This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. You look great. If it were me, I'd be running off somewhere. other than listening to a teacher. I thought yesterday was such light fare. Those of you that weren't here, we were brought to something richer. And I've asked John if he would get copies of the Heart Sutra, and so he's getting them. And... I'd preface, how many of you were here yesterday?

[01:00]

So for those of you that weren't, I talked about our song lives and just where we are, a little bit of my experience about our need to work on being welcoming. And I've had lovely discussions, and I want to thank all of the people that have... come up to me and sat with me and shared with me the last 24 hours is really appreciated and has been really rich. Someone said, you're here to relax and keep talking to everybody. But I'm working on a book, and so it's actually really helpful because the way that I work is not to sit down and actually work on the book, but to actually think about So there's been just many really beautiful and rich threads that have come up.

[02:02]

I just want to say, if anyone can't hear me, please just put your hand. I know I have a low register voice, and so it doesn't always make it to everyone's ears. I'll raise my voice if I'm trailing off. But one person I was talking to said, I'm really grateful that you were willing to... share some of what you did, and I want to say two things to segue into what I'd like to share today. I said to her, I said, you know, the peculiar nature of being able to share as I did yesterday is very unusual. not just because I was willing to share it because I hold a seat that enables me to share it, that empowers me to share it in a way that's different than people that are having the same experiences every day.

[03:07]

Various forms of... Not at all intentional. That's clear to me. It's clear to me that people... mean well and intend well and have good hearts. And so I hope that it's clear from my demeanor that none of what I say is about blame or pointing fingers outward, but really... towards ourselves and embracing ourselves within a larger conversation that I was actually myself surprised is what ended up being talked about yesterday. But it may be clear for me that I sit in this unusual position and I don't think that that should be lost on us.

[04:15]

that actually there are people that are, I would say at this point, for myself personally, much more impacted by the many ways in which we can not be welcoming, even when we're doing our best to extend being an invitation. So it's just important for us to recognize that, that I am sitting in a seat of privilege. to be able to share in this way. And so some curiosity is helpful if you're wondering what might be experiences for other people as well, whether that's individually or collectively. And I'll say that even sitting in this particular seat, I think probably in the space of two hours there were things prior to the talk that people said to me that I would say are untoward. They were challenging. They were the kinds of things that are unbeknownst to them.

[05:17]

The kinds of statements or ways of relating that people would experience is unwelcome. And I just have, you know, 20 years of scars. So I'm pretty well fortified against... taking it personally or going anywhere with it. The other thing that was shared, I was having a conversation actually this morning. Someone asked me, like, is this your work? Is this what you're doing now? Is to bring this conversation to the sanghas. And I paused and I said, you know, I think, yeah, it's part of it. And there's reasons for that because it feels like a need for and it feels like I have a seat that enables that to happen. But it's also important to not, for me personally, to be who I am fully, not just as a person, but also as a teacher, so that I'm not pigeonholed into just being the teacher that talks about diversity and inclusion.

[06:30]

So I just wanted to offer that as we segue into a little conversation about this text that... Some of us may have read called the Heart Sutra. John is going to pass them out, and I'd like to see you all's version here. I've seen it in the past, but I wasn't sure. I want to quote things that are not... Oh, it's very close. Anyone that needs one... One of the things that I really have enjoyed over the lifetime of my practice is to look at texts and look at them again and again and see what kind of comes up and what shows up from you at different times.

[07:42]

And the Heart Sutra is, within the texts that we chant regularly, hands down my favorite, because it's so rich. Recently I was in New York and I spoke about five different sanghas and I did something that I never do, which is I decided before I went what I was going to talk about. I never do that. And it was really great because it was the same text and it was the same subject and of course they were entirely different talks. And that speaks to both the richness of the sutra but also my inability to stay on topic. But mainly what I was headed towards and would arrive at eventually is that I have come to believe that the Heart Sutra has within it a problem statement and then a kind of challenge to everything that had come before it and then a solution.

[08:54]

which I think could be really useful for those of us that feel like we can get sort of lost in the amount of texts and instructions, and there's all of this stuff. So, as you may know, what's peculiar about the Heart Sutra is that, first of all, that it's called a sutra, and that it was not the words of the Buddha. So typically, anything that's named a sutra is... actually the words of the Buddha. So it's unusual, and it also testifies to how loved it is. And it was lifted up and exalted in the Mahayana schools into something equivalent to the words of the Buddha. And what it does, at least in my understanding and reading of it, is it kind of... a lot of what Zen did, which is it looked at all of the proliferation of ideas and concepts about what the practice is and just said, you know, it's none of this.

[10:07]

It's none of this. All of these things that you know and that you love and that you're particularly in China, right, making like volumes and volumes of teaching and study about normal business. So, and the entire body of literature was the, you know, perfection of wisdom sutras, teaching. And so it was a great, enormous volume. They have they called them shlokas. In Sanskrit, they called them shlokas. And so it was 108,000 shlokas, which are basically sort of like phrases, like lines. And that was great.

[11:11]

You know, it's like wisdom beyond wisdom that you will never get to read all of. It was kind of what it ended up being. And not to mention that most of the people were not literate. So they couldn't actually read these great volumes. So who could possibly penetrate wisdom if they couldn't read and get to these many, many volumes that, you know, it took up what they were writing on at the time. It, you know, took up like huge spaces. It's sort of like having old supercomputers instead of our laptops or iPads. And so this wisdom beyond wisdom and the effort to get it, make it more available, was reduced. And then it was reduced again. And then it was reduced again. And then it was reduced again. And on to the essence of it. And so what they're holding is the essence of this great wisdom.

[12:17]

And it basically came down to this. you know, it starts out and says, you know, Avalokichisvar was doing this practice, and in the midst of this practice came to understand the nature of things. And what his discovery was, you know, that Avalokichisvar was historically actually a male bodhisattva, and in China came to be represented as a feminine aspect. But that form and emptiness are all the same thing. That we're making differences out of things, that we're separating things that actually shouldn't be separated. And all of the other heaps, all of the other sets of ways in which we approach obtaining information

[13:20]

are also empty of any kind of inherent meaning, inherent existence. And say inherent to say that they relied on other things. So it's not that things don't exist, it's that they don't exist without the other things that exist around them. So the chair doesn't exist without the floor, up doesn't exist without down, I don't exist without you. And in fact, I use you as a way to understand and relate to my own existence. And that was a hugely deep teaching. And the sutra then goes on to say, no, here are these classic teachings that we have. There's no form. There's no sensation. starting to pick up the ways in which we access information.

[14:23]

There's no feeling, there's no perception. So everything about the way that we know how to access life, that stuff doesn't exist. In fact, the sense doors don't even exist. There's no eyes, there's no ears, nose, tongue, body, mind. That stuff doesn't exist. There is no realm of sight, and so on and so forth to no realm of consciousness, which refers to a very well-understood teachings of the twelve dependent arisings. And there is no ignorance. There is no existence of ignorance, no ending ignorance. and there's so on and so forth to no end of old age and death which is also getting rid of some of the classic teachings these are the things that exist and all up until that time that's what had been taught this is how you know that you're practicing the Buddha's way because the Buddha expounded these things this is how life unfolds we're born and that we

[15:49]

get sick, die, you experience these different states of decay and destruction. And the Heart Sutra is saying that none of that is so. In fact, it says there is no suffering. And pretty much whatever school you were a part of, you may not have agreed on some of the other teachings, but you did agree on this kind of suffering thing. And there's no cause of suffering. There's no extinguishing. And there's no path. Anybody know what those are? Four Noble Truths. Heretic. This teaching, the sutra is saying the very foundation of not just one school, not just the Theravadan school, not just the the southern schools or the northern schools, the teaching that everybody agrees on.

[16:55]

You can see a few robes were blown up by this. And not only is there no path to wisdom, there's no knowledge which actually We translate it as knowledge, but that word should actually be wisdom, not the notion of knowledge. But there's no wisdom and there's no way to attain it. I'm like, what are we here for? Everything we know, turned upside down. So this is effectively a problem statement. With everything you thought you knew, it isn't so. And the sutra goes on to say, and because of that understanding, bodhisattvas attain the perfection of wisdom.

[18:09]

Because of their understanding, there was none of this, none of that, no eye, no ear, no nose, no suffering, no... 12 causes a dependent or rising nothing, no form, no sensation, no senses, no sense doors, no means of acquiring information because they recognize the emptiness, the not-so-ness of that. They get it. Not through the acquiring, but through the letting go. And just in case there are people that are having doubts, which I'm sure there's someone having doubts. There were lots of people having doubts. They say, far beyond your inverted views, this is truth. This is actually what nirvana is.

[19:11]

To get to this knowing. that these ideas and concepts are not wisdom itself. So all these scholars that have made volumes and volumes of teachings and held back the subtle truth from people, ordinary people like you and I, by putting these barriers in the way, of studying, I don't know, climbing great mountains of descriptions, you're no longer empowered to have that. Because the great warriors of awakening, those that have chosen to pursue awakening at all costs, have come to know

[20:19]

that all of those ideas, though useful as a means of turning our intention in a direction, useful to spur on our motivation, get inspired by words. They're not the thing itself. And all the Buddhas, past, present, and the future, know that this is so. Now, if you, my glasses on. They get up to the point where they say that far beyond these views, what's sitting in between there is an instruction, in my mind.

[21:23]

There will be many, many people that will refute this. Well, let's just go with this for now. So in the line that says, with nothing to attain, a bodhisattva relies on the perfection of wisdom. Thus the mind is without hindrance. Here's the important statement. Without hindrance, there is no fear. Without hindrance, there is no fear. Without the things that we craft, that we conjure up, whether seemingly good or seemingly ill, there is no fear. Our mind opens up into clarity, freedom. is liberated to be just as it is.

[22:28]

That is to say that there's nothing out there for us to accomplish, to acquire, to get, but rather to release the many ways in which we construct things that inhibits our access to our own hearts, to our own inherent wisdom, the one that we are all gifted with as a result of our being born. We come with operating instructions for how to be human, for how to be kind, how to be in relationship. Which is not to say that we can't use a hand or two, a little workshop here and there, maybe a parrot.

[23:41]

But when we get confused and we start believing that the things outside of ourselves are the things that are going to get us to ourselves, we've lost track of the only true teaching there could possibly be. I myself find it hard to believe that whatever energetic force, deity, God, divine, nothingness, everythingness, gave rise to the presence of such a vastly diverse and complex creature, as human beings are, would also decide that they all needed to adhere to some particular idea

[25:02]

or concept that existed elsewhere, that they had to go elsewhere for in order to get along with themselves, in order to get along with the self that is no different from others. It seems impossible. It seems impossible to me that whatever that intelligence is, whatever that life force is, would say there's going to be billions of you eventually, but you all have to go and drink from the same well in order to know how to be comfortable with who you are, how to be at peace with yourself, how to be at needs. seemed to me that it would make much more sense that just as we're given a heart that powers us through life, that we're also given the wisdom that powers our sense of love and compassion and connection with one another.

[26:30]

that it's just in here. And yes, we use vehicles, just like we use a vehicle to arrive in this place. We use tools and techniques to kind of hone our attention, to sharpen our skills, But never should those things be mistaken for the truth of the gift of our own inherent wisdom. And that what our practice is for, no matter what we are told, no matter what we mistake it for, No matter what addiction or distraction we're trading in using practice, is that the new addiction or distraction?

[27:41]

That the gift of our practice is no other than to point us back to our true selves. And that as powerful as practice is, as powerful and as moving and inspiring. It could never be anything of use if it is not pointing you back to your own inherent wisdom, to your own heart, to your own deep well of compassion, to your own love, your own eternal redeemability to your fundamental belonging in this place, in this time.

[28:51]

And no one can take it away. What this practice is that we share is to instill the confidence of the truth of that which already is so. Not to give you something new, but to instill confidence that what every single one of you somewhere deep down knows is kind of like We're skeptical. So it's fleeting. It's like someone that kind of runs behind us and we catch a flicker of attention. He sort of gets right by us.

[29:52]

We look and we go, oh, maybe I am worthy. Is that what that was? Maybe I do belong. that can't be taken away. Because it's fleeting for most of us in that way, we use the Buddha Dharma, we use this practice, we use Zazen to ground ourselves in unshakable confidence. So that which has always been so comes into presence, that we come into presence with it in such a way that it cannot be moved.

[31:04]

May it be so for each of you. We have time for questions, comments, or as one of my practitioners would say, outbursts. What do you think arises, that's what I'm studying, that work you know, is whenever I hear this thing about codependent arising, I also, right alongside of it, also hear either arise or cease.

[32:13]

And every time my hair is becoming or emerging or any of those kinds of things, I always do that. That's not so. And yet, yes, because... A lot of the things that we hear and speak in our practice are full of those ideas. So I find it bewildering sometimes. And I really appreciate what you are today. But will you say something about that? You already did, but... How can we... That's what they thought. When we did this, that's what they thought.

[33:21]

They said, oh wow, there's all this teaching and really it's not so. And I think there's just, we have different ways of entering into a relationship with that which is true. And so there are different texts. They almost seem to conflict with one another through different teachings. And this one conflicts with everything, pretty much. And it's no mistake that it is the most chanted text in the Mahayana school all around the world. because it's getting at something. It's getting at something that we almost don't... I don't want to believe it's true, but we almost can't. But we hold our attention and we chant it with someone called bright faith.

[34:27]

The faith that comes from a previous experience. that leads us forward, not just blind to faith. And eventually, we have our own direct experience, and it doesn't matter what anything says. It doesn't matter. You won't worry about it. And you will appreciate it. All of it. Can't hear you. Oh, sorry. I don't know how this will come out, but I'm always hoping it's supposed to be a conceptual understanding of felt.

[35:35]

these things that seem so, I don't know what, I don't think, or I don't know, get rid of no body, inner body, and no mind, inner mind, or really no left max. But the difference between a conceptual understanding and maybe a felt or experienced understanding of this sutra, Have you ever been in love? Yes. Do you know the difference when you are and when you're not? Yeah. Is it ever worse staying in a sangha where you don't feel welcome? Also, because I did it all the time.

[36:46]

It just kind of feels like, you know, people don't want me around. Then being here just, it hurts them and it hurts me. So, why would I keep doing it? I don't know why you would keep doing it. I'll tell you why I keep doing it. Um... For me, the purpose is a powerful motivator and clarifier. And so for me, my purpose was to practice. And everything else went underneath that. So I had lots of different priorities. This is how we do our lives, right? I had lots of different competing priorities. I had the... I was... I wanted to be welcome. I wanted to be in a place that reflected me back to myself.

[37:47]

I wanted to be in a place where there weren't shenanigans going on in the larger community. There was all sorts of things that were problematic from day one until day now. But I was very, very clear that the essence of what was held within the practice itself was something that, like, that was home. And I needed to be there. And I did not mistake the surrounding environment for my home. And that's not to say that it wasn't painful, but I would make a choice and say, okay, you're going to go into that situation, and it won't be easy, and that could be daily.

[39:01]

Are you willing to give up your home? Not yet. It wasn't even no. It was not yet. Because there may come a time when you say it's too much. And there was a time for me that I got to, oh, it's too much. And I was ready to do something different. But it wasn't because I gave up my home. It was because I found it someplace else. That's our responsibility. that you talk about one of the lines of the heart suture. Please. It's a line that I've had trouble with my relationship to in the beginning that I'm working on.

[40:07]

Nothing to retain. A bodhisattva relies on Prabhupada and thus the mind is without hindrance. Without hindrance, there is no fear. Those two lines, especially the first one, I can see that it's doing very important work within the sutra to connect the giving up to the transition. But I feel like there are important things there. I was wondering if you could speak to that section of thought for a moment. I'm going to just read the translation for myself because there are different translations and I want to make sure that I'm not making something... I'll at least give you the translation that I hold in my mind if I need to. So the translation that I know, that line says, indeed, there is nothing to attain.

[41:42]

Thus, bodhisattvas live, live. Prajnaparamita. It is a big difference. So I can't... anything and I'm not denigrating the translation but it's part of how I came to hold this sense that this is an instruction because it says all of this no path no wisdom and no attainment indeed there is nothing to be attained thus in that way because of that because that is so bodhisattvas live the perfection of wisdom, which is a different way of holding it. Does that start to clear what I'm saying? It does.

[42:45]

I so wish that I had a more complete understanding of how giving letting go of the idea that there is anything that can be attained that there is that there is like a drive that would lead you into your body that that can be related so directly just like letting go of fear it seems like in this translation that it's being set up in like a That they're often held together. It's like, there's no tainment, there's no fear. I wish I understood that really. No, with no hindrance, there's no fear. With no hindrance, no obstacles. No constructs. No built up stuff. No, I'm better than her.

[43:48]

She shouldn't have that. I should have got that sooner. How come that didn't happen for me? I should get that. There's no hindrance. I'm less than. I'm not worthy of that. I don't belong. There's hindrances in the mind. Meaning, not that we don't feel them, but they're not truth itself. They're what we build up out of cultural values, familial experiences, history, ancestral carrying forth. And this practice suggests uniquely that that can all be cut through. I haven't forgotten. I haven't forgotten it. But it can be cut through.

[44:53]

So that you can touch the direct experience of no fear. And in that space of having no fear about who you are, about the nature of just life as it is. Yeah. Shit happens. It's going to go with it. It's not a problem that it happens. It's a problem that I'm struggling with it. I'm trying to keep it from happening. I'm trying to make it happen. Wish that it wasn't happening. Wish it was happening. Wish it was happening like this. Nothing like that. And I do the same thing. I'm doing it all the time. Oh, I want to write a book. I want to visit Tassajara. I want to give a good talk. But whenever I mistake that for me, then I'm like, okay. So it's not about not having ideas at all. It's about when you get those ideas in the wrong place. in terms of your understanding of who you are.

[45:59]

When those ideas precede your direct experience of your own true self, then you have a problem. This is my understanding of what you just said. I'm repeating the same thing, but it definitely makes me correct. But the sense I did is coming from my own tradition, that we have a, through ideas and concepts, which, and oppositions, which are useful in a sense, I'm not sure this is an English word, but it is different, but mediated experience. That's right. And what the mystics experience is an unmediated experience.

[47:07]

That life just may have that direct experience, unmediated experience. And that, to some extent, those mediations, which are useful, are also obstacles, they can be hindrances, towards that unmediated experience. So through sitting, just being there, maybe we tempt, somehow, just simply to have that unmediated experience, this is what it is, it's just us. And if we do have that, unmediated experience, unhindered, unobstacled experience, then there's no gaining, no losing, and thus there's no feeling, there's We have no fear of losing something we can't gain, or gaining something we can't do. Something we can't. Is that a correct understanding?

[48:09]

Ashay. [...] Yeah, Ashay is African. Many different African cultures have that expression. It's Swaha. Yes. say something based on what you just said. We're all mystics. We're all seeking to be mystics. Did you hear the way that he described mystics? It's the people that have unmediated experience of the direct experience of life, of the truth of life. And so... We don't often talk about Zen practice in that way. It's really the only sort of school that exists in a way to suggest that everyone should be a mystic.

[49:15]

So we don't have any mystics. Because it's saying everyone should be a mystic. And... If you like the idea of mystics, of being a mystic, then you should hold that in your heart. And if you don't, just forget what I just said. I'm just wondering if you have ideas for navigating the question of should I persist in this... question was, you know, if it's in a song or in a particular practice versus say, this is too much for me to handle. It's not going to really aid my progress and I should seek something else out. But given the complexity and the confusion within which one navi is that choice, how do you navigate or how do I navigate?

[50:22]

I don't know how you know. I always think I'm a terrible example for such things because I clearly have not great boundaries. I don't know how to keep my mouth shut out and all these good things. And so I just fight for the space that's mine. I just decide, like, this is where I'm going to be and I'm going to fight for the space that's mine. And they got used to me. And I got used to them. And I say that, you know, even when all sort of Zen and its hierarchies and stuff, as a transmitted teacher. And I feel like that was never going to happen. That was like never going to happen. It never should have happened. Not because of who, of like me, but because of the obstacles, because I was so contentious. problematic and fought for my space because I knew that this was my home.

[51:27]

And I wasn't willing to give up my home because of anyone else's ignorance, because of anyone else's inability to see me yet. And I was just going to come out bloody and boring and It would be my home. Saying, come home victorious or come home on your shield. I'm just going to come home on my shield. Now, I know that everybody is not of that nature. And so we do have to make our own decisions, ultimately, about when it feels too much. But you know how when you're sitting and your knees feel like maybe they're going to explode? Just like maybe, just a little bit. blood, something. We used to have this instruction that was before you flinch, like, let it pass three times.

[52:30]

Let it pass three times. You can get through anything. Right? That experience, like, just, okay, this is terrible. Okay, this is really terrible. Okay, I think I'm Oh, I totally forgot that that was even happening. The bell rang. And so, I'm a believer in making the space for yourself if you are clear that that is your home. And you're only clear for as long as you can. I don't have any idea of what time it is, so what is this? 425. Thank you. Maybe one more? Um, can you just say something about the very last line, dementia?

[53:41]

Yeah, it's, um, it's, my, the translation that I understand is gone. Gone. Gone beyond. And it's referring to getting to the other shore. Gone beyond and awake. It's like a hail. Hail awakening. Like ashe. Amen. It's all of those things. It's all of those ways of lifting us up and saying word. or whatever your expression might be. But it refers to moving from the shore of suffering and the world in which we... I think of suffering as like a world in which we're not confident in who we are. To moving up to a place in which we're confident in the truth of our being.

[54:45]

Not moving from a world in which there are challenges and distractions and irritations and in-laws and flies and mosquitoes and to a world that doesn't have those things. Moving to a place in which we're confident, so confident in ourselves, that all of that is just coexistence. That's my Nirvana. Maybe I'm not exalted enough to go to the place where it's got halos and clouds and things like that. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma Talks are offered free of charge, and this is made possible by the donations we receive. Your financial support helps us to continue to offer the Dharma. For more information, Visit sfcc.org and click Giving.

[55:47]

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