In my efforts to keep in touch with the younger generation, I listened to a commencement speech given by David Foster Wallace when he was still alive. I guess it was given about 10 years ago, 11 years ago. And then the name of the speech is called, This is Water. And I understand that this was a popular speech among younger people. Pardon? Older people too. Older people too? Have you listened to it? Yeah. So I listened to it. And the part that led me to bring it up to you was that he told a story at the beginning, which was two young fish were swimming along.

[01:18]

And they met an old fish who came by and said, how's the water? And then they all swam on. And after a while, one of the younger fish said to the other younger fish, what is water? So right there, I would like to point out that the old man did not say, this is water. He said, how is the water? And the young man said, well, what is it? What is water? And with all due respect to David, a younger man, I disagree that this is water. We are swimming in water, you know.

[02:23]

Fish do swim in water. But if they're swimming in the water and they say, this is water, that may be popular. But I kind of have a different point of view. My point of view is... what is water? We could say, Zen students are sitting and an old teacher comes in their room, like Suzuki Roshi, and says, how is Zazen? He didn't say, he didn't very often say, this is Zazen. He said, how is Zazen? I think that the statement this is water has the merit of directing some people's attention to the water. I appreciate that. But I guess I'm offering a supplement rather than saying this is water to get people's attention to the water.

[03:32]

I would say what is the water? What is the water? How is the water? The old man could have said But he said, how is the water? That's what the old man said. The old man did not say, this is water. If you're a fish, water is pretty important stuff. It's nice if some old fish encourages you to pay attention to the water. which you're in, and you're in this. It's really important. It's good to pay attention to what's important. For fish, water is important. So the old fish, let's not miss this opportunity. And so then, of course, I thought of the dogans.

[04:35]

Fish swim in water. and no matter how far they swim, they never reach the end of the water. Birds fly in the sky, and no matter how far they fly, they never reach the end of the air. And then he says, people, etc., are also like this. So then I say, humans swim in confusion. Oh, I forgot.

[05:37]

I forgot. An important line. Fish swim in water, and no matter how far they swim, they never come to the end of the water. Even in a little aquarium, they never run out. They don't bump into the wall of the aquarium. They just keep swimming. And you could put them in the ocean. It's the same thing. They don't come to an end. They never find the end. And if the fish leave the water, they will die at once. Birds also never reach the end of the air, but if they leave it, they die at once. Humans swim in confusion, and they never reach the end of the confusion. And part of their confusion is they're trying to get the end of confusion.

[06:44]

That's part of our confusion. We kind of want to understand it, but we want to understand it by getting to the end of it, you know, to the land of non-confusion. But we don't live in the land of non-confusion. We live in confusion, and there's no end to it. And if we leave, we will die at once. If we leave confusion, we will die at once. And some people try to reach the end of the confusion, the end of the water, without swimming in it. Or they try to reach the end of the air without swimming in it. And some humans try to reach the end

[07:47]

of confusion without swimming in it. But by swimming in confusion and asking, what is it? How is it? It's not that we find the end. It's that we find awakening. We understand that to say it's water misses the point. We become Buddhas when we swim in confusion. Buddhas are the great swimmers in confusion. They really know confusion. And they wake up in confusion, not wake up and then go someplace else. They wake up in the confusion, about the confusion, and that's because they've been studying it. They've been asking, how is it? How is it? How is it?

[08:49]

What is it? How is it? How is it? And also, again, part of the confusion is, oh, somebody's trying to get out of the water. That will be death spiritually. And again, What is this trying to get out of the water? What is this trying to escape from confusion? A lot of people are trying to escape from confusion rather than be intimate with confusion and wake up to what it is. So maybe for the young people we have to say, hey, by the way, this is confusion rather than, how is confusion? because maybe they don't know that this is already confusion. So just tell them that this is water. This is confusion.

[09:51]

And then after they're looking, or even you might even say, this is confusion, and it would be really good if you would pay attention. If you don't pay attention, we may have some catastrophe. So this is confusion. Pay attention. And now that you're paying attention, Now I'm going to ask you, what is it? How is it? But again, this is pretty boring. Just, what is it? How is it? This is what's happening. What is it? This is what's happening. How is it? How is it? How is this reality? How is confusion reality? How is greed reality? How is hatred reality? Humans swim in hatred, and there's no end to the hatred.

[10:57]

And if you try to come to the end of hatred without swimming in it, you will not be successful. But instead of trying to come to the end of the hatred, if you switch to compassionately asking, how is this? There will be freedom and awakening in the midst of hatred. I thought I might mention that to you today. Bodhisattvas... Swim in confusion. Bodhisattvas swim in the Buddha Dharma. And they ask, what is confusion? What is the Buddha Dharma? And they wake up to what confusion is. And they wake up to what Buddha Dharma is. By swimming in it.

[12:00]

By walking in it. By flying in it. Oh. What is it? How is it? The amount of time we have left to discuss the Dharma is... Even the Buddhas don't know how much time we have. I could say it's immeasurable also. The amount of time we have left is immeasurable. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't be grateful for whatever amount of time we have. We're so fortunate to have heard about the possibility of questioning what's going on, of questioning our delusions and our confusion.

[13:04]

This is a wonderful teaching that we have been given. Studying the great scripture, how is it? What is it? But I hope we keep swimming together. I hope we keep swimming through delusion, through greed and delusion, and through the sutra. And keep asking while we're swimming. What is Sonia? Sonia thinks that if you don't say, what is it now, then you defile it. Then it's open. That's my thought.

[14:05]

Did you hear Sonia's thought? If you don't question it, you're open to defiling it. oh I see if you don't say now no I don't agree I think if you say now now what is confusion if now you don't say it I'm just saying to say what is it is our way of dealing with not defiling it and also say what is it now is another way But you don't have to say the now. I think without it, you might think you could. You've got it. It's also with it, you might think so, too. This what is it is a medicine for people who grab it. So what is confusion is for people who grab confusion and try to get rid of it.

[15:11]

What is it now is another medicine for the same purpose. The now is not required. But I don't think it hurts. You can also say, what will confusion be? How will confusion be? You can put it past, present, or future. That's fine. Basically, you're oriented properly by wondering what it is, by paying attention to it and wondering. paying attention and wondering paying attention and wondering paying attention not trying to get rid of paying attention to what? to the confusion to the greed to the hate to the fear

[16:17]

Pardon? Yeah, and the same with Dharma. The same with the sutra. Yeah, so I was about to put my hearing aids on, but I was interrupted by the visitation of some kind of a cough or a sneeze. And now I'm going to finish the process so I can hear what this young fellow says. What if we ask, what is right here? That's fine. We're swimming in right here. Yeah. Which happens to be whatever, like confusion. What is right here? Joy. Yeah, or joy. If there's joy, what is joy? What is a follow-up question?

[17:36]

What if we ask what is here before we ask what is right here? If that's what's coming, we can work with that too. How is that? You defiled it very nicely. That was good. You really defiled it. What is it? It's good. to say it's good misses the point. But thanks for missing the point right here to demonstrate how tempting it is to miss the point. Yeah, thank you. He's showing us how to defile that wonderful question by answering it and saying this is the answer.

[18:40]

That's great. Thank you. Say again. I don't know, but that's a good question. Maybe the way you speak without defiling is you say, I'm not going to speak. What is the Buddha? I'm not going to say. Or... You can just be quiet. Or you can say, just by the way, to say it's this misses the point. You can say, I don't know. That's already been used too. But this particular one, I don't know didn't lead to then is there no practice.

[19:43]

The nice thing about saying to say that it's this misses the point is that then that makes people think, Well, then maybe it's nothing. But we're not saying it's nothing. It's just saying you can't defile it by saying it's this. It's a life. It's our life. And to say our life is this kind of misses the point. But that's okay. You can do that. But this ancestor didn't do it. He said, nope. And then, does that mean there's no practice? Nope. I don't say that. I say... that this thing, this wonderful practice of the Buddha just cannot be defiled by anything you say about it. So that's what I have to say, he said. What about what Ted is saying about it? I don't feel like there's much defilement going on with Ted right now concerning the practice. I don't feel like Ted's chuckle is saying that this chuckle is it.

[20:47]

He seems to be practicing, doesn't he? I don't know how he's practicing. It's kind of keeping up to himself. I'm open to your question. And if you want to turn your question into an indictment, I'm ready for that too. Yeah, you can do that too, yeah. These are ways to not slip into limiting and grasping. Even though you might not be very popular because people wanted somebody to tell them what's going on. Sorry, that was silly. That was undefilable.

[21:58]

That was undefilable. Oh, you had something more serious? Okay, here we go. Are you ready for one final piece of seriousness? is happening or what is this, you know, they'd call it, you know, have fear and call it something. Huh. I think that would have been fine too. Two swift fish are swimming through the water and an old fish comes by and says, what? What? Let me play here. Yeah, that's perfectly good too. That's especially good for the young fish who are aware that they're swimming in water. It's good for them. But sometimes they don't even know they're in water. So the old guy says, what is water?

[23:01]

I thought the old fish said, what are you doing? Yeah. What are you doing?

[23:13]

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