This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good morning. Thank you all for coming to Green Gulch Farm. aka Green Dragon Temple. My name is Thierryu. I have the privilege of living here at Green Gulch, which means that every day I just roll out of bed and into this hall. It's quite wonderful to see you all here on a Sunday, knowing that you've come over the mountain really made the effort.

[01:00]

I find it really encouraging, really inspiring. Maybe this practice of just sitting there has some value after all. Someone seems to have longed for it enough to cross a little mountain at least. So thank you for coming. Welcome. In our life here at Green Gulch, in our week at Green Gulch Farm, we have many ceremonies, many activities. And one of those ceremonies, activities, is called the Sunday Dharma Talk. So that's the ceremony that we're currently involved in. And I always am, when it's my turn to, you could say, officiate at the Sunday Talk ceremony. I often wonder, what could I possibly say?

[02:06]

What teaching, what practice could possibly meet all of these different people coming from totally different places, at totally different points, on totally different paths and non-paths? What teaching could meet all of you? What teaching could I offer that could meet you all? The Buddha is said to have one of his many superpowers, was that he could give a Dharma talk and everybody would just hear exactly what they needed to hear, which is quite a wonderful skill and truth, actually, that if we're open to the Dharma, we do hear what we need to hear. You can't... count on my having that power. I will not say something that is necessarily useful and helpful to you.

[03:11]

But you can still hear a true teaching today if your heart is open, if your mind is open. You know, when we chant at the start of the talk, we say, I vow to taste the truth of the Buddha's words, which is sort of like, hmm, it's on me. Hmm. The Buddha can talk, you know, the teachings can be offered. I can say something. But in making that vow, we each sort of take responsibility for hearing the true Dharma, hearing the true teaching. Yeah, that was so-so. If we've taken responsibility, if we've taken this vow to hear the teaching, every meeting, actually, we say all beings are our teacher. Every meeting, we're hearing the truth. So that's our attitude that we bring. So please do that. Listen for the true teaching, despite anything I may or may not say. And I recognize that I'm still on the hook, even though I hope and trust and expect you all to listen well, to listen deeply, to listen for something true for you.

[04:26]

And my words are in the silence between them. But still, I have to offer something. I have to say something, give some talk. So what's a teaching I can offer, a practice I can offer that will meet all of you, no matter where you are? Is there such a teaching? And I don't know. I think maybe even the idea that there would be has some problems. But there is a teaching about this. There is a teaching from a great Buddhist sage named Buddha Gosha, a 5th century Theravadan sage. And he offers an answer to this question of what teaching will meet all of these people today? As paraphrased by Edward Konza, the great Buddhist scholar,

[05:33]

Buddha Gosha says, two only among the 40 meditational practices are always and under all circumstances beneficial. So there's this teaching that there's two practices that are always and under all circumstances beneficial, which means I could give it as a Sunday Dharma talk, and no matter where you are, according to Buddha Gosha at least, you might be met by it. It will have some benefit. The idea is that I could teach any of the other 38 or millions, and they might be utterly transformative to someone, you know? These practices and teachings that are offered in the Buddha Dharma. But they'll miss others. They won't be generally useful. They'll be only for specific circumstances. But there's these two, and what are the two? The two are the development of friendliness,

[06:33]

and the recollection of death. Among all the practices, only two are always and under all circumstances beneficial. The development of friendliness and the recollection of death. In other words, the universal teaching may be the only universal teaching. A true and universal teaching, according to this is, you know, be kind and remember that we don't have much time. Be kind knowing that we don't have much time. Knowing that we don't have much time, be kind. Be kind to really feel how we don't have much time together. So friendliness and the recollection of death. He didn't also say that it's always and under all circumstances good to give short teachings, but I think that in my experience that is true.

[07:49]

So one of my intentions today is to give a short talk and saying that may help me to do it. So friendliness and the recollection of death. Really, that's my talk this morning. Can we open ourselves to, can we take up these two intimately connected universal practices of kindness and recollection of death? So by friendliness is meant metta or loving kindness. We often hear that formulated as this prayer, this wish, may all beings be well, may all beings be happy. May all beings be safe and free from all suffering. So we offer metta as a prayer, and we also cultivate this feeling of metta, looking upon all beings with this warm, open-hearted, warm regard, no matter the circumstances, no matter the conditions, no matter the many reasons not to, you know, on any given day.

[09:11]

is to look upon all beings with warm regard. And so we work on this feeling of having warm regard towards others. And then as bodhisattvas in bodhisattva practice, we also sort of join in the responsibility for this wellness and safety and ease and liberation and freedom from suffering. We don't just wish it or feel it. Oh, I'm so feeling you. I'm still feeling how I want your suffering to be relieved. It's beautiful. And then as bodhisattvas, we also join in the responsibility for relieving that suffering. And that one is pretty easy for me to get behind. Metta, loving kindness. Sure, it's hard to think of like a counterexample. If you're like me, you hear a teaching, you kind of try to rebut it. Well, I don't know. I don't know about that. What about? You can think of some particular time when that teaching might not work and then we have the path to ignore it.

[10:18]

What about friendliness? What would be so bad about loving kindness? When might that not be appropriate? Even in the midst of some strong countermeasure of some sincere, wholehearted standing up for something or speaking up for something, still seems generally useful to not lose total sight of our humanity, of our warm heart. It's maybe not the only thing we need to do, but it's always beneficial. But this death one, this death one feels a little thornier. Are you sure, Buddha Gosha? Can we really just talk about that with anyone and it'll be useful? Are you sure? So the Buddha and Buddha Gosha are calling us, you know, despite our hesitation and despite the pressures some of us feel in ourselves and maybe from our culture to avoid, avoid that topic.

[11:36]

The Buddha and Buddha Gosha are calling us to open to it, to trust it. that if we're truly going to come to life, which is what Buddhism is about, truly coming to life, if we're truly going to come to life, it's vital that we open to, that we recollect death. There's no other path to coming fully to life. Or I should say there's no path around that. There's no path that doesn't include that awareness. So this doesn't mean that we indulge in some idea about death or lean into, yeah, death, death, we're all going to die, death. You've maybe met or been such a person. I have. We're all going to die.

[12:38]

That's a little, that's not quite the spirit of the... of the Buddha's teaching on recollecting death, that's called indulging death, leaning in, you know, kind of like making it your thing and like scaring people with it. It's just knowing it, just opening to it, just keeping it close, remembering it. I often remember Norman Fisher relating to death as an uncle. Uncle death. Uncle death. Just always kind of in the picture you know well there's Uncle Death in the photo you know it's not like obsessing about Uncle Death but just having him around open so I've come to see you know despite my reservations and really feel and experience that this turning towards the truth of death with the right attitude with the right posture

[13:40]

is totally no different than turning towards life. It's the quickest way, actually, to come to life. You know, if we knew we didn't have much time, how would we be sitting here? Just another Sunday, one of many Sundays. What if this were the Sunday? How would we be sitting here? And in that invitation you might feel, as I do, a deep turning towards life. I think I'd want to be fully alive. That's what's on the other side of that question that we're avoiding. So maybe there are some counter examples, you know, maybe there are some people and sometimes when this practice is not beneficial.

[14:42]

We don't have to be fanatical about it. But to hear this call, to invite yourself to turn towards the recollection of death. I made a long list of reasons not to think about death. That was my process this morning. Here's all the reasons not to, you know. It'll bum me out. I'll get stressed out. It'll undermine my activities, you know. Like if I'm thinking about death, I won't finish my project, you know. You told me it's all going to just be dust in the end. Then I'll lose my motivation, you know.

[15:45]

Or I'll just go into some hole of doom and gloom and death. I'll feel some stress. And I do think it's useful, you know, without enumerating the many reasons why we may not be doing this practice. I think it's useful to consider, is something blocking you? Is there kind of a, oh yeah, I know, I kind of know that fact. I learned that fact a long time ago. Could you, like, move on to the next topic, please? What is in you, you know, that allows... or obstructs your feeling of the fleetingness, your feeling of the shortness of the time. Can we trust, how do we come to trust, as Purgosa so clearly does, how do we come to trust that opening

[16:48]

to the fact that we and everyone we love and everyone we don't love will die? Can we trust that opening to that truth, deeply sitting within that truth, that that will be positive for us, that that will bear fruit, that that's worth doing despite our resistance? There's a lovely sutta in the early Buddhist tradition called the Simile of the Mountains. Maybe some of you are familiar with this, but I wanted to share. It imagines a king, or it has a king, and the Buddha is telling the king, inviting the king into a kind of inquiry or imagination. And he has in picture... receiving from a messenger who kind of comes running into the king's hall and says, I come from the north with grave news.

[17:53]

The giant mountain, you know, as tall as the sky and as wide as the horizon is coming, crushing all living beings coming towards you. I wanted you to know that this giant mountain is coming. Do whatever you think should be done. And the king's like, ah. And then right when he's kind of getting his bearings, then... Another messenger comes running from the south and says, king, king, a giant mountain is coming from the south, crushing everything. Why does the horizon as tall as the sky do something? What will you do? And the king, reeling, gets him another messenger from the west and from the east. There's these four mountains closing in, rolling in from each side. each time the messenger says do whatever you think should be done do whatever you think should be done knowing that these mountains are coming towards you so then the Buddha says I inform you great king I announce to you great king aging and death are rolling in on you

[19:14]

When aging and death are rolling in on you, great king, what should be done? What do you do? Where does that leave us? If we would trust that that would leave us in a good place, then we might be open to that fact. What would I do if I really looked at those giant mountains? So we just keep our eyes down. So then the wise king says, if Buddha, the situation were like this, what else should be done but to practice the dharma, to practice right conduct, skillful deeds, beneficial action? That's so beautiful. How wise indeed this king, you know? oh, I know what I'd do.

[20:15]

There'd be nothing to do except practice the most important thing, except be kind, except do good. I think we worry that maybe we'll go into some despair or that we'll start being careless or reckless if we knew that these mountains were rolling in. But this king says, and the Buddha affirms, no, you know the mountains are rolling in. Actually, what's affirmed in our wisdom is, I think I would breathe out and breathe in. I think I would open my eyes and look around at the people I treasure and feel the breeze, touch the earth, be kind. I would wake up. That's all. But I think many of us think that if we open to death, then something else would happen other than that.

[21:21]

One of our Dharma brothers at San Quentin, where we have, as many of you know, a Buddhist sangha, shared with me a story that indicates that the parole board seems to have a similar idea. that if someone were facing death, they're kind of not so reliable. If they're facing death, they might kind of be dangerous because what do they have to lose, you know? So a couple of weeks ago, we said goodbye in our sangha to a practitioner who has been practicing in the sangha for actually about 20 years. He's been inside for 42 years. I mentioned him before in a Dharma talk, a great sitting mountain. who has been in San Quentin for 42 years and practicing with us when he can't for about 20, and received a terminal diagnosis of a bone cancer and applied for a compassionate release that, you know, I have bone cancer.

[22:37]

I'm in hospice. Would you just let me out so I can die with some dignity? And I think I'm not a big danger to society, you know. And some of the feedback he got was, well, you know, you're going to die in a few months, so you might be reckless. You might just do anything, you know. What would stop you? What threat, you know, what repercussion could hold anymore if you're going to die anyway? You might just go enact all of that chaos and hedonism that you most deeply want to enact, they seem to be suggesting. So they thought, you know, with age and aging and death rolling in, he'll be acting violently. And he, feeling aging, feeling death rolling in from all sides, getting very close, he said, I just want to go fishing. I just want to go fishing.

[23:39]

What should be done? You know, what would you do, O King, when aging and death are rolling in? know maybe go fishing you know just be quiet by a lake you know that's what I want and not go like kill some people left to kill or like take some drugs I haven't taken yet how about just go fishing maybe take some breaths by a lake that feels true that's the truth that's from the man meeting it you know looking at the mountain that's what's arrived that's what's there for him And when I've done this practice, you know, as an imagination and invoking, inviting, remembering that this is coming, I feel that completely. I don't feel like, great, I'm off the hook. I feel like I want to live sincerely. I want to live simply and cleanly and clearly with connection, with kindness, with integrity, sincerity. I find that when facing death, when considering death, inviting death, there's a coming to life.

[24:57]

My heart opens, my mind softens. I feel more settled, a little slower, a little more clear, a little more kind, a little more grateful. A good friend of mine, a Dharma sister here, keeps saying when she encounters this practice, The light in the trees. We've been doing these practices together of recollecting death. And that comes up. Did you see how the light shone in those trees? We come to life through this practice. It's not a turning away. It's a turning towards. So there are many benefits that we can feel and that the teaching offers. Many benefits that come of this practice. wholeheartedly recommended. And of the many practices, including urgency and fearlessness and settledness and liberation and non-attachment, there's also friendliness.

[26:10]

So the Dhammapada says, there are those who are aware that they are always facing death. Knowing this, they put aside all quarrels. There's no time. There's no time for quarrels when we're facing death. So I've been just appreciating and chewing on this teaching of Buddha Gosia or maybe Edward Konza. Chewing on this relationship, how intimate these are, friendliness and the recollection of death. It might just be one moment, the friendliness that comes from my touching the recollection of death, and then the recollection of the beauty of you, you know, of each moment, which connects me with the transience.

[27:14]

So if you feel the invitation, if you hear the call to this practice, I invite you to try it out. And you might say, well, how would I do such a thing? But I think you know. You just let yourself have that thought. Or maybe you notice how you're not letting yourself have that thought. There's a lot of suttas and contemplations and exercises and ceremonies and even implements. You know, you get some like skull beads. All kinds of ways that we can practice intimacy with death. And in the end, it's just about finding a way to open our heart and mind to my own death is inevitable. Everyone's death is inevitable. How shall I live? I want to share a traditional reflection briefly.

[28:22]

Many of you may be familiar with it. It's the five reflections. And this seems like how the Buddha taught this practice is he just kind of talks you into it. He says, OK, well, picture it. You say, well, but I can't. Well, yeah, of course you can't because you're alive. By the way, it's not about death. We don't know anything about death because we don't know anything about life, which is also an important point. We're afraid of death without knowing what life is. We're afraid we're going to lose something, but we don't know what the thing is that we're going to lose because none of us have gotten a handle on the being alive thing. So it's not that we come to know what death is. It's that facing death, we come to kind of inquire into what life is and realize that we have no idea and it has no handles. It's just marvel and wonder gift.

[29:29]

So Buddha doesn't say, here's what death is. He says, just keep it in mind and keep it close. And remember maybe these five things. Remember and reflect that I am of the nature to age. There is no way to escape aging. I am of the nature to have ill health, to be sick, to be ill. There is no way of escaping being ill. I am of the nature to die. There is no way to escape death. All that is dear to me and everyone I love are of the nature to change and pass away. There is no way to escape being separated from them. You know, knowing this, we put aside all quarrels.

[30:46]

So turning towards being of the nature to age and become ill and die and lose everything and everyone. Opening to this, an insight emerges. This is the fifth reflection. It's the insight borne out from these first four. And that is, my actions are my only true belongings. I cannot escape the consequences of my actions. My actions are the ground on which I stand. All I have are my actions. It's so beautiful, given that all will be dust, you know? Then what matters? All that matters is how I live. All that matters is how I live. What I do, all that matters is my integrity. So we may feel the intimacy in that practice. We may feel the warmth, the softening, the friendliness. And then this sutta takes a beautiful turn, but it's often left out, which is simply to say, to repeat the reflections, noting, I am not the only one who is of the nature to age, who cannot escape aging.

[32:07]

All beings are of that nature to age and will not escape aging. All beings are of the nature to be sick. All beings are of the nature to die. All beings are of the nature to lose everything. For all beings, all that matters is how we live, our integrity. So considering my own death, I find friendliness with softness. And then when I think of you and your impermanence, likewise, a softness. Friendliness is there. maybe next Sunday there'll be a good Dharma talk maybe next Sunday I'll really open to the teaching I hope so but the mountains are rolling in you know if there weren't next Sunday knowing there's still time even in this so so Dharma talk

[33:52]

there's still time to open to the true teaching, time that won't come later, time that is not guaranteed. So if there's something you want to hear or be or live or touch or open to, now is the time. Can't count on next Sunday. to leave you with a practice that also has friendliness and the recollection of death and that's the practice of breathing all the way out which those who know me know that I never pass up the opportunity to share the practice of breathing all the way out you can try it now just to breathe all the way out

[34:58]

and not try, necessarily, to be alive. Just surrender in that exhalation, breathing all the way out, giving everything up. And then at the end, seeing if life comes. At the end of the exhalation, when we've given up everything, surrendered, given away, even being alive, exhaling so deeply, so fully, we're not even trying to be alive. Breathe out all the way and then just see what happens. Inhalation. I'm alive. We come to life through letting go into death. We come to life moment after moment. We do this practice of recalling death every moment by just exhaling, letting it all go. And we don't stay there. We just open from that ground to receiving.

[36:02]

Receiving life. Right there, turning towards, settling into, opening to death. Right behind it. Life just comes. Not produced by ourselves, but given, received. Receiving life in that way. What could we do, you know, but want to turn it over, want to dedicate it, want to share it with each other? So thank you very much for your kind attention today. Any good that's come of our ceremony this morning, we offer to the well-being and liberation of everyone who's here and everyone who's not here. Thank you very much. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our programs are made possible by the donations we receive. Please help us to continue to realize and actualize the practice of giving by offering your financial support.

[37:09]

For more information, visit sfzc.org and click Giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[37:20]

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