This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfcc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Thank you all for coming on what is a very difficult day for the community. I would like firstly to thank my teacher, Ryu Shin Paul Heller, who right now is leading a three-month practice period down at Tassahara. I want to extend my deepest gratitude to him for ferrying me through many years now as a priest. I would also like to thank the Tanto Genkioko Timothy Wicks, who you just heard from, for inviting me to give this talk. And I would like to, our online friends over here, I want to greet everybody that's online who's joining us.

[01:01]

As you can probably tell from my accent, I'm not native, born and bred here from the US. And I spent many years doing what you're doing, watching Dharma Talks online from far afield in Venice in Italy. The timing always worked out well. Seven o'clock on a Saturday evening, I would get to watch the Saturday morning Dharma Talks. So it's with a very warm heart that I welcome you all. here with us in this room and as part of the community, an extended part of our community. I am shell-shocked, and it is going to be with your wings that you will carry me through this Dharma talk and in the arms of the Buddha, who I am sure is carrying a friend. So, as the Tanto said, this is a... It's Valentine's Day. I will not be talking about Valentine's Day, but I will be talking about love, although it might not seem that way necessarily at first.

[02:08]

I'm going to be unpacking the five remembrances. And one of the reasons that the five remembrances, which I'll read to you all in a moment, are so important to me is when I was young, when I was a teenager, and I was looking for a religious path that always felt very a spiritual calling, it felt to me that the majority of the religions that I looked to tended to have kind of unsatisfactory platitudes about what our life was about and what the great suffering that we faced as human beings, even at the tender age of a teenager, you know, we face a lot of suffering. And... just none of the religions really addressed them. And so I read the five remembrances and I was really struck by how unflinchingly they reminded me of what our life is about. Really, they regard life's fragility and our own true inheritance.

[03:14]

And they are attributed to the Buddha himself and they're embraced by Dharma communities across all the Buddhist traditions. So the five remembrances are, I am of the nature to grow old. I cannot escape growing old. I'm of the nature to have ill health, and I cannot escape having ill health. I am of the nature to die, and I cannot escape death. All that is dear to me and everyone I love is of the nature to change, There is nowhere to escape being separated from them. My actions are my only true belongings. I cannot escape the consequences of my actions. My actions are the ground upon which I stand. They're pretty powerful. The Buddha himself said, these are five facts that one should reflect on often, whether one is a woman or a man or anywhere in between, lay or ordained.

[04:22]

And when I read these five remembrances to various friends of mine over the years, I was surprised that the vast majority of people found them depressing. And I didn't. I really found them enlivening because they spoke to me of the preciousness of our life. The first three, of course, are what led the Buddha to become the Buddha, to go in search of understanding. the suffering that we face as human beings. For those of you who are unfamiliar, and I imagine most of you are familiar, I'll briefly go over the story of Gautama Buddha, who was born and raised a prince, and very, very wealthy and privileged. He was leading a very wealthy and privileged life, and really hadn't seen much of human suffering at all. And so as a young man, decided that he really wanted to leave these prisoners, these palace walls.

[05:25]

He wanted to leave the palace. He wanted to go beyond the walls and just move amongst the people and see what life is like for ordinary people. And so he ventured out and was shocked when he saw first an old person. He had not seen an old person before. He saw somebody old and hunched over and struggling. Then he saw somebody who was sick and in a lot of pain and And then he saw a corpse, he saw somebody who was dead. And here you have your first three remembrances, old age, sickness and death. And then we have these last two. All that is dear to me and everyone I love is of the nature to change. And that speaks of one of the great tenets of Buddhism, impermanence. It underlines and underpins all of our teachings. Anitya or emptiness. And there is no way to escape being separated from them.

[06:31]

And right there we have dukkha. We have suffering. Unsatisfactoriness. Everything is going to change. Things are not going to go the way that I want them to go. Things are not going to go the way they should go. And there's going to be times when life is hard. I can't keep the perfect thing. In fact, I can't even keep anything. So these five remembrances were actually first found in the Upajatana Sutta, or verses of contemplation. And as I mentioned before, were actually based on Buddha's own words. And they... are intended to be recited. They're intended to be memorized, internalized, metabolized. For me personally, I have them printed up and they are at a spot in my studio where I see them every day and I read them every day.

[07:40]

And it's a very helpful reminder. You can print them out and put them on your mirror when you brush your teeth in the morning. You could see them You could carry them with you in your wallet. I really do encourage you to print these out and keep them with you as a reminder of life's fragility. That way they become a kind of a touchstone. They become something that you can reflect upon. That we're of the nature to grow old. get sick, we're of the nature to die, and we're of the nature to lose the people that we love. So facing these hard truths, this is the Zen way. And as is our practice, we don't look away. We sit Zazen, we face the wall, what comes up comes up, and we don't look away. I had an example of this where I saw how facing the difficulty of

[08:46]

was really supportive. My father died from a brain tumor when I was about 28 years old and he'd been diagnosed with it and he had survived and miraculously it looked like it had gone away and then it came back with a vengeance and the doctors gave him six months to live. And it was so interesting. I was living in the UK at the time, and I flew out to South Africa to live with him for a few months just to support him and to support my stepmom. He was having a lot of seizures. It was hard. And it was really interesting to me because there would be friends who would come around to visit him. These are neighbors, people from the local church, well-meaning and good people who are coming to visit my father. And as soon as he said he's dying, without exception, no, you're not.

[09:51]

You'll be fine. You'll see. It's fine. He's like, no, I'm dying. And they're like, no, no, no, no, no. You mustn't think like that. You need to stay positive. You're not going to die. It's fine. And their reticence to look in the face this great matter of death It was suffocating him. My poor father wasn't able to deal or process with the people he loved, what he was going through. So I was very lucky by that point. I'd been practicing for a little while. And I was able to speak to him one evening and say, how are you doing? And he told me, you know, There was relief for him in facing it. The courage that it took for me to face it with him offered up a certain solace and a relief, like I said.

[10:56]

And that way, death and illness becomes non-stigmatized. This is a gift we can offer the people around us so that death and illness is not stigmatized because it is our true inheritance. It is our life. It's actually a precious part of our life. When you see somebody who is suffering, don't kid yourself. That person is showing you the nature of your own life and how precious it is. You might not feel it acutely at that time, but that person is showing you what it is to be human and to face the truth of your own life. The Buddha says, Now a disciple of the noble ones considers this. I am not the only one subject to aging who has not gone beyond aging. To the extent that there are beings, past and future, passing away and re-arising, all beings are subject to aging, have not gone beyond aging.

[12:07]

He says this about sickness and about death. To the extent that there are beings, past and future, passing away and re-arising, all beings are subject to death, have not gone beyond death. I used to go with one of our dear members to offer funeral services to the homeless. And I was so struck by the language that was used in these services. He was kind enough always to offer non-denominational services, which are automatically thought it was a lovely thing. But he always said, this person, and he gave their name, goes forward into the great mystery preceding us by a few years or a few months or a few days.

[13:09]

And as Hemingway so poignantly pointed out, Do not ask for whom the bell tolls. It tolls for you. All that is dear to me and everyone I love are of the nature to change. There is no way to escape being separated from them. And this is true of myself as well. I have changed. Everybody and everything around me changes. There is not even a moment that things stand still. Just witness the color in the trees. And don't lie to yourself about the nature of your life. This is what the five remembrances are saying. Remember every day, let them be the air that you breathe and metabolize them. And whatever you choose to do with your life, be wholehearted. Another example of facing impermanence and recognizing its preciousness was...

[14:17]

was shown to me with this delightful example of old age. I was in northern Europe at some ski resort somewhere with my former husband, Rob, and there was this elderly gentleman, he must have been in his mid-80s, and he slipped and he fell. And Rob ran up and picked him up and helped him up, and the old man looked... at Robin with a twinkle in his eyes said, you only get to be as old and decrepit as this if you're very lucky. And he understood. He knew about the preciousness. He knew about the preciousness of old age. So about to live the life that you're already living. Old age, sickness and death are also underpinned by emptiness and impermanence. And this is what makes them precious. Everything changes everything. This is the essential teaching of Zen. It's not like I'm sitting here and everything around me is changing.

[15:22]

I'm changing too, and what I'm doing is changing everything around me, and everything around me changing is what's changing me. It is this constant maelstrom. Now let's look at the fifth truth, which in some ways is the most interesting. As an introduction to it, I'd like to consider the notion of my actions. He says, my actions are my only true belongings. Actions are impermanence. They are a verb. They are not still. They are activity. I'm going to read to you a couple of translations of that fifth remembrance. So the original one, the one that I read, which I believe is a translation by Thich Nhat Hanh, said, my actions are my only true belongings. I cannot escape the consequences of my actions. My actions are the ground upon which I stand. One translation is, I am the owner of my actions, heir of my actions.

[16:29]

Actions are the womb from which I have sprung. Actions are my relations. Actions are my protection. Whatever actions I do, good or bad, of these, I shall become the heir. And a third translation is, I am the owner of my actions, heir to my actions, born of my actions, related through my actions and have my actions as my arbitrator. Whatever I do for good or for evil, to that will I fall heir. Those are obviously talking quite strongly about karma and that would be a whole separate talk. But our actions are the only things that we can stand on because action is itself a verb. It is an expression of activity and time. And even saying activity and time as though they are distinct is inaccurate because activity is an expression of time and time is an expression of activity.

[17:33]

And fundamentally, that is all that exists is an expression of activity. Activity is my only true inheritance. Activity is the ground upon which I stand. So in truth, we have no true belongings. This notion that my actions are my only true belongings. No, we don't have any true belongings because if everything is activity, then there is no abiding hard and fast reality that is me that is somehow separate from activity. And therefore, There is no subject and object. There is activity. And only activity. Suzuki Roshi said, strictly speaking, there are no enlightened people. There is only enlightened activity. And I would make that even more nuanced by saying there is only enlightening activity because it is a continuous activity.

[18:40]

activity of body, speech, and mind. And every moment that seems to pass is so excruciatingly precious. But we get used to them passing, and eventually we solidify them, thinking that in some way they exist outside of their activity. But they don't. We neglect to see the emptiness underpinning all the activity. that it simply changed. An analogy I like, which some of you may have heard before, is our life being like footage of film. Before everything was digital, you would have a film, and it would be made of individual images, and each of those is a flash of moments. The moments are rising, but it goes by so fast. that we think there's a continuous.

[19:43]

And we think and we're given the impression that there's something that's continuous and contained, but it's not that way. It's a constant expression of activity arising. So this is a call to pay attention to the present, which is the only place that we can engender a fact. Every now and again, I have a look at the lojong slogans. They are a contemplative practice that the Tibetans use to train the mind. This is not a Zen thing, this is a Tibetan thing, but the lojong slogans can be quite helpful. And I've just picked one out the other day, which I just thought was apropos. It's number 28 and it says, abandon any hope of fruition. The commentary is, the key instruction is to stay in the present.

[20:50]

Don't get caught up in hopes of what you'll achieve and how good your situation will be someday in the future. What you do right now is what matters. Our actions are our only true belongings. They are the ground upon which we stand. Activity is all that exists. What you do now is what matters. And yet you can't escape the consequences of your actions. There is always cause and effect. The cause creates an effect. The effect is the cause of the next effect, which is the cause, and so on and so on ad infinitum. And as we say, I've heard it said here, you can't unring the bell. When I was learning how to be a Doan, I remember the Eno giving me a wonderful lesson in this great truth. when I rang the bell too soon for the Doshi one day, and I was about to correct myself and ring it at the appropriate time, and the Eno put their hand on me, and they were like, you can't unring the bell.

[22:00]

You've made the step, you've taken the action. It exists, the consequences will be what they'll be. You can't unring the bell. So this is the important thing to see, is the nature of activity versus things, or what we see as things. All that is dear to me and everyone I love is of the nature to change. And I really, excuse me, I really appreciate this languaging. For the longest time, you know, after I initially read the remembrances, I just thought, oh, it's all about losing stuff. You lose your health. You lose your life. You lose your youth. You know, you lose your people. But then I'm like, no, no, that's not the words. That's not the words. of the nature to change. You don't lose them. And when you look very closely, you recognize that you can't lose something that you never had. I think of my friend Emily who lost a being that was very, very close to her for 14 years.

[23:12]

It was a very deep love. And... how much I appreciated her wisdom when she said to me that she didn't lose him but had gratitude instead for the 14 years that they spent together. Because you can't, what's the opposite of losing something is to own it. You can't own something. There is no you and there's nothing to own. There is only activity. So there was gratitude for what was and not what she had. And when we recognize that our lives are made up of activity, we can also see that the way that somebody dies is of little import.

[24:15]

when we consider the activity of their life, when we remember what they did and how they affected so many people around them every day with great acts of generosity and kindness. Emily also said that the sorrow around the passing of a loved one is really love on a different level. And love is not a noun. Love is a verb. Love is an action. It is an activity. And it is the ground upon which we stand. So don't let there be anything residual. Love completely with your whole heart and your whole being. Paul Liushin, my teacher, gave me a wonderful lesson.

[25:18]

He gives me many of them, but they're often very subtle. You have to pay very careful attention when you pull students. And one of the lessons he frequently gives me in his own subtle way is I would go to him and I'd be excited about some piece of news. Oh, this great thing I just bought or some wonderful conversation I'd had or feeling really good or whatever it might be, some good thing. And instead of being, oh, that's good, I'm glad you've got that, or I'm glad you bought that, he always says, long may it last. And it's this wonderful reminder about the five remembrances. Things change. And when we do understand the nature of the final remembrance, it can actually help alleviate. some of our suffering, because we see into truth of the nature of things.

[26:19]

And so the same way that we have the precepts and their opposites, the five remembrances are reminding us about the preciousness of our lives, that even while we are of the nature to grow old and have ill health and to die, our life is so precious. And let's also remember that we don't exist independent of our context. We don't exist independent of anybody or anything around us. So while I might be growing old, so are we all, you know, all of us. So vow to live the life that you're already living with all beings. Because your life is already living you. Pause and meet your life and commit to it wholeheartedly. Zen practice is about facing hard truths, facing our life and vowing to live it completely. I am of the nature to grow old.

[27:26]

There is no way to escape growing old. I am of the nature to have ill health. There is no way to escape having ill health. I am of the nature to die. There is no way to escape death. All that is dear to me and everyone I love is of the nature to change. There is no way to escape being separated from them. My actions are my only true belongings. I cannot escape the consequences of my actions. My actions are the ground upon which I stand. Thank you. For more information, visit sfcc.org and click Giving.

[28:31]

May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[28:33]

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