Is it working? It is. I aspire to talk to you about some wisdom teachings, some teachings which are conducive to wisdom, and some Zen stories which are for the sake of developing wisdom. And I feel a need to make some basic points first.

[01:12]

First, not everybody that comes to talk to me is asking questions which I feel I should respond to with wisdom teachings. Sometimes the same question, in another situation, I feel like I would respond with wisdom teachings. So for example, someone might come to me and say, I feel unprepared for everything, anything. For example, they might not say, but you can imagine some things you might feel unprepared for. You might feel unprepared for death of so-called yourself, or the death of somebody else.

[02:19]

For example, you might feel unprepared for illness, you might feel unprepared for insanity, you might feel unprepared for poverty, or riches, and so on. And then this person said, I don't know how to be prepared. So I felt like first I would address this statement, this presentation, first I would address it with, just to make sure, with the inquiry about how the person practices with the feeling of being unprepared, or anyway, the words, I feel unprepared.

[03:27]

How do they practice with the words, I feel unprepared? I inquired. And the person said, well, first I'm swept away, or I believe it, I believe I'm unprepared. And I said, well, being swept away isn't exactly a practice, it's more like a response. But anyway, if you do have the thought, I'm unprepared, and you feel swept away by it, you feel like you believe it, then still I say, how do you practice with feeling swept away by the thought, I'm unprepared. Or the thought, how can I be prepared? And then the person told me the practices. Then the person remembered the practices, that one practices with what's appearing in this world.

[04:31]

The person said, well, I would welcome it. So when the thought, I'm unprepared, arises, one can practice compassion towards it. When the thought, I'm not ready for this, or I don't need this, etc. When any thought arises, one could remember to practice compassion towards it, starting with generosity. And then move on to being careful of your karmic response, be careful of your actions of body, speech, and mind, in response to, I feel unprepared, etc. Big etc. And then be patient with, for example, I feel unprepared.

[05:40]

Or, I don't know how to prepare. And then, again, move on to look at your aspirations about how you'd like to practice with whatever is appearing, whatever is appearing, whatever is appearing, in other words, how to practice with your consciousness. Because what's appearing, now we're getting ready for teachings, what's appearing is consciousness. All appearances are consciousness. Consciousness makes appearances. Consciousness makes representations of life which appear to us. And we can feel, well, I'd like to actually, I aspire to be really calm with all appearances,

[06:51]

with all appearances, for example, with all appearances, and an example would be the appearance of not being prepared for x, for my life. I wish to be really calm and flexible and undistracted and relaxed with all appearances. Like, for example, I'm not prepared to die right now. Or, I am prepared to die right now. I'd like to be relaxed and buoyant and flexible and open to the thought, I'm not prepared to die. Or, the thought, hey, it looks like it's time to die. Looks like this is the time. I'd like to be calm and relaxed and open and buoyant and playful. With death when it comes.

[07:54]

And with sickness when it comes. One would kind of need to want to be that way in order to be that way. So, the aspiration and energy to be concentrated in the face of sickness and death, in the face of their appearance before us, we need that aspiration. And then we have a chance to actually practice concentration with sickness and death. And also with healthiness and life, by the way. Then we're ready to hear the teachings about what this death is, about what sickness is. And those are the wisdom teachings which I wish to discuss with you. But before these wisdom teachings are really going to work, before we're going to be able to enter them,

[09:00]

we have to be relaxed. Before you can enter, before you can let go of delusions, before you can let go of appearances as being reality, taking appearances as reality is a delusion, of course. Before we can let go of ignorance and enter the whatever of wisdom, we have to be relaxed, flexible, undistracted. Where are we going again? Oh yeah, wisdom. What are we letting go of again? Oh, whatever I'm holding on to. You have to be concentrated. And again, if you don't practice compassion with this stuff, whatever it is, if you don't practice generosity and ethics and patience and enthusiasm, it's going to be hard to be relaxed and playful and undistracted by it.

[10:03]

A slap in the face, a spit in the face, if you're not already relaxed and flexible and undistracted, you might get distracted by it. But if you're really concentrated, you have a good chance of when the slap hits the face, you can like, oh, here, wow, it's like a home run. Or like a beautiful pitch. Or like a well-struck bell. Or like a perfect kiss. Just the right word. Just the right color. Ah, that was just the right slap. It landed perfectly. And the pain was just exactly what it was. And now I'm ready to practice wisdom with it.

[11:05]

I hope that you can practice compassion towards what appears to be this room, the people here, and the language that is being offered. Okay, I'd like to suggest to you that... There are several things I'd like to suggest. I'm trying to think of which one is the best one first.

[12:13]

Can you hear me okay up there? Yes. Just a little more time. Okay. Well, just let me suggest to you what you've heard many times before.

[14:10]

That delusion and enlightenment are both kind of pivoting on self. Or selfhood. There's a story that when we've already got a self, and then we carry it around while we live, that's what delusion is like. Which many people probably could identify that that's the way they're operating, is they've got a self. As a kid there was a TV show called, Have Gun, Will Travel. So, it's like, have self, will travel.

[15:12]

Have self, will be a mother. Have self, will be a spouse. Have self, will be a Zen student. Have self, will practice compassion. You can practice compassion even while you're carrying a self. The compassion you practice while you're walking around, carrying yourself someplace, on your back or on your head, or at your heart. You can still practice compassion, but to practice compassion while carrying a self is called delusion. When the practice of compassion comes, and engages with the phenomena, and there's a self there, that's enlightenment. When the self arises in the causal process of, for example, compassion,

[16:14]

when the self is born there, that's enlightenment. When the self is born in the coming together of causes and conditions, that's enlightenment. So enlightenment sees how the self is born. Enlightenment, delusion is a self already been born, and here we got it. And we're gonna live our life. When our life comes and shows us how self is born, that's enlightenment. Back to compassion. Moment by moment, or moment by moment, or moment after moment, moment after moment is calling for compassion.

[17:16]

Each moment is saying, help, or each moment is saying, please give me compassion. Every moment is saying, please give me compassion. So we have a chant which says, moment after moment, thought after thought, every thought is saying, please give me compassion. Every moment, every thought is saying that. So, we have a practice of compassion, where we try to be mindful, moment after moment, thought after thought, compassion, compassion, thought after thought, I'm listening to you, I'm listening to you, I'm listening to you with compassion, I'm compassionate. I'm compassionately witnessing you, thought. I'm not ready, I'm compassionately listening to you, I am ready. I'm compassionate listening to you. I'm not good, I'm compassionate listening to you.

[18:18]

I'm better than other people, I'm compassionate listening to you. I'm angry, I hear you. I want something else to be happening, I hear you. So in that situation, if we're doing that kind of practice for moment after moment, we're hearing, we're listening, we're witnessing with compassion, now we can hear a teaching which says, well, the appearance of the body is consciousness. The body which appears to me, mine and yours, the appearance of your body is consciousness. The appearance of my body is consciousness. We have a mind which constructs appearances, and we know them.

[19:23]

The way of constructing it, we don't know. But the results of this cognitive construction we can see, these appearances which are constructed, we know them. And now there's a teaching which says in addition to that, it's saying that when there's an appearance of your body or my body, if you see the appearance of my body, if there's any sense of ownership of my body on your part, that's the self. If a body appears and you think you own it, and maybe it has your name on it or something, but anyway, if you think you own your body, so to speak, that's the self, that's self. And that's something to study and see, what that self

[20:33]

is. That's it. Is it already there or has it just been born? Is it already there or was it just born by the ownership of an appearance? The teaching says it is born by the ownership of appearance. It's born by the appearance and it's born by the ownership. You've got the appearance and the ownership, you've got a self. And the appearance is born by an inconceivable process of cognitive construction. And we can see the appearance and we can see the sense of ownership, and there is the sense of self. The feeling of owning a body is fundamental for humans to feel like there is somebody. When there's just a body and there's no ownership,

[21:35]

there may not be a sense that there is somebody. If there is, is that somebody a priori to the appearance of the body or is it something that's born in the appearance of the body? Usually when it's before the body, when it's already there, the self is already there, the owner is already there, and now it possesses this appearance and this appearance, this practice, this practice, this person, this house and so on. If it's beforehand, that's delusion. If it's beforehand and applied to everything that we're doing, it's delusion. So also the self is primarily the sense of mine, mine, mine, mine. I hate to say my students, I hate

[22:46]

Do you possess your students? Oh, what an accusation. But if there is an accusation like that and nobody owns it, hey, no self. And then if there is ownership, oh, there's the self. It got born in the appearance of an accusation and somebody owning it. The ownership is the sense of selfhood. One can, human beings can be aware of this. So you can be, you, human beings, we human beings can be aware of the sense of selfhood because it's the mine. And then there's a me. There's me and mine. And it's amazing. These little tiny babies, they learn that it's mine, nobody teaches them. Before people say, that's your room, that's your food, before

[23:50]

people say that, they somehow figure out that it's mine. And they extend that mine quite widely. Sometimes without limit. Because in fact, the whole world to these babies is in appearance. They're into the same stuff as older people. They have appearances too. Their mind is making appearances and they own them and their self is developing there. You can see this. You can see this subtle thing of appearance, ownership, mine, me. We are not cruel to this setup. We are compassionate to it, right? Appearance, compassion. Ownership,

[24:51]

compassion. Ownership, self, compassion. Appearance, ownership, self, suffering, compassion. We're compassionate to this potentially nauseating, obnoxious situation of going around owning things with or without people's permission. You can think you own people even though they don't agree with you, right? And then you can have a problem with that sometimes and suffer. And we practice compassion towards people who think they own us. You think you own me? We want to practice compassion towards that appearance. By the way, disowning is pretty much the same thing. So owning, disowning is owning. And then that's the main thing. There's also then another sense of agency. Like an action arises, the sense of an agent,

[26:02]

the sense of who did it, that also supports the sense of the self. And then there's location. There's an appearance and a location. That also is a condition for the self. There's an appearance and there's a there, so there's a here. Or you can switch it around and there's a here and there's a there. You can be the here or you can be the there. Usually the self is here and the thing it possesses is there. Usually the self is here and the thing it does is there. You can switch it though, go ahead. Those are the three main ones, but the central one is mine and then there was somebody who did this, me or not me. I cannot lie, it was me, if it was a good thing. And location. However, location by itself is not sufficient.

[27:07]

Check it out. Here-ness is not equivalent to me-ness. Check it out. Me-ness has here-ness with it often, but just here-ness is not enough. Just being, okay, I got the here, that makes it me. Not quite. But if you got a here-ness and then also ownership, then you got ownership located, which is quite common. It's the ownership. And this mine and me, people think also the Buddha is teaching me, self, but actually the way the Buddha teaches it primarily is mine and self. And that's also the way modern mind sciences have discovered that the brain actually does it that way. It makes appearances and then conjures ownership and that's the self, primarily. And these other aspects are there too. Ownership

[28:15]

number one, agency and location. And there's other factors too. Emotional background, a gut sense, these other feelings are part of like me-ness, but the main one, easy one for you to work on today is just meditate on ownership and see how the self's there and see how that's the pivot of suffering and release. This is kind of like, what do you call it? Somewhat abstract presentation of the teachings on self. And the object of our study is this self which arises around possessing appearances. Actually we can't possess the way things actually are independently co-arising because we're part of the process. And we don't like that. We have evolved to not be involved with the actual process of creation, so we make these appearances

[29:18]

which we then can own and grasp. So for now, that's enough on sort of like, that's kind of the theory, the theory of self, which you can find in some Zen texts. This is the theory of delusion, the theory of enlightenment. The theory of delusion is, hold the self which is born before things happen. Hold the self which is already there, that's delusion. Realize the self which is not yet there but which is born moment by moment by conditions. And again, if the conditions aren't there, there's not a self. If there's not possessiveness, etc., agency and so on, then the self isn't born. There can be moments where it can happen,

[30:26]

there can be like a body in front of you and you don't own it or not own it, and like, uh-oh, this is weird. Nobody owns anything around here. Something's missing, oh yeah, right, a self. That can happen. And that's fine that it happens, but that's not really the point, because that moment when something's appearing and nobody owns it is kind of a vacation from selfhood, but what really is important is when you see that when the self arises, you don't think it was there before it came up. That's what we have to see. And so a break from it might be kind of useful. Hey, there was a moment there where there wasn't any possessiveness, there wasn't any mind, there was no me, and then I saw the me come

[31:31]

up and I noticed that when it came up, I didn't notice that it came up, I thought it was already there, and that was delusion. Or actually, there was a moment there when I saw it come up fresh and I hadn't seen such a self before, it was just a condition of ownership. Ownership came up. And then I watched the self born and I was relieved of my belief that there is a permanent self, an a priori self. I wanted to talk about something which I probably shouldn't talk about, but I'm going to anyway,

[32:44]

and what it is, is what I wanted to talk about. I wanted to talk about the statement that there was no Zen in China, that the Chan or Zen phenomena is something that occurred in China and there was not such a phenomena in India. And I wanted to tell you about that, I want to talk about this story about Zen, because part of wisdom teachings I would suggest to you is history, history is part of wisdom teachings. When somebody says, I feel unprepared, I want to make sure they are practicing compassion towards that statement, you know, I feel unprepared, I want to check, in that thought, are we listening to that thought with compassion? And if yes,

[33:48]

then we can talk about the history of that thought. History discussions are part of Zen wisdom tradition. So here is a story, the story is that the thing called Zen, this historical thing called Zen, this historical event called Zen, which the story goes that it occurred over centuries and is still going on. If you go to China, some people in China say, yes, Zen is still cooking away here. Go to Korea, they say, yes, Zen, yes. They don't say Zen, they say Son. Go to Japan, they say Zen. Come to California, they say Zen. Zen, a lot of stuff, right? Go to France, they have Zen and art of baguette buttering. So Zen is still

[34:50]

going on and we are saying that Zen didn't start in India, it started in China. We have a story about this big country with this great culture and all these amazing, beautiful people and all these terrible, terrible, cruel emperors. And in that country, this thing called Zen came up, which is a Chinese way of saying Sanskrit word. That's the story, I told you. Some people say there was no Zen in India. There wasn't a Zen like just any old place and there wasn't a Zen in Indian Buddhism. Now, what I just was going through there seemed to be an appearance of some words and I hope you are compassionate towards those words

[35:51]

and I hope you check out to see if you own or don't own those words. I'm checking to see if I own them. I don't know. Oh yeah, a little bit of sense of ownership of those words. I'd also like to say that I like the image of this lotus, the lotus flower. And there's a sutra which we have a story that the sutra was composed in India and was transmitted to China and Korea and it was a big hit in China. It became the most important scripture in Chinese Buddhism, the Lotus Sutra. And in the Lotus Sutra it doesn't say what I'm about to say to you, but you hear this expression around Zen Center a lot. May we exist in muddy water with purity like a lotus. Thus we bow

[36:55]

to Buddha. May we exist in appearances and possessiveness and self-clinging and all the afflictions that come up with self-clinging in this mud of suffering that comes from believing this me that comes up with mine in relationship to the world of appearances. May we live in that mud with purity. And if we can live in that mud with purity, which is pretty good, there's a result which is called a lotus blossom grows up out of that mud. If you live in it, if you're living in the mud and you resist it, the lotus flower will not grow. If the lotus

[37:59]

flower resists, if the lotus, excuse me, if the seed of the lotus flower, if you put it in the mud and the seed says I ain't going to have anything to do with this mud, the seed will not germinate. I refuse to have anything to do with this gooey, wet, moist, polluted situation. I'm going to stay right here in this little seed, this lotus seed. I'm not going to open to this trash, which hurts. I'm not going to open to the pain of possessiveness and defensiveness and ownership and self. Put a lotus, put a seed for a lotus flower in the mud and if that seed is too hard, it won't germinate. Does that make sense? The Lotus Sutra does not go into such detail, but I'm doing that for you. This is my commentary on the Lotus Sutra. I'm pointing out, but actually

[39:04]

the Buddha kind of implies that, because he says, well, I think it's time for me to tell you about the Lotus Sutra, but actually I think I shouldn't, because there's some people here, he doesn't say it this way, but I'll just say it this way, who are hard-coated seeds and they won't let my teaching in and that would not be good, because they will get resistant and aggressive in response to this amazing mud I'm going to give them. I'm going to give them mud which is called the Lotus Sutra. The Lotus Sutra is mud which makes lotuses. So I'm not going to talk about it. So then the people who are hard-coated walked out and he said, great, now I can talk to the fools who stayed, who are open to my offering. But I'm saying that. So I'm talking about, if you're in the mud, which means you're in

[40:09]

the realm of thought, which means you're in the realm of appearances of thought, or thoughts of which are apparently something, if you're in that realm, you're in the mud. And if there's any possessiveness in that field, you're in the mud. Now, if you practice compassion towards the mud, then you're ready for the lotus to grow. And the story is that some people did open to the suffering of India. For example, the historical Buddha opened to the suffering of India for a long time. And the roots of his compassion spread through the mud and made this beautiful lotus blossom. And it just, and it opened, it sprouted and made a stem and then made a bud and then it opened. And you know, lotuses open, and you know what

[41:10]

they do at night? They close. And then they open again. And then they close. And then next night. And then the next day they open. And you know, sometimes at night when they start to close, some animals go inside the blossom and hang out there because it's warm. And in the daytime they open up and the animal comes out. These are usually small animals, like insects. They get to live in the lotus at night and then fly out of the lotus in the daytime. So that's what lotuses do. They, after they grow up, they open and they close and they open and they close. And then finally they open and then they don't close. And their petals drop. And when their petals drop, they expose the fruit. The flower is great. And

[42:17]

there's a fruit which can make more flowers. And so there's the fruit of this wonderful flower. There's this fruit of this wonderful example. Enlightenment, which has grown out of compassion. Wisdom, which has grown out of compassion towards the mud. Now we've got the fruit. No petals, just this. It's kind of a pod, right? It's a pod container. It's like a dish. The lotus fruit is like a dish, right? And it has these holes in it which have these big fat seeds about the size of marbles inside these little pockets, right?

[43:22]

And so there's the seed. It's exposed. And after a while, the stem gradually gets weak too. And it kind of like bends up and bends and bends. And then the fruit bends with the stem and the fruit goes down into the mud. And then being in the mud, those seed pods, those little round, they're not really seeds actually, those little round balls are seed pods I believe. They have lots of seeds inside. Anybody know anything about lotuses more than me or less than me? Anyway, I think there's like maybe ten, twenty little pod holes in it with ten, twenty round balls of seeds inside. And then it goes down into the mud and then those seeds, those seed pods swell up. And they swell and they swell. But it seems like

[44:32]

I guess one of them swelling, you know, especially if it's towards the center, one of them swelling, it'll just stay and swell and swell and swell and build up more and more pressure. But it won't be able to break out until some of the other ones swell. But when a lot of them swell, enough, then together they burst the container for all the seeds. They burst and they explode. The fruit explodes and it explodes out of the water, into the air, wow! And sends these balls, these swollen, softened balls of seeds flying all over the place. And then they fall into the water and make new lotuses. And that's what happened in India to the lotus of the

[45:35]

Buddha's teaching. The Buddha's teaching opened and closed and opened and closed for centuries. The wisdom of the Buddha's opened and closed for centuries, but finally the petals dropped, the seed formed, it went into the mud and then it exploded into Central Asia, Mongolia, China, Southeast Asia, Sri Lanka. And then the same thing happened in China. It exploded over to Japan and it exploded from Japan to the United States. And now here we are, trying to make this lotus. Now, when you plant a lotus anyplace, if lotuses are anything like humans,

[46:39]

which they might be, because I think lotuses have DNA, don't they? I think they do. I guess they do. I imagine lotuses have DNA like humans have DNA. Like Buddhists. Buddhists have DNA. Right? And when you have DNA making a living being, the living being is sensitive to, for example, some of the things that make DNA. And some of the things that make DNA are very similar to what we call viruses. So the human DNA is to a great extent carrying the results of past generations leading to us, of those DNA being infected by viruses and incorporating other genetic information. So I believe that the human DNA is to a great extent the result

[47:41]

of viral infection. Not all viral infection can be incorporated into transforming the DNA, but some can. That's how we evolve. That's how our DNA has evolved. But also Buddhist DNA is the same. When you plant the seeds of Buddhism, which have exploded from India into Chinese soil, they get infected by Chinese... I think it's RNA, right? I think that there's a type of virus which is basically RNA. Anybody correct me on that? That's what I remember from my New Yorker article. So AIDS doesn't seem to be the type of virus which is modifying our genetic code, but there are other viruses which do. So we are currently evolving in that way through viral infection. And Buddhism is the same. You plant it in a different environment

[48:48]

and it gets infected by the local viruses. So when Buddhism was transmitted to China, it got transformed by Chinese culture and made a new adaptation. But I would emphasize that the Indian DNA is still there. It just gets augmented by the Chinese. So I think the Indian one should be... we should not forget the Indian DNA and that will help us understand the Chinese contribution. And then we can understand how it's a new flowering of the ancient lotus. Because the Indian Buddhism of the past is gone. Now there's a new Indian Buddhism. The Indian Buddhism that we have now in India was never there before. It also

[49:56]

has evolved and is evolving now with modern Indian cultural context. So, what I just said to you was a story about Zen, and I didn't tell you yet what the Chinese viruses were, but there are these Chinese viruses which are beautiful viruses. They're like life-giving viruses. They're viruses relative to Indian Buddhism, but relative to Chinese culture. Some of the great products of Chinese culture are what we call Daoism and Confucianism. Those great traditions exude viruses which infected the Indian Buddhism which transmitted and made these new schools, made these new flowers. So the lotus seeds

[51:07]

from India flew over to, exploded over to China, went into the soil, incorporated the Chinese cultural context and made new flowers, lots of new flowers, lots of beautiful new flowers, and also some not so beautiful flowers. Some bad weeds came up there too, but that happened in India also. And one of those flowers was Zen. And the Zen is, I think if you look at the Zen story, if I look at the Zen story, here's a story I would have about them, and the story I have about them is that mostly they're, the famous ones are about wisdom teachings. There's not so many Zen stories about monks being kind to their thoughts. For example, of monks being kind to the thought, I'm not prepared to practice Zen. Most of

[52:13]

the stories are about monks who knew how to be kind to thoughts like, I'm not prepared to talk to the teacher. Can you imagine that some monks in China, when they're going to see the Zen master, may have thought, I'm not prepared to meet the Zen master? We don't usually hear that the monk was thinking that. Usually we just hear what they said. Now they may have actually had that thought, uh-oh, how did I wind up here with this guy? I think I came to the wrong place. I'm going to some other monastery. They do actually say that, I've changed my mind. They do say that, but it doesn't tell you how they practice with those thoughts, how they practice compassion with them. But I would say, I would imagine they did practice with those thoughts, that they could deal with their thoughts about their relationship with their teacher, how their quality of practice relative to the teacher's, the teacher's quality of practice relative to them. I imagine. But again, we don't usually hear so much about all the compassion practices they did with their thinking. The famous stories

[53:19]

are about the conversations around the self. That's what the famous ones are about. We watch the student come and talk, and we're able to watch, is the student aware of the self? And is it the self that they're holding on to and bringing to meet the teacher? Or is it the self that wakes up? Or do they come carrying a self, and the teacher helps them see that they're carrying it, and they switch and realize the self is born through the interaction and realize enlightenment. This is the pivot of many of these stories. You can see them that way. Can you understand what I'm saying so far? Any questions about this before I tell some stories? Yes? As I go along, am I going to? I'll say a little bit right now. One of the things that happened

[54:26]

in China is that the founder of this tradition called Confucianism is called Confuza, or Confucius. Confuza, one of his main disciples was named Mengzi. Is that how you say it? And Mengzi had a teaching which was that mind and nature were close associates. Mind and nature as reality were close associates. And Chinese Buddhism grew up with this cultural message that mind and nature were close. So this mind-nature thing got translated to mind and Buddha-nature,

[55:32]

that they were kind of like the same thing. You don't find this much in India. It was there in China before Buddhism came. And Buddhism started to pick that up. Then also, there was a great event, a person who they say existed named Zhuangzi. His book is called Zhuangzi. And in his book, it seems like he's proposing a mind that was reality. And in his book, reality itself. A pure mind that was reality itself. Also, Indian Buddhism doesn't so much propose a pure mind which is reality itself. There's some justification for it, which I've mentioned before. Buddha did say in a few places, he said, mind is luminous, but is defiled by adventitious delusions. But he didn't say there is a mind which is a pure

[56:41]

reality itself. He didn't so much clearly simply say that. But the Chinese did. And when Buddhism came, it picked up this quality, which led, it seems to some people, at some point in the history of Zen, of saying that this is a special transmission outside the traditional teachings, not depending on words, which directly indicates the human mind, seeing its nature, becoming Buddha. That understanding, that way of putting things, we have trouble finding in India. And even if you found it someplace in India, still, it became a centerpiece of what people thought of as Zen. I'm not saying that's true, I'm just saying that's a story. But Zen was saying, point to the human mind, that's the point. That's the point of practice, point to that. Now I'm saying, it's not mentioned that in order to point at that,

[57:45]

and have that be a successful subject of study, you have to practice compassion with it. But let's say you practice compassion with the mind and you look at it, you see its nature and become Buddha. But part of the understanding here in China was that seeing its nature is Buddha, it is Buddha nature. That's part of a new development, which became associated with Zen, but other schools too, other schools of Chinese Buddhism, I'm just talking about Zen, this became a dominant element, the dominant element of Chinese Buddhism, the most successful one is, mind is Buddha nature, and see mind, you see Buddha nature, you see Buddha nature you realize Buddha. The Indian story is different, which I've been telling you. The Indian story

[58:48]

is, mind has three characteristics, an imputational character, a fantasy character, and other dependent character, which is dependent co-arising, and a thoroughly established character, or a reality character. That's mind, has these three characteristics, and these three characteristics are also all conscious construction only. But there is, when you talk about the phenomenon mind, it has a defiled aspect, it has a pure aspect, and it has an aspect of dependent co-arising, which is pure and defiled. That's the Indian message about the mind, and the Indian message also is, this is all conscious construction, these aren't like substantial realities, these are characteristics of mind, which themselves, there's no basis for grasping these, but still we're articulating these so you can understand mind. We're not saying

[59:51]

that mind is just the third quality, which is the pure, or pure and purifying aspect of mind. And the pure is related to what is pure and impure. The human consciousness is both pure and impure, because human consciousness is actually free of the impure, and yet it still has the impure of which it is free. So the human mind can have appearances projected upon it, by which human beings can know it, but they know it not as dependent co-arising, which is really how it is, arising, but they know it by their projections of appearances upon it, and possession of its self-creation and karmic consciousness. So Buddhism is saying we got this karmic, or Indian Buddhism is saying, all sentient beings have is karmic consciousness. The Chinese Zen people did not lose track of this. I've told you many Chinese Zen stories

[60:54]

about where they're aware all sentient beings have is karmic consciousness, which is a consciousness that arises based on this defiled projection, or defiling projection upon the actual creative process of our life. And then there is the actual creative process of our life. And then there is the fact that our actual creative process of life is free of any projections upon it. The projections do not actually touch the creative process. The creative process is inconceivable, and all conceptions are just gobbled up by the inconceivable process. They're not excluded, they're totally embraced, and there's no way they touch the process. And that freedom is what, in some sense, some of the Chinese people thought that was mind, in some sense that mind only had one aspect, which was the reality aspect. So they're not completely separate, because the early view that mind was this pure thing in itself, representing

[62:01]

the truth itself, that in Indian Buddhism, in Indian Mahayana teachings, we say mind does have that aspect. It does have an aspect that it is free of all human projections, all conceptual overlays. It is free. But it doesn't say that's all there is to it. Before Buddhism came, the Chinese had this teaching from Zhuangzi that that is the mind, it's this reality mind, this true mind. So there is this true mind teaching before Buddhism came, so Zen then talks about this true mind. However, some of the Zen people, the way they talk about it, they don't take it that simply, and they bring back in the more complex story. So that's also part of the story of Zen, is that the Indian teaching that the mind has these three aspects, and that they're all conscious construction, that teaching was very well

[63:02]

transmitted to China by the great Shrenzong, the great pilgrim, who was a great monk before he left China, then he went to India for 16 years and brought back these Mahayana teachings on mind, translated them very well, very nicely transmitted it. However, the Chinese didn't like it, and they made up this other version, which some people say attacked this well transmitted Indian teaching about the mind, attacked it, and pretty much somebody said erased it. And this new version of the mind became dominant, and some people say Zen is part of that. But I would say, yes Zen is part of it, but also I would say Zen somehow discovered the erased transmission and reawoken to it. Because this one version is not the whole story, the version of the mind is just the pure reality principle. There is a pure aspect of mind, and Bodhisattvas

[64:06]

do meditate on that. And by meditating on that pure aspect, by meditating on how our life, our actual creative process of our life, is free of all of our ideas of it. And we do have ideas of it, right? Things are going well today, things are not going well today. We have ideas like this, and this is how we know our life. But actually our life is completely free, totally, absolutely, everlasting. The way our life always is, every moment, in everlasting, everlasting time, in eternal, eternal time, is that it is free of all of our projections. The projections are churning away, the process of causation is churning away, and each moment of causation is new, like we say, the unique breeze of reality. Can you see it? That's the first poem in the Book of Serenity. Creation is constantly including the patterns of spring into the ancient brocade. The ancient brocade is the history of our

[65:14]

evolution as beings, and nature is constantly weaving in new stuff, the new fresh material. Creation is always new and fresh and different. We are not the same as we were yesterday. This is a fresh moment, and this moment is fresh again, and again. This is creation, it's inconceivable, and any way we tell stories, like the one I just told, like the poem I just said, it never reaches it. And that purity is the freedom of all of our stories about how creation works, including the story that it's working, and that it's beautiful, and that it's inconceivable. All those stories too, which are standard stories, never reach the actual beauty and inconceivable process of life. And it's always that way, it's always pure. But we have to train to see the purity by recognizing the impurity. The Chinese were

[66:14]

suggesting, just look over at the purity. Because if you can see, and that's what Bodhisattvas are looking at, they're looking at the purity, and by looking at the purity you become Buddha. That agrees with Indian Buddhism. Look at the reality body of your life, look at the reality character of your life, that's what Bodhisattvas focus on, and they evolve to be Buddhas. That part agrees. But the part that that story doesn't include, is that in order to get to that place, which doesn't depend on words, and it's outside the scriptures, you have to be very generous and compassionate towards the words and the scriptures. You cannot enter the wordless realm of reality except by being compassionate to the realm of words. And that teaching of there's a pure mind and just look at it and become Buddha, it's true there is a pure mind, look at it and become Buddha, but you cannot see that unless you're kind to the impure

[67:21]

realm of words projected on your dear life. And I will say more about that if I live longer, which I won't actually, but if my successors live longer, they'll probably keep talking about this, because they're conditioned to do so, because they talk about it so much they'll probably continue. Okay, so now you ready for the stories? Okay, so I was going to bring up the story which I just brought up just now, and the way I was going to tell the story was, I was going to say, I have long heard the story that Zen was a uniquely Chinese creation, which had no real precedent in India. I was going to say, I've long heard that, that Zen is this combination of Indian Buddhism, Chinese

[68:26]

Daoism, particularly Chinese Daoism, and Chinese Confucianism. I've heard that, I was going to say that, I have long heard this, but I didn't. I said, I have long heard of Dragon Pond, last time. Because when I said I have long heard, I thought, oh yeah, where have I heard that before? Well, I heard Dushan, the Zen master Dushan say, I have long heard. So I switched from telling that I've long heard that Zen was this combination of Indian Buddhism, Daoism, and Confucianism. I switched to the other I've long heard, and when I switched to it, I told the story. I didn't mean to, I didn't mean to, but it was so perfect because I told the story of this guy who said it. The guy who said I have long heard of Dragon Pond, Dushan, he was a guy who was very committed to Indian Buddhism, and the Indian Buddhist

[69:31]

story of the Bodhisattva path. And then he heard of this Zen thing of see nature, become Buddha, like that. He heard that and he thought, that's heresy. So there were still Chinese Buddhists at his time who were still kind of loyal to the Indian transmission. When they heard the Zen one, he decided to go and defeat these heretics. And he was through various things, to make a long story short, you can listen to last week's recording and you can get the whole story of Dushan's travels, where he meets the lady in the mountain, and then he finally gets referred to go visit Dragon Pond, which is a place and a teacher. So he gets to Dragon Pond. He gets to the place and the teacher. Now I imagine the Dragon

[70:37]

Pond didn't think he owned Dragon Pond. But I imagine Dragon Pond could see the appearance of Dragon Pond, both the place and the person. But maybe Dragon Pond was not possessive of it. Or maybe Dragon Pond saw the possession of it and saw the self arising and was enlightened. So the enlightened Dragon Pond was waiting for Dushan. And Dushan comes and says, I have long heard of Dragon Pond, but now that I am here, I don't see a dragon nor a pond. And then Dragon Pond steps out from behind his hiding place and says, thus you have truly arrived at Dragon Pond. That's the story I told last time. Were you here? You were sick. Did you tell her about Michelle? Anyway, you can listen to it if you want to. But you see, that's the wonderful thing. I wasn't really distracted. I told a story about

[71:38]

this very issue of this thing I've heard about for a long time. It's a special thing that happened in China with the school of Zen where they said, see mind, look at mind, see its nature, become Buddha. That story popped up there. Just by, I've long heard. And Dragon Pond interacted with Dushan in such a way that I think Dushan switched from being this excellent monk who was practicing Buddhadharma to seeing that in practicing Buddhadharma there's an excellent monk. He woke up from, I'm practicing the Diamond Sutra. I'm a teacher of the Diamond Sutra and I'm going to dethrone these Zen heretics. And he

[72:38]

switched from student of the Diamond Sutra, dethroning Zen heretics, and then there's a self. It switched. And it switched with the aid of one of those Zen heretics. And how did it switch? He was with Dragon Pond late at night and Dragon Pond said, maybe you should leave now, it's getting late. And he stepped outside Dragon Pond's room and he said, it's dark. And Dragon Pond lit a paper lantern and as he handed it to Dushan, he blew it out. And Dushan saw the birth of the self and was awakened. So, the funny thing is that the heretic woke up the person who was correct. This was heresy, but the Zen heretics can sometimes wake up people even so. That was last time's story.

[73:42]

This week's story is different. Okay, so which one should I tell first? Should I tell this one or this one? This one? Do you mean this one? Or this one? This one? This one? This one. Okay. So, we have a story about, his name is Fa Yen. And Fa Yen, which means Dharma Eye. And I have two versions of one story for you. And I have two versions of one story and one version of another story. And I'm going to tell you two versions of one story. Actually, both story one and story two are really about the same thing, same technique, but there's two versions of the one story. So, what are these stories going

[74:46]

to be about? They're going to be about people who are studying the self, switching from I'm studying the self or I'm studying Buddhism to in the study of Buddhism there's me. This is the story. So, Fa Yen was teaching at a monastery and there was a director or superintendent of the monastery. His name was, he was called Superintendent Tsu, which is short for Shren Tsu, Superintendent Shren Tsu. So, one day the teacher of the monastery was talking to the director and the teacher said to the director, why don't you ever come and enter my room? Enter my room is a technical term in Zen meaning, come and study the teaching with me. So, he

[75:49]

was a teacher of the monastery but the director never came and talked to him about the teaching, he just took care of the monastery. He said, how come you never come and talk to me? He said, oh, don't you know teacher, I already got enlightened with somebody else. And the director said, Fa Yen says, oh yeah, tell me about it. And this story is told in case seven of the Blue Cliff Record and case seventeen of the Book of Serenity. So, I'll tell you

[76:51]

the Blue Cliff Record story this morning and this afternoon I'll tell you the Book of Serenity story. So, you get to see how Fa Yen works with different people about the same thing. So, the superintendent says, well, I think, oh yeah, I said to the teacher, I think the short part of his name is Lin, teacher Lin. He said, I asked him, in version one, I asked him, what is Buddha? I want to tell you right away, in version two, he asked him, what is self? What is the student's self? What is the student's self? What is the student's self?

[77:57]

So in one story he says, the superintendent said, I asked Master Lin, what is Buddha? In the other version of the story he says, I asked Master Lin, what is the self? It literally is, what is the student's self, which as you understand is, what is my self? So, it's interesting. What is the self and what is Buddha? Kind of the same thing. It's not to say the self is Buddha, it's just that inquiring what is the self, is the way Indian Buddhism and this Zen teacher, and the Zen people, so here's where, this is more like Indian Buddhism. Not just saying, it shows that they don't just think that the mind is Buddha, it's that inquiring into what the self is, is what inquiring into Buddha is. Inquiring into delusion is inquiring into Buddha. So, one story is, what is the Buddha? What is Buddha? What is the self? So, Master Lin said in response to what is Buddha or what is self, he said, the fire

[79:15]

God comes looking for fire. So, when Superintendent Tse was with Master Lin, he said, what is Buddha? What is the self? Master Lin said, the fire God comes seeking fire. It doesn't say here, but I understand what he means is, that when he said the fire God comes seeking fire, I entered reality. Okay? No? What's the matter Linda? You missed something? Well, you may feel you missed something, but the Superintendent Tse thinks he didn't miss something. He thinks he was enlightened. He asked the teacher, what is Buddha? The teacher says,

[80:22]

fire God comes seeking fire, and he understood what Buddha was. Dash, he understood what the self is. You're not making that claim, so this story might be helpful to you. He didn't think he had to ask any more questions. You're not like him. So, then Fa Yen said, good words. In other words, what the teacher said to you was good words. What is Buddha? Fire God comes to seek fire. What is the self? Fire God comes to seek self. Fa Yen says, good words, good teacher, good boy, but I'm afraid you misunderstood. Do you understand that part? Fa Yen says to the Superintendent, I'm afraid you misunderstood, even though I like

[81:25]

your teacher's teaching, but I don't think you understood. So, he said, can you say something more to me? So, then the Superintendent says, the fire God is in the realm of fire, and he is seeking fire with fire. You can translate that into English. What is Buddha? Buddha is seeking Buddhahood. Buddha is in the realm of Buddha, seeking Buddha. You can translate it that way, or another way, which I'll tell you in a minute. I'll tell you now. The other one says, the fire God is in the realm of fire, and he is seeking

[82:30]

fire. I said, the Superintendent said, I asked, what is the student's self? And Master Lin said, the God of fire is seeking fire. Fa Yen said, how do you understand? The Superintendent said, the God of fire is in the province of fire. The fire is like seeking the self by the self. So, that's what he said to Fa Yen, and Fa Yen said, I'm afraid you don't understand. Good words, but I'm afraid you don't understand. So, then he says, could you say more? And so then the Superintendent explains. Did you

[83:45]

get his explanation? You forgot it, right? I'll say it again. The fire God is seeking is in the realm of fire, in the province of fire. He is seeking fire. Likewise, I am Buddha, yet I went on searching for Buddha. That was the Superintendent's further explanation of his understanding. And then you can imagine what Fa Yen says next. Sure enough, the Superintendent does misunderstand. Restraining his anger, the Superintendent left the monastery and went across the river. The Superintendent got angry when Fa Yen twice said to him that he

[84:54]

misunderstood. After he left, Fa Yen said, if this man can be saved, this man can be saved if he comes back. If he doesn't return, he can't be saved. His teacher thought he had enlightenment. He told the story of his enlightenment. Fa Yen said, you don't understand. Explained more, he explained more. Fa Yen said, yes, you don't understand. He got angry. Can you imagine a student getting angry when a teacher says you don't understand? And thinking this is a really stupid teacher? And then leaving the monastery? Well, that's what happened in this case. This enlightened director didn't

[86:01]

like Fa Yen telling him twice that he didn't understand. He left. And Fa Yen said, if he comes back, he can be saved. If not, uh-uh. Out on the road, the Superintendent thought to himself, he's a teacher of lots of people. How could he deceive me? So, he turned back and again called on Fa Yen, who said to him, just ask me and I'll answer. Whereupon, the teacher is Buddha. And Fa Yen said, Fire God comes seeking fire. At these words, the Superintendent

[87:06]

understood. That's Fa Yen's method of helping people study the Self. Any questions? Yes? So, is part of that humility that the Superintendent was humble enough to come back and ask the teacher? Humility is definitely part of compassion. So, that's definitely part of it. And he might have been humble before. You know, when he went to Master Lin and he said, what is Buddha?

[88:09]

And Master Lin said, Fire God seeks Fire God. He might have been humble when he asked. If you're really humble, you might be able to notice, oh, I'm coming to ask the teacher a question. And I asked him, what is Buddha? He says, Fire God seeks Fire God. And maybe in a humility, maybe he saw that the person who came there to ask was gone. And now, in the coming of the response, also a new person came. Maybe he woke up to the birth of the Self. Maybe he saw what Buddha was. And then guess what happened? Yes, Kim? He asked again? No. He lost his humility. He lost his humility.

[89:12]

He became enlightened. He, the Self, became enlightened. Apparently that's what happened. So he went to see Pha Yen and didn't ask Pha Yen any questions because he wasn't humble anymore. Why does an enlightened person need to be humble? Well, he found out. Because if an enlightened person is not humble, then they don't go and ask the teacher questions. And the teacher says, how come you don't come and ask me questions? And then he says, well, because I'm enlightened. Didn't you know? And the teacher says, oh really? Tell me about it. So then you tell him about your enlightenment. You tell him about your enlightenment. Because why not? You don't have to worry about being humble anymore. Now you can be possessive, now that you're enlightened. Now you can carry a self around, but it's an enlightened self,

[90:12]

so no problem. So when an enlightened person thinks that they don't have to ask questions about Dharma anymore, then we have a deluded person. Which Pha Yen kind of thought that might be the case, because he never came to ask. Enlightened people ask questions, like Kim. Asked a question. That's an enlightened person. Unless there was some self that did that. Then that's a deluded person. But if you notice a deluded person, you're humble. So then you ask more questions. So that you can learn how to ask a question and realize that in the process of asking the question and meeting the teacher, in the coming together of those things, there's a self born there. And you can see how it's just an illusion.

[91:13]

So he lost his humility, but somehow he did ask the question and then the teacher verified that he actually was an enlightened person who was carrying around an enlightened person. So therefore he was a deluded person carrying around an enlightened person. And he told him so. And the deluded person who was carrying around an enlightened person got angry and left. But then he reconsidered. Something about him which was his seed of enlightenment told him to go back. And he went back. And again he asked the teacher, what is Buddha? And the teacher said the same thing. And again he probably understood that as the question was asked and the teacher answered, there was a self born. And that's the self. And nothing more. And he was awakened again. But after this second awakening, he probably didn't

[92:21]

stop asking questions. He probably didn't hold on to his enlightenment, probably. But maybe he had to do it a third time and a fourth time to have a practice that kept noticing if a self is being carried. And if it is, to be humble about it and say, here, I offer you my delusion. Help me. Help me find a way to work with this so we can turn the corner. So we can melt the glue. Is that clear now? So this is the technique of Phayen with the superintendent. And this afternoon I'll tell another story about how Phayen worked with another Bodhisattva. Yes? I have some words that I think summarize what you've been saying. Being animates identity.

[93:26]

Identity inquires into being. So self, as you're talking about it, I hear... Would you say it again? Being animates identity. Being animates identity. Identity being a definition of the self. Identity inquires into being. Hopefully. Hopefully. And also, being inquires into identity. Hopefully. And when being inquires into identity, or rather, inquires into identity, when inquiring inquires into identity, there's a realization that identity is nothing more than a word. I'm just going to ask one more thing, but before I do, I wanted to kind of get a pulse

[94:29]

on the group. And are we going to have lunch soon or not? And if so, maybe that would be helpful. But if not, I can save the question for this afternoon. I just wanted to see what you were thinking. Well, a pulse of the group. Are people ready for lunch? That was kind of a mild response. We are planning to have lunch. We are planning to have lunch soon, I think. I'm planning to have lunch. I mean, I'm planning for you to have lunch. I want you to have lunch. Thank you. I always feel welcome to have lunch with you here. And I always feel like if I needed any extra food, I feel many of you would welcome me to come and ask you to share your lunch with me. Is that right? Not everybody said yes. That's okay, I can accept that. Some

[95:31]

of your lunches might be a little, you know, small, I know. So, do you think, yeah, so, you can wait now. Would people, either way, okay? If you ask a question? It sounds like it's okay. You have some supporters. The answer may wait until after noon. I'm not really sure if I've got this stuff. You do. This will help, I think, with some of my confusion. The quality of ownership, it's my understanding, and again, I could be deluded, that there needs to be some sense

[96:33]

of embodiment of, let me finish, okay. Some embodiment of the consciousness of what self is or isn't, as opposed to, I mean, in being in the presence of some persons who have become dissociated through trauma or through lots of stuff that the human condition can do to people, there is no self. There's just dissociation, you know. So, that's in contrast to, that's in contrast to one that's somewhat sane or someone that's here now with the consciousness. So I think the question is, does the consciousness need to be in the embodied self that doesn't

[97:40]

necessarily have to be me, mine and mine again? I mean, does that sound like delusion or what? Or did I just miss it all together? Say something! I'd like to say that before you said, say something, I felt you were asking me not to speak. Really? Yeah, because I was going to speak and you said, you stopped me. I just want to tell you that, but I was going to speak and you told me to stop. Are you aware of that? She hadn't finished her question. She just said. You went like this, like you were still finished. She hadn't finished her question, right? But I'm telling her that until she asked me, I didn't know if I was going to respond before she felt she finished her question, right? So then I stopped because she told me to stop. So I'm just telling you that I didn't know,

[98:41]

but then she said, she was acting as though I was waiting too long. Did you notice that? Yeah, I was getting anxious. Yeah, you were getting anxious. I just want to point out that interplay, that you're speaking and I have a response and you tell me to stop because you're not done, and then I give you the space and you kind of imply it took too long. I just want to point that out. Okay, thank you. You're welcome. One thing I would say is that I feel that when we talk about trauma or dissociation, for example, what's it called? Autism? Autistic people I think are people who are really prone to and skillful at dissociating. They use dissociation to cope with what's happening. I would say they use dissociation to cope with the stress of embodiment, that they are embodied

[99:50]

and that they like people who are less prone to dissociation. We're all somewhat prone to dissociation and I think we try dissociation when we possess our body. So I would suggest that they actually do have a sense of self, but the stress they feel around it is so intense that they can't stand to be there. So when you first said embodiment, I think we are all embodied, all of our consciousness is embodied and that embodied consciousness creates an appearance of the body. Which then, if there's possession towards it, there's stress. And sometimes some beings are so sensitive to that stress, it's intolerable. So then they dissociate. But they're dissociating from their embodiment.

[100:55]

They are embodied. Their consciousness, they're dissociating from their embodied consciousness because it's too stressful. And we all have some tendency. That's what I'm talking about. The lotus in the mud. We have to train ourselves to be compassionate with the stress. Not the stress of embodiment, but the stress of an embodied consciousness, which creates appearances which are possessed, creating a self, which then creates a stress. And that pain, we need to learn to tolerate. We need to do it ourselves so we can teach others who are not able to tolerate it, skillful ways to deal with it when it comes, rather than dissociating. Because even those who dissociate, they know that that works, but then it's hard to come back to the mud. Like I heard this guy, I told this story, this autistic man,

[101:57]

when he was in the playground and people were messing with his body, it was so painful, he couldn't stand to be there, so he would start squaring numbers. And most of us can square for a while. Like 2 squared is 4, 4 squared is 16, 16 squared is 256, 256 squared is... and that kid could do it. And then square that. Imagine how concentrated you have to be to do that. If you're that concentrated, that can get you away from the stress of being on the playground. And it worked. He said, after a few rounds of squaring, I was on this peaceful island, surrounded by beautiful, serene waters. He said it worked. The problem is how to get back. Some people, what they need is they need some way to get assistance and instruction

[102:59]

in a way that they can hear it, that will help them deal and be compassionate to the stress of being a consciousness that is possessive of what it sees and has a self, which is then stressed. Selves are stressed. Because there's a separation between your mind, which has created an appearance, and your mind, which thinks it owns the appearance. The mind is being split apart by this process of illusion. So we need to be compassionate to this. And if we're compassionate enough, we can relax with it, and then we can start hearing the teachings which point to the process. That was very helpful. Thank you. You're very welcome. And did you want to ask your question before lunch? Jean? Oh, I'm sorry.

[104:00]

The only comment I had was that I thought it was pretty interesting that he got angry and left. Yeah. Isn't that interesting? Yeah, it's kind of interesting. Yeah, and I'm so glad that none of you have left. Thank you for staying. I was thinking that, and then you answered it, that he had the seed of enlightenment that caused him to turn back. I was just thinking that when he removed himself, that he may have had the space to do the practices, to give some generosity to the anger, to the pain, to then be able to turn back. And it also just seems really consistent that any of the enlightenment stories come a third time. Is that sort of the key? So can I see you twice more today? Would you say that again louder?

[105:04]

I said it comes in threes. The enlightenment stories come in threes. So could I come and see you twice more today? Actually, you saw me a second time just now. Oh, this is true. Look out over lunch. Okay, I will look out over lunch while I'm begging for food. Thank you very much. Good night. Buddha's Way Beings are numberless. I vow to save them. Delusions are inexhaustible. I vow to end them. Dharma gates are boundless.

[106:10]

I vow to enter them. Buddha's Way is unsurpassable. I vow to become it.

[106:22]

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