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. Well, to have this presented as part two, I wonder what the connection is between yesterday and today. Me. Well, one connection is that between... ethics yesterday and various practices of attention that we do in Buddhism, meditation and mindfulness and concentration, is that my own appreciation of ethics and sila clearly arose out of doing my practice. I had no particular interest in ethics when I first came to my practice, to Zen practice. And if someone, you know, It told me that the whole purpose of doing Zen practices has become more ethical.

[01:04]

I don't know. I would have gone and done something else. That wasn't so interesting. But in fact, it's one of the big surprises. Also one of the great precious treasures was the degree to which a sense of virtue or ethics or integrity was born through the practices I was doing. And from that, greater interest in ethics, not because it was a should, an obligation, but rather it was kind of the expression of what was unfolding through the practice. So what I'd like to do is to talk to you a little bit about... Can people hear me okay? A little bit about the earliest uses of meanings of the word sati. The word sati is the... Pali, a word in Sanskrit is smirti, and it's the word that's translated usually into English as mindfulness.

[02:06]

And as I think many of you know, mindfulness has become a very popular term, not only in Buddhism, but in the last couple of decades, but also in our secular culture and the secular applications of Buddhism is taking a big way through the field of mindfulness. It started with the work of John Kabat-Zinn, primarily. In 1979, he was sitting a long retreat, and in a ten-second period of time, he had this flash of inspiration to bring the mindfulness practice he was learning on the Buddhist retreat into a hospital clinical setting. And those ten seconds spawned a whole large... movement, multifaceted movement that's become extremely popular, bringing mindfulness, it's called mindfulness-based stress reduction, into hospitals, school, and it spawned kind of a mindfulness in schools movement, in cognitive therapy, many different areas.

[03:16]

He's had a huge impact. Those 10 seconds had a huge impact on our society. And the way that mindfulness has come into our wider secular society, many people engage in mindfulness without knowing it has its Buddhist roots. And some of the definitions of what mindfulness means, how it's described, defined, in the secular applications of it, are somewhat unique. And some of them, we won't recognize some of the definitions in the Buddhist terminology. Also in... I saw that, you know, when I was a student here at Zen Center, primarily in the 1970s and 1980s, in the ancient world. And in that ancient world, I've kind of stretched my mind as much as I can, my memory, to try to remember how often people used the word mindfulness back then. And I can't remember it being used ever.

[04:18]

It must have been used occasionally. But that wasn't part of the understanding of practice, wasn't through the filter of mindfulness. I went back and saw what Suzuki Roshi had to say about mindfulness in Zen mind, beginner's mind, and he does mention the word, but his definition of it I didn't recognize as anything that I'd heard in the mindfulness tradition I practice in, in Thailand and Burma. It's a very nice definition, but I think it means something different than what it has come to mean in other places. Suzuki Roshi defines it as readiness of mind. And it's a little bit different because usually mindfulness means knowing what's happening in the present moment, not just being ready for anything, just being open, kind of open. I think that the term mindfulness began to creep in into the kind of Buddhist scene first through Thich Nhat Hanh. He had an influential book called Miracle of Mindfulness. It was published, I think, in the late 60s, but it didn't really, I think, kind of take hold until the 1980s and start having some effect.

[05:21]

And then Jack Kornfield, Joseph Goldstein, started also having a bigger and bigger impact. And this whole Vipassana movement in America has become quite popular. And I think that has had a big indirect effect also to have increased the amount of interest in mindfulness in the Zen scene. And now I suspect, I'm not around Zen Center that much, but I suspect that the word mindfulness now is used much more frequently now than when I was a student here. So maybe some of you will tell me that, you know, I'm curious how often it's used in the vocabulary and the discussion here about practice. So the word, the ancient word is sati. And... there is the most important discourse in the Buddha for the mindfulness tradition, the whole Vipassana tradition, is a discourse called the Satipatthana Sutta, usually translated into English as the Four Foundations of Mindfulness.

[06:27]

So this is the text for mindfulness practice, core text. If you go through the text, to see what it tells you to do, what's a practice actually to do, nowhere in that text does it use the word mindfulness as an activity that you're supposed to be doing, as a practice you're supposed to be doing. So isn't that surprising? The text that's supposed to tell us how to practice mindfulness doesn't tell us anything about that. So if you go through all the suttas of the Buddha, the word sati appears regularly enough, but nowhere is it an activity that we do. Nowhere are we told, now, direct your sati on your breathing, direct your sati to your body, direct your sati to notice certain things.

[07:38]

The way that we would say often in English, direct your mindfulness to know your breathing if you're doing breath meditation. Direct your mindfulness to the work you're doing and notice your hands cutting the vegetables. Be mindful of what's going on there. My mother telling me, be mindful of walking into the house with your muddy shoes. Why aren't you more mindful? Why aren't you paying more attention? Focus on something. So generally, many times people use the word mindfulness as a directedness or application of attention towards something. So nowhere in the ancient discourse of the Buddha does mindfulness present in that way. The word sati is not presented that way. So if you go and look at how... Nowhere is sati really defined, which is nice. because maybe what it is in a narrow definition misses the point.

[08:41]

The way we understand sati and much of the teachings of the Buddha is functionally for how it functions and what it leads to in our practice. And so you have to look at the functional definition of it, the context in which things occur, to understand how it's supposed to work. And so there are... a number of verbs connected to the word sati. So to help us understand what sati is, we look at what verbs are connected, what activities that are connected to the word sati. And one of the most, probably the most common word connected to sati verb is to abide, to abide in. One abides in sati or dwells in sati. Probably the closest to a popular colloquial English phrase or word for this would be one rests in sati.

[09:43]

So sati is something we can abide in. Another very common word connected to sati is to enter into. So sati is something we enter into. It's not something we do. It's something we enter into. So enter and abide into. A place where you see these same verbs being used, enter and abide in, has to do with concentration practice. To practice what's called the jhanas, the absorptions, one enters into these absorptive concentration states and one abides in them, one rests in them. It's the same kind of word. And as it has come down to us through the Theravadan tradition, I don't know if you know this, but as the Theravadan tradition developed, they bifurcated, separated the path of mindfulness from the path of concentration. And so the idea that if you would practice mindfulness, you're not doing concentration.

[10:49]

If you practice concentration, you're not doing mindfulness. In the earliest discourses of the Buddha, these weren't separated. In fact... probably the most common place where the word sati appears in the early Buddhist discourses is in descriptions of what's present in the third and fourth jhana. So sati is present in the third jhana, sati is present in the fourth jhana, these absorptions. And so one enters and abides in a state that's connected to, that has an element of sati as part of it. two more verbs connected to the word sati. It's the word cultivate. In the suttas it says sati is something we cultivate and that can seem like an active verb. That's something you do. However, it's like a gardener, a farmer who's growing a plant.

[11:51]

We say the farmer cultivates the plant, grows the plant, but the farmer is not growing the plant. the farmer creates the conditions and the plant grows itself, right? The farmer's not out there yanking and pulling it, you know, they can get longer. It's, you know, you create the conditions for the plant to grow. So when we say that mindfulness is cultivated, it's the same thing. We create the conditions for something, not, sorry, sati to grow. We can create the conditions for sati and then sati can grow, but we don't actually, you know, actively, intentionally create, you know, the growing. And then the fourth verb connected to sati and the suttas is the verb to establish. And to establish, when I've taught this before, I've asked people, how do you establish sati?

[12:56]

I use the word mindfulness. Then how do you establish mindfulness? And the most common response I get from people is you allow for it. You relax and let go of what interferes with it. You surrender to it. That's what people mostly say or ask, as opposed to you kind of gear up and get really tough and strong and try to apply yourself and do something. It's more something like you let go of. And in the letting go of, the sati, the mindfulness, is there. So what we see from this discussion is that sati is not something that we do, but it's more like what in English we say, it's what we be, what we are. So we say in English, in America at least, the difference between being and doing, and because some people are neurotic doers, it's so helpful to do a practice of just being.

[13:57]

Sati is closer to being than to active, intentional doing, you know, activity. So Sati is more what we are. I had a discussion, some of you have read the book Satipatthana by a monk named Annalio. I think Paul maybe has used it for practice periods. So I had a discussion with him a few weeks ago about the Sati in the texts and what I was finding and And he was happy to hear all this, and he said, yes. He said, yes, sati is something we are. It's not something we do. Now, in Mahayana Buddhism, you might then celebrate and say, well, it means our Buddha nature. It's like who our essence is. I would say that, at least in the early Buddhist tradition, it's a little bit more like, maybe like, it's not like our essence of who we are, because they tried not to point to essences in this early tradition.

[15:00]

But if you're cold and you go out and stand in the sun and you get warm, you are warm. You're not essentially warm, but you become warm. You don't make yourself warm, except you go stand in the sun. It's your job to stand in the sun, but then you allow the sun to warm you up, and then you are warm. So sati is something we are, it's not something we do. So I would suggest that it's a little bit different than how it's usually often taught in secular applications of it, in the Theravada, the Vipassana schools of practice. So what is it? So what is it that is something we enter, abide in? What is it that we can cultivate and establish? So in this Satipatthana Sutta, that's often translated as the four foundations of mindfulness.

[16:04]

It's probably not the best translation for the Pali terms. Sati, for now, which is called Sati, the second part of that word, it's upatana, and upatana means something like setting up. or establishing. And so I prefer to translate it as the four ways of establishing sati. So what is sati? So then the text goes on and says, and how do we establish these four establishments, these four ways of establishing sati? And then it describes it. It says, one abides, great word, abide. Abbots are supposed to be abiding abbots, meaning they're here, they stay here.

[17:07]

So one abides observing the body in the body with ardency, clear understanding, and sati, having put aside covetousness and distress concerning the world. So the four ways of establishing sati are done by abiding, observing. So there's two different things. To abide, I think it's nice to say it means to rest in something. And as you're resting, abiding, the observation is going on. And those two things, abiding and observing, are described by these three qualities of ardency, clear understanding, and sati.

[18:10]

Ardency is a word that I like to render as wholeheartedness, to be wholehearted. Zen students, I think, know about ardency. Those of you who have hair are supposed to be practicing as if your hair is on fire. And some of the people here have managed to save themselves from that particular problem. So I don't know what motivates them, but that's ardent to practice that way. It's a wholeheartedness. And then clear understanding is a very important part of this. where there's a clear understanding and knowing of what is happening in your experience as it's happening. So there's the capacity, the cognitive ability of the mind to recognize and see and understand is prominent in this practice. And then there's a sati thing. So ardent, clearly understanding, and sati.

[19:15]

The clear understanding part is a very important part in this Satipatthana Sutta. Because in this text, the things that you're supposed to be doing, the activities you do there, are to... The primary one is to know. To know and to understand. To experience. To consider certain things. And the thing that's even most active... would be to relax, to calm the body. Those are the things we do. So you can say that this kind of doing, to know, to understand, it's a little bit the active side of the mind. It's not so active. It's not like you're fixing yourself. It's not that you're trying to do something or accomplish something. But it is a kind of doing, try to see clearly enough to understand what's there.

[20:18]

But what does a sati side mean? So if there's two sides of practice, there's the side that's more active, which is the knowing, understanding, experiencing, calming. And then there's the part that's more like being, a state of being, something you rest in, that is sati. So what is sati? So what do you think? Do you have any proposals for how to translate this word based on what you've heard so far? Yes? Attention. Bear attention. Bear attention. That's in the mindfulness tradition. There was a man named... Nyanapanika wrote a very important book called Heart of Buddhist Meditation. And he there has the term bear attention that he uses. And so... He wrote it originally in German.

[21:22]

And as he translated himself, he was fluent in English, living in Sri Lanka back then, and maybe spending time in British prisoners of war camp. He got pretty good at English. And he... In German, he called it... Bear attention, he called it... I don't know German, so my pronunciation is probably way off mark. But... Beoback. That may sound familiar to anyone else in German. Beoback. Beoback. Yeah. How would you translate Reine Beoback? Reine Beoback. It's more observing. Observing, yes. But now we call mindfulness Atta. Yeah, he uses that word too, but for this particular expression, bear attention, he uses this, in English we have to translate it more directly as pure or clean observation.

[22:25]

But any time he translated, he wrote the book in English, he did bear attention. That's had a very impactful meaning. But bear attention, thank you. So someone else, yes? Open awareness. What is the open part of the, why not just call it awareness? What does the open part do? Okay. Thank you. Allowing everything to be. Allowing everything to be. One dwells, one enters into allowing everything to be. 99.99999999 go on quite a bit of things in the universe I allow to be all the time because I don't know about them. So, I guess maybe you can do it more thoroughly. So, that's nice.

[23:30]

Okay. Being present. So, being present. Yeah. Isn't it? Isn't it? There's not a separation. Even suchness seems a little bit remove isness it seems isness suchness is already a little bit removed so isness so dwelling ardent clearly understanding and how would you say it in English so dwelling so abiding abiding observing body in the body with ardency clear understanding and isness great thank you Without interfering? So it's a little bit like allowing, just allowing without interfering.

[24:39]

Nice, yes? Peace? So being at peace, being peaceful, ardent, clear understanding and peaceful? Yes? Calm. Okay. It's a little similar. Yes? In terms of, you know, a lot of things might fit in, but whether it, you know, the difference is between what is a translation that works as a, what's a word that works as a translation versus what's an explanation or an interpretation or a... kind of expansion of the word. And so we're kind of looking for a word that might work for sati. Spacious.

[25:41]

Okay. It's great to hear these. I hope you guys are practicing this way. Presence. Presence. So ardent. Clearly understanding and present. Receptive. Acceptance. Unhindered. Unhindered. What's unhindered? The experience. The experience is unhindered. Engagement. I think that would be more like a doing, wouldn't it? Connectedness?

[26:49]

Someone dwells in a connectedness. Soft mind. Ardent, clearly understanding, and soft mind. It begs the question, though, what's mind? That's easier. I think it's easier than mind. Available. Nimble. Nimble? Nimble. Kind of a little bit like Suzuki Roshi's readiness of mind, maybe. Raw experiencing? What? Raw experiencing? It's a body feeling, right? It's a being rather than doing. So experiencing is one of those things that you're not really doing.

[27:54]

Experiencing is sort of the input from the end. Rawness is just without It's great if I understand you. So you're saying that if there's not a doing, like a mental doing, then maybe it's more connected to the body. And so somehow the body's receptivity, the rawness, immediacy. Without the mental filtering. So the bare attention involves without mental filtering. Great. Embodied. Embodied. I'm a mindfulness teacher, so sometimes I kind of say I prefer to translate sati as bodyfulness, because in the West we put so much emphasis on the mind. The word mind is not in the word sati. And the person who coined that word to translate sati was an English gentleman in the 1880s. who saw how it was being used in the King James Bible.

[28:59]

And so he thought it had kind of a sacred connection, and it meant kind of hold something in your mind, and he thought that that was a good translation for sati. And it took a little while for that to kind of stick, but eventually, after a few decades, that became, for many centuries, many decades, the primary translation. Yeah? It's interesting that in the West we... that mind is being located in the head. And my Qigong teacher is Chinese, and he will say, in my mind, and he points to his heart. And then , mind, heart. And our teacher translates as intuitive wisdom. So that's all body. to your point. So it's interesting. Why is mind the head? Why do we prioritize the mind when we translate sati and say mindfulness?

[30:04]

What most people find when they start meditating is that their mind is really full. Okay. Well, thank you. I delight in all those. I hope that you all find that those qualities of those ways of being meaningful for you in different settings, different times. In the Theravadan Western world, there's a monk by the name of Bhikkhu Bodhi. Maybe some of you have heard of him. He's one of the primary translators of the early discourses of the Buddha and So the long discourses of the Buddha, not the long discourses, the middle-length discourses, there's three big collections of these texts that he's translated. So one of the most learned kind of people in our tradition. And he, in his translation of his books, translated the word mindfulness.

[31:10]

But most recently, he has said that his preferred way of translating sati is as lucid awareness. He says you can't define it only as awareness because it needs an adjective. Awareness is too maybe vague or too broad or encompasses too much. Sometimes awareness in English simply means knowing something. So we have all kinds of awareness movements, like, you know, fire awareness movement, or, you know, awareness ribbons that people wear, because, you know, it means to keep something in mind, to remember people, to know something, what's going on. So it's a little more cognitive, perhaps. So he feels like it needs to be an adjective. So his choice was the word lucid awareness.

[32:13]

What do you think of that as a choice? Nice, nice over there. How about over there? How would you define lucid? Like I know lucid dreaming is like you're very awake in your dream. Would you define it as like awake? I think that you asked how do you define lucid? And I think that connection to the idea of lucid dreaming... As I understand the term lucid dreaming, it means that you're aware that you're dreaming when you're dreaming. So the awareness is strong enough, established strong enough, that you could, in a sense, you kind of can know or feel that you are aware. The quality of awareness itself stands out in highlight. It's easy to be so absorbed in what you're doing...

[33:16]

that the fact that you're aware disappears. Like they say the fish doesn't see the water it swims in. But as the practice of sati develops and becomes stronger, gets established, that some quality of attention that's called sati, maybe awareness, stands out stronger and stronger. At some point it's so strong that what you're aware of recedes in importance. It's maybe a little bit like first you're in the dark and then someone turns on the light and now you're aware that it's light. Wow, I can see now. And then you can see what's around you. But at some point maybe this light gets stronger and stronger and stronger that you're mostly aware of the light. You don't no longer see the objects around you. Maybe you're almost blinded by the light, the intensity of it. So maybe it's a poor simile. But kind of the similar idea that as practice gets stronger, the awareness gets stronger.

[34:18]

At some point, the awareness stands out in highlight more than what you're aware of. Yes? It's filled with light. Great. When I used to live here at Tassajara, I would be going up and down these paths between the cabins, you know, for days and days and days on end until sometimes it occurred to me to look beyond the tops of the tree canopies.

[35:26]

And so I was always surprised when I finally kind of looked wider that this is a very unique, you know, little ecosystem here with the trees and the shade and everything. And beyond, it's kind of desert everywhere else. It's so open and expansive. And... So, you know, it was kind of always so interesting to have the attention, the awareness, open up and be wider than the confines of the actual property here in the wider context of the hills. I don't know if any of you felt that here, being here, the shift to this open. So you can open up wider and still be aware of here, but it's now in this bigger field. So for me, in looking at these suttas and these texts, I'm coming to the idea that probably the best way of translating sati is to translate something to do with awareness.

[36:32]

And it might be just awareness itself works, but maybe awareness needs to be qualified, the way Dika Bodhi says. And because awareness is something that's possible to rest in, it's possible to enter into being aware, it's possible to establish it, it's possible to cultivate awareness, it's possible to abide in awareness, depending on exactly how we understand awareness. But if we understand that it's in the text, it exists together with something that's more active. If awareness is something we rest in, It's there in balance with something that's more active, and that's the cognitive ability of the mind to know and to understand. And so in the Satipatthana Sutta, it over and over again emphasizes how important it is to know. So you know what's happening as you breathe, with your breathing.

[37:39]

You know the sensations of your body. You know the feeling tones as you have them. you know the mind states that you're in, and you know what's been called the hindrances, the seven factors of awakening, the four noble truths. These things are known. So then how do we hold these two together? How do they occur together? Maybe we can call it the more passive or the receptive qualities of awareness, that we rest in awareness and this active side of actually knowing what's going on. And my understanding understanding is that in this ancient tradition, and still to this day with the modern Vipassana movement, that these two things need to be held in balance together. It's not one or the other, but it's both operating together. In different times, we emphasize one over the other. Sometimes we emphasize resting in awareness, and sometimes what's important is to emphasize the knowing function of the mind, and actually know what's there.

[38:46]

in order to bring things into balance. But the idea is to eventually have them there together in a balanced way. I've noticed that some people in the Vipassana mindfulness movement, partly because of the way sometimes the instructions are given, that they understand that mindfulness is a cognitive activity of the mind, and sometimes even a verbal activity in the mind. And I've known people, because of the emphasis in some schools of vipassana, of using mental notes, that they think what vipassana means is to constantly say words in their mind, hearing, hearing, itching, itching, thinking, thinking, feeling, feeling, and they're trying to keep up, you know, to do all this stuff. And that's certainly one of the ways it's taught. However, if you go to Burma to practice in the monasteries where they teach that kind of what's called mental noting, The whole context of how that practice is done there is done in a situation where people develop a lot of concentration.

[39:52]

And when you have a lot of strong concentration, you have a lot of beingness, you have a lot of presence, you have a strong sense of being embodied, you have a strong sense of awareness that you're resting in and dwelling in. Concentration is a state. You can't enter into a concentrated state without resting in some kind of state. So the context for that kind of mental noting is together with this concentrated state. But that's often forgotten or not noticed when people have brought their practice to the West and people are focusing this constant mental noting without the balance. And then there are people who focus only on the awareness side, resting in awareness, resting in being. And it can be a very powerful practice, especially for people who do a lot of doing. And I think most Americans, most Westerners who come to this practice, come with minds that are pretty busy doers. And it's a radical thing. Sometimes it's because the whole sense of self, the way we engage in the world, the way we understand the world, is all built up in the mental doing of our mind.

[41:04]

It's a radical thing. to have the rug pulled from underneath all the doings of our mind and just do a being practice and just to allow, let be, just to be aware. But the suggestion of this Vipassana, the Vipassana tradition, is that you can only go so far, it can be quite far, but only so far if all you do is rest in awareness. That you have to then bring in the balance of this cognitive side, the knowing side, where there has to be clearly seeing something. And so this thing of seeing and understanding, together with the awareness, having those in balance, is what can take you as far as possible. And what you find at the end of the Satipatthana Sutta, the last so-called foundation of mindfulness, is in particular the wisdom side of the mindfulness practice, or the Sati practice.

[42:07]

And it's wisdom because here is where we're beginning to understand how certain things work. The earlier exercises of Sakyakottana are mostly exercises just know. Bear attention knowing. Just allow things to be. Know your mind state. If you have an angry mind state, just hold it there lightly. Hold it openly. Be aware that you're angry. Don't be for or against it. not to judge it, but offer yourself the kindness and the companionship of just allowing the anger to be there. And this is a very powerful thing to do. But in the last foundation, here the task is to understand something about the causes and conditions for the arising of the anger and the causes and conditions of how it helps you let go of it. And so this wisdom side... comes with understanding the causal connections, the causal... And the whole emphasis in the earliest Buddhist tradition on impermanence is we see the impermanence of things so we can see how things arise and how things cease, how things are abandoned.

[43:19]

And this is the core insight of the Four Noble Truths, is we see something exists, we see that the cause for its arising, we see the seizing of it, and then we see the way to seize it. And this pattern of the Four Noble Truths, seeing X, the cause, the cessation, and the way, is probably the central and most essential insight of the earliest Buddhist tradition. And when you get to the Fourth Foundation of Mindfulness, you'll see that pattern plays out in the wisdom side of the exercises, the emphasis on... the five hindrances, the seven factors of awakening and the rest of them. And so with this, with this balance of sati and clear understanding and starting to see and know how the mind operates, then the mind becomes nimble because nimble means that it's not fixated and caught in the grip of its attachments, grips of its preoccupations.

[44:30]

When the mind is caught in the grips of its preoccupations and tight, then it's not relaxed, it's not nimble, it's not flexible, it's not fluid, which makes it very hard to let go. But when you can see how things arise and how things pass, and the mind is resting in deep state of awareness, deep state of concentration, where there's very little strength behind the attachments, then it's possible to let go in a very deep, to drop in a very deep way. And this early tradition then sets this up, the cultivation and development of a strong state of awareness of sati, so that that awareness, that state of mind, is soft and relaxed and clear, so we can see clearly, and in that clear seeing, learn something about letting go in a very deep way. So my preferred way of translating sati is either as awareness, or to go along with Bhikkhu Bodhi, the idea that needs some adjective in front of it, I prefer the word clear awareness.

[45:41]

And then to save the word lucid awareness for when the sati is quite strong. And in the Satipatthana Sutta, there's a term that's used for when the practice is strong. that has a prefix in front of sati called pati, pati-sati. And so that pati-sati, I like to translate as lucid awareness. So we establish awareness, we establish clear awareness, and then we do these practices that strengthen that sati, that awareness. So we don't have to just be stuck with whatever awareness we happen to wake up with one morning, but we can strengthen, develop, enhance, expand, open up, establish, allow for, rest in a state of open awareness, clear awareness, receptive awareness, and that when that becomes quite strong, at some point it becomes lucid.

[46:48]

And when it becomes lucid and very strong, it's very hard for awareness to be lucid if you're completely preoccupied with something. Because the stronger the preoccupation is, the more you're blinded to everything because of your preoccupation. And you can't be lucidly aware if you're completely zeroed in on the thing that you're concerned with. And so how do we not be blinded by preoccupation? And that's part of the task of this whole thing. of this four ways of establishing awareness. So, questions, comments? What do you think of this? Yes? In Zen, I know you put a lot of emphasis on not knowing. So I'm wondering, you said that knowing is an important part of mindfulness.

[47:51]

How do you know without being preoccupied or without I'm just wondering if you could say more about knowledge. I think that if you have preconceived knowing, then you can't see clearly. So the seeing and the knowing of this early tradition is direct and immediate in the moment, and then you let go of it, and you're ready for the next moment to know it for what it is. But there is clearly a sense of knowing that has to happen. And that's like a conceptual knowing? So if you're sitting in zazen, and you've been sitting there for quite a long time, and your knee starts to hurt, what kind of knowing is useful to have at that point? Is it useful at that point to say, you know, not knowing, not knowing, not knowing, not knowing?

[48:52]

Is that useful? Is that wise? It might. But it's also dangerous. I've known people who have damaged their knees up here in the Zendo because they weren't paying enough attention to the signals from their knees. And so they didn't know what those signals were. But I've also had my pain where I found that all my fantasies about... I knew what this meant. This means that now I know that I'm going to be in a wheelchair the rest of my life. You know, all these kind of projections and fantasies that I add on top. So the art of this is how do we be present for something and not bring a lot of preconceived ideas, a lot of fear, a lot of imagination, a lot of projections.

[49:54]

So this idea of not knowing can be very important. But how together with that do we also know responsibly what's actually there? And how do we bring attention to the pain in the knee so we can really track and really notice the difference between the signals which are saying danger, you continue any longer, you might hurt yourself, versus those signals say this is fine. I mean, I've sat with so much pain in my knee. that I kind of broke into a sweat. But I knew it was not damaging. And I sat with knee pain where I knew I can't sit this way. I shouldn't go one more second with this. So sometimes there's a time for knowing, sometimes for not knowing. And how do we do that balance? Yes? I feel like I've had some experiences It's possible, yes.

[51:23]

But how do we... I don't want to know what I'm doing. Is it sort of like it's happening in a place that's, like, before conception? Or it's like before I can, like... Yeah. This is great. I think it sounds to me like a strong practice. So that's nice. But that's very nice. But what happens in that kind of situation, it's possible to have some deep letting go and very meaningful letting go, release... An experience of peace, we let go of our habitual mental formations, activities and all that. But if you don't understand how those formations came to be in the first place and how you let go of it, what had to happen, then you have no wisdom. And then it's kind of like an accident then. And then you can kind of set yourself up, kind of try your best to set yourself up for that accident again and hope. But if you understand how it all works, then you can maybe do something about it.

[52:30]

You can maybe set up the conditions more appropriately and helpful. So what I mean, for example, if you notice that you're afraid a lot, and you don't quite understand what you're afraid of, but you feel this anxiety, and then perhaps you can meditate, or sit zazen, And lo and behold, in 40 minutes of zazen, somehow the anxiety just drops away. This is great. Zazen's the way. Finally some peace. I had this anxiety for years. But then you leave zazendo, and within five or ten minutes the anxiety is back. Where did it come from? So the solution then, of course, is to go back to zazendo and sit some more. And, you know, and get the relief and get the freedom again. And so maybe then you go back and get your ten minutes afterwards and then go back, you know, flee back to the zendo.

[53:34]

Because it's kind of like a drug, you know, using it just to kind of, you know. But if you leave the zendo, having the anxiety disappear temporarily, you're calmer, and then... the vantage point, from the point of the perspective of this calm, relaxed mind that you have, you enter your world slowly enough that you can watch what thoughts, what beliefs, what emotions start emerging. And you can watch those slowly arise. Then you start seeing how the magic trick is done. So you might see, for example, just to make something up, you might see that your anxiety begins as soon as you encounter another person. And this tells you something about the nature of that anxiety. It tells you it has to do with your relationship to people. So then you keep doing it.

[54:36]

You keep going to the Zen, don't coming out and paying attention as you come out. Sure enough, every time I see a person, I get anxious. So you keep looking and keep looking. And after a while, you realize, wait a minute, it isn't just that I'm anxious when I see people, when I see people, I'm worried they're going to judge me. And it's fear of their judgment which triggers the anxiety. If you know that that's the steps, then you can perhaps address the whole issue of fear of being judged by people. And then, next time you come out of the zendo, you can see someone, maybe the fear of judgment arises, but you don't believe it. You know, I'm not going to go along with that. That's just an old habit. And it doesn't translate to anxiety. So understanding, knowing how the trick works, gives you an ability to find your peace that you don't have if you, you know, were able to let go well, but then just pop back to life as usual afterwards at some point.

[55:44]

So this early Buddhist tradition puts emphasis on understanding. And the trick is to have the understanding be immediate and direct, kind of like this intuitive wisdom, as opposed to a lot of reflection and thinking and analyzing and engineering of the mind to try to figure out what's it all about. That's the advantage of a very quiet and calm mind. As you can see, it's so obvious. It stands out in the highlight. You don't have to analyze it. It doesn't have anything to do with your biography and what happened to you as a child. You see it operating in the moment. And that's... Make sense? At some point it's good to... If you're letting go of something a lot and it keeps reappearing... then at some point you shouldn't let go so quickly.

[56:46]

And then just be with them. Sometimes letting go is doing too much in practice. I mean, sometimes when people teach you how to sit in Shikantaza, they'll tell you letting go is too much. You kind of miss the boat if you're letting go. What you do is you let be. And if you let be, then you have a chance maybe to see what's actually there. So there's some of you, again, I think you know this book, Satipatthana, by Analyo, a venerable Analyo. And so because of his book and his studies, he's, at least in the Theravadan world, considered to be one of the leading experts on this whole Satipatthana sati. when we were talking a few weeks ago, he said, you know, it's kind of noteworthy, or I don't know if he said ironic or something, or noteworthy, that the people who, the Buddhist traditions that best preserved their early understanding of what sati meant, are the Zen folks and the Dzogchen people.

[58:12]

Isn't that interesting? So why do you think that is? Why do you think that the Zen people have this, the sati part? Yes? I don't know, but I think that it comes back to a curiosity in practice, really. And as in Knowing by not knowing. And to ask questions. Not in a petty way, but to just have the attitude of show me more. So curiosity, knowing with not knowing. Okay. And a loving compassion. Great. Okay. Thank you. Nice. Yes, Toba. Spaciousness.

[59:16]

Spacious mind, spacious awareness. So that's more what Zazen is about maybe for some people. Yes? Because we're not relying on words and letters. Because we're not relying on words and letters. Yes? Maybe because we are keeping our sense page open, it's more about being aware of what's around us than... So in Zen, it's awareness that's all around, not just what we're thinking. It's sort of what's happening that we can experience through our senses as opposed to what's an internal... Okay, great. The emphasis on the body, Zen as a body practice. The emphasis on the body in Zen, so this idea of being embodied and, you know... Bodyfulness instead of mindfulness. Yes? I think of how we sit for a while, then we go and do some work, and we sit some more, and we do more activity.

[60:25]

So we're kind of going back and forth all the time. It allows us to develop awareness in our life as well. Great. So the emphasis that the awareness practices all encompasses both meditation and our life. And perhaps by going back and forth between work, use your word, and meditation, on one hand there's awareness that's there, the being of awareness and sitting. And then you learn a lot about yourself if you're at Tassajara working. I remember working in the kitchen here and I was at Fukuten. And it became so painfully obvious that I was neurotically attached to wanting everyone to like me. And if you're Fukuten, it doesn't work. So I had to kind of get over it. At least the way I was Fukuten.

[61:30]

Yes? or even a thought. But what I'm really struck by is that you also mentioned Dzogchen and a lot of the things we might say about Zen do not apply to the Tibetan practices. It's highly analytical, many of them are highly analytical, philosophical, directive. But usually Dzogchen is not that. Dzogchen is clearly not those things. Oh yes, definitely. There's a somewhat established theory that Dzogchen is the Chan lineage in Tibet and that Tibetans don't really want to admit that because it's China, right?

[62:34]

Yes. by that statement. No, it wasn't the last time I heard you say that, but this time, because it seems like if, you know, a monk or a nun in the Theravada tradition is practicing, you know, knowing when I'm sitting, I'm sitting, knowing laying down when I'm laying, it seems like they are practicing a really intense form of mindfulness. And so I'm not sure why you make that statement, actually. I think it has to do what I said earlier, that it's possible to, when you're sitting, to know you're sitting. When you're standing, know you're standing, know these things. And it's emphasizing the cognitive knowing aspects of the practice, but not the sati aspect. So what you dwell in, what you abide in, the awareness you abide in. And so I've known people doing Theravadan practice who have misunderstood it, who are imbalanced, only doing the cognitive thing. Yes? So rather than being aware of anything specific, it's more just establishing yourself in awareness, and then things arise in awareness, but that's not the point.

[64:12]

That's what you're saying? Okay, great. Like this play between form and emptiness. I don't know what when Grant said lucid and people look like, I was thinking, what's the light? Is that... So an interesting exercise to do in meditation, probably most productive in meditation, zazen, is if it should happen in zazen sometime, that... your mind is hardly thinking at all. Thinking has gotten really weak and thin.

[65:15]

There might be thoughts drifting by, like clouds and endless sky, just even gaps between your thinking. Or maybe it's seemingly the thoughts just stop for a while. Notice the quality of the mind, the quality of the awareness in that state. Just kind of take it in, kind of let it register, get a sense of what it's like. And then wait... just go about your life and wait until sometime when you get really caught up in some kind of thought. You've just robbed a bank and you go sit to meditate. You know, and you're like, this has been a big thing in your life, right? And like, boom, you know. And then watch your preoccupation. You're really juicy. You're really caught up in it. And then... When you have that really good example of being really caught in your thoughts, strong vice of thought thinking, get a feel for what that's like.

[66:18]

Really sense and feel what the mind is like, what awareness is like in that state. And then compare those two states. And probably when you go back into that more open state of the very few thoughts, you might see that now the mind feels more expansive, lighter, both in terms of luminosity or clarity. Luminosity also means clarity, as opposed to, you know, bright light. It's kind of like the fog has cleared and you can see really clearly. But also light in terms of weight. And that when the mind is really caught up in some kind of good, juicy thought, like you just dropped the bank and you're worried about getting caught or something, you know, really, you know, that it feels contracted, things get dark, You're so caught up in the words, in the thoughts, in the concerns. It's kind of dark and narrow and contracted and heavy. It's very interesting to compare these two. So look for an opportunity.

[67:18]

Are you suggesting just trial and error? Just wait. Just wait. Hopefully you have both experiences. Are you suggesting she robbed a bank? No. You don't have to rob any banks, but chances are... that you're just living your normal life the way you live, even without robbing banks. Something will grab you at some point, some thought and concern, and it has you by your throat. And then look at the quality of the mind in that state. And then hopefully there's some time when the mind is really peaceful and relaxed and hardly any thoughts and concerns. And then compare those two states and what the mind is like. And maybe then, with that comparison in mind, maybe you'll get a little more sense of what the lucid is. adjective might mean. But just go about your business and if you are always caught up in thoughts then maybe it's good to go talk to a teacher.

[68:24]

And if you never find yourself caught up so you can't do this exercise just count your blessings. Yes? to add that also to check in with the body when the mind is agitated. It's a great one. You're tense somewhere. I think of what Ryushin says about the moments and how that there isn't actually a moment. It's just a way that we try to segment time, like a way to describe it to ourselves. But it's just fluid. And so you can't be in the moment you can just turn toward. You can certainly be in the moment, but you can't be aware of the moment. Where else are you going to be? He talks about it as being with, but the word moment itself almost like implies like a segment. Yeah, yeah, true. But it would be a being with, and so it's because of that that's fluid, then the way of being aware or mindful would be a turning toward.

[69:34]

a turning toward what is unfolding, what is going on right now. It's possible for it to be a turning towards, and the mind does that regularly. If there's suddenly a loud noise outside, even without intending it, your mind would turn towards that noise. So the ability of the mind to turn towards something is a well-recognized phenomenon. There's even a term in Buddhism called manisikara. The mind turns towards something. But that's a different function of the mind than the function of being aware, open aware, or clearly aware, where the mind doesn't have to turn or move at all. And so one of the things I like to teach is that the language is often used in meditation circles sometimes. Now bring your mind back. Your mind went off someplace. Now bring it back. Bring it back to the breath. The mind never goes anywhere. That's a metaphor. The mind moves and you're bringing it back.

[70:36]

Sometimes it's an unfortunate metaphor. And you have people who jerk their mind back and pound their mind back, bounce. The mind doesn't move at all. The mind doesn't move at all. So what you can do is rather than move the mind, if you want to focus on your breath, don't bring it back to the breath. Let the breath come back into the mind. Yes. It can be. Imagination, our ability to have a To have a sense of possibility, what's possible, is a very important part in practice.

[71:40]

If there was no sense of knowing the possibility of being free from suffering, why would you do anything? So the intuitive sense or the knowing or the sense of the imagination that tells us, you know, I don't have to live this way forever. I don't have to always be doing, you know... doing this grind of a life that I'm living and plugging away and looking for status and trying to get everyone to like me and trying to make a lot of money and always being in the vice of my fear and anxiety. I don't have to be this way. I think there's another way. Maybe I'll go to Tassajara. We have to stop. So... See, the Tanto is responsible for, all of us can just be here and I can just teach and we can all listen. But the Tanto's imagination has to be broader and bigger. He has to keep in his mind the imagination of this working of Tassajara, the timing of things and what's next.

[72:41]

And it's a cabin crew and dining crew and what they all have to do. So it's one of the great gifts that the Tanto gives us is that he keeps his imagination active. He'll come back here many years from now and sit in the back of the class like this and he doesn't have to think about it at all. Wisdom is connected to imagination. It can be. And imagination is very dangerous too. Most of people's suffering comes from their imagination. So I don't want to validate it too much. But So thank you very much. 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.

[73:43]

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

[73:49]

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