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. Good evening. And welcome. especially to those of you who are coming here for the first time. I hope it isn't too strange for you. It all makes sense, you know, in its own peculiar and wonderful way, the whole orchestration and theater of Zen. But I'm not going to talk about that Today is the first day of our practice period.

[01:08]

Practice period being a dedicated period of time to arousing what's most important and living in accord with that. The heritage of it is that in the time of Shakyamuni Buddha, most of the time they were bendicants and they were wanderers. They walked around the area in northern India, and during the rainy season it was too wet to walk, so they stayed in one place, and did a lot of meditation. That was the beginning of what we call practice period.

[02:13]

In the early tradition, and still in the tradition in Thailand and places like that, at the start of a practice period, you renew your vow of practice. If you're a monastic, then that vow would be the monastic rules. And if you are not a monastic, you would commit to taking the five prohibitive precepts, which are don't steal, don't lie, don't kill, don't intoxicate. and don't harbor our will, is one version. And both of those forms, the full monastic forms and those prohibitory precepts, they're attempting to address, they're attempting to create a container

[03:29]

that will hold our practice. Then, of course, another part of that container is doing this, committing to this with others. And as we start a practice period, making that commitment, acknowledging what we're undertaking, is in many ways a crucial step. It's how we start will sustain how we continue. And how we start and how we initiate has two aspects to it.

[04:32]

And they're both, in a way, about alignment. One aspect is about inner alignment, and then the other aspect is about outer alignment. In what way do you align yourself with your own aspiration, your own vow, your own intention? What is that process? And then the outer alignment is how do you set up your life in a way that will both sustain that vow and express that vow. And that's a common theme in practice. The way we engage sustains our intention and expresses it. Even in the prohibitive precepts where we're refraining from doing something. It's an expression of our vow, our aspiration, our intention.

[05:39]

So before dinner, late this afternoon, 5.30, a group of us from the practice period met together to discuss such great lofty matters, and I offered the group a question. And the question was, if at the end of this practice period you said to a friend, you know, I got out of that practice period just what I was hoping for. What would that be? How would the practice period have gone? What is that? aspiration. And of course, our mind, we can take that on as a mental exercise. What do I think of that consideration?

[06:46]

And we can make whatever conclusions we wish with our mind, but we can also let it drop down to level. We can let it connect to something more heartfelt. And of course, at that level, it's both thought and feeling. And it's both known and unknown. Often our aspiration... is quickened, is stimulated by something we've glimpsed or sense. And, you know, it's sometimes in our life, it's pretty obvious where our life is out of balance. It's pretty obvious what's causing us pain.

[07:50]

And our intention to relate to that, to deal with that, is quite straightforward. If we set that aside to put it in a different category, and we look at something more in the region of what's the most important thing to do with this life? This precious life, this limited life, a limited lifespan. in the midst of it being so easy to be distracted, in the midst of it being so easy to be too busy to really pause and ask, I mean, what's the point of all of this? So to pause and explore.

[08:54]

And so in the tea, we split into pairs and because it's much more interesting and fun when someone else is listening to you be wise and thoughtful. There is just a way we're gregarious creatures. When someone else is bearing witness to us, it supports us. So the group did that, you got out of this practice period what you were hoping for? If your aspiration for your life, for your practice, however you want to construct the question, if that blossomed, if that came into full being, what would it be like? And then usually we have a narrative with it.

[09:55]

And then I said, okay, now crystallize it. Crystallize it into maybe three or four words, maybe a couple of phrases. And usually that process tends to quiet the mind, tends to draw us to something essential. And there's an interesting process in our inner alchemy, where as the mind quiets, often the heart becomes more vibrant or open or alive. And what's going on for us becomes literally more heartfelt.

[11:00]

And this is part of the inner alignment. We could almost continue that imagery from mind to heart to something more essential, to something beyond words, something beyond the movements of like and dislike, and preference of our being. And it's interesting that this capacity is not so far away that we can't glimpse it or get a taste for it. So this is the exercise we did in the tea. And it reminded me of a phrase of Dogen Zenji. The theme of the practice period is continuous practice. And the finder of this school of Zen wrote several essays, fascicles called continuous practice.

[12:14]

And that's our general inspiration for the practice period. But in another fascicle he wrote, this way of being is unconstructed, wondrous, and unsurpassable. It's unconstructed, that it's not just what your mind, what your thinking process constructs. That it's something more intuitive. It's something that touches our being more deeply. I often find inspiration in poetry. And here's a phrase that a poet Mahud Darwish used.

[13:16]

He said, this way of being is in the poetics of no thing. This way of being is in the poetics of no thing. That way in which when we engage what's going on and we don't turn it into a thing. We don't construct some definition of reality. We just experience it. We let it be sensed. Unconstructed. And wondrous. The word means wondrous, mysterious, inconceivable. and unsurpassable, that it is... You know, when we ask ourselves, what's the most important thing?

[14:18]

You know, the finder of this center, you know, Suzuki Roshi was famous for saying, and the most important thing is... And then, of course, each time he said it, the last part was different. The most important thing is zazen. The most important thing is sustaining a good attitude. The most important thing is soft mind. The most important thing is to make your best effort in every moment. So... That each element of practice is unsurpassable. They're all... the most important thing. It's not a competition. It's not like my aspiration is in competition with yours. It invites complete involvement.

[15:22]

And when it's engaged in that way, it has a fullness, it has a completeness. So the word's a little misleading because it's not unsurpassable in comparison to what is surpassable. It's more that how can we engage this precious human life in a way that holds it up as the most important thing. So to get in touch with this as best you can. At this point in my life, what's the most important thing, or to put it in the language of the practice spirit, what's the most appropriate way to engage

[16:33]

And to let that question draw us into a place beyond just the constructs of our mind. And then it's not that we have the question thoroughly and completely answered. It's actually... when we attend to it closely, we discover, as I said before, there's something we know about it, and there's something we don't know about it. It's actually an invitation into a way of being that's somewhat uncharted territory. Its importance is in that we sense there's a wider, a more open, a more gracious, a more connected way of being.

[17:37]

Unsurpassable in its appropriateness. Kategori Roshi said, complete openness of heart. That was how he described it. And then he described that state of being as repentance. Repentance as complete openness of heart. That way in which our aspiration isn't limited by our resentment of the past. Most of us are here because in the past we've been hurt.

[18:48]

Most of us carry, if not all of us, carry the marks, the wounds, the deficits, the burdens of that past hurt. But our aspiration is asking us to open beyond it. To not let it define us. To not let it hold us back. Because... an intimate relationship between forgiveness and the forward movement of our aspiration. Sometimes it's forgiving others, sometimes it's forgiving ourselves.

[19:52]

Sometimes it's forgiving the whole world and all the humans on it for doing what they're doing. And in the middle of that, allowing the courage of an open heart. And then, in Buddhism, there's another paradigm, another sensibility. And it's contained within the word sila, or shila, which is the root of the word shield, which protects against. So the shila protects this inner alignment from what we might say the inner distraction and the outer distractions.

[21:06]

Within Buddhism, there's a simple binary, which is do what supports the inner alignment and refrain from doing what undermines it. And the skillfulness of getting in touch, literally, with this inner alignment is then the engagement. that can distinguish between, okay, this is what supports it and this is what undermines it. It comes, it's felt. When we feel that open grindedness, then we will feel what undermines it. Then we will feel what separates us from it and tosses us back into more habituated states of heart and mind. So the inner alignment makes this attentive discernment.

[22:20]

And of course, implicit in that is that we are in touch. And most of us, you know, we're somewhat in touch, somewhat not in touch. And this is where the outer alignment comes into being. how do we set up the particulars of our life? How do we set up and relate to the behaviors that we engage in? And at the start of a practice period, you know, the participants are... they're offered an array of... activities that they may engage in. The primary one being zazen. I mean, in some ways we could say that zazen is the expression of this alignment, it is the engagement of shila, and it is this refraining from what undermines

[23:45]

and upholding what supports awakenedness. So there's Zazen, and then there's a variety of events that will constitute the offerings of the practice period. And then if you live here, There's an expectation that you will participate in what's offered. And if you engage in that and you watch yourself, you discover. You discover the ways in which you'll do it and hold back from doing it. you can see that wholeheartedness is an elusive characteristic.

[24:56]

Like you can bring yourself to your cushion to meditate, and you can take your posture and engage your breath, and still your mind and heart do what they do. still your mind can become unsettled and distracted. Still your heart can get agitated with one difficult emotion or another. But can we, in the middle of that humanness, can there be this steady pulse of aspiration? And then the steady pulse of aspiration, of vow, I know it would be the more classic term. The steady pulse of vow instructs us in how to relate to the different offerings of the practice period.

[26:08]

It asks something of us. What is it to sit wholehearted every single time you sit on a cushion. And if you continue to practice, what you discover is that that request is bottomless. It just keeps ripening. keeps offering its gifts and it keeps deepening its request. And they go together. It offers its gifts and at the same time it says, and don't hold on to that. Let it open and be part of

[27:10]

everyone's practice. And then the sila in the external is quite practical and particular. What is the combination of rest, exercise, diet, engagement, that will keep your body and mind healthy and vital for practice? And how would you engage that along with the other responsibilities of your life? In another place, Dogen Senji says, it's perfectly possible to get enlightened as a layperson. It's just difficult.

[28:17]

So as we meet our lives, you know, to be realistic about our responsibilities and the time they take. And not let not let our vow of practice become unrealistic. Because in its own way, it can flow into whatever we're doing. And then also, there's certain things like meditation, practicing mindfulness, that will keep showing us just exactly how to let our vow flow into everything. But as we start, for each of us, with a clear head, look at our life.

[29:18]

Okay, what responsibilities do I need to uphold during this time? How will I make the time to practice? What's doable and sustainable? And then we can also look at our life and we can say, and what things would be helpful to let go of, in contrast to what I normally do? What would be helpful to let go of? What would be helpful to invite in? Do I need to put myself on a digital diet, you know? You know, I find myself checking my emails, and every now and then I say to myself, do you really need to do this?

[30:27]

And I find my mind quite slippery, you know? There's a certain amount of function, you know, I'm expecting some message about this to do this. Of course, it's also a social engagement, so it's kind of wonderful to know who wants to talk to you or has answered your message or whatever. And then there's a certain way in which In some schools of education, they have quite a strict admonition. For children under, I think, five, don't let them have any engagement with technology of this sort, internet, computers.

[31:39]

And it's an interesting thing to watch, you know, the difference between the vibrancy of your immediate surrounds and how that's distorted by the intrigue of what can appear in a screen. Shakyamuni Buddha didn't leave any admonitions about it. He didn't create any rules about how often you should look at your smartphone. So there's a way in which each of us is challenged to make it up. It's a creative act. And there's a way in which engaging this whole process is very helpful when it's engaged with a sense of humor or lightness.

[32:56]

Hmm, what about that? What about the way, the frequency with which I look at my emails? What would be a creative and skillful way to look at that? to not let the request of practice become one more thing that we should do. I should meditate. And then it takes on this kind of onerous thing, and then the very thought of it is a little annoying. Can we remind ourselves that practice is in essence benevolent and attempting to nourish the wholesomeness of our being.

[34:00]

Can there be something in our engagement of that inner aspiration or vow that draws us towards joy, that draws us towards and this nourishes my being in a profound and beautiful way? What is it to sit with that demeanor? What is it to look at the array of your life, your priorities, your responsibilities, the things you'd like to do? The things that would be helpful to refrain and the things that would be helpful to add. What would it be like to look at that to engage that in a way that lets my life blossom. To engage that in a way that a confidence, an ease, a sense of creativity, a sense of appreciation are stimulated.

[35:23]

What would that feel like? So I would say, this kind of attitude as you examine and look at the outer alignment, can you craft a mandala that has its own beauty? It's not just recklessly trying to do the impossible. It doesn't leave you chasing after your life. Can it have this steadiness that each thing is given the time it needs? And when it feels like you are... breathlessly chasing after your life, can you pause and think, is this okay?

[36:33]

How come it's like this? I mean, that's what mindfulness is. This coming to connection to the moment. And so if you're thinking about doing the practice period, I'd really encourage you to do that. And weigh, you know, should I put something aside? If I'm going to add these things, should something be set aside? Are there conversations I need to have with others? that allows them to know what you're doing, that creates a contract, an agreement with them.

[37:41]

Okay, so be it. And can your vow that goes beyond knowing, can it have this practical element to it too? No? Yes? This body needs rest, and food, and exercise, and how's that all going to fit within this? So the very mandala of your practice period, the surround of your life, it holds a compassion, a wisdom, and a skillfulness. that it's more a vehicle that will draw you into happiness than the burden of what you should be or should do. And of course, this is an impossible request.

[38:51]

Because who knows what's going to happen tomorrow. We come at it with this open attention. We come at it with this heartfulness, with this aspiration. It's just part of the nobility of the human spirit. And in the process of a practice period, we craft our commitment. And then that, engaging that, staying aware of that, illuminates what's going on. You know, if you want to see how the mind moves,

[40:03]

dedicated attention to staying completely in touch with the breath. Then you'll really see how your mind moves. We make our dedicated intention with the vow of our practice, and then we see the play of our life. And then that informs How to practice? How does that get held to that it can be a vehicle of awakening, a vehicle of nourishing our being, diminishing our suffering, increasing our sense of ease and happiness? And I'd like to end by reading part of that poem that I quoted.

[41:15]

It's a long poem, so I'll just read the first part. The poem is about describing almond blossoms. To describe almond blossoms, the glossary of flowers doesn't come to my aid, and neither does the dictionary. Speech will snatch me to the scam of eloquence. And eloquence wounds meaning, then eulogizes the wound, like a man who dictates to a woman her feelings. How can almond blossoms radiate in my language when I'm just an echo? They are diaphanous laughing water that sprouts from the branches out of a century dew. They are lightweight, like a light white musical phrase, weak as a flash of thought that stares at our fingers before we carve it in vain. To describe almond blossoms, I need visitations to the subconscious to guide me to the name of an emotion that hangs on trees.

[42:27]

What is its name, this thing in the poetics of nothing? Yet, if a writer could manage in a fragment to describe almond blossoms, fog would recede from the hills and the whole nation would say, this is it. I don't know if that had anything to do with the talk I got. But to me, it had its own invitation beyond fixed ideas. Thank you. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma talks are offered free of charge, and this is made possible by the donations we receive. Your financial support helps us to continue to offer the Dharma. For more information, please visit sfzc.org and click Giving.

[43:31]

May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[43:33]

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