This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfcc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Welcome to Green Dragon Temple. My name is Erin Merck, and I'm very delighted to be able to share this space with you this morning and share in the Dharma together. And we've already been doing that, just being in the space, walking in, settling, tuning into our bodies, doing some ceremonial activity. So already we're sharing in the Dharma. And before I launch into some of the main themes for today, joyful and nourishing pride day.

[01:04]

And my, one of my Dharma friends dropped this by just before the talk. Not sure what I'll, I think I'll put it, maybe I'll put it right, any advice, right here. Okay. Thank you also to the Tenzo for providing me with the gift of the flag, which I was going to make one. It was a lot easier. And so my talk is not actually going to be like an official pride talk just because I wanted to talk on a different theme, but I do want to acknowledge the day and just touch into it a little bit. So just as a reminder for us all, or if you're not very familiar with Pride or the history of Pride, 55 years ago, Friday, marked the anniversary of what's called the Stonewall Riots.

[02:06]

I don't know if any of you were there at the time, but on June 28th in 1969, a group of queer folks, mostly led by trans women of color, notably, some of you probably heard of Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson, decided to stand up to the ongoing police brutality that was happening, not just to the queer community, but in that case, because folks gathering, identified as queer. And at that time, exhibiting any kind of homosexual behavior could land a person in jail. And the cops, in arresting people, they would kind of come through and arrest people in really humiliating, violent, aggressive, and brutal ways.

[03:12]

So on that night, group gathered there was just fed up and decided to resist. And as you all know, this event, which went on for about six days, six days of sitting in and resisting, resulted in what is now the ongoing global fight for LGBTQIA plus rights. And today, Pride Day is a lot about celebrating queer visibility and queer joy, just putting numbers together. I think right at this moment, the San Francisco Pride Parade, which is one of the largest in the world, is happening, is opening. I think it might be the Dykes on Bikes right now, which is one of the best parts.

[04:15]

But it's also a day to kind of lump up our reserves to be able to continue ongoing resistance to all that's happening now. And I'm sure that if you read the news, you know that while the arrow on the new, this is actually progress pride flag. There's a 2.0 that also has a symbol for intersex folks. And there's a forward moving arrow that you can see there. And we've actually taken some steps back, I would say, in the country. So there's a lot more work to do. And I think today is a day to just rally and fill ourselves with energy. I or claim the I experience when it comes to queerness or queer rights.

[05:16]

Just want to invite you in. It's your history too. And to consider joining us. Of course, we've all heard of allyship. There's also another frame that I really love, which is called being an accomplice. So inviting you to be an accomplice. And there are many ways that you can participate. All of which I think starts with education. just learning about the history that we've all, you know, been denied in a kind of mainstream way, and young folks are being denied right now all across the country and world. I'm a high school teacher, and I'm proud to say that my school, I don't think our school could be, a school could be more queer, honestly, and queer... affirming and just very visible. And I also am one of the teachers of a class where we get to share this history along with lots of other history, centering lots of different histories.

[06:20]

So I wanted to recommend to you all, if you have time today or this week, there's a really short documentary that I love that I find very inspiring, both for my practice and just to hear about some of the in this movement that I never learned about as a young person. It's called Stonewall Forever. It's only about 20 minutes long and widely available on YouTube. And not only do you get to hear from some of the elders who were kind of experiencing this movement firsthand or experiencing Stonewall firsthand and pre-Stonewall as well, but they're also... The documentary is created by youth activists who are continuing and broadening the movement today. So it's just, it's really a tearjerker. It's a beautiful film. Warning, there's a lot of swearing, but if you can get past the swearing, you can kind of just, I think it's a, you'll find it inspiring as well.

[07:22]

So that is my acknowledgement. I'm touching into pride. And I'm going to, change gears a little bit, so I'd be a little clunky. But I want to tell you all about a little bit about these past three weeks. Today marks the day when I'll be leaving Green Gulch. Sad. After spending the three weeks here, and I've had the... blessed experience, just the incredible experience of participating in a 21-day ceremony, a ceremony called Dharma Transmission Ceremony. And the Tanto Timo, who's not here today, invited me to give the talk today as kind of a way to make a little seal, I think, on the ceremony. And maybe also just because I was around and there was an empty spot.

[08:27]

Thank you, Timo, for inviting me. This ceremony requires just so much support from the entire community. And I really want to express my just deep and heartfelt gratitude to everyone who participated. It's been such a joyful experience for me. And really, you all brought the ceremony to life. A ceremony that's about me receiving Dharma transmission, but it's also just everyone. It's a ceremony for everyone. And I think, you know, people could feel that. I especially want to thank my teacher, Ajun Linda Katz, for inviting me to participate in this ceremony and also for all of the ongoing, detailed, loving efforts that she put into every single moment of this ceremony. this experience for my entire life.

[09:31]

Thank you, precious teacher. I also want to thank Green Vilches Abbot Jiryu for supporting me to be here for your inspiring teachings that I was able to experience while here, and I'm sorry for missing the one. And also the gift of this beautiful kotsu that Jiryu made. made out of walnuts. I don't entirely know what it is yet, but I will learn. And I'm just, yeah, I feel. Thank you. I also want to thank Lauren, Kokyo, Tova, and Carolyn for all of the work preparing for and also participating in various ceremonial roles. Throughout this ceremony, there's a lot to do, and this is on top of all of their other jobs. So thank you all so much. And finally, all of the Green Gulch staff and students who just helped in so many different ways, volunteering, just even letting me stay here, giving me shelter and food and being kind.

[10:47]

I really felt the vibrant practice here, and it's such a gift. And I feel so full with everyone's practice. So there's so many people to thank, and I'm going to stop here with it, but it will keep going for months. So thank you. So although most of the Dharma Transmission ceremony is kind of private, it's really an intimate ceremony between teacher and disciple, There are some public and participatory aspects of the ceremony that maybe even some of you, if you come here regularly or if you came to any of this recent one-day sittings during the past three weeks, you might have kind of seen it happening. And one of those ceremonies that involves other people and is right out in the open is called the Daily Jundo.

[11:52]

These are a series of circumambulations. As I understand it, jindo actually means circuit or literally means circuit or circumambulation. People can correct me if I'm wrong. And each morning of this 21 days began with a circumambulation to 12 different altars around Green Gulch. Altars representing various Buddhas and Bodhisattvas that are awakening beings, and other important members of both the Zen and larger Buddhist family. So the person in training, in this case me, makes offerings of light, incense, full body prostrations if possible, also a specific mantra for each altar, and then a mantra for walking the circumambulation, and ending with a kind of prayer and dedication to all beings that takes place right outside here on the Zendo deck.

[12:57]

It's a beautiful, I found it to be a beautiful circular ceremony. And I think I was so overwhelmed when I first got here and just trying to learn all the different forms and jump right in and get into the rhythm of the Green Bulge schedule that it took me a few days to notice all the circles. And then I really start to feel them and how there's just this circuit of energy and nourishment happening in this ceremony. So for each Jundo, there is a support person called the Jiko. And the Jiko's job is to carry this little incense, a little box where there's burning charcoal and incense as well. And they also carry at some points a bowing mat. And they kind of walk after the person who is making the offerings. And they volunteer to wake up before the wake-up bell every morning, which is pretty early.

[14:00]

And then also there's another jindo later in the day. So shout out to all the people here who volunteered. There were so many. I got to... do this ceremony or be in this ceremony with so many different kinds of people. And I found that this was one of, this was a really enjoyable aspect of the 21 days, just getting to kind of... be in this choreography together with really different styles. So sometimes I didn't know what direction they were going to come from or where they were going to go or how they were going to do things. And so we would just kind of figure it out together. And it was just a really beautiful expression, I think, of our way of practicing in ceremony. Ceremony is a big part of Soto Zen lineage. And also our way of practicing in community with others. So it's a very difficult ceremony to do by yourself.

[15:05]

And so while engaging in these ceremonies day after day and ceremony after ceremony for 21 days, so that's just one of the ceremonies. There are other ceremonies of bowing and offering throughout the day and then just the... regular schedule as well of lots of bows and offering and chanting and taking in the teachings. What really comes out, what's really alive for me today is the full body experience that our Zen tradition offers. Although we can definitely get very intellectual about Zen and it can be really fun. And we can engage our intellect quite actively. It can be very helpful to study in this way. This ceremony reminded me, in my view, that our Soto Zen practice is fundamentally centering the body. It's really a big body practice and centers the body in really powerful ways.

[16:15]

helps us to understand our body as kind of the ultimate Dharma gate for being able to wake up. And at the end of this talk, we'll be chanting the Bodhisattva vows. So one of the vows is Dharma gates are boundless. I vow to enter them. And this ceremony, along with the Dharma, the kind of regular practices that we do every day, I could really feel the Dharma gate of the body. So from the first moment of the ceremony, even like amidst all the overwhelm and kind of being tired and trying to figure out where everything was and what to do, I really felt that my job was to offer my body to the ceremony. And once I kind of got into it and felt like, okay, I'm starting to understand where I should go and what time and all of that.

[17:21]

I could also feel the offering back, the return from the ceremony to me, feeling the gifts of the practice that we have here, the gifts of compassion and wisdom kind of flowing in from the ceremony. And so from my experience, in the ceremony and just being able to be here in residence with my body for these three weeks, I felt so strongly how important this is in our lineage to bring our bodies into the space and practice with our bodies. Also, with so much repetition and kind of rhythm, which is usually how we practice in Zen training anyway. There's a lot of just day after day following the schedule and kind of surrendering yourself to the schedule, to the forms that are happening, that are put before you and the container that has been created.

[18:28]

I really felt a lot of softening and opening and humbling. feeling that it was okay to let go and open to this because it's such a beautiful container for practicing. And in opening in this way and feeling so open, the sensation that I'm left with here is just how precious and fragile our human existence is and also how much possibility There is for us to support one another, to untangle and to transform our collective ancient twisted karma. We often talk about ancient twisted karma. Just all of the stories, our personal stories and cultural stories and the larger histories that intertwine and keep us kind of caught.

[19:36]

And what possibility there is for us if we have the support, both of the container of the amazing lineage and teachings that are here for us, and that we're all amazingly here to receive them, that this is really our possibility as humans. This is what we can do with our human life, with our human body, with our human mind. So I wrote a little poem about this ceremony based on these nine Dogen teachings that I was studying for months to be ready. I thought I would just share it. It's called Transmission Poem. Practicing together. warm hand to hand buddha and buddha awake intertwined blood vein flowing our original face leads the way home a map of love breath body goes beyond love

[20:57]

This sensation of tenderness and softening reminded me of a teaching that, from what I know, is taught quite explicitly in Tibetan Buddhist lineages. It's also taught in our lineage in a different way, which I'll talk about, called the Four Reminders. Some of you might have heard of this teaching. They're considered a very basic foundational training usually given to students at the kind of beginning of their practice. And often a teacher will want to make sure that a student is grounded in these teachings before receiving other teachings. Because sometimes if you maybe start too soon, the fear is that you... you'll maybe get too much in your head or miss kind of the point. So foundational teaching of the four reminders. And the four reminders in this structure are, number one, human life is precious.

[22:12]

Number two, all is impermanent. Death can come suddenly and without warning. And number three, All actions have a result. Humans create karma. Number four, if you are human, you will experience suffering at some point. These reminders, I appreciate them because they're kind of like a tidy little package that sum up foundational teachings of Buddhism. So it's easy to remember also. So it's kind of nice to... Just turn them. And they're considered powerful thoughts that we can have. I think in Tibetan lineages, the idea is that you actually put the thoughts into your being. You try to actually think these thoughts. And Zen, that's not our approach. But I think that we create the conditions for these kinds of thoughts to arise spontaneously.

[23:23]

I love the sort of little bit like sneakier or subtler way of this lineage. We actually have the first two of these teachings inscribed on the wooden plaque called the Han, which you may have heard before. It's an instrument that's used to call people to the meditation hall. And on the Green Gulch has two Hans. So there's one right outside here that you're welcome to take a look at. And there's also one out there in Cloud Hall. You'll hear it. It's the first two of the reminders. So on the Han, it says, Great is the matter of birth and death. No forever. Gone. Gone. Awake. Awake each one. Don't waste this life. Great is the matter of birth and death. No forever.

[24:24]

Gone. Gone. Awake. Awake each one. Don't waste this life. So although we don't, you might not necessarily receive that teaching unless you are assigned to the job of hitting the Han, which usually happens pretty early in a person's practice here. Nonetheless, when we hear the sound, the wooden clunk, this is our call to head to the Zendo. So this is what a person does to not waste their life. Come to the Zendo. And in the Zendo, we sit in silence, together allowing ourselves to just sit to just be opening to the experience of the present moment to the experience of body and breath which you can do right now and although we most of us will turn and face the wall when we practice zazen in this lineage

[25:40]

We engage in this very vulnerable and intimate practice together in community. So it's something we do together. And our ability to, I've noticed that our ability to stay present and engaged is enhanced because there are others practicing with us. So it's the circles, again, that feeling people's intention and willingness, even when you're tired, even when... Maybe there's other things that you're not sure or you're not sure how useful this will be or you feel busy. It's helpful to have other people committing to the same practice to be there with you. Then I noticed while I was thinking about these four reminders, I noticed that one of the first teachings that we chant in the morning was After we practice Sazen, so we get called by this Han that has the first two reminders on it.

[26:43]

We chant the robe chant before we put on our robes, if we have them. And then we chant what's called the repentance vows. So we stand up and we face the altar. And these are the second two reminders. And the repentance vows go like this. All my ancient twisted karma from beginningless greed, hate, and delusion, born through body, speech, and mind, I now fully avow. So all my ancient twisted, or I've heard it also as tangled, Kind of like that one. All my ancient, twisted, tangled karma. From beginningless greed, hate, and delusion. Born through body, speech, and mind.

[27:46]

I now fully avow. The repentance vows are there to remind us before we kind of launch out into our work. Our work in the world or our work here. This is the world too. how we want to take care of our life. Each of us has a personal story and history. We carry the twisted and tangled legacies of our families, of our cultures, the wider cultural influences as well. And so our daily task as students of Zen is to approach these tangles with courage, with some curiosity, compassion, and steadiness. slowly by slowly teasing them apart. And this is what makes our human life so precious, that we can do this. We can allow some space between our kind of karmically driven impulses and our actions, what we decide to do next.

[28:48]

We can actually learn to notice our habit patterns and to start to deliberately tease them apart, to examine them. And decide which ones are actually aligned with our inmost request, our inmost values, and which ones we're ready to let go that aren't really serving us or what we most want to do with our precious human life. I think that working with our ancient twisted karma is kind of like pulling out bindweed. This was my task on one of the community farming days a couple of weeks ago. I'm not sure many of you have been tasked with pulling out bindweed or are familiar with it. It's actually really pretty. I didn't realize it was such a problem, but apparently it's a problem because it kind of not only tangles around other plants, but takes all their nutrients and kind of takes over.

[29:53]

But it looks really... cute little flowers and it's kind of everywhere i didn't even realize it was in the garden of the place where i was staying and i told someone i was asking them about the garden i said well luckily there's no bindweed here and he was like like all it's like literally all over the whole space um anyway uh also it seems like it grows back right when you pull it out it's already like growing back And so I think working with our habit patterns, with our ancient twisted karma is very much like this process. Like you know you're just going to have to come back to the same place over and over again and kind of try to get to the root. Sometimes you pull at it and it breaks off and it's like, okay, it's going to grow back right away. Then you try to like dig around it and then you're like, ah, is this really worth it? But you just keep going.

[30:53]

come back over and over. And I'm sure if you are curious and you want to see some of this bindweed, you can find it. It's all over the place. And just as a closing to that idea, I think one of the reasons why we want to keep working at getting our personal bindweed taken care of is because then we'll be able to water the seeds that we most want to nourish. And our habit patterns won't be stealing all of our energy, taking all of our energy and all of our nutrients. We'll be able to cultivate other seeds in us that may not have had the chance to flourish. So as I was thinking about this precious human life, theme, I came upon a poem by His Holiness, the Dalai Lama, and it's a poem called A Precious Human Life.

[32:04]

So I wanted to share just an excerpt. It's kind of a pretty long poem, so I'll share just a little bit. A Precious Human Life. No, sorry. A Precious Human. No, it is. A Precious Human Life. Every day, Think as you wake up. Today, I am fortunate to have woken up. I am alive. I have a precious human life. I am not going to waste it. I am going to use all my energies to develop myself, to expand my heart out to others, to achieve enlightenment for the benefit of all beings. Every day, think as you wake up. Today, I am fortunate to have woken up. I am alive. I have a precious human life. I'm not going to waste it. I'm going to use all my energies to develop myself, to expand my heart out to others, to achieve enlightenment for the benefit of all beings.

[33:14]

So in closing, before we get to... If people have any questions, comments, or expressions, I just want to extend the wish for each person in this room to realize the preciousness of your own human life. And may we help one another know our preciousness, see our preciousness, and to support each other's practice. May we draw on our individual and collective practice as a source of strength. to meet the challenges of the world with courage, creativity, and energy. And may we dedicate our practice to the benefit of all beings in all directions. So thank you very much. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma talks are offered at no cost and this is made possible by the donations we receive.

[34:18]

Your financial support helps us to continue to offer the Dharma. For more information, visit sfcc.org and click giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[34:32]

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