For more information, visit sfcc.org and click giving. The interesting way we can get presented with something Does our mind turn it? This is not what I want. This is what I want. This gets associated with this or that. Or does it turn the mind? No. Ah. So you were expecting something else, but you got this. Now what? Is that an annoyance? frustration or spark.

[01:05]

What's happening now? And we can intend, we can vow, we can like the appropriate factors of existence holding up the virtue of now what in its ingenuity and creativity and still in the moment something's requested beyond whatever preparation we think we've done or we've merit or something we've accumulated. And as we immerse into Shin, as we immerse in the being that's created through circumstances, inner and outer,

[02:30]

interesting way our capacity to attend, to notice, acknowledge and engage such moments is enhanced and they just pop up. That's more or less what I want to talk about this morning. In the spirit of going south to head north, I want to start with Dogen's fascicle, Zazen Shin. Towards the end of the fascicle, he comments on a classical text that was written in the Song Dynasty, where someone made his wife's work to collect all the descriptions of Zazen that he could find from that era and he collected 1071 according to Dogen and then Dogen casually, determinedly and decisively says and they all miss the mark everyone and then he berates and belongs it you know

[04:02]

Everybody talks about sasa, but they all got it wrong. They teach their students about sasa, and they got it wrong too. Except for maybe one or two out of the 1071. And as I was reading that piece, marveling at what to make of it. Something arrives in our experience, in our perception. The mind wants to manage it. Should I judge it, appropriate or inappropriate?

[05:04]

draw a conclusion that's persuasive in terms of my notion of practice. For me it was like a marvelous mystery. At different times I've thought Well, Dogen was caught up in this or caught up in that, or his sense of purpose was such that he had to emphatically refute that which wasn't accurate. I grew up in an environment It would be kindly and sweetly called sectarian rivalry.

[06:12]

A little like, say, what's happening in the Middle East is sectarian rivalry. Yeah. Which, of course, it is with daily consequences. So refueling someone else's religious expression was... the order of the day in upholding by coincidence the virtue and accuracy of your own was also the order of the day so with that as a background reading this I remember the first book I read and said I was enthralled, I thought, this is it, the perfect spiritual practice. It's tolerance, it's benevolence, it's wisdom, it's compassion.

[07:19]

Far above the tolerable limitations of Christianity. And I stayed with that delusion for many years. It greatly fueled my fervor and dedication. But here's what I would say now about this notion of upholding and diminishing. There's an obvious way. It just misses the point. It casts us back into dualism. And yet, there's a challenge for us to take the experience that arises for us and in a way cast it in a vernacular

[08:43]

that speaks to us. And it's a delicate proposition. Does that mean set up standards on your own, create your own version of practice? And the answer is yes and no. Something that's heartfelt. something that resonates with our being, that beyond words says, yes, I will. That in that moment of, you know, yesterday I was saying about the proximity between our challenges, our struggles, our difficulties in practice, and the intimacy, the absorption of of being what is. It's a territory, maybe every single one of us, whether we like it or not, is obliged to explore.

[09:54]

Usually that which is comfortable is comfortably and easily put in its place. It's pleasant. It's agreeable. It's satisfying in a way that the world has arrayed itself for us. And then the troublesome statement, the pressing the wrong button, and getting confronted with something we weren't expecting. This morning when we were eating breakfast, my right knee was hurting like crazy. And I was thinking, what's this?

[11:02]

My right knee never hurts. Well, today it did. Fierce teaching of the physical world. You could try and philosophize that way. You could try and find a Dogen quote that soothes it. Think of the Celtic saints who welcomed suffering as part of their crucifixion and purification. The discomfort is right there. And what is it that turns the heart and the mind and the breath into notice, acknowledge, contact, experience?

[12:10]

Because as we explore, well that's challenged. is a teaching. There's a teaching that's maybe not so visible or obvious for us, where it's comfortable. So as I read that about talking, involving not knowing. 200 years after the fact, he's referring to the Sun Dynasty in China, not the land of its birth. Long since my notions that Zen

[13:30]

as a practice and a religion is the expression of perfection. If half the history I've read about it's true, it's got its own embarrassments. And who doesn't? But this getting at the alchemy within us, the alchemy of engagement that draws forth presence, that draws forth engagement, that draws forth allowing the moment to turn the self rather than the self

[14:35]

determinedly wishing to turn the moment. As we immerse in sushin, this is a wonderful exploration we can do. And certainly In those times, in those moments when the mind is settled, when its experiences are momentary, that turning stands forth. When we see a particular thought arise, There's a phrase that's translated as bits and pieces of mind.

[15:44]

Those momentary bits and pieces of thought and image. Last night I drowned. I was the road manager for the Rolling Stones. How in the middle of your shoe could such a dream happen? I can't even remember the last time I thought of the Rolling Stones consciously. When I woke up intrigued by some Adventure. Enterprise. We were all about to endeavor. Bits and pieces of mind. It comes out.

[16:50]

And normally the mind that makes sense of the world edits out such irrelevancies, and holds us in familiar territory. And with this suitable narrative, glues them together into a plausible version of reality. which conveniently helps us function. A few months ago, someone came to see me and they were in the throes of paranoid delusion.

[17:55]

And the narrative that we're putting together wasn't very helpful. So maybe we should be fortunate for the narrative we're putting together. But it's mostly helpful, although not completely. Mark Twain said, there have been many disasters in my life, and some of them actually happened. As presence becomes more available as awareness, more accessible this bits and pieces mind this momentary experience sometimes we can notice as the mind settles an image a feeling

[19:02]

don't know with non concluding attitude. What does it all mean that Dogen wrote that? And that 800 years later, we're mining it for guidelines on our practice. Did he write it with a quirky smile on his face? Or did he write it with a clenched jaw? I'll teach them. Where I grew up, defender of the faith was a powerful notion, powerful archetype. Because they were right to ruin our faith.

[20:16]

Or did he just write it to see what it did to people's minds? I'll just throw this in. Stop them dead in the tracks. Mischievous and lighthearted. realize, to acknowledge that whatever conclusion we're prone to make, it's conjecture. That these moments of consciousness are themselves, that they

[21:29]

to self it's not necessary to get to work on them and make them into something plausible acceptable and that in this way what arises in our consciousness with this disposition is Whether it startles you, and where did that come from? Or whether it feels utterly familiar and predictable. Oh, yeah. I've seen that one before a few thousand times. This time is this time, and this is it, with no before and after.

[22:40]

It's its own time being. It's its own moment of existence. And here's how Billy Collins toyed with this. He called this poem, sitting up in my body like a man riding an elephant draped in a carpet of red and gold his turban askew singing a song about the return of the cranes I'm inside my own head like a tiny fumaculous a creature so excited over his naked existence he scurries all day from one eye socket to the other just to see what scenes are unfolding before me.

[23:41]

What streets, what pastures. And to think that just hours ago, I was as sour as Samuel Johnson. I was as sour as Samuel Johnson, with a few bad cherries in him, quarreling in the corner of the rat and parrot, full of scorn, for the incontinence of man and the inconstancy of woman. And to think further that I have no idea what might have uplifted me. Unless it was when I first opened the front door to look at the sky, so extensive and burdened with snow. Or was it this morning when I walked along the reservoir? Was it when the dogs scurried some ducks off the water And I stopped to watch them flapping low over the frozen surface. And I counted them in flight, all seven, the leader and six hurrying behind.

[24:48]

Oh, that our life could float as easily. as the images Bill Collins creates. But our life does all sorts of things in its bits and pieces of mind. It pops up this way and that way. And as it does, you know, one of the ways our gathering awareness can mislead us doesn't seem like any great accomplishment.

[26:05]

Seems more like a large group of unruly children running all over the place. Children, I said, stand in a line. But they rush everywhere. Endlessly exploring what is. this mind this disposition that's not only willing to engage but willing to let the moment speak more with the sense of wonder and not knowing than how exactly it fits in to the formula of practice

[27:11]

Does the sound of the jet pass through the sky or through my mind? Is it the roar of war or is it some deep wrangling that has its own reassurance? what thoughts arise in relationship to the proximate cause, the initiating experience. In Dogen and Gyoji, it says, from this that practice

[28:35]

that waking, and then nirvana. Amazing. Just like that, you're a narrow hunter. When the mind's saddled, all that can happen in about a third of a second. In some ways that blended with some early Buddhist teachings where my own notion of notice, acknowledge, contact and experience came from. As I was thinking about it in the abbot's cabin, I thought it was a little bit like minestrone soup.

[29:38]

Take some ingredients from here, some ingredients from there. Entering the moment. Sometimes the product of diligent effort, sometimes coincidence of proximate cause and immediate experience. Sometimes enabled by receptive attention, just opening to what is.

[30:43]

sometimes sparked by directed attention. And as it arises, as Dogen says, the world comes forth and creates the self. I was saying the world comes forth and turns the usual consciousness, something sparked. This is the gift of being in the middle of Shishu. It has no fixed prescription.

[31:49]

It has no preordained outcome. It can't be corralled with some preset conclusion. In fact, maybe we could all listen carefully to the whimsy Billy Collins' conclusions. Maybe it was this, or maybe it was that. Or maybe it was just those seven ducks taken off across the frozen wire. On land the above. And in that turning, seeing the nature of what is, the extraordinary nature of interbeing.

[33:04]

But sometimes it opens into a spacious quiet. And there's an affirmation beyond conclusion, beyond description. beyond any notion of what should or should not happen. And this is vritta. Sometimes translated as experienced consciousness. Such is the nature of our consciousness, it can experience the experience of awareness, of awakening.

[34:10]

Another descriptor that's given is learned. Seems to me that's a dangerous one. Unless we say learned beyond, knoweth. Learned beyond concluding. So Dogen says presence, practice, Sometimes spacious. Opening into unobstructed stillness. Sometimes active.

[35:23]

Demonstrating the energy that arises in getting a lot. But my knee hurt like crazy. I was energized. Not in the way I wanted to be energized. I'd much rather be, you know, aligned and feeling flow and all that good stuff. But it was energizing. The inner being carries in it the vitality of existence in all its forms. It isn't the exclusive

[36:27]

of serenity. And then nirvana. In that moment of being, no need to do something to it. No need to do something against it. No need to recharge and grasp it and figure out how you're going to fit it into the great domain of the world according to me. I'm going to annihilate it with dislike. It's funny how that seldom works and that we still think of it as one of our first responses.

[37:32]

we grasp it in desire. Or more that in being turned we experience what it is to non-grasp. Sometimes the activity of practice raises up, stimulates the vitality of existence. And it's a disorderly mess.

[39:02]

vital, it's passionate, and sometimes fortunately beyond thought. And just to continue the basic practice is very, very helpful. to make them some kind of rigid mantra that defends us against the disorderliness of being alive. But returning to, yes I will, returning to what's happening now, returning to making contact, returning to being willing to experience, returning to being willing to let the moment speak rather than imposing upon it.

[40:25]

And in this regard, working with the posture and working with the breath can be a great ally. because they can be literally embodied. So while the mind is leaping all over the place, that embodied physical wisdom of body and breath can stay close. And in the middle, of the experiencing the inhale or the exhale in the middle of experiencing the uprightness of posture the sensations of physicality they offer no guarantees but they offer

[41:33]

way to stay close. And in our city, whether we're in the grips of one of Dogen's 1071 erroneous views, or we are right in there with the one or two he approves of, turning to something utterly and completely fundamental to a human life that will open and flower and bloom in

[42:41]

the giving attention in the receptive attention. In a Gyoji, Dogen says continuously, as she translates as ceaseless practice. The Gyo means observe, observance. The Gyo means conduct. And the Gyo means observance. observance of conduct, the conduct of observance.

[43:48]

So, in the middle of Sushi, to give ourselves this This intimate experiencing that reveals, reveals the heart of our practice. beyond the words the ideas the conclusions that we might try to give it it reveals the workings of our karmic life in that resonance between those two realizations liberation whether you want to get grand about it you can call it nirvana or just a moment of ease a moment of ease

[45:44]

not conditioned by acceptable circumstances, but a moment of ease that arises in being accepted just as it is. And they need to grasp, they need to push away, they need to conclude, they need to shape it in some way other than its appearing. They don't seem so necessary. And Gyoji Dogen says, and then back to the start, what's happening now?

[46:43]

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