In the practice of Zen, we let go of the ultimate and join hands with all beings and walk through birth and death with them. This is called the goal or the fruit is to be able to do that. service or compassion?

[01:27]

Compassionate service. And as I've been saying over and over again, compassionate service is not just your idea of what's compassionate service. Okay? In the practice of compassionate service, the customer is always right. Or the happiness of the customer is really the happiness and growth But if you think about it, or even if you don't think about it, if you hear about somebody holding hands, joining hands with all sentient beings, and walking through birth and death with them, you might feel a little bit like, gee, that's kind of ... how could I do that?

[02:30]

I mean, actually, to walk through birth and death with people, wouldn't that be ... wouldn't that be something? It might even be nothing. So how could you do that? Well, any ideas? Just one. What? Just do it. Hey, there you go. That's the best way. Just do it. Anything else for tonight? Or tomorrow? That's really, that's all. Just do it. And how can you just do it? Well, one way we say is you can just do it, of course, just by just doing it, but it means you don't, well, you don't have any fixed views about how to do it.

[03:39]

For example, if you say, just do it, people say, well, how? idea about how you just do it. I don't recommend this movie but I happen to have seen it myself, it's called, it's the last Indiana Jones movie, and the last, they say at one point he's standing at the edge of this cliff and they just say, just walk out there on faith and he just takes a step out into emptiness. So without knowing how to do it, you just do it. The great master Nanyue Huairang went to visit the great master Dajian Huineng and Huineng said, �Where from?� And he said, �From Mount Sun.� And Huineng said, �What is it that thus counts?� And he said, �I

[04:56]

to say it's this or to talk about it, and this is the point." And Hui Nung said, well, does that mean you don't have practice, you don't take care of your life and there's no transformation? You don't have practice and confirmation? And he said, I don't say I don't have practice and a realization. I just say that they cannot be defiled." And Hui Nong said, this non-defilement is protected by all the Buddhas. I am thus and you are thus too. This is how you walk through birth and death with people. I mean this is how you can do it. This is how you can just do it.

[05:58]

Without even pointing to how to just do it, you just do it. You just wash your face. Okay? Now, this week I've also been talking and for all summer I've been talking about meeting yourself. Zen practice, and I've also been talking about meeting somebody else, or somebody else meeting you. Zen practice has two basic parts. One part is meet yourself, the other part is meet somebody else. Meet your teacher, meet your student. Those are the two parts of Zen. One's called just sitting. You sit, And when you sit, you meet yourself. And the other one's called going to see the teacher.

[07:03]

When you see the teacher, you meet the teacher. Those are two parts. You got to do both parts. You can't just go meet the teacher. Some people want to do that part. You can't just sit by yourself. You need to do both. When you read the scriptures, it's good to read the scriptures and instead of trying to find out, well, it's okay to try to find out, to think about what is the person who wrote this, what does it mean for them? That's one way to read them. Another way to read them is, the person who's writing this is talking to himself. Why does he talk to himself this way? Why don't I read them like I'm talking to myself with these words? And if I was talking to myself with these words, what kind of a person would I be? Why would I talk to myself like this?

[08:06]

So you read it like you're talking to yourself. Until you feel like, yeah, I could talk to myself this way. And why would I talk to myself this way? Maybe I would talk to myself this way because Talking to myself this way is really meeting myself and it's really, I really feel good talking to myself this way. I don't know why, but I feel really great talking to myself this way. The person who talks to himself or herself this way is really, I can't even say, it's just fantastic, or not even fantastic. So when you can take a teaching or take anything and use it like you're talking to yourself and you really feel like you're meeting yourself, aside from your ideas of meeting yourself, or rather in the midst of your ideas of meeting yourself, but in a kind of harmony between the kind of extremes, the extreme ways to meet yourself.

[09:29]

One way to meet yourself is, I can't meet myself. I'm not up to it today, or it isn't worth my interest today, or I'm frightened today, or I'm bored today, I can't meet myself. That's one way to meet yourself according to your idea. In other words, to not meet yourself according to your idea, which is to meet yourself according to your idea. The other way is, I can meet myself today, I'm quite interested in myself, I'm fascinated with myself, I'm fascinated with my body, I'm fascinated with my breath, I'm fascinated with my thinking, with my concepts, with my feeling. It's just really interesting. Sometimes people feel like that when they drink coffee. Or some other kinds of things. They get really interested in themselves. They think, I can meditate on this person.

[10:31]

This is pretty interesting. This again is meeting yourself according to your idea of meeting yourself. This is kind of like the song of meeting yourself according to your preconceptions about what meeting yourself means, which is kind of okay. Those are two extreme versions of what you think meeting yourself would be like or wouldn't be like. Harmonizing those two ways you come up with a way that's meeting yourself beyond your idea of meeting yourself, which is the same as just doing something. So, for example, one person named Dogen Zenji, when he met himself, he started singing. And what did he say? He said, the mountains and rivers of the immediate present are the manifestation of the path of the ancient Buddhas. abiding together in their normative state, they have culminated the qualities of thorough exhaustiveness.

[11:35]

Because they are events prior to the aeon of emptiness, they are the livelihood of the present. Because they are the self before the emergence of subtle signs, they are the penetrating liberation of immediate actuality. The ability to ride the clouds is always from the mountains. The subtle work of soaring in the wind is always penetrated through from the mountains. The great master Fuyo Dōkai said to the assembly, Green mountains are always walking.

[12:40]

A stone woman gives birth to a child at night. This is the way he talked to himself when he was meeting himself. This is what he said when he met himself. This is not meeting yourself according to your idea of meeting yourself. This is real satisfaction. Do you believe that? Probably you believe this is not meeting yourself according to your idea of meeting yourself, wouldn't you? Wouldn't you say that? When most people hear this they cannot meet themselves according to their idea of meeting themselves when they hear these words, right? Don't you have trouble meeting yourself according to your idea of meeting yourself when you hear those words? Think about, could you imagine talking to yourself this way? Who would you be at that time? Hmm?

[13:42]

You would be a forgotten self. These words come from a forgotten self. Forgotten selves sing like this. They sing other ways too, but anyway, this is a song of a forgotten self. Forgotten selves have voices, nice clear voices, open throats, open guts. open hearts. They can't remember anything but that. What do they remember? They remember right now, I have this to say. So, this is called, you do your own work now. You find out what it's like to have your forgotten self. Don't try to find out somebody else's forgotten self. You talk to yourself this way. And when you've forgotten yourself, then go Take somebody else's hand and see if you can forget with somebody else in front of you. See if you both can forget together. That's called meeting another person.

[14:49]

Does this make sense? Good. Now, another thing I want to say is that I heard from a linguist, this guy heard it in person from this linguist, his name is Noam Chomsky, he said, you know, language, if you just reach in, if you just take language and just lay it out there and you reach over and pick it up, language is generally speaking not very good for communication. You can use language for communication but By and large, that's not what language is really good for. Does that surprise you that someone would say that? No? Good. What he means is that if you look at language as the lay of the land of language, which he does, and you just try to use it to communicate and you look at how it works, a lot of the times it doesn't work.

[15:56]

It actually has all kinds of design flaws. English language is fantastic, but it's not very good for communication. It's not designed for communication. What does he think language is good for? Can you guess? Creating a self. Creating a self? Yeah. What else? Well, I would say training. Yeah. You heard me before. Did you hear me before? Yeah. He said it's good for getting people interested. And I like that, I think that's what it's for. A Zen person uses language to get people interested in Zen, not to communicate to them what Zen is, but to invite them in to a place where they're also inviting themselves in.

[17:01]

We invite ourselves into Zen and there we look for each other and we look for ourselves. After invited in, we don't know. So I'm going to say some things about meeting, which I said before, which are like meeting another is like meeting yourself. I just said about meeting yourself, but primarily that was not communicating to you how to meet yourself. It was a few how-nots to meet yourself, right? I told you two ways that are not meeting yourself. But those are ways, those ways of not meeting yourself. All right? Like saying, well, I'm meeting myself. I can meet myself. I can meet myself. Or I can't meet myself. Those are not meeting yourself. I didn't tell you those to communicate to you how. That's how not. But even how not doesn't tell you how. It doesn't show you the way. But what it does, hopefully, is by giving you some foothold on, at least on the nots, you may be interested to try

[18:08]

Just give it a try. I hope you got interested. But I didn't tell you how. I gave you some parameters in which you can enter this middle space. And the same with person, I've been talking about how to meet a person. On one extreme the way to meet a person is to give in to them, is to be weak and submit. The other extreme is to rebel or defy them. Those are not how to meet people. But by the aid of those two knots, maybe you'd be encouraged enough to try to meet them through the harmony of those two. But I can't tell you how to do that. But I hope that by saying that to you, you're interested to try, that you have enough of a feeling for the possibility of it by those two knots. At least you know it's two things that aren't it. Among everything else, you've got two that are off the chart, and a whole bunch of other things that are sort of like those two. So maybe you have some feeling that it's possible to meet.

[19:12]

Do you? Good. Again, I would, Suzuki Roshi used to say that The job of a Zen teacher is to get people interested in Zazen. We definitely do not indicate what it is. It's part of our tradition not to point. Pointing is again a defilement of the practice. We say, come on, try it. Try what? Try Zazen. What's that? Try it! I need you to try it. I love it.

[20:13]

It's great. What is it? Try it. Wash your face. Come on time. Sit right down. Now, of course, if a person's really... No. Somebody says, I remember Saki Roshi said, my students want me to teach them how to practice Zen, I don't teach them so they go to college teachers and they show them how and they never come back. Now I'll maybe brag for some other people that they actually are so kind that they don't tell people how to do it. And of course they lose almost all their students. Not all, most.

[21:19]

So the job of a bodhisattva, the job of a Zen teacher is to protect people from thinking that what they think Zazen is, is Zazen. to encourage people to admit that what they think is the practice is what they think is the practice and that's all it is, is what they think. And the practice is this kind of thing which is a little bit ... it doesn't exactly get tuned in by ... even that would tune it in if I said what I was about to say. The practice, I would just say, is completely free and untouched by our ideas about it. It's so untouched by it that I can't even say it's not them. So, the way a teacher protects people from their ideas about practice is not even to tell them that they aren't right.

[22:42]

But just to simply say, yes, that is your idea. Your idea is that, huh? That's your idea? You think it's that? Oh, yes, that's what you think. Oh, I understand, you think it's that. Is that right, that you think it's that? Sometimes they say, no, it's not that, but they don't mean, no, it's not that. That's just sort of something that they say. Understand? Because it wouldn't be right to say, If somebody said, well, Zazen was this, it wouldn't be right to say, no, Zazen's not that. That would still specify that what it was, wouldn't it? No. But sometimes they do that just because they kind of get weak or bored. They can't stand it, teachers. So they say, no, it's not that. Sometimes they even say, yes, it is that. But this is like a human being talking then. The teacher actually doesn't indicate yes or no, because the teacher is dead when the teacher indicates.

[23:54]

Because when this indication is made, the student is not present and the teacher is not present. There's no teacher then. The teacher is the one who does not indicate. The teacher is the one who reflects. who says, oh, is that what it is? Like I gave this example a couple weeks ago. This person I know works with some severely disturbed people. And this one couple came to the crisis clinic, a man and a wife, a wife and a husband, a woman and a husband. What's so funny? And these people, well I won't say what their diagnosis was but they had a lot of problems.

[24:56]

The woman carried a big briefcase, leather briefcase with a chain on it and in the case was their medications. There are twelve kinds of medications and she dispensed them to each of them. And they'd been married for three years, this couple, and since the time that they were married, neither one of them had been hospitalized for three years. Before that, there had been a lot of hospitalizations in their career. The man was a real big man. Real huge, big, real big, like, you know, twice the size of most of us. And the woman was sort of just medium-sized, too. Someone asked her, asked them if they ever were violent, and the man said, nope. And the woman said, not usually, but I'm very protective of my husband.

[26:03]

If anybody tries to hurt him, I would get violent. And then at some point they were weighing them and as I told you the husband weighed them very much and the wife got on a scale and she was one of those doctors and she moved the scale over to, one of the things over to 150 and then she moved the other one over to 40. Okay? Got that? So then she said, she said, to her husband and the people, they were interviewing them, she said, well, without my clothes on I only weigh about a hundred and sixty. Do you understand? But she only had just a pair of pants on and a t-shirt. without my clothes on, I weigh about 160," she said.

[27:12]

And her husband said, 160? That's like a teacher. He's there, he heard her say it. He's got some problems, but still he could see, you know, the 150 and the 40. 160 from 190 equals 160? He could see all that and figure that all out, sort of. But you know he's got some problems, maybe he's not right, he's got some psychological problems, maybe she's right, maybe he just calculated wrong. The point I'm trying to make basically is that he's there with her and he's there with her because he needs her and he loves her and vice versa.

[28:21]

They're with each other. They walk through birth and death together. Having some impression about each other but not so sure who's right or wrong and trying to meet. And I've said this before too, I want to say again, that the meeting occurs between these two extremes of defiance. What do you mean 160 and submission? Yes, dear, that's how much you weigh, that's right, that would be correct. 160 if you didn't have your clothes on. Not those two, not either one of those, but 160? Wow, that's interesting. How did you come up with that? Tell me about your calculations.

[29:25]

But most people aren't interested in other people. They really aren't. So they'd rather just say, okay, you're right or you're wrong. Let's go on to the next thing I have to say. Don't get me into this 160 business. So the image that I'm proposing is that we actually join hands with people and also that the Zen practice is in the context of joining hands with everybody and walking through birth and death with everybody. And when people get into situations like saying 150 and 190 equals approximately 160 plus a t-shirt and a pair of pants, we don't pull them out of that. We don't reach down there and say, oh no, it's not. We stand with them right there until they get up and go on from that statement.

[30:36]

The teacher is with The student, the teacher, feels the suffering of the student. The teacher suffers until the student is happy. And the person who is living in the teacher maybe wants to, you know, correct the situation. But the teacher in the person does not want to do that. The teacher wants the person to grow up and take care of themselves, but who can do that? Who can just stand there and walk hand in hand with a person through birth and death without any fiddling around? Who can do that? Well, this person who doesn't carry a self is the one who can do it.

[31:42]

It's very simple, but not easy. Does that make sense? Got some problems? Some problems with it? No? Well, it's hard. It's hard to do. But that's anyway what I think is the job, our job with each other is to stay close without manipulating. To do what we think is best without doing it so that people will do something in particular, just do what we think is best.

[32:50]

And what's best usually is in this place between, is happening in the arrival of all things. There's one other aspect of this I just want to mention quickly and that is, after you get people interested in meeting themselves and entering the space of meeting another, then it's good also to get them interested in making a commitment. So that once they get into that space, once you get interested and get into the space, and after you sort of get scared sometimes because you can't remember who you are or you actually forget yourself and then you try to remember again by running away, you make a commitment to stay there.

[33:59]

So another thing is you can't actually explain to people how to make a commitment, but again, well you can sort of explain, but I mean their commitment is their commitment, but you can get people interested in it. So both interested in people, in themselves, and then get a commitment. Or get them interested in making commitments. a commitment to join hands with all beings and walk through birth and death with them. Starting with yourself, take your own hand and walk through birth and death and then take the hand of at least one other person and then try to get a mutual commitment out of it. Now, there's two possible songs.

[35:19]

One song is sort of from the point of view of asking for somebody to stand with you, and the other would be for you to commit yourself to stay with them. And I don't know if we have time for both, but I'd like to start with one of them. And I don't know exactly how to do this. This is more complicated than the other songs we've done. These songs are relatively easy. They were kind of like folk songs. These are like downtown songs. So the first song I'd like to try is called Stand By Me. I'll say the words and then we'll try to sing it, okay? has come and the land is dark and the moon is the only light we'll see. No, I won't be afraid.

[36:22]

No, I won't be afraid. Just as long as you stand by me. So, darling, darling, stand by me. Okay. Start over. Start over. At the beginning. Go back to the beginning. Okay, you got the words? That's the first one. When the night has come And the land is dark And the moon is the only light we'll see No, I won't be afraid No, I won't be afraid Just stand as long as you stand Stand by me

[37:40]

Darling, darling, stand by me. Oh, stand by me. If the sky that we look upon should tumble and fall, or the mountains should crumble to the sea, I won't cry, I won't hold back, shed a tear, just as long as you stand, stand by me. Darling, darling, stand by me. Oh, stand by me. So that's one direction. You should ask somebody to stand by you.

[38:43]

How about you stand by them? There's another song about that. This one we don't have music for. This is called, You've Got a Friend. OK? And this one, I don't know what tune it is, but let's just try. OK. Richard, come sit by me. When you're down and troubled and you need a helping hand And nothing, oh nothing is going right Close your eyes and think of me And soon I will be there To brighten up even your darkest night

[40:23]

You just call out my name, and you know wherever I am, I'll come running. Oh yes, I will see you again. Winter, spring, summer, or fall, All you've got to do is call And I'll be there, yes I will You've got a friend If the sky above you Should turn dark and full of clouds And that old North wind should begin to blow Keep your heads together and call my name out loud Soon you'll be a-knockin' upon the door

[41:38]

You just call out my name And you know wherever I am I'll come running Oh yes, I will see you again Winter, spring, summer, or fall All you got to do is call And I'll be there, yes I will You've got a friend May our intention be re-penetrate every being and place with the true merit of Buddha's way.

[42:58]

Tilt your whole world and say, Ganga Bhavanam bhujan se gandham [...] Beings are wonderless. I am about to awaken with them. Fusions are inexhaustible. I am about to end them. Dharma gates are boundless. I am about to enter them.

[44:01]

The Earth's way is unsurpassable. I love to be healthy.

[44:10]

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