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. Hello, everybody. I would like to express my deep gratitude to all of you for inviting me here today. I'm very thankful to the San Francisco Sound Center for inviting me here today to share time with all of you. I was there last year and had a wonderful experience of seeing that a beautiful building turned out to be designed by Julia Morgan and also spending time with the core members of the Zen Sangha.

[01:04]

Personally, I'm a big fan of Shinru Suzuki Roshi, the founder of Zen Sangha there. I read his well-known book, Beginner's Mind and Zen Mind, many years ago, as a way of learning English as well as also to understand more the profound wisdom of Zen tradition. As you know, he was extraordinary master, impactful human being. As a suspicious synchronicity, and yesterday while working on a book with my editor, I quoted a very humorous anecdote about him. The book that I'm working on is an introduction to Chud. Chud is a very radical practice in Tibetan Buddhism.

[02:11]

The literal meaning of Chud is cutting through. That is based on the Prajana Brahmata Sutras and also the Vajrayana. And then I... I quoted this humorous anecdote about him while working on book with my editor in Zoom, and we decided to put that anecdote into my book, which will come out sometime next year. The anecdote is that one time somebody asked Shinryu Suzuki Roshi, what is the hell? is that hell is where you have to speak English louder in front of many people. And that's such a humorous story. Every time when I tell this anecdote to my Western friends, as well as also my Tibetan colleagues, the lamas, everybody loves.

[03:21]

I feel that that anecdote, not only take us to understand his personality, but also a profound spirit of a Zen tradition. Personally, I have been practicing the Parajanaparamita Sutra as one of my favorite liturgy is at the Heart Sutra. When I was a young boy back in Tibet, I went to a monastery, and we had to recite many liturgies. One of the main liturgies that we had to chant every day was the Heart Sutra. And then I somehow ended up liking the Heart Sutra very much, even though I didn't have any

[04:27]

conceptual understanding of the lines, those are quite enigmatic lines in the Heart Sutra, like no eye, no nose, no tongue, but somehow that sutra grew on me. I kept reciting that sutra, and especially whenever I go through confusion and... obstacles in my consciousness, most of them obstacles are happening in our consciousness. I recite the sutra and then feel that somehow my mind becomes more auspicious and also more liberated. And I know that the heart sutra is such a big part of the Zen training. I have friends who are wonderful Zen teachers, such as Norman, and I go to also South Korea once every year and have many friends who are Zen monks and nuns.

[05:47]

Anyway, today I might like to talk about the ideal or the Bodhisattva-Arkta, which occurs at the very beginning of the Heart Sutra. The Avalokiteshvara is the center figure in the Heart Sutra. As you know that the dialogue happens in the Heart Sutra between Avalokiteshvara and the Shariputta. Avalokiteshvara is called Chinese in Tibetan language. Often Avalokiteshvara is being portrayed as a Bodhisattva. And then the Bodhisattva is a powerful archetype in Mahana Buddhism that express

[06:55]

the noblest, the highest principle or virtue or the idol of humanity, such as absolute love, limitless compassion, fearlessness, courage, selflessness. People loved these bodhisattva archetypes throughout history in asia so much that and there are these temples being dedicated to the bodhisattvas many bodhisattvas the eight bodhisattvas samanda badra and so forth in ancient china people decided to even designate a whole mountain usually quite majestic grand mountains such as a rotation in ancient china and omitran as a representation of a bodhisattva rotation is a very beautiful mountain

[08:21]

and mainly in China where I have never been there and that mountain is a perimeter site but it is also considered the abode of Manjushara Bodhisattva Manjushara and then in Tibet Potala Potala is this beautiful hill where the Potala Palace is situated. That hill is considered the abode of Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara. My friends in South Korea told me that there are also these majestic mountains in Korea which are being regarded as the sacred representation or the board of Bodhisattvas, such as Avalokiteshvara and Manjushara, it totally makes sense that people chose these beautiful, grand, majestic mountains as a board, or somebody's board of Bodhisattva, because the mind, the heart of Bodhisattva is also majestic, grand.

[09:48]

because it's full of love, compassion, courage, and fearlessness. It feels very relevant right now to bring the whole idol of Bodhisattva in our spirituality, in our conversations. My friend, Norman, if my memory is correct, wrote a book not a very long time ago, and that has to do with the path of Bodhisattva. And especially right now, the path of Bodhisattva is more relevant than ever when the entire world, as well as the this beloved country, United States of America, is in a turmoil in many ways.

[10:56]

By pandemic, natural disaster, political turmoil, and so much division. Somebody told me that recently a spiritual teacher made this bold statement that there is a mass sarcasm happening in the united states i don't know whether that is true or not but it feels that somehow the society is a losing heart in my opinion and because of the division political turmoil confusion are so that the whole culture seems to be quite volatile right now. This is an important moment for us to recall the spirit of Bodhisattva.

[11:59]

And so we can reclaim our heart. And that knows how to love. That knows how to heal. That knows how to unite. And that knows how to transcend all this... Mind created divisions, divisions between political parties, divisions between ideological groups, divisions between race, and so forth. And bodhisattva is an archetype, but also in the end, the whole spirit of bodhisattva is that we are invited to be a bodhisattva. Maybe in the beginning of our spiritual path, bodhisattva is an archetype, but in the end, bodhisattva is your true identity. You're the one who are invited to be bodhisattva.

[13:05]

This was some kind of powerful realization that happened to me When I was young, I loved these bodhisattvas because they seemed to be kind and gentle, understandable, like Avalokiteshvara. I used to recite the mantra with the name of Avalokiteshvara when I was in Tibet. The mantra goes, Omani Paneham, and then... There are all these different forms of avadokiteshvara. One of them is known as four-armed avadokiteshvara. And there are all these thangas, the sacred pendants of avadokiteshvara. Whenever I gazed upon those thangas, it made me feel that I was very much loved, accepted.

[14:07]

I felt that the image of Avalokta Shiva as kind and motherly, just radiating kindness, love everywhere. So I almost worshipped the Bodhisattvas as an idol, but later as I continued my training in Buddhism, I realized that the whole underlying principle of the The ideal of Bodhisattva is that we are asked to become a Bodhisattva, or at least to embody the principles of Bodhisattva. In the Buddhist tradition, usually they talk about that the Bodhisattva has two practices, and sometimes they call it papaya,

[15:12]

and the pranjana. Paya, literally, means skillful means. Pranjana is a wisdom. Many stras often talk about that if a bodhisattva misses one of them, then her path is incomplete. One of those two practices of bodhisattva. remember Paya and Parangana. Paya skillful means Parangana, once again, the wisdom. Paya skillful means has many indications, but today it feels right to interfere in this context, Paya as a compassion or the big heart. And then And Plangyana, wisdom, is the awakening, the non-awakening to nature reality, the emptiness, Mahasiniyata, the no-self, or the Dharmata, Dharmata, the nature of all phenomena.

[16:29]

Mahayana sutras often remind us that if a Bodhisattva is one of them, And then even though Shiohi might be making quite extraordinary progress, let's say, in the realm of wisdom or in the realm of prayer, but then her path is incomplete. One time I was almost like enticed and almost I was really completely taken over by this most love of the emptiness. And then I would be thinking of emptiness, would be meditating on the emptiness quite often. And then the whole idea of emptiness made sense so much to me that I felt that if somebody can truly

[17:37]

be awakened to an emptiness, and then that will be the ultimate answer and remedy to everything. And then one's suffering would go away and one would be totally free, complete, and would be happy, which is true in some sense. And then I start writing poems, and my poems are filled with topics like emptiness, nangyality, dharmakaya, and so forth. And one day I presented one of my poems to this Tibetan Lama, and he read it, Doro, he said, it's wonderful that your poem described the ultimate truth, the emptiness of dharmakaya. but you haven't mentioned anything about compassion.

[18:40]

Maybe next time when you write these poems, you might like to include the whole language of compassion and love. And that was a kind of wake-up call. Even though he just said that quite casually, but left a big impression in my mind, I realized that how important to bring together by other school for means and the wisdom, the heart and the insight. On the other hand, yes, sometimes people will be perhaps very much immersed into spiritual practices that have to do with love and compassion, but then they may not have insight or they may not have even aspiration about true awakening or the wisdom aspect of a bodhisattva.

[19:50]

And therefore, bodhisattva is somebody who practices, embodies these two principles, the heart and the insight. the love, compassion, and then the wisdom. Of course, these two are quite a big topic, but maybe I will talk about a little bit the wisdom aspect of bodhisattva's path. In this context, wisdom is not some kind of intellectual understanding or some kind of knowledge, because knowledge is always intellectual understanding that can be learned the quiet and accumulated from listening to somebody or from reading books or from just thinking this wisdom branch and refers to some kind of non-conceptual awakening to the the nature reality whereas the nature reality is often obscured by our own

[21:03]

thoughts, ideas, and limited concept. And perhaps the 90, if not 99, but 90% of our suffering is actually coming from this fundamental unawareness that our consciousness really doesn't see the way things are. Our consciousness is kind of lost in this false version of reality. often regard as the duality and the Buddhist traditions. But the awakening to the way things are, or the natural reality can be very liberating. I'll tell you an anecdote how it can be liberating. One time I was driving with some friends from there's a giant modern city in South Korea, the Seoul, to a Buddhist temple in the mountains to hold a weeklon retreat.

[22:13]

Then we were driving at some point on this very modern, chic-looking bridge. Then one of my friends, who was a Buddhist monk, said to me in English, luckily he spoke English fluently, this bridge is called Wenho. Wenho is a very famous Buddhist master as well as almost like a cultural icon in South Korea. He said everybody knows this name, Wenho. And that was quite a Ironical because Wenho was a Buddhist master who lived hundreds and hundreds of years ago in Korea. But that bridge is a very modern matter out of steel and very futuristic.

[23:23]

It was kind of a little bit somehow strange as well as interesting. And then I asked him to tell him a little bit of the story about this great master. He said, one time, Wen Ho decided to travel to ancient China to learn Buddhism with a friend of his. And then they started the journey. One day... They had been walking all day and got very exhausted, ran out of food. Not only that, it was already late. There's no village in their sight. And then darkness fell. They got so exhausted, they couldn't continue walking. And then one hole just fell on the ground, but suddenly felt extremely comfortable.

[24:28]

And then he fumbled down and he found a container and noticed that there is a liquid in that container. He drank it and ate it. In his mind, it was the most delicious food he ever consumed. And then he fell asleep. He fell asleep perfectly. He just felt that he is sleeping on this royal bed. Morning came, he woke up, he looked around, and realized that he was sleeping in the cemetery filled with the skeletons everywhere. And then he also realized that he was drinking this, like... blood and power in a skull cup. In that moment he was awakened, he decided that he does not need to travel to Shana to study Buddhism because he understood what Buddhism is about.

[25:45]

And to me, this is a very powerful and maybe a little bit radical anecdote that really tells us what what true awakening is, because often our consciousness, our ordinary consciousness, really does not see the way things are, and we tend to see the whole reality in our own life in each and every moment through this hard distorted perception, and therefore, And there's so much suffering in this human life and simply out of that fundamental awareness. Whereas if you're able to see more, there will be less suffering, just like the story of Hoang Ho.

[26:47]

And therefore, in the Buddhist practice, or every ritual, reciting sutras and meditation. They all are, in some sense, just methods that can help us to wake up and to realize the emptiness of the nature of reality. And emptiness is not a concept, it's not an abstract, it's a learning experience of being free from the change of our limited ideas and concepts and every tradition has been imploring various methods to bring about that liberating awakening as you know in zen tradition you use a coin in my tradition especially

[27:50]

The Dzogchen masters also often use quite a spontaneous and improvisational means to wake us up. I'll tell you another story. One time this monk went to study Dzogchen with a lama, and lama tried to show him the nature of reality. and he couldn't understand and one time mama said how about if you pick up this bag of barley from my house and then carry that and run fast as much as you can to the top of that mountain and then don't look back just keep running all the way to the top of the mountain and he had so much reverence to his master And so he accepted this request.

[28:51]

He picked up this heavy bag of barley and started running towards the top of the mountain. But at some point, he was so exhausted that he couldn't run anymore. He fell down. In that moment, he felt that he was awakened and saw the nature of reality. And he was so happy that he came back and ran towards the Lama's house. master's house and said, now I know what nature reality is. The lama, his master said, I don't care whether you're awakened or not. Where is the bag of barley? And all this amazing method that they use to wake us up. But to me, The secret of awakening or the pranjana is not so much even the meditation, not so much all these Dzogchen techniques, but having this deep longing to wake up, deep longing to be awakened, if you want to say, emptiness or ineffable or nature of reality.

[30:14]

That deep longing is a... perhaps the most essential secret ingredient for such a powerful awakening. And you can tell that that longing was so important for all these great masters of the past by reading their life stories. I used to give you this example. Imagine that you have been walking in the Sahara Desert for many days, and then you run out of water and food, eventually you feel that you are quite tormented by thirst. And then there will be a point where you will lose all your desire, all your ordinary desire, desire for success, desire for comfort, desire to revenge.

[31:15]

all those ordinary desires will go away on their own and then the only thing that will be desire alone for the water that's all you perhaps wanted you want to get to river and drink water and if you fall asleep perhaps you'll be a dreaming water and i often use that as a analogy to describe and that we might like to also And why that kind of longing, just like that analogy, like longing, in this context, longing for awakening in the same way that you would be longing for water if you're lost in a Sahara Desert. And that longing, I think, can take us to the authentic awakening. And that longing sometimes happens on its own, and other times has to be cultivated. Sometimes I wonder why we go to temple and meditate and keep reciting all these liturgies.

[32:22]

I think all the things we do in the Buddhist tradition are just methods to cultivate and to ferment that devotion. I even noticed that when I go to temples and practice it, meditation and reciting liturgies that my longing gets a little bit stronger of course then i lose that and many monks nuns in asia spend whole lifetime enchanting and reciting what they're really doing is they are learning how to cultivate that longing longing to wake up longing to realize the great emptiness or the nature of reality. So going to the temple, chanting, early morning, setting, studying, they all basically eventually help to develop this very powerful Loman.

[33:33]

And once that Loman takes place in our consciousness, then I believe that authentic awakening, realization of emptiness is more than possible. And then some people might think that the whole idea of awakening in emptiness is a very stoic, kind of abstract, maybe it's almost like true stoic, but awakening is very alive and rich. It is extremely joyous, according to the Buddhist teachings. And for example, When you read Doha's Songs of Realization by Dzogchen Master, Longchenpa, the whole poem is full of joy. I even describe his poems as an ecstatic poem because he exudes so much joy and happiness. And his poems that often talk about the ultimate truth, the emptiness, the non-reality, no-server.

[34:41]

In the same way, that is true for Zen Buddhist tradition. I have been a little bit hunting Buddhist poems for the last, whatever, 10 years. I come across many Buddhist poems and for many reasons. Rao Kan is one of my favorite poet and Japanese Buddhist master because at least in my opinion, His poems are full of joy. Every time when I read his poems, I cannot manage except just be quite joyous. I've become kind of happy every time when I read his poems. It's very contagious, and therefore sometimes I pick up some of his verses, read it, and then bring me... So much joy, I sometimes read that before I have a mail, and so that joy can take place in my heart.

[35:48]

And those often writings and beautiful poems express the joy, this profound, unconditioned joy of awakening. And then The other, I remember, important aspect of bodhisattvas practice is the paya. In this context, that's called paya, is any path of heart, the compassion and love. And right now, there's time in the history world that needs a lot of compassion, And also a courage. And there are, I think, ways that we can develop compassion and courage. This is good news. We don't have to be despondent. Sometimes maybe we have a doubt about the humanity and a doubt about ourselves.

[36:55]

I don't know whether that doubt happened to you, but many of my friends, even myself, have sometimes a doubt about humanity. in the whole human world. Many of my friends actually expressed their despondence, hopelessness about humanity and some of them feel that the whole, the human world is kind of descending and there's not so much really bright future and they're kind of losing our integrity, our heart. It's totally understandable why some people feel so hopeless because what you see in the world is not very encouraging especially if you are reading the news cycle that constantly report all the worst things are happening in the world that news usually don't report the good news good news about that people are helping each other and there's a

[38:05]

Act of kindness happening somewhere in the world. I think in reality there are so many, so many good things happening in the world. Even if I just think of yesterday, so many good things happened in my life. I tell a few things. Yesterday when I woke up, some of my friends called me. Some Tibetan Lamas called me. And I met with them outside. while practicing social distancing with a mask. And then they just poured this loving kindness and I can feel that they helped me as their friend. And then I was walking in my neighborhood, ran into this couple who live not too far away from my house and they're really nice. So all I saw was an act of kindness.

[39:06]

But then I luckily didn't read so much news. But if I read news, perhaps I could just end up believing that this world is just filled with all the negativities. But the truth is that there's so much goodness happening in the world all the time. And yet, because the culture is so volatile right now, and we're also political turmoil, it's very easy for people to lose the hopelessness and despondent, feel despondent in thinking that the whole human world is like failed test or something like that. We should not, I think that we should believe, we should hold the faith that humanity is going to take the right path. And also we should believe that we are capable of being bodhisattva.

[40:10]

We should develop faith, trust in ourselves. The Mahayana Buddhism teaches the Buddha nature, Kodatadangarbha, in both Zen and Tibetan Buddhism. I'm glad that I'm talking to many people who are part of the Mahayana because In Mahayana, we could say there's Buddha inside you, but sometimes that doesn't work with the other. I remember one time as a group of people invited me to pay a visit to this refugee center in Malaysia. There were many refugees from Burma, Muslims, and a lot of Buddhists, my friends, Malaysian Buddhist Sangha decided to go there, and they just extended their kindness to them, and they also gave them a donation.

[41:13]

So anyway, there was a young man lying on bed, the interpreter said that, oh, he's a Buddhist, and then I joined my hands and said, I remember that. Buddha is within you. I don't know why I said that. Buddha is within you. Maybe there's some kind of Mahayana Buddhist Khaleesha. I thought that would be helpful because I believe that maybe he is very much lost in really feeling hopelessness. And by saying that there's Buddha inside you will perhaps give us some kind of... He was a little bit challenged. He said that I'm Theravadan Buddhist. I never forget that instance. But here, many of us are practicing the Mahayana tradition. So this is a totally acceptable narrative. This whole idea that there's a Buddha in each of us.

[42:15]

The Buddha in nature. This is not a theory. There is indeed a Buddha in each of us. And then sometimes it's very hard to see that there's a Buddha in each of us. Other times maybe it will be quite easy to look inside and see there's a divinity, there's a Buddhiness, whatever you like of Buddha in each of us. I noticed that during like the residential meditation retreat where people meditated for seven days and then that people naturally began to recognize that they're the Buddha in themselves because our mind becomes clear, there are not so much thoughts, and we kind of processed all our ordinary emotions simply from the merit of sitting in silence for their sin and theirs. And then kind of our consciousness woke up eventually, and then we began to see and

[43:18]

We began to feel lots of love, compassion, peace. It's very easy to trust and known that there's Buddhiness in each of us. I even remember that it's very easy for me, or at least very comfortable for me to say, oh, there's a Buddhiness in each of us on the sixth day. day of the meditation retreat. First day, I try to be a little bit cautious not to say in easy way, the Buddha inside. You, perhaps, many people don't feel that way. But anyway, the point is there is divinity and we need to have a faith in each of us, in our ability to transcend, in our ability to become bodhisattva and to love and to hold the whole humanity in our heart and to also become fearless and courageous to face all the situations and sometimes not lose our heart.

[44:25]

It's almost time for me to pause, but let me say just a few words. This afternoon I'm going to read another group and we're going to chant the Heart Sutra. in Tibetan language, which is part of our usual liturgy, in the hardest, at least in Tibetan version, there's like this big, like elaborate opening where Buddha was meditating at the Vulture Peak Mountain with monks, and then Shaliputta stand up and began to have a conversation with Avalokiteshvara. Usually when I recite Harakiteshvara, even I try to imagine that whole, some kind of play in my head, like trying to visualize that Buddha was sitting there, Avalokiteshvara was there.

[45:29]

So what I'm trying to say is that maybe whenever you recite the Harakiteshvara, when you come across the name of Avadoktashvara would be very powerful to remember that Avadoktashvara in Europe, there's Avadoktashvara inside you, was ready to be reckoned. When Avadoktashvara is reckoned inside you, you will manifest in the form of boundless love, courage, compassion. Thank you everybody, thank you for your your invitation. 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.

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May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

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