I feel that we are living in the midst of crisis. I feel that way and I imagine some other people also feel themselves to be living in crisis. We have political crisis, economic crisis, environmental crisis, health crisis, personal crisis, interpersonal crisis, and on and on. I see a person sitting in an audience who requested that I speak about membership in San Francisco Zen Center.

[01:16]

So there's a membership. Crisis has a possible definition would be intense possibility of injury or harm. Another meaning of it is turning point. or a critical turning point. So I feel that I'm living at a turning point. I imagine that I am, I hear that I am, I'm being taught that I am. I am a turning point.

[02:25]

And may I propose to you that you're like me, that you're also a turning point. There's a Chinese expression which is used to convey crisis. It's two characters. One character is the possibility of harm or injury. And the second character means opportunity or working or machine or mechanism. So in some sense the compound means danger and opportunity, but also like a danger machine. How danger is working

[03:32]

how the possibility of harm is functioning. So, and I imagine that this has been going on for thousands and thousands and thousands of years of living beings that they've been living in crisis all along and Thousands of years ago there was a teacher who we call the Buddha. And I imagine the Buddha was living in crisis too, living with all other living beings who were living in crisis. And what did the Buddha do? What was the Buddha's way to be in this crisis? the Buddha was a teacher. The Buddha taught, taught about the crisis.

[04:38]

And in each occasion, in each occasion he would teach according to the occasion. He would teach in an appropriate way. Appropriate how of what? well, apropos of the crisis, here and now, and he would respond to the crisis, to the beings he met, in a way, promote them becoming free and able to realize peace. He responded in the midst of crisis in a way to make Buddhas. The Buddhas are reproductive enterprises.

[05:47]

Buddha is a reproductive enterprise in the midst of crisis. Buddha wishes to reproduce herself. One of the expressions for a Zen temple is a Buddha-making house. And sometimes we say here at Green Gulch that we have this farm where we grow Buddhas. We have this temple for growing Buddhas. I feel kind of embarrassed to talk about Buddhas. But I live in the crisis of feeling embarrassed about talking about Buddhas and continuing to talk about them.

[06:48]

I join the Buddhas. I want to join the project of making Buddhas. So what is Buddha, by the way? Well, I don't know. I don't know what Buddha is. But I... that a Buddha is not... something that lives by itself. I don't think Buddha is like somebody or something that's living by herself. I don't think that. I think a Buddha is something that's living in crisis in such a way as to make more beings who are living in crisis in such a way to be free and at peace in crisis.

[07:58]

And in in political, economic, environmental, personal, interpersonal crisis to transmit a way of being at peace and free in the crisis. And that way of transmitting is not something that exists by itself. it is transmitting the way things exist by themselves. Buddha is the cognition that nothing exists by itself, including Buddha. Each of us is not by ourself.

[09:06]

And now I say this and I hear this, but realizing it is an intense practice. Because in order to realize that I'm not something by myself, that to be me is not to be something by himself, to realize that, I have to be completely me. So I tell myself that what I am is something that includes everything that's not him.

[10:15]

I include all you, all of you, and everything else in the universe I include. and I am included in all of you. I am the pivoting of all of you and me, and me and all of you. And that pivotal what I am and what you are is Buddha activity. The activity of Buddhas is the way you, each one of you, is pivoting with everything else. And the way everything else is pivoting with you. That is Buddha activity.

[11:18]

Sometimes we say Buddhas have an activity, but they are that activity. So to make a Buddha is to make living beings completely themselves, which are pivoting with not-themselves. And this smooth interchangeability of me with you and you with me, that unhindered pervasion of you and me that is what I want to realize in my life and want everybody else to realize. That's Buddha. So I have a job and my job is to totally exert being me.

[13:09]

In totally exerting being me, I realize that I am not me. in order to realize that all of you pervade me, I have to totally me. And, you know, until I totally exert being me, I don't really realize how you all pervade me. And when you all pervade me, I am invisible. All I am is but all of you. And then I have no problem letting me be all of you. If I can let you be all of me, I can let me be all of you. If I can't let you be me, I'm at risk of hatred. If I can't let me be all of you, I'm at risk of obsessive greed.

[14:33]

But let's say I don't have that problem. Let's say I can let you be me and let me be you. Then I don't have obsessive greed and hate and I don't have fear. Then I'm at my place doing my job and these obstructing emotions aren't functioning because What they mainly do, their main damage, is they stop me from being me, which is my job in crisis. And when I do my job, then Buddha's activity is realized at, through me. Buddha also has to be realized as somebody, as you or as me.

[15:39]

You are the opportunity for real life. You are the only opportunities. You and other living beings are the only opportunities for Buddhas. They're not floating away in the neighborhood of us. They are exactly, each of us, and thereby being empty of ourself and full of everything else in the universe. Now we just, last Tuesday we had a training period here in this temple. About 40 or so people have come to train at being themselves. And so the whole temple for people to be themselves so they can realize Buddha's response in our crisis.

[16:52]

They come here in crisis. This is a crisis center. And it's a Buddha in the crisis center. So they come here and sit and walk. And each person has their own little work area in this room. Like this is the abbess's work area. That's Timo's work area. and his work area might be moved a few feet soon. Each of us has a little work area, a place for us to work, to work wholeheartedly at being what we are in the moment. To train at that. And people are telling me that they have resistance to their work. they have resistance to sitting at their training area.

[17:56]

And I also have resistance to sometimes I'm not wholeheartedly me. I maybe a little bit wish I was somebody else or someplace else. Now the people in this in this training period, they know what I'm talking about, probably. As a matter of fact, most of them gave their seat up to the people who are on the edge of the platforms here. You're sitting in somebody else's work area right now, which they generously gave up for you. But sometimes when it's time to come in the room and be themselves, maybe they wish to do something else. And so they feel some resistance to coming into the and doing what?

[19:01]

Being themselves. And then when we're outside of this room, when we have other work areas too, like kitchen, the fields, making beds for guests, office work. We have other work areas. And in order to do the work in this room and the other work areas, we need, of course, we need to engage with the work. We need to be in conversation with others. So part of the work of being ourselves is for people to ask us to do things and us to respond. Maybe by saying something like, okay, or I have resistance to that suggestion, or not right now please, or thanks for asking.

[20:12]

Lots of possibilities. And in order for me to, I have to have, I need conversation. But I also need solitude. I need solitude with nobody talking to me to realize that even when nobody's talking to me, I have some resistance just to being me. And one of the ways my resistance manifests is I think, what should I do next? And that's anxiety. Another way the difficulty of being me manifests is I'm not thinking about what to do next. As a matter of fact, I think sitting here at this seat, I really can't do much about doing next because I'm stuck here for 20 minutes or 40 minutes.

[21:17]

I can't get into my next. Think of something that I could do next. It's like I can't promote anything other than being here, and that's boring. But boring is kind of scary, so then I'm anxious again. This boredom and anxiety are also turning on each other. So in my anxiety, in my difficulty of being myself, in my difficulty with... and then my resistance to myself and the emotions that come up kind of like take me away from being myself. All these things are opportunities for compassion. And by being kind to myself in my position and patient with myself and generous with myself and careful with myself and diligent with myself, I can actually be here

[22:27]

wholeheartedly and realize Buddha's pivotal activity. I can verify that in crisis I am including the whole world and included in the whole world. I can verify that this is peace and freedom in this world I can sit in the middle of crisis, being myself wholeheartedly. And that practice reproduces itself. That practice transmits itself in this crisis. And now the next crisis, completely be myself. Which is pivoting, this wholeheartedly, completely being myself, is pivoting with not-myself, and that activity is transmitted in the world of crisis, and then the next crisis, and the next crisis.

[23:34]

The new crisis. Every Sunday at Green Goats there's a new crisis. this will go on. But will the practice of wholeheartedly exerting your position, will that go on? It will. It will. And it would be helpful to that if you would, you know, want to do it. It still is going to go on even if you resist it. You are going to... you are going to eventually stop resisting being you in the moment of crisis. But you could also start today, and so could I. And if we do start today, then we could also start again later today. Part of the program is to restart moment by moment, because every moment is a new

[24:47]

a new life to be fully lived as me and as you. And to be fully lived as me, I have to be generous with the appearance of me and the appearance of you. I have to be willing to be in solitude with me and in conversation with you which I'm blessed with. I wish to transmit my solitude to you. And I thank you for transmitting your solitude to me, that your solitude is you're transmitting to me. You're saying to me that I can be in solitude, that I can do my solitude work of being me here. That's your gift to me and my solitude is my gift to you.

[25:51]

I come here and sit here in solitude and transmit it to others and they transmit it to me. I right now am here in solitude with you. I support you to be here with all of us in solitude, alone, completely yourself and nobody else. To be in solitude, they support you to be in solitude all day long. And we have special rooms to do it like this, but we need it all day. And when I'm sitting in here and nobody's talking to me, when I'm sitting at this table and I'm not talking to anybody, I'm still in conversation. I'm not saying any words, but I am conversing. Now I am including everything and letting myself be included in it.

[26:59]

I'm being supported by everyone to be myself and I'm supporting everyone to be herself. I saw some young men or some young boys or maybe old boys and young men here at Green Gulch about 12 to 14. They're not in the room. I don't think they're in the room right now. I think they're someplace else in the valley.

[28:08]

They were here to stay overnight here last night. I imagine if they did come to this talk, that a lot of them probably would have a go. They probably would have thought, boring, and thought about getting out of here somehow. I'm not saying you're bored with what I said, but you might be. Or if you're not bored, you might be anxious, like, well, what am I supposed to do? What do I do next? I don't have to, but I could imagine that you're not very enthusiastic about being yourself.

[29:10]

Even though I've been talking about it and saying how good it would be that a lot of you think, well, this is not actually that interesting. I really don't want to do this. When's this going to be over? I could imagine that. I could imagine also that you thought, well, Actually, I think I will consider this possibility of being myself completely, of totally exerting myself in each moment for the sake of all living beings who are having trouble doing this and need my support. Because I think it is hard for me to do this, for me to live this way of being me moment by moment. ...realize Buddha's response in crisis. And I think I do want to do it, and I think I might have trouble remembering it, but I do want to try to be mindful of this type of practice, the practice of totally exerting myself moment by moment.

[30:26]

I just had this thought, I wonder if anybody does not want me to totally exert myself. I wonder if anybody does not want me to wholeheartedly be myself. And actually, if anybody doesn't want me to, I invite you to let me know. I'd be interested to see if anybody wants me not to be myself. And then if there is anybody like that, then I could say, well, what do you want me to be? And we'll see what the next question is. But actually, I didn't ask you. I'll ask you now. Do you all, do any of you want me to be totally myself? I heard something. Mm-hmm. And does anybody not want me to be myself totally?

[31:54]

Okay. And I might just say one more thing is that I have been trying to practice this way and I don't exactly find it hard when I actually remember and give it a try. I mean, I may be having a hard time sometimes, but I don't exactly find myself having a hard time. It's more like being myself completely is very subtle because, again, being myself completely is is being not myself completely. So when I actually try it, it's .

[32:59]

And I do find it to be liberating and peaceful. And now I take a step which is a little bit, seems a little risky, and that is, I don't find anything other than being myself liberating and peaceful. That's the only way I'm fearless and at peace and free, is by being who I am. And anything else I try is basically... I get stuck, because I can't actually be anybody else, but I can try.

[34:07]

Or I can forget to do my job, and that doesn't work.

[34:12]

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