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. Welcome, everyone, to this talk. Those of you who are here for the first time, is there anyone who's here for the very first time tonight? Great, a special welcome to you, to Beginner's Mind Temple. And my name is Tova Green. I'm very happy to be co-leading this six, where we just began last week, a six-week practice period.

[01:05]

A time when we have more classes and study and community gathering every week for tea. And this time we're studying a wonderful text, a poem that was written in the sixth century that is so relevant to our lives. It's as if there's no time at all that's elapsed between then and now. The title of our practice period, for those who are perhaps not participating in it or haven't heard about it, is Culting a Mind of Radical Trust, Zen Practices for Living in an Uncertain World. There's a lot in that title, and we're starting to explore some of the themes, trust, And what are some practices that can help us live in today's world, which is so full of strife and challenges.

[02:12]

So I'm hoping that tonight in my talk, I will be able to connect with you in some way that you'll find helpful. And as we explore a few lines of the text that we're using for the practice period. It's called the Xin Xin Ming. So I want to start with a poem. The Xin Xin Ming talks a lot about mind states, and we all have mind states in which we are drawn towards some experiences or things and find others unpleasant or experiences we prefer to avoid, and this is a source of unhappiness often that we are, we often don't get what we want.

[03:21]

And this poem is a poem by Jane Hirshfield. She's a poet who, as a young woman, spent several years at Tassajara Zen Mountain Center And during that time, she was already a poet, but she didn't write during the whole time she was there. And when she returned to her life in the city, she started writing poetry again. And she's a local poet, a prize-winning poet. She's written many books of poetry and also a couple of books of commentary. even though what we'll be talking about tonight has to do with preferences, I have to say she's one of my favorite poets. So this is a short poem she wrote reflecting on her experience at Tassajara Zen Mountain Center. Even now, decades after, I wash my face with cold water, not for discipline nor memory,

[04:31]

nor the icy awakening slap, but to practice choosing to make the unwanted wanted. So it was that last line that really grabbed me that I thought was relevant to what I'd like to talk about tonight, making the unwanted wanted. So Tassajara is deep in the mountains, in the Ventana wilderness, and many of the cabins that students live in are unheated, and they all have sinks, but the sinks are only cold water. So Jane was remembering that experience of washing her face with cold water. And especially in cold weather, we might really prefer to have it hot, but that was not a possibility. So I'll just read it one more time.

[05:33]

Even now, decades after, I wash my face with cold water, not for discipline, nor memory, nor the icy awakening slap, but to practice choosing to make the unwanted wanted. So usually we choose what we want, not what we don't want. And this The text we're studying, the Xin Xin Ming, starts with some lines that specifically refer to how we are prone to be ruled by preferences. The great way is not difficult for those who have no preferences. When love and hate are both absent, everything becomes clear. and undisguised. Make the smallest distinction, however, and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart.

[06:38]

To set up what you like against what you dislike is the dis-ease of the mind. So dis-ease, we could say disease, but I think of it as dis-ease, when we get wrapped up in what we like and don't like and crave certain experiences and avoid others, our mind is often restless and not at ease, and we're unable to access a kind of peace of mind or quiet of mind that can be extremely nourishing and a kind of stillness that can permeate our lives and enable us to be more open to whatever comes our way. the line when love and hate are both absent, or you could say liking and disliking are both absent, everything becomes clear and undisguised.

[07:59]

So to have a clear mind, it's helpful to be aware of what clouds our minds. And this... seems very connected to me to the fifth precept. The precepts, is there anyone who is not familiar with the term precepts, Buddhist precepts? There are a couple of people. So I'll just say that the Buddhist precepts are ethical guidelines, or you could call them beacons, that help us... express our interconnectedness with one another through our speech and our actions and help us... They're not rules. They're more ways of helping us examine how we would really like to act in such ways

[09:06]

as we can express our compassion, kindness, and respect for all living beings and things. So the fifth precept is sometimes expressed as, I vow to... refrain from intoxicating mind and body of self or others. So that's my own body, my own mind, or intoxicating others. And it can also be expressed in the affirmative as cultivating a clear mind. So the ways in which we intoxicate ourselves or others are very, very broad. It's not just a matter of drugs or alcohol. or other addictive substances. But we can think about intoxicants, including things that we read, ways in which we listen to the news, or sometimes work can be an intoxicant.

[10:27]

We have difficulty refraining from it. working or sometimes abusive relationships can also be thought of as intoxicants. I'm going to share one version of this precept by Thich Nhat Hanh because I think he expands it in ways in which our understanding of what an intoxicant is and the impact it can have on our lives and on our world are all taken into account. And Thich Nhat Hanh calls the precepts mindfulness trainings. So his version is, aware of the suffering caused by unmindful consumption, I vow to cultivate good health, both physical and mental, for myself, my family, and my society. by practicing mindful eating, drinking, and consuming.

[11:31]

And I really appreciate that he talks about each of the precepts in relation to oneself, one's family, or you could say one's community, and our society. It goes on to say, I vow to ingest only items that preserve peace, well-being, and joy in my body, in my consciousness, and in the collective body and consciousness of my family and society. So ingesting items that preserve peace, well-being, and joy extends, as he says to... not only foods and other items that contain toxins, but some TV programs, magazines, books, films, and conversations. So if we think about intoxicants in the broader sense, what comes to mind, I'm just going to ask you to reflect a moment, what are some of the intoxicants that you grapple with in your own life?

[12:48]

and which of them may also affect your family or your community or the wider world. I can just give a couple of examples. There was a student who was living here for a while who gave away her computer because she found that she could not stop watching movies until late in the night. She couldn't stop with one movie. She would watch several movies, and so she was just unable to get enough sleep, and the only way she could deal with it was by giving away her computer. I've had similar experiences, not with watching movies, but there was... a time when I would play online Scrabble, and it was time to go to bed, and I had only played one game, and I thought, well, I could play one more game, and I love words, and anyway, it was the same thing.

[14:00]

I had to stop playing online Scrabble because I just couldn't stop with one game. So these things have a way of absorbing our attention and sometimes overruling our sense of what what is really the best way to take care of our bodies and our minds. At Tassajara, during practice periods, we're asked not to read fiction or play music or listen to music. And I had never thought before going to Tassajara that... Novels were a form of intoxication, but I actually do find now when I read a novel, it's so hard to put it down and the characters are with me all the time. They become very real. At Tassajara, where there is a lot of time to sit and it's a very quiet place, the opportunity to leave some of those things behind

[15:12]

and really let the mind grow still is quite rare. And so I came to appreciate those admonitions. I'm also someone, if I hear a piece of music, it continues in my mind. I can hear it long after the music has stopped playing. So those kinds of things, they may seem small, but they can... And, you know, it doesn't mean that you would stop doing those things forever. It's just for a period of time. You can maybe choose to not have that kind of stimulation for the mind. I wanted to also talk, though, about a different kind of mental activity that can be very consuming. And those are... They can be called... Aiken Roshi... Robert also wrote a book about the precepts called Mind of Clover.

[16:15]

And he said, wherever you are, self-centered thoughts are waiting in the wings. Give them a wave, but don't let them take over. So what are self-centered thoughts? I think sometimes they're thoughts that have to do with our identity, who we think we are, or some qualities about ourselves that we value. And this came up for me very strongly on Saturday. We had a one-day sitting here. We started sitting early in the morning and ended at 6 and ate our breakfast and lunch in the zendo sitting. And the night before, some of us who are called practice leaders meet with students during... one-day sittings. And Terry, who's been my Chico, my assistant for the practice period, and I set up a room the night before, a room that I don't usually use for these meetings, practice discussions, we call them, with a lot of care.

[17:27]

And I had a new bell put in the room. And in the morning... As students left the zendo, they could ask for practice discussions with the different teachers. And so after that happened, Terry told me no one had signed up to see me in the morning, so that I went back to the zendo and sat the periods of zazen instead of meeting with students. And I was settling, and that was... Fine. And then after lunch, she told me that no one had signed up for the afternoon either. There were four periods of zazen in the afternoon. And I started having a lot of both some sadness because I enjoy meeting with students, but also feeling, well, maybe I'm not a teacher people want to talk to. Maybe there's these feelings of not being

[18:32]

thought well of not being liked, and I started feeling very sad and a little sorry for myself. And we went back to the zendo, and I sat, and then gradually I realized how quiet it was in the zendo, how this was an opportunity actually to sit the whole day without having to... leave and just be able to tune in to what was happening in my body and mind. And it turned into an incredible gift, actually, to have that time. And those ideas about who I was and what, you know, they just fell away. And also I was wondering how I would do, because sometimes I get knee pain when I sit for many periods.

[19:34]

And we had two 40-minute periods of zazen in the afternoon, as well as two 30-minute periods. And near the end of the day, I started feeling a lot of pain in my knees. And I was able to just sit with it. I knew that once I got up, the pain would go away, so I wasn't injuring myself. And I felt so settled that I could sit with the pain. just tune into my breathing and the sense of quiet, and I just felt so grateful for that experience because it helped me find a strength that I don't always have, and I found that I could sit through what was unpleasant without moving. And sometimes, you know... having that experience in zazen carries over to one's life so that it's easier to meet a difficult experience facing it and not moving away from it.

[20:39]

And that I think is what is making the unwanted wanted, being able to sit with, not necessarily seeking it, but sitting with it when it comes your way, knowing you have the strength to deal with it. I'm just going to check the time, a little more time. So the sense of dissatisfaction with oneself or with others or with some aspect of life can be called dukkha, which often is thought of as suffering, often interpreted as suffering. But... dukkha is actually a state of mind. Bad things may happen, but how do we respond to them? Difficult things, how do we respond to them?

[21:42]

We can respond in a way that intensifies suffering. As when I was in my, I would call it my negative mind state, about not having people sign up to see me, that was creating dukkha. And when we can let go of some of our preferences, and in the text we're reading, the commentary on the Xin Xin Ming, or actually I forgot to say, the translation of that is sometimes trust in mind. The... text that we're reading is written by someone named Musang, a scholar in Massachusetts, and he talks about opening our clenched fists. So our clenched fists could be our ideas about ourselves, who we are, or it could be the things that we feel we just can't do without.

[22:46]

If we can open our clenched fists, we can experience what may be the opposite of dukkha, which is happiness or sukha. So I think that's a useful practice to think about how can we, when we notice that we're holding on tight to something, really want something to go a certain way or to have a certain thing, if we can open our hands. There's another phrase that another Zen teacher used, opening the hands of thought, allowing thoughts to come and go. and not recognizing when we have fixed ideas about things, and can we open our minds and loosen up a little bit. So Musang also says, when we closely examine our own personal worlds of preferences, of picking and choosing this over the other,

[23:53]

We find we are essentially trapped in a world of reactivity, pulled this way and that in response to what we like or don't like. But through meditation, we can cultivate a way of being in which this reactivity is absent. Then it is as if we are looking at things directly rather than through a distorting lens. So I would like to end with another poem by another one of my favorite poets. Her name is Ellen Bass, and she lives in Santa Cruz. And I'm going to leave a few lines out. I hope she's not listening, but if she were, I would ask her to forgive me, because poems have a certain integrity, but it's a little bit long. So this poem has within it a Buddhist story that you may have heard before. It's called Relax by Ellen Bass.

[24:55]

Bad things are going to happen. Your tomatoes will grow a fungus and your cat will get run over. Someone will leave the bag with the ice cream melting in the car and throw your blue cashmere sweater in the dryer. The other cat, the one you never really liked... will contract a disease that requires you to pry open its feverish mouth every four hours. Your parents will die. No matter how many vitamins you take, how much Pilates, you'll lose your keys, your hair, and your memory. There's a Buddhist story of a woman chased by a tiger. When she comes to a cliff, she sees a sturdy vine, and climbs halfway down. But there's also a tiger below, and two mice scurry out and begin to gnaw at the vine. At this point, she notices a wild strawberry growing from a crevice.

[26:02]

She looks up, down, at the mice. Then she eats the strawberry. So here's the view, the breeze, the pulse in your throat. Your wallet will be stolen. You'll slip on the bathroom tiles of a foreign hotel and crack your hip. You'll be lonely. Oh, taste how sweet and tart the red juice is, how the tiny seeds crunch between your teeth. So, how can we be present for this life? the wanted, the unwanted, all that we meet and all that meets us. Oh, that was not Ellen Bass, that was me. But I will end with her last three words, three lines. Oh, taste how sweet and tart the red juice is, how the tiny seeds crunch beneath your teeth.

[27:12]

So we have some time for comments, questions, if anyone would like to share anything that occurred to you as you were listening or that you might want to ask more about. Yes, Chris. Yes, I do have similar experiences.

[28:37]

Thank you for sharing your experience. And I think we often do become addicted to whatever it is in order to not face pain. And I think one of the ways of facing pain is having a chance to get quiet and really explore what that pain is What is it about? And sometimes that shifts the pain, whether it's physical or emotional or mental pain, it can shift as we begin to examine it. I was talking with a friend today who has a very, very full life, and her father recently died, and she's so busy taking care of the house he lived in and his belongings and all of that, she's not able to feel her grief. And she's expecting that she's going to continue to be this busy for a while, and what she's really looking forward to is going to Tassajara for three months in the fall.

[29:44]

And she said, I know then I'll be able to feel it. I'll be able to feel the grief of my father's death if I don't get to feel it before. So she wants to face it, but this isn't the time. She can do that. So I think, what is it that helps us face the pain in our lives? It's a really good question. So when you say solve the problem, do you find that's a mental activity and then you're not feeling the pain so much?

[31:08]

I think we all try to make sense of our experience and I think it may be possible to go back to feel the experience, to be present in the experience and then also wonder, well, is there something I can learn from this or how can this teach me? I'm not sure that I mean, it sounds like you're torn between staying with the experience and also thinking about the experience. And I think it's okay to do both. You know, you don't have to choose. You can't do them both at the same time, but if something is... You'll find out if the pain keeps coming back or if the experience is still alive for you, it's something that you're working with in some way, it will keep coming back.

[32:58]

And sometimes you need to take a little space from it. Yes, Christopher. I don't think so. I can feel intoxicating, but it's not always intoxicating. No, I don't think it's... I think love is a very beneficial feeling and experience.

[34:02]

It's just... We can be addicted to the feeling of being in love, I think. You know, just... living for those moments when we're in love and other moments when we may not be feeling that may seem less worthy or less gratifying. But I think those moments of feeling in love are wonderful and special, only we can't hold on to them. And I would... Love is a wonderful thing. Enjoy it while you have it. No, really, I once had a practice discussion with one of our teachers, and I came in and said, you know, I'm really happy. I just feel happy. I don't have any problems to talk about.

[35:02]

He said, enjoy being happy. You know, it's fine. It's one of the states of mind, but I just know that... I'm not always going to be happy. I'm not always happy. So enjoy love when you're in love. How are we doing for time? I think there's time for one more question if anyone has one. I'll call on Peter because he hasn't spoken. Well, you could practice with that, but I think if it's something else that's unwanted, just to be curious about it, you know, rather than pushing it away.

[36:08]

What can you learn from it? Or what is it? What is it that, you know, if you can identify something that you don't want or that you want to avoid, what is it about that experience or person or... even food, you know, to just be curious about it, explore it a little bit, and maybe that will create a little more spaciousness in your relationship to it, or allow you to be with it more fully. If it's something, you know, there are things that are unwanted that we can't avoid, but we're all aging, we're all going to get sick at some time, and we're all going to die. So how do we meet those experiences? Is that at all helpful?

[37:14]

Thank you. Thank you very much for being here and for your kind attention. For more information, visit sfcc.org and click Giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[37:52]

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