So we're studying Case 59, and I noticed as I looked at the case, as I thought about looking at the case, I thought, well, let's go to Case 60. This case is about a dead snake, and some people might have difficulty studying a dead snake. When I looked at the case, I realized that it's really worthwhile to spend more time on it. Is it possible to turn that down a little bit? You can hear the ocean or something. Good mic, yeah. Is this okay? All right. So I do think that there's actually a great deal in this case. So we'll study it some more, okay? But before we do that, I thought I might read a little article from a magazine.

[01:02]

It's a travel magazine called Kandenaste. And so somebody who writes travel magazine articles got into our koan class a while ago. Yeah. and wrote an article about the koan cross. So he went to Green Gulch Farm, this guy, this article.

[02:06]

He was writing by Green Gulch Farm. He was also writing about Tassajara. Can you hear me okay? No? And so he came to Green Gulch and he attended one of the classes, one of the evening classes. This one was given by Rev. Anderson, the former Abbott of the San Francisco Zen Center, who lives at Green Gulch. It was part of a continuing series of classes of about 50 students who, like law students, were doing case studies. Though these were found in a book of folk tales known as koans. Oh, excuse me. Though these were from a book of folk tales with koans as punchlines. He didn't understand that the whole tale was a punchline.

[03:15]

I came in on the wrong koan. LAUGHTER Having pored over the previous case about a guest who comes to a monastery and is told to go wash your bowl, this class had gone past that case. They were onto an exemplary figure, the exemplary figure of the person of no rank. And the Linji said, there's a person of no rank. who's constantly going in and out of the portals of your face. Anderson was a gangly, Midwestern-seeming person. No.

[04:32]

This was brought to me by someone who found it in an airplane. He wore small glasses and a black robe and a mustard-color apron. LAUGHTER and a mustard-colored apron that covered only his chest. It's actually lower tonight. His hands were under his apron while he walked around and acknowledged the students by name. At Tassajara, there were talks too, but this one was really wacky.

[05:34]

Doubtless because I was not getting it, really. He also said, both his head and his face were covered with a five o'clock shadow. The next morning in Zazen, I put my attention on the plane, the crossing, where my breath became the air around me and crossing back again. The air became my breath. Anderson came over and straightened my spine for me. Then a moment later, he all of a sudden recited the koan about the portals of the face. After a minute or two, he added, for the beginner's mind, who has not realized this, look, look. I felt I was realizing something, but nevertheless, I was relieved when the sitting ended and I could ease my joints.

[06:49]

End of article. And the name of this issue is host list. Hot list. So Zen Center's on the hot list. Okay. Yeah, I guess, you know, so some people on the plane could be meditating on the person of no rank, constantly going in and out of the portals of their face. It's possible. Before getting into the case, I'd like to... In the commentary on this case, there's some background...

[07:53]

on the teacher in the case. So I'd like to read the background on the teacher before we get into the case, okay? So when Shan Master, Qing Lin, Xiu Qian, the third generation abbot of Dengshan, first came from Jiashan to call on Dengshan. Dengshan's honorific name is Wu Ben. So we have here a monk whose Buddhist name is Shichan. Shichan, okay? It's a Chinese Buddhist monk. And he's called, in this introductory thing, Qinglin. This is his name after he becomes a teacher. But before he had his own monastery, his name was Shiqian.

[09:00]

And before he came to study with Dongshan, he studied with Jiaxan. So he comes to Wu and Dongshan, he is going to become his teacher, and he will become the third generation abbot of Dungshan. So after Dungshan dies, one of his disciples becomes the abbot, and then after that disciple either dies or goes someplace else, Wu Ben, I mean, Qing Lin came back to Dungshan to be the abbot. So when he first came, to visit Deng Shan, Deng Shan asked him, Wu Ben asked him, where did you come from? Qing Lin, which as you may have read, means green forest. Green forest said, Wu Ling.

[10:06]

Wu Ben said, how does the way of teaching in Wu Ling compare to here? Qing Lin said, in other lands, bamboo sprouts in winter. Wu Ben said, cook fragrant rice in a special pot to offer to this man. Qing Lin then went out. Wu Ben said, later on, this fellow will trample everyone on earth to death. This is a kind of a Zen, ironic way to talk about somebody becoming the great Buddha. Trampling everybody to death, I guess, means he's able to help people drop all their egotistical, self-centered habits

[11:13]

So I would say then later, after he had been at Dongshan for a while, Qinglin was planting pines. There was an old man who asked him for a verse. The master here then is Qinglin. He's still studying with Dongshan, but he's called the master in this historical history. portrayal of him. So although he's a monk studying the monastery, this old man asked him for a verse, which was something that people might do. Ask a monk that he found inspiring for a verse. So Ching Lin's planting pine trees, and he writes this verse. And it says, point sharp, And by the way, the characters there, Chinese characters, are a character which means sharp and the same character repeated, so sharp, sharp.

[12:29]

And that character, the etymology of that character is the the feeling of grass, young grass, or maybe bamboo. Bamboo is a grass. Young grass coming up to the ground, that first fresh green that penetrates sharply out of the ground. That's the meaning of that. So it's like fresh green sprout. So sharp, sharp, fresh, fresh. Three feet and more. Thick, dense, covering the wild weeds. I don't know in what generation people can see these old pines. So that's the poem. There's something for you to think about there, look at.

[13:33]

Anyway, the old man was very happy with the poem and brought it to show the great teacher Dung Shan, the great teacher Wu Ben. And Wu Ben said, I appreciate your joy, or I share your joy, old man. This person will be the third generation of Dung Shan. So at that point, I guess he decided, he specified that he would be the abbot after the abbot after him. Ching Lin took leave of Wuben and went to Ching Suo Mountain in Shan Nan Fu, where he lived in a hut for 10 years. And you know, when I read that, I got this feeling of kind of the way I felt about practice before I came to Zen Zen.

[14:47]

And sometimes I feel that way since I've been to Zen Zen too. It's kind of like... This feeling like it would be nice to just go or just be in a little hut someplace. You know, you and a little shelter and the earth and your body. Not as much you and body, but the body, having a body and a mind in a little sheltered area and be involved in things like breathing, eating, sleeping, getting some food from some place, bringing it back, eating it, just sitting in a simple little place, dealing with life at that level. And that's kind of the way I felt about practice when I first started getting interested in it.

[15:54]

But it's hard to live that simply in a way. Even though it's so lovely, it actually is not that easy to live that simply. I tried it and it was really hard somehow. Because not running around and being busy, one realizes that one is uncomfortable. So it's kind of funny that such a simple, lovely way of living, if you just live with that, somehow your discomfort just gradually comes up and it's hard to stay there. And so many people then leave, many people then go to a monastery to live with other people, even though in some ways they just want to live very simply. But it's so hard that they need encouragement, so then they live simply together. But then when you live in a monastery for a while, and you get better at living simply, then life gets more complicated. Then they give you jobs like, you know, head cook and work leader, treasurer, director of the meditation hall and so on.

[17:04]

Then life gets complicated. And then after you train for many years, it's possible then to leave the monastery and then finally to go back to that little hut where you I originally felt that life can be that simple and direct and basic, but now after your training you can actually stand to be there. And now you have the discipline to enjoy just being alive and spending your days... breathing. So I had that feel, I just felt that, you know, And that feeling, that appreciation for such a simple life, you know, comes and goes in my life. Sometimes I just, you know, at Tassajara, for example, and even here sometimes, just walk off into the woods for a while and just sit there. And in some ways that's all there is to it.

[18:05]

And I'm going to be gone like that. But for a moment there I can just sit there. between birth and death and be alive. So he did that. Well, he did it for 10 years. But he thought, wait a minute, there's something more to this. So he said, suddenly he remembered Wu Men's words and said, I should help the ignorant. How could I be confined to a small measure? Eventually, he arrived at Sui Province, where it happened that a community invited him, and he dwelled in the Earth Gate Little Green Forest Sanctuary. That is why he is called Qinglin Little Forest.

[19:08]

So there's something, you know, something about that that a lot of us Zen students would be happy with a very simple life just to like, just very simple life. And yet somehow that kind of misses the point in a way because That enjoyment of simplicity is really to be shared, and that's too limited. So we go on a rhythm between simplicity and embracing complexity, simplicity and embracing complexity. And so our life in the community is well-suited to having that, hopefully, to having that alternation. And please look at your life and see if you have that alternation. So I think many of you have very complex lives, but do you have some time when it's very simple, like your body and mind dealing with gravity, hunger, thirst, defecation, sleep?

[20:25]

you know, these kinds of basic things. Do you give yourself a chance to, like, do that basic and then go from there back into the market and then come back? So, do you go back and forth like that on some basis? The ancient masters needed that alternation. They didn't spend all their time Their whole career was not spent just helping people. They also needed this time away in various patterns. So we need it too, probably. Also, they didn't just go away into the mountains by themselves. They came out of the mountains too. But I feel like most of us are out of the mountains. Do we have time when we really live simply? We need that too. It would be nice to give up living simply entirely, but we may be not ready for it, ever.

[21:35]

Here's how he taught. One example of how he taught, besides the case, he said to his monks, you people should investigate apart from mind, intellect, and cognition. Go beyond the roads of ordinary and holy to learn Only then can you be in command. Otherwise, you are not my disciples. Okay? Now the case, the introduction says, try to get rid of it and it stays. Try to keep it and it leaves.

[22:36]

Not leaving, not staying, it has no country. Where will you meet it? Everywhere, every place. Tell me, what thing can be so special? Not leaving yet staying, dwelling yet departing. Not leaving and not dwelling, he is without a country. Where can he be met with? Tell me, what thing is it that can be so marvelous? What thing is it that can be so marvelous? Well, here it is.

[23:41]

A monk asks Ching Ling, when a student goes by a shortcut, then what? Is this marvelous or what? Is this the thing that's so marvelous? When the student goes by a shortcut, then what? Well, he says, a dead snake lies across the great road. I urge you not to step on it. How you doing?

[24:50]

Hmm? The monk said, when one steps on it, then what? And Ching Lin says, you lose your life. The monk said, well, how about when one doesn't confront it, or doesn't bump into it? Ching Lin said, there's still nowhere to escape. at just such a time, then what? Okay? So you're taking a shortcut. You're on the road, taking a shortcut.

[25:50]

How is that? There's a dead snake. Don't bump into it. Be careful. If you bump into it, you lose your life. If you don't bump into it, you can't escape either. At such a moment when you can't escape, or you lose your life. Then what? He says, it's lost. The monk says, where is it gone? He says, the grass is deep. There's no place to look for it. The monk says, you too should be on guard, teacher. And Qinglin claps his hands and laughs and says, this one is equally poisonous, or your poison is equal to mine.

[26:51]

And at the end of the commentary, Not at the end of the commentary, sort of at the end of the commentary before the verse. There's a call on collection. And the comment in the inexhaustible lamp says, Ching Lin's mainspring, or his pivotal function, the way he moves in situations and responds to his students, is swift and sharp. And the commentator says, this is not a light only for one time. It's a standard for vast ages. So some later teachers felt that the way he was teaching here not only seem to work and be a light in this occasion, but can be a light for a long time, maybe even a light for now, even, you know, what is it, hundreds of years after that comet, maybe 900 or 1,000 years after the comet, we can find a light here.

[28:25]

This is an interaction between two people, although the person in the story is called the monk, so we don't know who it was. He apparently was not noted enough to get his name in here, but Ching Lin likes him. So it's a pretty happy interaction between them. So some kind of important interchange is occurring here. So what is the light here? Can you see the light of this interaction? And so I'd like to endeavor to discover the light here. There's some words, there's some words in the commentary and there's a verse, a couple of verses, actually three, four verses,

[29:29]

related to this case, helping us. But before we read any verses, let's see if we can open our eyes to the light here. The light which seems to be in the story. We could look at the commentary. Maybe we'll find the light in the commentary or in those other verses. But another way to do it would be try to find the light in the story ourselves and then see if these verses and commentaries can help us get different aspects, reflect the light in different ways. Yes. We're reading it now.

[30:59]

We're reading it now. We're reading it. [...] They're kind of like asking the snakes. They're stuck on a cat again. They're stuck on a tree. They're stuck on a tree. They're stuck on a tree. They're stuck on a snake. They're stuck on a tree. They're stuck on a tree. They're stuck on a tree. I'm trying to get the situation to tell you what to do to happen anytime. I was like, the future is that definitely might be seen.

[32:05]

I think it is expected. But curious, if you have a bad message, just curious that you choose to be on your application of the future. So it's one big new point that's going to be more like this new plan. If you watch out for your own plan, So originally you felt like a teacher saying, yes, you're a good student, and now you're feeling like, be careful with what you've got. But those might not be mutually exclusive.

[33:05]

In other words, good students have something to watch out for. What's a good student, by the way? What are some of the characteristics of good students? Huh? Pardon? Rude. Yes. Uh-huh. So I think commitment is a characteristic of a good student. What else? Yes. Testing, challenging, pushing, what? Pushing the envelope. Pushing the envelope, uh-huh. Yes. Bypassing the teacher. Heartfelt irony.

[34:06]

Showing up. Yes, that's kind of a commitment. Wholeheartedness. Pardon? Patience, right? And something else I was thinking of just recently was that when Dogen says that when you go to see the teacher, you take your views and just, well, step them aside or throw them away. Just throw your views away. It's another characteristic of a good student. Is that being upright? Yes, it is. Right. But after you put your views aside or let go of your views, you're now open. So another characteristic of good students, good students open, So you can listen.

[35:15]

Your ears are open, your eyes are open, your hands are open. You can receive because you're open. You're not holding on with your ears, holding on with your eyes, and holding on with your hands. So you can receive. But there's a danger there for a good student. So it doesn't mean when you're open that you don't like then come back with questions and It doesn't mean that you don't have, like, real intense questions about, well, what's going on here, you know? But you're really asking questions about the truth. You're really interested in the truth, maybe. But that doesn't come from that you brought your interest in the truth with you and holding on to your interest in the truth. You let go of it, and now it comes back again. But it's this fresh interest, this sharp, fresh interest. Like, you hear something and you really wonder, well, what's that about? Or, I don't agree. But this isn't I don't agree, which is holding on to your old view. It's a new I don't agree. That's part of being wholehearted and maybe almost like rude.

[36:22]

But it's a rudeness that happens in openness. And it isn't like rudeness that's like laying your old trip on the situation. Hopefully the teacher is doing the same thing. But that's dangerous, that openness. You can bite yourself with it. In one sense, this monk is also, he wants a shortcut, you know. Even a shortcut is not, because as it says below, even a shortcut is not short enough. So even directly going along the road is still kind of like a delay. And so if you, but anyway, approaching what it might mean to get into the practice immediately part of what's involved to get into practice immediately is that there's somebody else there. You don't just walk in by yourself. There's somebody there to meet you. So this is a story about this monk wants to enter right away, so there's an opportunity there.

[37:30]

And this opportunity is there, and if you don't meet it properly, if you lean into it, you bump it or try to get away, that's not real openness. And then you'll get in trouble. Now, at such a moment where you're not running away, when you're open, then there's this freshness. So this is like In a sense, this kind of talk can be an instruction or maybe a light to us about how to be in such a way that we realize the light. It's a kind of a light on the light. Yes. Right.

[38:35]

Right. Right. Right. To be patient, but you have to be patient and yet there's an urgency here. A good student is an urgency without rushing. So he has the urgency, which is good. He wants to practice directly, immediately. He wants to practice the shortcut, in a way. But he has to do that without rushing. So again, looking at this case, looking at this story, looking at your life, can you find the balance between urgency, wholeheartedness? Not the balance between that, but an urgency or a wholeheartedness that isn't hurrying and that isn't holding back. That's the...

[39:39]

some sense of what's being, some sense of what's being instructed here. Do you carry yourself in your life that way? Do you have urgency in each meeting without rushing the meeting? And I think, I would guess that probably many of you feel an urgency in a number of meetings that you have, that you feel, you know, There's a person here or a situation that really demands my immediate attention, my full attention. This is something which, if it isn't taken care of, could hurt someone's feelings or discourage someone or whatever. Someone could be hurt. And yet we have trouble not rushing ahead or running away from that kind of urgency. Does that sound familiar? Sometimes we don't feel that urgency and then we aren't maybe feeling like, oh geez, then we don't feel like we'll get out of here or rush ahead or do something.

[40:51]

So that's nice that we're not rushing or withdrawing or we're patient, but maybe we're not feeling the life, the criticalness of this opportunity. So to feel that criticalness of the opportunity and not get flustered and try to get a hold of it. So some of the later Zen teachers felt like Qing Lin, Green Forest, was really good at staying there with this opportunity, this pivotal opportunity. He was very quick. And he was right there with it. And the monk was pretty good to meet him there too. So it's pretty good. Anybody else? Kevin's got his hand raised, but he already did one, so anybody else want to go ahead of Kevin, Sunchild?

[42:09]

Yeah, sharp, sharp, quickening, quickening. That sharp also means quickening, you know, fresh. And if you're practicing that way, uh, You're not alone. It may seem like after a while. Yes? Mm-hmm. They're dangerous.

[43:30]

Anything what? Anything what? Right. Right. And yet there is activity. There is a sharp, there is a sprout coming up out of the ground. There is this pine tree. And the pine tree now comes up out of the ground and it actually gets bigger and bigger and grows. So there is this activity and you can, huh? Right. Well, activity and getting something. It's activity that doesn't gain. It may grow, but it's not gaining. And for us, I think part of the story also is just saying that for us, part of the way you work it out and test yourself is that there's something there, that you're confronted with something.

[44:45]

And again, I think it's maybe easy to dream of activity which isn't like activity to gain something, but can you then actually go out of your way to enter into this situation where you're meeting someone and doing something with someone and even then not get into doing something or gaining something? You may feel like you're not trying to gain anything, but when you go to meet someone, then it maybe surfaces you, that there is some underground, some unconscious or subtle trying to get something. Because you might say, otherwise, how would you go to the meeting? How would you get to the meeting without trying to get something from the meeting? Well, that's the point. We have to be able to get to meetings without trying to get something from the meeting. Because a lot of people can stay in the hut and think that they're not trying to get something, which is swell.

[45:49]

But can it also be realized when you actively go to meet somebody? So this is a good koan to work with people on. And for the rest of the week, whenever you notice the activity of meeting another person, Is there a trying to get something from it? And the other way is, do you think that when you're not trying to meet someone that then you're not trying to get something? And if you think so, well test it by seeing if it's possible to meet someone with that same immediacy, non-gaining presence. And for example, tonight, can you be here in this class? Here we are together with commitment, wholeheartedness, and not trying to get anything.

[46:57]

Thank you for your confession. And noticing this kind of thing, noticing that maybe you're enthusiastic but you're trying to get something, when you notice that, and notice that it's a mistake in terms of what we're talking about here, noticing that it's a mistake, then noticing that it's a mistake and recognizing it as a mistake can be done without trying to get anything out of recognizing it as a mistake. Okay? And just recognizing it as a mistake rather than, you know, now that she hears it, it would be good that she did that, rather than somebody else just saying, oh, now I'm going to confess mine. So to actually just the recognition of a mistake as a mistake is, in fact, the activity of moving along the path that is actually furthering and growing the Dharma. Does that make sense to every single one of you?

[48:21]

So if you notice that you're operating with a gaining idea, noticing that that's a mistake, acknowledging it as a mistake, that's fine, and that's enough, and not only that, but that contributes, that supports the truth being realized. Yeah, well, you have to recognize it as a mistake. Do you have to say it to someone else, you mean? No, you don't have to. But sometimes it helps to say it to someone else because sometimes when we notice a mistake and we recognize it as a mistake, sometimes if we say it out loud, we realize in the process of saying it that we didn't fully recognize it. Or the other person says, well, what's the matter with that? and you realize you left out a little detail. So recognizing it means recognizing it accurately, you know, without adding something to it, without making it worse than it was or less than it was.

[49:27]

And sometimes if we just say it to ourselves, it's not as clear as it would be if we recognize ourself and say it out loud and have someone else say, hmm, okay. Or, I didn't quite understand. You explain more and you realize you didn't say it quite right. No? No? Mm-mm. Yeah, like for example, let's say you went to a meeting with someone. and you really cared about meeting the person, you really wanted to show up for the meeting and contribute your energy to having the meeting with the person, but either during the meeting or after the meeting, you noticed that you were trying to get something and do something. Now, some people wouldn't be up for hearing about that, right? Some people who aren't practicing Zen might say, well, what are you talking about? So they might not be the person you tell it to.

[50:31]

But they might be. You might say, right while I'm doing this I realized that I was trying to get somewhere in this conversation or get something out of this meeting. I wasn't just here with the energy and enthusiasm in my life to be with you. And that's what I feel like I have to give to you. Liking it? Liking coming to the class? I think it's an optional feeling. You could feel it, that would be fine, or not feel it, that would be fine. You could be enthusiastic about going to meet someone that you didn't like. But you could also be enthusiastic, of course, about going to see someone you did like. But in both cases, could you be enthusiastic about meeting in this way where you're not bumping into the meeting or trying to get away from the meeting?

[51:41]

And I would say, yeah, you could. You could say, I'm enthusiastic about meeting certain people I don't like in this balanced way. And I'm enthusiastic about meeting people who I just happen to like in this balanced way. Which means for the people you like, you're not like sinking your fangs into their veins and sucking their blood. And the other people, you're not trying to like plug your nose and get away. Maybe plug your nose is okay, but don't try to get away. Well, I might have said that, but another way to put it would be that he sat simply enjoying what it was like to be free.

[52:54]

It's sometimes called, there's two different ways. One is called, he enjoyed the taste of liberation. but he didn't exactly sit because he liked to sit, he just continued to sit and while he was sitting he was enjoying the taste of being free. I think another way to say that maybe his motivation for sitting was not because he liked it, but in fact, he was enjoying it. His motivation for sitting was to clarify what he understood, to kind of immerse himself, cook himself in his understanding. So he kind of like absorbed himself into his new understanding. That was really, I think, his motivation. And in fact, his understanding was the same as freedom. The Buddha at that time, the truth for him equaled end of suffering. So he was in fact studying the truth he realized, concentrating on the truth to clarify it, but that was the same as concentrating on the bliss of freedom.

[54:07]

he was concentrating on the dharma of interdependence. He saw that dharma of interdependence and he was really letting it totally pervade his body and mind, so it was really clear and deeply penetrating him. But it turns out that meditating on interdependence is his thing, meditating on happiness, so he was doing both at the same time. Well, no, I think it was a little bit more like, I want to clarify this. So in Buddhist practice, it is sometimes the case that after you have some insight, it's recommended that you sit still afterwards, that you don't immediately like it. that you don't necessarily immediately go tell somebody or immediately write it down or immediately write a poem. But if you can, just sit still for a while with the insight to be quiet with it.

[55:16]

So it's like a dream or something. You see a real clear dream. If you start to move, you might shake it up a little bit. So it's more like that. You don't want to hold on to it. If you hold on to it, you disturb it. And of course, if you get excited and tell people about it, or do a paving or poem or something, you can disturb it. Whereas if you just immerse yourself into it without holding on to it, that's the best way. For this kind of insight, anyway. Maybe artistic insights are meant to be immediately acted on. Maybe if the artist is sitting there and gets the... If the artist's commitment is to create a painting, then maybe you would immediately But even in that case, you might steep yourself so that you could keep track of the vision as you started to move and paint, that you wouldn't lose it in the middle of the vision. So even there, it helps. Now, another part of this is that it helps.

[56:17]

It also lets the vision grow, or lets the insight grow, to bring it out and enact it with other people or in other media, to paint it, to sing it, and to dance it, and to interact. That helps, but if you go too quickly, you lose it, and then you have nothing, you know, that's not, you can't meet with. Yes, Kathleen. Yeah, that's, yeah. So, you know, like, does a dead snake hurt you, you know? So, just look at that. Why not say, why say a dead snake instead of a poisonous snake is there? Right? Is that what you mean? If you're saying, you know, okay, you want to like, you know, you're really enthusiastic, you have a feel of urgency to get right to the point.

[57:20]

Why not say there's a poison, here I am, I'm a poisonous snake. and you have to meet me in a balanced way. If you're not careful, you'll make a mistake here. Why didn't you say a living poisonous snake? Why a dead snake? We debated this last week whether it was alive or dead. I mean, last whenever it was. So that's your question, right? So what's the advantage over this comment of a dead snake? Is it just irony? Yeah. Well, you know, irony is very... Well, I often say irony is one of the most common Zen rhetorical devices is irony. So it might just be being ironic to like, again, to make it sharper. You know, like, well, there's a snake waiting for you. And maybe making it dead makes it even more... I don't know. Which do you feel is more vivid if somebody says, a dead snake or there's a snake waiting for you?

[58:25]

Or there's a dead snake? Which is most vivid? Which has the most... I think the point is that it's a poisonous snake and it can bite you and it's dead. Well, I think the snake represents the thing that you have to have a proper relationship with. Namely, everything. I think the snake represents everything. Like an introduction, okay? What is it that, huh? Yeah, I think it is the snake. The most marvelous thing is the snake. Where is it? Everywhere, every place. I think the snake is everything, but emphasizing that everything is an opportunity.

[59:28]

And let's not waste the opportunity, but let's not get hysterical about this either. and freak out and miss it because we're getting so, because we realize how important it is that we miss it because of that. So how do you like balance between, so what if there's a snake or, you know, so what if I'm alive and also, you know, I'm alive and you get so excited about it, you miss it that way too. So what's so marvelous? Life itself, you know, the snake, same thing. except that life is not passive, it can meet you, it can bite you, and also you can kill it. Yes, that's right. Yeah. I think Dino and then Kara, Thank you.

[60:53]

by making something that I'm trying to find out, revealing the spirit of me, revealing the mess, seeking the air, the pathway to the earth, in order to get the sight of me, to walk out of me, to death, but to death, to death, to death. Right. What is it? Be respectful. Be respectful of living snakes and dead snakes. Be respectful of the people you think of as like, you know, like living snakes, and be respectful of the people that you think are dead snakes. And again, respect means, respect means look again. Look again. Carol? Carol?

[61:57]

Yes. Once again. Yes. Uh-huh. Mm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. That's interesting. Mm-hmm. So you asked a question, and now I'm a dead snake. Now. Yes. Is your hand raised? Yes. Thank you.

[63:06]

So the subdued self, there's two ways to understand subdued. One would be a kind of a self that had been subdued or had been, in some sense, temporarily crushed, or the self is just being subdued. And the other, so that, or dwelling in emptiness, in other words, sort of like leaning into a little bit the interdependence of the interdependent self. So the true self is really an interdependent self, but you can lean into that, you can get too much into that, and not realize that, yeah, interdependent self, but I need to meet somebody, a particular other, too. I think that can connect to the teacher, maybe not the snake, but the teacher is there to remind you that you have to not overemphasize the fact that you're interdependent with the teacher.

[64:35]

The teacher is actually somebody else, too. Right? Yeah. And that's dangerous. In that openness, you could say, you could slip into dwelling in the emptiness. Like, you know, well, you know, the teacher's views are my views, and my views are the teacher's views, and I have no attachments. But in that space, there still should be like, here's my view. Wow. The danger would be that you'd be open and lose your contribution to the meeting. That would be one mistake you could make. The other mistake you could make is not to let go of your views and drag your views in and push them around. Yes, Vernon?

[65:45]

Wait a second. You said when the poem doesn't tell you too much, you have to do all the work yourself. But the poem's not telling you too much. The poem's already done some work. So it's not that you do the work by yourself, it's that you do your work. Because you couldn't do that work, the poem hadn't told you not too much. If the poem tells you too much, then you can't do your work. It's harder to do your work, right? So when a poem doesn't tell you too much, it tells you enough, tells you something, but not too much, so that you have to do your work. Not by yourself, though. The poem can't do it for you, and you can't do it by yourself. But if the poem does too much, then you can't do your work.

[66:52]

If the poem doesn't tell you anything, then you can slip into thinking that you can do it by yourself. So again, how can a poem be good enough to get your interest when it doesn't tell you too much? You know those poems? that you're reading them and they're not giving you anything, but somehow you keep reading? How do they get you to keep reading these things where you're not getting anything? And you're making this effort, you know? They get you to make the effort to keep reading them. Of course, maybe somebody tells you, it's really good. Keep going, even though word after word, page after page, you don't get anything. Keep going, because it's really a great poem. So these koans are like that, right? This koan doesn't give you too much, does it? It gives you something, but not too much. It kind of like, it gives you enough so you realize you've got some work to do. So, do you, do you, you know, is the ball in your court now?

[67:57]

And do you realize what your work is that you need to do? And this work that you're doing, you're not doing by yourself, though, you're doing with the koan. The koan's not doing it for you, and you can't do it by yourself. But are you going to do it? I mean, are you going to do your work? So think about it, whether you're going to do your work. Because we're going to study this koan next week, too. Because we have to do our work now, right? At least for one more week, we have to do our work. Will we do our work? We don't know. But are you willing to do our work tonight? Are you willing to think about committing yourself to do your part The ball's in your court. And you can throw it back if you want to and then have it come back to you and do your work again. You can be working on it all week for every situation if you want to, but are you going to take the responsibility and make a commitment to work on this story in your daily life? And if you are, you could say so right now.

[69:11]

And if you aren't, you could say so right now. And then we could ask you, how come? What's the problem? Because it seems to me that it would be good to do your part, to work on this. Seems like a perfectly good thing to work on. What? Yeah, it would be good, you know. And somehow we have, you know, this Master says this is a light for many eons. So maybe you could use this just for a week. Try it for a week. And if you don't like it, get another light for the next week. Elmer? What is the motivation when I'm aware of the inner forces of the body? There's no anxious place in the end. Well, I think your faith could be that you understand

[70:29]

that to meet situations, to meet animate and inanimate beings with openness and respect, to meet the situations of your life, to meet your own internal experiences and to meet beings, human and otherwise, that you meet, to meet them with openness and respect, to be ready to meet them in that way, that that would be a good way to practice. Right. And you can meet the koan in that way, too. This koan is both you meet the koan that way, plus the koan is also telling you to meet everything that way, so that you don't have to just be looking at this book or thinking of this story when you practice that way. Although you practice with the story that way, the story is also telling you to meet everything that way. But nobody can do this for you, but you can't do this alone because you need all these people to meet.

[71:35]

You need everybody to meet. You need everything to meet. You wouldn't be able to do this if there weren't these people who were meeting you, who were coming up to you and offering you their particular gift, which in some cases is like, well, geez, this person is really hard to meet. This person, again, you want to get hysterical with or not be interested in. So to get freaked out with somebody isn't really the way to meet it, and to not care about somebody, and to think that this meeting is not a big one or an important one, that's not really it either. So your job is to meet each situation with this basically same attitude of letting go of your views and seeing what's happening with energy. Not kind of, oh, shoot, whatever. but when there could be to be there and like face the anxiety of the meeting without trying to get away from it or control it or deny it. And in meetings where you don't feel the anxiety, give them your attention too, which then maybe bring on the anxiety.

[72:39]

So does that make sense to you? And if so, then you have faith in that practice. And if you have faith in that practice, well, then practice it if you want to. And I'm asking, do you want to? And that's how to work on this koan and enjoy this koan. And then you can study it. And then from that way you can study the koan too and read the verses and see what happens too. You don't have to read the koan. We'll study it next time. But if you don't practice this way, then you're missing an opportunity, which this koan is telling you it's dangerous to miss this opportunity. And the monk is also saying, teacher, don't you miss the opportunity. Oh, really?

[73:46]

It struck at you? And it didn't get you? No. Wow. So this case is really appropriate this spring. Yeah. So maybe this is the spring to really be careful and not waste your time. Maybe this is the most important spring of your life. What time is it? What? 8.57. Three minutes before 9 o'clock. Wow. That was fast for me. Was it fast for you?

[74:51]

Huh? Yeah. Okay, so any other comment before we plunge into the snake meeting? Could you wait one second? Anybody who hasn't said anything, who wants to say anything before Kevin, who we appreciate very much. Okay, Kevin. Oh, yes, Roberta? The story is really rough, because a few weeks ago, I was driving the country, and I knew the snake, and I could tell everybody, and I could tell everybody, and I could tell everybody, You thought that just before you hit the snake?

[75:59]

Yes. Oh, you saw this, Nick. Well, yes, and the road was just going on. Oh, I see. Yeah, yeah. Mm-hmm. And I can't remember the moment before. I can't remember the road, but it's on quiet. It's about there. So, so, But that also was interesting about your perception.

[77:10]

It was just a perception of this in your heart. And also, personally, you've got a dead state. You've [...] got a dead state. Yes. [...] Okay. Thank you very much.

[77:58]

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