Good morning, everyone. Thank you for coming to Green Gulch Farm online for our Dharma Talk today. Dharma Talk will be offered by resident priest Carolyn Cavanaugh. She's in the Zendo now offering incense and prostrations, and will take this seat shortly. As many of you know, we have live transcription enabled, so you should see the option on your device to hide or remove the automated subtitles. Thanks again for coming and the talk will begin shortly. After Carolyn takes her seat, we'll have the chance to recite together the opening verse, which I'll put in the chat window. and thank you for coming all of you in here and all of you out there somewhere listening to this I wanted to recognize the deep suffering in the world at this moment the unprovoked aggression toward the Ukrainian people as well as those in the midst of challenges in Afghanistan Sudan

[07:28]

Yemen and numerous other countries, including our own. The stories and photos in this week's news showing a staggering amount of suffering. The extent of devastation and loss is overwhelming. The world has always been plagued by the dynamics of racial, economic and political violence. But the lens of the internet has offered a heart-wrenching close-up view of the devastation of thousands of lives shattered and country shattered as well. The root of aggression is often traced to inequality and power, inequity. Can we study that same aggression that also arises in ourselves? And when we do notice how we do care for it, how do we care for it when we do notice that aggression?

[08:36]

Can we take the time to study it? From a distance, when we look at the natural world, listening to the birds and coyotes around Green Gulch, they seem at peace. But that's just our idea of what's going on. There's a whole lot of posturing out there. aggression, and sheer dominance in the natural world that mirrors our own. Suzuki Roshi said that you must be very patient if you want to understand Buddhism. But he was seeking a better word than patience. The usual translation of the Japanese word nin is patience. But he said perhaps constancy is a better word. We read this recently in our morning stand-up meeting and I realized I don't know what constantly means and that's why I include it in this talk.

[09:43]

Constancy is the quality of having a resolute mind or purpose. Steadfastness. Suzuki Roshi said you must be You must force yourself to be patient, he said. But in constancy, there is no particular effort involved. There is only an unwavering ability to accept things as they are. The two partners of constancy, or steadfastness, effort, are transiency and continuous practice. When you are sitting in the middle of your own problem, which is more real to you? Your problem? Or yourself? Or you yourself? The awareness that you are here right now is the ultimate fact. This is the point you will realize in Zazen practice. In continuous practice, under a succession of agreeable and disagreeable situations, as you may face in the coming week during Sashim,

[10:57]

you will realize the marrow of your practice. People who know the state of emptiness will always be able to dissolve their problems by constancy. Or if it's easier to think about, patience. The basic teaching of Buddhism is that everything is transient and will change. And there is a constancy in our effort to practice with the transient nature of all things. Can we live our lives fully engaged, wholeheartedly, all the time? This is the theme of Dogen's essay on continuous practice. On the great road of Buddha's ancestors, there's always unsurpassable practice, continuous and sustained. It forms the circle of the way and is never cut off.

[12:02]

Between aspiration, practice, enlightenment and nirvana, there is not a moment's gap. Continuous practice is the circle of the way. This being so, continuous practice is unstained, not forced by you or others. The power of this continuous practice confirms you. as well as others. It means your practice affects the entire earth, the entire sky in 10 directions. Although not noticed by others or by you, it is so. You should accept knowledge as if you are hearing it for the first time, but this doesn't mean to receive various pieces of information merely as an echo of your own opinion. It means you should not be surprised at whatever you see or hear.

[13:07]

If you receive things as an echo of yourself, you don't really see them. You don't accept them for what they actually are, due to our own preconceptions. No other activity besides zazen will appease your suffering. I have an idea that continuous practice has an appearance. The activity of the Buddha way is like the flowing river. Our activity is Buddha. Not this or that person has our actual intentional activity is Buddha. Not this or that person but our actual intentional activity is Buddha. Activity mirrors our intention. Each moment of consciousness has an intention. Sometimes the mirror is hard to look at.

[14:09]

It's not reflecting something that the most important thing is. Reflect and look again. Continuous practice is not necessarily something in the world. Love, but it should be the true place of return for everyone. Continuous practice is not necessarily something people in the world love. But it should be the true place of return for everyone. In other restless postures, you will have no power to accept your difficulties. But in Zazen posture, which you have acquired by long, hard practice, your mind and body... have great power to accept things as they are, whether they are agreeable or disagreeable. Suzuki Roshi says, actually, it's easier for those who have difficulties in sitting to arouse true wake-seeking mind than for those who can easily sit.

[15:20]

I wanted to shift gears a bit. and talk about what's happening at Green Gulch this spring. We lost a great, beautiful old friend this week, the tall 100-plus-year-old cypress near the tea house and parking lot. The cypress has been in decline for many years and appeared dead with a fungus near the base. Many were worried that it would fall on the tea house and nearby buildings. and I was asked to find an arborist to remove it. We had the spring equinox ceremony at the base of the cypress to celebrate the beginning of spring and to give thanks for all the life the tree has supported through time. Many of you remember the seasonal beehive in the tree trunk of the cypress. The bees decided to stay the winter this year, and so we've accommodated by them by cutting the tree,

[16:29]

above the busy nest, about 25 feet up. Well, this is iconic cypress beauty and support as well as the often used raven nest in the very tip top branches of the tree. There were no eggs in the nest while we were arborists removed it. Continuous practice with old age, sickness and death is extremely difficult. Many thanks to this elderly, sentient being, beautiful even in its passing. I think everyone remembers walking by, looking up, seeing it from almost anywhere at Green Gulch. that tree's been pruned, that all the deadwood has been pruned off it year after year, trying to keep it together.

[17:42]

And finally, this year, there was no new growth on the tree. I wasn't overly worried, as Nsuki wasn't actually that worried either, but many people were. And I certainly didn't want to be responsible for the tree falling on a building. especially the tea house. Thank you, Fu, for the ceremony. That was lovely. Wendy Johnson came and offered a few words. We had it in the dark, like 6.15 in the morning or 6.30 in the morning. It was very atmospheric. All of us living here are stewards of both Zen practice and the land.

[18:42]

Even if you work in the kitchen, you're part of this land stewardship team. As you walk around, we all care for the beings in this valley. As a community, we create and make a wholehearted effort to take care of the watershed as we shift from each new season and situation. This is practicing constancy in our efforts and creativity in how we meet the ever-changing transiency of drought, plants, and animals in our watershed. We're relying on past experience of caring for the earth, but we need to shift our habits to adapt to new situations. Historically, along the coast, the summer weather and moisture we receive is quite predictable. Fog for weeks on end, up to nine weeks was my, why I've lived here was the longest.

[19:46]

They were very long weeks. And Dagon, who has died, used to go out every day to the ridge or town just to get a little sunshine on his face. And I remember him well every time we have a really foggy day. We missed that fog. We depended on that fog to grow lettuce. All the brassicas like moisture and that light. Unfortunately, we can no longer depend on months of fog to keep the valley cool. The drought is changing the way we planned and how we take care of the soil and the watershed. Finding solutions to these problems require a nimble response. The farm is considering moving toward no-till planting, which would help provide a porous soil structure, increase organic matter that facilitates growth, root growth, water retention, and overall healthy soil structure.

[21:00]

On the land and garden, we're planting more natives, retiring garden beds. and in general, reducing the number of annual flowers we grow each year. We're in the process of studying models to improve the capacity of existing reservoirs, enabling us to eventually remove the Zendo Pond as a water storage basin. The dream is to have the Green Gulch Creek flow freely down to Redwood Creek and the ocean, the Pacific Ocean. directly. This would create a more stable habitat for plants and animals. The coho salmon, if it was enough rain, could make it further up the creek. The western box turtle could find a nice pond further up the creek all summer long.

[22:02]

That's the dream. That's what we're moving toward. We don't know when we'll get there. but we're doing the investigation now. I've been reading some books lately on the environment, and I wanted to talk about one of them, which I was very moved by. I wanted to recommend reading Diana Beresford's She's Irish name. I'm not sure how to pronounce that. She's a well-recognized author, kind of a genius. She has several PhDs and masters in various disparate subjects. She's a medical biochemist, botanist, climate change visionary. She's been living in Canada for decades. She has a unique understanding of modern Western science and ancient knowledge and shows how

[23:06]

interdependent all of our natural systems are and the role our forests play in earth and ecology. She's created, this is, I was really inspired. I don't think I would love to be part of this. It's a huge operation. She's created an ambitious bio plan as a step in encouraging ordinary people to develop a new relationship with nature, to join together, to replant the global forest. She's using it as a tool to mend the holes in the fabric so that the forest will be planted, the seas will have fish and marine life, the air will have more oxygen and less carbon dioxide. She's extremely persistent in her ecologic teaching efforts. You can say she embodies Suzuki Roshi and Dobin's constancy or steadfast effort

[24:07]

and continuous practice in the transient nature of all things. She created a film about Forrest. I can't remember the exact name of it. I watched half of it last night. And she shows where in Ireland they cut down all the trees on various islands or parts of the coast. And the water right next to that island became void of life as well. The whole ecology was based on that forest, on that piece of land. The same thing has happened in northern Japan. They thought it was a good idea to cut a forest. And then they found... that all of the sea life couldn't prosper.

[25:11]

The whole system was completely interdependent. She wrote several books. The one I read most recently is called Sweetness of a Simple Life. In a sense, that's what we have, the sweetness of a simple life. We don't always recognize it. how sweet it is until we go out in the world and have perhaps other experiences. He also talks about in Japan, and perhaps other places, they have forest bathing where you go into the forest at Shinto temples.

[26:11]

Apparently there's forests and they're very popular to walk into and you receive all the aerosols from all of the different trees and pines. Has anyone ever seen that before or been in that or felt that when they go into a forest? that sense of you don't recognize that apparently she's a biochemist and she she recognizes all she's analyzed all of the various aerosols that affect people there that heighten their sense of well-being I want to finish with a poem an old friend gave me who no longer lives here. The poem is by Miroslav Holub, who is a Czech poet.

[27:20]

Officially, the heart is oblong, muscular, and filled with longing. But anyone who has painted the heart knows that it is also spiked. Like a star. And sometimes bed-raggled. Like a stray dog at night. And sometimes powerful. Like an archangel's drum. And sometimes cube-shaped. Like a draftman's dream. And sometimes gaily round. Like a ball in a net. And sometimes a thin line. And sometimes an explosion. And in it is only a river. A weir. And at most one little fish.

[28:20]

By no means golden. More like a gray, jealous... Is that a fish that's pronounced correctly? Louch. It certainly isn't noticeable at first sight. Anyone who has painted the heart knows that first he had to discard his spectacles, his mirror, throw away his fine point pencil and carbon paper. And for a long while, walk outside. That's all I have today. Please take care of each other and the places you inhabit with care, with constancy.

[29:26]

Give as much as you can to others, but also to the land, to the animals. Share what you know. Thank you. Equally extend to every being and place the true merit of Buddha's way. Beings are numberless. I vow to save them. Delusions are inexhaustible. I vow to end them. Dharma gates are boundless.

[30:38]

I vow to enter them. Buddha's way is unsurpassable. I vow to be coming. Does anyone have any questions or comments? If anyone online has a question or comment to share, please put it in the chat to Green Gulch Zendo and Mark from Insight to Zendo can pass it along to Carolyn. Thanks very much. Yes, Gladys. I can't hear you.

[31:41]

Continuous practice? Constantly. I mean, it's... Being patient. She's asking what constancy specifically is, which is how I started this lecture by looking it up. It's more than patience. Sometimes we have patience, but there's an underlying feeling about having patience. It's like we have to make ourselves be patient about something.

[32:48]

Perhaps you were like that during this talk. Reconstancy is a continuous effort. I see it as a continuous effort. It's always there. You do your best. Do you know how that feels, Gladys? I see they try their best. The best effort is always going forward. So we're putting our best effort forward. I think that's what Suzuki Rashi is saying, just one step at a time. And that could be considered patience, I guess, but it's more... Some people think of patience as resigned, like we're resigned to something, like the stoplight, to be patient.

[33:58]

It's to continue to show up every morning to Zazen, to cross your legs or sit in a chair. Taking a deep breath in and out. It's a consistent practice of studying yourself. Of being ready for whatever shows up. Of not trying to get away from your problems. Of being present. Whereas patience is a feeling like you're doing something. Does that make sense? Yes, Chris? I think in each individual, sorry, that's a long question.

[35:51]

He's asking about constancy again. And how to create a vision for his practice. So constancy is the quality of having a resolute mind or purpose. steadfastness in whatever you're doing. And with sitting meditation, that might just mean showing up to the zendo, sitting down and accepting this person right here. It's not setting an intention for zazen necessarily. It's actually making the commitment to show up and be with whatever arises. Suzuki Reishi said, you must force yourself to be patient sometimes.

[36:55]

But if it's your own choice, the constancy of showing up for whatever is happening in your life might sometimes seem like patience, but it's kind of a steadfastness to meet whatever is in front of you. ever arises. Does that answer your question? The hard word to talk about. He said that, Nathan said that Constancy is, I'm sorry, could you say it again?

[38:09]

Patience can have expectation or restriction, whereas constancy, you're always just showing up to what's right there. When you're patient with something, I think we all can think of examples of ourselves or probably someone in our family. When we're trying to be patient, we have feelings about perhaps that are different. We have expectations or perhaps we have restrictions, as you said. But if we're always just there to meet each thing, I think that's what Suzuki Roshi is talking about, constancy. It's not an effort beyond just being present. Oh, now everyone has a question. Is this who? always right there.

[39:39]

Oh, sorry. Zussi wants to know where her kind heart is when she's joyful. Say it again. Her joyful heart, her kind heart, and her big heart in constancy. Where are they in constancy? think you know where they are. Maybe there's some leaf litter on top, but they're right there. They're right there in each of your steps. We all have that kind heart, that joy. And even if we don't at that moment, it's just under the surface.

[40:42]

I don't think we have to look far to find it, to feel it. No more questions in the zendo. Caroline. haven't seen those signs of protest about water going to the ocean.

[42:07]

Yeah, I think we all have ideas about different ideas about everything. And so those people who don't have adequate water to do the farming they would like to do or the whatever they want to use it for. Yeah, we all have attitudes around everything we do. Here we value living in harmony with everything in the valley. For decades, about 50 years, we've used this endo pond. In the summer, we've created a reservoir that water no longer goes down to the ocean. We're one of those people.

[44:00]

We just put the dam in last week. We do, we like to grow organic food for people, water the crops. But all those species who depend on the water, coho salmon, red-legged frogs, western pond turtles. We want to take care of them too. It's a long process to take a pond off the creek, an irrigation pond off the creek. It feels like I've been trying for decades. Green Gulch has tried for decades to do so.

[45:04]

How to envision it. Doing the studies required to create the information to make an appropriate decision. We've got lots of grants to help us make appropriate decisions. They're just doing studies to help us make an appropriate decision. It's not an easy thing in those kind of Studies are available to everyone. We have water flowing freely through our land from our spring. Most people have to purchase water or given a quota of water for their crops. We're setting our own quota for crops and how much we'd like to grow with them.

[46:11]

We grew much less last year on a smaller piece of land, fewer fields, and we'll do the same this year. I don't know how to answer questions from other other people about keeping water for their use. I think at Green Gulch we've always tried to use as little water as possible for our showers, for our cooking. Last year we had buckets we were taking every here and there. As soon as we wash something, we use that bucket for another water for another purpose.

[47:13]

But that's a lot of work. We thought it was a lot of work as well, but we were dedicated to the process until the first rain. I think we can only Help people to understand by showing them alternate way of doing things that it works well if they're interested. And we can have constantly constancy and patience in doing that and talking with them, of showing models, of helping them, of becoming involved in a wider conversation. But it's not easy. It requires a huge effort, continuous effort. It's true, what Joe says.

[48:51]

And I think we all felt that. I think we all appreciated walking by that tree every day and feeling its practice, feeling its strength, seeing how it offered itself to everything around it, the bees, the birds. Ravens. It was continually offering itself. Did I answer the question? Now the big questions.

[50:13]

How do we feel about the injustices of Putin and other challenging beings in the world? Is that adequate? This is probably how he came up with the word constancy instead of patience. It's kind of this effort. Can we have loving kindness to someone creating harm? Can we show someone creating harm devastating lives in a country? Can we show them forward or around their idea.

[51:26]

I think that Putin is seeing that we can show a way around by the support we're giving to a small country, smaller country. I don't know if we can ever change his feelings or his methods. And I'm not sure anger is particularly helpful. Sending anger his way is particularly helpful. But can we offer, can we sit still in the midst of it? Can we Should I phrase it?

[52:29]

Can we not give up trying to meet his, what do you call it? I'm trying to say it nicely. His force, his force with our open, Our openness, like what is really going on? I mean, this is what we ask to all people in this situation, or we try to, it's like, what is going on? Where did these ideas come from? Why does he need all that, all this? I think the world is responding to that with generosity. And he sees that. And maybe that will be a tincture.

[53:40]

But it's hard to say. Thank you everyone for your, oh, Shannon. You're welcome.

[55:50]

Shannon was talking about the constancy, and when I conversed about the animals and the birds being sounding cheerful, yet there are constant bickering going on between them. And the natural world is vicious. If you get really close to it, you can see it's like they don't hold anything back. It's our perception of them that looks so... I mean, sure, they play. They have a great time. Those ravens up there play up in the sky. I think they're having a good time. They don't seem benevolent. But there's a lot going on in the world that we don't understand or misunderstand. And yeah, to acknowledge that and be present for whatever arises.

[57:00]

This seems like a great time to end this talk and to wish you well on your voyage of Sashin this coming week. May you have steadfast sitting find grace in yourselves and the Sangha. Thank you. Thank you everybody online for coming. Your presence and practice is much appreciated. If you feel you can make a donation to Zen Center, as always, thank you very much for you offer, and please know that it really is sincerely relied on and appreciated. Way back in the comments, I put a link, and maybe I'll do so again if you feel able to donate.

[58:09]

If any of you would like to say goodbye as you sign off, you're very welcome to do so. You can unmute now.

[58:17]

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