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ah am i mom in fishers dividing the wednesday night tax to dog in two different festivals have dug in to and
i am
well sad
this ah i thought ah i'd like to do that too i'm not one of the fast cause of shovel again so bad from another book podcast
java games are swim on t which is a collection of
tox that out and gave
ah kind of like this evening talks they often seen in the our beginnings in an evening talk and sad and then and then that the damn attack is he is sam
as set forth and the person who wrote this down with devil's disciple con angel di or show would chant every morning and he was one of dozens first disciples and his successor his damn a hair one of his time my ass
ah
so he would this is how i imagine it this was before dogan had established a hey ah
a haiti oh hey monastery and he had come back from china after
being dissatisfied with the practice in japan he had gone with his teacher meal was in to china to study and down find the way and there he met regime his teacher and we seek our transmission from him and then came back to japan but for a number of years he didn't really have
off his own practice place he went from place to place and they must finally given kind of dilapidated old
our temple and he renovated and building the meditation hall there and that became a new temple kind of like us a temple within a temple and he began to practice then people began to come to him to practice and there was about fifty monks who are
wow steady with him practice together and this isn't about at twelve
ah twelve thirty eight or something like that
so you can imagine these fifty monks so in their teacher together in this our monastery practicing and and an evening talk is given in his disciples writing it down in to to remember since there's no tapes right at that time
so this is one of the first books thistle the this translation is term cleary and it came out a baby and eighty sir nineteen eighty but there was an earlier version of this and the title in english was primer which i always pronounced his primary but a primer or soto zen
was one of the earliest books you could get about zen
and i read that very early so imprinted on me very strongly
ah
s sam
you know ways to practice and what to look out for him ah
goggins very seventies very intimate conversations with his monks so
the audience or monks there are again but i think it it actually speaks to a situation here very well on
and how we practiced together
so it also under mention that i was recently interviewed by someone who's writing their dissertation on
it's kind of complicated but one of the aspects of it is what is a mature sense to him
our practitioner and we had a very interesting conversation trying to piece out what are you know is you know as soon as you try to tease out qualities of course you see that those are not anything to hold onto either but what makes a mature student
what tom
so i'm
some maturity is how ripeness are being developed
and i feel like these stories and these are short talks to the community that dog gave our at the thrust of them is to develop and mature his students
so i just have a selection of of ones that i wanted to read and then
oh parts and then make some comments
i can see here
so the first one is is pointing to not clinging to ideas in all these things i think we've heard many many times and but when we hear them again i find it always very refreshing and encouraging to hear
there was teachings it's like the sweetness of the dharma ah it's sweet every time you hear it so
the first one really get it some it points to difficulties that we have nowadays too even though this is from the to one hundred spread it says some
ah but it starts at one day he said and and then it says he also said just because discipline behavior and vegetarian diet
is to be maintained yet if you therefore insist upon these as fundamentally as i think i have to have the lights up a little bit i'm sorry thank you
echo is echoing should turn the volume down a it
can you hear me okay without but about okay
so this about vegetarian diet and kind of clinging to these you know pure pure food and behavior just because discipline behavior and vegetarian diet is to be maintained yet if you therefore insist upon these as fundamental established them as practice and think that you can thereby a
hey the way this is also wrong
do not take this to be fundamental just because it is a good thing
ah yet and then of course right away yeah i do not mean to say that you should therefore violate precepts and be self indulgent to cling in such a manner is an erroneous view it is that of an outsider meaning someone who is now practicing the way so i think what is
point two is clinging to any thing and attached to it and
it reminded me of fun
suzuki roshi this cute cricket cucumber between a lot of you're reading here
was not very fond of all the food trips that we're going on
it has her at the time where you could and couldn't eat and very very strong ideas about brown rice and and what should be served in not in
so there's this wonderful part where he some there's a cabinet has to be moved it has a higher one of the pine cap on mean a wooden cabins was moved from one place to another and it was a major job it paul this girl was the on
master carpenter and he rigged everything up and they had rollers and they had machines and people were yelling directions and whereas all this stuff going on and and the quote from suzuki or she is
i hate food trips but i love work trips
so
is some you know being aware that he really this is what he like really was attached to it he was out there excited with everybody else is this cabin was pushed down the
the middle of us are created for trips and
so i think come it's just just pointing it out this this kind of fun
it's not that were don't have a vegetarian diet here when it's not like well let's now eat meat but it's being attached to it as if
did you know notions of holier than now or we're doing right and others are doing wrong and in those kinds of ideas
become hindrances
ah
so another point is some
when he talks about as concentrating on one thing
ah
let's see

i think i'll skip that one and and talk about this one which is how we talk to each other in the monastery and how you how we help each other when we noticed that you know there's a mistake or something so he it says in an evening talk he said do not
use foul language to chastise and be little monks even if it is an evil and incompetent person do not scorn that scorn that person or vilify them without consideration in the first place no matter how bad they may be read more than four monks are assembled this
is the community of monks or that this is the saga
i'm thinking of monks as a as a term that includes just a practitioner the way we kind of use it is
not necessarily mail but
leading the monks life lady of bleeding a monastic life
when more than four monks are assembled this is the community of monks the saga and is an important treasure of the nation
so if your disciples are out of line or your fellow practitioners you should teach and guide them with a compassionate heart a kind heart and this has translated as this is the translation of ah
the heart of a grandmother or an old woman
him

and then he goes on to tell this story about rooting his teacher which was one of the earliest stories that i heard which was
ah his teacher was all by the time he was a practicing with him and he would go around and in the meditational and if the monks were sleeping we talked about this in the practice period tita the difficulties with drowsiness and sleepiness and and he would hit them with his slipper
her yet
sometimes this you were meditations slippers and and he would web web web web on the backs of his monks
to chastise them and and as dogan or as a buildings quoted as saying they were glad to be beaten and they praised him
me so so this all teachers finally he said this one's to his ah
his disciples i'm already advanced in age and by now i should have taken leave of the community and gone to live in hermitage by myself and just taking care of my old age but in order to shatter the delusions of each of you and to transmit the way i am acting as abbott
therefore a sometimes bring forth words of chastisement and i do things like beat you with a stick he also used to stick for this i have great trepidation nevertheless
it is the way to uphold the standard of the teaching in place of the buddha oh brethren please extend your compassion to forgive me for this
so this this image of this old guy feeling like it mattered so much that he shattered the delusions and help these
how young practitioners or young or old but these practitioners wake up that you hit them with this slippery even know he was kind of ghetto pen of tired and knowing that
can also feeling like this trepidation and doing it but philly him he must and please forgive me

and then there's a needless to say it is wrong to point out other shortcomings and blame them for their faults when you are not such a person yourself
we should watch out very carefully when you see the error of another if you think it is wrong and compassionately wish to guide that person we should employ tacked to avoid angering that person and should contrived to appear to be talking about something as
else
and to me that some
it's a wonderful you know
skill in means to it and cook a cucumber it talks about suzuki roshi often saying something to to you that seem like he was talking about somebody else but somehow it really hit home for you but so he had this way of
to saves having to seventy in your hearing or in a lecture that was meant for you but
and he also said you know he might want to hit this one mississippi should be to hit the one closest to him but it was meant for you and it's all the same anyway
so this kind of feeling
so you should contrived to appear to be talking about something else and that allows people to be able to hear it and haven't come and deeply without defending you know against ah against it it comes in kind of another way
ah
let's see
now this one i i found very helpful
ah which is
well read it in an evening talk he said the basis for understanding talk about xin in the school of the ancestors is to take the mind which thinks it already knows and revise it step by step in accordance with the words of the
a teacher
so ah this
ah you know
if you're aware of your mind you find yourself sometimes thinking now
yeah i already know all that you know i don't want to eat or
you know kind of reaping ahead to what you already know so that you can't hear what somebody say or what you're reading because you're already putting in your own two cents so kind of leaping forward with the mind
so
taking this mind which thinks it already knows and revise it step by step in accordance with the teacher and then there's this example you think you know who the boot is and shocking madeira meta a boot or something and yet if your teacher should say that buddha is a frog or away
worm you should believe that frogs and worms are buddha and should abandon your former understanding
however students of recent times cling to their own emotive views and based themselves or their own opinions thinking that buddhahood must indeed be such and such a way if it is something different from what they themselves think they say it can't be that way as long as they are
wandering a delusion seeking something which resembles their own emotional judgments most of them make no progress and and the put away
so
you know for me often hearing something i find myself fighting it you know like it doesn't make sense that can't be true and and also on
trying to keep it out and or so this is pointed to as a pair of this emotional emotional cleaning out that emotions are
what we're trying to get rid of emotions but to take the mind that thinks it knows and is clinging to what it thinks is right and revise it you don't let it shift slowly slowly
and what what this reminded me of as once when i first started practicing actually i haven't been to a yet and i was in the city i think it was working the kitchen for a session and the tensile whose name was beverly beverly white and she'd been to tassajara so she was an older student i think she'd been there for a year
and now
so she was pouring cereal from the part into a storage container a steam steam steam container steamer and i was supposed to hold and help and scrape so i'm watching in she's completely calm and moving very slowly and point
and i'm and with doing this with her and and i will say is not going to fit it's going to flow over it's going to flow over watch out it's good a floor and she looked over at it fit perfectly when right up great to the top with a little space she knew what she was doing and i was very involved in what i thought was right and
my opinion a better tell her and
ah so at that moment i saw how this mind of you know also in there was wanting to be right and wanting to be in charge and just a whole bunch of stuff you know
and she quietly know scraped or of no sheep she looked to me and said would you please be quiet
as it she said would you please be quiet
if they had done it stop me
so the mine that's attached to what it knows
and
one's own opinions and views and emotions and base everything on that you know it's a kind of closed can have mine
so
ah
so this is this is back to concentrate on one thing that i was young
so often we as i feel like we're so fortunate to be ah at a practice place
practicing together in the practice period or
ah you know involved in supporting a practice period and
by effort that it took to get here to arrange our lives to make the space to commit ourselves to this
you know and then when we finally get here you know there's a cell by our my dad you know and wanting to panic get out of it somehow
i'm in various ways you know
so
what he's pointing out here is doing one thing
and
it's as even worldly people meeting not ordain people are not practitioners and monastic situations rather than even worldly people rather than steady many things at once without really becoming accomplished in any of them should just do one thing well and steady enough to be able to do it either
even in the presence of others
i prefer that you know it reminded me of tea ceremony where you practice and practice in your class and then at a certain point it's time for you to make tea for a real not just in a class situation for a t gathering and to be ah to have studied
the
and be able to do it even in the presence of others and
and that goes for other things he dumps being dough on or other kinds of things in the temple but down
i'll go on our natures of the
so if even worldly people know that you know to to steady one thing and put your energy said one thing rather than dilettantes this where your you dabble a jack-of-all-trades and do a lot of little things here and there to actually pull your energies into doing one thing and then in buddha dharma it's the say
same way
in this exalted in far reaching buddha dharma if one takes on too many things at once it will be impossible to perfect even one thing even concentrating solely on one thing those whose faculties and capacity or doll by nature will have difficulty in thoroughly mastering it
strive students to concentrate on one thing alone
and then he's asked a question about what that one thing might be to devote yourself to and he says sitting meditation
so
you know this
i would say that for
for us our concentration is on sitting meditation but often that's one of the first things to r
to be dropped you know
as a more comfortable we are sitting the more we the longer we've been here there's sometimes for some people there's feels like there's more leeway in in dropping the one thing and lots of other things become very interesting and very
i draw our attention so at least in the practice period i feel like
to make that a priority to really make that a priority and you know there's the some practice of if you're ill if you're sick to not go to work
and but if you can get up for anything get up to go to the sand i get up for thousand and service if you can and then go back to bed and this is sometimes very hard if iran if you're a regular staff member and your part of the crew there depending on you
and you're trying to hold up your end of the the work it can be very hard to do that is kind of but in the previous period i just wanted to say that to make the emphasis years as a practice and forgo the work
and that's it that's a kind of out of tulsa heartbreakers period
a protocol or whatever ah that that's what suggestion
so just do one thing when i say one thing i mean we're doing all sorts of things all day long but the for yourself in this way to one thing because the practice period goes by very very fast you may never have another practice period really and
you've made such an effort to be here and ashley not only in the prefer to be a green gulch
how
so i if i had slippers maybe i go around and say don't waste time and let's not waste time while our here
oh
because life goes by so swiftly and we never know what's gonna happen next
and he talks about that
impermanence

so as i thought after thought does not linger day after day flows away the swiftness of impermanence is a fact right before our eyes you need not wait for the teachings of a master or written scriptures thought afterthought
without making plans for the next day thinking only of the present day the present our since the days to come are extremely indefinite and impossible to know you should only think of following the way of buddha of buddha's just for today as long as you're alive to follow the way
of buddhist means to abandon bodily life and carry out various activities for the sake of the flourishing of the teaching in the benefit of living beings
so
you know our tendency to get caught up in
what's come in what's gonna happen or do and and so this brings back to concentrating on that which is before you
down to thought afterthought or moment after more we say we hear moment after moment so often that it's almost like a jingle bells jingle jingle
our slogan are some things i yeah yeah yeah i heard that moment of torture it's so i'm overused you know but i actually like thought afterthought does not linger day after day flows away the swiftness of impermanence is a fact right before our eyes that kind of quality if you
you can if we can bring that into our daily life
ah
i think this will all feel that actually they'll be there will feel that

let's see
hum
this some
this is a point where he makes actually in several these little faster than at festivals little little talks he he really stresses this point in and i think we know it as you know no traces you know you've heard that before if you leave the kitchen if you're going to make a snack with no traces
ah
and down
so this is bringing it further i think in an evening talk he said in the present time most people both the world links and those who have left the world i concern that others know when they do something good and hope that others do not know when they do something bad
because of this there develops a lack of harmony between inside and outside
be sure to harmonize inside and outside repenting of mistakes hiding real virtue and not adorning outward appearance when must maintain a spirit of attributing good things to others while taking bad things upon oneself
so i think you know we can all resonate with that feeling that we have of wanting people to
not know about our
vaults and and
blind spots and undeveloped areas and wanting people to know about our virtue in her goodness and actually going so far as to hide the bad stuff or the unwholesome and in promoting the wholesome stuff you know
and
the he goes on to say
it he's not saying that you should display bad behavior if you do bad behavior to show okay everybody you now know i'm i do these and wholesome things but down
where he suggests is that you you know you don't
put forth for everybody our the good you've done but but you do bring forth your faults and repent you know we have our repents you actually come for them and say and we have this practice you know
the in a very kind of town
mild way where the dough honor someone who's in service or doing the temples the sounds of the day for the temple and if you make a mistake like you rang the bell to later you forgot or and everybody was late to the sender or those kinds of things there's actually a practice which you've noticed of saying
i bring this fourth and apologizing at work meeting in bringing forth this is very mild but it actually i think it's appreciated and rather than hiding it in
we're being defensive you know well it wasn't my fault you should have told me or whatever we do to to get of deflect that
ah
as you faced moment and meet the situation you should just consider all things for the sake of the flourishing of the teaching and for the benefit of living beings which he said before so when so if you're doing something and you're doing it so that other people can see and
and say and
graduate you or whatever
then there's this gaining ideal that's all laced into that and it is this harmonious and actually has an and harmonious even though the thing you are doing in and of itself was a fine thing it's ah
it has traces known as these traces so
suzuki roshi has a wonderful story about
hiding the good
when he was at commissar university he
had been a monk in living in monastic situation and he went to the university and lived in a dorm
and he took it upon himself he had this practice of getting up early before everybody else and cleaning the bathrooms
which he said really it was like soldier so do job in the men's room but it was he wanted to find out what is pure of way seeking mind was pure meeting not tainted by this dualistic thinking you are gaining idea so
so he put this great effort into getting up early making sure nobody was up but if the light was on for his
the head of the school who stayed in the dorm area during the week that he wouldn't do it and it was very boy was really
he says later attached to this having pure way seeking mind but then it began to trouble them why am i trying to hide do i really want to be found out do i really wish he would see me doing this cleaning in the morning and his his mind was just reeling with was he pure was a pure was an mp
you're and did he want to do this or not
so this whole thing broke open for him in a psychology class at the university where the teacher said
it is impossible to get a hold of and know your past mind
and so your effort to do that like to have this way this pure mind that he had that he felt he had before if you tried to get ahold of that now there is no way you could do that and ah you can thoughts do not linger you cannot hold onto them so so he said it was like a and ny
i meant what he said where he was freed from having to worry about pure impure where they will seat or not he just did it for the sake of doing it just cleaned bathrooms they need to be cleaned just do it so he'd he dropped
this concern and and it didn't matter to him more whether he was it or not seen her
so
this hiding
heidi go era
bringing forth that good stuff and we we often don't even realize how we're kind of trotting out
how good we are
i talked about that a little bit on saturday a great sticking it thumb and pull out of them sticky num falmouth pull out of plum and say what a good boy am i that kind of billy say what a good girl my
l
so
so we do things for the sake of bodhidharma for the sake of the teaching for the sake of our practice and that's it and there's ah that's this teaching over and over which
we have to ponder that you know what that means in our daily life
so
this is about boredom which i i thought was very helpful also

so he's talking about practice and study purchase realize that practice and study are fundamentally the buddha way itself without any object of seeking even if in your heart you want to do things
greg the unwholesome deeds of the world do not do them and do not weary or take notice of the boredom of the practical exercises of the study of the way and the basis of this practice cultivating it single mindedly it is when you carry on without any quest from your own mind even as to fulfill
killing the way or obtaining the result that you would be in conformity with the principle that you should not seek outwardly
so
bringing up boredom during these practices over and over and over and this board may come up and so his is encouraging them to just go for without the often boredom
if we're not board often it's because their self interests involved were looking for something for us that that really interests us or we want it for ourselves that's what's kind of feeling it so when when board of as arising there's there's non seeking as well we're not so interested we're not looking outside
and this boredom arises usually what we do is try to if we're bored get rid of it it is quickly as possible in any way we can write but this is looking at boredom as
some closeness to what it might be like to not be seeking outward what is that
and if you stay with boredom what we call boredom
there may be some other qualities there that new fresh that's not constantly working in seeking so i think part of you know the repetition over and over of the schedule in the rounds of the day in the services and all this the boredom okay in long settings and so forth did not weary or two
take notice of the boredom
of the practical exercise of the study the way and the basis of this practice cultivating a single mindedly it is when you carry on without any quest from your own mind so this question
getting things for yourself to our boredom kind of is dropping them
hey getting bored
see

this when i remember really this
you know years ago one day he said basically says there was a zen master named such and such and there was a man who had grasped the truth and awakened to the way and his practice and attainment excelled even that of the elder even the i think the am the one person who was reading the temple doesn't say abbott says the elder so
one night this this practitioner who excelled went to the abbess quarters of must have been the am it burned incense bowed and said please allow me the head seat of the rear hall
at that time the sand missed a bad time the zen master this abbott wept and said since the time i was a novice i have never heard such a thing is this
for you are meditating monk to seek the head seat or the position of great elder is a serious mistake
you have already awakened to the way better than i have but as you're seeking for the head seat for the sake of advancement if i were to allow you you could be allowed even the fred hollow the position of great elder your attitude is base and ignoble and so on and so forth anyway i remember that being the impression that mm
made at me
of
now this is a particular kind of country and i think now someone's interested in doing something they may come forth the a and i'd really like to be
you know head carpenter whatever in and that you have ideas about it and you'd like to get a cool and so this happens you know but but also what happens is it maybe some of you have experienced this that
you are we are excelling in one way or another in either a job offer
practice and and then
it creeps into that is wanting to be wanting acknowledgement and so that
i think the part that really hit me was that he wept at that time the zen master wept he because here is this primo students in other student who and yet there is this gaining idea that was
this harmonious so i don't as i'm saying this i i don't want to 'em
put a damper on anybody ever coming forward and say it volunteering to do something i'd like to that please volunteer to be had cheated and all these different things but to just have that spirit this to understand this spirit and how
asking to be the head butt head ct and i asked him to be you don't make me they had monk please
rather than it it it's a
what is it i feel like it's a family way or something family way meeting this way that we've inherited of waiting to be asked and allowing other people to acknowledge rather than coming forward like praising self at the expense of others or something so it's
i don't mean to criticize anybody here who has ever come forward and asked but i just i just know how strongly that imprinted me as a new student
and i think this is the last one that i wanted to share
oh
this is a quote
two things one day he instructed
familiarity this as an ancient said and i'm not sure that's confusion or because often it would say zen master to of ancient this brother ways is from koko the gorilla
which arrived in the mail today it's love by cocoa
coco's painting it's nice that
neon er koko the gorilla yes
who doesn't know cocoa
coco is am a gorilla that been was at the san francisco zoo and has been taught sign language asl our guide combination i guess and she am
you know there's all sorts of this is fund-raising she did this for fundraising period way
the
yeah that create everything anyway this wonderful conversation she has with
you know like then they're like zen dialogs where you as cocoa what she thinks it and she'll say she says whatever comes into her bag she has no kind of social constraints she just
anyway
i want your purse yeah she just she's very direct direct communication
so and they're trying to get a preserve for her in way and michael the other one the other gorilla that's
so they've been fundraising for a long time in its
yeah
so that the oh this some i think we are many of us are familiar with the courtroom suzuki roshi about if you walk in the rain you get drenched but it's an outside if you walk in the fog it's slowly seeps in so come on could be so this is from dogan
familiarity with good people is like walking through mist and do although they do not drench your garment in time it becomes imbued with moisture
what this means to say is that if one becomes well acquainted with the good without realizing it
one becomes a good person
meditation as well if you do it for a long time you will spontaneously become suddenly aware of the great matter and should know that sitting meditation is the correct entrance
so that image of walking in the midst of the fog you know suzuki roshi in getting the garments went through and through down to the skin rather than just drenched from the outside this is drenched through and through i i think i do get some other time i remembered that it was
as i found out that it was dogan who had said that or that it was a quote from job but anyway just found this today and want to read that
so
this is also the importance of having good friends you know kalyana metres good friends because use it when you spend time with good friends or anybody you you become influenced end it seeps in so
and the last when i wanted to read i think this is the last one
is just as you know we just had this new student entrance and that new student amps shoe so hedman entering summary just the other day so here's for this monastery that just opened up on january twenty eighth twelve thirty six dog at first requested me a job to occupy the first seat been in
a headlock kosher temple thus after an informal meeting he first asked me as hedman to take up the whisk and preach i was the first head monk of kosher temple
i just felt so connected with what they're doing since we just did this so this is the quote from nobody says now this temple invites its first head monk and today for the first time with the taking up of the whisk meaning the teaching be carried out do not worry how small the car
aggregation is did not be concerned that you are a beginner at fan young there were only seven or eight people and at ja schon there were no more than ten nevertheless they each carried out the way of buddhists and ancestors this was called the flourishing of the monasteries
so
are you know whether the practice period is large
the or if we're comparing it to other ones larger or smaller than other ones or if there is
ah less people in the zendo than we would like even so did not be concerned with the size and
somebody else can be concerned about where those people who are but for each person who's practicing if it's not your responsibility to track where people are to not nappy concerned just now
ah know that even a small group practicing together like that
is carrying out
buddhists way
do not worry just don't worry about it just completely practice ah thorough yourself and that will be the flourishing of the dharma
when i was once visiting category roshi who was they are but of minnesota zen center
some people from zen center came san francisco cents that are visited there to talk with him
effort to invite him to be abbott for a year with us and we went to thousand in the morning and there was three of us and like three think they're about three other people and he came down he did full morning greeting he you know walking around this room with alves six of us or whatever
did a full service he just conducted himself it didn't matter if there is one too if nobody was there he was completely ah
practicing the way
oh and you could feel that the dharma was flourishing there
ah not dependent on numbers so i hope we could have that spirit here as well
thank you very much
me