the way that the room was set up in Zendo last week and wondered about having a class in Zendo. So we're exploring that possibility to see if it works. Some other people also, when I checked around, thought it was more spacious. However, tonight it's not so crowded. A few people didn't come. So maybe this room will. Not be so crowded. I like the intimacy of this room, but it was really crowded before. So we're looking into perhaps meeting in the Zen door. Do you remember the story from last week?

[01:10]

Do you remember the story from last week, Tracy? No. Well, one of the main stories we told last week was about a Chinese monk whose name is virtue mountain. And he was a student of the Diamond Sutra of Perfect Wisdom. He studied the sutra and he studied commentaries and he actually taught actually very important in the life of the fifth ancestor of Zen and the sixth ancestor of Zen.

[02:17]

And therefore, in many succeeding generations, the Diamond Sutra is very important. He was not of the Zen school, apparently. But he appreciated the Diamond Sutra, just like many Zen family members do. a rumor about the Zen school that in the relationship among the practitioners there was a direct pointing at the human mind whereby its nature could be seen. And in seeing the nature of the mind becoming Buddha by this vision of the nature of the human mind.

[03:22]

And that sounded to him like a heresy or a dangerous understanding of the Buddha's teaching. So he thought he would go from his and meet the Zen teachers and refute them. Does that sound more familiar to you? So on his way to meeting the Zen teachers and refuting them, he said he was going to pull the teachers off their teaching seats. On his way to meet the teachers, he met a woman who was selling cakes at a roadside stand, and she asked him a question about the Diamond Sutra, which he couldn't answer.

[04:33]

I mean, he couldn't speak even. And that was the beginning of his opening his mind to possibilities which he had not yet accepted. And she recommended that he go see a teacher named Dragon Pond and he followed her suggestion. And he met Dragon Pond and they spent some time together and apparently on the first day that they met he understood this friendship between a teacher and a student whereby there can be a seeing the nature of mind in becoming Buddha. Part of the confusion in the story might be that when he heard about becoming Buddha,

[05:42]

he may have thought that they were proposing that seeing the nature of mind, one became a Buddha on the same level as, for example, Shakyamuni Buddha. But another understanding of see the nature of mind and become Buddha is see the nature of the mind and become awakened to the mind. Become awakened to the mind. Have your mind illuminated and wake up to what it really is. It doesn't necessarily mean that upon this illumination there isn't many more years of practice. So in the early teachings in India and then in China and Southeast Asia and Central Asia, Korea, Japan and so on, in these countries there was a teaching that a person can actually wake up, can understand the nature of mind

[07:06]

And that's actually like entry into the actual Buddhist path. There's a warm-up to that, but when one awakens to the nature of mind and realizes that the nature of self is not a thing by itself, but a process, one is initiated into reality. But in the early teachings, and in later teachings. After that, there's a considerable period of training after awakening. So there can be authentic awakening, but lots more training involved. And so I think maybe when Virtue Mountain heard that they saw the nature of mind and became Buddha, that they were saying that when you see the nature of mind you're immediately finished with your practice, that you have culminated perfect enlightenment and there's no more practice to do, no more training.

[08:15]

So there is a stage of practice when there's no more training, but there's a stage of training before and after awakening. And the interesting thing about his story, as I wish to indicate to you, is that he thought that the Zen people were saying that by seeing the nature of mind, you enter into reality, you wake up, and then you're done with your practice. He thought that's the word they're saying, and he knew that was wrong. The funny thing about him is that after he woke up, he looks like he thought he was done, which I'll go over that again with you. So anyway, he woke up in the presence of his relationship with Dragon Pond, and he was very happy about that,

[09:29]

And he said, I will never again doubt this teaching of seeing the mind, the nature of mind, and awakening. Up to this point in the story where he's saying, I will no longer doubt the teachings of the teacher. I will no longer doubt the teachers under heaven. Up to that point, I think he was interested in pursuing wisdom and protecting the true wisdom teachings. But I don't know if he thought that he was pursuing friendship. So what I suggest to you is he was pursuing friendship from before he was born.

[10:35]

And after he was born, he continued to pursue friendship. But when he heard, for example, about these Zen teachers, I don't think he understood that he was hearing about his friends. I imagine he was not thinking, all my friends are heretics, and I wish to go and realize my friendship with these heretics. But I feel that this is a story of friendship, of friendship. which heard his call for perfect wisdom. While he was studying the Diamond Sutra, he was saying, I want to understand the Diamond Sutra. And he was responded to and supported in his study of the wonderful Diamond Sutra of perfect wisdom.

[11:49]

And then, He continued to wish for wisdom. He continued to wish for friendship. But he didn't know he was wishing for friendship. I think he knew he was wishing for wisdom. But I don't see that he knew he was calling for friendship. And when he heard the stories of the Zen people, I don't think he realized that these stories, these stories that he thought were stories of heretics, were the answer to his prayer for friendship. It looks like he didn't understand that he was asking for friendship and now the rumor of the Zen people was, your friends are the Zen people who are pointing to the mind. And this is a response to your request for friendship."

[12:58]

And then when he got this response to his call, he responded to it, to making a big effort and traveling a long way to meet his friends. And then he met this woman selling cakes. She was responding, she was sitting there waiting for him to come. She knew that he wanted her friendship. So when he came to get the cakes, she was willing to give him the cakes, but she really wanted to give him even more. She wanted to give him Dharma. And she did. Still, at that point, when he first arrived, I don't know if he thought, oh, my friend, here's a friend. But I think maybe by the end of his conversation with her, when he couldn't answer her question, I think he was starting to open to this woman is the answer to my dreams of good friendship.

[14:11]

I think he was starting to open to I remember you You're the one who made my dreams come true A few moments ago I remember you You're the one who said I love you too I do, didn't you know? I think he's starting to understand. Although he didn't say anything in the record. He just followed her suggestion to go meet another friend, Mr. Dragon Pond. And the friendship, the story of friendship goes on. And it looks like he's starting to wake up to it. He wants to spend time with this person.

[15:20]

I don't know what they were doing, but they spent time together into the dark of the night. And then finally his friend said, it's getting late. You probably should go. At this point, I think Darshan is realizing he's met a good friend. He doesn't yet know how good. departs, and it's very dark outside, he says it's dark. And again, I don't know if he realized that he was requesting this darkness. Maybe he was. So that his teacher could give him a light.

[16:22]

His friend could give him a light. he could blow the light out and he could have inner illumination. And then at that point it becomes more explicit that he understands he's met a good friend and he's very happy about it. And the next morning the teacher celebrates his realization of this friendship. And the teacher, I imagine, knew that a friend was coming to visit him. The one who understands friendship knows that friends are coming.

[17:26]

And they come. And when they come, They're happy to see their friends. But some of the friends that come don't know that they're friends. But anyway, Darshan woke up to it. I see that. I imagine that. I imagine that. And I wish to practice that. I wish to practice, here I am, and my friends are coming. Do you mean that he knew his friends were coming because everything that came was his friend? Correct. And also he knew that they were coming because he was asking for them to come. He was inviting them. So it isn't just everything that comes. He was also kind of begging for the friends to come. Because part of the friendship is that things don't come But the friends don't just come because they're friends, they come because you ask them to.

[18:32]

The teacher is asking for the friends to come, and he doesn't know when they're going to come, or what they're going to look like, but he knows that his call will bring a response. And here was the response. His call as in his conscious call, or because everything is a projection of his unconscious? that comes. It could be a conscious call, but it could also be his body, the way his body is, because he's been consciously calling for sentient beings to come and be saved with him. He's been doing that. So that transforms his body and unconscious process. So he might be thinking, it's like Monday. But he also understands that friends are coming. But he might not think friends are coming. But his body understands, because he's a good friend, his body understands that when humans come and when night comes, this is the answer to his prayer.

[19:46]

This is his dream come true. Of course, this particular person was, historically speaking, a big dream come true. This is his main successor. A successor in this friendship. And who is the successor? This guy who the form of his approach, the form of his friendship was not the usual kind of friendship. one could see how he might not have understood. The way he talked looked like he didn't understand that he was coming in friendship, as they say, or coming in fellowship. And this way that he was, of not necessarily looking like people's idea of what a friend looks like, he continued after his awakening. So that's kind of a review of saying that we have this expression, wisdom seeking wisdom, and now I offer this kind of words, friendship seeking friendship.

[21:05]

Friendship calling for friendship, friendship responding for friendship. And I'm saying, looking at the process, this mysterious and ungraspable process of friendship, is also looking at the ungraspable process of wisdom. Yes? So are you saying it's friendship even though in appearance it may not be? Like, don't judge a book by its cover? Yeah, it's don't judge a book by its cover. And not only that, but the book It's one book, and it's got basically two covers. One is friend, and the other one's not friend. Those are two covers of the book. The book is actually friendship.

[22:08]

But sometimes friendship looks like not friendship, and sometimes friendship looks like friendship. But if you judge friendship by the appearance of friendship, That's an equal mistake, although maybe not as scary, as judging friendship as not friendship. So when you consciously ask for friendship to manifest it, is it the entire book? And not so much of a friend appears to you? You consider that a friend in disguise? Is that what you're saying? Let me see. Part one of what you said was, when you consciously call for a friend... That's what you said earlier. Yeah. I can consciously call for a friend. I can say,

[23:09]

Friend, I could say friends, I could say come friends, and you might say to me, did you just consciously call for a friend? I might say, mm-hmm. And that's part of friendship, is that you consciously think, this is my friend. That's part of it. That's one form of it. But your thinking about what it is is not the most fundamental part of it. The most fundamental part of it is inconceivable. So in this story, he was not thinking, I'm going to visit my good friend. I'm going to visit my teacher. He wasn't thinking that. What just came to my mind was, I was in China once, and you were there in China, and one day we were going to go visit the temple of the sixth ancestor.

[24:24]

And as I was leaving the hotel room, my wife said, Oh, you're going to visit your ancestor. And so I became conscious that I was going to visit my ancestor. I was going to visit the sixth ancestor. Now, supposedly he died in 713. Common era. I wasn't thinking about that. I was just going to visit my ancestor. And I was consciously going to visit my ancestor. And I was very happy at this thought of going to visit my ancestor. But whether I thought that or not, which I almost didn't, and it was such a wonderful thought to think, I was going to visit my ancestor.

[25:33]

Now, if I thought the sixth ancestor is not my ancestor and is not my friend, I could have thought that. But I'm saying I still was going to visit my ancestor, regardless of what I thought. That's what I'm saying. The fundamental friendship is inconceivable. And the conceivable, the covers on the book come and go. But the fundamental friendship is inconceivable and uninterrupted. And sometimes you might think that you're going to see your ancestor. And sometimes you might think that you're going to the grocery store.

[26:47]

And then when you get to the grocery store, you suddenly realize that you're visiting your ancestor. all along. So then the next part of the story is Deshaun leaves his good friend and goes off to visit another well-known good friend, another person who is a friend of all beings. But someone might say to you, that person who is well-known to be a friend of all beings, is he different from other people?

[27:51]

Aren't all beings friends to all beings? And I say, yes, all beings are friends to all beings. But some are better known for it. And the ones who are better known for it are sometimes trained with how to deal with being well known as a friend. Because when you're well known as a friend to many people, you have different problems But whether anybody knows you're a good friend or not, fundamentally we are. If we don't know, or if we resist that, then we suffer. But in our suffering we are still actually in good friendship with those who do not resist and who are not suffering.

[28:56]

Can you say what you mean by friend? How are you defining friend? That I need you and you need me. And I need you to know that I need you. And I need you to know that you need me. And I request that you respond to my request, whatever it is, and you do. And I request that you understand that and you will someday. And you want me also to understand that now or whenever is best for all of us. This relationship is what I call good friendship. This is perfect wisdom. The way we're relating to each other... Actually, I said before, our true relationship is good friendship.

[30:05]

Our true relationship is perfect wisdom. We are wisdom seeking wisdom. We are friendship seeking friendship. And everybody else is meeting us in that. And our job is to enter that understanding. And you can enter it consciously. You can also enter it unconsciously. And you can resist it unconsciously, too. We do resist it unconsciously, partly as a result of past conscious resistances. Partly as a result of past calling these people friends and these people not. We actually have some physical problems with some people. But those problems are actually a request and a response.

[31:16]

to see those problems as a medium through which we're working our wisdom together. So that's another setup for the next thing that the monk does. He goes and visits this well-known teacher, another well-known teacher named Guishan. And he goes into the teaching hall and does not observe the usual clearly. He knows the usual rituals for meeting a teacher and paying your respects. And he's carrying his backpack, you know. Some people say under his arm. Some people say anyway. He's carrying his traveling equipment. He doesn't change into the proper attire for meeting a teacher. But I say, now he understands he's coming as a friend.

[32:19]

But also I say, he doesn't yet know the subtle way, the appropriate way to express it. So he comes in with his traveling stuff on, walks this way and that way, and then says, nothing, nothing, and walks out. And then he says, kind of like, well, that wasn't actually that. That was sort of not right. He said it himself. Nobody said it to him. He said, that wasn't quite it. Excuse me, that reminds me of a story which I think I've told many of you before. The story of Samuel Johnson. He was a scholar and a man about town in London. But he followed a monastic schedule in his own house. And so part of monastic schedule, Christian monastic schedule sometimes, is have a midnight thing called matins.

[33:26]

Is James here? Is that right? Is Matins at midnight? No, it's later. Later, 2 o'clock? Right. So he would get up in the middle of the night on a regular basis and perform Matins. He wasn't a priest, but he followed this monastic schedule. He would get up and pray like at 2 o'clock or something. And one night he was praying and something terrible was going on in his nervous system. And he changed his prayer to a special prayer in Latin. And the prayer was, heavenly friend, do whatever you want with my body. His body was already a wreck. Do whatever you want with my body, but please do not, please don't let my mind be destroyed. And he finished his prayers and went back to bed.

[34:33]

And after he was lying in bed for a while, he thought, that wasn't a very good... Those verses were not that good. Then he got out of bed again and he prayed, Heavenly Friend, thank you for preserving my critical faculty. So Deschamps went like that. What he said to Guishan wasn't quite right, even though he understood now. This is my friend who's been calling me, and I'm coming to meet him. But his verses were not quite right. So he went back and tried again. And he walked in. Now he changed into his regular formal outfit with his okesa and his bowing cloth. And he goes in to see the teacher, and he bows and so on. And then when he finishes bowing, he picks up, he holds up his bowing cloth, and he says, Teacher!

[35:35]

And, or maybe he said teacher. And then Guishan reaches down to pick up his whisk, But before he gets it up, he just yells at him and goes out. His spirit, you see, his unique personality, just like yours and mine, you see how it was before he came to meet his friend? He was going to pull the guy off his teaching seat. That was his style of friendship, which he didn't see as friendship. And I didn't either. I didn't see it as friendship either. But now I say I see it. His friendship was to go and pull the Zen teachers off their seats. This is his affection for his good friends. Now, of course, when you go up to your friend to try to pull her off her Dharma seat or teaching seat, and then you look into her face just as you're about to pull her off the seat, instead of pulling her off, you might kiss her.

[36:49]

she might kind of like wink at you and say, don't you know why you came here? Oh, wow, yeah, right. I didn't come here to pull you off. I came to realize our friendship. But that was his style, pulling people off Dharma seats and so on. And so he goes to see the great master, and his style is storming around, yelling, and so on and so forth. But this is his friendship. But still, even though it's his friendship, the first round, he missed it. And it's by his own admission. So he goes on now to keep his style of friendship, but it still can be refined. And he's realizing that. And so both teachers say, this guy is a handful. He's a handful for Buddhists and ancestors. The kind of friendship he's got is going to be something. And sure enough, it was. But it was his style.

[37:56]

And that's not some of our style. We have our own style. And our style might look more like somebody's idea of friendship. Or not. So that's my review and reframing somewhat the story. And I apologize, but when I do this, I think, this reminds me of somebody, this way of framing things. I apologize for this mental association. And the person he reminds me of, his name is Eihei Dogenzenji. When he looks at the interactions between people in his shobo genzo, He sees this friendship, I feel.

[38:58]

Like for example, when he sees the interaction between Bodhidharma and his four main disciples, he tells them, bring your understanding. Each one presents a unique understanding. It looks like, and then he says to the first one, you get my skin. He says, you get my skin. You get my flesh to the second one. You get my bone to the third one. You get my marrow to the fourth one. He says that. So it looks like the last one's a better friend than the first one. Or something like that. Or the last one's deeper than the first one because marrow's deeper than skin. But Dogi's interpretation is are completely his good friend and his good friend to all four. There's no way to get around this.

[40:03]

And then sometimes it looks like the teacher puts the student down, and then some teachers reverse it and say, well, actually, the student was better than the teacher. Fine. Now we can do another story, unless you have something you'd like to say about what I said, or unless you have something to say about what I didn't say. Yes? If we keep going in the story, he leaves again in a kind of similar manner. Would you say that again? You want me to repeat it? Yes. It could be kind of like a repeat, yes. Well, I mean, I didn't hear you. If we keep going in the story, Deshaun leaves again in a kind of similar fashion. And then there's this part where if he doesn't come down off that mountain, he's going to be trapped in that cave.

[41:18]

Yeah, if he doesn't come down, or if he doesn't come down on the mountain, and if friends don't come to visit him, That's not good. But friends did come to visit him. Yeah, they came. And other stories. The next story is about one of the people who came. People did come to visit him. That's another thing. If you look at Zen stories, you see stories about some ancient teachers who were living by themselves in the mountains. living on solitary peaks. They were, but the understanding is they were just going there to make more, because it had better parking. They just had to go away from their teachers so that their friends could come and they could do their job of showing people friendship in this new location.

[42:25]

But they already had gone to a place and met their teacher and realized their friendship. And now it's time to spread the friendship to a new location, to a new pond, to a new muddy pond. So they say that. when the teacher feels the student has understood the friendship, then the teacher says, you will go to the top of a solitary peak and revile the Buddhas and abuse the ancestors. Both the teachers said that. And he did. That was his style of friendship. which is, in a way, it's part of the kind of scary part of Zen, but the other side is, it's part of Zen which says that some of the people we know could be friends, because they act like, in a way, that we have trouble seeing as friendship.

[43:29]

I know it's friendship, but I just can't see it. Zen stories are saying, really, you should see it. You shouldn't say, well, yeah, yeah, yeah. But this is an exception. This friendship is not reaching this person. This person is not being a friend to me. I didn't ask for this person to come and be my friend this way. And they're not asking me to be the way I am. They're telling me that I should be different from the way I am. If people really are my friends, they should accept the way I am and not ask me to be different. People actually do accept the way we are. And they're not asking us to be different. And also, they don't accept the way we are.

[44:31]

And they are asking us to be different. Am I hearing you say that Guishan felt that he did get consciously full out, that it was friendship there? Yeah, I think Guishan... But again, it's not like Guishan felt that Deshan was fully matured. He could just see, this guy is going to understand. he already has understood, and now he's coming here to show me his awakening. And the first time he came in, that was crude, but he realized it himself. And then he came back and did his version again, and then he left. And then Guaishan asked the head monk, well, what happened to that person? And the head monk said, he left. And then he said, that person will go to the top of a solitary... He's not saying he's done.

[45:36]

He says he's going to be a Buddha. And on his way to Buddhahood, he's going to spend some time on top of a peak, of a mountain, and then he's going to revile Buddhas and abuse ancestors. That's on his way to Buddhahood. It's not like he's already completely done. He's going to mature and train more with his new friends that are going to come in large numbers to visit him. And they did. So, he did understand already, and his understanding was going to get deeper. He was predicting his perfect understanding and he was saying he's at a level now where pretty soon he's going to be able to go and realize it even if nobody's around.

[46:48]

And people will come to the place of the person who can realize friendship even though consciously nobody can see any friends. Does that make sense? Well, I'm identifying more strongly with this story. It's amazing. And in my imagination, anyway. And so I'm seeing myself there slashing at the wind, is what it feels like to me, up there on that mountain. Excuse my arrogance. And I'm not going to get free now. You shouldn't go up in the mountain until you're already free. You should not be up in the mountain before you're free. You should be down at the bottom of the mountain, surrounded by people who may or may not look like friends.

[47:55]

So you can see, oh, there's a person. I see somebody, and I don't think they're my friend. And I do see somebody, and I do think they're my friend. You should be working on that, which he was doing. But he woke up with Dragon Pond, and Dragon Pond sent him off. But then goes on to say, if he keeps slashing at the wind, I don't remember the exact language, but he's never going to get out of that cave. Right. If he keeps slashing at the wind, he'll never get out of the cave. Okay. Okay. Did Dragon Pond send him to Guishan, or was that Deshan's idea? It doesn't say that he sent him. So what's your understanding of Deshan's intention in going to see Guishan? I think he wanted to meet his friend, his friend Guishan. Dragon Pond wasn't good enough?

[48:59]

Dragon Pond wasn't good enough? I think Dragon Pond was... Yes, I think Dragon Pond was good enough. And since he was good enough, he was ready to meet another friend. Like... Well, excuse me. Part of what... Part of the story of what led me to focus on friendship was reading... the story of a boy named Sudhana who meets Manjushri. And now, Manjushri did send him to the next teacher, but the reason he sent him to the next teacher was not because Manjushri was not good enough, Manjushri Bodhisattva, Manjubosatsu, meets Sudhana, Zendai Doji.

[50:08]

They meet. The boy is very happy to meet the great Bodhisattva of wisdom. He's very happy to meet this person and he gives rise to the thought of complete perfect enlightenment and then he thinks. well, if I wish to achieve perfect enlightenment, maybe I should give some instruction on how to achieve it. And Manjushri says, that's good. It's good that you aspire to enlightenment. It's good that you aspire to meet somebody who can help you understand the practice for realizing it. And then he says, but it's hard to find these friends. Anyway, he does say, but go see someone. Go see Megha. Manjushri is good enough. Sudhana thinks Manjushri is good enough. But Manjushri realizes, I need to send you to somebody else, even though this is good enough isn't great understanding.

[51:13]

This is wonderful. So he's very happy to be with his teacher, and his teacher sends him to another friend. And they don't use the word teacher in the sutra. They use the word Kalyanamitra. They use the word good friend, beneficial friend. That's the word they use. So he meets this great bodhisattva friend. And the bodhisattva friend, who is very impressed with him, and he's very impressed with the bodhisattva, sends him to another friend. And that friend sends him to another friend. And that friend sends him another friend. There's no talk about these people aren't good enough. These people are inconceivably wonderful. And he's so happy with each one. So happy. And each one gives him this great teaching. Because he asks each one, could you teach me the Bodhisattva way? And after they give him the great teaching, then they say, but how could I teach you about the Bodhisattva way? And then they talk about the Bodhisattva way, which shows that they could not teach the Bodhisattva way.

[52:15]

They did this great teaching, but nobody can teach the Bodhisattva way because the Bodhisattva way is... And they go on about that. And then he sends them to the next teacher. So he leaves one teacher who was far beyond good enough. Wonderfully. joyfully great teacher, and he leaves them because that teacher says, go see another teacher. Each one is wonderful. Each one he appreciates. And each one sends them to another teacher. Now, it doesn't say in the story that Dragon Pond said, go see Guizhou. It does say the lady sent him to Dragon Pond, but it doesn't say Dragon Pond told him where to go next. But Dragon Pound did say, he's going, where is he going? He's going to meet Buddhas and ancestors. That's where he's going. And what's he going to do when he gets there?

[53:19]

He's going to be their friend. And how is he going to be their friend? He's going to revile and abuse them. And that's what he does. And then when he meets that teacher, and that teacher says, He's going to do it again. The first one said, this young person is going to be a great teacher. And this is the way he's going to be a great teacher. The next one said, he's going to be a great teacher. And this is the way he's going to be a great teacher. They're both predicting him. And it doesn't say that he doesn't have a story of 51 more. But that's the practice. The teacher sends you, according to your unique Nature sends you to do your unique friendship with teacher after teacher. In other words, friend after friend after friend. But the Zen stories do not repeat it literally the way the sutra does. The Zen stories are, in some sense, well, there's a lot more of them.

[54:25]

There's more than 53. If you go through the whole of all the Zen stories, you'll probably find those 53 in there. But the sense stories are quite a bit shorter than each of those 53. I have a dream that you're getting very sleepy. Your eyes are getting heavy. We're getting very sleepy. So is it possible to open the window? Yeah, it's possible. Would you be willing to open a window? Sure. Would you be willing to have a window open? Yeah. Would you be willing to open a window? Any other windows could be opened over there? Over there? We could get nice and cold before we go to bed.

[55:30]

Yes? So, if we are all friends, are we all teachers, one to another? Well, that reminds me of another story, which is, Guishan's Dharma brother, Guishan's teacher was Bai Zhang. And Bai Zhang had many wonderful younger friends. Another one was called Wang Bo. Guishan is his student and Wang Bo is his student. And one time, Baijian went into the Dharma teaching hall. And the monks were all there. And he took his walking staff and he started swinging at them and running at them.

[56:35]

And they all ran towards the door. And when we got to the door, he said, What is it? And then when Wang Bo became a teacher, became a good friend, took the official position of sitting in the good friend seat, he went up to the hall one day, and his monks were there, and he ran at them with his stick, swinging at them, and they didn't move. They froze. You're all slurpers of dregs. You're all slurpers of dregs. Well, yes, but he said, if you continue like this, how will you have today? You're all dreg slurpers.

[57:36]

Don't you know that in all of China there's no teachers of Zen? So in this good friendship, really, you can't really find the teachers. You can't really say, this is the teacher and that's the student in the good friendship. We say, what about with the Buddha and the sentient beings? The Buddhas are those who know that you cannot find a Buddha separate from the sentient beings. Still, there's Buddhas and sentient beings. But you can't find any Buddhas in all of China, and you can't find any Zen teachers in all of China. And we have all these great teachers who tell us that you can't find any teachers. But the teachers who are telling you that you can't find them, you can't find. And the teachers who say you can find them, and I'm one of them, you can't find that one either.

[58:42]

So sometimes it helps people to say, the teacher is here. And Guishan, when Deshan was walking back and forth, and then when he came back and held up his buying cloth and said, teacher, he was going to go down and get his teaching device, his whisk, his symbol of authority. He was going to get it there and hold it up and do some teacher thing. But Deshan just yelled at him and walked out. Who is the teacher? The teacher is the one who is not abiding in the position of teacher, and the teacher is not abiding in the position of student.

[59:48]

That's the teacher. And that teacher is not abiding in that teacher who is not abiding either. So one style of practice is the Zen family style, where you have people looking like a teacher just to show people how not to abide in the teacher position. Some people don't look like a teacher, and they say, see, I'm not abiding in the teacher position, which is fine. Do you know some people like that? They're not abiding in the teacher position? They really are. you can't tell, because they're avoiding sitting on the seat. And some students are really not abiding in the position of student. But the way to prove it is to take the appearance of a student and see how you can not abide in that, and take the appearance of a teacher and see if you can not abide in that.

[60:50]

So we play that game, as you can see. Like yesterday, we had a ceremony, and one person was sitting in the chair in the middle. Was that person abiding in that position? Of course not. Did he prove it? That's for you to find out. But we have the form of the teacher. So you can see, is that person abiding in that position? Am I abiding in my opinion that they are abiding? Am I thinking that, hey, they're Are you abiding in that opinion? And if you're not abiding, how are you going to know? How are you going to know? Yeah? Does abide mean carry over from one moment to the next?

[61:52]

Abiding would be imagining that you could. So abiding actually cannot be established, just like you can't establish being carried over from one moment to the next. But we can imagine that we abide, and we can imagine carrying over. And then again, can you cultivate not abiding in that? And I've heard that the answer is an emphatic yes. And also an answer can be, I don't know, but I want that. I desire that. And what is that? It's perfect wisdom. What is that? It's good friendship. Good friendship is not carrying over from one moment to the next. It's not abiding in this life. Good friendship is the reality that we're not abiding. So we knowingly and willingly transgress

[62:56]

Have you noticed? Like, we try to take care of this temple. Like, I appreciate that the new Ino is cleaning out the stuff under our altar in the Zen Do. Actually, Angel. Pardon? My assistant, Angel. Angel! Yeah, she's farmed it out for a friend. Yeah. Angels cleaning under the altar. Isn't that great? And can we do that? Can we clean under that altar? Can we alter the bad feng shui of the altar? We've got all this junk stored in there without abiding in it. We've got an altar to take care of. it without abiding in it.

[64:02]

If you don't take care of the altar, you might not notice that you're abiding in it. But if you take care of it, you can discover that you are maybe. And then we can work on that together. So we have all these opportunities to take care of things and then see if when we take care of them, we start to get stuck in them. Does that make sense? Is it difficult to remember that? For most of us, it's difficult to remember that we have these forms, like teacher, student, friend, and can we work with them without abiding? We have these stories, yes. It seems like what I'm hearing is that non-abiding is the greatest intimacy.

[65:08]

I've experienced something like this when I've had conflict with somebody and there's a kind of meeting when suddenly the terms of the conflict just go away and there's just a face-to-face meeting. It's extremely intimate and it transforms the whole arrangement. So I've stopped abiding in the terms of the conflict and just meet. And not knowing that, Surprise sometimes helps us deepen realization of the intimacy, of friendship.

[66:14]

Anything else tonight? So what's the takeaway? is there are so many opportunities throughout the day to remember the friendship. There are so many people we meet who offer us in the meeting. And so many people we meet who are meeting with other people who offer us an opportunity to open to the friendship. Just like I mentioned in the first class, try to remember to be open to the possibility that everybody you meet is a bodhisattva. Which is now, try to remember that everybody you meet is a good friend, is a wisdom friend.

[67:27]

Try to remember that. Try to remember that that's possible. How's that for a takeaway? That's good. I just connected the dots with the D&B example last week. Somebody said to me at dinner, I'm not dinner, at dishes, I was doing dishes, somebody said, can I ask you a question about DMV sometime? And he said, nothing spiritual or anything. I don't know what he was talking about. How could nothing spiritual about DMV? Maybe he wants the address of that particular DMV. Because at that one, Can you talk about taking care of things and welcoming them in a way that helps you, you know, to not abide in them or to let go of it?

[68:36]

And in what ways? Like, what what is this? What is the form of this taking care? How do you take care? Well, one summary of the way you take care of something is you practice the six basic bodhisattva training methods. That's the way you take care of things. First one, generosity. And part of practicing generosity is to notice that you're abiding. In other words, that you're not being generous. Part of practicing generosity is to notice stinginess. In other words, when you're taking care of things, part of the way of developing not abiding in them is to notice that you're abiding in them. That's a normal part of the process. So, for example, you're taking care of the altar.

[69:40]

You're being generous with your time and your energy and your life, taking care of the altar. And then you may just notice some stinginess. Like, for example, somebody might say, would you please stop working on the altar? Let somebody else do it. And you might, you know, if you were me, you might say, well, I was just getting into this, you know. Don't take me off this job. This is my thing. I'm like doing this great thing for Zen Center. I'm fixing this altar, this junk pile under the Buddhas. Don't take me off this job. Here you were trying to be generous and then somebody asked you to do an art job and you notice you were clinging to it. You were abiding in this activity of generousness. But noticing that is part of finding out what generosity is. Because we might think we're being generous, but really, we're just being possessive.

[70:42]

We don't notice it. But sometimes we are generous, and we're not abiding. But if you keep doing it, you start to notice the places where you are. When people first start taking care of something, sometimes there's very little attachment to it. Like, do you think you own the altar yet? You don't, right? Do you think you own the altar? you become more and more at risk of thinking it's your altar. And some people who have been at Zen Center, not for a year, or five years, or ten years, but 20, 30 years, they should be really developed. But actually, because they've been taken care of so long, they start to think it's their Zen Center. They actually think it's theirs.

[71:44]

Some of these really... long-term devotees of Zen Center. They've given so much, they say, well, what can I say? It's mine. But some people actually think they own Zen Center after just a few weeks. In some ways, they're lucky. You don't have to wait for 30 years to find out that they're alive. Anyway, we have these different patterns and taking care of things. These methods of taking care of things. And there's generosity to start with. The second one is ethical discipline. So ethical discipline, you start to notice, I'm being generous, but actually, I think I'm better at being generous than the other people. I'm taking care of the altar, but... And I think I'm better than the people who used to be at Zen Center who dumped all this garbage under here. It's cleaned out every practice.

[72:49]

We're talking about intense dumping. You'll find some interesting stuff under there today. And if any of you would like to go live there, and see if you can stay overnight in there without abiding. So when you realize not abiding, you realize that you can't grasp it. But you can train by aspiring to it, and [...] then notice when you slip off and confess and repent and aspire to it and aspire to it, the theory is you will become the reality of not abiding.

[73:50]

But the path between... the initial wish to realize this great mind and the full realization of it is quite a few moments where we notice we're abiding or where somebody else knows we're abiding and points it out to us and we tell them we do not want to hear that. I actually don't need to hear that kind of thing from you about how I'm abiding when you're actually the one who's abiding around here. It's amazing. It's just amazing. It's so wonderful. It's our bread and butter. It's our bread and butter. So is it like, is it like time to go to bed now? You want to head out? Okay. Yeah. All right. Well, thanks for being good friends

[74:53]

Be alert, please. Next week we might meet somewhere else. If all the causes and conditions come to play. We might meet in another room. Can the sound be amplified in there? Your sound? I don't know. How's the sound in here? Do you hear me okay? Come close. Wherever we go, stay close.

[75:30]

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