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 from people like you. morning so as I was mentioning loudly and when we were meeting yesterday in the evening in the yard in the retreat center that today I would talk about Shingi and really there's an either Shingi and an inner Shingi and that's what I'd like to talk about today because in the heritage of Buddhism each time a retreat is started

[01:33]

There's a kind of an initiation, you know, in a Thuravadan tradition, the initiation is collectively reciting the five prohibitory precepts. And in our tradition, it's reviewing the Shinging, reviewing our vow, our intention, our resolve, very much in the hope that... As we begin, so will we continue. And as we begin and as we engage that inner alchemy that reconnects us to our vow, our intention, that's what will sustain us. Inevitably, whether we intend it or not, whether we like it or not,

[02:34]

the fruition of our karma will present itself. And we'll be obliged to practice with it. And it's this resolve that gives us the guidance, the sustenance, the perseverance to do that. What is that resolve? But I also, before I jumped into that, wanted to mention sitting in a circle. Seems to me one of the lackings of our tradition is the few occasions we get to sit in a circle. We're in this together.

[03:35]

Each of us, of course, is practicing with our own body and mind. But how we do that, how we engage that, is an influence on others. And each of us is challenged by the limitations of our own karmic being. And we need each other's support. You know? each of us will dare to open up to what within us is challenging and open up to what in our environment is challenging when we feel the trust and support of the Sangha. So there's a collective challenge for us. How do we create that kind of environment.

[04:38]

In a way, this is the delicacy of Shingi. We could become very strict, almost punitive in our engagement. And maybe we'd enhance the level of compliance. Or maybe we wouldn't. Really, if you set your mind to it, you can get away with a lot. Several years back in the summer, the summer Shingi is not so different from the winter Shingi. But in the summer, a group of energetic young students, after evening Zazen, when the old folks would go to bed, they'd go to the flats and play music and smoke dope.

[05:43]

But we were all asleep, we never knew. I'm not in any way advocating that. I mentioned it as an illustration of how, if you set your mind to it, your mind can come up with all sorts of things. But of course, in the man, we saw the consequences of that kind of behavior. Not surprisingly, they find it hard to get up the next morning to go to Sassen. Not surprisingly, despite their youth, they seem to be very tired. So whether or not we can, excuse me, whether or not we could create a level of strictness that could keep us all in line

[07:04]

we'd miss the point. We'd miss this side of collective support, respect, and trust. We'd hollow out that inner resolve. Because in a way, the request of practice period formidable no it it's quite demanding in its schedule and it's quite unrelenting you know every day get up and again give it a hundred percent yeah in the midst of all the turmoil and challenges of your karmic life bring forth your resolve, your dedication, your energetic commitment and engagement in what is.

[08:11]

And the collective challenge is to make that doable. Think of the Sangha. Think of that kind of generous mind. I'm here to make this doable for everybody else. As somebody so wonderfully said in the work circle yesterday, I'm here to serve you. We're all here to serve each other. to collectively discover and enact a result. To my mind, that appears, manifests most effectively when it has a thoroughness and kind of relaxed attitude.

[09:37]

Be thorough, but not uptight. It's a while since I've led a fall practice period. The last three I led were all in the winter. When you come in winter, it's cold and dark. The environment sort of says to you, you better get focused because this is serious. You know, in the warmth of the fall, in the... There's still... the spaciousness of summer lingering.

[10:51]

So to let that teach us the relaxed part. The way in which awareness is 50% appreciation of what's happening. That appreciation, that natural, simple appreciation of what's happening, that starts to loosen up the mind that says, not enough. Something else, something more should be happening. But the other 50% is... Letting go of the distraction, of the agitation, of the unsettledness. And as we make this purposeful step into practice period, to recognize that within each one of us and collectively,

[12:12]

the request for settling in. It has nothing to do with becoming dour or rigid, but it's more like an act of compassion where we start to see the unsettledness Let go. As we attend to the breath, we can see where it gets stuck. Where it's held in shallowness. Where it has a slight or not so slight contraction. And we start to see the request to open. Allow. Let the inhale.

[13:16]

Manifest, fully opening to now, to what is. 50% appreciation, 50% resolve. And we do it together. And it's a scary process. It doesn't seem so scary when we're not so close. As we get closer, it gets scarier. And then it becomes wonderfully paradoxical. In the middle of the scariness, joy. in the middle of our own sense of suffering, appreciation for being alive.

[14:33]

And we need each other's support in that process. And then of course when we bring that kind of attitude, we receive a great gift. When we give that support, we feel it. So last night I mentioned a little bit about the heritage of the inner alchemy you know going the whole way back to the prati moksha this notion that comes from early Buddha recently I was reading a number of scholarly works on the origins of Buddhist texts and the more investigations done the more confused

[15:48]

or the more complex the whole picture becomes. Apparently, there is no original text. As best we could tell, there were a number of texts lines of dharma originating with shakyamuni somewhere in the midst of it all. But the notion of the pradimoksha does seem to have very early roots. Conduct, vow, resolve that moves, that facilitates awakening. This is the very heart of our practice.

[16:56]

And even logically, it totally makes sense. As long as our karmic formations are strong, whatever our experiences, first of all, will be influenced by our karmic formations in its construct, but also how it's related to be influenced by our agendas what we want what we don't want how we tend to think and feel about what we're dealing with and the challenge for us is to continue to facilitate an awareness that helps us to see what's going on to facilitate an awareness that helps us to see what's going on. And in the lore of Buddhism, the disposition, the engagement that enables this awareness

[18:18]

expressed is realized through shunyata shunyata being the nature of what each moment is the awareness of a dynamic interactive constructed existence bodhisattva dwells in Prajnaparamita. The bodhisattva dwells in the awareness of seeing what is, of seeing shunyata, the nature of what is. And seeing the nature of what is, we start to see through the karmic constructs. And in both the early suttas, this is brought forth.

[19:32]

In the Mahayana suttas, this is brought forth. In the Vajrayana suttas, this is brought forth. Even in the yogic texts, you know, Patanjali says, without shunyata, the asanas cannot be related to thoroughly. talking about this Suzuki Roshi brought up the Japanese term social which he describes in different ways but mostly describes it as pliable available attentive awareness sometimes called original mind Natural awareness.

[20:33]

And Achancha, you know, noted Thuravadan teacher, also spoke in the CM terminology. And this is instructive for us because... As we explore awareness, as I say, how we begin will support how we continue. To recognize as we begin that we're not trying to manufacture something. We're trying to let the clamor settle And let something what's originally there become evident.

[21:39]

Become evident, become informative, and become actualized. And guess what? This is what I'm going to talk about all practice periods. So there you go. But the great thing about it is you can see all the Buddhist teachings sort of reach out from this core principle. And yet it's quite simple. When the clamor of our karmic formations is let go, this becomes apparent.

[22:46]

This is realized. How to do that? Well, that's what we'll spend the whole practice period discovering. We'll look at some of the Not surprisingly, the Zen methodology will look at the core methodology that's really underlying all the skills of Buddhism. And then for each of us, the challenge of translating that into how it is accessible within the structure of our own being, you know? for each of us to see one of the patterns of my thinking and feeling. Where do I tend to hold back?

[23:56]

Where do I tend to push too hard? And because a lot of those patterns are underpinned by what we would say in the West, our psychological constructs. This is the trust, the support that will allow us, that will give us the courage, the inspiration to start to set down. wonderful psychological defenses we have spent so much time creating and the marvelous mystery of our being is that there is a way in which they make sense to us as we watch the manifest their themselves persistently sometimes it's hard to know

[25:02]

This is where we need the, in this mystery of what's hard to know about our own karmic formations. This is how, where I resolve and our engagement in the process of practice. And this inner process this inner Shingi. To discover in our own being the demand of awareness, the discipline, dedication, the persistence, and then how they're accompanied by patience, compassion, acceptance.

[26:28]

When we investigate and engage like this, the dharmas, the heritage of Buddhism appears right context of our own being. We don't need anyone else to tell us that it's so. We can experience it directly. And this is why it's persuasive for us. Of course the teachings can guide us to where to look. But then we do the look again. as we consider this this marvelous challenge of awakening to let it stimulate the intention to let it stimulate the aspiration and and let that

[27:47]

into resolve. A marvelous, mysterious inner alignment. As we get in touch with our resolve, sometimes we can feel the spine of it, literally. Sometimes we can feel the breath of it. As Dogen likes to say, the nostrils clear. Something in us knows so it is. Something in us invites quiet. something in us deeply remembers.

[28:56]

This is why, given all the possibilities of what I could be doing, I'm here. How come this was the possibility I landed on and chose to engage with? resolve and then how that resolve can become a constant companion that we can access it in a way as we practice we learn both how to give over more fully to that resolve and we refine it.

[30:00]

Because if it becomes fixed, if it becomes singular, it misses the multiplicity of life. Darwish put it like this this way of being is like the poetics of nothing or nothing that is as each moment is met and the mind conjures up its perception its formulation its response and its conclusion it's met with an awareness that sees it as a process it sees it as a flower unfolding and this is the imagery that

[31:26]

Amundar Vish used as he talked about this. He used the imagery of an almond blossom to talk about the poetics of nothing. And this engagement awareness and in how awareness can reveal for us how we're constructing and help us not get trapped in the construct in the response to the construct this is the delicate exploration of our practice And so constantly in the shingi, the shingi that Dogen wrote, he brought in koans.

[32:35]

The mind of koan is investigative. Not to arrive at conclusion, but to see thoroughly what is. To see the particulars, the details of it. to the poet attempting to do the same except with the flower, the almond blossom. To describe an almond blossom, no encyclopedia of words is any help to me, no dictionary, no words that would carry me off to snares of rhetoric that wound the sense And praise the wound they make. Like a man telling a woman her own feeling. How can the almond blossom shine in my own language?

[33:39]

When I am but an echo. It's translucent. Like liquid laughter that has sprouted on boughs out of the shy dew. Light as a white musical phrase. Weak as the glance of a thought that peeks out from our fingers as in vain we write it. Dance as a line of verse not arranged alphabetically. To describe the almond blossom I need to make visits to the unconscious which guides me affectionate names hanging on trees. What is its name? What is the name of this thing in the poetics of nothing? I must break out of gravity and words in order to feel their likeness as they turn into whispering ghosts and I make them as they make me, a white translucent.

[34:51]

If a writer were to compose a successful piece describing an almond blossom, the fog would rise from the hills and the people, all the people would say, this is it. The Ider Shingi reminds us the inner Shingi. The inner Shingi sees within the other Shingi how each involvement is both a big deal and nothing special. Each cash-o. The other day I thought

[35:54]

Oh, we need to have a class on how to gassho. You gassho with your whole body. The gassho is so engaged, there's really no space for anything else. In the gassho, the world stops. The divine mystery is bowed to and it responds. The placement of the fingertips in front of the nose, the placement of the elbows, the openness of the chest, the position of the spine, the utter willingness to bow. Without the inner Shingi, this is never apparent.

[37:02]

The gashou is just some peripheral appendage to the great world of me. Some trivial event. It's just a current nuisance, distracting me from the marvelous intrigues that I usually think about. But with that inner Shingi, the Gesho is the savior. It's the reconnection to now. This is what it's all about. This is the entry into now. This is the opening, the connectedness. whether it's to another person, whether it's to your seat, whether it's to the blue jay, your balls entering the meditation hall.

[38:18]

The forms of our practice are perfumed in this way. the scent of the Dharma we engage them as an act of appreciation someone was saying to me yesterday And in the quiet it felt like my ability to hear was enhanced. I could hear the bees on the bush outside but it seemed so utterly evident and loud. inner Shingi will invite us, will make accessible that kind of awareness, that kind of natural appreciation.

[39:52]

It's not the product of some great concentration or determined effort. It's just the resonance of our deep wish to be alive. Awakening is not some great victory over some terrible evil. It's just this opening of the almond blossom of a human life. And no encyclopedia, no dictionary can encompass and express it fully.

[40:55]

In Bandawa, Dogen says, no one can force it on you, and you can't even force it on yourself. So this careful attention to how to stimulate this inner alchemy. What is it that lets... your breath soften and your nostrils open. What is it that allows some space around the agitations and yearnings of your mind and emotions? kind of resolve, this kind of inquiry.

[42:15]

This delicate balance of appreciation and diligence. And then allowing the outer Shingi to constantly resonate with that inner resolve. To find its expression in each of the forms. Without the inner Shingi, the outer Shingi becomes a nuisance. It becomes petty foolishness. Why does it matter where you put your shoes or how you place them? Why in the middle of the rushing stream of my life would I pause completely

[43:40]

and bow before I go into the bathroom. But with the inner Shingi, that pause and bow, your whole life depends upon it. It's the most important thing there is in that moment. It's a blessing. It's a gift. It's a rediscovery. It's a reminder. As we begin, we'll sustain how we will continue. As you begin, we'll sustain how you continue. Resolves an interesting thing.

[44:47]

You know? You could get busy. Conjure up a lot of ideas in your head. Maybe. Feelings? Hmm. have a better chance with them. But even closer, something that can be felt in the body and in the breath. Something that stimulates and influences the state of mind. And knowing for you in your own alchemy of being. What helps to bring me back? And can you come back as an act of kindness towards yourself?

[46:00]

Not as some sneaky kind of self-criticism. when there is some sneaky self-criticism that too hmm 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, visit sfcc.org and click giving.

[46:51]

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