I vow to denounce the truth of the Tathagata's words. Good morning. Well, in the last few days, I've been doing a lot of research. It seems like there's been a change in the weather.

[01:02]

In the mornings, it's chilly. A bright and brisk fall air. And a few days ago, I was in New York, and also there, there was a chilly fall wind, and the leaves just beginning to fall from the trees. I really like the fall. Fall's my favorite time of the year, I think. I don't know what it is, but I guess the angle of the sun is different in the fall, and so the light is more mellow and richer in the fall, to my eyes. And you can feel the whole earth and all the plants and animals reacting and changing with the fall air. And yesterday, unexpectedly, it rained in the morning,

[02:11]

and there's a little patch of grass outside my house, and it seemed to just soak up the rain, and really seemed to welcome and receive the rain in a very strong way. And it looked like we were going to have a wet and cool day. But then, later on, it grew quite sunny and bright, and the grass, a little patch of grass outside the house, seemed to enjoy and receive in a very strong way. The sunshine after the rain. And it made me think about how weather is. Every day there's weather, and it really has a big influence on our lives. Weather changes all the time, every day. I wish I understood weather better.

[03:18]

A couple of years ago I tried to study up about weather by reading high school geography textbooks. And I did understand it much better, but I'd forgotten what it was I understood, which is unfortunately typical of me. So I have a vague idea that, although I don't really understand weather, it seems like weather is always a constant fluctuation of the same stuff. There's no new weather. It's the same water, and the same air, and the same wind, and the same sky, constantly going through different changes all the time, recycling and repeating, never quite the same twice. And although meteorologists and people on TV and so on study the weather, and they can know a great deal about it, I think we know a lot more about weather now

[04:22]

than we knew just a short while ago. Still, no one can encompass the total causality of weather, because it's just too inclusive. Nothing's left out of what causes weather, so nobody can really entirely predict the weather. And certainly nobody can control it. Even though we're so smart and we have all these machines and so on, we can't type in certain words and then get a certain kind of a day of weather. No matter what words we type in, the weather is going to be what it is. And the thing is that no matter what the weather is, and there's weather like hurricanes, and tidal waves, or sunny days, mild days,

[05:25]

whatever the weather is, our great Earth openly receives it without complaining. And receives it in a very strong and inclusive way. There's a sutra from the Pali Canon that says you should be like the great Earth, because you can spit on the Earth and piss on the Earth, and the Earth won't complain about it. It won't mind at all. It will just take the spit and the piss and the hurricane, and it will turn it into good use. It will fold the hurricane, or the spit, or the sunshine into the healing process that is life. And even if we human beings continue to overpopulate, and because of our greed continue to be unable to live in a normal, ordinary way, and therefore harm the Earth greatly,

[06:33]

even that very harm, the Earth will fold into the healing process of life. Because nothing ultimately can harm the great Earth. It will endure. Even if it is destroyed, as it will be destroyed at the end of this world system, still, in some form it will endure. Because existence endures. And you know why I'm saying all this about the weather, because it's just like our inner life. Our inner weather. And today, as we sit all day, we may experience various kinds of inner weather. Maybe we'll experience the warmth and sunshine of a blissful state of mind.

[07:34]

Or maybe we'll experience fear, or boredom, or avoidance, or resistance. Or tremendous pain, physical pain, or mental anguish. And just like the weather, whatever inner weather comes, it won't stay all that long. It will change. It will transform into something else. Maybe as we sit, we will begin to discern the various causes and conditions of various states of mind that arise and pass away, which is good. But even if we do understand more the causes and conditions of states of mind, we won't be able to control them, and we won't really be able to predict them. What arises will arise, and what passes away will pass away.

[08:39]

Good things will come and pass away. Difficult things also will come and pass away. This is the one thing we can be sure of in all of life. So we should try to imitate the Great Earth today as we sit. Just accepting what comes and goes without trying to control our mind, without trying to predict our mind, or understand our mind even. Simply to permit our mind and to fold whatever comes into the healing process that is our life. And that should be our effort today. Our human mind, unlike the grass, unlike the ocean, unlike the earth,

[09:48]

is greatly given to conceptualizing. And the whole world, as we know it, is the product of our conceptualizing human mind. For us, there can be no other world. So it is important to understand our world for what it actually is, and not to take our world as we see it, too literally. The past and the future are concepts. This is not to say that the past and the future don't exist. They exist in a way. They exist as concepts in our mind. And so we have to deal with them seriously, and they do influence our lives. But they are concepts. If you look for the past and the future outside your mind, you will never find them.

[10:56]

Our zazen practice takes place radically right here in the present moment, which is to say, entirely outside of time, because the present moment is also a concept. We ourselves, our ego, or our sense of who we are, these things are also concepts. So we sit. We just sit. We become more and more intimate with this just-right-now sitting, with this breath, with this posture, with all the inner and outer weather, until all of it falls away,

[12:05]

until there isn't a speck of room for anything or anyone, but just this sitting. And not even sitting, because that's a concept, too. The other day I asked someone something like, Well, are you dating anyone now? And they said, At the moment, there is no one. And I thought, that's pretty good. Pretty good zen. Pretty good zen instructions. Pretty good motto for zazen. At the moment, there is no one. No room for any conceptions whatsoever. When we really get down close with our practice,

[13:09]

there just simply isn't any room for anyone. And if in that place any conceptions should arise, like winds or rains, we just recognize them as conceptions, and we let them gently fall and moisten the soil of our lives. And what we think of as ourself, as our life, my life, my ego, is our journey, is our path. My ego is my path. And all the weather it brings into my life is just the weather that I need to grow my life. So, often we think we need to get rid of something, or somehow improve something, or change something,

[14:15]

or go beyond something. But that's to assume that that which we feel we need to get rid of, or go beyond, or change, is somehow something fixed that needs to be removed. But it's not something fixed. There isn't anything fixed that is there. There's only our path. Our very confusion and obsession is our path, is our way. So we need to fully admit it, and permit it, and sit within it. If we can do this completely enough, and honestly enough, it will heal itself. And it will produce something beautiful and unexpected,

[15:20]

just like a hurricane comes with all its destructive power, and then later you come back and there's greenery, and wonderful tropical plants growing up everywhere. So please try your best today to sit carefully, with a strong effort, but without trying to exercise control in any way. In the beginning of the period, take your time setting your posture, feeling what it's like to sit up straight, rocking back and forth, side to side, so that you get a good sense of what your posture is. With the top of the body lifted up, and the spine straight, and the head coming up toward the ceiling. And when you feel that you have carefully noticed your posture, then breathe in through your nose,

[16:23]

and breathe out through your mouth, quietly. And when you come to the end of the breath, press down, push out more air, and press down on your belly, so that you can establish the sensation of the breath in the belly, and stay with that in your sitting. After you feel the sensation of the breath in your belly, you can count your breaths. With each exhale, just one, and the next exhale, two, and so on up to ten. And if you lose count, just go back to one again. And if you feel after counting for a while that you don't want to count anymore, then you can just follow the breath in and out in the belly, or you could keep counting. If you get into it,

[17:26]

you could kind of hypnotize yourself. The breath is very mesmerizing. So if you notice that you're being kind of mesmerized, you feel like you're concentrating, but it's kind of like sleepy, or trance-like, then brighten it up by being more acute, and more aware of all the different parts of the breath, the beginning, and the end, and the middle of the exhale, and the beginning, and the end, and the middle of the inhale, so that you're seeing the whole breath, and this will wake you up. If while you're practicing this way, thoughts arise in the mind, or heart, or sensations arise in the body, you can turn toward the thought or the sensation and see what it is, without avoiding. But when you see what it is, then you just let it go and come back. You don't want to analyze it, or chase it, or speculate about it, or delight in it.

[18:29]

Just see it, and then come back. So this returning, over and over again, returning to our place, that's the practice, to return a million times, a billion times, to the breath, and the posture. And if it happens that you are able to do that, and stay with the breath and the posture very well, without much sensation or thought, then apply more energy to each breath, and question the breath. An inquiring spirit, raise up an inquiring spirit, so that each breath is crucial and alive, so this is the process, I'm just reminding you, you all know this, I know, but it seems like a good idea,

[19:31]

now that we're sitting all day, to remember this, to say all of this again. This is the way, this is the method, the non-method of Zen practice, this is the way to include everything in your life, to clarify everything for your life, and to forgive everything as your life. Now I know that sometimes people in long sittings experience pain, so I want to say a word about pain, and practicing with pain, in case that should arise. Pain is a really good aid to concentration. Pain is a part of Zazen,

[20:32]

just as pain is a part of life. It's never necessary to go searching around for pain, it'll come anyway, or not. So it's not about make pain come, it's good for you. But if pain does come, our practice is to experience pain as pain, to notice that everything else on top of pain is not pain, but is concept. An old saying in Zen refers to this as putting concepts on top of experiences, as putting a head on top of your head, which is basically how we live our lives, with heads on top of our heads, so that we never get to experience our actual head, because we have a head on top. So pain is a great opportunity

[21:36]

to just experience something as it is, pain. Pain is pain, it's very immediate, and it's very clear, it's hard to fool ourselves about it or rationalize it away, so it's a pretty good thing to work with. It's a pretty clear training ground for experiencing our whole lives, just as they are, without adding anything on top. So when pain comes, if it comes, just breathe, continue to be with your breath, don't stop breathing, don't stop being aware of your breath, particularly at those times. Then if you do that, you'll see how many thoughts your mind will produce, like, I hate this pain, why doesn't it go away,

[22:39]

why does it always have to happen to me? She's not feeling pain probably, look at him, he probably isn't feeling any pain. Or how come I always go out of control when there's pain? Many thoughts. But just keep breathing, and let those thoughts fall, and be aware also of the pain with the breath. And you'll see that pain isn't so bad, it's all the thoughts and resistances to the pain that makes the pain so much worse. If you think that the pain

[23:40]

is going to ruin your life and make it so that you'll never walk again, which is unlikely, but you might feel that. Or if it's just the pain is just unbearable, and you absolutely have to move, then you can move. But I would say to practice like this, when you come to the end of your rope, when you absolutely cannot sit there anymore, sit there for 5 more breaths, or 10 more breaths, and then after 5 or 10 more breaths, very gently move. And you'll live your life in those 5 or 10 breaths. Believe me, a lot about how you live your life in those 5 or 10 breaths. So I recommend that as a practice for you, in case lots of pain comes up. Wednesday night in my Dharma talk

[24:47]

I brought up a saying of Dungsan. Once he said, There is a person who in the midst of a thousand or ten thousand people neither turns his back nor faces a single person. Now you tell me, what face does this person have? There is a person who in the midst of a thousand or ten thousand people neither turns his back nor faces a single person. Now you tell me, what face does this person have? And Yunchu answered, I'm going to the Zen Do. So this is a wonderful dialogue between these two great Zen ancestors. And to me, when I hear these words,

[25:49]

it reminds me that our practice is really the practice of love and devotion. Pure devotion and pure love. Which means that we never turn our back on a single thing, inside or outside. No matter what we receive or don't receive from others. We never turn our back on them. Because we love not to be loved in return but simply for the sake of loving. To love, to be devoted to something, someone, to everyone, to everything is its own reward. And if we love in this way, completely, without expectation, never turning our back,

[26:50]

we ourselves will benefit enormously from this, no matter what anyone gives us or doesn't give us in return. Because there always will be a sense of joy and fulfillment in our lives. So as Deng Xian says, we never turn our back but we never face a single person. It's like a person said to me, at the moment there is no one. We turn toward everyone, never turning back, but in the intimacy of the actual moment of our lives there is always no one. Because our lives are just too close for anyone separate. In the intimacy of our lives

[27:56]

we find all the kinds of weather that there can be. And in each raindrop there is all of the rain and all of the rain and there is snow and there is sunshine and there is drought too. That's the nature of weather and that's the nature of our love. Another time a monk asked Deng Xian, if a snake were swallowing a frog what would be the consequence of rescuing it or not rescuing it? Deng Xian said, if you were to rescue it you would not be seeing with your two eyes

[28:56]

and if you were not to rescue it shapes and shadows would no longer be manifest. If a snake were swallowing a frog what would be the consequence of rescuing it or not rescuing it? If you were to rescue it then you would not be seeing with your two eyes and if you were not to rescue it shapes and shadows would no longer be manifest. So this is a very deep and wonderful answer to a very, very important question for our lives. Today we're sitting but tomorrow we'll get up from our seat and what are we going to do? If we think we can do something we won't be seeing with our two eyes because we will be missing the essential fact

[30:01]

of all of life that whatever is done will be undone whatever is made will be unmade whatever lives will die what goes up comes down. This is the deep underlying pattern of all of life. So how can we live with this fact? Really deeply being aware of this fact all the time. Will we be discouraged? Think that nothing's worth doing? Will we retreat from life just sitting on our cushions in our temples in our zendos cleaning and ignoring the world? This is impossible. Not that it's not a good idea it simply can't be done. If we were to act like this the whole world would fail to appear

[31:03]

because the world appears only because we appear and act out the energy of our lives. So we must act, we must go forward we must dance with the energy of our lives and we need to do this with our eyes open aware of our limitations aware of what the world really is forgiving the world and ourselves completely and acting out of devotion and love, come what may. It seems to me such a very, very unlikely thing that we should be together today like this, practicing

[32:04]

in this zendo. If you go to the mountains and look up in the sky and see the stars sometimes I'm startled, you know because you don't see that many stars around here because of all the lights but when you go into the mountains it's almost bizarre how many stars there are in the sky. When I was in the mountains in August I remember how many stars I didn't remember there were that many stars but there's tremendous numbers of stars up there huge distances galaxies on galaxies this is a big universe nobody knows how big it is it doesn't even compute in terms of concepts of big or small and in this measureless universe is our little planet

[33:08]

tiny little piece of dust spinning around with about 5 or 6 billion people on it a little crowd of us huddled together on this little dust moat still misunderstanding each other still not seeing each other, it's unbelievable, you know and among those 5 or 6 billion people there's just a few of us sitting together today so it's very unlikely that this would happen it's surprising, precious so I just want to say

[34:13]

to remind myself of that and to remind you of that what a precious and unlikely possibility this is that we're enjoying today and I personally feel very grateful that it has turned out that way in this particular day I feel like it's a great piece of luck and I feel very privileged and grateful that this one precious day that in a trillion, gazillion billion, quadrillion copulas will never ever come again this day so I appreciate that that we can sit together today, peacefully in the endlessness of time and space so thank you very much for your attention

[35:17]

and I hope that my words have not disturbed your zazen too much may our intention

[35:31]

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