Today I'd like to talk about Zen, and actually I feel a little uncomfortable sometimes talking about that word, bringing up that word, even though I love it very much. It's kind of cute, isn't it? Z-E-N. And it has so many positive associations for me. But I don't really know what Zen is, but I thought I would talk about it today. I was attracted to Zen and therefore indirectly attracted to the teachings of the Buddha and the Buddhist tradition through stories about Zen, so-called Zen monks

[01:22]

I read these stories and a number of the stories really struck me as the way I wanted to live my life, showing me a way to live, showing me the possibility of a person being free in the midst of of praise and blame, a possibility of being generous in almost all situations. Even when someone might catch you off guard and try to steal something from you, before they know

[02:35]

that you would give it to him anyway, still to be able to give it to him. Like sometimes people might try to steal something from you which you don't really mind giving away but you feel offended that they didn't give you a chance to give it. But I read stories about people who could excuse that little sort of bad start in a relationship. I didn't think of it in those terms, even though I was a psychologist in a sense. I didn't think of what I wanted to be as to become free of myself.

[03:40]

But I think that's what it was. I saw people who had a self, I shouldn't say people who had a self, but people who I assumed had a self, a sense of self, and didn't let that encumber them. So one of the stories which I've told over and over again was the story of a monk who lived in a small fishing village in Japan and he was accused of being the father of a child, of a young girl who he wasn't married to. and was falsely accused and strongly criticized for this irresponsible behavior, for this alleged irresponsible behavior.

[04:54]

And the parents of the girl came to him and, you know, really read the riot act to him. really criticized him strongly and said he was a disgrace to the Zen tradition. And in my mind, the story included that that hurt him, that it hurt a little bit to be so strongly basically spat upon. If he didn't feel anything, that's okay, but that wouldn't be such an interesting story to me. I think, you know, to me, if you push on Buddha's cheek, it's more interesting if the cheek goes in a little bit.

[06:04]

To me, a Buddha in the sense of a person, is not a person who is plastic or bronze. If you push on her cheek, the cheek would go in, and if you bring warmth to the cheek, the cheek would relax, probably. If you pet the cheek, the cheek would probably have a positive sensation. If you spit in the face, it would be painful for the face. Or if you slap the face, it would hurt. So, to me, the story was more meaningful to me to feel that when he was insulted and attacked falsely, and called all kinds of terrible things, that that hurt him.

[07:08]

And when he was hurt that way he said, I see, this is happening to me. In Japanese he said, Ah so desu ka? Ah so, oh so this is happening. And then they said, and when the baby comes, you can take care of it. And they brought him the baby when it was born and he did take care of it. Well, he took care of it with the assistance of a wet nurse. So he and the wet nurse took care of this baby for, I believe, two years. And the girl, the mother, finally told them the truth, namely he wasn't the father, somebody else was, and the parents came back to the priest, the monk, and said, we're so sorry. We're so sorry. we were so cruel to you and you didn't deserve it and you accepted our cruelty so graciously and so patiently and didn't attack us back and not only that but you took care of our grandchild for two years and we're so grateful to you and you're such a great priest and such a

[08:43]

a credit to the Buddha way, you are truly a great monk. And I think that probably felt pretty good for him to hear that. But he said, oh, I see. Ah, so desu ka? Is this happening to me? And I said, this is the way I want to live. I didn't want to live so that if someone insulted me and attacked me I wouldn't feel anything. I didn't want that. And I didn't want that if someone was kind to me I wouldn't feel anything. I didn't want that. What I wanted was that no matter what I felt, and I expected to continue to feel a variety of things, that no matter what came up, and no matter what went down, I would always be the same.

[09:50]

I would always say, Oh, this is my life. And I still want to be that way, and now, whatever number of decades since I read that story, I'm not saying I'm that way. I'm not saying I'm that way. Now I understand that it's not really me being that way. The way it is for me is that when people insult me, sometimes it hurts. It doesn't always hurt when they insult me. Sometimes when they insult me, it doesn't hurt. Sometimes they don't insult me hard enough.

[10:55]

And sometimes I know they love me so much that I really don't think they mean that. And then sometimes it doesn't hurt, even though they're trying to insult me. And so I still have had some effect from insults, and also praise and appreciation of my life. It feels good, usually. Once in a while it doesn't, because it's not strong enough. Or it's meant for somebody else, but it's not really about me. But what has become my life is that this one, this way of being the same, no matter what happens, that way of being, that one who says, oh this is my life, oh this is my life, oh this is my life, this is happening, that one has kind of almost taken over completely

[12:29]

That's not me, that one. That's more and more my life. It's sort of at the center of all this stuff that's happening. It doesn't really, in the midst of all this stuff that comes and goes, it doesn't really come and go And it can say pretty much, it can say anything it wants. And it can talk. It's not me, but it can use my mouth. And it's using my mouth right now. And it's using your ears right now. and this is what I came to Zen to become intimate with.

[13:43]

And it wasn't even that monk back there hundreds of years ago, it wasn't him either, it's just what we all really are, you know, a pure presence That's always the same. It doesn't come and go. And this is what they mean by Zen, I think. Nobody knows what it is, I don't know what it is, and nobody else knows what it is. And yet, it's the closest thing to what we are. It really is what we are. That's what I think. That's what I feel, that's what attracted me to ZEN. I'd like to make a discrimination between spiritual practice and what we sometimes call, I don't know what, psychotherapy or

[15:05]

psychological practice. Psychological practice, I think, is to study and inquire into and become intimate with psychological processes in a, well hopefully in a beneficial way, in a healing way for that psychological process. And spiritual practice, I think, is to become intimate with the nature of existence itself in such a way that existence itself is benefited, is healed.

[16:16]

So, Zen can be both, I think, a kind of psychological practice and a spiritual practice, ultimately a spiritual practice, but initially a psychological practice. And the two are really inseparable, and not really two. But it's helpful, I feel, to pull them apart and look at them separately. Spiritually, I think what Zen is about, it is about healing the world. healing the wound in the world. And psychologically then is about studying how the wound in the world is manifested in our own psychology.

[17:30]

So by studying our own psychology, finding the wound in our own psychology, in our own consciousness, is a path or a medium in which we in which we all together heal the wound in the world. The wound in the world is that the world is split into different beings. that the oneness of the world has been somehow cut and has been made into separate things, and our own psychological process the same, that we experience, we perceive ourselves as separate from each other.

[18:54]

and therefore the world is a world where there seems to be this sense of separation that is now dramatically enacted in a world of separation and pain. So one of our Zen ancestors, his name was He's a Chinese Zen teacher, and he used the word Zen. He said, practicing Zen is dropping off body-mind. His name was Ru Jing, which means like pure, or like purity. And studying Zen is shedding body-mind.

[20:14]

In the word study, I said studying Zen before, I said practicing Zen, studying Zen, this character that I'm, the first character before Zen here, is a Chinese character which can mean practice, penetrate and reach to, also to meet, also can mean to meet, and it's usually used in the sense of meeting a superior. So I don't know if you consider Zen your superior, but to meet Zen to study Zen, to practice Zen, to penetrate Zen, to reach Zen is dropping off body and mind, dropping off actually body-mind. That's what the Zen teacher said Zen was

[21:25]

to reach what doesn't come and go, to reach freedom from coming and going, to reach freedom from birth and death. and birth and death, to reach freedom from birth and death, to reach freedom from misery, to reach freedom from separation between self and others, to reach, to penetrate, to meet freedom from the wound in the world. to heal the wound of the world is dropping off body-mind.

[22:36]

Body-mind means any experience you've ever had in your life. Body-mind means Feeling breath enter your body, or feeling breath leave your body. Feeling mind, body, body. It means seeing a sunset or a sunrise, it means meeting a friend, it means eating a piece of toast and drinking a cup of coffee. It means kissing someone. It means feeling insulted. It means feeling praised. Anything you've ever experienced, what we mean by anything you've ever experienced is body-mind. And these things arise and cease. They come and they go. Everything that comes and goes is body and mind, is what we mean by body-mind.

[23:51]

meeting Zen, healing the world, is a body-mind dropping away. It's when that thing that arises, it means when your experience arises and ceases, in the midst of this arising and ceasing, there's just no attachment to it. when in the midst of the arisings and ceasings, the comings of thieves and the goings of thieves, the coming of donors and the going of donors, in the midst of all these things, in the midst of all these experiences, all these experiences just come and go, and in that sense, they just drop away.

[25:00]

And even when they come, they drop away. We have no attachment. Training ourselves to be like this is to train ourselves to be intimate with the One who doesn't come and go, who's always with us, who never was apart from us and never will be apart from us. So the psychological work is to find a way of being in the midst of psychological phenomena, such that the psychological phenomena is constantly just dropping away. When it's arising it's dropping away, when it's ceasing it's dropping away. In other words, it's released, it's let go of in its comings and goings. I like this very nice Zen, Z-E-N, simple and practicing Zen is simple too.

[26:22]

Practicing Zen is simply dropping off body and mind. And in case it wasn't already obvious to you, none of us do this. None of us do this. Nobody can do this. You cannot, I cannot drop off body and mind. So therefore, nobody can do Zen practice. Nobody can do this thing called reaching to and meeting Zen. Nobody can do it. That would be holding on to body and mind. But Zen practice, although I can't do it and you can't do it, because Zen practice is dropping off of you doing things and me doing things.

[27:39]

It's dropping off of the psychological process where we think we do things, where there is the appearance of me doing something and the disappearance of me doing something. That's the psychological experience. I did that, that's a psychological experience. I didn't do that, that's a psychological experience. Now I'm starting to do it, that's a psychological experience. Now I finish doing it, that's a psychological experience. Now I started not doing it and now I finish not doing it, this is a psychological experience. psychological experience is neither good or bad in this perspective, although you can rank them as good and bad, in this situation psychological experience is something that gets dropped off. It gets dropped off. It can be dropped off. It can be dropped off. It's just that you and I don't do it. but it can happen, and when it happens, Zen has been met, and the world is healed.

[28:45]

The world is wounded when we think that we can hold onto body and mind and control it, and get it to go this way or that way. Now, what is the practice? Is there anything for us to do in this practice that we can't do? And in a way I would say, no. I mean, I did say no. Any further instructions? and the further instruction I've mentioned recently, the further instruction is, it's a way to be when psychological phenomena are arising and ceasing, it's a way to be with them such that you and I can, it's a way of being

[30:06]

It's a way of being that is a mode or a medium in which one can realize body and mind dropping off. It isn't something you do to make body and mind dropping off happen. Body and mind dropping off is already happening. It's already happening. Zen is already happening. it doesn't start and stop, it's happening now. Body and mind are dropping off right now, but in order for us to realize it fully we kind of have to be there in the dropping off. So the mode in which one can realize this, or the realization can come to one, is expressed by the simple little phrase, well, the Zen monk said, this is my life.

[31:19]

But, this is my life means, how can I say it in such a short phrase, this is my life, This is my life and I mean thank you very much. I have no complaint whatsoever. This is my life. I bow to this experience right now. I bow to this experience. It's beyond I like it or don't like it. I like, I don't like, is just another psychological experience. Something happens, I like, I bow to that. Something happens I don't like, I bow to that. I put my hands together and I say, I put my heart together and I say, yes, this is my life, this is my life.

[32:23]

This is my life, thank you very much. Not for this, but thank you very much is the way of being with this such that this, whatever it is, drops away. Such that the realization of the dropping away of whatever this is happens. and I have no complaint whatsoever. I practice, maybe I don't understand, but I practice. There is no alternative to this psychological experience. There is no alternative to this right now. If I think there's an alternative, I complain. If I don't complain, I realize the practice of no alternative.

[33:28]

this is my life, this is the Buddha's teaching, this is the Buddha's teaching, and [...] that's the way it is every single moment of my life. And I say, thank you very much for giving me the teaching called, I don't like this, the meeting with Zen, the penetration of Zen is this dropping off of all psychological experience. Therefore, the psychological experience is the blood, the body of Zen.

[34:33]

It's the thing we let go of. You can't practice Zen without a body and mind that's dropping off. We don't get rid of the body-mind we realize that it's dropping away. You've got to have a body-mind to realize what is free of body and mind. And you've all got one, so you're set. Now all you've got to do is the practicing-then part, which is already going on. You just need to join the Zen that's already happening all day long. And the way you join is, honest to gosh, I'm not kidding, thank you very much. I mean really, thank you very much. Not for this. Not for this.

[35:35]

Well, okay, do you want it to be for something? Well, better not to be for anything, because if it's for something, you might think it's over there. So it's almost not really a for, it's thank you very much coming from that which doesn't come and go. This thank you is not about anything, it's just flat out thank you very much. It's not about anything, but it is the way you feel when Zen has gotten to you and you've gotten to Zen. And there's another side to the story. So, not only is there dropping-off body and mind, but there is the dropped-off body and mind.

[36:41]

You see, there's dropping-off body and mind, there's a kind of dropping-off that's happening all the time. It's like it's always dropping-off, it's always happening. It's happening now, it's still happening, it's happening again, I mean. What is it dropping off of? It's a dropping off of body and mind. But there's also a body and mind dropped off. There's also a body and mind that's dropped off. It's not nothing. There is an actual way of being that's this dropped off body and mind. So, you know, on Tuesday, in the morning here, in the early morning I was sitting in a little room over there, having a discussion with somebody about pain.

[37:59]

she was coming to talk to me about some pain in her life. Well actually she came to talk to me, I don't know if she was coming to talk to me about pain, she was coming to talk to me about Zen and she brought up some pain and when she brought up the pain I felt the pain in my heart and this pain I felt was because of what she was telling me. And so I just tried to be with the pain and say, thank you very much, I have no complaint whatsoever about this pain. And similar pain kept happening like that. Body and mind kept paining. And so I kept trying to be with it. And then I thought, well, maybe I should lie down and be with it lying down position. And so I did that for a while.

[39:05]

And, well, one thing led to another, and I decided that it would be okay to go to the hospital. So I went to the hospital. And the people in the hospital didn't know what it was, but, you know, there was the possibility that it was a heart attack. It didn't seem like a heart attack, but then it turned out it was a heart attack. So I had this little heart attack, and so that happened. This happened. It was a little bit painful. It really wasn't very painful. They asked me, on one to ten, how would you rate it? Ten is the most painful thing you've ever experienced, and one is just a little bit painful, and zero, I guess, is either not painful at all, or happy. But anyway, they said, so I said, well, I'll give it a three.

[40:07]

It wasn't that bad. Now, maybe it was more than three, and maybe I was just trying to make people feel like, boy, he has experienced some real pain in his life. Because, like, you know, a heart attack is just a three. So I've been thinking about, was I underestimating? But it really was not one of the major pains of my life. I've had harder times in the dentist office, really. And I've had harder times, you know, thinking about some things I've done to people. So it really wasn't that bad. there was a little bit of anxiety around it, and I invited my wife to come to visit me in the room, just in case it was the end, because I didn't know whether I was going to live through this thing.

[41:10]

I didn't want her to miss the last psychological experience. And you know, when I was in the hospital, I was in this emergency room and I could see, you know, things going on in various other parts of the room, and I could see these people out there, you know, these hospital workers, and I also saw some Zen people out there. you know, with their, what do you call it, their chic hairstyles, and their simple dark clothing, and some of them were wearing bathrobes, because it was early in the morning.

[42:23]

And I looked out there and I saw those people, and I felt this pain that I have, and this little problem that I have, this pain I have, and this body I have, and this problem I have, and this life I have, this life and this body I have, I felt like it was about Well, I'm not saying it is, but I felt like it was about three inches deep, my pain, corresponding with the pain rating. But when I saw those people out there, I felt like the gratitude around this pain, the gratitude which when I look at them I feel.

[43:32]

Gratitude was so, so big. It almost, not completely, but almost completely dwarfed my little pain and my little concern about dying. When I came to practice Zen, I wanted to learn how to realize dropping-off body and mind. I didn't expect to meet the dropped-off body and mind. The dropped-off body and mind... When I came to practice Zen,

[44:41]

I wanted to learn how to realize dropping-off body and mind. I didn't expect to meet the dropped-off body and mind. The dropped-off body and mind of an ocean of loving beings. An ocean of beings that through which love comes to this person. And it turns out that as I practiced, I realized that this ocean of love was necessary for one to dare say thank you very much, I have no complaint, absolutely no complaint whatsoever.

[45:50]

The ocean of love was necessary for one to dare to say thank you very much. I have no complaint, absolutely no complaint whatsoever, even if there is more than point number three pain. If I'm surrounded by this love, I'm okay. that way, I realize the dropping off body and mind which sets me free of the pain, and not only that, but heals the world. And I'm not the only one who's surrounded by an ocean of love.

[47:30]

I'm not the only one who's surrounded by the dropped-off body and mind of the Buddha. which comes to us in and through every single person, every single thing, every single psychological experience we have, this dropped-off body and mind comes to us, supports us to realize the dropping off of body and mind. The Zen practice is not done by us, is done by nothing, it is always connected to the dropped-off body and mind. So there's always the dropped-off body and mind, there's always the dropping-off of body and mind. If we really can learn to say, thank you very much, I have no complaint whatsoever for love in this form, for love in this form,

[48:47]

for love in this body-mind form. All love comes to us as body-mind experiences. Because it's so wonderful, because I'm so grateful, I can accept that it's dropping off. Because I've been so fortunate, I can let go of my good fortune and get another installment. Sometimes it comes as a heart attack. Sometimes it comes as an insult. Sometimes it comes as praise. Sometimes it comes as spit in the face. Sometimes it comes as cancer. Sometimes it comes as a sunrise. Sometimes it comes as fog. But it's always coming. And if I don't say thank you, and if I think there's an alternative, or if I think there's an alternative and I don't say thank you, if I complain in the slightest, in the slightest bit, then somehow, even though I'm surrounded by love, and supported by love,

[50:22]

to experience that I'm being released from my body and mind every moment, even though that's going on all the time, even though the whole world is supporting my life as to be the place where the world is healed, and where I am healed, even though it's going on all the time, if I complain, the curtain drops and covers it up. And if I don't complain, and I really do say thank you, then I do feel this love. And when I do feel this love, you might think, well then it would be easy to say thank you if you felt it, and then it would be easy not to complain. But sometimes, even when the love is coming very clearly, and it's very obvious, even to us, we still sometimes can't face it and say, no, thank you.

[51:43]

Like, I don't deserve this. This is too much. You people can't love me this much. I can't face it. No, no. No, no, don't love me so much. I'm not worthy. Okay, fine, that's a psychological experience, and then when you say, no, no, I can't have, this loves too much, I don't deserve it, just say, right in the middle of that, thank you very much, I have no complaint whatsoever, and that one will drop away too. I didn't get close enough to death to really get tested on this particular tour to the hospital.

[52:50]

And maybe I would have become afraid closer to the event, but I really wasn't afraid, I was overwhelmed with gratitude all the way. so much kindness, from the first pain till now. I do not regret or complain about this happening. I'm a little embarrassed, and I don't complain about that either. I'm a little embarrassed to die at 56. and partly because I think I was in some counter-transference with the projection that I would live forever. We're good Buddhists, we know we're impermanent, we're not going to last forever, we all know that, but deep down

[54:02]

We think we'll go on forever. There are some adjustments, but basically it's forever. And some people thought that I was going to live forever and be healthy forever, secretly. No one would say that out loud, of course. But this thing surfaced that I think some people confess that they actually thought I would live forever. And some part of me thought so too. So that's why I'm embarrassed. Fifty-six doesn't sound like forever. So my mind, you know, keeps functioning just like yours, my body keeps functioning with the mind, body-mind, body-mind, happening just like everybody else. but I really am pretty close to having no regrets and no complaints, pretty close.

[55:11]

I'm pretty convinced that's the way I want to live, and I don't even regret that I haven't been living this way the whole time I've been living. I don't regret that I used to complain more, I'm just happy that I've heard the teaching and have a chance to practice it. I'm very, very, very, very happy. I'm very happy that I can offer this body and mind to the world to be dropped off. And you get to offer this body-mind to the world to drop off to. It doesn't belong to me any more than to you. Everybody can give it away, moment by moment.

[56:17]

and when I was in the hospital there was a test that was going to happen and there's a risk factor in the test and so the people who were there I called them into the room where I was and I just told them that there was a risk factor and there was a possibility that I would die in this test, and I just said, you know, that I'm just really grateful to you. And some people in this room, I never saw your face before, but I'm grateful to you. And the people whose faces I have seen before, I'm grateful to you. I really am, and I just want to say that just in case we don't meet again, because we never know when our last meeting will be.

[58:13]

And I'm grateful to you for the love that is coming to me from you. That's basically what I'm grateful for. And I'm also grateful just as a way of being with you, not really even for you. Actually, there was a person in this room who came to see me one time and she said, I just want to tell you I'm so grateful, I'm just so grateful. And I don't know to what, but I'm grateful. And I must admit I was a little disappointed. that it wasn't to me that she was great. I'm so happy.

[59:34]

And again, it's not so much that I'm so happy that I survived the heart attack, I'm just so happy for nothing. I'm just so happy for life, for nothing. I don't know what life is. Someone asked me yesterday, she said, well, you know how you used to sing songs? Will you still be able to sing songs? And will you be able to sing some new songs?" And I thought, you know, I would be able to sing songs. Why not? It's a good way to go, isn't it? Maybe I shouldn't sing, you know, to it, you know, strenuously.

[60:36]

But I have a microphone with an amplifier, so I don't have to really sing that loudly. And my main problem is, you know, which song to sing. So, I'll let you choose without telling you what song it is. Okay? One song I'm touching with my right hand, and one song I'm touching with my left hand. So, how many people want me to sing the right-handed song? How many people want the left-handed song?

[61:46]

Were there more left-handed ones? Could I ask the right-handed people to speak, to say yes? Could I ask the left-handed people to say yes? Oh, you're a right-handed person? Were you? The right-handed song is a kind of a more strenuous song. It's a Broadway musical song. The left-handed song is a folk song. The right-handed song is, You Gotta Have Heart.

[62:55]

Miles and miles and miles of heart. And the left-hand song is about the Red River Valley. So, I was born in Water Valley. So, as you see, it says, you can sing along. And somebody told me that there's such a thing as a pitch pipe, which I keep forgetting to learn how to use. MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM Come and sit by my side if you love me. Do not hasten to bid me adieu But remember the Red River Valley And the cowboy who loves you so true From this valley they say you are going

[64:50]

I will miss your bright eyes and sweet smile. For they say you are taking the sunshine that has brightened the path for a while. would you say? Okay, where should we start this, Paula? You gotta have heart. All you really need is heart. When the odds are saying you'll never win, that's when the grin should start.

[65:55]

You've gotta have hope. Mustn't sit around and mope. Nothing's half as bad as it may appear. Wait till next year and hope When your luck is batting zero Get your chin up off the floor Now's your chance to be a hero You can open any door But to do it, but to do it You've gotta have heart Miles and miles and miles of heart Oh, it's fine to be a genius, of course, but keep that old horse before the cart. First you gotta have heart. First you gotta have heart. Then you gotta have heart. Aum.

[67:10]

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