So I'd like to begin by reiterating one of his basic, or perhaps his most basic message, and that is to realize awakening immediately, using nothing but this body-mind. Without trying to change this body-mind into something else, just to completely settle into this as it really is. To settle the self, completely on the self.

[01:16]

One of the theme songs of two practice periods ago was, to accord with the causal nexus. To be in complete accord with the causal network that you are now in. Not to get ahead of it, not to be behind it. With the confidence that this is the right view. And that positive transformations of this world of suffering will naturally arise if

[02:32]

we can completely accept this situation as it is. Not a dream of this situation, not to accept a dream of this situation, but to accept this situation as it is. As the Avatamsaka Sutra says, the basic affliction of ignorance itself is the immutable knowledge of the Buddhas. Doesn't say a dream of the basic affliction of ignorance is the immutable knowledge of the Buddhas. The immutable knowledge of the Buddhas is the basic affliction of ignorance as it is.

[03:33]

This Buddha sees, and by seeing what the basic affliction of ignorance is, realizing what it is, is Buddha's awakening. Buddha doesn't try to change the basic affliction of ignorance into something else. But Buddha simply awakens to what it is. This is the foundation of Buddha's way, it's the foundation of the Zen school. I think it's Nanyue Huairang, the Sixth Ancestor's dear disciple, one of the main disciples,

[04:53]

when he came to the Sixth Ancestor, Huaineng, Huaineng said, What is it that thus comes? And Huairang said, To say that it's this missed the mark. The Ancestor said, Well then, is there no practice in realization? And Huairang said, I don't say there's no practice in realization, just that it cannot be defiled. And the Ancestor said, This undefiled way has been practiced by all the Buddhas.

[06:01]

You are thus, I am thus too. I'm glad to see you, kid. What is it that thus comes? To say that it's this already misses the mark. What is your body-mind? To say it's this already misses the mark. Just your body-mind as it is. Not pointing to it even and saying it's this. Not the slightest discrepancy, subject and object. The body-mind is not an object of your awareness.

[07:10]

So you can't say it's this. It can only be thus. And you can't say it is thus even. It only can be thus. So we don't say there's no practice in realization. We don't say there's no transformation. Only that this transformation cannot be defiled. There can be transformation, but it is not transformation by trying to transform something. It is transformation through completely settling into that which is going to get transformed. It is only through complete acceptance of this body-mind and therefore complete acceptance of this world as it is that this world will be transformed. And we deeply want to transform this world.

[08:13]

Want this world to be transformed. But if we don't accept this world of suffering and in particular if we don't accept this world of suffering as it is here in this body and mind which is the only way we know it anyway we don't accept it. It gets transformed anyway, but not in a beneficial way. The world is the consequences of our attitudes and our aspirations. If we have the right attitudes, the world will be transformed in a beneficial direction, in a positive way. If we have the wrong attitudes and the wrong aspirations the world will be transformed into more suffering. The right aspiration is non-dual thinking.

[09:15]

The wrong aspiration is dualist thinking. To think that you can change this world or change yourself into something else is simply the wrong attitude, the wrong view. But if you can settle yourself onto yourself completely if you have confidence in that and that that will transform the world this is the right view. So it doesn't mean that you like the world the way it is and yet you're grateful for it. Because this world, this body and mind is the only vehicle in this moment that you can use to realize Buddha now.

[10:17]

What is it that does count? To say that it's this, misses the mark. What is it that does count? Then is there no transformation? I don't say there's no transformation only that this transformation cannot be defiled. So, just a second. So you got that? So defilement means thinking that you can create that transformation? The defilement in this case is to say there is my body-mind that's one defilement. To say this is it, that's one defilement. Another defilement would be to think that you can create the transformation.

[11:40]

You don't create the transformation. You, as you are, creates the transformation. You not being the slightest bit off sides using football terminology you being you without any doubt about that. You being you as you really are, that is the transformation. But if you look at yourself or look at your practice over there already that is saying it's this and you missed the mark. Not to mention if you look at your practice over there and try to make your practice better or worse or anything. If you play with your practice as an object that distance, that creates a transformation but unwholesome transformation, unfortunate transformation

[12:45]

so all, many people, both Buddhist meditators and ordinary people all over the world of other religions and non-religions are reaching out and trying to grab the self as an object and make it better or maybe make it worse. That dualism causes a transformation too but a painful transformation, a transformation into suffering. The non-dual accordance with the causal situation with your life as it is, not even you according with it but just being itself, that's undefiled. Yes? Do you use the word defiled because you are putting a name to this? Is that the defilement, putting a name to something? Well if you put a name to it as an object, the basic defilement is making it an object. Thinking that something is out there, separate from yourself

[13:50]

then you're over here and the causal situation is over there. And then of course as soon as there's something out there, you name it. So the naming then provides further vehicle for bewitchment into that style of living. And then you can manipulate situations and so on. And you do manipulate them but in an unwholesome unfortunate way because of that. It says it cannot be defiled so even if you're pointing to it, it can't be separated it can't be defiled. So thinking that you're saying this is delusion. Right, it can't be defiled either. So this world is the result

[14:53]

of living beings actions views and aspirations. And I think that most of our aspirations are pretty good. Namely we want to save all sentient beings, we want to release ourselves and all people all living beings from afflictions and entanglements we want to understand all the different teachings and we want to realize the Buddha way. This kind of aspiration transforms the world. And if a bodhisattva develops this type of vow, works at it works at it, works at it, it does eventually transform the world. But our attitudes I don't know about our attitudes, our attitudes are a little bit harder for us to keep pure

[15:57]

to keep non-dualistic or to reiterate not in their non-dual purity. So it's hard for me even to talk without slipping into dualism. For Dogen Zenji one of my views of him is that he has a phenomenal emphasis on the phenomenal very strong emphasis on the phenomenal. And part of what I mean by that is that he's emphasizing that it must be the phenomenal you must know the phenomena. So for example

[17:01]

if you're sitting zazen and you're trying to settle into your body mind you should know whether you're settling into a dream of your body or a physical sensation. You should know whether the posture you're working with is a concept or a physical sensation. If you have a concept of your posture and you know it's a concept, you can settle into the concept of your posture. But if you have a concept of your posture and you think you're settling into and being aware of your body as a physical thing then you're not recognizing your body as it is. And although you're willing to accept your body in fact you're confused.

[18:02]

So one side of the practice is to be willing to accord with the causal nexus. The other aspect is to know what it is and be clear and not confused about what it is. So what's posture? Posture is upright posture. Not leaning to the right or to the left, forward or backward, right? But is the way you're using, is the way you're figuring out what leaning forward and backwards, right and left is that a dream of forward and backwards? Or is it actual physical sensation you're using? It's complicated.

[19:05]

Sometimes I look at people and they don't seem to me to be orienting upright in relationship to gravity. I can see them with my eyes. They can't see themselves. To me they're a physical thing. I can also have a concept of them. But it's based on a physical thing. I shouldn't say I can have a concept. I do have a concept of them. What I'm going to talk about now is a little bit difficult to understand. Now when I say that I say it not to frighten you and have you stop listening, but to tell you if you're having a little difficulty with what I'm talking about now or the way I'm talking, that's understandable that you might have some trouble. Because this is a little bit different way of talking than you may be used to.

[20:10]

Shakyamuni Buddha said in describing the five skandhas the first skandha, form, under that we have a thing called body. A conventional word, body. So he uses the conventional word even though he other places says there is no such thing as a body. Except as a concept or a word there's no physical thing called a body that you can experience. There's no empirical basis for a physical body as something which has arms and legs and a head. There's no such physical experience as an arm. What kind of, what are the categories of physical experience?

[21:38]

Color. Sound. Smell. Taste. Touch. There's no touch which is an arm. There's no smell which is an arm. There's no color which is an arm. There's no sound which is an arm. There's no taste which is an arm. An arm is a concept. There's no empirical basis for the experience of an arm. There is empirical basis for the data which we use to dream up an arm. So if you're sitting and you're aware of arms and legs and spines and chests and things like that that's fine but you're not actually relating to physical data at that time.

[22:41]

You're relating to a concept which is fine if you know that that's what you're thinking of. And in a sense upright posture is not necessarily a physical posture. Upright posture means awakeness to what is physical and what is mental. And being able to discern which is which. And also to have an uprightness and awakeness in the middle of physical sensations. But first what are physical sensations? What is the actual phenomena of a physical sensation? I'm having a physical sensation. I hear sounds. I hear sounds. My own voice.

[23:44]

But I really don't hear a voice but I hear some sound. I also hear some sound which I might think is rain and I might say it's the sound of the frost melting off the roof. When I first heard that sound I was happy. I thought, oh, it's raining. And someone told me, no, it's just the sound of frost melting off the roof. But before it's identified there is a physical sensation out there. However, when I know it as an object it is not a physical sensation. It is a concept. As soon as I'm aware of it as an object I'm aware of it after it's been converted from a sound into a concept. But still is it a concept of a concept

[24:51]

or a concept of a physical sensation? I propose that to sit upright in correct bodily posture means that you sit upright in the middle of this awareness in the middle of these concepts and know which are physical concepts and which are concept concepts and which are feelings and which are emotions. And that sitting upright in the middle of these experiences such experiences and knowing what they are this is what's meant by realizing Buddha using nothing other than body-mind. And confidence and faith in the Buddha way means that you actually can live there

[25:51]

or live here in such a world of experience. And you trust that living in such experience only in such experience and using only such experience is the way to benefit yourself and all beings. And actually that using anything else will be a disservice to all beings. This is a flinching from the real responsibility. Following your breath has many benefits.

[26:52]

One of them is that you can get concentrated. Another one is well, I guess the other one is I want to mention is that if you can follow your breath you become cured of your jadedness. And jaded means weary, tired out. Reading the Avatamsaka Sutra and hearing and reading descriptions of worlds

[27:54]

on top of worlds [...] reading about the world which is above this one going past as many worlds as there are atoms in a Buddha field whose name is such and such and whose Buddha is such and such and above this world, past as many worlds as there are atoms in a Buddha field which is shaped like this and constituted like this, whose name is this and whose Buddha is this which is constituted this way and named this and whose Buddha is this and above this and above this and above this, and above this, and above this, and then to the right of this, and above that, and above that, and above that, and to the right of that.

[28:56]

Being willing to read this cures me of being jaded. But if I skip over all that and go to a place where something interesting is happening in the text, and then if I skip over other things like that and go to another place where there's something interesting happening in the text, I become more and more jaded. And I become less and less willing to just be in the realm of my experience. So following the breath is nice to concentrate, but also it brings out the person who is willing to follow the breath, who doesn't need something more interesting than the actual experience

[30:00]

of the breath. We need this innocent, unhurt, dear child. That's the one who is interested in actual phenomenal existence, who actually thinks it's interesting, who can actually see what the basic affliction of ignorance is. When my daughter was learning to speak, she was learning to speak English and Chinese at the same time. And for example, when she was learning dog and cat, when she was learning dog, if she

[31:14]

saw a dog, she would say, dog. If you're riding in a car, if you drove by a pet store, she would see the dogs in the pet store window. And she would see the dogs in the street, and she would see dogs in other cars. And she would see dogs on people's shirts, and she would see dogs on covers of books. And she would see dogs on signposts and on television sets. She would see dogs everywhere. Constantly seeing dogs. When she was learning airplanes, she saw airplanes everywhere. I was driving down the street with her, and she was sitting in the front seat next to

[32:18]

me. And in Chinese, the word for airplane is feiji, which means flying machine, or winged machine. And she said, feiji. And I said, where? And she pointed. I stopped the car because I couldn't see anything, and I looked. And maybe 30,000 or 40,000 feet in the air was an airplane. And it was as tiny a spot as I could possibly recognize as an airplane. In this huge blue sky, she saw this tiny, tiny little thing, these little wings sticking out there. It wasn't by trying to see Buddhas inside of atoms of worlds or anything special like

[33:20]

that. She was just trying to see airplanes. And she was willing to work on seeing airplanes, not because she was trying to work on seeing airplanes, but because she wanted to see where the airplanes were. This is a child. Children do that. It's natural. They don't work at it. Nobody tells them to do it. You can't stop them. Put them in a room with no airplanes. They'll find the airplanes. So how is it that the child can be interested in phenomenal experience like that? How can they do that? It's quite natural. It's the Buddha nature. And so that's why I've been emphasizing these other practices, because in fact, we may have

[34:38]

some trouble, some resistance to living at this very basic, simple, innocent level of experience, the most basic level we can possibly be at, because it's very repetitive. It's the same thing over and [...] over. Or there's some difference, but it's basically the same. Is it lotuses of flaming pop-nots, jewels? Or is it lotuses of incense, pearls, of brilliant arrays of top-not jewels?

[35:39]

Not that important a difference. Reading over these lists, I saw one interesting one the other night. It was that this one world was constituted of the sounds of the transformations of Buddhas. In other words, that as a sentient being gets transformed into a Buddha through metamorphosis, it makes a sound. It was the sound of metamorphosis of sentient beings becoming Buddhas. Those sounds were the sounds that were the actual substance of one particular world. Matter, you know, material existence is sounds, smells and so on. So imagine a world, the substance of the world was sounds. Not tangible things, but just sounds.

[36:42]

And the sounds that were there were the sounds that the metamorphosis of becoming a Buddha. That was one interesting thing I saw among all these worlds. And I underlined it. I'm not criticizing myself for having a mind that thought that was interesting. I still think it's interesting. What I'm pointing to is a mind that can stay with what's going on in lieu of interesting things like that. Thank you.

[37:49]

So one view that I'm proposing to you is that when you're sitting here, for example, you're sitting here working on your posture. And perhaps you're trying to follow your breathing. Let's say you're trying to follow your breathing. It's not so much that you're going to be successful at Buddhism if you can follow your breathing, although that will probably be good. But rather that following your breathing may help you utilize not only the breathing or the breath to realize Buddha immediately. But it may help you use the opportunity of the many other experiences besides your breath that are happening too to realize Buddha directly. In Zen we don't concentrate on the breath and then stop.

[39:11]

Sometimes it happens, but we don't necessarily follow the breath and then not see the wall anymore or not hear the bell ring at the end of the period or not hear the other sounds and smells and tastes and touches. And of course many people while they're following their breathing think of other things and actually feel distracted from following their breathing and sometimes get upset about being distracted from following their breathing. But being upset about being distracted from following your breathing, being upset about being distracted from following your breathing itself is the immutable knowledge of the Buddhas. If that's the thought you have in your mind, that's the one you have to utilize. I'm not saying it's good to be distracted.

[40:14]

I'm saying you have to use that one. You can't use another one. That's the one you've got. The nice thing about following your breathing is that if you can be simple enough, naive enough, innocent enough, childlike enough to spend your time following your breathing, you may be innocent enough to use a distracted thought also to realize Buddha directly, immediately. Or to let Buddha use that to realize itself. What time is it? Twenty-nine to ten.

[41:19]

So in this way I'm talking, following the breathing is a concentration exercise, and it's a very simple concentration exercise, or a simple topic anyway. And part of the advantage of it is to tenderize your awareness so that you will be willing to live in the phenomenal world. And again, people may theoretically be willing to accord with the causal nexus, but when it actually comes down to it, even if it's not a bad causal nexus, even if it's not a painful causal nexus, they often have trouble according with a boring causal nexus.

[42:42]

Or simply a phenomenal experience. So these so-called preparatory practices are to dualistically remove that sophisticated, jaded consciousness which is unwilling to live in the world of experience. And the world of direct experience is the world of joy. Thank you very much.

[44:16]

Thank you.

[44:21]

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