Satsang with Mooji Kwa-ya-yi-ma-ken-man-chi-ju-ji-su-run-ka-do-ve-ta-chi-ne-ga-wa-ku-wa-ni-ho-y-ra-i-ki-o-jim-ji-tsu-ji-o-i-ki-ji-da-te-ma-tsoran An unsurpassed, penetrating and perfect dharma is rarely met with, even in a hundred thousand million galpas, having it to see and listen to, to remember and accept.

[01:17]

I vow to taste the truth of the Tathagata's words. Good morning. Coming into the Buddha Hall, bowing, Adopting a certain solemnity. It's theater. It's creating a place. Creating a time, a now. There's... Scientist philosopher Sheldrakes, his name,

[02:27]

who has a notion called something like transmorphogenic field. That somehow our collective attending and engaging creates a transmorphogenic field. A way it creates a now. like you're in a relationship, and when it starts, the person is your sun and your moon, and it's a moon. Is this not light enough? Thanks.

[03:31]

It's like you're in a relationship and the person is your sun and your moon, your day and your night. And then the relationship continues and then one day you notice that maybe you're not sure whether you hate them more thoroughly than you love them. So you decide to go to a therapist together. So you've been living with this person so intimately, so committedly, and now you're going to go outside of that transmorphogenic field to discover what's going on inside that transmorphogenic field. And yet, that discovery of going to see a therapist is fully dependent upon the engagement we create there.

[04:58]

How can we create a circumstance, an opportunity, a communication that reveals something that's become a mystery? Can we find a way to realize what it is we're in the midst of all the time? We're living with this person, interacting with them every day. And yet we go somewhere else to discover what it is we're already doing. So this is part of a ritual. This is part of coming in, bowing, chanting, of attending to, of bringing a sense of circumstance, a sense of occasion. the moment.

[06:17]

So yesterday I referred to this in two ways. One was being still and the other was not scratching an itch. So here's a poem about being still. Hold still. The trees ahead, the bushes beside you are not lost. Wherever you are is called here. Treat it as a powerful stranger. Ask permission to know and be known. Forest breathes, listen.

[07:21]

It answers. I've made this place around you. If you leave it, you may come back again, saying, here. Here. Here is the place. Here the way unfolds. So to hold still means to not scratch the itch. As tangibly as when there's an itch on your cheek, to let the itch itch. When we scratch the itch without thinking, it immediately disappears.

[08:31]

And then we can ask, what just happened? But then it's a memory. And memories are tricky things. Sitting in the Zen Dome, Can we notice the impulse to change our posture before doing anything? Many years ago, I went to Bangkok, and I'd never meditated before, and I went to a temple, Wat Pleng, and I said, I'd like to meditate. I'd like to learn to meditate.

[09:35]

And they said, okay, go into that room over there. And here's the instruction. Take any posture you like. Listen to the signs, see the sights, feel the feelings. And before you change posture, notice the impulse to move and then move. That was the instruction. Then they left me in the room for 10 days. Before you move, notice the impulse to move. Find the experience in the body.

[10:43]

This is very helpful. Connect to the experience in your body and then let your body move your body. When your mind adjusts your posture, that's your mind with its ideas and opinions and judgments about posture. Maybe it's on the road track. Maybe it's not. And David Wagner in his poems is treated as a powerful stranger. Pain is a potent process.

[11:53]

We're in a cooker. We're being cooked. Today's body is not yesterday's body. Today's mind is not yesterday's mind. Treat it as a powerful stranger. Cold still. Let it come here. So in this simple practice right there with our body, we discover a way of holding. Maybe something more generous or simple than holding.

[12:57]

Just allow it. Not initiating movement. As we discover that about our body, we start to discover it about our thoughts. We start to discover it about our feelings. What is it to hold still and let thought be thought? What is it to hold still and let emotion And a rising emotion, itch. That sadness, that anxiety, that desire is a kind of itch that wants to be scratched.

[14:07]

This process of holding still, of allowing stillness, is called cessation, shamatha. And this is a form of the bone. Signs so straightforward. Yeah, yeah. And then what? And then hold still again. Here is the place, here the way unfolds. Coming to this place, the simplicity, is quite a formidable task. You know, if we think of the story of Shakyamuni, without Sajjada, coming along with their ordinary mind, saying, hey mister, you look like you need something to eat.

[15:20]

Here, eat this. So then he eats and discovers, yeah, indeed, I was hungry. Where was I? That something right in front of me was invisible. How was I reliving? What was I doing? Discovering the subtler dimensions of holding still. Some deep release. some deep okayness about the movement of human existence. Then he was able to settle. Then all the things he'd learned about practice were not tasks.

[16:29]

They were not demands. They were not restrictions. They were allies. They were guides. They were opening flowers. They were Dharma gates. They were the bushes and trees, as David Wagner says, that helped him find where he was. They were the way unfolding. So to let the details of our school that we have inherited whether we like it or not, let them create a sense of occasion.

[17:36]

To challenge ourselves to hold still. Or as I was told at what plane, Try to notice the impulse to move, experience it, and then consciously move. This is also holding still. So in a way there's three attributes or three expressions of holding still. One is like Shakyamuni receiving food and discovering he was hungry.

[18:43]

It's like we allow the inhale and discover how to breathe. It's like we put out our bowl and receive food and discover giving and receiving. It's like we pay attention to the moment And the moment comes to life. It's like we bow to someone in the hallway and they bow to us. And Buddha meets Buddha. Some dream of self. Each occasion offers an invitation, offers a support, a nurturance.

[20:09]

We receive it and discover, indeed, being nurtured. Opening up the cocoon of self-concern, self-preoccupation. Maybe we think we don't deserve so much love and support. We're not worthy of it. Maybe we think it isn't really there. Maybe we're not quite sure how to receive it.

[21:15]

To be like Shakyamuni, we sink a more difficult, painful path. Surely, must have more virtue. Recently, I was reading a piece by Rob Speer. Rob Speer, masterminded. the execution of many people during the French Revolution with a deep sense of the virtue of it. Somehow this atrocity by being so atrocious seemed to him verified the virtue of revolution. funny what our mind can do if it doesn't really hurt and it isn't really difficult it isn't good practice and then the funny thing the complexity of our human existence

[22:47]

That'll be the very thing that will send us running, screaming in the other direction. Or we'll bat our heads against it in some fierce struggle. The middle path Don't run away from it. And don't turn it into some fierce conflict. Sit down. Take your best posture. Be as attentive and present as you can. If it reaches a point where you can't stand it anymore, move.

[24:09]

There is no success or failure. But you can't have a strategy. Human existence does not work this way. You can't have a strategy. that will guarantee you'll never itch. One way or another, you'll itch. Your body, your mind, your emotions, your memories, your fantasies, your fears, your disappointments. Let the itch itch. That's how we discover we're alive. That's how we discover. Here is the place. Here the way unfolds. So we receive the gift already given

[25:27]

similar to our finder. How hungry do you need to be before you're willing to receive food? The second way to let the itch itch, to receive the gift already given. The second way to let the itch itch is sitting still. is creating the transmorphogenic field of Zazen.

[26:41]

It's time to attend to the details, to the theater of something called sitting done, of sitting upright, of disposing body and breath and mind to being willing to be fully present and to actualize that willingness very deliberately And when being alive itches, letting it itch. That's Shikantaza.

[27:47]

Just itching. As I was saying yesterday, this is a yoga craft. of letting the body adjust the posture, not the mind. The craft of letting the body breathe, not the mind.

[28:49]

The craft of letting the signs and the thoughts and feelings come here and happen here, not going to them. When you need to move, completely committing to moving and doing it with the same ceremony that you brought to sitting still and upright. Letting this craft create a basis, a foundation, a capacity to hold the itch. To hold the itch of painful memories as they come billowing forward, covering the whole sky.

[30:11]

the itch of fantasies of the future that will fulfill a lifelong longing to discover by experiencing directly the nature of ichig, the nature of dukkha, the nature of pushing away and grasping, the nature of everything is a Dharma field. Everything offer is a teaching.

[31:20]

This is the place, here the way unfolds. And then the third way is to Take up the path. This path that unfolds to engage it. Rather than taking up our karmic path, to take up this dharmic path. Rather than letting the itch create reality. Rather than that bitter memory activating our resentment, our aggression, our disappointment.

[32:34]

To ask, what is it to practice with this? What is it to practice with this? This arising experience. We hold still. The arising experience becomes apparent. The question, what is it, is made manifest and responded to. What is it to practice with this? is to take the next step on that path that's unfolding. What is it to practice with this feeling?

[33:43]

What is it to practice with this excruciating pain behind my right shoulder? What is it to practice with not being sure whether I should take a nap or walk around and engage the moment. What is it to allow each thing to be a Dharma field? opening flower that perfumes existence with the Dharma.

[34:47]

What is it to take up the particularities of the schedule as part of the alchemy of this process? what is it to enter the Dharma field so thoroughly that the karmic world we clung to so dearly is forgotten as Dogen Senji says forget the self And the myriad things come forth and create nothing but Dharma.

[35:51]

This is nothing but the act of expression of holding still. Dugan Zenji says, the binary of realization is not distinct. Because the realization comes forth with the not knowing of the possibility of Gudadharma. In the throes of Shashin, in the throes of this process, we don't exactly know where we're at.

[37:20]

And we don't need to know. We touch this, and this guides the next step. the ache in your body with your physical being and that guides the next step of being body should you hold still right there and let that sensation be the whole universe should you lengthen your spine adjust your shoulder breathe into it. And what will happen if you do that? You don't need to know. You don't need to know exactly the why and where for of the process.

[38:30]

Here is the place, here the way unfolds. Right there in the midst of that sensation, the response creates itself. Right there, the rice gruel of awakening is completely given. What it's going to look like, what it's going to create, we don't need to know. Just hold still. Let the itch itch. Hold still. The trees ahead. The bushes beside you.

[39:39]

The breath inside you. The sensation in your knee. The thought in your mind. The sign of the traffic. The light coming in the window. The breathing of the person beside you. They're not lost. Wherever you are is called here. Treat it as a powerful stranger. Ask permission to know it and be known. The forest breathes. This great forest. this natural environment of being, within and without, pulses with life. Listen. It answers.

[40:43]

I have made this place for you. If you leave it, you may come back again, saying, Here, no two trees are the same. No two moments are exactly the same. Each arising is the arising of now, unique, complete, referring to nothing but itself. No two trees are the same to raven. No two branches are the same to run. If whatever a tree or a bush does is lost on you, you're surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows where you are. Let it find you.

[41:46]

May our intention equally extend. We'll be in that place. We'll be there. [...]

[42:24]

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