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'm so grateful to be here. I'm such a longtime admirer of the of Shunru Suzuki's lineage and what the community has done over the many years here for, for the Dharma writ large and for just plain human beings, uh, um, here and, and so far around. I am on a book tour and, and actually, actually I've, I've, I've written six books. This is the sixth book. Uh, um, um, They've explored various aspects of the Zen life over the many years.

[01:04]

I have arrived in my dotage. I am 76 now, and I think I'm going to provide entertainment as this speaker keeps trying to escape. I've explored the Koan way, meditation. I did a little history of Zen come West. This is my pause and look back at my life, and through that, a reconsideration of a spiritual life writ large, a Zen life specifically, and what it might mean for us as we live over the years and years, and if we're lucky, years, and where that might reveal itself. To give it a little bit of a framework, I've attached the 10 ox herding pictures of Zen Renown as a little bit of a superstructure.

[02:08]

It's always been interesting to me because it was never meant to be more than a trellis on which to grow the vine of my reflections. But from the beginning, from the publishers and the editors and everything, it's taken on its own life and it's kind of a a big part of this. If you can stay or come back for the workshop, I'll be talking mainly about that there. A number of things happened along the way here. As a side to this, I have a story. And what happened was that many years ago, when I was really just beginning, I stumbled upon a book by by somebody named Simon's roof. And he appears to have written a single book. It was called journeys on the razor's edge. And it's, it comes out of him spending four or five, six years in India in the first half of the 20th century.

[03:12]

And, and then, um, when he came back to the States, he published this book. And it was mainly anecdotes that he had culled out of the spiritual traditions of India. And there was one little tiny thing. It was maybe a paragraph, two paragraphs. And it captured my imagination. And I thought... There was something in there that was important for me, although I wasn't quite sure what it was at that time. And I've thought about it for many years. And then some years ago, independent of writing this book, I began to do my own version of that story. And I went through numerous revisions. I've posted it on some of my social media pages over the years. Finally, it seemed... As I was coming to the end of this narrative, that is the arc of a spiritual life, I realized there was sort of a coda or even a summation of what the whole book was in that short story.

[04:23]

And so I did the final version, forced to have the final version because it's not published. And then... I've had to admit to people that after I tell you the story, you won't have to buy the book. But I hope you'll consider it anyway. It's got great pictures. I think that's enough to introduce the story. And... Maybe afterwards we'll have an opportunity for some conversation. We can go anywhere you want. There's an old saying about politics. You run for office with poetry, but you must govern with prose.

[05:30]

As the spiritual way opens for us, we discover our lives must incorporate both prose and poetry. There are the ordinary tasks of life, work, relationships, maybe romantic partnerships or marriage, sometimes children. There is the ticking of the clock. It certainly feels like prose. As we open our eyes and hearts, we discover something. Actually, it's all poetry. In fact, it turns out the universe is writing stories and songs, actually whole symphonies. And here we are, you and me. We, in fact, live and breathe and take our being within stories. like the turtle in that old joke, its stories all the way down.

[06:35]

And so, to recap the song and prose and poetry, to bring it all together. Once upon a time, long ago and far away, there was a burglar. She was quick-witted and nimble-footed, And so she was successful in her chosen trade. However, as sometimes happens when one is good at something, she kept pushing the envelope. And with that came the disaster. She was discovered trying to break into a rich merchant's home. She fled without anyone catching a glimpse of her face. However, as a great cry of thief rang out, Pretty much the whole village was soon in hot pursuit. Fortunately for her, she was just far enough ahead of the crowd that when she saw a cave opening between the road and a creep, she had time to throw herself into the water, roll in the mud, and then climb back out to the cave.

[07:47]

There she sat, settling into a traditional meditation posture in front of the cave opening. It looked exactly as if she were simply one of the many mendicants, monastics, mad people, or others who took to the road on the great spiritual quest. When the crowd arrived in front of the cave and the convincing-looking monastic, their leader saw her and said, Oh, holy one, did you see the thief we were chasing? The burglar cried. simply ignored the question and continued sitting as if she were meditating. One of the villagers said to their leader, can't you see she's meditating? We could earn some very bad karma if we disturb her. And then another said, let's wait. When she's ready, she'll speak. There was a muttering of agreement and the leader understood when leads by ordering people to do what they want to do. So they all, you know, that...

[08:50]

In other contexts, there's been a pretty good laugh line. Let's enjoy this. So they all sat on the ground in front of the thief and waited. While the burglar sat there pretending to meditate, she desperately wondered when they would move on. Instead, more and more villagers gathered. Some remained standing, most sat down, a few even began to meditate themselves. She had this terrible feeling, as if she were trapped in the bottom of a dry well. After about two hours, vastly longer than the burglar ever thought she could hold still, she pretended to awaken from her meditative trance. Slowly opening her eyes, she looked out at what was now about 50 people, all of them quietly waiting.

[09:57]

She cleared her throat and spoke softly, but with enough volume to be heard by everyone there. Why are you looking for some poor thief, dear ones? Wouldn't it be vastly better to search for your own true nature? After all, who isn't stealing their lives by ignoring the great questions of life and death? It's not really a dramatic pause. With this, the villagers were overcome. some with grief at their wasted lives, others at the call to something more important than perhaps they had ever considered before. A few ran back to the village to gather flowers to give her. Others went home and got some food as an offering, including rare treats. Presented with the flowers and food, the burglar ate, trying not to gobble or look greedy, then asking herself what a wise person would do in a similar situation.

[11:04]

She asked that the majority of the food be distributed among those present, specifying that the poorest get enough and particularly some of the best delicacies. She also handed out the flowers to everyone. People felt graced. Finally, the rich merchant himself stepped forward and implored the wise nun that she remain here and grace their village with wisdom. The burglar thought to herself, well, I'm good at my trade as a thief. It is hard work and it is too dangerous. This holy nun gig, it could be an easy way to make a living. As a thief, she thought she could easily steal what she needed just by pretending to be holy. So she said, I will stay with you, but only for a brief time. The villagers were ecstatic.

[12:07]

They brought her blankets and candles, and someone even thought to bring her a down-filled pillow. Life was comfortable beyond what she had ever experienced. The price was that she had to pretend to meditate forever. hours every day and then in the early evening to answer questions the villagers would bring to her answering questions turned out not to be difficult it seems she knew what a good and generous heart would do or as she thought it what a sucker would do not a lot of difference she was pretty sure pretending to meditate however was harder She knew people were watching, so she really had to hold still. Life paraded by on the road. Merchants, monastics, families, and children. A small reference here to the arc of the book.

[13:12]

Once an ox led by a boy with a rope held in a loop through its nose, trotted by. The pair paused and looked at her. Their eyes, boy and ox, were dark pools. Then they moved on without saying anything. Time passed. Days turned into weeks. Weeks into months. The food was good. The blankets were warm. And oh my, that pillow. But the burglars meditating continued to be a terrible ordeal. She experimented with her posture, trying to find a position that wasn't painful. She began to sit on the pillow and gradually became comfortable sitting cross-legged. Over time, her knees began to drop and then touch the ground. But then there was her mind.

[14:15]

She fantasized about everything that had happened to her life, how she was raised and the poverty, the violence, the gift of learning to read at the local temple, and the reading of books. There weren't many, but she read them over and over. Then there was her trade, figuring out how to steal without getting caught, experiencing what happened early on when she was caught. The moments of joy and the long times of boredom and the intermittent flashes of pain. terror. She also fantasized about the future, about what new treats the villagers might bring, about what she would do when she tired of this and returned to the road and a life of burglaries. But as she passed in her imagination from the past to the future, increasingly she noticed something else. At first, it was like a flashing silence, just for a moment.

[15:20]

Gradually, it grew larger in her consciousness. After a while, as those weeks passed into those months, that space, that quiet, that just being present became a large part of her holding still, pretending to meditate. Something was now different. She began seeing the villagers in a new light. And even the words that came out of her mouth now landed in her own ears in a new way. She gradually came to know the villagers, their sorrows, how they could be so petty and even sometimes cruel. The various intrigues of their lives, their loves as they arose and sometimes fell apart. Other times deepened. Their many generosities, sometimes unconscious, sometimes grand and even costly. Gradually, she began to love them.

[16:24]

And increasingly self-aware, she began to see how her own life was just like theirs. She knew they were different, and yet somehow, mysteriously, they all were also one. Increasingly, as she spoke, everything she shared was based in that mystery, that they were different, and that they were more closely connected than the finest woven fabric. Then the teenager appeared. He approached her one evening, made bows, and said he had been wandering looking for a teacher. And he began to hear of this amazing nun who spoke wisely and, more importantly, modeled the great gift of silent meditation. He declared he wanted to learn her wisdom. Not knowing what to do, she simply ignored him.

[17:28]

He took a place in the dirt below her as she began to pretend to meditate. He sat quietly. The next day she told him, go! She wasn't interested in having disciples. But he continued to sit with her at a respectful distance. She knew she had to pretend to be generous, so she made sure he was fed. And before long, the villagers made sure he had blankets and even a pillow of his own. He seemed much less interested in them than she was. What he seemed to love was to sit quietly. She asked him, what are you doing while meditating? He said he did what he was taught when he first decided to walk the spiritual path. He counted his breath, putting a one on his inhalation, then exhaled, and then put a two on the next inhalation and continuing until 10, after which he repeated the process.

[18:33]

She said nothing. Then she tried it for herself and discovered it helped with her concentration. but it also tended to obscure the quiet place that seemed increasingly interesting to her. So a few days later, she told him that he might try just sitting quietly, not trying to think, not trying to not think. And he did. She began to wonder if it was time to escape. The problem was that there were villagers around pretty much all the time. And the boy, well, he was there all the time. So the burglar was stuck. Over time, the burglar grew quieter. She witnessed the day as it began. She witnessed the day as it passed.

[19:35]

She witnessed the evening as it arose. Her last moment before sleep was noticing, witnessing, being present. And her words almost always came from that place, the place where she saw she and they were all the same. Increasingly, she talked about the silence, about what she found and what they might find. One day, the boy came to her and said that when he took a walk down by the creek, a crow called out. And in that moment, he realized the crow, the creek, the trees, he himself, and all things were joined so closely that the right word for what was true and present was simply one. And then he added, embarrassed how he knew even that one seemed a bit too much.

[20:36]

She wasn't sure what to say. So she simply smiled at him, put her hands together and made a small bow. They continued together in this way as the months turned into years. She wasn't sure when it happened for herself. In fact, she never had that big thing like her disciple. What she did have was a gradual growing into peace and joy and gratitude for it all. In that parade of humanity, at some point another ox trotted by, this time without an attendant. It ignored her and just continued on its way. The image of it swishing its tail as it trotted down the road stuck in her heart. Eventually, her fame as a wise counselor and teacher of the ways of the heart spread across the country.

[21:44]

She was attended to faithfully by her disciple who was increasingly seen as a wise teacher himself. A small community of monks and nuns gathered around her and within the village others seemed to become wise as well. One year she fell ill but that seemed okay. Her disciples tended to her and that was okay. The villagers came to ask her last questions and that was okay. The world, terrible as it was, was also something wonderful, something amazing. And when she died, her senior disciple, now a wise and respected counselor, oversaw the burning of her corpse. He installed her ashes under some rocks out beyond the small monastery of nuns and monks that had grown over the years.

[22:54]

the community elected him to succeed their founding teacher. Always before he lectured on the mysteries of the way, he would thank the good gods that he had been given such a wonderful guide on the mysteries of life and death. The teacher who stole his delusions. And in doing so, opened his heart. Mysteries. piled upon mystery the intimate way. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma talks are offered free of charge and this is made possible by the donations we receive. Your financial support helps us to continue to offer the Dharma. For more information, please visit sfzc.org and click giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[23:56]

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