A few months ago, Reverend Michael Wenger invited me to come here on a Saturday morning and give a talk. He told me that this spring there's a practice period and in a sense the theme of the practice period is Way Seeking Mind, is that right? and asked me to sort of give that kind of a talk, a way-seeking mind talk. I said, OK, and so here I am. Can you hear me all right in the back? We have the term way-seeking mind, of course, is an English expression, English words, and it's a translation, actually, of Chinese, a Chinese term.

[01:19]

The Chinese term is Daoshin. I wrote it out for you so you can see it. This is Dao, top character is Dao, next character is Shin. And I made some copies of this and as a souvenir of this morning you can If you'd like, they're on the desk. You can just have one if you'd like. My Chinese calligraphy is, you know, not very good, but anyway, there it is for you to have this piece of paper, or a piece of paper like this. You can have this piece of paper, too, if you want. To remember this Dao Shin, this way-seeking mind,

[02:23]

This word, the first character, Dao, probably you've heard that term, Dao. It's often translated as the way. And they use it in Daoism, meaning the way of the Daoist sage or the Daoist practitioner. In the tradition of the Buddha Dharma, when it was transmitted from India to China, they used this character, Dao, to mean the way, because it means literally a path, but also they used it to translate the word, I mean, to translate bodhi, or awakening. So this character means enlightenment, awakening, bodhi, and also means the path, of living the Buddha way. It also means, to make things interesting, to talk.

[03:35]

The next character, and so this is the character the Chinese use to translate the Sanskrit word bodhi. The next character, the bottom character, is a character for mind. It means consciousness, cognitive knowledge, but it also means the heart. So this character is used to translate the Sanskrit word for mind, citta, but also it's used to translate the Sanskrit word hridaya, like in our heart sutra that we chant. Prajnaparamita Hridaya Sutra. So this character is used to translate heart and mind or consciousness. Together, they're used to translate bodhicitta or the mind, the mind of enlightenment or the mind of the way. But the character citta can also have a meaning of will or intention or wish.

[04:42]

So it can also be translated as the wish of for enlightenment or the intention or the will of or towards enlightenment. And just saying that, I just want to draw attention to the will of enlightenment is a little different from the will towards or to enlightenment. In one sense this is enlightenment's will. This bodhi mind or this way-seeking mind is sort of under the auspices of enlightenment. There is this enlightenment which wants to express itself through living beings. Enlightenment wants to express itself. So it has a kind of will, a wish,

[05:46]

to realize itself through us. So that's like the will of enlightenment. But then when it starts to happen in us it's like we wish, it's like I or you wish enlightenment. But in a sense our wish for enlightenment is really enlightenment's wish for us to realize itself. So it has both sides and much more. And not only is it a wish for enlightenment, but is the wish for enlightenment for the welfare of others? Or to even say, this bodhicitta, this way-seeking mind, is the desire or the will to benefit all beings, and in order to do so most effectively, realize the most skillful, the most wise, the most kind possible state in order to work for the welfare of others.

[06:58]

And that state we refer to as complete, unsurpassed, authentic awakening. Then under awakened state we can really be unhindered in our devotion to beings. So part of the request for a way-seeking mind talk is to somehow talk about, I guess, various conditions or various causes and conditions that seem to involve the evolution of this desire for enlightenment in order to benefit beings. And the expression also in Chinese of causes and conditions also sometimes can be translated as story. The causes and conditions for something are the story of something.

[08:02]

So this can be a story of this mind as it tries to express itself through people, through persons, So again, how or where can this wish to realize Buddhahood for the welfare of others, where and how does it come from? And I would suggest to you that it doesn't come from you. or me, or Buddha, or great bodhisattvas who have this, who are this wish.

[09:11]

For me, I think it comes from not you, not Buddha, but the communion of you and Buddha. It comes from the intimacy of sentient beings and Buddhas And the intimacy is this dynamic relationship that we as biological events have with this wonderful enlightened way of being. We're intimate with it and yet sometimes we don't feel the intimacy. And the intimacy can be sometimes characterized as we are not it and it actually is us. So it's more intimate than being the same or different.

[10:13]

When I was, this is a story, when I was a little boy, two years old, I got paralyzed from inflammation of the myelin sheath. around my spine. That was the diagnosis. It's called poliomyelitis. And so I was fortunately sent to a rehabilitation clinic. And while I was infected with this virus, is it a virus? and paralyzed, I was in a hospital and away from my mother and father and spending most of my time with nurses, and they kept me somewhat moving during this sickness.

[11:41]

They kept massaging my legs and arms and kept stretching me. I remember being in the hospital. I remember the nurses saying, you're a big boy. You're a big boy. You don't have to cry as they stretched me and stretched me to keep my muscles from atrophying, from disuse. And I remember the darkness of that time, but I also remember somehow I remember being conscious. Sometimes my mother would go to social events with other

[12:54]

women about her age and she would take me with her and they would have I don't know what they had they had food and conversation with each other and they would sit in chairs and talk and drink coffee and tea and cookies and I would sit next to my mother quietly And then I would sometimes get a little sleepy. And they would take me upstairs into one of those rooms where the ladies put their coats. And I would be put in this big pile of ladies' coats. with all those different kinds of perfume smelling on the coats.

[14:02]

Now some people say that there's, that there's actually kind of, there's bad stuff in perfume, carcinogens and stuff that may cause brain damage. But I was pretty happy swimming in this ocean of ladies' coats. And then I would be semi-awakened from my repose late at night and taken home. And my mother would say, they all said you were so good. My mother, I think, trained me to sit still next to her and quiet. And I think it was soothing to her. So as I grew up, when she had something difficult to do, she would often take me with her to sit me down next to her.

[15:12]

And I would sit there quietly. And she would feel more at ease having this quiet little man next to her. One time she took me Christmas shopping, and I had some money in my pocket. And these Santa Clauses are on the street ringing those bells, asking for donations. And I knew those weren't the Santa Claus. I was old enough to know that wasn't the Santa Claus. But this is still why I thought there was a the Santa Claus. I knew these were like assistant Santa Claus who were raising money for, and not raising money to buy kids presents.

[16:23]

Well, actually maybe raising money to buy poor kids presents, although I didn't quite figure out why they would have to pay money to buy kids presents, but anyway. I took some of my money. I took a quarter, which at that time to me was a rather large amount of money. A quarter at that time was worth about $500 today. So I took this quarter out and I gave it to the Santa Claus. But I kind of watched to see if my mother noticed. And I knew that there was a difference between giving it and giving it and caring whether I was noticed or not. I don't remember whether she noticed, but I noticed and I felt really good giving that money to Santa Claus. At that time that was the largest donation I had ever made, of money anyway. I made some other donations before that in terms of my meditation practice with my mother.

[17:28]

when I was a little older, I think I must have been at least eight by this time, I had a wonderful bedroom which I shared with my little brother. My little brother had not been trained by my mother as a soothing factor in her life. And if she had something difficult to do, she would be sure not to take my little brother with her. Because he was like, if she took him in the car, it was like having a cat in the car. He always wanted to go with her, but she didn't want to take him unless I was there in the car with her. So my little brother, really different energy than me, and really funny and fun. Anyway, I could give quite a long talk of my brother, but I'll just say anyway, I shared the room with him and he destroyed a lot of my toys and I didn't beat him up because he was just a little guy.

[18:58]

He didn't understand that if you take a plastic model airplane of your big brothers and put it on top of a lamp, it will melt over the bulb. So anyway, this room had windows on three sides. Like not just one window, but a whole, it was all windows on three sides. And one side was a wall. And it was on the second store, and it was a house that was set back from the street, so it was in the middle of a block. So this window, it was out in the, so I looked out, it was kind of like having a tree fort, because I looked out the window and there's trees all around. And I used to spend quite a bit of time just sitting in that room. And sometimes when I was sitting in that room, I would hear a ringing. But I knew it wasn't actually a sound out in the room, but something in my head.

[20:04]

And I felt a little uncomfortable, and I thought, maybe that's my conscience. Maybe I did something unskillful. And I also used to wonder, sitting in that room, about my parents dying and how I would do if they died. And I used to wonder if Jesus happened to come to visit me through the air and stood outside my room and said, come here, Rebbe. I used to wonder, would I walk out into space to meet him? I thought I might. I wasn't sure. But I was wondering, as a test of my confidence, in the invitation whether I would do it. So at that time I was kind of getting into something or other, spending time just sitting there.

[21:06]

I also went outside and played with kids and stuff like that. But I did spend quite a bit of time just in my room there. And my parents noticed that I was spending quite a bit of time in my room. They thought maybe there's something wrong with me. How many people have heard this story before? One? Two? You have? Great. So far only two people have heard it? Oh, it's your story. That's your story too? Okay. Or you can come sit next to me. So they thought maybe I had a hearing problem. That's why I was spending all that time up in my room alone. So they sent me to an ear doctor, but there was nothing wrong with my ears. So then they sent me to a psychiatrist. A child psychiatrist.

[22:15]

And his name was Dr. Hansen. And so I would go see Dr. Hansen, who was a child psychiatrist, and at the beginning of the session he would say, is there anything you'd like to talk about? And as far as I can remember, I always said, no. How many people have heard this story before? Oh, you two have heard it, because you're married, right? So anyway, then after I said no, then we would do things like build model airplanes, which I could take home and my brother could destroy. But anyway, he was an adult. AND HE WOULD PROVIDE THE BUILDING MATERIALS AND HELP ME BUILD THESE THINGS SO I COULD BUILD THEM, BUT I COULD BUILD THEM MORE SKILLFULLY WITH HIS HELP.

[23:25]

SO WE MADE SOME REALLY NICE Model airplanes, like not just plastic, but wood kind, you know, where you have balsa and you wrap them with paper and paint them and they actually could fly. And we made boats, sailboats and battleships. And we made cities, like model cities and castles. And I got to take this stuff home. And I would travel all the way across a fairly large city, Minneapolis, to go see this guy because I actually liked seeing him. I enjoyed that time. And at the end of the session, when the time allotted was over, he would say, is there anything you'd like to talk about? And I always said, no. And I went to see Dr. Hansen for about a year, and I really liked going, but then soccer season started, and I wanted to play soccer after school rather than going to see Dr. Hansen.

[24:35]

I didn't want to miss one day, so I stopped going. But not because I didn't like to go see my child psychologist. I actually did like, I liked the therapy very much. And in case you can't tell, I still remember how kind Dr. Hansen was and skillful. And I don't know if he cured me of that situation of being kind of somebody who sits quietly in his room. But I did have that therapy anyway. Around that time, and this may have had something to do with the situation. Around that time I was once playing with my toy soldiers and my parents noticed that my array, sometimes called an army, of toy soldiers had become rather extensive and they wondered where all the toy soldiers came from.

[25:41]

And I told them that I bought them with the money that they gave me to put in the bank. Is that your story, too, over there? So they would give me money, you know, and there was kind of like a, they were trying to train children to bank, you know, so they would give, they would give you money and you'd go and bank it at school, you know. So I told them I withheld the money and bought the soldiers with the money. So they checked my bank book. But actually, they found that I had been putting the money in the bank book, which I actually enjoyed doing. So then they said, well, where did you get these soldiers? And I said, I stole them. And so we took the soldiers back to the toy store or paid the toy store for them, I don't remember which.

[26:50]

And then my father took me for a little visit to the jail. We went into a jail, to a police station that had a jail. And we came into the police station. My father said, could I show this young man your cells? And they said, huh? What's that, eight? It's about eight, yeah. It was a big year. So they said, yeah, go ahead, show them the cells. So we went in. We went into the cells. And there were the cells. And they were mostly filled with bicycles. at that time that was not packed with little boys. Little boys saying, where's my mommy?

[27:53]

I'm sorry I took those soldiers. It's not funny. Anyway, and my father said, well, would you like to spend some time in these cells? And I said, no. I said, well, this is kind of what happens if you steal stuff on a regular basis, anyway. You wind up here. Of course, I knew that, but it was kind of like reinforcing what most eight-year-old boys know already is that you can go to jail for stealing. But he wasn't self-righteous about it. Matter of fact... What he said was, you know, it would really hurt your mother if you went to jail. He didn't say it would hurt him. He said it would hurt my mother. And I think at that time he confessed to me that he had stolen things too. So he wasn't speaking to me from a position of moral superiority, but just pointing out to me that there are consequences.

[29:04]

One of the consequences is you might wind up in places like this, sleeping with bicycles. And the other consequences might hurt your mother. and your grandmother, et cetera. Around that time also I started to go to the YMCA and I enjoyed doing that too.

[30:08]

And they had swimming and they had like craft shop. You could make little like wooden objects, like little wooden boats, little wooden airplanes. And they also had a pool room at the YMCA where boys could, Christian boys, could play pool. And so one day I was playing pool, and some bigger boys came over to me and did something like, removed me from the pool table. They interfered with and bullied me away from the table. And I kind of went along with it because they were quite a bit bigger than me. And then there's a big African-American boy.

[31:12]

That was before we said African-American. came over and told those other boys to leave me alone. And I really appreciated that, that he was protecting me that way. I didn't know very many African American boys, but that one was protecting this white boy from other white boys. Although I did stop stealing soldiers, as I became around 12, I noticed that being kind of bad, or something in the neighborhood of kind of bad, or mischievous, or delinquent, or something, I noticed that it was actually, in my neighborhood anyway, it was kind of like a sign of courage and creativity.

[32:35]

So I decided when I was about 11 or 12, I decided, and also in those days, you know, I knew that when you're like that age, you can do practically anything and they won't really put you in jail for very long. And that a lot of people would think was really cool. So I decided, at least for one year, to really be as bad as I possibly could. So I went back to a life of, sort of a life of crime. And I had some companions. And one of the things we did one spring morning, well actually one spring night was, this is when I was 12. Yeah, 12. We broke into a gas station. and took the keys to a beautiful Hudson.

[33:43]

That's a car. And we took it for a ride even though we didn't really know how to drive. Somehow we got it going and drove it around through the night around the city and then as the sun was rising We went around a corner by this beautiful lake, and this thing had those kind of like seat covers, really slippery seat covers. So we went around the corners, and my friend was driving. He was 13. And we went around the corner, and I slid across the seats and bumped into him and caused him to sort of let go of the wheel. So he crashed into a tree. And then we got out of the car. We were OK, kind of.

[34:47]

Some little bit of damage to our bodies. But we got up and out of the car and walked away from the car. There was a fisherman nearby who thought that was unusual. So we went about our hiking. And after not too long, we saw a police car coming. So we kind of like ducked down, but that didn't really, they saw us. And they came up to us, and I don't remember where exactly it happened, but they invited us to get in their car. And they took us to a hospital to get our injuries treated. and then they took us to jail. Not the same jail as before, this was a much more interesting, this is like downtown jail. And, you know, to tell you the truth, I really kind of, I got fingerprinted.

[35:51]

I kind of like that. And then we got brought towards our cells. And on the way to the cells, we went by a cell full of, not bicycles, But, you know, kind of, I don't know what the word is, energetic females of the human species. And they were like, when we walked by, they were like whistling and reaching through the bars to get us, you know, hey, cutie. I thought that was cool, too. And then we got put in jail into our own cell. And in there, there was a Native American guy, a little bit older than us. And I thought that was cool too, to be in jail with Indians. And then they served us lunch. And you know, in those days, I actually, the lunch they served us, I thought it was really quite good.

[36:53]

Now, I could tell you part of the reason why I thought that was quite good is I often didn't have lunch. So this is like, I don't know what it was, like tomato soup and bologna sandwich. It was like, you know, I thought it was good. I enjoyed the lunch. So this was like, so far, it's pretty good. Then my mother came to get me, and I didn't feel so good anymore. And on our way out of the police station, she took away various, what do you call it, took away a lot of my gear, my gear, my juvenile delinquent gear that I purchased myself from stuff, from money I had made working. And I, you know, like I had a beautiful brown leather jacket and I had motorcycle boots and a black t-shirt. All this stuff, like really like state of the art gangster clothes. for 12-year-old boys.

[37:56]

She took away all my nice stuff. And I let her do it because I felt sorry for her because I knew she didn't like to go to jail to get her son. And I was ashamed, even though I had a good time up to that point, actually. And that night, I went to a dance... and i told my friend don't tell anybody about this but he told people when i went to the dance everyone all the kids at the dance thought what happened was totally cool it was like i was never so popular just like i thought i might be but i was still So anyway, I was very popular and the whole thing was quite fun. And the problem was it hurt my mother and I could have got killed. And there was a man who lived in our apartment building.

[39:03]

My parents had recently... become separated, not yet divorced, but separated. So I was a big 12-year-old, at home with my mother. And she was trying to, I don't know what, be my mother and my father. And she sometimes would try to discipline me. And around that time, one time when she was disciplining me, I said, stop, beep, and around. Understand? Do you understand? Stop beeping around. And she went, who taught you that? And that was the last time she disciplined me. She was just afraid of me after that. Stop beeping around. And so she talked to this guy who lived in our apartment building who was a really big guy. I was a pretty big 12-year-old, but he was a big 40-year-old.

[40:04]

He was 6'4 and weighed about 260 pounds, which in those days was like 500 pounds. And he was also 1946 National Heavyweight Golden Gloves Champion of the United States. And he liked me. He really liked me. He had two daughters. I think I was kind of like a sort of a substitute son for him. And he often would come and ask me to spend time with him. So I really knew he liked me. And he came to see me right after this incident with the police in jail. And he told me about when he was a kid, and the stuff he did when he was about my age. And he didn't tell me what a good boy he was. He told me that he was just as bad as me. And I was impressed how bad he was and how big he was and how kind he was.

[41:13]

I really felt he loved me just as much as Dr. Hansen. And then he said to me, you know, it's easy to be bad. And I thought, this guy knows what he's talking about. And it's true. It's easy to be bad, actually, a lot of the time. Sometimes, maybe not. But usually, it's easy. It's easy to be bad. He said, what's hard is to be good. And I thought, hm, OK. I'll try to do what's hard. And it was hard. And I kept forgetting that I wanted to do it. I wanted to be good. And about a year later, I was in my room feeling kind of bad about, I don't know what, maybe that belt, that ringing was in my ear again.

[42:18]

And I was feeling bad, and I I just thought, oh, if I would just concentrate on being kind to people, most of my suffering would evaporate. If I would just focus on that point. And I felt really liberated. And I intended to go to school and just concentrate on being kind to the fellow students instead of concentrating on what they thought of me. or how to get them to be kind to me. I really thought that was the way to go, but as soon as I opened the door to school and saw all these fabulous beings, I would forget. Now I would put it in, you know, in terms of another way that I didn't really put it that time, that I could see that at that time that

[43:22]

It wasn't so important about whether people loved me, although that's somewhat important. The important thing was how I loved people, that that orientation was really my salvation. The other one of quite reasonably being concerned about who and how people loved me was very uncomfortable most of the time. Once in a while, they seemed to be kind of like on board or loving me the way it was appropriate. But just the concern for it just seemed to be very uncomfortable to this 13-year-old boy. And the reversing, the thing I could see, would really be a great relief. But I couldn't remember when I actually saw them. As soon as I saw them, I kept thinking, what do they think of me? How do they feel about me? Do they like me? I kept forgetting and kept remembering, kept forgetting and kept remembering for quite a few years.

[44:29]

And then when I was late teens or something, early twenties, I started just reading some books about English translations from Asian storytellers. And I remember I read Krishnamurti and I read this first page of a book and it said, wherever you go all over the world, people are pretty much the same. Everybody is, and then the page turned. And I thought, hmm, interesting. And then I started also to read some books about Zen practitioners. I hadn't lost interest in Jesus, who I thought was pretty cool, from stories I heard about him.

[45:44]

But I had no daily practice related to them. I read these stories. And again, although Jesus was, I thought, cool. A lot of the stories seemed to be too lofty to me. Couldn't see how to apply them. And I read these stories about these Zen people. And basically, I guess what I felt from the stories was They really seemed unafraid to live in the world with everybody else. They seemed to be unafraid to wade into the mud of daily life. And that includes that as they would enter the mud, difficult things would happen to them. that they would get insulted and praised and insulted and praised.

[46:50]

They'd get treated in different ways and all the different ways would affect their body in different ways. People would give them things and take things away from them. And I mean, this is a situation which quite a few people are in, right? You're in a situation where people are, like, loving you and hating you, insulting you and praising you, giving you things and taking things away. Is that familiar? This is, like, pretty familiar to a lot of people. But it seems like some people actually decided that they wanted to be in that place, they wanted to be there, not because it's so nice there, but because they actually wanted to be there and help out. They actually wanted to like, yeah, be helpful to the other people who were in this mess.

[47:56]

And it would be hard on them in certain ways but they actually wanted to enter all realms. If everybody's comfortable too, they actually want to enter those realms too and love the people there. Love them in a way that would help them wake up from their suffering. And they wanted to realize enough wisdom to help other people realize enough wisdom to help other people realize enough wisdom to be free. They wanted to do that. It seemed like that. They really wanted that. I got that feeling and I thought, yeah, I want to be that way too. But how can you be that way?

[48:59]

If you want to be that way, how can you be that way? And then I found out that they actually had a way of training that desire. That that desire to actually wade into an intimate relationship with everybody you meet. The way these the way these courageous bodhisattvas, these people who heroically stride into intimate relations, where they really can express themselves fully and teach other people to do so in such a way as to liberate beings, they needed some training. Because although they feel that way, without the training they would forget. we would forget.

[50:02]

So I think maybe that's also familiar, that you think of something that would really be good, and on your way to do it, you forget to do it. So this way-seeking mind can arise in this world, and it arises out of intimacy with Buddha. Somehow it comes up in the mix of various kinds of criminal activity. Some people are more criminal than others, but we're all kind of like somewhat And in the midst of bumping around unskillfully, Buddha's right there with us all the time.

[51:11]

Buddha doesn't say, oh, there's the people over there, you know, bumping around, being unskillful, getting in trouble, being selfish, suffering, and I'm going to stay over here until they get better. Buddha is right there with every unskillful criminal. And even Buddha's there with all the people who don't think they're criminal and think they're better than the criminals. Buddha's even with those people who think they're superior to criminals. So those of you who have not sunk to that level, Buddha's with you too. And those of you who are like sub-criminal, Buddha's there with you. Nobody's bad enough or good enough that Buddha is not wanting to express herself through them. Nobody. That's my understanding. And that's what those stories about the Bodhisattvas is like.

[52:16]

They're like they want to be with everybody? They want to be with everybody? Like my grandson says, you know, Buddha wants to be with everybody? Yes. Why? Buddha wants to hold hands with everybody and walk through birth and death? Yes. Why? Well, because that's what Buddha is, is wanting to walk with beings through birth and death until they wake up and want to walk with beings through birth and death until they wake up. That's basically what Buddha is. And the training is to be able to, like, do that. When I first was attracted to these people, it wasn't like I thought, oh, I want to attain Buddhahood.

[53:17]

I just wanted to be the way they are, and the way they are is enabled by Buddhahood. It isn't that I want to, like, be sitting cross-legged cool like that guy. with those nice round cheeks and the bump on top of the head and the halo and people bowing to you all day. It wasn't that I... I had nothing against Buddha, but I was not attracted to Buddha. What I was attracted to was these men and women who, like, held hands with people and walked into the mud, if that's where they're going. And if they're coming out of the mud, okay, let's go out of the mud. If they're going to play golf... You know? Okay. Like that woman now who played golf with the boys yesterday. You know? Buddha's walking with her too. Buddha's saying, you're going to play with the boys? I'm not going to. You're out. No. Buddha's with the boys too, playing with her. Everybody's got Buddha all around them. Lots of Buddhas. But we need to train that.

[54:22]

We need to be mindful of this. Otherwise we forget. But it's there. I think. Looks like it. So this temple actually, you know, also is called Hoshinji. And we, in English, we say beginner's mind. Technically speaking, beginner's mind is Soshin. Soshin, which literally means beginner mind. So Soshinji is the name of this temple, not really. The actual name is Hoshinji, but that's, when the temple was named, we wanted to call it, or some people wanted to call it Beginner's Mind Temple, but someone suggested that Soshinji doesn't sound as good as Hoshinji. But Hoshinji Hoshin-ji and Soshin-ji together are kind of interesting.

[55:25]

Hoshin-ji is short for Hotsu Bodai Shin-ji. Hotsu means to give rise. Bodai is Bodhi and Shin is mind. And that's shortened to Hotsu Shin, giving rise to the mind. Then you combine Hotsu and Shin, you get Hoshin. So the name of the temple literally in Chinese is the temple of giving rise to the thought of enlightenment. But we translate it as beginner's mind. Beginner's mind isn't really the thought of enlightenment. Beginner's mind isn't really the thought of enlightenment. The thought of enlightenment is this actual thought when you actually want to give your life, not just to all beings, but to give your life to training yourself so that you can give yourself to all beings really in a helpful way, in the most helpful way.

[56:31]

It's actually wishing to become a Buddha in order to really be able to help beings. Of course, it's based on really wanting to help beings, but it's more than just that. It's actually wishing to become supremely beneficent. However, beginner's mind is like more primitive. It's more like noticing that noticing that somebody helped you at the pool table. Noticing that somebody's challenging you to be good instead of doing what's easy. Noticing that it's cool that some people can really wade into it with people and really be there no matter what. It's like that stuff, which isn't yet thinking, I want to be a Buddha. So a lot of people come and say, you know, I don't really want this enlightenment business.

[57:33]

I just want blah, blah. Is it OK that I'm at Zen Center? I don't want to save all beings. But they a little bit think it's cool that somebody does. And they want to hang out sort of in the area. and commune [...] with this spirit of really wanting to save all beings until the Bodhi mind arises. So the beginner's mind and the Bodhi mind are really very intimate. And that's the name of this temple is giving rise to the thought of enlightenment. But also the name of this temple is All of you, no matter what you're thinking, you have this same thing just waiting to pop, waiting to blossom. It's in you. No matter, even if you're not at the stage of, I would really like to become supremely enlightened in order to benefit all beings.

[58:36]

Even if you don't feel that, even if you feel silly saying that, it's okay. There's something in you which is the seed of that. So in that way, the name of the temple is kind of nice. The English is emphasizing this very, very, very, very universal basic mind that wants to eventually become the mind of enlightenment. And the name of the temple is actually the arising of this spectacular wish to love perfectly. So remember those two things about this temple. And hopefully you still dare to come in here because of beginner's mind. You're all OK to come in here. And there's something also very great that this temple is dedicated to. Usually there's question and answer here. But I can't do the question and answer.

[59:39]

But if there's anything you want to bring up now, I could do it for a little while. Is that OK? Or should we stop? One question? Two questions? Well, they're leaving, so they don't have to ask a question. Anybody have art? See you later. Kitchen? Any good kitchen? Yeah. Any questions? Short questions? Long questions? No questions? Yes? Well, I saw him first. Sometimes I feel like that voting stuff, that narrative sort of calls me to monastic practice or practice in a temple. Sometimes I feel like it really calls me out into the world. Sometimes it's hard for me to feel like the Zen Center or Kasahara or something is in the world in the mud. It's the same kind of way that that having to live in a city being more immediately conducted with some of the problems that were sort of shielded from the Al-Tahara, those don't seem to arise.

[60:53]

I'm wondering if you've heard that before. Can everybody hear his question? So sometimes he feels drawn to go into the mud right now, right? And he feels like monastic training is a little bit of a... a withdrawal from that immersion in holding hands with people in birth and death. Okay? I think it's perfectly fine. If you're ready to hold hands and walk in the mud, go right ahead. You don't have to wait. You don't have to go to Tassar first. You don't have to train monastically first. Okay? Go right ahead, please. However, when you get in the mud, if you start to notice that you're getting a little queasy... and you're withdrawing anyway, maybe a little monastic training would help you. Because maybe in that situation you could find out what it is that's leading you to be kind of like queasy. Because sometimes in the muddy situations, the people aren't saying to you, well, what is it that you're causing you to kind of like withdraw from us?

[61:58]

How come you're not like totally open to us? How come you're like attached to some agenda of what you think is right, et cetera? They don't necessarily ask you. they just act in a way that you notice you're withdrawing from. So it may be that, generally speaking, people who are like out there immersed in daily life need to do a pilgrimage from that type of bodhisattva activity into the monastery. And in the monastery you can develop certain dimensions of practice that are hard to develop in the sewer. However, then you should leave the monastery and go back someday. And those who are living in the monastery for a long time and becoming very good at what you can develop in the monastery, they should do a pilgrimage into the sewer to test their monastic experience, to see if it's like, help them be more open-hearted and flexible and courageous.

[63:02]

So back and forth. Some people may spend more time in monasteries than others, but almost everybody needs to have some monastic training in order to be ultimately effective in the city, in the sewer, in the hospital, in the hospice, in the peace rally, or even in the Pentagon. Somebody needs to go in there. Was there another comment over here? It went away? Okay. Is that all? Yes? Jackie gave me three fishes that her mother gave her. Two red and one green. Would anyone like a fish? A candy fish? You would? Here comes a red one. Is that enough?

[64:08]

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