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. Good evening. So first of all, can everybody hear me? First of all, I wanted to thank all of the students and the teachers here at Tassajara, because it's just an amazing, amazing place that you are providing for us. And I don't know how it is for you, but it's also a place where we have incredible, unexpected

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encounters. Suddenly people show up from that usually are like thousands of miles away. They're here. So universes come together. Somebody told me they meet somebody they haven't seen, I think, since 15 years or something like that. Meet here. We go up to the Suzuki Roshi Memorial, and there is also a person's teacher category. Sogyam Trungpa Rinpoche's Ashes. And most importantly, we have very unexpected encounters with ourselves here and there happening. some of them very pleasant and some of them quite challenging. So for that to be provided by all of you, including the guests, which I want to thank too, because by coming here in the summer and supporting Tassajara and City Center in that way, you are part of how this continues to be here.

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day after day and year after year now. So that's what I wanted to first say thank you for. This is going to be a short talk. I also asked the Tanto to go like this or wave at me or whatever it takes if I get lost and don't keep track of time. And I was thinking about the enormous amount of suffering that is in this world. The earthquakes in Nepal, the bigger size suffering like the earthquake in Nepal, the violence with fundamentalism, how overwhelming that can feel and kind of how powerless we might feel in the face of all of this.

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And then I thought, Tazahara or wherever we are is also the same world. Maybe not as pronounced or as huge, but we have fundamentalism here. We can get very fundamentalistic about forms or about the teaching and how it should be expressed or what's correct Buddhism and what isn't and right way of doing something and what isn't. So, you know, it's human. We all have those capacities and those parts in us. And so what can we do?

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What can each single one of us, how much can we do to change that? And that's where I feel we have so much opportunity because For example, the founder of this school, Dogen Senji, says somewhere that practice is continuous and sustained, it never ends, it's never stained, it's never forced, it's not a moment's gap between aspiration, intention, practice, enlightenment and nirvana. the power of this continuous practice kind of affirms or confirms every being, ourselves, others, and it means that our practice, which in some ways we could say each of our actions, affect the entire earth and the entire sky in the ten directions.

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although not noticed by others or by ourselves, it is so. And this is, of course, because everything, absolutely everything, is completely interconnected. So whatever happens anywhere it is, affects the entire sky and the entire earth in the ten directions. And Hafez, the poet Hafez, says it in a different way. He says, now is the time for you to know that everything you do is sacred, permeates everything. So I thought, You know, I thought of the six paramitas, which are the perfections and which are called, they are the very essence of our true nature, of each one of us, their true nature, of yours and yours and yours,

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comes with being alive. That's our true nature, is what is expressed in the six perfections. And so if we practice those, we uncover, we allow that true nature to come forward, which is ultimately wisdom and compassion that is not unlimited. unbounded, unconditioned and unconditional. So it says, if we practice those, they help us cross over from suffering to freedom, to being awake, to enlightenment, to the shore of happiness. They support everybody to cross over.

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They help everybody. Because we're so interconnected, we can say, when one being wakes up, the whole universe wakes up. So we have a field of practice here. in this relatively small world that is just an amazing opportunity. So the six perfections or six paramitas are the first one and I think I want to come back at the very end to that one because it's like the ground on which all the others are built and arise and kind of come back to. And that's generosity or giving. And it's boundless giving. That means it's giving that is unattached to expectations or repayment.

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And I also thought it could be just giving each other the benefit of the doubt, including ourselves, because... The way we perceive something is so shaped by our conditioning that we can, A, say for sure, we never get it right. We just don't. Which is actually really wonderfully liberating, if you really think that. So you can hold it lightly. You can have some humor and hold lightly what you perceive. wonderful person over there and that awful person on the other side. Just give yourself the benefit of the doubt. Just don't understand that probably that same person, I mean, who here has not had a fixed idea about somebody, particularly when they're kind of a distance away, you just see them over there doing whatever.

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they're doing, and then when you have to work with them suddenly, it's like you see a totally different person. And you're surprised. So, can we just know that and keep remembering that, because our mind, usually when we have something, something great or something terrible, It likes to obsess about it. It likes to look for evidence to reinforce that perception. Oh, here she goes and does it again. The awful, awful thing. And here again, and here again. So then we have so much evidence it becomes more and more true, it seems. But it's just absolutely a fabrication. So, giving the benefit of the doubt, for example, is an act of generosity.

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Just keep looking, keep paying attention, keep being open, keep understanding that we only see a little piece, if at all, of the reality of the situation. Then the second parameter is the parameter of ethics. So that means being upright, having personal integrity. It's actually ultimately harmlessness of body, speech and mind, of action, thought and talking. And we have the precepts which actually help us how to practice those.

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So, for example, another tendency we might have according to our perception because somewhere inside we actually know how unfounded they are how kind of fragile and not really real so we try to get company so we go and lobby we like to hang out with people that see it the same way you know I worked for a long time for a while I worked at the kiosk at the train station in Basel because I wanted to just do that and I worked And so the people from France, Germany and Switzerland would come to that kiosk in the morning. And we had papers from all over Europe and international. And after a while you would know the people who would come regularly. You would know which paper they bought, which cigarettes and which chewing gum.

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And you would have their package already ready and you would know how much it costs. So it was a very quick transaction. And every evening we would wrap up the old unsold papers and in the morning we would have tons of newspapers and magazines. And I suddenly realized it's quite amazing how there's a whole industry and millions of people working to support your particular business point of view and help it be really fixed and unchanging and who goes and buys the paper of the opposition? Almost nobody. And that was such a wonderful discovery for me, how industrialized and how much business that tendency of our mind to look

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for confirmation for something that cannot, is not the truth. It's just a particular way of looking at something and then making it suddenly something really real, substantial. So, we say in the precepts, don't talk about faults of others. So if you were just to not lobby for your view, do you agree that this person is really a very bad priest or a very fabulous cook or just whatever? We think then these are our friends. But at the same time, if we talk about other people or other people's faults, it also creates a lot of anxiety because if they talked with me about whoever else like that, what are they going to say about me when they're with other people?

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And what I'm going to say about them to other people and we don't say to each other. So my teacher, Reb Anderson, for a while... If somebody came and complained to him about somebody, he would say, did you talk to the person? No, I can't. I'm too afraid. Or no, they will get so upset. Or I don't want to hurt them. Or he would say, I don't want to hear it. Go talk to them. Because what does it help you to tell me about them? And what does it help you to tell me about them? So he would just say, talk to them. find a way to say it. And often we would then find out actually there was nothing to say because it wasn't really so big a deal or already it had changed or it was really something we had to say and we had to find a way which changed something how we were with ourselves and how we were with the other persons.

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The third paramita is the paramita of patience, tolerance, forbearance, acceptance. And that is radical tolerance. So in one of the writings I've looked at, it says, it's the forbearance that forbears insults adversity, distress, wrong others have done to you, and we just bear it. Without resentment or reactivity or retaliation. So that's like being an iron in the fire. You know, if someone does, you feel wronged or you feel criticized wrongly or not treated right, and you practice forbearance.

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You really check that when you start having, you know, I'm going to get back to you thoughts or fantasies of how you're going to get back to them. If you let go of that, if you... you don't engage that. It's cultivating our ability to be loving and compassionate in the face of difficulty and challenge. And that's what we would automatically and completely be doing all the time when we are awake. The fourth one is perseverance or joyous effort.

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So it's the courage to practice for the benefit of all beings, regardless in what circumstances you're in. You keep being generous, you keep being... And generosity means towards yourself and to the other person. just to give space, to allow for change, to allow for possibilities. Even you can't see them, you know they are there. They may not appear for a while. It's cultivating, and that cultivates a sense of self-confidence and self-reliance if we can do that. If we keep... coming back to practice, if we keep remembering. I find today we went up to the Hiroshi Memorial, the Sangha Week group, and chanted the loving-kindness meditation.

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And it's such a beautiful piece because everything is in it. about practice. Don't be submerged by the things of the world. So, for example, don't be bogged down by the horrible news we're getting or by powerlessness. Just keep practicing in your small circle. It affects the entire sky and the entire earth. To keep remembering that everything, as Suzuki Roshi once said in one of his talks that are in Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, Whatever manifests, manifests in a tentative form. Even though it seems so solid and so fixed, it's a tentative form. It's in continuous flux. It's dependently co-arising. So if I have a conflict with somebody, can I remember that this conflict is dependently co-arising and I'm not...

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It's impossible that I'm only the victim of this situation. I'm a participant in the situation, even though I might not see that right away because the other one was just out of the blue, the way they were, and I had nothing to do with me, but actually that's not true. A, I was there, so it wasn't happening to another person. And so can I look how am I a participant? And maybe I'm a participant because I didn't speak up two months ago and I didn't speak up five weeks ago and I didn't speak up three weeks ago and I haven't spoken up and created a situation that allowed for something to become bigger because I was too afraid or didn't want to be bothered. Everything is dependently co-arising.

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Nothing happens by itself. Then the fifth one is concentration. The capacity to be mindful and present. Another way of saying concentration. increasing capacity to be mindful and present moment by moment. And that creates a stability so we become less reactive to what happens. We have more space around things that come up around us or inside of us. So that we have a great opportunity here because we go and sit in the Zendo just with ourselves.

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We can be mindful and can slow down and see where our mind wanders and bring it back so that in the end we can say where the mind is and not the mind is just pushing us all over the place. And that then leads to the awakened heart and mind of Prajnaparamita. In the winter practice period, we have this beautiful chant to homage to Prajnaparamita, which we don't do during the summer, which is actually the chant to our own awake nature. means that wisdom and compassion knows in the marrow of the bone about the interconnection of all things and that every action, every thought, every word affects the entire sky and the entire earth in the ten directions.

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and knows that, how we say in the meal chant, that giver, receiver, and gift are one. They're not separate. The giver is the receiver, and the gift is the receiver at the gift. It's one thing, giver, receiver, and gift. So I wanted... read you a poem by Hafez, which is somewhat based on that understanding that whatever appears, whatever it is that appears, needs to be met with complete Radical respect to be able to see it completely.

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And the poem is called There. There I bow my head at the feet of every creature. This constant submission and homage of kissing God all over, someday every lover will do. Only there I prostrate myself against the beauty of each form. For when I bring my heart close to any object, I always hear the friend say, of this I am here. And Uchiyama Roshi says, on his last day of life, expressed what he wanted his life to convey.

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Just bow. Putting my right and left hand together as one, I just bow. Just bow to become one with Buddha and God. Just bow to become one with everything I encounter. Just bow to become one with all myriad things. Just bow life becomes life. So if you have any questions or comments

[28:54]

Yes, Fancy. Thank you for your talk, Christina. One thing that often comes to mind with lists, I guess, like Armitas or any of, a number of lists in Buddhism that represent things to be cultivated is sometimes it occurs to me that They can be practiced as sort of the mind trying to do what is a natural function of an open heart. And that just doesn't really work, you know. You kind of end up being this robot if you practice in that way. So, I don't know. What do you think about that? That's an interesting... but there's also the same fake it till you make it which actually is pretty powerful if you do that with the intention to make it if you think it's a substitute it won't work then you become a robot but if you

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If you know something, if you know that kindness is the ticket and you are being kind, you are refraining from being unkind. It's not putting on extra kindness, but you're refraining from being unkind because you know that you want to be kind. It starts making you more kind. It starts bringing that heart into It's inviting that heart that's there anyway. It just hasn't been engaged. It engages it. Okay? Thank you. And that's why I love uchiyamas. We can always bow, particularly when we have difficulties. If we bow, really physically when we're by ourselves, for example, and something difficult comes up and we just engage our body and bow to the difficulty that we don't know how to change or what to do with it or find it maybe frightening or upsetting or, you know, we just bow.

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Something starts changing because that's bringing... us into a physical form and it engages our body and it changes something energetically. It's a gesture of respect even though we don't know how this thing that we bow to is in the best way respected. So there was once somebody who said when people had conflict was Just the instructions. Each time you cross on the path, just bow to each other. Don't talk. Don't try to figure it out. Because it makes you fuel the fire often when you talk too early, when there's a conflict. But just bow. Just affirm your intention to find a way. And the way will show up. The way will find you. So that's why I love Uchiama's kind of that he wants to say that is the full expression of my life, those five sentences.

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Okay, thank you very much. 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.

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