This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good morning. So this morning, as some of you noticed, or maybe all of you noticed, The kokyo started the chant at the wrong moment, and we fell into a wonderful mass hesitation or confusion or something. The orchestration of our ritual, when we're in it, we don't know we're in it, and then something different happens, and we're What?

[01:00]

Startled? Hesitant? Frightened? The way in which our so-called mistakes have their own zest. They have their own way of supporting us. There's a little Japanese poem that says, when the shoe fits perfectly, it becomes invisible. Like when we're just humming along inside our neatly organized, orchestrated ritual. We don't know. We don't know who we are, what we're doing. We're just being. And then something draws us back into some Awareness.

[02:02]

So this is my illustration of Shuri's third step in the six gates to awakening. I mean, I hope I didn't embarrass the Kokyo. I mean, I wasn't trying to... point the finger at any kind of lacking or inappropriate behavior, more that this is our life, things happen. It doesn't matter how well-intentioned you are, how disciplined you are, occasionally you miss something. You don't notice, it just happens. In an archarmic world, You know, it's part of an equation of good and bad and success and failure and right and wrong. But in the Dorma world, it's all part of the texture of conditioned existence.

[03:10]

It's all part of the texture of what is awareness? How does it thrive? How does it come into being? And this is this third gate. contemplation, engagement in conditioned existence. So we make our so-called mistake individually, collectively, and it teaches us how to practice. It teaches us the nature of what is. It teaches us something about becoming nobody in the midst of engaging the familiar.

[04:13]

And it teaches us how readily and easily that can be cracked open and something else can happen. You know? the ritual is utterly haphazard, well then it never becomes invisible. We're just struggling with its haphazardness. Maybe judging each other. Well, you're not doing it right. I'm doing it right. Chant at my speed. Or whatever our minds might create. And then when something... approximates harmony. We can flow into it. We can literally lose ourselves in that being.

[05:14]

And especially in Soto Zen, this is significant expression. or facility of the ritual. One way we could say, well, all of our conduct is just the ritual performance of practice. And then what this affords us You know, now that skit night is over, so you don't have to burden yourself with thinking about your skits. And you've given your ways-thinking mind talk, so you might as well do something with your mind, right? Part of the heritage of Zen is mind as a tool.

[06:23]

mind as an agent in the process, an ally in the process of awakening, rather than some incessant repetition or assertion of the agendas and issues of your psychological and karmic being. Could you say that sentence again? Could I? Well, we'll find out. Mind as an ally or an agent of awakening in contrast to being an incessant repetition of psychological karmic issues or agendas. Um... One way we could come at it is we could say, well, we need to establish some kind of equanimity, some way in which the response to what's going on has some settledness, some fluidity, some okayness.

[07:50]

in a state of dramatic distress, well, that's very consuming. That's very demanding. It's hard to attend to. It's hard to contemplate what you might call the pattern into which the particulars are falling. How settled, how equanimous do we need to be? Any answers to that? What do you say, Eric? You should hide your head down. Either look like you were riding or asleep. But you look so alert, I thought.

[08:55]

Eric must have an answer. Very good. And of course, this is Dogen's point, right? The inquiry is what stimulates the involvement. You know, in Gakijo Yijinsu, he says, First and foremost, a rising Bodhi Doshan. Bodhi, awakening Doshan way mind. The mind that's investigating and expressing awakening. Any other thoughts? Yes, Steve. It's like my analytical mind, like the mind that I use, say, to make a schedule, to make a plan, to do something.

[10:01]

It's also sort of the same analytical mind that I can use to beat myself up or come up with ideas or beliefs or whatever. And it sounds like that same analytical mind is the mind that you can use to see some element of tactics or that will arouse something. Yeah. Sort of yes and no. When that mind has loosened up, at least loosened up, some of its karmic tendencies, when it has let go of some of its, the urgency of its issues, then it's more available. And so I was saying, well, we can come at it from the perspective of equanimity. and a certain level of okayness.

[11:02]

So we go into a moment of disarray in the middle of breakfast. Okay. That's what's happening. Should we stop? Should we keep going? What? What? Nobody died. No way. We all got our breakfast anyway. Yes? What's the relationship, Trisha, since you were in equanimity? What's the relationship? Well, the thoughts that were just flashing through my head was when that moment of disruption comes, we can fearfully try to, as quickly as possible, put back together normal.

[12:11]

Right? Or we can be intrigued by this new arising. To my mind, I sometimes muse on, sometimes as we enter the unknown, we think, oh no, this is so scary. Sometimes when we enter the unknown, we think, wow, this is an adventure. This is going to be something interesting. Both ways we're entering the unknown. I think something of the equanimity of practice, would be a little bit more particular as we engage the moment the enrichment of that engagement the nourishment of that engagement brings to us that's a very clumsy way to put it initiates

[13:28]

and okayness, and it initiates some form of sukha and pity, physical and mental joy that soothes our anxieties and fears, makes us more capable of being in an unknown, undefined moment, and a zest can arise. And I think that zest is close I think it's close to appreciation. Something pops up and there it is. Extraordinary. Extraordinary. Like a gift. And then you can look at our distress, I would say, with a compassionate tolerance.

[14:29]

Yeah. We're all so sincere trying to get it just right. And then in one amazing moment, we head off in the wrong direction. Okay. Do you want to follow up on that? Yeah. Can't really be calm. Equanimity is more about staying balanced. I mean, they have some overlap. We could say calmness is more about being subdued. Equanimity is more like you can flow with it. There's some capacity to come back to that place of balance.

[15:34]

But it's not rigid. It's not like it doesn't move. It just stays serene or subdued. Do you want to say something? Yeah. I'm just wondering if you think that this same humor can be applied to when we think we're doing something right. The same humor? I'm not quite sure what the same humor is. Do you have a sense of what the same humor is? When we have a feeling that we are out of our pattern, there's a little bit of a struggle to get back. But it's kind of like flipping on ice. The more you try to hold your feet where you think they should be, the more you're going to slide. So you enjoy the fall.

[16:35]

Try not to make it to disasters. But what about if you apply that same feeling to being sure-footed? So that you don't walk or you don't think like you always know or you don't. But you open it up to possibilities. And you let it unfold in the moment rather than in your mind predicting what's going to happen next. And humor in there? Humor to me is an egg. So it helps me to get into that frame of mind where I'm not clamping down on something as it is. I think it should be. So interjecting humor

[17:38]

even when I think I know what I'm doing. It gives me that little push to be off balance. Not the same balance that you're talking about with equanimity, but maybe the balance that gets me to equanimity. I would tweak it a little bit. I looked more for this term I was using a while back, social, soft mind, the mind that's attentive, available, but isn't too stuck on, in its doing, ensuring the right outcome. I mean, if we pay close attention, there's always... some variation to what we're doing.

[18:42]

And I would say, actually, in the intimacy of ritual, it's that some variation that keeps a certain aliveness. Because the danger of ritual is that it becomes routinized and then you're sort of like on autopilot. But then I think for each of us to find those subtle nuances or maybe not so subtle nuances that help keep us alive in the middle of whether it's going right or whether it's going off balance. Yeah. And it does seem to me that humor keeps us closer than agitation. I mean, of course, sometimes agitation, you know, makes something more evident, how attached we were to what was happening or what we wanted to have happen.

[19:52]

But I think humor is more likely to teach us something about soft mind. And then, as Sassi was saying, you know, so, Then last time I mentioned the first two koans, the one in the Gateless Gate and the Hekigan Roku, the Blue Cliff Records. And the one in the Blue Cliff Record, don't know. So we engage the ritual with the dedication. with wholeheartedness and I would say within that it affords us the opportunity to not know. We're engaging the breath, we're engaging the body, maybe we're reading or chanting aloud and we're following the Kokkyo and the Makugyo.

[21:06]

In it, there's no design on a particular icon. There's just this immersion, there's this involvement. And we do it collectively. So it can demonstrate the realm of not knowing. And in a way Zazen can be considered, and this is a teaching that Zazen is a similar activity. You engage Zazen with this full dedication to the process of Zazen and don't know the outcome, don't know how it should turn out, what should happen, what should not happen. But there's aware, wholehearted engagement.

[22:11]

And then towards the end of the last class I was saying, and then you can also carry this with you. When you go to your room, you can pause at the door and open the door and don't know what you're going to see, don't know how you're going to feel, don't know what you're going to do. Yes? I think about the collective activity of the chanting makes it a lot more out of control, which helps me. That's the way that I can make it turn out. I don't even have a chance to get a handle on it. So you're just there, and people are doing what they're doing, and you may want it to be different, but it isn't. So the thing about the fact that there's so many people contributing to this thing helps me, okay, well, this is what's going on. Whereas that it's my own thing. I think I could deceive myself more easily that I could direct it. Yeah.

[23:16]

I think that's a very good point. The collective activity. In Zen, the collective activity of Zazen, not just the ritual of chanting, but that being part of a collective involvement supports us to let go of clinging to a certain kind of individual being. Yeah. And then there is something amazing. There's a way in which we hear, and what comes out of our mouth is affected by what we hear, but it's not a cognitive process. I mean, we can try to make it so, and sometimes that can be instructive, when we let down into something, it will happen. And this is a very curious and wonderful thing to engage in.

[24:27]

It sometimes occurs to me that we're doing exactly the same thing silently in Zazen. We're letting down into a state of being. It's more palpable in Sashin. as we individually and collectively become less caught up in the intrigues of our individual consciousness. Someone was saying to me last Shashin, they were saying, well, I'm in the kitchen, but somehow or another, when I come into the middle of Shashin for that period of Zazen, it's easier to settle. I sort of feel like I'm supported by the settledness of everybody else. We can look at that from the context of don't know.

[25:32]

The individual context has its own version of reality, its own things it needs to worry about and desire and to be angry about and resent and be afraid of and feel guilty and ashamed about. As we don't know, those are loosened up, lightened up. As Dogen Zenji would say, sometimes forgotten. As Kadigari Roshi would say, forgiven. So don't know as an ally, as you're trying to carry this continuous awareness into your life, as the routine of practice period has seeped into your bones, despite all your stalwart resistance.

[26:39]

It has become part of you. Now you wake up mostly around 3.40, whether you like it or not. And on a personal day, what a tragedy. So something in us has attuned to this collective being, to this rhythmic being of the practice period. And we can play with that. Now, rather than just, you know, if you think of Bodhidharmas in the wake-up sermon, he was saying, well, the first of the four practices is to tolerate your karma. Yeah, it's right.

[27:44]

We bring all these, the fruits of the causes and conditions of our life. And then we sit and they off-gas. They give off whatever they're going to give off. Fantasies and fears and all sorts of amazing and wonderful things. And as we sit and we tolerate it, and we come to this place, I would say one of the crucial things at this place is don't waste time. Don't think because there's some sort of comfort level. It's not so hard to get through a day. It's not so hard to get through a tough hard week. Great. So now, now that the struggle for survival is not so urgent, this beautiful opportunity to explore more thoroughly the workings of human consciousness.

[29:03]

Now that the mind is no longer an unrelenting dictator, Maybe it can be an ally in unpacking just the way the world, according to me, is glued into a solid lump. The world, according to me, has a kind of monolithic authority. This is reality. We start to pay attention and we see that's not what's happening anymore. Sometimes noticing the flowering plum tree and something startling in its abundance and beauty happens. And then this adventurous exploration.

[30:08]

What does happen when you enter your room? Where do you think you're going? What wonderful or awful things do you think are going to happen there? What is it to be in that space? Have you re-entered the womb where you can somehow melt into restoration and healing? Or is it a place of obligation? I really got to tidy up and look at my altar. I should be achieving that. Oh yeah, and I should write those three letters and do my laundry. From this softer, more equanimous mind,

[31:11]

So what? That's what arises. You can't wait to lie down and get some sleep or whatever it is. As the mind softens, the good and bad of it become secondary. They don't have to be totally gone. they just become not the authority. And we start to see the workings. In Jagajaya Jinshu, Dogen Zenji quotes Nagarjuna. Nagarjuna says, the mind that sees impermanence is awakening. We can think of this mind that sees impermanence when the mind is deeply settled and present, when the mind is coming into intimate contact with samadhi.

[32:32]

Phenomenal impermanence starts to become apparent. And this, of course, is an extraordinary potent. And I'll come back to it in a few minutes. But just the very mind that appears entering your room, the mind that appears throughout the day. Let me just finish this thought. So don't know says... Of course that mind... wants to assert a reality. Look at its workings. Look at how it's coming into being. Look at its propositions. Don't just casually accept the reality it asserts. When you said, when you talked about seeing the impermanence of the world, you may see the flickering on and off phenomenon that is happening.

[33:40]

Yeah. And so obviously this momentary contact I was talking about, you know, of disrupting the narrative, and now what I'm saying is, you know, you can disrupt the narrative not as some serious Zen act, but as some enchantment in just being alive. Like when the Kokyo starts to chant at the wrong place. It's like, well, look at us. Isn't this amazing? Here we are in a frightened disarray. And all that's happening is we're just not too sure whether we should or shouldn't chant.

[34:43]

How amazing. Yes, John. So I, for me, I'm seeing like the things that I don't want to look at myself. Like when you say when you go into the room, watch that, you know, the things that are coming up that I really, you know, I don't want to be that, you know, these things that are coming up for me. Violating thoughts, you know, stuff like that, you know, that like, you know, The other day I saw myself punch somebody. I mean, I wanted to punch somebody. And to see that actually go, it's like, well, that's my ally right there. It's like, do I want to awaken about that?

[35:52]

Or do I want to follow through with that and be that, be a violent person? Right. Well, thank you. That's, you know, before I first started practicing, I probably still, you know, want to, you know, just be, I want to be at peace. I want to be at peace, but I don't know what that looks like. But actually, it's too much about it. You know, what my karma is. Yeah. And in a strange way, the first con, in the blue cleft record is a radical proposition. It's saying don't know the way. Don't know whether this is good or bad. Just let it arise in its suchness, in what it isness.

[36:53]

But don't forget I did say that Not to say it's a necessary precursor with some equanimity, some degree of malleability, resilience, trust, okayness. It's like if what's arising is throwing us all over the place, well then we have to find a way to accommodate that. Whether we need to do loving-kindness meditation, or some meditation, some strategy that brings some settling or whatever. Not to exclude that and not to even say, well then, okay, our life is now just a series of just skipping along and smelling the flowers. No, just to say that

[38:00]

we can punctuate and in a very interesting way allow for a radically different response to what arises. Sometimes even when we have a fierce arising, there's a lot of energy there. There's a lot of determined involvement. If we can touch that with not knowing mind, that can be a very interesting proposition. This notion of fiercely defending something even with violence. What a precious truth. What a vulnerable state. to create such an imperative?

[39:02]

What would it be like to get in touch with that formulation, with that way of being that has those attributes? If that kind of inquiry can come forth, it can be extraordinary. some of the mythology, and I don't mean to use that word derogatory in a derogatory way, but just as the mythology of our world, according to me, if we can shed light on it, sometimes it's enormously informative. And those deep, intense emotions, usually there's an attribute of regression in them. They're usually deep-seated. They're young formulations.

[40:03]

They're not so reasonable. And they're not so persuaded by reason either. So your reasonable mind says, well, now, wait a minute. Let me just be reasonable about this, okay? But then when the moment comes, out the window with the reasoning. something more authoritative is going to run the show. So that too. And this is also the kind of the territory of appropriate response. Yes? Do you think being a priest or more importantly maybe being a teacher Does being a priest or being a teacher enhance your don't-know mind?

[41:05]

But it's a great question. You know, often when I'm giving a talk or teaching a class, as may be evident, the way it comes together for me is there's something over here to talk about and there's a kind of don't know exactly how to do that. But they don't know And the something to talk about stimulates something. So what comes out is not exactly spontaneous.

[42:16]

I remember one time I was reading a piece by Suzuki Roshi talking about how he prepared to give a talk. And I find it very reassuring. He says, OK, start studying something. Something in that, some point in that sends me over here, and then I start looking at this, and then some point in that starts me over here, and then pretty soon I'm nowhere close to where it started and what I thought I was going to talk about. And then I go and give the talk. And I thought, oh, okay. I can see myself in that too. I mean, very much, I think our relationship to Dharma is informed, it's my own notion, by a kind of feeling connection, you know, that has associated with it a state of mind, a state of being, rather than, okay, here's the six points, and under each point, here's the three subcategories.

[43:27]

and now I'm going to go in and lay them all out. For me, okay, that's interesting. That's an interesting matrix reference. Shri Yi's six gates, I find that interesting. Bodhidharma's four steps in the realm of practice and the singularity of principle. Dogen Zenji's Yakujo Yujutsu, arousing, way-seeking mind, Nagarjuna's bold statement. But they're just inviting us into something and then the challenge is, can we enter that? And can we own it? Can we relate to it in a way that it's, we're talking about Now we're talking about the lives we're living and the mind and hearts we're living it with.

[44:33]

So there's a long answer that pretty much avoided your question, didn't it? Yes. watch, I was the door on and I mindlessly started lighting a small charcoal. And then I realized that it was already burning and I know I should put on a large charcoal. And my normal pre-heather, you know, pre-do-on-meo-heather would just put the small charcoal there and not worry about it, but I was trying to make the right thing. Good approach. Okay, well, hold on. It works. So I had this like burning small charcoal sitting on the Dr. Saucer, and I tried to put it out with the candles, not dark.

[45:39]

So then I took on a large charcoal. Meanwhile, the Wupan started, so I wasn't really far enough along, and I had to go strike the bell to end Zodlan. And I was like, oh, Paul has his eyes closed still, which was a big mess. And then I finally got the large charcoal, like one over here. Still wasn't looking very well, as she so couldn't attest to. And then it fell. onto the stand of the holes of tobacco, and there was all this sprinkling of embers, and then I wiped those off with my bare hand, and everything was flat, clean my hand. And then I put the large charcoal in there on top of, you know, the old small charcoal, while the other small charcoal was still burning. And then I went around, sat down quickly, didn't finish, struck the bell. During a rope chant, since no one was facing out, except for you and yourself, I ran around to the table, took the small charcoal, and I just buried it underneath it all. So now... Yes?

[46:41]

I think the old peddle would have handled it better. It's the small charcoal. And now, I have two, you know, I have a buried charcoal, not cloth peddle. And, um... I don't know. It just seemed like I made a mess trying to file it for him. Did you see any of that, or were your eyes closed? I could see you over there kind of like, and I was, one thought I had was, well, she's kind of really close this morning. And then I sort of got interested to see, well, you're going to get done, and get back in time to ring the bell. And I was thinking, oh, it's getting touch and go. It's getting touch and go. but don't know little lies for, okay, in the realm of how we want to set up the altar, there's a right way and a wrong way. And then, in a bigger sense, it's just how it is.

[47:45]

It doesn't mean don't try to do what we've agreed we're going to do, but in another sense, it's just... the workings of the moment. And so we can say, and this is a key point in our style of practice, that relatively speaking, there's a right and a wrong. Beyond that, it just is what it is. And so we can engage the relative, but we can engage it with the equanimity of emptiness. We engage what arises in Zazen diligently, skillfully, within the way, the technique we're sitting with, and then it turns out the way it turns out. The interesting thing is, I felt a little rushed.

[48:48]

I knew the world wasn't going to end if I didn't do this correctly. But I think that because I had this idea, my thought was jumping ahead to you, somebody seeing that I had lit the wrong charcoal and like the feeling, like, oh, I lit the wrong charcoal and I knew I should have lit the right size charcoal. So that was like going on to me, you know, and then when I saw it, it was a chiseau and that, you know, I was relieved. At least it falls and see the little earthquake and the ash right now. And then the other thing was after I sat down to start service, I watched Delta ride around while like trying to review the whole thing, like, oh, you didn't, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I was like, well, I'm just going to focus on this. And it really took a lot of effort to continue to let go of those extraneous thoughts about reviewing the past of what just happened. I mean, it's just a process anyway, regardless of whatever the incident is, just a process of review of something that just happened. And it wasn't until like meeting bell number seven and the big bells where it just sort of fell away because I was really focusing on striking the bells.

[49:52]

I'm glad that didn't really affect doing the whole service. Yeah. So anyway, it was just an interesting moment, the whole two, three, four minutes. But how interesting. We start to consider existence a certain way, saying, yes, and right and wrong are provisional, and things turn out the way they turn out. And then you say, well, by the way. You know? I mean, if we were... in some kind of space saying, you know, it has to be like this. You know, maybe your prompting would be, well, sure as hell not going to mention that to anybody. Because I feel so comfortable confessing my complete mess up this morning in front of everybody. Apparently. Yeah. Mistakes are mistakes. Mistakes are mistakes. Right. Mistakes are so-called mistakes. They are indeed.

[50:58]

Complete phenomenal expression. And maybe it's not utter coincidence that the second khan says, Joshu's, don't pick or choose. It's kind of the complement of don't know. Don't pick or choose. In some ways, fairly sophisticated notion. Stay in tune with the context, be appropriate, be sincere and dedicated, and don't get caught up in notions of right and wrong about how it turns out. It will turn out the way it turns out.

[52:09]

And can that permeate into all the variety of activities you get involved in during the day? It's multifaceted. Sometimes it's very helpful in Zazen. If you remember a while back, I had to sit down and don't know if the seat's going to take your weight. and something wakens up in the process of sitting down. In Zazen, don't know your body. Discover from the sensate experience what it is to be body. So on the phenomenal level, on how to have an engagement with the habituated, often, hidden constructs that glue together normal.

[53:14]

How to let them start to be seen. And how to come at this with soshin, soft mind, with some trust in your own sincerity and dedication. No matter how the charcoal turns out, this was your dedicated effort in the moment. And then you can watch. Are you trembling with fear or what? Sometimes this is the consequence of our sincerity. We act like this activity is a matter of life and death. And in some ways it is. And in some ways it just isn't. This is the play of our practice.

[54:23]

Just don't become sloppy saying, oh yeah, whatever. The second case, in the gateless gate, Hyakijo, makes up this fantastic story. You know? Hakujo and the Fox. Anybody doesn't know that story? You don't? Well, okay. They don't have any foxes, don't you? I'll tell you in brief. Hakujo and the Fox. He turns up to the monks and then he starts telling them this yarn. about how he says, prepare for a funeral. And then they prepare for a funeral, and they go out, and he takes them up the hill, and he says, here's the dead monk, and the dead monk's a fox.

[55:28]

And they're kind of baffled, and they say, what? And he says, oh yeah, this... I was talking to this fox. And he... He explained to me that he was a monk, but he was asked a question, does the enlightened person transcend cause and effect? And he said, yes. And for giving that answer, he was transformed into a fox for 500 lifetimes. or a long time, whatever way you want to think about it. And so he said to Yakujo, well, what would be the correct approach to this question? Is the enlightened person beyond cause and effect?

[56:31]

And Yakujo said, the enlightened person does not ignore cause and effect. that here's the charcoal, here's how we're going to do it, here's how we've agreed to do it, here's how we set up the ceremony of service. We do it with diligence and dedication. We live our monastic life even though this is a construct. This is our shared agreement. We have said, this is how we will practice in this valley. Even though the finder, Suzuki Roshi said, you know, if we went somewhere else, if we lost this place and went somewhere else, the practice would be different. But even though, here it is, and we do it as thoroughly and diligently as we can.

[57:39]

And we know whatever arises, arises. No matter how diligent and sincere the Kokyo or the Doan, it turns out the way it turns out. And it's just what it is. So, with both, it's not an either-or. Is this a matter of life and death? Or... Is it just a mere confusion that we're grasping at in terms of ideas? And we should ignore it. The enlightened person does not ignore the constructs. So this is the second case. The first one being Mu. And I'll come back to that in a minute. Any thoughts on that? Is that... Am I losing here or is that wonderfully clear? Yes.

[58:45]

So the enlightened person doesn't ignore? Yes. Yes. What does it mean to the same thing as failing to identify with causing effect? What about falling into causing effect? What's the relationship between these? These phrases? Yes. Well, you could say in a way they're all pointing at identifying and falling into or pointing at saying mistaking a relative reality for an absolute reality. So the awakened mind sees this is not an absolute reality. This is a construct.

[59:52]

However, this karmic world runs on constructs. So we acknowledge that. We respond to that appropriately. So that's the point to the con. It's like this balancing. You could say moo. It's like sweep any kind of structure you have, sweep it away. Any fixed idea you have, sweep it away. Okay, well, that would, good and bad, sweep it away. The right way to do it and the wrong way to do it, sweep it away. Well, then, let's just wander around doing whatever the hell we feel like. So we quickly need the second call.

[60:54]

Did I answer your question? You did, thank you. Thank you. Once there was between sort of don't know mind and trying to get the right mind, we shouldn't be keeping the chest between them. Don't know mind and try to get it right? Yes. I would say that they're both operative. It's like when you're doing, you're diligently and wholeheartedly following the particulars and the prescriptions for being done. And when you co-kill, you're diligently and wholeheartedly following the prescriptions of being done, of co-kill.

[61:54]

And it turns out the way it turns out. It's not one or the other, it's both together. And I would say this is the wind of the Zen school, that we are diligent about what we're doing. And as Suzuki Roshi says, and if we were on a different mountain, it could very well look quite different. That doesn't negate what we're doing. It just accepts the condition and nature of existence. I'm not sure. Could you say a little more? Because I'm not sure exactly what that means, what you're saying. Let's take a simple example. Cappuccino. I might have a preference for cappuccino over espresso, which I kind of hold on to. I do prefer cappuccino to espresso. But it won't cause me difficulty when I'm suffering as long as I'm not thinking or choosing and saying, I can't possibly go to that coffee shop because I don't have any cappuccino.

[63:01]

This would be like an Italian question, wouldn't it? No, it's a great point. Because... I'm just deciding how to relate to this. Because it leads into... If you think about the paradigm in early Buddhism, the arahant cuts off all desire. So there's no picking and choosing because there's no desire. And then you move to the Mahayana. And there's a peculiar phrase that says having few desires. which is saying don't be dictated to by your desires if you're all caught up in your preferences

[64:15]

then it's very difficult to write in the context, the factors that allow for awakening being. Because those adamant picking and choosing will keep disrupting, will keep agitating. You will continually be excited about getting what you want and annoyed and angry about getting what you didn't want. So this kind of vague notion will release it to the point where there is some equanimity. So you go to the coffee shop and you think, oh, they don't have cappuccino here. If they had, I'd have had one.

[65:18]

Until you can be present for what is, rather than just lost in absence of cappuccino. or spaciousness to bring in question what is this I that picks the truth? Well, so in the last machine, one formulation I offered was the seven factors of awakening. Mindfulness, investigation, energy or diligence, and then this kind of joy, and then a settling, and then samadhi, and equanimity. So that's one formulation. And I think today we're sort of skirting around thinking, well, how do you bring those into being?

[66:34]

And so today I was offering a kind of version of investigation and seeing And then that can unpack this very important notion in Zen of form and emptiness. This is all constructed, therefore it's empty. And then in the form there is a particularity that we adhere to and diligently uphold. And this is a characteristic of the Zen school. See, that's kind of where I was going today. But to my mind, what proceeded was relevant. Because this settling in, this somewhat subduing of the urgencies of our karmic life,

[67:44]

This somewhat enhancement of our capacity to be aware and make contact, these are very useful factors. Yeah, please. I was just going to say that it seems like we've been talking a lot about mind and consciousness. And I just wonder what the role of the body physical is in that. It seems like there is a relationship they do influence each other. Yeah. Well, as I was just saying, you know, in some ways what I'm saying today assumes what I said before. And if you think about it, In the talks, maybe not so much in the classes, but I would talk a lot about coming back to the body, coming back to the breath.

[68:49]

I mean, mind and body are intertwined. Not to say, in what I'm saying today, not to be implying, oh, and the basic practices, we just drop them off now because we're so advanced. No. We always stay close to the basic practices. This is beginner's mind. When you sit down to do zazen, you always come back to basics, and you will notice. If staying in touch with the basics is difficult, well, guess what? That's today's zazen. If the mind and the body readily settle, okay. then it's more about residing in presence. So it's implicit in there that the body practice... Staying aware of the body is a wonderful way to carry awareness.

[69:55]

It's more tangible and accessible than trying to stay in touch with this lightning-fast mind. And I was also saying last time, and this is in the practice of Mu, you know, Mu is practiced as a long extended exhale, sometimes with your mouth open, just like that. Harada Roshi teaches, he doesn't consider it his teaching, but he teaches, The first exhale, open your mouth like this. And then you exhale very, very slowly. Maybe for a minute or so. And in that, you drop away all thoughts and mental activity.

[71:01]

I thought, wow, it's that easy. So Mu... traditionally has that kind of assertive, stimulating the one-pointed concentration. Whereas you could say, don't know, is stimulating more this receptive continuous contact. And I would say all three are intertwined. The momentary, the one-pointed, and the receptive. And if you watch how you're practicing, you'll see each has their place in your daily life and in your Zazen. Yes, Sarika.

[72:11]

Concentration goes for a hike. Now, you wouldn't be saying going hiking and being very concentrated. Equinibity, when concentration is lost. It's a little bit like when... so-called mistake happens. When we lose connection to what we're doing, something goes awry. And then in the creation of that, can there be presence that both says, okay, we've deviated from, within the context of what we're doing, we've deviated from what was intended.

[73:32]

So-called mistake. And then, in another way, here's what's appearing. Here's how the charcoal is. Here's how the sangha is chanting. The equanimity, what I was trying to say was, do we flow with it or do we try to resist it or resent it? Do we try to recover the normal or do we want to blame somebody for having caused this great disaster? Or do we just say, okay, Here it is. Now what? Well, it looks like we're continuing to chant, so we'll continue to chant. So, in a wonderful way, our mistakes, which inside our karmic perspective, would be a deficiency.

[74:50]

would be a sign of our lack of expertise or inadequacy or something. They're just an arising that has its own kind of teaching. The teaching, you've probably heard one continuous mistake. Our practice is one. So this is kind of woven into that. That's not saying, you know, you're a terrible person, you always do it wrong, and that's a disaster. It's saying, things are always a little bit out of balance, inviting us to rediscover balance. Attending to the arising of the moment is in contrast to being caught up and lost in the karmic arisings.

[76:11]

The karmic arisings are in search of getting what they want and avoiding what they don't want. And this never works out quite how we hoped for very long. So we have what's known in the business as dukkha. And having equanimity around dukkha doesn't come too easily. And this karmic world with its dukkha is lessened. And in a wonderful, generous ways, a kind of okayness comes into being. Like mistakes, just being mistakes is a wonderful kind of okayness.

[77:16]

Okay, I can be Don. And probably between now and the end of the practice period, I'm going to make some real whoppers. No more mistakes. Yeah, yeah. Well, at that point, we'll get down to the 20 or so minor mistakes. Minor? Yeah. Like how a bell could have been a second sooner or later. or one continuous mistake. So the samadhi helps establish an okayness and that okayness starts to reveal to us some of the fluidity of being and helps to ripen equanimity. the karmic horizons, especially when you're sitting and you're feeling more settled when the karmic horizons are dancing in front of you or inside of you and you're noticing them and you're not like being and there's a sense of not being compelled by this emotion thought is that because when you say attending, attending doesn't necessarily I'm thinking you're not saying that attending to what's going on is oh yeah so that person made this mistake and they stink because of this and blah blah blah I mean that

[78:50]

Some people might say that's attending to what's going on. That doesn't seem like that's what you're saying. Well, it's attending within the context of the karmic arising. And then all of that's asking to become into awareness. It's developing the story and then the next challenge is to be aware of developing the story. Everything can be available for awareness. The more elemental the moment of awareness, the less it's a construct. This is why I say the one-pointedness plays a role in all of this, because the one-pointedness becomes more elemental, phenomenological. J, cawing, then it's like caw or J. And then when there's less associations that arise with that J, caw, then the training of thoughts is not going to continue then.

[80:12]

If you're able to sort of drop it at the first thought. And you're not going to go down that bunny trail of associations that arise. That seems to be more... So if we don't attend to the thoughts that are arising, then... we may get lost in them and follow those narratives. But if we're tending to what's happening, then perhaps that narrative can be kind of nipped in the blood before it becomes a, you know, before you start reifying it. It is. But the reality of practice is to have a versatility, to have a repertoire of engagement. However, if it's momentary and exact, There's call and there's not knowing other than sound arose, fine. If you're in the throes of something, having some furious argument, while you're sitting on your bed having some furious argument, then to notice, acknowledge, make contact, oh, I'm arguing with so-and-so and that happened three years ago and

[81:25]

Right now my heart's pinding and here's the emotion. The width of practice is whatever arises, be aware. The exacting nature of practice is just this moment as it is. But they're not exclusive. They're inclusive. And then I was trying to say that both these koans can offer an approach to that range. Okay, any last comments or questions? Yes, Jared. I have a question. I have a question about where Dogen says in unconstructedness there's stillness and stillness there's immediate realization. And one question was I was wondering how far he's going. Is it like, you know, is it like I'm looking at a book or something and I'm constructing the sense of my sense of I isn't saying it's a good or a bad book, which is sense perception?

[82:35]

Or is it building on that like the sense perception, which is a construction, even not my sense of I, but it's just, what is it? Does that make sense? It does make sense, yeah. So we don't know, right? We don't know what was going on in Dogen's head when he wrote that. We can surmise. He considered when he was sitting with Ru Jing, and as far as we can gather, when he was sitting with Ru Jing, the practice was an intense meditation practice. that included one-pointedness, and that Dogen deeply saddled into one-pointedness.

[83:42]

In one-pointedness, in the jhanas, there's a stripping away of constructiveness. Like in the fourth and fifth jhanas, you're down to stripping away the construct of time and space. From his later writings, it does seem that that experience with Ruji, which he calls dropping off body and mind, is this radical, elemental perception of being. From his later writings, it does seem that that was seminal. He refers to it a lot. It was foundational. It was kind of like the seed to many things that grew up from there. He refers to it a lot, and then he extends it.

[84:46]

He says, and you can drop off body and mind just in cutting the carrots. So we can say this unconstructedness and stillness covers the range, covers the range from deep concentration in a single pointed way to this wholehearted engagement in the particulars of what we're doing and also in this continuous contact. like when you're serving, when you're being a server, this staying present, staying attentive to what's going on and not constructing a lot of ideas and opinions and judgments. It's very hard to serve and think, do I look good? Does everybody think I'm doing a good job?

[85:48]

If you get into that, you're likely to run into the wall or something. So I would say that seems to be one of his primary experiences, and certainly as he expanded his practice, he said, and this appears in all the modalities of practice, not just in deep concentration. That's more saying, I'm just participating in what is rising without saying, this is good, this is self-conscious of how my questions are.

[87:00]

It's more that than this image dropping off. That makes sense, yeah. Go for it. Yeah, I mean, people have questions. Okay. Don't answer, go for it. Would it be like what he was talking about, would it be kind of like letting go of a condition of belief structure that we kind of created for ourselves? Could be. Could be. Now, if we're observing something, we have very fixed idea based on what we've been conditioned to view. to think that this unconstructedness would just be ready, right? That's correct. It would be. It seems easier to have direct experience of what we call sound or what we call body against the cushion.

[88:07]

Not so easy. What is the direct experiencing of thought? How do we practice? As I've been settling down after being gay, I noticed all I can say is electrical activity under the words, behind the words. I wouldn't want to say agitated, but energetic quality. Are there times when I'm more subtle? It's there, but it's very subtle. That was one... That's a question. Is that a way of directly experiencing thought? Or are there others? So we have a bit of a problem, a language problem, because...

[89:14]

When we go into the Dharma, we have the five skandhas. And where do we consider thought lines there? Is thought the formulation that arises, or is thought, are we talking about consciousness, which any one of them can be? I think usually we're talking about the sankhara, the formulation that arises from the experience. And we could say, well, just being aware of electric activity or energy or whatever you're saying is pre-sankara to a large degree. Maybe not completely, but to a large degree there's no formulated ideation. So maybe... when you're sitting there and thought?

[90:21]

Practicing with thoughts once they're formed is one kind of practice. But then is there a direct experience of thought the way there is? Can thought be experienced as a phenomena? Not exactly. The formulating that state of being, but once the thought has come into being, we can be aware of it, but it's more complex than a phenomenon. But just like you're saying, being aware of a certain... You know, it's interesting because the word sankara covers both the process of formulating and that which is formulated.

[91:28]

So in that seminal place of something coming into being, it hasn't quite crossed over into a construct that we can be aware of. We could say we can experience the disposition, the energy of it, as you were doing. You know, that's possible. And sometimes you can watch. It's kind of your awareness going back and forth with the two. What do I do? I try to stay anchored in the body and the breath and let a receptive awareness without any clinging arise. And then whatever comes, comes. And let it be a now, here and now experience.

[92:33]

Some sense of... And on that note, we'll pause and go up to the Zendo and put it all into action. Thank you. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma talks are offered free of charge 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 sscc.org and click giving.

[93:17]

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