This podcast is offered by San Francisco Zen Center on the web at sfcc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good evening, everyone. It's a joy to be with all of you once again, whether you are here in the Buddha Hall at Beginner's Mind Temple or you are online in the online Zendo. For those of you who may not know me, my name is Tenzin David Zimmerman, and I'm the abiding abbot here at City Center. And if you haven't been around for a little bit, we are in the midst of a 10-week practice period, a fall practice period, which I am co-leading with Abbott Ed over there. And the theme of our practice period, the on-go, is an appropriate response. Encountering Suzuki Roshi's Teachings on the Blue Cliff Record.

[01:02]

So for every Dharma talk on Wednesday nights and some of the Saturdays, as well as the Tuesday class, we are exploring a classic koan collection called the Blue Cliff Record, the Hegegan Roku. And in the process, we're also incorporating Suzuki Roshi's commentary on it, which we fortunately have. So for tonight, I'm going to... take up another koan in the collection and explore with you. This time around, a koan that kind of goes by two different names. It's found as case three in the Blue Cliff Record, and it's case 36 in the Book of Serenity. So sometimes the koan collections, the koans show up in a number of the different collections. And in the Blue Cliff Record, Book of Serenity, it goes by Master Ma is Unwell. And in other collections, it goes by Sun-Faced Buddha, Moon-Faced Buddha. Anyone familiar with this? Many of you?

[02:03]

Great. Okay. We'll get to revisit it together. And this is how the case goes, the main case. Great Master Ma was unwell. The temple superintendent asked him, Teacher, how has your venerable health been in recent days? The Great Master said, Sun-Faced Buddha, Moon-Faced Buddha. So for anyone who may not have encountered Master Ma before, he also goes by the name of Matsu Daoyi. And in Japanese, he's known as Basu Doitsu. He lived from 709 to 788, and he was one of the most famous Chan masters in the Tang Dynasty. And he appears in a significant number of koans, so he's kind of all over the place in Zen literature. He was the chief disciple of Nanyue, and Nanyue's teacher was Weine, the sixth ancestor.

[03:06]

And so that makes Matsu Masterma the eighth Zen patriarch. And he had a lot of disciples. Apparently, I've seen different numbers, but the highest I've seen is 139 disciples. So he was a very busy teacher. And Matsu was particularly known for his strength, for his vitality, as well as for his rather strange appearance. It said that when he spread out his tongue, when he put his tongue out, it would go and cover his nose. A pretty long tongue there. And he also had two wheel-shaped marks on his feet. whether or not they were birthmarks or something else. He was said to walk like an ox. And he had a tendency that when he looked at people and looked at things, he'd kind of stare like a tiger. So he had this kind of intimidating stare. And he's accredited with a number of Zen innovations, which you might find them as the classic expressions.

[04:18]

The katsu, the sudden shout. And also the kiyosaku. And we don't use the kiyosaku anymore. It's the long stick that will often be used in Zen on the shoulders. Actually, it's very helpful. It actually relaxes the muscles in the shoulders. It's not actually a matter of beating someone, but it actually energizes the shoulders and helps to wake up. and then also asking abrupt questions to people, particularly when they were kind of going out the door. He shouted at them or yelled at them and asked them a strange question, and it usually led them to some kind of enlightenment experience. However, in this story, Master Ma is sick. In fact, he's very sick. In some cases, it says he's on his deathbed. And this is the case, how it's presented in Record of Matsu. We're told that about a month before his passing, Matsu climbed a nearby mountain.

[05:22]

He went for a walk. And as he was walking through the mountain's forest, he saw a cave that was kind of flat. And he told his attendant, this ruined old body of mine will return to this ground next month. Okay? So basically indicating that he knew his life was coming to an end. And once he said that, they returned to the monastery. And not long after, Master Ma became ill. And so the monastery director wanted to check in on him and knocked on his door and came in and said, how is the venerable feeling these days? And Master Ma replied, which is sun-faced Buddha, moon-faced Buddha. And then on the first day of the next month, so literally a month later, having taken a bath, he sat down, crossed his legs, and passed away. So another one of these Zen teachers who dies sitting upright in Zaza posture.

[06:27]

So what do we make of Master Ma's response? Nichi men butsu, gachi men butsu, sun-faced Buddha, moon-faced Buddha. In a text known as Buddha Name Scripture, it explains that Sun-Faced Buddha is eternal and lives in the world for 1,800 years, or in other words, eternity. And the Sun-Faced Buddha dwells in this kind of limitless time and place. And the Moon-Faced Buddha is one day of life. It's a 24-hour period, a day and night. And so the moon-faced Buddha is our everyday human life, our everyday life of karma and limitations. The moon-faced Buddha also means that life is a succession of moments, moment after moment after moment after moment.

[07:31]

And we're never going to necessarily know when our last moment will be. And the sun-faced Buddha, on the other hand, is all the radiance of Buddha condensed into this present moment. So the phrase sun-faced Buddha, moon-faced Buddha, it expresses our universal human situation. We are all fragile, impermanent, limited beings. We're here today. We're gone tomorrow. in that very limitation and uncertainty, there is still an eternal and radiant Buddha. And because of this, because that radiant Buddha is present with us moment by moment, even in our limitedness, we can find dignity and beauty and a chance for a vivid spiritual life.

[08:36]

And so regardless of the circumstances, we can find a sense of peace, happiness, satisfaction. Even though our strengths and our weaknesses, our joys and our sorrow, all those are different from each other. So we're very unique. We're particular. We're our own particular moon face, and yet we all share sun face. So whether sun-faced Buddha or a moon-faced Buddha, both are Buddhas. Both are perfect and complete in themselves. So we've got a health-robust Buddha or a sick and dying Buddha, and both are perfectly fine. And so his commentary on this koan Suzuki Roshi says that the difference between matsu and ordinary people is that

[09:38]

Whatever happens to Matsu, he can accept things as it is. Sun-faced Buddha is good. Moon-faced Buddha is good. Whatever it is that is good. All things are Buddha. And there is no Buddha even. Even though I die, it is all right with me. And it is all right with you. And if it is not all right, you are not a Zen student. It is quite all right. That is Buddha. If I suffer while I'm dying, that is suffering Buddha. And there is no confusion in it. So he's saying true acceptance of the way things are is the Zen way. That's what a Zen student is practicing. Accepting things just as it is. Doesn't mean, you know, you... You can't also change them, but you have to start from the place of this is it. This is reality. This is things as it is.

[10:39]

I see that. I accept it. Now how am I going to work with it, right? So everything is all right when we have this open, inclusive mind, this expansive mind where we're open to all the experience that we're experiencing. It's all right because it can't be any other way. And so whether or not we deem it at some point good or bad, can we start from the foundation of it's all right. All experience is of Buddha. And then Suzuki Roshi continues. He says, maybe everyone will struggle because of physical agony or spiritual agony, but that is not a problem. We should be very grateful to have a limited body. like yours or mine. If you had a limitless life, it would be a great problem for you. Do you agree? Without limitation, nothing exists, so we should enjoy it.

[11:42]

The only way to enjoy our life is to enjoy the limitation given to us. I think that's kind of a provocative statement that Suzuki Roshi is making, that the only way to enjoy our life is to enjoy the limitation given to us? How many of us are willing to enjoy the limitations given to us? I don't know about you, but I have some difficulty at times accepting limitation on my life. Particularly if it's limitations on my personal health. I had COVID about a month ago and I was like, no, I don't want this. That's not what I want. My well-being or limitation on my happiness or my prosperity. Those are not limitations. I feel so easy, accepting. And yet, as Geroshi notes, without limitations, including the limitation of death, nothing would exist. There's nothing that is impermanent.

[12:47]

And because everything that comes together is going to come apart again. It's just the way it is. And life persists because of impermanence. We're only here because of change. Because things have changed, we are here. We're able to be here now. So our effort as practitioners is to really see and feel this truth and accept it. And furthermore, only when we have incorporated impermanence, change, and life's difficulties into our living as something that's necessary, that's acceptable, that's fine, okay, this is what is, rather than kind of something to be feared or avoided at all costs, only then can we really find a deeper sense of happiness and ease. It's a happiness and ease that actually is our embracing, that's inclusive, that's wide and expansive.

[13:54]

It has room for difficulty. It has room for impermanence. It has room for limitation. So our suffering usually, I don't know if you've noticed this for yourself, usually comes about our resisting, our denying or rejecting what is, by turning away from the difficulties. I don't want that. Or why me? Why does this always happen? Why do bad things always happen to me? Why do things go the way I want it? We might be complaining, you know, or we might lament. You know, if it only weren't so, if only things were different, you know, then I'd be happy. You know, then the world would be a better place. But our practice is to be able to abide and find a sense of rest within the limitations, within the disease, and even within the disease, if we have some disease, right? to find a way to be with the experience that comes from a place of compassion, from care.

[14:59]

You know, it's something that we want to be able to extend not only to ourselves, but to others around us, how they are practicing and working with their own sense of limitation. And we only really learn to appreciate our life and its preciousness through consciously embracing its limitations. What would that be? Consciously embrace the limitations of your life, the problems, or what you perceive as a problem. So, elsewhere in this commentary, Suzuki Roshi says, we should understand our everyday activity in two ways and be able to react either way without a problem. So, two ways to understand our everyday activity. One way is to understand it dualistically as good or bad, right or wrong. And the other way is the understanding of oneness.

[16:01]

So now, Zen koans often present to us and they guide us through kind of an interplay between the relative and the absolute or the ultimate. So you could say the dualistic aspect and the oneness aspect. And What we see in Master Ma's response, it encompasses both a dualistic or relative realm and the ultimate realm or the realm of oneness. So he's able to say he equally dwells in both. That he feels great and unconcerned from the absolute point of view, from the oneness point of view, and that he's sick and he feels lousy from the relative point of view. Both are simultaneously true. It's not a problem. They're not in conflict with each other. So, of course, our small, grasping self doesn't want to be sick, doesn't want to die.

[17:04]

Nor do we want those we care about to become sick or die. But great teacher Ma, in effect, is saying, you know, I'm okay. My moon-faced Buddha is dying, but my sun-faced Buddha is dying. is living the eternal life. So I may live for 1800 years, or I may only live for a day and a night. And neither prospect concerns me. In this moment, I am here. Right here, in this moment. This is the only life I have. I am alive in this moment. This is the only life you will ever have. Right here, right now, in this moment. There is no other life. So don't go looking for it. And that's Zen's primary orientation, living in the now. Not in the life of yesterday, not in the life of the future. Buddha living Buddha right here, right now.

[18:06]

This is the only place that Buddha lives. Of course, it's an internal Buddha, so it's all throughout time and space. So whether I am a Sikh Buddha, or a healthy Buddha, or a cold Buddha, or a hot Buddha. We were studying Tangshan's No Heat, No Cold yesterday in our class. A happy Buddha, a sad Buddha. Buddha, Buddha nature, that's kind of another way of thinking of it is this limitless, luminous awareness, right, is always the common denominator in all of these manifestations of Buddha. So Buddha is Buddha is Buddha is Buddha. And with all the fluctuating myriad appearances, our effort is to take the posture of an upright Buddha. And it's in this simple truth that we can find rest and equilibrium, or what Suzuki Roshi often calls composure.

[19:16]

So that's why we practice, Suzuki Roshi tells us. That is why we engage in zazen, to be able to accept things as it is and have complete composure and equanimity in our life. So that we're not being tossed about by our reactivity to the vicissitudes of life. So how might we be like Master Ma? equally able to find a measure of composure and ease when facing any type of situation. Sick, healthy, alive, dying, preferred or not. And Suzuki Roshi and other Dharma teachers throughout history have repeatedly reminded us that such equanimity blooms from the wisdom and the spaciousness of Zazen. zazen practice or meditation practice, it comes from the recognition that what we fundamentally are is not limited to or bounded by condition, karmic consciousness or experience.

[20:28]

Now there's a verse by Shwedo who gathered the Blue Cliff Record in its initial form together that accompanies this particular corn, which I find quite moving and I want to unpack with you. And this is how it goes. Sun-faced Buddha, moon-faced Buddha. What kind of people were the ancient ones? For 20 years I have suffered bitterly. How many times have I gone down into the blue dragon's cave for you? This distress is worth recounting. Clear-eyed, patch-willed monks and practitioners should not take it lightly. Sun-faced Buddha, moon-faced Buddha, what kind of people were the ancient emperors? So this is not a critique of emperors, right? It's just actually a query of who are we? The lives of the ancestors, regardless of their social status, pale in comparison to the infinite life of sun-faced Buddha.

[21:50]

And even if you have all the conditions for an easy life, you must still go into the cave of practice and allow your relative self to become undone. For 20 years, I have suffered bitterly. So this speaks to the need for strong, endless, continuous practice throughout the ups and downs of our lives, the loss, the sufferings, as well as the blessings, the good things. Each of us has suffered. Anyone here not suffered? Yeah, I didn't think so. So no one else is outside of that. How many times have I gone down into the blue dragon's cave for you? And this line references a Chinese legend in which jewels of many colors are hidden in a cave guarded by a dragon in the depths of the sea.

[22:58]

And that anyone who wants to obtain the treasure must dive into the depths, enter the cave, and wrestle it. from the dragon's mouth. So who has the courage and the perseverance to make such an effort? Have you met any dragons in your life? Were they guarding any jewels, any treasure? Did you wrestle them? What was the outcome if you did? Here's a... another koan verse that also references the blue dragon cave. And this one's from a collection of Zen teaching stories titled Koans of the Way of Reality. This is number 103. Each crisis an opportunity. Yet if you fail to act, you miss it by a thousand miles. The cave of the blue dragon is ominous. Only the fearless dare to enter.

[24:03]

It is here that the forest of patterns is clearly revealed. The myriad forms evidence. It is here that the one bright pearl is hidden. So where is the cave of the blue dragon? Well, nowhere else than inside ourselves. The cave of the blue dragon is that place within each of us where we store all our stuff. All of our, you could say, psychological bilge, right? So to speak. The stuff we don't want to deal with. Anyone have any of that? I should see more hands in the room. I know. Yeah, okay. Okay. So all the karmic sludge, right? That we'd rather not have see the light of day. when you push something away, when you deny or suppress something, it goes underground into the dark tunnels of our karmic consciousness.

[25:12]

So this includes all of our fears, the shames, doubts, regrets, anxieties, everything that we have buried deep within us, hoping that by shutting them off, that they won't have much pain power over us, right? So that the world won't see what a tremendous, insecure mess we really are. Now, obviously, it's unassembly very difficult to go into the Blue Dragon's cave. It takes a certain degree of willingness and a fearlessness to do that. In many ways, the process of entering into the Blue Dragon's cave The cave of the blue dragon turns you into a child in some way. Because it reminds you, it takes you back to that place of vulnerability again. Where so much of that, what you pushed away initially, is very young in many cases.

[26:16]

So in the cave of the blue dragon, the forest of karmic patterns is clearly revealed. Once you get in there, you see. all around you, the patterns of your karma. The structure of the cave itself is made up of pillars of karma built up over time. So we see the way we function, what we're about, where we're sticking, what our buttons are, all the myriad forms of our routines and denials. Everything is evident in the blue dragon cave. And it's in the cave of the blue dragon that we find out about ourselves. things we don't want to be remembered or recall. And it's in the cave of the blue dragon that the one bright pearl is hidden. It takes courage. It takes effort and persistence to go into this cave and retrieve its treasures. How many times have I gone down to the blue dragon cave for you?

[27:26]

Who is that you? Small, frightened self? Another self? Another being? Is that you, the sun-faced Buddha? The moon-faced Buddha? Buddha, Buddha, Buddha nature itself? Is the you, the bright treasure you have been seeking your whole life? And while it's obviously... Each of us who personally has to go into the cave, who has to do the work, the hard work of practicing with and excavating our karmic conditioning. There are also others who are willing to make the perilous journey for us and with us. So you're not alone, right? Someone like a Dharma teacher or a Dharma friend. a loved one who has a measure of understanding and freedom and is willing to go into the muck and the dark difficulties of the dragon's cave for their students, their friends, their loved ones, for all beings, despite the risk that it may bring.

[28:44]

So another word for that kind of being is a bodhisattva. A bodhisattva doesn't go into the blue dragon cave just for themselves, just to save themselves. They also go to be a benefit to others. So in order to work and help in the world of samsara, we must be like Jizo Bodhisattva. This Bodhisattva who's willing to go into the hell realms to offer mirrored beings dwelling there some respite from their suffering. And as bodhisattvas, we may ourselves encounter great hardship and suffering by choosing to go into these difficult realms to be a benefit to others. But this distress and suffering is worth recounting and worth enduring because doing so offers ease and hope to our fellow humans.

[29:53]

We might be even be able to show them a way out of the cave of sorrows and into freedom. Clear-eyed, patch-willed monks should not take this lightly. So last week, our Friday movie night here at Beginner's Mind Temple, we have a movie night sometimes every Friday, sometimes every other Friday, you know, frequently. Anyhow, last Friday, a number of residents and I watched an inspirational documentary called The Rescue. And the movie chronicles the, I think, rather enthralling, against all odds, story that transfixed the world in the summer of 2018. It was the daring rescue of 12 boys who were between the age of 11 and 16 and their 25-year-old soccer coach.

[30:56]

from deep inside a flooded cave in northern Thailand. And they had been trapped there for 18 days. Has anyone seen the movie or you recall the incident, the story? Some of you do? And this movie, The Rescue, was made by National Geographic. And it's available on Disney Channel. So if you want to see it, it's really quite well done. I think of all the, there's now about four or five movies. about this incident. And I think this is probably one of the better ones. There's actually another one that's a dramatized version. It's called 13 Lives. And that one's on Amazon. It's also, I think it's pretty well done. So as a documentary, The Rescue successfully weaves its archival and interview and reenactment footage. to recount the events of the rescue as they unfolded. And you might recall from the news that the wild boars, and this was the name of the soccer team, the Thai soccer team, right?

[32:00]

They had, after game of practice, ventured into what are called the Tam Leung Cave System. And they wanted to celebrate a birthday of one of their teammates. And they had only... planned to be there for a very short time. They're going to go in, do a little excursion, and then come back out. And so they weren't prepared. They didn't have any provisions with them. Maybe a little bit of water. And then, just so happened, it began to rain, and it began to rain very, very heavily. It's actually the monsoon season came like two weeks earlier, and they hadn't anticipated this. And the cave quickly flooded, and the boys were trapped. And so they were missing for 10 days and were finally found by divers, cave divers, a mile within the cave. So just imagine, these divers had to swim a mile to get to these boys, right? And they were found on a ledge.

[33:00]

And this whole, you know, it took, once they were found, eight more days for the boys to be rescued. So they were in the cave for a total of 18 days. 10,000 people helped, including 100 divers, scores of rescue workers, soldiers were there, medical professionals, and other experts from around the world. All these people converged to save these 13 boys. And unfortunately, in the process, one of the Navy SEALs, the Thai Navy SEALs, died. His oxygen ran out. And he drowned. And they had to figure out how to get the boys out of the cave. Very complicated system where I won't go into, but basically drugging them, masking them, and swimming them out. It took three days to get all 13 boys out during this very complicated process. And at the very end, just as they got the very last boy out, the pumps, one of the main pumps that was keeping the cave

[34:08]

cave, the first few chambers, the water low enough so they could go in and out, broke. And suddenly the water started pouring up again and rushing in. And the few rescuers that were still there, they got out just in time. But literally, had it been an even hour more, they probably would have all died. So I don't know about you, for those of you who followed it, I was very captivated. You know, I was watching the news, touched by the boys' situation, you know, each day tracking the initial search and then the rescue efforts and finally the repercussion, what's the word, recuperation of the boys. And I could just imagine them sitting in the dark, losing track of time. They didn't know what time it was. They didn't know what day it was when they were found, right? Sitting there in great discomfort. cold, hungry, scared, uncertain of what was going to happen.

[35:10]

And sitting there, surrounded by an impenetrable sense of the unknown. And of course, experiencing fear, great fear. I may not survive. The cave of the blue dragon is ominous. Only the fearless dare to enter. How many times have I gone down into the blue dragon's cave for you? Now, there were those who initially gave up hope finding the boys and rescuing them, even some of the experts. And when they did find them, they recognized that it would take so much effort to achieve them that it may not be possible and that some of them may die. as they try to actually bring them out. And two of the cave experts, the divers, that had brought it actually at one point decided to give up.

[36:11]

They said, this is not something we can do. And they had thought about going home because they thought this is pointless. But then they had a change of hearts and decided to try one more time. And this time, they successfully located the boys. And the divers, when they first came up, in the cavern, there's two of them, you know. He said that when he first came upon the boys, the minute he found them, he realized that the responsibility was now morally on him to save them. He felt morally obligated to save these boys now that he had found them. And this is the ethical orientation of a bodhisattva. The minute I take the Bodhisattva vow to save all beings, the responsibility is then morally on me to make my best effort. I must commit my whole being to this endeavor.

[37:13]

There's no giving up. There's no leaving anyone behind if you've taken the Bodhisattva vow. How many times will I go into the blue dragon cave for you? And just like the rescue divers went back into the cave over and over to care for the boys, to bring them food, medicine, to eventually extract the boys. Despite great fear themselves, they talked about their own fear. They talked about the tremendous risk that they themselves had to endure. So too must the Bodhisattva be willing to return to the cave of samsara again and again to free those who are trapped there. How even if we ourselves initially escape from the cave of the blue dragon, eventually we realize that our practice and our Bodhisattva vow requires that we return not just once, but again and again, despite the dangers of pearls.

[38:21]

Pearls. We enter the cave of the blue dragon as many times as necessary until we have helped liberate every being who's there. One of the notable details of this story is that when the boys were first found by the two British divers, they were reportedly meditating. Remember that detail? It turns out that their coach, whose name was Ekopo Chanfawang, had trained in meditation as a Buddhist monk for about a decade before he had to leave the monastery to take care of his sick grandmother. So he entered the monastery at the age of 12 because he had been orphaned by his parents. And then he left when he was 22. So not too long before this incident, a couple of years. So he taught the boys to meditate by following their breath in order to keep them calm and less anxious and be able to also preserve their energy.

[39:27]

And in the midst of great uncertainty, the coach invited the boys to join them in an upright posture. posture of zazen, helping them to find this place of fearlessness and composure despite their distress. Helping them to rest as Buddhas, sit upright as Buddhas in the face of great uncertainty. I don't know if you saw, not too long after this was discovered, made public, there was a cartoon that was circulating in which the artist had shown the coach with a lap full of the of tiny boars, little boars, and peacefully all meditating. And he's depicted holding them in his cosmic mudra. So when we sit, we create here in Zen Center a mudra. And the idea is we're holding the whole universe in this mudra. So he was holding these boys in his mudra, teaching them to meditate, connecting to the whole world at the same time.

[40:32]

And another detail that I found intriguing was that rather than just sit in the cave kind of helplessly mourning their situation, the coach had the boys spend a good time digging a hole. So with the limited light that they had, their flashlights, he had them dig a hole. The boys had dug a 16-foot deep hole before being rescued. That's a pretty deep hole, right? And He said he wanted to give them a sense of purpose and direction, helping to focus their attention on making their best effort despite the situation. And they were making an effort to free themselves, even though they didn't necessarily know what the outcome would be, nor knowing whether there were others who were simultaneously making their best effort to save the boys. And when I heard of the boys' effort to dig their way out, I thought of the analogy of the baby chick who's in the egg poking its way out of the shell from the inside, while the mother is also pecking from the outside to free her loved one.

[41:44]

So we have the boys inside digging away. You have the rescuers outside digging their way in. And so... Likewise, well, we as Zen students, we need to make a sincere and dedicated effort on the inside of our practice to liberate ourselves from the Blue Dragon's Cave. Our teachers and our Sangha friends, they're also making a concentrated effort to help us break free of the Blue Dragon's Cave. So if we observe carefully, we will actually see That the whole world beyond us is also making a great effort to free us. It may not seem that way at times. You may not recognize that at times. It may feel at times that it's actually trying to push you back into the hole. But actually, the world is trying to free you. So we have to do our inner work.

[42:47]

We must sum up the courage to... to fearlessly turn again and again into the blue dragon cave of our delusions and our fears and our karmic tendencies. But we are never alone in this endeavor. The whole world is supporting us to become free in its own way. When the boys were asked what they had learned from their experience of being trapped in the cave, one of the boys, a 13-year-old, said he felt stronger, said, I have more patience, endurance, and tolerance. That's pretty great. Another of the boys, his name was Adul, said it taught him not to live life carelessly. And so while many of the boys wanted to be pro soccer players, You know, when they grow up, at least four of them said they hoped to become Navy SEALs so that they could help others.

[43:50]

Twelve of the boys also took temporary ordination for nine days as a way to express their gratitude for having survived the ordeal, to acknowledge all those who had assisted in the rescue, as well as to honor the former Thai SEAL who had died trying to save them. And how wonderful it is to hear how out of this very life and death situation, the Bodhisattva vow arose for many of these boys. They wanted to manifest it. They wanted to live a life of vow. And may it be that way for all of us. For we are all in the blue dragon's cave, wrestling with the great matter of life and death. I'll conclude by saying, sun-faced Buddha, moon-faced Buddha, how many times have I gone down into the dragon's cave for you?

[44:56]

1,800 years? 18 days? A day and a night? Each time, Buddha. Buddha seeking Buddha. And when I'm healthy or when I'm sick, When things go my way or things don't go my way, Buddha. And when I'm the person I want to be, or the Bodhisattva I vow to be, or when I'm the person who's lost the cave, Buddha. So it's not that there's no caring whether our suffering is active or not in any moment, or how it is that we're living our life. All of that is daily practice. Making the effort. It's very important to continue that practice. It's just that when we can be right where we are, right here, with complete willingness to go down to the depths of the dragon's cave in every moment, that's where we find the treasure.

[46:09]

The treasure of aliveness, of wholeness, and of liberation. And being in sangha together, being in community together with us who are also entering the dragon's cave helps us tremendously. It encourages us and gives us a sense of confidence when we're feeling challenged to practice because of whatever the circumstances are. For all of us making this effort, what I wish for myself and others is fearlessness and composure. that whatever we're facing, whether it's health or sickness, pleasure, pain, joy and sorrow, ups and downs of life, birth and death, that we find our stability and our composure in our zazen posture as we meet whatever is rising. May you find the pearl in the blue dragon's cave every moment.

[47:17]

Thank you very much.

[47:43]

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