Shuso Talk

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that
try again
so this morning i like to talk about time and i thought the title of the talk might be there's no time like the present
but then i thought about it more and i thought really there's no time but the present and that's what i'm gonna do and i'm getting at in a pure different way and so i thought i'd start by same why i wanted why the topic of time wrote
up for me and kind of grabbed me and
i i think the first reason is that appear years ago urging the cat who lives at tassajara came to my door and i came to live with me kind of chose each other and when i first heard her name i
i thought it was a funny name for a cat i didn't realize that it was the name of tokens bicycle oj which means being time or time being and when i heard that it seemed like a perfect name for a cat and then i i've tried to read or g added didn't make any sense to me at all
so ah that's been a classical that i've wanted to understand and read again and so this seemed like an opportunity to study boogie
and then many years ago i have i heard a tick nhat hanh
say present moment wonderful moment and that praise has stayed with me present moment wonderful moment and
it reminds me about
coming back to the present moment and how it also reminds me how easy it is to slip away from being aware in the present moment
and
and i realize how caught up by am it's probably a lot of us are in clock time the time that is is kind of by limiting and subways where you know often found myself thing i don't have time to do this or that or a just feeling that time as
fleeting and
i'm not very spacious
and yet i've always loved the phrase the fairy tale start with once upon a time a long time ago now when we when you hear that phrase when i hear that phrase time kind of opens up and it's magical things that happened a long time ago could be happening now and that kind of
boundary
the clock time dissolves
so for all those reasons i thought it would be interesting to explore time and then also in reading the lotus sutra
there is
and a way of getting into this kind of vastness of time that is offered in the lotus sutra so seem that this was a good practice period to be looking at time
and i've found that as i've been studying time it's actually helped my doesn't practice it's supporting me to stay in the present moment so i thought i'd try to weep that in to the talk as well
so i'm i'm gonna start with a poem that i wrote the valerie requested at the end of my last talk because i think it might help us get into tough a hard time
and it's called the road
the monastery needs the road
the fourteen rutted miles rising to the crest descending to the valley
the hairpin curves sharp rocks steep cliffs
nothing to catch you if you fall
this road dictates slow driving sturdy vehicles care and attention
yes get carried away by the ancient oaks the occasional wild boar the limestone bones of the hills baird to the best sky get carried away but keep your eyes on the road and take your time
when you reach the monastery you have already been on a journey through the wilderness
the monastery needs the road
so
slowing down a little bit i think this talk is going to be a journey it
through a baby a journey that might take you to disneyland the ocean and downtown los angeles know
and trip that has different parts to it and hopefully will take us back home at the end
so i'm going to talk a little bit about a
techno hands view of time and the lotus sutra and read a part of the lotus sutra chapter fifteen at sixteen parts of them and than a talk about eugene
the time being and also ken wilber
ah a short piece from a book of his called no boundary
am
and we'll see how all of this relates to our doesn't practice
ah
and i want to thank a few people for helping me with this talk linda ruth who studied ngugi with me one afternoon and shannon who let me her notes from a class that norman fischer gave about gucci
and
rerun who
they found she was reading the ken wilber book and i showed it to me blended to me and then judith mako and graham who topped with me about time and leann who lent me her one room to study in when a cold afternoon
so many people have helped me with this cock
so can start with a thick nhat hanh
he tucks about the lotus sutra and time
the in it by showing the difference between the historical view of time and the ultimate feel of time in the lotus sutra and the historical view of time is cut about conventional view of time within the past present and future and where a shock
mooney buddha actually lived for eighty years in in in his body
in india and preached at him kevin an enlightened and tide and died
and then
you know the places where he lived are real places you can go to them on pilgrimage in and see where he
where his life took place
that's the historical dimension of shakyamuni buddha's existence but there's another way of looking at shakyamuni buddha as being
present it
billions of years billions of
calpers have been an incredibly vast such a huge space of time that we can't grasp it with the rational mind and that's what a kick me out had referred to as the ultimate view of time and in that view of time
the buddha is with us now and we're all buddhas so that's another very powerful way of looking at time and
there's a a metaphor that to get han uses that really helped me to understand this go the metaphor of the wave and water
and suddenly to read a little bit when we look at a wave on the surface of the ocean we can see the form of the wave and we locate the wave and space and time looking at a wave from the perspective of the historical dimension it seems to have a beginning and an egg
end a birth and death a wave can be high or low a wave can be long or short
many qualities can be ascribed to the way the notions of birth and death high or low beginning and ending coming and going being or non-being all of these can be applied to a wave in the historical dimension so you evolved into the ocean and sea
same waves and if you have a sense of them arising and disappearing him
so we too are subject to these notions when we look from the historical dimension we see that we are subject to being and non-being we are born but later on we will die we have a beginning and an end we have come from somewhere and we will go somewhere
that is the historical dimension all of us belong to this dimension shakyamuni buddha also has a historical dimension
trip i just talked about at the same time all beings and also and all beings and all things also belong to the ultimate dimension the dimension of reality that is not subject to notions of space and time birth and death coming and going a wave is a wave
but at the same time it is water
the wave does not have to die in order to become water it is already water right in the present moment we don't speak of water in terms of being or non-being coming and going water is always water to talk about a wave we need these notions the wave arrives and passes away
has gone somewhere the wave has a beginning and an end it is high or low more or less beautiful than other waves the wave is subject to birth and death none of these distinctions can be applied to the wave and its ultimate dimension as water in fact you cannot separate the way from its
ultimate dimension
even though we are used to seeing everything in terms of the historical dimension we can touch the alternate dimension so our practice is to become like away while living the life of the way in the historical dimension we realized that we are also water and lived the life of water
that is the essence of practice
so thinking about
water
as perhaps the dharma kiah
the the body the dime of body of the buddha and the wave as the nirvana kaja
and they're both
they both have a reality although the dharma coyote we can't really grasp that we can't grasp it to our senses or grasp it at all
ah
so
the place in the lotus sutra where
the distinction or where it's he the gap
the distinction between the historical dimension of the buddha and the ultimate dimension really comes forth in chapter fifteen and sixteen
chapter fifteen is called springing up out of the earth
and
it starts with and we're still at
in chapter fifteen in that place in the in the sky with the ah
the great stupa and
at that i'm just can read a little bit of from chapter fifteen and talk about it at that time the bodhisattva sad those who had come from other lands numerous as the sense of eight ganges arose in the great assembly and with folded hands saluted and
both to the buddha say world honored one if the buddha will allow us after his extinction diligently and zealously to protect and keep read and recite copy and worship this sutra in the saha world we would preach it abroad in the land
and then the buddha said to these body satsuma has sought but there's no need for you to preach it because
i have already taught this sutra to
and and infinite number of body sat by my side but as and at that moment all these bodhi bodhisattvas bring to sprang forth from below
each one of them leading a red new as the sent as many as the sands of sixty thousand ganges so this enormous number of bodhi sub buds arose from the earth all followers of the buddha all having been taught the lotus sutra and
and
my trail than asked how could this thing where have all these bodhisattvas come from and how could you possibly have preached the damage is so many people in your short life span
and the buddhist says all these great bodhisattvas from numberless calpers have studied the body have studied the buddha wisdom all of them have my converts
what i now speak as the truth believe me with single mind's eye from a long distant past have instructed all this host and then my trail and the numberless bodhisattvas and others were seized with doubt and perplexity wondering at this rare thing and re
reflected thus how has the world honored one in so short a time instructed such innumerable countless awesome care awesome on cares of great bodhisattvas and caused them to abide in perfect enlightenment
in so short a time how hast thou done such great buddha deeds and by buddha power and buddha merit todd such an innumerable host of great bodhisattvas to obtain enlightenment
so this is the question my tray of poses to the buddha
and in the next chapter chapter six sixteen it's called revelation of the eternal life of the to togheter the buddha explains how this happened and
my
my good son since i veritably became buddha their have passed infinite boundless hundreds of thousands of myriads of cody's of utis of calpers
so the buddha says that he is the buddha for this enormous period of time and
since i became buddha in the very far distant past my lifetime is of infinite awesome care calpers forever existing an immortal good sons than he explains
something about the understanding we have that the buddha only lived for eighty years the lifetime which i attained by pursuing the bodhisattva way it's not even yet accomplished but will still be twice the previous number of calpers
but now in this unreal nirvana i announced that i must enter the real nirvana in this tactful way that to target to teach us all living living beings wherefore if the buddha abides long in the world men of little virtue who do not cultivate the roots of goodness and are
spiritually poor and mean greedily attached the five desires and are caught in the neck of wrong reflection and false fuse if they see the to target to constantly present and not extinct
they will then become puffed up and lazy and unable to conceive the idea that it is hard to meet the buddha or a mind of rib or develop a mind of reverence for him therefore the to target to tactfully teaches no big shoes the appearance of buddha's in the world is a rare occurrence
so he's saying that just the whole idea of the blue having lived for eighty years is tactful means the way of
inspiring us to keep practicing because we think that life is is short and that buddha's rarely appeared and
and the historical dimension that's true
but in the ultimate to mention the buddha has always been here then he talks about a parable the parable of a good of a doctor who has he's very wise doctor and he has many sons and and
and business takes him on a trip to another country and while he's away his sons drink all the medicines that he left behind some of which are poisonous and some of them
become very ill and rolling on the ground and at this moment the father comes back home and he sees what has happened to his sons and
of the sons who drank the poison some have lost their senses other are still sensible but on seeing their father approaching in the distance they are all greatly delighted and kneeling salute him asking how good it is that you are returned in safety when our foolishness have mistakenly dosed ourselves
with poison we beg that you will heal us and give us back our lives
the the father cares about his sons and so he
find some herbs and mixes them up and offers them to his sons and says this excellent medicine with color cent and fine flavor altogether perfect you may now take and it will at once rid you of your to distress so that you will have no more suffering
so some of the sun's take the medicine and they're cured but there are others who have although they're happy that their father as home and greet him and ask him to heal their illness are unwilling to take the medicine
and see you might wonder why by will they take the medicine
but they refused to take it and the father's reflects alas for these sons afflicted by this poison for their minds all unbalanced
see me and implored to be healed yet they are unwilling to take such excellent medicine as this now i must arrange an expedient plan so they will take this medicine then he says to them you should know that i am now worn out with old age and at the time of my death and the time of my death has now arrived this
excellent medicine i now leave here you may take it and have no fear of not being better and then he departs again and sends a messenger back to tell his sons that he died and now when the sun's hear that his father is dead their minds are greatly distressed and they will
reflected by father were alive he would have pity on us and we should be saved and preserved but now he has left us and died at a distant country now we feel we are orphans and have no one to rely on continuous grief brings them to their senses and they recognize the color sent an excellent flavor of the medicine
and thereupon take it they're poisoning being entirely relieved the father hearing that his sons had have recovered seeks and opportunity and returns so that they all see him all my good sons what is your opinion are there any who could say that this good physician had committed the site
the sin of falsehood and then the whole of them liam's and no world on at one
so and then the buddha says i also have like this since i became both buddha infinite boundless hundred thousand myriad cody's of negatives of awesome care calpers ago for the sake of all living beings by my tactful power i have declared that i must enter nirvana yet there is none who can
lawfully excuse me of the error of falsehood so he's saying that and
is
going to die and
his limited lifespan is an incentive for everyone to study and practice fully embrace the dharma and then there's something about i think for all of us having a sense of the
preciousness of time sometimes that we feel and someone close to have died
and i know that this happened for me when my father died this year
and even before that when my parents i could see that they were really aging and nearing the end of their life and entered a nursing home and i felt i am just really wanted to throw myself into this practice i didn't know how much time i had myself
to live and and after my father died it it felt even like even stronger do the thing that's most important i don't put it off
because we never know
how much time we have so i think that's the the buddha's
ah
story of the
the doctor
leaving and telling his sons of he had died brought them to their senses and the fence it was an incentive for them to take the medicine or two at which is i think of metaphor for practicing so
the
in a way that they even know we think that conventional time is what's really real i think this parable and this these chapters about the historical and the ultimate lives of the buddha
may help us to turn that around and see that
what we think of as our lifespan being so limited is just a conventional way of thinking about it but really
there's a fastness that we are also part of
so i think that my fear a good segue into
luigi and
actually there's one
one passage in had had i think that will also help us
as a bridge to luigi
in terms of the ultimate dimension the lifespan of the to togheter is immeasurable and infinite yet even though an ultimate reality the buddha is not born and does not die nevertheless he pretends to be born to exist for a while
while and to enter nirvana to show living beings of the of the world how to take care of themselves the buddha gives us the spiritual medicine we need for the healing and transformation of our bodies and minds the practice of mindfulness now it is up to us to take the medicine and practice diligently
lee so that we too can get in touch with the ultimate dimension and recognize our true nature of no birth and no death
and what this points to is that it's actually the way we can tap into the ultimate dimension is through practice and
luigi the the called ngugi
helps us to understand that
just to say a little bit about uchi it was written by dogan in fear twelve forty and it's who and g
the characters little means being having existence and g his time so sometimes it's translated as existence time and sometimes being time or time being
and and dobyns view of this time and existence are inseparable
that's kind of ha
they'd be a hard concept to grasp time and existence are inseparable
and he starts by talking about conventional time because he says because the signs of times coming and going are obvious people do not doubt it
nobody we can
see the seasons come and go the hours come and go so we think that our conventional idea of time clock time in real
ah but then he says c h thing in this entire world as a moment of time
including the self the self is time
so time isn't just clock time and if you begin to question
that you like can begin to see
that
that time is ah
unlimited
ah and then dogan says each moment is all being each moment is the entire world
and i think this is so hard to understand because it's beyond concepts like the can a conceptual line has trouble grasping this that
time is same famous self and the same as consciousness and buddha
i'm time is not separate from new dogan says you are the time being right now
so are being is beyond the linear sense of time
and then he says a pine tree as time bamboo is time
everything in time
ah and norman says about this we encountered this multi dimensional bursting with life way everything is
ha imbued with time and time is everything
then dogan says do not think that time merely flies away and nights or conventional notion of time do not see flying away as they only function of time if time merely flies away you would be separated from time
in essence all things in the entire world are linked with one another as moments because all moments or the time being they are your time being
when he says all things in the entire world are linked with one another as moments that brings up for me the way we're all interconnected
the idea that everything arises
dependent colorizing me because of this that arises there's no nothing that separate from anything else and am
i'm gonna skip son had there's a phrase that jumped out lindland diverted i studied this vigorously abiding in each moment is the time being
and
the way we can experience says through our practice moment to moment if your present in in zazen
your vigorously abiding in each moment
and
and fully present there is
like everything is there in that moment i know if i can express it it's really
certainly
well i don't know i can express it
ah
so i'll read a little more dogan become think he expresses it really well people only see time's coming and going and do not thoroughly understand that the time being abides in each moment
even if people recognize the time being in each moment who could give expression to this recognition
so it's very hard to get it to explain it to
and then he goes on to say that time being is entirely actualized without being caught up in nets or cages again it's our conventional ways to can try to box it in
because we know it's easier to easier to understand clock time away than this other time being
ah but this his next lines i think i'm a really magnificent the time being of all beings throughout the world in water or in foreign land is just the actualization of your complete effort right now will be done again
the time being of all beings throughout the the time being of all beings throughout the world in water or on land is just the actualization of your complete effort right now
all beings have all kinds in the visible and invisible realms are the time being actualized by your complete effort
glowing do to your complete effort
without your complete effort right now nothing would be actualized nothing would flow
so i think that says that as we practice fully
we are
are holding up the world and snc and each being creates the world as it is so that
what we do and how we practice really makes a difference
the time being of all beings throughout the world in water or on land is just the actualization of your complete effort right now
and that since we're all connected with all beings everywhere that if were putting out our
effort and living fully practicing fully in every moment this benefits on the everywhere
oh i think that's the real beauty and gift of of this practice in this facile gucci
i'm
and it reminded me of a phrase in this self-fulfilling self receiving some modding last practice period we studied this with paul as part of the vendor why
so this will probably sound very familiar
this being so the zazen of even one person at one moment imperceptibly accords with all things and fully resonates through all time
thus in the past future and present of the limitless universe this as it carries out in the buddhist teaching endlessly
each moment of his eyes and is equally wholeness of practice equally wholeness of realization
that princess back to the
present moment of practice and

ah
think
the
sense that
as were present moment by moment breath by breath with our practice
where
ah
benefiting all beings everywhere and done
so how can we do this
one thing that came up from me lasts a shame on
that i found very helpful actually
linda roof pointed out to me and side that my mudra was kind of falling down
tilted this way and leave my hands were in my lap and so i i started working on
they working on working with for anyway being mindful of my mudra in zazen and and
i am
i placed my hands in the mood dry and take a few breaths and then i noticed that my motorhead slipped down and so as as for while i practice to earn counting my breath and i get to three or four instead
thinking and then noticed that my mudra had fallen again and it in every time i started thinking when hundred fell and
so
as a
paid more and more attention to the murderer and breath
i was able to interrupt the chain of thoughts more ah more readily
and i found myself daydreaming much less and being much more present and
it was son a constant you know just it was wonderful to have something physical to help bring me back to the present moment
so
whether it's the murderer or the breath or pasture all of these things that i can help us
i stay present an
may have your own path
your on way coming back to the present moment
new that that i found very helpful ah
did not
not drifting off
i want to say a little bit more about the present moment and referred to
ken wilber who's a someone i've never been able to read before
kind of kind of daunting
but ken wilber is a kind of explores consciousness and his he draws from many thinkers and poets and
spiritual disciplines in his writing and
this
chapter is called the no boundary moment and
he says we it is really talking about how we can experience the timeless moment
the moment
where were totally in the present and one way to do this is through the senses
ah
if you think about it you know if you hear a sound whether it's a my voice or but we're sitting thousand sometimes it can hear ah sounds of the kitchen or the creek or not so many now but in the summer of birds and
each sound we hear we here in the present and he says you cannot hear past sounds nor can you hear future so the only thing you ever hear is in is the present
and then just as all sounds are only present sounds so all tastes are only present tastes or smells are present smells and all sites are present sites you cannot touch see or feel anything resembling a past or a future
with the senses
ah
as is a very helpful ways of being in the present and i think that's the same with the mood dread posture the breath all of these are our only things you can experience in the present moment
and
even the so we can understand that in our direct experience through the senses there's no past only up a an endless present still we must us have firmly convinced that we know something about the past
task seems very real and will versus that that's because of memory
yeah we have memories of of the past
we've read things about the past ah but in actually memory
itself is the present experience
but if you have an interest
if you're sitting and you
think about something that happened earlier in the day that thought is happening in the present and
alan watts he you
wilbert just refers to something alan watts says which i'm going to read what about memories surely by remembering i can also know what is past very well remember something remember the incident of seeing a friend walking down the street what are you aware of
you are not actually watching the veritable event of your friend walking down the street you can't get up and shake hands with him or get an answer to a question you forgot to ask him that the past time you are remembering in other words you are not looking at the actual past at all you are looking at a present trace of
the past from memories you infer that have been past events but you are not aware of any past events you know the past only in the present and as part of the present
so we we think we know the past but we only know it as we thinking about it in the present and it's the same with thoughts about the future i would they have plan sir anxieties worries about the future but we're all were experienced expert
sensing those in the present
and
huelva goes on to say that from most of us are most the time we are so caught up in thoughts of the past or concerns about the future