Good morning. Joshua asked his teacher, Nansen, what is the way? How do we practice? What are we doing here anyway? What's the point of all of this? Nansen said, ordinary month is the way. Well, then why all this extraordinary effort? It's a very good question. So this is day three. Day three of a five-day sashim. It's like the pivot point. There's a way in which

[01:15]

Sashin has started to do its work on us. The influence of following the schedule. The influence of resisting the schedule. The influence of moments of awareness. and moments of distraction. The influence of bringing forth a dedication, the influence of losing dedication. They all cook us in their own way. They draw us into and involvement, and engagement in what's happening.

[02:30]

And the life we were leading before Shashin, the life we were leading after Shashin, start to diminish in contrast to the intrigue that's going on for us now. It's a very helpful and potent time to renew our intention. Of course, any time is a potent and helpful time to renew our intention. But this is time. Because the request of Shashin is sinking into our bones. It's not just something in our head or even our heart. It's something that's starting to penetrate more deeply. And we've watched ourselves.

[03:32]

We've felt ourselves as we've related to it. Now the request, what does practice ask of me? Can be heard a little more thoroughly. it can be felt a little more thoroughly. From what's arising for us as we practice, we can have a clearer sense of what that request is and start to discover how to meet that request. How to renew our vow, our intention. And I would say, returning to basics. It's not about doing something startlingly different.

[04:32]

It's about doing the ordinariness of Shashin. Following the schedule. Letting each event be itself. Engaging it as thoroughly as possible. the giving over to the exacting nature of being mindful. Now we're closer to ourselves. We're closer to what's going on for us. We can see in another level of detail what exactly that proposition is. Not to say that Sashin is a linear event.

[05:37]

Each day we settle a little more, we become a little clearer, a little happier, a little more serene. Sashin is more like a journey into the unknown. Sometimes you come across a quiet, peaceful meadow, quite beautiful and serene. And sometimes you wander into a dark forest and it's really hard to know what the hell is going on. Sometimes your body is a great ally. Saddled, light, powerful. And sometimes it's your worst enemy. Twisted, knotted. It's not a happy place to be. So what is the continuity of effort, of engagement that can run through, that can flow through all those changing events?

[06:57]

Those changing sense of our own being. What is the request of practice? You know, over the last couple of weeks, in the first couple of days of sashim, I've been trying to map out what I think of as the yogic craft of awareness. Trying to describe details such as experience the experience. When the mind comes into awareness, to be aware, you're aware. To have a tangible, palpable experience of something other than the world according to me.

[08:02]

To let that stand as a counterpoint to the usual habituated patterns of thought and feeling of the world according to me. To discover something about release. To do something about how creating a connection to our own physicality. starts to create a foundation, starts to create a container that can hold the movement of our human life rather than spin off into some other time, some other place. But the intriguing and even in some ways paradoxical point of practice, especially Zen, Soto Zen practice, It's not about accomplishment. It's about engagement.

[09:07]

Jean-Paul Sartre said, genius is what we invent under pressure, under difficulty. So nonsense says, yes, stay true to what this practice asks of me. Stay true to every day is a good day to practice. Stay true to this very mind is Buddha. But not because you're going to create something special. Not because... As a poet put it, you're going to become the luminous angel we desire. But more like, as another poet put it, poet put it, in her poem, you waited for something to come, it came, and it wasn't what you were waiting for.

[10:32]

And this is our practice. We bring forth our diligent effort. And something's created. And it isn't according to the plans and hopes and aspirations we had. I remember once in my own life, I decided... I knew exactly how to get enlightened. And I set off to do that. And I set off to find the place to do it. And I went there and I practiced, if I say so myself, in quite a sincere and dedicated way. And then at a certain point, I felt utterly defeated.

[11:39]

I remember saying to myself, I felt like I'd just gone 15 rounds with the world heavyweight champion and being knocked out each round. And then I went back to the main temple. And I was just, while I was in the forest, I meditated all the time. I slept as little as possible. Very diligent, dedicated. Then going back to the main temple, I couldn't bear to sit. And I couldn't bear what went on in my mind when I didn't sit. It felt like practice was torturing me and I couldn't reach. I'll just clean the toilets all day.

[12:46]

That's what I did. I got up early before the other monks and cleaned the toilets. If I can't help myself, maybe I can just do something useful. Now I reflect back on that time and think the whole process was very useful. I think when we allow ourselves really notice what's going on. In Zazen.

[13:52]

We see how unrelenting our conditioned being is. This stream of thoughts and feelings and images. How utterly challenging it is to stay in contact. To not sink into some dream. How to keep consciousness, keep alertness, keep awareness on the surface of that stream of consciousness. rather than sink into it. But the very process of diligently engaging to do that, we learn so much.

[15:02]

We learn practice is not about getting what you want. No matter how virtuous, a goal you think it is. Practice is not about success, but it's not about failure either. Of course, both come up for us. They come together. Practice is not about a special state of mind. Practice is about the state of mind the conditioned nature that's already here. Maybe that we think of as ordinary. But there's something about the diligence that draws us closer.

[16:10]

to Jean-Paul Sartre's version of genius. The way we adapt under pressure, under stress, under difficulty. When we just skirt around going into mechanisms, defenses, psychological defenses, daydreams, distractions, Well, when we go into those states, we think we have problems. I have problems in my life. But when we pay close attention, we see we have a much bigger problem. And that's the one that's really bothering us. We can't make life do what we want it to.

[17:14]

There is no strategy for it. No amount of effort will accomplish it. Often one of the most powerful ways we discover this is just sitting with an achy body. We see tendency in us to contract, to resist, to squirm, to distract ourselves. And just a very simple request, sit upright, stay present in the body. We discover in a way below thought, underneath thought, what it is opening to the moment just as it is. And the challenge for us is to translate that, it's to transfer that into all the other modalities of our life, of our consciousness.

[18:27]

I often think of in happy yoga, There's something learned there in a stretch. A stretch as far as you can stretch. You pause and make as much contact as you can and explore something called softening, releasing, more thoroughly engaging. That has its own concentration. That has its own intimacy. That has its own teaching of going beyond. Of the interface between holding back and releasing into. This is where our practice happens. The interface between holding back and releasing into.

[19:37]

How do we take one step up a hundred foot pole? How do we take one step beyond this conditioned life that we've so diligently and determinedly crafted? How do we release into something lighter? What do we release into each moment? It's very helpful to remember that there are many moments that offer us support and nourishment. When we taste the food we're eating. When in contrast to the conflicted body

[20:45]

of the Zendo, we feel the fluid body that walks down the hall. In those moments of quiet mind, just to be present for them. Even if they're fleeting. allow the structure of Sashin to support this kind of activity. To watch in ourselves the inner work of renewing our vow. into a different relationship to practice.

[22:00]

That we're not practicing to accomplish. We're not practicing to avoid. We're simply practicing to be with what is. To be part of what is. To discover more carefully challenges and difficulties we have around doing that. And to let those challenges and difficulties spark our genius. Because as we engage in this, the way we formulate our vows, this is impossible I vow to do it. It's the very nature of engaging the impossible.

[23:06]

It's the very nature of asking for an unconditioned response to a conditioned existence. Staying close where the genius occurs, where the discovery occurs. We can float off into our own emotional pain. We can stay busy with our own determined effort to make it the way we want it. We can soothe ourselves with pleasant fantasies.

[24:11]

But we disconnect from the fundamental point. There's a way in which we will remain a mystery to ourselves. There's a way in which practice will remain a mystery to us. is a way in which we will continue to formulate it in a way that sort of misses the point. So as we settle into our unsettledness, as we meet our so-called successes and failures in Shishin. As we return to the core request of practice, let something sink in, register as fully as possible.

[25:32]

Concentration can be deceptive. Sometimes, as we cultivate through our engagement the capacity to be concentrated, to stay in contact, it picks up an unpleasant object to concentrate on. A painful memory or thought. And the energy of our being flows through our connection, our concentration into that unpleasantness and makes it more unpleasant. And often those states toss us around. That's when it's very helpful to just stick by the fundamentals.

[26:42]

Just follow the schedule. Just do the next thing. Just stay in touch with your body. Just keep engaging breath and body. Just attend to noticing and noting rather than being swept away by. And it's strange. of our own genius. Our difficult states are an expression of our dedication. Our difficult states are an expression of concentration. In other states of mind, we just successfully block out those painful things. Here we are. We're getting them in technicolor in full detail.

[27:52]

And how to respond is a chord. If it's overwhelming, we need to find a way to soothe. If there's a settledness, to open up and experience more fully. There's no prescription that works for all states to discover on the occasion. And when we have our moments of settledness, To be aware we're aware when we're aware. To let them register, to let this other formulation of what it is to be alive, of what it is to be me, of what the world is.

[28:54]

To let this other formulation speak, express its truth. That when our own truth comes up with formulation and conviction, can have a counterpoint. Yes, Mary. I understand what you're talking about, and it's always, I don't know, intriguing to me, and it's hard to find ways to talk about it. How do you, what, you know, you said, be aware that you're aware, but yet, how do you do that without separating from your experience? You know, without getting to that, what's called the community? talking to yourself about the wrong concepts? Don't talk to yourself. Don't put it into the wrong concepts. Once we started to become aware of such activities, the request of practices don't go there.

[30:00]

When we're not aware of those activities, the practice is more opaque to us. The question is the jewel. I mean, it's not some strategy that for sure will prevent us from doing that. I mean, he said, right in the awareness there is the contact, there is a direct experiencing that can guide us. Direct experiencing that can guide us. When there is awareness, it's more like opening up to what already is than doing something to it. I'm talking about opening up to the experience that already is.

[31:03]

Being aware of that. Being aware of opening. So it's tricky to talk about because it happens in the realm of experiencing, not in the realm of thinking. So discovering as thoroughly as we can To live the life we're living. To be the person we are. To breathe the breath we're breathing. To feel the feelings we're feeling. Ordinary mind is the way.

[32:08]

And within the container of sashim, it will keep us close enough to that mind, to that way of being, that we can study what it is, that we can stay close to what this practice asks of we now, that we can stay close to the yogic craft we've discovered, that helps support that you know to refer back to this little poem I read yesterday tighten or turn towards nothing the circle that is the world's things

[33:12]

Coming into as exact a contact with what's in the moment as we can. Letting go of all the constructs. Coming into contact. And then as we do that, it opens up. And the naked circle can grow wild, wide, maybe wild too. Enlarging, embracing all. it again, turning towards nothing, the circle that is the world's thing. Then the naked circle can grow wide, enlarging, embracing all. Actually, the word in this translation is titan.

[34:15]

But I thought that was too close to contracting. Maybe... So this translation says, tighten to nothing. I think of it more as drawing in. Simplifying. To the contact of this moment. Then this moment connects to every moment. One sign can make us aware, and as we stay aware of sign, a symphony of signs comes in the being. Kasemola says.

[35:29]

You waited for something to come, it came, and it wasn't what you waited for. This is as if we sit down, we bring our body, our breath, our best intention. And then it just happens the way it happens. This is our sashim. It happens the way it happens. Can we keep turning towards it? Can we discover the subtle work of more fully and deeply and subtly being willing to be the person we already are? Have the feelings we're having.

[36:34]

And have the mind we're having. And the body. Can we start to learn from, see and learn from, the ways in which we turn away, we resist. Can we state close to that intention? Can we find it in each circumstance, in each situation? Ordinary mind is the way. May our intention

[37:28]

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