I mentioned yesterday, was it yesterday, I gave a talk yesterday morning about, you know, that in the path of the Buddhist practice, the first thing, in a way, is what we call renunciation, the first thing. This is not always, we don't always tell people that because renunciation is to some people not very attractive as a concept or as a practice or anything. So sometimes we don't mention it. We talk sometimes more about like a bodhisattva vow and even that we sometimes downplay a little bit because that sometimes isn't very attractive either. So sometimes we don't even talk about that, and we talk instead about the most exciting part, and that is non-dual meditation, which is actually, don't worry, be happy, you're perfect, even though you're a jerk.

[01:19]

And so that's what people, a lot of people like to start down there with non-dual meditation. But actually nondual meditation can be kind of intoxicating if you don't have these other two practices at the root. And I got on this thinking about renunciation recently partly because I was going over with the priests last week about the priest ordination ceremony, and the first thing in the priest ordination ceremony is renunciation. That's the first part of the ceremony. So then I carried forward into the lecture, but I also thought I should mention it here because these stories are about, these Zen stories are about non-dual meditation.

[02:29]

Or you could also say objectless meditation. Or again, it's meditation on, you know, don't take this world of suffering too seriously. But we say that after you already took it very seriously. after taking it completely seriously, or not even taking it seriously, but taking it completely, taking it on completely, and then as a result of that, giving rise to this great vow, great spirit to attain complete enlightenment in order to help all beings, which you have accepted the suffering of, then it's time to lighten up with non-dual meditation. Lighten up and remember that there's really nothing to this whole thing anyway.

[03:33]

All this suffering and these miserable creatures and your own stupidity and all that stuff. There really is no such thing as your own stupidity or your own intelligence or you or other people. So, you know, don't get too worked up over this stuff. But we say that to people after they're worked up. If they're not worked up, we don't tell them about not getting worked up. If people go around saying, no problem, it's all empty, that's okay, if they've really shouldered or saddled the full scale of the full reality of suffering, then you can laugh it off anytime. Like I sometimes say before Sashin, uh, If you follow this schedule and you're on time for every period and sit still, go ahead, have a ball. Have a good time. And some people think that I'm... What did you think I was... What did you think I was for saying that?

[04:35]

I don't remember. I probably thought it was... After you got into the session... A bad joke. Yeah, a bad joke. After you got into the session, you thought it was a bad joke. Once you're suffering completely, it's okay to have a good time. That's non-dual meditation. So these koans are about that. So we, in a sense, have to be careful that when we study these stories, either we have renounced the world and given rise to this incredibly wonderful aspiration, before we study them. Or at least you should know that we haven't given rise to those and that in some sense we're on shaky ground studying these things. And then go ahead and study them on shaky ground. And when I say renounce the world, I don't mean renounce people or trees or clouds or rivers or frogs.

[05:46]

What I mean by renouncing the world is renouncing But what is the world, by the way? What do you mean by the world that we renounce? What's that? What is the world? Self. Self? The world of duality. Yeah, but what is the world of duality? Separation. Well, it's the world based on craving, right? The world is craving, is thirst. And so when we say, renounce the world, we mean renounce craving. We mean renounce thirsting for something other than this. So if you first practice renunciation and then give rise to this wonderful aspiration, then you can do a practice

[06:50]

that's not trying to change you into a better person. But you've already entered into kind of a program of, with lots of dilemmas and stuff in them, where there's some striving. You've made a commitment, you've made a goal, you've committed yourself to the highest goal possible, and then you practice meditation to, in some sense, renounce the goal. But, you know, you've really committed yourself to it beforehand. Okay, so that's kind of a... I just want to say that again before we start studying these stories. And again, fundamental to renunciation is to feel the impact of how much suffering there is in this world. It's really awesome, as you may have noticed.

[07:51]

And it doesn't happen just when it makes sense for it to happen. It doesn't happen like, well, I mean, it doesn't happen necessarily when you think it makes sense to be happening. Like someone doesn't, someone can be in relatively good health and be smart and good looking and still be, you know, paralyzed with pain and fear. It's incredible. Or it's hard, anyway, it's hard to give it credit. It's hard sometimes to believe it. And how do you help people when they're suffering like that? When they're suffering in a way that you can't completely understand yet? Like they're suffering because, you know, They can't cope with mailing lists or computers, which seem like not such big problems, but it's not so much that the computer is a problem, but they can't stand coping with the computer.

[09:05]

It really gets them down. And yet somehow they have to deal with such things. How do you help somebody like that? And when you start talking to them about it, and they tell you, try to find out what the problem is, they start breaking down. And when they look to see what the problem is, they start to see something else, which is even worse than that problem. And what do you do? How do you help them? It's a real big question. So can these stories somehow help us figure out how to help people? Is there some clues in here about how to help people? Well, there are, I think. But again, there has to be the enthusiasm to help people.

[10:10]

And where does that come from? Kind of tired tonight? You want to help people tonight? You do? I start at home. What? I start at home. Start at home. Is there anything you can do for yourself tonight? Would you be more comfortable sitting up on the couch? So we used to be, last time we had this class, this is, how many classes, how many meetings are there in this class? Six? Five? Four? Three? There's five? Five meetings? Five? Are we meeting next week? No. Is that why there's only five? Huh?

[11:10]

I guess I think I'm going to Minnesota. Whoever said that, yes. So there's only room for five weeks? Is there room to meet an extra week or do the other classes start right away? So should we reduce the price of this class? I did already. You did? Oh, good for you. Then we'll have another class starting right away, right? So we'll have five classes before the practice period and then we'll have six classes during the practice period for increased price, right? Yes. Okay, so last time we had this class we were talking about Case 21 or the Book of Serenity, right? Do you know this story?

[12:14]

D, right? Do you have a copy of the text? Did you bring any copies of that thing? Can you look? Well, you want to just read it? Anybody else doesn't know this story and you're new to the class? So here's the story. Sala, you want to sit up close in front here? Those are at the auditing section back there. Okay, so here's the story. There's two characters in the story. One's, I'll tell you their names in Chinese first. The one's name is Yin Yan, and the other one's name is Da Wu. Da Wu. Yin Yan means cloudy cliff, and Da Wu means enlightened way.

[13:15]

or Enlightened Way, yeah, or Enlightenment of the Way, or the Way's Enlightenment, the Path's Enlightenment, okay? Enlightenment of the Way, yeah. So these two guys are brothers, and one, and Coddy Cliff was sweeping the ground one day, And his brother came up, Dawu came up and said, you're too busy. And Cloudy Cliff said, you should know there's one who's not busy. And... Then Dawu said, well, then there's two moons. Two moons.

[14:23]

And then Cloudycliff said, raising his broom, which moon is this? And Dawu walked off. That's a story. Can you remember it? If you can, it's not surprising. Can you remember it? Yes? Can you recite it? Want to try? You don't have to if you don't want to. I'll tell again if you can't decide it. Want to hear it again? Sure. Do you know it? No, I think I only know it in parts. Yeah. So Yuen Yuen was sweeping the ground. Da Wu walked up and said, too busy. Yuen Yuen said, you should know there's one who's not busy. Da Wu said, Then there's two moons. And he then raised his broom and said, which moon is this? Dao walked off.

[15:25]

That's the story. Yes. What about the other lines that aren't included, that are in the business process of the second moon, but there's just the moon in this case? What about them? Yeah. You know why they went in front? I don't know why he did that. Maybe just to make the story stand by itself, since those are comments at a later time. But in the, as I mentioned, in the Chinese text, it has those comments right away after the story. But that's the basic story that happened, apparently. Okay? So, do the newcomers have any questions about the story? Is that the one that's written exactly, or is it a longer story than that in the book?

[16:26]

In the book, that's the way this translator did it. But in the English translation, that's the way it is. But in the Chinese, it had some comments right after that, which happened some time after that. Other monks heard about this story. The story spread around China. And another Zen teacher, when he heard this story, said, Indeed, this is the second moon. And then somebody, another Zen teacher, heard the story and said, The butler watches the maid politely. The butler watches the maid politely. Yes? So what's the dialogue on renunciation going on? Pardon? How are they talking about renunciation? I don't think they are talking about renunciation. I think they already have practiced renunciation.

[17:28]

That's already set. These people have practiced renunciation for a long time and they've also given rise, I think, to the authentic, true spirit of enlightenment. These two guys. Now they're having, in that context, they're having this discussion. So, for example, he could have been, instead of sleeping on the ground, he could have been nursing sick people. Or he could have been making sandals, which he actually did make, he'd made sandals to make money. Or he could have been building a temple. Or he could have been talking to... someone who was lost he could have been doing something to try to help people as an expression of his file and he could have been doing so perhaps quite skillfully and his brother could have walked up and said you're too busy and he could have turned and those in those activities and he could have said you should notice there's someone who's not busy

[18:42]

And his brother could have said, then there's two moons. And he could have said, you know, raising some gesture of what he was doing, he could have said, which moon is this? This story can happen whenever you're doing anything. You could be sitting in the meditation hall quite still and someone could come up to you and whisper this in your ear that you're too busy. Is it incorrect for me to think that that exactly is talking about renunciation? That what is talking about renunciation? Each of these people and what they are saying is in addition to how they're thinking about this unbusy one is also espousing their opinion of renunciation of bodhicitta and non-dual meditation. Yeah. You can have all of that going on at once. But they're not directly talking about pronunciation.

[19:51]

And they're not directly talking about bodhicitta. Are they? And very few of these stories do they talk directly about it. Which is why I'm asking you. Because I can't see it. It's not so direct. So I'm asking what they're saying. I don't think you can see it there. You could just as well not see it. I think. These are actually the results of the last stage. Well, I hope so. I hope that that's why the story... I think that people who knew these guys felt that that's the kind of people they were. That they had really trained themselves for a long time. And that they were open to the pain of their life. and that they could see that other people were suffering. And therefore they can have conversations like this and not just be denying the world's suffering, even though they're not directly talking about it.

[21:03]

Of course that's what they're concerned with, so then they can talk like this and settle some subtle points about how to help people. But that's why I mentioned at the beginning, because you can't see that necessarily in these stories. Can you? Not literally, anyway. But people, you know, have conversations in various places, even in Zen temples, where they have various chatty little smart talks about Buddhism, which are fine. But if there isn't this grounding in the world of suffering, then these conversations are not necessarily going to be helpful. What kind of conversations come to mind? What kind of conversations come to mind or comments come to mind when you describe that? Describe what? Little petty chatty talks on Buddhism that don't really help the world.

[22:08]

It isn't the words, it's whether they're grounded or not. If you're completely facing your suffering, someone comes into the room to visit you, you can say, good morning, darling. How are you? And that can also be kind of a, you know, unhelpful comment. Or you can even go up to someone who's suffering a lot themselves and you can say, you know, something, I don't know what, something quite, you know, talk to them about baseball or whatever it isn't the words necessarily that's what i mean it is the words but you can't say that such such a conversation can't happen any ordinary conversation could be helpful or could be a distraction you have to look in your own heart to start with it's pretty hard to tell uh what's going on with anybody else if you haven't checked out what's going on with yourself and if you haven't checked out

[23:11]

what's going on with yourself, then you probably, you might know that because you haven't even looked to see how you feel. But if you've checked out your own state, then you have a chance to notice and you see how you work, then you might have a chance to see that other people work pretty much the same way. But if I don't check out myself and I look at other people, I think they work some way, but In fact, I don't actually see how they work because I don't look at myself. So my own denial of myself obscures my ability to see them. So then what I say to them could be just kind of idle chatter and quite a distraction. Even if it sounded like some story like this. Does that make sense? Yes, it does, but I try on and I think if you're checking out, if I'm checking out, if I'm checking out so closely... Yourself?

[24:17]

Yeah. Yes. It makes it hard for me to check anyone else. Marjorie, there's a place up here if you like. And... You can sit here if you want, if you like. Yesterday you kind of handed me an exercise and you said... feel your pain and come back and talk to me and I'll ask you another question. It just so happened that since yesterday I've been in an intense amount of pain so much that I basically feel dysfunctional for the day. Dysfunctional means you can't do what? My normal daily things that I would maybe want to do. Or maybe the same, you know, I'm not having the same conversations with people. Right. Conversations might change. But I mean, I imagine that after that passage, when I look at others in a different way or maybe have more insights, that's what I'm hearing you say.

[25:18]

But while I'm feeling my pain, we're in it, it doesn't make looking at others so easy. Yeah, at first it might be difficult. Like, I don't know, if you're tightrope walking. When you first start tightrope walking, of course, you have to be very careful with your own balance. and you don't have time to notice how other tightrope walkers in the neighborhood might be doing, or even how people are down on the ground, how they're doing. You mostly just have to concentrate on your own balancing situation. But after you become more skillful at tightrope walking, you can start noticing your environment a little bit, perhaps, and still concentrate on tightrope walking. You can even start concentrating and noticing how you notice your environment. You can watch your mind, how it functions when it notices things. Then you can start to notice how other people are behaving, and if you watch other people who are tightrope walking, you can kind of start to tell when they're losing their concentration.

[26:19]

And you can see that, you can watch and see, well, now, they're losing their concentration now, and then you watch, now they fall. so you can start to see that they that just like me when i was doing that and i lost my concentration i fell too so they must be kind of like me they're behaving kind of like just like i am so you start to feel closer to them because you start to notice that they operate very much like you And then you start to also develop sympathy because you understand why they're falling off the rope. And you also know probably it probably hurts them kind of like it hurt me. And so then you might just, you know, even work all the more diligently at balancing yourself so that you can show an example. to them about how they might do the same. But at first you might not be able to be aware of yourself and what's happening to you, and at the same time notice other people.

[27:26]

But after you get more and more skillful and attentive to your own state, it gets, you know, you have a little bit more energy available. When you first start sitting in meditation, it's hard to keep track of your back being straight and your eyes being open and your mouth being closed and lips closed and tongue on the roof of your mouth and not leaning to the right or the left or forward or backwards and keep the mudra against your abdomen and keep the thumbs, tips touching, keep your elbows away from your body and all that's kind of hard to keep track of at first. But after you sit for quite a while, you can do that quite more and more skillfully. At first you can barely keep a track of that, you can't in fact take care of that and also think of anything else, which is part of the reason why it helps you concentrate. But after a while you can do that and think of other things, so then you have to take on more challenging meditations. So in fact tightrope walkers, instead of being concerned about teaching other people how tightrope walk, after they can basically stay on the bar they start to carry umbrellas

[28:31]

or I guess parasols usually, and juggling balls and riding bicycles and stuff, to keep concentrating higher and higher levels of attention on what they're doing and their balancing by taking on more and more complex tasks under the circumstances. Whereas in this case, once you have done the basic work of acknowledging your state and noticing the cause of your state, and actually seeing that you don't want that cause to be there anymore, and then you actually really do want to get rid of it, the cause of your suffering, then naturally the next thing is to be concerned with other people. Because that actually helps you do your work. Plus you just naturally open your eyes open to it. But before you do that, if you look at other people, it's actually a little bit of a distraction because it's playing into your distraction from yourself.

[29:39]

But after you're completely concentrated on yourself, then the other people you see is not a distraction anymore. It's actually starting to be the real compassion because you're starting to see how people really are. You understand them better because you understand yourself better. You understand their suffering because you're facing your own. So your compassion is more real. And therefore your thought of enlightenment is more real too. So I appreciate you being so obedient and turning around and acknowledging your situation. And in fact, at first, when you first start doing that, it's hard to continue certain things which you can do when you're not looking at that. And in fact, a lot of things we're ordinarily doing are actually what we're doing to distract ourselves from what we're feeling. And then when we turn around, look at how we're feeling, we can't keep doing these things which we're doing as distractions. But if you want to do them later, you can come back and do them. And as a matter of fact, things that used to be distractions can turn into acts of compassion later.

[30:45]

For example, the same distracting conversations can be now coming from a place of being grounded in your own state and what's happening to you and then what you say is quite helpful. So this conversation right here, you can walk up to people. Once you're grounded in your state, you can walk up to people and you can say stuff like, you know, you're kind of busy today, aren't you? And that can really be coming from compassion, which in this story probably was. This guy really loved that guy probably and said, you're too busy. But he was actually probably trying to test his mind and get to know, you know, how he would handle that comment. to see if he was caught up in his work of compassion, because it's actually quite compassionate to sweep the ground. It can be busy, but it can be compassionate too. It can be expressing your gratitude to the earth. Who knows what it could be? You could be demonstrating your state of mind to all around, but you could also be getting caught by it and getting busy, so your friend checks you out.

[31:59]

It says this teases you a little bit, just to see how you're doing. Your brother, your sister. But if you're teasing from way off the ground, from way away from your suffering, it may not be helpful. I was talking to Susan and Vicki this morning, and I sometimes say to people that I used to say, if I ever commit suicide, it would probably be because I can't get a long-distance operator In other words, if down here is my suffering, my pain, my misery, sometimes I'm cruising way up above it, far out of touch with it, with a nice big buffer between me and my suffering. I'm having a good time, in a way, in denial. And then I make a telephone call or something, and I call a long-distance operator, and she's not helpful. So she pulls me down a little bit, like this far.

[33:03]

She pulls me down a half an inch towards my suffering. Well, this half an inch of suffering or whatever is optional, right? I don't need this. You know what I mean? Forget it. but if she would if she would say you know I don't want to place your call you know you don't have the right information and I'd say how irritating and I don't like that you know and she'd say and by the way we're not only going to come up and disconnect your telephone but we're going to kill your family too but even that just talk you know when they actually came then I wouldn't be irritated anymore you know And like I said to my wife, sometimes she goes and spends more money on things than I think she should. And I say, when you do that, if you want, don't just do that. Also lose the change. And also get in a car accident on the way home.

[34:10]

And then also get majorly injured yourself. And it's not just to hide the original problem. It's to, you know, not let me be distracted by minor problems. Get me down to the ground, you know. So, you know, when we're floating far away, a slight reminder of suffering, we sometimes just want to bat it away like an insect, you know, just bat it away or kill it. But if we get brought down all the way to the bottom, then we don't flail around anymore, we don't fight. We just relax and take it. But it's hard to get down there and it's hard to stay there once we get there. But thanks for trying. So is there anything else on this story you want to talk about?

[35:16]

We've talked about it already quite a bit. I don't mean to discourage the new people from asking questions. Does it make any sense to you, this story? No? Well, some of the people who have been taking the class care to entertain some questions. Can you ask a question about the story? The new people, can you ask a question? I'm about to start. Yes? I just had a question about a word that wasn't sure that I could say when the brother said, you're too busy, and then the other one said, you should know as one who's not busy. No, you should know there is one who's not busy. Oh, that makes a lot of sense. Yeah. Meaning himself? No, no. There's one who's not busy.

[36:18]

No, it means kind of like, well, you could say meaning himself, but meaning that he seems to be busy, but also another part of his mind is completely not busy. We seem to be running all over the place, but everything we seem to be doing, simultaneously with everything we seem to be doing, there's somebody right there all the time who's not doing a thing. We're worried, you know. We're suffering. We're doing all kinds of things. We're in misery. We're busy being sad. We're busy craving. But right there, simultaneously with the craving, is one who's not... into craving. There's one who actually, in a way, is too stupid to crave because there's one who can't even think of anything other than this, who can't imagine something other than this, like that this would go away or that this would stay.

[37:24]

They can't even think of the future. They can't think of anything external to what's happening. Therefore, they can't be busy, they can't suffer, they can't cling. That one's also right here, right now. So then his brother says, well, then there's two truths, two realities, two minds in every person or in everything. Well, I would say, yes, there are. But his brother doesn't say, yes, there's two minds or two truths. He just says, which one is this? So is this right now the world where you're not busy, is this the world of complete peace, of complete tranquility, where you can't even imagine that there's somebody other than you, or anything other than you? Or is this the world where you do think there's things other than you, and you're quite busy, agitated and suffering?

[38:30]

Which world is it? You can say whatever you want, but then somebody will ask the question again, which moon is this? And at that time, the other brother walked off. He didn't answer the question. He just walked off. But if he did answer the question, it would be implying to the moon, because he would be choosing one side or the other, then, instead of reflecting. Well, he would, I mean, in a sense he would because he'd be busily talking, you know. He'd be answering the question. He'd be choosing one side or the other. That's busyness, right? So he would be doing that, but still the question applies to what he'd be doing, too. In his answer of yes or no, which moon would that be? Even though he may seem to be busy, still, whenever you see anyone busy, you can still say, there's someone who's not busy. You should know, no matter how much busyness you see, you should know there's someone who's not busy. But is the one who's not busy someplace other than the one who is busy?

[39:35]

If the one who's not busy is someplace other than the one who is busy, the one who's not busy is busy being someplace else. The one who's not busy is not busy enough even to be someplace other than the busy one. Busy people can go away from busyness. That's another kind of busyness. Like going away from the city up to the mountains is a kind of busyness. But the unbusy one can't go on retreat. Doesn't need to go on retreat. Can't even think of going on retreat. He's incapable of going on retreat. and is incapable of not going on retreat. So every time you do the busy thing of going on retreat, you take the unbusy one with you. The unbusy one is the fact that simply you can't move. Did you have a question?

[40:44]

Well, I was going to make a comment that sounds similar to that. The contrast between washing the dishes to get them clean and washing the dishes to wash the dishes. Is that similar to what the story is? It's similar, except you might even speak a little bit... You might make your language even a little bit... Instead of saying washing the dishes... Did you say washing dishes to get them clean? Or washing the dishes to wash the dishes. You might say washing the dishes, not for washing the dishes... or to wash the dishes, but washing the dishes just as washing the dishes. Not even for that. It's like that, yeah. So there's no busyness in just the fact that the dishes are being washed. The fact that they are being washed is not busy. And also, the fact that they are being washed implies

[41:48]

that there's no such thing as the dishes being washed. And that's always there with everything. The meaning of everything is not that thing. Yeah. Did you describe the not busy one? Did I describe the not busy one? a moment ago by saying that that one is only aware of itself, the other one, the busy one. You said it was an interesting choice of words, but I kind of lost it. The busy one is not aware of anything. The busy one is just aware. But the busy one is not aware of something other than itself. The busy one is not aware something other than itself it it is it is our our radical stupidity that we don't we can't even imagine that somebody's other than us there's part of us who can't part of our mind cannot think of something outside of itself and that part of our mind is calm all the time because the basic thing that disturbs us is we think there's something outside of us or rather as soon as you think something's outside yourself your mind is disturbed

[43:16]

But there's a part of us that's always there that can't imagine something external to itself, and therefore it's never disturbed. The varieties. One kind of upset is an upset that people call calm. Another kind of upset is what people call more calm than that. Another upset is what people call extremely calm. And another one, and so on. And then there's also, of course, the upset which is called rather upset. Another one's called extremely upset. And so on. We have all these words four different states of busyness. They're all... Anything like that, it's all busyness. And we go through these states moment after moment. There's always this busy activity. Always, basically. Except in certain states of, you know, brain damage or... Things like that. But for practical purposes, for practical life, we're always producing such a mind.

[44:20]

Our such a mind is always produced. However, there is another awareness, which is always there too, which doesn't have any objects. It's objectless meditation, or non-dual meditation. In other words, part of us really doesn't want to be somebody else. So, any, yes? Well, if they look too busy and there's one that's really always one that's not busy, could the story be the opposite? Could it also be that too calm and that maybe they're never sitting there with about maybe something that's too calm and then there's one that's busy? Would that be true, too? That conversation could have happened.

[45:23]

But true calm, in one sense, is not true. Because, in other words, you might say to someone, what you might mean is you're into a kind of busyness, which is to pretend that you're really calm. You're so calm that you don't realize how busy you are. So, in other words, your calmness is a fake calmness. And the Vimalakirti Sutra, the first monk who is interrogated by Vimalakirti is Shariputra, who is meditating, probably fairly calmly. And Vimalakirti comes up to him and says, this is not true contemplation. This is not real upright sitting. Why? Because, you know, you look calm. Real composure, real meditation is that you're completely engaged in worldly affairs. So if you look like you're not involved in worldly affairs, that's a kind of busyness.

[46:31]

But it's a very tricky business because you think you're meditating. But really you're just looking like other people, perhaps, and also maybe fooling yourself into thinking that you're meditating. But really what you're doing is you're doing a worldly activity called looking like you're not doing worldly activity, which is a very tricky kind of worldly activity because you're fooling yourself. So you're not going to get caught on that. What's an example of being not busy, or really be unbusy? What's a state or a description of something that you would perceive as someone really not being busy? When someone is really willing to be busy, I see the unbusy one. Most people are not willing to really be busy. I mean, then students, anyway, are not willing to really be busy. But when you see, for example, a child who's completely willing to be hysterical, or an adult who's completely willing to be hysterical, or Zen students when they occasionally let go and just be crazy and stop trying to kid themselves that they aren't, at that time you can see the unbusy one there.

[47:51]

The unbusy one is not holding back, doesn't do that thing of holding back. or holding forth. The busy one holds back and also pushes us into things and holds us back from things. The unbusy one is right there with whatever our engagement is. So, you can see the unbusy one when you see how a person is in them being the way they are that's the unbusy one. So you can actually see it in the way the person is at that moment. So if a person is like halfway in to being what they are, then the fact that they're halfway in is the unbusy one. They're fully ambivalent. They're completely ambivalent.

[48:57]

And they're unbusy about being completely ambivalent. But they could be busy if they... Pardon? But they could be busy about being ambivalent. Well, everybody's... Of course ambivalence is a busyness, yes. They are busy about being ambivalent. But when you see how... When you see that the busyness is ambivalence, when you see that this is the form of busyness right now, it's ambivalence. When in that fact it is that way, that's not busy. Right? And in the way the person is of being ambivalent, that is their liberation. They can't be liberated from being unambivalent when they're ambivalent. Now, of course, it's nice if they switch over from being ambivalent to unambivalent, but that's some other day. That would be good, probably, but that's some other day. But it might not be good because they might be ambivalent about doing something bad, and to switch over to being unambivalent about doing something bad wouldn't be good.

[50:01]

What's really good is not to do good or do bad or to be ambivalent or unambivalent. What's good is to realize what's happening, and what's happening is people are busy, and also the fact that they're busy the way they actually are, that's the liberating principle. So that's what we mean by The butler, seeing the maid, takes care. Or, the butler watches the maid politely. Now, I said that, but we don't understand yet why that is so, do we? I think that's a very important phrase because nobody understands it, but tonight we will understand it. The butler, seeing the maid, takes care. The butler, seeing the maid, takes care.

[51:10]

Or, the butler watches the maid politely. Are these trying to say the same thing? Are they supposed to be saying the same thing? What are these? Oh, no, those are two translations of the Chinese. Of the same thing? Of the same Chinese expression. And this is a comment on this story. This is a comment, perhaps a comment that encapsulates the whole story or shows us the essential dynamic truth of this story. It's a possibility. Another comment on this story is, indeed, this is the second moon. The whole story could be the second moon, in other words. Let me say that story I thought about yesterday, that steps, what, seven and eight or six and seven, that when the butler sees the maid, it's almost like their own feeling.

[52:11]

And you take care, you don't grasp it. Maybe that's that juncture where you're slipping into attachment. Yeah. So what does it mean to be polite? What's the ultimate polite thing? Detachment. Yeah, detachment. Don't interfere. Huh? Don't interfere. Don't interfere. Say nothing. Say nothing? Well, not necessarily say nothing, but if you talk, to talk in such a way that you really respect the way things are. However, it's also not polite to not see what you've got in front of you. Okay? For me to be polite to somebody And to leave them alone without noticing them is not very polite. So to actually see them and then still be polite, to actually see the way they actually are and then leave them alone. It's easy to leave people alone before you find out what's happening with them.

[53:12]

But once you find out what's happening to them, you've put quite a bit of energy into noticing. You've given them your full attention. You've become friends with them. You've become intimate with them. And now leave them alone. So being polite to people you haven't met yet doesn't count. It's being polite with the people that you're really, that you've actually seen, to leave them alone. To see the maid and take care. To not grasp. If you actually see the maid, you know you can't grasp her. If you actually see the maid, you fall flat on your face in awe, reverence and worship. That's why someone said the fundamental sin, the first, the original sin is to not trust the other. But again, going backwards, you can't trust the other before you even check yourself out.

[54:25]

You can't trust the other before you check yourself out. And then fall in your face? Well, check yourself out. Once you check yourself out, then if you look at the other person and you're awestruck, yeah, then fall in your face. So in other words, part of being polite to people, God, isn't this interesting, part of being polite to people is studying yourself. Because you realize that in order to really be polite to people, you have to be able to see them and you have to study yourself in order to see others. So being polite to people is not just going around gawking at other people and then leaving you alone. It's actually doing also the work of taking care of yourself. Like that story about the... It's a story of a father and a daughter. The father and daughter are... They're tumblers, acrobats. And the father's got the daughter up on his shoulders and he says to the daughter... Okay, now, you know, you take care so you don't fall. And she says, no, you take care of yourself so I don't fall.

[55:33]

You're present in the presence of the maid. You're present in the presence of the maid. This is... From my point of view? You. From your point of view, I'm the maid. And you're the butler. Pardon? It's an acceptance, but again, this acceptance is predicated on self-acceptance. You don't go around accepting other people before you accept yourself. And of course, it means you don't accept other people before you accept your own suffering. And you don't accept others before you accept your own suffering and notice the cause of your suffering because you can't accept others before you notice the cause of your own suffering because you can't accept yourself before you notice the cause of your own suffering. Because if you accept yourself, that means not only do you accept your pain, I mean, it means you really accept your pain.

[56:48]

And to really accept your pain means that you admit that you don't accept your pain. Right? Does that make sense? So you have to admit your pain and notice that you don't accept your pain. And then you can accept others. Does that make sense? Do you have a different story? Oh, no. I can't accept that. Could it be explained that the butler is the non-busy one watching the maid, the busy one? It's interesting to me that they're both servants. So it takes on some sort of bodhisattva thing. Yeah, you could say... that the butler is the unbusy one and the maid is the busy one, but we wouldn't say it that way in these days, would we?

[57:49]

This wasn't written in these days. I know, but gotta be careful. But one might have said that several hundred years ago. But butlers just didn't happen to. Well, butlers have this way of sort of standing and watching. The maitre d' politely watches the waiters. There you go. Thanks. The maitre d' is the unbusy one, watching the busy waiters. But I think it's also, it's also that, you know, the willingness to be busy at admitting your pain, that's busy, that's busy work. Admitting your pain is, you know, is busy work, plus you're admitting, you're becoming aware, you're becoming busy, admitting your busyness. It's all busyness. However, the willingness to completely get into that project, which you're already into anyway, and be honest about what you're up to, that shows the manifestation of the unbusy one.

[59:00]

And the whole story is both of these things going on simultaneously. It's not like the unbusy one's better than the busy one. It's not better. It wouldn't be life if we just had one side. It's the dance between the two, or not even between the two. It's like this uninteresting dance called life. You know about life? Yes? I'm likely to hurt you, maybe tonight, and I don't know if that bothers you. You don't know if it bothers you? It doesn't bother you now? Okay. Oh, what do you mean by hurt me, by the way? Huh? You don't know what that is either?

[60:03]

Observing you experiencing pain and suffering that I perhaps even deliberately caught. Observing me in pain is not hurting me. That I brought about to you personally. What pain can you bring about to me? Not trusting you, slathering you. Not trusting me, there you go. So if you don't trust me, that hurts me? What did you say? Probably? Yeah, that's a really good example. Now, you won't for sure hurt me if you don't trust me. What will really hurt me is if you don't trust me and I see that and then I don't trust you, that's what hurts me. really you not trusting me doesn't hurt me what hurts me is if I don't trust you who is not trusting me that's what hurts me and of course it might encourage you also then to again not trust me so in some sense we might encourage others to hurt themselves by not trusting them I have the experience that when I see somebody who doesn't trust me I often then turn around and don't trust them

[61:22]

Because I know that people don't trust me, you know. You never know what they might do to me. So then I start being concerned. When I see their lack of trust in me, I start being concerned with my own stuff. And being concerned with my own stuff, then I hurt myself. I become concerned, well, they don't trust me, so are they going to say bad things about me now? Are they going to say I'm untrustworthy? Are they going to say why they don't trust me? So then I get into that. Rather than trusting it and saying, no, they don't trust me. Hmm. What's this about? What is this about? Instead of saying, oh, they don't trust me, now what's that going to do to me? But it's my turning back to my self-concern that really hurts me. Which is similar to saying, I don't trust them. I don't trust that your lack of trust in me is an opportunity. In other words, I'm not polite enough I don't say, oh, Wes, thank you for the lovely lack of trust.

[62:25]

How did you know that's what I needed tonight? I don't do that. I think, lack of trust, oops, now what's going to happen next? Is he going to tell somebody else why he doesn't trust me and the whole room's not going to trust me pretty soon? Oh, my God, wouldn't that be awful? A whole room full of people not trusting me. But maybe if we got to that point, I might stop and say, oh, I get it. I get it. I'm supposed to try to figure out what this is about. I'm supposed to say, hmm, what are these people trying to tell me? This unified presentation. Huh. I might not get it, but I might stop and change my mode. Rather than say, I don't trust you guys for not trusting me. I might start wondering, what are you trying to tell me? Yes.

[63:29]

May I ask why he said that? I don't really feel comfortable sharing that. It's a personal thing. Sorry. Your answer. I think it's rather brave of you to say that. And sometimes when you're able to say that, then you're able to look at it, and it makes it worth it. You're real brave. Well, that's one possible reaction. I had a situation where someone, he couldn't trust me. And I knew that that trust, that was unfounded. There was no reason for him not to trust me. And I didn't react by, in turn, not trusting him. I trusted him and tried to show him even more that he could trust me. And I realized that the reason he couldn't trust me was because he didn't trust himself.

[64:33]

And it hurt both of us, but it was a different kind of response. I'm good for you. I'm not that way. I don't either. I've been thinking along with that in this fundamental sin about not trusting the other, that there's the other out there that you don't trust. You can run to back and forth, but it's also not trusting the other. If you see yourself in good or bad or doing, not doing, it's not trusting that process in yourself, too. Then you create your own suffering or separation. Right. So you have to have this fundamental trust. This is exactly as it should be, or something. Right.

[65:35]

So, actually, I didn't mention this, but she said fundamental trust. So in some ways, in order to practice renunciation, you have to have faith. Because why would you even start to admit your suffering if you didn't have some faith? in your experience. So in order to develop renunciation, you have to have the trust in your own process, not to look at it. And at the same time, we can get kind of happy about the fact that no matter what happens for the rest of our lives, we're going to have our own process. We're always going to have that to work on, and nobody can take that away from us. Well, I shouldn't say that, but anyway, maybe so they can. But that's one thing we maybe can, you know, this is a great opportunity from now on that we have this stuff that we're experiencing to work on.

[66:38]

We can start right now. I think that that was kind of a message from the unbusy one. Yes? I've been sitting here thinking that the unbusy one was the big guy. But it's just the game. It's just noticing the busy or the not busy. And not putting a name to either one. Is that what you're saying? What? Is that what you're saying? To not put the name to either one of them? Not put up, you know, good or bad, unbusy or not busy. Right. The unbusy is not... In this day and age, it has a bad connotation. I mean, we're busy. We're so busy that we don't live our lives.

[67:41]

Yes. So I think of the unbusy one as the better place to be. Right. There's that tendency. Whereas the unbusy one doesn't think that way. No. No, right. The busy one does. And then also we have to be careful, like Sue brought up, of not getting into this special kind of busyness which looks not busy, just to sort of trick ourselves and others. In other words, because part of us doesn't really judge against being busy, doesn't say it's bad to be busy and good not to be busy, because it's part of us, therefore we can be busy and we will be busy, so let's be busy. And let's appreciate the fact that we're having this busyness all the time to work with. And everybody in this class has been completely busy the whole time, this class. The question is, have we enjoyed it? And the unbusy one kind of gives us permission to really enjoy the workings of our process, our functioning.

[68:48]

And no matter what we say in the world in the busy world no matter what no matter whether we say you know this business is really worthwhile paying attention to still it's the actual willingness to pay attention to it that's the unbusy one all the promotions and stuff or demotions of what's happening to us all the encouragements and good stories about what's happening or all the saying this is terrible that's happening this is just more busyness But the actual, the actuality of our being willing to experience what's happening to us, that's, that's the other side of what's happening to us. We only have a few more minutes on this case, unless you guys want to, you know, this is kind of, say goodbye now to case 21. That's a good way to say goodbye.

[69:55]

Let's cry a little bit, some of us. Case 21 has been a good friend, hasn't it? But you can come to visit it again later. Secretly, outside of class, you can discuss it. But we're going to go on now. Next week we're going to go to Case 22. Unless you say otherwise. Yes? A hermit? I'm going to try a hermeneutic question. Hermeneutic, oh yeah, hermeneutic. Anyway, two things I was wondering about. Later we talked about the snake handler, and I was... And then later, the sentence after that is, the doings of childhood seem shameful when not. Yes. So, in thinking about the snake handler, I was thinking of snakes as a kind of gnosis or knowing.

[71:04]

Is that sort of a way of saying a person who has done the confession, we'd say, as we've been saying, or noticing this self, that knowing heart. That's one piece of the question. And the other, the childhood versus old, is this sort of a commentary on the stages of understanding, maybe? I don't know. What I thought in childhood is sort of seeing the self before it... it more reflected on itself, and then as you're old or as sage, then you're looking back and seeing or understanding the behavior, the unaware behavior. You could read it that way. You could also read that the

[72:05]

the things we do in our childhood, although they're lovely in their spontaneity and innocence, there's more, there's... Still, even though they're beautiful in that way, still they're somewhat embarrassing when we look back on them from the point of view of later developments, even though in some ways they're better than what we're doing now. Still, and as a matter of fact, now that we've gotten older, Not only do we not have the spontaneity of youth, but we feel embarrassed by the time when we were better. So we're really a mess. That's another way to read it. But also another way to read it is he was kind of showing off, even though it was spontaneous. It was a kind of gaudy to be throwing staffs down on the ground and acting like they're snakes. But actually, as we mentioned last time, when he threw the staff down on the ground, really it did become the snake.

[73:11]

He was a sorcerer. He was a trickster. He made the stick turn into a snake. And he was just a youngster and he was able to do that. But still looking back now, it's part of the dynamic in Zen is that we're not supposed to be you know in some sense we're pretending like we're not doing that kind of stuff we're not doing any of that shamanistic stuff and yet these people do that kind of thing in their youthful exuberance they manifest their abilities in shamanistic functioning now and then but later it looks it's kind of embarrassing that's one way to see that We will be studying this snake business more later. Case 24. having shed illusions and enlightenment, having cut off holy and ordinary, although there are not so many things, setting up host and guest and distinguishing noble and mean is a special house.

[75:23]

It's not that There is no giving jobs on assessment of ability. But how do you understand siblings with the same breath, adjoining branches? Although you are freed from delusion and enlightenment, and have exhausted holiness and ordinariness. A particular capability is still needed to establish who is host and who is guest and to distinguish between noble and base. It's not that there's no measuring of character or assigning of work How do you understand kindred spirits of the same branch?

[76:37]

Kindred spirits or same breath, okay? Spirit and breath. Kindred spirits, the same breath on the same branch. How do you tell the difference between the two? Okay? Between the two brothers? So close. Siblings of the same branch. The same branch of the tree, of the lineage. Okay? Two brothers of the same branch. Same teacher. How do you tell a difference between these two brothers? You're too busy? You should know there's one who's not busy. Okay? That's one level. How do you tell the difference between the two? But there's something else that has one breath. Your life. Same breath, same branch, same life, but there's siblings there.

[77:45]

There's two brothers or two sisters in the same breath. How do you tell the difference between the two? Moment by moment, how do you tell the difference between these kindred spirits, between these siblings which have one breath? This is a question of this story. Which moon is this? So this is called a koan. This is your koan. Which moon is this? Which sibling is this?

[78:46]

You can take this and work on it for the rest of the week, rest of the month, rest of the year. the rest of the century. And you can even work on it into the next century. Which moon is this? Which of the two kindred spirits is this? Anyway, For the sake of fun, we'll go on to Case 22 next week. And if you need a copy, there's some up here. I'll pick it up after class. You have two weeks to get ready for this. Thank you for your attention.

[79:57]

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