This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. It's nice to see all of you this morning. It's been a while since I've given a talk at Green Gulch. My talk this morning... I have two parts. But there are two parts of the same thing. I have a little book here called Abhidharma Studies that was printed in the

[01:06]

early 60s. And there's a section that we don't usually, at least I have not been familiar with, I've been using this for some time, many years, periodically. It's called the sixth qualification, excuse me, six qualitative factors. And it features six practices that interact with each other and balance each other and that are present in our everyday life, moment to moment. But I'm not usually stated in this way.

[02:15]

But before I get into that, I have a little story that I'd like to present. And you may have heard this before. I don't know if you have. But it's by priest Doan Yuanzen from the Tang Dynasty. He talks about his experience of practice on Mount Isan or Guishan. Mount Guishan, Chinese. Guishan lived on Mount Guishan. in China. And this monk practiced with him on his mountain.

[03:17]

And this is what he had to say about it. He said, I have lived on Mount Guishan for over 30 years. Pretty long time to practice at one place. He said, I have done nothing but eaten Guishan's rice and shit Guishan's shit. I learned nothing from my master, Guishan. The only thing I have accomplished was to tend to a water buffalo. When he wandered off the road, I yanked him back. And if he trampled on other people's fields, I hit him with my whip.

[04:27]

After a while, he became quite tame. The only problem was that he would follow anyone who called him. But now he has changed into a pure, innocent beast who stays next to me and always looks serene and bright. Even if I stay, even if I try to chase him away, he stays right with me. So that's Priest Yuan Do on Yuan's ends. Testament. There's 30 years of practice. We just stayed on the mountain and just ate.

[05:30]

Boop. Then the water will blow. And after 30 years... He didn't have anything to show for it, except that the water buffalo was always glowing. It's like a kind of testament to don't seek anything, just do the practice. And that we get the practice or get the result through our pores. We always say that we receive the practice through our pores. Just do the work and don't worry about it.

[06:34]

And at some point, we come out shiny. Shiny. I just thought I would use that as an introduction. As a matter of fact, as I was studying the main subject here, the six qualitative factors, I ran across that. Oh, I remember this. So I thought I would show that with you. So, you know, when we practice sin, there's always this question. Why do we do this? I mean, especially when we get into a tight corner. You know, ordinarily, we kind of know why we do this, practice. Getting up every morning, going to the bathroom. Since I was in, eat breakfast, that's pretty normal.

[07:37]

But in the middle of seven days of sashimi, when our whole body is aching, Possibly. Why did I do this? How do I get out of this? Good question. I always thought, how do I penetrate this? How can I actually stay here? So, these qualitative factors, six qualitative factors, also have their opposites within the six. So there are factors that balance each other and are present in our life moment to moment. So I'll read, I'll present the list of the six, and then I'll talk about each one of them. The first one is tranquility and serenity, cultivating tranquility and

[08:45]

and serenity. The second one is cultivating agility, sometimes called energy, but it's a certain kind of energy called agility. And the third one is called pliancy or flexibility. And the fourth one is called workability. Workability is like clay or gold. And the fifth one is proficiency, being able to do what you're doing well. And the sixth one is called uprightness. So these are very common to us, but as a group,

[09:46]

balance each other and work together and are always present in any wholesome state of being or state of mind. So these six factors apply to both body and mind. Like tranquility and serenity of body and of mind, agility of both body and of mind, pliancy of both body and mind, workableness, which is a factor of balance of both body and mind, and proficiency of both body

[10:47]

and mind and uprightness of both body and mind. So going back to the beginning to look at what is it meant by tranquility and serenity. Tranquility is kind of like a body of water. That's without any wind. Body of water without any wind, which is very placid. I don't know if you've been to Japan, but there's certain parts of Japan where they grow a lot of rice. And at a certain time of year, the rice paddies are flooded with water. And the water is so still.

[11:48]

It's like a mirror, and it mirrors the clouds and the sky. And it's the most beautiful thing, and it corresponds to our inner tranquility, our inner calmness. And I can see rice and growing rice as both a physical... and spiritual aspect for Japanese people. And it's the root of nirvana in a certain sense. It's like the seed of nirvana. And this is what we do in Zazen, right? Hopefully, when we sit. I like to express these six factors as factors that we experience in Zazen because it gives us a very easy reference point for our activity.

[13:04]

But you can use any activity to express these six. So it's also a kind of deep stillness. ravana, you know, it's called the cool state sometimes. I remember Sissy Guru, she's talking about how we should cultivate a warm feet and a cool head. So, warm feet is the basis and the Cool head is our peacefulness. So it's also the root of composure. And it's the aspect of samadhi.

[14:11]

Samadhi is like this. Samadhi is the cool head and the warm feet. And samadhi is stability. The character for stability is the same as for samadhi. Serenity is like a sunset. Like at the end of the day, if there's no war going on, we have some peacefulness, then our mind becomes serene, like beautiful sunset. And so it's the expression of the joy. I think serenity is the expression of the joy of samadhi or the joy of tranquility. So we can't always experience that in our everyday life, but it's there within the activity of our everyday life.

[15:19]

There are two ways to express serenity and tranquility. One is through zazen and cutting off activity, other activities. But it's also the essence of all activities. And it should be, I don't like to use the word should, although I enjoy it. It's easy to say you should. But we should allow that serenity and tranquility to be the basis of our activity. I can't read that. To be the basis of our activity, no matter what we're doing. So that's how we practice.

[16:23]

We're getting a notice about somebody who enters. That's all. But this leads into the next factor, which is agility, which is, of course, agility in a sense, lightness, springiness, our mind and our body, which is a kind of counter or balancing factor to serenity and tranquility.

[17:27]

Because serenity and tranquility can lead to, not sloth, but laziness or scattering of energy. You may feel so good you don't want to move. So you need a little bit of agility to motivate you I like to think of agility as like a young colt maybe a week old or two weeks old and prancing around the corral and light almost not even touching the ground I don't know if you've seen experience that but the colt bouncing around on the tips of it so it's just barely touching the ground and springing all over the place.

[18:32]

So it's nice to have that kind of mind. So it's like being alert and alert and buoyant, energetic. It's like having the ability to turn to a wholesome object unhesitatingly, both mentally and physically, if possible. You know, it's like releasing our natural energy Not forcing anything. Not being solidly within our body and mind. And having clarity.

[19:37]

There's a certain kind of clarity that we experience in young beings. So it's like... I don't think it has much to do with age, although it might, depending on who, you know, your propensities. Sometimes, as we get older, as we all do and are doing, moment by moment, and our body slows down and But we still feel, we don't feel old in our mind. Ask most old people, I don't feel, I just feel the same as I always did when I was younger. That's kind of like buoyancy of mind.

[20:39]

Even though you keep getting older, certain aspect of clarity and buoyancy are still there and you still think you're 21. So that agility is a complement to serenity and tranquility. And then there's something called pliancy, pliancy of mind, pliancy of body. It's called softness. Suzuki Roshi and flexibility. Suzuki Roshi used to talk about soft mind. Usually we think of soft mind as kind of like sluggishness. But this is not sluggishness.

[21:43]

It's the mere enemy of pliancy of mind. It means that you bend with a merge with things and take shape with things. You know how to take on different shapes. Like Aplokiteshvara is supposed to be able to take any shape of any person. Aplokiteshvara can walk into any situation and blend with it and know exactly what shape to take in order to be part of that situation. This is a very important factor for us. We tend to, not all of us, not all the time, but there's a tendency in people to

[22:51]

stay in our own space and find our safety in our own space. But Avila Kiteshvara can become a woman in order to blend with a woman, can take the shape of a man to help a man, take the shape of a dog or a cat or whatever to have an appropriate association with whatever he or she is meeting. It's kind of blending and at the same time keeping our own space. So pliancy or flexibility the ability to take any shape.

[23:55]

And that's dependent on open-mindedness, non-attachment. It's like grass, a mind of grass, that when the wind comes, the grass just takes the shape of the wind, whereas houses and big trees blow away, but the grass doesn't get damaged. Because the grass knows how to take the shape of the wind. So instead of harboring resentments and ill will, which is its opposite, we know how to ride the waves. And waves are continually coming away. So it's the opposite of stiffness and resistance.

[25:01]

There was a book that was written by a really neat guy back in the 60s. It's called Giving In to Get Your Way. instead of forcing your way on people or on situations, to blend with situations in order to find the correct way. And we find actually that when we are not stiff and more yielding, that things come our way without having to seek them out. So it's the opposite of dogmatism and rigidity, resilience. So these two, agility and pliancy, we usually talk about some of the others, but we usually talk about these two aspects.

[26:12]

And they're very, very important, especially in Zazen. The secret of sitting Zazen, and especially of Sashin, is, well, tranquility is like the goal, maybe, or one goal, if we have one. And agility and pliancy allow us to sit up straight. And the most confined posture with various sensations, bodily sensations that we may or may not like. And if we don't have pliancy and agility, it doesn't work. So these two wonderful aspects are forced on us.

[27:18]

Too bad. But we're so lucky. The fourth one is called workableness. That's really important. Workableness is the balance of factors that you're working with. If you make a cake, you know, or you're kneading bread, making bread, We used to make bread all the time back in the 50s, 60s. So much water, so much flour, and so forth. And knowing what the balance of those ingredients are, if there's too much water, it doesn't stand up. And if there's too much flour, it gets stiff and falls apart. Mm-hmm. So we're working with a balance of workableness all the time in our daily life.

[28:26]

Usually clay and gold are used as examples. If you've ever done pottery, you know, workfulness of the clay, you're always getting the slip and the various ingredients that go into the clay and balance. Doing that all the time. And we're doing that with our mind all the time and we're doing it with whatever it is that we're handling. Um... This has some sense of mindfulness. It's a real mindfulness practice factor. And it's called tempered.

[29:30]

It's temperamental or temperature. Mental temper. And it's how swords are made. and horseshoes and various metal things. You use fire to shape the metal and then you use cold water to set the temper. And this is how all the fine metal works are, especially swords. This is how Japanese sword makers always were working on their implements to refine them so well.

[30:32]

So temper is a really important factor in our practice. As we begin to refine our practice, call temper tempering so don't lose your temper each one of us has a temper which can be either smooth or rough temperamental mental temper and when you know sometimes we talk about a person's personality in terms of smell or in terms of taste. When we think of each other in those terms, and temperamental, to keep a fine temper, which is a balance of mind and body.

[31:45]

You can tell a person's temper through their actions and the way they walk and the way they relate. So we should be thinking about that or at least aware of that as an important factor in our practice. A tempered state of mind not too firm and not too soft. So we're working with soft and firm all the time. To address someone firmly, to address someone softly, we should be able to do this automatically, depending on how we perceive or feel or smell or taste someone's personality. So, you know, when we sit in Zazen, we're tempering all the time.

[33:00]

And we should be firm and soft at the same time. That's the secret of Zazen. Well-tempered, firmly sitting, but with a soft mind and a soft attitude. so that we're totally flexible all the time. We're never stiff, never stiff and hard, always soft, and at the same time, firm and tempered well. That's the secret of Zazen, and that's what we should be looking for all the time in Zazen. The next factor is called proficiency. We want to do something well. Why not? Even though we want to do something well all the time, we don't necessarily come up to that. But at the same time, because we have a soft mind, we can accept that fact and we just keep working.

[34:10]

What's the end of Sazen? The end is the beginning. The end is always the beginning. Every ending is the beginning. So there's no final end. So proficiency. You know, we want to be fit mentally. We want to be fit physically. But we always have some kind of disability or flaw or problem with doing what we really want to do, which is good, actually. Because it motivates us. So instead of thinking, what's wrong with this practice?

[35:15]

How can I come up to this practice? That's our question. Not what's wrong with this practice, or why are they doing this this way or that way, or what does this mean, or something like that. How do I come up to this practice? How can I do that? And we're always coming up to it, and we're always sliding back. And as we keep coming up to it, we gain confidence. Confidence is really important. Proficiency is the practice of cultivating confidence and making an effort to maintain our mental and physical health.

[36:17]

And we gain faith and confidence through continuous practice, constant practice. Constant practice and devotion leads to confidence and proficiency. Selfless practice and spontaneity leads to spontaneity. Because selfless practice means you give yourself over to yourself. Instead of trying to be yourself, you just give yourself over to yourself. I'm using the word cultivation, but usually we don't use that word so much. But I think in this case, I like to use the word cultivation because It's like cultivating a garden.

[37:23]

Our practice has many wonderful plants. Our body is full of wonderful flowers. And how we take care of that and cultivate it for the sake of itself. So the opposite is like hesitation, ambivalence. You know, it's wonderful when new members, new practitioners often, I think most new practitioners, although making an effort, still have some ambivalence. And it's wonderful when And let go of the ambivalence.

[38:25]

And simply accept the difficulties. You know, as we know, the difficulties that we have are the heart of our practice. We either give up or we plunge ahead. And the going ahead in practice is what gives us our confidence. You know, people always compare themselves to each other. We're always comparing ourselves to somebody else. But when we can stop doing that, or when we can use a comparison for positive action instead of jealousy or wishful thinking, then that becomes useful.

[39:30]

It's a motivation. So-and-so can do this and that, and I can't. But you can do yourself. You can't do somebody else, but you can do yourself. You can find your own proficiency within your own disability. This is, I think, how we actually practice with our inability to be perfect. If we actually utilize and focus on what we can do, that's realization. instead of wishing we could do what somebody else can do. That's what fulfillment can be.

[40:37]

So, the last one is called uprightness. Uprightness, of course, has to do with posture, but it's posture of mind. as well as posture of body. So the body follows the mind, even though the body can influence the mind. The body does influence the mind, but the mind is the leader. And the mind, when the mind is upright, the body can be upright. So when our mind is... open, totally open, without any conditioning or without being caught by conditioning or stuck in conditioning. That unconditioned mental factor is called uprightness.

[41:46]

It goes beyond conditions. You know, when we sit in Zazen, we assume the unconditioned posture. When we look around us in our daily life, our postures are often and mostly conditioned by our fears, our anxieties, our happiness, or whatever it is that we're thinking. So in Sazen, we're not thinking about anything except Sazen. So posture is totally unconditioned and open. And it's easy to sit for 40 minutes. It can be easy to sit for 40 minutes just concentrating on your posture. Or just concentrating on your breath. Or going around and your whole body, because the whole body is changing all the time, even though it looks like we're sitting still.

[42:50]

and micromanaging your body because it's always changing. And it just sits still that way, totally flexible, totally open, and unrestricted, to find that unrestricted posture in your totally restricted body. So, you know, the history books talk about Shaky Muni's noble posture, noble bearing, noble bearing. What is noble? Noble means totally upright. And according to the history story, when Shaky Muni's

[43:53]

Five companions that he practiced with saw him coming after his moonlight experience, morning star experience. They said, who is this that's coming like that? With this noble bearing. And there are other stories like that. I think with Moggallana and Shariputra, were walking along as young acolytes. And this, somebody went up to him and said, who are you guys? You have such a noble parent. It was simply an empty mind of brightness. also called backbone.

[44:58]

You can... I think he used to talk about... He didn't say backbone exactly, but he said posture. Unless you can hold the posture of your back, it's really hard to sit on that. So going back to the beginning, tranquility, and tranquility and uprightness are the two pillars of our practice, and which we express in Zazen, and we can express all six of these in all of our activity. all of our actions, workableness, agility, pliancy, those three inner practices are really important.

[46:19]

So when we sit in Zazen, to have softness and pliancy and to let go and workableness. When I sit down, I actually think about those factors. Not necessarily in that order. I have a suggestion that I have to give to my members that whenever you sit Zazen, every single time, you give yourself Zazen instruction like you were giving Zazen instruction to somebody else. And see how that works.

[47:21]

Actually, people forget. These are factors that are all the components of efficient thoughts. Tranquility and serenity. Agility. Lightness, buoyancy, cliancy, softness, soft mind, flexibility. Workableness, like clay or bread or gold. If there's too much water, it doesn't work. Too much solid substance, it doesn't work.

[48:24]

So refining, it's called refining, refining your practice. If anybody wants a list of these things, I'm happy to supply you with it and to give you all the information about this book. I don't know if it's still extended or not. So I hope that wasn't too boring. For more information, visit sfzc.org and click Giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

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