it says, in chapter six, the Bodhisattva talking to the Buddha's name is Gunakara. And so the Buddha says to Gunakara, independence upon, independence upon names which are connected to signs, imputational character is known.

[05:42]

You want to know about the individual character? It's... If you want to know it, then you can depend on names which are connected to signs or images. For example, body. It's a name, and it can be connected to an image like, you know, you name it. You name it, you name that image. So that's the imputational character. If you want to know what it's about, it's when you have a name for something that you connect to something, to an image or a sign, like a body or a mind, like a feeling, an idea. It's like a name that you connect to an idea that's about an idea, or it's a name that's connected to an idea, that's connected to a feeling, about a feeling, or a physical thing, or a practice or whatever.

[06:53]

That's the imputational character. That's our normal body and mind. If you wholeheartedly engage body and mind, then that body and mind that superimposed body and mind upon your actual body and mind, your real body and mind, that body and mind will drop away and it will reveal, or the body and mind which supported that imagination all along, that will manifest. That's the original face. Zen likes to use words like original face because somebody else uses an expression like original face. They like to use images to convey the teachings of the Buddha that are related to stories of the ancestors. Some ancestor said that one time, so then we use that term for what?

[07:57]

What is the other dependent character? It is the original face. And I also mentioned to you that there's like three characteristics of phenomena. One is pure, one's impure, and one's both pure and impure. The impure one is the is the fantasy character, the imputational character, the imagined character, that's impure, and that doesn't exist. The body and mind that drops away doesn't exist.

[08:58]

But even though it doesn't exist, it appears to exist, and the way it appears to exist hides the original face. And then there's the pure. The pure is the thoroughly established character, the reality character. And you know that one Now that one. This maybe is a misprint.

[10:06]

You know that one as the absence of the fantasy in the other dependent. And it's pure. It's the absence of the impure. That's the pure. It's the absence and the non-existence. It's the non-existence of the fantasies about our body and mind. And it exists in a pure way. But it doesn't exist in an absolute way. It exists in a conventional way. And then there's the original face of the other dependent character, and that is both pure and impure. The original face is pure and impure. The original face is both pure and impure because it supports fantasies.

[11:25]

As you may have noticed, fantasies are well supported. And they are supported by this wonderful original face. which is, which when it manifests and we understand it, everything is enlightenment. But it also supports the reality pattern because the reality pattern is the way it's always free of fantasy, even though it supports fantasy. And the other dependent pattern is kind of strange because the way it's known is the way that the original face is known or the other dependent character is known is independence on strongly adhering to

[12:30]

the other dependent character as being the imputational character. So the way you know the original face is by strongly adhering to fantasies about it. The way you know the original face is by strongly adhering to a made-up face. So the way you know the other dependent character, in other words, is incorrect. However, if you're kind to your incorrect way of knowing, that incorrect way of knowing, body and mind, drops away and you get to be with the original face, but you don't get to know it. The chant, the section of the Bendo, which we call the self-receiving and employing samadhi description, that describes the original face.

[13:38]

What the original face, that describes it, that's not, that's just a fantasy about it, but that is the fantasy, Dogen's fantasy about the original face. And he talks about the original face in his description of the original face. But although the original face or the other dependent character is manifesting, you're not knowing it. It's not something that's met with recognition. It's something you're living. It is actually your life. And so, the main thing is how to relate to the imputational character in such a way that it drops away. Or, so that we stop adhering to it as our life. Just give up, abandon it.

[14:42]

When you abandon it, then you get to live your life. So how can we study the self in order to forget it and drop our body and mind? How can we sit wholeheartedly How can you be with what's hiding reality in such a way that it drops away? So a simple way is to say, be wholehearted with it. So if you're sitting, be wholehearted with the body and mind sitting, and the body and mind sitting will drop away. through all the difficulties that we have been experiencing, and some of you have been quite sick, still we've carried on the practice through the sickness.

[15:44]

Perhaps to the point of wholeheartedness, who knows? But anyway, that's a possibility, is that we're somewhere in the neighborhood or approaching wholeheartedness. And if we wholeheartedly sit or wholeheartedly walk or wholeheartedly stand, if we wholeheartedly breathe or wholeheartedly think or wholeheartedly feel, if we wholeheartedly body and mind, it drops away. And then also Dogen Zenji tells us that Studying the self is another expression for wholeheartedness. Studying the self to the point of forgetting it is to wholeheartedly sit to the point of forgetting it. And so what does wholehearted sitting look like or sound like or act like?

[16:55]

What kind of acting with a body and mind, what kind of acting with the coverings upon reality are wholehearted? It would be a wholeheartedness that would be studying the self. It would be studying the self that was wholeheartedness. Not just a wholehearted study of the self, but studying the self would be to be wholehearted. So if you're wholehearted and give something to someone, you would be paying attention to how you give it, be it paying attention to your posture, be it paying attention to your feelings, be really there wholeheartedly when you give a gift. So, in order to wholeheartedly give a gift, you need to study yourself. In order to study yourself, you have to act wholeheartedly.

[17:58]

In order to study the Self, you have to practice giving. You have to practice ethical training. You have to practice patience. You have to be heroically effortful. You have to be concentrated. And then, of course, at the final point, the wholeheartedness is wise. Right up to the point where you're not wise, you're not wholehearted. At the point where you're wholehearted, you're wise. Our body and mind becomes dropped in the wisdom wholeheartedness culmination of all this supportive wholeheartedness. And we can't be wholehearted if we don't give and if we're not ethical and if we're not patient and enthusiastic and calm. So the basic bodhisattva practices are how you get to the point of wholeheartedness where you enter reality.

[19:09]

And one more point is that in the sutra, not in the sutra, but in the sutra, yes, but in the disciple, Asanga, who is the great disciple of this sutra, he talks about entering into reality Entering into the reality of conscious construction only. Entering into the reality that everything we see, everything that exists for us, is really a covering over reality. When you understand that it's just a covering, you enter reality. The reality of just covering. And then he says in chapter 3 of the... of his summary of the Great Viggo, he says, who enters into understanding reality? And he says, well, there's four characteristics.

[20:16]

One is bodhisattvas who have permeated the continuities of their consciousness with much You can say either hearing or learning. So the first thing about the first requirement of wholeheartedness by which you enter reality is that your mind, your consciousness has been permeated with much listening, much learning of what? didn't say. But I'll tell you, it's learning the great vehicle teachings. Remind me to come back to this point. The second point is that these bodhisattvas who enter reality, for whom body and mind drops away and the original face manifests, the ones who enter that

[21:26]

they have rendered service, they have offered service to innumerable Buddhas. And the third point is they have a definitive commitment or a single faith. And I'm going to come back to that one too. And the fourth point is through well-matured meditation, or we could say through well-matured zazen, they have increased their good roots. So the people who have those four things going, they enter reality. Now going back, A lot of people think that when you wholeheartedly sit, that that doesn't necessarily include that you're listening to the teachings a lot.

[22:33]

That you have done much listening to teaching in the practice of sitting. Here he's saying that The wholeheartedness involves listening to teachings. And he says permeating the consciousness that you keep watering your consciousness with teachings. Watering, watering, watering. As you listen to teachings, listen to teachings and listen to teachings and listen to teachings, and that permeates your consciousness. The karmic activity of listening to teachings transforms the support of karmic activity. The karmic consciousness which studies teachings, when it studies them, as it's studying them, it transforms the history of that consciousness. It transforms the past karma of that consciousness which supports the present karma.

[23:41]

The ones who enter reality are the ones who permeate a lot. So that's part of the reason that I practiced with you last night reciting the Fukan Zazengi during Zazen. I don't know if it's the case now, but I think in times of your the monks of Eheiji Monastery recited the Fukanzazengi in the evening Zazen periods. They were instructed to recite the Fukanzazengi, of course in Japanese, during Zazen. We had, in 1970, Zen Center invited a a Japanese teacher named Tatsugami Roshi to come and teach at Tassajara. And he had been Ino at Eiji for 13 years.

[24:43]

And so while he was teaching at Tassajara, evening zazen, we chanted to Fukunzazengi during evening zazen in Japanese. But then that practice dropped away. I... brought it up again last night, so you would experience reciting the text during zazen. Your consciousnesses were permeated by the karma of listening to and reciting that text. Part of Zen practice is to recite texts. Now, we do it in morning service. The Heart Citrus is permeating your consciousness. The Fukan Zazengi, the Jyo Mir Samadhi, all these teachings are permeating your consciousness. your consciousnesses are being transformed by the karma of listening to and reciting these texts.

[25:51]

This is a normal part of the practice of those who enter reality, according to this teaching. This is a normal part of being wholehearted. Wholeheartedness includes listening to teachings. Wholeheartedness for the bodhisattvas includes listening to teachings. And when the listening becomes great, then you're one who's about, that makes you ready to enter reality. But also you need to serve innumerable Buddhas. So I've been thinking now, what does serving innumerable Buddhas look like? Because some of you maybe have trouble with your non-original face. plastered on your original face, you may have trouble seeing all the Buddhas you're serving. And I thought, well, one way of serving Buddhas is to wholeheartedly sit.

[27:00]

And like Bodhidharma, wholeheartedly sit and look at a wall. when's the wall going to drop away and show me the original face? Well, supposedly he had already seen the original face and he was continuing to practice being kind to the what? To the imputational character. To the fantasy of a wall. To sit there and look at a wall or a floor. Not saying, well, come on, fall away floor and show me the basement. Fall away wall and show me the sky of Buddha's mind. No, I'm just, I am sitting here with single faith as an act of serving Buddhas. As great ancestors have done, they sat and they served Buddhas.

[28:03]

They were sitting there serving Buddhas. That's part of wholeheartedness. That you're sitting and serving Buddhas and you're not in a rush for the serving of Buddhas to be overcome. Because even after the curtains drop away and the original face manifests and everything enlightens you, you continue to serve Buddhas. Before the original face manifests, before you realize wholeheartedness, you can still be serving Buddhas by sitting as wholeheartedly as you are able to at this time in history. It's pretty lonely to be sitting there in a cave unless you're serving Buddhas. I mean, apparently nobody was there with him for a while, just sitting there. But he was happily sitting there serving Buddhas by his wholeheartedly sitting.

[29:08]

And of course, he got to enter reality too, which is quite encouraging. The third point is, yeah, this definitive faith. What's faith in? You could say, well, it's faith in sitting, but it's faith in wholehearted sitting. It's faith in wholeheartedness. Single-minded, single-hearted. Definite commitment in wholeheartedness. That could be your faith. Bodhisattvas have faith in wholeheartedness. They have single-minded faith in practicing these innumerable bodhisattva practices which are summarized as six. They believe in those practices. And they're not... It's not that they don't believe in anything else because... They just don't think there is anything else than wholeheartedness. They don't think there's anything else than infinite practices of bodhisattvas. They believe in all of them basically as one thing, the great vehicle.

[30:13]

They believe in the great vehicle and they listen to the great vehicle and when they're listening to it they serve Buddhas and when they serve Buddhas they listen to it. And the third point is they have matured meditation, they have matured zazen. But in a way, you know, this fourth point It's already been spoken of by the previous three, but in the sutra they speak of Zazen, they speak of meditation having these two dimensions, two sides, two wings. One side is called tranquility, shamatha, and the other side is called insight, or vipassana. And again, when I read

[31:17]

the teachings of Ehe Dogen, I see him talking about these two sides. For example, there's a text called, I think called Gyaku Doyo Shinshu, and it's about, at the end it has something about, there's two ways to penetrate body and mind, or two ways to drop off body and mind. One, is called going to a teacher and listening to the teaching or asking about the teaching. Go to the teacher, meet the teacher and ask about the teaching. The other side is to wholeheartedly sit. When you go And then he says, when you go to see the teacher, one way of translating it is, going to see the teacher and asking about the Dharma opens your mind.

[32:20]

Another translation is, going to see the teacher and asking about the teaching or listening to the teaching gives your discriminative thought free range. In other words, you use your discriminative thinking when you ask about and listen to the teaching. That's vipassana. But it's not vipassana unless it has this other side, which I mentioned before. If you just give your discursive mind free range and open it up for work, open up your discriminative mind shop for work, it's not vipassana unless it's connected with tranquility. And Dogen says that too. to do one of these, to do the going to see the teacher without the concentration, it's not really going to see the teacher and listening to the teacher, and it's not really insight.

[33:22]

But also if you practice insight and practice concentration without going to the teacher, going to the teaching, and letting your mind function in the context of concentration, then the concentration doesn't really drop off body and mind either. But he says something also here when he's characterizing just wholeheartedly sitting. He said, when you're wholeheartedly sitting, you're kind of like focusing on practice enlightenment. you're focusing on how they're they're the same thing. Which again is this one-pointedness of thought. Chittas ekagatas. So when you're the one side of the practice is to just be concentrated on practice and enlightenment on the unity or unifying practice and enlightenment.

[34:30]

Just focus on that. but also you're focusing on the unity of self and other, too. Because in concentration, in samadhi, you have this one-pointedness of thought. And that's kind of like single faith there. But we also need to get the, now get the discursive thought, the thinking mind going in that context of what? We're practicing thinking or talking or listening but it's in the context that this practice that we're practicing is practice of enlightenment or that our enlightenment is not someplace else but it's being functioning through our discursive activity now and We don't just think that, about that unity. We are actually, that's the way we are.

[35:35]

We are that unity. And we have this prashrabdhi too, which is this, there's a buoyancy. We need a buoyancy when we're talking to the, when we're listening to the Dharma. We need a buoyancy, a flexibility. We need it so that when the Dharma touches us, when the teaching touches us, or we touch the teaching, when we get a little touch, we don't bat it away because it doesn't go with our usual idea. So another thing Dogen says is that go to see the teacher so that you can give up your idea So you go to see the teacher so you can give up your idea of who you are and what your body is. You're holding on to your body a little bit. So the teacher says, well, that's not your body.

[36:36]

Hand it over. And then you sort of like have a buoyant response to that. Like, no way. I'm going to keep it. This is mine, not yours. You have no, you have no, you can't say anything about my body. Just kidding, just kidding. Here, here's my body. I brought it for you. You want this thing? So you have to exercise your mind to see if you can let go of it. Because you might say, oh, practicing layman one, I'm here, great, cool. So you need a buoyancy so you can give up everything I just said today and tomorrow and so on. Now you have it. And I hope that you practice it.

[37:36]

Anything else this morning? It's still morning, according to some people. Yes, Richard. Could you say a little bit more about the giving, giving it up or to neutralize? Well, you know, you're doing something and then someone asks you to do it differently and you say, fine. Like you're working fast and somebody says, slow down. Or you're working slow and somebody says, speed up. And you say, fine. And then you say, just kidding. I'm not going to do anything you ever ask me. Are you trying to get a hold of how to give up? If you have anything to offer. You didn't hear me offer anything? No, I hear your point. Yeah, you hear my point, great.

[38:42]

Basically, you know, bodhisattvas aspire to the point of giving up everything. Whatever they've got, they give it up. Anything good that you've got, when you give it up, it gets better. Anything not good you've got, when you give it up, it becomes non-functional. Anything bad you hold on to, it gets worse. Anything good you hold on to, it wilts. Bodhisattvas want to give up all wholesome and unwholesome things so that the wholesome will thrive and go beyond itself. Anything else? Yes. I hear you saying overall, maybe, that to be a bodhisattva, to become a Buddha for the benefit of all beings, you need to serve Buddhists.

[39:49]

Yeah. Yes. Yeah. And that would be appropriate service to Buddhas, because Buddhas are trying to help you become Buddha. But to also try to help you become anything, you know, make slight improvements in your state of suffering, too. But they would also like you to be free of suffering, even prior to becoming a Buddha. So Buddha did make great efforts to teach his first disciples how to be free of suffering. given those teachings but he also told them that the way he practiced in the past and that he also talked about the Buddhas he served it's amazing to hear the Buddha telling stories about the Buddhas he served it's far out I mean it's really far out to hear him say these things

[40:50]

I could, but I'll do it later, because I haven't memorized it yet. It hasn't permeated my consciousness enough for me to do justice to the stories Buddha told about how he served Buddhas by name and place. But I'll try to bring the text sometime in the future. more accurately tell you stories of Shakyamuni Buddhas, stories of serving Buddhas. But when you're sitting facing the wall, that could be your gift to Buddhas. That certainly could be your gift to Bodhidharma. Hey, Bodhidharma, I'm doing what you did because I think you're like totally cool. I'm doing what you did, teacher, because I love you, teacher, and I want to do what you did. This is how I show you I love you, is by doing the practice that you did. And I heard that Buddhists practice wholeheartedly, so I'll practice wholeheartedly, because I think it's cool, but also, I also want to say, this is a service to you who have shown me this.

[42:11]

I don't really understand the second type of compassion. You talked about sentimental, relational, and true compassion. What's the teaching in this relational compassion? Well, I may have said relational, but literally it says the compassion... First is the compassion which has beings as objects. Sentimental. You could say beings as objects, but basically... is that the object of your compassion is objects that you think exist. And so you're thinking of compassion, you think compassion exists, you know, in a kind of non-conventional way, real, real compassion, really existing beings, really existing suffering, and also to say really not existing suffering would be another sentimental attitude. But that's not usually what people... If people thought that really suffering didn't exist, then they wouldn't feel any compassion.

[43:38]

Right? Nothing to feel. To think that compassion, to think that suffering really exists, you can feel compassion. But if you thought suffering really didn't exist, you wouldn't feel compassion. But that's also sentimental. You know, you're not really hurting. There's no suffering there. I'm not going to feel any compassion. So that's sentimental non-compassion. But we're talking about sentimental compassion. The next one is you look at the elements of compassion. Even if you look at the elements of the practice of compassion, like even if you start looking at compassion as being comprised of generosity and ethics and patience, the compassion starts to be not so... not so existent. As you start to actually get into the details and elements of compassion itself, you start to realize that you don't know what compassion is really.

[44:49]

That you've been carrying an idea of compassion because you'd like to get a hold of it. So as you actually get into the work of compassion, you naturally, it starts to get analyzed into the elements that comprise it. And then also when you start to listen to the people you're caring for, And you start to study them. You start to realize that they're also made of them. They aren't a solid, permanent thing that you've been trying to help. You know, and you don't really... Who you used to think they was is kind of a... you know, a category for who they are. And you start to realize, well... The person who I thought was existing there before, I can't find that person anymore. I'm sort of finding a new person, but I'm starting to see actually it's a flowing kind of person. It's a fluid thing. And then the same with the suffering itself. I thought the suffering was this, but now I realize the suffering is that, but it's not really that either.

[45:51]

It's just that it looks like this now. And then the ethno and so on. As you get into the elements of your experience, of compassion, your elements of your experience of the beings you care for, the elements of the experience of the suffering, as you get into it, the sentimental attitude you had, your habitual take on compassion and suffering, it's not to be so sticky anymore. It's kind of like it's still there, but you're not falling for it much. But there's still a little bit of a sense that something's out there in front of you. that there's compassion out there, that there's suffering out there. Even though you don't have this sticky, habitual, sentimental attitude towards the suffering or towards beings or towards yourself or towards the practices, it still looks like something is happening out there in front. And so, again, in the teaching of conscious construction only, the bodhisattva comes to a place where there's nothing standing out there in front of him anymore.

[46:59]

There's nothing like appearing out there separate. And this is when they enter into perfect awakening. And who has that place is people who are wholehearted with sentimental compassion, this other kind of compassion, and they work with it until there's nothing standing out there in front of you. that illusion is not arising anymore. The conditions for duality have dropped away. They can be re-entered because it might be helpful to people, but you have just awoken. And that's where great compassion is. Like you were saying, it's not mine, it's not yours, it's not ours, you know, it's just, in fact, it's reality. and it's not out there in front. That's great compassion.

[48:02]

That's great compassion which grows with great wisdom. Okay? Do particular teachings correspond in your mind to those texts? Well, teaching the five skandhas It's a teaching that goes with developing the compassion which has elements as objects. Or there's also the teaching of the 18 elements, the 18 datus, the 18 elements. That's a teaching. If a person was practicing compassion and then they studied those elements, that would... Or the six... Ayatana is the six sense stories. Those kinds of traditional analysis. Or the practice as the eight limbs of enlightenment. All these analytic presentations start to open up your mind to life as not this graspable idea.

[49:05]

Yes. Quickly, may I offer three constructions which I think parallel to what you just said? OK. Special case compassion would be like sentimental. General case compassion would be elemental. It's categories of analysis. And then finally, no case compassion. Fine. You're welcome. Yes. Two questions. One is, when you say mind, can I translate as a way of thinking? This is... Second one is, I read, Suzuki Roshi said, when I find, or someone finds somebody's zazen, that beauty is not in you, not to him, but like a... That kind of thinking, and also recently I had conversation with somebody in this community, and she said that if somebody appreciates you, like fully accept it because that appreciation or kindness is in that person.

[50:28]

So if I don't fully accept it, kind of rejecting that person's kindness, I felt like those two stories are saying the same thing. So if you could explain. If I find beauty in somebody, that beauty is also human? Maybe, but maybe not. The first point, when you hear the word mind, can you translate that as way of thinking? I wouldn't say that you can't. I would just say that mind is not just the way you're thinking. Usually what we call thinking is what you're aware is going on in your mind. Usually what we call thinking is what you think your mind's doing right now. Like right now I think I'm talking to you in this room and we're talking about thinking. And later we'll talk about beauty and things like that.

[51:32]

This is my thinking and when you talk to me I think you're thinking too because you're talking. So that's active thinking consciousness. But active thinking consciousness is supported by the consequences of all past thinking. which is, that is what we call in this tradition of the sutra, that's called the storehouse consciousness. So, that's also mind. It's actually, and that mind is transformed by our present thinking. If we think wholesome thoughts, that transforms that what we call unconscious dimension of mind, it transforms it. And the unconscious dimension of mind, which is the results of all the past active thinking consciousnesses, that is supporting and being transformed. And it doesn't exactly transform the active consciousness, it just supports it.

[52:37]

But the active consciousness transforms, because store consciousness is the consequences of active consciousness. So mind equals both of those. It includes present activity and the consequences of past activity. And they're constantly supporting and transforming each other. All that is mind and all that the practice is intended to set us free of. So what is modern thinking? Past thinking and present thinking. What is modern thinking, right? Is that Mind is more than thinking, yes. For example, one of the results of your past karma is that you know how to speak Japanese. So you have an ability to speak Japanese right now, even though you're speaking English. That's more than you're thinking.

[53:40]

Your ability to speak Japanese is not speaking Japanese. It's the thing that supports you speaking Japanese. And your ability to speak Japanese is the result of lots of past karmic activity of speaking Japanese. That's mind, yeah. Like some people have a mind. They're just walking around, talking, looking at the birds, shaking hands with people, and they can sit down and play the piano. As soon as you give them a piano, they can play it. But their mind is a mind that can play the piano even when they're not... They have that ability even though nobody can see that they do. They make you feel, I think that person knows something. You can maybe sense, some people's unconscious, that there's great skill there. Sort of the way they speak English is somewhat conditioned by the fact that they can play the piano really well. So your ability to do things that you're not doing right now is still part of your mind.

[54:46]

It's just that the opportunity isn't being given. So mind is mostly this... you know, mostly it's the results, you know, this, right now we're doing a little bit, but the results of all of our past karma is really like very big and complex. And, you know, so, is that enough on that for now? Okay. Second question about beauty? About seeing beauty or somebody talking to you about beauty? No. Like, if I see the beauty in somebody's zazen, I want to be this person. Like, I want to sit like this person. Yes. Which means it's also, like Suzuki-ro talks about that, that is, beauty is the person who perceives it, not the out there kind of things.

[55:54]

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, and same with ugliness. So could you explain? Well, in fact, everybody's original face, I would say, in reality, is beautiful. Everybody's original face is beautiful. But we project on some people's original face another face which we think is beautiful. So what... whatever you look like, I make up a fantasy about you that I look at when I look at you. And that's called body-mind. So my body-mind is partly how I see you and how I see Anna and how I see Timo. That's my body-mind. And if I'm wholehearted about the way I see you people, the way I see you people, which is my body and mind, will drop away.

[57:01]

And I will see who you really are, and who you really are is really beautiful, but not the way I think it's beautiful. So beauty is a fantasy. Beauty is fancy. No, no, it's not that much that beauty is fancy. My idea of beauty is fancy. When I think, oh, that's beautiful. Like one of the first things that I heard Siddhartha Ganesha say that shocked me was he said, when you look at a flower and you say it's beautiful, that's a sin. And I thought, he's so strict. So you, in fact, some part of you probably, you could say, looks at a flower and you intuitively know the beauty of the flower. And then you think, beautiful. But that kind of confines that relationship. So, also, if I see somebody does that, oh, I want to be that person, it's the same, like it's a default?

[58:10]

No, to say I want to be that person depends on what you mean when you say I want to be that person. I would say this, when you look at maybe, like I actually realized at some point that I thought Suzuki Rishi was beautiful, but I realized that some people didn't think so. I realized that he would walk into certain neighborhoods and people would just think, oh, little Japanese man. But to me, he looked beautiful. But I kind of knew that I was kind of like my my creation. But I think coming back to another part of your earlier conversation is that when someone tells you that something appreciates you, or when you appreciate someone, that in order to become free of your appreciation, which you may not want to, but in order for that appreciation and what you're appreciating, both,

[59:20]

to drop away and show you the truth, you have to be really kind to what you're appreciating and your appreciation. So if you practice wholehearted appreciation and wholehearted, which means to be generous with your appreciation when it arises, let it be. When other people appreciate you, to be generous with it. If you do that, the world that you're in will drop away and your original face will manifest. This will also apply to when you see people that you don't think are beautiful or people aren't appreciative of you. That's another body and mind where you feel unappreciated So my mind arises and I feel, oh, I'm unappreciated. My mind arises and I feel, oh, I'm appreciated. So I told over and over this fundamental story that attracted me to Zen was a Zen person is sitting and people come up to him and say, we don't appreciate you.

[60:26]

And he welcomes it. Then they come up to him and say, we do appreciate you. And he welcomes it. And then I saw that I imagined that and I said I want to learn that because what I want to learn was also to drop what I wanted to learn. I didn't want to get that, actually, because I could sense that what he was was someone who wasn't holding on to being insulted, he wasn't holding on to being praised, he wasn't holding on to being a Zen master, he wasn't holding on to not holding on. So everything that happens for us, you know, is just body-mind. In other words, it's just mind. There's nothing but mind for us. Or I should say, everything is just mind.

[61:33]

That's a better way to say it. Everything is just mind. And if we're wholehearted about that, everything will drop away and reality will manifest. And it's beautiful. But it's not a beauty that we can get a hold of with the word beauty. But when people say we're beautiful or ugly, wholeheartedness is to learn to welcome that. And of course it's hard to even welcome When people say we're beautiful, that's sometimes hard to welcome, too. Yes? One of the things, first is the confession. And I thought last night, because I hate Oh, my God.

[62:35]

Oh, I thought you were going to say, now I remember you stayed. I know, but I thought, a thought crossed my mind when you said, I thought I was going to hate it, so I didn't go to Zazen. But that's not your confession. You came. It's true. You loved it. Isn't that amazing? I mean, I both appreciate and feel exhausted by the process of making this go on. But I just, anyway, I just wanted to say I really thank you. I appreciate it. I'm actually checking it, and I thought it really kind of helped infuse something. I don't know what that's like. Well, how did they say it? I'm like... I was surprised.

[63:36]

Thank you. I was surprised. Thank you for this story. Thank you. And the other two things I wanted to say was, one, I think what you said, or I think I understand it thoroughly established, is the absence of fantasy. It's not just the absence of fantasy. It's the absence of fantasy in the other dependent. It's not just, it's not just the absence, it's the absence relative to our life, you know. It seems if the thought heard something in their life, maybe I would know that, and I thought that if it was the absence of, how would I actually know it? Yeah, well, you can actually know that. How would you know that, or what is it? How would you know it? Yes. Whether it's characteristic or something. I'll just say this for now and we can talk about more later, but basically if you look for something and can't find it, it doesn't mean that it doesn't exist.

[64:47]

But there's a way of looking for something so that you know not only can't I find it, but nobody could ever find it. It's just not findable. And you can know that. You can know that your idea about things cannot be found in the things. You can know that definitively. And the way you know it, by the way, is to be completely wholehearted with it. It sounds how I'm feeling at the moment is, which is kind of the same thing that you said you would come back to, is this faith. To me, I don't know if I would know, but if I just have faith that you wouldn't know it. I mean, there's a, for instance, it's a conventional world that says two plus two is four, and I know that, but it's not, don't be afraid of that.

[66:01]

It's, it's, it's just, you know, No, I'm actually talking, when I come to talk about the original face, about the other dependent, the other dependent, that is not known the way we know things ordinarily. But the other two, one is known by fantasy and the other is known by correct perception. You can actually perceive that something can't be found in something that nothing about it can be found. You can understand that there's nothing you can find about the way things are other-dependent. And that's the way they basically are. You can understand that But that understanding sets you free from this misunderstanding. And in that freedom, there's no idea of that freedom which actually is appropriate to that freedom.

[67:08]

And you can understand that. You can know that. And part of us has trouble understanding what I just said because you want to know what I just said, but that part you won't know because that's the imputational. Got it? See, that part that wants to get what I just said is the imputational. That part, there's nothing about that that's going to apply to this other knowledge. It's not going to be like that. It's empty, right? You can't get a hold of it. You can't find it. Yes. Is that what you're just describing and no trace of realization remains? Yeah, that's no trace of realization. Right. There's a realization that goes on forever with no trace. Or a freedom, a freedom that has no trace.

[68:17]

Yes. Yes. You say the absence of our imputation in the thing. And I wonder where the... In the other dependent character. It's not really a thing. It's the other dependent character of things. It's easier for me to describe that because you keep mentioning like the absence of our imputation of our fantasy in the mystery table in red. No, it's in the mystery of the table. So the table has three characteristics. One, a thing characteristic. which you put on it. Yeah. One has an ungraspable, inconceivable, mysterious characteristic. Okay. Where does this knowledge come from, that this mysterious characteristic exists? I can understand... Where does it come from?

[69:19]

Yeah. I can understand to see that... It comes to you first... To understand... In words. That's how it comes to you. And the words come from those who have realization beyond words. So some people have worked with words and become free of them, and from that place they send us back a message which we turn into words. But their realization is about the imputation character of their perceptions. It's not that they have... There is no perception of the mystery, right? There is no perception of the mystery for them, but there is a perception of the absence of the non-mystery in the mystery. They do have that. I can understand that sentence until the point where you say the absence of the non-mystery.

[70:21]

But then you continue in the mystery as if that is something which is somehow there or perceived. When I say in, I don't mean in like the opposite of out. In and out are more repetitions, are more words. It's not really in or out. Those are constructions. It's just that the mystery mysteriously supports the absence, and the presence of fantasy. It supports that, but not really like an in-out kind of support. I think I've just hung up because it always sounds to me like it is put as if the mystery exists. It exists conventionally, just like the absence exists conventionally. The only way that the The only way that the other dependent exists is independence on conventional designation.

[71:31]

That's the only way it exists. It also only exists as a word. Maybe to put it another way, what is... Excuse me, but the imputation doesn't exist at all. I would say it exists as an imputation. What's being imputed doesn't exist at all. Only the word. So we're not saying that the other... We're not saying that the original faith exists, and we're not saying it doesn't exist. We're not saying it doesn't exist. Buddha doesn't go around saying... generally speaking, the special cases, like the self doesn't exist. The findable, substantial thing, that doesn't exist. But all of the phenomena, he doesn't say that they don't exist or do exist. He says they exist in a mental way.

[72:33]

So the other dependent character, you know, The original face, we don't say it doesn't exist, we just say how it does exist. And the way it does exist is that it exists only as conscious construction. That's how it exists. But we're also not saying it doesn't exist because it does exist as conscious construction only. It does have that way of existing. But the only way it could not exist would also be by conscious construction. Think you almost got that, didn't you? So I'm not saying the other dependent exists or doesn't. I'm just saying that if you want to talk about how it does, this is how it does. That's called conventional existence. And the other one is the same. This knowledge of the absence, this knowledge, this perception of emptiness, which liberates you from holding on to your imputations, that also exists only conventionally.

[73:38]

That doesn't really exist. It doesn't anymore really exist than the other one. It only exists conventionally. It only exists... The perception of emptiness, the understanding of emptiness, that has no absolute existence either. That only exists conventionally. Just like... Just like that which is free of self... the other dependent character, that the original face, which is free of our self-face, from our mask, that also only exists conventionally. But we're not stressing, you know, that it does exist. We're just saying, well, it exists in this conventional way. It's kind of a light existence. It's existence light. but unlike Bud Light this is an unpopular light people like existence heavy usually and non-existence heavy so we're not into existence heavy or existence or non-existence heavy we're just into conventional existence yeah

[74:55]

I was remembering something from the Sunday Yamarachana Sikha. I'm not sure I'm remembering it fully, but I wanted to ask you about it in relation to the original phase. And that is, there was some place where I think it might have been a number of ways in which the three characteristics are empty or something like that. And the other dependent was empty, I think, in two ways. And one was that it was... Is this right? Am I remembering this correctly? Well, so far, you remember right that the other... It was empty in the sense that it was empty of the invitational. And then it was empty in the sense that it was not the object of observation for purification. Is that right? That's why I'm not remembering completely. And that's why I wanted to ask you to relate it to why Dogen was... She's bringing up one of the more difficult points in the sutra. And here she is bringing it up.

[76:01]

This is our life. So in chapter six, I just told you about chapter six where it talks about these three characteristics. This is chapter six of the Tibetan translation from Tibetan. Chapter seven, they talk about these different types of emptiness. So in chapter six, they, the authors or whatever, they talk about three types of characteristics, three types of own being. Actually, in that chapter seven, they talk about three types of lack of own being, which parallel with the three kinds of own being. So the imputational character has a lack of own being in terms of character. In other words, the way it is, its character has no own being. It doesn't exist at all. It's empty even of character. The other dependent character has two kinds of lack of own being.

[77:06]

One is, which is different from what you said, it lacks own being in terms of self-production. Of self-production. It doesn't produce itself. Self-production. It lacks own being in terms of self-production. Self-production. Because it's other-dependent, so it lacks own-being in terms of self-production. But it also lacks own-being in the sense that it lacks being the ultimate, which has the power to purify belief in the impotential. It doesn't have that power to be an object of purification of the misconceptions. it doesn't have that refuting power. So it lacks, it has an ultimate lack of own being in the sense that it lacks the ultimate also. Whereas the ultimate, it is the lack of own being.

[78:10]

But it doesn't lack the power of being the ultimate. It is the ultimate. It can refute our belief that something can be found when we understand it. That was very difficult, but today you all understood it perfectly. It's amazing. But that's a slightly different way of saying that the ultimate...it isn't that it lacks the absence of the imputational. it lacks being the ultimate. Because it actually does lack the... It lacks the imputational, that the other dependent lacks the imputational, but it doesn't really lack it because it supports it. It supports it, and yet, what it supports is absent of it. Say in. Yes. Yes.

[79:16]

Do you think that it might be accurate to say that all these teachings are descriptions of experience in meditation? You know, you said accurate, and even before you said what you're offering, I thought rather than accurate, maybe the word that you could use would be useful. So it might be useful to say, all these are descriptions of what happens in meditation. Yeah, might be useful. Except there's also, but that's a very optimistic way of seeing this. I would say that all the delusions that people are engaged in are really their meditation practice. The way they're meditating is that basically all they've got working is delusions, but they haven't yet admitted it. So when you start to admit that what you're working with is delusion, your delusion process has turned into meditation.

[80:25]

You say that's useful accuracy? Is that what we're engaged in? Accuracy just sounds a little too substantial. But I think you meant a useful precision. I think we're talking about precision here. I think accuracy and precision are related, but accurate sounds a little bit too real, rather than, we're being, I think like, what is its name, T.S. Eliot said, precise but not pedantic. We want to be precise but not make it too heavy, you know? And be clear about the words we're using so that we can wholeheartedly engage them. And when we have a term and it's put in such a way that we can engage it, then I think it becomes useful for liberation. That we have, okay, now I know where to be generous and I know where to be careful and I know where to be patient with this word.

[81:39]

And other people can help me be patient with this word because we're clear about what word we're using. It's sort of experiential. That is what it is. And then there's an imputed self that is describing. Yeah. I like that way of using experience. There's experience, but then we impute to the experience and we think our imputation is the experience. We do have experience. But our experience is mysterious. And we don't like that. So we make our experience graspable. And we kind of like that for a while, but then we, what happened to my experience? Something's missing. I got something, but I lost something. What we lost, we lose our experience when we make it graspable. And so we describe the process of grasping, and if we wholeheartedly engage the process of grasping, dash body-mind, it drops away and we have our experience.

[82:44]

So that's like exploring all these teachings, right? exploring all that may fall away and experience over and without. We experience the teachings wholeheartedly. We allow ourselves to be permeated with them as an act of service to all beings. And we do all these practices with all these things. And all these teachings, our interpretation of these teachings, our rendition of these teachings as ideas, they drop away. And we realize where the teachings are coming from and where our life really is. Yes and yes.

[83:45]

To me it seems like from the example in which the way you describe compassion, and particularly like the second kind relating to elements, this kind of way of teaching to kind of open it up to inquiry and then it becomes like non-dual it's also like the shifting in the thinking of um like a dual logic to a logic that holds kind of multitudes so somehow yeah so that's finally a process that i'm referring back to what timo said like um Anything where you try to talk about exists or doesn't exist, you fall into dual logic. It's like plus, minus. And our languages or our computer system is very focused on always having yes or no, so cutting it down to that.

[84:57]

But the teaching goes in a different direction, has like, The teaching goes in a different direction from... See, now, if I say that, that's another... You just demonstrated. The mind turns it into... And so I'm suggesting that we have to wholeheartedly engage the way you can't get away from... If we wholeheartedly engage it, it drops away. And if nobody brings it up, it's still there. So bring up it not being there, and that was the same thing. So let's get it out in the open so we can wholeheartedly engage it. If we wholeheartedly engage duality, duality is impermanence.

[86:01]

imputed upon non-duality. So the teaching is actually not to try to get away from duality, but how to fully engage it in the fullness of the engagement in following the duality all the way to the tips of the duality. The emptiness splashes up. Yeah, I thought I did, but basically that you, I guess, one, you can believe in wholeheartedness, which means you could believe in the, in all the bodhisattva practices. Wholeheartedness is a summary of Wholeheartedly sitting is a summary of all bodhisattva practices going on when you're sitting.

[87:06]

So I believe, I might have a... If I believe in wholeheartedness, I believe basically in all the practices. But it's like, it's a single faith in all the practices. So when I'm sitting, if it's wholehearted, I must be practicing giving, ethics, patience, heroic effort, concentration and wisdom until all those practices which are embracing infinite wholesome activities, until they're all there at this moment of sitting or whatever, there's not wholeheartedness yet, so then the edifice of illusions still can stand a little bit. So, I think, you know, Dogen Zenji is saying, I believe in this Mahayana teaching, which I call wholeheartedly sitting, because I live in Kamakura, Japan, and some of my friends are making the teaching really simple, so I'm going to too.

[88:13]

And I'm going to condense all of Mahayana Buddhism down to wholeheartedly sitting. And I'm even going to take away wholehearted and just say sitting. Wholehearted engagement and sitting still. But all the Mahayana teachings must be there because this sitting still is mental one-pointedness, is buoyancy, flexibility, is generosity, is patience. All that must be there in this sitting. That's the sitting which, the sitting I'm talking about is enlightenment. It's sitting which is saying, this sitting must be enlightenment. Well, if this sitting must be enlightenment, then all the enlightenment practices must be with this sitting. So this sitting in enlightenment, enlightenment is going to practice as his sitting. That's his single faith. But it's really, I think, his faith in Mahayana. So I feel he's very much like the bodhisattvas that are being referred to by Asanga and other bodhisattvas.

[89:25]

Okay? So, yeah, are you... So we are saying, you know, when you're sitting there, are you... Do you have a single faith that you're practicing the same faith as all the ancestors that you're doing the practice that they did? Because they practiced enlightenment when they were sitting. Do you want to have your sitting be enlightenment? And that's the idea. This sitting is the practice of enlightenment, the enlightenment of this practice. Even though sometimes it just looks like a... people sitting in a room together, having, feeling a little bit sick. Is that enough for today? Yeah, well, thank you. Thank you.

[90:27]

Someone said that he was writing from a Zen group someplace. He said, we're using this book, Being Upright, as a study guide for our preparation to receive the Bodhisattva precepts. He said, do you have a study guide that goes with Being Upright? Or would you please write one? And I thought, that's a good idea. So I'm inviting people, for starters, if you have any suggestions about how to make a study guide or something that you think would be good to be in a study guide that would accompany that would help people who are studying being upright in relationship to receiving the precepts. If you have some suggestions about a study guide that has questions or exercises that could be done in relationship to the book, you could just send me your suggestions and then at some point we might start working on making a study guide.

[91:47]

I welcome your input on this idea, which seems like a pretty good idea. And if it's okay with you, I'd like to chant the Fuganzo Zengyi a few more evenings. Tai Tai song? Did you practice Heiji? No. Do you practice at Sojiji? Do you practice? You don't chant for Kansazengi there at night, do you? During Sashin? Okay. So, at Sojiji they do it during Sashin in the evening? Yeah. During Zazen? Yeah. And I think maybe in Heiji they do it more often. So some temples they do it sometimes.

[92:53]

And at Tassajara, like I said, we did it every night. But different monasteries have different policies. But one of the advantages of doing it there is that... it's a little bit different feeling from doing it in morning service. So just to experience the difference of doing it at night from doing it in the morning, I thought we could do it a few more times just to have that experience, that permeation of our consciousnesses. Yes? It also invigorated me to do the chanting. I felt like energy at that time of time that isn't usually there. It was part of the chanting. It was a result of the chanting. All right. Well, thank you for your efforts through all the difficulties of body and mind.

[93:52]

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