I want to review what we read in morning service on Monday, what we've been reading the last few days. A lot of you don't have the book, but let me just tell you that we've been reading around page 420. And on page 424, the section is called, the chapter heading that starts on page 424 is called A Demonstration of the Development of Skill and Means. And then the first heading is Training in Skill and Means. Okay?

[01:03]

So, what is it? Skill and means made up of? Somebody read that paragraph, please. Okay. So, did you recognize us when you were reading them the other day? Well, anyway, these are them. And what are they? training human beings. And so now, the Buddha asks the Buddha how you do these 37 bodhisattva shikha.

[02:11]

And by the way, notice also that sometimes the concentrations on emptiness, signless, and wishless are given just before these in the sutra, and sometimes they're given right after. So these meditations on the signless, the wishless, and the empty are close neighbors to these 37. Now, could someone else read what the Buddha answers about how to do these practices? Well, first of all, let's see. So the first he explained about how to do the emptiness concentration. And then later he explained how to do the forward-right efforts. So if we read this, I think it will take the whole evening to read this and discuss this.

[03:25]

But note here that this is one place that you find out, again, more information. You will find out more. information, more instruction on how to practice these 37. At the end of the second paragraph here on page 125, it says, It is thus, Subhuti, that the Bodhisattva makes complete conquest of the dharmas which constitute the wings of enlightenment. Develops them and dwells through them. but he does not realize the truth. So that's that. Maybe we might come back to this.

[04:28]

Do you understand what's being done here? So this is skill and means practice, and the Buddha asks, how do you practice these 37? How does the Bodhisattva practice these 37? And now the Buddha explains how to practice these 37. Yes? What is the formless concentration? The formless attainment? It makes a difference, but I don't think it bears on.

[05:30]

What we're trying to do is just learn how to do these 37. I don't think that it has to do with the path. I don't think it would be the law that I was talking about. Okay, then the next section is headed as overcoming hostile states. And then dwelling without a support, carrying out the vows made in the past, skill means the skill which is uncommon and then the skill which is unattached. And in that section it says, moreover Siburi, the Bodhisattva, the great being, becomes one who wants to contemplate these very deep stations, that is, emptiness of the subject and so on, to emptiness of non-existence of own being, the poor applications of mindfulness to the Eightfold Path, the doors of deliverance. So here,

[06:31]

You learn the various kinds of emptiness, and then you do 37 Wings of Enlightenment, the 37 Bodhipaksika, and then you do the meditations on wishlessness, samadhi, I mean emptiness, and signless. And then in here is a business about... realizing the reality limit. The bodhisattvas, what do they do with the reality limit? They don't realize the reality limit. Yes? Well, the reality limit is the dharmadattu. And there's various things in the dharmadattu, and one of them is nirvana. Okay, then on page... Again, the skill which is without wishes for the future.

[07:43]

And under that heading 2, it says, it is impossible, it cannot be, that a bodhisattva, a great being, who courses in the sixth perfection, in the various kinds of emptiness, in the poor applications of mindfulness to the Buddha dharmas, and who has made a complete conquest and thus is endowed with a vision and cognition should fall into the unaffected or become intimate with beings of the triple world. So again, 37 are included with these other bodhisattva practices. So in the section on the skill which is unattached, We talked about this point before, and there's nothing much new here. Just the point is that you don't attach to the skill, you don't realize the skill. You learn the skill, but you don't realize it. You learn the skill, but you don't realize the reality limit.

[08:48]

But in the section on training and skill means there you will learn something more about how you actually do this thing or practice these things without realizing it. So this section is quite... will be quite relevant, page 24 and 25. And then also I'd like to make a little, as usual, preliminary mark, once again relating to questions about why people who practice just sitting would study this material. And as I mentioned before, these are skill and means that we sit zazen, but then as you know, after we sit zazen, we stand up.

[09:54]

The bell rings and we stand up. And then after we stand up, we walk. And this sitting, this standing up, and this walking represents, in a sense, you could say it represents concentration or wisdom. Represents wisdom or penetration. Understanding. And then precepts. And then skill needs. So we don't just sit there. We get up and we walk. In this case, we're talking about doing Zazen. And as we discussed in the other class on Saturday, when he finally comes down to it, says that what he means by doing Zazen is the essential art of Zazen is to think of not thinking.

[10:57]

That's the essential art of Zazen. Thinking is emptiness. Thinking is form and not thinking is emptiness. So zazen is our word for meditation on emptiness in ancient Mahayana Buddhist practice. Meditation on emptiness, of course, also includes meditation on signless and on the wishless. So we leave this meditation on emptiness and we start walking. And where we walk, in this case, we walk into the 37 wings of enlightenment. And these 37 wings of enlightenment we learn and these 37 wings of enlightenment are originally learned, originally attributed to the Arhats, the Pratyekha Buddhas, the Shravakas who learn them and realize them.

[12:01]

they become impeccable in the practice of these 37 liberative, personal liberative practices. For the bodhisattvas, they are liberative practices for others that you learn. And you must become impeccable at them, too. Now, it doesn't have to be these 37, as I mentioned before. 37 are just having to be But you have to, I mean, you don't have to learn today's learning. You can learn roller skating, you can learn cooking, baking, piping, nail delivery, female delivery, childbirth, tap dancing, counting, and so on. There are various other skills you can learn.

[13:03]

And you must learn them also in . Which is the traditional stuff. Because at a certain point, it narrowed down to one practice. This is me, the mundane God. This is the fifth and mundane God. So at a certain point, all these practices converge to one point. you cross over from, when you first start doing these practices, you do them from a mundane point of view, a dualistic point of view. So in this section here, you have what's called Sambara Marga, and Varyoga Marga. In this section view, mundane practices. And when you switch over from the mundane to the quick mundane, that's called Darshan Marga, and then the Kavana Marga. And then when you come up the other side of this thing, you're doing what's called a Shait Shemada, the outside discipline.

[14:12]

But you've gone through the Arhat school. And this switching over from one side to the other, when you go from the point of departure from the dualistic to the non-dualistic in terms of the traditional skill and meaning of Bodhisattva or the traditional Nirvana leading to practices of the Shravaka, you all go through one little hole. One object of meditation, and one time, and one realm. It's a particular object of meditation called pain. It's a particular world called comedic wisdom. It's a particular truth called pain, and it's a particular moment. It happens in a moment. So it gets down to very narrowly points. Then you just find out, you look at the other truth, look at the other realm, look at the expand your practice until you, once again, you know all these practices in all possible ways.

[15:14]

And you go flying out. And when you go flying out here, if you're doing it, then you learn, let's say, shorthand. But you have to learn just as well as you learn these. Or you have to learn just as well as you learn lower. So you must become impeccable at at these skill and means. Now, after you become impeccable, then, to use the expression of a commenter on ballet dancing, you become ineffable. As you get very good, really impeccable at these concrete, in some sense, or specific and highly defined practices, like shorthand, tap dancing, and bodhipaksika and you really know how to do these very well there's a natural implication of that impeccability ineffability is a natural outflow or natural combination the the shravakayana actually naturally bubbles over into the bodhisattva yana the shravakayana is actually an illusory stage

[16:36]

that's given to those who are susceptible to being converted by that particular way of looking at practice. But if you practice the Hinayana way or the Shravakayana way thoroughly and completely, you naturally will become interested in people and become vulnerable to their suffering and want to work with them. Or another way to put it is as you study dharmas very carefully, you naturally see the implication of the relationships. Oftentimes, in Arbidharma class, people say, of course, once again, they have 40 software training. But still, even if they didn't, I think, as you'd be good at Arbidharma, you start realizing that all these definitions are conditional. You start realizing the conditions, and pretty soon you see that, actually, these naturally go forward into emptiness. The inevitable stage will lead you right back to the meditation on emptiness.

[17:42]

And the bodhipaksaka, as you become very good at them, will take you right back to zazen. You will be doing zazen with them. And there will be no difference between those practices and zazen. And then, again, get off your cushion, stand up, and start walking into some other practice. Get good at it. see the implications of it being emptiness and come back to Zazen again. Around and around we go. So this practice is during a phase where the person, where the Bodhisattva is articulated his or extended his Zazen into daily life. During that phase, the beings who are engaged in those practices are liberated. They're sort of picked up or converted by that activity which they're into today. The tap dancers, pick up a bunch of tap dancers. And you take them into ineffability, you take them into emptiness with you. And when they're done, they're Zen students. So it's to convert big beings or to, you know, what do you say, you know, Buddhas, if you look at the characteristics of Superman, for example, they have webbed feet, webbed hand.

[18:49]

The webbing is to scoop up people. Actually, the webbing is webbing between his hand. It's called emptiness, right? The space between these hands depends on the fact that the space between these fingers is dependent on, and it has no meaning aside from the fact of the fingers. That's with it. And that itself collects being. So you bring beings with you every time you loop. So it helps people, but also the Bodhisattva is helped by this cycle too. Can you hear what you're saying? You have to speak out that way. Maybe if you stood up and talked in a higher pitch. On what you just said, again, rest on the why . But in fact, we only evaluate what . Well, it's not necessarily only valuable

[19:58]

We're studying this particular little thing here. You may understand by studying this, even though you don't practice it well enough to realize that you should do the same with some other things you're doing. Something you have to do this with, and this is to encourage you to do it either with these actual practices here. I'm not telling you to do these any more than I'm telling you to do these. But we have specific instructions on how to do these in a way that they become emptiness practices. We could apply them to these, too. But then, if I did, you might think I was recommending that you learn roller skating in particular, where I'm not. And also not recommending it in particular. You have to do something, either inside this traditional circuitry or outside of it. But it will really be helpful, most helpful, if you actually take something where you can actually see that you're helping by roller skating.

[20:59]

So that's right, you have to practice it. It touches like you have to practice Zaza and you have something to extend in the first place. If you can't practice, if you don't feel like you're practicing Zaza in the first place and like you have something to extend, if you don't feel like you're getting up on something when you start doing kini, well, then you better watch out. The last thing is about dharams. Well, it's about thoughts, too. Dharams include all the other ones. One from body. Well, one for feelings, one for thoughts, and the other one is both inside and outside.

[22:09]

I mean, both for things and also for mental events. You gave an example. You gave an example. That's right. Where do the labels come from? And when you get very good at giving those labels to those kinds of thought, you'll see where they come from, and you'll see that they're empty. That's the point. You'll see where they come from. You'll see where they come from causing conditions, and they're a loser. So I'm going to ask you now what you found out in your study of the four applications of mindfulness, and then after you tell me all the things you found out, then what I'm suggesting to do is first look at them one at a time, first from the impeccability side, and then from the ineffable side.

[23:17]

First from the side of learning them, and maybe realizing them or not, anyway, learning them, and then go on to see how they would be bodhisattva practices. do that with one, and it may be that we'll only do one, but to start with the mindfulness of the body. If you are interested, I'm willing to do all of them, but it may take too long. But I'm talking about, so I'm actually thinking about doing them. It might help if you told us what things you found out, in your studies about four applications of mindfulness, maybe starting with, since we're going to do that first, starting with mindfulness of the body or application of the mind, application of attention to, or fixation of the attention to the body. Any problems in doing this practice on the

[24:26]

at least on the level of the Shravaka? Do you all understand how to do it? Yes? What do you think? What do you think? What, did you do one at a time? Can you imagine that you would do two at a time? You can only do one anything in a moment. One moment is, one definition of a moment is doing one thing.

[25:28]

However, what does that say in five minutes? What would you say then? Or even in two minutes? For example, in Zazen, are you doing one or more of these practices in terms of mindfulness of the body? How many are you doing? Beginner's instruction, Zazen. How many of these are you doing? You're doing at least two. You're mindful of posture, mindful breathing. So introductory meditation, zazen instruction, asks us to do two body mindfulness practices, which are given in these Anayana books and Mahayana books. And you do them according to your own aesthetics. You do them, certainly in a few minutes, you probably do a little of each. In one period of zaza, you would definitely do a little of each. But some people might do just a little bit of body and a lot of breath.

[26:34]

They just might set their posture at the beginning and really not notice it much for the rest of the period. But really be very aware of their breathing. Some other people, the very beginning students, would be aware of their posture the whole time. Because it's really... They're fraught of taking care of this unruly physical event. And they should know what this body is doing, how it's moving, all these pain, all these things they're forgetting to do. So at the beginning of practice, maybe more on the physical side and later less on the physical side. But even older students, after 10 years or 20 years, are still working and aware of their posture while they're sitting. But after 20 years or 30 years, even though they're doing, once again, the practice of being aware of their posture and their breathing, for them that's mindfulness of emptiness, concentration of emptiness, which is Shikantaza.

[27:39]

So that's why Shikantaza, that's one of the ways of seeing why Shikantaza includes mindfulness of breathing or why mindfulness of breathing includes Shikantaza. If your attitude is right and you don't lean over way over on the form side of mindfulness of the posture and breathing, and you let the emptiness side be there too because form equals emptiness, then you're doing shippantata. And if you lean way over on the side of form, you're doing beginning meditation or beginning mindfulness of the body. Okay? Any other points about mindfulness of the body? Yes? You have to choose those who are not there. You have to choose those who are not there.

[28:42]

You have to choose those who are not there. [...] From this place, from this place, from this place, to this place, to this place, to this place, to [...] this place, to this place, to this place, to this place, You can do both ways. If you're practicing shikantaza, and you're basically meditating on emptiness, then you do that with whatever comes up.

[29:48]

And what the form of the thing is, we say, you know, form is emptiness, emptiness is form, but also feelings are emptiness. Emptiness is feelings. And perceptions are emptiness. Emptiness is perception. Impulses are emptiness, and emptiness is impulses, and consciousness is emptiness, and emptiness is consciousness. So whatever comes up, everything that comes up goes in those categories. Things that don't come up, don't go in those categories. They still just include what comes up. Everything that comes up goes in those five skandhas, and those five skandhas are empty. They're all marked by emptiness. But if you're meditating on emptiness, then whatever you want. You don't have to have any, you know, partitions in your practice. Whatever comes up, you're sitting with it. That's all. But if you don't feel like you're really ready to do emptiness practice, then if that's your opinion, okay, then it's probably better that you decide which one you're going to do.

[30:56]

That you're going to do mindfulness to your breathing and mindfulness to your posture. In fact, That's why we say, we don't tell people, just sit. Just go do shikantaza. Just go sit. Hurry up. Get down there and do it. No, we start them with the form side of things. Namely, you should do micro-sleep body. And they say, what do I do? Not follow my thoughts. We just say, let them come and go. You don't have to do anything with them. So, you have to decide whether you just... You know, whether you feel good about just letting whatever comes up be a meditation. No sense of just, you know how to handle it, you handle everything the same. Maybe you see everything. Everything, every form, every feeling, every impulse, every perception, and every consciousness that you're aware of, you see that as inseparable from intimate.

[31:59]

If you can do that, then whatever. If you don't get ready to do that, then you better say which of those four you're going to do, plus within those four, which ones you're going to do. There's many practices within body practice. And even there, you should pick. So we now say people should do body practice. We say they should do two of those body practices when it first starts here. We don't say, well, you should do corpse meditation or go to the graveyard, because part of it, we don't have good graveyards anymore. And also, we don't know if you people, or we don't know if we can go out there and do a good job in the graveyard. Some of you might, you know what you might do. Might start kicking over tombstone, get thrown in jail. Or, you might say, as you're walking out there, say, this Zen Center is really crazy, I'm going back to Chicago. But even in Zen, though, we can give you instructions so you don't, We don't have graveyards, and we don't have swollen corpses, and we don't have et cetera, et cetera.

[33:03]

So we give you something that you all can do, and we can watch you so it's very safe. It's called a safe way, a comfortable way. We're all doing the same thing. It's very easy. Later, if you want to, you can go do these other practices. And Zen monks do go out in graveyards, although not highly publicized. They do these other practices. But they don't mention it. all the things that Zen monks have done don't come down to us because only sort of the most thrilling and interesting and unique aspects of their life come down to us. So a lot of the just sort of humdrum of a Buddhist monk life isn't passed down. So you don't hear about all these sort of ordinary practices that Zen monks have done. Like the ones you're learning about which sound rather bizarre to you, unusual. They're not so unusual to a Buddhist monk. They're more common than some things that you are used to hearing, that you're used to hearing these fantastic Zen stories.

[34:07]

And most of the Buddhist monks in the history of the world did not hear nearly as many of you already heard. You're just hearing like the treasure, you're just being exposed to the treasure trove of these fantastic events. Events that only happen once, you know, like Chakujo burying a fox, giving a chino ceremony for a fox. You hear about that and you go, what? And the more you study it, the more far out you realize it is. It's just incredible. And the fact that you bring those guys out there and have them do it with them. I mean, it's just not something he said. He actually got his whole community go out there and do that ceremony. Violated precepts. I mean, that's really far out. You hear about that. That's what you hear about. You don't hear about the fact that All those monks did all these other ordinary things. So when you hear about the ordinary things, you think they're far out. When you hear about the far out things, you think, well, I've heard those kind of stories. That's one of those Zen stories. But that's just sort of part of our sort of, what you say, overly rich American background, that you've been exposed to these secret texts, which are in paper thought.

[35:20]

And yet you haven't been exposed to just the ordinary kind of hard labor of Buddhist practice. like going out and hanging out in graveyards and race and things like that. It's okay. That's part of the reason why we have sort of a distorted impression on why we hear about these practices, they seem kind of weird. Because we're coming at it kind of from the back, which are working our way back to the beginning. It's okay. It doesn't matter. Okay? Anything else? I was looking at the other grounds of caution. I guess we find sections of my things that I find a long section of my things that we need to breathe. Which, when I compare it to the city of mine, it seems to be something that it's time.

[36:26]

What do you think? When you crush it, they talk about very specific to the difference to do. Siddhi Maga is more like breathing out, breathing out, breathing out. So in the Siddhi Maga it says, well the Tera Vodmi way is more like you say, you know, you say, now I'm breathing out, now I'm breathing in. Or as he breathes out, he knows that he's breathing out. As he breathes a long breath, he knows I am breathing a long breath. Whereas the presentation in the Abhidana Koshya is more like, why don't you read some of that to people? On the one hand, the teacher would be onophanous to empty the vacuum of movement.

[37:51]

Onophanous smirti is mindfulness of breathing. Mindfulness, inhale, and exhale, actually. It has six effects. It is perfect when it is endowed with the six operations. Counting, following, fixing, observing, transplanting, and terrifying. Counting. Counting. To fix the mind on in-breathing and out-breathing without effort or contention, to let the body and the mind be such as they are, by the memory alone, count from one to ten. For fear of abysam zippa, which is distraction, and the zippa of the mind, not below ten. There are three faults to avoid. A, to count with omission by counting, by taking the two for one, counting too high, taking one for two, counting in a new manner, by taking the in-breath for the operating in the right person.

[38:55]

The counting that avoids these faults is correct. Yet, in the course of the exercise, the blind has become distracted. One should count in every point of departure until absorption ends. This is the following. Without intention, follow the progress of the arrow, which enters and leads until it goes into two senses. Does the inspired arrow occupy all the body, or does it go only to one part of the body? The ascetic follows the arrow, breathing, breathing, throat, the heart, the navel, the kidneys, the thigh, and thus following the two feet. The ascetic follows the arrow, breathing, through a distance of a hand and a cubit. According to Levin Masters, he follows the exploration of you know, circle of air, unquote, which hold up the universe and to the Vairamba winds. What is the Vairamba? I don't know. This opinion is not a minister.

[39:57]

Okay, so, and then here it says, how does a monk observe, dwell observing the body? Goes to a forest or to the foot of a tree? Isn't that Theravada text called the Maha Satipatthana Sutra. Maha Satipatthana means the same as Smriti Pupastana. Or in an empty room, he sits down with his legs crossed, and that's why it's not so funny that you breathe through the thighs and feet, because they're right there. In Zen, sometimes you hear about breathing into your hands, you know, when the air comes in. here between in and mudra. So it's basically the same thing, you breathe with your whole body. Okay. He crosses his legs, holds his body straight, and sets up mindfulness before him. Mindful he breathes in, mindful he breathes out.

[40:59]

He's aware when he breathes in a long depth. I am aware. I am breathing. in a long breath. He's aware when he breathes out a long breath. I'm breathing out a long breath. He's aware when he breathes in a short breath. I'm aware I'm breathing in a short breath. He's aware when he breathes out a short breath. I'm aware I'm breathing out a short breath. He trains himself to be conscious of his whole body when he breathes in. He trains himself to be conscious of his whole body when he breathes out. He trains himself to calm the state of his body and mind when he breathes in. He trains himself to calm the state of his body when he breathes out. As a skillful lay operator or his apprentice, he is aware when he makes a long turn, I am making a long turn. As he is aware when he makes a short turn, I am making a short turn. In the same way the monk is aware when he breathes in and when he breathes out, he trains himself to be conscious of his whole body.

[42:02]

He trained himself to calm the state of his body as he breathes. Thus, he dwells in his body internally, thus he dwells in his body externally. So what's the point between you two that you want to talk about? I don't know if it would be presentation in the cushions for the more specific. They're a different style, it's true. But I can see this is more specific too because it talks about being aware of the different circumstances that might happen. And there you more talk about There's some emphasis on the dangers and how you're aware of some dangers and distractions.

[43:03]

Here it's not pointed out at this point. But other places it is. So there they say, you know, for fear that you will, they sort of explain why you, they explain the number 10. If you do more than 10 or less than 10, you could, it'd be pretty easy to get distracted and still pull it off. For example, you could do the one and be pretty easy to be distracted and just say one. Or if you went to read a high number, you could move around for quite a while before you found out that you were . But 10 is kind of a nice, what do you say, compromise. Anything else? I don't have much more thought about the deep, the both ways to do the practice. Less space.

[44:15]

Akasha, just space. You're welcome. Okay, now... For people, did some of you read this book or this book? What was your impression about the practices of mindfulness of the body? The other ones are posture and awareness of coming to this, awareness of posture and best you be aware of coming and going. The monk is aware of going out, coming in, he is aware of when he looks towards and looks away, and then repulsiveness practices, and then elements practices, and then decay of a corpse, and so on. What impression did you have of these? And then also we read the ones that are also learned here, in the sutra, those ones in the sutra, the mind once the body is fairly well laid out,

[45:27]

He goes to the burial ground. Bodhisattva sees all sorts of dead bodies. And then up above there it says the Bodhisattva, of course, is the perfect wisdom. Contemplate this very body as it really is. From the soles of his feet upwards to the top of the hair downwards. Bound by nails, skin, teeth, filled with manifold impurities. So what's your impression of all these mindfulness practices? What happens if you do them? Do you do them? What happened? Just reading this thing, it's while you're reading it anyway. You're doing it. You're doing mindfulness of the body while you're saying these things. So what happened to you while you read it? What happens to you while you practice these practices? Sobering. Sobering. I think so too. Quite sobering. What's another word for sobering?

[46:31]

Uh-huh. Any other words? Break down your perception of what you're doing. Break down your perception of what you're doing? Okay. Yes, sir? Well, let's stick in body now, okay? What about the body? Your other mind is feeling like pain, but that's still a feeling. That's still a feeling now. Let's do body. Body is not feeling. Feeling is a mental thing, even if it's physical. But can you say something about the body? Yes? Yes?

[47:55]

It lightens the body. It's sobering as lightning. Is it? It's sobering lightning. . Thank you.

[49:00]

No, if you're walking around and you're not paying attention, your foot's not your foot. That's not what you think anyway. You don't even know what your foot is, do you? If you know your foot, your foot, you're doing this practice. So that's not what you're talking about. I did. But it's the only thing they should do like to ask me. My daughter is from outside of the country. It reads to me. There will tell you friends who will consider us as well as we have to try. Yeah, just a plan for us as well. That's what we have to do. That's what we have to do. That's what we have to do.

[50:02]

That's what we have to do. Well, you don't have to talk about it. You don't have to say, this is not like over there. Because actually talking about it is, even in these practices too, the thing of I am talking is actually a way to get it into your heart. If you have to talk at first to do these practices, then as you repeat them, eventually you won't need to talk anymore. Talking actually gets in the way. Because if you have to talk while you're doing them, then you can't do them while you're talking to somebody about something else. So if you're doing these practices, you want to do the talking phase when you're alone. And do a lot of it so that when you're with other people and you're talking and reading and so on, you can still continue. So that you can be aware of your posture while you're reading, aware of your posture while you're talking, and so on.

[51:07]

And aware of all the aspects of your breathing while you're talking to somebody. So we've had people in our office who are trying to count to one of ten. And as Daniel said, we've had to carry them out. They were crying in the office. Because they couldn't do it. It's a dear heart, but anyway, that's not the way you do it. You have to get it sort of inside at some subliminal level of awareness, subliminal level. Otherwise, you can't do it while you're talking to a telephone. Also, while you're eating, it's not a good time to follow your breathing. Also, not good for your health. But you can be mindful of your body while you're eating, I'll tell you that. a good time to do what's called repulsiveness of food practice. But if you don't want to do that one, you can just go whatever you want of food practice, mindfulness of whatever aspect you can take, the sours, the sweets, the bitters.

[52:18]

I have to be prepared and food very hard. It's aerating your food, making it lighter. Right. There's all these individual subtleties. There's also awareness of defecation also, which some people have difficulty being aware of that. But other people seem to be able to watch the whole process little by little. So there's all these other practices which I mentioned here. They're right there. They're happening. You're feeling them. You're experiencing them in your body. But they're not spelled out here because they're infinite.

[53:22]

So the ones that are given here are ones that you can, in addition to those, you can do. or a selection. They talk about basically four postures, but there's quite a few. For example, they're squeezing behind chairs. Rather than, rather than, that's not listed in the book, but actually it is one of the postures that we take. Okay. So there's sobering. They're calming, they're concentrating, they're sobering. And to notice that you, for example, to notice that how much you don't want to be aware of your body or how much we tend not to be aware of our body is concentration. It may not be as much concentration as humanly possible, but it's probably a sign more. The reason why you say that is because other times you're less aware than that.

[54:29]

Although you're aware of how difficult and distracted you were, at the same time when you were noticing that, you were considerably more concentrated than what you were comparing to. The moment you saw that you were, or just before that you said that, you were noticing something. So they're this way. They are, as you know, as I mentioned before, they're the antidote to what? This particular practice is the antidote to... Right. And the repulsiveness practices are specifically, you can see how they will be an antidote, considering the body as pure. But the other practices, the other body mindfulness practices, they help you do that practice. Once you can follow your breathing, you could do literally repulsive practices. But the other ones also will show you this. And also, as he was saying,

[55:30]

Break down experiences of what do you say? Break down experiences of the body. Yeah. They break down experiences of the body literally in a sense of breaking it up into pieces. So the repulsive practices are not only to show you the impurity of the body or the impurity of the corpse or whatever, but also the unloveliness of the body or the unloveliness of the corpse, but also they break the body down into its parts. which will be quite useful when you start trying to get emptiness practice regarding the body. If you really do this practice without going to another realm, without going to, for example, if you do certain kinds of concentrations, example, on a blue disc or a white disc or something, and you concentrate very obsessively and sprung in it, you will project yourself.

[56:37]

At that moment, if you're doing that, you will have no lust for, if you're doing it fully, if you really have attained the trance on that object, you will have no lust for, or you will not consider it as lovely as a human body or anybody else's human body. You will not think that way. It is impossible to think that way and simultaneously be fully concentrated on a blue disk or on a red disk or a white disk. Is that clear? It is? Everybody clear on that? Yeah? No? Well, yeah, it is. It's somewhat like that, yeah. In order to be fully concentrated, you could not be paying attention to the human body. And if you thought the human body was lovely, you would be paying attention to it.

[57:40]

That's one way to see it. But we're not talking about that way. We're talking about not going to another realm, or rather staying right here, where you still see the human body in its gross form. But now seeing its gross form, or its gross, or what do you call it, composite form, Not necessarily saying this is ugly or this is yucky, but rather just looking at the parts. Look at the hair pores. Look at the earwax. Look at the anus. Look at the toenails. Look at the heels. Even on a beautiful, so-called beautiful body, look at all the different parts. Consider all the different functions. inside and outside, the whole thing, and really do it. And believe it or not, you might find that your attitude will change towards the body. Maybe you don't want to do that, but anyway, it would change.

[58:43]

But something else happens, and that is that as you do this, you will find that the body, although you look at all the different parts, you won't be able to say, now we're starting to drift into the ineffable side, you won't be able to say, you won't be able to spot any characteristics of the body. Now, some scientists might disagree, but anyway, from the point of view of the meditator, the human body does not really have any characteristics. Not the human body. When you get into characteristics of the human body, they're not characteristics of the human body anymore. For example, you say, well, that's blue, blue eyes. Blue is not a characteristic of human body, and eyes are not a characteristic of human body. And you say, well, a certain kind of eye is characteristic of human body. But if you get into certain kinds of eyes that are characteristic of human body, you're not dealing with characteristics anymore.

[59:50]

You're dealing with composite things. You're dealing with descriptions. You're not breaking things down anymore. Of course, each Each human body is unique and different. But when you start breaking it down into parts and looking carefully at it, little by little you realize that when you actually get to something which is really a characteristic, something that really you can say that this is a characteristic rather than a gloss or some person's particular eye, you start to lose track of the human body when you get real characteristics. And as long as you keep something that you can see as a human body or a particular human body, You're not dealing with characteristics anymore. You're dealing with the human body. You start to notice as you study this more and more and you break it down. Not only do you, but also another thing that happens is there's this sort of feedback. As you become more detached from the human body and think of it less as beautiful and so on, you become less, more dispassionate with it and you're willing to let it break down.

[60:55]

You're willing to let it sort of be whatever. And as you let it be whatever, you find out that when it's there, there's no characteristic. And when it isn't there, there are characteristics. That the human body doesn't really have any characteristics. And things that don't have any characteristics from the point of view of Buddhism, whether it's Abhidharma or Mahayana, they don't exist. The human body doesn't exist. So what starts out to be awareness of an illusion, as you do these practices, you become more detached from it and consider it less beautiful and become more calm. And the more calm and the less, not less reverential, but less sort of enchanted you are by it, the more you can see it break down even more. And pretty soon you realize that when it's gone, it's gone. Before it's gone, there's no characteristic. So when it's gone, it's gone. And before it's gone, It has no characteristics. So when it's there, it has no characteristics and it doesn't exist.

[61:59]

It exists only as a composite of illusory things that don't exist in themselves. Or when it isn't there, well, it's not there either. In other words, when you break it down into its actual components. Its actual components leave you no body. And the human body is not actually made up. It's not the sum total of a bunch of realities. If you put all the realities of the human body back together, you won't have a human body. You won't. There won't be a human body. You only can make a human body by imaginations on some other kind of realities which themselves will see something about later. Yes? What's like the webbing? The relationship. The webbing is like the relationship. It's not because of the relationship. No, you switched. You took the next step already. But anyway, that's all right.

[63:01]

I'm just talking about sort of the entree to that realm. My question is, it's not like you can feel a bunch of stuff and you can put it together and say, how are you doing about it? But it's like a complaint. You didn't have to make it. It's nothing more than that, plus the things that are related, they themselves are also just concocted. So maybe this is too much I'm talking about. From the point of view of the Abhidharma, there are certain realities, dharmas.

[64:03]

And these dharmas can be put together into certain events. But they never get put together into a human body. Human body is just always something you imagine. And you don't need a human body, so-called, in order to imagine one. You can imagine a human body without having this thing if you're called a human body. Now this thing here, this thing here called a human body, this thing, I'm not saying it exists anyway, okay? But the people who say it does exist, get some of those people together and you have them say, it's out of a human body, and they'll say, yes, that's a human body. And then you bring up a little closer and they say, oh, it's not a human body. It looked like a human body, but it wasn't really a human body. In other words, they will recognize something which is not a human body, according to their definition, as a human body.

[65:11]

They can't tell the difference sometimes. You can fool them. But what is this thing that they call that they're really human body? That's not a human body either. The thing that they'll agree with the human body is not a human body. But they will agree something with the human body and they can be fooled. They say, well, they can be fooled. What does that mean? It means that they will say something with the human body which then they will say isn't a human body. But what is a human body? It's just that they say it's a human body. There never is such a thing. It's just what they say. There's no place in a any place where you can find actual definition of a human body in our experience. Think about that. That's what we've been taught here. But you start with the assumption that there is one.

[66:14]

And if you study it, you find out that there isn't. So by doing these practices very well, you find out that there actually isn't a human body. Find out that there isn't. you'd actually get to know that. I haven't been able to try to find something that works.

[67:21]

You're still in a content stage? Yeah. Or is it anything else? There is another stage, right? At the point. There's a stage where it sort of comes together and it gets smooth and you sort of do it effortless. That's called attaining concentration. It's attaining. Then it becomes easy. It's not tiring. You can just do it all day. But this stuff is quite a bit more... It's quite a bit harder than... It's more on the level of learning how to be a brain surgeon than it is on how to be a roller skater. It takes a lot longer. Children can learn how to roller skate, and adults can learn too. Children can learn faster. But almost no child can learn how to concentrate. To concentrate requires terrific motivation. You have to remind yourself of how rotten the world is.

[68:26]

And you have to keep working that long time until you attain it. Excuse me for saying so, but you told me a certain thing about your practice. You have attained certain things in your meditation. Certain things have become smooth for you. Certain aspects of this thing called full meditation. You've already attained some things and become smooth. There's just many phases, and maybe you don't see that one becomes moving on to another. Just look at how much your posture has changed, and how things that used to be impossible, you now do with ease. In fact, that's the case. I mean, some of the things you can do now with your body, you just plain couldn't do before. Forget about that they're clunky, just impossible. There's a reflection of that. You can't do that with your body and not have something like that happen with your mind because it's just your attitude. You just thought your body existed in such and such form so it couldn't do certain things.

[69:32]

Since the body doesn't exist in the first place, to say that you can't do this such and such with your legs is just because you have such an idea of your legs because they really aren't even there in the first place. So you're willing to give up the idea that these legs which don't exist have to be in that form anymore. You've allowed them to be another form, which you also took as real. So I think that actually you have experienced this, but you just sort of, you're looking perhaps at your current clunky stage that you're on. So we're always on a clunky stage if we're practicing Buddhism, because we're always going to the next trick. Well, not always, but we spend a good share of our time on it going to the clunky stage. If you wanted to sort of go back and talk about what you've already attained, you could sort of get into how... certain things you've gotten together. But that's just, you know, you don't typically feel like doing that right now. Or you don't need that kind of encouragement. Okay.

[70:34]

Anything else in the mindfulness of the body? Yes? I don't know. I think it's definitely the first, it's definitely that you're feeling at the first that you find the The practices are repulsive, plus it will tend to develop a repulsive, you'll start thinking of the body as repulsive because you're thinking particularly repulsive parts of the body in addition to the non-repulsive parts. If you just think of all the parts of the body, you'll find out you think some parts are already, you think they're repulsive. In fact, when you think of a very beautiful body, you'll notice that you're not thinking about certain parts of it when you think about that.

[71:46]

Now, maybe you know somebody who has a beautiful foot. But that person who has a beautiful foot might not have a beautiful whatever. So if you take somebody who you generally think is beautiful, often you might find that they have kind of below average feet. But even an above average foot, if you really get down there and look at it closely, you can certainly find certain parts. that are not so cute. But if you really look at the whole body, you can start with your own if you wish. That's a good one to start with because you have ready access to it and so on. Although you can't see all parts evenly, equally well. You can sort of imagine if you can't see them. If you really want to, you could see them. And you, without any training or me telling you anything, I'm not telling you these are repulsive.

[72:52]

It doesn't say that these are repulsive. It doesn't say, look at the repulsive anus. Look at the repulsive, I don't know what. It doesn't say that. It doesn't say, look at the repulsive toenail or heel. It just says, look at those parts. And you'll find out that you think they're repulsive. Funny thing is you don't usually think about them. Some people just think about this part right here. And they put a lot of energy into this part right here. It's funny, isn't it? Everything else is covered up, so you don't have to worry so much about the rest of the parts. When you have a shaved head, maybe you start worrying about this part up here and this part back here. When you shave your head, I noticed myself, a lot of the tensions in your face start spreading over your whole head. So generally speaking, your face sort of calms down and becomes softer when you shave your head.

[73:58]

And if you look at people who have beards, you know, it tends to make their eyes more intense. And when they first shave their face, this part of their face is very tender and childlike, literally because it hasn't been covered, but also they haven't been using it to express their karma. So it's kind of like raw virgin territory again, like John. Do you notice how cute he was when he put you there? But it takes, when you shave your head, it takes a lot of intensity away from this part of your face and spreads it out. Because you're not presenting so much just with this anymore. You're presenting your whole head more equally, in fact. And it spreads out the intensity. If you were nude, you'd start presenting other parts of your body too. You'd notice people looking at your arms and at your knees and at your feet. You'd be aware, you know, that the little doggy knows your feet and the little doggy's watching your butt. The little doggy knows your armpits.

[75:01]

And your face would become less important. And you'd become more aware of your seat and your armpits and your fingernails and your butt. and so on and so forth. You would, wouldn't you? Don't you become more aware of it when you go to the beach? Some people do anyway. They notice a pot belly that they didn't notice all winter. Hey, what's this from? I mean, different. In fact, we don't keep aware of our whole body, and sometimes we think we're quite cute. Looking at the very smallest area, find one little area Hey, there's clear right there. Why do we do that? Because we want to regard the not so lovely or the not so pure as pure or lovely. So if you narrow things down enough, you'll find something pure and lovely. Like your new glasses.

[76:03]

So I think I would say that they're repulsive, but you don't have to work on being repulsive. You yourself will think they're repulsive all by yourself. As you get into knowing the parts, and the repressiveness, I think, is as you get to knowing the parts, something more important, more useful will happen. Namely, you'll see, it'll dawn on you that things are all just made up. Unity doesn't make sense. It has, if you regard the body as a positive in itself, it will make possible, for example, it's good in itself because it's concentrating and also it will tend to prevent sexual misconduct. If you really do it, if you get into it, you'll see other people that way too, even when they have clothes on.

[77:10]

If you're really into it, you'll see people that way and you won't be so, you know, so, what do you call it, vulnerable to a notion that somebody's really attractive. It won't come up so likely. So if you're following certain category, precepts and so on, it'll be easier to do them. What's the heavy PR job? But did they say propulsive, or did they just tell you what's there?

[78:18]

Well, they say impurity, but they mean impurity by, for example, filth they call impurity. Aside from that, aside from using the convention that excrement is impure or unattractive, I don't think there's much more imputation there. I think they're just sort of taking what most people would call not so cute and agreeing on that. In some sense, they're being conventional about it. I don't think they're saying eyes are... For example, they get into this mucus thing. I guess they even say that the eyes are not so cute. If you get up and look at the eye carefully, in some ways you can see it. Like you can see an eyeball on a table, you don't think it's beautiful, do you? Well, you don't, right? Or even if you just see part of the eyeball on a table. Just the part you usually see. You usually don't think that's a beautiful eye. You might. People can do almost anything if they want to, but... It's more in the setting and the mood, you know, the lighting.

[79:32]

But anyway, the thing about those practices are they tend to be phrased in such a way that you might think that they're ending themselves. But that's what they're for. They're for converting beings who... who don't want to go on, who maybe would like to just, they would maybe be able to be freed from desire for men and women or something. And this would be handy. So they, in some ways, they can be phrased to appeal to those who would like short-term results. Nirvana soon. Nirvana for me. Liberation from sexual torment this year. Something like that. And it doesn't, and it will do anything to get people into this, you know, hooked on this stuff. Because once they start doing this, if they get good, and once again, still, if you get good, you'll get your short-term results faster and better. As you get good, they subtly leak some other more basic facts start to come out.

[80:47]

As you become aware, same thing with roller skating. If you get to be a really good roller skater, If you get to be a really good horseback rider, if you get to be a really good pool player, if you get to be a really good piano player, you accidentally find out some other stuff. Just by simple fact of seeing how music is made, of seeing how roller skates roll, you notice that roller skates are an illusion sometimes. You have insight. Just like athletes, you know, the psychic side of sports. These good athletes, usually good ones, have these spiritual, these big clunky people. See, they don't talk about the psychic side of piano playing. People don't be so, aren't so surprised that sometimes you can say, well, did you know Bach had some kind of enlightenment? Oh, really? That doesn't make any news, you know? Everybody knows that he was in touch with somebody.

[81:51]

But to hear these 500-pound guys tromping around the football field are in touch with something, too, just by virtue of the fact that they have to watch where they put their feet because they'll get penalty if they don't put in the right place. They learn something, too, because actually there's lots of 500-pound people, but only a few of them get in the National Football League. The ones who are most mindful and intense and take the most amphetamines. Those are the ones that get in. And they... And when they're really high on those drugs and they're really running around those fields, they sometimes, they look very carefully to see where the ball is. You know? And this means 14,000 bucks if they can get that fumble. And that concentration, something happens there. You know? Something more than what they're expecting. So, if it happens in those situations, you can imagine what would happen to you if you did it here. Can't you imagine?

[82:54]

That's what we're doing. We're trying to imagine what it'd be like. And are you ready, Jonathan? Where is it? Did I forget it? Are you saved? Did you bring your music until? Where is that thing? So the bodhisattva actor, so the shravaka, the hinyanist, after doing these practices, becomes very good at them. We'll see the illusoryness of the body. This practice which started out just to be on a concrete body starts to break down and go into another realm. Just like if you're aware of your posture and your breathing, you can't stop it from... It will become Shikantasa.

[84:04]

There's no way to stop it. That's why you can do it and there's no problem because you will notice. There's no... You will start to see the breath as different from the body. You won't be able to hold up that different thing. And your body and other bodies, you realize, depends on just the discrimination and so on. And pretty soon, you can't stop it. You'll start to see emptiness. Of course you know that. So the Bodhisattva will see that. Anyone will see that the body doesn't exist, that it arises from illusory causes, that it doesn't come together and doesn't fall apart. the body doesn't come together. And the body doesn't fall apart. If it came together you could see it come together. But has any of you ever seen your body come together? Where did it go?

[85:46]

My body. I love it so. My body. So cute, so fine, this body of mine. My body was the cutest thing. Gave me the best of everything. Plenty of hope. Gave it the best of everything. Plenty of fresh air and exercise and vitamins and minerals and apple pies. Plenty of sleep. Plenty of friends. Rode it around in a Mercedes-Benz. Then it came time to die. Left and never said goodbye. And when it died, it got so big and green. No! So many learns you've never seen. My old friends quit the scene. Smelled just like an old latrine. Then the birds joined in the feast. They didn't even mind the stink at least. Now all's left is bones so bleached.

[86:51]

Who would have guessed it would happen to me? Now it's ashes to ashes and dust to dust. All because of hate and lust. Sure seems like a lot of fuss. It sure seems like we make a lot of fuss over something that's just bloody fuss. I don't know if you can. Are we going to sing with that? This is a rock and song book. I'm a singer. Pam. Three, one, two, three. Three, two, three.

[87:56]

Three, two, three. Three, two, three. Three, two, three. Bye. Bye. Bye. Now it's ashes to ashes.

[89:22]

It's kind of bolder. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. so anyway the body is just blood and pus and various things like that and those things when you see what the body is made up of parts that it's made up of those parts also if you look at those you'll find out like if you say the body has skin and bones and pus and organs and stuff like that if you look at the parts you'll find out that that doesn't hold up either you have to break those down

[90:40]

And when you look at those, you break those down, pretty soon you'd be down to dharmas. Once you're down to dharmas, you realize that if you put those dharmas back together, you wouldn't wind up with the human body again. But somewhere along the way, you have to make a cognitive leap. You have to sort of say that you've got this thing. You wouldn't otherwise come up with it. You can't actually experience this thing called the human body. You only experience other things. You can talk about what you do experience, but you never experience the human body. You just say you do. In fact, you don't. If you look at your experience, you'll never take the whole human body in. You cannot experience it. Think I'm wrong? In fact, you talk about having it all day and all night, but you never experience it. You experience tastes, tattoos, smells, Sights and sounds, little things you experience.

[91:44]

You'll never get a human body out of that. You can feel something here when you sit on that cushion. You can feel this. You can see things, but you still all see. If you talk about what a human body looks like, how you can tell the difference between a human body and a picture of a human body. You can talk all you want about how you can tell the difference, but in fact, you can be tricked. You can talk about how the human body moves. But there's no such thing as movement. This guy named, what's his name? Don Hanson. He sees this thing that he makes. These people that he makes. How to make moles and then paints and stuff. You cannot tell the difference between them and a human being from a distance. You maybe say, well, I can. There's some intuitive way you can tell. But you try to describe the way you tell the difference. Try to describe it. Maybe some of you could. I doubt it. I think the difference that you use would be you use some other tricks and other ideas and you'd be wrong sometimes anyway.

[92:53]

It really doesn't exist. It's really just imagined. And if you do these practices, you'll see it. You'll see that it doesn't come together and it doesn't fall apart. It isn't born and it doesn't die. There is birth and death, but not of the human body. That's not, look in the Abhidharma texts. They don't talk about the human body being born and death. They don't talk about the human body. It's a non-entity. It doesn't happen. They talk about the coming of warmth into a personal series and then going of warmth. That's what birth is. Birth is a corrupt form of consciousness. this is all maybe talk but anyway if you do this you see this do these practices you see them you see the body doesn't exist and the bodhisattva takes that and goes on to see the body doesn't come doesn't go sees that it's emptiness itself sees that it has no characteristics and something that has no characteristic doesn't exist something that doesn't exist is not born something that is not born has no characteristics things that don't have the characteristics

[94:12]

Then there's no wish list, because you have no wishes for things that have no characteristics. You have no plans for things that have no characteristics. You have no hope, you have no desires. So, meditation on the body, awareness of the body, leads to awareness that it doesn't really exist. You know the parts, you see that they don't come together, they don't fall apart, that they have no marks, they have no characteristics, they have no birth, they have no death. They have no self. They don't possess anything. Nothing possesses them. They have no master. They are not created by a master. They are not created by an agent. You can't find any of that if you look. And this leads you to what's called the concentration on the wish list. You do not take anything into account anymore because you have nothing to take into account. And the wish list goes with emptiness. So you take yourself back to the great Mahayana meditation called it. by meditation on this illusory thing called a body.

[95:17]

In daily life or in Zog Zen. And this is the first of the 37. Bodhi Paksa goes. First taken out of the harhat practice and then naturally flows into the Emptiness flows into bodhisattvas practice. So, I would be happy to do the next three to show how they practiced on the inayana or shravaka level and how you make the transfer back to practicing emptiness. How you go from form to emptiness, basically. How you go from... umbrellas to emptiness. But if it's going too slow for you, send me a note and I'll stop.

[96:20]

Or you can say it's on class too. But then some of you might not say so. So if you'd like to go on to some other kind of study and this is taking too long, let me know. But if otherwise, I would suggest then that you can now study the mindfulness of sensation, which is an antidote to the idea that things are pleasurable. In other words, it's the antidote to the obverse of the first noble truth. People think that life can be pleasurable, whereas Shakyamuni Buddha said, life is suffering. And he didn't mean part of the time. So if you sometimes don't see what he's talking about when he says that, then if you learn this meditation called mindfulness of feelings, you'd be able to see the first noble truth.

[97:28]

Then take the next step and go back to empty. And then mindfulness of thoughts. and see where they come from. And if you see where they come from, you'll see their emptiness, too. First of all, learn how to do it. In a yana point of view, or the shravat point of view. And then, mindfulness of dharmas. Study whatever you can find on it. And also, I would suggest, look at that section. Meditate on the section in the sutra, on page, How to Train in Feeling Me. The sutra we're just reading now. page 424 and 425 it explains how you should do these practices there's a message in there how to but first you have to do them first you have to learn how to do them from the shravaka point of view then when you if you get fairly good at that way then do this and you can take the next step because this assumes this practice here assumes you know how to do it as the hinayana way already and now how to you know the form see now how do you

[98:32]

How do you see the emptiness in the form you've learned? That's why you don't grasp it, because once you learn the form, you see the emptiness simultaneously, and then you don't grasp it. This is one little hint here. I think maybe next week, maybe one or two more weeks, and we finish this, and then we'll simultaneously, by doing this, have learned quite a bit about how to do the meditation on You got back early. The meditation on the signless, the wishless, and the emptiness. Also, I already told you about this book and this book. Okay? And so read these. These are the Hinayana. Okay? Read these and read them until you get a feeling for it. Which maybe just one reading is enough. And also, here's Dodding's energy description.

[99:37]

It's in this one, volume two of the Shobha-Genza translation, under 37 Wings of Enlightenment. And Har-Dyal, and the sutras, and various places in the sutra, and many other places. Actually, you don't need things. All you need is to look. Get good at these things and look, and you'll see emptiness. Emptiness has no marks. There's no hints about how it's there. It's right there in form as it is.

[100:17]

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