Yesterday I said something about Buddhas being born of compassion, Buddhas being born of the process of purifying our relationship with suffering. And born out of compassion, these Buddhas have practices involving no seeking. This practice of the Buddhas, this non-seeking practice of the Buddhas,

[01:04]

is when it comes to a self, it is the self being intimate with the self. The self being intimate with the self is non-seeking. It is the phenomena at hand being the phenomena at hand without seeking. The practice of the self being the self is always the same.

[02:17]

Therefore it is the practice of ultimate reality. Always and everywhere the same. renouncing sameness and difference, it's always the same. And the self, being intimate with the self, realizes the Buddha's teaching of no-self.

[03:37]

I don't seek you to sit up straight. I just suggest it. In order to practice this non-seeking way I feel that human beings need to understand and feel that this practice, this non-seeking practice, this radical practice of being intimate with the Self, nothing more, nothing less, lives in the midst of great warmth.

[05:09]

It is a renunciation of making more or less out of ourself. But that can seem cold to a person. We need to understand that it's because of great compassion and great loving kindness and joy that one can renounce everything. especially greed. We are warm beings and we need to understand that the radical practice of making ourselves, our mind, like a wall,

[06:28]

is a great benefit to all beings. It makes us able to escort all beings through birth and death and show them the way to nirvana and back. So loving-kindness and compassion and joy and equanimity emerge from the Buddha's heart And practicing these take us back to Buddha's heart. Loving kindness, boundless loving kindness and compassion and joy, warm us up, give us confidence that we are not rejecting or abandoning living beings, including ourself, that we support and are supported by all life.

[07:53]

Then we can practice equanimity, which purifies our warmth, which keeps our warmth from having outflows in terms of self and other. So, in order to purify our compassion and our love in kindness and our joy, we need to practice equanimity, which is again simply the self being intimate with the self. It is loving beings and wishing them the best, the very best. It is loving beings and hoping that they would be free of compassion and working to find out what that means. Excuse me, that they'd be free of suffering and working to find out what that means with no expectation and no preference.

[08:57]

to work to help beings purify their relationship with their suffering, to help beings purify their relationship with the suffering of all beings, to help beings develop compassion with no preference that they should be able to develop it, with no preference for their Buddhahood over their present state. If there's the slightest preference, This is not intimacy with what's happening. This is leaning a little bit some way or another. And this then forms the basis of outflow, of gain and loss. So we need to practice equanimity to purify these other loving practices. And these loving practices keep equanimity warm.

[10:00]

We need a mind like a wall so that when we're sincerely wishing the very best for this sick person, we have no expectation that they will be well. We have no preference. We are just the self being intimate with the self. And this realizing no self, this self of no self, this dropped off body and mind can take the hand of whoever and walk through birth and death with them to nirvana. Now, I say that Master Ma was always sitting.

[11:06]

In other words, he was always intimate. That he had no seeking anymore. And out of this non-seeking state dropped off body and mind, his hands reached out in the world and touched many monks. He showed many monks the way to always sit in intimacy. When I say Master Ma did that, I mean I trust that he did it, which means I trust somebody did this. I don't know who Master Ma is, but I think somebody did this once.

[12:16]

Otherwise, where would I have gotten the idea? Somebody practiced this way, and somebody wants to practice this way. I don't really know who wants to practice this way but I'm telling you somebody does. And the one who does is inviting some other people to join. So I say in language that there was a master ma who always practiced this way of intimacy. So he was taking a walk with his attendant one of his attendants, apparently, named Wai Hai. And I made a mistake yesterday. I said Wai Hai meant ocean of wisdom. Hai means ocean, and Wai is... There is a Chinese character, Wai, which means wisdom, but this particular Wai does not mean wisdom.

[13:28]

So it's not... His name is... It means bosom. It actually means this place in here in Asian clothing where the robes fold over. It's the bosom. Or also it's the place where you put love letters. It's either the bosom or to carry in the bosom. Why? So his name really is more literally, more accurately, the bosom of the ocean. Yeah, the bosom of the ocean. So, anyway, bosom of the ocean was walking with the horse master. Waihai was walking with Matsu. They were holding hands. And a flock of geese flew overhead and Master Ma said, What was that?

[14:33]

Or, And Wai Hai said, Geese, ducks, I don't know. And Master Ma said, Where have they gone? And Wai Hai said, They've gone away. They've flown away. And Master Ma took his free hand and took a hold of Wai Hai's nose and twisted it hard. And he said, you still think they've flown away? You still say they've flown away? So this is, you know, what do we say?

[15:35]

This is the actions which are coming from where? From compassion, which has no seeking in its practice. People probably think, oh, he was trying to make Wai Hai wake up. I don't think so. Of course that was his vow. And his activity was born of the wish to liberate Waihai. But his practice, I don't think, was seeking anything. I think that hand was like driven by the entire universe to reach out and twist. It wasn't some kind of like… It wasn't seeking anything. This is the hand of intimacy with all beings. It twists the nose. And then Waihai cries out in pain and goes home to his cabin.

[16:39]

And when he gets there, he cries. One translation says he wails pitifully. Pitifully. And there's another, apparently another attendant, more than one attendant to Matsu. Another attendant monk says, How come you're crying? Are you crying because of your parents? He said, No. He said, Are you crying because someone scolded you? He said, No. How come you're crying? He said, The great master twisted my nose and it hurts still. The other monk said, well, how come he did that?

[17:54]

And Waihai said, go ask him. Or, do you understand why he did that? Do you understand? Did you understand what happened? And Waihai said, go ask him if I understood. Go ask him how come he did it. So the attendant went and asked the master, how come you did that? Did Waihai understand? Did he understand? And the master said, Waihai understood. The monk went back and told Waihai, the master says you understood. Waihai laughed pitifully.

[18:59]

The other monk said, Just a minute ago, you were crying. Now you're laughing. How come? Why, I said. Just a minute ago, I was crying. Now I'm laughing. Right now. The other monk didn't know what to say. The next morning, Master Ma went up to the hall, ascended the seat, and they had this mat that they put out in front of his seat, not for him to bow, but for monks to bow who wanted to ask a question. So after he got up in his seat, his attendant, who was Waihai, rolled up the mat. So Master Ma got down from his seat and went back to his cabin. And his attendant followed him.

[20:04]

When they got to the cabin, Master Ma said, I didn't even give a talk. How come you rolled the thing up? Waihai said, Yesterday you twisted my nose and it hurt. Master Ma said, Where did you place your mind yesterday? Waihai said, My nose doesn't hurt anymore today. Master Ma said, You understand. And there's two translations. You understand yesterday's events. Another translation is, you understand today.

[21:07]

Or I guess you could say, today you understand yesterday. That's the story. That's a story, a Zen story. Stories like this are, what do you call it? They're something that made the school of Zen. There are stories of Buddha, you know, having kind of interactions like this with his students. But then after Buddha, for a long time, there weren't so many stories. Mostly they just retold Buddha's stories and Buddha's teaching. But when you got to people actually like Matsu, at the time of Matsu, they started telling stories about Matsu instead of studying the scriptures.

[22:18]

The stories of Matsu became more what the teachers talked about and what the monks talked about than the scriptures. They thought these were more to the point. So there's the point. Here's the story. A story of love which manifests a practice which is always the same. Which is always the same and which some people finally manage to practice all the time. so

[24:29]

I just read a little quote that a person who eats caviar with no deliberation is simpler than someone who eats grape nuts on principle. You could make substitutions on grape nuts. And on caviar. You know, the Buddhist practice doesn't even have a principle.

[25:57]

Like, you don't even have a principle. To have a mind like a wall, you don't even have the principle of a mind like a wall. Being intimate with yourself, you don't even have the principle of being intimate with yourself. You're like flat out, nakedly yourself, without even remembering to be yourself. You just are. You can warm up to it by thinking, okay, one, two, three, I'm going to be myself. But gradually you have to drop that. One, two, three, I'm going to do this really neat practice. like, you know, I'm going to do the ancestor samadhi, there's some hesitation, there's some deliberation there. If you hear this teaching, you might feel sad because you have to leave all your toys behind in the burning house.

[27:00]

All your leveraged, all your practice levers kind of leaving behind and have nothing but the one practice. So a little sadness is a sign that maybe you heard the instruction or even a lot of sadness. All those wonderful practices that I have to let go of. You can put him in the bosom of the ocean, I didn't know which was best, to sit today or to do the brief doksans.

[28:38]

And I didn't dare ask you last night what you thought because I was afraid that democracy would creep into the situation. So I made a decision to sit with you today. without consultation with you. So I will be sitting with you as though we're going to have a painful day. We're going to have, well, some of us are going to have pain. And we're going to have to purify, not have to, we're going to have a relationship with pain today. And I hope we can purify our relationship with pain today. And in that practice I hope Buddha is born. And I hope a non-seeking practice is realized today in the community of beings who have bodies that hurt.

[29:48]

If anybody's body doesn't hurt, don't worry, it's okay, you're excused. Remind us So I'll be sitting here with you. Somebody said that they had some quality time with Rozzy. And I thought, I think all the time I ever had with Rosie has been quality time. I can't think of any non-quality time with her.

[30:51]

She's always sincere. But Razi is also scared. She's so sweet, but she's frightened. She's frightened that she's going to be abandoned, I think. She's really worried about that. She quivers when she thinks she's going to be left. She's totally sincere. But she's frightened, and I feel sorry for Rosy, that she's so frightened of being abandoned. So I try not to abandon her, because I don't know how to teach her that she should face it.

[31:57]

She doesn't speak any English. But you do. And you don't have to face abandonment because it's unreal. You just need to face that you think you might be abandoned. That you think that when the pain gets really bad you might be abandoned, or that you might be abandoned and the pain might really get bad, and nobody there to hold your hands and walk into death with you. But, you know, since you speak English, we can tell you that that's not so. And if you look carefully at the thought that you're going to die soon and

[33:09]

be abandoned and suffer, if you can become intimate with that, you can realize the Buddha's teaching that that's not ultimately true. Nirvana is ultimately true. At least that's the proposal of the Buddha. The bad news is not ultimately true. The good news is ultimately true. Isn't that funny? Of course, the good news requires requires this effort of becoming intimate with

[34:16]

the bad news. Completely intimate with the bad news. Developing a pure relationship with the bad news. Having equanimity about the bad news is the gate to the good news. But it's pretty easy to say the sentence, having equanimity about the bad news, but to actually have, be equanimous in the middle of the bad news and not prefer things to change and the pain to go away.

[35:20]

That's really, that's really a challenge to us. So we've got the challenge. Do we want to meet it? Do I want to meet it?

[36:39]

Do I aspire to meet the challenge of being intimate with suffering? Well, speaking for myself, today, yes, at least today, at least one more day, a practice, one more day of pain, one more day of practicing loving-kindness and compassion joyfully with you and hopefully with equanimity Tomorrow, I don't know. We'll see.

[37:41]

Schedule will be not so painful in some ways. So, I don't know if I'll be able to practice without the encouragement of this session schedule. Without being trapped by this session schedule. to coming and sitting here again and again. But today, anyway, since I can't get out of it, no dokes on to entertain me. There's a tie, I think, between Linda and Susan.

[38:43]

That was easy. Work it out, girls. I don't know. I hate to say his name. I don't want to put pressure on him. Yes? Earlier in your talk you said, or I heard you say, that if someone is sick or whatever, you feel genuinely compassionate and caring for them, but not to have a preference as to whether they get well, just as well.

[40:07]

Yes, I know. Well, does that mean not caring? no you do you do yeah so she's saying if someone's sick and you want them to uh and you want them to get well but you don't have a preference for them to get well over being the way they are now does that mean you don't care no you do care that's you care you if you look at them and you feel pain at their sickness you want them to be well you want them to be happy you really do and if And if they get happy, if they get well, you will be very happy if they get well. Okay? You do care. But you don't prefer the way they're not to the way they are. The way they are is they're sick. You don't prefer the way they are either. You don't prefer that a sick person is sick. You accept that they're sick and you love them right now.

[41:11]

If you wish that they were some other way, you hurt them right now. You tell them they're not good right now. You do. You also drain yourself. You weaken yourself. Your energy starts leaking out of yourself because you are rejecting the way the person is right now by wishing they were some other way. Wanting them to be happy... Without expectation. If you have expectation for yourself or others, if someone's sick and you wish them well and you expect them to get well, if you keep up wishing that they were well with an expectation, you will eventually stop wishing that they were well. You will drain yourself and you will stop caring about them. If you have expectations, you will stop caring about them. If you don't have expectations, you won't stop caring about them.

[42:22]

If you do have preferences, you will abandon the person. And the reason why you abandon them is because of your expectations and because of your preferences. Because your mind, the way you think, in terms of preferences and expectations, will start endangering your life. And the combination of wishing them well with your expectations, you will remove yourself from that dangerous field and go away from them. So the funny thing is that some people who really love other beings and wish them well with this kind of outflow thing, they run away from those people. After a while, these people become horrible to them. This is called burnout. So, we... look at someone we wish them well with no expectation that helps them right now they may never get well but every moment that you wish them well without expectation helps them right now and in some ways the without expectation is it's not exactly more helpful than wishing them well it's just that a lot of people wish somebody sick well

[43:47]

But almost no one wishes them well together with no expectation. So you've got to have both. Because some people who don't care that they're going to get well don't prefer for them to get well either. And also don't prefer for them to stay sick. They just don't care. That doesn't really help them. It's the combination of really wanting them to be well, really wanting the best for them, without expecting anything. The combination is what helps a person because they know, how strange, this person really wants me to be well and if I don't get well, they'll just hang in there and keep wishing me well. I don't have to get well to keep them around. But some people actually will, they'll wish somebody well You know, wish them well means get over the illness, get off the drug they're addicted to, stop the bad practice they're into, whatever. They wish them well, and when the person doesn't change after a while, they stop and they leave the person.

[44:50]

They get fed up. It actually happens. But to be with the person, to be close and really want them to be free of their suffering without expecting it, this is a unique gift. This is compassion. Compassion does not, real compassion does not wish for them to be different even though you wish them to be free of suffering right now. So that's how Matsu can walk through birth and death because he doesn't have expectations. If you have expectations, you can't meditate all the time, because you're going to expect something, like today, you're going to expect something from today. You maybe get through to today, but you won't be able to practice indefinitely, because you drain yourself by the expectation. Mother of Lord, it seems to me that you have some energy.

[45:57]

You can say it creates energy which blocks. Yeah, you can say that. You split the energy into two. And then there's gain and loss. Subject and object. But when you want someone to be happy, there doesn't need to be any duality there. And if you'd have no expectation, there's no duality there. And if you have no preference, there's no duality there. Then the energy doesn't go back and forth, up and down. It's just contained in one living space. And then you can continue to practice with that energy. So the energy is there already. And enjoying the energy and appreciating the energy is part of the source of wishing yourself and others well. But if you interject the expectation, you split the energy into two, and then there's this gain and loss thing.

[46:59]

And after a while, you can't stand it anymore. So then you run away from taking care of yourself. You know, like, you do good things for yourself, and it doesn't work, and you say, oh, I'm not going to take care of myself anymore because it's not working. Here I've been brushing my teeth all these years and they're falling out. I'm just going to eat candy. Rather than, well, try to take care of my teeth, they're falling out, but I still want to take care of my teeth and I'll still take care of my teeth, even though it doesn't really do anything. I still do want to take care of my teeth. And like being a dental hygienist, you know, you clean people's teeth and they don't brush them. They come in day after day, you know, with their rotting teeth. You know, I'm not just going to do it. Don't really clean these teeth.

[48:00]

They're not worth it. People actually get discouraged because they expect something. And then they don't take care of things. Yeah, it's unconditional loving. Right. Yes. You know what you're talking about happens with people who are in grief. I know two people who have had severe grief. And they've lost most of their friends. In fact, they've Right. So some people, I don't know, lose their child or something, and they're probably going to be grieving for the rest of their life.

[49:08]

I mean, it's fairly likely, some of them will, that that never will stop. So this is the friend you've got now, and you do care that they're grieving, and you want them to be happy, but they're not going to, like, stop grieving. So if you want them to be happy and expect them to get over their grieving, then pretty soon you're not going to be able to stand to be around them anymore. But if you want them to be happy and you have no expectation, you can stand to be there. And, you know, They may grieve all the way through, but to have somebody there who wasn't expecting them to get over it helps them. Maybe the grief ends, maybe it doesn't. I don't know. That's not under our control. But again, in the situations that we're in,

[50:15]

Everything that comes is the Buddhadharma. But watch out, because even so, sometimes the hand reaches up and twists the nose. And this twisting the nose is not coming from this nose. This student is not the Buddhadharma. The hand and the nose interacting, that's the Buddhadharma. I don't think Matsu had any expectation when the nose was twisted.

[51:19]

I could be wrong, but I don't think so. That's what I think. No expectation. And therefore, we're still telling the story. Is that enough this morning?

[52:02]

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