This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good morning, everyone. Good morning, especially to the young people who are here. Today is the first Sunday of the month, and as we do each first Sunday, the first part of my talk is specifically for the younger members. And today, I'm going to talk about something very particular, because today is a very special day. Who knows what today is? Yes. Today is Buddha's birthday.

[01:01]

Absolutely correct. Today is the Buddha's birthday. Today is the day that we celebrate Buddha's birthday. And as we all know, birthdays are one of the great days of the year. Yay! Yay for birthdays. Yay for Buddha's birthday. And Buddha... was the guy, because of him, that's why we're all here today, because of his birth and his life and what he did in his life and so on, that's why we're here. So it's a really special day for us, Buddha's birthday. So I'm going to tell you the story of Buddha's birth. He was born a long, long, long time ago, like way before you were born, way before your parents were born, way before your grandparents were born, your grandmothers and grandfathers, way before even I was born, which is really a long time ago.

[02:22]

That's when Buddha was born. And he was born in a different part of the world all the way around on the other side of the globe in India. Thank you. In the northern part of India is where he was born. So the story starts in the northern part of India where there was a small kingdom and the queen of that kingdom, her name was Queen Maya. She was married to King Suddhodana. And Queen Maya was pregnant. She was going to have a baby. So... One day, while she was pregnant, she went to take a nap.

[03:24]

Because being pregnant is... hard work, actually, and very tiring. So she went to take a nap during the day and she had a dream. Now, before I can go further with the story, I have to ask you something, which maybe you all know, which is about elephants. Some people know, even before I ask that question, So you all know elephants, right? How many people have seen a real live elephant, like in the zoo? Like in the zoo or someplace? On the savanna? How many of you have seen an elephant? Almost everybody. And has everybody who hasn't seen a real live elephant seen an elephant like on TV or in a movie or something like that? Everybody, so everybody knows about elephants, right? OK, so elephants have horns that are called tusks.

[04:29]

How many tusks does an elephant have? Now, I know a lot of you know the answer to this. So when I count to the number three, you tell me the number of tusks that the elephant has. One, two, three. Two. Two tusks, exactly. A regular elephant has two tusks, which are these big, long horns that come out of its mouth, I think. Anyway, somewhere around there. They're like teeth. They're like giant teeth. They're similar to these teeth that we have, except much more gigantically bigger than that. So a regular elephant has two tusks. And how big is an elephant? Yes. Do you want to say how big an elephant is? That's right. That's right. It's like way up there. Like if I stood up and I reached my hand up high, that's how tall an elephant would be.

[05:35]

And somebody said they weigh about four tons, which is right. So four tons is like, I'm not sure of the math, but four tons is like 40 people maybe. Like, if you took 40 people and one elephant, it would be about the same? Well, that's true. If it was a baby, it would be different. But we're talking about adult elephants. So we have to specify adult elephants. The reason I'm asking about this and asking about adult elephants is because Queen Maya, when she took a nap, she had a dream. And in her dream, a gigantic elephant. appeared, a dream elephant. This elephant didn't have two tusks. This elephant had six tusks, three on each side. And the usual elephant is that tall. This elephant was much bigger than that and much heavier than that.

[06:39]

It was like a super elephant. It was like a super dream elephant that Queen Maya had in her dream. Now, elephants are known for being wise animals. They're very wise because they live a long time. They live about the same length of time as humans, but they have very large ears. And because they have large ears, they listen. And if you listen, to the way the world is, and to other people, and to other animals, and you listen for a long time, the result of that is that you become wise. So this super elephant was like super wise on top of everything else. Now I got one more thing. Not only was this elephant unusual in these ways, but the elephant in its trunk, in her trunk, she was carrying a giant lotus flower. Lotus flowers are really, really beautiful flowers.

[07:46]

And the unusual thing about a lotus flower is that it doesn't grow in the ground. It grows out of muddy water. That's the environment that a lotus flower really likes, is to grow in muddy water. A lotus flower looks at muddy water and says, oh, yum, I want to grow up there. Most of us look at muddy water and say, yuck. And that is exactly the point because this very beautiful thing called the lotus flower grows in this stuff that most of us don't think is so beautiful called muddy water. So this dream elephant with the lotus flower got closer in the dream, in Queen Maya's dream, got closer and closer and closer. and closer to Queen Maya, and then disappeared right into her, melted right into her.

[08:51]

So that she, well, actually what happened then is when she woke up, she went to a dream interpreter. There were people around in those days, if you told them what your dream was, they would tell you what it meant. So she went to a dream interpreter and said, Well, the dream interpreter said, because this fabulous thing happened to you in the dream, you're going to have a child who will be very wise, like that elephant in your dream, and very beautiful, like the lotus flower in your dream, and very compassionate, very kind to other people. So that was the beginning of it. Then... Does anyone know how long a mom is usually pregnant before they give birth? The usual length of time. Yes. Nine months is the usual length of time. So there are many unusual things about Buddha's birth.

[09:53]

And now you're going to get another one, which is that his mom was pregnant for 10 months. And it was only after 10 months that Buddha came into the world. So You can imagine that Queen Maya was very ready for Buddha to come into the world carrying around that baby for 10 months. She was on her way home. She was actually going to visit her mom and dad. And she stopped in this beautiful grove of trees. And during this very quiet time, she held on to a tree, held on to the limb of a tree, and Buddha was born. Shakyamuni Buddha was born. He wasn't called Shakyamuni Buddha at that time. He had a different name at that time. Gautama, his name was. But that's when he was born. When he was born, flower petals of all different kinds of flowers fell from the sky.

[10:59]

And jewels like rubies and diamonds and gold bracelets and sapphires and cornelians and all kinds of things and they fell all of those jewels fell from the sky they didn't hit anybody though they just fell and they were just around so that everything was just extremely beautiful and not only that but two sparkling streams of water fell from the sky and washed the baby buddha and queen maya and later Because of that, because of the flowers falling from the sky and the streams, what's that? Tea? Green tea? No. But you've got the right idea. Because of that, because of that, that's why later when we have a ceremony, we're going to each have a chance to pour sweet tea over the Buddha because it's like that, that we're going to do that.

[12:05]

So you should know that actually we're not sure if all of those things really happened. You know, flowers and jewels from the sky and streams of water. We're not sure. But the reason why that's in the story is because every mom and dad feels that way when Babies are born. I'm getting choked up because that's the way I felt when my wife had two babies, not at the same time, five years apart. It felt like, and that's the way your moms and dads felt when you were born.

[13:13]

Just like... Just like it's the greatest thing in the world. So that's what happened when Buddha was born. And then also what happened is that four guardians appeared. four big, big guys, you know, like the Avengers, or, you know, like really strong, like Thor, right? In the Avengers, four really strong, big guys appeared, and they stood in each of the four directions, north, south, east, and west. The four guardians stood in each of the four directions, and the four guardians thought to themselves, each of them thought... I will not allow any harm to come to Queen Maya or to the baby Buddha.

[14:16]

And that also is just like us, because we need our parents and our grandparents and our uncles and aunts and fake uncles and fake aunts and teachers and all kinds of people to protect us when we're small so that we can grow up to be good people. and strong people. That's the way it works. Okay, I'm almost done. It's getting to be a long story because a lot happened. So the last thing I'll talk about is that with the four guardians and the four directions, all the flowers and jewels and the stream and everything, the next thing is that Buddha, when he was born, unlike the rest of us, knew how to walk and knew how to talk right away. Usually it takes a year or two years, but for Buddha it was right away, so he took seven steps and he pointed up to the sky with his right arm and he pointed down to the earth with his left arm.

[15:25]

And he said, below the heavens and above the earth, I am now here. So later you'll see there's a statue where he's doing, he said something, he didn't say exactly that, but something like that. You'll see a statue of him and then you'll get to pour tea over him. You already saw it. Some people already saw it. So that's the story of Buddha's birth for now. And now Patty and Alf and Chelsea and are going to go with the kids and do things. And you kids are going to go away, and we'll see you in a little while. OK, thank you. Thanks for coming. Each year we've been having, for many years, we had a pageant in which a poem written by Norman Fisher, more poetically describing the very events that I was just talking about with the kids.

[16:38]

The poem is read out loud and then enacted by the Green Gulch mostly resonant community with dancing and all kinds of stuff. And it usually is on what used to be the lawn, which now is a rather roughly shaped pile of dirt over there. So I'm not sure... whether we will bring back the pageant next year, but this year it was too much to try to imagine doing it. So we're just going to, after the talk, we're just going to have a briefer ceremony. And remind me, in case I forget, when we finished the talk, Alf asked, I don't know if he spoke with you, to... let them know that we're done with the talk so that they can prepare things.

[17:38]

There were a lot of kids, huh? My goodness. Lots of kids. They are really adorable, worthy of being adored. Sometimes. I mean, most of the time. Most of the time. So, let's see. So, in the Buddhist calendar, the Buddhist celebratory calendar, there's a big event. at this time of year, in the spring, Buddha's birthday, and another big event in the middle of winter, celebrating or remembering Buddha's enlightenment.

[18:52]

Can you hear me all the way back there? Are you okay? Good. So during December, usually December 1st through 7th, is a special meditation retreat called Rohatsu. which is the big meditation, so to speak, the big meditation retreat of the year for Zen practitioners, commemorating Shakyamuni Buddha's enlightenment. And on the morning of the eighth day, according to the myth of his enlightenment, when he saw the morning star is when he had fully understood the way things are. So we celebrate that, his enlightenment in December, and in the spring we celebrate his birth. And it's not an accident, you may have noticed, that there are other religious traditions that also have mid-winter and springtime events.

[19:57]

In the winter we need light, enlightenment, we need to be enlightened, in order to encourage us to get through the dark time of the year. And then in the spring, as you all know in Judaism, there's a celebration in the spring of freedom. And in Christianity, there's a celebration of the resurrection, of rebirth, of birth, of being born again. I'm less familiar with Islam, but I believe there is also a midwinter and a spring event, celebration, commemoration, marking for Islam as well. I was going to say, if anybody knows about the Islamic tradition after the Dharma talk tapped me on the shoulder, I'm interested to hear.

[21:01]

I looked it up on the web, of course. I googled it up. I googled Islam or something. Anyway, it said something, but I didn't really understand it. So if you know, let me know. So this is not an accident that there are these different things. They're not exactly the same. Light, I mean freedom and light and... birth, and in Buddhism, the birth of Shakyamuni, as I'll try to explicate further, is the birth of freedom. So, not exactly the same, but definitely very resonant. And why they're resonant is because they all have to do with us.

[22:01]

That's the reason why they look so familiar. because they have to do with our human life, much more so, or deeply so, rather than something that happened to somebody else some other time. So one way to understand Shakyamuni Buddha's birth is historically and scientifically and archaeologically and philologically and so on and so forth. And, you know, there's historical evidence that there was some wise sage who lived at some time around then in northern India and taught and said things that were good to say and good to hear. But Our practice, that's what we emphasize in Zen, our practice, our way, has to do with not that so much, or not emphasizing that, but rather emphasizing you and me and our circumstances and our life and the world that we live in and the universe that we inhabit.

[23:30]

In Zen, it's called the 10,000 things sometimes or the 10,000 grasses. That's what, from a practice point of view, our understanding of Shakyamuni Buddha's birth has to do with that. It's concerned with, its emphasis is on our own practice, our own realization, our own path. with us, our cultivation and development of wisdom, which, as I alluded to in the story, means wisdom is understanding how things are. A. B. Getting with the program. living according to how things are, being at peace with how things are, being in accord with how things actually are.

[24:42]

So I remember when I first came upon this idea that this story, which I had become familiar with of Shakyamuni Buddha and, you know, the later part of his life when he's... you know, brought up in the pleasure palace, and then he goes to town and sees old age sickness and death and cuts his hair off and does this and does that, you know. I was familiar with that story, but there was a particular point. I was reading a book. It was called Alone with Others, which is a great title by a Buddhist teacher and scholar named Stephen Batchelor. And he explicates in detail how Shakyamuni Buddha's story is our story. Is the story, I had a phrase for this, it's the archetypal trajectory of our spiritual life. I was looking forward to that phrase. Archetypal trajectory of our spiritual life is the story of Shakyamuni Buddha.

[25:54]

refers to the deep currents of our own life, the deep currents of our spirit, of our soul. That's what it's about. That's what we do. That's why we're here. That's what the point of the teaching is. And that's good because we can use all the help we can get. because we have a really amazing ability to get into trouble and sometimes make trouble and have difficulties. Tremendous, expansive ability, you may have noticed, to do that. So we can use all the help we can get from the deep, of our spiritual life to help us in that.

[26:57]

And that really is what the point of practice is, is to help us with, one way to say it, is to help us with the difficulties in our life. Help, that help comes in the form of waking up and freedom help in practice in zen practice comes via buddha dharma sangha buddha the teacher dharma the teaching sangha the community of practitioners that's the those are the vehicles of the help And the help itself is help in the direction of waking up and freedom.

[28:05]

The ark is straightforward. We might even say simple. You know, the formula is what Jesus said. Ye shall know the truth and the truth will make you free. You'll understand how the world is. And that understanding is the basis of free activity, is freedom. So, we wake up. Our practice is the practice of waking up. Waking up to how things are, which it's important to note is not how we want them to be. How things are does not conform, shall I say necessarily, does not conform always, does not ever conform to what we want, what we think we want, what our small perspective is.

[29:26]

from our small perspective, we think we want. How things are doesn't conform to that, is not limited to that. It goes way beyond that limitation, is in fact unlimited. We get with the understanding of how the world is unlimited, not confined. This produces freedom, or we say nirvana. But I think, you know, I don't know because I'm not in the culture so much, but I think there's a lot of confusion about what nirvana is. Nirvana is not where your problems are all gone. and you no longer have any problems anymore.

[30:30]

That's our idea of Nirvana. And if we use the perfume called Nirvana or listen to songs sung by the band called Nirvana, then maybe we'll, you know, that won't happen. So that realm where your problems are not current, where they're gone, there is such a realm. It's not nirvana, though. That's called the deva realm. That's the realm of the gods and the goddesses. And occasionally we get to visit that realm. We're in the deva realm, and then we don't have any problems. Usually it's a short visit. It's always shorter than we'd like it to be. It's usually a pretty short visit to the deva realm. Then we're back. to the human realm. And then sometimes also... So in the human realm, there are problems and difficulties and there are methods of alleviation and relief.

[31:38]

That's Buddhist practice, understanding. In the deva realm, there are no problems. Then sometimes we visit the hell realm. We go to hell. In hell... There are problems and no solutions. We're stuck. We're caught. There's no exit. That's being in hell. And we visit there also sometimes, usually for longer than we'd like. So we visit the realm of the gods and we visit the realm of hell, and there are a couple of other ones. I won't go into detail. But those are just places we visit. That's not nirvana. The nirvana of Buddhist understanding, the nirvana of how things are, is the nirvana of impermanence, the nirvana of everything changes, of no permanent self, no abiding self, nothing, no one, no how, no way has an abiding self.

[32:57]

That means a self that sticks around for a while. It usually does stick around for a while, but not very long. If we live in accord with that understanding, that's nirvana. As I say, that's as much nirvana as we're going to get. Not exactly what we had in mind, but That's all that's on offer. If we don't live in accord with how things are, with this ever-changing, flexible, mutable way that we and life is, then we have dukkha suffering. And there are forms of suffering that are not in addition to that also.

[34:04]

But that's a major form of suffering. So as I was saying, in the winter, excuse me, we celebrate Shakyamuni Buddha's enlightenment. And his enlightenment is called, his enlightenment experience is called, in Sanskrit, it's called Anyuttara Samyak Sambodhi. And in our Zen lineage, we chant, every day we chant something, we talk about Anyuttara Samyak Sambodhi. In English, that means unsurpassed, complete, and perfect enlightenment. The bodhi part is translated into English as enlightenment. But bodhi comes from a root of B-O-D-H-I, that's the word, Anyuttara Samyak Sam Bodhi. That Bodhi that we call enlightenment comes from a root B-U-D-H.

[35:11]

That's a verbal root that means to wake up. So it's actually, if we were to do it in English, more etymologically correctly, it would be unsurpassed, complete, perfect waking up. Waking up to how things are is the implication. Completely waking up to how things are. And as I said here before, if we were to call this religion by its English name, right now we call it by its Sanskrit name, Buddhism. If we call that by its English name, that buddh of Buddhism is the same buddh. So we would have to call it wake-up-ism. We're practitioners of wake-upism. And that's the same Buddha. So that's why I said we celebrate the birth of waking up. The birth of Buddha.

[36:13]

That's what happens in the spring. We celebrate the birth of waking up. And in the winter we celebrate complete and perfect waking up. Sounds pretty much like the same thing. And it is. because that's all there is to celebrate, is waking up. Two different ways of celebrating the same, of celebrating, marking, knowing, teaching, understanding, practicing, encouraging ourselves to practice the same thing, called waking up to how things are. In that sense, Shakyamuni Buddha was not born 2,500 years ago. Rather, Buddhas are, countless Buddhas are continuously being born. That's the active meaning of the celebration of Shakyamuni Buddha's birth.

[37:17]

The active meaning has to do with what we are doing now. So this is also spoken of in the Lotus Sutra. The Lotus Sutra doesn't speak specifically about Shakyamuni Buddha being born into this world, but the Lotus Sutra explains why is it that Buddhas come... Do you need something? Is there a parent around who... Oh, okay. Yeah, wait until your leg wakes up. That's called, this is called Avalokiteshvara, responding to the cries of his son. Take your time, take your time. So in the Lotus Sutra, it says that Buddhas come into this world, Shakyamuni Buddha explains, why is it that Buddhas come into this world?

[38:27]

And he says, Buddhas come into this world To open, show, help us realize, and help us enter Buddha's insight, Buddha darshana. To open, show, help us realize, and help us enter. Open, show, realize, and enter. Buddha's insight, which, again, if we use our etymological tool here, what we're really saying is open, show, realize, and enter the insight of awakening or to make it even more verbal, awakening insight. That's why Buddha's come into this world, to show us that, to open that, to help us realize awakening insight. And a core piece of this, a core feature, a core element of awakening insight is that we are below the heavens and above the earth, that we are simultaneously, paradoxically, self-contradictorily unique, individual, particular, you,

[40:00]

Me, and at the same time, we're completely connected. There was a ceremony many years ago, like 45 years ago, 40 years ago, where I was in a situation where I was answering questions. Each person would ask a question quickly. It's called a shuso ceremony. Some of you know this ceremony. And it's at the end of an extended practice period. I was at Tassajara. And there was one of the questions... I'm going to get to this question. The question I want to talk about, I'll get to it in a minute. The first question was asked by the person who was my... who was my assistant kind of for the practice period.

[41:01]

And his name was Brian, and he's no longer alive. And his question was, what's a nice Jewish boy like you doing in a place like this? At that time, I was a boy. Anyway. A few people later, there was a man named John Steiner and my name is Steve Weintraub. And he said, his question was, what is our name? And I said, John Weintraub. So you're you and I'm me and I'm you and you're me. And I'm me and here's a cup and there's water and I'm drinking it and The water is me and I'm the water. The cup is me and I'm the cup. The cloth is me and I'm the cloth, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

[42:04]

So simultaneously, we have our own individual life. Each moment of it, all the millions of moments of it that you have already experienced and maybe millions more, I hope so. that are very particular, very karmic. They're very much exactly following from the causes and conditions. The causes and conditions of our life lead to every hair on our head and every not hair on our head as well. That's our life and we're completely connected We're so connected, we are each other. Or maybe a more, because that sounds very, we are each other.

[43:07]

A more approachable way to say that is, I think, is that all of us together are one thing. Which is, I say approachable because it's more obvious. that the current arrangement right now, Sunday morning, May 3rd, you where you are, me here, the vibrations of the air that are coming out of here and going into that part of you, that's all very temporary. In a moment, it's all going to be different. I used to go hiking in an area of the Sierras called the Minarets. Down, you hike in on the eastern escarpment from Mammoth Lakes. And they're called the Minarets because they're six or seven very high peaks.

[44:08]

And when I read about it, when I was there, I read about it. The Minarets were 350 million years old. So at the time of the Sierra Uplift, the Sierra Uplift that created the Sierras, they had already been around for 290 million years. So they looked at the Sierra Uplift as like a young whippersnapper, you know? This is like, well, who are you, you know? Where did you show up from, you know? So right now, we have this particular arrangement of events. called Me and You. But 350 million years from now, it's not going to be the same thing. It's going to be a different arrangement. Way, way, way different arrangement. When the sun, right? The sun's supposed to burn out in about five or six billion years. So...

[45:16]

That understanding is a very core piece, this understanding of our... To say connectivity is not connected enough. To say relatedness is not related enough. To say oneness maybe sounds a little too West Coast, but that's the idea. Both, both the individual and the connectedness, The reason we don't emphasize the individual is that we're pretty clear. We know about that part. It's very easy for us to fall into, I'm me and you're you. It's less obvious for me, for us to say, I'm you and you're me. So we have to keep talking about it and expressing it. And Dogen, our great ancestor Dogen, expressed it as, in a work of his called Yui Butsu Yobutsu, in a work of his called Only a Buddha and a Buddha, he said, the entire universe is the true human body.

[46:31]

Which I believe he was talking about this reality that we should wake up to. And that's a very beautiful, poetic, elevated way of saying it. But we can also say it in a much more simple, straightforward, everyday kind of way, which is simply, don't get caught. Don't get stuck in our own ideas. in our own opinions, in our own conceptions, in our own dividing up mind. It's the dividing up mind that makes the you and the me. But there's a mind that doesn't divide up. There's an experience that doesn't divide up. And if we cannot be caught in the dividing up mind, then we get a flavor for this other side.

[47:39]

It's not really another side, but this other side. In Zen, this is called fishing with a straight hook, which is a phrase and an image I particularly enjoy because it has a quality of humor to it, like a hook, right? When you go fishing with a hook, a hook has a curve. And there's a point at the end of the curve. That's what you catch the fish with. Sometimes there's an extra little barb as well. So if you go fishing with a straight hook, what do you catch? You don't catch nothing. It just goes right off the hook. This is a very wonderful thing. metaphor for our practice. We make a big effort, get out in the boat, putt, putt, putt, go to the place, throw the thing out there, but there's a straight hook at the end of the line.

[48:49]

No fish get caught. You just catch nothing. That's our zazen practice. It's the practice of catching nothing. So just not to be stuck, not to be caught in our ideas. In formal practice, when we're sitting, when we notice that we are caught, stuck, confused, lost, then we return to our breathing. We return to counting our breath. We return to shkantaza, just sitting. And soon, after a nanosecond or two or a minute or two or a year or two or a decade or two, we get lost again. Get confused again.

[49:51]

Get lost in dividing up mind again. Forget this other side. And when we remember and say, oh, I forgot that other side, then we come back. It doesn't matter. how long the interval is. Zen students, practitioners, a favorite entertainment to practitioners is measuring our practice. Good zazen, bad zazen, you know, that kind of thing. Oh, that was really good zazen. I was really concentrated for, you know, 16 minutes probably, you know. That was really bad zazen. I was just reviewing the 39 steps the entire time. And other Alfred Hitchcock movies. But it actually doesn't matter.

[50:54]

It only matters from the point of view of dividing up mind. From the point of view of the mind that grades and measures and chooses this over that. From the point of view of undivided mind, we practice, and when you get lost, you return to undivided mind. And when you get lost, you return to undivided mind. And when you get lost, you return to undivided mind. It doesn't end. It doesn't stop. We don't figure it out. We don't figure out how to do it. So that's in our formal practice. But Suzuki Roshi's big emphasis, a big emphasis of Suzuki Roshi's way was zazen and everyday life. So we carry this core of Buddha's insight, this core of Buddha Darshana, this awakening insight core with us as we work on it, we practice it, we try to carry it into our daily life.

[52:02]

and not be stuck and caught in innumerable ways. Yesterday, I was at an all-day event. I'm a psychotherapist, and I have to do continuing education. So I went to a continuing education all-day event over in Berkeley put on by the Psychotherapy Institute called... racism and trauma in contemporary society, the relevance of psychotherapy. And the speaker was a man named Dr. Kenneth Hardy. And it was really very, very powerful. He spoke from his own experience, his own life experience, and many people that he had spoken with over the years about the traumatic effects of the trauma of and the deleterious effects of racism.

[53:21]

And, you know, it had been scheduled a year ago, but of course, since then, many, many things have happened. terrible things. I didn't engage him in the conversation, but fundamentally that kind of mentality that we are all quite subject to is an extreme version of dividing up mind, an extreme version of I'm separate, I like this, I don't like that, an extreme version of being stuck and caught in some bad rut. So this way expresses itself in formal practice and in our daily life and in our relationships.

[54:25]

Our relationships with our friends and spouses and children and parents. The sign, the mark of a psychologically mature person is the ability to hold more than one perspective, more than one opinion, namely their own. It's the ability that, it's called empathy, right? You may have had an argument with such a spouse or child sometime recently who had a very different opinion about some particular thing than you did. This is what happened. No, this is what happened. This is what happened. No, this is what happened. Psychological maturity is the ability, we can't necessarily agree, but the ability to hold some other idea. than our own really get it that's based on this interconnected idea that's based on this sense of relationship of connectivity so it has practical practical ramifications in this way so

[55:53]

I think we need to end, but I want to say one more thing. I'm sorry. They're banging at the doors. The last thing is that, so in preparing for this talk, I have a thing on my computer, an archive of Suzuki Roshi's talks, of all of the talks that he gave. They've all been transcribed now. And then Shinshu Roberts, a practitioner... did an index. So I was able to look up Buddha's birthday in the index and the different things that Suzuki Roshi said, different Buddha's birthday. 1969, 1970, 1970, no, not 1971. 1971, yes. So in 1970, Suzuki Roshi spoke at Buddha's birthday and here's a little bit of what he said. He said, If we lose this spirit of continuous practice, it could be a very awful thing.

[56:59]

But if we continue our practice, something very beautiful and meaningful will result. The most meaningful thing is our effort to develop Buddha's way. The most meaningful thing is our effort to develop Buddha's way. So in that last sentence, I hear this echo, or I'm echoing him, this sense, develop Buddha's way. Buddha's way is not a fixed thing. We develop it It's a developmental activity. It's an activity. It's a doing. It's a verb. It's not a noun. The most meaningful thing is not even Buddha's way.

[58:06]

The most meaningful thing is our effort to develop Buddha's way. That locates it right back to us. That's our practice. Thank you. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our programs are made possible by the donations we receive. Please help us to continue to realize and actualize the practice of giving by offering your financial support. For more information, visit sfcc.org and click Giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[58:53]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_97.31