So I wanted to begin this evening. First of all, it's very nice to be back and to see you all. Well, I can't really see all of you yet, but I'm going to go to a gallery view to do that. Okay. So, yes. Hello, hello. Just let me kind of glance around for a minute. Yeah, I'm fine. I did it. Great. So I wanted to give you some news from Green Gulch, what's been happening here before I start looking at Uji again. It all seems relevant. You know, I read this fascicle and I'm like, well, that's time being is all we've got. You know, what he's telling us is that everything is time being. This is right now is time being and this is the whole of reality. whatever's happening in the moment is all of it.

[01:16]

And all there ever be, you know, all we've ever known, all we will ever know, so it's somewhat predictable, you know, it's like time being, it's right now. And so everything seems to be very alive, you know, in what's happening here in our community and significant in various ways. So four of our very senior people have now moved away from Gringolch. They've gone to Enso Village, which is the retirement home that has been created by Zen Center in concert with the Quakers. I think we've talked about that a little bit. Anyway, it's a beautiful place. I'll be moving there in March myself. But it's so different. My neighbor, Emola, that house is empty. The one across the way where Mickensuke, the gardener and the baker, lived for a very long time is empty. And Maya Wender's house, the tea teacher here, is empty. And there's this sort of sea change that's happening among the senior residents here.

[02:24]

We had a beautiful ceremony for these four major senior teachers here. And we went to each of their work areas. So this was last week. They've been now up at Enso Village for a week, and they're kind of getting used to their own new routines up there. It sounds good. It sounds like they're all settling in, and it's a lovely place. And I visited, and I'm very happy for us to have such a lovely place to go. So the ceremony, we started down on the farm and thanked Emela. for her many, many years cropping vegetables and leading farm crews and selling to the markets and all of that. She was one of the main reasons we could farm here successfully. And then we went from there. We went to the garden area where Suki had been head gardener for a very, very long time. And most of the landscaping at Green Gulch, if you've been here, is quite beautiful. And that's Suki's art of plants.

[03:26]

knowing where and how to plant and keep them alive and make this very beautiful. All the grounds here are very beautiful. And then we went to the bakery where Mick had been. He'd been the head baker at the Tassajara Bakery for many, many years. And then he came to Green Gulch, and I think it's been over 20 years that he's been baking bread here. beautiful oven, and the smell of baking bread has been one of the most wonderful features of the morning. You walk down to the Zendo in the morning, and there's this fresh bread odor coming from the bakery. Well, that's not happening now. Mick has moved Tanso Village. And then we stopped at the tea house, and the garden doors were open into the tea garden, which Maya basically was the creative artist that created the garden and brought the tea house to life. the tea program to life. And although she'll continue to teach tea, and I hope any of you who can, who are local, would be able to sign up for one of her monthly teas. They're quite wonderful. Get to go inside the tea house and be taught some things about how to arrive and make use of the garden.

[04:31]

So then we said goodbye to her at the gate of that wonderful place. Yeah, and I'm... And I'm going to probably have some similar kind of farewell. I don't have a location at Green Gulch because I wasn't one of the people who sort of established, was established on the land. As all of them said, they were really located, like the bakery and the garden and the farm and the tea house. I don't have a place like that. I've been around the Zendo. That's kind of my place, which doesn't belong to anybody. But that's probably where I will get to say goodbye to the community. And also Sonia. uh who some of you know will be joining me in that and that farewell in march so that was really big that's been a major change and i we all feel it i rev and i were talking about how it feels like a little bit of a like a ghost town you know so many faces over so many years and it's changing and um and then this week was rohatsu sushin today at noon was the final

[05:36]

this final lecture, Jiryu was leading the Rahatsu Sesshin. Rahatsu means eighth day of the twelfth month. So the eighth day of the twelfth month is the day that in our reckoning, Buddhist reckoning, is when Shakyamuni Buddha woke up. That was his enlightenment day. So one of the celebrations we do here is the Buddhist enlightenment celebration, which is... quite elaborate ritual that is a big celebratory. It's one of the happier ones, unlike the Pari Nirvana where the Buddha has died. His birthday is a happy one too. That's in the spring. And then this enlightenment ceremony is a very happy ceremony. So the flowers were thrown around the zendo and people were dancing around and we were circumambulating the room and there was a lot of kind of squealing. I think the people were... Also very relieved to be done with Sashin. So it was kind of a jubilee. And so now that's finished.

[06:37]

So things, you know, it's like time being. So for the time being, you know, we had a celebration. And for the time being, our seniors left. And for the time being, we're here together right now. So, you know, this is what it is. And Dogen sort of, I think he really nailed it at this essay. I've read it through... several times now and each time i get some kind of fresh inspiration about you know what he was seeing how he was seeing the this this route this present life that we have not abstract it's really like right here in our dharma position what he calls dharma positions that's the time being where each of us is and what each of us is doing you know And we're all together in that. Whatever I'm doing is connected to whatever you're doing, both on a galactic scale, the largest possible extension of our shared reality, and on the very intimate scale, when we make personal contact with one another.

[07:40]

And how sweet is that, to be touching. Arrows meeting in midair, as it says in one of our Dharma poems. So that's the news from Green Gulch and what we've been doing here. We're getting ready for the break of the holidays. But then the exciting news about the future is that we're planning and beginning to prepare for this wonderful precept ceremony for two of our sangha members. Yang and Melissa will be receiving precepts. So I've been spending... a great deal of time doing what I needed to do to prepare for that. They spent a great deal of time sewing their raksus. Well, Ying actually wasn't able to do that because there's no sewing teachers where she is in Singapore. So one of the very kind and generous students here offered to sew a raksu for her. And so I have that here and I have Melissa's raksu here.

[08:42]

And then there are a number of papers that get created. There's the lineage paper I think I've shown to you over the time we've been together with all the names starting with this big red circle at the top which represents the Buddhist enlightenment. So the Rohatsu, the moment of his awakening. And then his name is down. There's this red line that flows through with all these names starting with Shakyamuni Buddha and then his disciple Mahakashapa and Ananda and so on. So we chant those names as part of our morning service. the Buddhas and ancestors, and you go all the way down and then you come to Bodhidharma, all these names that we've looked at in the transmission of light, each of these transmissions is exactly that, the transmission of the light of understanding, of awakening. So these names go down and each of the teachers has their disciple and then that person becomes a teacher who has their disciple. So the names flow through, first they flow through India and then they flow into China with Bodhidharma.

[09:46]

who arrives in China, and then the names are now Chinese names. And then you go down even further, and there at the bottom, there's this Japanese name, Dogen Zenji, who went to China, received Dharma transmission from Rujing, and then he brought that home to Japan. So then the names on our lineage chart are Japanese names, until you get to this Sentatsu... baker who's zentasa myoyu who's richard baker who was received dharma transmission from suzuki roshi whose name is there and then richard baker and then tension reb anderson tensions enki and then because i received dharma transmission from tensions enki from reb my name's next and then after my name i put the name of the people who i'm giving precepts to so ying's name will be after mine and melissa's name will be after mine on their documents So that's part of what also is involved in preparing for receiving the precepts.

[10:47]

And they also get a new name, which they will hear for the first time on Thursday at 3 o'clock. And certainly you're all invited. Any of you who live in the Bay Area and has any way of coming, you're more than welcome to come. Some people already said they can and will. So you'd be more than welcome. There are a lot of people from... green culture on vacation right now. So I know it's going to be fairly intimate in a very big room. So that's fine. That's lovely. And at the same time, if anyone else can join us, it would be just great. So that'll be Thursday this week. And then after that, we have this big break coming up for a while of the New Year's... break until we start the January intensive, which Tenshin Roshi is going to be leading, as always. He has for many, many years. This three-week intensive that some of you have come to, and it's already quite full. A lot of people are coming, so we'll see old friends who come each year, and then some newer people who will come for the first time.

[11:54]

And also to let you know, for some of you knew that Reb had a surgery. Two days ago, he's been talking about it. It's not a secret. He had this kind of blockage in his abdomen. There's an aortic tube that goes down to your legs. And he was having a lot of difficulty with pain in his legs when he'd walk because, as they discovered, the blood wasn't getting down into his legs. And you'd really need that in order to get the muscles... to function. So once that was discovered, that actually was a relatively simple repair, although it took several hours, and he was under anesthetic, and so all that. We were doing well-being ceremony for him on Friday, and he's home. He was home Friday. He's walking around, and he said it's amazing because already the pain is gone in his legs. It was just this amazing thing that medical science is able to do.

[12:56]

I mean, we all know it's kind of... how many things have turned into kind of simple procedures, you know, tiny little opening, and then this alleviating this discomfort. So he was back in the Zander this morning, and that was wonderful. It's very nice to have him there. So that's the news. That's all the news from Green Malch. So I want to just turn back a little bit to some things I said earlier. Two weeks ago, I was sharing with you the scrolls that I had offered to the art workshop. We do a Zen and art workshop every year. lovely art teacher named Sueko, who I also gave her precepts many, many years ago. And then she and I have done this art and Zen workshop. And it's really delightful because everyone just sits around drawing things. And Sueko's a very fine teacher. So even if, whether you know how to draw or not, it doesn't matter.

[13:57]

You end up making something that's really great. And everyone goes, oh, that's so nice. Because she has, you know, she pour, you pour ink on the page and you roll it around and somehow it all starts to look very, Very interesting, and everyone's an artist in that class. So I was sharing with you the scrolls that I used as my piece of the workshop was to do some Zen teaching. So I thought, well, I wanted to share with you that these scrolls are each representing a season. So the seasons are these, what Dogen talks about in Uji, the beginning of the essay. are these dharma positions. So he gives this little poem that I've gone through a couple of times with you where he names these various kind of odd examples of dharma positions. So, you know, he says, he talks about the highest mountain and the deepest ocean and these kind of demons and Buddhas. And so all the kind of contrasting pairs. And then he talks about the commoners, the names of commoners and so on and so forth.

[15:01]

So, So basically what he's doing is giving examples of time being. That's a time being and that's a time being. So it's kind of like anything you can name and anything you've experienced or what you're experiencing and of course what you're experiencing now qualifies as a time being. It doesn't matter if you like it or not. It doesn't matter if it's a devil or a Buddha or a commoner or a king. Time being. That's time being. They're all the same. They're arriving in time. as being, time and being as one, one word. So Uji, time, being is just this one word that Dogen is kind of drilling us on. This is it, this is it, this is it. So in his language, you know, he teaches us that the only real true unit of time is the universe itself. That's the true unit of time and which the only unit of time, you know, which is the only unit of time and is the whole of time. So the universe is time, is being,

[16:02]

And that's it. That's the clockwork of our existence, is the universe itself. So what I like about reading this kind of material is that it's sort of, it's like an accordion. I was thinking about that. I watch my mind when I'm reading Uji or some of you. The Avatamsaka Sutra has been a study that Reb's doing right now, which is another one. It's very expansive. It's a visioning. They're visions. And a lot of the Mahayana sutras have visionary, they're expansive visions, universal visions, like Indra's net, the largest possible thing that one can imagine. And so basically this is how we, when we open our minds, we open our feelings to that part of what we are, to that aspect of ourselves. The entire universe is the true human body, as Dogen says. So when we... kind of allow ourselves to even try to imagine that to be true.

[17:04]

The entire universe is the true human body. That's like the accordion opening, you know, taking in all that air. And then you give it a big squeeze and you come back to being a person, you know, that makes noises and says things with all that air, you know, so that big expansive universe comes through the voice of a human being, you know, and then you go back out again. And you come back in again. So I think that's part of what the delight of reading these texts is. If you let yourself go, you just let yourself take the ride, that you really have this sense of like the magnificence and vastness of existence and then coming back home to the particularities of your house and your room and your friends and what you're going to wear today and all that kind of stuff. All of these are Dharma positions. Everywhere along the expansion, every part of that expansion is a Dharma position and coming back is back to a Dharma position and so on. So, you know, Dogen is using words and inviting us into this understanding that he achieved in China.

[18:09]

So he had this, you call it realization or an awakening or whatever, something... big enough that he kept talking about it. You know, it's all he talked about. After that experience was this realization he had about this, about time being, about his resolving his quest for, you know, if I'm already Buddha, why do I have to practice? So he was all tied in a knot about, you know, I don't get it. He had these doubts, as all of these teachers express, as we're reading in The Transmission of Light. Every one of them starts off with, you know, like... All of us, it's like, I don't get it. I don't know what's happening. And I've been talking to students during sashing and they're so dear and they really are having an amazing transformative experience. When you sit for a long time like they're doing, you know, by about the fifth or sixth day, you start to get kind of like jello. You know, they're getting very... kind of open and liquidy and feeling some relief from the tightness that they perhaps felt when they began or when they arrived.

[19:21]

I want more. Or I want to keep this. I don't ever want to lose this clarity I'm feeling right now. So each one of them who comes in and brings their Dharma questions into conversation, it's almost always about this isn't enough. Just this isn't enough. It's great. But I have a fear that once I leave here, I'll lose it. Or I haven't really gotten it yet. It's nice, but, you know, it could be so nice, right? So, you know, I mainly discourage them from trying to get anything better than just this. You know, I said, no, this is it. You know, you really, you just have to take this ride. And that's always just going to be, this is it. This is it. So that's kind of the... nail that Dogen keeps hammering over and over again. Just this is it. Just this is it. Which just slips away so easily from our experience. It's like, no, I think that is it. Or that was it. You know, we go forward and we go backward. But just to try to stay on the mark of where we are, what we're doing, you know, left foot, right foot, left foot, right foot.

[20:26]

That's very hard. And it sounds so simple. It sounds simple. Just be where you are. But boy, try doing that. Just try being where you are. Fully, fully present with your activities and fully engaged, like wholehearted. That's another big thing of Dogen. Wholeheartedly engaging in the present moment is enlightenment itself. That's his motto. So our true nature, the true nature of reality is Dogen... realized it and writes about it, hasn't changed at all from that moment when he had that experience in China to this moment we're all experiencing right now. Nothing's changed. It's the same experience that human beings have. Whatever that was and whatever this is, we can't really say. I mean, that's part of maybe the frustration of we want to say or we want to be told. We want to get an answer that makes sense that we can

[21:26]

hold on to and that's kind of the human thing is grabbing you know wanting to grab something or possess something and time being is not like that you can't get it because it's what you are it's like you know it's it's like trying to get yourself well you are you don't have to you can't get yourself you've already got it you're already there so um you know so whatever it is we don't know what it is we can't say what it is but we are it And so in the morning, we begin this, we often chant about, you know, how did this all start? The term Buddhists use is beginningless. It's beginningless. Time being is beginningless. There's no marker for it. Ironically, what also is beginningless, as we chant in the morning, is our inborn human tendency for greed, hate, and delusion. So along with just existence itself, we have this human being thing that's running along and being confused. And so that's part of our nature is confusion and hatred and greed.

[22:31]

So we're a package deal. We get to be Buddha nature and at the same time we have this responsibility to notice those qualities that we are born with and to see how we can... minimize the harm because we also come with this kind of mammalian spirit to protect living beings. We start with our own young. We were protected as children. We all made it this far. We've been protected. And that wish to protect others is another inborn quality. So that wish to not cause harm is what motivates us to really begin to look deeper and deeper into those moments when we Try to get things for ourselves or try to get rid of things we don't like. You know, so fast. Those get rid of it or give it to me or whatever. So that's really the heart of practice is to keep track of what's going on here, you know, and come from our precept, come from the precept of wishing to live for the benefit of others.

[23:36]

And if others also do that and live for the benefit of others, then we get included. You know, they're living for the benefit of us, and we're living for the benefit of them. And in that way, everyone is cared for, you know, equally cared for. So, as I mentioned a few weeks back, the primary purpose of this discourse of Dogen's is to awaken us to the vastness of this present moment and to ourselves with all of our limitations. So those are the twins, the condoined twins. Conjoined twins of our existence are a person and the universe, conjoined. We're like, no way to separate them. They'll never be separated. And somehow, one turns and you can't see the other one. This one turns and you can't see that one. It's just not fair. You cannot turn fast enough to see both sides of your nature, the Buddha and the sentient being. One always hides the other one. And in the vastness of the present moment, and eventually, hopefully, we begin to see ourselves as inhabitants of a pure land of spiritual freedom that's beyond measure.

[24:51]

That's the way these sutras talk. They say, they image for us that idea of there is a way to see the world as a pure land of spiritual freedom beyond measure. So I like this quote by Dr. Kim, who I've mentioned many times. I'm very fond of his way of teaching. He says, this teaching, Dogen's teaching, is not for the sole purpose of inducing this vision of this Buddha land. Although that happens, and that's helpful. When you read these sutras, you do begin to enter into that vision of the Buddha land, of the pure land. But in fact, to help us to penetrate... into the core of that vision as equally the core of our own embodied life. So there again, you have the core of your own embodied life is equally the core of this vision of this Pure Land. So over and over again, the invitation is to see how those two things are not separate.

[25:54]

know even though it's hard for us it's really hard for us to to catch that the truth of that it takes effort and i'm just really appreciating the session the effort that folks make and sitting session um that kind of effort you know to just be quiet enough and still enough to really hear you know and see and feel what is and isn't so and So this way of understanding time and being, as inseparable, as beginningless and endless, fits very nicely with Dogen's understanding and teaching about zazen. So he says that when even just one person at one time, one person at one time, sits in zazen, they become imperceptibly one with each and all, the myriad things, and permeate completely all time. So, you know, he's saying this again and again. Just one person at one time, sitting zazen, becomes imperceptibly, you can't perceive it.

[27:00]

In some ways, it's an act of faith to understand that or, you know, to say, I think that's true. Even though I can't see it, I think it's true that there's a universe beyond my perceptual field, that there is something much bigger than me. I kind of think it's true. I forget. But then if I look out there, especially at night, you look up, it's like, oh, my. What's going? Where am I? We're in outer space. So imperceptibly one with each and all the myriad things and permeate completely all time. So this is... You know, this is kind of the science fiction of dharma. It's a little bit like Star Trek or, you know, that kind of thing, traveling through space. So the unity of time and being allows each of us as individuals to access the truth of that realization for ourselves. You know, the same realization the Buddha had in the morning of his awakening on the eighth day of the twelfth month, when he not only saw, but he also became.

[28:06]

the totality of the universe, you know, with one bright star at a time. So it's just that one bright star was enough to give him that knowledge that there was no separate self and that the star was making him. That was the realization. It's real. This is real. That this star is making who you are right now. And just like what we're doing right now is making who we are right now. So I also talked about the opening verses of Udi. that I think you all probably remember if you've read the classical recently. He gives us all these pairs of opposites I was just talking about. And to understand that no matter what we do, those pairs of opposites always come together. You know, that whether we perceive them or not, in our world of relative truth, you know, we don't see the dark when it's light. And we don't see down when we're up. or up when we're down. And we don't see good when there's evil showing and so on.

[29:11]

And yet without these partners, without light and dark partnering, without up and down being partnering, inseparable, without that happening, then none of those words could refer to anything. They'd have no meaning. And without light, what need would there be for the word dark? There would just be light. We wouldn't even need that word. So these opposites are co-creating one another. So without cold, there's no need for hot. And without me, there's no need for you. So we depend. We're interdependent. Again and again, that's the primary message of these teachings. So even though we experience only one side or the other of our two-sided reality, the one side, the mundane side, what... Suzuki Roshi called Ji, and then the other multidimensional and inconceivable side, the Ri, it's very good for us to remember that both sides are always there, you know, or rather always here, you know, right here.

[30:18]

Both sides are always here for the time being, you know. So without this broader and more inclusive view of ourselves and of the world, then we get very caught up in our limited view from our own Dharma positions, you know, just me. You get very stuck on me and my needs and my, what I call mine, things that I call mine. And we see ourselves as a set of definitions that insane of them can often feel very strained. You know, it's a point of feeling like it doesn't make any sense at all. You know, when I say things like, well, I'm... a white Anglo-Saxon female born in 1948 in San Francisco, California, and I used to be the abbess at Green Gulch Farm. You know, I can keep talking like that, but it's like, who am I talking about? It just doesn't resonate. It gets further and further away from my actual sense of my life and my being. The more I talk, the more I feel like I could just write that on a piece of paper and mail it to somebody, but it doesn't feel like I'm talking about me.

[31:21]

You know, you can all try that for yourselves, right? Describing yourselves, you know, like, tell us something about you. And then you start talking and afterwards, like, well, that's just something off about what I'm saying here, you know? And I think it's more and more true as I get older. Like, who cares where I went to college? It doesn't really have any relevance to time being, you know? So I think you all remember that story of Emperor of China asking Bodhidharma. When he arrived from India, who are you facing me? And Bodhidharma says, quite honestly, don't know. I thought, oh, what a great answer. Don't know. How could I know who I am or where I am? We say a lot, but how could we really know? So if we accept the limitations of language to describe ourselves in combination... with our inherent Buddha nature, then we begin to discover this wisdom and compassion that is pervading the totality of existence.

[32:26]

Time being is also the time being of compassion and wisdom is always there, along with the challenges and difficulties and the inaccuracies of our language. Compassion and wisdom are right there in that mix of things that we are. I think the real miracle is that we are here at all, you know. It's like, don't you think? I mean, it's like, you know, we're here at all is a miraculous appearance. And yet we don't seem all that surprised by it. I think we get more surprised by other things like, you know, what time is it? And I'm late for work. And, you know, I'm running out of groceries. I got to get to the store. I mean, we get kind of surprised by those mundane things, but that we're here at all. is really kind of stunning if you allow it to be, if you allow yourself to see that and beyond our comprehension. So this is kind of the invitation to breaking the set of thinking we know where we are, what we are.

[33:32]

So this week I want to look a little bit further into Uji and also share the last of the scrolls that I showed to the Zen and Art Workshop a few weeks back. So the ones I showed you last time, I'm not going to bring them up again, but I just wanted to briefly mention them, represent for the four seasons, summer, fall, winter, spring. And so each one of these is a good example of a Dharma position, ones that we're very familiar with. And like the ones that Dogen said, the highest peak, the lowest point of the ocean, the demons and Buddhas, staffs and whisks and pillars and lanterns. the sons of commoners, the earth and the sky. So those are all dharma positions. So winter, spring, summer, fall, those are dharma positions. They appear, but what are they? Can you get a hold of them? Like Dogen says, we don't call winter the beginning of spring or summer the end of spring. So there's a way we make a distinction between these seasons, but how do we do that? What is the magic of creating that sense that they're different?

[34:36]

as they're just kind of passing through. Like my trees right now in my yard, they're not my trees. The trees in the yard right now, one of them has lost all of its leaves, and one of them is in the process of losing its leaves, and they're all over the ground. It didn't seem that long ago that they were budding out and blossoming and covered with flowers. So there it goes again. There's this... transformation that's going on before our very eyes. So for the Dharma position of winter, I chose the scroll that was calligraphed by Susie Girish's teacher, Kishizai Ion, the Dogen scholar, which reads, Deep Mountains... snowy night inside thatched roof hut. So that's a Dharma position. Winter is a Dharma position. And I think we all know it. We've all been in winter. Some of us live in deep winter. And I've lived in deep winter when I lived in Wyoming. And that's a real thing.

[35:37]

You don't go out of the house without being prepared for running out of gas or whatever. I always had skis in my car. I really learned and was taught by friends to be careful. Because deep winter needs some care for our warm-bodied little mammals need to be warm and stay that way. So deep mountain snowy night inside thatched roof hut. So he's safe. He's warm inside this thatched roof hut. So these three lines are from a poem by Dogen called Seclusion. So the time being of seclusion. The Dharma position of seclusion, of being alone. So that's another... way that we all know that we all in many ways walk alone our lives are basically uh you know no one knows my mind or how i'm feeling until i share it there's there's no way for anyone else to know you know whether the water is warm or cold that i've got my hand in only i know and uh so this seclusion is this this person that the person so the

[36:44]

The longer poem, Seclusion, is by Dogen, and the ancestor's way came from the west. So Bodhidharma came from the west to China. And I transmitted it east, that's Dogen, took it to the east, to Japan, polishing the moon, plowing the clouds, so he's looking at the sky. I long for ancient wind, you know, the wisdom, this ancient wind, this understanding. So he's longing. Dogen was longing for wisdom. and insight. How can worldly red dust blow here? Deep mountains, snowy evening, thatched hut inside. So that's the scroll for winter. And so this is, as I mentioned, one must have the mind of winter to both hear and endure the true nature of reality in which both sides of any given proposition are included, whether we like it or not. the all-inclusive universe, you know, isn't tailored to our preferences.

[37:45]

And so what we need to do is tailor ourselves to work with our preferences so we don't get thrown off, you know, don't fall into pits of despair or complaining, you know, because just this isn't good enough. I just don't like reality the way it's turning up, you know, but reality always wins. What we need to do is learn how to be adapting ourselves. Our minds are open, and mostly that has to do with opening wider. So the second Dharma position was for spring, the scroll I showed then, which is my favorite one. Flower opens, butterfly comes. So flower opens, and the butterfly comes. This is a beautiful image. I've thought about it often, ever since I... showed this scroll and talked about it. It comes from a longer poem called Butterfly Dreams by Ryokan, who was a 19th century Zen poet, hermit and poet. And this one was calligraphed by a teacher by the name of Yanagiri Saison.

[38:51]

So the poem is, with no mind, blossoms invite the butterfly, with no mind. The butterfly visits the blossoms. When the flower blooms, the butterfly comes. That's the verse that's calligraphed. When the flower blooms, the butterfly comes. I do not know others. I do not know others. Others do not know me. Not knowing each other, we naturally follow the way. So it's not about knowing each other. It's about this concert that we're all performing together, this arising together. It's already happening. I don't have to know anything to be part of that, that inclusive, all-inclusive. concerto that we're playing together. So as a Dharma teaching, this scroll brought to mind the insight about this all-inclusive universe, that all things arrive together at the same time. And the flower opens, the butterfly comes. If the flower opening is our conscious awareness, so my mind opens, I'm aware, and Buddha was awake, his mind opened, the flower opened, and the butterfly, the star, came.

[39:59]

That meeting, right there. Flower opens, butterfly comes. So the butterfly represents objects of awareness. So the star was the object of awareness for the Buddha's awakening. Different teachers have had different objects of awareness. Some of them, it was a sound, it was a sight, it was a teacher touching them in the face with their whisk. All kinds of things, but always about an object coming to meet that opening, that awareness that had opened. merging into this one present reality. Those two combined is time being. Awareness and the object of awareness. So this merging that unifies in every moment of time this person with each and everything as it arrives. And then the next one was the Dharma position of summer, which was calligraphed by this Rinzai Zen teacher from a poem by the... Zen hermit poet, Hanshan. And this scroll reads, Singing in the wind, a single chorus of pines.

[41:02]

Singing in the wind, the sound of the wind, a single chorus of pines. So this, again, this all-inclusive, the sound of the wind, you know, the wind makes sound when it hits the pines. Without the pines... Maybe you can't hear the wind quite so well, but when it hits the trees and they start to rattle and sing. So he's evoking that moment in nature. So this is a sound poem, that awareness that arises from hearing, from hearing. So again, this is taken from a longer poem, this by Hanshan. Wonderful, this road to cold mountain, yet there's no sign of a horse or a carriage, so he's off in the mountains. That's where he lived, the Hanshan lived off in the mountains, away from civilization of his day, which, you know, horses and carriages. In winding valleys, two torturous trace on crags piled who knows how high. A thousand different grasses weep with dew, and pines hum together in the wind.

[42:03]

The pines hum together in the wind. Now it is that. Straying from the path, you ask your shadow, what way from here? You ask your shadow, which way do we go from here? Sweet. So this feeling of being lost in the mountains for the poet evokes this journey that we take in the energetic years of our lives. Those years that are filled with passion and seeking and looking and trying to figure it out. Most of us may, perhaps, not all of us, but most of us may have passed that particular prime time, and it's such a relief. We don't have to, you know, figure that out anymore. We don't have to figure out my career or my partner or, you know, where to live or any of that. It's just like, okay, got that done. It's time to kind of turn toward, you know, what's next, which, you know, it's like the end of time. The end of time being the next big phase will be that. of facing impermanence, facing the impermanence of my life.

[43:09]

It's like, wow, that's kind of important. I'm paying attention to that. This is the journey that takes place in our bodies, and most importantly, that takes place in our hearts. Kind of lost. We're a little bit lost. Hello? Is anybody out there? And then we all find each other and hold hands in the woods. Then the last one is the scroll for the Dharma position called Autumn. And this one was calligraphed by an abbess, very rare, Zen abbess in Japan, who also teaches the tea ceremony. And the verse that she wrote is from a poem that Dogen includes in one of his essays called The Sound of the Valley Stream, The Forms of the Mountains. And here's what he wrote. The sound of the valley streams are the Buddha's long, broad tongue. So again, we're having an insight from hearing. The colors of the mountains are his pure body. Tonight I heard the myriad sutra verses uttered.

[44:09]

How can I relate to others what they say? So he's evoking the experience he's having in nature. In seclusion, Dogen was out there in this amazing, beautiful place. If you've ever been to Eheji, it's stunning. It's in the midst of a... Cryptomeria forests. So Cryptomeria, very much like our redwoods, they're huge, big conifers, and they're very old, the ones at Aheji. So here's this temple in the midst of this forest of trees, of giant trees. So the colors of the mountains are his pure body, the sounds of the streams, the valley streams, the long broad tongue. So water really pours through these very steep canyons in Japan. A lot of the places we saw had these really steep canyons. So the water just comes, and there's a lot of rain. So the water just comes pouring down, the sound of the valley stream. And we get that a little bit here during the rains at Green Gulch. There's a culvert over here.

[45:11]

It gets full up. And sometimes in the winter you cross the creek and there's this kind of miniature roaring little creek that's going by. Most of the year it's dry. But pretty soon, the sound of the valley stream is the Buddha's long, broad tongue. The color of the mountains, his pure body. Today I heard the myriad sutra verses uttered, how can I relate to others what they say? How can we possibly express those inspirations that come when we hear and see and know that we're not separate? So, you know, as Dharma's teachings... Again, we see the dance of the two truths. This profound truth that we all see and hear in this relative truth are the sacred texts, the ultimate truth, that are calling out to us to listen. So all of our senses are basically sutras, are receiving the sutras of the sounds of this world and the tastes of this world and the odors of this world.

[46:13]

They're all singing to us, talking to us. And all we need to do is to listen. You know, just to listen. Take a break. I was thinking when we just had our few minutes at the beginning, quietly together, I thought, you don't have to sit quietly very long. Five minutes is actually pretty great. I mean, that doesn't feel different to me, those five minutes, than the 40 minutes in the zendo in the morning. It's just a little more of that in the zendo. So for those of you who have some... challenges, schedule challenges, and so on. If you can allow yourself just to take five minutes of quiet sitting every now and then, when you remember, just stop and let a few minutes go by. Just standing there. I was telling one of the students who started his first year at Stanford, and he's very busy. He took all these classes. He said, I really overdid it. And he was doing nothing but working all the time. And he's feeling really like he's not going to be able to maintain his practice.

[47:17]

A lot of people talk like that. And I said, oh, dear. I said, well, you know, you're geared up for what you're going to do. You're obviously qualified to be doing this scholastic work. And at the same time, you need to stop. You need to just stop. That campus at Stanford is quite beautiful, and there's lots of plants there and lovely little spots off the trail that you could just go stand for five minutes or ten minutes between classes. Just let yourself, you know, just let it go. Let it all go and take that break, that rest. It's amazingly refreshing to allow that to happen. And then there's never a day you have to feel like I'm not practicing. course you are because you're awake and so whatever you're doing you're awake to it it's just you forget that this is your life and you are awake and just to keep reminding yourself of of of that you do hear the sound of the sutras they're coming to you see the color of the mountains and so on so the final scroll i want to share with you that i told them about or showed them at the at the um

[48:29]

workshop, at the art workshop. It has a very special meaning to me personally and also to my Dharma sister, Maya Wender, who asked our teacher, Tenshin Roshi, Tenshin Reb Anderson, to choose a phrase that she would then have made into a scroll. So this teaching is really familiar to us here at Zen Center because it's a statement that was made by our Chinese founder, Soto Zen founder, Dengshan. We looked at Dengshan quite a while back. In Japanese, it's Tozan Ryokai. And Tozan lived from 807 to 869 during what is called the Golden Age of Zen, the Tang Dynasty. So I want to show you this scroll that Reb wrote and Mea had framed. Where are you? Oh, yeah. Can you see it?

[49:33]

No, it's your script. Oh, you see the script. Do you see it? No. No? No, it's just what you're reading. Oh. Well, let me try it again. Let's see. I will try it again. Yeah? There we go. Here it is. Okay. So this is the scroll... that just this person. And then Green Dragon, the whole works. That's Reb's name in English, the whole works. Zenki. And so that was the time he was the abbot here. Green Dragon, the whole works. So it's kind of interesting, this story. I'll just read what Mea has here. So this saying by Dongshan is... It's basically literally just this is it. So that's familiar to you.

[50:34]

That's a very, very familiar Zen thing. Just this is it. And so before leaving, just before his master's death, Dong Zhan asked, if after many years someone should ask if I'm able to portray the master's likeness, how should I respond? After remaining quiet for a while, Yunnan said, Just this person. So Yongyan is Dongshan's teacher. Dongshan has different spellings, but Dongshan's teacher is Yongyan. And he's really helped him to awaken almost all the way, but not quite all the way. Dongshan took a while. He was, as Reb said, he wasn't that bright, but he was really determined. So he kept coming at it, you know, for many, many years. He kept coming back to teachers and saying, well, what about this? And what about that? He was the one as a young boy who when he heard the heart sutures, no eyes, no ears, no nose, said, but I have eyes, I have ears. And his teacher said, you know, you're not, I can't teach you.

[51:35]

You go to find a Zen teacher. So that's where Dongshan got sent off to study Zen because he was just, you know, just not too bright. He needed a little more convincing. According to the medieval Chinese legal custom, this is a phrase by which a criminal formally confesses their guilt in court. The phrase expresses a thoroughgoing assumption of responsibility for one's being. Just this person. So when you're accused of something in Chinese court, that would be how you say, yes, I did it. I'm guilty as charged. Just this person. Fully responsible. So Reb said in a Dharma talk in 2002, it looks like, he said, I confess I'm just this ordinary person. And learning to confess that thoroughly requires bringing lots of compassion to the ordinary person. In particular, bringing compassion in the form of practicing precepts to this person and bringing compassion in the form of confession. We confess to being just this ordinary person. And the more compassion we bring to this person, the closer we get to understanding non-duality of just this person and the Buddha.

[52:44]

So again, we have the person and the Buddha coming together as one time being, as one time being. An ordinary person is one who makes mistakes and one who suffers. So that would be us. So that is what I wanted to share with you today. And I think I'll spend maybe another. So next week is Christmas. Eve, and my daughter will be coming, so there's no class next week, as you saw in the little opening thing. I don't know what it's called. Anyway, the thing that shows up, what does it call? Banner. Banner, thank you. The banner. There won't be class on the 24th. Then the following week, I'll be back again to do a little more... Looking at Uji, I've been enjoying it so much, and I really hope you are too. I've particularly been grateful to Shinshu Roberts for her book and how thoroughly she explored all the different ways of looking at this text.

[53:52]

And so I'm not quite ready to give it up. But when we get to the end of Uji, we'll have to talk together about what you might like to look at next. There are lots of options. So, yes. So anything you would like to share or bring forward, it would be very welcome. Hi, Guy. You made it. I did. Thanks to – I was a little late. My apologies. But thanks to time zone and me not following it appropriately, I thought – It's an hour later now for me, so I ended up having an extra hour and made it here. Oh, isn't that the time being? Yeah, the time being. I love those moments where we're so sure, right? And then it all falls apart, whatever it may be. I prefer it when you have a lot of anxiety for something and then you notice there was no reason to, right?

[54:57]

The meeting gets canceled or whatever. Yes, yes. What did I do all that for, right? So much work up here, right? Nofu, I just wanted to thank you so much for sharing that last scroll. It seemed like it had a very deep impact in the... in my practice right now because I feel like personally in practicing precepts and investigating my actions and especially my emotions, I think I'm finding myself more and more to becoming maybe critical or almost judgmental of my own self or feeling things that would be, you know, an ordinary person would feel, right? It is an ordinary person would feel stressed in traffic right or uh or these other little nuances that i think in practice they become amplified right because the ocean might be a certain way and when we see a boat causing all these waves we're we're like oh something must be wrong and to bring it back and to hear reb say right our our teacher in our lineage to say no it's one who makes mistakes and one who suffers and it

[56:16]

It just brings me back, right, to remember that it's not a question of purity or of perfection, it's a practice, right? It's a constant, one whole mistake. So instead of focusing on that or being self-critical, remembering that compassion is all-encompassing, right? To think that... I can only have compassion outwards without having it inwards, right? And understanding that the same way there should be understanding for whoever is cutting me off, there's that equal understanding for me feeling frustrated that someone, you know, almost in my car or whatever it might be, right? Well, compassion is Buddhist practice. So when you bring compassion toward yourself, that's Buddha practicing. So right away, you're doing Buddhist practice. so that's what sentient beings do they do the practice of the buddha and then that that brings them this great comfort as that just what you're talking about like oh compassion for myself patience with my anxiety and my frustration and you know yeah those are all the that's what the buddha gave us he said why don't you try some patience yeah why don't you try some compassion with yourself yeah and and

[57:40]

To remember, right? Those are the moments that we remember we're all human, I think. And that we connect to others as well, right? I couldn't imagine constantly being on the hilltop, right? How would my conversations go? How would I relate to those who are feeling frustration? And how could this possibly be communicated if it's not in the same... Spoken experience, right? That's what I think is so wonderful about your teachings as well and the way that they're spoken is that it's like, yeah, we've been there. We know how it is, and it's okay. It's really okay. We can all take that next step, right? It's really okay. And that's what makes it possible for all of us. You know, it's like nobody's excluded. Everybody can. We all have a ticket. That's right. That's right. You can use it or you can hold on. I think I've told you all, but my daughter, when she was little, and I think it was kindergarten, this lovely little preschool in Mill Valley, the teachers would have the students make up the rules.

[58:51]

And so, you know, no biting, no name-calling. So they had them all on the wall, all these rules that the kids had made up. And one of them was everybody can play. So, you know, I was on the playground, and these kids were playing. doing something and somebody came up, one of the kids came up and said, can I play? And another kid said, no. And then one of the other kids said, everybody can play. That's a rule. I was like, oh my God, that's fantastic. You know, I wanted to put that up here at Gringold. Everybody can play, you know, everybody's welcome to come in, to join. When do we unlearn that right now? I'll never, I'll never, I already maybe. Well, I'll never forget. a story that was shared, I forgot their name about one of the students, I think it was a teacher who had shared it, that one of his students or in the school was asked what they would never want to give up.

[59:52]

And their answer was my memories. And that was absolutely wonderful. I thought I always remember that as well, especially in in the time being in this accordion that we do, right? As hard as it is to be in that moment, right? That ability to expand and to remember that whatever we think we've lost, what is lost, right? What is it that we have to lose? What could have been ours to have been lost, right? Well, you're a little young. to not realize that your memory is going to go. It's like going real fast. Right, exactly. It's okay. You'll be fine for a while. But most of the rest of us who are in my age group, it's like, what was their name? I have no idea. Where were we yesterday? I don't know. Memory is not actually something that you can hold on to. But that's okay, too. We have to also bring compassion to ourselves as we fade away. Thank you.

[60:55]

No, thank you. Thank you so much. And thank you, Sangha. Hi, Marianne. Good to see you. Good to see you. Thank you. And thank you, Guy. I'm reminded of the Dalai Lama. who used to say that when we reach out to compassion to the other person, we ourselves are feeling the compassion for ourselves at the same time. You know, that it's just that beautiful moment of compassion, cold-passioning. I wanted to also ask a question. I see a difference between the two phrases, just this person. reminds me or touches moments of humility for me, just this person, reality-touching, humility. But then the word zengi, the whole works, touches me in kind of thoughts of hubris.

[62:02]

Ah, well... Just this person is... Just this person seems simply just this person, like justice is it, being intimate with what is our reality now. But then the whole works, again, just speaks of hubris. So I don't know. Can you explain? That's good. That's a good question. Well, first of all, Suzuki Roshi gave him that name. So it's his Dharma name. We don't give ourselves a Dharma name. They're given to us by our teachers. So the whole works is like that universal identity, the bigness of our existence. And just this person is according when it's in here, and the whole works is when it's out here. So it's really just the expansion of just this person is the whole works. Okay, like big mind.

[63:05]

Big mind, big mind. And how it works. So Rab is particularly good at details of scholarly detail and knowing – like getting all the books and getting all the words right and so on. So he really likes how it works. That's kind of part of his – what draws him in Dharma. So I think it suits him. I think it's kind of like – how does it work? It's more like his inquiry. as a person, as a Dharma student. It's like, you want to know how the whole thing works, don't you? Right. So investigating every corner. Yeah, every corner, every moment, just time being. It's like, what's this one? What's this one? Right. But I can appreciate the impression you had. That may be a little bit too much for a name. Especially since we talk about our the beauty, really, of our interdependence.

[64:09]

We can't lose our connection without... No, we just dream we have. We just dream being separate. Right. Thank you. You're welcome. Good to see you. Good to see you. Hey! Ying! There you are still over there. Yeah, a little bit of that gets stressed out, but that's okay. You know, this is like talking about this. Maybe Zen helped because a typical reaction of me will be like, oh, we have to change all those plans. You know, that sucks. I get very mad about it. But I'm now like, I think a little bit easier. You know, the habit is a little bit less. I want to tell people what happened to you. Oh, yeah, because I was supposed to fly yesterday at night from Singapore to San Francisco. And then we got this. The day before that, we just got email from notification from United saying your flight need to be like have extra stop or blah, blah, blah.

[65:20]

So it's like basically trying to send us a notification, but didn't let us know they actually are struggling with that. So eventually they had to cancel it yesterday. I think there's just some issues they're trying to resolve by then. So flight canceled. And because as a family, we have five people and little kids. And eventually the earliest one we can get on is the 20th. So the time being, because we have 14, oh, to California, we have 18 hours of advantage in terms of time difference, like you would say. So we can get there on the night of the 20th, although we get on the airplane on the 20th in Singapore. Wow. Well, it's working for us this time. Yeah. The other way would be a problem. I know. But other way, we'll be like, yeah, but anyway, we'll see if they don't reschedule. So hopefully not. We're ready for it. If we need to change, we'll change. Yeah. Thank you for the email.

[66:20]

That was really comforting here. Hey, but I was reading a blog by Robert Sapolsky. Have you heard about him? A neuroscientist? Okay, basically I got this email from Stanford. He's a Stanford neuroscientist. So he has this book called Determined. But in this book, he's trying to analyze from the biology and neuroscience perspective. There's no free will. So I got very interested. I was like, huh, no free will. So I started reading. I find such amazing support for no self. It's just from science and the biology perspective. I know I'm a little bit like that's my habit, like to draw, you know, cause... those relationships. Why can't I just drop everything to practice? But I still want to look into it. I'm with you. I'm with you. It's just so helpful. He could go through all the biological reasons why we think there's actually a central administration trying to decide some decision. It's not. He used literally language of it's a turtle under a turtle under a turtle.

[67:24]

Basically, all the cause and the conditioning from beginningness. That's what he's saying. He's saying that you have to go back to the first day or two days and thousands of years and the pre-whatever. You know, all those biological, social, cultural reasons of our behavior. I mean, it's just so helpful. And there's one thing he said, which I relate to meditation a lot. It could be my delusion again. Because he's saying that we have this prefrontal cortex. And a lot of research and lab research found out that prefrontal cortex is very... much responsible for us not to do the habitual thing. So basically when human being has a habitual reaction or urge to do that, but then they actually control themselves not to do that for the benefits, right? Of others and themselves. The prefrontal cortex was working diligently. So then I looked at the people and their prefrontal cortex actually get developed over time, especially teenager years. But even for adults like us, it can grow. It can be more developed.

[68:26]

Sometimes I thought about Zen. Zen is all about changing your habits. Like my urge, right? When I meditate, I have so many urges. Then I come back to my breath. And in my life, I have so many urges to yell and do those things. And then I sometimes control it. It's like working on my pre-colonial cortex. Talking to my husband about this. He likes science because he doesn't like my bullshit too much. But he liked the science. So I was telling him, he's like, huh, this is interesting. So he got very like... So that's why I was like, sorry. Sorry for being a little bit too excited. No, this is wonderful. I can see your prefrontal cortex growing as you speak. See the balls coming out of your forehead? I need to do something that's non-habitual. Yes. Please do. Please do. Enjoy that.

[69:27]

You know, that's what we're here for. Be creative. And to learn new things. So the old things, we can do those already. You can do the old things. They're boring. But new things that are beneficial. I mean, that's the thing. We also want to, you know, maybe that conditioning goes back isn't about beneficial. So somewhere along the line, we've evolved this idea or it came to us through these beings. That being beneficial is really the way to go. You know, just doing yourself or what your grandparents did or whatever. That's not all that impressive. But being beneficial, maybe that would be something worth, you know, growing some more brain cells. Yeah. Yeah. Because we're so wired as, you know, right? Biological creature. We have so many, like, urges by natural selection. But then the interesting, the magical thing is... we have this frontal cortex that's not very developed until very late, like compared to other animals. So giving us opportunities to change some of the early misbehavior.

[70:31]

So that's just like so interesting. And then it's like something we developed thousands of years ago to address that. I feel like, I mean, Buddhism, not just then. Yeah. Yay. Yay. I'm so excited. This is my new year. Yeah. Something I'm very happy about. We should all celebrate. Celebrate with you. I feel the same. I'm all very true. It's something truly wonderful. Yeah. We'll have you in California very soon. Yes. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Maybe it's a good time to anyone who have a burning, something burning. I'm going to go on gallery again. There we go. Okay. All right. Well, have a lovely week, and I'll see you in January after the New Year.

[71:34]

Oh, Melissa. Melissa's our other ordinee who will be on Thursday. Yang and Melissa will be receiving the Buddhist precepts. And again, all of you are more than welcome to come and be with us if you can. Well, if you're welcome to unmute and say goodnight. Happy New Year. Yes. Thank you, Kuru. Thank you, Sangha. Thank you, Sangha. Happy Holidays. Thank you. Happy Holidays. Good luck, Ying. Good luck, Melissa. Thank you. Thank you, Alicia. You're welcome. Yes, congratulations. Safe travels and all. Thank you. I hope United cooperates. Yes. Too much rain. Thank you all so much.

[72:23]

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