I remember that yesterday I thought about today. On Friday I thought about Saturday. And I thought, oh, there's a one-day sitting. I thought how fortunate the people are who could come into this hall and practice enlightenment, practice the Buddha way. we are so fortunate. When the attendant came to pick me up and bring me here, because I was expected to come and give a talk.

[01:10]

And she said, do you have anything? And I said, I think I said, I have nothing. I was very happy to say that. So here I am. I don't mean to brag, but since I have nothing, if I have nothing, I'm well qualified to speak about the Buddha way. If I do have something, I'm not so well qualified, but I was invited to speak, so either way, here I am talking to you. And it occurred to me that I could mention to you something that I say over and over.

[02:23]

I seem to be a Zen priest. And I heard our dear ancestor, who we call Suzuki Roshi, I heard him say, the job of a Zen priest is to encourage Zazen. I remember him saying something like that. Maybe he said to encourage the practice of zazen. And that made a deep impression on me. And so since that time I have actually been engaged in encouraging people to practice Zazen.

[03:31]

My understanding of Zazen has evolved over the approximately 45 years since I heard him say that. When I first thought of Zazen, I thought it was to sit cross-legged on the ground in upright posture, hands in the cosmic meditation mudra, eyes open and gazing down, tongue on the roof of the mouth. and to continue to be mindful of posture moment by moment, and to be aware of breathing moment by moment. And now I think zazen totally includes such an exercise, such a ritual.

[04:40]

But my understanding of zazen is completely, immeasurably, inconceivably, totally culminated enlightenment which surrounds and supports somebody when they're sitting cross-legged in upright posture, paying attention to what's going on in their consciousness. Zazen completely holds them and supports them as they're practicing that way. So all day long as we sit here together, the Zazen I'm talking about is your good friend who supports you in your human life, which today is sitting cross-legged quite a bit.

[05:47]

However, when you get up and stand in front of your seat, zazen doesn't abandon you, it supports you and sustains you to stand. And when you walk, it supports you to walk. And when you have formal meals or serving formal meals, zazen is also the good friendship in which you are inconceivably living. The inconceivable friendship which surrounds your conceivable life and your inconceivable life. Until recently I didn't hear Suzuki Roshi say, Zazen is to sit in the midst of a big invisible world. But recently I heard him say that, almost 43 years after he passed away, I hear him say that with the aid of

[07:04]

recordings of his voice. Zazen is to sit in the midst of a big, invisible world. The way I would rephrase it, I wouldn't say big, I would say immeasurable. Invisible, inconceivable. Zazen is to sit in the midst of the inconceivable mind of good friendships. between Buddhas, bodhisattvas, and all of us to sit in this invisible friendship and also to enjoy visible friendship. We can sometimes visibly see it, too. We can see a visible version of it, like you came here to practice with your friends In this room, this is a friendship which you can perceive.

[08:07]

For all I know, some of you don't even think that this is friendship. I don't know. I'm not going to do a survey yet. Later, I think I might do a survey. But right now, I just want to say that the Zazen I'm talking about is the inconceivable friendship in which the Buddhas practice and through which the Buddhas practice. And our zazen is to sit in the middle of that friendship. At noon service we're planning to chant what we call the Self-Receiving and Employing Samadhi. Is that correct? That's our plan. It's a It's an English translation of some writings by an ancestor named Ehe Dogen Dai Osho. And in there it starts off by saying something like this.

[09:13]

Now, all Buddhas and all ancestors who uphold the true Dharma, or who uphold the Buddha Dharma, All these Buddhas and ancestors who uphold the Buddha Dharma have made it the true path of enlightenment to sit upright in the midst of self-fulfilling samadhi, self-fulfilling awareness. All Buddhas and all ancestors have made it the true path of enlightenment to sit upright in the midst of good friendships. awareness of good friendship. That's where they sit. What's good friendship? Good friendship is the way all the Buddhas are supporting us right now. All the Buddhas are inviting us to enter enlightenment. It's the friendship where we say, I honor Buddha.

[10:17]

I wish to serve Buddha, I wish to serve the ancestors by practicing the Buddha way and they say thank you and we say you're welcome. It's the realm where we practice friendliness which we can perceive and where we practice friendliness which we cannot perceive and where other people are practicing friendship with us that they can perceive and we can perceive and where others are practicing friendship with us that we cannot perceive but nonetheless they are practicing friendship with us this awareness is the awareness, which is the standard. It is the criterion. It is the touchstone of the practice of the people who uphold the Buddha Dharma. This friendship, this inconceivable mutual assistance, which is uninterrupted, unceasing,

[11:24]

unthinkable, unnameable, unstoppable, infinitely beneficial. And in our tradition we call that practice of sitting in the midst of this great inconceivable friendship, we call that zazen. But of course, I don't know of course, but that does not only apply to when we're sitting cross-legged. It means the practice

[12:28]

It means practicing in the midst of awareness of that friendship. It means aspiring to make every action we do an inaction, an embodiment, an enactment of the good friendship, which the Buddhists say is the totality of the Buddha way. The totality of the Buddha way is good friendship and vice versa. And we cannot see that with our sense organ, which is sensitive to electromagnetic radiation. We see it with our Dharma eye and our Dharma heart. Another description of our practice is, which is kind of simple, is number one, clean the temple.

[13:46]

Number two, sit. And we seem to do that here. We clean the temple and sit, and clean the temple and sit, and clean the temple and sit. But an interpretation of clean the temple, which I offer you, is give up everything and sit. Give up everything and study yourself. give up everything and study good friendship. In order to give up everything, we sort of have to clean everything.

[14:48]

But clean means not mess with it. It means take good care of it. In order to let everything go, we have to take good care of everything. So we take care of the room, we take care of the body, we take care of the mind, and then we let go of everything, and then we practice sitting. Now that we've given up everything, including our sitting, we practice sitting in the midst of studying the self. checking out what the self is in a friendly way, seeing if there seems to be friendship there. And if there's not friendship there, aspiring to be friendly towards the appearance of unfriendliness.

[15:52]

I've actually heard in some Zen temples, I won't mention the names, people say, in the temple they say, the people in the temple seem to be unfriendly. I thought that people at a Zen temple would be friendly, but they look like they're unfriendly. What about that? Sometimes people say that to me. Not that they don't say I'm unfriendly. I think they're afraid to say I'm unfriendly. But they tell me they think some other people look unfriendly. They don't actually say usually so-and-so is unfriendly. They just say so-and-so looks unfriendly. Matter of fact, a lot of people around here look unfriendly. This happens to me when I'm visiting others in centers. I guess that the people who have read Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, and a lot of people probably think Suzuki Roshi is a pretty friendly person.

[17:19]

I'm going to do a survey now. How many people think Suzuki Roshi is a friendly person? One, two, yeah, quite a few. I think you're right. However, when I met Sikiroshi, the person who was the actual person who they called him, when I met him, my first time meeting him was, well, excuse me for saying so, but the first time I met him, it wasn't him. So I went to Zen Center in San Francisco. I had already been to Tatsuhara to visit the monastery right after it opened in the summer of 1967. I went there after the first practice period just ended in August. And he wasn't there. I didn't go specifically to see him.

[18:22]

But anyway, I found out that the Zen master was not at the monastery. And I wasn't disappointed because I actually went there to visit my friend from high school. And I didn't like Tassajara. I thought it smelled bad and a lot of flies. So I was happy to get out of there. But I still thought it was an interesting visit and I met some interesting people who would become my good friends, who would become my good friends over the years. I left, but somehow after I left and was glad to get out of there, after a while I thought, I want to go there and live there. Weird. Anyway, I went back to visit San Francisco Zen Center later that year of 1967, and I was intending to meet Suzuki Roshi. And so I went to the Zen Center after, first of all, mistakenly going to the Go Club.

[19:27]

and thinking that that was the Zen Center, but then leaving the Go Club, which was next door to Zen Center, and going to Zen Center, knocking on the door, and a handsome Japanese Zen priest opened the door of 1881 Bush Street. And I said to him, and I thought he was Suzuki Roshi, I've come to join Zen Center. And he said, oh, well, come in and sit down. I'll get the president for you. And I thought this person was Suzuki Roshi, but he looked like he was about 38. And I heard Suzuki Roshi was like in his early 60s. And I thought, great. Zen's really good for you. rather than he was supposed to be early 60s and he looked like he was 106. Nice young handsome man.

[20:33]

And so anyway, then I sat in this priest's office for a while and the president came and got me. And I found out that wasn't Suzuki Roshi. That was Katagiri Sensei, who was 38. So I didn't get to see Sugroshi at that time. But the next day I came to Zazen and I was sitting on the floor looking at the floor and he walked by. I somehow, I guess I knew it was going to be him. He walked by and all I saw was his feet because I was looking down and I didn't look up and say hi. I just kept looking down, saw these feet walk by And when I saw the feet, I thought, these feet can teach me Zen. I did not say, these feet can teach me totally culminated enlightenment.

[21:36]

I did not say, these feet can teach me good friendship. I didn't have that understanding at the time. Now I do. But at that time I thought, these are Zen feet, they can teach me Zen. I was happy about that. That was good enough for me. When the period of meditation was over, I think, but I'm not sure, that we chanted the Heart of Great Perfect Wisdom scripture three times in Japanese, and then after we chanted, we went out There were two doors in the Zen Do. One was the entrance door, which could also be used as an exit, but there were four other doors. One of them was to Suzuki Roshi's office. So he stood in his office, at the door of his office, facing into the Zen Do, and we went out through his office. Each person went out through his office and bowed to him and then went down the hall.

[22:40]

When it was my turn to meet him, I joined my palms and looked at him and bowed. And when I looked at him, he looked at me and then he looked away and didn't look back. And then I moved on. I didn't think, oh, he's unfriendly. But I did think, did I offend him by looking right in his face? Was I not supposed to be looking right in the teacher's face? Because he looked away. He didn't look at me and smile and say, welcome to Zen. He didn't look at me and smile and say, you're going to be a good Zen student. He just looked at me and looked away, and he kept looking away. I didn't think, he's abandoned me. He's rejected me. But I did think, well, maybe I wasn't supposed to do that.

[23:44]

And I also thought, maybe he's afraid of me. Maybe I frightened him by looking right in his face. All that stuff went through my mind in somewhere around one second. And then another thought came was, wow, I don't know what happened. And that's probably really good. And I still think that's really good that I didn't know what happened. And I wanted to study with him more even though I didn't know if he was my friend or not. And I practiced with him for a while, a couple weeks, a couple months, a couple years. And he was pretty formal with me. He wasn't cold, but I wouldn't say he was warm with me. I didn't feel, oh, this is a really great guy who's really warm towards me.

[24:50]

I didn't think that. But I did see him with some other people, particularly I saw him with some elderly Japanese ladies, and he seemed to be very warm with them. and almost chatty. They were definitely chatting away to him, and he seems to be happily talking to them, and they were very happy to talk to him. And I looked at them and I thought, he's not that way with me. And I soothed myself by thinking, he's not that way with me, but I practice sadhana with him and I know he appreciates that and he practices with me so that's fine for me. And around that time, in that early years of my time with him, he said one day, your teacher may someday, may sometimes not be your friend.

[25:59]

And I thought, great, because you don't seem to be my friend. You seem to be my teacher. You do seem to be my teacher. You are my teacher, but And I am your student, but you don't seem to be my friend, and you're not friendly with me according to my idea. I think what he meant is, one of the meanings he had was, your teacher may not be able to be your friend the way you think a friend is. He was not a friend to me the way I thought of being a friend, but he was friends to other people the way I would think that he might be a friend. So that encouraged me to feel that I wasn't being rejected by him, even though he didn't seem to be my friend. So after I was around Zen Center about three years, I was about to go to Tassajara for a practice period that he was not leading, was going to be led by a visiting teacher.

[27:31]

And he said to me that he, when I go to Tassajara, he wanted me to train with this teacher and learned chanting from him. And then he shook my hands for the first time in three years. And then I somehow, when his hand touched my hand, I could feel the friendship. I mean, I could feel friendship. Somehow I felt, oh, friendship has arrived. And it was a big friendship. And it was warm. And it made me feel like this was always here. And I also felt like he didn't shake my hand because I thought this. This is what I thought. He didn't say this. He didn't shake my hand like this when I first came to Zen Center. He didn't want to distract me from the practice by this warmth. But this warmth is there to support us to practice, I feel. And it was there before, and it was there after.

[28:36]

I never knew, and none of us knew, how much he cared for us. And he didn't know how much we cared for him. How we care for each other is inconceivable, inconceivably wonderful. This awareness of this kind of reality that I'm talking about is the context of the true path of enlightenment. It's the context of our sitting practice. It's to sit in the awareness of a friendship that we do not yet fully understand, but we hear about it. And at noon service we'll chant, except for the servers unfortunately don't get to hear it. We'll chant this thing which describes the realm of inconceivable good friendship among all beings.

[29:46]

So while we're sitting today, we have the opportunity to give up everything, moment by moment, give up everything. But again, not give up everything by taking good care of everything. Give up your posture by sitting upright. Give up your posture by walking carefully and quietly. Give up your posture by being aware of your posture. Care for your posture thoroughly and thereby give it up. Care for your breathing thoroughly and give it up. Care for your thinking thoroughly and give it up. And after giving everything up, then study the self. And the self, what the self really is, The self really is good friendship. That's what your self really is. Your self, my self, is how everybody's supporting you.

[30:49]

That's your self. Your self is how you're supporting everybody. That's your self. Understanding that self is enlightenment. And understanding that self is what helps everybody. Of course you can help people even before you understand this, and you are helping people even before you understand this. But the unhindered benefit and blessing for beings is unfolded through understanding that you are helping all beings and all beings are helping you. Again I heard Suzuki Roshi in a talk which was given in San Francisco where someone said to him, yesterday or today you said that

[32:01]

we have to be enlightened in order to help people. And this woman said, but that would mean that almost none of us in this room could help people. And Suzuki Roshi said, well, enlightenment, that's a big word or something like that. For bodhisattvas, enlightenment is to understand that others are yourself. Understanding that others are yourself, understanding that others, that you are, that what you are is dependent on others. Others, everything that's not you makes you. Understanding that is enlightenment. Understanding that, that's what helps people. Because that's what we can have trouble believing sometimes, that everybody we meet is ourself.

[33:11]

And everybody we meet gives us life. Understanding that is enlightenment. Understanding that is what helps everybody. So we have a chance to give up everything and understand that. If we don't give up everything, it's hard to understand it. But we can give up everything, because we can take good care of everything. We can. Everything we can take care of, we can do that thoroughly, and when we do, we can give it up, and then we can open to how it is that others are our self. Yes, I do mean those others. They are your self. So I will be here with you, and I just want to tell you, I vow, I aspire to sit with you and walk with you today, maybe tomorrow also, but today, at least until after I wash dishes, I vow to be upright in the midst of the awareness of good friendship.

[34:30]

of your good friendship to me, no matter how you look, no matter what you say, to be aware of your good friendship to me, your friendship which is making me wake up, and my good friendship to you which is assisting you to wake up. I vow to sit in the midst of that awareness today with you. you are invited to enter this self-fulfilling samadhi of the Soto school of Zen, which is the true path of enlightenment of those who take care of the Buddhadharma. So, not having anything, I'm very happy to tell you all this. And I have a watch in my pocket here.

[35:36]

This watch was given to me by somebody who I'm not allowed to tell you who gave it to me. And this was her grandfather's. And it's gold. And it keeps time. And it's made in Shanghai. and it says it's quarter of eleven. So I'm very happy to talk to you about this friendship and I will continue to do so for the rest of the year and then I don't know what I'll do. But this year the topic of my study and my teaching is the teaching of good friendship, which I've heard is the totality of the Buddha way.

[36:42]

And early today, wouldn't that be nice? Kitchen won't miss a thing. And of course, when you leave, you're invited also to go in the kitchen and practice kitchen work in the midst of the self-fulfilling samadhi. Okay? If you're happy and you know it, raise your hand. It's okay to raise two, that's fine. Is there anything you want to say before we conclude this friendship fest? You're welcome. May our intention

[37:50]

Equally extend to every being and place with the true merit of Buddha's way. Beings are numberless. I vow to save them. Delusions are inexhaustible.

[38:14]

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