This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Okay, we'll try again. Okay, at this time of the summer, I often remember at the end of one summer... somebody, some fellow whose name I don't remember, he was from Utah, he said at the end of the summer, which is a few days from now, we do a party, for those of you who don't know that, after the guest leaves, just the students are here, and he said, we really did something here. And I think of that, you know, it's like we really are doing something and we've almost done it. something here.

[01:00]

And those of us who have been here all summer have really done it. But actually, those of you who have been here a few days and those of you who are guests have really done it, too. We're really doing it. Anyway, we're really doing something. Some mysterious thing we're doing. But now, we who are coming to the end of being here for a while are coming into this period that is sometimes called a transition. And I think a lot of people are feeling the transition-ness of this time, where people are either leaving and going to unfamiliar places. What? Is there a skunk? A mouse. Okay. There's a lot of interruptions in this lecture. Just get it together. Okay.

[02:04]

We're feeling this transition because we're going to different places, places that maybe we don't know. Or even if we're going back to places where we've been, we've been here. So maybe there's something different about us or something different about the place. And that can cause some... excitement and sometimes some disease. Or even if we're staying here, we're going into practice period. First there's the work period or vacation or something, but then there's practice period and there are things like tangario. I don't know how many of you have heard of tangario, but it's this thing that people have to do when they first enter a Zen monastery, the monastic practice periods of it, where they sit for five days. And in olden times, they had to sit outside the gate. Now we let them sit in the zendo. Or we make them sit in the zendo, one or the other.

[03:08]

So, you know, it's something that most people don't do lightly. It's like you get up, but we get up at that time of the year. We get up at 4.30 in the morning. And we sit with them for a little while. And then we leave them to sit by themselves all day long, all day long until we go to bed. We come back and join them at night, and then we go to bed about 8.30 or 9. So, you know, there's some dread of Tongario for those people who haven't done it yet. It's kind of like, for me anyway, it was like standing on the edge of a cliff and knowing I was about to take a step over but had no idea what would that mean. But I do want to say that no one has died from Tongario. And actually, almost every person who's tried it has gotten through it. I mean, there are a few people who have just decided, I don't want to do this.

[04:12]

But they're like two in all the years that Tassajara's been going. So it's not as bad as it sounds. Or it's not as bad as I imagined it to be anyway. Maybe it's as bad as it sounds, but it's not as bad as I imagined it to be. So we're at this transition time. And even those of you who haven't been here very long and are maybe going back to familiar settings, I think you've had times in your life when, and maybe now is one of them or maybe not, when the unknownness of your life is more apparent. So I wanted tonight to talk about the unknownness, or that time, that time of not knowing, maybe in a different way, or a little different way anyway. Dogen, the founder of this school, at one point said, When Dharma fills one's body and mind, one thinks that something is lacking.

[05:20]

So he's saying, there's more to this quote, but I just want to point out. So he's saying that when we realize that something is lacking, or when Dharma, when the teaching completely fills us, then we think that something is missing. And this is sort of the way we feel at a transition time. We notice something's missing. I don't. I don't know what's happening next. I'm feeling uneasy. So Dogen says, when Dharma fills your body and mind, you notice that something is missing, that something's lacking. And we could turn that around and say, when we notice that something is lacking, there's the potential for Dharma filling our body and mind if we know how to use that time. So he says, when Dharma fills your body and mind, one notices or thinks that something is lacking.

[06:25]

For example, when we sail a boat into the ocean beyond sight of land and our eyes scan the four directions, it simply looks like a circle. No other shape appears. This great ocean, however, is neither round nor square. It has inexhaustible characteristics. To a fish, it looks like a palace. To a heavenly being, a jeweled necklace. To us, as far as our eyes can see, it looks like a circle. All things are like this. It's a kind of beautiful image, isn't it? I don't know exactly how he knows what the ocean looks like to a fish or a heavenly being, but... I'm willing to believe that the ocean looks like a palace or a jewel necklace, and yet to us it looks like a circle, even though we pretty much know it isn't a circle.

[07:28]

So there are at least three ways that I've thought of that this feeling of lack or feeling of something missing is true. I mean, in Zen and other... spiritual practices we often say nothing is missing nothing is lacking like this moment and this time and this being are complete and that's maybe an enlightened way to experience life that nothing's lacking and that's true and this is also true that something is lacking that's the problem with words You know, two opposite things can be true at the same time. Or false at the same time. So tonight, I want to look at how is it true that something is lacking. So one way that it's true that something is lacking, and this is very obvious to us, is that we can't see the future.

[08:36]

So we know that. We know we can't see the future. Of course, we usually don't live that way. We usually think, oh, well, tomorrow I'm going to do this, and then in three days I'm going to do this, and I have to prepare for it. And sometimes we do prepare for it, and that's a good thing. It's not bad to think that we can see the future, but it would be foolish most of the time, unless you're clairvoyant or something, to think that you actually can see the future. So to... And to think that we see the future, to act in a normal way as if we can see the future, I think leaves us with a little bit of dis-ease, because at some level we know that we can't see the future. So, you know, we're a little uneasy about all our plans for the future. We do our best, usually, to ignore that feeling. Also, we feel some disease when we realize the extent to which we can't see the future.

[09:56]

So if you're sitting here right now, if you settle as much as you can just right now, come close to yourself, bring your mind close to your body, and just be as present as you can, And then if you notice how much we can't see the future, what we don't know about the future, how we really don't know what's going to happen tonight. We don't know. We don't even know really what's happening now in our lives that aren't here. It's kind of like we're sitting in this tiny little circle of light that's now and here, and we're surrounded by darkness, by unknownness.

[10:58]

Here we are, and then here's another minute, and then here's another minute, but beyond that, it's dark, it's unknown. And that leaves us, can leave us, a little uneasy if we focus on that. So that's one way that this feeling of lack or of something missing is true. Another way is even sort of like this picture of the ocean that looks like a circle but has inexhaustible characteristics is even right here in this circle of light, there's a lot that we don't know. There's a lot that, thank goodness, we don't have to think about. We don't have to think about digesting our dinner. Thank goodness that's just going on. We don't have to think about breathing or our heart beating. Mostly that's just happening.

[12:02]

We don't know whether most of us, maybe some of us know that we do, but most of us don't know whether we have cancer right now. We don't know very much about each other. We have lots of ideas about each other, but really, what is that other person thinking or feeling? What's their experience? Mostly we don't know very much about it. So this feeling of lack or of missing is true in that way also. In fact, Suzuki Roshi said that big mind, Suzuki Roshi often talked about big mind as... a good way to live, the equivalent of enlightenment, in a way that big mind is knowing that we have to see the world through our small mind, that we experience the world. I experience the world just through my body and mind, and everybody else is experiencing the world slightly differently through their body and mind.

[13:10]

And to know that is... Because mostly we forget that and we just think, oh, this is what's happening. You know, I see you, you're frowning, I know you're in a bad mood. Or I know you're mad at me or, you know. So to actually remember and have in our experience that I can only experience the world through my small mind is a whole other dimension. life in fact many it leaves room for many many many dimensions namely all the other ways that the ocean can be besides a circle and it leaves room for this something's missing something's missing in my experience and then the third way that something is missing is this missing ability of ours, this inability of ours to fix or protect or control our life.

[14:21]

So this is pretty deeply ingrained in us that that's our job. You know, it's my job to make my life a good life. whatever our definition of a good life is, and it's to make my person a good person, whatever we define a good person as. But we're actually, we don't have that much control. One Zen story is that a student asked to Zen Master, what do you do when 100,000 million things all come at once? And then Zen Master said, don't try to control them. And then he said, they aren't actually things. They're the Buddha Dharma. And they're not controllable. So we think, no, I'm supposed to control a lot of things.

[15:24]

Maybe we don't think we're supposed to control everything, although we'd like to. At least anything that has to do with us and our life. But to actually not control, it doesn't ring quite right that we should not try to control anything. So it doesn't mean that we don't have some responsibility for how we act. We are acting. So even though it isn't under our control, there is some... some responsibility for what we do. We have to take responsibility for that. Somebody told me today that they were in a retreat with a teacher, I'm not sure what tradition, and at the end of the retreat, the teacher said to the participants, you know, we're here in the retreat, in the meditation hall, and we think this is where we come and we

[16:34]

We sit, and we're trying to practice hard. And then we go out, and we go home, and we relax. But really, so this teacher said, but really, it's the other way around. It's like, you come to this retreat, or you come to this meditation hall, or you come to Tassahara, and you're totally supported to relax, to relax into practice, to... relax into meditation, to relax into presence. And he said, and when you go out, you have to take on renewed effort because you're not so supported to do that out there. I would say to, when you come to Tassajara or to the Zendo, that we are totally supported to experience trust, that in a way Tassar is a laboratory to try out trust.

[17:40]

Is it possible, does it work to not control things? Does it work to be this person, each of us, this particular person, does it work to be this person in society? Does it work? When I'm around other people, does it work to be this person? And to really try that out, to see what happens if I'm actually open to who this person is this moment. Can I stand it? Can they stand it? Will they keep me? It's this kind of scary thing, but Tassajara is actually set up to support us to try that. Just try being yourself. It's true, it's within quite a structure, especially if you're here as a student.

[18:41]

There's all kinds of things you're supposed to do while you're exploring whether it's okay to be you. And then other things you're not supposed to do while you're exploring whether it's okay to be you. But that structure, those guidelines are... are there so that you can see who, what am I? And then is it okay to actually be open to this person? And then when we go out of the meditation hall or out of Tassajara, then I would say rather than, and then we have to like, you know, pull ourselves together and try harder, that... Hopefully, with having explored, is it okay to be me, and is it okay to trust, that we will carry that questioning about trusting with us.

[19:46]

And wherever we're going next, we'll be taking ourselves, we'll be taking our biggest experiment with us. And so we can continue this experiment of, is it okay to be this person? Can I relax into being this person? And will that be... Is there any way that that could work? I'm pretty convinced, having looked at this in myself for a while, that... Actually, what I'm pretty convinced of is that all of the optional suffering in the world is caused by our not wanting to be ourselves. Mostly, not wanting to have the feelings that we're having. It's as simple as that. There's non-optional suffering because we have bodies, because we have minds, because we have emotions.

[20:52]

There's some suffering that's just going to happen. But the suffering that we don't really need to have for ourselves or for others, I am pretty sure comes from when I don't want to be this person. And as I say, really, a lot just because I'm having some feeling I don't want to have. And without even noticing it, I do some habitual thing which causes suffering. So I invite you to check that out. If you start doing something that seems to be causing suffering for yourself or somebody else, see if there's something you're trying to avoid. Maybe something as simple as an unpleasant feeling. Maybe something as simple and complicated as a very unpleasant feeling. And see if you can stop.

[21:53]

Just stop. enough for a moment and allow it. So here we are at this time of transition, like always. And maybe we're feeling... that there's something missing. Maybe we are noticing that there's something missing. And maybe we can allow that accurate missing to be Dharma that's filling our body and mind. We can actually stay there with a feeling of something missing and open to the present as it is. Do you have any thoughts, questions, comments?

[22:59]

Yes, Raven. Could you please speak a little bit more on the relationship between this particular practice of trust that you were going to and intimacy and community? Not romantically, but intimacy as friends and friends. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Did you say in this intense place? Yeah, I do think that is one of the ways that Tassar forces us to try out to do an experiment with trust. Here we are in this deep valley, pretty narrow valley. It's interesting, you know, if you're... There are generally about 150 people in the valley, and it doesn't feel so much that way. There might not be quite that many now, but in the summer, usually there's about 150 people, and mostly it doesn't feel so crowded.

[24:07]

I think that's partly because most of the guests come here and sleep. They need to. The world is kind of crazy, so they come and they sleep, and then they come to meals. Maybe they go to the Narrows or something too. But it does feel kind of crowded at certain times, especially for the students. Pardon? Physically, emotionally, yes. You know, these weren't people who you chose necessarily to be living next to or working with. And it's pretty close, you know, and people get a little worn down. You know, they get, maybe there's less sleep than you would normally have, and you're working in a job that you didn't necessarily choose.

[25:10]

You know, probably not too many of us thought, oh, I want to go to Tassajara and cut vegetables or serve on tables, you know. and uh oh anyway there's just so many ways that we run into each other you know that intimacy and is that all right and and the especially the feelings that come up within us is it all right is it all right to feel anger at being told what to do you know is it all right uh to feel scared Is it all right to feel irritated? So that's what I'm suggesting, that we actually trust enough to... So what usually happens is we feel irritated and we want to get away from that feeling and we think, well, either I have to get away from that person or I have to make them act differently or I have to convince myself to...

[26:18]

you know, love them in some way, do a meta practice or something, you know. So rather than that, it is a kind of meta practice, but anyway, rather than that to find the space one way or another to actually have that feeling, just as a feeling. And I think if we find out that we, first of all, that we live through it, because a lot of those feelings we are, you know, we We have a sneaking suspicion that actually we'll die if we have them. But if we live through it and we come through it without messing up our life, our trust grows. Is that anywhere near what you were asking? Or can you say more if it isn't? to see the presence of these people and to not feel the kind of depth of connection that I believe could be possible at any moment in person.

[27:46]

And the people who are around us most, most particularly. Because we know that we all sit together every day. We all know we have these deep moments in common. especially for students who've been here a long time, it's hard to see the passing through of the potential deep connection. Yeah. So you're saying you sense the possibility and sometimes maybe even experience a deep connection and then it's frustrating for you when that doesn't seem to be happening. when either you or the other person is distracted or seems worried about something else or is just, I don't know, in a different mood than you are. Yeah. That is common, but I would suggest that pretty much any ideal we have about what that deep connection should feel like is going to keep us from experiencing it as it is at the time.

[28:56]

So... You know, if you're in totally different places, there's still some connection going on there, but it's going to be harder to find if you think it should look a certain way, you know, if it should feel warm, you know. Sometimes that's not the connection that's happening. You know, sometimes the connection is like, ew, you're reminding me of my mother and, ugh, you know. That's, we don't, we're not so happy about that connection if somebody, you know, thinks... I'm their mother, I'm like, I'm not your mother. You know, stop feeling that connection. But actually, if that's the connection that's happening, I'm still not their mother, most of them. There's a couple of them out there that I am, but most of them I'm not. But that's, you know, from the, you know, the ocean is not round, right? The ocean has myriad. possibilities and one of them is that i bring up their mother for them thanks yes ocean well there isn't any way really not to act you know to not do something is to act so this isn't a passive thing on the other hand we have so many habitual actions

[30:25]

that are mostly based on getting away from our feeling, even when we're trying to act out our feeling. If we think, I feel anger and I have to express it, I don't think that's the way to really feel what the anger is about, to actually be still enough with the anger to feel the depth of what's going on there. I would suggest refraining from acting to some extent, but that doesn't mean you don't act. You actually do it. We're totally responsive to each other. We're exchanging energy and words and who knows what all we're communicating with each other. I don't think it's not acting, but our habit way of acting, it's useful actually to cut through that a little bit sometimes to see, partly to see what happens.

[31:33]

Thank you. No? Did somebody over there raise their hand? Okay. Anybody else? Yes, Maggie. those two people and then in just a couple instances in my life that trust has been broken. I feel like I get the person and I'm just wondering how can we continue, how can I continue to cultivate trusting when that kind of event happens? If your trust is based on the other person being a certain way, it's going to be broken. They can't necessarily be the way that you hope they will be, or even the way that they've been.

[32:39]

So this is really trust of the wholeness, including the exact way that you are right now. So is it... is it okay to fully embody this person? And then, you know, that means, like, is it okay to fully embody this person when they're around this person, however they're being right now? And that doesn't mean that you always stay, you know, really close to them. Sometimes you might walk or run away. But can you do that from, okay, I can... I can stay close to this person. Okay. Thank you all very much. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center.

[33:44]

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, visit sfcc.org and click Giving.

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