last two days i i've said that the buddha way himself And then the thought occurs to me that lack of harmony among beings is born of a lack of total engagement with the self.

[01:06]

And that to study the self, one way to understand, forget the self, means that you forget about studying the self only in a limited sense. Forgetting the self means to be totally engaged. So that if you're studying the self does not mean you're studying something that's an object. You're totally engaged in it. As I said many times, the problems of the world arrive from a misunderstanding of what the self is and what the other is. By total engagement with the self, an eye is opened, an eye is born from this total engagement, which sees by this total engagement the fulfilled self, the self which is born of the other.

[02:54]

It's not the other, but it's born of the other. It's different and inseparable from the other. This is the same as to say we find the I which sees the oneness of self and other without forgetting the difference. sees the oneness of mind and nature without denying difference, which sees the connection among all beings through total engagement in the separation among all beings. And to be totally engaged in this separation is called courage, is called self-affirmation, and is called affirmation of life.

[04:22]

Affirming life not in the sense which we're usually willing to affirm it, but in its total dynamic, ambiguous and contradictory reality, in that life is what must always be going beyond itself. Can we find the courage to enter into a life which is constantly transcending itself? A life which includes death. Which includes contradiction. And I propose that we cannot affirm life as it really is if we cannot affirm the death which is part of it.

[05:33]

We must find the I that sees the fulfilled self. which is the same as to find the eye that sees Buddha. And in the Lotus Sutra, the Buddha said, those who practice all virtues are upright and honest, gentle and flexible, will see me, the Buddha, expounding the Dharma right here. Practicing all virtues means to enter the mud and get dirty.

[06:51]

for the sake of those who are stuck in it. It means to enter the water and get wet for the sake of those who are drowning in it. This is to practice virtue. the self enters the mud. It means to put yourself into every action. And it means that virtue is not something external, that your self is involved in the virtue, and the virtue is not

[07:58]

separate from the self. It's the courage to enter into the silent and quiet dynamic life. A life where self and other are turning round and round. Someone told me that she was in a conversation recently and realized the reason that she didn't trust the other two people in the conversation, and that actually she didn't trust anything.

[09:45]

This is painful. It was painful for her. And it shows, again, the source of pain of not trusting the other because we think the other is not us. When I first met Suzuki Roshi face-to-face, it was on the occasion of bowing to him upon leaving his endo. The Zen center was located in Japan. At the end of the zazen, I bowed to Ichi, the practitioner, through his office.

[11:23]

I bowed to him. I looked up. And he looked back at me. And then he looked down. And I left. And I thought right away, now, did he look down because I shouldn't have been looking at him? Did he look down because I did something improperly? Or did he just look down? My mind spun around a little bit more, but after not too long I realized that really I didn't know what happened.

[12:24]

and that I would never find out. And I still haven't. But then I felt that this is what I came to Zen Center for, is to enter into a relationship like that, where every little thing made a difference and where one never knows Even if one thinks one knows, one must immediately go beyond that. So knowing or not knowing is not the point. The point is to transcend. And this is not something that I had to do or you have to do. Life does this. This is its nature. The question is, do we have the courage to enter it?

[13:40]

And in general, Buddha Dharma is to clarify, to recognize and clarify and to develop our weakness. In order to recognize, clarify and develop weakness, we must be brave It doesn't mean to create weakness or to look for it, because again, the weakness that I look for will be the weakness that is not really the weakness, is not really the real issue.

[15:14]

The real issue is the weakness which just happens to pop up in front of me. My lack of courage can be clarified and can be developed. Not developed in the sense of getting more and more cowardly, but developed in the sense of affirming it so thoroughly that I realize it transcends itself. Trusting the other does not mean to think, oh, he's right, or I can trust him to be good.

[16:15]

That's not what I mean by trusting. Trusting means... that you go into the mud of a relationship with this person who might be anything, who might be completely wrong about this or that, who might be unable to drive a car without driving off the road It doesn't mean you should get in the car and say, they know how to drive. It means you embrace your relationship with this person whose driving ability is in question.

[17:20]

Whenever you get in a car with anybody, in fact you don't know what will happen. It doesn't mean you should assume everything's going to work out in this way or that way. But I can say this, that if you can affirm the reality of the situation, everything will work out just fine. And if the person does drive off the road, you can talk to them about it. If you're with reality, you'll transcend your death. Although I don't recommend doing that. Getting in cars with people who you haven't checked out to some extent.

[18:24]

But you know, you can spend the rest of your life very happily in the parking lot talking to the person about their driving history checking the brakes the tires getting the latest information about traffic laws this is a perfectly good human situation to spend the rest of your life in all the contradictions of the universe all the pain of this world will arise there as you're waiting to get into the car You don't have to go anywhere for these problems to reach you. Each and everything that happens is an extraordinary opportunity if you have the courage to be a human being. which includes being a person who does not trust the other and thinks that mind and nature are separate, rigid things.

[19:54]

You don't have to make self and other merge. All you need to do is be still and quiet and you can see them merge. And again, still and quiet, not just still and quiet like still and quiet under certain circumstances, but still and quiet under this circumstance. affirming life, affirming the life which is willing to transcend itself.

[21:28]

This is the second day of our session and today Things may become more difficult. You may become more aware of this pain. Many kinds of pain you may become aware of, but particularly you may become aware of this pain, which is the pain of not trusting the other, of not trusting what gives you life. I was first attracted to Zen not by the practice of uprightness, but by the stories of Zen yogis living with other people in a way that

[23:04]

I wanted to be. The stories of people who had the courage to be themselves with others, who had obviously embraced themselves totally. In other words, they embraced self and other as one thing and could do simple extraordinary things because of that being settled in the silent stillness where we are one. I was attracted to the actions which emerged from this quiet, still place.

[24:11]

But not having information about where they were coming from, although I could see I wanted to be like them, I wondered how they got to be that way. Then I found out that they all belonged to the same yoga school, which is to enter the mud with all beings to sit upright and to be gentle and flexible so that the mud and the uprightness can constantly go beyond itself into the next turn. Our human life is ambiguous. we may have trouble embracing and engaging in the ambiguity of our life.

[25:29]

Ambiguous means, the root means to drive or lead around Ambiguous means susceptible to multiple interpretations, uncertain, doubtful. Human life is uncertain. It's doubtful. Can you affirm such a life? Do you have the courage to live in that kind of a world, or what?

[26:35]

I think we'd like to live in a world that wasn't uncertain. If we knew about that one, we'd prefer that. Let's embrace a certain world. But if we do embrace a certain world, we may be blessed with pain, pain which so shows us that embracing and engaging in a certain world, in a world which is not susceptible to multiple interpretations, that that is painful. Consider the possibility that your pain is coming from embracing a certain world, a world that's not turning on itself constantly, a world that's fixed, a life that doesn't turn on itself, a life that's not uncertain.

[27:46]

that we sit and we live with that life and pain knocks at the door and says, this is not life. This is the negation of life. And there's something about life that does this kind of negating. And I accept that too. If it wasn't painful not to accept it, I don't think I would. If I wasn't anxious when I didn't accept it I don't think I would. But before I embrace the totality of my life I will be afflicted by anxiety. And the totality of our life is the totally dynamic reality of our relationship with each other and all of this earth.

[28:52]

A world where there is no one-sided rightness, where neither side can be by itself right, but only when both sides our dancing can rightness emerge. And this dance is sometimes quite painful because we resist it, because it's happening like this. Goodness is the courage to live this life like it really is. And it is not like our plan. When it is like our plan, when it is like our desire,

[30:07]

then pain comes to say, snap out of it. It's not going like that. Nietzsche says, your dearest virtue, well, he said your dearest self is your virtue. The ring's thirst is in you, reaching again and again for itself. The ring is always struggling, ever reaching for itself.

[31:24]

And in the chant that we do in the morning where it talks about Buddha's seal, Buddha's seal also, it's Buddha's mudra. Buddha's mudra, Buddha's mudra, Buddha's seal, Buddha's ring. Mudra means ring. or seal. In you is the ring's thirst, is the mudra's thirst. The mudra is always reaching for itself, yearning for itself, trying to close the circle. In every action you do, bring yourself to the action. Not you doing the action, bring yourself into the action, into the mud.

[32:33]

Feel that thirst to complete the circle. This is your dearest self. This is your courageous self. I don't think it's exactly a weakness that we perceive ourselves as separate from other things. The weakness is that we are enchanted by that perception and are driven by it.

[33:52]

The weakness is the cowardice of not facing that as simply a delusion and the cowardice of not facing the pain that comes from believing the perception of separateness. If you can notice how it is that you don't embrace the pain which comes from the separateness from the belief in the separateness. Which means your separateness from the pain in your knees, your separateness from the pain in your back, the separateness from the pain in your butt, the separateness from the pain of your embarrassment of not trusting others. If you can clarify this weakness it can develop into

[34:59]

awakening, a particular awakening based on a particular weakness. So the Buddha Dharma is, must be practiced for each individual because each of us have a slightly different place where we're pained, in a slightly different place to be courageous. This kind of work, this kind of dancing, is completely ordinary.

[36:34]

It's really completely everyday activity. And to actually engage in this work, engage in this meditation, is the most extraordinary thing. Life is really like this. And yet, life also has this strange quality that it can turn away from this. This life that's constantly transcending itself is right under our noses.

[38:43]

Our breathing is telling its story. And our pain is telling us about that slight deviation from this story, from this life going beyond itself constantly. The little bit of difference, the little bit of separation from that drama is our pain. Our pain is encouraging us to settle that difference by total self-affirmation.

[40:02]

to have the courage to be like you are because you love life. Plus, if you're not sure you love life, you have pain to remind you. But the final closure does not come from being goaded on by pain which comes from turning away. The final closure comes from love, for loving that things are actually this dynamic. Seven days sitting alone in Green Gulch.

[41:36]

This sitting can cut through thousands of layers of misty clouds. late summer in the mystic village. She's wearing subdued colors. So strong is the habit to turn away from life.

[42:53]

So horrible are the things a human being can do once he turns away from life. So horrible are the things that we can do when we're not courageous So impossible is it to do harmful things when you're courageous. We won't be able anymore to do things one-sidedly if we have the courage to embrace this life. For now, if you notice the weakness, the human weakness, that you think you can do something by yourself, admit this weakness, clarify this weakness, and develop this weakness until you understand that we do everything together

[44:27]

And even the opportunity to study our weakness is given to us by the kindness of everybody else. These people who we don't trust give us the chance to see the way our mind works and how painful it is. how painful it is to turn away from life. How many times do I have to go down into the green dragon cave for you? How many times do you have to go down

[45:44]

into the green dragon cave for me. This green dragon who's turning the pearl in her mouth. this painful thing, round and round.

[46:19]

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