Good morning. One morning breakfast took a long time. Then right after breakfast, we went to work. And as we were walking out of the building in which we were eating breakfast, the work leader was standing there. He said, you're late.

[01:02]

To all of us, you know. And, of course, it's completely beyond our control, right? We were doing the breakfast ritual and we were obliged to be right there doing what we were doing. Then we got up and we walked straight outside to be scolded. And I thought, ah, the joy of Zen. In a whole different place, I sat around with a teacher. We had to go four times a day to Sanzang to answer your koan. And most of us, you know, when you start to answer a koan, you're foolish enough to think that you have some idea about what an appropriate response is.

[02:08]

teacher would ring the bell when the session was over, the interaction would go. Sometimes if I was taking a breath to say something, he'd ring the bell. Sometimes I actually got one or two words of it. Her's breath did the issue. away maybe it's no wonder that we become so intrigued by the world according to me given this formidable maybe ferocious aspect of life it doesn't matter

[03:16]

So much we pursue what we want or endorse what we don't want with aversion. The world is the world. No matter how intensely we demand it operate on our terms, it operates the way it operates. Sometimes in Zen it's said that stubbornness is a virtue in Zen practice. But sometimes it's said that stupidity is another virtue. So there's reason for home. I remember reading Suzuki Roshi singing when he was young and he was training as a teenager.

[04:31]

The teacher he was training with was particularly hard. And everybody else ran away. But he said, he was too stupid. He didn't realize that was an option. we will persist with the world according to me. And maybe we'll even be puzzled why this time, when I'm asserting it so passionately, the whole world doesn't change to be in accord with it.

[05:35]

So a significant part of our practice is to wait up, to notice, to take to heart this human condition. In my mind, the arguers never cease. The skeptic and the amazed. The general and the particular. In their uneasy relationship. Then the Robin sings. Even in the midst of our existential drama that we conjured up for ourselves the moment appears and of course usually we cast it aside as irrelevant and get back to the real work of making the world the way it ought to be

[07:14]

and making the self, of course, the way it ought to be the primary task of Shashi perfecting yourself according to your own preference and then you would need to feel the weight of that. Maybe we may feel how compelling that is, how urgent, how insistent that we will start to consider other possible ways to relating to existence. So for the last couple of days I've been saying Dogen Zenji's teaching.

[08:32]

Maybe it wouldn't be inaccurate to say his primary teaching. Gigi Yuzama. Engaging the process of the self and this steady practice of seeing and feeling and experiencing what arises this steady practice of noticing acknowledging and experiencing what arises and recognizing, acknowledging that this process will display itself in so many ways sometimes the mind will start to become lucid the moment will start to become spacious the arising of moment

[09:59]

would seem, as Mary Oliver says in her poem, amazed, amazing. Like a yellow school bus. Or as Jay Harjo says, in beauty, I looked up her battle and she's creaked Indian, plays a saxophone and chants to music, native music, jazz, funk and rock. So wrap your mind around that. as these moments arise and experientially we start to rediscover what it is to make contact with the moment what it is to experience it in in now

[11:44]

somewhat mysteriously to also become familiar with when consciousness gets pulled into sort of unformated existence and it can't seem dense hard to fathom hard to describe George Harjul said. Open your votes up to sky, to earth, to sun, to moon, to one whole voice, that is you. And know there is more that you can't see, can't hear, can't know, except in moments steadily growing and in languages

[12:50]

that aren't always sound, but other circles of motion. Cool is our dominant medium of communication. is thought. And the language that gets inclined with it, and the understandings that come forth. But there are other aspects of consciousness. And this is why tending to the body can be so instructive and so supportive.

[13:52]

It offers us a tangible way to be conscious of that thinking and understanding. When the mind goes beyond thought, When the mind is growing beyond thought, beyond language, then in the unfamiliarity, it can feel swamped. It can feel dense, opaque. When you relate to something tangible, like sensation in the body. offers another kind of access it might seem to you in hearing this that it's one of those odd exotic Buddhist teachings it's really of no use but actually I would say it's extraordinarily valuable

[15:22]

The immediacy of the moment is always a wordless experience. It appears before our commentary. And just as interestingly and important, it's an antidote to our commentary. As we immerse in Sushi, as we continually engage the consciousness that is structured around me, as we continually engage it, as we continually turn towards leading it just as it is. Experience the experience that's being experienced.

[16:32]

Constantly needing it as it is. As we do that, these moments of wordless experience will emerge. And as we become more aware, you know, in our normal consciousness, they're cast aside and irrelevant. But as we said, they can not only be relevant, they can be deeply instructive. Physical world, the touch, the smell, the taste, the sound. These can start to speak in their own way.

[17:43]

They can start to speak the darkness. Trees, grass, pebbles. the physical world. And to light it, the experience. And we start to experience not only that the world constructed around Not only do we start to see that for what it is, we start to see it's not the whole picture.

[18:47]

And of course, we knew that before we ever picked up up the guns out. There's knowing it as a concept that sort of hovers over separate from how you live your life. And there's knowing it in a way that influences how you breathe and how you think and how you walk down the hall and how you lift up your chopsticks. and how you open the door and how you sit in a chair Dogen Zengi says in body and mind study of the way there's two approaches one to study with the mind one to study with the body to study with the mind

[20:07]

need to study the various aspects of consciousness, such as citta, pradaya, and virta. Consciousness, as we normally think of, citta. In our sitting, when the construct that's come into being is adamant of course it will draw us in it arose with such authority and urgency because it's a powerful expression of the word according to me We can start to live inside it.

[21:19]

We can start to understand it. Associate thoughts and feelings with it. Or we can experience the state of mind of This is a good time in Shashin, you know, right now as we enter the middle. In moments, just to pause and notice and feel the state of value. And you notice that your mind is busy chewing on something Just pause and feel the state of mind that's associated with children.

[22:23]

And the mind is spacious. When the sound of the machinery has its own music, the right one at the back of the truck says, represents the passing of the moment. notice that state of mind too this beautiful human capacity to notice this beautiful human capacity of inviting spaces

[23:40]

Often it's the intensity of the contraction as it releases that appreciates the spaciousness. Sometimes we notice it in macro waves. The intensity of a period of Zazen. seems so demanding so exacted the bell rings and you stand up and then ease permeates can we allow that ease can we facilitate that ease in the midst of the flow of consciousness as Joy Harjo tries to speak about in her poem open yourself to the sky to the earth to the sun to the moon to the one whole voice that is you

[25:17]

Tioghako Okamura, translating Jini Samai, says, there's nothing outside the self. The one whole voice, the one whole being, that is you. This spaciousness, that includes anything and everything that rises. So I've been saying, whatever it is, breathe it in. Breath after breath. You know, to parse it, we could say, oh, this is like an antidote to struggling with what arises trying to make it something else seeing it as a separate concept letting it be associated with there and then to breathe it in another aspect another expression of now

[26:51]

beyond that nothing to know for this is the daughter the heart one of the Chinese commentaries says grass and tree mind each thing beyond words just itself the heart of being a very interesting thing happens to us as we start to get close Start to see what a rat we are.

[28:02]

Start to see... Not only is mind insistent on its commentary, on its understanding, on its wish to control, on its associated stories and its feelings. that they are absolutely extraordinary. They're much wilder than we really imagined. The notion of self is so extraordinarily persuasive and important for us that it draws in extraordinary display of response.

[29:07]

We emote in fraction of a second. We associate emotions with anyone and anything we try to They can carry a symbolic significance. We can project. We're wonderful creatures in our capacity. Isn't it amazing? Now when we're fully invested in the world of itself, this is a terrible realization. That's what I really like. How will I ever be happy?

[30:14]

How will I ever be safe, secure? How will life ever be predictable, understandable? If we're looking at the self and we're looking at the way these constructs arise, they are teaching. Even that simple sound can evoke a feeling. All memory can arise from 10 years ago and capture my imagination.

[31:18]

The narrative, communication, conversation can spring up and demand that it express itself so what? it's just what's happening in the moment it's just consciousness being conscious. Breathe it in. Experience it. When we breathe it in, often it starts to reveal how it registers in the body.

[32:37]

as we notice how it registers in the body we receive a different kind of communication about it sometimes it feels like the movement of consciousness is about contracting or expanding, grasping or releasing. Sometimes it can feel like what's being energized or what's being allowed to draw the energy back to now. There's no need to go chasing after these notions or experiences that they reference.

[33:55]

Just stay with the basics. Breathing in. Experiencing, embodying what arises. This is Ardhaya, heart consciousness. and it works beyond thought, below thought. Know that there's more, that you can't see, can't hear, can't know. Maybe in Zen we would say,

[34:58]

You can't see, but seeing can see. You can't hear, but hearing can hear. When there's a construct of itself, it's related to in context of self. When the self loosens up, something more needy is. Can't know. Except in moments steadily growing and in languages that aren't always sound but other circumsumption. See yourselves and know that we must take the utmost care and kindness in all things. You know, yesterday I was talking about reassurance.

[36:05]

As the mind settles, there's less grasping of the agendas of self. And this is reassuring. The skillful way to approach that is with a gentle, patient benevolence towards your own process the human condition as it usually operates causes difficulties and pain it unsettles us in the language of Joy Harju.

[37:11]

The usual beauty of the world is not so accessible. But using this time for more deliberate, steady, patient involvement in the process of self and watching the difference between being inside the self being turned around by his agendas it's working and seeing the self and in that sense in that place experience in the self. This shift, Doving Zenji says, this shift is the transmission of the teachers and ancestors.

[38:20]

This is what we're studying. This is the core. We see it inside that consciousness is lost inside a waking dream, and then we come back. Experience being back. What's the body of it? What's the posture of it? What's the breath of it? From that place of connection, come back to uprightness. Okay. Maybe I've tortured you enough with that. Yeah, hopefully this will add some ease. In my mind, the arguers never stop.

[39:33]

The skeptic and the amazed. The general and the particular in their uneasy relationship. Then the robin sings. Then the bulb of the lily becomes the stalk. The stalk opens into a handkerchief of white light. Oh, what is beauty that I should get up at 4 a.m. trying to arrange this thick song. What is beauty that I should bow down in the fields of the world as though someone, somewhere, may be? But what is beauty that I feel it to be so hot-blooded and suggestive, so filled with imperative beneath the eaves of exchanges, beneath the leaves and the clouds of its thousand and again thousand opportunities.

[40:43]

That mind trip, that mind can pass and let the world speak however it wants to speak. Yes, the request of the machine is formidable. Come out from breakfast and you're up ready for work meeting. Someone told me that that work leader had been a sergeant in the Marines. I watched with a new eye when I heard that. There is in our style of practice a definite request.

[41:55]

It asks something of it, it doesn't. now to get stuck there you just need it as best you can what it's really saying is give yourself to the moment and just like our vow delusions are inexhaustible not about success it's not about conquering it and then we're on easy street it's about seeing the nature of how it is this is the practice see the nature of what's going on and when we start we start with the mind we start with emotions because they are most prevalent and they're also most delicious

[43:21]

they're not the enemy as we shift how we relate they have the teacher oh look at this as we breathe in it as we embody them we see that's how we live experience we embody it in the body and we sit and as it unwinds the body It's amazing. And as the mind unwinds, the mind is amazing. And thankfully, the physical world allows us to stand on it and look at it and touch it and smell it and taste it. And this physicality of being

[44:24]

grounds us vividly. It draws us back into now. It punctuates the narrative of me. Let something become evident. Just let the gathering sign come to its crescendo. And we notice, does the mind have a noun to go with the sign? Does the mind have a story to go with the noun? Does the mind have a few

[45:27]

to go with the sound. As we settle in this machine, we forget where we came from. We forget what's supposed to happen or not happen. And we come alive here. exacting place becomes a new abode.

[46:40]

And as we go through the rigor of giving over to it, it gives time. experience that walking from my room to the bathroom is its own journey we experience that painful story that arises for us it's just asking for compassion It shows us that the person who we're inclined to have a negative judgment abode is just a person living a life.

[47:58]

In this context trying to express the practice as best they can. And when we give in that space, it's more like a thing of beauty. As Mary Oliver would say, a handkerchief of life. Once at one of those famous Renza Shashin's, during the work period, the teacher sent someone to tell me to come to tea right then with them. And when you go to tea, you should bring a gift.

[49:03]

But the person said, come immediately. So I picked a weed. a little flowering weed out of the crack and the stepping stones. We took paper or napkin and folded it up. We sat down and I presented the gift. The teacher took that, examined it very, very carefully, maybe for two minutes, which is a long time, called his assistant and said, water this, keep this fresh, I will take it back and plant it in our garden in Japan. I thought, life is surreal.

[50:09]

Isn't it great that there are moments when it doesn't have to make sense, that we can just frolic in its due? And in some ways, for me, my connection to that teacher blossomed in that moment. We could throw it together, accomplishing nothing. Thank you. 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.

[51:14]

For more information, please visit sfzc.org and click Giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[51:24]

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