Good evening. Well, it's good to be at Tassahara again. I write yesterday, and today we had our Dharma group. And our Dharma group has been, can you hear me? Yes, sir. Talking about, I've been talking about Suzuki Roshi, his teaching. which I do every year. For those of you who are not familiar with our practice, Suzuki Roshi was the founder of our practice and the founder of Tosahara, along with his students. So I'm going to continue that theming. I'm going to talk about one of my favorite talks it's a short talk because this is a short talk about groundedness Suzuki Roshi's most important I don't know about most important but the thing he was most

[01:33]

adamant about was how our practice is to be grounded most religious practices have a spiritual aspect and Buddhism has a spiritual aspect Zen has a spiritual aspect because Zen is just Buddhism. It's nothing special. It's simply Buddhist practice. But Suzuki Roshi always never promoted what we call spiritual practice as different from ordinary everyday activity. So he was more interested in being on the ground than being in the sky.

[02:34]

And finding your way on the ground, if you cannot find your way on the ground, then you're sure to lose your way in the sky. So, of course, Suzuki Roshi, ordinary everyday practice was spiritual practice. Washing the dishes is spiritual practice. Sweeping the floor, sweeping the ground is spiritual practice. Working in the garden, of course, is spiritual practice. But he was more interested in the ground than in the plants. how to cultivate the ground because whatever comes out of the ground comes out healthy and beautiful when the ground is healthy and beautiful.

[03:47]

So there's no distinction between ordinary mundane practice and spiritual practice. going to the toilet is spiritual practice. It's great and wonderful, as you know. I asked somebody who was giving a talk, and I said, well, what's most important, eating or pooping? Eating. But actually, that quote, One is not more important than the other. As we know, so that must be me, huh? As we know, so atomic energy, atomic energy is wonderful, except there's no place to poop.

[04:57]

There's no place to put poop. So we're stuck with the dynamics of the energy which is going to kill us and there's no place to put the waste. So all things being equal, as it's said, those are not. So we have to be very careful about what we do. Suzuki Yoshi also, I'll read you a little bit when he says, he says, Most of us study Buddhism as though it was something that was already given to us. We think that what we should do is preserve the Buddhist teaching by putting food in the refrigerator. Then to study Buddhism, we take the food out of the refrigerator whenever we want. It is already there. Instead, Zen students should be interested in how to produce food from the field, from the Dortmund.

[06:00]

So we put emphasis on the ground. So the ground, we have three aspects of Buddha. Dharmakaya, Sambhogakaya, Nibbanakaya. Dharmakaya is the ground. Dharmakaya is the fundamental aspect that is the parent of all life, according to our dharma. Everything springs forth from the Dharmakaya, which has no specific mode. You can't say it's this or that, but wherever you point, it's there. This is the ground for which all aspects, all individuality arises.

[07:04]

So we're all flowers of the ground, of the Dharmakaya. Dharmakaya is our essential nature, and the essential nature of everything. Sometimes we call it Buddha nature. Sambhogakaya is our wisdom mind, which is when we touch the ground of beings, we allow wisdom mind to arise. And when we practice appreciating everyone and working together with everyone, which is called Sangha practice. So these are the three aspects, but everything arises from the ground. I remember when I was Just before I started to practice Buddhism, that was in 64, I had this urge somehow to grow tomatoes.

[08:12]

There's this little plot of land, and I had never really done that before. So I dug up the ground, and it was a hot day, and then I took off my shears and I walked on the ground. And when I took off my shears and walked on the ground, I could just feel the earth, and I could feel my connection. And I could feel this terrific experience of being one with the ground on my bare feet. So later, when we started the Berkeley Zen Do, I was in charge of that. And I knew that I really had a feeling that my Zen practice was connected with the ground, connected with gardening. farming, actually. It was a big yard in Berkeley. So my plan was to sit size in it, and in the daytime, I would work in the garden.

[09:15]

And it was the beginning of the organic gardening moment back in the 60s. And I just went all for it. And I had this green vegetable garden that was producing like crazy and making it making compost was the biggest part of it like the plants were great but the most interesting part was fertilizing the ground and taking care of the ground and Suzuki Roshi was talking about this and I was totally into it and Suzuki Roshi encouraged us to find our own way he really liked when his students could find their own way and he didn't tell us what to do he came to kind of and encouraged us but when we had felt that we had a way that we knew what we were doing according to the way he brought us up that culture was more than just an idea

[10:31]

And to me, working the ground was a spiritual practice. And it didn't need any kind of deity. It didn't need any kind of ecstasy or something. But when the ecstatic feelings that you have from spiritual practice are put into mundane practice, then actually it works. When we become too excited about spiritual practice, which is divorced from mundane practice, then we have a problem. That's called egotism. We want to be promoted by the spiritual practice. But when we forget about it and just put it into mundane, ordinary activity, sweeping floor, and forget about it, that's when it really works.

[11:43]

That's when everything comes alive. Because you're allowing that light to come through you and illuminate your world. So Suzuki Roshi didn't talk a lot about precepts or rules. He said the precepts or the rules come forth from you. They're not something imposed. That's why he's talking about... putting the dharma into a drawer and then putting it in the refrigerator and then taking it out that's a dead dharma live dharma comes from your activity and your understanding and the true groundedness comes from zazen so we have a way of being grounded in reality through zazen zazen is like water

[13:02]

You can't fool water. And you can't fool zazen. Because when you have zazen, they'll always give you a problem. And you can't escape. You can only let go. Water is the same way. If it's not, if the connections aren't good, it will leak. So everything has to be, you can't fool it. And in zazen, you can't fake it because you suffer. So zazen is how we touch the ground and let go of our ego. If you can't let go of self-centeredness, you suffer. It's a true test of how we know how much ego we have. It's the ego thermometer, a barometer. tells us, you know, you're just fooling yourself.

[14:07]

So how do we stop fooling ourselves? The only way we can do that is to open ourselves completely and let go of our self-centeredness. That's spiritual practice. Spiritual practice means letting go of self-centeredness so that instead of being self-centered, we move over and become Buddha-centered. And with your Buddha-centered, we need a delusion on God the hub of your will. Generosity, goodwill, and loving kindness is your hub. That's how we induce spiritual practice. We just put ourselves on a different wheel. Zuki Moshi didn't want to tell us so much how to do things, but he just watched us as we practiced and found out where we were.

[15:24]

But he was always there, and always telling us good things, but we didn't always understand what he was talking about until we experienced it ourselves. So he says, all of us have Buddha nature. And the teachings that grow out of Buddha nature are similar to one another. The teachings of different schools of Buddhism do not differ so much, but the attitude towards the teachings is different. When you think that the teaching is already given to you, then naturally your effort will be to apply the teaching to this common world. For instance, The Theravada students apply the teaching of the 12 links of causation, ignorance, will, this is a little technical, I don't want to go through that, and how to apply that to our life, to how we were born and how we die.

[16:37]

But Buddha tried to save us by destroying our common sense. Usually we're not interested in the emptiness or the bareness of the ground. Our tendency is to be interested in something that is growing in the garden, not in the bare soil itself. But if you want to have a good harvest, the most important thing is to make the soil rich and to cultivate it well. The Buddhist teaching is not about so much food itself, but about how it is grown and how to take care of it. Buddha was not interested in a special deity or something that was already there. He was interested in the ground from which various gardens will appear. For him, everything was holy. This is a story from Esau that I tell a lot. There was a farmer and he had three sons. Actually, he had three sons and two daughters.

[17:44]

I'm making it. It's spudging a little bit, but it's better. He sends it to him. And he said, boys and girls, it's about time for you to go. And I'm leaving the farm to you. But I want to tell you that there's a buried treasure on this land. And it's... And he died. So the boys and girls looked at each other and they said, well, let's start digging. So they got their shovels up and they started digging, digging, digging, dug up the whole place. Nothing appeared. And they said, well, let's try once more. Okay. So they dug, [...] dug. Let's dug up the whole place. Yeah. No, no, no, no, no. One more time.

[18:46]

Okay. The last time. So it died. No word. No treasure. They said, well, it's spring. Let's plant the field. So they planted the field. And wow, you know, it's an enormous deal that they'd never seen before came up. And then they looked at each other and they said, you think this is what the old man was talking about? This is. So, Suzuki said, Buddha did not think of himself as a special person. He tried to be like the most common person, wearing a robe, begging with a bow. He thought, I have many students because the students are very good, not because of me. Buddha was great because he understood, his understanding of people was very good.

[19:48]

Because he understood people he loved them and he enjoyed helping them. Because he had that kind of spirit he could be a Buddha. That was a good description of himself, actually. So the ground has no special shape or form. But all the various forms arise from the formless ground. Sometimes people, Zen students, really like to sit Zazen and be grounded in Zazen, which is touching the ground. But it's also important not to just stay there. You can't stay there. You have to get off your cushion

[20:50]

and work. In the summertime, students come to Tassajara to practice, and the practice is work. Sometimes they say, work does working. Somehow we don't convey to them that work is practice. And so we make a distinction between work, sometimes, and Sasa. It's not as if Zazen and then being in this particular building is Zen practice. It is Zen practice. But when you step out the door, that's also Zen practice. When you're practicing, there's nothing that's not Zen practice for you. Everything you meet is your practice. Everything you do is your practice. And the more difficult it is, Suzuki Roshi always emphasized that through difficulty that's when you find your enlightened practice is right in the middle of your difficulty right in the middle of your biggest problems is where you find your enlightened practice so sometimes people say

[22:17]

In Sultan Zen, you don't have koa practice. But they don't understand that everything in your life is your koa practice. You don't have a special practice called koa practice. Everything you do is part of your koa. And you meet your koan moment by moment in your activity. Doody called it Jejo koa. the colon of your daily life. Your daily life is not something separate from your life in the zendo. If you turn it around, the life in the zendo is your daily life. And your life outside the zendo is very special practice. You can think that way. But actually, it's the same thing. It's just that you're grounded in zazen, And when you leave the Zendo, you're grounded in daily activity.

[23:22]

Chopping the vegetables. Just doing. Chikantaza is what it's called. Just doing. Just being at one with your activity without any separation. No separation between spiritual practice and ordinary mundane practice. Chopping the vegetables creates spiritual practice. Cleaning the toilets. in the Zen monasteries, the head monk. The head monk's practice is cleaning toilets, which is considered a very special, wonderful honor. So we don't make these decisions. If you don't understand this, you're not yet practicing. So when I would go to see my teacher, Suzuki Roshi, I'd often bring him a problem that I had. and then he would give me a more complex problem based on that.

[24:28]

And he'd say, oh, you brought me a problem. And I just gave you a bigger problem. And then he'd laugh. And then we'd both laugh. And it was great. And I didn't want to go away. Nope. Laughing about my problem. Definitely don't address it. that practice is not escaping from your problem. Facing your problem and finding your release in the problem. Finding the enlightened practice right within your problem. And you always say, if you don't have a problem, you'll never practice. So satsang is not an escape. As a matter of fact, you just step in and do a bigger problem sometimes. Don't your knees hurt? Right now? So what a great practice this is.

[25:30]

So I'm so grateful for my teacher for giving me so many wonderful problems. He said, you know, you should apologize to your parents for giving them so much trouble. He was also the most compassionate person I know, and also the one who gave us the biggest problems. Then I had five more minutes. Also the ground, he talked about the ground being like a movie screen.

[26:37]

A movie screen is just this black, white background. And in the movie theater, the movie is projected onto the screen. And then we don't see the screen anymore. We only see the movie. And then when the movie's over, you see the screen again. And so we've had this experience of the movie, but the movie always has a beginning, a middle, and an end, whereas the screen is continuous. So the ground is like the screen. It has no special shape or form, and anything you project on it, you can do that, but it doesn't stick. When it's over, it's over. And our life is like that. Our life is like a movie.

[27:39]

And when you sit with us, you can see that happen. Because you're grounded. And the movie is just going by. We call it the scenery of our life. So we have the scenery of our life, which is our ideas and our thoughts. and our feelings and emotions and all that, but at that point it keeps changing, always changing, and it's all projected on the screen. And a good deal of it is fantasy or dreaming. We have waking dreams. We think they're not on the way, but they're not necessarily. Satsang is to wake up. That's what it's called. It's waking up. You dream and you realize, oh, this is the dream because there's nothing special.

[28:46]

It's just mind stuff. It's just bubbling up because the mind has to have something to occupy it. So we have... If you watch children growing up, you can see how There's nothing that they have to think about, mostly, but they do think about stuff, and the mind is grasping for this or that to entertain it. So, so much of our stuff is entertaining ourselves, but we take it very seriously. We take it very seriously. We never kill each other over it. I wanted to talk about this thing of the world. today, but I don't like that. It's too complicated. But we should open this. And if we take care of our surroundings, we're all frustrated.

[29:54]

How are we going to take care of the world? We take care of ourselves, take care of each other, take care of our place, take care of our environment. And that has to look, if everybody has that, with compassion for our surroundings and each other, that will go a long way to settle in the world. And if we stay grounded, we won't be able to have people here. Zip Europe, she talked about composure as the most important thing. How we don't get pushed off of our seat, so to speak. And it's not that we're disturbed. It's not that we're not disturbed.

[30:55]

Samadhi means undisturbed, imperturbable. Inperturbable is our goal, but it's not necessarily, it doesn't necessarily happen all the time. You don't feel bad if you're not perturbed. I mean, if you are perturbed, if you're not perturbed. But to be settled and not panic. It takes practice. It's getting more scary.

[31:53]

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