This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations by people like you. So we just reminded ourselves that confessing our prayer or our small mind or the tendencies that we have is a way of opening up our more complete our totally complete big mind and the generosity of that that each person in this room may feel You may actually feel some lack of generosity, but I'm confident that each of you has a complete, inconceivable, infinite resource of generosity.

[01:15]

I'm mentioning this partly because last night I listened to the news. I was up in Rohnert Park and listened to the news hour, and there was a lot of talk of scarcity, of financial insecurity and fears around that. And so it's important, I think, for us to recognize our Zen spirit of generosity. And I think as I've been reflecting on it, we've been studying Dogen Zenji's San Sui Kyo, the Mountains and Rivers Sutra, and it's all about generosity. The open-hearted presentation of the wealth of mountains and waters.

[02:25]

I'll read just a little... a bit from the opening, mountains and waters right now actualize the ancient Buddha expression. So even just that, what is the ancient Buddha expression? Is it not an expression of complete boundless generosity? And then Dogen says, these are actually the mountains and waters speaking here. This is a sutra Meaning, it is the true dharma of, say, the universal law of things. Mountains and waters themselves are expounding the truth in this writing of dogens. Each abiding in its condition unfolds its full potential. Because mountains and waters have been active since before the empty eon, since before time, he's saying, they are alive at this moment.

[03:41]

Because they have been the self since before form arose, they are emancipation actualized. So since these mountains and rivers are The myriad things that are actualized in this present moment right now, this is the teaching of your existence is actually manifesting right now as the center of, you could say, the center of things. Not off to the side, but right where you sit. So I think we, in our human limitations, sometimes forget our true nature, our boundless nature, and we need to be reminded sometimes by this kind of teaching.

[05:00]

I've been changing in mountains and waters. One day I brought up the psalm I remembered as a child, where I lift up my eyes to the hills, from whence cometh my help. I'd forgotten which psalm it was, and last week someone reminded me, it was Psalm 121. So then I looked up Norman Fisher's version, He revised and re-edited and re-presented many of the Psalms inspired by his Buddhist practice. And so then I took Norman's and then I changed it. So I just finished rewriting Psalm 121 and I want to read it to you. I lift up my eyes to the hills and glimpse the mountain peak.

[06:06]

What is the source of this rising spirit? You are the source, mystery of heaven and earth, who brings firm footing on the unknown path, who is constantly present, everywhere aware. I see this now. There is no obscurity. Nothing is dim, asleep, static. For one who questions and engages with what arises, you immediately respond, connect, protect, so that the intensity of sunlight does not burn and the coolness of moonlight does not confuse. You remind that grasping is evil and support and reveal the open heart you guard my arrival and bless my departure now and always I'm so happy so happy with my own version now some of you may be offended and it is a you could say it's a non-theistic version of the

[07:30]

Psalm 121. Or you might think it's a pantheistic version with sunlight, moonlight, mountain peak as emblematic of source. Or actual source. So Sometimes even just a glimpse of a mountain will inspire you or remind you of your fundamental intention. Your, I'd say, an innate vow to be completely who you are. Sometimes just seeing someone else sitting like a mountain And we say zazen is like taking the position of a mountain, being imperturbable, not, you know, confused by clouds, allowing clouds to come and go.

[08:46]

So sometimes just seeing someone or seeing like Manjushri sitting up on the altar or Shakyamuni Buddha touching the earth is... a reminder of that fundamental generous spirit. And by generous, I mean generous to yourself as well as to all things. So this then may offer some encouragement to, you know, ones who feel somewhat weary or tattered. And it's okay. It's okay to look for some encouragement. It's hard because this universe does not repeat. It's hard to accept that when you yearn for what's familiar. When you want something that is known.

[09:51]

And yet this whole unfamiliar A universe that's not repeating is supporting you right now. It's hard. You may sometimes think that you're traveling in a circle and you come back to where you used to be, but actually you can never return. It's more like a kind of spiral configuration that keeps moving, like a labyrinth where you're at the center always. And that's a question, can you be right at home when you're right at the center? And all around is the unknown. Pretty difficult, actually. So Dogen, riding in mountains and rivers, is encouraging us to take this courageous spirit Take up this courageous spirit and not just think that we live in a world that we can even know, that we know or that we think we know or that can be known.

[11:07]

I was listening to a recent talk given by Luminous Owl pointing out that, in one part of it, he's pointing out that So the fundamental realization of Buddhism and the insight of Buddhism is that the reality of things is ungraspable. Fundamentally ungraspable. It's the nature of the way our mind and the universe are in relationship. And as soon as we take that step, which I put in the psalm here, that the universe itself, mountains and waters, sun and moon, remind you that grasping is evil. That may be a pretty strong word to say that grasping is evil.

[12:14]

But grasping is that root of delusion from which all of our karmic problems say... devolve. So Dogen tries very hard to remind us that the way we see things is not exactly the way things are. And yet, it's in the investigation of how we see things that we know how things are. A little later on in this Mountains and Rivers Sutra, he says, all beings do not see mountains and waters in the same way. Some beings see water as a jeweled ornament, but they do not regard jeweled ornaments as water. What in the human realm corresponds to their water?

[13:18]

We only see their jeweled ornaments as water. Some beings see water as wondrous blossoms, but they do not use blossoms as water. Hungry ghosts see water as raging fire or pus and blood. Well, you can see why hungry ghosts are so hungry, right? Seeing water as fire or seeing water as pus or blood, it's pretty hard to receive that great relief of one's thirst, right? If you see water as fire. Naturally, you'll go very, very thirsty. So this is an invitation to you to notice, oh, if you're feeling thirsty, if you're feeling some lack, how is it that you're viewing this?

[14:26]

the nourishment around you? Is there some way that you are not receiving it? Not seeing what's available as water. Dragons, on the other hand, Dogen says, dragons see water as a palace or a pavilion. Some beings see water as the seven treasures or a wish-granting jewel. Wish-granting jewel. This is Jesus Bodhisattva up here and is holding a wish-granting jewel. Some beings see water as a forest or a wall. Some see it as the Dharma nature of pure liberation, the true human body or the form of the body and the essence of mind. Human beings see water as water. Water is seen as dead or alive depending on the seer's causes and conditions.

[15:34]

So it's difficult to say who has created this land and palace. It's difficult to say who has created this land and palace right now or how such things have been created. To say that the world is resting on the wheel of space or on the wheel of wind, is not the truth of the self or the truth of others. Such a statement is based only on a small view of assumptions. People speak this way because they think that it is impossible to exist without having a place to rest. So here Dogen is addressing that fundamental problem of how to find a place to rest, how to find a sense of, say, composure and peace and ease without being able to figure out the universe, without being able to figure out how the universe exists, what does it rest on.

[16:51]

Ultimately, what is the ultimate, say, foundation of things? Pretty difficult. So how then to cultivate this generous spirit in the face of a sense of lack or a sense of things not being quite right? So we actually have to encourage ourselves and encourage each other and at the same time watch out because encouragement itself can be kind of a problem. Then we can depend on that. Or the form of the encouragement may be kind of limiting, kind of confusing. So then it's tempting to get caught with a particular brand

[17:52]

pattern. And again, miss the vital transformation of mountains continuously, dynamically changing. So I think this sitting, this sitting, Zazen itself, taking this posture and sitting upright in the midst of Everything that's going on, being willing to actually stop right in the middle, is an act of generosity itself. An act of courage and an act of wisdom. You may not feel it, and you may not notice it immediately, but why are we all doing it? There's something in us that suggests that It's hard to understand the power of it, but yet we sometimes feel it.

[18:55]

And those who experience it, even just with a glimpse sometimes, feel, I don't want to lose track of this. I can't quite say what it is, but I don't want to lose track of it. And it's such a challenge in the midst of a world of propaganda suggesting, oh, that you need something outside yourself. So what is, and so actually we go about, many people are spending a lot of their effort accumulating comforts. I like the phrase that my Zen Dharma teacher colleague in Mount Tremper, Daido, took the word affluence and called it affluenza.

[20:06]

Affluenza. Affluenza. As a kind of disease, right? Affluence as a kind of disease. Affluenza. So how to... cultivate spirit in the face of all the affluence and the comfort there may be I think there's a lot of fear right now that a lot of that may be slipping away may be threatened and then it's hard to generate your own spirit of generosity when you're holding on to something that may be threatened. So sometimes we need to kind of push ourselves to move past the complacency that comes from all of our affluence.

[21:12]

So there's a story of... I don't know where in Nowak Roshi. Nowak Roshi was a farmer, a Zen teacher. And every day, he'd get up and get into the pig pen with his pigs and take a switch and hit this pig on the rump and oink, oink, oink, and driving the pig around. Oink, oink, oink, drive it around. Oink, oink, oink, drive the pig around. Keep switching it on the rump. For... half an hour or so. And one of his students finally asked him, so what's the purpose of chasing the pig around? And he said, it gives her spirit. Gives her spirit. And I imagine it did wonders for his spirit too, actually. I used to enjoy that when I was a kid, actually.

[22:19]

My uncle had lots of pigs, and we'd go and visit his place. And I enjoyed taking a little stick and chasing the pigs around. So this story has particular benefit for me and my own spirit. Then, of course, when the pig turned around and came at me, then it was reversed. Then I really had good spirit, right? Running the other way. So I wonder now, you know, what's the state of your spirit? And as you go through your life and your activity, do you notice what in your reactions comes from some limited view? from just being say acting in a position from coming out of some anxiety or coming out of fear or coming out of some sense of resentment or loss so in calling attention to your own habits

[23:44]

I mean to call attention to what you do by habit, to acknowledge that, and then also to see what you may bring to that as practice. Just to inquire into habit, to notice what you do from habit, is already transformative. To bring the question to it. The other day I was talking about bodhicitta, the mind that seeks the way, or the innermost request, and someone asked about, how do you know it's your innermost request? And that itself, that question, what is innermost request? That question itself is the mind that seeks the way, is bodhicitta. And...

[24:49]

may open up some generosity of spirit. Now, if you're noticing that you're resenting someone else, you may also look at, is there something in yourself that you're not being generous with? If you're noticing that... You're resenting the time someone else is taking to grieve their loss. And sometimes people do that and say, oh, come on, get on with it. Your mother died two years ago, and so why are you still dragging that around? Or your divorce was five years ago, and you're still not over it. Sometimes people... are not generous with each other's need to fully experience what they're experiencing.

[25:57]

I talked to my mother on the phone yesterday, the 14th, and it's the, let's see which, the third anniversary of her marriage to my father since he died. And she's, you know, experiencing that loss in a particularly poignant way on that anniversary, the anniversary of their wedding. And so... So I asked her about it and how she was doing with that and what she was doing with that. She was going through her collection of cards that my father had written to her on the anniversary and reading those cards.

[27:09]

For just a moment I thought, why should you wallow in nostalgia? I didn't say that, though. Then I thought, this is actually, this is deeply meaningful to her, actually. To acknowledge her life. And for her to acknowledge her life now is to call up the whole say, many, many, many, many, many, many past moments that have come and gone but are still giving meaning to this moment. So to say that this moment is ungraspable doesn't mean that it's not infused with meaning from all past moments and all future moments that are present

[28:20]

right in this moment. So I felt that she was actually accepting and kind of quietly just noticing for herself the little points that come up around the loss of that relationship. that was so important to her. So my more generous feeling is to, oh, of course. Allow that. And allow that for myself. I've been... Many times I've been saying that to forgive... is to stop hoping for a different past.

[29:24]

So to stop hoping for a different past doesn't mean to ignore the past. But it means to take it into account fully and acknowledge the power of it. I want to read some from a poem by Dick Lurie. He had a very difficult time with his father, I think. Some of this poem was in the concluding moments of the film Smoke Signals. How many of you know the film Smoke Signals? A sprinkling. Yeah, maybe a. 20% or so. So I recommend it.

[30:32]

It's a wonderful film and completely it's an expression of Native American wisdom. And some of this poem was included in it called Forgiving Our Fathers. Maybe in a dream. He's in your power. You twist his arm, but you're not sure it was he that stole your money. You feel calmer and you decide to let him go free. Or he's the one, as in a dream of mine, I must pull from the water, but I never knew it or wouldn't have done it until I saw the street theater play so close up I was moved to actions I'd never before taken. Maybe for leaving us too often or forever when we were little. Maybe for scaring us with unexpected rage or making us nervous because there seemed never to be any rage there at all.

[31:39]

For marrying or not marrying our mothers. For divorcing or not divorcing our mothers. And shall we forgive them for their excesses of warmth or coldness? Shall we forgive them for pushing or leaning, for shutting doors, for speaking only through layers of cloth, or never speaking or never being silent? In our age or in theirs or in their deaths, saying it to them or not saying it. If we forgive our fathers, what is left? So right in the center of this, maybe for leaving us too often or forever when we were little, maybe for scaring us with unexpected rage or making us nervous because there seemed never to be any rage there at all.

[32:43]

So much to forgive. So in this practice of sitting It's coming to terms with everything that bears upon this present moment. All past karma, all future potentialities are actually present right in this moment. So as you sit with this generous spirit, the spirit of being willing to say, I see. what is. I'm willing to see what is. Not pretending otherwise. Noticing the tendency to not see. Noticing the tendency to revert to some story about what is.

[33:54]

Noticing the tendency to recoil or to grasp. This is the spirit of generosity. It's being willing to actually be generous with all of those tendencies. To recognize those tendencies and not to say to cramp them by constricting around them or by turning away from them, to recognize those tendencies as having their own life, their own space, their own, say, karmic energy, and giving them that space, being generous enough to give them that space. So in the case of forgiving someone who has mistreated you, misunderstood you, failed to recognize you, failed to appreciate how great you are, completely missed the boat with you, ignored you,

[35:25]

or sometimes challenge you in a way that was say you felt defeated or in extreme cases of say having contempt for you belittling you to actually bring a generous spirit to all that is a tremendous tremendous challenge and undertaking and goes So completely contrary to usual human idea of mind and our usual human way of coping and our usual human way of trying to fix all those things, straighten them out or get revenge. And the wisdom in it is to realize that none of those things really are

[36:27]

quite true quite the reality the way in which you've grasped it is actually the root of all suffering and to grasp it at all to grasp or to grasp it in the sense of holding on or grasp it in the sense of seeing that there's some object to push away either one of those simply adds fuel to the, say, narrow view that you have. And so to allow it to have space, to allow the image of the person in the dream, to allow that to have space and simply sit with it, Be willing to be with it. Be willing to be in the same world system.

[37:32]

Because it's already there. That is an act of wise and generosity. So simply to not attach to things. is generosity itself. Giving space. So this applies to your own body when you have some injury to allow it to have its own room for healing. Even to have, you know, when you have some cloud of thought following you around or hanging over your head, to simply be willing to inquire, you know, okay, who are you?

[38:36]

What are you? And when all the past injuries come up, to again and again say, oh, okay, I see that for me to wish for anything different is a failure. It's not true to the capacity of the true nature of Buddha mind that is present right now. So I invite you in this day of sitting to be generous with yourself. all of your tendencies, and to be generous with each other. Allow people to be exactly where they are, in their own karmic position.

[39:41]

And then allow them to emerge from it in their own way. To offer help when you can. And to offer help when you can means that you can actually see, you see what is. You're not offering help to protect yourself from their pain, which you're feeling in yourself. You're offering them help for them to mature their own power of generosity. So, please find a way to lift up your own eyes. Lift up your own heart.

[40:45]

If mountains help, then regard mountains. If Buddha image helps, then regard Buddha image. Venerate Buddha image. If some simple phrase helps you remember your own deep intention, then bring that. Bring that up to light. And then having done that, take stock of where you are. And see wholeheartedly, oh, can I be right here? Yes, I'm already right here. Why not be right here? Thank you for listening. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our programs are made possible by the donations we receive.

[41:49]

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

[42:04]

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