This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfcc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Sit comfortably, whether you're sitting in front of your computer, on a chair, on a cushion, walking, standing. Please, please be in a comfortable and steady position. Is there anyone here for the first time today? Welcome. Suzuki Roshi, the founder of our school, who came here from Japan, first to Soko-ji and then here, taught Zen mind, beginner's mind.

[01:22]

And so, beginners hold a special place in our tradition with a heart of practice, that it would be good if we could notice and follow. Today we're going to look a little bit at some teachings about breathing from a sutra called the Anapanasati Sutta and how those are used in our particular tradition, Soto Zen. And There's a part of the sutra at the very beginning that people don't usually notice or talk about. And I'd like to talk about that part to start. So there's a part of the sutra where the Buddha is, everybody talks about this as establishing the context and skips over it in about three sentences of commentary. But it's the part of the sutra where the Buddha acknowledges that there may be people in the room who are

[02:30]

possessed of different kinds of insights, who have different kinds of experience and different kinds of backgrounds. And I think that's a very important part of the sutra because it includes everyone who's hearing the sutra and everyone who needs to practice with it. So I'd like to translate that into some of the language of our school. some of the language with which we practice every day, and say that there may be people in the room with a great deal of experience in practice, and there may be people with a great deal of innocence in practice. There may be people who have superpowers gained from years of dealing with impairments, or trauma in this generation or in previous generations.

[03:35]

There may be people from different countries, people in different physiological states. There may be teenagers. There may be women about to give birth. There may be people who have severe... issues that need to be acknowledged and addressed. Each of those people, from the very beginning, is fully endowed with all of the virtuous characteristics necessary for awakening. And because of our habits and preconceptions, we don't necessarily realize it. And we have... a practice that acknowledges equipment that we all share. Each of us is embodied and each of us is infused with the spirit of life through the breath.

[04:43]

And we usually think of the body as under our control in some way that we can make ourselves stand up and sit down. We can... do different things with our arms and legs, our feet and hands. But 99.99999999999% of the body is not under our control. The body is a collection, a set of committees or organisms that have learned how to cooperate with each other and interconnect with each other over billions of years and billions of light years. And there's way more about the body and about the breath that we don't know than that we do. So I'd like to acknowledge that this lecture is happening in the context of a practice period.

[05:49]

And in our tradition, we have practice periods. which are periods of time of several weeks in which we agree to focus on a particular topic and share particular experiences like meditation or classes or homework that helps us understand something about our life. And this practice period is called study the self. We're studying the self. And this practice period is being led by my Dharma brother, senior Dharma teacher Ryushin Paul Haller, sitting on my left and the camera's right. And during this practice period, San Francisco Zen Center is also going to experience large changes in leadership.

[06:52]

So, for instance, Abbot David is going to become the central abbot when Abbot Ed steps down. Mako is going to be the Shinmei, or new life, of this community as abbess. And Jiryu is going to transition to be the abbot of Green Gulch when Abbot Fu steps down. But during this time, we will still be thoroughly embodied. and thoroughly enlivened with the breath. And we'll still be practicing with all the conditions that we have. So one of the assignments in this, I think the assignment for this week, please correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the assignment for this week is something like, What experiences have you had today?

[07:56]

What experience have you had today that stands out for you as impactful? What is either in your emotions, so there was a big like or a big dislike or a big disturbance or a big anger, sadness, joy, or fear. What stands out for you in your experience of the day or the week? And whether it's emotional impact or whether it's something that you can't stop thinking about that keeps coming up even at night. And let's look at how some of the practices of meditation breathing, particularly the ones that relate to ourselves and the world, can help with this particular experience, can help us see it clearly and respond to it from an inclusive heart and mind.

[09:09]

So I'd like to do that if possible, and I'd like to use some guided meditations from our ancestors in this tradition to help us do this. So if you settle yourself, I'll just give you a moment to find an experience that you'd like to work with. We'll be doing about 30 seconds of Zazen to come up with an experience. So I will do my best to time us for 30 seconds. It's a little less than 30 seconds, but you've got one.

[10:20]

Anyone need more time? Anyone online need more time? Out in the world? So I'd like to start with a teaching from our ancestor Bodhidharma. He asked us to... sit, breathing in and breathing out, and to keep our condition in mind, but to settle ourselves in the seated position and in the flow of breath as it occurs in and out. Now, Bodhidharma's instructions are very terse. So I'm going to repeat his instructions and word them differently.

[11:24]

So Bodhidharma said, in the outer world or outside, don't activate the mind on objects. In the inner world, No coughing or sighing of the mind. That's a translation by Tension Rev. Anderson. Yeah. No as in X. No coughing or sighing of the mind. So, inside. Mind like a wall. Thus, we enter the way. So, if the trigger was outside, if the trigger for the emotion is outside, how do we not activate the mind around that object?

[12:38]

If we already have a reaction, how do we not have a little glitch or a regret in the heart and mind. If we're just human, how do we make our mind to be like a wall? And all of this seems like a pretty high bar for entering the way. So let's see. Holding the object in mind. On the inhalation and on the exhalation, the strength of perception for that object might change. So you might see it very vividly on the inhalation. And a little more diffuse on the exhalation. Check it out. I'm not sure whether that's true or not.

[13:44]

So check it out. that trigger might appear to change or it might not appear to change. But can we, for a breath or two, stay steady and deeply observe the feeling of the breath and the study of that subject that triggered us? And inside, how do we not cough or sigh in the mind? Being with the inhalation and being with the exhalation allow the soothing qualities of the breath to be present.

[14:52]

We don't exactly own the breath. We usually think we do. But can we feel the breath as it goes in and out as a gift of how we're built? A gift of all phenomena to us. mind like a wall seems really kind of hard to do. But can we withdraw our hair trigger reactivity to develop a little more sense of bare presence with what's happening in us as we bring that subject to mind?

[15:57]

in the context of breathing in and space, breathing out and space. So you'll notice that the solidity of good and evil, the solidity of ownership begins to ray a little bit around the edges. The spaces give us a brief moment of silence. And thus we enter the way. So let's look at this another way. And I'm just going to quote Suzuki Roshi in his instruction for beginners. So you can find this in Zen Mind Beginner's Mind.

[17:00]

There's a section on breathing. And let's just use his section on breathing as we contemplate that triggering event or phenomenon in the context of an upright posture, in the context of the rhythm of the breath. So here we start. So again, make yourself comfortable and refresh your posture. And just start with a long exhalation to ground ourselves. And now begin. When we practice Zazen, our mind always follows our breathing. When we inhale, the air comes into the inner world.

[18:03]

When we exhale, the air goes out to the outer world. The inner world is limitless. The outer world is limitless. We say inner. We say outer. Actually, there's just one world. In this whole world, our throat is like a swinging door. Air coming in and going out, like passing through a swinging door. If we think I breathe, I is extra. There's no us to say I. What we call I... is just a swinging door which moves when we inhale, when we exhale. It just moves.

[19:06]

That is all. When the mind is pure and calm enough to follow this movement, there is nothing. No I. No world. No mind. No body. Just. swinging door. When we practice zazen, all that exists is the movement of the breathing. But we are aware of this movement, not absent-minded. To be aware of the movement does not mean to be aware of small self, but rather the context of universal nature. or Buddha nature. This kind of awareness is very important because we're usually so one-sided. You and I. This and that.

[20:12]

Good and bad. But actually, these discriminations, these reactions, these triggers, what they bring up in us, are themselves the awareness of the universal existence. You means aware of the universe in the form of you. I means aware of the universe in the form of I. You and I. Swinging doors. This is not even an understanding. It's just the true experience of life through Zen practice. This moment, it opens one way. The next, it opens the other. So there's, you can... Thank you.

[21:17]

You can... Record this in your own words. Record this chapter in your own words. And play the tape and sit with it. It'll be very, very, very interesting to meditate with the breath in this way. So let's try to understand why Suzuki Roshi's words are so powerful. So when I first read Zen Mind Beginner's Mind when it came out, and I thought, oh, that's a nice book. And then I started practicing every day, and I opened the book up again and read the same chapter, and they seemed completely different. I had to look at the book because it seemed so different. I thought, is this the book I already read? What? Or is this just the cover of that book, and the book is different? But it turns out that that book is so subtle and includes so much teaching in such simple language that we can come back to it again and again, and it will always be different.

[22:33]

It's really lovely. It has the mastery of simplicity, the simplicity of mastery. So... This teaching that Suzuki Roshi is giving includes both elements of Theravada, the way of the elders, and of Mahayana, the part of Buddhism of which Zen is part. So Theravada and Buddhism, the original teachings, tended to emphasize the foundation of personal virtue. to liberate oneself as a way to be an example in the world and to learn how to let the world be as it is. And you kind of had to renounce stuff in favor of a deeper understanding of reality and for the purpose of finding freedom through alert awareness.

[23:42]

in specific krama or progression of liberation. So you have to kind of get comfortable and then begin to see in ways that were taught so that you could understand the path of liberation from suffering. And we find joy and tranquility in repose and in the context of a set list of topics. and a progression for self-study. And in Mahayana in Zen, it might seem a little bit less structured. And that's because the foundation is a little bit different. It's the foundation of the Bodhi mind, or the heart and mind of awakening. And personal virtue grows out of an acknowledgement and dedication to So our process is the process of liberating all beings through action in the world.

[24:50]

And our renunciation means to renounce the things that appear to hinder us by a process of just diving in and plunging in without outflows. What we're renouncing is a limited view of them. And our main concern to do this is that we don't carry preferences. We don't try to practice while through the lens of carrying this fixed self through every moment of experience. So our alert awareness is towards a kind of inclusive freedom and the emptiness, the understanding of emptiness or freedom from specific issues. balances out with, oh yes, but there's a world to be helped. There's people to be helped. So our joy is in the welfare of each and all beings.

[25:56]

There's an infinite number of topics because each of us in ourselves and outside of ourselves is a topic for understanding. So let's look a little bit at a couple of stories in our Mahayana and Zen tradition that are teaching stories for how we use the breath to understand our triggering event. How am I doing on time, by the way? Anybody? I'm okay? 15 minutes. Okay. You need a refresher of your posture, or are you okay? So Bodhidharma, the guy who talked about mind like a wall, had a teacher in Japanese, Hanyatara, and in Sanskrit, Pragyatara. Pragyatara is wisdom.

[26:58]

And we don't know so much about Hanyatara, but some people say that Hanyatara was female. And it hasn't been proven one way or the other. So let's just use they for Prajnatara. Okay? Because we don't know. Okay, so this case is a story from a book called The Book of Serenity. And this is case number three. The Invitation of Prajnatara to Eastern India. So here's the introduction. The state before the beginning of time, a black tortoise turns towards fire. The one phrase specially transmitted outside of doctrine or teachings. The lip of a mortar bears flowers. Now you remember you chanted, having it to see and listen to, to remember and accept.

[28:07]

The introduction continues. Now tell me. Where's the see and listen to, remember and accept in this? This is the case. So once a Raja of Eastern India invited Prajnatara to a feast, the Raja asked them, Why aren't you reading scriptures? It was the custom for... Buddhist teachers to read scriptures in exchange for food. So the Raja said, well, why aren't you reading? Prajnatara replied, this poor wayfarer doesn't dwell in the realms of body or mind when breathing in and doesn't get involved in myriad circumstances when breathing out. I always recite such a sutra.

[29:10]

hundreds and thousands and millions of scrolls. Okay, this poor wayfarer doesn't dwell in realms of body or mind on the inhalation and doesn't get involved in stuff on the exhalation. I'm always reciting this sutra, hundreds and thousands and millions of scrolls. So my life, the life of my breath is this sutra. I am reciting the sutra. So it's a very interesting idea that the breathing or the body is the sutra that's being recited. That's why I'm saying there is someone here with a lot of insight and experience. There's someone here. With the innocence of new practice, there's someone here with the superpower that comes from living with impairments and having to function with everybody else.

[30:22]

There's someone here who is living with the compassion, the simple stopping based on generations of epigenetic trauma. There's someone here who thinks... They're immune due to privilege, but has the stirrings of something in their heart. There's someone here who thinks they're a victim, but has the stirrings of power in their hands. We always recite such a sutra, hundreds and thousands and millions of scrolls, not getting involved. all the way when we breathe in. Not getting messed up all the way when we breathe out. And that's what breath does. Breath takes us from the realm of voluntary to the realm of involuntary, from the realm of what we think we know to the realm of what's been given to us.

[31:33]

And so the The idea of in the study of the breath, not getting involved, not getting involved. And the in-breath, the experiencer and the experienced come into view in a framework of repose, of in-breath and out-breath. On the out-breath, the concept of experience or an experience fades away. You'll see if you sit in the Zendo long enough, that there's a change in the quality of attention when you inhale. There's a change in the quality of attention when you exhale. It comes into view. It goes away. It swings. It moves. So this koan is about reversing and about sudden life, new life that comes up when we do that.

[32:37]

The idea of a separate... experiencer and what's experienced begins to pivot and the place of separation becomes the place of intimacy so breathing in breathing out this diaphragm of which you know we are made a diaphragm lungs and all of the Veins and arteries that create a respiratory system that is nourished by food that's given to us or that we work for and so on and so on and so on. To be with the breath reverses our understanding of what's out there, what's in here, and what we think and what we think we are. And there's another case that talks about this that's related to this one.

[33:43]

I'll just quickly say it. So this is a case about Yangshan who asked a monk, where are you from? And the monk said, I'm from Yu province. Yangshan said, do you think of that place often? And the monk said, always, I always think of it. Yangshan instructed. The thinker is the mind. The thought of is the environment. Inside there are mountains, rivers, and the great earth. Buildings, towers, halls, rooms, people, animal. Everything you can think of. Now shine your light in to think of the mind that thinks. Are there so many things there? the monk did.

[34:45]

And the monk said, when I get here, I don't see any existence at all. And Yanshan very kindly commented, this is okay for the stage of faith, but it isn't yet right for the stage of And the monk just was like, huh? Don't you have any particular teachings for me? And Yangshan said, look, to say that I had anything particular or not just wouldn't be right. Based on what you've seen so far, you get one mystery.

[35:48]

You can take the seat. You can wear the robe. After this, see for yourself. Okay. So this is an incredibly rich story about what happens in the world of meeting. between inside and outside, which we can study with the breath. It would probably take about six hours to go through this koan and understand how the breath relates to it. But just to say that part of the meditation on breathing, the meditation on breathing follows another sutra very closely. a sutra that I used to write out these sutras and give them to people, and recently one of them came back to me and I gave it away again.

[36:53]

So the other sutra is the Maha Satipatthana Sutta, a sutra on the four foundations of mindfulness. And the sutra about breathing that we're studying this practice period closely follows that sutra. So it establishes our understanding of the breath of the body, through our feelings, through our mind, and through mind-object. And this week what we're studying is the mind-object part of that. In other words, the environment, mind and environment. And so what Yangshan is doing is playing with our preconceptions about the mind being in here and the environment being out there. He's asking us to turn the mind back, shine it, Onto the mind which thinks, which closely parallels our instructions for Zazen. Okay, so to think not thinking.

[37:55]

And how do we think it? Non-thinking. So our categories get destroyed temporarily in the process of shining the light in to see what really is there. So the main teaching of this case about Yangshana and the monk is to reverse how our karmic consciousness usually builds up after a moment, to reverse how the chains that bind us to specific reactions from specific triggers, how that process usually works. That's what this koan is about. It's about blasting off into the realm where our preconceptions about subject and object, self and others, mind and environment, simply cease to bully us, to push us around.

[38:58]

It gives us freedom. So when the monk said, Yangshan said, do you think of that place often, the place where you came from? The monk's response, I could talk about just the monk's response for a very long time, but I won't because I'm running out of time. But let's just say that Yangshan has given him an instruction on reversing thought, reversing karma, going upstream into his habitual way of thinking until he can sit at the source and watch those preconceptions begin to coalesce. And he asks the monk to make his thinking mind the environment of his study, of his self-study. So instead of thinking of the environment that he's studying is outside, he's asking him to make his own thinking mind the environment that he's studying and to explore that with his heart and mind.

[40:08]

So the monk had a couple of options. He could actually do it or he could deflect. And so our usual habit is to deflect. The monk deflected into non-existence. He said, when I get there, I don't see anything. So this is kind of a callow response. It's not a mature response. So sometimes when we begin to practice, we get stuck in the glamour or beauty of enlightenment experiences, and we don't realize that the purpose of those experiences is self-study, that we actually have to use those experiences to be intimate with ourselves and the world as we are, not as we think we need to be. Of course, the monk didn't appreciate the teaching.

[41:11]

He said, don't you have any teaching? Can't you give me something? Why don't you give me something? What's wrong with you, teacher? Okay. And Yangshan sends him back to school. He sends him back to the beginning to have his own experience of the mystery of life. So... Let's close this out by returning to the experience that you chose at the beginning. To hold it in the mind, to breathe a bit. On the inhalation, maintaining poise. Releasing arms and legs and let it come up. And on this space after inhalation, You've already created the uprightness in the inhalation of posture that safely contains that experience.

[42:14]

So you can uplift, you can use the space after inhalation to assert that now you're going to let go and to create the physical and physiological framework for letting go that's safe, that's held with that uprightness. And on the exhalation, keeping that uprightness, maintaining that uprightness, just release it into all that is from whence it came. Whatever the issue is, give yourself a break. You'll notice that in the exhalation, you can see that whatever it is changes. And in the space after exhalation, you've already let go. Can you enjoy whatever stillness is now shining in your heart and mind?

[43:27]

Even if it's a little, even if it's a tiny little space. So when the Buddha teaches about impermanence, It's not just the fact that things change or end. It goes deeper. You'll see that the breath leads us to study our intimacy with that, its interconnection with all of the causes and conditions which our habits chain it to, seem to chain it to. With the breath, you can see that it doesn't have any characteristics to identify it. Those characteristics and their impact on us are just a function of our habits of thought. So no language, including how you describe that event to ourselves, can ever express what it really is.

[44:37]

having that experience, that trigger, is like being in the ocean of life where we can feel the impact of the wave, but we can feel a specific wave, or we can feel the vastness of the water, or we can float in the water, feeling the waves and depending on the vastness. And you can see in this meditation on that trigger that it has much more potential than we usually assign to it. We call it emptiness, but it's actually a sort of fullness. No one can hold or control that trigger. We can never fully know that trigger and how it came up. So like... I was once talking about a specific trigger with Sojin Mill Weissman, my transmission teacher.

[45:46]

And there was this long silence. And then he said, Vicki. And I said, yes. And he just looked at me very kindly and said, can you... live your life in a way that's a little less horrible for you? I was like, oh, Belle. Get lost. Don't you have any particular teachings for me? What's wrong with you? Anyway, that trigger is not just... impermanent and interconnected and without distinguishing features that last and so on it's not just empty but it also we think we have a goal in relation to it we think we have an aim or a place where that trigger needs to go like straight to hell usually but if we wish something in relation to it

[47:00]

That wish doesn't cover its actual meaning for ourselves and in our lives. And so we may get a little bit confused about that trigger, whatever it is, because when we see it as it is, it's the whole colorfulness and drama we've assigned to it begin to fade or change. It gets new colors. And new meanings. And our craving or aversion for it doesn't know what to do. There's a little bit of confusion, perhaps, or not really knowing who we are in relation to that trigger. Because its boundaries have changed for us. He beat me. He abused me.

[48:01]

He defeated me. He robbed me. The Buddha points out. A person who thinks this way will not be free from hate. She beat me. She abused me. She defeated me. She robbed me. A person who does not think this way will be free from hate. Hate is not defeated by hate. Hate is defeated by love, by intimacy. Okay? And that's one of the first teachings of the Buddha. So when we immerse ourselves in that event with the heart and mind of all beings, of this practice, its hold on us fades away. And we can be with, in a very refreshing way, its deep nature, its deep process. And its connection to everything that is. And as it is said in the case.

[49:05]

There's the introduction to one of those cases. To Yangshan's mind environment says. The ocean is the world of dragons. Disappearing and appearing they sport serenely. The sky is the home of cranes. They fly and call freely. Why does the exhausted fish stop in the shoals and a sluggish bird rest in the reeds? Is there any way to figure winning and losing? So let's just say you are a dragon who can disappear and appear, who can play wherever you wish. You are a crane of beauty and strength and freedom. can fly through the sky with faithfulness and joy. Why take the position of the exhausted fish, of the bird who can't move?

[50:09]

What in this situation can be limited to gain or loss, winning or losing, having or being without? So I'd like to end. with gata, a verse that I say in the morning when I wake up. And this gata is one of several that was given to us by Suzuki Roshi for our daily practice. You want to help me? It's like Tinkerbell, right? If you clap your hands, if you bring your hands together, this gata will live. This morning as I wake I vow with all beings to bring all things to awakening without throwing off the world. This morning as I wake I vow with all beings to bring all things to awakening without throwing off the world.

[51:17]

Breathing in, breathing out. Breathing in, breathing out. breathing in, breathing out, with love for all beings. Thank you very much. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma talks are offered at no cost 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. May we fully enjoy the Dormo.

[51:59]

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