I always find it... I guess I have to talk louder here. In the city they now have amplifiers. You can't hear me back there, please let me know. There's two traditions of Zen lectures, one long and one short, and I favour the short, or nothing at all. But I see that you start lectures so that I have an hour and 15 minutes. Maybe we'll all go to bed early. When I first came back I had to give my first lecture and I think I talked 20 minutes. 10 minutes? No. 5. You weren't there, were you? Anyway, Roshi, somebody repeated the lecture to Roshi and he

[01:05]

said, good but too short. Anyway, I really feel that. In the city I have to give a talk every Saturday, so I just do it down here. There's no schedule. Not having anything to say about Zen is in the nature of it, so it's actually rather difficult to say something about it and not confuse everybody. But this practising here is some opportunity for us because this practising

[02:23]

in the way you do here in the summer, with guests coming down, is much closer to what it'll be like if you become Zen teachers and you have to have your own place. There will always be people coming and very few people or teachers are ever able to just practise in a monastic situation with monks. And also it's very similar to how you're going to have to lead your life when you leave here. But it also presents problems for the students here and for me speaking to you because, as I was saying to somebody at meal time tonight, I ate with a guest tonight because I had to see somebody during regular meal

[03:32]

time. Zen is a kind of apprentice system, as you know, where it really depends on a group of people getting to know each other very well over quite a long period of time and getting to know the tradition well. And one of my favourite statements of a Zen teacher was, is, I respect him because he never told me anything openly. And that was Suzuki Roshi's way particularly. He never... He talked a lot but actually his lectures were always rather introductory and what he was really teaching he never said openly. So the way is then to

[04:32]

be quite alert to what's being said or not being said. So in fact we talk about the teaching of non-sentient beings. One statement is, the teaching of non-sentient beings is unthinkable. But anyway, many of the koans are based on the question about the teaching of non-sentient beings. Loring was talking at dinner too. He talked about the way-seeking mind. And he said,

[05:50]

which allows us, allows our practice to continue. And the only way we're going to... we can make a practice like here at Tassajara work continue, is if the older students have a strong sense of continuing their practice, not only for themselves but for the other students here and for whoever comes here. There's no way, for instance, I can really talk about Zen to all of you at once. The best thing we can do is to continue our practice in... I don't know how to say it. Just to do it is not exactly what I mean. You have

[06:53]

to have the feeling that when you're sitting zazen at your home, that this zendo is your home. So whatever we do here, practicing with whoever's here, the sense that this room, our zazen practice, is where this place makes most sense and where we make most sense. In the city I talked about, in Blue Cliff Records, the story number 17, which is about one-sided views. And the story is that a monk asks, it's always a monk asking, anyway, the

[08:03]

monk asks, why did Bodhidharma come from the West? And the teacher says, and he was translated as meditating long and becoming weary, which actually is a colloquial expression meaning, thank you very much for practicing. There are hundreds of, probably more than five hundred stories based on the question, why did Bodhidharma come from the West? So when the teacher and the monk asked, why did Bodhidharma come from the West? The teacher said, thank you for asking that question again. Thank you for repeating that question endlessly. And our practice has to be

[09:14]

like that. Way-seeking mind means, actually, repetitive mind, to ask yourself some question like that, over and over again. No matter what answer you come up with or feeling of solution, you have great confidence in your doubt, that it's the doubt about the answer. You ask it again and again. And actually, our life is like that. Every day we wash our face, we do the same thing over and over again. Particularly in a place like Tassajara, we do the same thing over and over again.

[10:15]

And this repetition has some, I mean, for most people, it's maybe rather boring. It's the one thing they want to avoid, is the repetition of their life. But for someone who practices Zen, each time it's something, some satisfaction to repeat. Each breath. So when we meditate, we just, first, we just notice our breathing, each breath. Just a repetition of the previous breath. But actually, there's a whole world on each breath when you practice Zen. So we keep

[11:19]

coming back. I mean, when you're here practicing this summer, we just keep coming back to this Zen there, and sitting. Not because, exactly because the Han begins, or the bell rings. The same way we come back to our breathing. One day, a few years ago, I calculated that I'd sat Sazen maybe 15 or 20,000 hours. I think if I'd done anything else that often, I'd have something to show for it. Nothing. There's a

[12:25]

story that Soke-yan Sasaki-roshi, who was with the, not the Sasaki-roshi in Los Angeles, but the Sasaki-roshi, who was at the First Zen Institute in New York years ago. It's in a recent Zen Notes. But one day there was a dog barking in the back of the temple, and barking with the temple, some kind of fight going on with the temple dog. And Soke-yan was a young monk at the time, and he said to his teacher, I'll chase the dog away. And he said, let our dog chase it away. And then he added, don't you let a fireman put out

[13:35]

the fire. Anyway, I rather like the story, let our dog chase the dog away. Because in a, particularly for us in America, but in a community like this, we have to let a lot of other people do their job. Actually, it's a kind of, what he was talking about was practicing charity. When you really have the sense of including others, then others

[14:37]

can do for you what you wanted to do. Say, you always wanted to write a book. If someone else writes a book, you say, ah, at last, I don't have to write the book now. He did it for me. So everything can be, if someone else does something, it's the same as you're doing it. I think it's pretty hard for us to give up. Most of us have some kind of cherished idea about what we really want to do. Maybe we should do it. I'm not saying we shouldn't, but also we should be able to let others do it. Let somebody else practice Zen well. Maybe your job is just to help them practice well. There's another Bodhidharma story which is nearly the same as the first, but a little

[16:04]

different, which is, again, a monk asks about Bodhidharma coming from the West. The teacher says, when you have your own temple, what will you tell someone who asks you that question? How will you let someone else answer the question? We shouldn't always be just trying to answer

[17:26]

the question ourselves. We should be maybe trying even more to let someone else answer the question. So over and over again, your life is to try to make an opportunity for other people to practice. Even if you're a hermit, you should, completely by yourself, still, the sounds should sound you, and anybody who comes, you should be open to. It's the same here, whether you're a hermit. Actually, we're all hermits. Even if we're here, we're kind of hermit, sitting at the mouth of our cave. small group of people, you can talk more particularly about some method. I mean, mostly

[20:01]

I just talk about the basis of Zen practice. And with a small group of people, you can talk about the method, some method maybe. And then with your disciples, you can talk about the third kind of practice, realization. But that you don't actually, there's nothing said. Somehow by practicing together, you understand. So the basis of our practice is, from the Hinayana point of view, is the recognition of suffering and egolessness and impermanence. And we should know exactly what the conditions of our life are, and how unreasonably difficult

[21:15]

life is. You should be intimate and familiar with what you are, and your difficulties, and the various ways you feel about things. Anyways, Zen practice is a way of becoming familiar with ourselves, and ultimately familiar with everything. And from a Mahayana point of view, the basis of our practice is the acceptance of our existence of Buddha nature, or essence of mind. Our essence of mind is pure. And for method, we talked about method. There's the

[22:37]

Hinayana way is the eightfold path, you know, right livelihood, right view, etc. And here at Tassajara, that's rather taken care of. So you don't, in that sense, this monastery is based on the eightfold path, so you don't have to worry about it. You don't have to worry about right livelihood down here, because all you have to do is follow the schedule. Pretty simple. But the Mahayana way is, the simplest form of it, is maybe something like, with every thought, no attachment to things, and with every step, no attachment to place.

[23:42]

That you can practice anywhere, here or in San Francisco. But it's not so easy, and when you get to the city, you find that moment after moment, to have no attachment to things, or no attachment to place, or space, your space, is nearly impossible. But actually, living in a monastery is much easier. But then there are more, if you practice, if you're with a small group of people, there are more specific ways we can talk about method. How to imagine

[24:48]

your mind, how to consider the contents of your mind, how to view your mind, and what to identify your mind with, what to identify your body, speech and mind with. But all of that will come when your practice brings it out for you,

[26:15]

so that you find yourself up against some kind of barrier in your practice, and you can't figure out exactly what it is, but you feel some barrier. Then this kind of thing, sometimes it's just a repetition of what you thought you'd already solved, a repetition of what you've heard over and over again, suddenly it doesn't make sense, actually. You've just heard it, you know. At that point, you need some method, or some confidence, or some relationship with a teacher. But you get to that point by repetition in your practice, seemingly meaningless repetition. Most of you, anyway, many of you give up pretty easily. You don't give up your practice,

[27:24]

but you give up. To practice Zen, a certain kind of energy is necessary that keeps you at it, like that. And you continue your practice, but that energy, when it is there, you know, for you, you... sometimes there's a big question in your life, or a teacher asks you a question, and two or three weeks later, after staying with it, you say, aha, my understanding is such, and I've had this good experience from facing the question, and I've analyzed it in such and such a way. And then when that's not accepted, you know, you're rather angry, or you think that's enough, maybe three weeks of working on one question, and maybe three years would be too short. All

[28:33]

you need is one question which you can really look at carefully, over and over again. You don't need 100 koans or anything. Just one is good enough. One question held before you in your practice, over and over again, is much more valuable than looking at many questions. Everything will come out of that one question. We don't know what we're doing, but over and over again we repeat the question. So what keeps us

[29:38]

going, you know? And often, you know, you're told by your teacher, it's no matter what you say, it's wrong. So what keeps you going? First of all, you need just the energy to stay present, which is pretty difficult to be present all the time, to not be wandering off, you know, to feel really abiding right where you are. Owning, owning everything. That alone takes maybe several years

[30:42]

of bringing yourself back to where you are, bringing yourself back. And then you go, and then you come. How do you come back? So you have that imperturbable, calm place. Pretty difficult. Once you get so that you don't wander off, there's some shift that occurs. There's no effort to stay present after that. But then your Zen practice really begins, because you can begin to look at a question. You can begin to hold the question before you. Before you can be present in that way, you can't hold a question before you. You can't even hold your own presence. So no one can teach you what practice is. But there's some elusive sense of, maybe at first,

[32:08]

it's a sense of almost having it. Each time you do Zazen, you almost have it. Over and over again, you almost have it, some feeling like that. So you come back to Zazen. Each time, it's no better. You almost have it, or sometimes it's just nothing at all, no sense of practice. But you come back, and come back. But if you can practice with the same persistence that breath follows breath, one after another, then you can practice right through the summer, and next winter, next year, next year, and next year. And that kind of practice will include everybody. What Mahayana practice means is that there is really no practice that doesn't include everybody.

[33:18]

It doesn't mean group practice only. And it means you can't practice just for yourself. You can have some kind of attainment if you practice just for yourself. But to practice in that way isn't real Buddhism. But you must practice in a way that allows others to continue with you. Even if you're by yourself somewhere, you practice in a way that allows others to continue with you. How will we do that until our old personality and name and person, sort of like a shell,

[34:21]

just fall away? Maybe all of you have been reborn already, but you haven't got out of the shell yet. But if you continue just pecking away from inside, eventually it'll fall away. But a lot of you want to sort of, as I said in San Francisco, reach around outside your shell and

[35:25]

tap on the outside. Or you want somebody outside to tap and do it. You want Suzuki Roshi to come back to life and clap each hand. But it's impossible. You must keep pecking yourself over and over again. Because you can't tell what's outside the shell. There's no way except to keep pecking. Over and over again. And that repetition becomes the very satisfaction of our life. Over and over again.

[36:48]

Do you have any questions? I just think you're living in easy circumstances. You practice, but we are not. It seems as though

[38:41]

you're not being hard enough on yourself. You're not asking enough of yourself, so it's impossible for you to practice. That's true. Is there something that you should do for yourself, by way of putting yourself in a practice situation? In each case it's different, of course, but I think we know what to do. Practice, then, is to find, is to,

[39:53]

we don't know how to open ourselves to knowing what to do. So the best way is to do Zazen, actually. Our practice is, Zen practice of all Buddhist practices, is the practice which adds the least to you. When you practice Zazen, you already will be alive that forty minutes, already breathing. So you just sit, not adding anything, just sitting there. But when we do that, having less distractions, we usually find out what we should do.

[40:55]

You have to give up the idea that somebody somewhere knows what to do, that each moment is what to do, that there's nothing somewhere else which is what we're supposed to do, or find out. First of all, you have to come to accepting just what you are now, just what everything is now,

[42:07]

without any ideas about yourself, about what it is. Nothing added. Of course, that's why we come to Tassajar. You say that you gain nothing from all those hours with food. Is it actually true? Yes. There is no change. Nothing changed. What kind of change would you like to have? A slower time, a slower sense of time, a sense of the flow of life itself.

[43:22]

Or a penetration into a more secure, more central place, more space. Well, to talk in practical terms, the more you have a sense of having nothing, of having gained nothing, of possessing nothing, the more your time is slower. It's all that sense of possession that speeds our time up. Do you have a sense of pure possession? Well, of course there's some change, and your friends notice it.

[44:28]

You notice some change, I suppose, but as all of you practice, you notice some change in yourself. But the attempt to think about the change or grasp the change eliminates the change, defeats the practice. You can only practice when you give up any idea of improvement. What do you mean by giving up improvement? Well, a change, then. If you practice, it's pretty difficult not to practice with some idea of, well, I'm doing this and it'll help me, you know. And that's true for the first few years, that it does help you, and life's a lot simpler and you don't go up and down so much. There's some other satisfaction than what you used to think was happiness or sadness.

[45:40]

But that's really only beginning practice. And after having that equilibrium, the practice, really, of giving up any idea of anything begins. And that's really what Zen practice is all about. That's where, you know, like regular Buddhism leaves off and Zen begins. I mean, the koan, that story I talked about in the city, I guess, Saturday, that I like, is the student, no, excuse me, the teacher says, the teacher says first, the teacher says,

[46:43]

even if from the beginning you say nothing exists, even if you say that nothing exists from the beginning, you are not worthy to enter the zendo for a meal. And so the monk says, who is worthy? And the teacher says, one who has not yet entered the door. And how completely we can't enter the door. How completely we give up Zen practice. We continue, I'm talking about continuing, continuing, but we give up practice completely, we give up everything. That's Zen. Then we're talking about Zen practice. So from that point of view, no matter what you do, there's nothing that can be gained, nor is there anything gained.

[47:46]

I mean, it's really true, I'm not just kidding you. What is it that keeps us sitting? What is it that keeps you sitting? I suppose that's the same for all of us. We have some, what Suzuki Goshi used to call some inner request, or our inmost request, which we don't know quite what it is, particularly when you first start practicing. So a lot of us have lots of ideas about what's going to happen to us, what practice is. Actually, there's just some request we feel. Sometimes I think it has to do with people who can't accept anything that feels inauthentic.

[48:51]

So nothing feels quite right, you know? So you don't know, you feel some inner need to accept only what's authentic, or what feels complete or real. And nothing feels complete or real, particularly in America today. Okay. So you end up doing zazen, you know, you end up putting everything aside, and there you are in your heartbeat, well, that seems sort of real, you know. Breathing goes, that seems sort of real. What else, you know? So then you can practice with that idea, this much is real, you know. In Sashin, there's quite a lot of pain, and that seems real. And somebody says to you, oh, it's not real, it's just... But actually it seems quite real. So if you start your life over again with this feeling, to start from the very beginning, you know, as if you knew nothing,

[49:53]

just I'm sitting here, and this much seems real. What else? And if you really ask that question, what else, accepting the world as it is, but also asking what else, not so easily satisfied, you know, then you practice, until your nature extends everywhere. Thank you very much.

[50:32]

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