This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfzz.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good morning. when I gave a talk the other morning, I was trying to evoke the spirit of intention, vow, resolve, how it has both a formal dimension and how it has both, for want of a better word, an existential dimension. And I read this poem.

[01:01]

We'll go with uncertainty towards the old choices for clear-cut answers, to a softer, more permeable aliveness, which is every moment at the brink of death. For something new is being born in us, if we would but let it. We stand at a new doorway, awaiting that which comes. Daring to be human creatures, vulnerable to the beauty of existence, learning to love." Anne Hillman. In some ways, I think part of the theme of my talk was, don't worry, nothing terrible is going to happen. And, of course, part of that's up to you, what you choose to, how you choose to practice.

[02:07]

And, in fact, this morning, I wanted, in a sort of circuitous way, get to the other side, you know. We could say there's two especially as we initiate, maybe as we initiate most endeavors in our life. What's my intention? What's my vow? And then the other side is, what does this ask of me? Part of my appeal, the appeal of that poem to me is it balances those quite nicely. Yes, death is close by. It's an interesting thought. I think it illustrates something about the opening, the realizing that practice is asking of us.

[03:14]

When we're about seven or eight, it dawned on us, people die. And then since then, the fact has remained the same. But the relationship to it, the profundity of it, the pervasiveness of it has been registering more fully. So in one way you could say, it's pretty obvious the nature of things. We don't really need a whole bunch of Sanskrit, Japanese and Chinese terms to get it. We came out of the womb and started living it. And yet, such is the nature of our human existence that we need reminders, that we need something

[04:20]

that shifts us out of what has accumulated over our human lifetime. In simple, basic Buddhist teaching, it says, well, we have these three primary impulses. We move towards what we want, we move away from what we don't want, and we struggle in an agitated way with that process. I'm sure you all know the word dukkha, right? Anybody who's never heard that word? It'd be kind of wonderful if you hadn't. Maybe you haven't heard this translation of it or definition of it. So it has two characters, du and ka. And the ka, in the core Sanskrit, it means being or presence.

[05:34]

And the du, the root of the du there, the D-H-U, is contraction. Contracting the presence of existence. Now, many have heard of the term sukha. Ah, well, good. So sukha is generally translated as pleasant sensation. When the mind softens and opens and becomes simply present, it influences how the moment is being experienced, and it gives rise The sukha, the su there, the ka is the same as dukkha, but the su is kind of spacious, soft in quality. So we have sukha, we have dukkha and we have sukha.

[06:40]

in this kind of opening. We stand at a new doorway, awaiting that which comes, daring to be human creatures, vulnerable to the beauty of existence, learning to love. Now, what's not to like about that? Doesn't that lower your anxiety a little bit? So given these, you know, commonly called greed, hate and delusion, in case you didn't have some way to beat yourself up or something to stimulate your self-criticism, given their influence on us, there's two qualities of practice, you know, this daring.

[07:55]

What does practice ask of you? Actually, maybe just take a moment, maybe close your eyes and see what comes to mind in response to that question. What does practice ask of you? We'll come back to that. It's an interesting correlate between what we might say, even in the realm of intention, you know, what do you want from practice or what's your agenda for practice?

[09:00]

And then to just shift it, what does practice ask of you? And as that quote I made about Ndogan Zenji, saying, nobody can force it on you, and you can't force it on yourself. I think most of us, or maybe it's just me, but I think it's most of us, tend to... in our virtuous, sincere dedication, bring in some sense of imposition on this state of mind, on this state of being, on this arising emotion, especially when we experience the contraction.

[10:02]

I would offer you this notion, that when the sukha arises, savor it, appreciate it, immerse in it, soak it up. That's the term that's used in early suttas. Soak up that. Like a spine soaks up water. And when dukkha arises, explore. What is it to not turn away? What is it to open to? And it's a delicate process. If you engage in this way, you're going to spend the whole practice period noticing the gross and the subtle ways contraction is responded to.

[11:11]

I suspect that everybody in this room has worked with that on the realm of painful sitting. I think we all go through a fire of thrashing around in our physical discomfort to discover, that really doesn't help. And so, as a last resort, we try opening to it. It's a little bit like dying, the truth of dying. We can keep learning and learning about that core truth. And this process of realization In the first case in the Book of Serenity, which I'm not advocating you study, it's a very difficult case because it's so utterly stark.

[12:26]

It's like saying, what is the summation of all the Buddhist teachings? It doesn't give you a whole lot to go on. It goes something like this. Manjushri says, or the Shakyamuni sits down, Manjushri says something like, here is the Dharma king. The Dharma of the Dharma king is thus. And Shakyamuni gets up and leaves. But in the commentary, it's a very interesting term. And I'll tell you the term after I'll quote you these three random little thoughts.

[13:27]

The first one is, Someone told me recently they got a plate at flea market, and here's what was written on the plate. If you want to bake an apple pie from scratch, first you have to create the whole universe. Okay? Here's the second, for instance. Someone said to me this morning, they said, find out the rest last night. How about that? Yeah, how about that? Is it something you want to hide? Is it something you feel righteous about? I am going to take care of myself, regardless of what the Tenkan, Vino, the Tanto, the practice leader, the universe say.

[14:46]

that being accountable, that being willing to explore the edge. This is a demanding schedule. That's how it is. That's how it's intended to be. It's not meant to be a breeze. It's meant to have you discover what you're capable of, to explore that edge. I'm going to go to bed early in case I might start to feel sick. Maybe too timid there. I'm going to force my way through it.

[15:50]

I'm going to be nothing but heroic, determined, and let nothing stop me. Can we force awakening? Can we force opening? That old joke that I think most of you have heard, the diligent student comes to the teacher and says, if I'm really diligent, how long will it take to get enlightened? And the teacher says, about 10 years. He says, well, what if I double my effort and I'm really strenuous and determined how long will it take? Just 20 years. And yet, to watch yourself, which way do you intend to lean and can you stay upright?

[16:56]

The process of awakening has its own sila, its own shingi. Within the shingi we create for our collective well-being and our collective awakening, our collective support of each other. There's that. But then also, the internal alchemy that helps you awaken. It balances maybe the ways you hold back and the ways you push too hard. And sometimes we see, we can watch the mind move from arrogance to self-criticism. And in some ways, it's our search for balance. You criticize yourself a whole lot, and then you sneak in a few arrogant stories about yourself.

[17:58]

And then you move back the other way. How can we just stay balanced? equanimity. And one simple answer is we watch. We watch both of those minds with, is that so? Is that so? The third, for instance, Mary Oliver saying, what is the name of the deep breath I would take over and over for all of us. What is the name of the deep breath that I would take over and over for all of us? Call it what you want. It's happiness.

[19:05]

It's another way to enter the fire. One of Dogen Zenji's themes in his teachings, as he wrote them up in the Shubha Genzo, was Khotsu Budaishin, arousing the mind of searching for the way, the mind of awakening. And that's what I've been trying to point at. What is it? in the midst of all the things that come up for you while you're here, what is it that will help each of those myriad experiences offer some guidance, some expression of awakening?

[20:15]

This is our challenge. Is it remembering something? Oh. Like what Mary Oliver is pointing at. Those moments that often arise in the Zen Dome. Although sometimes I feel like they even arise at work meeting. Sometimes the mood at work meeting is a little bit light or frivolous. It's like we're just not taking ourselves so seriously that day. And then sometimes it's just quiet. Does anyone have any announcements? No. Okay then, let's go to work.

[21:20]

Sometimes when we chant, you know, you can feel the zendo turn into one voice. That one voice has one body. That one body has one breath. In Mary Oliver's sense, what is the name What is the mind? What is the heart? What is the experience of the deep breath breathed over and over for all of us? Call it what you want. Sometimes it's just the sound of the creek.

[22:41]

Sometimes, when we've been sitting quite a while, it seems, it feels, that the creek flows through us. That what we call mind and the signs of the creek are not so different. These moments of contact, these moments of being. In the Zen school, you know, Zen, Chan, immersion, Zen, Chan, Janna. This immersion both points at, illustrates, and expresses awakening.

[23:55]

And Dogen Zenju says, this is what we're exploring, as we go along. In the Binduwa, he says, the seated expression of it is Jiji Uzamai. Another dangerous term. Who hasn't heard that term before? Good. And I'm sorry for those of you who did, but hear it for the first time. It essentially means opening and engaging and being what arises through this conditioned human existence.

[25:08]

and explore what it is to abide in that flowing stream. In the terms GGU, sammai is samadhi, continuous contact, and the GGU is the character of ease, in the engagement. In the talk I gave, I was talking about the dawn experience of you struggle for a practice period being dawn, practice period ends, you go off into the red dust of the world without a care or a thought about that. you come back and there's some sukha, there's some su, there's some spaciousness around being a dog.

[26:28]

Probably you're still not perfect at it, but somehow having engaged having succeeded and failed and tried harder and tried softer. And this is the messiness of our practice. It's not a pristine event. Maybe for the rare few. They say, Shakyamuni came out of the womb and took seven steps. I think it's the rare few do that. Most of us come out and give a hearty cry. What the hell is happening? Then we realize maybe it's not okay to just keep yelling out like that, especially as we become adults.

[27:41]

So in the commentary to that first case, the dharma of the dharma king is thus, the term comes up in its sandhava. When a horse is answered, give a horse. When a horse is asked for, give a horse. When a poem is asked for, give a poem. And when salt is asked for, give salt. Curious mind, adventuresome mind, engages without some forcing. to explore this.

[28:48]

Usually we find our vow, our intention, our resolve, as we're skillful with them. You can check. If your vow, your intention, your resolve are something that you need a break from, or something that You have to stiffen yourself up to engage. Maybe look more carefully at that. This practice is to alleviate suffering and promote awakening. It's not to exacerbate dukkha, contraction. It's to bring forth sukha.

[29:55]

But it's a messy process. Expect to make a mess. Someone asked William Stafford, how are you such a prolific poet? He says, I just lowered my standards. lower your standards about what you expect from yourself. I would suggest think, you know, delusions are inexhaustible and I'm going to try on pretty much every one of them. One way or another. And I allow to practice with them. internally, collectively, it's a beautiful notion. Any thoughts, any questions about that?

[31:01]

Or was that, I hope that was, yes? I believe I heard you define samadhi as continuous contact. You did indeed. How many words? My choice? Okay. Sometimes having a so-called limitation has its own kind of adventure. I took a poetry class once with Naomi Zhihabna, who comes here in the summer, and she said, okay, you're going to write a poem And it's going to be three words per line. And it's going to be your life story. Do you know?

[32:02]

Okay. Have you heard of the term objectless concentration? That wasn't a very confident nod. That was like... That term? Sometimes it's coined in relationship to Shikantaza. That in Shikantaza there is no fixed object that's being connected to or being contacted. The awareness is established and everything that happens is made contact with. And when that contact is continuous, that's samadhi. In the early canon, the use of the term is broader than that.

[33:03]

It has a variety of meanings. And with that, I would say, especially in relationship to the term shikantaza, just sitting, has an appropriateness in the Zen school and, I would say, in many of the meanings that it has in the early Canon II. And it includes, if you think, continuous contact includes one-pointedness because the continuous contact can be with a single object or it can be with this flowing object. But I'm going to look back, not today, but I'm going to look back to Dogen Zenji's Gigi Yuzamai because it does seem, when you look at the extent of his teachings in Shibu Genzo, that that particular term and that way of engaging and expressing and manifesting in Gigi Yuzamai

[34:16]

is pivotal. And this other term, Hotsubuddhashin, arousing wayseeking mind, arousing Buddha mind, is also a pivotal term. Any other questions? How much conscious study of other teachers within Zen Center and coordination of their, of the teachings do you do or on the reverse conscious distance from other teachings and other teachers at the school do you do? Because you shared many words that were said in very similar ways last practice period. You know, funny things happen to us as teachers. Norman Fisher and I, who's sort of in and out of Zen Center now, he has his own robust and thriving Sangha.

[35:25]

But every now and then, and not frequently, but we meet up and, you know, in a casual way, because we're both intrigued by Zen, even after all these years, we talk about Zen. It would always be remarkable to me. You would think, oh, these guys must have been comparing notes. Or you would say, well, you're talking very much the way Rab talked. I have no idea what Rab was saying last practice period. And we didn't talk about it. I think we come from the same school of Zen. We've gone through the same training. We've trained here. I think it's... That's part of it. And then there's other ways. We're all quite different. But we don't... We don't compare notes. You brought up zucca and zucca, which I kind of had always the same as, like, at least that success.

[36:36]

It seems more like a keel underneath. Mm-hmm. Sukha? Sukha as melancholy, did you say? I think of duke as being sort of like a lovely wheel. That's often, that term is often used, you know, because somehow when the two compounds are put together, it's often translated as out of balance. You know? And then people say, it's like a wobbly wheel, because a wobbly wheel is out of balance as it turns. It isn't equanimous. It's not upright. It's wobbling around. It feels sometimes like being sad or mentally doesn't go wrong. It's helpful to remember that, especially in the Soto Zen School, we are not trying to manufacture certain attributes of existence.

[37:58]

We're working on how we're relating to whatever arises. So a certain mood can arise, can cause us distress, agitation, other painful emotions or not. And what I was just saying a few moments ago, Miles, was that for most of us, whether we like it or not, we try on, we we struggle with a whole variety of responses. And I would say it's not even that we then figure out. Sometimes we set our mind to figuring out. But as you'll see in a moment when I quote from Dogen's fascicle on Hatsu Buddha Shin, there's layers of complexity to our human consciousness

[39:09]

they don't simply avail themselves to figuring out. I would say we live through and hopefully we can encourage ourselves to be as conscious as we live through all the things that come up while we're in practice period. And any one of them can be a teaching. And in fact, Sometimes opening fully to what we might consider a failure, a negative emotion, opening up to that can teach us a lot. Sometimes it teaches us a lot about dukkha. nice work if you can get it.

[40:16]

It's a little bit like appreciation and gratitude. And enthusiasm. When these things come forth, they have a buoyancy, they have a space, they have an energy. And sometimes they say, The Buddha is the skillful physician that he brings forth the appropriate medicine to reach state of being. And so the challenge for us as our own Buddha, as our own medicine person, how do we bring forth these conditions that can help us, support us, and encourage us.

[41:23]

When I talk about the inner alchemy, you know that the root of that was turning lead into gold. I think it becomes appropriate to say, how do we take or afflicted, agitated states and start to relate to them in a way that start to loosen up the dukkha. And I would say enormous patience. First, lower your standards. Second, remember, delusions are inexhaustible. This is not a quick fix. And third, give yourself a break, because it was quite a shock coming out of the womb.

[42:29]

And it's been quite a shock since then, too. I remember watching my grandson in his early weeks and months and thinking, wow, There's no letting up on what's asked of you. First thing, you've got to learn how to breathe or you're really in trouble. Then the next thing, you've got to get the digestive system working. There's so much to learn. And we come at it fully committed. Yes, I will. And then we take on this human life. Okay. Let me quote you a little bit of Nishijima's, Nishijima Roshi's translation.

[43:35]

But let me tell you a story first. In this, he says, citta, the discerning mind, the thinking mind, is a primary agent. And once I was in Japan, and I was staying at... I can't remember the name of the temple. Tupokuji. I was staying at Harada Tangan Roshi's temple. And I... was offered an interview with him, Dogusen with him. So I don't know why I thought I would bring this up. Maybe because this sentence, I'm jumping in, I'll come back to the start. He says, citta is called thinking mind. Without this thinking mind, it is impossible to establish bodhi mind.

[44:45]

And for those of you who don't know, in some ways, this utterly contradicts a great deal of Zen teaching. And so, for some odd reason, I thought, that's what I'll ask Harada Tangan Roshi about. And he looked at me like, you idiot. You want to waste my time answering that? And he dismissed the notion and then he dismissed me. In general, this is the translation of this fascicle. In general, there are three kinds of mind. Citta, here called thinking mind, Hriddaya, Here called The Mind of Grass and Trees and Virya.

[45:51]

Here called Experience our Concentrated Mind. Thinking Mind, Hridayah, you know, Heart. Here called The Mind of Grass and Trees. That one's tough. And then the third one here called Experience Mind. As a sense door apprehends the experience, we call it sign of the stream. We call it tree outside the door. We call it touching my fingers. This is how we create a universe

[46:55]

so we can make an apple pie from scratch. Of course, we also have to create the notion of an apple pie, we have to create the notion of apples, and we have to create the notion of baking, so this is citta. It's not a neutral event. If you watch carefully, It's amazing how so many things, almost everything, we have some feeling or response to it. It's a little misleading here when it says, is grass and trees.

[47:57]

Yeah, grass and trees. And if you think how this comes up in some of Dogen's festivals. But here's this footnote. The mind of grass and trees describes the instinctive processes that exist in the life force itself that are prior to consciousness. I would modify that a little to say they're not prior to consciousness, but they're prior to the consciousness in which citta has stepped in and gave it all formulations. This is why I would say experience the experience you're experiencing. If you forget everything else I said this morning, I'd offer you that.

[49:07]

Experience the experience you're experiencing. As we experience, there is engagement, there's interaction. Interaction quite naturally takes us beyond the separation and thinking about and naming. Of course, experience is seminal. How else can we say the side of the creek unless ear consciousness has experienced it. But so rapidly, in a fraction of a second, citta steps in and labels it and maybe adds a few adjectives just for good measure, the soothing sound of the creek, the melodic sound of the creek, the annoying sound of the creek.

[50:20]

sitting would be so much easier and more profound and deep if it was quieter here we had a few adjectives and then we add a little commentary but at the heart of it the heart of it pradaya this process of engagement. This is an interdependent existence. As human beings, we're not only stimulated by the creek, we're stimulated by each other's actions, each other's way of being. This is what creates the connectedness of sangha.

[51:29]

This is what invites us out of a separate self. And it's a wonderful thing to watch. When do you feel connected? When do you feel... isolated, alone, lonely. I read quite recently that the British government has just set up a post called the Minister of Loneliness. And it's this person's job to, I guess, look at the issue of loneliness. Maybe they'll all practice mindfulness. The heart of being, you know, Hraddhaya Sutra, the Heart Sutra.

[52:39]

The great wisdom beyond wisdom. Wisdom beyond that which is cultivated in citta. The Great Wisdom Beyond Wisdom Heart Sutra. And then the last one, Vriddaya, Vridda, Vridda. I've been chewing on this word for quite a while, searching out, you know, because it's... Anyway, I was in India, and I had the good fortune to run into a Sanskrit scholar. And I took the opportunity to ask him about this word. And it was a little bit like, you know, you ask an expert in any field what exactly a word means.

[53:48]

And after about the second sentence, they're just... ticking off into a level of exquisite detail and cross-referencing. But I did get something out of it. Experienced and concentrated. I would say, to go back to the way I was using the word samadhi, you know, that when we make contact and immediately interrupt contact with chitta, naming it, liking it, disliking it, having a commentary about it. And now that I've said that, that reminds me of something else. And now that I've activated some of my psychological significances, let's talk about me. What could be more interesting?

[54:54]

So not so much concentrated as we usually think of it, single-minded concentration, as continuous contact. As I was saying earlier, even when you continuously contact a negative emotion, it can have a rich teaching for you. Sometimes we dip deeply into an emotion and it's like, And of course, if I have that deep feeling, I'm prompted to this kind of behavior. The insight doesn't come from figuring out. The insight comes from dipping down into Vridha. And then it bubbles up. And don't take that too literally. I certainly don't mean to be literal in that spatial reference.

[56:03]

Maybe it expands out. Sinks down. Sinks down. The continuous contact enables a depth of experiencing, an intensity of experiencing, a fullness of experiencing that's deeply informative. Citta Hraddhaya Vriddha. Yes? Paul, could you please spell those three words? Citta? Even though it sounds like it's C-H, usually it's spelt in Sanskrit. Excuse me.

[57:06]

It's starting to sound like that's Sanskrit scholar. Ask me a simple question, I'll give you a complicated answer. C-I-T-T-A. Exactly. And actually, it's a term that has a variety of meanings. But this particular one, according to Dogen, He's right in the fascicle, so he's referring to thinking mind. And then Hraddhaya, another Sanskrit word, is H-R-I-D-A-Y-A. And then Vriddha is V-R-I-D-D-H-A. What I was saying was, I was commenting on Dogen's, where he said, experienced and concentrated.

[58:17]

And I was saying, rather than concentrated, continuous contact. And then what continuous contact gives rise to is what we might call a depth of experience, or a breadth of experience, or a fullness of experience, but somehow a richness in contrast to thinking about it. And that that is informative. Hogan often says, mind is grass, trees, and walls. He does. And there's somewhere where he says, people think that mind is thinking, dreaming, imagining, knowing. He says, no, it's grass, trees, and walls. And yet here, he says it's threefold.

[59:23]

My understanding is that that particular phrase is a classic Chinese phrase. It's important to remember that, you know, to us, not knowing the classic references, we think, oh, this is, all this was crafted by Dogen. He's the original. But actually, like, Fukhan Zizengi has drawn a lot from a teaching about zazen that was written a hundred years before. And really, in a way, you could read it as a commentary on the previous teachers. But we don't know that. So when we read grass, tees, walls, tiles, and pebbles, we think, Dogen just made that up. No, it's a classic term. And he's referencing a classic term.

[60:27]

And here's part of the challenge for us. It's because Buddhism, whatever language it's involved in, you know, each language has its own convention of reality. And then Buddhism comes along and it coins its own terms out of the words. like we have the word in common language now, mindfulness. If you just go back to English, that doesn't easily represent what in Buddhist terms we've taken it to represent. And so similar with some of the phrases in Daugan's language. Just putting aside all the history of the term and just confronting it, sometimes I kind of get it, but it's a feeling of, holy shit, no, when you feel that, and there's no explaining it, and often it comes after, say, coming out of a sweat lodge or something where you've been off.

[61:48]

But then it really has impact. Yeah. And that's what I'm saying. When there is... depth, fullness of experiencing through continuous contact, it's potent. That experience has experience that the one that we, it sort of happened and we didn't quite notice, it doesn't have. Now, the one we didn't quite notice is available for that kind of contact. We don't actually have to do the whole sweat lodge to walk out and see the tree. The tree was always there, or I was always capable of seeing it. But coming out of the sweat lodge and seeing the tree, the intensity of that seeing expressed itself in a deeper experience.

[62:53]

And it's not unusual. to have a deep experience and to remember it for years and actually still have a taste of its wordless potency. I think many of us are... That's what keeps us hanging around this strange Zen thing. We've had an experience that spoke to us, that spoke to citta. And it was like, hmm, okay. You know? And then, as Mary Oliver says, call it whatever you want. You know? Call it Buddha, call it Christ, call it, you know, Great Earth, whatever you want to call it.

[63:55]

That is the nature of citta, to try to integrate it in the conventional lived experience. Otherwise, how will it inform, how will it illuminate the everyday mind, the everyday habitual way of being? that we have taken on so endearingly called me. Glenda, did you have? I was. Glenda asked me, how does the term satay relate to what I'm saying now?

[65:05]

We could say, Glenda, that as we take on these notions, as we let them cook with our intention, as we let them cook with what does practice ask of me, that we will see that being aware is a way to engage, express, and manifest what's implied by these teachings. And we could define sati as awareness, that doesn't have an agenda. Be aware of what's happening. And in some of the early suttas it will say, and the initiating point is sati.

[66:22]

And then others will say, no, no, no. First of all, you've got to clean up your act. You've got to get a little generosity in there. You've got to get a little diligence. You've got to get a little patience. And then we can get to sati. But really, these are all suggestions. They're not intended to say, this is the only way. Maybe that's a good place to stop. Any other questions before we do? Experience the experience you're experiencing. Who is experiencing? I kind of have some fault with the language. Well, change it into the language that works for you. Experience the experience that's being experienced. I guess it's just like...

[67:26]

Is it separate from what's being experienced? Citta can explore that and say, oh, well, we've got here an infinite regression or all sorts of, or, you know, let's look at Descartes' philosophy because he worked on that. There's all sorts of things citta can do. In the Zen school, we're saying, we're pointing at experiencing and letting that illuminate the nature of conditioned consciousness. And then from that perspective, we see, well, me, self,

[68:29]

It's a proposition that is being used in relationship to the nature of consciousness and it has a functionality in the conventional world and it has a limitation in that it can be used in a way that doesn't embrace hriddaya and vridda. Does that help? Kind of. It's like this morning, you know, oh, hummus for breakfast. Okay, that's conditioned mind. Breakfast hummus is an oxymoron based on the conditions of my life. And something sees that. Do I identify with... Do I identify with... I is what thinks hummus for breakfast is slightly...

[69:33]

Yes. Or we could examine it a little more. Was it the sight? Was it the taste? That stimulated pleasant or unpleasant? That stimulated associated thoughts? And as they took hold, was there... an engagement of a sense of self in all of that. Yeah. Yeah. It's just like, what's instructive about it beyond that this is just conditioned reality? Yeah. And this is the wisdom of the plate Dean of Elden brought. Dana Veldens is a priest who also writes about cooking the plate.

[70:38]

To make an apple pie from scratch, first you create the universe. You create something called hummus. You create a quality of pleasant or unpleasant, good or bad, tasty or distasteful, you create a sense of me relating to this. And if you think about it, if you think, so consciousness works, I think, interestingly enough, Western science and Buddhism align here about a sixth of a second. So in the following 10 seconds, I had 60 thoughts about that. If you can imagine, if we were thoroughly present for half of that, how incredibly informative it would be.

[72:03]

I guess I get what you're saying. Well, a sixth of a second is pretty fast. It's quite a challenge. If you can spot gaps, if you can have six experiences a second and think, but there were so many gaps, you're doing pretty good. Anything else? Okay, I will put... I'll put that copy of... Did you ever do a triple translation on this one? Hotsuburashin? No, okay. I'll put... It's K70 in Nishijima's Shobogenzo. I think in Kastanahashi's the numbering's a little bit different. And I'll weave that back in.

[73:09]

To me, when I first read that, I couldn't believe it. I thought, no, that can't be a good translation, or a correct translation. Then I read some others, and I thought, hmm, there it is. And then I got silently dismissed by Harada Tanganyahu. I'll put it on the reserve. I had intended to do this, and maybe I will in the next class. I think it's good that we stop and go back to the zendo and wash your ears out in the pure side of the creek. had intended to do a repeated question your partner you know you see you pair up with someone and that person keeps asking you the same question what does practice ask of you but maybe you can be your own partner and ask yourself or maybe you want to try it with someone

[74:34]

if you know the structure of repeated questions. If you don't, it's not about putting you into your thinking mind. It's about having you drop down into a more sort of instinctive response. And it's interesting. When you do it and you really drop down, sometimes you say something that comes as a surprise to you. You know, there's some ways in which we're quite intolerant of our own stuff. Yeah, I've heard that before. I've heard you say that before. But when we say something new, it's like, oh, okay, now I'm getting interested. What else have you got to say? What does practice ask of you? It's, you know, practice asks something of us.

[75:47]

And we're not so happy with that fact, because this part of us would much rather that it fitted nicely into our agenda. And that's why we need this. Most of us need some of the reassurance, the trust, and the composure that comes from a skillful intention. The intention that says, Okay, I'm going to commit to this. I'm not expecting it all to go well. I'm going to sit Zazen now. I'm not expecting my mind to be pristine. I'm expecting it to do all sorts of things.

[76:51]

And I sincerely intend to sit with awareness in the middle of all that. And we'll see what happens. And if it's ever anything like other times that I've said. Diligence and benevolence, they seem like they're an odd couple, but actually they're a great match. Diligence and benevolence. This is your best expression of living your life. You are the way you are because of your continual effort to meet the life you're living. Why wouldn't you be kind to a person who is like that?

[77:59]

Thank you. 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.

[78:25]

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