This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good morning. I guess I first should confess my own stupidity. I never made it to the top of Hawk Hill, actually. But I was pretty, I made it as far as I could. And then on the way down, I slipped and cut, which then I didn't want to really admit. And so I thought, no, it's only a scratch. Something like that. And later on,

[01:01]

became clear that it would be good to give it some attention and it finally went, as I mentioned, after the Huizhiki mind talks, I got to the emergency room and I waited because there were many people there. So it was 2.30 in the morning before I finally, before I got some attention and the person nurse practitioner who was very good. I think of her as the doc. The doc said, so what, why did you wait so long? I said, well, I guess I didn't take it seriously enough. So she said, well, usually we don't put any stitches in anything after eight hours. But in this case, it really looks like It should. So she put five stitches in it and told me to keep it clean and change the dressing and various things.

[02:06]

So anyway, I feel very lucky, actually. And in the future, I would say to anyone, when you get a scratch, get a second opinion right away. have someone else here take a look at it. Preferably someone who knows what they're looking at, if possible. And be ready to give up your previous plans. And I was kind of stupid about that. But I'm also lucky. I feel like, okay, this is... Presumably, anyway. I don't think there's any infection happening there, but we'll see. So what are we doing?

[03:07]

We're learning how to be human beings, actually. In one of the Dharma talks during session, I stumbled on quoting Pogo, or Walt Kelly's Pogo, and I couldn't remember the whole quote, so now I have it here. There is no need to sally forth, for it remains true that those things which make us human are, curiously enough, always close at hand. Resolve, then, that on this very ground with small flags waving and tinny blasts on tiny trumpets, we shall meet the enemy. And not only may he be ours, he may be us. Forward. So, yes.

[04:16]

What's the remedy when you realize the enemy may be us? Okay. maybe ourselves, or maybe our attachment to ourselves and our delusions about ourselves. So the reason I went up to the city and to Green Gulch was because of Shukai Tokudo. Shukai Tokudo means Tokudo means attaining the way and Shukai means leaving home So leaving home, attaining the way, which is what we call our priest ordination ceremony. And so there were three people at Green Gulch who were taking vows, retaking the bodhisattva vows of priests,

[05:22]

in this lineage. And before they took the vows, they had to get properly dressed. So there's a whole first part of the ceremony is getting more and more fabric. I don't have all those layers on here. But this is the Buddha robe. And it's the Okesa. It comes from India. And then underneath that we have our koromo. This is a smaller version of the koromo which is actually Chinese robe with long sleeves to get in your way. So it's like you have to be an aristocrat, right? You're not doing manual labor with long sleeves.

[06:23]

And then underneath that we have the Japanese kimono. So we have India, China, and Japan in kimono and also jiuwon, Japanese underwear. But then under that, we also have JCPenney T-shirt. So... So we carry, actually, being fully dressed, we have all these layers of teaching, actually, and history and culture that are part of the whole outfit and part of the troublesome solution to being a human being. It's a lot of reminders. And so the people... receiving the robe and bowls and the precepts were Sonia Garden Schwartz, who was at Tassajara for many years.

[07:32]

I don't know. How many years, Leslie? Was she 10, 12 years, I think? Yeah. Before we could pry her loose from Tassajara. She's at Green Gulch now. And Stephen Hale, some of you know Stephen Hale. And Yohan Ostelen. So those are the three newly minted bodhisattva priests. Yeah, and they were fumbling with their... So sweet to see them trying to figure out what to do with all this. Wearing the field that's beyond form and emptiness. And so actually that is the study of the Sandokai. So I wanted to do a little bit different this time.

[08:35]

Instead of just going through one chapter, I'd like to take both talks six and seven. Suzuki Roshi's talks six and seven. He actually mentions the text for number seven in the Sixth talk, anyway. And the next time, do eight and nine. So we're at verse... And also, I wanted to also add a little bit from Shohako Okamura's commentary when I get to that. So we're at... The four elements return to their natures. Just as a child turns to its mother, fire heats, wind moves, water wets, earth is solid. So that's starting with verse 17. And already I have some question here. Four elements, Suzuki Roshi's translation is the four elements resume their nature as a child.

[09:45]

turns to its mother, or as a child has its mother. Fire is hot, wind blows, water wets, earth is solid. So it may be helpful to point out that there's a whole big discussion going on right in here, actually. But it's also talking about our own body, our own experience. These are the elements of our own bodies. So I want to kind of skip Suzuki Roshi's first few paragraphs. He does talk about elements, talks about the idea of having what's the smallest unit. But then he says, this is on page 86, it says, it looks as if we're talking about matter, but these elements are not just matter.

[10:56]

They are both spirit and matter. Thinking mind is included. Accordingly, emptiness includes both matter and spirit, both mind and object, both the subjective world and the objective world. Emptiness includes is the final being which our thinking mind cannot reach. And then the next paragraph is where things I think get interesting. Each of the four elements then resumes its own nature, that is, comes to emptiness, just as a child turns to its mother. without the mother there's no child, that the child is here means the mother is here. That emptiness is here means that the four elements are here. And even though the four elements are here, they are nothing but a momentary formation of the final emptiness.

[11:59]

So there's two ways here that he expresses. He says the four elements resume, each of the four elements resumes its own nature which is emptiness as a child turns to its mother. So that's one. It looks like there's separation there. It looks like there's child, mother as separate. It looks like there's elements in emptiness and that there's some sense of elements having to return to their true nature and emptiness. But then in the next statement he says that the child is here means the mother is here. That emptiness is here means that the elements are here. And so that means there's no separation. There's the identity that the element and its nature are one and the same.

[13:04]

So... So I want to depart a little bit from Suzuki Roshi for a minute. In Chohaka Okamura's Living by Bao book, he has some commentary also on Sandokai. In this section, Well, maybe I should read the rest of it too. It says, fire heats, wind moves, water wets, earth is solid, eye and form, ear and sound, nose and smell, tongue and taste. Thus in all things the leaves spread from the root. The whole process must return to the source. Again, there's this idea of returning to the source. And trunk and branches share the essence.

[14:09]

revered in common, each has its speech. I want to come back to that line in a little bit too. But this is this matter of returning to the source, like a child turning to its mother, returning to the source. He's talking about that this is using a Taoist language. And so there's a quote here that Shohaku takes from the Stephen Mitchell translation of the Tao Te Ching from Lao Tzu, which goes like this. Return is the movement of the Tao. Yielding is the way of the Tao. All things are born of being. Being born of non-being. Being is born of non-being.

[15:12]

The Tao is nowhere to be found, yet it nourishes and completes all things. The Tao gives birth to one. One gives birth to two. Two gives birth to three. Three gives birth to all things. So that's the quote from the Tao Te Ching. And then Shohaku Kumar says, unlike the Chinese, Indian Buddhists didn't believe that emptiness is the source of form. They believed that form is emptiness, and emptiness is form, but not that emptiness is the source of form. In this poem, The Sound of Kai, Shohaku says, we can see a mixture of Indian and Chinese philosophy. Some modern Buddhist scholars conclude that because Zen is a mixture of Chinese and Indian thought, it is not true Buddhism.

[16:15]

But isn't it more complex than that? Suzuki Roshi talks about our way as being the undivided original way. The same way as Shakyamuni Buddha and all of the Indian ancestors... But we find different expressions. We find different expressions of this. Shohaku goes on to say, we can think of Chinese Buddhism as Chinese culture influenced by Buddhism. We can look at it or we can look at it as Buddhism influenced by Chinese culture. Similarly, we can think of American Buddhism as American culture influenced by Buddhism or as Buddhism influenced by American culture. we need to find, in the end, we need to find our own expression of dharma, of reality. Then Shohaka also quotes Nagarjuna.

[17:18]

This is the, which I'll also throw into the mix here. This is the Inada translation of the section, chapter 24, from the Mula Midyamaka Karakas. which we studied here a couple of years ago, Nagarjuna's saying, and this is, we won't go into it in great detail, but just to understand, says that the teaching of Dharma by various Buddhas is based on two truths, namely the relative, worldly truth, and the absolute, Supreme Truth. Those who do not know the distinction between the two truths cannot understand the profound nature of the Buddha's teaching. Without relying on everyday common practice, that is, relative truths, the Absolute Truth cannot be expressed.

[18:21]

Without approaching the Absolute Truth, nirvana cannot be attained. We declare that whatever is relational origination is sunyata, emptiness. It is a provisional name for the mutuality of being. And indeed, it is the middle path. So this is like the declaration of the middle way of the Madhyamaka school. of Nagarjuna, who is also one of our ancestors. So he has his way of saying that what is relational is identical with emptiness. We declare that whatever is relational origination is sunyata, is emptiness. So this is part of what Chohak was saying when he says Indian Buddhists did not say that

[19:28]

phenomena come from the Tao, or from the Tao as his source. That's a Chinese expression. But the Chinese are working with some way of conveying, so Sekito Kisen here is working with some way of conveying this profound teaching in his poem, Sandokai. So, Shohaku then It concludes here by saying, When we read Sandokaya as a Buddhist text, we need to understand it from a Buddhist rather than Taoist perspective. Forms are not derived from emptiness. Unity does not give birth to difference. Five fingers are not born from one hand. Rather, one hand and five fingers are exactly the same. Sometimes we say one, sometimes we say five. one hand, five fingers.

[20:30]

Exactly the same thing. But sometimes we point out fingers, and sometimes we point out hand. So then, with that, Suzuki Roshi is working with this same kind of problem of how to express this. And so on page 87, he comes up with the word, independency. Independency. A new word. Someone asked him about it. He said, he made it up, right? He said, he was always working with English dictionaries trying to find a way to express Buddhist understanding. So he's saying, these lines, the trunk and branches share the essence. Revered in common, each has its speech. These lines express what I call independency.

[21:32]

Each one of you is independent, but you are related to each other. Even though you are related to each other, you are independent. You can say it both ways. Do you understand? So, Buddhists understand... usually we say independent with no idea of dependent but that is not a Buddhist understanding of reality we always try to understand things completely so we will not be mixed up we should not be confused by dependence or independence if someone says everything is independent we say okay if someone else says things are interrelated That is also true. Whichever you say is okay.

[22:34]

But if someone sticks to the idea of independence only, we will say, no, you are wrong. There are many koans like this, for example. And then he goes into this koan from Shoyoroku case number 30, Dasui's Ionic Fire. And he says it like this, if the final karmic fire burns everything up, at that time, will the Buddha nature exist? Sometimes the teacher will answer, yes, it will exist. Sometimes the teacher will answer, no, it will not exist. Both are true. Someone may ask him, then why did you say it will exist? That person will get a big slap. What are you thinking about? Don't you understand? Don't you understand what I mean?

[23:37]

That Buddha nature will not exist is right and that it will exist is also right. Do you understand? From the viewpoint of independency, everything exists with Buddha nature no matter what happens to this world. But even so, nothing exists when seen from the viewpoint of utter darkness or the absolute. That which exists is nothingness or darkness. And then I think he should have stopped there, but he continues, right? In which the many things exist as one. Many things exist, but there is nothing you can say, nothing you can see or say about that. There is no way to understand things by explaining them individually. That's just an intellectual description.

[24:39]

We must have an actual feeling of it as well. And then this next paragraph is a quote that I used in the Thanksgiving ceremony statement. If you can just appreciate each thing one by one... then you will have pure gratitude. Even though you observe just one flower, that one flower includes everything. It is not just a flower. It is the Absolute. It is Buddha himself. We see it in that way. But at the same time, that which exists is just a flower. and there is no one to see it and nothing to be seen. That is the feeling we should have in our practice, in our everyday activity. Then, whatever work you do, you will have a continuous feeling of pure gratitude.

[25:43]

A continuous feeling of pure gratitude. So coming back to my confession at the beginning, if I appreciated this conversation, cut in my hand with pure gratitude. So I have to confess there was a moment or a while I didn't appreciate it with pure gratitude. So I'm ashamed of myself for not appreciating it with pure gratitude. So because of that, then I didn't take good care of it. So there's good, so this is, regarding each thing with pure gratitude, is this feeling that includes both the oneness of things and the individuality of things.

[26:51]

This is a feeling of independency that he's talking about. Then he goes on to say, this understanding is improved, or he says should be, but this understanding is improved day by day by our pure and non-dual thinking. This is improved or realized by our practice. This is realized by our practice day by day. We say, you cannot catch a fish in the same place twice. Or we have the saying, notch the rail of the boat in order to mark our location. This is also like saying, well, if you're in the boat and somebody drops their diamond bracelet overboard, then we say, yeah, you better quick

[27:56]

file a little notch in the boat, rail, so then we can come back and dive right there and find it, right? So that's a mistake, you know, it seems so silly, but that's, we're catching ourselves, if we pay attention, we're catching ourselves doing that, you know. People have some remarkable experience in Zazen and think, oh, I want to mark that, you know. I want to get back to that. And then the other, and then he says the Chinese story of the hunter who sees a rabbit. The hunter hunting and he's walking along and the rabbit jumps up, leaps out, crashes into a stump and drops. And all the hunter has to do is pick up the rabbit, right? So then the hundred comes back the next day and waits by the stump for the next rabbit to come and run into it.

[29:04]

That really worked, right? So, he says, this is very foolish. What it really means is we should appreciate what we see right now. Oh, beautiful flower. Oh, beautiful rabbit. So there's some good questions in discussion here in this tube. So I wanted to, before we open it up here, look a little bit more. Someone, so he says, the question is... If we understand our closeness, our dependence on things, then we are independent. Are we independent even if we don't understand this? Suzuki Roshi says, it's so, but the point is you don't feel that way, so you don't have the understanding.

[30:12]

Even though you don't have a really close feeling toward others, if you know this fact even intellectually, you will not make too big a mistake. Or you will not stick to one side, so you will not be so arrogant. There's something very important here. He says, when I talk this way, he says, I'm talking about things as if I am a completely enlightened person. For an enlightened person, this is true. But for people who are not enlightened, this is just talk. When our practice follows this understanding, That is true Buddhism. Our practice should not be just intellectual. Even if you practice hard, without this kind of understanding, your practice doesn't make much sense. It will still be involved in the idea of somethingness. And then the person asks, quoting what he just said about an enlightened person, is very true, and a non-enlightened person is just talk.

[31:20]

And Suzuki Roshi says, What's missing? Practice is missing. Practice is missing. And then he uses the image of it's difficult. He says it's difficult because we easily stick to something emotionally. So now I'm at the top of page 91. He says it's easy to understand nothingness. It's easy to destroy an intellectual understanding. But to deal with emotional difficulty. is as hard as splitting a lotus in two. I don't know how many gardeners here have tried to split lotus, the whole plant. He says, long strings, splitting a lotus in two, long strings will follow and you cannot get rid of them. The strings remain. So the more you try to piece it apart, the more you get... you get this whole big tangle of roots and fibers.

[32:24]

He says, with intellectual difficulty, it's as easy as breaking a stone in two. May not be so easy, but crack, you know. Splits in two. But with the clinging of emotions, this is very difficult, actually. Difficult to have. It may not be so difficult to understand intellectually, but difficult to actually live this true way. Well, maybe one more question and answer. The question is about someone hurting another and getting upset emotionally. And then the questioner tries again and says, if a person really sees things clearly, is there no situation that would upset him emotionally?

[33:35]

So this is really, you know, an enlightened person. Does an enlightened person get upset emotionally? Suzuki Roshi says, upset? I don't think so. But affected, yes. There's a big difference between the two. A Buddha may be upset quite easily in the sense of being deeply affected. But when upset, it's not because of attachments. Sometimes Buddha will be very angry. Anger is allowed when it is Buddha's anger. But that anger is not the same as the anger we usually have. If a Buddha is not upset when he should be upset, that is also a violation of the precepts. When Buddha needs to be angry, he must be angry.

[34:37]

That is characteristic of the Mahayana way. We say sometimes anger is like a sunset. even though it looks like anger it is actually a beautiful red sunset if anger comes from pure mind from purity like a lotus it is good so maybe we pause here for a minute and see if everything here is clear yes anger without attachment That's what Sukiyoshi's saying. Buddha's anger is being deeply affected. So if something is really being harmed, someone's really being harmed, the feeling that may come up may be anger as possible. So that's one.

[35:43]

So kind of energy that's coming up may be understood as anger. It may be expressed. It may be expressed as anger. Don't do that. Another example would be you're sitting. So you're sitting. You're simply sitting. Anger arises. This is Buddha's anger. Anger is arising. This is all Buddha's mind. You're not doing anything. You're just sitting. Whatever arises is Buddha's mind. So we don't try to get rid of it. We don't try to turn it and deny what it is. It's the anger. Okay? That's another kind of example.

[36:50]

Yes. seems to me like what I was always taught as a martial artist was when you find yourself in a difficult situation, when you lose that cool, when anger arises and you react to that, that's when the mind's not connected with the body and there's no appropriate response can manifest. But then when mind and body are one, anger doesn't, you're being attacked by your family's something's being done that's wrong eventually, and there's no label to that this person has to obsess me.

[38:04]

It's just a response, an appropriate response to that. It seems like anger would get in the way of an appropriate response. And I understand seeing anger arrive, that's just what comes from now, but I wonder how that relates to a person coming from that awakening, holding my is a bodhisattva wanting to react to respond appropriately and how that actually fits in to how anger fits in. Anger may be present, but then how can an appropriate response come from that? And how can any anger not be from self-clicking? So I think, yeah, you answered it at the end. The anger that doesn't come from self-clinging is Buddha's anger. So it's not usual anger that's coming from, he's talking here about, that's coming from emotional attachment.

[39:13]

Usual anger is coming from attachment. So it's not, so we're talking about something that is beyond Thinking. If that helps you understand, yeah. Yeah. And... But the key there is, is it coming from attachment? Or is it coming from self-clinging? Or not? It sounds like that's exactly what was the point of can you see clearly?

[40:15]

Can you see clearly? Or are you involved in the screen distortion? And we're always involved at some level. Even the most so-called enlightened person has to keep checking, you know, where is this coming from? Is this coming from attachment? So you have to be willing to be angry, actually. He's saying, yeah, actually a Buddha is willing to be angry. It's not abiding in some kind of idealized state, we might think of some idealized state. So that may be the difference with pure martial artist and a bodhisattva.

[41:17]

Also willing to be angry. So this is something you can't actually quite, you can't define. There are a couple other hands up. So I'll go there and then here and here. Yes. Is there a relationship of independence between my fingers and my hands? Yeah, independency. Independency. Independent dependence. Independency. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks for asking. Yeah. Show again. Probably not.

[42:24]

Probably some attachment. Attachment is also Buddha's mind. Attachment. Buddha's mind. But we're saying independency is both. It's not either. It's not separating one from the other. So even though we say, oh, Attachment is this, and non-attachment is this. Both are Buddha's mind. So to say, independency is to go beyond thinking that it's one or the side or the other. So this is some effort to convey some feeling. It's not intellectual, but it is being willing to be fully present no matter what. not thinking that you can somehow escape being a human being.

[43:32]

Is there a difference between being deeply affected and compassion? Maybe that's what's meant by compassion. Being deeply affected. Because We say that dharma has two sides. One way of saying is there's wisdom and compassion. And wisdom is to see things like one, empty. And compassion is to see relations. Oh, this finger is friends with this finger. And seeing that we're connected. So that's compassion. So I think in the next step, chapter or our next talk, we'll get into that a little bit more. Yeah. Rachel? This is a lingering question that your hand reminded me of when you were talking about your stitches. From what I understand so much of the thinking and calculation part of this

[44:51]

study comes from stories and examining our lives. But I often wonder if we start to have a tendency to moralize everything. When there are pros and cons that you administer for that, if it's more or less appropriate and how we know when we should be moralizing something and when it's like Yeah, it's something always to pay close attention to, you know. Are we notching the rail of the boat? So sometimes that's... Sometimes that's some effort that is actually kind of an escape, trying to get away from the reality that we need to keep addressing.

[46:14]

Was it Thomas Wolfe, the book You Can't Go Home Again? So you can't go home again. So you say shukai tokudo is home leaving. But actually you can never go home again. If you think that home is some place in your memory. So you can't go there. So sometimes what you're just referring to is maybe moralizing or making some teaching out of it. Some idea or trying to get some comfort. rather than saying, ouch, and going forward. So it's good to be paying attention to that tendency. Maybe we should go to the next talk.

[47:25]

Seventh talk. without any idea of attainment, because it's also talking about that. Wanting to have some teaching is also wanting to have some attainment. You know, having something I can hold on to. So in this talk, Suzuki Roshi says again, he says, in my last talk, so on page 97, in my last lecture I explained the meaning of the independency of everything. Although things are interdependent with respect to each other at the same time, each being is independent. Sekito was talking about the nature of reality at a time when most people, forgetting all about this, were judging which school of Zen was right or wrong. That's why Sekito Zenji wrote this poem. Here he's talking about reality from the viewpoint of independency.

[48:27]

and then talks about the southern school and the northern school. But... So it looks as if... The next page, 98, says, Eye and sight, ear and sound, nose and smell, tongue and taste, it looks as if Sekito is talking dualistically about the dependency of eyes on their objects, But when you see something, if you see it in its true sense, there is nothing to be seen and no one to see it. I see something, but really there is no one seeing it and nothing to be seen. Both of these are true. So Sekito is talking about this oneness of I and form. That's how Buddhists observe things. We understand things in a dualistic way, but we don't forget that our understanding is dualistic. So that's it.

[49:31]

Of course, we're always forgetting. We're always forgetting that our understanding is dualistic. So that's why we have this practice to continue to be recalling that our understanding is dualistic and we need to also see that things are not the way we imagine them or believe them to be. There's a discussion in here about killing things, which came up before about the person hitting a spider with the one hitting the mokugyo, and then he got into talking about earwigs. Has anyone seen an earwig lately? Not lately, huh?

[50:32]

We used to have a lot of earwigs. I don't know. I don't see this. Huh? I think here and at the Great Gulf, they get into little tubes of things. Interesting. At one time, anyway, there were earwig issues. He says, this is at Tassajara, when he says, there are many earwigs here. And they are harmful. So when you think there are many earwigs here, they're harmful, I have to kill this one, then you're understanding things only in a dualistic way. Actually, earwigs and human beings are one. They are not different. It is impossible to kill an earwig. Even though we think we've killed it, we have not. Even though you squash the earwig, it is still alive. That momentary form may vanish, but as long as the whole world, including us, exists, we cannot kill an earwig. So be careful.

[51:33]

Then later he says, to kill an animal, excusing your action through some reasoning is not our way. Actually, when you kill an animal, you don't feel so good. That is also included in our understanding. So sticking to one idea or not is what he's saying. The way to observe precepts is to have complete this page 100 now is to have a complete understanding of reality. That is how you don't kill. You may think that if there are precepts you should observe them literally or else you cannot be Buddhist. But if you feel good just because you observe some precepts that is not the way. To feel sorry when we kill an animal, is included in our precepts. Everyone is involved in this kind of activity, but the way we do it and the feeling we have may not be the same for everyone. One person has no idea of precepts. Another is trying to make himself feel good through religious activity or by observing precepts.

[52:41]

That is not the Buddhist way. And then he comes to compassion. He says, the Buddhist way is, in one word, jihi, Compassion. Compassion means to encourage people when they are feeling positive and also help them get rid of their suffering. That is true love. It is not just to give something or receive something or to observe precepts. We practice our way with things as they naturally occur. Going with people, suffering with them, helping relieve their suffering. encouraging them to go on and on. This is how we observe the precepts. We see something, something, but we do not see something. We always feel the oneness of the subjective and objective worlds. When we practice in this way, we are independent.

[53:48]

And he says a little bit more about that on page 102. He tells the story of the monks carrying a woman across the river. I think probably everyone knows that story. When you are involved in the dualistic sense of precepts, man and woman, monk and layman, that is violating the precepts and is a poor understanding of Buddha's teaching. Without any idea of attainment, without any idea of doing anything, without any idea of meaningful practice, just to sit is our way. So that's the statement that was kind of extracted and taken for the summary of this whole talk. Without any idea of attainment, without any idea of doing anything, without any idea of meaningful practice even, Just to sit is our way. To be completely involved in sitting meditation is our Zazam.

[54:59]

And this is how we observe our precepts. Sometimes we will be angry. Sometimes we will smile. Sometimes we will be mad at our friend. And sometimes we will give them a kind word. But actually what we are doing is just observing our way. I cannot explain it so well. But I think you must understand what I mean. Do you all understand what he means with his poor explanation and mine? Any other questions or comments? Yes. Ken, as you know, studies with Shodo Harada. Ken is a Soto priest. And he asked Parada Roshi for a koan thing. And Harada Roshi said, you can completely burn yourself up.

[56:03]

And another comment, he was talking to Ken about his specific state of mind in Sashim. And he said, you can let go of everything, but you should keep some anger. You're going to need that. Not you can, but one needs that. Don't let go of anger. Yeah, it may be useful to keep, until you actually can see it and burn it up completely, you need to keep something. It's a little like charcoal or compost, you know, when you take wood and you kind of reduce it down to charcoal. Or you put something in the compost, And it's continuing to be nourishing, and so it's not helpful to try to rush it. So I actually have a few places in my body that I'm kind of particularly watching something that is nourishing.

[57:17]

It's something that has some feeling of needing more attention or needing more study. So not to dismiss anything prematurely. Yeah. You don't understand what? Why would you split a lotus anyhow? Does anyone have an idea why you'd split a lotus? I would split a lotus to propagate if I want to propagate lotuses.

[58:30]

How to... Yeah. To see what's inside. To see what's inside the emotion. To see what's inside the lotus. He's not saying... He's not really talking about why to propagate lotus so much. But, of course, people do have the experience of trying to separate fibrous roots. And to sort out what happens with emotional entanglement and attachment... is reminiscent of that. So the question is not so much why to split a lotus, but why to investigate emotion? Why understand what is the way in which one is believing in some delusion? Because our beliefs and our delusions, it's the belief and our delusions that then contributes to the emotion of anger.

[59:37]

Does that make sense? Kind of. But then we were also talking about how a little bit of anger is good. Well, a lot of it. It's immeasurable. It's a lot or a little. It's not a matter of a lot or a little. It's a matter. It's a matter of... I mean, that's just one example to keep a little. But the anger, as it is, is good. As it shows up. Then, can you see it? Can you actually see? And that means see with all of your senses. Can you actually continue to be present? So seeing it means to be completely present with it. To be present with it means to be fully participating with the anger.

[60:37]

You can't understand it unless you're willing to be right there in anger, in the experience of it. So this is a fundamental practice of seeing things as it is. So that's why we, because we really want to see things as it is, we're willing to be right there in the tangle of the anger without getting tangled up in anger. Yeah, thanks for that. Right now I'm just listening to my own body and it feels like I need to do this for a little while.

[61:55]

Yeah. Grant? You're always, I think that should be the kind of the attitude of practice. Being willing to burn up completely, do whatever you whatever you're doing completely. And so it's like the Dasui's Ayonic Fire. Is there anything left? So burned up completely? You think, oh, no, nothing left. Burned up completely? Yes. Yes, Buddha mind.

[62:58]

It's still there. He's talking about the same thing. This is in Ganjo Koan actualizing the fundamental point which is going beyond going beyond this distinction, right? Going beyond this distinction means that you have no problem with this distinction. You have no problem with relationship. It doesn't mean you don't have difficulty. It just means that it's fundamentally not a problem. In the moment of separation and meeting something that's

[63:59]

just what it is. In the moment of seeing that, oh, there's nothing there, that's also what it is. So meeting it, this feeling of intimacy is just being willing to meet completely. So, it's, yeah, Gengel Cohen's talking about the same thing. When there's Buddhas, And enlightenment, there's birth and there's death. Yeah, there's birth and there's death. You have to be willing to die. You have to be willing to be born. Both of these are actions of simply being present. Completely generous. What? Yes? What? and it just seemed in my experience anger is very sticky and I'm not it just seems to me to try to see it with all of my senses would possibly just cause more bound up in anger I don't understand how that

[65:26]

yeah as soon as you're bound up with anger that's say the entanglement of myself as if myself and anger are separate So, yeah, it's kind of tricky. It may be very confusing. And with Zazen, though, it's pretty safe. Pretty safe to sit there and be completely angry. But then...

[66:32]

You're not acting on it, you're not expressing it, you're not doing anything except experiencing it. So it's not happening with someone else. The delusion is that there's someone else. The delusion is, oh, that there's someone to be angry at. Of course, that's the nature of anger, is to be believing there's someone else. But to completely devote yourself to experiencing the sensation of anger is to know that there's no one else. It's just this experience. So you have to be careful with it.

[67:37]

If you think there's someone else, then pretty soon you're getting... You're right, it's very sticky. It's quite compelling. It's like it's inviting me to believe there's someone else. It's inviting me to believe there's something to be angry at. But that's a dualistic view, of course. And so in Zazen... If we say shikantaza is just purely sitting, there's no one else. It's just zazen doing zazen. So we have to keep working with that tendency to believe, oh, there's something there. It's so real. It seems so real. Our world of all of the independent... separated beings seem so real. And, of course, on that side it is.

[68:40]

We're living in that. So we can't just erase it away. We actually have to suffer our own delusions. We actually have to suffer our own karma. We can't just wipe it away. That would be just creating more karma. The idea, oh, I can erase this. I can't erase it. I actually have to fully, [...] fully feel what this is. So this may be, the word burning up may be exactly what it feels like. But it also may feel like I have to be willing to die because I think that I'm here and it's there. And if I let that come If I actually let that be me, then I'm losing my identity, right? My identity is defined by this separation. So actually, sometimes we say, you know, in Zen practice, you die on your cushion, you know?

[69:50]

And it really is that point of, do I have confidence enough to stay here while... This whole identity and this sense of this other dissolves. So this is a profound realization. It's not something that is so easy. It really is. It's like really in the muck. You're really in the muck. Splitting the roots of the lotus is in the muck. So, Lisa, you had your hand up, and then I'll go back over here. No? That was a delusion I had. Okay. Cecilia. Yeah, but it was that, that you just said, that Haragato came, that he should, he will burn, he will burn.

[70:55]

In Shikantaza. Yeah, in Shikantaza. It's that you need to the idea of two. Because you are one. And you save it. Yeah. But you can't eliminate the idea of two by trying to figure out or by trying to eliminate it. Because that's investing more energy into two. So the practice of our practice is to be willing to be right there with the two. with the sense of opposition, the sense of resistance, the sense that there is something there that is a big problem, big difficulty. So there are other hands. I think, Brian, you had your hand up. Yeah, you said something about just a few moments ago about having the confidence to show up regardless of what's there and be there.

[72:00]

Mm-hmm. And I'm wondering, confidence in what? And how do you know if your confidence... I mean, is there not a danger that your confidence has an element of control? Yeah, there's a danger, of course. So that's an investigation. Am I confident in something? Because the confidence I'm talking about is confidence beyond something. So, yeah, that... If there's some notion of there's something that I have some leverage, even a little bit, you know, that's not true faith or true confidence. So giving up anything that I'm dependent on. In the Prajnaparamita literature over and over again, it says bodhisattvas don't depend on anything. don't depend on anything so this is this is confidence and it really is being willing to to trust that whatever it is that's that's giving me this whole moment of awareness whatever that is which I can't say you know how this happens

[73:32]

How does this moment of awareness happen? Whatever this is, it's already supporting me. There's so many billions of elements that are contributing to this moment of existence. Billions isn't enough. Trillions. Gazillions. It's very funny to think that we have much control. And yet, we have this little... We have a chance to be aware. We do have a chance to wake up. And we know it because we can notice ourselves closing down. We can notice ourselves wanting to grasp onto something and believe something. We can notice that. And so when we notice that... And we can refrain from that very tantalizing impulse just to do that.

[74:35]

We can actually stop right there where that desire kicks in, wanting to control something. Right there, we have this wonderful chance to just wake up to things as it is. So this is a deep investigation, deep investigation of the desires that we already have and all the things that we have adopted, sometimes very casually and sometimes because of our fear, our profound fears, we've adopted things that we're holding on to. So to deeply investigate, what's the fear behind that? And to face that, this is letting it all burn up.

[75:43]

It's already burning up. Buddha did a whole talk on, you know, everything's on fire. You just usually don't realize that everything is burning. It's already gone, in fact. All the things that you think are so substantial are already gone. Maybe one more, and then Caitlin. I wonder if to experience an emotion fully, whether it's anger or something else, is it important to acknowledge the two before you experience the one? Would you ask that again? experiencing any emotion wholly is to first acknowledge that there is a Jew or sort of moving to a place where it is.

[76:59]

You actually can't move. To experience it is already experiencing other. Anything I can experience is already dualistic. It's always experiencing other. I can't experience anything other than other. Okay? It's always experiencing other. So, not turning away from that, other. So this is the The koan, you know, or the student asks the teacher, what happens when a thousand things are coming at me, you know? What, ten thousand things are coming at me. What do I do? And the teacher says, don't try to control them.

[78:03]

Be completely still. Right there. Ten thousand things are coming at me. Be completely still. So it's like other. multiplied by 10,000. This practice is to not try to control all that, or even one little bit of it, but to be completely still. So this is not turning away from other, and at some point this is realizing there's no separation of this experience that I think is my experience, but there is no other There's no self and there's no other. But it's just the experience. Does that make sense? So the experience of no other actually includes other in it? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There isn't any other.

[79:06]

There isn't. Yeah. So it's, you know, Probably everyone wants to have the experience of no other. Isn't that wonderful? To have the experience of no other. And the experience of no other is the experience of other. That's it. Don't move. Don't try to think, oh, some other experience. Okay? Thank you for engaging in this study. And it is always pointing to our practice. 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.

[80:08]

For more information, visit sfcc.org and click giving.

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