In the Zen system, and I just gave you a handout, but I'm going to start from a different place. In the Zen system, the question, what is Buddha? What is awakening? What is it to be awakening? I'm not sure whether it's a day or an activity. Here's some answers in traditional Zen literature to that question. This very mind is Buddha. No mind, no Buddha. Three pines of hemp. What is the price of rice in Milan? What does your dream say? Go away, don't shit here. Shit. If it's not working?

[01:39]

It's the light green. It's going on. Okay. It's on. It wasn't on. It'll take a second to get there. Okay. Here we go. So for the matter, I'll just read it again. Word Buddha. This very line of Buddha. No one, no Buddha.

[02:41]

Three pounds of pen. What is the price of rice in Eop? What did your dream say? Go away, don't shit here. Are you sorry to say that again? so as I've said a couple of times sometimes it occurs to me that the way it comes the words that come to my mind is that Zen uses a certain kind of poetic response. You know, when we do the yoga class, I like to do this material to loosen up your neck. But I learned that from .

[03:44]

And she said, her teacher called this dragon coming to drink at the lake. You could say it's stretching the muscles in your neck, but you could also say dragging, coming to trunk of the leg. And then in the Zen school, there are several lists, like how you answer a question, how the teacher answers a question. Here's one of the lists. First place. manifesting a wave through going outside. Second way, cutting off the head of the island. Third way, without understanding, without hope. Fourth way, dense little trees, bright flowers. Fifth way, giving a peach, returning the flower.

[04:52]

Sixth way, returning the light to shine the pin. Seventh way, displaying the state of contradiction. Eighth way, the commonalities of light. Ninth way, enlightening the student with an indirect answer. Fifth way, using the force of the word to force the word. What was this, Rick? This list was in a little book called The Mind of Chinese Cha. But some of you used to teach this guy, I guess, to the library. So, I say all that in contrast, in complement to, it is sort of, well, what seems almost linear, methodical, sequential, analytical process of the Sakipitaphasutra.

[06:18]

Just take it, take it apart, take each section, take that apart, lay it out, and look at it. And they both have their legs. And now I want to give you a confusing and delundering guide. So you can realize directly how these two fit together. In Zen, when we say, what is Buddha, we're not saying, we'll just say any stupid old thing. That's only Zen it's, you know? It's a Zen thing. And even though those styles of response happen, like poetic names, you know, giving a pitch, return a poem,

[07:28]

Even though this is called driving and drinking at the well, it still has a wisdom, a physical wisdom to it about loosening and strengthening the neck. Oh, it's terrible that my mind might change. I don't know the name of these muscles, but you could list it from that way, too. Here's what I think what happens for us in practice. Something very basic about grinding ourself in sense experience. And then there's something amazing about what the human mind does with it.

[08:34]

We're way beyond, just way more than a good set of linear logic. We make all sorts of associations and imagery. In one way, you could think, well, we're just one long pole. That's our life. And like any pole, it doesn't confine itself. to linear logic or conclusions. And so if we try to say, okay, well, I'm going to take me and I'm going to put me in a box, a logical linear box, you're not going to fit. There's going to be a whole lot of yards inside that box that you're going to neglect, be confused by, or somehow... not the enclosed harmony and relationship with it.

[09:39]

And then in the other hand, you turn it on its head and you say, well then, the Zen word is just like any old thing, you know, just cause like anything that's a Zen thing. There's something about how these two combine, how this drowningness and how this can do. The genius of the invention of the human response in a moment, how these two combine is what we're looking at. And I hope divide is A couple of examples like this. So you could spread out all the tunes again.

[10:47]

You look very nice. [...] And notice your disposition now. Maybe you're relaxed and comfortable. Maybe you're thinking, oh yeah, I've done this before. I can't, you know, or who says it's easy? Or maybe you're still, it's still kind of a little bit nerve-wracking and anxious and worried about

[12:02]

being exposed or something, it's difficult. Who says it's difficult? So not difficult, not easy. Maybe including both difficult and easy. It's getting in touch with how you're coming at this. The consequence of having done it several times. Maybe how, noticing even how that ripples through your physical state, your attentiveness, anything else? Okay, so here's the guide. In truth and heresy, I'm going to ask you to do two things at once. And then later I'll give you my notions about it.

[13:05]

We can discuss it. So here's the two things you're going to do. It's a question and answers. But while you're answering the question, I want you to try to stay in contact with the sensation of moving your lips. So the question will come. You'll be involved and engaged in answering the questions. but also try to stay in contact with the set of physical sensation of moving your lips. The question is, what is Buddha? So we'll do the usual routine. If you could, when I read the bell, you could start asking and start answering. Okay. Okay.

[14:17]

Don't question the answer. Okay. Thank you. What is Pluto? What is Pluto? What is Pluto?

[15:21]

What is Pluto? A really hard question. That's the answer you want. What is good at? [...] What's relax? What's relax? What's [...] relax?

[16:23]

What's relax? [...] What is this? [...] ... ... ... ... ...

[17:29]

What? [...] So when you finish your answer, if you could just close your eyes. Close your eyes and return to sense experience. How did that influence state of mind? How is the breath? knows the attentiveness, alertness, any notable physical sensation.

[18:42]

And when the bell rings, you can just change worlds. What is it? [...] It's good. What is good? What is good? What is good?

[19:51]

What is good? What is good? What is good? Surprise. What is good? [...] Letting go. What is good? What is good? What is good?

[20:59]

What is good? I said, what happened? First of all, thinking, as we go, we would then finish the whole thing. What is good? What is good? What is good? Tolerate. What is good? Tolerate. What is good? Inquiry. What is good?

[22:01]

What is good? With me. What is good? Talking and kissing. What is good? What is good? Imagine validity. What is good? Just close your eyes for a moment. And again, just notice everything, anything.

[23:03]

continuing thoughts or dialogue state of mind And then you can just come to closure with your partner, and then if you would, turn back towards front.

[24:13]

Thank you. Yeah, I think there's one way to ask the question. What's mutual? Okay, good question. How was it doing things at once?

[25:15]

Next. I was so busy trying to form an answer to English, but I was completely unable to make it as complete. So for me the question was so similar and in some way very similar to the one is now question that maybe after the first one or two years I forgot to pay attention to the because I noticed when I was asking the question, I answered first. And so when I was asking the answer, it started to sort of think, oh, she's really admitted to her lips, comparing the way her answers were. Realizing, oh, I didn't. But until then, I didn't really... knew I wasn't, I sort of was OK with having done it.

[26:19]

I mean, because I couldn't, I realized really quickly that I couldn't do well. And so it was . You realized that really quickly? Usually right after the first one, I sort of said, oh, I can't do this together. Because body and mind weren't, there just wasn't enough room in being truly present with what arose, to pay attention as well to my listening to have enough space. I found that the degree to which I was paying attention to my lips, and it varied. Some questions I was more paying attention to my lips, some less. But the more I paid attention to my lips, the less my answers were any kind of logical, what would be a logical response to the question, what is Buddha?

[27:20]

So what did you do? Sometimes I talked about my lips. Sometimes I talked about what I was hearing, or it was much more of a hear-and-now answer. And, you know, intellectual answer. My lips, like I said, it real fast. I mean, it's just like, so I should pay attention to my feet and my legs. It's dead. I have some energy. It just tried to feel the energy coming from the ground in my leg, which I could manage to support as it felt like trying to tap your head and rock your belly at the same time. But I could sort of manage that and still come out with some answers. But I could not do it. But don't think about lips. It's real. Yeah, I slapped myself in place first, which was a visible experience.

[28:26]

I used that as kind of an entryway. And I went to something that I often do in what you read in art, where you're doing and minding words with it. kind of unity between the two. And so I've had a sense of things growing, like in the sound or something. You know, it was a little bit that way. But I, so you said that physical thing has been injured. That's true. I thought my people was, I'm all sorry, not my people. I thought what I did when I do it. It changed. I missed what you said there. And how was it when you did it?

[29:28]

When you answered? Well, when I answered it, I'm grownly when I'm talking to someone. I just get overwhelmed by And I can't really stick around with it, even when I'm not talking about it properly. Does he have a question? No. When I was asking him the questions, I could pay attention to my lips, because there was always the same, but I was concerned about my answers, and when I was concerned about my answers, I was not able to. And so I didn't, you know, I'm good to 4% of it about my lips, but I couldn't really focus on my lips at all. I just found that the suggestion that we pay attention to our lips was, it just provided a sense of, like, a reminder of being alive. Like, the sort of feeling of, like, warmth going over.

[30:29]

Like, the warmth of speech. It somehow, like, connected the act of speaking in a way that just felt really stabilizing. And, like, I felt like I didn't have to keep checking, wait, am I alive, are we here? But I noticed that I'm always doing that. Were you able to give answers and pay attention to your lips? I don't really feel like it was separate. I just felt like the answers were part of, I don't know, I just felt, like, aware of speech as a physical act, as, among other things, a physical act. Okay. I just gave a feeling of warmth. The first time you asked me, I felt like paying attention to my lips was an answer. I didn't know how to express that. And I noticed that I needed to slow it down to pay attention to the sensation of my lips.

[31:34]

If the faster, if I responded fast, it was different. Like right now, I can sort of do it. I don't know if it's because probably this is just coming up, not thinking about what I'm saying so much. So when somebody asks a question, I'm like, because they're thinking about it instead of expression about it. And then the expression is the expression of the intentional thinking. So it was a little bit more disconnected that I'm not thinking about what I'm saying. I feel like I can follow my list just fine. Like if I repeat what you're saying while Ian was giving his answer, I was repeating it with my list. I can follow, I can really pay attention closely about what I'm doing. that I wasn't thinking about. I wasn't trying to create what was coming out. It was just coming out. Yeah. Okay. Anyone else? So at first I kind of even did a cheat process. I figured out what I was going to say.

[32:36]

And then it was kind of interesting. And it was like, yeah, I would... speaking, and I was conscious of the physical part of that. And that was interesting to that where I felt more dispassionate about what I was saying than I think I would have otherwise. Not that it was less true or that it didn't really come from the core of who I am, but more that it was just kind of there. I was a little bit less attached to it. Well, I answered the questions, but I had a difficult time thinking about my lips at St. Bernard. So when I remembered my lips, then I burst my lips out, and I looked down at one of my notes and tried to talk that way. And I figured out a question and answered it.

[33:40]

So it was just kind of a game going back and forth. She won't buy, you know, . That's about it. Okay, thanks. Yes. When I was asking the question, it felt like men were growing up. They got really big breakfast. And they're still . He was answering. I was watching with him, and at some point, I forgot that he was the one sleeping. I felt like I was sleeping. But, for catching him. When you were answering, you couldn't do it? Okay. Can I have one? Sure.

[34:41]

I also noticed that sometimes There were sounds coming up on my lips. I couldn't question my lips that I noticed was happening with my tongue and my teeth. And I wanted to start feeling all of this stuff and hear the sounds. And it was hard to just notice just the lips. My perception was that it had a grounding function, paying attention to the lips at the same time as talking. And then I felt as if through, you know, when I was answering, I gradually settled, my energy settled. And then I, when we swapped out, it felt as though throughout the exercise, it was also in the room. I could see the energy in the room was gradually settling. I don't know if anybody else had that, but yeah, that's what it felt like.

[35:43]

So in the investigation of sense spheres, what is touch? It's not like when you're investigating touch, everything else is gone. Especially if you do it in activity. And then all these interesting variations that you just experienced. Sometimes the mental activity is so dominant, there's no space for anything else. And then the part about, well, what's that about? Not so much. Let me have more ideas about it, but an invitation to experience more closely. What is it to be consumed by what mind is creating? And also, what is it to not be consumed by what mind is creating?

[36:59]

What is it to stay connected to another sense sphere? And when you do that, how does it shift consciousness? So in terms of investigation, it's not so much about, right, okay, well, how will I get it? the right way. Whatever comes out for you offers something. All sorts of things. All the experiences you had. If I put more attention in the science sphere, it's almost like the mind wasn't getting enough attention to think well. And then more subtly there was, well, how do you allow them to dance together?

[38:05]

How do we allow for a certain kind of blending and combining? Can you make it happen? Do you allow it to happen? How do you engage? How is that engaged? How does the sense sphere grind in the here and now? So that what comes up in mind, which is, in many ways, the most powerful one, doesn't sort of sweep away creating its own reality as it really does. And the other ones disappear, you know? Here and now disappears, and the world according to me is reality. Because as I've been saying, that's like a dream.

[39:09]

One of the Zen answers, what does your dream say? What does Buddha, what does your dream say? What are you dreaming of right now? contrast to, of course something comes up in mind. That's the genius of our human existence. That's the beauty of it. And are we entranced by it or seeing it? Is it an awakening process? Or is it just sort of re-embellishing? So this is how the sense spheres operate. This is part of the contribution.

[40:15]

And as we discovered, sometimes to connect to the sense sphere, you have to sort of loosen up the goal or the way mind is being energized. And interestingly, sometimes you don't. You know? And one way we could talk about something, or sati, or mindfulness, is discover had to be grounded in the self-spheres so that a response to the experience doesn't sweep awareness, consciousness, away into something other than here and now. And that's what helps. Could you say that again? To be grounded in the sunspheres so that what arrives in response to the stimuli. I mean, we're always hearing, seeing, touching, you know, and to what degree we're energizing them.

[41:27]

Well, that's, you know, another kind of exploration. But they are happening. And we are, maybe we're energizing at all, but at least we're energizing celibate in any given moment. And we have a response. And then part of that response is the product of an extraordinarily complex organism called this meat, whatever you want, Buddha, whatever you want to call it. How not to ignore that? And how not to be swept away by it? It isn't the delicate exclamation. And then sometimes you find, well, I need to emphasize the sense of yours in a kind of simplistic way.

[42:29]

Know what? You know, sometimes in Zen we say, do it with know what? Don't think about it. Don't go into the head. Don't conjure up all sorts of stories. Just be the sense fears. It's a training, you know? It's an exploration. It's a discovery. This very mind. Let the activity of the response of the complex organism be seen for what it is. Don't go into a dream. Don't let it sweep your way into an unaware state. So that's part of what we're doing in our city. Don't go off somewhere so when you come back in five minutes you have no idea what happened. But don't sit there trying to control, suppress, limit,

[43:35]

Or prevent this complex organism from being what it is. And so we're exploring. Sometimes we're leaning towards simplicity. Sometimes we're leaning towards let it all happen. Give the cow a large pasture to play it. This very God is Buddha. We can hang through it. as the teaching, as the process of awakening. And then in Zen school, it contrasts to early Buddhism. It's more like we're looking at the whole pieces. What does this complex organism generate?

[44:45]

What does it create? Rather than, okay, let's pick it apart. It's actually a sophisticated notion. All the sensory input happens, there's a complex response to it. And without any preferencing, just be aware. So even in the Zen school, we pay due diligence to be in your body, notice your bride. Notice your state of mind. All of me have their relevance and their appropriateness.

[45:47]

All these practices. I could sit here and say, okay, first of all, notice color. Just be aware. And then we could say, okay, now be aware of life. Okay, now be aware of surface. There's the floor surface, the wall surface, the ceiling surface, the table surface. Now be aware of space. Now put all that gather and be aware of will. And there's a way in which each of those can enhance the experience. It really is the coming at this awakening up from different directions.

[47:03]

What I'm saying, let's take it apart and activate different thoughts. And then the other one is saying, open up to the whole gestalt and let it, his diligence is, let it be so present the soul is for God. And I would say our practice combines the two. No. We do it diligent way and patient way. bring awareness to different things. When you're eating, taste your food. When you're walking, be in your body, be aware of your body movement. When you're sitting, be attentive to your posture and your mood, your thoughts, your pride. And then this next that I've talked about, it's just offering more nuance.

[48:09]

I intend to explore those nuances. Just the same way we could sit here and attend to different constituent parts of the presence in this room. Without ever asking ourselves, what do you think about it? The early Buddhism said, well, is the experience of color pleasant or unpleasant? Is the experience of light pleasant or unpleasant? Is the experience of space pleasant or unpleasant? It's sensitizing and enlivening the experience that's already happened. This is the flavor of these kinds of rhythms.

[49:16]

And then they're engaged in that way. They offer that kind of enlivening capacity. And that kind of exploration. So we've been talking a lot about sati mindfulness. That kind of openness. And then the next quality... investigation. What is the experience of color? It requires a certain kind of investigative involvement. We'll use what we think. You investigate what you like under judgments or your mental process. Something like that. And then the third quality is about energy.

[50:28]

As you start to investigate, color comes a light. It's enlightened. It's like yesterday, or was it? I think it was yesterday where I was saying, Sit down without being sure the seat is going to hold your work. The process of sitting down is light. The contact with the seat is light. The work does get your weight over to it. And then there's a wonderful recipe because as it's enlightened, it supports awareness. So what God is saying, you know, one thing you can think is like, okay, I am practicing mindfulness. I'm doing it.

[51:29]

And the world is this great and I love that I am doing. And then when you bring a certain kind of relatedness to it, you discover it's like interaction, you know? Color can come alive. Color can enlighten me. Color is practicing me. This world is practicing me. In fact, there's no separation between this idea called me and the experience of something called work. So when that's engaged in that work, it's energizing. When we separate it from it and say, no, no, no, this is about me.

[52:37]

I'm what's important. This is just an irrelevant, inanimate, separate from me. It's like we'll go back into a drink. It's like the energy is devoted to the drink. And then that produces whatever it produces. And maybe that, since this is so boring, this inanimate existence, this inanimate environment that's doing nothing except just lying there. You might as well pick up something more interesting. And when this energy comes forth, this space, this interaction becomes alive.

[53:43]

Literally, it brings joy. Because something fun is happening. Now the difference between pity and what we might normally think of happiness or joy, you know, our normal relationship to happiness and joy is, I'm getting what I want. What joy? Finally. This is really nice. Whereas this dynamic interactive joy, it's not about me. It is about me because I'm the beneficiary of it. It's not generated by the world according to me. It's generated by something

[54:49]

More engaged. And then, as we experience something more engaged, and the joy it offers, you know, Dovin Sanji says, you forget yourself. You forget all the things you're usually telling yourself it's important to worry about or feel anxious about or sad or angry or desirous about. And when you stop that, when you forget to do that agitation, guess what? You get a whole lot of comments. So the next factor, you know, is the usual translation now that it's calculated.

[55:56]

But it also has a flavor of a kind of, sometimes in Zen school we say, nothing special. which is, in a way, a big lie, because what we're saying is, this is so incredibly itself, nothing else is needed, and we don't even have to make a fuss about it. Just the way it is, it's so excellent, we don't even have to say it's special. It doesn't even require indulging. It's just, boy, So that quality of not requiring anything extra, all that kind of urging effort to change it, to fix it, to lessen it, is released.

[57:10]

It's like a sigh of relief, but also something like Now the next quality is continuous attention. The translation is samadhi. And if you remember earlier, we made a distinction between focused on point of attention and what you might call continuous attention. So in continuous attention, The object of it, the point what's being contacted might shift. The attention, as what's arising shifts, each arising is met with attention.

[58:15]

So the continuous attention, that's somebody. And of course, If there's a subtleness, if there's an energetic arising that has a sensibility of concreteness, for somebody, it's pretty simple. And then the last quality is equanimity. And it's a little bit like trust. It's a little bit like confidence. There's no need to do anything to this.

[59:24]

There's no need to stay separate from it. There's no need to hold on to this experience of it. It's just to let it flow. I think part of it flows. And when that's happening, there's a kind of a smoothness to it. Once I did this conference, well, I was attending it. He was doing it. And it was a time when there was still a lot of sectarian disruption there. And then every day we would do something. We'd meet with this group and meet with politicians.

[60:29]

Victims of violence, you know, we can meet with community workers. We do all this different sort of stuff. All sorts of things that be presented, you know. Some of them, tragedies, you know, you hear something and be awful. And then some of them, what? And then... Something really caused you to think, yeah, how do you get at that basic human tendency to separate and attack other? To be with your tribe like a distant, fat tribe. And he would just, from my eye watching him, He did this very interesting thing, you know. Most days he'd be like that, and I'd be like here, and he'd come in, and each day as he'd come in and see the classroom, he'd kind of nudge me with his elbow.

[61:36]

And make some kind of comment, you know, like utterly playful. It was like, remember we're just here at Wayne, you know. then these things would happen. And then sometimes his face would be this expression of utter pain and sadness of what was being presented. Sometimes he'd be just laughing in my blood. Sometimes he'd be deep in the thought about, how do you do that? How do you have war in tribes? Discover how not to war. There were all sorts He just flowed from one experience to another. Like one day, we had a morning session. The morning session ended, and we were going to start the afternoon session, I think about 3.30.

[62:38]

He took a helicopter, went to another place about 120 miles away, did a whole session there, flew by helicopter, and then just sort of walked into the afternoon session. And flowing with equanimity from experience to experience. So it's not like equanimity is like a rigid effect. You have a blank look on your face that no matter what happens, you're sort of Nothing changes you. No. Equanimity is giving over to everything and letting it flow. So each time we sit down to remind ourselves that signs and awareness is about being.

[63:51]

And it's cultivated by a willingness to be. To be what happens. To be what's happened. Now we may bring in, in the spirit of skillfulness, certain ways we direct our attention. We may be cultivated certain factors. We may be paying attention to our lips while we speak. Or noticing the movement of our hands. But still, So in the Zen school, when we ask, what is Buddha? We put all these factors together. This amazing human life. This amazing complex organism. part of this amazingly complex existence.

[64:56]

Now we're being told there are at least billions of galaxies. At least. Somewhere between billions and billions of billions. Roughly speaking. They all have their own effect. They all have their own way of view it. And we're part of that. And in the midst of that, we dare to speak with the authority of our subjective experience in response to what is Buddha. What is it to wake up as part of all that? No?

[66:04]

For no good reason, I'd like to, after this long day. Yes, in the native America, inspired a lot of his mother called, like someone called Joy Harjo. of her bio. I just want to. Joy Carjo, a Native American poet and storyteller, influenced not only by her Greek, you know, Greek Indian tradition, but also by the Navajo beauty way and by federal stories. Her would describe it It's a relationship to the earth on a physical, spiritual, and nipple-poetical level. She's a more big, talented performer and saxophonist. Combine music, chanting, and poetry with jazz, folk, and rock.

[67:14]

LAUGHTER Here's what's right about for you. You can design your vicious jazz punk or rock. Open your holes up. The sky, the earth, the sun can move. To one whole voice that is you. And know that there is more that you can't see, can't hear, can't know. in moments of steadily growing, in languages that aren't always signed, but circles of motion. See ourselves and know that we must take the utmost care and kindness in all things, breathing, knowing we are made of all risks, and breathing, knowing that we're truly blessed

[68:25]

because we were born a day soon within a circle of motion, like people running out the morning inside of us. So there. Something in us appreciates beauty. Something in us appreciates harmonious resonance with words. Something in us knows how to practice. You, yourself.

[69:32]

Not, you know, the world accorded to me. Not, I'm special and everything else pales by comparison. Not the anguish. When am I just going to get everything I want? How to let that be held with a tenderness that we can start to study it. How to meet it with a discipline that helps us not just to track it. This is the kind of intriguing

[70:38]

dilemma of our practice. And in the spirit of joy, hard joy, how can we do that with beauty? How can we do that without causing ourselves more anguish or other people more anguish? I would say all that is included in what is Buddha. In the Zen school, what is Buddha is utterly immense in its request. Here's the whole universe in its endless complexity. Could you put all that into one phrase, please? How to relate to that?

[71:42]

How to awaken in the middle of it? Could you give me a concise answer? And then we say, okay, here it is. There's one student's story where Amrit Bradwell's teacher, this student says to the teacher, Could you talk about what's impossible to talk about? And the teacher says, okay. So now we're heading to the ship. We're heading to the main guru. We're going to kick off this. and live it, you know, and dedicate it with.

[72:43]

And I would encourage it between now and then. Try to keep it cooking, you know? And I would say the way to keep it cooking is keep living it, you know? I mean, you can refine your ideas. That helps, you know? Up to a point. What helps much more is staying close. Dushan asks, why don't you learn in 30 years of practice, Dushan? Dushan says, staying close. Seeking to stay close. Notice what kind of wonderful Go through all the different kinds of experiences, but it's conjured up in this amazing human existence.

[73:53]

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