Hello, everybody. Good evening. I recognize a lot of faces, but for those of you who I don't recognize, my name is Jordan, Jordan Thorne. And I'm the Tonto here at the Zen Center, at City Center. Tonight's talk, is this working? It's very quiet. because it's done by my knee. See, Buddhism is a teaching of cause and effect. How is this? You know, if you say, what's Dogen's name backwards? Knee god. Think about it.

[01:04]

Well, tonight's talk is about the first noble truth of Buddhism, the truth of impermanence and change. And I hope that that's obvious later on. Actually, I don't really care if it's obvious. Because the first thing I want to say to open up the subject is, I want to say that the practice of Buddhism is a great ocean. I want to say that the practice of Buddhism is a great ocean of awakening that includes our entire life. And this ocean of awakening accepts everyone. our way of Zen practice, our way of awakening, includes everyone without reservations, without limitations, without hindrances.

[02:22]

And while any one of us individually might feel, as I sometimes and often do feel, that in some way my life or your life is limited, And while each of us might not always agree with the fact that we are actualized Buddhas, these doubts and reservations and personal opinions in no way reduce or deny or stop the complete truth that absolutely without doubt, we are each and every one of us launched onto the path of awakening. And launched onto the path of awakening and for each and every one of us in this room, but also each and every one of us everywhere.

[03:29]

The prediction, I believe, I say, I tell you, the prediction of Enlightenment has been made and will be fulfilled. This is where we're going. This is where we're going, but what brings us to this moment? Where are we at right now? What brings us to this room today? What reason, and there may be many reasons, but I ask, what reason is there that we find ourselves at the corner of Page and Laguna streets on this lovely, warmish, clear evening? And for all of you, I answer this question.

[04:32]

I tell you, I say, that we are here in this room just as we are here or there walking down the street in the Mission District or wherever we are. Because we share a common fact amongst us, which is that we, and you, and me, that we all of us have within us a deep desire to live a helpful life. a deep desire to find out how to live a way that's useful, not just to ourself, but to other people. And this instinct that I recognize in myself and in all of you is something that's called the Bodhisattva's vow.

[05:34]

The recognition that our selfishness is most fulfilled in working towards the benefit of others. So I am here this evening, tonight, sitting in front of you because On another day, some years ago, I walked up the front steps of Zen Center, and I knocked on the door. I said, when the door was opened, I said, hello. But actually, I was kind of nervous. And I asked for some information about the schedule here. I was invited in, given a few pieces of paper, and then I came back on another occasion. And while it might be too simple to just point to one moment in my life as the start of my practice, because actually, in fact, I had lived a life up to that moment, I'm going to say that I still can understand in some way that knocking on that door and saying hello and walking across the threshold set in motion directly the causes

[07:09]

that find me here in front of you. And why did I knock on the door? What was it? I want to share the reason that I walked up those steps. And, of course, words aren't quite up to the task of explaining really anything. But nonetheless, I'm going to say, I'm going to use a few words, I'm going to say, I walked up those steps because I was disappointed with my life. And disappointed is a particular word. It's a particular word that sometimes has kind of like a negative implication. But I understand, thinking about myself, that disappointment, was actually an opportunity, was an opening, was a beginning.

[08:15]

And another way to frame that moment when I walked up the steps is to say that way back then when I was a young man in my 20s, I came to the Zen Center because I had lost faith in the type of happiness seeking for, that I seem to be looking for. And alongside my personal sense that I was not being fulfilled in my personal agenda of happiness, alongside of this, because I read and I was interested in things, I had read about Buddhism and I heard about this thing called practice. And I had heard about this thing called the Buddha, an awakening. And all of these words in my mind, in my heart, seem to be a kind of antidote.

[09:23]

They seem to be a kind of pointer that I thought I should check out. I feel a kind of shyness to say this. But nonetheless, I'm going to say that all of the Buddhas in the past and in the present and in the future, all of these Buddhas from beginningless time to the present and through the forever future

[10:33]

all of them know that the path of practice is a great ocean. And also they know, and I feel a little concerned of saying too much here and actually wondering how I know this, but also I say that these Buddhas of past, present and future know that the path of practice is also a river. And also, I tell you that they know that the path of practice is sometimes not an ocean and sometimes not a river. Because sometimes Buddhism is a hand that reaches out to help us. And sometimes Buddhism is like a lattice in the garden.

[11:36]

that supports the plants to grow tall. And, you know, like a lattice or like a fishing net, a woven net, sometimes Buddhism is a thing which if you pull on one corner in the far distant edge, it's tugged. You know, when I began to practice Buddhism, one of the things that appealed to me about this way was that it did not seem to be mystical or obscure. It seemed to be a teaching of cause and effect and something that I could, in my own life, directly in my own experience, wrestle with.

[12:37]

But as time has passed, I've come to... I feel that Buddhism also is all of that practical stuff, but it's also mysterious. And we cannot know the end of our lives and how we connect. Norman Fisher, who is a person who is my teacher, some years ago was walking down the street in San Rafael. He was walking down in an industrial area where there was a sort of like Home Depot kind of store. And in this industrial area of San Rafael, there was also the – this is a 20-year-old story, 15-year-old story. I don't know if it was called a recycling center. I think it was just like the garbage dump. And it was in a fenced area, a fenced lot, acre, a square lot that surrounded where his car was parked.

[13:52]

And he was walking down the street to his car, and it was a very gusty, windy day. And he saw, coming down the street towards him, a number of pieces of paper that were, he had appeared, had escaped from the recycling area. They were gusting down the street. in the air and on the sidewalk and rising up. And as they approached him, a piece of paper stuck against his chest. Stuck against his chest. And he pulled it off his chest and he looked at it and it was a love letter from one of his students who was in Japan at that time. And the letter was written to another one of his students who lived in Marin and Norman didn't know that they were in a relationship. And there it was. Mysterious gate. When I came back to live at Gringolch after having been away from Zen practice and Buddhism for about 10 years, I lived at Gringolch farm.

[15:00]

And I had previously been ordained. So I kind of set it aside. And I was living at Gringolch. I think Blanche was living there at that time. And one of the first times that I kind of went over the gate, I went over the fence, I went with some folks from Green Elch to San Francisco, and I went to Green Apple Books on Clement Street. And it's a lovely used bookstore on the second floor. I don't know if this is true now, but then they had a bulletin board where Tai Chi classes and apartments for rent and stuff was posted. And... I don't know what it took me to glance at the bulletin board, but I looked at this bulletin board and pinned to the center of it was a photo of me on the day I was ordained as a Buddhist priest in my kimono in this Buddha hall. I looked at it and I thought, what?

[16:05]

I took the pin out and I looked at it and there was only one pinhole in the picture. And this was an event that had happened 13 years earlier. I took it to the desk. I showed it, I said, why is this here? I mean, you know, has this been here, all that? And there was, you know, they didn't care about it at all and didn't even realize that that was a picture of me. You know. I said, can I have it? And they said, sure. That's the only picture I have, actually, of my ordination. Mysterious. Who can figure these things? Anyway. So here we are tonight.

[17:08]

Together. Who knows what Causes and conditions have brought us here to this evening, to this place. But what we can know, what I do believe, is that each of us have our own DNA. Each of us have our own history. And I believe that for each of us, we each have our own moment that brought us to this question of what are we doing? And if you haven't had that moment yet, I trust you will. Beginning to practice Buddhism or Zen or whatever you want to call it,

[18:10]

Beginning to practice is like finding someone that we like and giving them a first kiss. We can never know where that will lead us and when it will end. It might happen for a foolish reason, but we've launched ourself. beginning to practice, is something that changes our life. And in the unfolding of our life, which is happening all the time, I think that we already might, not that we might, we already do know kind of what Zen has to teach us.

[19:12]

Actually we do, I think we know what Zen practice, where it needs to lead us. But the problem is in the fact that we, for each of us, our own deeply seated reasons, we fail to honor this knowledge. Most of the time we try to kind of make a bargain with truth. We don't accept it. We don't act on it. The individual personal human life that I have and that you have and that we have together is a precious gift. It's a fragile precious gift. And one thing is certain, I don't say this to be macabre, but one thing is certain, if we're born, we'll die.

[20:25]

Eventually we will die. And in between, things will change. Buddha, in the story that we honor as his story, or her story, Buddha began as a sheltered householder. And in that life he saw an elderly man, a sick person, a corpse, a renunciate. He saw these markers of transiency. And with these seeings, his bodhicitta, his thought of awakening, arose. And, you know, all of us have already seen these things.

[21:31]

And I feel some confidence that even though these stories, there's a story of a Buddhist seeing, like an elderly person, a sick person, I bet you that he'd seen them already before. There's no shortage of these sites. A while ago, this is actually some time ago, in case for those of you who have your copies of The New Yorker stacked beside your bed, you'd have to go back a couple years. But a while ago I saw a little cartoon in The New Yorker. There was a young boy and it was one panel, one piece, one drawing. And he was together with his parents at what looked like an amusement park because behind there was like a Ferris wheel and there was some other kind of like sketched in right. And in the sky above there was, it looked like the Fourth of July or something, there was a firework display with humongous kind of, you know, like explosions and

[22:42]

racers of fireworks going off. And I think there was in the near horizon like elephants that were bouncing on their rear feet with a ball tossing with their feet. And the little boy said, I'm bored. And that's one way of saying. Another way of saying this was given to us by Bhushakyamuni Buddha, our first Zen ancestor, when he noticed that when we look for our fulfillment in the things of the dualistic world, the world of appearance, that things change. And he named this experience of how things change

[23:45]

and how what we are looking for when we find it soon is not there in front of us. He called it the truth of dukkha or impermanence. I don't think you have to be brutalized by life to understand that things change and that there is a disappointment inherent in that to us. To some of us there is a disappointment. there's an expression, be careful what you wish for, you might get it. And we might ask for a new car or a new job or a new boyfriend or whatever. But when we get that new job or car or apartment or job or whatever, it doesn't, well,

[24:48]

Sometimes it seems okay, but also sometimes it seems like, this is not really what I'm looking for. Sometimes when I talk with people in this thing called practice discussion, with quotes around it, practice discussion, I say to them with quotes around it, I say, who are you? Close quote. And to this question, who are you? I get many answers. But I think maybe tonight I'll say to you all, I'll answer my own question to you. I'll kind of answer it. I am someone, who am I? I am someone who has been disappointed.

[25:49]

And I have been disappointed most simply by not getting those things that I thought would make me happy, but I've been more significantly disappointed by actually realizing what I wanted and then having the experience that that really wasn't what I wanted. You know, the... This is okay, I understand now, after practicing for some time. I understand that the gritty stuff of our life is accomplished, is what makes our roots grow stronger. Like we used to say in the meal chant, in our meal verse, we used to say, may we exist in muddy water with purity like a lotus. I think the new translation, which probably is maybe more accurate in some level, but misses, for me, the poetry of the other one.

[26:51]

We say, abiding in this ephemeral world like a lotus in muddy water. Abiding in this ephemeral world. Ephemeral is kind of a precious word. I loved the old one. I loved the old verse. May we exist in muddy water with purity like a lotus. That caught... Something for me. Because in Zen, we don't just focus on things that are obviously kind of pure and shining. For instance, like Zazen might seem like it's something that's pure and shining. It's something that's spiritual. In Zen, we practice on finding ourself amidst the muddy water. If our state of mind in zazen or in Buddhist practice is delicate and special, well, be grateful for it, but actually that's maybe not it.

[28:01]

We practice, if I can say such a thing, we practice zazen in order to realize the world that's around us already, to join it. not to... Well, we practice to see the way things already are and to lift the fog. But actually not the mud, but to lift the fog of our self-importance. So meditation... So this thing we call in Zen, Zazen, meditation is the core of our Buddhist Zen practice. But it's not really something special.

[29:13]

Many years ago, one of these Zen stories, that we've been given as a gift many years ago in a land far, far away called the Golden Age of Zen in this place called Tang Dynasty, China. There was a young student of Zen. He arrived at a monastery that had a very famous teacher called Joshu in Japanese or otherwise known as Zhaozhou. And this young student asked, Zhao Zhao, he said, I have just entered the monastery. Please teach me the Dharma. And Zhao Zhao said, have you eaten your rice yet? And the student said, yes, yes. And then Zhao Zhao told him, oh, well then go wash your bowl. In response to the request to teach him, he was asked, have you eaten yet?

[30:14]

Yes, I have. Go wash your bowl. Now, we don't know what it was really like at that moment, but I can tell you that in the story that's been brought to the present of that encounter, it said at those words, the young student opened up and saw things about themself. On another occasion, this same teacher, Zhao Zhou, who said, have you eaten? Oh yes, go wash your bowls. Zhao Zhou said, a metal Buddha cannot withstand the furnace. A wooden Buddha does not withstand the fire. A mud Buddha does not withstand the water. Know that the genuine Buddha sits within you. that we might come to practice expecting fireworks and elephants parading on their rear feet.

[31:31]

We might come to practice some hope that we will arrive at a kind of glorious awareness. But our life is not some ancient story. It's what's happening here, now, today, with us. Our life is full of car alarms and compromises. And after dinner, yes, we have a special opportunity. we can wash the dishes. When we wash the dishes, do we realize what an opportunity that is? Maybe not.

[32:38]

Maybe we don't even want to wash them. So earlier I said, what brings us to this place? And I've been saying some things about this. But I have also something. And I said, what brings me to this place is because I walked up the steps and I knocked on the door. And yeah, yeah, that's what brought me here. But we need to come to this place over and over and over because, regrettably, For most people, once is not enough. Here's a story of myself, of me, something that happened to me. After having walked up these steps and after having entered the temple and practiced, I lost my faith.

[33:47]

I lost my commitment. I doubted myself and whether it was really worth it all. And as a consequence of that, I found myself living across the bay, living as a householder, which adds certain joys and pleasures, certain miseries and hell realms. I was living as a householder in the East Bay, and on one particular evening, I found myself, I was, at a party. I guess it was called a party. I think that's what they call it. And as this party gained a kind of a velocity of enthusiasm,

[34:56]

as this party, as the voices in the room of the party became more loud and familiar, at the same time I felt within myself a kind of distance growing. A distance growing from what seemed to me to be important. And as everyone around became what I looked like, it was more happy. I became sad. And a sense of doubt came into my heart. I think I had a sense of doubt about what was passing for intimacy in the room. But really, this wasn't other people's problem. This was my problem.

[35:58]

I don't want to judge those folks. I just want to say for myself, in this moment of feeling, in some sense, what I call separation, a bunch of words came into me. I had the kind of, like, a sense of, like, I just, I didn't even, like, order them. They just came to me. And they're not really that special words, but I haven't, it's odd, because I forget so much about what happens even today, that, you know, years and years later, I remember these words, and they were. What brings me to this place where a stranger's voices strip my mind of memory? Who are these echoing spirits, who are these echoing spirits, teaching me a life that owes no debt to freedom?

[37:09]

What lesson is there in a dream that has no end? So the practice of Buddhism is a great ocean. It's a great ocean that includes our entire life, that accepts everyone, includes everyone, and also doesn't really care whether we float. Maybe. Maybe, I'm not sure about it. The practice of Buddhism is a body that we fit into without reservations, without limitations. But there is one thing that makes a difference while we swim in this ocean.

[38:16]

Because if we want to take advantage of this opportunity, we have to do our part. You have to take the steps that we need to take. Because what lesson is there in a dream that has no end?

[38:40]

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