Thank you. I'd like to talk tonight about I guess basically the encouragement of freedom which we sometimes hear in Zen temples called the encouragement of sitting meditation and tonight I'd also like to say that that's the same as encouragement of giving I'd like to encourage myself and all of you to just sit to give yourself to yourself and to give others to others I'd like to encourage you tonight to do that and the frogs doing the same the frogs showing

[01:36]

how to be a frog. And I guess I'll try to show you how to be a Reb and hope that you'll show me how you are you. And I hope you already feel more encouraged to do so. Do you? Good. Well, I can almost stop then. But the prod's continuing, so I'll continue a little bit longer. Although I promise it'll be short. If I stop now, that would be wrecking. So again, a Zen teacher's job is to encourage people to model themselves on themselves. if you want to realize Buddha's way don't try to be like Buddha don't try to be like somebody else Buddha doesn't want to be like you Buddha wants you to be like you completely so this is just to encourage each of us to be completely focused on this present moment

[03:08]

to die into the present to let go of everything and be this present person that you are now and then allow the future to naturally unfold and arise out of that total presence. Just be still and quiet. But when I say this, I've had the experience that people think that I mean to you that perhaps you should cut something out of your life.

[04:30]

That you should eliminate some busyness. Again, you should make yourself into somebody else. Even though I just said not to do that, still, when I say that, people think, no, he must not mean that. He must mean I have to... I guess I have to get rid of the person who isn't willing to be himself. It's hard to believe that just being focused on the present would work in ordinary daily life, in ordinary civilian life. It's hard to believe that just being still and simple, is practical. So again, I remind you of the story of Cloudy Cliff sweeping the ground.

[05:42]

And his brother... enlightened way walks up to him and says you're too busy brother and cloudy cliff says you should know there's one who's not busy and enlightened way says well does that mean there's two moons And Cloudy Cliff raised his broom and said, which moon is this? So again, in our daily life, even if you're sitting still in the meditation hall, someone could walk up to you and say, too busy. If you think the slightest thought, someone could say you're too busy. But there's somebody right there, no matter how busy you are, no matter how much you're involved in liking this or disliking that, no matter how much you're involved in myriad conflicting commitments, responsibilities and obligations, no matter how much you're running around trying to take care of all that, no matter how much you're resisting it or giving into it or being pushed around by it, no matter how much pain you feel about all this stuff,

[07:12]

There's somebody who's not busy. There's somebody who is just being that way and not trying to be any better than this busy person. And when you hear, again, when you hear about this, part of you is like enlightened way and part of you says, well, then there's two moons. There's one that's busy. There's one that's running around like a crazy lady. And there's one that's just sitting there. These are two moons then. Two truths. Two worlds. But which world is this? Is this the busy one or the unbusy one? The unbusy one is not busy. That means it's not even busy enough to be someplace else from the busy one. It really is willing to be what's happening.

[08:20]

And this is also giving, letting yourself be the way you are, giving yourself to yourself. And then giving others to others, letting them be the way they are. In this way, sitting still and quiet, giving yourself to yourself, brings you into oneness with what's happening, with ta-ta-ta, with suchness. Ta-ta-ta. Not kind of ta-ta-ta, but ta-ta-ta. Kind of busy, huh? Ta-ta-ta. Ta-ta-ta. But ta-ta-ta is what's happening.

[09:23]

And Buddha doesn't try to change it into ta or ta-ta. Just ta-ta-ta. Let ta-ta-ta be ta-ta-ta. Do you know what ta-ta-ta is? That's a Sanskrit word. It means... Suchness. It means what's happening. And Polly, it's even better. Da da da. Da da da. Let suchness be suchness, please. This kind of willing giving of what's happening to what's happening I also sometimes use the word readiness this is just to be ready not ready for this or ready for that or ready for that but just to be ready

[10:39]

Are you ready my brothers? Are you ready my sisters? You know that play Hamlet? You know how it starts? Anybody know how it starts? It starts by a guard saying, who's there? That's the basic issue here. Who's there? And is she ready? After that, there's quite a bit happens. A lot of busyness. And as one, as I think Mark Van Doren said, Sheikh Hamlet is the busiest play in the world.

[12:24]

The world's busiest play. But at the beginning of the busiest play, the question is, who's there? And then comes this very interesting young guy who is very upset about all this busyness. And what is the first thing he does? He thinks about it. He wonders, should he keep putting up with all this busyness? And actually, he isn't really putting up with it. He's, he's, what do you call it? He's, he's fidgeting. He's, what do you call it? He's wiggling on his seat, isn't he? He can't stand how busy the play is. He's resisting the busiest play. He didn't hear the beginning. He didn't realize that the play is about who's there. He resists, he fights, he thinks, he wonders, can I go on?

[13:30]

Shall I go on? Shall I go on with this misery that's coming from my resistance to this busyness? And he thinks and he thinks and he thinks and he doesn't come up with a solution. Then he starts acting out. He starts bumping people off. He starts putting on plays. very skillful it doesn't work finally when the play is almost all over he realizes the way the way which was there at the beginning namely who's there who's here what does he say he says readiness is all Readiness is all. Unfortunately, it's too late. I hope it's not too late for us. And actually, it's not too late.

[14:34]

Even though he got in trouble after that and died soon afterwards, at least he realized it before he went. Readiness is all. That means, I think, give yourself to yourself and be ready for whatever comes from you being you. If you want to, you can struggle, you can fight, you can resist. You can force people to drag you kicking and screaming into your present existence. That's fine. Hopefully you'll get to the point where you'll see readiness is all. And then even if poison arrows hit you after that, at least you'll be ready for them. And you can die with dignity and peace and compassion. And then, in King Lear, also towards the end of the play, after various horrendous things have happened, I forgot who said it, but somebody says,

[15:50]

ripeness ripeness is all let's go come on ripeness is all let's go you're going to be able to go soon don't worry but ripeness first get to the place you are and let it ripen before you move on to the next thing Things don't ripen unless you let them sit there. All you got to do is let them sit there a moment, completely, that ripens them. That's as long as they live. So ripeness and readiness is all. That's about all I have to say, except I'll give you some examples now. I was at a meeting with somebody one time, and he took out this beautiful pencil, automatic pencil, and gave it to Mel as a gift.

[17:06]

And he had given it to him because Mel had admired, he had one of his own, and Mel had admired it, and next time they had a meeting, he brought him and gave him a gift. So I admired it too. That is really a nice pencil. So at our next meeting, he gave me one. I was very grateful. And I took it back to my house. When I got there, my wife said, boy, that's a nice pencil. Can I have it? And I said, pretty quickly, I said, no. But I felt really bad. Here's my wife, my wonderful wife. Wouldn't even give her a pencil. This is a really nice pencil, but still.

[18:09]

I mean, really. I was ashamed. Believe me, I was ashamed. I was ashamed. I still am ashamed that I was that way. However, I also let myself be that way. I let myself be the person who was not ready to give it. I was ready to be me, and I was ashamed of it. But I would have been more ashamed, and I still would be more ashamed, if I had given it to her before I was ready. Because if I give it before I'm ready, it's not giving. It's called buckling under shame and pretending to be good and denying who you are. I say forget that stuff. It isn't giving anyway. She doesn't need the pencil and she certainly doesn't want me to give it to her if I don't want to give it to her.

[19:15]

She does not want it that badly. Some things maybe she does but not the pencil. She only wants me to give it to her if I want to give it to her, I'll tell you that for sure. Just like all of you, I'm sure, if you saw that pencil, would want it. But none of you would want me to give it to you before I was ready. I know that. But I might want to give it to you before I was ready because I might not be able to stand the pain of being ashamed that I didn't want to give it to you. But I say, take it, because that's who you are. You don't want to give it. Be yourself, kid. So I was myself, and I said, I don't want to give it. I think she even asked a second time, and I said, no. You can't have it. Maybe I said, yet. I knew that eventually I'd probably want to give it to her. The next day, it was close to Christmas, the next day I thought, I'm ready to give it. I'll give it to her for Christmas. So it was a, it was a secondary Christmas present.

[20:17]

And I gave it to her when I was ready. If you give before you're ready, it means you give before you want to give it, before you're happy to give it, before it's a joy to give it. Giving before then is not giving. It is something sick and turns into resentment. If you give when you're ready, not only are you happy to give it, but you love the person for giving you a chance to give it. That's giving. That's being ready. First of all ready to be who you are who's not ready. And then later you might be able to be ready. I don't know if it's the next day or the next day or the next day. Maybe it never comes. I don't care. The point is, be on time with who you are. Trust that person, even if that person is selfish creep. Because in fact, that's what it is anyway. That's da-da-da. Why lie to yourself? Why try to kid yourself into thinking you're somebody you're not?

[21:20]

Trust honesty. Honesty will show you the pain of being the way you are. If you're selfish, admit it. It'll be painful. You'll want to change. You'll want to give it away eventually. Anyway, that's example one. Now, see now. It's going to be fast. I had another really good example, but I'll tell you this another day because I want this to be a short lecture, okay? So I'll go to example three and skip example two, although example two was really good. I promise to tell it later. But example three, I brought props and everything, so I got to use them. Example three is, it is a story. It's a story about this kind of thing. It's a story about readiness. It's a good story.

[22:23]

I think you'll like it. Unfortunately, you can't see me very well. Maybe I can use this light here. There was a lady who practiced Zen back in San Francisco. Her name was Connie Lewick. She loved jazz music and ball-headed men. So she particularly enjoyed practicing Zen because the men often had shaved heads. She thought Suzuki Roshi was extremely cute. Of course he was. When I came to San Francisco to practice Zen, she had already been practicing for some time and she stopped practicing about the time I came to Zen Center, and I didn't see her for several years. And then about approximately 10 years ago, yeah, 10 years ago, I would say approximately, maybe 11, 12, one of our members, who's a doctor, came and told me about the patient of his, who was a Zen student,

[23:41]

And he thought it would be nice if I visited her. And he told me her name, and I remembered her. And she was in the hospital, and she was suffering from emphysema. Emphysema makes it hard to breathe. It's kind of a lung disease, isn't it? So I went to visit her there, and she had been given steroids to help her breathe, so that made her very big. So she didn't look like what she used to look like. And she was very, very happy to see me because she liked this haircut. So she was very nice to me and grateful. And also, when I visited her, I chanted the Heart Sutra in Japanese and in English. And she also loved to hear the Heart Sutra. And I visited her, I don't know, a few times, two or three, and maybe the third or fourth time I visited her, I asked her if she perhaps would like to come and live at Zen Center.

[24:48]

I didn't say so, but I meant to come and spend the rest of her life at Zen Center, which might not have been very long. But I don't think I said, do you want to come and die at Zen Center? But she said she would like to live at Zen Center, and she asked me what kind of place it was, And I told her about the building, which she actually hadn't seen, I think, because we moved into that building after she stopped practicing with us. I told her we had a very nice guest room overlooking a garden. And under the guest room, there was a beautiful piano, because I knew she liked music. And she said she would really like to come and live at Zen Center. So I went back to Zen Center in San Francisco and I asked the people, the staff there, would it be all right if she came and lived at Zen Center and died at Zen Center? And they discussed it for, it took a while for them to decide, but anyway, finally they decided, yes, she could come because Zen Center wasn't yet a hospice.

[25:51]

This is the pre-hospice time when each case had to be handled individually like this. So finally we moved her in and into this room overlooking the garden with the cute ball-headed men taking care of her and the jazz piano downstairs. And she got into the room and she was very happy to be there. We got her in her bed and we asked her if she would like some tea and she said yes. We went and got the tea for her and brought it to her and she died. And she gave me a present. She willed me a present. And here's the present she gave me. It's a necklace. Can you see it? It's a Chinese necklace. It has these three carnelian circles. And beautiful macrame, whatever you want to call it.

[27:00]

What do you call it? String? with a little gourd, wooden gourd down at the bottom, not a tassel. And beautiful, this macrame is in the form of the symbol of infinity knot. Anyway, I thought that was really a nice thing. But, you know, even though I thought it was a nice thing, I sort of don't wear jewelry. at least in public. So anyway, I couldn't use it myself and I couldn't think of who to give it to. I offered it to my wife and she wasn't interested. And I thought if I give it to somebody else they might be confused. So I've kept it for many years and kept thinking of who I can give this to. When it was people's birthdays or whatever, I thought, could I give this to them? But I never could think of anybody any appropriate use for it. So there it was. And then about six and a half years ago, when I became abbot, former abbot Richard Baker sent me this in the mail.

[28:13]

It's called a kotsu. It's kind of shaped like a tongue. Can you see it? Got a little kind of turned up thing, like one of those party favors blown out. And Zen priests carry this when they lead services or something. Sometimes people say it's like a back scratcher. And sometimes people say it's for like pulling compassion into the room. But anyway, this is... And it has a hole in it. See the hole? You see the hole? You're supposed to put something through that hole. And I tried various things. And... to put through the hole, like various kinds of chains or ribbons or whatever. And every time I put something through, my wife would usually say, oh, that's really ugly or tacky or don't do that, take that out of there. But then about a month ago, somehow, I don't know how it happened, but I picked this up and I picked this up.

[29:22]

And I looked at it and I thought, hmm, I took this thing and bent it, and I stuck it in this hole. It's a little hard to get in there, but I pushed it through. And when I pushed it through, I didn't know. I thought, well, how is this going to work, you know? And I thought, oh, I guess I could just pull it like that and go like that. And then I could pull this thing up through there. And back around like that. It didn't work. There. There.

[30:26]

I don't know if you can see how it works. Can you see how it works? It's just the right thing. It's just the right thing, isn't it? Isn't it beautiful? I showed it to my wife and she said, ah, it's kind of neat. So it took 10 years for me to find a use for this thing. And it took me six years to find something to stick through this hole. This is just a small little thing, right? It wasn't that painful for me to wait all that time. And I tried various things. I tried various uses for this. You know, I couldn't find anything. I tried various things for this and I couldn't find anything. Do you understand? Ripeness is all. Just keep trying and you'll find the right fit.

[31:26]

There's a hole in all of us. Something's going to fit. Something's going to fill it. And we've got some stuff we don't know what to do yet. And that's the stuff that's going to fill it. But we've got to wait and just keep working until it comes together. In the meantime, just be yourself and, you know, take care of everybody. Okay? Do you understand? Hmm? You're not supposed to ask questions, though, because that'll make this thing long. You can ask questions tomorrow.

[32:07]

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