Reference to the freestyle dance where at one point it might come from you, at another time it's the whole world, it's really you just passing around. And there's a part that I was wondering about where you spoke about the watching, it was always watching. And is there a point where it was no longer watching? where you are, the dance. I was wondering about that. Could you talk about that, if there is such a point? Well, I could say, yeah. Or another way to put it is, you're watching, but you're looking. Just before the line where it says, the pearl in the bowl rolls... No, no. In the subtle round... No, actually, there's another... Yeah, where it says, the pearl in the bowl rolls of itself, the line before that is... contemplating a mirror without objectivity.

[01:04]

So you look, you see everybody as a mirror, but you don't see them as external to yourself. So you're observing, but you don't feel like you're observing something outside. You feel like this is a revelation of who you are. So you're not really looking at anything anymore. It's not like your observing is taken away, it's just that you're not observing something other than yourself. So like when you're dancing, maybe when you're first dancing, you're dancing with your partner. But then at a certain point, there's not really you and your partner anymore, there's just the dance. Or your partner's not separate from you. Or your partner's showing you who you really are, kind of thing. So in a way it's like you're not seeing anything outside anymore, but it's not like anything changes neurologically or anything, you just understand the whole situation differently. Yes?

[02:05]

I was wondering, why was beauty causing terror? Pardon? I didn't understand the part you were talking about, where beauty causes terror. Yes. Owing to beauty causes... It's not that the beauty causes terror, that beauty is actually terror. It's not beauty causes terror, but that beauty is... that there's terror in beauty. Like, you might be suffering, but still beautiful. Is that what you're saying? Definitely, but more than that. Like, if you look at somebody... and you start to see who they are, it's terrifying because they're not just that person there. You're seeing the whole universe and all the darkness around the world is manifesting through this person. You can see, you can suddenly see what you can't see.

[03:08]

And if there's any face there, you know, if there's any person there, any limited person, there's terror because the other person in their totality is the end of you. Or another way to put it is between us, there's something separating us. And you could call it an ocean of death, if you like. And when you enter that ocean of death which separates you from someone else, you become terrified. But it's not beauty if you crumple. It's not beauty if you hang out there more than a moment. It's not beauty if you can't stand it. It is just the beginning of the terror. It's not like a long-term, you know, like a five-minute terror or a two-minute terror or a three-week terror. It is just the beginning of the terror. Like when you look at someone's eyes in that moment there when you realize you don't know who it is and you wonder if you can stand being there without sort of like being smart or knowing what to say.

[04:20]

So you move away from that into, well, I should probably, no, I should do something or whatever. Then you start to calm yourself down, get yourself back on the ground, sort of speak, you know, become proficient and not so stupid anymore. You know what to say. You're a grown woman. You got some smart things to say. You know how to cope with this. Well, the beauty's gone. Now, if the terror lasts, that also is very depressing and destabilizing. but the beginning of the terror, which you can still stand. And another part about it is that it's something like, and it's all the more awesome and terrifying that it disdains from annihilating us. Whatever you're contemplating in beauty doesn't kill you. And it's all the more awesome that it doesn't. You feel like it will or it could, but it doesn't.

[05:24]

It's not into those small potatoes of annihilating selves. What you really are disdains annihilating me and makes it all the more awesome. So it isn't the beauty. The beauty doesn't cause the terror. What causes the terror is the way things are. The way things are are simply far beyond all of our dreams, all of our philosophies, all of our opinions, all of our attachments. And when you open up to how vast and wonderful everything is, your little games are threatened. Terror is only possible for the little game people. But we are little game people. And our little game people get scared. We get scared. So the child in us, rather than trying to be proud and get things together, just reaches out for it. And just touches it. Even though you can't get a hold of it.

[06:28]

It's like a child can't get the whole mother, but he can touch it. So the reflex of reaching for, rather than getting yourself back together, or freaking out, is the process that lets the beauty touch your life. But you first of all have to be there in the moment when it is born, when it's fresh, when it starts, and also be present and extend it, sit it, enter that dynamic world. Yes? You're simply talking about... You're talking about the description of being. Well, I'm talking about sort of not exactly the dissolution of the ego, but like the ego is definitely in threat. It's endangered. It doesn't really fall apart. It's just endangered. And to live in that world is to constantly endanger your ego. But it doesn't eliminate it or make it fall apart.

[07:34]

It's just that you're not always protecting it and holding on to it. You just let it be there and be in danger. And it is in danger because you're always actually making up new egos all the time. The ego's changing too. But to realize that danger, to enter that dangerous realm for the ego, is to enter the realm of beauty. And the ego's scared all the time. And the ego recognizes that it's a stupid situation. It's a dangerous... foolish situation to go into. But, it must, you have to go into it with stability and composure. Otherwise, it turns, the beauty doesn't, it's not beauty anymore. You lose it. And the ego, as soon as you start moving, the ego re-entrenches and gets back together again. Your stillness is what allows you to open up to the awesomeness of your experience. And then, when you open up, your ego's, your ego's endangered. But not really going to get killed. Yes, Tell me your name again. Huh? Tally. Tally. The pivot you were talking about, is this a still point?

[08:37]

Is the what? Is it a pivot you were talking about? Is it a still point or is it dynamic? Does it move, is it processed or is it motionless? It's still and dynamic. It's still, it's motionless and changes. We have an expression for when we're sitting in meditation. Sometimes we use this, go-tsu, go-tsu-chi. Chi means ground or earth. Go-tsu is an image, it's like this, the character's like this. There's a line like this, and a line like this, and a line like this. It's kind of like two legs under this one line. And it's kind of like the image of a bald mountain. So it means stable or still, like a monk. But then you say go, that's what that means, that character means stable and still.

[09:39]

So they intensified by saying go-tsu, go-tsu. But when you intensify that stillness and say go-tsu, go-tsu, another meaning of that is wobbly. As you intensify the stillness, it starts to wobble, like a drunk person. But I remember one image of, you know, in China they had these kind of immortal people. They're called the Seven Immortals of the Bamboo Grove. And one of them they described as, he swayed, when drunk, he swayed majestically. So, you know, in the midst of his drunkenness, he was still very present. And these people, another thing about these people is these people always drank in groups of friends. They didn't go drink by themselves.

[10:42]

They drank, but they drank in their group. So, you know, they got feedback on their drunkenness. It wasn't an escape. It was something they did with everybody. And I'm not sure about this next story about this guy, or if this is a story about anybody, but I think maybe it's a story about this guy. This guy was a great scholar and poet, and also a flute player. He wrote a wonderful book about the art of playing a Chinese flute. But he made some mistake in the presence of the emperor of China. I think it was the emperor. an error in etiquette so he was sentenced to be to be have his head removed which of course is going to happen to all of us eventually but anyway this is kind of a sudden thing to him and so as he was about to have his head removed he said just a minute to the executioner he said I'll make it deal

[11:58]

If you use a really sharp sword, I'll give you a very precious secret of Chinese cooking. And I don't remember exactly what the recipe was, but it was something like, peanut sauce is excellent with tofu. And the executioner said, that's not a secret. And he cut his head off right away with tremendous rage. And of course, it worked. The head came right off. It fell down on the ground and rolled a little ways. And then a piece of paper came out of the mouth. The executioner went over and opened the paper.

[13:00]

And then written in very beautiful Chinese characters, it said, that was a sharp sword. So, very dynamic situation, huh? Getting your head chopped off. Can you be present and have a few jokes? Or are you going to kind of like think of the future? What's going to happen next? How's it going to feel? It would be nice if it was sharp and cut real clean. And then after that, what's going to happen? No, no, none of that. Or maybe that. Anyway... The more still you become, the more you realize how dynamic everything is. In Buddhism, things don't really move. They just change. And if you're still, if you're quiet and still, you can open your heart to change.

[14:07]

If you're moving a lot, well, then you think the reason why everything's changing is because you're moving. Like if you see, one time I saw a car driving down the hill in front of Zen Center in the city, and I thought, usually people think that the car is moving down the street because the wheels are turning. But I understood that the car was not. That wasn't why the car was moving. It has something to do with it. It's one of the elements in the image of it moving. But things don't move because the wheels turn. Just like this doesn't disturb stillness. There's stillness here. Same thing. What turns this into motion? You say, well, because you moved your arm. No. That's not what makes it move. One time I

[15:19]

I was sitting in meditation and there was a person standing in front of me. And suddenly the person was standing 60 feet away. So I saw the person fly through the air. Actually, what I should say is that the person was standing in front of me and I saw him fly through the air and be standing 60 feet away. But really what happened was I fell asleep and he walked 60 feet and I opened my eyes again. So I thought he jumped 60 feet. And I thought, well, that's unlikely. So I figured I must have fallen asleep. And I asked him if in fact he had flown and he said, no, he walked. And it took him about three minutes. We dream, what we see, we dream up. We're dreamers. And so let's be honest about it, that we're dreaming, and then we have a chance to enjoy the dream.

[16:28]

But if you think your dream is reality, well then, that's called delusion. Yes? I wonder if you're saying what we see, we don't see like through a window, like through a lens, we see like projectors. Yeah. And we can shut off the projector and stop projecting personality or ego or self. It's nothing. We can just see. Yeah, except I would say it's like a projector, but the projector's turned back on yourself. I look at you and then I say, okay, and I project back on myself what you are. I don't project. And then, once I project back on myself what I think you are, then I tell you that what I just made you up of is you. Then I say you. Which I have to tell you about. But I don't have to think that that's true. I just tell you and then I think, see what happens.

[17:31]

And the more I realize that I'm projecting it back on myself and then talking to you about it, the better chance I have to adjust when you say that you don't understand what I'm talking about. And maybe I'm even wrong. You have a really different view. Because then I'm ready for that because if I'm doing it, maybe you're doing it too. And it's not so much that, you know, you're right or wrong, but this is just the way you're working. And you can tell me about that. Yes? Dream, little cartoon, I saw about two birds. They were sitting on a branch, and one of them looked at his brain and said, maybe we could just clap his face and fly away. And he said, but we can't. And the first person said, oh, you dreamer. And they dreamed themselves up into the sky. Yes. Yes. Can you explain a little bit about the swastika story that you mentioned in your talk?

[18:46]

I didn't really understand that. Well, actually, I didn't really say it enough so that anyone could understand that. The way the swastika usually works is, you know, it turns like this, I guess, you know. Clockwise. Yes? I would really appreciate it if you would say a little bit more about that symbol and its history before. Its history? What do you mean? You tell me what you want to hear. Well, just that it's a very, very old symbol. Yeah, it's an Indian symbol. And... Didn't I say that already? No? It's an Indian symbol. We don't know exactly where it started, but... probably pre-Vedic times, way before Buddhism, like 3,000, 4,000 years ago, they made this sign.

[19:49]

And so what it is, is it's a cross that's turning. So as it turns, as this thing turns, it leaves a little trail. So you have these trails left behind. And sometimes they draw it so that you can see the lines that are capering off like a trail. So, And so, you know, our life is like turning like that on each moment, spinning around like that. And our experience is just this turning from our various forms of going from heaven to hell, happiness and sadness, and being various kinds of people that we can be, or even transmigrating to other forms of life. So that's what the symbol is trying to convey, this possibility of going round and round indefinitely and going from misery to happiness and so on.

[20:50]

So that's the process, all right? Now, what I didn't get into, I guess I kind of chickened out in terms of having time to... I thought it was a little too abstract, I guess. was that we need to, again, see that this false ticker can turn in the other direction. It can turn around. Okay? One way it can turn around, if it's turning like this, okay? I'm showing you it's turning like this, right? You think it's clockwise, most of you out there, right? But to me, it's counterclockwise. All right? You're watching me do this, but me watching myself do it turns into, I'm seeing the opposite of what you're seeing. So usually we're just carried along by this cycle. If you turn around and look at the cycle, you change your way of being with this cycle. And you reverse your relationship to it. And then in a sense you're watching the cycle go in the other direction. And someone asked Tsugen Roshi, you know, about this counterclockwise thing.

[21:58]

And he said, if you look at it, if you look at the swastika from my point of view of turning, I have a swastika here and it's going in the other direction. If you turn it in the other direction with the, if you have it like this and then the tails are going like that, okay, if it goes this way, it's like the tails then kind of like bite at what's happening. It doesn't want to go that way. It wants to go the easy way. That's the regular way, is the easy way of turning and leaving a trail. But to turn around and go the other way, it's kind of like you get some interference. You're going against the stream of birth and death. You start chomping away at birth and death. And the way to chomp away at birth and death is to turn around and look at the process. But again, just like I told you, if you look at this place... is very elusive and you can get frustrated because you want to understand. You want to understand. Your mind wants to understand. But as you get more and more closely tuned into this, you start to realize even more how elusive and subtle it is and you get frustrated and it's hard to stay there and study this.

[23:07]

But that's the way it should be. Again, if you turn the process around, it starts munching on your reality. Another way I thought of it is if... Part of the reason why these things leave a trail is they leave a trail of their impermanence, like they're burning up. So we leave smoke behind us in a sense. The smoke of the effects of our actions. If you turn such a thing around, if the smoke's coming around and you turn it around, the smoke starts coming and you turn it around and you get smoke in your face. So when you first start turning around, you get a lot of smoke in your face. If you just go along with your program, it seems easy in a way. It's miserable, but it's easy. If you turn around and look at it, you get confused by turning around and feeling the stuff come back at you. Again, that's normal. You should expect that. But eventually it clears up. You get beyond the trails of your karma and you start to see it more and more clearly. The space clears up, but you're not leaving a trail in the other direction in a sense. You are leaving a trail in that direction.

[24:14]

Now it's the trail of liberation rather than the trail of bondage. So there's an effect of your practice left behind you. So that's reversing spastika, which I didn't feel up to. I was going to talk about it, but then I kind of like gave up because there's just so many things I can bring up in those talks. I mean, I can bring them up, but then the people start to fall off their chairs and I feel sorry for you. But someday, I'm just going to keep talking and never stop. No, you can have tea and muffins. I'll just keep talking. Yes. Practical question, speaking of smoke.

[25:19]

In one of the areas of my life, I'm in an environment where there is a lot of pain and a lot of suffering and anger and people feeling that some of the things that are going on aren't ethical. And I've tried using all my various skills, and I have quite a few, and there's really, in this particular situation, nothing I can do. And there's no way to escape it either. And so, I was wondering, you know, when you're in a community with that kind of pain, what does the Buddha do? The Buddha concentrates upon her own behavior. She doesn't look at the other people's unethical behavior. Actually, I'm not complaining about that. That's not a thing the Buddha does. The Buddha doesn't complain. Because Buddha has no alternative. When you think you have an alternative, like if you see some unethical people and you think you have an alternative to those unethical people, then you complain about them.

[26:26]

You'll grumble. I wish I had some ethical friends. But if you realize you have no alternative to your friends, then you stop grumbling and you just go straight ahead. So you're not complaining and also not blaming. You don't blame either. But we do turn around and look at our own unethical behavior, our own faults. And by turning around and looking at our own unethical behavior, then even if there are people who are being unethical, everybody will be protected. The way to protect beings from my own unethical behavior is to watch my unethical behavior. That also protects other people from other people's unethical behaviors. And then what about their suffering, which they're always talking about? The thing that it protects them from is suffering. That's all we need protection from is suffering, right? Is there anything else we need protection from? That's it, isn't it, pretty much?

[27:28]

That's it. Otherwise, we're pretty much up for it, aren't we? Yes. We're here for a while, and we're up for it, basically. I mean, basically, we're here. This is it. We're ready, okay? But the suffering is the part we have trouble for, so we need some protection from that. And the protection from suffering is called enlightenment. So if you contemplate your own unethical conduct, your own mistakes and errors, that protects you and everybody else from suffering. So what the Buddha does is the Buddha notices her ethical behavior and owns it. That's it. I mean, he owns it with a kind of sense of not having an alternative to this, but this is what I am. And then you just go ahead with everybody. But that owning happens in the middle of intense, dynamic pain. that has no, like, boundaries on it, like, okay, keep that pain over there, we'll have this pain now.

[28:33]

No. There's no kind of like, there's no like, kind of like deals being made here. It just, the pain's coming from all directions, simultaneously, and you can just barely stand the beginning of it. And so there's beauty in life. And that's how you are sustained in this work, by the beauty. It feeds your spirit, so you can keep breathing in the pain. Buddhas are studying delusion, which is the cause of pain. That's how they protect themselves from the pain which arises from delusion. They're right in there. They're right in there. Thank you. You're welcome. Yes? I'd like to have you explain why that doesn't mean that if I'm standing on a street corner watching a child about to run in front of a car, that I'm just standing there saying, well, at least I'm not pushing her.

[29:48]

You know, there are certain senses under which I'm obliged not only to look at the rightness of Lionel's standpoint, but also to actually take action to help other people. When you were talking to this lady, of course she said that there's nothing she can do about it. But I understand very well the importance of why I started with my own behavior and looking at myself. But there are lots of examples, some of them dramatic enough to understand. Well, the one you just gave is a good example of something where you do something, right? Right. So how do those two relate to each other? When I focus on my own behavior and when I... Save somebody from something immediate and dangerous. Right. So, if you watch your own behavior, which means to watch everything, but anyway, if you watch your own behavior and you witness, if you witness yourself in the advent of all things, you also act from that place too.

[30:54]

So you act from yourself, oneself, in the advent of all things. So you reach over and you stop this guy from moving his knee into this machine. Just like that. Thank you. That's all you do. But when I see his leg, there's nothing I can do about his leg. That's just the way it is. I have to accept his leg. Okay? But when he starts to move it, my hand goes like this and stops it. Maybe stops it, but maybe not. But anyway, my hand goes like this. And there's nothing I can do about that either. It's to witness and act on one's self. There you are in the street. There's one's self. Okay? You witness that self standing in the street and you act on on the self, that's the advent of all things. There you are, truck, street, sky, little girl, you, reach out and pull her away from the car.

[32:01]

Automatic, no alternative, protection. Okay? Like, what is it, I talked about this story of a wheelwright This is a wheelwright's center, right? Wheelwright is somebody who makes wheels right. Makes them round. Puts them on wagons and stuff like that, right? So, in China there was a wheelwright, and I won't tell you the whole story. I'll just tell you the abbreviated account, and someday I'll tell you the whole story. But basically he said, in my work, if I go slowly... It's easy going, but it's not firm. If I go fast, it's hard going, but doesn't fit in. Without going fast or slow, I find it in my hands.

[33:04]

And I accord with it in my mind. I can't teach it to my son. My daughter can't learn it from me. There's an art to it. Therefore, I just keep making wheels for 70 years. So, there is action from this enlightened state, definitely. There's also action from deluded state. In both cases we act. Question is, are you coming from delusion or from enlightenment? Are you coming from cooperation with everything or are you coming from imposing yourself on the situation? Does it come into your hand? or do you put your hand on it? And these two worlds are turning on each other all the time. Yes, sir? Well, I was here a few weeks ago in a discussion with Lavender. I asked him about the behavior of the Zen community in World War II. Yes, in Japan? He was talking about it now.

[34:08]

Yes. I was wondering why didn't these leaders of the community, why didn't their practice inform their actions? Because apparently they didn't. Well, it's hard for me to talk about somebody else's practice. Really hard. Oh. Yes. Oh. We just did. That's not somebody. That's an example of, you know, I'm not talking about somebody else at that time. You're asking me about some people who lived in Japan a while ago. It's hard for me to talk about them. I don't see them. It's all just abstract, okay? Okay. It's history. It's facts. It's information. Well, we're getting off the track here. Just talk to me about me, okay? I don't know about your behavior, so I can't tell your practices. I can tell you about my behavior. I'm here, okay? This other thing about Japanese people, I don't know what was going on with them. You say it's facts and stuff. I don't know about that. All I know is about me. And I can tell you that...

[35:03]

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