pretty much that a lot of people love you. That pretty much, that basically you're supported and loved by the universe and particularly by people. I think you also kind of need to feel that all the Buddhas are there with you, supporting you and rooting for you. It's very difficult to face the ultimate truth if you don't feel that kind of support. So I feel that that we need in this community anyway, meeting Tasselhard, we can go to City Center, and all the workshops I do around the country and so on, I feel people really need to have the context of great love going towards yourself, towards others, and coming from others towards yourself in order to actually meditate on ultimate reality, in order to meditate on these awesome topics of selflessness.

[01:03]

Basically, I think that people, you know, believe in themselves, are self-concerned, and don't think that they don't feel a lot of support, so they keep holding on to themselves, and they're not going to consider topics which might release them from this self-clinging unless they feel supported. So the context of deep study in Zen is love. Not like or dislike, but love in the sense of like, you know, we're inseparable kind of thing. That's the context of deep, deep, deep insight. And it's also the fruit of deep insight. So it's the context and the fruit. We don't have to worry about the fruit, we just have to establish the context and do the work and the flower and the fruit will come. And then the flower and the fruit are then again the context for more deep work, which has more love as a flower.

[02:08]

So it's kind of a plant-like reproductive process. So I intend to give teachings, those teachings which help us tune into the ultimate reality. I intend to bring up teachings from the past and from the present that help us tune into ultimate truth, or what we call the Dharma body. At the same time, I have to keep, I think, what do you call it, banging the drum, playing the music for creating, maintaining the context of a great love for this teaching. And so I think I have to go back and forth because I've noticed you emphasize deep insight too long, people forget about the love. So I have to keep, however you don't, if you emphasize the love, you don't have to necessarily keep reminding people of deep insight.

[03:14]

they might just fall into it accidentally. Because when you really feel love, sometimes you just sit still and see it. And a lot of Zen stories are about some person comes there and they feel a lot of love and suddenly they see. But I think there's some discipline here too, within the context of love, some discipline. So part of what I will offer you is meditation teachings for how to settle into the dharma body, the true body. But also I'd like to talk with you off and on about how the forms, the regulations and ceremonies of monastic practice are also opportunities for settling into meditation and ultimate reality. Because that's what they're there for.

[04:20]

Their ways, these forms that we have are ways of meditating on how the self and the other in the form of ceremonies and regulations, how the self and other come together and are one or two. And When they're one, that's selflessness. But as we, as I, as you, meet these forms, there's usually some kind of form plus something. Well, that something can drop away. Usually there's the form and kind of like over-interest in doing it or under-interest in doing it. Very seldom is there just intimacy with the form and that's it. There's just the form.

[05:20]

There's just sitting, just bowing, just breakfast and so on. Usually there's kind of like a little bit, something extra. And so there can be training during this practice period about how to like take away the extra, take away the body and mind from the forms. But Anyway, but I don't know if you want to do that. Because that can be embarrassing. If you're just doing it on your own, that's fine. But if anybody else is interacting with you, if there's a form and then there's something else, that something else might be something that you could be embarrassed about. Namely, it might be like you. I don't know if you want to have this thing happening. This is something to think about. Right away. This last practice period that I did here, towards the end, actually, I said, oh, I didn't ask you, did you want to be trained? I didn't ask him at the beginning.

[06:22]

But towards the end, I asked him, and several people said they did. But maybe some people don't want to. Actually, like, get trained. They just want to, like, enter the front side of the practice period and come out the back and just leave me alone. I know how to do it. And if I can survive, I'm sure something good will come out of that. And I think that's true. If you just, like, stay here for three months, you're going to be fine. You're going to, you know, it's going to be worthwhile for most of you. Some of you, I think, you've done enough of that and it's time to, like, take a step up. But, and I can tell you which are which if you want to know. So, So, on the topic of... We have three pure precepts in the Soto Zen school. Three pure precepts. The first one is to embrace and sustain regulations and ceremonies.

[07:23]

The next one is to embrace and sustain all good things, all good dharmas. The third one is to embrace and sustain all beings. The first one is the one that focuses in training in the dharma body. Second one's about the bliss body or the reward body. Third one's the transformation body. They're all important, but the first one's ultimate reality. The first one's the one that hurts. Next two are like, no problem. First one is the bitter one. First one's where you train in selflessness. That's the first one. So that's the one that monasteries are really well set up for. So I'd like you to think about whether you want to train in that first pure precept or not. And maybe those of you who want to could let me know because I'm not going to impose upon anybody that doesn't want to train in this stuff because it's just, you know, why bother you?

[08:27]

I won't bother you if you don't want to, like, work on this And if you do, I won't bother you either because you want me to. This, you know, right now, this is like middle of January, early part of January, middle part of January, 1999. And this is like 30 years since I came out of Tongariro, like today. And when I came out of Tongariro, I was happy. And I'm still happy. When I came out of Tangario, I was happy to do whatever they assigned me. When I went into Tangaro, I came into Tassajara and I was walking around Jamesburg in the dark. Even back then, it was a Jamesburg. Walking around in the dark and I stepped into a cesspool. And this cesspool had, you know, it was like a cut-off 55-gallon drum.

[09:42]

So when I went in, I gashed my shin on the edge of the drum. This is in the early days of Zen. We didn't know about disease. It's like, you know, hepatitis, tetanus, stuff like that. We didn't require people to have tetanus shots before they came. Anyway, I got cut. And I went to Tangario and put on long underwear. And went and sat in that old zendo. And so my long underwear and my gash became one. And after Tangario, I went to the bath to soak off the meshed thing. I was happy to get out of Tangario. And we had a work meeting right up there, you know, below the... It wasn't a zendo then, but right up there above the men's dorm. And somebody says, does anybody know how to drive a truck? And I said, I do.

[10:43]

So I got in this big truck we had and started it, but the truck had no brakes. The truck rolled down the hill towards the men's dorm, but just before I got there, I put on the emergency brake. So that was the first thing I did after Tongario. So that was the end of the truck project. So then they said, well, why don't you guys do something else? So we had a crew of people to go up the road. And during Tangaroa, there's a big storm. So the road got kind of, not exactly washed up, but a huge, you know how the roads, the stream sometimes jumps to turn? There's various places where it can jump, not turn the corner, and run down the road instead. So I did that a couple places and made these big, ruts, so he went and filled in the ruts. And I remember one of the people at that time, I was somehow put in charge of this rut-filling crew, and one of my co-monks sat at the edge of the rut, which was about four feet deep and about three feet wide, and he took these pebbles and threw them in.

[11:47]

Anyway... We have this practice period. And, you know, I went up to the Zen door last night, and also this morning, and during the events up there, some of you don't get to see this stuff because you're looking at the wall, as you should, meditating on ultimate reality, but I saw this Zen student walking around the Zen door like this. Kind of like, I don't know what, the Queen Elizabeth stepping through the mud. She was afraid of maybe her robe would get in the mud. And I told her that usually we walk in shashu in Zen, and that's not necessary to lift your robes up. And she seemed to take it quite well.

[12:48]

I know this person, so I figured, you know, from previous discussions that she was open to some training. Anyway, I think you all know that the usual posture in the Zen door is a shashi when walking around, right? You all know that? It's unusual. It's not right or wrong, it's just kind of a training opportunity. So now that's clear. Then you can, after that, then you can go like this, walk around like this. Then someone can say to you, what are you doing now? Or, did you know about Shashu? Or whatever, you know. It's a loving thing, you know. The context is loving. It's not like, you're wrong, you know, you're evil. Not in Shastri. That's not it, you know. That's not it, really. I was, you know, walking around the Zendo here at Tassajara one time, carrying the stick, and then afterwards at tea in the afternoon, Sunukhi Rishi showed me a way of, taught me how to walk in a certain way.

[14:03]

But I didn't feel like, oh, God, you know, he's telling me I'm wrong or right or anything. I just felt like, oh, this is what I came for. I'm getting instruction from my teacher about something in Zendo. That's what I came for, so I'm getting it, so yay. I didn't feel like, oh, he's saying I'm a bad student. I thought he was saying he loves me. He's got a few minutes left to live, and he's spending his time talking to me about the way I walk. So I was happy. That's what it's about. It's not about, you know, you're wrong. It's about, is there any self here with this practice? We got this form, and how did it get into this? Who did that? Where did that come from? Just, like, check it out. That's all. And it turns out that there's lots of opportunities because almost everybody's doing something around these forms. You know what I mean? Like we have this sort of like upright posture and then we have all these people who are doing these various things in relationship to that.

[15:08]

So there's always like some opportunities to check. How are we doing here? And sometimes there's nothing much to say, just to check. You know, are you sitting straight? So I check your posture during zazen. I sometimes can't see what's going on because lots of clothes on, but I sometimes feel your back. I'm just checking. My hand's checking and you can see what you feel like you're doing. Sometimes I have a suggestion. I don't say I'm correcting posture. There's nothing wrong with your posture. There's nothing wrong with walking around with zender like this. It's not wrong. It's just something to check on and say, well, what's that about? Do you mean to do that? Well, maybe, yes, I do. I'm doing this little thing for you. We're just checking. Just, what is happening here? That's all. What is actually going on? What are you intending here? But the feeling should be a loving context.

[16:09]

And it is, basically. I mean, it's like, here's a chance to check, to see what's happening. But I don't know if people want to do that. Another thing I noticed, you know, when the Taṃgāryo people came in, you know, they're happy, right? They just had a bath, right? So they're coming into Zendo, and we have this other, this practice of, let's see, you come in the door, I'll do this now. You come in the door, this is the back, they're coming in the back door, I guess, yeah, coming in the back door, and they're going to go this way or that way, right? I mean, so let's say it's going to go this way. So then you go this way and then you get to the beginning of the time, is that right? And then you do a Shao Shu Ba. Is that right? That's what I thought. So I watched these various people on both sides do that thing. So each person did it and then each person has a chance to say, when you're doing that, are you there?

[17:20]

Did you actually mean to do that? Was that like what you meant to do? Or was that kind of like you were actually going, you were like across the room and then that thing happened sometime after you made the decision to go there or something like that? So, what does it mean to actually like stop? Do you actually stop when you do that? Is it an on-the-motion thing? Is it kind of like... Or do you actually stop? But we could just say, let's just say for this practice period, for example, we could say that we can vote even. Should we, like, stop? And do Shastra bow? What do you think? Huh? What? Is that okay to stop? Like, you know, actually stop? Do we have time to do that? This is going to cut into something probably if we do this. But, you know, what's it going to cut into? It's going to cut into, like, upright sitting time, right?

[18:23]

Because if you stop there, that's going to cut some time out of the time you get to sit. Unless you run fast to your seat. But we haven't discussed that part yet. It's not like, this is not like right, and then this is wrong. It's not like that. We could say no stopping, too, and then it would be, you know, but we could say stop. And then, like, you could see if you stop. And you could see that maybe it's not that easy to stop, but you did it anyway. And then I can also see if you stop, because I'm sitting there watching. And it's not like I'm kind of going... It's just, you know, after 30 years, it's just kind of natural that I notice every single thing you do in mind detail. You know? It's just quite natural. You go in the Zen room, boom! You see everybody's posture like that. It's just quite natural.

[19:24]

It just comes naturally after living in the environment. You just feel that. So, watch this now. Now I'm going to do a Sha Shubha. Now I get down here. I'm not going to come up with as much mindfulness as I went down. That's pretty hard. I find it's easy to kind of be mindful going down, but coming up... Instead of going down, bump, and stop someplace, and notice it at the end of it, and then come up. That's a major mindfulness practice. I mean, really. You feel that? Come on. It takes time. It's like there's your life. Don't you... I have other things to do, right? But really, since what you're going into is this zazen period, you really can take time to get there.

[20:32]

And what about the people behind you? They want to get to their seat. I'm holding them up. I'll tell them about you later. I hope she didn't get a burn in her nose. Maybe she ate something, huh? Did you eat something, Miraz, off the floor? Anyway, I would actually suggest that there is that way of bowing where you actually stop in shashu, and you go down, and you feel yourself go down, and you notice when you have gone as far as you're going to go, and you notice you're stopping, and that you come back up. And I'm saying that that is a major, we would make a major change in the Zendo for each one of us that does that. So, that's an example.

[21:36]

I don't know if you want to practice that, but there it is. What do you think? I mean, Does somebody not want to do it? And if you don't, then I appreciate you saying, I don't want to, and if I don't do it, I don't want you to talk to me about it. And I won't. I can remember who doesn't want any feedback about that point. Maybe I'll forget sometime. Like if you say, it would be better if you said, well, I want feedback on everything else, but not that one. because then it's hard to remember. It's easier to just remember people don't want feedback than they want feedback on some things and not others, but I could try myself. And I'm not necessarily going to say every little thing I notice, but that's a question, is whether you want to work on things like that. And again, if you don't, then you don't have to. Really, I think it's okay. We're not going to ask you to leave Tazara if you don't want to. it's actually okay. I mean, I really feel that way.

[22:36]

I think you're missing out on something, but it's okay. So I'm sincere to say, if you don't want to work on something like that, tell me or somebody else you don't want to, and then if I see you coming into Zendo and not stopping at that point, I won't say anything to you. But if you do it once or three times, I might say, you know, were you there when you bowed this morning? If I have a chance, if you're talking to me, I might say, well, no. But I won't ask you if you don't want me to ask you questions like that. And if you don't want to also keep track of that kind of stuff yourself. This is a way that training can... you know, this is the way you should train in ultimate reality, is to, like, take a form, and then watch what happens, and then see if there's any self around in there, and what, you know, what is it?

[23:45]

What is that extra thing? What is it? And would you be willing to let it sort of, like, drop away? Or not? And if not, why not? What are you afraid of? And we are afraid, because we think, you know, We have problems around that, right? But this is how you can actually work on this kind of thing. And that's what that precept's about, that first pure precept, about training in ultimate reality. But you've got to have a context here. You've got to be loving yourself so you don't feel like, okay, if I do this, if I miss that shashuba, I'm going to get terrible all day. No. It's not to be mean to yourself about this. This is a favor to do to yourself. So we need to have a loving, friendly feeling in the community so it isn't like people are shooting each other down for this stuff. It's more like it's opportunities to help each other. And there are several, like the gassho, you know, bringing the palms together.

[24:53]

Now, Suzuki Roshi taught that the tips of the fingers, even with the lower part of the nose, and the hands about this distance away, and arms lifted away from the body. He himself didn't do it so much that way, but it's what he recommended. Thich Nhat Hanh recommends doing it with like, like you have a little lotus bud in your hands, right? So he recommends doing it like this, and he does it more like this. But a lot of people in his group do it this way. I don't know if somebody does Soto Zen way at his group, whether he has to put a little lotus in there or not, but... Anyway, there's different styles of these things. So in different monasteries you have different forms that we agree on so we can check and help each other in that monastic context without thinking that this is right. It's just an opportunity to come together.

[25:56]

So even within Zen Center I say, do you want instruction on bowing? And they say yes. I say, well, let's do it this way for this practice period anyway. Let's just agree on this. And then you and i can watch and see how that goes because i'll see you do this quite often and do you want to check that out and they say yes and then next time i say well your hands you know lift it up a little bit more did you notice that or and the same with and there's a way of buying too frustration you know like is it like this or like this or like this or you know what is it well we can agree on this and then every time you bow There it is. And so on. So there's quite a few like this. Do you want to work on them or not? And so I can imagine some of you do and some of you might not. But there's a whole bunch of them. And this is a time to work on this, but not just to be perfect little or whatever it is, formophiles, but to train in selflessness, to train in the Dharma body.

[27:01]

But again, as I said, there has to be kind of a friendly environment for this, otherwise it's kind of like I can see those people, they're really into the form thing, but really what they're into is they think they're better than the other people. If it's that kind of feeling, then it's hard. But this is one point that I ask you about, I bring up, and I notice it's already kind of popping up there as a question. So once again, that's just about the monastic forms. But there's other meditations which are more having to do with meditating on your mind, setting up forms in how your mind works, which is basically the same kinds of exercises. But the way you're working on it doesn't really show in terms of the form of your posture or anything.

[28:15]

But I'd like to bring up both these kinds of things. So now it's, let's see what time it is. It's 8.12. And so I'll stop now if you have any questions or comments. Gordon? Yeah, I think I would like very much to practice this. I decided that I really do like the service and all this time I have not. Would it be all right if I opened this? Sure. But what I was wanting to know is, is there a possibility, or is there some kind of a... I know that sounds a really dumb question, but is there a possibility of a form sheet so that I know the various types of forms that are, you know... We don't have a form sheet. We have a regulation sheet, which is called guidelines.

[29:17]

So the guidelines say, walk in shashu, but they don't tell you how to do shashu. Like, you know, shashu might be like this, like this, like this. So we have regulations here, like walk in shashu when you have your robes on, walk in shashu in the zendo. That's a regulation. So maybe we'll go over the guidelines sometimes. But the ceremonies or the forms, you need instruction in. And so... senior, senior people might be giving you a hand there. Like, Inos and Adons, if they're up to it, and me and Tanto and practice leaders might give you a tip here and then, here about, you know, how you're walking, your posture, the way you're wearing your robe, stuff like that. If you're up for it, stand up, and we all know that. Do we have here a sign-up for this thing? Huh? What? Okay, so everybody can help Gordon.

[30:20]

So, but be nice to him, you know. Don't like say, okay, Gordon. Lovingly help him figure out, you know. No, he doesn't need police. What he needs is loving instruction. Right? Right? And so, you know, if you can help him out, do that. I mean, some of you others, if anybody else wanna sign up for this now? One, two, three. You don't want to, David? Because I got a couple things for you. Okay, I don't know who's next, whether it was Liz or Justin. Maybe ladies first. How should we get our hands in the down? Okay, so here's what I would suggest, is that the hands be basically flat to the ground. Now, there's other ways to do it, okay? Even in so-called sokozen, for example, some people go like this.

[31:26]

There's various ways, but I would suggest just the hands, like dasho, and then your hands go like that. Just flat. And you lift them up like this. Not like this. Not like this. Sometimes they say, it's like Buddha standing in these... So just put your hands down and clap. And you lift them up like this. That's okay. What's the problem with the push that helps you get the phone call? Some people cut their head three times. I think that I would say you can do it any way you want to. So one way is like this. Cut the head once. The other way is... three times. In Suzuki Roshi, in early years, they do it three times. And in later years, they do it like this. Real talk police said that you should lift your hands up as your forehead touches the ground exactly.

[32:30]

He read what was recorded. He said, no, I heard him in a talk. He heard him say that in a talk. Oh, on a video on the open set. He said that was the most important thing. What? He said that was the most important thing. I'm down like this, and you have to touch it with your hands. Yes? Support your elbows on the floor, or do you bring your lower arms up? I support my elbows up. I think some people lift the whole thing, but I think I have a double honor to look down at that list. So here's one way. This is something which you can decide, and then this is the way you're going to do it, right? Or you can say, I can do both ways. Either way, okay? Say, I'm going to try this way for the first move.

[33:31]

I'm going to go down like this, touch my hand with my head, touch it, and then lift my hand. Okay? All right, you can say that for yourself. That's what you're gonna do for the first move, being like this. Is that kind of a, sort of, a little laggy? Yeah, it's very laggy. This is the way I do it. I go like this. And, but Pedro thinks these guys are standing like this. Like this, like this. Right away. I am kind of a small lift. There's quite a lag between them. I'm like a little bit of a lift. But you can do it either way you want. It's hard. I think I would recommend, though, that you have your head tucked before you lift your hands because if you don't, it's going to happen to you right there. So, I put the hand down, then touch the head, then lift the hand.

[34:34]

Or put the head down and lift the hands at the same time. Either way, keep your side. You're there, right? That's the point, you're there. Okay, is that okay, Liz? And it's hard for people to learn that. It's hard to, unless you're looking, it's hard to see if your hand is doing it. Some people do look, but it's okay if they're already touched. If you come for doksan, I can tell you what it looks like. You can jump in with me. That was my question also. I have another question. Should your feet, like the props you're taking, go flat on the floor with your toes? Suzuki Roshi himself Put his, you know, let's see, how do you do it? His feet went, the top of his feet went back usually, okay? But usually they recommend for, they usually recommend, I think, hei hei ji, did you put hei hei ji or soji ji? Hei hei hei ji, I think they recommend that you have your toes bent up, you know?

[35:42]

See, the tips of your toes are touching. You do this, hei hei, soji ji, you know what I mean? Like... Western people do that. It tears if you step on it, you mean. Fear of tears, yeah, right. Fear of tears. I recommend you try to find it without reaching back there and doing that stuff, if you can. Better to use your hands in the front rather than the back. That's a difficult practice. With the feet, they can be either way, I think. But the Shashu thing is pretty straightforward, right? We do that, try to practice that. And there's other things too we can work with. Anything else, Manuel? There's a difference between a Shashu bow and a Gassho bow as far as how far you go, right? I think I think some you know sometimes you do a shau shu bao a gao shu bao way down sometimes you do it part way down sometimes again in Japan they do a gao shu bao where they go down with a patch like this right way down and sometimes so I don't feel like we have to get into that yet

[37:04]

These are just more things sort of leading up to this kind of subtlety, but how far are you going to go down? Yes? I don't. I said that I will talk about the mind and the body, but you can't see by looking at me whether I'm... Whether my mind is like a wall, you can't see. So it's hard for you to help me with that. So I said I would give instructions on mental training and also physical. The form and ceremony are also physical. It's also mental training that you were saying, so I don't emphasize one. My body and mind are the same, which seems like a discipline. Yes.

[38:08]

Yes. How do you feel it? If you have any suggestions, let us know. And if anybody else has any, I'd be happy to hear about it. Yes, about concentration, about deliberation, about being more intimate with the sound. Pardon?

[39:09]

Being more intimate with the sound, I understand. So do you have some suggestions about how to be more intimate with the sounds? My own experience is that sometimes I don't like vibration, but when I concentrate on the hallucinations of the rain, when I hold my breath. Pardon? When I'm more mindful, and when I try to do it, when I'm trying to... I fix more about the pronunciation, and then my object set between the name and the style, more very bright and more vital. So you find it helpful to concentrate on pronunciation?

[40:10]

Yes. You find that helpful? Thank you. Let's see, now it's 825. Are there some other? David, did you? Yeah. Last practice, you said something about some students require nurturing, some students are ready for training. Right. And some students will ask for training, but they're not actually ready for it. Right. So I guess I'm wondering if, well, maybe you could talk about it a little bit. Well, let's say somebody says they don't want training. All right? Then do they want more training or not? If they don't want either, well, then they're all set. Right? They don't want anything, right? They don't want, they don't want, I don't, they don't want to be hurt or anything, but they don't want nurturing and they don't want training.

[41:16]

If they want training, then in the process of the training, one might find out that they're not getting nurtured anymore. So then we'd have to be more nurturing. Somebody's like, in the training process and they're not giving themselves love, it shows. because they often get very tense and start acting hyper-vigilant, and the breathing gets off, or they become rather zombie-like, and so on. Very strange things start happening if a person's training themselves and disciplining themselves without some loving feeling. So then that day we would try to emphasize that for a while. This is for a person in a training situation so they're getting feedback, right? So then part of the feedback was you see tense, right? How are you feeling today? Terrible, blah, blah, blah. How come? So I inquired and I found out that the context of his training is a very brutal and unfriendly environment.

[42:17]

So then you have to soften the situation, make it more gentle and tender and loving. It's supportive. Set the training aside for a little while and look on this. But if the person doesn't want to be trained, then you might not even notice that they're not getting enough nurture. I think everybody needs to feel nurtured and supported before they dare expose themselves to a discipline. So feeling nurtured, supported, and loved is a basis of discipline, is a basis of learning in a way. But so some people, they might feel like, you know, I'm not ready for training yet. I just want to work on nurturing. Well, fine. Let's do that. And some people do that for years, which is fine. No problem. And then after that, they feel, now I'm ready for some trainings and disciplines. Nurturing is actually training too.

[43:19]

It's training in love. It's training in positive energy. It's training in learning how to receive and give love. It is a training, yes. Excuse me, are you making a distinction between the love present in nurturing and whether or not it's present in training? I'm using your phone. Am I using a distinction? You just said the thing that you felt that it was necessary to set aside the training in order to involve the student with nurture. It might be necessary. For example, someone might feel not nurturing enough to take on a practice where they would start noticing maybe the discrepancy between their behavior and just some standard. They might feel too anxious about it. Okay, so I'm interested in what you said based on the fact that later you quantified it by saying that the nurturing is, now this is my term, an environment of love.

[44:24]

Correct. So where do we stand in terms of training? Is that not also an environment of love? The environment of love is the environment of training. Right. So what is the distinction in your terms between nurturing as an environment you love and training as an environment you love? Well, I would say the training method inside of the nurturing. Right. Because some people do not want to get training. For example, some people don't want any negative feedback. They can't see that yet as nurturing and supportive. So they train . But once they feel enough support, they can receive negative feedback. Right. So this is perhaps a question of making on the ground . Yes. Anything else? We have the rest of talk about this.

[45:27]

But is there anything else you want to talk about? Yes? Would you be willing to train in overzealous forms or zealous underzealous forms? Yeah, right. Some people are overly zealous. Particularly, they tend to be overly zealous about other people. I guess I feel like if You're talking about being present and doing a form, but when I sort of decide that I'm going to follow all the forms... Yes. ...and I'm going to do this, that's meeting over the outside of my form. Right. So there's, as I mentioned before, there's basically two kinds of resistance. One is to be overly involved or indulge in the practice, and the other is to sort of hold back. So leaning into... too much too enthusiastic too much I'm going to be really good at this or too much I don't like the form leaning backwards and most people overdo it or underdo it it's hard to just like do the practice and it's like that's it so go too far go not far enough back and forth overzealous underzealous there's both ways of resisting the actual just settling into the form

[46:47]

Does that make sense? Did I answer your question? Either one, yeah. Either one. They're both really darling. They are. They are. Is that enough for now in that particular cycle of this stuff? And let's see. I don't know if we've decided yet, but we're also in the process of deciding what kind of daily schedule there will be. I like the three-day schedule that we, I don't know, three or more-day schedule that we have.

[47:53]

I like it. But I have some problem with having three regular days and then two unusual days. So I'm talking to the practice committee about maybe having four regular days and then so-called day off rather than have about three days and then a work day and then a day off. So we don't have a stretch of four days of the same schedule. And so there's consequences about that for work and other things. So we're talking about that. We haven't decided yet, right? Yeah, we'll do it tomorrow. Yeah. And the... The other thing is that, not the other thing, but another thing is doksans. And part of the way into the last practice period I did here, I started doing brief doksans.

[49:01]

And I myself have found that a good way to keep in touch, to have more frequent meetings than shorter. It's not possible to have long meetings more frequently. So I think I will offer that again in this practice period of having these brief meetings. And some of you haven't done this before. So maybe for a week or so, some of you might want to do it and see if it seems appropriate or something you want to make a commitment to, and then after about a week of seeing what it's like, then we'll see who wants to continue. But then after that, then you commit to do it.

[50:04]

and I commit to do it too, and we don't stop doing it. We don't say, well, I don't want to come today. We don't take days off from that practice. Whenever it's time to do it, then we do it. But you can stop, though. If you start doing it and you want to drop out, you can drop out, but you can't drop out and then get back in and then drop out and get back in. And some people also maybe aren't sure they want to do it now, but they could join later. Is that clear? So there's a commitment to just do it. But you might want to... I think it would be okay for a week just to sort of test it out to see if you want to or not. I will also do... dog sounds where people just sign up for a given dog sound and that happens and then unless you sign up again you won't get called so there'd be one set of dog sounds where a group of people would be doing them and they just every time we do it that you just be on that regular cycle the other kind is you'd sign up for an individual meeting and that would be also probably longer it could be longer

[51:18]

And I also see people for informal discussions. So there's three ways, and you can do all three or none or whatever. And of course the regular ones, I mean the short ones, they would be quite frequent and the longer ones where you sign up, then they're going to be less frequent. So that makes sense. And I myself prefer to do it that way. The distinction between formal and informal is that if you want to talk about your plans, talk about the future, talk about other people besides yourself, besides us, talk about problems of Tassajara, things like that.

[52:23]

That's an informal discussion. And so the brief or the regular Doksans are more just about your practice right now and whatever's coming up right now. And of course anything can come up. but you're not talking in terms of your history or your future or other people, even though you might want to talk about some of those things sometime. And, of course, it's sometimes very important to talk about those things. But the doksan is a kind of conversation which it's kind of rare in this world to have that kind of talk so I feel like I'd like to offer this kind of unusual kind of conversation to you because you can talk this other way you have been talking to people like this for your whole life so you still have that opportunity many other places but this is a special kind of conversation focused on the present moment and your actual practice not

[53:36]

you know, what you might do sometime, but what you're actually practicing. Okay? And I have a, it's called the Razi Sutra here, which I can read to you sometime. Is there any other questions at this time? Can I do the Razi Sutra? Please. So this person, this dog person named Razi has come with me. She's a little doggy. She gets frightened, I think, of various things.

[54:44]

She's actually afraid of children, I think. I don't know what happened to her children. Anyway, she's quite high energy and kind of sensitive. And yet she's really wonderful, too. So here's the Rasi Sutra. It's called the Rasi Guide. Rasi commands are come here, Stay. Like if you want her to not come with you someplace, she says stay. Rozzy, stay. Like if she's coming into Zendo with you, say, Rozzy, stay. And also if she's on you or furniture or anything like that, the command is Rozzy off. If she's jumping on you or something, she might do that. You say, oh, that works pretty well. And also rollovers.

[55:47]

Especially if you have a treat in your hand, she rolls over. Although I found out that she can't roll over into Tamiya mats. She needs some traction. And another command is no. So those are for things like if she chases raccoon or deer or she's biting you or something like that. Just say no. That's pretty well. She does chase raccoon and we don't want her to do that because they're much bigger than she is. Although she does have a rabies shot. She's kind of fearless in certain ways and raccoon and deer can kill her. She doesn't want to go after them. She also understands let's go. G-O is a big word for her. And so let's go. Get ready for immediate action. She understands walk, the word walk.

[56:48]

She likes that word. And so if you people want to take her a walk, you can take her. Just let me know you're going to take her. Or let somebody know you're going to take her. But you're welcome to take her on walks if you want to. Okay. Stay with me, that is, when crossing the street or something. And she also likes pine cones. I brought some pine cones with me, small ones. Possibly our pine cones are too big for her, but I brought the greenhouse pine cones if you want to throw pine cones for her. You can try a variety of words with her since she has great linguistic abilities. She knows your tone of voice and is used to simple praise such as good dog, good girl, or more exalted expressions of devotion such as earth goddess. If you want Rozzy to go somewhere with you and she doesn't know you,

[57:52]

Take her leash. You don't have to put the leash on her. Just have her leash in your hand and she'll go with you. So if you want to take her and she doesn't want to, I'll give you her leash and she'll go with you. So you don't need to put it on her. She likes her leash. Rozzy should not be fed at the table scraps or anything other than dog food or dog treats. She has a very sensitive stomach, so don't feed her anything but her dog food or regular dog treats. Rozzy snaps without biting. She doesn't really bite. She snaps. She hits the side of her teeth on you. She snaps when she is overstimulated. Sudden movements, loud noises, big crowds of happy, raucous Zen students, and they trigger this unattractive behavior. So if we're having a dance or something, she wouldn't be able to come.

[58:54]

She just gets too excited and starts, you know. She's great, but she's not good at dances. And also, don't come straight down above her head. Come underneath her if you're going to touch her. She gets frightened when stuff comes at her from above. If you don't know Rozzy, don't try to approach her from the top. If you put your hand on her head, like, for example, putting your hand on her head, also don't expect her to be really friendly right away. She responds to frequent low-key conduct. She loves walking, running, fetching. She's very sensitive to your liking her. Ticks love Razi and need to be removed from her after she's been in a brush. They're kind of easy to see because she has a light coat.

[59:59]

So that's the Razi Sutra written by her mother, Rusa. Any questions? Rozzy's position during the practice period is Jack Russell Terrigan. Is that enough for tonight?

[60:21]

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