We will now begin today's Dharma Talk offered by Green Gulch Head of Practice, Jiryu Rutschman Beiler. Please chant the opening verse along with me. The verse should show on your screen now. An unsurpassed, penetrating and perfect Dharma. is rarely met with even in a hundred thousand million kalpas having it to see and listen to to remember and accept i vow to taste the truth of the tatagata's words Thank you for being here.

[05:38]

It's a misty and cold here at Green Gulch, summertime. Jenny said, my name is Jiryu. I'm the Tonto, head of practice here at Green Gulch. Jiryu, your volume is a little low on your mic. Okay, how about now? No? Yeah, that's better. Is that better? Yeah, that's good. Okay. So here at Gringolch today, a number of us, about half of the sangha is

[07:00]

having the opportunity to practice a half-day sitting, sitting upright, any of them spaced in the Vendal. I want to thank you for being here, for sitting today, and ask you to please continue your sincere and upright sitting as you practice with the talk today. Just more Zazen that we practice together. So in addition to my role here at Green Gulch as the head of practice, I also support in whatever way I can and have for many years supported the Buddha Dharma Sangha at San Quentin. And as an extension of our program inside for the last few years, we've been holding twice a year events here at Green Gulch for any Sangha members on the outside who can come. And this year, since we can't meet in person, we're weaving our event this time around to talk this morning.

[08:07]

It's really sweet to see any of you here. Thank you, Buddhadharma Sangha, for being here. And a bow to our founding teacher, Seto DiBarros. Now our circle is the fruit of his persistent and compassionate presence. So I want to talk today about something near at hand. I want to talk today about being overwhelmed. You say it's good to talk about something you know. I know being overwhelmed, my special friend. And I had this thought actually many months ago. around March. And if you remember way back in March, I thought, wow, this is kind of overwhelming. I should talk about being overwhelmed.

[09:10]

And then the rest of the summer just kept relentlessly unfolding. And so we have this overwhelming global pandemic. tragic consequences, lives and livelihoods, the economic collapse, and this mass isolation from each other's bodies, this painful distance. I mentioned that the Buddhadharma Sangha is represented here, and from the outside we've been watching as closely as we can, we learn how terrible this disease has been for our Dharma brothers inside San Quentin. It's so disturbing and overwhelming. So everyone's sentence, however long or short it was to be, is suddenly maybe a death sentence, not the idea.

[10:15]

It's awful, breathtaking illness and so little support, so little chance to really be held and healed in that. No air, no circulation, no windows. So apparently 26 men inside already have died. And they report maybe 2,200 are sick or have been sick, which is well over half of the population. And it may well be more. We heard from inside some folks It's declining to be tested, feeling that if they are positive, they maybe will just get isolated further. So this is an overwhelming tragedy. And my heart is with those suffering just down the road here.

[11:18]

So then as the magnitude of spring unfolded into summer and the magnitude of the pandemic was making itself clear to us, then we witnessed together the murder of George Floyd, the great mass uprisings for racial justice, this great and overdue awakening that his merger sparked in many of us. It's overwhelming and continues to be. Now, just this week, Jacob Blake with seven bullets in the back while his kiddos looked on. Kids about my kid's age are watching as he's shot seven times in the back. Paralyzed and shackled to the bed in the hospital. So overwhelming. overwhelming suffering, overwhelming racism, overwhelming evidence of overwhelming systemic racism, and also overwhelming how many of us want to turn away, retreat back under the covers of denial and just get back to normal.

[12:38]

And that's in a way what's at stake in this question of being overwhelmed, of working with, of meeting our overwhelm. is that part of what we do when we're overwhelmed is we shut down and try to shut it off. And I see that happening in myself and all around. Let's just go back under the cover. So then it's already seemed all boiling over and the fires, you know, and so the trees too just couldn't take it, you know, erupted into flames. and forests around us here nearby at Green Gulch, in Point Reyes as we know, down at Tassajara. To, you know, becoming used to checking the air quality, getting used to this fine layer of ash over things. So Tassajara getting evacuated again.

[13:42]

We at Green Gulch packing our go bags again. overwhelming. So I wonder if you're feeling relaxed yet at this Zen talk? I sometimes help with the hosting of these talks and on occasion have gotten a chat, someone reaching out to me. Please, help me relax. Help us relax. We come for uplift, of course. We come for a way forward. So are we relaxed yet? No. I think often of a well-respected scholar of Buddhism, it may have been Griffith Holk, I don't remember right now his name, but he said that while we in the modern West often frame Buddhism as stress reduction,

[14:48]

Why are you talking about all this stuff? You're stressing me out. I was already stressed out. Buddhism is about stress reduction. We're supposed to be releasing our stress. So this scholar said, you know, we call in the West often we call Buddhism stress reduction, but it would be more true to the tradition to call it stress induction. So if this practice is about bringing to the surface, calling forth what's difficult and painful, the facts of life, of no self, of suffering, of impermanence, and facing them, so we find the stress, we call up the stress, we open to the stress, we can move towards it, and then we can transform it at its root. So this is an important point. Relaxation is not exactly the goal. Transformation is the goal, and relaxation can be part of that. but so is turning towards the stress and the pain, opening to the depths of the overwhelm, truly receiving and transforming that.

[15:56]

So relaxation can help create the conditions for us to notice how profoundly overwhelmed we are, but it's not the goal. So as they say, you're welcome for reminding you all of what incredible time we live in. This all somehow is called 2020. That's sort of our shorthand for these overwhelming situations. So in all of this overwhelming difficulty, all this suffering and constriction around, I feel it's hard to stay awake and alert and responsive. I notice in this overwhelmed state, I start being careless with myself and in my relationships, being short and reactive. It's okay.

[17:00]

It's okay to be short and reactive and overwhelmed. But it makes it hard to keep meeting our life is to keep meeting each other with our full heart, our deepest vow, with our clarity of practice. You know, there's all of these huge issues around. And then for me, in the day-to-day, I'm in the situation called online elementary school. So I have a first grader and a fifth grader. So I'm a first grader, six years old, and is expected to be on Zoom for about four and a half hours every morning. I'm trying to figure out what worksheet, you know, the teacher would say, okay, now get the worksheet that's the... And just crying in frustration every day, every day, so frustrating. The pressure to achieve something and also just confusion about what to do.

[18:05]

So I'm finding I need to be there with him, try to be there with him. And we have overwhelmed... teachers and overwhelmed students and overwhelmed parents. I also manage recess, which is different times for the different kids. And of course, the staff, the lunchroom. So my, you know, in appreciating the stress of that, the overwhelm that that can be on top of everything, really, I feel... deep respect and sadness for those who really can't be a present for this online learning the way that i'm privileged to be as hard as it as hard as it is i can't imagine just needing to leave and leave them alone as though the online the zoom could educate so you know drip drip drip this cup that's already overflowing just keeps getting more in it

[19:07]

So turn off the spigot already, right? We all just want to turn off, turn down the spigot. And it seems the handle has broken off. Somehow the water just keeps pouring out. Those of us at Green Gulch who are familiar with the plumbing here may know this situation well. The water is just gushing out, shouting, where's the shutoff valve? Nobody can remember people fanning out to open lids and look for the shutoff valve. We need to find the shut off valve. We should turn off the spigot, this drip, drip of suffering and the causes of suffering. As Bodhisattvas, we vow to find these valves. We vow to turn off the spigot of suffering and the causes of suffering. Even if we're not sure where they are. Even if the map is... buried in the maintenance office somewhere or maybe it's right in front of them so i picture my my personal overwhelm as this cup overflowing just more and more um Thich Nhat Hanh reminds us of another image not of adding water to water but putting salt in water so he writes the Buddha offered this wonderful image

[20:39]

If you take a handful of salt and pour it into a small bowl of water, the water in the bowl will be too salty to drink. So spoon by salty spoon this year. The little water bowl called Jiryu is getting saltier and saltier. It scoops, more and more scoops coming into this little water bowl. And occasionally some big dumps and more little scoops. And it's too salty to drink. It's too salty to nourish others. Too salty for plants and too salty for animals. Too salty to be of much use to those around them. And maybe you know that feeling. Maybe you know what I mean. So Thich Nhat Hanh continues. If you take a handful of salt and pour it into a small bowl of water, the water in the bowl will be too salty to drink.

[21:42]

But if you pour the same amount of salt into a large river, people will still be able to drink the river's water. Remember, this teaching was offered 2,600 years ago when it was still possible to drink from rivers. So if you pour the same amount of salt into a large river, people will still be able to drink the river's water. Because of its immensity, the river has the capacity to receive and transform. So as bodhisattvas, we try tirelessly to reduce the salt in the bowls of suffering beings. This is our great vow and the great work that we bow before and try humbly to enact. But also as bodhisattvas, we know that our capacity to meet and respond to and reduce the suffering depends on our own nourishing, our own receptive and transformative capacity.

[22:52]

So at the same time, we work to reduce the salt flowing into these bowls. We're studying and practicing how to widen in ourselves. to widen this receptacle, how to deepen this river that's receiving scoop after scoop of salt. So this practice of enlarging that bowl, of deepening that river, we call Kshanti Paramita. This profound and profoundly beneficial Bodhisattva practice for all beings of tolerance, or capacity, inclusiveness, welcoming. So this Kshantiparamita is medicine for overwhelmed bodhisattvas. And I've been searching around for it and trying to take it. I wanted to talk about that practice today.

[23:55]

Before I do, though, I want to say something that's important to me that I find myself saying again and again, which is that this practice of the Buddha Dharma, this practice of Zen, is for our own heart. It's for each of our own heart. Sometimes we share it with someone when they ask. Sometimes maybe ask three times, like, are you sure? You all today, you know, have arrived to hear the Dharma. So you've arrived to hear the Dharma for yourself, to see what light that shines on your own heart. And as we begin the talk, we tell each other this. We do this chant that says, I vow to taste the truth of the Tathagata's words. I'm here for the teaching that it may enter my own heart. We do not listen to the Dharma. We do not come here to learn some ideals.

[25:03]

or some ideology that we'll then get to use to judge others or advise others, much less demean others or ourselves. So we don't gather ammunition from the Dharma to use against ourselves and each other. So I feel and worry. another scoop of salt here, about this wrong view, this, you could say, heretical way of using the Dharma, which would be to see the Buddha's analogy of the salty water bowl and say, look over there at that being who's reacting, who's hateful, who's crushed by overwhelm. They are like salty water. Surely it's because they're failing to practice Kishantiparamita. Or likewise, to look within at our own deep pain and suffering, our own reactivity and hatred and brokenness and say, you're not practicing tolerance.

[26:16]

You shouldn't be feeling this way if you were practicing tolerance. If you were a wide river, it wouldn't be so salty if you were a better Buddhist. Well, this is a profoundly wrong understanding. an offensive use of the beautiful teaching. If we taste some salty water, we can't assume that the bowl is small. We have no idea how much salt went into the bowl. We can't know and can't speak of how much salt is in someone else's bowl. We can't taste the saltiness and then make some estimate of the depth of the river. We don't know how much salt was in. What are the conditions? this may be a person with great capacity for suffering great capacity to meet and welcome their life and yet sometimes there's just too much thought and also we can't in ourself with our own suffering know the extent of that condition of how much salt we're working with so sometimes there's just so much thought that it overwhelms

[27:35]

any river the ocean is inconceivably deep and wide and in this overwhelming time for our climate even the ocean is getting saltier or the sky the sky is vast without limit and as we know when enough forest burns the air is thick and choked so we don't fault the ocean well it was not deep enough The ocean wasn't deep enough to deal with climate change. Where we don't fault the sky. Must not be vast enough. Let it be smoky this morning. I see the AQI, right? We're all now assessing, many of us, the air quality index. Every morning, can I go outside? The air quality index is 180 today. The sky really should be practicing more spaciousness. Of course, the sky is inconceivably vast.

[28:36]

There's just a ton of smoke. There's just a lot of smoke. So please don't use this understanding to judge the depth or shallowness of a person. So we may see a person who's enraged or numb or addicted or cruel, really suffering from any affliction. We can't say... Geez, they should practice meditation. Their capacity must not be very great. We don't know. So my wish, you know, is that we hear this call to capacity, to Kshanti Paramita, as a positive growth for us, not as a negative judgment. So we can practice growing our capacity, deepening this river, while also absolutely respecting and appreciating the deep and well earned suffering of ourselves and everyone we meet.

[29:38]

The translator for His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Geshe Thabdindjimpa summarizes the teaching of the Dalai Lama on Kshanti which he translates as patient as a resolute response against adversity stemming from a settled temperament unperturbed by either external or internal disturbance. So this Shantiparamita, this medicine for overwhelm, this welcoming or inclusiveness, is a resolute response against adversity stemming from a settled temperament unperturbed by either external or internal disturbance. And goes on to say, certainly this cannot be described as passive submission, rather it is an active approach toward adversity. So kshanti is the capacity to respond.

[31:08]

It's what allows the water to be nourishing. It's what allows us to respond when we manage to respond rather than react. So it's a resolute response to be wide enough to not have to turn away. And not turning away to be able to, as Thich Nhat Hanh says, receive and transform So the great river is not turning away from the salt. It's being wet. We know when we practice this paramita, when we welcome, include, widen our capacity to be with what is, that it's the very opposite of turning away. We turn away because we don't have the capacity. We don't develop the capacity so we won't have to So this is the receptivity that allows us to meet what's happening and to respond with our bodhisattva vow.

[32:20]

So to this point, I wanted to share a letter that I received just a few days ago from a member of our Buddhadharma Sangha. This Sangha member is no longer at San Quentin. He was transferred a year or two ago to another prison, and we were really sad to lose him from our Sangha. So he writes about this very practice and what it has been for him, and I wanted to share that. I'll read much of the letter, but not all of it. So he says, since I arrived here at the new facility, so much has happened and my practice has really helped me through it.

[33:32]

So first he tells of some violence that's occurred in the prison, some murders inside, some stabbing. He says, after the stabbing stopped, then there was the killing of George Floyd and other African-Americans and all the protests. Then came the COVID-19 and all the deaths from it. A couple of my friends died from it in San Quentin. Now at this present time here, we have all these fires and it's so bad that you can see a haze of smoke in our building. So the readings you sent could not have come at a better time when there's so much suffering going on. But most importantly, I found myself just suppressing all these tragic events one after another. So I've decided to take the time out to sit mindfully with each of these tragic events and send loving kindness and compassion to all those affected by each of these tragic events.

[34:46]

While doing this, I felt the hurt and tears build up in my eyes because I had been suppressing my feelings, which was causing me suffering. What I truly needed to do was show loving kindness and compassion to myself. Lama Rod Owen said, it's okay to be angry. It's okay to have this experience of being pissed off right now. And I'm not going to hide out from it. I'm not going to push it away. I'm going to hold it and take care of it. I wasn't okay with the hurt I was feeling or the suffering, so I was suppressing it, pushing it away, as Lama Rod Owen said. But now by sitting with these feelings, like I have a bowl in my hands with each tragic event inside of it, I will hold it and take care of it by using the breath.

[35:50]

Breathing in, I see all these tragic events and all who have been affected by them. Breathing out, I send loving kindness and compassion to all who have been affected by these events. In doing this, I'm practicing the first paramita, dana paramita, offering joy, happiness and love. As Thay says, when we give, the other might become happy, but it is certain that we become happy. Thank you for hearing those words from our dharma brother, his sincere heart of practice. Who, in his overwhelm, turns towards the teaching and noticed that he was suppressing his suffering, his experience, his grief. He had been turning away and through his practice he remembered

[36:56]

that he doesn't have to turn away. And right there, not turning away, finding that capacity to be with this incredible pain, right there, he reawakened his heart and opened his response of authentic compassion. I know this is so. I can see him now walking and sitting and working in the prison expressing and sharing the steepened compassion this being with this difficulty turning towards finding that capacity to sit with this suffering reminds him it doesn't break break him you know that's our fear that's overwhelm i can't let this in if i let this in it will break me and yet when we take the time hold mindfully with make a bowl for each of these tragic events and sit with it and grieve and feel far from breaking.

[38:06]

We remember our compassionate vow and then can express it. So by being with the difficulty, he was able to recover his true response, his loving and compassionate heart. And as we all know, that's not a one-time show. That's like again and again, unfortunately. Of course, he has done this before, which is why he remembered how to do it. And yet, you know, we forget. So our Dharma brother practiced with his overwhelm with a different bowl metaphor. made it made a beautiful hand carved lovingly carved bowl for each of these overwhelming events so he could look at it and be with it and care for it and then he consciously sat with each one practicing a form of tongwen using the breath to allow the suffering truly in not resisting the pain of it

[39:24]

welcoming that, and then using the breath to extend his deep compassion and loving kindness out. So I'm inspired by his practice. So I want to just mention some other aspects of practicing Shanti Paramita. Other ways we might train in this, if you feel like I do, that you could use a little more capacity, that this river is getting rather salty and could stand to be a little deeper. We might turn towards how we can train in deepening this capacity. I think the first step or the basis is a noticing, knowing that this is a capacity that can be trained. So this is true of all the paramitas. We don't just have a certain size bowl. just kind of a small bowl or i'm just kind of a mid-sized creek we um it's not like that this it's it's trainable these bowls can be enlarged and these rivers can be deepened so even just that insight is so powerful to reflect on in our own life like am i stuck with the capacity that i think i have or can i actually

[40:53]

deep in my capacity to be with suffering. So the insight of this Paramita is yes, and all the Buddhas and ancestors, all the Bodhisattvas have trained in this capacity. They weren't just like, wow, the Buddha was so, such a wide river, all of this suffering, and he remained a nourishing pool for beings. He trained in that. We can train in that. This is what we're doing here is training. So first remembering that we can grow this. This is something to grow. So a basic way that we deepen it is by allowing each, as our friend inside did, allowing each overwhelming thing to help our capacity deepen. So in the Buddha Dharma, we use our suffering. We recruit our suffering in support of our practice. Sometimes, and maybe you're not ready for this. I'm seldom ready for this.

[41:56]

But our practice of cultivation needs affliction. There could be such a person who becomes grateful for that overwhelm, grateful for the opportunity that it's offering to deepen. I wouldn't have been able to deepen if I hadn't received so much that I had to deepen with. So we can use this overwhelm to help our capacity grow, to remind us that we are training this. this as i often say is to allow the suffering allow the affliction allow the problem to become a bell to just resound as a bell calling us back to practice and then we hear the bell that's our suffering and we're able to be grateful for the opportunity to practice so it helps if we're if we're training and working with We're training in widening our capacity to see the overwhelm, just to see the overwhelm.

[43:04]

Our friends in Vipassana offer this wonderful practice of labeling. It's helpful. You know, when I'm shut down and reactive and overwhelmed, if you would ask me, I would say, I'm not overwhelmed. Just everybody is, you know, it's just all too much. That's not me. That's just it. You know, it's all too much. Yeah, that's not a real workable situation. There's not a lot that can be done with that mind, in that mind, until it takes that backward step, until it pivots and sees, oh, this is overwhelmed. So that's the label. From like, this is just true. It just is too much. From that, just that little thought, that little label, just stick a little note on it. Oh, this is overwhelmed. And then some transformation can begin. This is mindfulness in the strict sense of knowing how our mind is, knowing if our mind is in a wholesome or unwholesome spin.

[44:21]

So to say, oh, I'm overwhelmed. Suddenly I have something now I can work with. It's just too much. I don't have much to work with, you know, except for run around, as I was saying, looking for the valve to shut it all off, yelling at someone else to get on the damn valve. As soon as I say, oh, this is overwhelmed, now I can work it. Now I have something to work with. So every time we can do that, name it, our capacity grows a little bit. So this cultivation of Kshantiparamita, spaciousness, capacity in our practice is basically embodied. It's a practice of our bodies becoming able to bear a training in widening our hearts and our deep mind and our bodies. of widening this capacity.

[45:26]

So we can talk about how to do this practice. We can talk about this practice. Shantideva, in his great text for bodhisattvas, gives us lots of words to work with, sends us the text, sort of what he has to work with. And he offers up some ways we can talk ourselves out of hatred, for example. But in our practice, in Zen maybe especially, basically it's embodied. Basically, it's training in having in a spacious body that can receive. This is our zazen practice. Practicing receiving more and more of what's around us. We don't just practice focusing more and more narrowly. We practice receiving more and more widely all of what is. And as we do that, our capacity to be with everything grows. We might not know it. We might not even be able to grasp it. but the body is transforming through this practice. This is our faith and our experience of Zazen.

[46:28]

The heart and body is somehow bigger through this practice. So a few weeks ago, many of us had the chance to participate in a weekend retreat here at Zen Center with Abbas Fushrader and Reverend Angel Kyoto Williams. And Reverend Angel offered a grounding practice that I found very impactful. Embodied practice of recovering our ground, of finding our center and our capacity in our ground. So she had us stand and center ourselves and then gave some guidance of the kind that we use in our practice. feeling the support around us of our ancestors, of the bodhisattvas, the presence of supportive beings and feeling in our body that deep center, this grounded connection to ourselves.

[47:38]

So we can practice that in Zazen. And having supported with her words and presence, the arising of a very grounded state in us, she invited us to call into that space some irritation, some small annoyance in our life. Why would I do that? Don't harsh my mellow, as we say. Why would I do that? And yet, here I am, standing grounded, supported, calling forth. And it's remarkable how easy it is Even in this time of great tragedy, the little irritations are still totally available. It was very easy to find something to bring into that. Because still, even in all of this, the everyday is a series of small irritations. Each made more overwhelming by the overwhelming backdrop. But these small annoyances, these impingements, something that I don't want to let in because it shouldn't be doing that.

[48:49]

these little salty teaspoons you know so she she had us bring that in and it was amazing how you know to allow that little irritation to float in to this space of great groundedness unsettledness it was really informative as a way that i might meet bigger pain that i might meet deeper suffering deeper tragedy crisis so that starting small you could say if you want to cultivate shantiparamita maybe don't start with like everything but just one of those little teaspoons can we be with that in a different way what would that be to not be holding it out to not be keeping it out to let it in and feel our capacity to meet it totally.

[49:52]

You know, the water can stay nourishing. So along these lines, and I'll close soon. I wanted to close with a teaching I've been remembering from Suzuki Roshi that's along these same lines. beautiful teaching about a squawking blue jay very small problem in this time of such awesome problems but the beautiful teaching about the squawking blue jay and how we might let it right into our heart i want to close with these a few minutes of a couple of minutes of suzuki roshi's life and teaching which has maybe so imprinted itself on me because it's one of the few teachings that we have some video of.

[50:57]

So I'm feeling his call, how he's inviting us to work with this walking bird. Not as the whole of our practice, but as information, as a way that points to how we might work with all of this suffering. Each of the pieces, each of these bowls of difficulty. I'm going to try to do this for us all. We could invite Suzuki Roshi for a moment. You can let me know if it shows on your screen. Okay. If you think when you are reading something, if you think bad is there, you know, blue jade is over my roof, blue jade is singing, but their voice is not so good.

[52:14]

When you think in that way, that is noise. When you are not disturbed, by the blue jade. The blue jade will come right into your heart and you will be a blue jade. And blue jade will be reading something. Then the blue jade doesn't disturb your reading because you think blue jade is there. Vujay should not be over my truth. When you think in that way, that is more primitive understanding of being. Why we understand things in that way is because of want of practice.

[53:16]

When you practice more, can accept things as your own, whatever it is, you know. endeavoring to practice in this way. To let in that which I feel is disturbing me, that which is impinging on me. And I glimpse through this practice this possibility that Suzuki Roshi is so authentically reporting.

[54:21]

which is that when I stop trying to keep it out, it becomes my own life. There's room for it because it already is me. It already is and has been my life. I accept it as my own. You accept it as your own. This is my life. Of course there's room for it. you will be the blue jay and the blue jay will be reading something the blue jay is not some obstacle to me the blue jay is my life and i am its life but only when i open to the disturbance and again practicing with this small blue jay you know suzuki roshi knew profound suffering he knew the great work of this bodhisattva is not just about opening to blue jays.

[55:25]

And yet he offers this as this way, and you might glimpse it too, this way of moving with all of this overwhelm, each of these teaspoons of salt. So I want to thank everybody for coming. If you'd like to watch that, clip again, it's on the Zen Center website. Are you ready to close, Chiriu? I think so. I'd like to, before we dedicate the merit with our chant, I'd just like to offer the merit of our gathering today, of our coming together I want to offer that to the men inside San Quentin first and their loved ones and all those who work inside San Quentin with them.

[56:31]

This impossible and deadly situation. So we dedicate our practice to them and to all those suffering from racial violence and oppression, which is all of us. all of us suffering in the fact of this racial oppression. And to those impacted by these fires everywhere and those exhausting themselves to help beings. And so we offer this practice to all suffering beings. And I'm deeply grateful for your kind attention. We will now chant the closing chant, which will appear on your screen. May our intention equally extend to every being and place with the true merit of Buddha's way.

[57:50]

Beings are numberless. I vow to save them. Delusions are inexhaustible. I vow to end them. Dharma gates are boundless. I vow to enter them. Buddha's way is unsurpassable. I vow to become it. Before we open the floor to questions, I'd like to thank everyone for coming. If you feel supported by the Dharma offerings of our temples, please consider supporting San Francisco Zen Center with a donation at this time. Any size is gratefully appreciated. A link will show in the chat window now. Thank you very much. Also in the chat now, I'll post a link to that Suzuki Roshi video.

[59:05]

It's part of a longer, maybe five-minute clip if you'd like to watch it sometime. For this portion of the questions and answers, if you would like to offer any comments or questions, please click on your Participants button in your Zoom control bar at the bottom of your Zoom window. If you don't see the control bar, point your cursor over to the Zoom window and it will appear. After reopening your Participants window, click the blue Raise Hand button at the bottom of that window. You may also send your comments or questions through the chat. If you're on a mobile device, press the more button from the bottom control bar and click the raise hand button. If I also might add for the Buddha Dharma Sangha, we'll be here for another 10 or 15 minutes during some discussion and then we'll go back to our other room to continue the Buddha Dharma Sangha morning. Jerry, it looks like we have a question or a hand up from Ken.

[60:20]

Thank you. Ken? As a miracle of technology is my voice coming through. Well, first off, I would just like to say from deeply within my heart, thank you so much for today's topic. I mean, sometimes you just kind of wake up saying, boy, I hope today's Dharma talk is about what it's going to be about, and it was pretty much... like bullseye. And I just want to offer two observations. One of them was it was triggered by something you said about inviting in these pains, this irritation, and a trip that I took to escape the smoke to Sonoma yesterday. And I was talking to somebody about winemaking, and the expression came up, which I've always loved, that from the most distressed vines come the sweetest grapes. And it just, you know, when I was sitting there drinking this incredibly delicious wine, I found myself looking at the grapes that were about to be harvested within the next couple of weeks and smelling the smoke in the air and thinking, yeah, these grapes, like me, are going through this same thing, and it's going to affect them.

[61:26]

But how will it affect them? You know, is the wind and the fire and everything else going to make them perish, or is it going to make them stronger and yield sweeter fruit? And that was... It was a very healing observation. And the second piece is somewhat unrelated, came through Facebook, which doesn't always deliver great things, but on occasion has its moments. And this particular one was a memory of an event three years ago. And I looked at it, and I thought, oh, it was this big event that I was doing, and I was surrounded by people, and we were so close to each other. When I looked at it, I thought, oh, my God, that couldn't possibly be three years ago. I thought that was last year. And I felt this flood of joy at the notion that in three years, we're going to look back at this probably not with the same, oh, boy, wasn't that wonderful feeling, but with the awareness that where did the three years go or the two years?

[62:29]

And the four-word phrase, this too shall pass, popped into my head. Like, yeah, it's going to. It's going to. The problem with it now, I think, is when someone asked Einstein to explain relativity, he said, well, very simply, imagine you're a child, and one month of the school year, how long does that feel? And now you are that same child, one month of summer vacation, how does that feel? That's relativity. Now, he was being very tongue-in-cheek about it, but we know what perception does to time and the effect that it has on us. And every day now feels like a millennium. You know, and that's just a construct. That's just what we're doing, you know, as opposed to just, you know, and I'm brand new to this practice. Quite honestly, I started on April Fool's Day by attending one of Peter Coyote's Dharma talks. And he's been a friend of mine for many years. And I thought, well, let me try this. And this is in many ways saved me. But it's led me to these types of options. So thank you. Thank you.

[63:30]

I appreciate the... Yeah, that we can, there is, you know, and this is what our friend inside was feeling when he noticed the great fruit of being with this difficulty. And it may be that one of the ways we help to We need to, I think, to be careful with the this too shall pass in our practice. We often, there's a story of Suzuki Roshi in Sashin. Maybe many of you have heard the story saying people were sitting for seven days in great discomfort and expecting from the teacher, as we often do, a teaching about impermanence.

[64:32]

as support for dealing with this difficulty. And he is said to have said, this pain you have now will last a very, very, very long time. Not indulging this expectation for a teaching, a supportive teaching on impermanence. So it may be that sometimes that teaching, that knowledge might help us. I can bear this. because it's flowing. It's not fixed. It's not stuck. So I can bear this. And yet sometimes we use this too shall pass to not need to be fully with it now. Well, it's on its way out. I don't need to fully meet this guest because it's a short meeting. It's on its way out. So certainly impermanence, the constant intransience, inconstancy, the flow of life constantly changing. is definitely an element of the teaching and can be great support in our capacity.

[65:36]

But checking in and making sure that it's not deflecting from being fully with. This moment actually is forever. The problem that you have now, the pain that you have now, will last a very long time. Better to settle in. Better to settle in with it. Thank you. I appreciate your reflection. and appreciation of the topic. We have one more question from Terry. And then we'll close for the morning. Terry. Thank you, Jiryu, for your wonderful words. As you were talking, I was thinking about this is something I guess I think about a lot is How am I going to be open to and encounter those who I have a tendency to perceive as my enemies because they are on the opposite side politically?

[66:50]

I was thinking when you were talking about Tonglen, I thought, oh, Maybe that's what I need to be doing. But I'm wondering, I feel like I need to prepare for this. I'm wondering what guidance you can give me. Yeah, thank you. Probably not much guidance. You know, it's amazing. and informative and fruitful to make a bowl for and sit with the hatred in ourselves so you know rather than not be hateful rather than be quickly not help not hateful to to be with to make a bowl for that and sit with it attending it feeling it

[67:55]

You know, I think as I was thinking through this metaphor of the salt and my feeling that somebody shouldn't be how they are. And just remembering that Buddha's teaching about the conditions that we're all come from conditions and that we don't know those conditions. And that's not an excuse for anything. And that doesn't, it's not in any kind of opposition to what we call countermeasures or stopping harm. but just that appreciation of, I don't know where this comes from, but it has a cause. It has a cause that's bigger than this person. It has conditions that come from beginning with hate and delusion, and those conditions are in me too. And I can tell because I am feeling like hateful. So whether, you know, recently, I believe Tenshin Roshi was asked similar, and someone... a similar point.

[69:04]

Maybe it was someone else. Anyway, I was appreciative of the reminder that let's not get ahead of ourselves. Let's see if we can work with the Blue Jay before we think that we can go meet and maintain our capacity for already overwhelmed. We can see this might not go well. I can hardly be patient with my kids. It's maybe not time without some careful attention to go try to be patient with someone that I know will be overwhelming to me. So caring for training in a way we dedicate this training. We say in humility, I'm not, I can't do that. I'm overwhelmed. I can't do that.

[70:07]

And then we let that, and I want to be able to, so I need to train in this capacity so that I can. That's a response, but thank you. I think many of us are in that pain, feeling so disconnected from each other, so hurt by each other. so outraged at each other so thank you again for coming everybody we appreciate you taking the time and wish you the best in your practice in this overwhelming time um i think you'll be invited to a breakout room so you could join and anyone else if you'd like to sign off and say goodbye. I believe you can go ahead and unmute yourself.

[71:09]

Thank you, Jirio. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. [...] Wonderful. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you, Jirio. Thank you, Linda, for holding the sitting this morning. Thank you, Jirio. Thank you, Jirio. Thanks, Jirio. Thank you, Jirio. Thanks, everybody. Let's see. Jenny, can you make me the host? Thank you again, everybody.

[72:34]

I think if there's any Buddha, Dharma, Sangha people here, please stay in and I'll try to get you. Sorry, can you unmute yourself, Kanjin? I was just that there were a couple of phone people. It looks like they are gone. Okay. But I see Jun. Jun, you should be able to enter the breakout room now. Anyone else? It looks like us. OK. Maybe. Hey. Can I ask a question? You can, Peter. Kantian, I will see you in there. OK. I'll go. If you could start something. So what's the breakout room now? I don't understand this. Sorry, I'm just first time and I'm a bit confused. Peter, thank you so much for being here today.

[73:35]

Generally, this is the event. So the event, the Dharma talk happened today. So the talk is over. A funny thing is happening today where we're holding a different event for a different sangha that all know each other. So because we couldn't come to Green Gulch and have our meeting, we're having our meeting around this talk in this breakout room. So it's not... That's not part of the program, but I'm so sorry for that. I just wanted to understand that next time is properly. And there are many other offerings, as I'm sure you've noticed on the on the website for online ways of classes and ways, more intimate ways to connect with the teaching here. OK, thank you very much. It was nice talk. Bye.

[74:28]

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