We met here and I talked to you about the practice of the Buddhas. Didn't I? And in the Zen school, the practice of Buddhas is sometimes called Zazen. And the practice of Buddhas is practicing in the same way as all living beings. The practice of the Buddhas is the same practice as all living beings, and it's the same enlightenment as all living beings. The practice of Buddha is not some separate practice from our practice and vice versa.

[01:04]

And that same practice and same enlightenment of you and me and all other beings, that's Buddha practice, that's Zazen. According to my understanding, or I think the ancestral understanding, And that doesn't exclude any one person's idea about what they're doing. Whatever you think your Zazen practice is, is, of course, in the practice of all beings. What you think Zazen practice is, and what I think it is, is completely included in Buddha's Zazen. And the way I think, I can perceive. I have a perception of the way I think, and I also have a perception of the way you think.

[02:08]

Even so, the perception of the way I think is, if you excuse the modern term, the perception I have of my thinking is an icon of my thinking. It's a user interface. Even what I think about my thinking is actually not my thinking. My thinking is more complex than I perceive my thinking to be, and my perception is the same. but still I do have a perception of my perception, and I sometimes have perception of other people's perceptions, and sometimes I don't have perceptions of other people's perceptions, but even if I have a perception of other people's perception, they still have perceptions. my perception of them isn't the same as their perception.

[03:13]

And their perception of their perceptions is not the same as their perception. The way we are actually working together is an imperceptible harmony, and imperceptible mutual assistance and support. That's the way we're actually living together. Everybody? Everybody? Everybody in the world? Yes. Everybody. And not just the people at Zen Centers. But again, this is an imperceptible ritual support and harmony. It's imperceptible. Again, this comes up so many times in my mind.

[04:17]

When the diamond does not fill your body and mind, you think you understand. what's going on. When it doesn't, you could also not think to understand. But then you think that's right. When it doesn't fill your body and mind. When it does, you realize something's missing. It's like going out into an ocean and looking around, and it looks like a circle, but the ocean is not a circle of water. It's infinite. But there's a teacher who says, what we see in the ocean is a circle of water, and if you practice a training with that circle of water,

[05:19]

You will understand that it is just a circle of water, and that's okay, and then you'll open to the ocean and realize the ocean, but you never can see the ocean with your eyes and hear it with your ears. Use your circles of water, the sea circle of water. We can realize the entire imperceptibly ocean of accord. We can realize it. That's the proposal. of the tradition, but it is a deportment beyond hearing or seeing, but then doesn't really take good care of hearing and seeing. We do. And if we don't take good care of hearing and seeing, then we will not be able to realize the department beyond hearing and seeing. But if we do take good care of hearing and seeing, we will realize the department of the Buddhas, which is always surrounding us all the time.

[06:27]

I'll talk more about this, but I just wanted to review that, and also I quoted something here from Ben-Gur La, and that the first character I let you draw your, not draw, but invite your attention, if you happen to have a moment, to this character, which might be for you to say, Is it pronounced say? Say? Say. Very good. Is that say? Tony, is that say? This character, say? Hmm? How do you say it? How do you say this, tall? Tall? So. [...] OK. So. This character in English, has been translated, or could be translated as stillness, silence, or calm.

[07:45]

Most of the translations of this part of Vemba Vala into English that I've seen translated as stillness. I think Pailindika's Vemba Vala is about Let's understand zazen, which is seeing meditation. But it's also silent meditation. Anyway, most translations choose stillness for the translation of this word. But it also means silent, quiet, and calm. So I sometimes say stillness, I sometimes say silence, I sometimes say stillness and silence, referring to this character, And the next character is in metal, or metal, or in. In silence. And this character is a Japanese word. It's a possessive marker.

[08:50]

So that means silence. honor in or upon the middle of silence and stillness. And this means without, and these two characters mean fabrication or construction. So, this is a description of the situation. all this amazing, imperceptible, harmonious assistance that's going on. This is the situation in which zazen is living. So it's translated sometimes as unconstructed stillness, unconstructed rest in stillness, or unconstructed stillness. and silence. But another translation, the first one I saw, actually was in the mysterious mind beyond any human agency.

[10:04]

So this literally means without construction, without fabrication. But the earliest translation I saw was beyond human agency. This is beyond construction. The actual way of imperceptible practicing together... the way we're practicing together beyond hearing and seeing, it's kind of constructed by the whole universe. It constructs the whole universe. Our activity is constructed by everything, and our activity constructs everything. So there is a construction going on, it's just not human. It's not like I make the silence. So, talk and look Some of them might think, well, you stop talking.

[11:07]

You made the silence. Okay. But we're talking about a silence that isn't made by you or me. We're talking about a stillness, the way we're actually living together. in imperceptible mutual assistance. That stillness is not due to one or two or ten human beings, or even all human beings. It includes all living beings and the entire earth. This practice of the Buddha's is living in this unconstructed stillness and silence that doesn't come or go. And it includes all the constructive stillnesses So we practice, we construct stillness period after period over and over again. Very many of us are sitting still together. It's wonderful, and we're quiet. But that's something that's a human effort.

[12:13]

And the way we're working together perfectly, that's occurring in a in the silence which is there before you and while you're there and afterwards. So I just wanted to point that out. That's in the transmission from Dogen Zenji. But it's from before him too and after him. this transmission not only is, this transmission is, was imperceptible with each other's systems among all beings, but also this transmission fully resonates throughout all time. It's from before we say that, as we say it, and after. And then I wanted to bring up another Chanos character, this one here, which And I, with some trepidation, bring out these markers and put on this white board because I'm afraid I'll be able to be erased.

[13:22]

This character is pronounced in Senra Japanese, Gi. Gi. Okay. It's a Chinese character that some Japanese pronounce as 義. In Chinese, I think it's 義, right? What? Did you hear what you said? That's what it is in Chinese. Okay. And I would say the Dose of Unity is ceremony. or ritual. And it has two parts. The part on the left side is a radical which is a radical for human, human or a person.

[14:33]

And the radical on the right is also a and that Chinese character means righteousness, honesty, justice, morality. And it's pronounced in Japanese and Chinese So the character for... And so, you know, here I am now telling you about Chinese, right? The character is putting a person together with justice, with loyalty, honesty, morality, and all those things. The seminary is to join a person with everything good

[15:41]

And this situation here is a situation in which everything good happens. And this silence and stillness beyond human urgency is why this deportment of peace and harmony... Everything good is there. In Western, by the way, everything bad is there. Nothing's excluded. It's just that the bad is working harmoniously with the good. There's peace and freedom with everything, with the so-called the best people and the worst people working together, which is, in some people's view, the best. A peace that's real. The ritual is to join people with... is to join people who are doing perceptible things like sitting upright in meditation halls by themselves or with other people.

[16:51]

They're sitting there, they have perceptions of their activity and other people's activity, and what they're doing is dedicated to realizing something that is infinite and imperceptible, the Buddha way. And make the Buddha way, realize the Buddha way with our daily life. So that's what I'd also like to say. We have this text, which here's the acronym part. That's the acronym. What does that say? It's the acronym for Fu Kang Zha Zen Gyu. Fu Kang Zha Zen Gyu.

[17:56]

It's the universal admonitions or instructions for zazen ceremony. And most of the people who have translated that into English and translated the gi as method, way or something, Or they leave it out. They just say, universal admonitions for Zazen. But the last character is Gi. And I read an article with the aid of Risa Chui a long time ago, which is in Once Married from Cold Mountains. It's called, I think the name of the article is Salmoni of Zazen. To distinguish between the Salmoni of Zazen and Zazen. So I sit in the Zendo day after day.

[19:01]

I do the Samuni for the sake of realizing the Zazen, which is the harmonious peaceful activity of all beings. of Zazen. And the way we're doing it also is we sometimes do it in groups, kind of to get the idea that, well, I'm sitting here, but I don't do this by myself. So I'm practicing Zazen by myself with the support of all our beings, so I'm not doing it. And I never heard Suzuki Roshi say this, but I've heard... He was always very gentle with me, but he was... with some people who maybe he really liked. They said to him, they said to him, or they said, I do Zazen.

[20:04]

And he was, he kind of yelled at them and said, don't say that you can do Zazen. Don't call Zazen my Zazen. I don't talk like that. Yes? I guess my question is, are there signs? Like, if I'm connecting with the vastness that's not perceivable, one, will I know it? Two, how will I know it? And three, if other people, like, can it go completely? I guess it is. Dodo Zenju also says very nicely, and again, he's not the only one, but he said, when Buddhas are really Buddhas, in other words, when you're really into this, you don't necessarily think, I'm really into this. When Buddhas are truly Buddhas, they don't... I think it says, quotes, they don't think, I am Buddha, unquote.

[21:09]

They don't necessarily... They won't necessarily think that. However, one translation says they don't necessarily. Another translation is they don't. I think it's better. In other words, it's possible the Buddha would be sitting there and they would see this sign. The sign was, hey, you are sitting in Zazen. So you might actually, or you are doing Buddha Zazen. That might occur to a Buddha. But it's possible they never would think that. There are many signs, but the main thing is, it's not necessary to have signs, although people would like some signs. And if you go up to a Buddha and say, you're a Buddha, and you're doing Buddhist practice, the Buddha might say, oh, great. And they might think that at that moment. But then they move on. Yes? Could you say something about the word deportment? What deportment? Well, the department often uses the way their body is standing or sitting or walking.

[22:16]

That's department. So the way Buddha's body is sitting, the way the body of Buddha... is beyond hearing and seeing. The way all beings are practicing together, it actually sits, and it also does somersaults, it leaps. All the genetic speeds are just a sample of what our practice can actually do. That's why it's so fun to watch. Because you're seeing, actually, the possibilities of their things to do amazing feats of deportment. So the deportment of this 8% bill of mutual assistance is beyond what we can see. But it has a big function. It walks and talks.

[23:17]

Walking can't reach it, but it can walk and talk. But it's beyond hearing and seeing. And it can be realized. And again, it's realized by practicing with what you can hear and see. So it's realized by ritual. So we do the ritual of having an intensive, of having sessions, of having practice periods. We get together and in that ritual, and signs were occurring with some people, and some people never see any signs. But also, as I mentioned, did you say, John, you're going to unwind it in the grave of the dentist? So I asked him, when he goes to the dentist, to remember the practice. So if that means he's going to go to the dentist as a ritual, it's going to be a ritual.

[24:22]

to realize this practice in this place. So, yeah. When I first started practicing, I thought the practice is, you know, going in there, we're going there with those people and sitting. And I also, to make a long story short, as I was wandering around looking for my true home when I was a teenager in my early 20s and I was looking for my true home and I saw glimmers of it in the form of human beings living in different ways. So when you see it in books, sometimes you can get a hint of what you're looking for.

[25:28]

Like somebody once saw a monk urinating, and they saw, and they suddenly said, be a really good urinator. LAUGHTER And then they thought, I want to become authentically awake in order to benefit all beings. The body-mind arose when he was watching a human being urinate. Somebody once met some other practitioner and they thought, oh yeah, that's how I want to be. And that's what happened to me. I was looking around the university at my wonderful, brilliant professors, and I was wondering, do I want to be like these professors? I really respected them.

[26:31]

They were so smart. And I had a very tolerant, brilliant advisor. And I would sometimes have these great insights into what was going on there, and I would tell him, and he would listen to me, very respectfully listen to me, and then point out something deeper than what I had seen. He was very, very good. But still, I didn't quite see in him where I wanted to go. stories of Zen monks, and in those stories I could see where I wanted to go, how I wanted to be. So it was good for me to see that, but then I went that way. And little by little, over not a terribly long time, I got this message that all these people who were showing me where I wanted to go, but they had kind of a training program, a ritual training program.

[27:44]

And it varied according to the teachers, but basically it was, for many of them, it was sitting with others, silent and still. That was a common element. Almost all of them... the ritual of zazen. So then I tried to do the ritual, which I didn't see as a ritual, I thought of it as a procedure, as a training form to train myself so I would become a person like them. But I had a hard time doing it on a regular basis. And I got the idea, well, if you are doing training and you do it once a year, that's different than if you do a training and you do it every day, or even along every day. I thought, maybe that should be something that's done more regularly.

[28:47]

So I tried to do it more regularly rather than once. and I couldn't do it regularly. And I invited my friends to join me because I thought I'd do it, but they had other things to do. Even though they were respectful of me having this interest, they didn't come and sit with me. So I didn't sit very often. So another kind of like brilliant thing came to me. Maybe if you practice, People were already doing it. They need to be more successful. And also, things were happening during this training, I wasn't sure whether they... I often say whether I should or go to a mental hospital. They were unusual, and I wasn't sure if they were appropriate or to what I wanted.

[29:51]

So I thought maybe if I had a teacher, the teacher could say, well, that's no problem, or that's really, be careful of that, or that's great. And then I found out that there was a Zen center that had people practicing regularly and a teacher. And so I went and practiced with them. And in fact, with the aid of lots of people, even I could practice regularly for half a century. And another thing about the training, not only did I become regular with the support of other people, oh, but they became regular with the support of me. So first I was practicing out from whence I could be regular, and it worked. And then gradually I realized, oh, me practicing regularly helps them. Oh, well, I didn't mind that. One time during a session in San Francisco while I was alive, during the session,

[31:03]

Some of you may know that since Zendo has a main room, he also has a hallway outside, which they call the gaitan, which means outside seats. And for that session, I was sitting there. And during the session, I started to get sick. And as I got sick, I... As I got sicker and sicker, I think I stopped attending the work period. I was just feeling too sick, so I rested during the work period. But I kept going to service and meetings and the sitting. So I stopped going to the mails, but I kept going to the sitting.

[32:08]

Then I stopped going to the service. I was too weak to bow. So then I just went to the sittings. And, yeah, even when I was pretty sick, I could still do the sitting. I think I had the flu, you know, I was like really nauseous. And so, yeah, I just kept doing the sitting and did those more physically difficult things. I let go of them. After the session, I started to feel a little less sick. So I think I started to go to service. And then I started less sick, and I started to go to the meals. Then I felt less sick, and I started to go to work. And by the end of the session, I was fully participating. the person sitting next to me after the session, she said, that is really encouraging that you, the way that you kept sitting even though you were sick.

[33:13]

I realized, yeah, we really do encourage each other when we practice this way. This is a one-up to another topic, which is that sometimes people come and talk to me about having some difficulties with the ritual, with the training. When I first... I'll have difficulty being regular in the training, and then when I started practicing with the group, rather than having difficulty being regular, I have difficulty while I was doing the training regularly, and I was having a hard time. I had a hard time. I had a hard time. And then, after that, I had a hard time. I had a hard time.

[34:16]

It was hard for me. And... ...practicing regularly than having an easy time practicing once in a while. which I was doing before. I just practiced as long as it was easy. That was fine. But with the aid of my friends, I could really have a hard time. Yeah, I've had a hard time. So anyway, I mentioned that to Suzuki Roshi. I said, well, when I'm sitting there, I'm... my body was just kind of clawing hard and pain. It's so odd, I can barely find my breathing. And I said, but if I sit, I was sitting in front of the therapist, and I said, but if I sit in front of the therapist, things quiet down and I can find my breathing.

[35:17]

And he said, oh, sitting in front of the therapist is good for you. That was what he said to me. Maybe he said something else to somebody else. But anyway, he never said, we'll keep sitting in the Lotus. He just said, maybe that's good for you. So I kept doing it, and I kept having a hard time. Also, as I approached Zen training, a very attractive thought occurred to me, which was, I think I can do this training until I die. Part of the reason I left the University of Brilliant Teachers was because the practice there was mentally mental. You had to translate the mentality through your fingers into writing.

[36:19]

various other kinds of work with computers and stuff, which I was happy to do, but there wasn't much body in the practice. And I wanted to do, I think I wanted to have a practice that has a physical dimension of the training. I mean, a training form, the sitting practice, also the going, physically going to meet the teacher and physically engaging with the teacher in a ritual. I was very attracted to that, and I thought, this is a sport you can do to the end of sports. You go, you have to retire. This is a discipline that you might be able to do right up to the death. And I'm still thinking that might be possible. And I'm pretty close now, and I'm still able to go and sit with you.

[37:21]

And maybe today I'll die in this endo with you. And then that will be one happiness that I practiced right to the end. I need to retire. from the practice. And people do say, are you going to retire? Well, I may be forced to, but I don't quite see how that would work for me yet. It used to be hard, and then, and I told Suzuki Roshi about it, and he wasn't worried. And then, after about, yeah, after about three years, this funny thing happened in the summer of 19... It stopped being hard. And I thought, ooh, whoa, whoa. Am I becoming mentally ill? Am I missing something? It's not hard. And just a question, he said, practice isn't hard.

[38:23]

And something I always said, he said, sometimes the practice may not be hard for you. In other words, I thought, in other words, it's okay if sometimes it's practice isn't hard. And then he took out a piece of paper. This is paper. He took out a piece of paper and he folded it. He said, when we do aradama, we fold the paper and then we press on it before we make the next fold so that the movement is more stable. So I understood you saying that you have been doing the hard work of folding the paper, and now you're kind of just sitting on that fold. But there's going to be another fold, and then it will get hard.

[39:28]

You didn't say that, but that's what I understood you saying. And then that day, the next Zen Center officer was coming to me, and I asked him to leave. I was at Tosaha at that time. He asked me to leave the monastery and go to the city to be the director of the Sillis Center. And I thought, oh, here's the next fold. And I went and told Siddharashe, well, the next fold happened, he said. I said, did you ask the security about me doing this? And he said, yes. I said, well, if it's okay with him, I'll do it. So I went and I said, well, Lex Ferret came in and he said, what do you mean? And he said, well, they asked me to go to the city center to be director. And he kind of went, oh, did they? So before with that, before this intensive started, some of you were, I don't know, maybe doing five, sitting in a fold.

[40:36]

And then you come to the intensive, and there's a fold with your legs, for example, and your arms, they're folded, your arms and legs are folding, and it's getting hard. So people are coming to me and saying stuff like, and this is, again, people say, does it have to be hard? I said, well, what's the purpose? I said, I think it's to free all beings so they can dwell in peace. I think that's the purpose of this. Not so much the difficulty, but of the practice, which just happens to be difficult. The point of it is to bring peace and harmony to the world. Does that have to be difficult? No, it doesn't have to be. It doesn't have to be. But sometimes it is. Like the little guy there back in the day, it was not hard.

[41:42]

And that's okay. But then it is hard. Some people walk on level ground, and it's not hard for them. Some people, it's difficult to walk on level ground. But most people, if you start to tilt the ground up, as the air column becomes steep, it starts to get difficult. And when it's vertical, it's difficult for almost everybody. And so the intent is kind of like increasing, getting together and sort of increasing the incline a little bit. But not intentionally increasing, how bad is it does, because we spend so much time together. And we don't sleep in the same room.

[42:47]

Now, except you're saying you can sleep all day together. But those same people want to get up. So anyway, if they want to get up, let's get up and sit together. So we're sitting together. And sitting together can become difficult. And so some of us are already having difficulty. And I'm very happy that I can still do the program of this difficulty. But it's hard. It's hard for me, too. And I'm so happy I can still do it. But it's... I'm not worried when it's not hard. There are periods when it's not hard. I'm okay with that. And I want to be okay when it is hard. And... Yeah. And... Yeah. Yeah. And we could have more sitting than we have, or we could have less.

[44:05]

But before we came to the intensive, we already had less, remember? Remember around Christmas time, there was less, right? There was actually, right, that we had less sitting around Christmas time, wasn't it? And then you heard about the opportunity to go someplace where there would be more. And you just went there. And then you got there and you said, oh, it's hard. And we're going to have more opportunities. We're going to have a spring practice period. We can come to that too. And that will be hard also. Probably. Maybe. Sometimes. And then sometimes it won't be hard. Sometimes it will just be Then he says, this practice is the comfortable way. But it's not really comfortable.

[45:09]

If we're never uncomfortable, that's not really comfortable. Because then we start, if we're comfortable all the time, we start feeling guilty that we're so comfortable. And other people are so... So then we start feeling uncomfortable, and then we feel better. I didn't come to Zen... practice to get comfortable, I came to be able to be free of comfort and discomfort. And that's what I want. I want to be free of comfort, discomfort, gain and loss, pain and pleasure. I want to be free of that. And this practice is for that purpose, is to be free of gain and loss, which brings peace to the world. The problems of the world, I propose, come from people being caught up in gain. Gain, gain, gain, gain, gain.

[46:09]

And fear of loss, loss, loss, loss. That being trapped in that concern generates also all kinds of stress behavior. And we're here to... to compassionately respond to whatever difficulties come. I also think of this wonderful movie called Meru, in India, called Meru, which had never been claimed in human history. It's possible that this Meru was the mountain that the... Indian Buddhist thought of this mountain called Mount Sumeru. Anyway, there's a story about climbing it, and it's a documentary, and it's got a little section there where somebody asks these climbers, they made kind of a big effort.

[47:21]

and had a little bit of a hard time. I mean, they had kind of a hard time. There's this Austrian climber, some of you may know his name, and he actually, he climbed Mount Everest without oxygen. He could climb mountains and not have a hard time. Mount Everest, maybe he had a hard time, but without oxygen. But most people have a really hard time climbing Mount Everest, and nobody could climb this marrow, but these guys did it, and they had a really hard time, and actually they failed. Part of the thing is they didn't make it. They called it off. They could see that they probably would die if they kept going. came back maybe two or three years they came back and did it again and they succeeded and one of them who was in the first clone had major trauma to his brain because he fell and he they let him try again and he made it anyway I'll just cut

[48:39]

And the seminar says, why do you do this? Why do you climb these mountains? And one of them said, for the view. But if you took one of us up in a helicopter, I don't know if you know, if you took one of us up in a helicopter and put in this oxygen and just sat us on top of the mountain, we'd say, this is a really nice view. But it wouldn't have been the same if we had climbed it. So actually, enlightenment is in our face all day long. But it means our life fully is difficult. We think that what we see is it, but what we see is not it. So we have to, like, have a hard time, it seems like, but not all the time. It's just that we're not looking for it. It's just that it comes to us in a way, and then it comes to us and goes away, and we don't be forever ready to let it go.

[49:45]

It's part of the deal. And we're just not trying, in this practice, we're not trying to avoid pain or breathe pain. But it does come. And so part of the training is to get... to get... You're not able to relax... with the difficulty, and relax with the difficulty, and then you can play with the difficulty, and then you can be creative with the difficulty, and then you can understand the difficulty. But in order to relax with it, we have to be generous with it and careful of it and respectful of it and patient with it and enthusiastic about passionately embracing the difficulty. And then we can relax with it and move into

[50:49]

the actual creative process of reality. The difficulty, or even without resisting the difficulty going away, if it wants to go away. Yes, Linda. Yeah. I've been thinking about a question since you talked about, in the beginning, what you all said. And you said that All that is a human being in the presence of justice and everything that's good. And then you said also everything and everybody that's bad. We just say the good. Yeah. We just bring it up. You said that, near the beginning, that the word ki has a human being together with everything that's just and good, and also everything that's bad and everybody that's bad, right? Yeah.

[51:57]

No? Yeah, I said that. What do you call it? injustice and immorality and unrighteousness. It means righteousness. However, by practicing righteousness and justice and morality, we open to the realm that includes all the righteous and unrighteous together. But the character doesn't really mean... The character doesn't convey that sense of... that this righteousness includes all unrighteousness. So the question that rose in me was, why would I want to be in harmony with everybody that's doing harmful things? I don't know why you would want to, but I would want to because I want to help the people who are doing harmful things, like my granddaughter, you know?

[53:06]

She's new to me. And I was happy to see that she's new to her dad, too. She used to kick me in the face with her shoe. She wants to slap me. She's new to me. She wants to find out what the limits are, you know. So I definitely want to help this person who's being mean to me. And if people are more mean to me than that, I want to help them. And if they're mean to other people, I want to help them too. Because if I can help them, help them is help them become free of being mean. So I would like to help all mean people become free of being mean to people. And I would also like to help all the not mean people be free of being not mean people. So what attracted me to Zen was not stories about nice people. What attracted me to Zen was stories about people being not nice, and then other people, and the same people, maybe a few minutes later, being nice, and somebody there with compassion to the nice and the not nice.

[54:22]

So that story I often tell about Hakurei Zenji, he's being unjustly attacked, maybe insulted, And he says, asodeska. Then he is praised and respected. And he says, asodeska. I want to let you know to be equally devoted to the evil and the good in order to free people from both. And then I found out there's a ritual to help us realize that. So, somehow, I wasn't so much thinking that I wanted to help the people who insult me, I just thought it was so cool to see somebody who was even-handed with the insulters and the praisers. Well, that would also be helpful to the insulters and the praisers.

[55:27]

It would set both of them free. But first of all, I just thought it was so beautiful just to be able to live in that flexible way with the insulters and the praisers. I'm sorry. Hakuin is a Rinzai teacher of the 17th and 18th century who lived in that same area of Japan where Suzuki Roshi grew up, Shizuoka. And, you know, he did a lot of stuff, but that one story was one that was very important to me. That was like one of the glimpses where I thought, that's where I want to go, to that way of living. And I still do. And the training helps me remember that and realize that. Yes?

[56:29]

When you talked about the folds, you're sitting on the fold and then a new fold in those three years, it seems to me that what you didn't say, that instrumental, is that there's an element of faith that when you tell us, you know, whatever we're suffering or feeling now that's difficult, that it's for the benefit of all beings, or that it's not just our pain. There's a context for it. You have to believe it, or that you believe it, and that maybe I believe it. But isn't that part of it? Faith is definitely part of it, but again, when you say believing, that's kind of a controversial word. So I often say, faith is what I bet on. Faith is what I bet on. Faith is where I put my chips down. And so... Even my body, my body is my chip.

[57:32]

Yeah. So I put my chip over there in his endo year after year. I bet that that's a good thing. I bet that that truly is good for me, and I bet that me doing it will encourage some other people who want to do that bet. So that's a faith. To say I believe, I guess you could say. that might be good. And at least I'm betting for this life. We'll see how it goes. So far I continue to be encouraged by this bet, by betting on this. But I also bet that it would be good to make going to the dunes a ritual too. So I think I say in being upright that I I go to the dentist and the dental hygienist say, thanks, you mean my day.

[58:35]

Because they can see that I work on my teeth between cleanings. I appreciate that. So I brush my teeth for the dental hygienist to encourage them. To actually feel that, you know, they're doing important work and that people appreciate their efforts. So then it's a ritual. Brushing my teeth is a ritual. And I bet on that ritual of taking good care of the chip of our body. And sometimes we have problems with our teeth and it's difficult to take care of them, right? But I bet on taking care of them. And then if I don't take care of them, Then I do this pure and simple call of true practice, true body of faith, true meaning of faith, which is I confess I forgot the practice, I'm sorry. So I believe in the practice and I also trust that in the practice and I also bet on confessing when I forget that and saying I'm sorry.

[59:46]

And that's the true body of faith and true mind of faith that not only do you see something you want to see the way you want to see it, but when you forget that or don't act that way, you also go before the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas and say, I'm sorry. That's also part of it. And that's another ritual. where the person lines up with the practices they want to do by saying, I didn't do it, and then saying again, I do want to do it. And that practice of confession and repentance is a practice which is done every morning at many training temples. like Sho-Aku-Mukusa in Japan, they say that, all my ancient twisted karma.

[60:53]

And when raising this first request, the teachers did not mention that to people because they realized that particularly the Catholics would get upset. So after quite a long time, we started to practice that pure and simple color of true practice. We were strong enough to be able to practice confession. And also, even taking refuge was kind of dicey at the beginning of Zen in the West. Now we can take refuge and people don't say, religious. They don't necessarily all leave. So yeah, faith is really, as somebody said, it's like the stern of the... Not the stern, it's like the keel of the boat.

[61:59]

It's at the center. It makes everything possible. But it's really that this is what... Faith is what you think is most important in life. And no matter what it is, we can work with that. And it will turn into... the bodhisattva vow eventually. If somebody wants to be a great piano player or even a better piano player than other people, we can work with that if that's what's most important, and it will mature into the aspiration of the Buddha's passion. And it will be. At one point, you used the metaphor of, like, there's a fragrance. It isn't like you're full on, but there's something that draws you. Yeah. Yeah, like that story of Hakuin, there's like a fragrance. I think that's what I'm looking for.

[63:01]

Yes and yes. Jan and Sam. I think we're often attracted to practice or come to practice out of deep pain and suffering. But I think it's also important to know or to realize these times when things are going well and to take appreciation for them and have gratitude for the fact that, oh, I'm happy or things are going well because it won't last, you know. Tony, we can stop before you say because. You can just say, it's important to appreciate, and then you can add a bunch of becauses after that. But what you said was good up to that point. Because you slipped into something you don't really know about. But, you know, there's some theory about it. But it's good to appreciate when things are going well.

[64:12]

I agree completely. However, just want to remember, it's also good to appreciate what things are. And that's what I'm about to set forth, because some people are having a little hard time appreciating that things are not going too well here. It's a rough ride already, and it would be good to appreciate that. And that the ride is to appreciate that too, I agree. And if you don't appreciate it, I would say it would be good to appreciate that. Appreciate everything. Come free by that path, being grateful for everything. So again, the story I often tell is, once upon a time, I think it was in Japan or one of those other Asian countries, maybe Korea, maybe China, there was a very lovely woman who lived in a shu.

[65:19]

And she had so many children, she knew what to do. And a young man went to her one time and said, what's this? What's the secret of your wisdom? How do you really like to do it all the time? And she said, no matter what happens, I say, thank you very much. I have no complaints whatsoever. No matter how hard it gets, no matter how easy it gets, she says, thank you. It's not that she likes hardship or likes it easy. It's that she practices gratitude. and doesn't complain. Thank you very much, I have no complaint whatsoever. That's her practice. It's possible when she says, I have no complaint whatsoever, that actually in her room somebody says, oh, I do. But anyway, that's her practice. Thank you very much, I have no complaint whatsoever. She tells this young man. Try that. And if you met her sometime later, maybe a year or two later,

[66:25]

And he said, I'm sorry to report I haven't been able to do the practice you taught me. And she said, thank you very much. I have no complaint whatsoever. So gratitude, no matter what, is what we're trying to learn. And that's the path to free us from good and evil. or that's a path. Sam? I'll give that a try. I feel quite rushed. You feel quite what? Rushed. Rushed. Yeah, I don't necessarily... Say thank you? Yeah, no, no. You don't say thank you? You don't necessarily say thank you when you feel rushed?

[67:28]

No. Well, that's not the first thing, at least. Yeah. So, but you're thinking of trying to arrive, how to say thank you when you're rushed? Yeah. When you're rushing yourself or when other people are rushing you? Mm-hmm. You know, like, rush, let's go faster, Sam, faster, faster. It's hard for you to say thank you at that time? Yeah, I don't. I didn't do it this morning, at least. I kind of forgot all about that thank you part. We'll leave it. Cigarettes in the morning? Yeah. Soku? Yeah. You should say thank you, maybe, and then we'll have a piece of medicine for that situation. Yeah, maybe. Especially if you say it over and over again, you mean it. So sometimes I'm in a situation where I'm saying, inside I'm saying to myself, thank you very much. I have no complaint whatsoever.

[68:32]

I'm going to look and see. Does she, has that been, do you mean that? And they'll be, not quite, we'll say it again. One time in the early transmission of Buddhism to the West, like more than 50 years ago, Nancy Wilson Wallace, one of the benefactors of Zen Center, San Francisco Zen Center, she was in a class, I think, someplace on the planet, and there was a Theravada monk teaching loving-kindness meditation. And one of the people in the class kind of just got... at this instruction and criticized it and, you know, said how stupid it was because people are, you know, so angry and mean. To practice loving-kindness is ridiculous.

[69:34]

And the monk said, and then he went on with the instruction about loving-kindness. And now we also have this yee-wee-wee called A Lovely Day in the Neighborhood. So somebody criticizes Mr. Rogers for that perspective. This is something which one might want to learn, because one thinks it looks pretty cool, but not so easy to, when somebody says, you know, you're moving too slowly, Sam. You should rush, and then you may have a hard to say, oh, thank you so much. Basically, the more you say it, the more chances you have to look to see if you meant it.

[70:39]

It makes me feel bad about myself that I feel so rushed and so serious about these small potatoes. I mean, I have an insight, but it doesn't make me feel good. This ain't nothing, and now I'm disoriented. Sam was rushed for a good reason this morning. He was bowing around the altar when someone's utensil fell. So he must have felt really rushed. Yeah. Right? That was one occasion. Yeah, one of the, for me, another story from, like, a 1960 movie, At Tassajara, we had a lot of reading, and the road got washed out. So we kind of, we couldn't get any food in over the road very, you know, unless somebody like me and Mel went out and carried it in.

[71:47]

So we never ran out of food. We always had three meals, but the food got really simple. And the soups got very watery. Nothing like that you could bite in the soups. And one day, we had some croutons in the soup. Somehow we found, we who were sitting with the soup somehow became aware that there were croutons in the soup, but the croutons did not float. They sunk to the bottom. So if the server didn't put the water down to the bottom of the pot, If they just served from the upper half of the pot, then you would get no croutons.

[72:54]

Or you might say, I would get no croutons. And in the intimacy of monastic practice, especially when you're in your 20s and your marbles all lined up very nicely, you can remember the serving styles of all the different servers. You know, we're servers serve for the talk, and we're servers sit down and get the croutons, or whatever, tofu, vegetables. But we were not making tofu and vegetables. All we wanted was croutons. And they were like, eww. So anyway, I was sitting down at Zendo, the old Zendo, And somebody was coming down the aisle to serve me. And I remembered that person was the kind of person that scooped from the bottom.

[73:59]

And I was looking forward to him reaching me. And then I saw it coming around the corner. Another server. Hey, who is it? It seemed like it was almost, and he was like, turning the camera like I'm too rude. So the bar in the window was coming in, and he said to the guy, who's was coming. I was to see who would go to first. And the top server got to be first. And gave me some liquid.

[75:02]

And I didn't cry at that moment. I didn't cry because I didn't want any croutons. I cried later, not much later. I was still in the zindo. I cried that I was so concerned with such small potatoes that I went to the monastery ...was in practice, and it got really deep into realizing how selfish I was and concerned with croutons, that I could go that low. And I really felt like what I'm here for is to learn about my mind and to see how selfish I am. And it's really moving and embarrassing to see what petty concerns I have.

[76:14]

But even then, I could really say, this is what I'm here for. I'm not here to become a saint. I'm here to learn about my mind. And I'm embarrassed. I'm crying because I'm embarrassed. I'm sad that I'm this way. But also, I'm glad I know my mind a little bit. So, yeah, so you know your mind. You know your mind doesn't like getting rushed. You know you're embarrassed to be concerned about small potatoes, but sometimes you are. And that concern for small potatoes is calling for compassion. You can be free of being concerned with small potatoes while you're still concerned for small potatoes. And then you can teach other people who are concerned for small potatoes. But am I getting more potatoes or less potatoes?

[77:21]

That's pretty small. But that's normal. And the tree ring is to look at that, is to turn the light around and shine it back on that mind and see how they're all working. Thank you for your... Sometimes this study is really hard and sometimes it's really a delight. And we're supported to study it, study no matter what's going on, to learn how to do that, that working, turning the light on and shining it back on our consciousness. We're being supported to do that. Turn your light around, shine it back, and illuminate the self.

[78:28]

Learn what that self is. Study that self. And then become free of that self. And then body and mind drop off. But it's kind of hard work sometimes. Yes? I feel like the practice is the same when one is filled with subversive self-doubt and it starts like one can lose faith in oneself. One can lose faith in self, yeah. And it seems like the same practice applies to just study it to be compassionate with that lack of faith, that self-doubt that can fill one from doubting even that the practice is working or that one is worthy of the practice. It's basically the same practice. And that one of the things you were saying with the gratitude is just kind of acting as if, and that even though one is filled with terror, fear, and self-doubt, we still say thank you for this opportunity.

[79:36]

We still show up in the Zendo, even though we have doubt. Yeah. And at some point, the faith will come up. And if you don't show up in the Zendo, it's the same practice. You say at some point, the faith will come up? Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Some people emphasize self-doubt.

[80:42]

Some people seem to emphasize doubting others. Some people do both. And some people do neither. A lot of possibilities here. Whatever it is, it's calling for compassion. And no matter what it is, it's being responded to with compassion. And we have the opportunity to realize that. And we are in the process of realizing it. That's what we're doing. That's what we're here doing during this intensive.

[81:59]

We're coming, while we're doing that, while we're learning to listen to everything with compassion, and give compassion to everything, and we're calling to everyone to be compassionate to us. So everything I'm doing is to be compassionate to me. Everything you're doing is asking me to be compassionate to you. And while that's happening, the way somebody asks us to be compassionate is by rushing us, being with us. And we say something and they say, no. And we go, ooh. Oh, yeah, right. Oh, yeah, yeah, right. You want me to listen to you when you say no. And when you slap me, you want me to remember when you slap me.

[83:03]

And then you praise me. You want me to remember compassion while you're praising me. Not like sink into that, but like, oh, yeah, so on. So here we are. Sometimes people ask me to sing a song and I can't remember any. Sometimes people ask me to sing a song and I remember one. This is one of those times when I don't hear anybody asking me. But I remember them. And the one I remember is... We're in the army.

[84:22]

And we're not going to get rich. But that's what we're doing. We're so fortunate to be able to devote ourselves to Sangha. We can never escape it. There's no way we can go to get away from it. My way to go will always be in the Bodhisattva Sangha.

[84:51]

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