This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfcc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good morning. I do not have to walk in estrangement in foreign lands. And do not have to be afraid. Nothing can happen to me since I understand how everything is loving me. I have unlearned the I and now only know we. With the lover I became two. And from the two of us into the world and beyond all being grew the we.

[01:06]

And because we are everything, we are alone. I do not have to walk in estrangement in foreign lands and do not have to be afraid. Nothing can happen to me since I understand how everything is loving me. This is our last day of Sashin. As the Tante Rosalie talked yesterday about, it's such a rare opportunity. we have made space for and given ourselves, and the whole universe participated to allow us to participate. Everything kind of supported and fit in in the way it did to allow that to happen. And it's such an opportunity to be available to this life that runs through that particular being that you are.

[02:17]

and to realize that everything is loving you, me, everybody. It's not easy. We have to unlearn the I. We have to unlearn our conditioning, our ideas, our expectations, and open up to become more adept at just being available to the experience, not to the stories that we spin, not to the old stories we keep telling ourselves over and over and over, and that have such a magnetic draw for us to believe them and go back to them, not because they're true. They actually, mostly of them, make us suffer. They're very sad stories, but they are so familiar that they feel very safe.

[03:23]

So there is a draw to revert to them. I'll never be loved. I can't do it. This is my lot. And when we sit and we are supported by everything to just be Still. Take the physical posture, the mental posture of stillness. We get glimpses. But we also get glimpses of things that have been left undone. That have not yet been taken care of. So this practice is about waking up. to the heart of Buddha in ourselves. Everyone in us has the heart of Buddha. This is just one guy who realized it and then talked about it.

[04:30]

But he was as human as we were. So it says, I think in the Kosoho Tsu Ganmon, it says, Buddhas of old were the same as we. We in the future shall be Buddhas. And that's not just like flip saying, that's actually the truth. So when we sit down and we practice, it's a discipline. It asks something of us. It doesn't just happen by itself, even though it's always there. Not we have to make it happen, but we have to make an effort. Because if we don't, if we don't try out the teaching, if we don't have an intention, we are run by our preferences and our habits.

[05:32]

Our mind is run by them, our bodies are run by them, our feelings are run by them, and they run our life. over and over the same story. Who does not know this in here? Those old, same old, same old stories that we just in some ways wallow in because they're familiar and they feel safe and we've known them all along. This is the true me. And everything else is so scary because we don't know what it's going to be like. So we have to unlearn the I, that construct that we carry around. And we unlearn that by being still and allowing whatever comes up to come up, start to discern what is a habitual and what is a familiar reaction and what do the teachings say.

[06:41]

It's not substantial. It feels so substantial, but it's not substantial. Well, how can it not be substantial when I feel it's so substantial? This is it. It's not substantial. Can we keep... How can it not be substantial when it feels so substantial? To kind of... make the space to allow for the possibility that actually, even though it feels very substantial, it is not. It's very fleeting. At the Han we pass every morning, it says, awake, awake. Life is fleeting. Great is the matter of birth and death. Don't waste your time. So this is the last day. Don't waste your time. Don't waste your time imagining what you're going to do next. Because Rosalie said it so wonderfully, whatever you imagine, actually when you look, what is going to happen tomorrow is going to be different.

[07:51]

So you wasted your time imagining something that's actually most certainly not going to happen the way you imagined. Stay here. Your life is only happening here and now. It's not happening tomorrow, and it didn't happen yesterday. It's happening right now. Abide here. Come back to here. Now, in this body, in this experience, in this sound of the squeaking brakes, which is already passed, and the car is gone too, the truck. So, do not spend your time thinking up a life, or fantasizing about a life, or imagining in that life that's something else than what's happening right now.

[08:59]

It truly is a waste of time. And we all have a proclivity to do it, particularly when what's coming up feels unpleasant or scary or confusing or making us want or not want or we don't know what to do or we should do something or we can't do anything or whatever it is. So ultimately, if we... We have to learn. And that's the human capacity. We have to learn to see through it, feel through it, experience through it, not against it or not on it or not manipulating it. We cannot love ourselves.

[10:05]

So living your life completely is also loving yourself. If you can't do that, you can't really love anybody else. It just doesn't work. And that's not like, oh, I got it and now it's done. Actually, as long as we live... It deepens and deepens and widens and widens. And there's a next layer that we didn't know was there. And that might shock us because we thought, I'm done with this. And then it's here again. I have such a rattled brain. And you know, the beginning was actually the easiest, even though it felt the most big thing. Here I'm running, thinking, I'm running really well. Today, you know, I usually don't run anymore because I don't run well. Ooh, I'm running really well, and that's the last thing I knew. And I flew through the air and knocked myself out completely.

[11:08]

Then I had a Simpson family upper lip and bruises all over my face and a broken nose, and I looked pretty unattractive. But my awareness was narrowed down, so that didn't bother me. I looked in the mirror and said, oh, wow, look at that. Wow, I really banged myself up. That's amazing. And so that was fairly simple. There was nothing else to do but recover in bed and not do much. And I saw all my old habits come by, and they didn't have much... traction at all. I could see them and think they're really stupid, some of them, really. What? Did I ever believe that? I mean, that doesn't make any sense. And then I got recovered a little and looked more like my old self.

[12:13]

And my old habits come by and have a little more energy and suddenly those absolutely stupid energies suddenly seem to make more sense. Isn't that amazing? They suddenly seem to make sense again. I start to kind of be really tempted to believe them because they've been what I've always believed. They're like old clothes you feel comfortable in, or shoes that have adapted to your feet. So it's so interesting to see that. And then that... has passed and now every day I actually don't know what it's going to be. So I have old stuff coming back, old patterns. So when I was up till I was 33, I was basically mostly depressed. And I would have days where I would just be crying.

[13:15]

I would go to work and function and then I would go home and cry. And I started to I had a practice impulse, which I didn't know at that time. I hadn't heard about practice. But what I would do is I would go and clean the bathroom. I would cry and clean the bathroom, or I would cry and clean the kitchen, or I would cry and vacuum the floor, because I felt like I can't do anything valuable or that I enjoy. But my crying doesn't hinder me to clean the bathroom or the kitchen. And then later, maybe when I feel better, I have a clean bathroom and a clean kitchen and can do something else. So it felt like at least I had done something that was useful. While I felt I couldn't just enjoy my life.

[14:16]

So what's coming up? Now, occasionally, is an old feeling of, I don't really want to engage in this life. I don't understand why people can't live in peace with each other. I don't understand why we have these conflicts. I don't understand they love each other and they are at each other's throats. I don't understand it and I don't really want to engage in this life, so I'm just going to wait till I die. And the image, I never have any thoughts of killing myself or doing something to end my life. But the image I had was I would lie somewhere in the forest at the bottom of a big tree or a big rock, just curled up and just wait till I die. I was very peaceful. So suddenly I have these feelings come back because my brain is rattled.

[15:22]

got a shock so so then how do I hold this and it's tempting it's tempting oh here all these 30 plus years since I had that thought have not been real and now the reality of my life has come back it's very strange how it's not you know they have this alluring kind of familiarity And that's the true me, because that's the one I knew all along. And I forget things. This morning was an incense stick in the kabako when I came down with the incense, and I just suddenly didn't know, had service happened in the Zen, or was I supposed... Am I supposed to bow? So it's just these things. And also we get undone. I mean, you should see the Jisha and me.

[16:26]

I mean, the two of us are just totally spaced out. And our communication is absolutely, if you had it on tape, you wouldn't believe it. He says something, I say something. We both look at each other and don't understand what the other means. So that we're both sitting here is actually a miracle. And we all are maybe in some ways undone for sitting still. The regular thing is a little bit loose. But I wanted for today, I wanted to share with you the five precepts that Frank Ostaseski kind of worded. for the people that he trained in hospice training and in the Metta Institute. He was the founder of the Zen Hospice.

[17:27]

And he calls them, they are bottomless precepts. They are practices that can be continuously explored and deepened. And all our precepts are like that. Our life is like that. The heart of Buddha is like that. It is bottomless and always deepens and widens. These precepts, he says, are not linear. They have no value as theories or concepts. To be understood, to be realized, they have to be lived into and communicated through activity. So it's the same, like it's not who I am. It's much more interesting to ask, how am I? How am I treating this situation?

[18:28]

How am I relating to this experience? How am I relating to this thing? This thing. The computer when it's not working. The neighbor when the toothbrush lid is not working. screwed on or the toothbrush is squeezed in the middle rather than at the back or when how do I respond when I get an email that I find the tone is abrasive or that's the interesting question not I shouldn't be like this it's more like how oh wow like this so it's the Action, it's where we invest our energy in thinking, in feeling, is also an action. Or how we act physically. Or by speaking.

[19:31]

So precept number one is welcome everything. Push away nothing. So welcome everything doesn't mean take everything inside. It's just, say, oh, you're here. Okay. Not out or not in, but you're here right now, and I acknowledge that. In welcoming everything, we do not have to like what is arriving or arising. Then he says something so wonderful. He says... it is actually not our job to approve or disapprove. If we can take that in, that this is actually not our job to approve or disapprove, if you really let that in, can you feel what a relief that is for just a second? I do not have to approve or disapprove.

[20:33]

I'm relieved, released of that thing. not our job to approve or disapprove. It is our job to trust, to listen, to pay careful attention to the changing experience. It's not, he doesn't say to trust what I think it is. He says just Trust, not knowing what you're trusting, but trust that if you listen and pay careful attention, you will get information about what this is, and you will also see how everything continuously is in movement and changes.

[21:36]

is at the bottom of this receptivity, or doing this cultivates a fearless receptivity. So every day we chant the Heart Sutra, either in Japanese or in English, and this says, without fear, the Bodhisattva... What does it say in the Heart Sutra? Now I can't. Without hindrance, there is no fear. Yes. This is the mudra of no fear. Amida Buddha, where we bow and we come in to do the lecture, has a no fear mudra. It's this. It's not this and it's not this. It's just here. It is when we practice this.

[22:58]

And so I want to go back and say that's why practice needs an effort. It's not happening by itself. What's happening by itself is our habitual conditioned reaction. That's just how it is. So if we don't volitionally, intentionally act make an effort and put the energy somewhere else and shift the focus, this won't happen. When we do it, it is a journey where we will always enter new territory. It is a journey where we never arrive. That's when we say here in Zen, the path is the goal. There's no somewhere we're getting to. It's the path that is at the same time the goal. It's the continuation of discovery. It takes courage and it takes flexibility.

[24:03]

It is a mystery we need to live into opening, risking, and forgiving continuously. So welcome everything. Precept number two. Bring your whole self to the experience. So not just a little bit. And that's why Sashin is such an incredible laboratory. Because everything supports us to do that. And we, you know... To some degree we can and to some degree we can't. We space out, we fantasize, we're in tomorrow or in yesterday or in another life that we would like better. But when we come back, we are supported by everybody around us that is struggling with the same things and making the same effort to bring our whole being to the experience that is here right now.

[25:16]

When we do that, when we meet ourselves, because that's what we're meeting, even though it may seem I'm meeting you, I'm meeting actually my perception of you. I don't know that I'm really meeting you. I know you're Sydney, and I know you're not Eileen, but I meet actually... how this being perceives you. So then to say, well, that's who you are, is actually amazingly off, and we don't realize that. It's so quick that we would say, well, that's who that is. But it's our own perception. So in... In the Zendo, there is a lot of space for that to start working with that.

[26:31]

When we do that, we open ourselves both to our fears, pains, joys, and everything. It's not, oh, when I sit, then I'm only going to be joyful. No, it's everything. Everything that... is part of our life. And as human beings, there is no life as human beings that has not its share of suffering. It's just not possible. Things happen to us. We lose things. We lose people that are important. We get parents that don't know what to do with this child. because maybe they had parents who didn't know what to do with that child. We all have pain, suffering, and joy, and we all have the capacity to not be run by our reactions to those, to not have our life limited to be only reactive.

[27:43]

Then he says, it helps us to bring our whole self to the experience, helps us to draw on our strength and on our helplessness, on our wounds and our passion to discover a meeting place with the other. So actually our wounds and our helplessness and our fears are gateways. We of course think only our strengths are worth something. But that's actually not true. They often get in the way. It is not our expertise, but the exploration of our own suffering that enables us to... to form an empathetic bridge to another person, another being.

[28:51]

So that's, I think, why in Buddhism we said there is suffering in life, and when we are willing to explore the suffering rather than trying to get away from it at all costs all the time, even if that means I'm only going to live in my little room and never come out, there are people that... have to live that way because they're so afraid they can't leave their room. So it is not our expertise but the exploration of our own suffering, the willingness to explore our own suffering, not make it into a thing and this is the truth, but what is it and how is it and what is it showing me? then we will be able to be of real assistance or to build an empathetic bridge to another person, another being. Number three, very important for today, for day six, which is the last day, do not wait.

[29:58]

And he says, patience is very different from waiting. Patience is an active being present. Waiting is always full of expectations of something that's going to happen later and how it's going to happen. When we wait till this is over, till tonight, till dinner, we miss what's happening right now. And we miss what this moment has to offer us, which is all we have, moment by moment by moment. When we worry or strategize about what the future holds for us, we miss the opportunities that are right in front of us. And the thing about this is, of course, now we would wait for dinner, and at dinner we would wait for tomorrow, because tomorrow is going to be something else, and then tomorrow we're going to wait for Sunday, because Sunday we're finally off.

[31:11]

So when we have a tendency to wait, we wait all the time. We always wait for something next that's going to be more, better, alive, whatever. So it's not just right now we're waiting. So do not wait, he says. Four is find, that's also very important. And we've been talking about this in many ways. Marsha talked about it from the somatic experience. The thing is, find a place to rest in the middle of things. Hold your elbows in the middle of difficulty. For example, from an SE, somatic experiencing thing. You can hold your elbows sitting in the zendo. We're not going to come by and say, that's not a mudra. Hold your elbows when you feel it helps you.

[32:16]

And it makes a difference. It's a very sweet feeling. And children hold their elbows a lot. They can't fold their arms. They're too short. So they do that, but I think they also do it because their bodies instinctively know that actually that's a very soothing and calming position. You could teach that to Wilder. Yes. So find a place to rest in the middle of things. Not after everything is complete. That's one of my favorites. I would use to go home on the weekends after a week of work and clean everything and make order, thinking after that, then I can have my weekend. What happened inevitably was I cleaned for two days and then the weekend was over and the week started again.

[33:23]

And I went to work. And I did that for years. I never got it for years I would live like that. You think I'm still living like that? You made a face, so maybe I'm still deluded. Yes. Anyway, and it's hard for me to not do that because I'm convinced. I can only rest when everything is in order, but nothing is ever, it's never ever everything is in order. That's not the nature of life. It's just not possible. And if it's possible, it's in a little area for just a tiny little moment, and then it's out of order again. And it's so hard to let go of that.

[34:26]

So then I practiced coming home and sitting down. and not do anything, not start it. And I was highly uncomfortable for about a half an hour or 45 minutes. Really, I just wanted to jump out of my skin. This was going to be a terrible weekend. I just was so uncomfortable. And then something shifted. And I suddenly knew what I wanted to do. And I did something that I wouldn't have imagined before. I would take out my sewing machine and sew something or create something or, oh, this is the book I want to read. I mean, there would come up something that I didn't know was there and it was exactly what I wanted to do. And I did it and it was the most nourishing things.

[35:29]

But I couldn't get... to that coming home immediately. I had to sit down. And the way I explained it to myself was there is a particular energy when you work and when you stop. It actually seems easier to continue in that same energy rhythm rather than stopping and waiting for the shift and what other kind of wave of energy. C-rhythm is coming up. And that might be very uncomfortable. So that's what I did. I just basically tied myself to the chair and jumped up and sat down again and thought, oh, I do this. No, you don't. But it was really a big learning. And I'm just remembering I should do that again. So he says... It is possible to discover rest right in the middle of chaos.

[36:34]

Reb Anderson used to say in practice discussions, and I have said that to people when they come to me, to see me, can you relax in the middle of it? He didn't help me figure out how I could get rid of it or change it or make me feel better or anything. His question was often... Can you relax in the middle of it? And it is possible to relax in the middle of the most horrendous situation. It's like the eye in the center of a hurricane. There is a stillness that we can physically relax. So this is one of those. Can we relax in the middle of it? The elbows will help you do that. holding your elbows. Does it feel nice? So, when we bring, and then he says, when we bring our attention without distraction to this moment, we can relax.

[37:51]

What is the time? Am I going on and on and on? Oh, that's good. Okay, I go on a little longer. So I had an experience one day. After I've been a year at Sand Center, I went back to Switzerland to figure out whether I wanted to be here and also to find out whether I actually wanted to be here because I was afraid of going home. Going home meant... sitting down with my husband and figuring out whether we were going to get back together or separate divorce or what we were going to do. And so I decided I have to go home. I can't stay here because I'm afraid. If fear is underneath, and I don't know it, but I haven't checked it out, that's no basis of being anywhere. That is just not a good situation.

[38:56]

So I went home and I worked in a nursing home where there were people with old people, people with terrible, terrible situations, like they couldn't move, they couldn't speak, they couldn't communicate, and they were very stiff, they had to be dressed, they had to be cleaned, they had to be fed, and they were probably going to leave another place many years because all their organs were functioning and fine. And so first I was very depressed. I mean, every day I went home and I felt like, would somebody please carry me home and put me to bed? I mean, I can't stand it. And then I got a little bit more... I realized that actually I did feed the person the way I would like to be fed, when I would be fed.

[40:04]

Like, I don't like to mix everything. I like to have the taste of this separate from the taste of this. So I would kind of feed them like that. But I have a friend who loves to mix everything. So she gets a big Sunday ice cream construction with lots of different things. And the first thing she does is I go like this and I go... So I thought, well, maybe this person likes it mixed. How do I know? They can't tell me. Maybe I'm doing what I like and it's totally what they don't like. So I would alternate. I would sometimes mix a little and sometimes not. So that... hoping that occasionally that person gets exactly what they like. And that was a nice thing for me to do. I mean, I felt like I was suddenly allowing not knowing, and the person couldn't tell me, so I make more possibilities rather than just what I like.

[41:06]

So... I had to clean a lot of these people. I was a nurse's aide, so they would send me and say, you know, room number three and room number four, and would you please go? And in the morning, of course, they all had to be diapers changed and washed. So one morning I come and the nurses are sitting in the nurse's office having coffee, and I've... went through three rooms and I passed the nurse's office and said, oh, you have room number five. And in my mind, I go, I've done three. And they're just sitting there and I have to do it all. You know, they just dump it on me. Like, oh, do I have to do the toilets again today? Here, I did them yesterday. So I was in that mood, you know, and I came into this room. And there was this horrendous smell. And I always think this was a moment of grace.

[42:14]

I didn't do anything. I mean, my mind wasn't in a lovely, loving space. For some reason, I see the person from the door. I open the door. I'm hit by that smell. full diapers, I see the person and everything changed. It just changed. And it was this single one person. It was not number four. It was just this totally unique, singular being that needed being cleaned and being washed. And that was all there was.

[43:15]

There was no before and there was no after and there was no me having to do anything or others that could do it or didn't do it. That was just totally all gone. And it was just that one thing and I was totally clear what needed to happen and he was totally and it wasn't like there was no smell anymore but the effect on me was radically different and that is still when I tell you that I still can feel it that was such an incredible moment of grace of what reality is and what this teaching is talking about. And what we, the possibility is there to live every moment of your life that way.

[44:16]

It is there and it's always there. And it's there for each one of us. And I got a one-time experience of that. And so something helped me to bring my whole being to that one situation. And it was just, there was nothing missing. There was nowhere else I wanted to be. There wasn't even a me that could think of somewhere else to be. It was just totally complete, a wonderful experience cleaning up a diaper and a person and dressing her. So that's what he's saying. And access to that is if we start finding a place to rest in the middle of things. And if we use what we know, like holding our elbows, for example.

[45:22]

Then, number five, we've been talking about too, cultivate don't know mind. We have to cultivate it because the mind we usually reside in, we have all the don't-know mind. We don't have to create it, but we have to cultivate bringing it forward. We have it. We all have big don't-know mind. We all have perfect don't-know mind. We just forget it because we reside in that narrow little thing of no mind. I know this, I know that, I know the other. I do not have to walk in estrangement in foreign lands and do not have to be afraid.

[46:28]

Nothing can happen to me since I understand how everything is loving me. I have unlearned the I and now know only we. With the lover I became two. and from the two of us into the world and beyond all being through the we. And because we are everything, we are alone. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma talks are offered at no cost, and this is made possible by the donations we receive. Your financial support helps us to continue to offer the Dharma. For more information, visit sfcc.org and click giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[47:30]

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