This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good morning. So to arrive here, is there an echo a little bit? Is it okay? Sound okay? You hear the birds. I don't think I can give a talk so quiet that you can

[01:03]

You're the birds. So I want to just take a couple of breaths together and be reborn together as one body in this room. So I feel my breath in my lower belly. Seeing if I can coax the breath, remind the breath to drop deep down into the low belly as it comes in and to come all the way out from that low belly as it releases. And I want to adjust my upper body throughout the upper body

[02:06]

To be upright and strong and stable, like a pillar holding up the sky. Whatever that is for your body, however that feels. To be totally upright and dignified and present. fully taking up the space that's ours to take up. And then closing my eyes and breathing out and in. Just concentrating the mind on the feeling of that breath. Cutting through all the

[03:08]

noise and slime of the mind. Just for one or two breaths, complete concentration on that out-breath and in-breath. Now inhaling, opening our eyes, including the whole field, the whole wide field of light and sound and each other here. Open your eyes. But don't do anything. Just open your eyes. Now we're reborn together as one body. and again.

[04:14]

Wonderful that you all took the trouble to come today to Green Gulch Farm, Green Dragon Temple. And as always, I'm touched and a little bit perplexed that you would do such a thing and that I would do such a thing and that there is such a thing that people can do. Thank you to all supporters of the temples through all time that there can be such a thing, such a place that none of us understand what we're doing here and none of us are quite sure. It's a good idea. And yet, and none of us are as comfortable as we'd like to be. I don't think. Is anybody as comfortable as they'd like to be? Oh, could we switch? Wonderful. That is called being at the summit of the wondrous peak.

[05:37]

I don't want to be any more comfortable than I am. I could say I really can imagine being more comfortable than I am, but I'd actually rather be right here in this particular exact little bit twisted flavor of discomfort because that's the place where I also get to be alive. The other place is great because it's very comfortable, but it has this big problem that No one gets to be alive there because it doesn't exist, except as an idea. A kind of toxic idea, actually, in that it spoils our appreciation of our life in this moment. So there is something that calls us to these places, to this practice.

[06:43]

Some kind of longing or curiosity maybe or aspiration or vow is a word we often use in this teaching. Some kind of wish for wholeness or peacefulness, intimacy with our life and each other. And we're aspiring to that. We're sort of reaching for that. And we move towards it. And so we organize our life around moving towards it. And there's wisdom in that. And also it's a little dicey because this aspiration or this wish to become more peaceful and more fulfilled and more comfortable has this way of pulling us away a little bit from how it actually is right now.

[07:47]

before we're peaceful and before we're comfortable. Zen practice is right in that push and pull. There's something wonderful, intimate, harmonious, peaceful, connected, wise, kind. You want it, right? Don't reach for it or you'll miss what's right here, which is the place that those virtues relate. It's the only place we get to be alive. Now, there's this line from our founder, Shunryu Suzuki Roshi, the founder of these San Francisco Zen Center temples. He says something like, when we realize how difficult it is to cope with our everyday problems, we understand how important it is to practice zazen, to do the practice of meditation as an activity that we do now and then and as a posture that we take up in our life.

[08:58]

It's like when we sort of think we can manage our problems pretty well, then we maybe don't think that we have to practice meditation. But when we realize, oof, this is really difficult, then we realize we need our whole being, we need our whole being collected here in our life. And things are going okay, or we think we're doing something that doesn't matter so much, then it's okay to be scattered. in a hundred places, you know? This very natural sort of principle that when we are doing something difficult and important, our whole being is collected there. You know what I mean? If you're like juggling axes or something, your whole being... is there because it matters that you're there for it and because it's difficult.

[10:19]

So the sense of this invitation in Suzuki Roshi's teaching to sort of notice and appreciate how much trouble we're having in our own lives, in our communities, in our country, in our world. This is calling for us to really be here, folks, It's not really the time to be like in a bunch of places at once because we're sort of all needed here, totally here. When we think things are fine, we might not feel that. Part of that, part of inviting that understanding and calling forth our whole being to this moment of our life.

[11:20]

And what I see in this line of Suzuki Roshi of realize that it's difficult to cope with the problems of your everyday life is that we come to understand that the problem that we have now is where we actually want to root and plant and be in our life fully. I'm always, I don't know about you, but I have a theory about you, which is that you're like me, which is that every day, pretty much from the moment you wake up, you're waiting to get past the current problem. Is that just me? What problem? Yes. What's that? Okay. What problem?

[12:22]

Yeah. Whatever the problem is, whatever the problem is, it's amazing. The abundance of problems. There are bright problems and dull problems and subtle problems and intense problems and the kind of nagging problems and the kind of itching and the biting problems and the heartbreaking problems and the kind of like, dare we be a little bit joyful problems. And I have something good, but maybe it's about to go away problems. Basically, the Buddha said we have a problem, which is we have something we don't want. And we don't have something we want. And that's all day long from start to finish. And a Dharma talk is a good example, at least as someone who gives them. And also as someone who attends them with... I feel, okay, just get through this.

[13:25]

The crazy thing is that as soon as the problem is solved, there's two more. This is this thing. Is that the same as the efficiency trap? There's something like that where it's probably better if you didn't solve that problem Because as soon as you solve the problem, there's going to be two. There's something in our teaching also about that. Like better just stop and just be fully with this problem. Because actually you don't be in a hurry for the problem to go away. Because the next one is probably going to be more of them and worse. So just enjoy the current problem. People say Buddhism is pessimistic. But we just observe our life and we're always, sometimes it's subtle, you know, sometimes we can be pretty present in our life and that's so wonderful.

[14:30]

But even still, you know, the Dharma, this teaching of this practice can meet us even in that subtle resistance, the subtle resistance to our life. So we have a practice period here at Green Gulch, and I think some people who didn't live at Green Gulch thought, may have thought, I don't know, may have thought, I think there's less problems at Green Gulch than there are at my house. And maybe they're right, but then you all arrive, and I've heard there's some problems. even coming today, you know, to this beautiful place to be free of some problem in your life, but it kind of, there's another one. So the sitting down to meet how it is now, that's what Zen practice in some respects is about, to just sit down,

[15:44]

And meet with our whole being, this moment of our life as it is, with exactly the problem it has, not trying to get past it, not trying to get away from it, not trying to get to something else. So I wanted to share a Zen story this morning about a couple of Dharma friends who are like recurring characters in the Zen stories. This is a pair called Hofuku and Choke, and they lived in the 900s in the Tang Dynasty in China.

[16:53]

And they loved each other very much. and had various dharma adventures together, including going for walks and drinking tea. And they practiced together with their teacher, Seppo, who also had a dharma friend, Ganto. So Seppo and Ganto are these sort of pals that you see all over the teaching. go on pilgrimage together. And then Seppo's disciples, Hofoku and Choke, also have this beautiful communication between them, this fluid intimacy. One of the descriptions of a different ancestor describing their intuitive intimacy with each other is, when one raises something up, the other knows where it comes down.

[17:58]

this kind of like hand-and-glove, box-and-lid fitting. And we can have that with each other and with each thing, with all things, that sort of complete intimacy. We can finish the bird's sentence for it, and it can finish our sentence when we're wide open and still. when we're doing the practice of Zazen. So because of the power of their Zazen practice, these two friends were able to really understand each other. And here's one of the things they did together. Hofuku and Choke were disciples of Seppo. Once, when they went out walking together, Hofoku pointed out a mountain and said, that mountain is the famous Mount Mioho.

[19:05]

That mountain is the famous mystic peak. I think it's important to picture it as kind of like a scraggly squat kind of hill that he's pointing out on this walk. You know, the weather's not quite right. It's too hot or it's too cold. Maybe there's bugs. And Oboku says, it's Mount Mioho. It's the Mystic Peak. Doesn't look like the Mystic Peak. So this is Suzuki Roshi's telling of the story. So Suzuki Roshi then says, Mioho. refers to a famous mountain which appears in the Kegon Sutra. There is a story about a lay Buddhist named Zenzai Doji who visited 53 masters in southern India, but even he couldn't climb Mount Mioho.

[20:12]

Because of that, Mount Mioho is a very famous mountain. So Hofuku pointed at some mountain and said, that mountain is the famous Mount Mioho. Thank you for receiving that story. Later on, Suzuki Roshi says, you know, usually we hear these koans and we think we need to think about them. And then the more we think about them, the more we're going to get them. But actually, when you understand it immediately, without really understanding it, that's the right understanding. This kind of intuitive, that way I see people hearing the story, like we know what Mount Myoho is, like, yeah, I get that. And then if we say, well, what did you get exactly? I can't really say what I got. And we don't value that enough. We don't value that. We say, well, but what do you mean? What did you see? Come on. Like, what does that mean? I don't know, but I got it.

[21:15]

Intuitive wisdom, immediate understanding. It's a beautiful story. They're walking and the friend says, that scraggly squat hill is the mystic peak. So now we explain it and it gets all tangled up. Sitting zazen is to be in this, you could say, samadhi or state or just posture or heart of immediate understanding. Before you get it, before you understand anything, You're alive in some way and you know it. We don't know what that is. We can't get a hold of it. It doesn't have any handles. But before we make anything out of it, it's like immediately appreciated.

[22:25]

Then our mind is like, that was cool. What was that? Intuitive wisdom, immediate understanding. So in Zen practice, we're coming to trust that we can live in that place of immediacy, intuitive wisdom, and to trust that if someone asks us something, maybe something will happen. But not because we've determined that this thing of being alive should be figured out with our mind. Immediate appreciation of being alive. That's our sitting. So we sit still and upright, concentrated in the sense of some of the noise of our mind is put aside and just wide open, open eyes, open ears, open heart. Everything is just crisply and exactly itself.

[23:32]

Before we start calling things something, dividing things up, pointing to where something is, you know, the bird sings. And before we know it, you know, before we say that bird is out there singing, there's a kind of immediate appreciation, immediate connection. So we look for the intimacy. We feel maybe not whole. And we look for the intimacy. And we look for it in a place after we've carved things up with our mind. So the Zen practice of wholeness is to be in the wholeness before immediate understanding, intuitive wisdom. So Mount Mioho is the perfect place. I've been asking people, what's Mount Mioho? the wondrous peak.

[24:39]

It has this feeling of being this place of awakening or total peace and ease and well-being and joy, compassion. It's the kind of fulfillment of these things that we're looking for. You could say Buddha nature. Ultimate reality. The jewel mirror samadhi. Look, the jewel mirror samadhi. That hill over there. And, does he say, even Zen Zai Doji couldn't climb Mount Myoho. So the thing about Mount Myoho is it's a place where everything is perfected and fulfilled. And nobody seems to be able to get there. So here's the story.

[25:43]

So Suzuki Roshi mentions the story comes from the Kegon Sutra or the Avatamsaka Sutra. And in Sanskrit, Avatamsaka in Japanese, Kegon. And this Zenzai Doji is the seeker named Sudhana. And so Sudhana sets out it gives rise to the mind that seeks. Basically, Sudhana realizes that their life is, the problems of their everyday life are really difficult to cope with. And that wisdom and compassion are not optional. And goes out seeking for what we call the Bodhisattva way, how can a person live truly, deeply, wisely with their whole being for the benefit of everyone?

[26:46]

How can we be, how can I be so completely open and kind to each and everything? Because I see that it's really important because the problems are so deep and pervasive. I'm done running away from my problems. I've given rise to the mind of the bodhisattva who says, okay, here I am. I need help finding this way to actually do zazen with this life. So Manjushri, the bodhisattva of wisdom, says, here's what you should do. There's somebody named Megashri, who's a great teacher who lives at the summit of the mystic peak. And Magashri never comes down from the mystic peak. Magashri is always living at the summit of the mystic peak.

[28:06]

So Sudhana walks for seven days searching for the mystic peak and this person who's going to help them, but could not find it. It's right around here somewhere. He's walking in these mountains for seven days. I picture him kind of with the map, you know, mystic peak is right. I'm right around here, but he can't quite find it. Siri says, you know, arrived at destination. But he's looking around. I don't see Megashri, the person who lives on the Mystic Peak. This does not feel like peace and fulfillment and awakening. And it's not a coincidence, you know, that this is seven days. Seven days of sitting. Seven days of wandering. This week we start here at Gringold Trust. The Sheen.

[29:06]

meditation retreat. And traditionally, that's for seven days of wandering around, lost in Zazen, trying to find that peace that you once unfortunately had in Zazen. So, he's looking and looking and looking. He's most Certainly not at the mystic peak. And then all of a sudden, he's on some different mountain. Not the mystic peak. The kind of like scraggly, not so good, everyday life problems hill. And he runs into Magashri. He says, wait, you never leave the summit of the wondrous peak. Maybe you get that immediately again before you think about it. Magashri never leaves. the summit of the wondrous peak.

[30:06]

And then walking somewhere else, Sudhana meets him. So Secho, our ancestor who collected the Blue Cliff Record, which is the compilation that this story appears in, he really loves this part about how strange and kind of uncanny and impossible this is. Sudhana is definitely not on the wondrous peak. Megashri never leaves the wonder's peak, and yet they just met on the path. Setyo says, in the teachings, it says that the mendicant Megashri always stayed on the lone summit of the peak of wonder. He never came down from the mountain. Sudhana went to call on him and searched for seven days without encountering him, but then one day they met on a separate peak. Given that Magashri never came down from the mountain, why then did they meet on a separate peak?

[31:16]

You may say that Magashri must have come down from the mountain, yet in the teachings it says that he never did come down from the mountain, that he was always on the solitary summit of the Peak of Wonder. At this point, where are Megashri and Sudhana? So Suzuki Roshi continues telling, this story, giving a teaching about this story. He says, Myoho is supposedly a mountain that Zenzai Doji couldn't visit. He couldn't climb it. Why was it impossible to climb? Because that mountain is the mountain which covers all the mountains in the world.

[32:21]

Wherever you go, that is Mount Myoho. So before you climb up, before you visit that mountain, you are on the mountain. If you try to find out where the mountain is, it is no wonder that you cannot find out where it is. Actually, in reality, each existence covers the whole world, the whole universe. The mountain or river you see is not the true mountain or river. That is the true mountain or river. So I've been practicing with this, sitting with this story and walking with it, wondering if I'm at the wondrous peak and feeling that when I allow that I am, this is the wondrous peak.

[33:26]

Then all these things that I'm reaching for in my life sort of fall away for a minute. this is the place where my actual life is. This is a wondrous, wondrous peak. And it's not the peak I wanted or the peak I think I should get, but it's the only place where any of these virtues that I want to cultivate and realize can be cultivated and realized. It's the only place that I can stand to cope wisely and skillfully with the problems of being alive. I encourage this practice if you'd like to take it up.

[34:30]

Notice that we think the wondrous peak is somewhere else and feel what it's like in your, in your body and heart. When you say, this is the wondrous peak. It doesn't get any better than this. So then Choke, his friend says, well said, But what a pity. Which is a wonderful statement. Some of the translations just say it like that. What a pity. And I really, I think that must be what the Chinese says. Well said. That scraggly mountain really is the mystic, beautiful peak, Mount Mioho. Bummer. This is, you know, the brightness.

[35:37]

All of these stories of how precious and beautiful and profound and intimate life is. Those are stories about this exact moment of our kind of like sort of not so great life. That's what they are. And that's the only place that they are. There is nothing but this being alive with a problem. We wait and we wait and we wait and then we're dead. We are on the mystic peak now. Even if we get something great later, we're going to lose it. We are on the mystic peak. What a pity. The more maybe complete translation is, what a pity to say so. Like, I wasn't confused about any of that. I was just living my life immediately understanding and being intimate.

[36:41]

And we have this problem too, you know. All of you were doing just fine until you come to the Zen Center. So Suzuki Roshi was really worried about this and having a Zen Center, I feel, how it would confuse people. So Choke is saying, Hofuku, or whatever you call them, dude, we were having this nice walk and now you've got to start talking about the mystic peak and get me all excited about like the brightness and stillness and depth and interbeing of all things. And now I'm sort of reaching for it. But also, thank you. Satcho says, you know, if he hadn't said that right in front of us, that little hill right in front of us, is that bright mountain. If he hadn't said that, then thank you to those going to support the temple.

[37:50]

Are there places in here? If you say, this is the wondrous peak, this thing right in front of us, is the best, then we're going to grasp at it. But if you don't say it, then we might have missed it. So Satcho says, if he hadn't said anything, skulls would have covered the whole field. In other words, it would have been a It's more alive to point it out, like we're alive. And it's so strange. None of us know how we got here. None of us know what this is. It's completely ungraspable, inconceivable, and impossible. And it's like, even to say that, it's what a pity to say so, you know?

[39:03]

Because it's not, that doesn't capture it either. But if we don't say something, then it's maybe not enlivened. But if we say something, then it becomes something we grasp. So Zen is always sort of in this kind of problem. So the Dharma friend says, what a pity that you said so. And I guess they walk on. So maybe I'll close just by reading, if you don't mind, the full story here from Suzuki Roshi and then there's a comment or two and then we'll close. Noticing if there's immediate understanding of Suzuki Roshi's words as we sit upright and still.

[40:06]

open to light and sound. Before we make anything out of anything. Trusting that place before we make anything out of anything. Hofuku and Choke were disciples of Seppo, Once when they went out walking together, Hofoku pointed out a mountain and said, That mountain is the famous Mount Mioho. Mioho refers to a famous mountain which appears in the Kegon Sutra. There is a story about a lay Buddhist named Zenzai Doji who visited 53 masters in southern India, but even he couldn't climb Mount Mioho. Because of that, Mount Mioho is a very famous mountain. So Hofuku pointed at some mountain and said, That mountain is the famous Mount Mioho.

[41:13]

His brother Choke said, Well said, but it is a pity that you said so. That was the question and answer between them. Actually, the mountain is not Mount Mioho, but what pointed at the mountain is Mount Mioho. So Choke, Hofuku's brother, said, well said, but it was a pity that you said so. In this kind of question and answer, you have no time to think about it. You should understand it immediately. The moment Hofuku said, not as Mount Myoho, immediately his brother should have understood what he meant. And actually he did understand immediately. Yes, well said, but it is a pity that you said so. Usually, as with this koan, you think about the story over and over and over again, and you find out the meaning of it. But that is not good enough.

[42:15]

You should understand immediately. Myoho is supposedly a mountain that Zenzai Doji couldn't visit. He couldn't climb it. Why was it impossible to climb? Because that mountain is the mountain which covers all the mountains in the world. Wherever you go, that is Mount Milho. So before you climb up, before you visit that mountain, you are on the mountain. If you try to find out where the mountain is, it is no wonder that you cannot find out where it is. Actually, in reality, each existence covers the whole world, the whole universe. The mountain or river you see is not the true mountain or river. that is the true mountain or river. When Hofoku said, that is Mount Mioho, it is actually so. But like Choke, we should understand the other side of it.

[43:18]

Although that mountain is Mount Mioho, Mount Mioho can be any mountain, or it can be a river. So what Hofoku said is right, because he wasn't saying that they were looking at some special mountain. The mountain they were looking at covers everything. It is not just a mountain. It is something more than that. People say that Zen Zai Doji couldn't go to Mount Myoho. Maybe that is true, but on the other hand, Mount Myoho could be any mountain. Actually, any mountain must be Mount Myoho. That is what Choke meant. But Choke also says... It is a pity that you said so. If your understanding is perfect, there is no need to say that some mountain is Mount Myoho. It is a pity to say so. Thank you for your kind attention.

[44:20]

I hope that this teaching of being fully alive, right where you are, because it really matters, Maybe this idea now and then in your day of is this the mystic peak might support you as it has been supporting me so that we can be really present and hear for each other, for the world that needs us. Thank you for listening to this podcast. offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our programs are made possible by the donations we receive. Please help us to continue to realize and actualize the practice of giving by offering your financial support. For more information, visit sfzc.org and click Giving.

[45:27]

May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[45:30]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_97.11