This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfcc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good evening. This is a little bit of a strange lecture for me over the last month. I've been every once in a while thinking, what do I want to say? As I usually do when I'm lecturing. And for this one, there are like these parallel universes going on. There's the beginning of the guest season practice period with the people who I've known for years or at least months in this kind of transitional period. coming out of practice period and work period and going into the summer season and really wanting to support them to do that.

[01:09]

And the new students who I barely know and really wanting to give you my view of what's going on here, hopefully to encourage you. And then there's this whole other event happening the alumni retreat with old friends and old students and also a lot of my seniors. We spent an hour and a half or so this afternoon out at the retreat hall with these wonderful stories from the people who knew Suzuki Roshi. You know, really... It was very touching and inspiring, really, to hear their memories of that time with him and the effect that it had on them. And I'm like, why am I going to be giving a lecture?

[02:15]

And on the other hand, I feel like having... So Keith and I, my husband Keith, most of you know... We came to Zen Center in October of 1971. So Suzuki Roshi died at the beginning of December 4th, 1971. And so he was very sick by the time we came. And really the only time that we saw him alive, we saw him twice, once alive, once dead. We saw him alive at Richard Baker's Mountain Seeds ceremony. And he was very, he was about as yellow as his golden robe that he was wearing. and was kind of swallowed up in it, was my impression. And then he died at the beginning of that sesshin, and we went, each of us, Keith was sitting in the sesshin, and I just came from the neighborhood. Word got passed through the neighborhood, and we came and offered incense to his body. So that was the extent of my direct experience of Suzuki Roshi, and yet I feel like...

[03:22]

living here at Tassa, walking away from the tent yurt, I felt like, oh, no, but I'm like walking in that, you know, I could say lineage, but it feels more palpable than that. You know, it's like I'm walking in that space. I'm walking in that land that they were talking about being created. just in that land that Suzuki Roshi and these ancestors of mine created. For instance, a number of people said how much Suzuki Roshi encouraged them. He would say to them, I'm going to sort of quote some of you. It's your intention, your wonderful practice intention that has made it like this. Or you're a great Zen student when they knew they weren't really, like all of us, right?

[04:28]

But he was just very encouraging of that side of them. And in a way that fits in with what I want to say about what I think is going on here for now in the summer. Something about this... that we make together, laying the ground for us being open to our love for the world, for everything, and for ourselves. There's something about the way that we live here together that I think... lets us open up to that part of ourself that really wants to be of benefit in the world, really is a bodhisattva. Sometimes I think it's really, maybe it's just the way primitive humans had to live, you know, when there was just a tribe and they were really dependent on each other and where you didn't do certain things because you couldn't afford to be kicked out of the tribe.

[05:43]

And when a baby came along, you loved that baby. And if somebody was difficult, you still, they were part of your tribe. So you found a way to live with them that really expressed the way we are together. In some ways, it's like that at Tassajara. It's like most people don't get too far out because they really still want to be part of the group. So maybe it's just a sort of simple, primitive, human way of being if you're kind of cut off from... that you could just, like, walk around the block and be in some other world. But I think it's also the, you know, maybe the basis of Zen, at least. I'm sure all of you know Dogen's saying in the Genjo Con, to study Buddhism is to study the self. And I think that that's kind of a surprise to us when we, you know, we...

[06:43]

We have some idea of what it is to study Zen. Somebody is visiting. We have some idea of what it would be to come to a monastery and live at a monastery for a while. And I think for most of us, as we discover what it means to live with a group of people and to feel this love and support, and then to find... the other sides of ourself coming up, you know, our despair, our hatred, our resistance, our blaming, you know, all that stuff which we've experienced before, but which probably we were hoping would never come up here. And then there it is. And something in us, for most of us, is pretty sure that this shouldn't be happening.

[07:44]

It's like, no, no, no. I was coming to study Zen. It was supposed to be golden. And, you know, either I'm not a good enough person for being here or, you know, I don't have the real resolve or this is the wrong place. They're doing this wrong and that wrong and the other thing wrong and if they weren't doing that wrong then I would feel better. And everything would be going better. So I think embedded in that to study Buddhism is to study the self is actually the self. The self that is beyond what we think it is. The other Dogen quote that goes right with that, I think, from a different fascicle of his is the entire universe is is the Dharma body of the self. So to study Buddhism is to study the self and the entire universe is the Dharma body of the self, which I think means basically stuff happens and a response happens over here in this karmic body and mind.

[09:02]

And if we really want to study Buddhism, we have to be open to the entire universe in all its variations you know some things make us happy some things make us sad some things make us angry some things make us afraid some things make us joyful those usually don't give us too much problem we think those are the wonderful things but those other things you know how does one study that how does one What do you do with that side of ourself that comes up in this whatever context it is that brings out that part of us? So one of the ways that we study it, I was just looking through various books before this lecture,

[10:08]

And in the Dogen again, in the Gyakuro Yojinshu, the Guidelines for Studying the Way says, by bowing formally and stepping inward, we stumble into the realm of great ease. It's nice, huh? By bowing formally and stepping inward, we stumble into the realm of great ease. And then it goes on. In mind and body, there is no abiding, no attaching, no standing still, and no stagnating. There is entirely nothing to hold onto. By bowing formally and stepping inward, we stumble into the realm of great ease. In mind and body, there is no abiding, no attaching, no standing still, and no stagnating. There is entirely nothing to hold on to. This feeling of nothing to hold on to, of the continual movement, but sometimes abrupt movement, but even more, as we're trying to be settled on the self, be open to the self.

[11:35]

that there's not a self that can be gotten a hold of, and yet there's a continual revealing of a self that we can't get a hold of, a continual creating of me over and over and over again. as I've said before here, and today a friend and I were talking about it, how much we think it's our job to make myself into something, and how this comes up over and over and over again. Oh, I should be a good dining room worker. I should be a, this summer I'm going to really, whatever, in my life, out there,

[12:36]

something, some idea of how I should be, how I should respond. And the feeling, the deeply, deeply held feeling that this is my job to figure out what that is and then figure out how to get from here to there, how to get rid of those parts that I can see don't quite match up and turn them into what I should be. And we approached this I've often said kind of like, you know, like we were going to build a building. Like you need to draw out a plan and decide how many rooms you want and, you know, all that. This person said it's kind of like you're building a machine. You know, you like take the parts and put it together. And that, in fact, it doesn't work very well. I mean, you know, you can change some habits, you know. People can stop smoking and they can... start biting their fingernails. That was my big accomplishment in my life.

[13:39]

I stopped biting my fingernails a long time ago, and it's never been a bit tempting since. So may you all experience such a wonderful thing. But most of the other parts of myself that I thought weren't so great, I haven't been able to change so easily. So I think that one of the things that Buddhism is saying is that's like not your job. It's not your job to figure out who you should be and then how to make yourself into it. Your job is to be open to who is not standing still, not stagnating, not abiding, constantly flowing, but doing it right here in this body and mind, to stay open to this karmic being, which is the entire universe, which is... reacting to the entire universe and totally connected to the entire universe and yet where we find it is right here very accessible to us except we don't like it so then we have to you know find some way to get away from it and one really good way to get away from it is to blame something else and it isn't that those other things don't

[15:01]

You know, they're doing plenty of bad things. They've got their own karmic issues going on. And, you know, Tassara is not a perfect place, and neither is any other place. So there will always be something that you can say, that's the problem over there. You know, if that was better, everything would be better, including me. But it doesn't get to this where the entire universe comes here. to the bowing formally and stepping back, and therefore the realm of great ease. Lee Klinger is here, Klinger Lesser, and she last summer brought a group of women vets to Tassajara along with Chris Fortin, and she was telling me during one of our exercises in the workshop that... the women vets were very impacted by the bowing practice.

[16:02]

They were just like, they started bowing as often as they could to each other in the retreat hall and on the path to, probably Lee and Chris told them, yeah, it's okay, you can bow to anybody. I guess one of the women came and said, somebody bowed to me. What does that mean? And Lee and Chris explained to them, you know, something, whatever they said, you know, it's about respect or something like that. And yeah, somebody might bow to you. It's okay, you can bow back to them if you want. You don't have to if you don't want to. But, you know, yeah, the students, it's okay if you want to bow to them. So they started bowing to people, a lot of them, all of them bowed a fair amount. And they were, it was surprising to me, like, what was that? What was the impact of bowing that, you know, that they just, like, took to it that was so nourishing to them in some way? And when I read this Dogen quote tonight to myself, you know, bowing formally and stepping inward, we stumble into the realm of great ease.

[17:05]

Oh, yeah, there's something about bowing that is the kind of stepping inward. It's showing respect. Oh, let me think for a minute. It's showing respect, and yet it's kind of standing in my place. It's very similar to Zazen. It's saying, here's where I'm settled. Here's where I meet the world from, and I'm open to the entire universe. I respect this part of the universe that's in front of me, and I respect... the response I'm having to it. And that's kind of what I feel like we're doing during the summer.

[18:10]

And we take on these positions, most of which are basically manual labor. There's a little bit of creativity in the guest cook realm, and there's a little bit of mental activity in the office. But a lot of it is just like responding, you know, make this bed, fill this cup of coffee. You know, maybe on the path, one thing I like to recommend is that to notice that the guests are people. You know, sometimes we get in our own world, and we're just kind of like going from one task to another, and then we meet another student, and we're like, oh, hi, you know. But to actually notice that these... The guests are like people here in our realm, and you don't have to be in a good mood all the time. I promise you that. You don't have to be, and you don't have to smile at them. But if you do, they greatly appreciate it.

[19:12]

So if you notice that they're people and you want to smile at them, that doesn't mean the alumni. The alumni are people, and they are, contrary to what they've been told, This weekend, they are also students, basically. And they're guests. You can smile at them or not. It doesn't matter. They're happy either way. They've been here themselves, so they understand. But anyway, so that's the suggestion. That's a little parentheses in the lecture. But for what we are doing to this bowing formally and stepping inward, is one description of the whole life of Tassajara. It's like, oh, hello, I welcome you. And by welcoming you, what I really mean is I'm welcoming the me that comes up in the presence of you.

[20:13]

And sometimes that me is not all that pleasant. Sometimes that me doesn't like what it sees. You walk into a room that somebody is just... crashed by living there for overnight and you have to clean it up. Usually when the cabin crew walks into a room, the first thing they do is not bow. But internally, it is sort of what they do. They're just like, okay, here's this room. This is the shape it's in. Let's work with it. Or somebody a few years ago was, how did this go? It was about guest cooking and a discussion about whether, you know, the guest cooks were making the meals too fancy or not fancy enough or whatever. And really, you know, most times I think the guest cooks, they're just trying to cook a good meal.

[21:13]

You know, they're not like thinking about whether the how are the guests? Can we impress the guests? Or maybe it was about money. We have to cook good meals because the guests are going to give us money. You know, I think mostly it does. We don't spend our time thinking that way. You know, it's just like, this is what I'm doing and I'm pouring myself into it. Essentially, I'm bowing and stepping inward and saying, okay, no abiding, no stagnating. Here comes the next me. Here comes the next part of the universe. So this stepping into the realm of great, stepping backward and, what was it? Stumbling, yes, stumbling into the realm of great ease. How does that work? I think it is really true. I just want to remind you here that Buddha said, you know, don't believe what people tell you.

[22:16]

Check it out. Just have it as a question whether this is true. I think that's really worthwhile for the summer practice and for practice in our life, wherever we are, to have this question, is this particular self that's just arisen in response to the entire universe right now, is it okay? is it okay to be this person? And since I think that really is our biggest question, like that's the lurking question all the time, is it actually okay to be me now? I mean, sometimes it gets phrased as, do they like me? Will they accept me? Does that person like me? But still, I think it comes down to, is it actually okay to be this person? this karmic person, this one who's arising now, that if the answer is yes, that is the realm of great ease.

[23:24]

It's like, okay. And if it's true, which I believe it is, and we actually find out that it's true, okay, it was okay to be that me that I was kind of wondering about, and okay, it's okay to be this me, If we start to gain some trust in that, then it really is the realm of great ease. Then you're not having to create yourself. You're not having to decide who you should be and then how to get to be it. You can just be who you are now. You just bow and step inward and offer. Offer who you are. And then maybe somebody doesn't like it. Maybe somebody is like, ah, okay, who are you then? How does that, how do you respond to that? And can you offer that?

[24:26]

So, of course, this sounds maybe like, oh, won't that be pretty? But actually, as you probably can tell, it's much more... vibrant than that much more alive than that because you know real things happen people do get upset with each other people do get attracted to each other lots of things happen so in this never stagnating never abiding flowing on world to to in some ways very quickly bow and step inward because the next moment's coming is a very alive, a very alive event where we don't know what's happening from one minute to the next. Our plan, if we have one, is just like one speck in this constantly moving world, universe.

[25:33]

But there is a place where we can be. It's not a stagnant place. It's not a standing still, but it is a place. It's a place right now, just right now, to essentially bow and open. So that's what I think the practice of Tassahara is. That's one way of saying what I heard people saying today about Suzuki Roshi and the impact that he had in their lives, of really... by his tremendous acceptance of them saying, it's okay to be you. It's okay to be open to the you that's here right now with all the complexity of what that is and how that's come down to us in this place and also in the whole world. It's not just here. It's actually everywhere for us to test.

[26:39]

you know, to try that out, to try just settling, essentially bowing and being open to who is this person. So, somewhere is my watch. Hmm, okay, we maybe have room for time for, A couple of questions or comments, if anyone has any. Yes? Say, June. What does one do when it appears by the reaction, as far as you can tell, another person that would be okay that you are agreeing to them? Yeah.

[27:40]

Well, that happens regularly, you know, in many different ways. What does one do with that? Well, probably you have a reaction to it, and you try to be open to that reaction. By open, that doesn't mean defending that reaction. It doesn't mean, you know, claiming that my reaction is more appropriate than their reaction. It just could mean relaxing with my reaction, actually having my reaction, at least being willing to feel it. So not pushing it away, but also not defending it. So another way of describing it is not getting tight around it. If we're pushing away or we're defending it, it's a kind of tightening. So to actually have a reaction and then something else happens. Maybe we burst into tears. Maybe we, I don't know. I don't know, but it's not separate from that person. It's actually connected.

[28:42]

That person is, you know, the entire universe is the Dharma body of the self. So, yeah. Thank you. Is there somebody else at hand over there? Yes. Yasi. fear or conflict is something that's ever really going to be void in our lives. Be what? I think it's always going to be with us. Yes. In respect to us upholding responsibility for the Sangha within the community with all the interpersonal things that are happening. Yes. I feel like actually like my responsibility is to respond appropriately. So within that, given that, with all the forms, I guess... Sometimes it's really hard to offer an authentic expression of what's really happening for you.

[30:05]

when you have to uphold this responsibility to kind of meet various needs within the community. And first and foremost, your own, right? It's that you have to be yourself before you can meet everybody else. So it's like, how do you go about doing that and responding appropriately to whatever it is that... I'm not totally sure that there is conflict you know there there are very complicated situations and responses and people might sort of take polarized views of those responses but I think a lot of the time the maybe all the time the What's actually happening is much more mutual than we usually admit.

[31:12]

We feel like I identify with some part of it and I need to protect that part. But I think if we bow and step backward and take a little less like this is a reflection on me in some way and just be our part of it, I think it often goes, it matches the other, and the other person may not be able to see that. They may or may not be able to respond to that, but that doesn't necessarily stop us from feeling that. So what I think I just heard you say is something that aren't in medicine, which is what you were talking about earlier. Yes. It's like not allowing our defense mechanism or kind of stepping back, submitting something. maybe even through form, through bowing, or through cooking a beautiful meal, or through making a beautiful bed, or whatever form it is that we have to hold in the community.

[32:17]

Yes. Which can include feelings of, oh, that was painful, or that, but to, I think there really is a way for those feelings to be there in a very palpable way. without tightening around them, without feeling like this shouldn't be happening or this is happening and I need to prove it to somebody. It doesn't mean we'll necessarily be successful at that, but as our attitude toward our experience can change from... I should be a certain way. I should not have painful feelings. Most of us feel that way. You know, like, if I have painful feelings, something's wrong with the world. No, I have a body. I have a mind. I'm going to have painful feelings. Can I have them?

[33:21]

And that's where sangha comes in, right? Where, like, ultimately we remind each other that whatever they are, they're just constructions at the end of the day. That's where sangha comes in? Well, sangha certainly helps us experience a variety of them. And when sangha sticks around, which we do pretty much with each other, yes, there's some putting them in perspective at the end of the day. Thank you. Okay, it's 9.20. I promised you we'd end by this time, so... Thank you all very, very much. For more information, visit sfcc.org and click Giving.

[34:25]

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