We're discussing the bodhisattva precepts and last time I think I talked about the bodhisattva... Did I talk about the bodhisattva vow? Hmm? Did I? Yes. And so I... I... I don't want to get too heavily into imagery, but I kind of think of this image of the Bodhisattva vow as like the seed of the whole process of Buddha's path. in a way, I guess I'm thinking now in terms of the precepts as kind of like the flowering of that seed.

[01:09]

The practice of the precepts as the flowering. And the fruit of the seed is you know, just perfectly being who you are. In other words, being awake, being enlightened. And the dropping of the fruit is to share who you really are, or to share awakening with all beings. In other words, to teach the Dharma. And I'm sort of a little bit fiddling with what the germination would be, what the sprout would be, what the stem would be. Between the seed and the actual practice of precepts, there's a process there, too. So tentatively, I guess I'm now thinking of that the germination, the thing that sort of heats the vow up in a way, sets it free.

[02:27]

is renunciation. And last Saturday we had a day-long discussion of precepts and we talked a lot about renunciation. And then, between renunciation and the practice of precepts, I'm not exactly clear what to put in there. I'm a little unclear about it in terms of my botanical analogy, how I work this. But I didn't talk about renunciation in this class last week, did I? No. Did I? No. No. Maybe this month I will. Marian Monday, yeah.

[03:32]

In the koan class I talked about renunciation, because I feel like that when you approach the Zen stories, it's the same as approaching the precepts. In other words, if you're interested in the teaching, the stories of the Zen tradition, the stories of the awakenings, the stories of awakening in the Zen tradition, As you approach these stories, as we approach these stories, we approach them, we need to approach them with our conceptual mind at first. We need to, and that's fine. But in order to really enter them, you have to, like, give up your conceptual mind. It doesn't mean interfere with your conceptual mind or suppress it or discredit it or anything. It just means be upright. And if you're upright, your conceptual mind finds its natural place, which is just a conceptual mind. And in that sense, you stop meddling with it.

[04:40]

You stop trying to use your conceptual mind to understand things. You stop being a companion of your mind. So there's the story, in a way, there's you, and there's your conceptual mind. In the realm of conceptual mind, there's the story, there's you, and there's the conceptual mind. They're three different things. And that's the way it is in the conceptual mind. But if you just let those three be just as they are, that's renunciation. Because conceptual mind, because, you know, me and my conceptual mind, We want to use the conceptual mind in certain ways. We want to understand the story. We want to have this understanding or that understanding. In other words, we think the conceptual mind could understand something more than just the conceptual mind.

[05:44]

We think the conceptual mind, the conceptual mind thinks that it could actually conceive of reality of the story. But it can't. It can only conceive of conceptions of the story, which is fine. And if you just let it be that, that's an example of renunciation. That's an example of forgetting about yourself. Forgetting about being a companion of your thinking and just letting the whole process drop away. At the same time, not pretending as though you don't have a conceptual mind and not watching how it works. So we've got to balance, in some sense, two things, you know. One is we have to accept that we have human destiny, that it is our destiny to have a human mind, to have human thinking, human conception. We have to accept that destiny.

[06:46]

At the same time, we can be very relaxed and float with that like a feather floating in the air. But just think that your feather floating in the air isn't the whole story. You're also a highly determined process. Highly determined. And powerful. And powerfully set. Powerfully habitual. These two. So, given that we're this way, to abandon being that way means to completely go with it. like surfing or something. Also abandoning it, also renunciation means that you contemplate approaching the story or now approaching the precepts with this, another way to talk about renunciation is just to be upright.

[07:59]

So you don't lean into the story to try to understand it. You don't lean back from the story. You don't lean into negation or affirmation of your understanding. You don't say, well, my conceptual knowledge is just conceptual knowledge, therefore what I think is not true. You may think that, but you just drop that kind of thinking because to think When I say my conceptual thinking about something is not true, I believe that. I just believe that. But to talk like that, and to be able to say the other way, and have that have no more impact on me, then that shows an example of being upright. To say, what I think is true, what I think is not true. Those two statements are equal to me when I'm in a state of renunciation.

[09:00]

My practice is good, my practice is not good. Such statements are equal to me in a state of renunciation. And I do think sometimes my practice is good, or I do think, oh, my practice is bad. I can think that. But renunciation means they have no, there's no difference in the way they affect you. As a matter of fact, they have no effect on you, because you're not a companion to those things anymore. They're just like birds chirping into trees. Everything that happens to you, you have the same response. Basically. Like, what is it? But what is it not like, how can I get it? Or what is it like, how could this happen to me? Or this, you know, this really isn't right. What is it? Or this is really great. What is it? No. Just really a kind of a pure wonderment.

[10:05]

Now, we would like the stories or we would like the precepts to be, in some sense, we might say, more accessible. They are completely accessible. It's just that usually what we mean by accessible is grabbable. They are inaccessible. The precepts are inaccessible to grasping. Really, they're inaccessible to grasping. These Zen stories are inaccessible to grasping. Enlightenment's inaccessible to grasping. And it's all very fortunate that the precepts in the awakening are inaccessible to grasping, because if they weren't, somebody would have grasped them a long time ago, and then that would have been the end of them. Somebody would be hoarding them, stockpiling them someplace. Or, you know, or smashing them into smithereens. or telling people that they are more important than something else and thus defiling them.

[11:14]

But because you can't grasp the precepts and you can't grasp awakening, they're both completely pure, unassailable and totally accessible because nobody can interfere with them and nobody can prevent you from being intimate with them, not even yourself. All you can do is think that you grasp them, and then by thinking that you grasp what you can't grasp, you alienate yourself from the ungraspable. That's the only way you can not have access to something ungraspable, is to say that you grasp it. Only by grasping are you separated from the ungraspable, unattainable, undefilable, ever-present, unobstructed, complete, perfect, miraculous life. But the slightest, actually the tiniest bit of thinking that you can grasp is enough to make you feel really alienated from it.

[12:18]

So that's why renunciation, right off, gives you complete access to the study of the precepts and the study of the Zen stories. It doesn't mean you completely understand them as much as you could after eons of study, but it puts you right into the actual wonder of them. I used to play judo when I was in college. And the people who, you know, like if you, if you, the people who like would resist when they were, when you're, we also call judo playing. And it's also judo's called judo means gentle way. Kirk's a kind of martial artist. He is now. Usually, as usual, you grab the guy's... Just because, um, the formal way of starting is you grab the guy's, uh, this key, this clothes, here and here, and you, you grab these things, and you just sort of pull each other around by the cloth, you know.

[13:27]

This is sort of a dancing thing, right? And the people, and so the idea is you like to throw the guy, or the girl, or have the guy or girl throw you, and then the first thing you learn how to do is fall. And also, if you learn how to fall, then you won't be so afraid of being thrown. Because there's ways of falling which don't hurt. If you don't know how to fall, then you're going to definitely not want to get thrown. So if you don't know how to fall, and then he tries to throw me, then I might go like this, you know. And I'll make it harder for him to throw me. But I won't learn anything if I play that way. The way you learn is by getting thrown. And basically, what you want to be, when you play with good players, you're like this. You pull them around and they go like this. They're like this.

[14:28]

You throw them. It's just like a towel in your hand. They don't go anywhere. And if you can be tossed around like that, you learn a lot. You learn not only how the person throws and how to fall, but also, while you're getting thrown, you can often throw the other person too. And if they're good, it'll be like towels throwing towels in the air. You know, it's like birds. And you learn so much that way. But if you're rigid and holding and afraid to fall, you learn something, but not much, until you relax and go with the play. Yes. Yeah. Could you? Yeah, please ask for air if you need air.

[15:28]

So, renunciate, when you renounce, you know, when you give up, for example, When you give up your conceptual thinking, in this class, your conceptual thinking is going on, but you just give it up. You just let it be. You let it throw you, for example. Like your conceptual thinking might be, well, I don't understand what's going on. Well, just let that throw you. And you'll learn something about, of course, I don't know what's going on. Or you might think, oh, I do know what's going on. Well, just go with that and let that, I don't know what, throw you up in the air or set you down. You'll learn from the thought, I do know what's going on. You'll learn from the thought, I don't know what's going on. You'll learn from everything in that state of enunciation. And basically, you'll learn what the precepts really mean, is what you'll learn.

[16:36]

And, I don't know, Because the precepts themselves are really about how it is when we get set free from our thinking. That's what they're actually about. That's what the Zen stories are about. It's about when you're set free from your thinking. And you're set free from your thinking when you understand your thinking. And you understand your thinking when you're free from your thinking. and you're free from your thinking when you completely go with your thinking without trying to make it go the slightest bit different from the way it's going. You don't try to promote or demote your thoughts. You don't try to promote good states or avoid bad states. Not promoting good states or avoiding bad states is actually

[17:40]

developing good states. Goodness is not promoting or demoting in mind, not meddling, not interfering. So, as much as we can at the beginning, we practice renunciation and in the lay, I wrote a little article on the lay initiation ceremony and The difference between the lay initiation ceremony and the priest initiation ceremony, as we have been doing at Zen Center, is that the lay initiation ceremony does not have formal renunciation as part of it. But I personally feel that from now on, the lay initiation ceremony should have renunciation as formally a part of it. Because I feel... that all bodhisattvas, both lay and priest, must practice renunciation.

[18:44]

The priests do a formal renunciation by cutting their hair off. The symbol of cutting your hair off means just right down to the core, right down to the skin, flesh, bones and marrow of yourself, just drop everything off. And then, enter. And then use the precepts to enter the Buddha way completely. But I feel lay people should do that too. So in the future, I would like to, in the lay organization too, make a gesture of cutting the hair. So for the sake of the people who came Saturday, I don't want to spend the whole night on renunciation, but perhaps there are some questions you have about what is renunciation and how uprightness is renunciation.

[19:54]

One more thing I want to say, however, is that being upright is renunciation. Being upright is confession. Being upright is taking refuge. Being upright is the three pure precepts. Being upright is the ten great precepts. Being upright is attaining awakening. And being upright is sharing the awakening with all beings. The practice of being upright goes through all the phases of the process, except in some ways, not even yet. It's even in the seed, I think. Even in the seed, if you're upright, I think, naturally, the spirit, the wish to save all beings before yourself will arise in you. So I think that, in some sense, I guess the practice that goes through the whole process from the bodhisattva vow through the renunciation, confession, taking refuge,

[21:02]

three pure precepts ten great precepts attaining the way and teaching and maintaining the dharma being upright goes through the whole process but at one phase in the process being upright particularly I'm trying to unfold the renunciation aspect of being upright tonight yes Well, I was thinking about when you said putting other people in front of you, and I'm thinking of the situation when I see somebody... Were you here last week? Yeah. You were? Okay. Now... Okay. This has to do with renunciation. No, I know it does. I know it does. Definitely. Yeah, this is another example of renunciation. Yes, yes. Go ahead. If I want to help them, How can I be without my ego being picked on?

[22:04]

Yeah. That's why I asked if you were here last week, because last week I said you will not help others before yourself. You won't do that. You cannot do that. Again, we are determined as human beings, I would say, we are determined as human beings not to do that. We have to accept that. We will not help other people before we help ourselves. We're constitutional. We're incapable of it. It's non... It goes against the logic of our evolution. Okay? And I like the example of an airplane. Did I say that last week? You're supposed to put your own oxygen mask on first. If you don't help others, you will be envious of helping them. You'll be envious of them getting help, and you won't want to give them something you haven't given yourself.

[23:10]

So when you see people who demonstrate this wonderful thing of giving other people before themselves and thinking of other people before themselves, the reason why they can do that is because they've been really good to themselves. The reason why they can give away everything is because they've given themselves everything. If you have an apple, and you really give yourself the apple, you have enough of it, and you can give it away. If you eat it, you can't give the apple away. But you can, if you eat that apple, and another apple, and another apple, until you've had enough apples. Really. And you really feel, and you really let yourself have every apple. And when they bring in the apples, you're not going to mind giving it to other people. Matter of fact, because you really enjoyed, you gave yourself and were so generous with yourself, you will be happy, very, very happy to give it to others.

[24:11]

And, that's still different from wanting to help others before yourself. But, You really do have to give it to yourself before you give it to others. You won't. You will hold back. There's a little demon in us which will say, no, you don't. Don't give it to them. You didn't give it to yourself. They can't have it. You can't have it. I can't have it. She can't have it. There is that thing. Let's take care of that thing. Take care of it. [...] When it's taken care of, it'll say, okay, give it away. That's why sitting, you should sit in such a way as you take very good care of yourself while you're sitting. And when you take very good care of yourself while sitting, take care of your body and your mind, then you can give it away. And also, if you've shown good judgment in caring for yourself, your self will say, if you want to give me away, you've done a good job taking care of me, you probably know what you're doing, go ahead. But if you don't take care of yourself and then you try to give yourself away, yourself will say, you know, you've been doing a lousy job up till now, you know, and now you just, you know, forget it.

[25:23]

I don't trust you an inch. You've been bungling taking care of me, now you want to, like, give me away entirely? Forget it. But if you take really good care of yourself and show good judgment on how to take care of yourself, yourself will trust and let you toss it over to the welfare of all beings. Which then, as soon as you do that, the self will also learn that that was really a good thing to do for the self and say, do it again. Go right ahead. That is really a great thing to do for yourself is to serve others. That is the best thing you can do for yourself. It's the most fun. It's the most joyful. It's the most vital. However, before you can really do it, you still have to have done lesser good things for yourself for yourself to let you do that. So, in order to care for others, you really should take good care of yourself. It turns out taking good care of yourself is not overdoing it. Turns out feeding yourself is not like stuffing yourself.

[26:24]

Maybe once in a while you have to do it just to make sure, to find out that stuffing yourself isn't actually taking care of yourself. Taking care of yourself is feeding yourself just the right amount. giving yourself just the right amount of sleep, giving yourself just the right amount of exercise, not too much exercise, just the right amount, not too little. In other words, taking good care of yourself. That's what you learn how to do. And again, that all the more helps you take care of others. It doesn't mean that when they're getting too much exercise, you come in and bust them. It means that you know, you can see, they're getting too much exercise. And if they want your help, you can say, well, you know, if you exercised less, you'd actually feel better. You can tell they're overeating. You say, well, actually, you're eating too much. They're studying too hard. Or they're not studying hard enough. You can tell. You can kind of see when the... Because you've studied yourself, you can kind of see when somebody's, like, at their optimal level. You know what I mean? Like, if you listen to a car, you know, there's a certain sound in a certain gear, the sound's just right, and then a little bit too much or a little too low, a little bit too low, you know, lugging it.

[27:28]

It should be in a higher gear. or a lower gear. You can tell from your own experience how to help others in that way, from taking care of yourself. So you do take care of yourself first, actually, in order to take care of others first. In order to release the clean, the ego, you have to take good care of the ego. If you take really good care of the ego, you'll forget it. The ego wants to be taken care of just right. And part of taking care of the ego just right is to get to know it. What do you want, dear? And you have to get an answer. You feel threatened today? Yeah, I do, actually. What's the matter? Then if the ego can tell you what it would have liked better, that will help somebody get to know what the ego is. What it likes better or worse has something to do with this definition. The more intimate you get with it, the more it feels cared for.

[28:30]

And the more cared for it is, the closer it gets to be forgotten. And when it's forgotten, you're completely released to do what is even better for the ego. That's renunciation. Renunciation is to forget about everything else and just concentrate on study of yourself. It means renounce using yourself to manipulate everything. And it means you stop using yourself for anything. And not exactly you stop using yourself for anything, but you change to, you give up using yourself for anything and start watching yourself be used and used. You study rather than try to change the patterns. And the major change, the most major change, is to change from manipulation to study.

[29:30]

And changing from manipulation to study is not a manipulation. Manipulation can go right on. But now it's being watched. Now it's a learning experience. Just like I said before, the manipulation is like the judo play, is like the dance. And study is like going with the dance and learning. how the manipulation goes. Learning how you become a companion in your mind, learning how you're a companion of other people and how that dance goes, that's study. Put your emphasis on that, that's renunciation. And then how do you study? Again, you study by being upright, which again is renunciation. You don't even study like leaning into yourself or leaning away from yourself or saying this is yourself or saying this isn't yourself. You don't even know what yourself is. You just be upright and present and quiet and yourself will come to present itself to you.

[30:33]

Not the one you're expecting, but the actual one. Moment by moment. According to its schedule. And the way to go with it is to be upright moment by moment. And uprightness is not rigidity either. It's that softness and a being alert and soft at the same time so that you're able to go with it and you stay with it. Unshakably committed to study and flexible. This is renunciation. This is uprightness in the aspect of renunciation. Or this is uprightness teaching you how to practice renunciation. When you're upright, you have no idea of renunciation. True renunciation has renounced renunciation too. You're completely empty-handed and naked.

[31:35]

You don't know anything about Buddhism, precepts, Zen, good or bad. Meantime, all around you is good and bad, Buddhism, not Buddhism, evil, good, right, wrong, ego, non-ego, it's all flying all around you. None of it reaches your uprightness. And if you're into any of that stuff, you can feel yourself leaning into any of that stuff, and you catch yourself at some leaning. And when you catch yourself, and when you notice that you're leaning, then the uprightness is implicated. You can't, when you feel the leaning, you feel the uprightness. And that is enough for that moment. And if you just go like that, leaning, [...] that's the confession aspect of being upright. And that's how confession then supports the renunciation.

[32:40]

So you commit yourself to renunciation, and then you practice confession, which is basically noticing, I didn't renounce, [...] I'm still holding, I'm still holding, I'm still holding, I'm still leaning, I'm still leaning, I haven't forgotten, I'm still remembering myself, I'm still concerned with myself, here I am again, same old thing. But every time you confess, you're upright again. And ready to enter. I have a question. You said just a while ago that there's a self left. I was thinking of the idea of the conceptualized mind as our destiny, but then if you renounce all that, what's left? Is it called a self? What's left when you renounce everything? Everything.

[33:42]

One learns. What learns? If the conceptual mind doesn't learn or is not the best learning, what phenomenon constitutes the learning that goes on after you renounce the conceptualized mind? Nothing learns. They're just learning. There's learning of how to renounce, but nothing learns that. The self doesn't learn it. The self isn't like what do you call it, the repository of all, you know, all, what do you call it, enlightened education. Enlightened education is just to release you from the self. By releasing you from the self, if you want to be released from something, you better not dent it at all. Leave it perfectly intact as it actually is, is the best way for you to be released from it. But if you do any harm to yourself, you're going to have to, like, what do you call it, heal that, before you're going to be able to be released from that self.

[34:51]

So part of being released from the self is like, pay respects to the self, pay back the self, give it whatever it needs so it'll let you split. Fly. Not awake. I shouldn't say split, just be free. And there isn't something that's free. If there was something that's free, then you could grasp freedom. You see? But you can't grasp this learning. This learning is ungraspable because this learning is to be free from grasping. So there isn't something that is left. But it's not like everything is knocked away either. It's just this is the way to be with the arising and falling of things in the educational mode. The educational mode is... renunciation, and their educational mode is confession of non-renunciation, and is confession of a lot of other kinds of non-virtue too, which we'll get into later.

[35:56]

So the question from that is, is there a kind of faith that you can have if you really can renounce everything? Is there faith in renunciation? Is there faith in the way of finding this real learning? The logic of your statement of, is there faith, that's the logic of where faith is understood as belief. Is there faith in? And there can be faith in, but that's not what I call faith. That is belief. Like, I believe that if I do this, this will happen. It's a perfectly reasonable belief. That's not faith, though. Faith is to do the practice. Like some people think, oh, renunciation sounds good, oh, being upright sounds good, oh, practicing good sounds good, avoiding evil sounds good. They think that, and they even say, I believe it if I did that, or I think that if I did that, or I trust it if I did that, it would be good. But they don't practice it. Some other people maybe don't even think, oh, that would be good, they just practice it.

[37:03]

That's, the practicing is the thing. Yeah. Like, okay, some people think that was good. Well, who will put down their life on the line? That's a practice. Not even thinking about it, but actually putting your life on the line for something, that's faith. What is actually most important to you, when it comes down to it, what's most important to you? That will be your faith. So, you have faith in renunciation if you practice it. You have faith in the Buddha way if you practice it. You have faith in the Bodhisattva vow if you go around thinking, gee, I really would like to help everybody before myself. I wished everybody would be happy. I wonder how I can help people. Thinking like that is actual living faith in the Bodhisattva vow. Hearing about and thinking is good is thinking. And that kind of thinking might lead you to say, like we said last week, gee, I would like to learn to think that way.

[38:09]

I would like to learn to be that way. And actually practicing learning to be that way would be faith in learning that way. And then faith in learning the way would lead to the faith of actually being that way. The Buddha's word faith has to do with like settling down into something, sinking down into it. It's not a belief. In Christianity too, I don't think belief is faith. Belief is something you can do. Faith you can't do. You can't do faith. You can do something. And if what you're doing is the most important thing to you, then that is faith. But you can't do that. You can't like do this. You can't like do make this. You can't do this is the most important thing in your life. You can't do that. It's a gift. Faith is a gift. It's grace. In Buddhism and Christianity and nowhere else. Probably everywhere. But there's a common misunderstanding of faith in that it's a belief.

[39:13]

Any other questions on renunciation yet? I just had a question. If you consciously don't do something that's like a precept, is that grasping? If you consciously don't do a precept, like what do you mean? Consciously don't do something because it's a precept, like... You mean like you maybe have an impulse to kill something and you consciously don't do it? Not something that drastic, but I mean... It's not something that drastic or what? I wasn't thinking it. Killing, you know. Like killing maybe a mosquito? No. Not something that drastic either? Give me an example. I don't know all the precepts. Well, there's killing. Yeah. Well, there's just something that wouldn't be helpful. If you consciously don't do something because you know it's a precept, is that grasping? If you think about it beforehand, you go, I shouldn't do that. Not necessarily. No, not necessarily.

[40:19]

If you think of doing something, and you look at your motivation, you see that your motivation is not in order to help, to be helpful. Okay? And then you don't. Is that your example? I don't know. I'm confused. You said, I think you said, if you think of doing something and it's against a precept, is that what you said? Yeah. Yeah. So, yes, if you were thinking of something and it was against a precept, then you should not do that. You should not do something that's against a precept, basically, unless it might be helpful to someone. So, if you, like, the precept of... I don't know if there's any precepts that aren't too drastic for you to consider, but... Let's see if... How about being possessive of something? How about being possessive of your gift card? No.

[41:20]

Do you have any clothes? Yes. Okay, so one of the precepts is don't be possessive, okay? So let's say I come over there and say, well, excuse me, I'm going to take your shirt off now. You know, and... you might start feeling some possessiveness of that, right? And as I start to remove it, or I might not even try to remove it, I just say, may I have your shirt? And you may say, well, I'd rather, no, I don't want you to have it. I say, well, how about if I give you another shirt so that you won't be shirtless? And you say, well, you know, actually I want this shirt that says, I know that when one door closes, another one always opens. But man, these hallways are a bitch. So, even though you wouldn't be naked because I gave you another shirt, you actually want to hold on to that shirt, let's say. That's a precept. The precept says you should not hold on to that shirt, right?

[42:21]

You might think that. Yeah. Right? Is that your question? Is that your phrase? Is that an example? Yeah, I was kind of thinking around that. Okay, so that's an example of where someone asks you for your shirt and you use a precept saying not being possessive and you think, well, maybe the precept says I should give the shirt up because I feel like I'm being possessive of it now. Okay? Okay. Like a precept of not, you know, putting somebody down in order to put yourself up? Yeah, like that one. Do you consciously think, oh, I shouldn't do that because it's a precept? Is that a bad thing? Is that grasping? Is that not pronunciation? Okay, yeah. Okay, so you don't want to do this one with a shirt? You want to do this thing of praising yourself and putting somebody else down? Want to do that? Yeah, I'll try to do something as well. More likely to lie to you? Yeah, I guess. It comes up more for you? Okay. Because you're not... Sorry.

[43:23]

Because you would... You don't... You're not a type of shit, right? I get it. I get it. That's what I thought. Yeah. Okay. So now the time comes for you to say something good about yourself that might put Bob down, for example. Like you might be playing golf with Bob and say... You know, you both hit the ball and you say, boy, I really hit the ball well. And you might notice that that sort of implies that he didn't, so you might say, well, would that be clinging to stop myself from saying that? Is that your question? And I would say, first of all, I would say, you should try to not talk like that. It's such a way that you're praising yourself by putting him down. Okay, now... that you should actually do it that way. If you actually sit... I'll take it back. If you look at yourself while you're about to say that you did really well, you look at your motivation and you feel like actually you do kind of want to put yourself up and put him down.

[44:29]

Or you notice, well, I don't particularly want to put him down, but if necessary to put myself up, he gets put down, it's okay with me. If you notice that and you think, well, gee, that's not really that kind. then you should not say that. So the precept at first might kick you off to look at your motivation. But forget about the precepts for now, okay? And just always look at your motivation. Then look at the precepts. And if you look at your motivation and your motivation is not primarily to be helpful, then don't do it. Now, could that be clinging? The answer is yes. And you might not be practicing renunciation. As you look at your own motivation, you might not be practicing renunciation when you look. It's possible.

[45:31]

And then, if you notice that you're not practicing renunciation while you look at your motivation on this act, then you confess that you notice that you're kind of leaning and clinging. you notice that you're kind of thinking, I actually know what's good and bad. And there again, I just broke the precept. And actually, there's a little, back there, there was a little kind of like, a little one-upsmanship that I did, you know, in terms of like trying to be, manipulating myself into being a better person there. Actually, I was actually trying to do that with myself. You might notice that, and you confess that. And by confessing that, you have a chance to come back now again to approaching this particular little precept, this particular little act, in a more upright way.

[46:42]

So, by noticing some leaning or some motivation to not be helpful around your speech, And then looking even more deeply into your motivation, you may notice another kind of clinging or another kind of gaining thing there. And by admitting, you again come back to a place of more uprightness and more uprightness and more uprightness and more and more balancedness around this act. Is that confession to the person, or the other person, or to himself? Is the confession to the other person, to himself first, and then the other person? It depends on who the other person is. It might be the other person, but you might go to a third party that's not involved in it, because that might be confusing for the other person, you know, who's being put down, potentially put down, or something like that. Well, I mean, just to acknowledge that I realized that I was unkind.

[47:51]

Well, again, you say, should it be the other person? There again, it's speech, right? You're going to do something now, okay? Now consider it. What is your motivation in telling them? Look at your motivation. To clear the part of me that was unkind. Right. And would it be helpful to this other person? If you think it would, then... Maybe give it a try. And maybe it will. So, one level of practicing these precepts is for everything you do, before you do anything throughout the day, except you can't do it with your thinking, thinking's too fast, but with everything you say and every posture you make, before you do it, consider whether It is beneficial. But also, even before you consider it as beneficial, just consider, ask yourself, what is my motivation?

[48:54]

And then see if you get an answer. If you don't get an answer, then interrogate yourself. Is this beneficial? See what the answer is. Is it potentially harmful? See what the answer is. Do that. Of course, you can't do this. But still, it's recommended. Can it be clinging in this process? Yes. Can it be lack of renunciation in this examination? Yes. Will you discover the lack of renunciation? Yes. Will you discover the renunciation? No. You can't discover renunciation. Renunciation is ungraspable. You can discover the attempt to practice renunciation, but when you practice renunciation, You no longer need to know if you're practicing renunciation. Before you practice renunciation, you need to know whether you're... how you're doing. So as a way... So... But if you've also... if you practice renunciation, there's no problem in examining your motivation. If you practice renunciation, you're perfectly willing to go around examining your motivation all the time.

[50:00]

You could do... you could also be perfectly willing to go around and never examine your motivation if you practice renunciation. But if you practice renunciation, you don't really have to worry about your motivation anymore because your motivation is perfect. Because your motivation is just exactly who you are. So mostly, we make a commitment to practice renunciation. When we do, we're all set to practice the precepts. Then we practice the precepts. So mostly, in one sense, what we're admitting, what we're confessing, what we're noticing in ourselves is that we're not renunciates. We're lousy renunciates. That's mostly what we notice, that we're biased, that everything we do, there's some kind of bias in it. So, now I'm going to talk. Would you like your shirt cracked? Yes, please. But before I give it to him, I'm going to stop and think, would it be beneficial?

[51:02]

Now, before I answer him, I'm going to stop and consider whether it's beneficial to answer him. I think it would. You're welcome. Come again. I have some lot of t-shirts myself. What an interesting posture you have. Now, before I said that... Yeah, it's more interesting that way. Before I said that, I did not stop to think whether it was beneficial. Or, you know, what my own motivation was. Okay? That's one of the virtues. Now she's raising her hand again and again. I'm stopping. I'm wondering if I should continue to talk. That was the point I wanted to ask you about, was the thinking. It seems to me that as soon as I think, that's the minute I interfere. So if I think, well, gee, if I don't take my shirt off and file it in the precepts, I've already lost it. So somehow just having faith in myself and... Could you say that more slowly, please?

[52:13]

If I think about it... About what? about whether I'm violating the precepts, or whether I'm doing the right thing, or whether I'm being considered. I think about any of those things, and I feel that immediately I've either put a head on top of a head, or I've cut my head off. And to consider things, to think about them at all, I feel that I've just moved on. my center so for me it seems that you just have to have a certain deep faith in yourself that your actions will be right and you just kind of let it go. I with the feeling of wanting to be beneficial and thinking this might be beneficial disagree with you. I do not think that you should trust deeply in yourself that your actions will be right. Deeply trusting in yourself is not deeply trusting in yourself that your actions will be right.

[53:24]

Deeply trusting in yourself means to study yourself. Buddhism is not that you should believe that you're going to do the right thing. That's not Buddhism. Buddhism is the trust that if you would study yourself and forget yourself, you would do the right thing. And are you saying study is the same as forgetting? I'm saying forgetting is the result of study. So, when it comes to time to act, look at yourself. What are you up to? Now, if you're going to do something unhelpful, well, don't do it. If you're going to do something helpful, do it. It turns out that noticing that you're going to do something unhelpful and not doing it is a good learning situation. It's a good learning situation.

[54:29]

And thinking of something good to do, something you think would be beneficial, and noticing that is a good learning situation. And then acting from and carrying out the goodness is another good learning situation. Sometimes you think of something, you look at your motivation, you think it's good motivation, and then you act and you notice that you were wrong, that you didn't actually assess your motivation properly, but at least you looked, you tried it, and you learned. That's part of learning, that's part of studying the self. By studying this way more and more thoroughly, eventually you will forget the Self. And when you forget the Self, you will spontaneously do good and not do evil. So that finally you get so fluid in this that you don't have to necessarily do this checking the motivation thing. However, again, as I said, once you're this fluid in it, you're perfectly happy to check the motivation too, but you don't have to. But you don't trust, you should not go around trusting.

[55:33]

This precept class is not to tell you that you should not go around trusting that you will do the right thing from now on. That's just saying, be self-righteous, please. You know, be arrogant. No, that's not what Buddhism is saying. Buddhism is saying be humble. But not humble like to think, I'm going to do the wrong thing. That's another kind of arrogance. Be humble in saying, well, I'm going to be like the Buddhas. I'm going to follow the Buddha way. I'm going to study myself and find out what I'm up to and how I work. Now, faith in the self would be faith that if you understood what the self was, you would be free. and you find out what the self was, you forget the self when you find out what it is. The self, just like the precept, is ungraspable. And the precepts come from this ungraspable self. When the self is not grasped, what your self does is called good.

[56:35]

When the self is grasped, what you do is called not good. So if you're grasping yourself and then you go around saying, I trust that I'll do it right, then you're just doing wrong and then thinking you're doing right. It'd be better just to sort of like, even without thinking that you're doing right, you're still going to do wrong if you're grasping the self. But if you're not grasping the self, then you do good. Spontaneously, unavoidably. You are good. I mean, you don't even do good. Actually, when you've not dressed yourself, you don't even do anything anymore. You just are good. But so is everybody else, from your point of view. So renunciation is part of learning how to just forget yourself. And the next phase of the practice, after renunciation, is confession. Confession of... First of all, confession of non-renunciation.

[57:44]

And then confession of grosser things, like actions that come from self-attachment, like confessing lying, dishonesty, confessing putting yourself up while putting someone else down, confessing killing, confessing stealing, confessing being angry, confessing being possessive, confessing abusing the three treasures, and so on. That confession of those things ultimately boils down to confessing non-renunciation because you can't violate those precepts in a state of renunciation. You can't violate those precepts when you've forgotten yourself and let go of self-clinging, you won't violate it anymore. I'm sorry, did you say confessing the precepts, breaking the precepts, is having a confession? Confessing the precepts, confessing breaking the precepts, that's one kind of confession.

[58:52]

Confessing non-virtue is one kind of, in terms of going against the precepts, that's one form of confession. But fundamentally, in some ways, the most fundamental confession is I'm not upright. I'm leaning. How am I leaning? I'm leaning in the sense of I'm here saying that you're over there. I'm leaning. And I actually think that's true. Or I think it's false. And I really think that's true. That it's false. That's the kind of leaning to the right. or thinking of the future as though it were some other time. That's another kind of non-renunciation, because I'm concerned, you know, what's gonna happen to me? If you have renunciation, when you think of the future, you can't make it a real thing over there anymore.

[59:54]

It's just an idea. So then you're back upright again. So what is the point of confession? Because somehow, magically, we sometimes think we can be someplace else from here. Don't we? Like we're here, right? We're just here. Everybody knows that, right? And yet, sometimes we think, oh, well, I'm just here, but I really am here. Why do you say that? Question, I guess. You may think thou dost protest too much. Or you kind of feel like, well, I'm not really here. I didn't do a very good job being myself just a second ago. Or I think that way. How could I not? Well, I feel like it. That's the only way I can not. Or we think. We judge ourselves constantly. Or judge others. We do that. So, in that sense, and not only we judge ourselves,

[60:57]

But we believe that our judgments are true. Because you're holding to the self, then you judge someone, and the holding you do to yourself, then you hold to the judgment. Because you think you're really here, you think the judgment's really there. So I think Walter's really a nice guy. If I hold it to myself, I think that's actually true. Like I've gotten Walter in this nice guy box. Walter's not a monster. Walter's not Mount Everest. Well, sorry, Walter. I confess I did that, maybe, you know. which I may or may not tell you. I got Walter, he's in the man category, you know, blah, blah, blah. Got you under control. What am I doing that for? Why am I just here with this mystery called Walter? I don't even know if you're Walter. Who are you? Yeah, see? So, confession is to confess that I have trouble just being here, being upright with you in awesome wonder of who we are. And then, once I'm not willing to just be here empty-handed and naked, then I get into all kinds of other stuff.

[62:05]

If I'm not willing just to be here empty-handed and naked, then I might start lying to you, too. Like, you know... If you say, you know, do you think I'm a mystery? I might say, well, you know... Yeah, I do. Because I'm afraid to tell you. Because I think you're not a mystery, I'm afraid to tell you that I think you're not. Because you might be insulted for whatever you think you are. And I think this is all real because I think I'm real. Because I think I'm real, I think everything I think is real. And everything I think is everything I experience. So everything I think is basically biased. And so by confessing it, if I see a bias, how can I tell a bias? Because I have an innate, intrinsic uprightness with which I can tell that I'm leaning. And when I can tell I'm leaning, that doesn't tell me what my uprightness is, because uprightness cannot be grasped.

[63:08]

But in the calling a spade a spade, or calling a transgression a transgression, and also calling a transgression a transgression, even saying that that's another transgression, because I think that's true, again, I'm upright. And I don't get anything out of it, because I can't get anything out of uprightness, and not getting anything out of uprightness is renunciation. totally useless to me, I get nothing out of it. No gain for me. However, there is a gain for everybody else but me, because now I'm ready to actually respond to people appropriately. However, instead of responding appropriately, even though I'm ready now, finally, because I just admitted I wasn't ready a moment ago, again I slip and blow it again. But if I catch it, I'm upright again. So confession purifies and encourages and develops the renunciation. Martha? Did you have your hand raised?

[64:12]

Well, no, it was just, I think I'm going to take it back, but it was almost as you spoke, I felt like it was upright. It's uprightness that's calling the shots. It's uprightness calling the shots? Yeah. But there isn't such a thing as uprightness separate from it. So the way you're speaking, it's almost like there's being all of us. I mean, it's almost, when it comes to the Christian terms, sort of basic goodness. Yeah, right. Yes. This is basic goodness. It's our balanced, you know, inalienable integrity. And which cannot be grasped. And because it cannot be grasped, it can never be destroyed. Ever. It is immortal. This is the bodhisattva vow which has no abode. Uprightness has no abode. It has no location. Nobody can find it. Nobody can promote it. Nobody can destroy it. Death can't find it.

[65:12]

Life can't find it. Uprightness goes through birth and death. And confession is the process of continually purifying ourselves and returning ourselves to our upright position. Confession, if done properly, is a selfless activity and is basically the activity of noticing selfishness. And selfishness is not just putting yourself first, it's putting yourself as real. Once you put yourself as real, you naturally put yourself first. Because if yourself is real, it should be first. If you were real, you should be first. If the way you think you are is real, then you should take care of that and make that first before others.

[66:21]

But it isn't. And the way to realize that is to take good care of the self. And the way to take good care of the self is... to practice uprightness, and to practice confession. Confession should be something that is good for you. Like you were talking about last week, it should make you lighter. Yes? By real, do you mean, um, you're currently self-subsisting about what you're covering there when you say... When I say real is I mean, you know, again, when I say real, I mean that I think it's real, you think it's real. I don't mean that it's real. I mean that we think it's real, okay? And what do we mean by think it's real? We think it's, yeah, inherently existing. We think the self exists by itself. We think we're independent of other people. And if we were, then we should take care of ourselves ahead of other people probably. But we're not. So we should take care of ourselves in order to free ourselves from that idea. And the way we should take care of ourselves

[67:24]

Is what? How should we take care of ourselves? Study. That's how to take care of ourselves. And how do we study? Sit. Did you say something? I just said sit. Yeah, sit, right. Sit. And how do you sit? Right. That's how to take care of yourself. Of course, you try to sit and you notice you're not sitting upright, right? Or you think you are, and then you're not. So we adjust posture sometimes in Zendo, and people are sometimes surprised that someone has some suggestion to make. Why would someone be making a suggestion to me? I am upright. But if you're ever sitting and you think you're upright, before anybody comes to suggest you, makes some suggestion to your posture, you don't need anybody to help you then. If you notice that you think you're upright, you don't need any help at that time. You've just corrected your posture because you just confessed that you're off by thinking that you're right.

[68:28]

To think that you're on is off. When you're upright, no opinions about yourself reach you anymore. When you're free of all your opinions of yourself, then you have just taken good care of yourself. Then you are like what we call, you are a free person. When our opinions about ourselves or our opinions of others reach us we're you know we're off now if you think others are wonderful this is a great joy but you can think they're wonderful without thinking that they're wonderful and independent of each other that they're wonderful as independent substantially existing beings you don't have to think that You don't have to think it's true what you thought, but you can rejoice in the merits of others. And that's another practice that comes right after confession of your own non-virtue, is rejoicing in the merits of others.

[69:36]

Yes? So the problem with your example of thinking, like, if I think that I'm upright, it's because I think that upright is good, right? I could think I'm upright without... No. You could also think you're not upright. That also would be not upright. It's just that it would be, you know, it would sound the same as what you thought. To think that you're not upright is also not true. To think that you are upright, when you think you are upright, you make yourself not upright. You still are really upright. You're always upright, no matter what you do. But if you think you're upright, you destroy your uprightness for yourself, not for me. If you think you're not upright, you also destroy your uprightness. If you think that. But if you think you're not upright, and you confess that, then there's uprightness.

[70:40]

If you think you're not upright and you confess it, uprightness is there. If you think you are upright and confess it, you're upright. You should confess, thinking that you are or are not upright, you should confess When you notice that you think you are a Zen student or not, you should confess. When you think you are a good Zen student or a bad Zen student, you should confess either one of those. Confessing either one of those, you're upright again. Immediately. Immediately. Confessing about any state that the I, so to speak, is in? Yes. Because basically what you confess is non-renunciation of self. So is confessing renunciation, is confessing how you practice renunciation? That's one of, no. That's how you sort of like, in some sense, re-enter it. But you can practice renunciation without confession if you're not thinking anything. Renunciation doesn't require confession, it's just that if you do anything, if you do anything, then you have to confess that to reassert

[71:49]

to reaffirm your integrity. So, like, can you practice renunciation? Confession is a purifying practice. Renunciation is not a purifying practice. Renunciation is purity. Okay? You can practice purity by itself. But you can't do anything. You just sit, for example. Or you just... You are just the goodness of the universe. That's all you are. But if you get into any kind of leaning, any kind of bias... putting yourself ahead of somebody else, for example, anything like that. Anything you do, anything you do, anything you do should be confessed. When you confess it, you're purified. Purified, you're upright. Being upright and purified, being upright and purified, being upright and confessed, you're ready to enter the precepts. If you confess, then that is the precept.

[73:00]

You don't even have to enter it. I think that is... Yeah, right. You don't have to enter, therefore you can. You don't have to practice the precepts, therefore you do. The people who don't have to practice the precepts are the ones who really can. The people who do have to practice the precepts have kind of a hard time. But they should try too. But in order to be successful, the ones who have to, in order to be successful, they should practice renunciation and confession. And then when you do, then you don't have to. So you do. Buddhas don't have to practice. The practice comes with the Buddha, therefore they do. Those who have to practice are not Buddhas, so they should become Buddhas before they practice. And then they don't have to, so they do.

[74:01]

Yes? If renunciation is not in the realm of knowledge, is it in the realm of realization? Yes. Mm-hmm. And I confess each time just by saying I confess. That's fine. You don't have to, you can make it very simple. You don't have to, you can, whatever way basically wakes you up. You can have all kinds of different formulas that help you. Millions of ways to do this. Any more questions about this? I have a question about a precept, but I can wait till next time. Because I have a feeling it could get complicated.

[75:03]

Yeah, you wait. I think my plan, actually, I was going to introduce the, so the first three precepts are the taking refuge in Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. The next three are, you know, refraining from non-virtue, practicing all virtue, and benefiting all beings. That's one rendition of them, and then the ten. In this class, I was planning on very lightly touching the refuges because I have spent so much time in the refuges in other classes, and also because I kind of want to talk about the next three, because those are what I'm working on in the book. So I was intending to maybe just start those three this time, the three pure precepts. But I didn't get to them. We didn't get to them. But this is like, in one sense, the renunciation and confession are preparations to receive Buddha, or to go back to Buddha.

[76:19]

to go for refuge, or to receive refuge. In one sense, they're preparations for receiving the precepts. But in another sense, as Walter said, they are already the precepts. When you're upright, the precepts are naturally, spontaneously there. So it's not really a preparation, it's, in some sense, a revelation of the precepts. So, in one sense, in a ceremony you go, we invoke the presence of the Buddhism ancestor, we practice repentance, and we practice renunciation, practice confession, and then we receive the precepts. But in our sense, of course, the precepts are there right away as soon as you evoke the presence of the compassion of the ancestors. They're there right away as soon as you practice renunciation. They're there right away when you practice confession. But we go in this sequence, too. But they're there the whole time. And they're there before the ceremony too.

[77:23]

It's just different ways of working with these. Working with them. So would you say the next three again? You said there was the first three and then there was the... The refuges? And the next... The refuge in Buddha, Dharma and Sangha? Those are the first three. Right. And you said there were the next three. And then there's avoiding evil, practicing good, and benefiting beings. Or, the Theravada version is, avoid evil, practice good, and clarify the mind, the Buddha said. And the Zen way is, embrace and sustain right conduct, embrace and sustain all good, and embrace and sustain all beings. So there's three different ways, three different versions of these three pair precepts. So that's what I'd like to study with you. But Again, as we approach these precepts, we should approach in renunciation.

[78:30]

And even if we talk about practicing these precepts as though doing something and not doing something, we should still enter into that conversation in renunciation. And as we slip in our conversations, in our considerations of these precepts, which we will, We confess our slipping all the time. And then we come back to uprightness. So the uprightness is going all the way through all these things. We have to keep reminding ourselves, as we consider these moral or ethical questions, are we in the right posture to consider them? When we come to a Zen story, are we in the right posture to meet the story? When we meet another person, are we in the right posture? Or are we leaning? Want to get something from them? Are we afraid of them? Are we leaning into our belief about them? And so on. Or are we really upright and open and not knowing what the precepts are, and yet we're here.

[79:39]

Not knowing who this person is, and yet we're here. With our bodhisattva vow, our bodhisattva vow is, I want to understand these Zen stories, in order to help all beings. I want to understand these precepts and practice these precepts in order to help all beings. I want to meet this person and understand this person, myself. I want to meet this other person and understand this person in order to help all beings. This is our vow. Now, let's be upright and carry this vow forward into the study.

[80:09]

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