a little deeper and wider into what is right effort. If I may reiterate the obvious context of right effort. It is, the context of right effort is life. Being, being alive and being alive as a human we experience a great deal and notably we experience pain and pleasure and also sometimes we can't tell which and many other phenomena, but pain and pleasure are big, big ones for us.

[01:24]

right? Comfort and discomfort and confusion about which is happening. And we also regardless of whether our sensation is pleasant or unpleasant. As long as we have any dualistic thought operating and to which we are attached, we feel discomfort even when we're experiencing a pleasant sensation. So prior to cutting through dualistic thinking, we have an ongoing discomfort.

[02:29]

So discomfort is a big one. And then in the midst of the discomfort arising from dualistic thinking, we have various pleasant sensations arise and unpleasant sensations arise. Okay? Have I tuned in the world you live in? Everybody okay with that? I mean, trying to be okay with it? So in Sashin we settle into the situation which has this pervasive dissatisfaction or discomfort due to whatever lack of enlightenment is operating, plus pain and pleasure flashing and neutral sensation flashing. So it's quite an active situation and we have nothing to do really this week besides eat, sleep, serve others food, follow the schedule and experience this stuff.

[03:38]

So what is right effort under such circumstances and also throughout life in general So right effort is responding appropriately, responding in a skillful way to all this phenomena. It's skillful responding. And skillful responding means responding that we feel good about, basically. Even if we feel it's right, We feel it's like, hey, this is what it's all about, kind of thing. This is what I'm born for. This kind of responding is what I want to do in this lifetime. This is the way I want to be. I feel good about responding to this difficulty in this way. This is skillful. This is wholesome. This is happiness. This is freedom. This is tranquility. This is peace.

[04:39]

Right effort is responding in that way to our experience. Okay? Makes sense? So whenever anything happens, if we can respond skillfully right off, then we just right off have a skillful response. And having a skillful response prevents unskillful responses. So the first aspect of right effort, preventing the arising of unskillful responses, the way to prevent the arising of unskillful responses is by a skillful response. So if pain happens, the most skillful response to pain is just feel the pain. I say that's the most skillful response.

[05:45]

Just feel it. When the Buddha feels pain, the Buddha feels pain. The Buddha does not jazz it up, does not elaborate it, just completely feels it, exactly as it's registered on the body of the person. just simply sitting upright, standing upright, being balanced and open-hearted about this pain. If it's pleasure, the skopha response is, feel the pleasure. Completely. such complete, straightforward, honest, upright, concentrated, mindful, balanced, diligent, patient, and so on, experiencing pain and pleasure is being upright, and that prevents all unskillfulness.

[06:55]

They have no way to come up when you're responding that way. There are unskillful responses available which you may have heard about and which you will now hear about. They're always available. It's not that you're an unskillful person, it's just that you know unskillful ways to behave. You all know unskillful ways to behave. You all know ways to respond to what's happening unskillfully, unwholesomely, in ways that you feel terrible about, right? Those ways cannot arise while you're responding skillfully. They can't. That's it. I see. Now, what happens if we don't respond skillfully? Well, as they say, nature abhors a vacuum. And if you don't respond skillfully to any moment of experience,

[07:59]

In any moment of experience, if you don't come forward, if the living being doesn't come forward with a skillful Buddha response, something else comes up there. Unskillful response will come. We never don't respond. We're always responding. If we don't respond skillfully, unskillfulness comes. So now let's say what happens if there has been one or more moments where we have not been skillful and an unwholesome response, an unskillful response is manifesting. The second right effort is to abandon that unskillful response. So we've got unskillfulness manifesting now. It's happening. Now what's the response, what's the skillful response to unskillful response? That's the second right effort.

[09:02]

If someone's skillfulness should sneak through at a moment of lack of vigilance and manifest right before us as our life at that moment, what is now the skillful response to the unskillful response? Okay? So we started that yesterday, talking about skillful responses to unskillful responses. Now again, since discomfort is pervasive, there's going to be a lot of opportunities to respond to pain. So if we don't respond skillfully to pain, then there will be an unskillful response to pain. And the unskillful response to pain is usually, but not always, is usually based on avoidance. hatred and is expressed as ill will, anger, and so on.

[10:06]

Anger is an unskillful response to pain. It makes it worse. So now ill will has arisen. What is the skillful response to ill will? The skillful response to ill will is friendliness, loving kindness. As someone said to me this morning, I'm not very friendly to my pain. It isn't that you're supposed to like pain because, in fact, you don't like pain.

[11:09]

That's not possible. Because then you're... If you like it... Oh, excuse me. You can like pain. I take it back. Liking something isn't the same as pleasure. You can like pain. It's okay. But liking it is not being friendly to it. Liking it is another unskillful response called attachment or greed. approving it and saying, okay, that's all right. That's pretty skillful. Okay, pain, okay, pain, pain, okay, [...] all right, pain, yes, thank you, thank you, no, too much, okay. So yesterday I talked about each of these categories of unskillfulness and a one-to-one skillful response to the five different varieties of unskillful response.

[12:11]

I'll say them again. If there's ill will either toward your own pain or if you see something, some person or something, and seeing the object you feel pain and therefore ill-will towards the object. If you have pain inside yourself, you feel ill-will towards your own pain. You look at someone else, you feel pain at seeing their face, you feel ill-will towards the person. You could. Or if it's like towards a color of a house, like you go into some neighborhoods, you don't like the color that people paint their houses, certain kinds of greenhouses or bright red houses, you don't like them, you feel pain when you see those colors, you hate the house, and you might hate the people who painted the house. If you hate the people If you feel hate towards the people who are making the faces or painting the houses the wrong color, then practice loving kindness towards what you're feeling hate towards.

[13:29]

If you feel hatred towards the color, it's actually recommended that you analyze the elements of what you're angry at. Any way you dismantle the ill will, you abandon it by this application. That's the idea. If it's lust, if you feel attachment, you're getting agitated and upset, unskillfully responding to some positive sensation. But also, again, if you happen to, like, get attached to negative sensation, it'll be the same thing. Or if you got attached, or if you got aversion to a positive sensation, it'll be the same thing. Some people have positive sensations and get freaked out by that, right? They hate to feel pleasure. That can happen, right? We're so complicated. Some people associate pleasure with certain, often with some painful situations. So when they feel pleasure, they feel angry at themselves or angry at the thing that gives them pleasure.

[14:31]

Okay? The point is, you can respond unskillfully to pain by hating it or by attaching to it. You can respond unskillfully to pleasure by attaching to it or hating it. Usually in that order of frequency. Most common is to hate and unskillfully have ill will towards pain and the objects that seem to be associated with pain, less common is to attach to pain and the objects which seem to be associated with the pain, and vice versa. Most common is to attach to pleasure and the objects of pleasure that pleasure arises, and less common is to hate or have ill will towards pleasure and the objects But, you know, I've heard of some men, and I think I sometimes feel that way, if you see some very attractive person, you feel really, you know, you get really tense around somebody attractive, and you really like, after a while, you just have an aversion to these attractive people because you get tense every time you get around them.

[15:44]

You feel so tense, so nervous. After a while, you develop an aversion to the people you're attracted to. Of course, in a social anarchist situation, you feel attracted to somebody and you know you're not supposed to act on it. So you feel frustrated and tense, so you just want to stay away from the whole thing by avoiding the pleasant sensation. It's very complicated, but the point is, it's the aversion and ill will that's unskillful. To see someone that's attractive or see something that's attractive and to know that you live in a society where you can't just act on that and feel the frustration of that and feel the pain of that. So far, so good. I mean, so far, a Buddha would feel that too. Buddha might say, offer Buddha a very delicious cake and say, but you can't have it. You know, waft it under the Buddha's nose and say, you can't have this.

[16:47]

You want to, gee, I feel like you're torturing me. That's kind of mean. What are you doing that to me for? Just trying to cause you a little pain, Buddha. Well, you're being successful. This is really painful. Now we're going to move the cake farther away now. It's getting farther away. Do you feel the waning of the cake smell? Oh, it kind of hurts, you know. Maybe no attachment. Maybe no ill will at the paint, at the paint. Very skillful response to being tortured. The disciples testing the Buddha. So if it's attachment to the pleasure in yourself or in the object, if it's attachment to a person, you're supposed to bring up the repulsive aspects of what you're attached to to free yourself of it.

[18:02]

And if it's attachment to some physical thing, again, bring up impermanence. to help you as an antidote to this unskillful, clutchy, greedy, graspy, disturbing, agitating response to the pleasure. This is the antidote method which I talked about yesterday. Directly to the unskillful response, apply a skillful response. a response which will cause the abandonment of the unskillfulness. When the Buddha teaches this, he says, and so when you practice these antidotes, which are the opposite of the unskillfulness, then you will be, inwardly, you will be calmed, quieted,

[19:12]

tranquil and concentrated. So he says, if you practice this, then you'll settle down into a nice calm state by doing this wholesome response to these unwholesome responses. Then he says, but if in fact these unwholesome states, these unskillful states still come up, I just want to point out that the Buddha says, if you got this problem, apply this antidote, and then you'll be fine. And he says, but if you apply the antidote and you're not fine... So he's very kind of optimistic about the application of these techniques, but then says, but if they don't work, then try the next one. And then when he says, and if you apply this next one, then if you apply it, then you'll be fine. And then he says, but then if that doesn't work... do this one, and if you do this one, then that'll be, and so on. We don't talk like that anymore because we have, you know, you can be taken to court for that kind of talk.

[20:19]

So the next one is, some unwholesomeness arises. some unskillfulness arises. The next antidote or the next response, which applies to all the different kinds of unskillfulness, not just ill will and greed, but also drowsiness and dullness, also agitation and worry and doubt. To all those, the next antidote or the next skillful response is to basically self-respect. is one side, and the other side is decorum. Now I use the words self-respect and decorum because they're not such hot words. They're heated, charged words. Another word that could be used for self-respect is shame, and for decorum is fear of blame and punishment. So shame goes with that you feel self-respect.

[21:37]

In other words, some pain arises in you or someone comes up to you and shows you a face that's not real friendly, kind of a little frown on under something, you know? They don't look adoring or whatever. Someone presents you a face like that, you feel pain, and then you unskillfully response by hating them. Now, out of self-respect you feel like, well, geez, I can do better than that. You know, that really wasn't up to par for me. This is not the way I want to live, really getting vehemently angry at somebody for frowning in my general direction. Kind of like, you know, don't even frown anywhere over this way. That goes for you too, you know? Yeah, you too. So out of self-respect, I really think I can do better than that.

[22:43]

I expect more of myself. Or I'm ashamed of myself for acting in such a, you know, such a way. It isn't necessary to respond that way. When someone frowns at you, it's actually okay to respond. You don't have to respond with loving-kindness unless you're already angry. Because again, loving-kindness really, I really feel loving-kindness, before you get angry, loving-kindness is just simply to see the frown. There's a frown. And if you feel pain, just to feel the pain. Just feel the pain is the basic friendliness. But if you're already whomped up into hating the pain, then maybe you have to like put a little bit more sweetness into it. Does that make sense? Once you're already riled up and hating your pain, you have to sort of lean a little bit to balance it into like really kind of like feeling loving thoughts towards the whole general situation.

[23:48]

But basic loving kindness is to let things be the way they are, to really let the frowning person be that way and to really let your pain, which happens to you when they frown, be the pain. The way we're built is just like that. We can't help it. I don't think the Buddha, if you go and slap the Buddha, I don't think the Buddha's cheek relaxes from the slap. I don't think if you spit in Buddha's face that Buddha kind of like naturally feels all kind of like relaxed and warm. I don't think so. I think when you spit in Buddha's face, that the face would naturally kind of like recoil with a little bit of, you know, pain. Because screaming in somebody's ear, I think that they naturally kind of go, ooh. It's painful. But that doesn't mean that they need to hate it. See the difference? And similarly, if you go up to somebody and you say, good morning. I just want to tell you that what you did yesterday was really wonderful and helped all of us a lot.

[24:57]

You're such a wonderful person. It's normal when gentle, soothing sounds come into our ear and people really expect some warmth. It's natural for our body to relax and feel comfortable. It's okay. What's unskillful is to say, okay, well, let's hear more about that. Rather than really feel grateful for a moment of pleasant experience and also feel more grateful maybe for a moment of negative experience. Just feel grateful for life. That's really skillful. So out of shame, you feel you can do better than that.

[26:01]

When things are dull in the meditation hall or dull in your ordinary life, when you feel dull, dull is a kind of ungrateful response to the situation being dull. To get drowsy just because people aren't interesting. Actually, I've already told people I do this. Maybe I shouldn't do this. But when people come and aren't interesting, I go to sleep. When people come and hide from me, I go to sleep. Maybe I shouldn't. I'll have to look at that. Anyway, when things aren't really interesting and pleasant, or they also aren't painful, then, you know, can't really get angry, can't really get attached, I'll just go to sleep.

[27:09]

Or, can't really get angry, can't really get attached, I'll just excite myself. I agitate myself with a few thoughts of this or that. Can't really get angry, can't really attach. I'll worry. Hey, this practice isn't very painful. I don't have to struggle with it anymore, and it's not very pleasant either. So I think I'll doubt the whole thing. I'll think of walking out of this session. I'll think of giving up practice. That should liven things up a little. Rather than, we've got a situation here that, you know, it's not sunny, and the weather isn't that bad. It's just kind of a gray day. Just a gray day. I don't know if I'm happy or sad today. Well, I'm a little bit happy because it's nice to have a change in this beautiful weather, actually. The fog's really nice, so I got out of that dull situation. now those are very bad examples but anyway without getting into worse examples you feel out of self-respect you don't do that kind of stuff and also the other side is you actually worry out of what can happen to you the consequences of ill will the consequences of drowsiness the consequences of excitedness and agitation the consequences of worry and the consequences of doubt

[28:49]

out of worry of what will happen as a result of indulging in those unskillful responses to your experience, you abandon those unskillful responses. In other words, out of decorum, out of a sense of, you know, behaving in a decorous way. Because you know if you don't behave in a decorous way, there's some danger in not doing that. You can be blamed, you can be punished. And also you can punish yourself So a lot of people, new Zen students particularly, when they get drowsy, they can't go to sleep yet, they just feel drowsy. And they're very uncomfortable because they're just sleepy, they're just drowsy, and they're agonizing and being half awake. They haven't learned yet how to go completely asleep. And then, of course, this drowsiness doesn't bother you anymore when you're completely asleep, because you don't need to be drowsy anymore. But when the new students, or even some older students, when they occasionally wake up,

[29:51]

When they feel that drowsiness, it's quite annoying. I think I know what some of you are laughing at. By the way, Rain, I really liked your haircut yesterday. It's okay today, but yesterday was really cute. Did you see it? Wasn't that cute? All the ladies are nodding. You made a fashion hit yesterday, Rain. So are you grasping at this joy that you're experiencing now?

[31:02]

Are you willing to let it go? And for me to go back to my boring talk? Are you? Okay, so... Out of self-respect and out of fear of the danger of what will happen to you if you keep being unskillfully responding to your life, you abandon these unskillful responses. That's another thing the Buddha recommended. He used the analogy. He says, like a man or a woman, young and youthful, who really enjoys adorning themselves They would be horrified and chagrined and very uncomfortable to have a dead rat or a dead, I don't know, some other animal.

[32:07]

He listed a number of animals. Or a dead human corpse hung around their neck. So, you know, back in Buddha's times, there was young people like we have young people now. Old people, of course, weren't into that. In India, at the time of Buddha, when people got old, they forgot about dressing up. They just said, okay, you're old, you're not cute anymore, no more mating possibilities. Just take care of the kids. As soon as you have kids, you're old. Take care of the kids, work, support them, and then go to a monastery. But young people, of course, at the mating thing in India at that time, they would, like, get dressed up. And you've seen how Indian ladies get dressed up when they get married. They're jewels, and they really get bedecked, right? Jewels and really fancy hairdos and gorgeous clothes. This is what young, youthful people were into, and they really liked it and enjoyed it. So they wouldn't like, you know, like a dead rat hanging around their neck. Now I thought, well, today...

[33:12]

You know, it's different. You know, now our young people, they get dressed up, they wouldn't mind a dead rat around their neck. Like, you know, that could be, like, the coolest thing, you know. Or part of a dead human hanging from your ear. Or, you know, some piece of a bone through your nose. But the point is that young people are very concerned with decorating themselves in a way that's really like decorated in the latest and most inviting way, right? And they're really attuned to, you know, what is this year the thing to decorate yourself with? And that was cool last year, but not this year. Oop, that Narrow that pant leg. Anyway, young people are into that. So it's like that, you know. It's like you wouldn't want to decorate yourself.

[34:13]

If you're a Buddhist disciple, you don't decorate yourself with unskillfulness. You feel, really, no, I'm not going to decorate myself. You know, I'm not going to, here I am meditating. I'm not going to, like, you know, and, you know, drowsiness, you know, and laziness, and doubt, right? Take a Buddha and put doubt on a Buddha. It's not cute. And so on. So out of that way, he says, you don't do this. You drop it. And then you're calm, tranquil, concentrated. Then naturally you're skillful. You're just one skillful, happy person. You just drop it. He says, but now if they still keep happening, it's kind of an order, a little bit of an order here. If they still keep happening... Then what you do, the next one is, you disregard it. Write it off. What do you call it? Don't throw good money after bad. Cut your losses and get back to work.

[35:17]

And so on. Just look the other way. Now this doesn't sound too good again in modern days, but that's what the Buddha said. There's some merit to it. I would say still. So here's some stories. One is a story of a Buddha's disciple, Ananda. The Buddha had many great disciples, and one sort of like pair is Mahakashyapa and Ananda. Mahakashyapa was like really skinny, not exactly ugly, but like, you know, you could tell when you saw Mahakashyapa that he was not up for any fun. You know? He was this kind of guy, the kind of guy I told you about the other day. Well, I didn't tell the whole session, but he was the kind of guy that was really grimacing all the time. He walked around like this. Really serious, really ascetic. And he was not distracted by positive sensation.

[36:21]

And Maha Akashipa, well, at least he didn't look like he was. Maybe he really was distracted by positive sensation. He was really concentrating on not doing it. But anyway, it didn't look like he was indulging in positive sensation. But the other disciple, big disciple, was Ananda. And Ananda looked like he was always on the verge of having a treat. He was kind of round and cute and, you know, really got along really well with, you know, excuse the expression, the women. around. He really got along well with them, and they really liked him and thought he was cute. They were all saying, oh, where's Ananda? Where's Ananda? Oh, Ananda's so great. Ananda's so this. Ananda's so that. You know, and Buddha would always say, Ananda's busy, you know. Anyway, when the Buddha was about to die, Ananda said, well, I do have this kind of thing with the women, you know. I mean, you know how I am with them, and I do kind of like get into it, don't I?

[37:24]

But Nanda got a little, you know, Nanda wasn't completely subtle when the Buddha died and he was still a little bit responding to women with a little bit of greed. I mean, they liked him and he liked that they liked him and he a little bit kind of liked kept, you know, his appearance up with, you know, I don't know if he put, like, face creams on and stuff, but anyway, he was kind of hung up a little bit on the fact that all the ladies liked him. It was a thing he was working on. An unskillfulness arising in the great Ananda. And, of course, the Buddha told him, he tried to apply this thing, you know, think of how unattractive they were, but they kept coming, being attractive, and he just couldn't, like, keep in mind that they really weren't that attractive. They were so nice to him. They kept appreciating. And it wasn't just that they were good looking. It's not necessarily the attractiveness of their face, but they really liked him.

[38:34]

The positive, the glowing, warm feelings that they generated towards him. He really had trouble with that. not attaching to it. So he said to Buddha, what am I going to do after you leave? You know, with all this tremendous warmth and adoration that comes to me from the ladies. He said, well, just don't talk to them. So, but what if they talk to me? What if they come up and say, Ananda, Ananda? He said, uh, Don't look at him. In other words, look away if you can't handle it without an unskillful response. When I was at Tassajara, in my second practice period, I think,

[39:39]

In the old days of Tassajara, things were a little... I wanted to finish the four great efforts, but I can't skip over these stories, really. In the early days of Tassajara, things were a little bit kind of like it was the Wild West, right? This was back in 1850. You know, mostly cowboys at Tassajara, macrobiotic cowboys. There were some cowgirls, too, but they were, you know... They weren't so wild, at least in public. And our first Eno was a boy that I went to high school with. Actually, I went to junior high school with this guy. So we're old acquaintances and pals from a long time ago. He's a very funny guy. So the person who held the position that Jordan holds, the first time we had an Eno, actually, was this friend of mine. And he was kind of a wild Eno. He was not exactly what you call the model of discipline. One of the things he did one time was when he was being served, you've been served here?

[40:50]

Now, don't copy this, okay? When he was being served one time, he actually reached into the serving bowl with his hand and served himself. Now, I think some of you might understand it because sometimes there's really like nice stuff in there that you might want to... reach in with your hand and take like for example i don't know uh some of the salads there's there's uh there's some of that lettuce in there right but then there might be some like radicchio or um what's some other good stuff yeah right cherry tomatoes you might just want to reach in there and help the server right this is you all probably understand that right but i'm not talking about that i'm talking about reaching into the cereal Like the, I'm not kidding, the oatmeal. Reach in and scoop, scoop, put your hand, your filthy hand, into the oatmeal and scoop the oatmeal up and plop it into your Buddha bowl.

[41:50]

This is what the Eno did. Okay? Now, the reason why this Eno did this was to entertain me. I was the Hendoan. He's so kind, you know, trying to entertain me, trying to get me to laugh. And up above me, we're both sitting there, and up above us on the raised town there, the visiting Zen master from Japan is looking down at these Americans, you know. Actually, both from Minnesota, these two guys. One's scooping the stuff with his hands and flopping it in his bowl, and this other one is like really laughing. This is what you call a true story. Now, after that, that was one thing that happened. After that, then, during my succeeding meditation periods, what did I do? I had to look away from something.

[42:53]

I had to look away from the memory of our Eno scooping the cereal with his hands. I had to look away from that, because if I looked at it, I would just spend the whole period just giggling. But not only did I have to look away from it with my inner eye, my eye of memory, I had to look away from him because he was continuing to make faces at me and do various things with his face and body to try to make me laugh. And he sat next to me. So inwardly, I had to look away from these images. And outwardly, I had to look away from him. And meantime, you know, how can I, I had to close all my senses, right? Because he also talked to me during meditation. This is called, you know, look away. Because I didn't actually want to be like this kid. Here I came, I gave up my whole, you know, here I was an adult, more or less. You know, I had already finished graduate school and given up my whole worldly life to come and study Zen.

[43:58]

Here I am studying Zen, got the Zen master right next to me, and here I am giggling during meditation. I don't want to do that. It's a waste of time, especially giving it these stupid jokes. So I looked away from it, and I was successful. I stopped looking at the memory. You tried the opposites, the wholesome opposites. You tried shame. They didn't work. Just look away. So the Buddha says, if you do that, if you look away... then you'll be fine. Then you'll go right back, settle into you, be present, mindful, concentrated, ready, now, all set to respond skillfully to the next thing that happens. Okay? Make sense? Then he says, but if that doesn't work, then the next approach is look at it. And actually, I think this is really, although it's fourth on the list, I think in some sense this is really the one that I like best.

[44:59]

Look at it. Study it. see how it arose, see what it came from, what is its source of this unskillful response. How does this, you know, how does this, you know, ill will arise? How does this attachment arise? How does this drowsiness and sleepiness arise? How does this dullness arise? How does this agitation, how does this worry, how does this doubt arise? Study the dependent co-arising of these things when they arise. Now, again, one might say, I thought this right effort was about abandoning these things. It is, but when they arise, it's about studying them. Study, study, study. Now, I think the reason why they maybe put it forth is because just to make sure that people are able to avoid, to abandon these things and become free of them. So when you study them, it's not because they're harassing you, but that you actually are present and in concentration, the topic of these unskillfulnesses arise so that you can handle them.

[46:07]

This is a double agenda here. First of all, you're trying to become free of them in the sense of not being overwhelmed by them, but also this is an opportunity to both become free of them and also understand them. He says if you do that, they will drop away and you return to the wholesome, concentrated presence. And if that doesn't work, the last one is, which I told you about, kind of horrible one, is... He says, clench your teeth, put your tongue on the roof of your mouth. Sound familiar? That's this grimace, you know, the Zen grimace. All those Zen masters sitting like this. Statues of them... Unwholesomeness, crushed. Unskillfulness, crushed. So with a skillful response, with a wholesome response, you crush the unskillfulness.

[47:16]

You just like, ill will, attachment, crush them. Yeah. But it does say in the text, as a last resort. It's better not to be that heavy-handed about these things. It's better to be kind of like friendly with them and see them as little children running around in your mind and just, you know, not get involved. Just be upright with them. That's the best way. That would have prevented them from being a problem in the first place. But if you're caught and you tried all these other methods and you're still overwhelmed... than just kind of get serious and just get real, real serious. And sometimes the situation is so dangerous that you have to get really serious. And then try all the more gentle methods and they don't work and you still got a big dangerous problem here, so you have to get serious.

[48:18]

And I've told this story to some of you before. When I was at Tassajara in my first practice period, I was trying to concentrate and I was experiencing an alternation between the sleepiness and the dullness and the agitation. So, of course, when I was sleepy and dull, I couldn't follow my breath. I shouldn't say I couldn't, but it was hard. I couldn't. Some of you can maybe stay present even when you're sleepy, but I was so sleepy or whatever that I was spending many periods going, you know, one. I was counting my breath. One. One. I could only get to one. Then, of course, there's people who drink coffee, which I didn't know about at that time.

[49:25]

And they go, 37, 38. There's that one. Anyway, to actually just count from 1 to 10 and go back to 1, I was not able to do it. I was mostly into the 1. So I said, I think, you know, I've had enough of this. And I said, I think I really want you to knock it off and stop deviating your attention away from the breath and just stay on it. So I tried and I didn't do it. So I said, I'm not kidding. And I still didn't do it. I said, I'm really not kidding. There's going to be like a major problem here if you don't do this. And then things got a little bit more under control.

[50:28]

But not completely. And I got severely strict with myself. I threatened myself with, you know, major, not major, but serious physical damage. I forgot what it was, but like stabbed myself with my chopstick or something. And, you know, start with the thigh. And if that isn't enough, you know, the side of the cheek. If that isn't enough, the eardrum, the eyeball. And I forgot exactly what I did, but it got into that kind of thing of, like, really hurting myself if I wouldn't concentrate. And to me it was so important to concentrate, so serious not to concentrate, that I got really rough with myself about it. And you know what? I got myself completely under control. And I had no distraction. And I also introduced checks to make sure that I really wasn't like dreaming that I was counting from one to ten. I also counted the sets of one to ten.

[51:37]

and had cross-checks and stuff, so I actually got completely concentrated and was able to count from one to ten, count my breaths from one to ten without going to eleven or forgetting between one and ten, be right on the word, and if I went a slight bit off, I would start to give it to myself. And I got myself completely boxed in to that meditation and I could do the whole period with the slightest deviation. And sometimes they talk about that kind of meditation is like carrying a plate which is brimming with oil across a rocky courtyard with a warrior standing with a sword at your neck and he'll cut your head off if you spill one drop. That's sometimes that kind of concentration. So I was doing that and I was successful. And after I was successful, I said, okay, I'm successful and I don't want to do this anymore.

[52:39]

And I haven't been practicing that way since because although I got concentrated, I didn't want to practice that way. That wasn't what I came to Zen for, to be that coercive with myself, that rough with myself. But you can do that you can get yourself under control in that way but you don't I didn't want to be that way I didn't want to live that way and I don't practice that way anymore I just don't get in situations where I have to be that rough but there is that kind of practice a fascist state of meditation practice The way, you know, the way I was talking on Sunday was, some of you didn't hear that talk, was to emphasize the practice of being devoted to something you can't control. And you can't control your mind. If you try to be present with what's happening and just stay present with it and leave things alone and don't mess with them

[53:53]

negotiate, strategize, manipulate, but just experiencing things just as they are, just as they're happening. This is enlightenment. This is freedom. But you can't control your mind into being that way. That is actually your enlightened nature to be that way. But you can't control yourself into being that way. so these practices which I've been telling you about sound a little bit like trying to control yourself but actually another way to look at this is what you're doing in right effort is you're practicing right effort in the first case but you're not controlling yourself into practicing right effort by being completely with things as they happen. You're not controlling yourself into that. You are just being with your life as it happens. If you're trying to control yourself into it, you're not being with your life as it's happening.

[54:55]

You're still pushing a little bit. That's still not really right effort. Does that make sense? No? Now if you slip then, This is a manifestation of your uncontrolled mind, your untamed mind. And then these practices sound like they're trying to tame your mind, which they are. They're trying to tame your mind. But I like to put the emphasis on that you're devoted to this mind which is not under control. You're devoted to the mind. It's the devotion. not the trying to control. You're devoted to this thing which isn't in control. It's not really devotion to try to get control of it. That's more like ill will and all these other techniques. So the principle that I'm suggesting to you is that if you're devoted to your mind which is not under control,

[56:08]

and I'm going to say this even though it's not true, if you're devoted to your mind and also to all beings who are not under control, if you're devoted to your mind and all beings which are not under control, your mind and all beings come under control. I said that and I don't mean that, but it's as though they become under control. They don't really come under control they start acting the way you really want them to act. It's better than under control. By being devoted to what's not tamed, it becomes tamed. But if you try to manipulate or control what's untamed, I say, it just will keep rebelling because it's not loved.

[57:15]

It hates that you don't love it. And it keeps fighting. And sometimes the way it fights is it's seductive. Anyway, it keeps wiggling away and not getting under control because it doesn't want to be controlled by what doesn't love it. But if you're devoted to your mind, regardless of what it's doing, it becomes tamed. It becomes better than under control. It becomes wonderfully obedient and skillful. So these techniques which I just mentioned to you about ways to make effort in relationship to your mind which is manifesting unskillfulness, these ways of doing it are not ways to like be disrespectful of this phenomena. It's not being disrespectful of the unskillfulness even. It's being devoted to the whole process

[58:18]

And you have an unprejudiced heart about this whole process. And you're devoted to everything in it. And this devotion elicits a tamed, skillful mind. and these apparent techniques of antidotes, shame, self-respect, healthy respect for the dangers of not being skillful, looking the other way, studying it, and getting serious. All these are just dimensions, should be understood as dimensions of devotion. That your fundamental attitude towards all phenomena should be that you're devoted to all manifestations of life. And then life will come back and be just what it should be.

[59:25]

Now if you're already treating things that way, then in fact that's what will come up. Things will be presented to you and your basic attitude will be, yes, I'm grateful for this life. I'm devoted to this experience. And then unskillfulness doesn't flare up in the first place. If you flinch and aren't grateful to what's being offered to you, If pain comes and you aren't grateful, then unskillfulness is just manifested. If you turn and be devoted to this manifestation, that's loving kindness, it calms. If something pleasurable happens and you don't just say, thank you, thank you, thanks a lot, I'm alive. I'm alive. That's really what it's about. Yes. If you don't do it that way, then greed, you say, I want more of that. Greed manifests. Again, this is not a manifestation of life.

[60:31]

It's life. Life does manifest that. Oh, it's so good. It's so good. I want more. This is life. Devotion to that brings that, calms that down, settles that down. Oh, I slip, but something loves me. then that calms down. In other words, no matter what happens, you're devoted to it. It's all manifestations of life. No matter how horrible it is, you're devoted to it. If you fight it, it may die down for a little while, but that's not what you want. You may be able to crush it for a while, and that may be good for a little while, but eventually you have to respect everything that prevents the arising of unwholesomeness, that abandons and dispels unskillfulness when they arise, and then that attitude not only prevents the unwholesome from arising, but then you move on to the next two right efforts.

[61:42]

That is the generating of wholesome and the promoting and developing the wholesome. So then whatever happens to you, you do the same thing. You're devoted and grateful to whatever happens. That prevents the unwholesome from arising, stops the unskillfulness. You don't even have to dispel it, but it also develops the wholesome and makes this wholesome get bigger and stronger. So it gives rise to it and develops it. So in this way, this devotion to all beings is what it means to be totally devoted to upright sitting. Upright sitting is total devotion to all life. And to be totally devoted to total devotion is enlightenment. And it's all for right efforts.

[62:48]

including the unskillfulness which arises when you're not devoted, when you slip, which for most of us is quite a bit of the time. You know that movie, Babe, about the pig? The pig was like that. That's how the pig trained sheep. You know about that pig? Anybody not know about Babe? You don't? Well, Babe's not the whole story, but anyway. So what Babe did was, Babe's a pig. You know Australian sheepdogs? They train sheeps. You know about that? They train the sheep. The sheepherders don't train the sheep. The dogs train the sheep. Is that right?

[63:53]

Everybody agree? The people train the dogs to train the sheep. The dogs train the sheep. And how do the dogs train the sheep? Not in the Buddhist way, usually. They train the sheep by scaring the sheep, by getting into a posture which looks like they're going to kill them. They get down low, you know, in a position which sheep know is a position that predators get in just before they pounce. They get down in that position, the sheep go, okay, okay, okay, okay, what do you want? And sometimes they even growl and bite the sheep. Okay? That's how the dogs do it. So the dogs were training the pig how to herd the sheep for some reason. So the dog said to the sheep, okay, you know, growl at him and tell him to move over there. So the sheep goes, I mean, the pig goes, and the sheep go, look at the little pig. And then the dog says, no, really growl.

[65:02]

So the sheep goes, okay. And then the sheep even laugh more. So then the dog says, okay, go bite him. So the little sheep, tiny little pig goes and bites this big sheep, right? Goes running over. I can't bite the sheep. I know. So then the dog says, now go back and bite it. OK. The little pig goes back and goes over to the sheep and goes, little baby pig bite, you know. And the sheep go, oh, what are you doing, dear? The head, the boss sheep already knew this little pig and knew this little pig was really a sweet little guy. They wonder, what are you biting me for? He said, well, I'm trying to get you to move. well, dear, if you want us to move, ask nicely. And the little pig says, well, would you please move? And they say, by all means, and they all just move over.

[66:03]

So the pig would just, from now on, the pig would just go over and say, would you please go over there? Would you go over there? And the sheep were incredibly responsive. This little pig had the sheep under better control than any sheepdog in history. Now, you know, fascist governments don't agree with this policy, but this is the way. This is the way. Fundamentally, fundamentally and ultimately, this is the way. You can gently, lovingly, get yourself totally tamed and disciplined so that in the end you only think what you want to think and you don't think what you don't want to think.

[67:12]

You become completely disciplined. If you want to be angry, you can get angry. If it helps anybody, turn on anger. If you don't want to be angry, you don't get angry. But this doesn't happen by accident. It happens by complete, thorough devotion to your own experience and your own responses. That's how it happens. hundreds and thousands and ten thousands of hours of disciplining yourself in this devoted, careful, patient, mindful, concentrated, loving way. You can become a Buddha by being like a Buddha. which is learning how to be completely devoted to being completely devoted to what's happening.

[68:19]

That's the Four Right Efforts, Zen style. Okay? Now, was that okay? Could you follow that? I'm sorry it was so long. But to me, I was very happy to study them because, as I told you, I felt funny about those four right efforts and this thing about stopping the negative and getting rid of it once it arose. But I think actually it was a different world, you know, that Buddha lived in. You know, when kids used to get dressed up with jewels and stuff rather than rats. So we live in another world now. We have to be very careful of understanding that that way of talking was not meant to be cruel in the old days, this thing of stopping. It was their way in that world of talking about love. Indians in those days were different people.

[69:25]

So I think the way they expressed love was different than we do now. Any questions about this? Is it clear? Do you still have a question? No? Yes. [...] What do you do with the next pain that comes? What do I suggest to me? I suggest to be totally devoted to experiencing, you know, to this person and to this experience. That's what I'm suggesting. Yes?

[70:26]

When do you stop what? Being devoted? When do you stop what? When do you stop what? You mean, when do you move? Well, if you're totally devoted and totally grateful to the pain, okay? All right? Let's say that's the way you are. You're like completely, completely, completely grateful that this pain's there. Okay? And then you say, when do you move? You will know exactly when to move. from that gratefulness and from that complete gratitude and complete devotion to that moment of experience, if you want to move, there is no problem moving. If you don't want to move, there's no problem not moving. Sometimes it's good to move, sometimes it's not.

[71:33]

How do you tell? You tell from being enlightened. How do you be enlightened? Completely accept what's happening because that is what's happening. Be grateful that you are a recipient of exactly the same information that a Buddha would receive if a Buddha was in your body. Namely, you are receiving the experience that's happening right now. This is reality. Reality is what you use to figure out what to do with life. If you don't accept reality, if you're not grateful to reality, if you're not devoted to understand it, then you're not basing your actions on reality. You're basing your actions on aversion from or hatred towards reality. Therefore, all your actions are delusions based on delusion. When you're completely settled with your pain, your action will be right.

[72:35]

And it might be to move. It might be not to move. And the next moment, same thing. Moment by moment, if you're completely settled with reality, your action will be right. And right in a big way. Right for you, right for all beings. Your action will be a resource and a benefit for the entire planet, the entire solar system, the entire universe. This is like verifying reality as your life or verifying your life as reality. If we flinch a little bit from reality, that means we a little bit don't trust reality. That means a little bit or a lot are actions based on unskillful response. All of us have a chance to realize unity with reality today.

[73:38]

And then watch what kind of action spontaneously emerges from complete unity with what is coming to be. This is Buddha's activity. This is right effort. This is freedom from what's happening by devotion to what's happening. If we're not devoted to what's happening, we're enslaved by it. If we're devoted to it, we're freed by it. That's what I think. I have no doubt about it. I just sometimes am not practicing it. That's all.

[74:43]

But whenever I practice it, I have never regretted it. It has never let me down. What has never let me down? Total devotion to what's happening. which formally speaking we call upright sitting in the Soto Zen department. Any other questions? Matt? For doubt? Doubt is investigation, discussion, studying the scriptures, bringing your questions out, articulating them, dialoguing. You know, again, bring the... devotion to the doubt. The doubt deserves response, deserves study, discussion. What is the problem? Let's say it. Let's talk about it. That's the antidote to doubt. The antidote to doubt is not to like check out. Then the doubt just reigns supreme.

[75:46]

You have to go meet the doubt and find out what the problem is. What's the problem? That's devotion when doubt arises. That's respect for doubt. Doubt, there's a question. How do you respect the question? Well, let's hear the question. The loving, kind, respectful response to the doubt. Not like, no doubt here, get out of here. No. Anything else? Yes. Dory. Is your name Doris by any chance? No. Just plain Dory? Yes. well what comes to my mind is like in AA Alcoholics Anonymous they have these people who have been sober for a long time and they become sponsors or teachers and if they start drinking they're not sponsors anymore

[76:58]

Buddha lives in the present and Buddha is to be totally devoted to reality. Total devotion, total concentration, total peace and tranquility in the midst of the incredible vitality of the arising of this moment. Completely accepting and working and grateful and devoted to that. That's Buddha. Now, when you're not that way, that's not Buddha. That's called a regular, you know, suffering, partially present, partially devoted, or not very devoted at all, suffering person. So you're Buddha when you're that way. So a moment of total devotion is a moment of Buddha. A moment of 99% is, you know, a moment of, not 99% Buddha, I would say it's, It's a moment of suffering that's getting pretty close to being Buddha. But the little bit of holding back can cause a tremendous damage.

[78:06]

When you close the gap entirely, that's your Buddha nature. When you hold back, you're holding back. You can hold back 1% or 90%. You're not Buddha then. Your nature... is Buddha. That's why you don't feel good when you're not being that way. You're not comfortable. We're not comfortable not being Buddha. We will not really be comfortable when we're not Buddha. We're built to be Buddha. When we don't live that way, we don't feel right. And we shouldn't because we should feel ashamed because we're not living up to our nature. This is not really up to snuff. Except no substitutes. So is that it? No more questions? Okay. We're alive.

[79:16]

Right? This is what it's like right now. This is right in the middle of the session now, right? Right in the middle, just about, I guess, noon today would be almost the precise middle. So we're in the middle of the physicality of it. We're into it now, right? We're really physically experiencing the session. So can we just completely have our experience today?

[80:21]

Just really open up to it and say, OK, let's live all out today. And let's see what that's like. May I enter?

[81:00]

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