As usual, you have come here on a good day. This is not without reason. Today is December 4th. On December 4th, 1971, our teacher, our auspicious teacher, entered complete peace. Every year is a... is another December 4th. Which many of us feel deeply on that day.

[01:11]

For me, this one is particularly touching because it was 39 years ago when he passed away, and he was 39 years older than me when he passed away. So now I'm the age of our teacher when he passed away. In a way, he seemed like an old Zen priest when he died. So maybe I'm an old Zen priest. In the last few months of his life,

[02:16]

he gradually was unable to go down to the Zendo, or go down to the Zen temple. He lived on the second or third floor of the temple, depending on if you count the basement as the first floor. The Zendo was in the basement, so he had to go down two stories from his room to go to the Zazen, and go down one story to go to, like, the dining room. So gradually, he stopped giving Dharma talks, stopped giving doksan, stopped going to Zendo, stopped going to meals, and mostly was just on the floor of his apartment. He was receiving some you might say

[03:25]

you could say medical treatment, or you could just say medicinal treatment. He was receiving massage and moxibustion. My room was right next to his. I was available to help him to help he and his wife if they needed anything. And I was happy that they would sometimes ask me for help. I said to him, I asked him if I could just be in the room when he received his medicinal attentions. If I could just sit in the room quietly while he was massaged and while he received moxibustion. And he said, OK. So, there he was in his

[04:31]

in his interview room, his doksan room, lying on the ground, the great teacher, on his abdomen, on his stomach, with his back exposed for the treatments. And I was 39 years younger sitting cross-legged watching. I watched his body being massaged. I watched how he received the massage. I watched him wince when the when the cones burned down close to his skin. And the person would then take them off. One day the person who

[05:33]

offered this service was sick. So he said to me, I think he said, you do it. You've been watching. So I did it. And he said, pretty good. His body was teaching me, even though I wasn't saying anything, my teacher's body was teaching me in his illness. Those teachings embrace and sustain me now.

[06:38]

And I was encouraged. They encouraged me to be intimate with old age, disease, and death. They encouraged me to be intimate with birth and death. As I try to practice being intimate with birth and disease and death, as I remember to be intimate with them, not to try to get rid of them, but to be intimate with them, I become more confident that intimacy with disease and old age and death, birth and death,

[07:42]

that intimacy with these comings and goings is peace and ease. I know some of you over many years, I know you've had diseases and physical problems, and that in some cases you have received some medical or medicinal assistance, and are in less pain and disease now than you were a while ago. I'm happy for you. Recently, I was having quite a bit of pain around my right hip. Now, and people ask me, How are you feeling? And they say, Are you feeling better? I'm kind of a stuffy Zen priest,

[08:48]

so I say, I don't feel better, but I'm in much less pain. In other words, I don't consider less pain better. I try not to. There's a slope which I can slip down on, where I would consider less pain better. But I do consider intimacy with pain to be good, to be ease. And the pain that I'm trying to be intimate with now is less pain. It's less than before. And I guess almost everybody in this temple is in a situation where your pain isn't so strong that you couldn't come here today. All of us have some pain, probably.

[09:51]

All of us have some pain because if there's if there's the slightest separation between us and our birth and death, it's somewhat painful. So in the moments where we are not able to be intimate, there is some discomfort, some anxiety. And again, to be intimate with the anxiety that comes from not being intimate pacifies, brings peace and ease to the fear and anxiety. So our teacher,

[11:06]

I feel, did did his best to be intimate with his with his cancer, his liver cancer thirty-nine years ago, thirty-eight, and nine months ago when it became clear that he had liver cancer. I think he practiced with it. In an exemplary way, he set an example for us. And this example could be called the example of intimacy with birth and death. It could be called the example of enlightenment. Enlightenment that can live

[12:09]

in the misery of birth and death intimately. That can live in the misery of birth and death with peace and ease. And then, giving up that peace and ease and entering into birth and death again. Joyfully teaching beings who have not learned this yet. Today, we can do the annual memorial ceremony for our teacher. Right here.

[13:09]

We have an altar. We have pictures of him. We know his name. We have lovely offering to our teacher. We have offering furniture we can use. We have songs we can sing to him. So we can do a ceremony for him in just a little while. Joyfully celebrating his coming to us, his practicing with us, and his leaving us. I came here from a monastery called Zen Mountain Center or Zen Mind Monastery. And

[14:15]

I came here just recently. One of the practitioners there came to see me. She's from Germany. And and I don't remember exactly what she said, but it was something like for the first six weeks of this fall training period, I didn't call home. But then maybe I got word from home, people saying, what's going on? So I called. And

[15:20]

when I heard the voices and the concerns of my family, I maybe I'll add before I say that, I wanted to settle down before I called them. And I felt quite settled. And I called them, and when I talked to them, I felt really agitated and disturbed talking to them. And then she said, is this just a bubble? And I thought she was referring to the monastic situation, the monastic container. She could have been asking about life itself. But I thought she was referring to the monastic container. Is this just a bubble that we go into, and then when

[16:22]

life situations come, it just pops, and we're just, you know, at a loss for how to live our life again? Is this a little bubble where we go in, and we have some problems, like getting up early in the morning and dealing with cold, and a rigorous schedule of activities that are quite challenging, and you know, if you resist, you really get uncomfortable. You have to really go with it, and otherwise it's really difficult. But then after you get with it for a while, things kind of start to calm down, and you feel kind of at ease and settled. Is this whole setup a bubble which can just be popped by the voice of a family member? And I said, well, you could say it's a bubble, yeah, or you could see it as like a greenhouse where you take these little seeds,

[17:26]

and you put them in some soil, and give them some warmth and some water, and they germinate, and then they start to sprout. And I also jumped, changed metaphors, and I said, it's like a candle behind me. That candle's burning, but you can blow it out with your breath. If you put it outside, it'll blow out in a breeze. And switching back to the sprout, this little sprout, if you put it in a field, cold or wind or an animal, you can just crush it. This settling down

[18:29]

and becoming intimate with our body-mind, our dynamic body-mind situation, as we start to settle with it, we find a flame, we find a little flicker of enlightenment, we find a little sprout of great compassion and wisdom starts to sprout. But it can be easily lost by a telephone call or an exhale. It can be easily lost by an illness or an insult. That's normal. A flame is easily blown out. A sprout is easily crushed. So it's necessary to actually protect

[19:29]

the baby, the baby body-mind, the baby attempts to be present with birth and death, to be intimate with it. It needs protection. It's normal that it needs protection and without protection it gets lost. And many of you have seen it arise, start to grow a little bit and be lost. Arise, start to grow a little bit and be blown out. So we do need to protect it. And a time comes when the fire gets so big that when you blow on it it just gets stronger. And when you put water on it it just makes gorgeous steam. So we do need to protect

[20:30]

this. We do need to protect it. One way to protect it is the way we've been doing this morning. Coming here and sitting quietly to protect this mind of enlightenment, the mind of intimacy with all things and all beings. We are fortunate to have good health, health good enough that we can be awake and quiet and still. With this moment, one moment like this makes a life worthwhile. Two, twice as much. However, if we wish to

[21:31]

have this not be lost, this ability to be present with what's happening, we need to realize some kind of container for it. Most of us are not so advanced that we can take care of this flame, take care of this sprout. With no container, there must be a container. And the container is, you could say, I could say to you now, welcome Sangha, welcome community. I also welcome the teaching and I welcome the Buddha to create a container here for this willingness and gradual development of the skill of being present and intimate with what's happening. When we do the ceremony,

[22:33]

the ceremony is part of making the container for this precious, fragile, Bodhi mind, mind of enlightenment. The Heart Sutra, at the end it says, the last thing it says is Bodhisvaha, which means enlightenment, welcome. That statement, enlightenment, welcome, is a little bubble which can protect Bodhi. Those words can protect enlightenment somewhat, especially if before that you say gone, gone, gone beyond, gone entirely beyond.

[23:34]

Gone beyond what? Gone beyond resistance to welcoming. Welcoming what? This and this. Go beyond all resistance to welcoming this and you'll be able to welcome the next moment. Start all over. Perform a memorial ceremony to an exemplar of giving up resistance to sickness and death for the sake of welcoming Bodhi and encouraging other people to practice his life and his death. Seem to be encouraging people to practice. I think the last time

[24:54]

we were here together I brought up the dharmakaya, the reality body. Dharmakaya means reality body, a true body of the Buddha. The true body of the Buddha doesn't come or go, isn't born and doesn't die. Intimacy doesn't come or go. Intimacy with coming doesn't come or go. Intimacy with going doesn't come or go. But, intimacy can give rise to the true body can give rise to a vow to teach people. And that vow, the power of that vow can cause an appearance in birth and death. So we have auspicious teachers like Suzuki Roshi who appear to be born, who appear

[25:55]

to leave Japan and come to San Francisco, who appear to be having rice for lunch, who appear to eat the rice, who appear to get sick, who appear to die so that we can have access to the intimacy which is not born and does not die. So we honor we honor that person and we honor the process by which reality manifests as a person who shows us how to be intimate, how to be at peace with great pain and illness. So today, while we're not too sick, we can practice being intimate with being not too sick. Or anyway, being intimate

[26:59]

with how sick we are today. And this creates auspicious conditions for being intimate with how sick we are tomorrow. And this creates intimate conditions for being intimate with big illness and big death that will come. All the while, we have the joy of practice and the joy of encouraging others to do so. And it's just a bubble. It just goes away. So we need another bubble. Every moment we gotta have a little bubble, a little greenhouse to protect the flame, to protect the sprout so it can grow. And as it grows,

[28:01]

it starts more and more to make its own bubbles. The way a flame grows is it makes its own protection by getting bigger. A tree grows by making its roots get more pervasive. So, we're growing the flame of the Dharma lamp and the tree of enlightenment. Now, before I forget, it's before I forgot.

[29:01]

We're now at the time called before I forgot. In other words, we're at the time of me remembering. And while I'm remembering before I forget, I was asked to mention something about the next major event scheduled for this temple, which is a kind of New Year's greeting ceremony. This ceremony is scheduled for January 2nd, 2011, starting at about 9.30 in the morning. We're going to have a sitting like today. But as part of the sitting, there will be a an opportunity to express request for another year of teaching

[30:04]

from whoever you want to request teaching from. This started last year here because I think in December or or November, one of the members here named Laurie said to me, is there some formal way to request teaching? And I said, well, yeah. And one of the ways is at New Year's to do it. I said, for example, the priests who I'm training or the priests that I'm practicing with on New Year's Day, they write out a traditional document where they formally request their teacher to teach another year. They express their gratitude and ask the teacher to teach another year and wish the teacher will be around for another year. And so that's

[31:07]

a traditional practice. And there's a traditional form and last year non-priests did that form. They wrote out this statement or they made up something different that they felt was their way to formally request teaching in the coming year. And we had that ceremony here where people brought their documents and we bowed to each other, wishing each other Happy New Year and so we did that ceremony. Goodbye Robin. And so we're scheduled to do that again this coming year and you and other people are welcome, if you wish, to make that request to do so. You could also come to the sitting, even if you didn't want to make the request, that would be okay too.

[32:08]

Like you came this time and you didn't make the request. You didn't bring a document, so of course that's alright too. But for those who wish to do it, we'll have that ceremony on the second. Before that, over at Green Gulch, the priests will do it over there, a smaller group, and then people over here will do it after that. Once again, if you wish to know, if you wish to do that practice and you'd like to know what the traditional words are, I believe you can find it online. Is that right? I think Irene put it with the announcement. It was with the announcement. So there's an announcement. If you didn't get the announcement, you can contact Irene. If you want to. So this is totally optional. Don't feel any obligation or pressure to do so.

[33:11]

From outside. Maybe inside you feel an obligation. I'm generally awestruck by the lofty quality of the practitioners of this Sangha, including the Green Gulch Sangha, of course, and the Tathagata Sangha, and the City Center Sangha. The people down there are just awesome practitioners. It's really great. I hope they don't stop. I hope they can continue

[34:16]

to practice the way they're practicing. The ones who are practicing in this awesome way. The people who are... The people who forget, I don't wish that they continue to forget. I hope they start remembering. But so many of you are doing so well. I'm just... I'm encouraged to continue to take care of this body longer. Even though Suzuki Roshi left at 67, I'm willing to continue beyond his age. Is there anything you wish to bring up today before we do the ceremony? This morning? Before we do the ceremony? Did you know why you wanted to be in that room with Suzuki Roshi?

[35:23]

Did I know why I wanted to? Did you know what the teaching was? I wouldn't say that I knew why I wanted to, but I knew I wanted to. I knew that. Because I did. And I noticed that I wanted to be. I just thought... I didn't, you know... I thought just being with him, that's mostly what I wanted to do anyway. I didn't particularly care if he was giving a talk or not. I didn't come to Zen Center thinking, well, I'm going to come to Zen Center because he's going to give talks. I didn't necessarily think that that would be involved. The main reason why I came was, I thought, I want to be like those people in those Zen stories, which I didn't even know the word Bodhisattva. But I guess I wanted to be like the Bodhisattvas in those Zen stories. And then I heard they had a training program. So then I started to do the training program, but I found I had some difficulties with the training program,

[36:25]

in that I didn't know if I was doing the training right. And also I noticed I wasn't doing it very consistently because it was kind of hard. Because, you know, nobody else was doing it with me and, you know, I have other things to do. So I thought, like study or something, or I won't mention the other things. So I thought, well, maybe if I went to a place where people did it in a group, that it would be easier to do it. And if there was a teacher there, I could ask the teacher if I was performing the training right, the meditation. So I found out about this place where you could do the training. So when I got there, there was a teacher. And there was more than one teacher, but there were other good teachers too. But Suzuki Roshi was the senior teacher. So I just wanted to... I just thought if I'm just with him, then I'll be able to get any kind of instruction I need with the practice. So when he stopped giving...

[37:29]

having doksan and lectures, it didn't make that much difference to me because basically the way I saw the practice was just being with him. And then he could see my practice, and if he had any feedback, he could tell me, which he did. So for me, the fact of not doing any public teaching anymore didn't make that much difference, unless I couldn't be with him. Then it would make a difference. But I could be. Because as many of you know, I was the director of the building at that time, so I was in charge of room assignments. So I assigned myself the room next to his. So... I can't remember. I think I did it with a sense of good fortune that I could have a room next to my teacher so that whenever he went anyplace, he had to walk by my room. And if he needed me for anything, I was right there. So I did feel really good about it,

[38:30]

and it was a very nice room, too. Other people had nice rooms, too, but not that one. I didn't kick anybody out of it. It was vacant. I waited until nobody was there, and then moved in. Room 10. So, yeah, that was very nice to just be with him. So when he was having treatments or when he was having tea in his kitchen, they were just as good as me as, you know, big Dharma talk or something. So I didn't know what it would be like other than the usual, the usual, which is intimacy, is what it's like, and intimacy is challenging. So, again, I've told a number of times that although I came to Zen Center to be with a teacher, and I didn't think of being intimate with a teacher, but, in fact, now I see that's what I wanted. I wanted to intimately meet the teacher. But, actually, the meditation,

[39:31]

now I understand, is not just something I do by myself. The meditation is to be sitting and meeting the teacher when you're meditating. To meet the Buddha, to meet the great teacher while you're sitting is what the sitting really is. So here, today, you're sitting here, but you're not sitting by yourself. You're sitting with all the, with the Sangha, and you're sitting with all the Buddhas. So, yeah, I didn't know, I don't know what it's going to be like to meet the Buddha, but I know that's what I'm going in the room for. And to watch him, to watch my dear teacher, who is sick and suffering, receive medical attention, this was, I thought that would be a good thing. Now I see that I wanted, this is my way, at that time, under those circumstances, to meet the Buddha, who is not Suzuki Roshi,

[40:34]

and not not Suzuki Roshi, who is not me, and who is not not me. The Buddha is not inside or outside. The Buddha is our intimacy with our life, which includes all beings. That's what I wanted to do, but I didn't know what it would be like. But I was very happy with it. I was very happy to be able to go and sit there. And I still am. I feel so happy that I could sit there and watch my teacher on his last days. It's so nice. It's so, I don't know, I often say I don't know how I was so fortunate to be able to be with my dying teacher. I don't know. It doesn't seem, I can't see how I did anything good enough to give me this opportunity. But the opportunity was given. He said, OK.

[41:35]

He didn't say, You can't be there. He said, OK. That guy said, OK. He let me be there. It's amazing. And not only did he let me be there, but he noticed that I was there. So he knew that I was watching and that I was learning so that I could do it. So, yeah. And that's the greenhouse. That's the greenhouse. So when we're sitting, we need the teacher there with us. Remember, the Buddhas are with you, supporting you to be intimate with your experience. You can't do it by yourself. You need support. And it's there. It's waiting for you to invite it. Not waiting. It's present and still waiting for you to invite the presence of support

[42:36]

for you to do the difficult work. And again, it is difficult. And I also told you many times that sometimes, when he wasn't sick, before he was sick, he would sometimes say, you know, come here, I want to show you something. Or, you know, give me a chance to be intimate with him. And sometimes, in the meeting, he would ask me to perform a ritual. For example, to chant one of these echoes. This dedication. We're going to be doing a dedication during the ceremony where we dedicate the merit of our ceremony to our teacher, to our founder. So he asked me to recite or perform the echo in Japanese in his presence. So I did. I went.

[43:38]

And I was... I thought, how kind of him to give me a chance to receive his teaching about this chanting. So I recited like that. And he was watching me. And then... And then he would give me some feedback. And then he would ask me to recite, to chant again. And then he would give me some feedback. And after he did that for a while, I kind of started to feel kind of uncomfortable that he was giving me all this attention and all this feedback. I kind of started to feel uneasy with all this kindness. It was like there wasn't much room for anybody to be there besides the chanting and the Buddha. So I thought, well, that's enough of that.

[44:40]

I don't want to take any more of your time. See you later. It was just, you know, I didn't... I was concerned about myself in that situation. And I wanted to get myself out of it. Even though the whole point of coming to Zen Center was to get this attention, I wanted to get out of it. So... Even though the whole point of being born is to be intimate with our life, when we actually start getting intimate, we say, I think let's go someplace else, okay? I don't want to take any more of your time. When he was sick, his feedback was not so intense. So I didn't... When he was sick, I didn't feel so much like, well, I don't want to take any more of your time. I had no excuse, you know. I wasn't taking his time. So then I didn't try to get away. But when he was really, you could say, bearing down on me, but it wasn't really bearing down. It was very gentle. But it was just

[45:40]

too much love to stand, you know, too much love to receive and still have somebody there. You know? So the somebody who was still there wanted to get out of the room. But then he said, no, no, it's okay, I have more time, don't worry. And then tried to get out again. No, no, it's okay. Finally, anyway, those interviews did end. And I'm here to tell the story. But it's hard. It's hard to be intimate with self-concern. With, am I performing well? Does the teacher approve of me? Am I looking stupid? Am I looking smart? Am I looking pretty? It was interesting when you said that the love and your anxiety coming when you felt like somebody is there.

[46:41]

Is that because we don't want to be seen? Is it, why the anxiety? I think we do want to be seen and we'd like to be seen and also make sure that what, that the person who's looking at us thinks we're pretty good. So we do want to be seen but we don't want to be rejected after we're seen. We want to be seen by somebody we respect. We want to be, we want to be seen by a genuine seer. We want to be seen by genuine authentic vision. And, but then when the vision looks at us we sometimes say, what if they see my pettiness? What if they see my selfishness? We get scared about that. Then, then we kind of think, well maybe I should get out of the room before they see that. So far it's been going quite well. If they look, if I stay any longer they might notice you know,

[47:44]

something. So, I want to get out of here rather than, okay, go ahead, look, see that. See that pettiness. Suzuki Roshi, actually, could speak English really well, but he couldn't hear, in some ways, he was somewhat limited in terms of what he could hear. Like if you just said to him, hey Roshi, we're going to go get in the car now, he wouldn't get that. Yeah, I didn't get that. Yeah. I made it hard. He'd say, Roshi, we're going to get in the car now, he would get that. Or if somebody said a long paragraph to him at a Dharma talk or something, they say a long paragraph question, he'd answer the last

[48:47]

phrase at the end, which worked fine. The question was too long, anyway. But people who could hear it and understand it might try to deal with it, but he couldn't, so he just answered the last part and it was perfect. But still, he did have some problem in catching all the different parts of the speech. And yeah, so what was I bringing up this for? Anybody have any idea why I brought that up? Oh, you're so sweet. You're talking... Oh yeah, that, yeah. So, sometimes people would do a big complicated disclosure of some kind of like evil American thing that they were doing. You know? And even if they said it slowly, you know, if it got big enough,

[49:48]

he just couldn't follow it anymore. So he never, even the people who were telling him how bad their practice was, he couldn't get it. It had to have this, you know, go very slowly and carefully and explain how bad your practice was and then he'd probably go, oh my God, oh wow. But people, you know, so he didn't know how bad we were. He basically thought, you know, these people are great and then, we're trying to tell you something about... How darling. So, if he had known, you know, if we were Japanese, he'd probably know how bad our practice was and go back to Japan. Or go to Europe or someplace where people are not have such selfish practice. So, he was kind of misled in a way. And so as a result, a generation of Zen students

[50:49]

think, now here was a guy who loved us all. And he did. And there was no way for him not to, because he couldn't, you know, he couldn't find out how bad we were. The information just couldn't get to him. One time, he suggested, one of the students at Tassajara, he suggested this person be made, I think, director. And the other seniors, his other, his other senior students or actually more senior students who had already been director and so on, they said, oh, no, Roshi, it's not a good choice. And he said, well, why not? And they said, well, because, and then they told him some things he did, which he never did any, when he was with Suzuki Roshi, he was like, quite naturally, not trying to hide anything, but he was just like this really sweet, docile, devoted

[51:50]

person. You know, and that's what Suzuki Roshi saw. He said, let's make this guy, and he was smart and energetic, let's make him director. But when he got 50 feet away from Suzuki Roshi, he did things which you would not want the director to do. You wouldn't want that person to have the leader of the Tassajara Sangha who did those things. And so, the people told Suzuki Roshi what he did, which Suzuki Roshi never saw. But when he heard it, he says, oh, well, then maybe it's not a good idea for him to be director if he does that. So, in some ways, he was in a bubble. And in that bubble, there was all this love. Even he had a bubble. We need a bubble. Until, I guess, we're the whole universe. And we're working towards that, right? Universal

[52:52]

realization of the truth. Then there's no bubble necessary. But until then, even a great teacher needs a little bit of a bubble in order to be able to exude great warmth towards the students and encourage them. Sorry, what's your bubble? Hmm? What's your bubble? What's my bubble? Oh, Nobod, Tassajara, retreats I do. Those are my bubbles where I go someplace and everybody's like really good people, you know, excellent students, alert, you know. And even when they get feisty and so on, you know, it kind of makes it more interesting and lots of fun. That's my bubble. And in that bubble, the tree of faith and intimacy is growing.

[53:54]

Getting ready for the big wave to smash it to smithereens and meet that too, maybe. Confidence that that's the direction we're all heading. Confidence that that's the direction I'm heading so that eventually the bubble, well, the bubble does get bigger and it's broken but it popped but then it gets recreated. Like today, another recreation of a bubble. And then we're going to do a ceremony and make another bubble. And that'll pop and we have lunch bubble and we have work bubble. All these little situations where we can remember our intimacy with all beings and include all suffering beings, all enlightened beings. So, I don't have just one bubble, I have a constant parade of bubbles which are being

[54:56]

given to me and popped, given to me and popped, given to me and popped, given to you and popped, given to you and popped. And sometimes it's like given to you, popped, and where's the next bubble? I need a bubble. Where's a bubble? I'm like out here. No bubble. My practice is shot. It's gone. That's all over. Now I need some inspiration. Please help me. Oh, there it is. Thank you. Here we go again. Starting over. Here comes another sprout. Yes? Well, I'm glad you just said what you said about inspiration and the bubble. I find the notion of a bubble kind of disturbing. You find the notion disturbing? Yeah. Yeah, well this person thought it was disturbing too. So you need a bubble in which you can get the word about this bubble and deal with your disturbance. What she meant by the bubble

[55:59]

was the situation which was conducive to her being present with what's happening. That's what she meant. But also, the whole point is not to dismantle the bubble. The whole point is to be intimate, is to do the things you can do inside the bubble. And once you can be intimate with what's happening because you have a bubble around you, once you can be intimate with your life, when you have a container that supports you to be intimate, then the intimacy will take the bubble away. Once you, intimacy will allow you to dismantle the bubble. But first of all, you need some realization inside the bubble. And then you make a bubble, then you make a bubble again for yourself and others. So you know that story, right? The story is called How to Paint the Portrait of a Bird.

[57:00]

You know that story, don't you? You don't? I don't know. How unchildish of you. So, Jacques Priver, how do you, how to paint the portrait of a bird, a oiseau. It's in French, originally. So first, you get a canvas. And you take the canvas out and you put it by a tree in a forest or woods. Then you take the brush and you paint a cage. And then you paint the cage with the door open. And then inside the cage you paint something pretty, something useful, something beautiful

[58:01]

for the bird. So, here's an oboe. This is a cage we painted. You know? And we put some things inside for the bird. We want the bird to come into this cage, into this bubble. And so you came. The birdie. All the birds came. Then you then, then after you make the cage with the door open, then you sit still and wait for the bird to come. The bird may come quite soon, but it may take years. The quickness or slowness of the bird's coming has no rapport with the quality of the painting. When the bird comes,

[59:07]

if the bird comes, when it comes, you've already been sitting quietly, right? But when it comes, observe the most profound silence and stillness. When the bird goes into the cage, take the brush and gently close the door on the cage. Then, and then could be seven years later, then paint the bars of the cage away. But you don't paint the bars of the cage away until the bird is in the cage. And settled.

[60:07]

Serenely perched on her little, her little perch in the cage. So there she is, holding that little, that little piece of wood, you know, that they stand on, where they poop from. So she's perched on this little stick and you paint the, you paint the bars away so all the birds on the, standing in midair she can stand the vast spaciousness now because she's settled on that perch. You had something beautiful, something lovely, something useful for her so she could settle down there. Now she's settled. The whole point is not to paint the bars away. The bars are just a place where the bird will settle. The bars help the bird settle. The point is not to get the bars away. The point is to get the bird settled.

[61:13]

But that's not the whole point either. Now that the bird's settled, we paint the bars away. And then, and then we paint under the bird where there was the perch, now we paint a branch of a tree. And we paint the whole beautiful summer world back in. And then we wait again for the bird to sing. Yes? Is the open vastness that the bird came from originally that we want the bird to go back to? Wouldn't that be the enlightenment? Nope. Nope. That's part of it. But the birds already got that when you paint the cage away. The cage was a way you got the bird to come and settle down. And in the story, you had to settle down

[62:14]

before the bird would come. So somebody has to offer, somebody who's sitting still has to offer a place for the bird to come and settle down. And then you close the door on the bird so it will settle. Then you paint the bars away. Now the birds realize the vast openness. It came from vast openness. I know. It came there, but there's something besides coming and going from there. There's being settled there. When it came, it gave up being settled. Now everybody who's come from stillness and vastness is hysterical. We got to get people to calm down here. Yeah, you came from a good place. You came from a good family. Yeah, you did. You came from the best place. But now you've lost it. It isn't just we're going to send you back there. Before we send you back, we have to calm you down. We have to put you in a cage and you can bounce around the cage for a long time before you finally say,

[63:14]

okay, I'm going to sit down. So once you've settled down, now we're ready to remind her where she came from. Paint the bars away. But that's not the end of the story. The end of the story is not yet arrived. We have to wait for her to sing. She doesn't just return. She returns and sings. It's a joyful thing to be home again and you sing. So there's no final point, but just to go back to the vastness is not the end of the story. If you stop there, the story is not over. This story is over, not until they're singing. And even that's not the end of the story. The end of the story is when the bird sings that you can sign and say,

[64:16]

you can sign it. And you take, it sounds, people wince at this, but you take one of the feathers of the bird to make your pen and you sign it. That's the whole story. It isn't just returning. It's returning and singing. Yes? Doesn't it say if the bird doesn't sing, it doesn't mean it's a bad pen? No, it doesn't say that. It says something quite like that, except the opposite. Oh, the opposite. It says if the bird doesn't sing, it's not a good sign. Not a good sign. If the bird just sits there without singing, it's not a good sign. If the bird does sing, it's a sign that you can sign. So the point is that people have lost their way from where they come from. We don't only want to go back there ourselves, but we want to go back and then sing

[65:20]

to help others. It isn't just that we go back to our nice home, it's that we go back and we sing and tell people, you can go home and I'm going to make a cage for you. Buddhism is not just peace, it's also helping other people realize it. Did you get a point where you felt or noticed that Suzuki Roshi had signed off on your painting? No, I didn't. I was too young. And actually I said to him, one day I said, we don't have any problems, we being you and I, don't have any problems. That's basically what I said. In other words, we don't fight, you're not mean to me, I don't think you're mean to me. I find the way you relate to me,

[66:24]

I'm not saying any of this, but you're kind of easy on me, you're just one big encouragement. I just have a great time with you, things are going so well for me and you seem to be happy with me. I get the impression you're happy with my practice. And I am too, I'm not perfect, but I'm so happy to practice with you. To make a long story short, I said, we don't seem to have any problems. And he said, we will. But he died before we had problems. We had some problems, but they weren't big, you know. He pointed some things out to me, but so gently, it wasn't that difficult to receive. Basically, it wasn't that hard. But if he had practiced longer, we would have had problems. So, since he died for the last 39 years, I've had the problems that I would have had with him.

[67:29]

But he wasn't around in a physical human body, so the problem I've had is the problem I've had with many teachers in the Sangha, all the problems I've had. And I've had some problems, and people have problems with me. So it's been kind of a problematic situation, and so I finally did have the problems. So in a sense, all the problems I'm having and have had are the problems that I would have had with him. And that's his teaching, too. And he taught, you know, the problems you have now, basically, you're probably always going to have. Or get ready to have these problems forever, until you work them out, until you're intimate with them. I don't know if it's fortunate or unfortunate, it just reminds me of Luke Skywalker talking to Yoda. Yoda kind of warning him, you know, that he'll be scared. He'll have trouble.

[68:31]

It sounds quite similar. He goes back for more training, and Yoda is ready to pass on. Yep. Yes, I'm pretty sure Suzuki Roshi would wince if he saw some of the things I've done since he passed away. But I think he might, even though he winced, he might still let me practice with him. Maybe not. Maybe he said, that was too bad, you're out of here. Get out of here, Tenshin. You're not my disciple anymore. But then again, he might not be able to tell, you know, because... So maybe if he... So now he would be 106, right? Now. So, if he was still around and could see,

[69:34]

he might still not be able to see well enough to see how bad I am. So he might still let me hang out with him. And Shakyamuni Buddha might let me hang out with him, too. And Dogen might. They might let me hang out with him, even if they kind of saw all the bad things. I don't know how bad I was, but maybe they wouldn't. Maybe they'd say, you know, well, what you did isn't so bad, except you shouldn't be doing that after 45 years of practice. You shouldn't be doing it. I mean, if you did it as a beginner, it's okay, but this is just beyond the pale. You're out of here. Give me your robes back. It's possible that a small mistake by a senior practitioner is really a big mistake. If a guest student did it, it wouldn't be a problem, but after all these years to still be doing that, oh, my God, you're terrible. Thank you.

[70:37]

Thank you, Roshi. I'm ready when you're going to kick me out. I'm ready to go. I remember Kadagiri Roshi telling a story one time about a Zen teacher. He said, get out of here. And then Kadagiri Roshi said, that means come back. It doesn't mean that with everybody, but with a Zen master, that's what it means. With the Buddha, that's what it means. Some people you should listen to that and leave, because they're not Buddhas, but the Buddha means come back. I'm telling you to go, because you didn't come back. Now, come back. Yes. That would be the...

[71:41]

So, the story is Jaojo, right? So, a monk comes and he asks to see Jaojo, or he asks for some instruction from Jaojo, but he doesn't get to talk to Jaojo directly. He gets to talk to Jaojo's attendant. So, he said, would you ask the master what the ultimate meaning of the Buddhist teaching is? And the attendant comes and says, a monk has just arrived and he's asking what is the ultimate meaning of the practice? And Jaojo says, tell him to have some tea and go. In other words, bring him some tea, say, please have this tea, and when he drinks it, say, now go. That's the teacher's teaching to you about the ultimate meaning of the Buddha Dharma. So, then the monk, the attendant does that, and he comes back to the teacher and says, well, I told him to have tea and go,

[72:43]

and by the way, teacher, what is the ultimate meaning of the Buddha Dharma? And Jaojo says to his attendant, have some tea and go. Maybe he goes, have some tea, go. So, you're asking, what is that? That's the... You asked what that is? That's the ultimate... Huh? What kind of going? Oh, you don't want to know about the ultimate meaning of Buddha Dharma? You just want to know about what kind of going that is? If you want to know what the ultimate meaning of Buddha Dharma is, come here, have some tea and go. If you want to know what kind of going it is, it's, well, it's like, don't be attached to the ultimate meaning of Buddha Dharma, that's the kind of going it is. And if you actually practice drinking the tea and going, that's the meaning of Buddhism. It's drink your life, there's still a little bit left, drink your life, ah,

[73:45]

put your teacup down and go. May our intention equally extend to every being and place with the true merit of Buddha's way. Beings are numberless, I vow to save them. Delusions are inexhaustible, I vow to end them. Dharma gates are boundless, I vow to enter them. Buddha's way is unsurpassable, I vow to become it. www.mooji.org

[74:45]

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