This morning is the last class of this intensive. We'll have other discussion opportunities, but they'll be in the Zendo. There are 10 million things we haven't yet discussed, but I thought today, rather than try to bring up some of them at the beginning, let's see if you have anything you want to bring forth at the beginning, anything you want to discuss. A couple of months ago at a Sunday talk, I think it was, you mentioned something that impressed me. You said that just sitting doesn't necessarily mean only sitting.

[01:06]

Just can mean right, all inclusive, with all beings. And I'm sure a lot of people who are here right now Have you heard this before, so would you care to repeat it? Yeah, so just sitting doesn't have anything to do with the posture of sitting. Just sitting as Dogen used, referring to the zazen of the Buddhas. And, of course, Buddhas are practicing, or I should say, the zazen of the Buddhas, when he says the zazen, he means the practice, and the practice of the Buddhas pervades all postures. So if a Buddha is sitting, the Buddha is practicing sitting.

[02:13]

If the Buddha is walking, the Buddha is practicing walking. So just sitting refers to the practice of Buddhas. and their Buddhist practice is all-inclusive and it's true and so on. So if you're walking or if you're cooking or if you're talking at that time you can do a ceremony which is dedicated to or pointing towards the just sitting of the Buddhist. So you can be Yeah. Sitting. When you're sitting, you can do the same, but when you're standing, you're pointing yourself towards the practice we call just sitting. Practicing yourself, directing yourself or pointing, not yourself, but pointing, offering your practice in the direction of

[03:17]

practices all beings, directing yourself in whatever posture you're in towards the all-inclusive enlightenment, which is the enlightenment of all beings. So in that way you can practice just sitting all day long in different postures, including sitting in the zendo. Janice asked me to bring it up, so I did. Is there anything more you want to say about it this time? So we have this expression of sitting upright in the midst of self-fulfilling samadhi, sitting up in the midst of the self-receiving and employing samadhi. So that can be the ritual of sitting, but you're sitting offering your sitting at that moment to this samadhi, this self-fulfilling samadhi, which is the place where you actually are living, but your effort is actually to offer your present effort to this samadhi, this real dragon, the self-fulfilling samadhi.

[04:48]

So you're practicing in the midst of this awareness and you have this recognizable awareness. You're thinking that you're sitting in the midst of this big awareness, which is the Buddha, which is the same practice and the same enlightenment as all being. You're offering your thinking, posture, your voice, you know, you're offering it to this, you're sitting in the midst of this self-perceiving and employing samadhi. And the self-perceiving and employing samadhi is not met with recognition. Your posture can be recognized. Your awareness of your posture can be recognized. And that recognizable realm is offered recognizably to the unrecognizable, all-inclusive practice of all beings.

[05:52]

So we sit in the midst of that and we intend to sit in the midst of that samadhi all day long. Yes? that intention, that thought, for example, I want to offer my life to all Buddhas, I would think if it comes from mental, if it's a mental activity, it doesn't feel as far-reaching as if it's something that I would say comes from the heart, but I don't, I'm not quite sure what that would be in that context, because it's still, it's a thought, but it feels deeper, it feels more upright. So one way of practicing is you dedicate your thinking to this practice and you actually realize a compassion.

[07:04]

From dedicating yourself to practicing, to dedicate your action of body, speech and mind to practicing in the midst of this samadhi, you realize this samadhi. This samadhi, when this samadhi is realized, great compassion is realized. Then, the practice comes from your heart. Spontaneously, it doesn't mean without conditions, but the condition for the practice is now compassion. It's not just coming from your heart. the mental formations forming your thinking. So you're thinking dedicated to this, dedicated to serving this great mind. You're thinking dedicated to being an offering constantly, being an offering to this great practice. As you do this, there is the realization of compassion and then from this compassion comes the practice.

[08:11]

and the cultivation starts with the thought and that... ...paying attention to what you're doing. You're paying attention to your action of body, speech and mind. It starts there. And then, now that you're tuned in to what you're doing, then offer this body, speech and mind to this... ...samadhi to this... to the Buddha. to the Buddhas, the self-perceiving and employing samadhis, how all the Buddhas are working together with all sentient beings. You offer yourself to this realm of realization, and as you practice this, you actually get soaked by the place you already were. You already live in this place, but if we don't line up our karma with the place we live, if our karma is not a gift to where we live, our karma tends to obscure our actual environment.

[09:22]

Because where our karma is our interpretation of our relationship with the samadhi. So we're in relationship with all Buddhas and our mind creates a story of that. And also once discovered and studied and offered to this relationship, then the stories, the karma creates an obscuration between ourselves and this Buddha mind. But as we practice this way, we are freed from the karma and we enter into this relationship and then the practice comes from our heart. And then all the practice is the practice that we have always been living in, but because we are somewhat closed to it, it was somewhat hindered or severely hindered. I was reflecting on offering in relation to opening or being open.

[10:36]

And it seems kind of another language that there's in opening, there's opening to receive, but there's also opening to express. And it seemed like offering had that dimension also, like offering myself to receive whatever comes and offering myself as an expression of my life, myself. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And in that way also offering is related to being tranquil. Because when you're tranquil, you actually are quite open. and willing to give. Since I'm on the topic, and also what I was thinking of is giving and openness are similar to and related to being tender or soft

[11:50]

And so I'm often quoting the Lotus Sutra, chapter 16, which you read the verse twice. And in that verse is written these four characters. This is soft or flexible. This is harmonious. And this is honest and this is upright. The Buddha says those who practice all virtues like Buddhist and so on, and who are soft and harmonious, honest and upright, will see me right now teaching the Lotus Sutra. So this openness, this softness, also appears in other parts of the sutra. It appears also in chapter 2 where Buddha says, those who have this kind of soft, tender mind all will attain the Buddha way.

[12:57]

Dogen one time asked Ru Jing, what is this soft mind? And Ru Jing said, it's the willingness and I would also say sort of the openness to drop body and mind. So you can cultivate this soft mind which gets you ready to the dropping of body and mind, which gets you ready to open to this samadhi. So giving, open, tender, these kinds of minds or this kind of mind is a tranquil mind, or tranquil minds are this way, and it's also a mind which is ready to our actual enlightened relationship with all beings. Over here last, you talked about the intimacy between a teacher and a student.

[14:04]

Yes. And I was, there's a part of me that longs for that, but I don't live here. And I was especially moved when you were up here, Catherine, talking about, giving your confession about a request that we have had. So I'm wondering how to be a serious practitioner as a householder and in a relationship with a teacher, is it possible to still have that kind of intimate relationship and get feedback or requests from a teacher if we're not here all the time? So I just wanted to make clear that We're talking about intimacy between student and teacher. Yes. So one way that I see it is that the student-teacher relationship is a relationship which can be dedicated to the issue of realizing intimacy, that that could be the meaning of it or the purpose of it.

[15:10]

But it's not just to develop intimacy with the teacher, it's through that relationship to realize intimacy with all beings. Are such that the person or the being you're in a relationship does not necessarily commit to that as being the primary issue in the relationship. Does that make sense? Some people may say, I don't really want to work on that. So you are intimate with that person, but it's hard to work on realizing it if they say they don't want to. Not impossible, though. So, in some sense, for a bodhisattva-student-teacher relationship, that's the main thing, is to use that relationship to realize your intimacy with all beings. Is that clear? That's what I'm saying, anyway. Because bodhisattvas do vow to be intimate with all beings. And that intimacy is what's liberating.

[16:15]

And it's already there, but it's hard work to open and exercise it mutually. So now you're asking, can you work like that with a teacher at a distance? And I would say, yeah. But it's not the same as being in the same place because we're physical beings and to see somebody's face is a lot of information. To hear their voice is a lot of information too. But to see their face and to see their body and for them to see your face and see your body. We have computers so we can do that on a computer too. But still, the touch and the smell and the taste aren't there. And so there is a lot, you know, there's more opportunity face-to-face.

[17:22]

But as much as we can be face-to-face over the telephone or by email or whatever, it's still possible to make some contact. So it's still a choice that it sounds like, whether or not I want to take up the path and come back all the time or keep my life as it is. I mean, I'm looking for an and, but it doesn't sound like there is one to the depth that I would like. Let's see. Keep your life... Well, have my life in St. Louis rather than... Although I don't even know that Gringotts would want an old woman. Well, finding out whether they do or not would be, you know, an opportunity to develop intimacy. I think a number of old women are wondering if Gringotts wants them.

[18:26]

Mature women. I think already living here. Yeah, mature women. Does Gringotts want mature women? Are young women wondering if Gringotts wants them? Yeah. Yeah. How about the men? The elderly men are also wondering. So actually someone said that she was worried about this conversation we had the other day because she, well I guess one thing she said was she wasn't clear whether I made it clear that I was talking about priest training. I thought I was talking about priest training. I thought the original question that Anil brought up was, am I asking priests to be celibate?

[19:27]

Is that what you said, Anil? Yeah. So, and my answer, I'm not asking priests to be celibate. I'm not asking non-priests to be celibate either. I'm just saying that in an intense practice relationship of a certain kind, almost no one has the energy to take care of that relationship and also start a new one. If they already have a relationship, it may be possible to do both. So you already have a relationship, but if you were like here, living here now, and you had a relationship, which you do, and you wanted the relationship to really be like a relationship that you said, now I'm really working on this, I want to do this as soon as possible. And I might say, well, some people are doing it that way. If you want to do it that way, and you say yes, say, well, that way is that you're not spending your time starting new relationships.

[20:33]

Not to mention all the problems you'd have with your current relationship if you tried to start a new relationship. To talk to Michael about how you would start a new relationship with somebody else, it would just take all your time. You could barely do anything but that for a while, right? Does that make sense? You wouldn't have any time to talk to me except maybe to get counseling about how to spend all your time talking to me, which I would be willing to do. But mostly, you know, that would be the thing, that would be the relationship you're working on, and that would be fine. But do these people or persons, are you working with them to work on intimacy? And if you are, then that relationship could be used to develop intimacy. It's just that you wouldn't be taking students. But you can use a peer relationship, like in a marriage, to work on intimacy, too. And you can say, that's the main issue that I want to work on with you, and I want to work on intimacy with you to help me realize intimacy with all beings.

[21:36]

Do you want to do that? And the person might say, yes. And so you could use that. It's not a student-teacher relationship, but it's to people who want to be adults. want to be responsible to each other, so you could also work on this in San Luis with your current partner and both of you dedicated to realize intimacy. Now when you're here, for whatever time you're here, you could work on it with a teacher here, your teacher here. And you can try to continue working on your intimacy, realizing intimacy when you're separated from your partner, and you can also try to work on it when you're separated from your teacher. But I was talking about a certain period of time when you're actually with your teacher for a certain period of time, and then after that you're separated. So now I'm separated from my teacher in a way.

[22:37]

Do I still feel that way? Do I still wonder how he'd feel about my practice? Yes. How often? Pretty often. But it's not the same as if he was here. But I did have those few years when I got to be near him a lot. So knowing how that goes, I can offer that. others who want to be here that much. And even when he was still alive, he ordained some other people as priests, and he would sometimes say to me, I remember two times, one time he said, he kind of said, where is so-and-so, this priest you ordained? He says, if she wants to be a priest, he should be around. He hadn't seen the guy for, I don't know how many days it was. He just hadn't seen him. And then another time, I was sitting with him on Page Street.

[23:42]

It overlooks Page Street, and you can see the apartments across the way. And he saw one of his newly ordained priests coming down the stairs from his house. And... I realized he hadn't seen the guy for, I don't know, a few days or something. And he said, well, this is not pre-straining that I don't see him. So he was seeing me to tell me that my Dharma brothers who are not around, that they're not being around was not what he meant by pre-straining. He was saying, if they're doing it, they should, you know, you're here and they should be here too. They should be around like you are. He didn't say that, but he almost never said to me, you're not around. After I got ordained, he never said that.

[24:45]

He didn't say it before either, because I was around enough. I was there. But he did say to me that some of my darn brothers were not around enough. And I felt like, when he said that, I felt like, He really loved them. He wants them around. They're his boys, you know. They're his girls. He wants them around. And when they weren't, he said, this is not what I meant when I ordained them. He didn't say those words. He just said, this is not a priest's way, that I don't see them. Now, the question is, and I think this is what somebody was worried about, is do you have to be a priest to do this? No. lay person could be around too. It's just that if I offer priest training and somebody gets ordained to have priest training and then they're not there, then I and what you signed up for you're not doing. This is, you know, and I use that example of someone who did get ordained and they were totally present and that's what I meant by the ordination and that's what she meant by the ordination and it was like just fine.

[25:55]

That's what I meant by it was happening, and then she moved to another city, and I saw her once a week, and that was not the same. And I said, this is not the training, so we're not doing it. This is not what I'm doing with the other people, and this is not what I do with you. So try to find some other person to do it with you the way you were doing it with me, at that same level of intensity. But if a lay person wanted to do that, and some of you, like when you're here during practice period, you are kind of doing that. If a lay person wants to do it, then they're doing the same as a priest. But part of the reason why I also, if somebody's ordained, especially if I'm their mentor, part of the reason why I bring this up to them is because I think people think that priests are getting this kind of training. They don't necessarily consciously think, oh, I think they're doing this, but at least unconsciously, they think that the priests are getting trained by their teacher, and they respect them for that.

[27:08]

But they don't necessarily assume that non-priests are getting that training, so they don't give non-priests credit for getting trained this way. They don't give them credit for this. They don't honor them as much. So if priests are going to be honored for being trained, I think they should be trained. Because people just like give that to them. This guy, this woman, this man has probably been trained by their teacher. They probably spent time working together closely on their practice. So this is wonderful. This is a great person. I want to hang out with this person, honor this person. But if they haven't been trained, I think it's kind of misleading and hypocritical and can be very discouraging. So I want It's a good case, like I often say, if a priest gets caught shoplifting, you know, it could get in the San Francisco Chronicle if one of the priests here was caught shoplifting. Get in the newspaper. Whereas if a lay member of our community got caught shoplifting, it probably wouldn't be big news.

[28:14]

The reporter probably wouldn't even notice that the person was a Buddhist necessarily. If a person in robes with a shaved head was, you know, the police would say, well, I guess this is, you know, are you a priest? Yeah. And they start talking and then they call them, you know, it's in the newspaper. Because people, rightly or wrongly, expect more of people in that. I think these people are supposed to get trained. So a lay person can do this. But if they don't do it, it doesn't seem to be such a social problem. So you may be able to make arrangements to, on some rhythmical basis, have intense periods of intimacy practice with your teacher. and with your husband nearby or not, and then also have intense periods with your husband when you're not with your teacher.

[29:21]

But at a certain point also, I feel like, although a person may have several years of intense training, and after that, the training doesn't have to be as much face-to-face. So a number of students who trained with me for quite a few years are now practicing in different parts of the country, and they don't see me so much anymore. But I think they think of me in some sense just like I think of my teacher. And I'm still alive, so they can call me sometimes, and they can come to see me sometimes. They're at a distance now, but they have this imprint of training, which now they can do with other people. And when they're doing it with other people, just like they think of their teacher, just like when I think of my teacher. And a lot of the things I think of, I didn't realize until it came up in a relationship. I didn't realize, oh, this is what I do with him.

[30:27]

He taught me this. You realize things you learn from your teacher in your relationships with your students and your fellow practitioners. at the time the teacher's around, so the teacher's still there. Just like in the story of the sutra, when the children sobered up, their father came back. So the teacher goes away, and when you take the medicine, the teacher comes back. The teacher doesn't really go away, but sometimes the teacher has to go away. So separating is also part of the training, but usually after some period of closeness. It's like they lived with their father for a long time, but then in order to develop, the father had to go away. But if they weren't already intimate, the father would go away. It doesn't have the same impact. It just doesn't have the same impact anyway. When Dogen says, from the first time you meet a master without engaging in incense offering, bowing, chanting Buddha's name, repentance, and reading scriptures, does he mean you don't need to do the ceremonies?

[31:54]

You just have to sit from the first time, and later on you can do the ceremonies? I'm glad you brought that phrase up, because that's a... a very important part of his teaching. So he's saying, from the first time you meet a master, right? And he says, from the first time you meet a master with incense offering, bowing, but when you meet a master, you offer incense and bow. I'm not sure that that is implied. It's not implied. People don't know that, that when you meet a master... meeting a master involves incense and bowing. When Dogen was meeting masters, he offered incense and bowed when he met masters. When he met teachers, that's how he met them. He formally bowed to them. That's what the meeting style is. And then you meet. And in the meeting, you receive instructions about how to sit.

[32:58]

And then he says, once you receive the instruction, then just practice. But in order to receive instruction, you have to bow to the teacher. So you say we're doing it at the same time? I'm saying that they need to be done at the same time. And I'm saying that just sitting, that just wholeheartedly sitting includes offering incense even if you're not offering incense, it includes that you're making an offering. So it's a cycle. But I think what he wants you to do is he wants you to not be offering incense and bowing and chanting Buddha's name. He doesn't want you to do that. He wants you to practice sitting or bowing in the samadhi.

[34:08]

He wants you to practice it dropping off body and mind. And then, once you drop off body and mind, he wants you to offer incense chant Buddha's name, practice repentance, read scriptures. So, at the beginning he says, when the first time you meet a master without him doing these practices, just sit. And then his later works, he goes through and writes fascicles on each one of the things he said you don't have to do. But the point is that you do these things from the position of just sitting, or from the heart of just sitting. So he said, when you meet the master, what he means is when you've been initiated into practicing in the context of the samadhi, when you've been initiated into that practice, then just do that practice. And when you realize that practice, well then, do all the stuff that you don't have to do to realize the practice.

[35:15]

It sounds different in some other way where they emphasize the practices first and then you do the samadhi. Is that a misunderstanding? So some traditions, they have all these preparatory practices like bowing and chanting Buddha's name and visualizing Buddhas and making offerings. They have in repentance preparations. So when he says, meet a master, he means you're doing what all those preparations are for. So in some traditions, they tell you this substantial, wonderful, wonderful preparation for meeting a master. You have to, you know, hi master, you know. But if you're not in the right state of mind, you don't really meet the master. Meet the master means, from the first time you're intimate with the master, practice. But think also, say, from the first time you're intimate with anybody, practice. Once you're intimate with somebody, well, just be intimate.

[36:19]

Intimacy is dropping all body and mind. As soon as you're intimate with somebody, that's it. You don't have to do anything more once you're intimate. And then you're right to bring up that in many traditions, they say, well, people can't open to that, so let's have them do it. 100,000 visualization, 100,000 offerings. And after all those offerings and visualizations, then they're kind of like, okay, I think I'm ready to meet the Master. I think I'm ready to be intimate with incense. I'm ready to be intimate with the floor. And in our transmission ceremony, and it's the way we've been doing it lately, it's a three-week ceremony. And the first two weeks, The initiate is doing lots and lots of offerings and bows every day. And also, you know, walking around the temple making offerings to many altars over and chanting the names or the mantras of all these different deities and doing all these prostrations.

[37:29]

And in fact, they do seem to become more open and purified. And then they get ready to meet the master. It's kind of, we do it. Well, no, not really. It's not backward, there's a circle. We're walking around Buddha. Walking around Buddha. But when you meet the master means, I would say, if you're intimate with the master, then just... If it's a master in this tradition, then just sit. And then, do all those practices. Bogan also says, when there's prostrations, there's the Buddha way. Not prostrations, the Buddha way degenerates. But he wants those prostrations to be coming from intimacy.

[38:31]

And they will. Intimacy will make a prostrating people Yes. I was listening to the teachings this week and thinking about this concept of the khano-doko. And I've been thinking about khano-doko, thinking about it as an evolving development in the practice from which you've been talking about. Looking at this diagram, I wasn't getting a sense of that. So I'm trying to imagine what that might look like in an image. And then I heard you mention karmic enclosure. An image came to me of what that might look like. And I wanted to offer that, if I might, and get some feedback. I wanted to ask if you're attached to this, if I could erase it.

[39:36]

You can erase it. So I mentioned the board as a sausage, although now bordered by the board. And this karmic enclosure in the midst of the sausage. And I saw it. This? I don't know what it is. Oh. A little bigger, too. That might be difficult. I might be here for a while. Okay, I saw this as a karmic enclosure in the image of a circle. And if anyone can correct my spelling, is it one, two, three?

[40:44]

And I saw three evolutions. All of them squeaky, except for the last one. So this stage, this was the motivation stage we've been talking about. And this is alignment. What's the last word, John? Alignment. Alignment. Not enlightenment. I'm not there yet. Alignment. Alignment. And I'm just going to call this awareness. And by that I was thinking more awareness of the karmic enclosures. So in this first stage you've been talking about when you first come to... And my sense was that you have some awareness growing of the karmic enclosure you're in, of your suffering.

[41:49]

You're not looking away from it. You're not trying to distract yourself. And you start a practice of tranquility practice of sitting and maybe generosity toward that. But your focus at this stage is toward the karmic enclosure. You're looking in at the karmic enclosure. It's pretty much all you know. You don't really know what you don't know at this point. And then, through that practice, moves the karmic enclosure to this stage, which is the desire, the bodhisattva vow. And that's the motivation. Pardon me? Oh. Vow. Karmic enclosure plus vow. Okay. Is that clear? The second circle. An emergence of the, an awareness of the vow within the karmic enclosure. Is the karmic enclosure that person? Karmic enclosure is your sense of a person, of being a person.

[42:54]

It's the sense that you have, you're coming to some sense of your awareness of your karmic Self, in a sense, and the suffering in playing with that. And then coming here is, after the initial practice is getting a sense of like the bodhisattva vow or some desire that's outside of the, has a picture outside of this karmic enclosure that you just have a picture that something might be outside there. It has a motivation, but it's also the orientation. Orientation is moving up here. So this is the orientation step. And you're orientating toward this picture of the vow. So you're starting to look to the edges of the karmic enclosure. And you're also still looking inward. But now you're just starting to look outward. And you're starting to see the frontiers of the karmic enclosure, in a sense. And the vow is this model, in a sense, a picture, a model that motivates you now to be outward focused.

[43:58]

And that takes you. Alignment stage, which is now starting to align your actions to this image of the vow that you had outside. And then in the karmic enclosure here, this is where the ceremonies start consciously. And what happens at this stage, as you become more disciplined with your actions and align them to this image you have of the vow, it starts to transform the frontier of your karmic enclosure. And this for me. And then my other image that I saw was You're starting now to focus more outward, and as you do that, the Konodoko is softening, and it's actually becoming permeable. A permeable membrane, in a sense.

[45:02]

And your actions and your offerings are going out, and responses are coming back in. And that continually transforms this And that becomes the Konadoko there. And then for the Bodhisattva, does this part, I mean, I don't know if this is correct in a sense, but if it were, with the Bodhisattva, the actions in the Konadoko eventually just all become the Bodhisattva. With the action where? In the Konodoku. In the Konodoku, but also the activities within the karmic enclosure would all be ceremonies. Right. All action would become ceremony. And then you talk about the bodhisattva evolving from a small flame to a large fire.

[46:05]

So is that an evolution where The bodhisattva becomes all actions within karmic closure become ceremony and then it becomes second nature that they forget being that way. It becomes like autopilot as it evolves to the massive fire. You could say that it's spontaneous from their nature to dedicate everything they're doing and make everything they're doing a ceremony becomes like second nature or becomes like a direct expression of their realization. And another thing I thought of when he said a semipermeable membrane, he didn't say osmosis. But I thought of osmosis because osmosis is something that happens around a membrane. And there's this thing called osmotic pressure, right? And the thing is that different levels of concentration tend to even up across the membrane.

[47:14]

So if there's more higher concentration, Inside the membrane, the higher concentration tends to move in the direction of the lower concentration. And similarly, if there's a higher concentration of salt inside the membrane, the higher concentration tends to move outside. So I thought of this permeable membrane here, the higher concentration of, you could say, fire outside, starts to move inside the membrane or the higher concentration of fire inside or delusion inside moves out. Communication tends to go to even up the two sides and that osmotic principle I think applies to your diagram. That the except that the world of reality actually of ceremony.

[48:22]

And your ceremony joyfully welcomes the realm that the ceremony is celebrating into the enclosure. So the world of karmic enclosure then becomes permeated by the radiance of reality, and reality becomes permanent in the karmic enclosure, which it always was happy to receive. So I think this is a useful meditation, yeah. Thank you. You're welcome. And although you're not attached to it, someone else might be, so I want to erase it right away. So Arlene, you're not asking me about chapter 16. I'm not asking you? You're not coming up and saying, tell us about chapter 16. I'm asking questions about chapter 16 verse.

[49:25]

What's your question? Come up and ask your question, please. Would you translate and elaborate Any particular part? All of it. All of it? Okay. May I sit down? Yes, you may. Thank you. Thank you. Well, actually, maybe I'll talk about this during Sashin. But in Chapter 2 of the Sutra, a lot of teachings are given. And so in Chapter 2, towards the beginning of Chapter 2, is a place, this famous place where it says that only a Buddha together with a Buddha...

[50:35]

can fathom the reality of all existence, the Dharma of all existence, only a Buddha together with a Buddha. And in a sense, I could say that what that's about is to say only in intimacy, is the reality of all existence fathomed. So the Buddha, and we can use John's diagram still, which is the bond among all beings, needs to meet a Buddha. Somehow we need to enter into the meeting with the bond of all beings.

[51:39]

We need to meet the intimacy of all beings. In that sense, we need to be a Buddha to meet a Buddha. We need to become a Buddha and meet a Buddha. And Buddha is already a Buddha, so Buddha is waiting to meet us as Buddha in intimacy. And student-teacher relationship is a ceremony to practice this Buddha meeting Buddha thing. So there's already this bond, but some of the beings in the ocean of relationship have to, I should say, don't realize this bond among all beings. because this bond among all beings does not appear within karmic enclosure. It doesn't appear within cognition.

[52:46]

It doesn't appear within perception. It's not one of the perceptions. So the beings in karmic enclosure have to learn how to develop a relationship What isn't enclosed karmically, or that which encloses and embraces and sustains and is embraced and sustained by all karmic enclosures, So that's this only Buddha and a Buddha. It's mentioned here in Chapter 2. And then another thing that's mentioned in Chapter 2 is that, you know, for what reason does the World Honored One, the Tathagata, appear in the world? I should say, what is the reason the Buddha is teaching? And the Buddha is teaching because the Buddha wants to teach that by the cause and condition of desiring to open beings to Buddha's truth, Buddhas appear in the world.

[53:59]

By the cause of the desire to demonstrate Buddha's wisdom to beings, Buddhas appear in the world. By the cause and condition of wanting to, of desiring to awaken beings to Buddha's truth of Buddha's knowledge in the world, and out of the desire to help beings enter Buddha's wisdom, Buddhas appear in the world. So this is the famous one great causal condition of Buddhas appearing in the world. They appear in the world because of these four desires. That's in chapter two. So this chapter In this part of the chapter, it's showing you what causes Buddhas to appear in the world and what causes them to appear in the world. It also says later in this chapter, their vows cause them to appear in the world.

[55:06]

And it also says in this chapter that And Dogen quotes this chapter many times, but in the chapter on making offerings, he quotes this, which basically says, if you offer a single blade of grass to the Buddhas, all those who offer a single blade of grass, even with a distracted mind, will attain the Buddha way. So, I know a lot of us have distracted minds, we got that part down. Now, if you just take one blade of grass and offer it to Buddha, you will attain the Buddha way. All of you who, whether with, even, and if you don't have a, offer a blade of grass to the Buddhas, you'll also attain the Buddha way. But even if a huge, mass of distracted people would each offer one blade of grass, they would all attain the Buddha Way.

[56:13]

That's said here in Chapter 2. In this part of the chapter later, in this part of the book. It also says in this chapter that you will see all the Buddhas if you make these offerings. And it says you will gradually see all the Buddhas if you make these offerings. That's chapter two. But the latter part of the Lotus Sutra shifts gears and says that These Buddhas that... and the nirvana which they attain, this is not the true Buddha. The true Buddha is not the Buddha that appears and disappears in the world.

[57:15]

The true Buddha is... and there are innumerable Buddhas that are always present with each of us. but they appear and disappear, we can see them. We live in a world where things appear and disappear, and things that don't appear and disappear, we can't see. So Buddhas appear and disappear. And not only that, but sometimes they appear, and even after they appear, we say, ìThanks for coming, but Iím busy.î So then they disappear. And after they disappear, then we say, oh, what did they say? So they appear to teach us and they disappear to teach us. But they're always here.

[58:24]

And they appear to attain nirvana. But everything's already always in a state of nirvana. So all things are always in a nirvanic and originally in the state of nirvana. But in order to help people, this fundamental way things are appears in a way that seems to attain nirvana when there wasn't nirvana there before. And this seems to encourage people. So everything's in a state of nirvana means everything's in a state of freedom. But we don't seem to see that everything's in a state of freedom. So Buddhas appear in the world and show us freedom so that we can realize that things are fundamentally in a state of freedom. In this chapter they point that they just appear this way to help us. So in terms of this karmic enclosure or zazen of

[59:30]

of a person who does it and Zazen which is the activities of the Buddha. The Samadhi of the Buddhas in which we practice, that's the realm where everything's in a state of Nirvana fundamentally. That's the place where Buddhas are not coming and going. In the place where they're coming and going we do the ceremony of Zazen. is used to help people, we do the ceremony of zazen, where the appearance of nirvana, where nirvana appearing encourages people. But where nirvana is always the case, it doesn't really encourage people. They can't see it. The nirvana, the actual nirvana, cannot be met with recognition. So that kind of nirvana is not initially encouraging to people. Finally, it's more encouraging, but First, what it teaches is a nirvana which appears and disappears, which you can get.

[60:35]

This is my question, and it seems to be related to this chapter 16, actually, about this recognition versus realization, is one way that you put it. And so... you say this one is encouraging, when the Buddha appears it's encouraging initially, and then the non-recognized one may be more encouraging. So I can imagine this. But it seems like you've been saying that our practice is more about we're not so concerned with the appearing. We're more pointing towards the this non-recognized, non-encouraging Buddha. Right from the beginning, that seems to be Dogen's way.

[61:38]

In a way, yeah. So, naturally, this question is then how does that work? Where does our practice encouragement come from if we're kind of in a way the disencouraging appearance of Buddha? Well, part of the way it works is that we don't have the appearing Buddha anymore. We don't see the appearing Buddha right now. But there's appearing Buddha, right? People say. Well, we probably will, for a very long time in the future, another appearing one will appear. You're talking about this supreme Shakyamuni. I'm talking about the kind of Buddha that appears in the world where there wasn't Buddha.

[62:40]

It starts the thing rolling. But there's also appearances of... recognizable versions of Buddha that are possible anytime. Like what? Like a so-called experience. An experience. So you say these experiences can be encouraging, but they're not the real realization. So now you're talking about the experience of the practitioner? Yeah, so this is kind of this question that I... Well, let me just kind of shift in a different direction right now, for a little while anyway, and that is, if someone has an experience, one way to work with that is to... The experience is something the person's having and seeing this experience.

[63:42]

They have the experience and they think it's Buddha or enlightenment or something. So one way to work with that is have the person perform the experience in the presence of the listeners. So they can like bow or they can offer incense or they can speak. And then, for example, is their speech then in accord with the teaching? And can they express this experience in accord with the teaching? Okay? And so then you take this this experience and put it into a ceremony. In this case, you're not putting the enlightenment over onto the person's experience.

[64:47]

You're not saying that enlightenment is an experience. You're saying a person can have an experience. And I'm saying, let's get the person who has an experience and let's have them express it. other people who are students of the Dharma think that what they're expressing is in accord with the teaching. And if not, those people can ask this person questions. And these other people can ask this person to expound scriptures which this person has never read, which they should be. So this all sounds fine. I'm not quite done. And this is all in the realm of experience. The person's experience, but now the person's getting their experience out in the room. But this conversation is actually for the purpose of verifying enlightenment. The experience is not the enlightenment unless it can be verified in karmic enclosure.

[65:55]

Okay? But what about the case there's not this experience? It seems to be that you maybe have been implying, and maybe I'm misunderstanding, and Dogen, I think, can often be understood as saying, forget about this experience stuff, and let's just put our energy into this unexperienced realization that can't be met with recognition yeah yeah and that's so forget about the experience and just offer incense forget about the experience and just bow but then if there's no experience to kind of confirm really is realization then like somebody said the other day i think something well this thing but the experience doesn't the furious doesn't confirm it The experience maybe is encouraging but doesn't confirm it. What confirms it is to bring it back and demonstrate it in action.

[66:57]

That's what confirms it. Confirming is something that can't be recognized. So if you have an experience and you think that that's realization, you might be right. It's a ceremony. It might be a ceremony. Everything is a ceremony. But if you think you can recognize realization, that's not correct. But it might be, your experiences might be realization, and you might actually realize the realization, so then you express them and verify them as a ceremony towards that which we have now just demonstrated and proved that we've realized it. But we don't recognize that, we recognize the ceremony, we're satisfied with the ceremony. Just a person's opinion.

[68:01]

And what if there's no experience or any idea of what an experience would be or anything at all like that, there's just this teaching about the realization, and then will we just have faith or trust that that's so, but something seems missing? Okay. So you offer incense, and you offer incense, and at some point, whether you think you've had realization or not, you start to be able to demonstrate that you have realization. Maybe other people would notice, but you wouldn't. But you would still, you might be kind of like not a content person because... You would be a content person. You would be fearless. Then that sounds, seems like that's the experience. That's kind of the experience I'm talking about. when you're just a happy camper, a fearless person.

[69:07]

No more experience than that is needed, right? Well, you might feel that way. You might feel like, I'm a happy camper, I'm fearless, and I don't need anything more than that. But you're not saying you have an experience of enlightenment, are you, in that case? We wouldn't have to. No, you're not. There, nobody's saying that that experience is enlightenment. I guess maybe another way to put this question is, what about being a miserable camper, not appreciating this balanced realization that's covering everything? It's possible that if it was helpful to people for you to be miserable, then you would be miserable. And this miserable person would just happen to be, and also I guess they could even be afraid if that would help people. Yeah, yeah. But in that case, if you want to know how do we know if there's realization. How do we know that that's realization?

[70:09]

That's not realization. How do we know there is realization in this person? Okay. This person is realized. Well, then this person who is miserable and afraid would be able to expound. And this person, you know, yeah, they'd be able to do that. But even if they couldn't, are we saying that there is still realization? They're miserable and they can't expand the Lotus Sutra. They're still over here, right? And the real dragon... If you're offering incense and you attain the Buddha way, you will be able to, it will be able to be verified together with the other people in the community. So you're saying there's an attainment of a Buddha way and there's a non-attainment of a Buddha way. Right. And the attainment of the Buddha way comes from enacting the Buddha way in the form of making your action devoted to enacting the Buddha way.

[71:14]

And that leads to this person seeing Buddha by Buddha and so on and so forth. And if it would help people for me to be afraid, in other words, if I would become afraid and that would make everybody else in the room fearless, then I would become afraid. I would just become terrified and everybody else would wake up. That's what the Buddha would do. That's how the Buddha would use a realized person. But the realization, the person, this person who's realized doesn't think that their experiences, any of their experiences, are the realization. The realization is the way the compassion, through this person who's been practicing not to try to get experiences, but giving all their activity, all their practices are always devoted and given over to all beings and particularly to the realization of the Buddha way.

[72:16]

That's everything they do that way. And at some point, and they don't have realized or not realized necessarily. You might ask them, have you realized? And they might say, no, but they might not be based on experience. Or they might say, no, based on experience, but they are actually saying no. That's what they think. Or they say yes, and then you test if they say yes. But there's some criteria in light of happiness, peace, and compassion. Yeah. And that seems like, that's I guess what I was meaning by there's something that's actually, that seems recognizable. Yes, but enlightenment, because some other people are happy and at peace, but don't know, but can't can't deal with any Dharma questions. And they can't demonstrate any understanding of anything. And actually, if you talk to them, they really do believe there's a self. Right now they're happy. But a moment later, okay, they're terrified.

[73:21]

Whereas the person, realized person, doesn't get afraid unless it helps people. So we have that example, that story, right? The boy sweeping the ground, right? The teacher says, one of the monks says, it says in the Avatamsaka Sutra that the fundamental affliction of ignorance is itself the immutable knowledge of all Buddhas. Okay? And he says, this is very difficult. And then the other monk says, seems pretty clear to me. Let me show you. Now they're going to test it. Okay, there's a test. So there's a boy sweeping the ground and he says to the boy, hey you, the boy turns his head. Isn't that the immutable knowledge of all Buddhas?" And then he says to the boy, what's Buddha? And the boy goes, isn't that the fundamental affliction of ignorance? So you test it. And you test today and you test tomorrow and you know, this boy demonstrated that he had

[74:23]

It's what we call the fundamental affliction of ignorance. But the other monk actually looked at the boy and said, he thinks it's that way, that's why he's stumbling off. But it's not really the fundamental affliction of ignorance. I mean, it's actually the immutable knowledge of all Buddhas. But the boy doesn't realize it. He doesn't recognize that the fundamental affliction of ignorance is itself the immutable knowledge of all Buddhas. So this is about recognition. He doesn't recognize it. But the other people don't recognize it either. They just recognize this person doesn't realize it. They can see that he doesn't realize it, but they can't recognize it itself. They can't recognize the unconstructedness, which is the place where the immutable knowledge and the fundamental affliction are non-dual. That's the realization. And how do we bring the realization in?

[75:27]

By offering incense, by sitting as an act of offering. Sitting as an act of offering. speaking as an act of offering to the Buddhists. We do this, and we create an open... And realization develops, and the realization is developed, is not recognized, but it can be verified, because realization means proof. It can be proved. And it's happy to be proved, and it's proving is people using it. And so its proof is unhindered compassion. That's the proof of it. And it's up for being tested and verified constantly. That's what it's about. It seems like the proof is recognizable. Yeah, the proof is recognizable. Okay. The proof that people see. Yeah. But the realization... But actually, there's a little bit of a problem here because the proof itself... is not recognizable.

[76:31]

Wait a second. So the word proof... You almost had it. Yeah, you almost had it. And the word, what's the word, verification, that which can be recognized is not verification itself. So the proof that you can recognize is not the real proof. The real proof is unconstructedness and stillness. But that's why we do a ceremony to let the unconstructedness and stillness accord with our body and mind. We give our body and mind to the unconstructedness and stillness. We give our body and mind to that which can't be recognized. We cannot have a silent bond among all beings. We cannot recognize the way everybody's helping each other. We cannot recognize this. You can recognize something as that, but that's not it. So we make our whole life into ceremony, gradually more and more into ceremony, and as we do, we allow this unconstructedness to penetrate and permeate our being so that we are no longer a hindrance to its flow into the world.

[77:50]

And then, We do a ceremony, we continue to do ceremonies, but now the ceremony is living proof of the non-duality of Buddha's knowledge and human suffering. So we do ceremonies to get into the realization which can't be recognized, and we do ceremonies to demonstrate demonstrate and awaken and help beings enter into the thing from which this demonstration and stuff is coming from. So we do ceremonies to get in and we do ceremonies to bring out. We practice virtue to get in and we practice virtues to bring it out. But that which we're going into and coming out of cannot... No consciousness reaches it. No words reach it. But we use our consciousness in the form of making our consciousness, making our karma, body, speech, and mind offerings to this realm.

[78:55]

We learn to more and more make everything we do offer into this realm, to plunge into this realm, to plunge into Buddha's vow. And we reach it, but our consciousness doesn't make it. Can there be trust that the ceremony is enacting the realization? Trust, is that different than recognition? There's trust like interest. I don't trust like I think it's really true that what I'm doing is given. But I am sort of saying I do entrust, or I am saying, I am thinking this to Buddha. I am thinking that. I am saying that. I'm making a posture to demonstrate that. My karmic enclosure is lined up with this as much as it is at this moment. And then later I say, not today, I feel more actually wholehearted about it than yesterday.

[79:59]

That's why, and also, what you're giving to, I think helps you feel more like you're giving more wholly to what you're giving. Since you're giving to all Buddhas, I think you feel like you're giving more. And so you do start feeling more wholehearted, but you don't necessarily say, now finally I've reached wholeheartedness. You reach it, that's good, but you don't necessarily think so. But you keep doing it, and you keep doing it, and... you enter and realize the realm. So it's a realizable, ungraspable realm. It's ungraspable, insubstantial, unrecognizable, constructed in stillness, and it is immediate realization, and from it, compassion flows unhinderedly. And that's the point, is to realize this state, which is already the case, which cannot be recognized. Now, you may have experiences and people of the truth.

[81:03]

But the experience of the truth is not the truth. And the experience of the truth is a big encouragement and it should help you enter even more fully into it. But it's not necessary. It's not necessary. Again, I will talk to you about this more. We sometimes say the saint's cognition of the truth is not the same as the Buddha's enlightenment. The Buddha's enlightenment is a state. Is appreciation necessary? Appreciation of the working? I think that appreciation is necessary for experiences and for realization of the Buddha Way. You have to have appreciation. We have to be gentle, harmonious, honest, and upright. And we have to practice virtues. to enter this realm of Buddha's knowledge. But Buddha's knowledge is the same as this unconstructedness and stillness.

[82:10]

It is immediate realization. It is the way all beings are imperceptibly assisting each other. And that whole process cannot be met with recognition. People who have seen something about this are really good candidates for entering this way. But some people who haven't seen it can also enter it. And can appreciate it? Fully appreciate it? Can fully realize it. They can fully realize it. And when they fully realize it, they can, like, give Dharma talks with other... Some people who have an experience of the truth can actually ask them questions and help them realize in the world Buddha. Test them. to see if they can demonstrate unhindered compassion and see how they're willing to be tested.

[83:23]

And that proof in the realm of karmic enclosure encourages other people to follow the practice that they practiced by which they actually entered and realized that which mind cannot reach, which consciousness does not reach, but which can pervade, it can pervade your consciousness. And when it pervades your consciousness, you could have an experience. But your experience is not what's pervading you. Your experience of the light is not the light. Actually have experience of the light when it pervades their consciousness. They just start dancing and offering incense and sitting zazen and helping people. That's the way it happens when it pervades them. But eventually, these people will be able to give these Dharma discourses, if it's helpful, but if it's not helpful... It's the afternoon. This is short.

[84:36]

Yeah, short, but is it worth the walk? Is it worth the walk? traditional Zen thing, the monk walks all the way up to the front of the hall and goes, and goes back. It doesn't have to be long. I was thinking while you and I were talking, and correct me on the science, because I don't know anything about this, but I was thinking about black holes. It's like you actually can't you can't get in a black hole, right? You can't actually reach a black hole, but a black hole has effects that you can recognize, but those effects that you recognize aren't the black hole. So, you know, lights being bent, as you can say, lights being bent, and that's recognizable, and in some sense that's verification of the black hole, right? But that light being bent isn't the black hole. Somehow that was... You cannot see it. You can't get into it, but you cannot see it.

[85:37]

You cannot see the black hole. You can't get into it, unfortunately. Are you really talking about black holes? No, no, the black hole, you cannot see it. You can't get into it. Once you get in, you can't get out. Are you guys talking from the Dharma side? It pulls things into itself, because it has a very strong magnetic pull, and so it pulls things in, and then when they go in, they change a lot, but they can't recognize it. you probably get made into something that will never recognize anything ever. Just like this.

[86:42]

This is about John's model. The only thing that I kind of wonder about is it makes it sort of seem like there's a difference between inside and outside. You know, here I am in my karmic enclosure, and it makes it easy for me to think, well, something's out there. I don't know what John would say, but I think when he draws his karmic enclosure, he realizes he's drawing an illusion. This is thinking we're inside something. And thinking that you're enclosed is what we mean by being... You're enclosed only by your thought. But that has consequence. To think that you're enclosed or to think that the way you see the world encloses you from the world. To think that your idea of someone is who they are

[87:46]

it encapsulates you in relationship to them. But you're not really, they're not really what you think you are, so what you think you are doesn't really separate you. It's just like a conversation piece, potentially. Well, the end... Yeah, but the end's like first you're here and then you're there and then you're... Well, he didn't draw the line back from the first one to the last one to the first one. But you want to, right, John? Draw the first, the third one goes back to the first one. But that's already... Can I draw the line? So the problem with cognitive enclosures is that they seem to create a world where we're encapsulated from each other. And being encapsulated from each other, we're afraid somebody's going to burst our bubble, you know, or whatever, come into our little world and start rearranging the furniture of our body and mind.

[88:58]

So, but that's what karma does, is it creates kind of an enclosure, an obstruction, and then it's hard for our compassion to flow freely. I want to come back to what you mentioned about being intimate with a person that doesn't have to be a teacher and you still can practice intimacy, and through that intimacy with all beings. I find that there is a big difference being intimate with a teacher or being intimate with somebody else person maybe doesn't have the same concepts that we have been talking about. And the difficulty is that I feel I'm losing my ground if I try to do that by getting really entangled with the stories of the other person. So in a teacher-student relationship, I feel like a little bit more, there's more stability and maybe less stickiness.

[90:05]

I'm trying to throw my stories onto the teacher, but they don't stick so much. But if I do that with another person and it goes back and forth, I feel everything is covered with the stuff that's been through. So I find that much more challenging, and I wonder if it's really possible Yeah, well, it's possible, but it's very rare. But it's also rare between so-called student and teacher. It's a rare thing. Realize intimacy of reality. So it is really hard work, even with the teacher. And so sometimes the couple situation which you're talking about, sometimes both members of the couple have their teachers, too, which are, they're working on their relationship with their teacher. In their relationship with their teacher, they're trying to apply, maybe they're trying to apply in this relationship. But there are certain advantages in the student-teacher relationship, maybe, you know, certain ways you can set things up.

[91:13]

and agreements you can make that are harder to make in a non-student-teacher relationship. Like a student-teacher relationship is willing to have certain boundaries, whereas the other relationship may have trouble setting boundaries. Like parents and children have trouble having boundaries with their parents. It's a struggle to set them up and work with them and change them as the years go by. Whereas I think a lot of people are saying, okay, I'm going to go into student-teacher relationship and I kind of, I've heard even before I arrived that there may be some boundary issues here. For example, the teacher probably won't tell people what I say to her in this situation. Reality may be. And you might be able actually to follow through on that, the whole relationship, that there's never any problem of confidentiality, the boundary of confidentiality may be successfully carried through for many years.

[92:15]

But in some other relationships, there might be a struggle over it. You know, you told somebody that about me? Yeah, I had to because blah, blah, you know. And... So, you know, there's a lot of agreements of, you know, formal agreements I think people are willing to make with a teacher or a teacher is willing to make with a student that we might not be willing to make in other intimate relationships. But I've said this before, I'll say it again, that early in my time with Suzuki Roshi, I heard him say, with acquaintances, I think acquaintances are friends, you can be informal. But in intimate relationships, you need formality. And I think people, that's counterintuitive to a lot of people. They think, well, with people you're intimate with, you don't need any formality, you know? And with people you're unfamiliar with, how do you do, or something.

[93:22]

But actually, you can kind of be informal with people that you just meet. Because partly you know that you can't, you know, do too much, maybe, at the cocktail party right there with everybody watching. So you kind of socially know that there's some limit, but you kind of just say whatever, and you have no formal agreements with them, because formal agreements need to be made, otherwise they're not formal. So when we get intimate with people, we sometimes don't think we have to make these agreements. And when people get married, like in Zen Center, they make formal agreements about precepts. And my wife also, when I got married, she said, no hitting. And I agreed to that. she meant me not hitting her. And I agreed to that. That was a formal agreement. And she told me the consequence would be that she would leave if I ever did. So that was an agreement. I think if you have an intimate relationship, if you're groping for intimacy with people, I think whether it's student-teacher or otherwise, I think we need formality.

[94:29]

We are intimate, but we're not going to realize it unless you can find somebody who, you have to find language, words which you exchange to establish formal practices, formal agreements, formal commitments, formal boundaries. You need that, otherwise you're not going to be able to realize intimacy. then the formalities have served their purpose. And then you continue to practice them, but you don't really need them anymore, except to show the next generation. So I think that's part of the problem with non-student-teacher relationships or non- patient relationships or some such, is that people think that they can get intimate with somebody without the hard work of setting up formal practice relationships, formal practice agreements. Actually, it sounds like a contradiction, boundaries and intimacy.

[95:35]

Boundaries and intimacy sounds like contradiction. Again, I say over and over, if you set up a boundary, it should be done as a gift, not to control the other person. You're not trying to control them. Like, I want you to ask before you come in the bathroom when I'm pooping. You know? If you want to come in here while I'm doing that, I want you to knock. Do you agree to... You know? Because they may say, well, we're intimate. Why do I have to... You know, blah, blah. I... Will you agree to that or not? And then you negotiate that. Maybe at the end they won't agree and you accept it. Okay? Maybe some things cannot be agreed on. You can still work on other areas where you can sit like that in order to test and verify, to verify, to verify, to verify that which cannot be met with recognition. to grow up in this expansive openness and ungraspability of our relationship with somebody, to put our energy into so that we can practice giving and precepts and patience and diligence and concentration in the relationship.

[96:54]

Then we start opening to the intimacy. Intimacy isn't that you just hug this person and give them a hug. That's attraction. But intimacy is not that. Intimacy is ungraspable. Intimacy is to put away. And if you want to do that with somebody, you have to make your relationship a ceremony. Otherwise, you just have no way to test it. And it's just, you know, my opinion and your opinion. And then it's like throwing stuff at each other. And very sticky. Okay? Thank you very much. You're welcome. So once again, don't use boundaries to control people. Use boundaries as gifts, which you offer, and they don't control the people. even if they go along with the boundary, it's not because they're under control, it's because they just happen to agree to it.

[97:59]

Yes. So you talk about being upright and compassionate with our karma. Be upright and compassionate with our karma, yes. And in the Ehekoso Hotsugamon, Dogen talks about asking the Buddhas to share their compassion with us. So would being compassionate to ourselves be something like the ceremony to realize Buddha's compassion? Or is it the same thing? Yeah, you could do a ceremony of being kind to your own karma, and you could also be that way with your karma. But also, in addition, make that an offering to Buddhas. Like I'm being kind to myself, which is good, I think, and kind and compassionate. But it's not just that. I'm also making this an offering to Buddha. So I'm inviting... I'm not the only one who's here working on my practice. I'm not the only one who's working on my karma.

[99:02]

I'm inviting all the Buddhas to come and help me with my karma, too. Yeah. It seems more open-hearted and more effective, I would think. So would it be kind of like a first step, then, to say, to be compassionate with yourself, and then you can start practicing inviting the Buddhas to help you with that? That would be... If you did that one first, then it would be a first step. But if you did it second, it would be second step. So there's no particular relationship between... Yes, some people, it works better to say, may all Buddhas be compassionate and help us work with our karma. And then he might say, and may I be compassionate to myself and be compassionate to my own karma. You can do either one because it's a circle. So you can do one first or the other one first. They work very nicely together. Work with my karma. Please help me be aware of my karma.

[100:04]

Please help me be kind to my karma. Please be kind to my karma and make my kindness to my karma an offering to Buddha. Please study my karma. Buddhas have all practiced studying karma. And one of Samantabhadra's vow is do the practices that Buddhas have done. So when you do Buddha's practices, you're doing one of Samantabhadra's vows, namely studying your karma. Then, also, a Dharma gift to the Buddha, which Buddhists like Dharma gifts, Dharma gifts is, I'm doing your practices. So now I not only make doing your practices a gift to you, and also I'm doing the practices, which is I'm studying my karma. And I'm studying my karma kindly. I'm watching my karma graciously. That was kind of unskillful. That was kind of unskillful. That was kind of skillful. And I study, I notice the unskillful with the same attitude, pretty much the same as I notice the unskillful. I'm gracious with the skillful.

[101:06]

I'm gracious with the unskillful. Buddhists have practiced this way. Buddhists are practicing this way. They're kind to skillful and unskillful. So I want to practice that way. I am practicing that way. I make this an offering to Buddha, and I ask the Buddhas to help me practice this way. All that. Ask their help. Because, again, it says his, what is it, number one, two, three, four, five, number six, isn't it? Ask the Buddhas to teach. Sixth vow is ask the Buddhas to teach. Ask the Buddhas to turn the Dharma wheel. Ask the Buddhas to help you study. May all Buddhas and bodhisattvas help me become free of karmic hindrances, karmic effects, which are hindering my practice of my karma. So you invite the Buddhas to help you study your karma. And when you feel you are studying your karma, you make the study of your karma a gift to all Buddhas. And then you ask them to help you again. And then you do.

[102:07]

You do, and you ask them to help you to continue. So you're in this constant mindfulness of your relationship with enlightening beings. So what is the difference between studying karma by yourself and studying it with the help of the Buddha? One's deluded, and the other's in accord with the Buddha's teaching. You don't study karma by yourself. You just think you do. And of course, some people don't study their thinking, period. They just think. But they don't study their thinking. And some people study their thinking and thinking they're doing it by themselves. Well, that's wrong, and hopefully they study, not only am I thinking this way, but I think I'm studying my thinking by myself. And then if they have some Buddhist teaching, somebody might say, you do not study anything by yourself. You study them together with other beings. And then you go, that's weird.

[103:10]

I don't see these other beings, blah, blah. And then you start this process of evolution towards understanding that you practice with all beings, with all Buddhas, all the time. And you make a ceremony of thinking that way and talking that way until it is realized. And the way you're practicing with all beings is ungraspable and insubstantial. It's a radiant, brilliant fire of love, but you can't get a hold of it. But you can let it in and let it out through training. So Buddha is this process of letting in and letting out. Does that sound right? Offering to that you're doing, you're enacting Buddha, so you're not really making it an offering to Buddha.

[104:11]

I'm not going to argue with you about that. But you use that language. Yeah, I'm not trying to force you into making offerings to Buddha, but... No, no, no, I was just trying to clarify... Yeah, but you said you're not really making an offering, but you really are making an offering. So you got the part about letting in and letting out, but you didn't notice that you were making offerings. What are you making it to? You're making it to the very thing. You're making it to how you're in relationship to all beings. Well, if you're in the middle of that relationship, though, it's not something separate from you you can offer something to. No, it's not. But you still are offering. You still are giving. Even though you're not separate from anybody, you're still giving. That's what giving is about. Giving is about how you're not separate. Separate, you're giving. And as you practice giving, you realize you're not separate. So if you give to giving... If you give to giving, yeah. It's different from just giving to somebody.

[105:14]

You say so. I don't see it myself. Because somebody is also giving? Yes, everybody is also giving. Everybody is giving also all the time. That's reality. We're all giving. But if you don't practice giving, If you don't think you're giving, then your thinking is dislocated from you, and then you suffer. If you miss out on giving, if I miss out on giving, I suffer. If I don't see that you're a gift, I suffer. I almost had it. Well, I'd like to... My voice may work or may not, I don't know.

[106:31]

So we'll see. I'd like to kind of follow up on what you just talked about with Rachel. Because I've had that as home. And recognizing what's a gift and recognizing when I'm giving. And it just occurred to me that maybe the problem I'm having is I always think of gifts as something pleasant. But sometimes what I'm giving or what someone's giving to me might even be highly unfair. And you still need to recognize that as a gift, something that you can work with. I don't think you necessarily need to recognize it as a gift. You can recognize it as a gift. You can, but the gift you recognize is not the gift itself. Sure. So another way to say this, All this, however, does not appear within perception because it is unconstructedness and stillness.

[107:32]

It is immediate giving. Giving is enlightenment. However, giving which you can recognize is not giving itself. The giving you recognize could be the ceremony of giving. Is the willingness to give enlightenment? It's not separate from it, but being willing to give, but still not being able to. Realizing that everything's a gift and everything's giving. That's incomplete realization. The full realization is the actuality of giving and having our body and mind in accord with that. So that's why we practice the ceremony of giving, and it's very important to realize that pain is also a gift. Everything that comes is a gift. Everything that you are is a gift.

[108:34]

You're always giving and receiving with all beings, but the actuality is not recognized. So we practice the ceremony of giving, and that ceremony opens us to the actuality. You have to be honest to be a gift. I think honesty is part of what's necessary in order... No, no. Even if you're dishonest, it's still a gift. Even if I lie to someone? Even if you lie, it's still a gift. And it causes them harm? That's a gift? It's still a gift. Zero, yeah. You don't understand it, though. You're a gift, but you don't get it, and you're miserable. If you hurt people, you know, that's different from hurting people and wanting to, but in either case, you're a gift. If you try to hurt me, you're a gift. If you don't try to hurt me, you're a gift. If you don't try to hurt me and you do hurt me, you're a gift. No matter what you are, you're a gift. No matter what, all the time, that's reality.

[109:37]

You are a gift. And the way you're a gift is recognized. Thank you. But the way you're a gift can be realized. And in realization you can prove the giving. Yes, my question is very much connected to John's and even to Rachel's. Yes, Sherry is. It's connected to John's and Rachel's. And to mine. And to all's. Yes. And to Fred's. I would like to live a very beautiful ceremony of life and I would say if anybody asks me what has your life been I would ask except for a few beautiful moments ugly and pleasant achy thanks for the gift did you notice that you gave me a gift

[110:50]

Just now? If you say so, I'm grateful. But did you notice that you gave me a gift? Yes, well, I guess because I... Is that... No, whatever you are, you're a gift. Even if you come up here and lie, you're a gift. In any case... Is it possible that... If that same life that I consider parts of that life, for example, when I'm in a hurry and agitated, and if at that time I said, be compassionate with that agitation and so on, there would very little compassion come up, because that would be too wrapped up. Well, just mentioning being compassionate is somewhat compassionate. Just even raising the issue of being compassionate to this Russian person, this agitated person, just raising the flag of be compassionate to her, that's pretty compassionate.

[112:02]

But then to say, no, no way, I'm going to punish her for being so busy and agitated, I'm going to beat her up. Be compassionate to yourself saying that. No. I'm going to just beat her up. She's too stupid. She's too stupid. Be compassionate to yourself talking that way about her. Raise the flag of compassion moment after moment, and if you don't raise it, raise it. I like that. There's one question that is sort of iffy. If that same life, without changing anything, without changing a particle of if that same life had been in the spirit of offering, then that same life with all the pain, the ickiness, the hurry and so on, would have been a service. Right.

[113:04]

Is that so? Yes. And that ceremony would come to fruit to realizing the beauty of that life. And that life would then retrospectively be turned into a beautiful life. It would be changed by the final realization. The Buddha went through lots of tough times, tough times like you're talking about. and in the end realized that that was all part of this wonderful evolution. So then it turns from a dump spill into a step on the great path. A muddy, challenging, difficult step, but a step on the path. When I went to Tassajara, At Jamesburg, you know, before you go over the mountain, I stepped into a cesspool and gashed my shin on the metal edge of the cesspool.

[114:10]

That was a step on my path. That was a wonderful, difficult, yucky step on my path to Buddhahood. So, Rand, this is a ceremony. Oh, poor Lotus Sutra. That is the ceremony. Yeah. If I don't consider the ceremony, it is not a ceremony. Or it is... Yeah, I think so. I think if you say it's not a ceremony, then it's not a ceremony. You get to say, this life is not about being kind to myself. This life is not about making my life a gift. Then it was kind of a ceremony of ignorance. But we don't call that a ceremony. The intention is not to heal, not to benefit.

[115:18]

knock something on the floor, and you say, I'm sorry I dropped on the floor, and I'm now doing the ceremony of saying I'm sorry that I dropped on the floor. And this is a ceremony in the Buddha way. All the Buddhas have apologized for knocking sutras on the floor in the past. And now I'm doing it. I'm like the Buddha. So now my life is a ceremony. My intention was for it to be a ceremony. Did that make any sense? Yes. your intention means your thinking, your mental karma is devoted to this being a ceremony for the Buddha way, then it is a ceremony. And that's why wherever you are, not just at a Zen center. Just at a Zen center, a lot of other people will know what you're talking about if you say that. Otherwise people will say, But you don't have to tell people. You just make everything you do a ceremony. Thinking it is.

[116:21]

Line your car. Bring the person together with the truth, the reality. Bring the person together with justice. Justice is giving. And not just you giving to others. Justice is the way we're actually being. That's justice. That's the precepts. making your karma, the person's karma, line up with that, makes your karma into a ceremony of celebrating justice and righteousness. But righteousness is unconstructedness and stillness. Justice is unconstructedness and stillness. It is immediate realization. It is not met with recognition. And without moving a particle of dust, things are that way. We need to make what we're doing devoted to that and a ceremony of that where we bring our karma together with that and that opens us up to let the realization that lets the unconstructedness and stillness take over our body, speech, and mind because we give our body, speech, and mind to unconstructedness and stillness which means we give our body, speech, and mind to giving.

[117:34]

which means we make our body, speech, and mind ceremony, ceremony, ceremony. A confession? A short confession, okay. Yes. And I'll try to make this as simple as I say it. I'm afraid that once I leave here, or even while I'm here, my patterns of chaos and confusion and so on will take over and then I'll see everything as usual. Mm-hmm. So that's your confession of what you're afraid of. Yes. So you're that. Yes. Okay. And then how do you feel about that? I'm afraid. You're afraid, you feel uncomfortable? I'm afraid, I feel uncomfortable. And if I asked you what should I do, of course, you would tell me, well, be compassionate with that.

[118:44]

And I would say, but I will not be able to be compassionate with that. I will probably hate it. I'll be trembling in intrepidation and I'll forget all about ceremonies. So you're saying that now? No, I'm for ceremonies. Okay, I hear you saying that. So how do you want to practice with that? I'm asking you to tell me. Yeah, so be kind with yourself when you predict that you're going to crash. When you make these dire predictions about where your practice is going to go. like my practice is going to just tumble down into the pits of hell. Be kind to yourself while you make that prediction so that kindness will go with you even if you happen to go where you're, even if you're correct in your prediction, kindness will come with you. There is kindness in hell. There are bodhisattvas in hell being kind to the people in hell who are screaming out in pain and agony. And even if the kindness doesn't come up, just raise the flag, as you say, even if there's no flag.

[119:48]

Meaning, no kindness, but raise the flag of kindness. That's a ceremony of kindness. Ceremony of kindness. I'm very confused and my gift to you right now is confession of my confusion and a question, will you help me clarify my confusion? And the confusion is about the I. Realize, recognize, actualize. I get these all befuddled.

[120:50]

Could you help me? So this may not surprise you, but I will say be to your confusion about these things. Treat your own mind, which is confused about these matters, with the graciousness that you would treat your grandson if he came and told you that he was confused. Granddaddy, I'm confused about realization, actualization. Okay. I'm confused about that. And you'd be gracious and say, well, tell me about it. I hear that here you are. So tell me about it. You're the one who's going to tell me. I'm saying that to you. Tell me about it. Or I might not say tell me about it. I might just hold your hand and say, you know, I'm that way too. but I totally love you. And, you know, I love you when you're confused and I love you when you're not confused.

[121:54]

And I hope you can love yourself when you're confused, young man. So treat yourself like you would treat your little grandchild if they brought you this thing. And just keep doing that way and you will attain Buddhahood if you're generous with that and make those generosities gifts to Buddha. You will attain the Buddha way. Be kind and generous to your own confusion and also make that kindness an offering to Buddhas. And recognize that I'm doing that. And recognize you're doing it. Be aware you're doing it. Be aware that you're thinking your karma, your mental karma is doing that or your vocal karma is doing that. Be in line with this ceremony of graciousness towards your own confusion. And also make that ceremony of offering an alignment and worshipping Buddhas at the same time. And the Lotus Sutra says you will attain the Buddha way if you practice that way.

[122:57]

And becoming very clear about realization, actualization and recognition and how one's not the other and so on. and we'll be able to test you, and you'll be able to pass the test. When's the test? The test is when you tell me you have no confusion anymore. So don't rush, because it won't be a very nice test. It'll be very hard. Don't worry, I won't rush. Thank you very much. You're welcome. I have to leave in a few hours, unfortunately.

[124:17]

And I just would like to thank you very much. And I wish you a enlightening session. And I will sit with you on the other side of the planet. Thank you. So one understanding of Chapter 16 is that it's telling us that the Buddhas are with us in this world that we live in.

[125:22]

Is that clear, Arlene, that that's what's being said? I think we need more. Well, keep requesting more. If you wish more, please ask. And if you'd like less, please ask for less. When John was drawing his drawing, and then when Jane made the same question, I had that same question about the inside and the outside, and it seemed to me that if these arrows that are attending to the karmic enclosure pointed... It was blue.

[127:01]

Pointed... that way. Because I always understand the karmic enclosure as this thing, not the thing that's enclosed. And I think that what's enclosed so that there's only this thing that's the delusion. So then when we get over here, I don't know, it might have to change how, I didn't go further than that, because generally it seemed like a nice rendering, but it seemed like it would make the inside and outside problem not so, like the inside and outside is part of the illusion or the delusion rather than the way things are. So that was just something I wanted to propose in relation to this. John's nodding, so I guess maybe that's okay with him.

[128:05]

So to be aware of what you're thinking, in a sense, is to look, like you're looking at somebody's face, and it's good to realize you're looking at what you think their face is. You're looking at their face, but actually what you're seeing is something that's a mental construction. The mental construction is overlaid on them. So if you recognize that, you're sort of looking inwardly at your mental construction. So there's a kind of inward looking there, but you're actually also looking at what your mind is imposing on the world. So you're looking at the world and realizing that you're putting something on it, but actually you're also looking inwardly in the sense that you're looking at what you personally have in your mind, what you're projecting. So it's very dynamic. It's hard to realize how dynamic that is.

[129:12]

And I would also say that the dynamism there is the same as intimacy. So you can also realize intimacy and then check it out with somebody else whether you understand that dynamism properly. So studying the way the mental construction works is a laboratory for studying intimacy with other beings. And studying intimacy with other beings is a way to see how your mind works. So it's a venue of meditation. Green Gulch is always quiet. The world is always quiet and still. And it's wonderful to contemplate, to be able to contemplate that.

[130:24]

And when we get up and start moving out of the room, and putting chairs away and things, the sounds may be challenging to continue to listen to the silence. And when we move around the room, it may be more challenging to feel the stillness. And when we're sitting still, the stillness is wonderful, can be wonderful. And when we're moving to feel the stillness, is wonderful. May our intention equally stand to every being and place.

[131:31]

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