Good morning. This is very unusual to have Green Gulch closed for the public Dharma talk, the Sunday public Dharma talk. I can't remember, other than for Sashin, which is part of our schedule to close, I can't remember ever having needed to do this. And so we get to enjoy the quiet of a Sunday morning here in the valley in early spring with a full moon tomorrow. Looks full already. How marvelous, how rare. So what is our

[01:13]

Practice during not just difficult times, but what is our practice? And during difficult times, times of uncertainty, how do we accord with conditions? According with conditions. We're according with conditions right now and closing this morning, joining other places, city center and other churches and venues who have let go of gatherings. This is our according with conditions. I wanted to tell you a wonderful story, a heartwarming story, and kind of an amazing story about poetry and the coronavirus, which I wanted to pass on to you, which was passed on to me from a student in the city, Hiro Ikushimi.

[02:40]

He was one of our students, was the Ino at Tassahara, and is now in the city. And he sent me something that happened just a couple of weeks ago. Japan sent boxes, cartons, to China, to Wuhan, China, of thousands of face masks. There had been a shortage, and these cartons of face masks, thousands of them were sent, and on the tag, on the label, there was a fragment of a poem. And the fragment was, this is Hero's translation, mountains and rivers, lands apart, wind and the moon

[03:42]

under the same sky that was on this label. So this fragment of a poem comes from over a thousand years ago in the 700s in Japan, a prince in Japan. needed help for Buddhist practice and wanted a Chinese teacher to come to Japan and bring the precepts, a more nuanced understanding of precepts and ordination. So Japan made a thousand Buddhist robes and sent them to China with this wish to invite someone to come and help Japan deepen their Buddhist practice.

[04:45]

And the full poem that was sent over a thousand years ago with this request for teaching was, Mountains and rivers, lands apart, wind and the moon in the same sky, Sending these robes to you, Buddha's disciples, let us create eternal connections together." So that was the poem that was sent to China. And one of the monasteries that received these, the teacher there, upon reading that poem, that it was not an easy trip from China to Japan or Japan to China. At that time, it was quite dangerous. But reading that poem, let us create eternal connections together, and this request, he decided to go to Japan and teach and bring this precept study and ordination.

[05:58]

His name was John Chen. And this was in 753, I think, he arrived in Japan after 11 years of trying to get there with shipwrecks and political problems. And he just vowed that he would respond to this request. And he became blind, I think, at the end and went anyway. So fast forward to, you know, February, I think, 2020. And these packages arrive from Japan to China with this poem. This is the power of poetry. This is the power of heart connections and eternal connections. And even with all the difficulties between China and Japan,

[07:00]

this was received with gratitude and heart. And it was sent with heart. So mountains and rivers, lands apart, wind and the moon, the same sky. wind and the moon. So the moon, I think of the wind and the moon as wind is moving and turning and flipping and whooshing and, you know, myriad ways that the wind manifests according to conditions. And then contrasting that with or along with the moon

[08:01]

The moon also does changing, and yet it has a rhythm and a trust it will be there in its different forms. So the moon in Buddhism, which you probably know, is often called upon the image of moon for realization or enlightenment or Buddha nature, moon. Wind and moon together in the same sky is like the interfusion of the myriad things, the myriad manifestations, each moment changing, ever-changing, and the moon in the same sky together, always together.

[09:05]

So a particular koan has been coming up for me in the last weeks, and it just seemed like it was calling me to talk about it. And the koan, maybe some of you know, it's also from, you know, over a thousand years ago, koan from the Tang Dynasty in, you know, between 600 and eighteen and nine hundred something. This koan is called Every Day is a Good Day. Every day is a good day. And this is a koan from the Zen teacher Yun Men. And Yun Men was famous teacher, was the head of or began the Yunmen School, one of the five schools which lasted for 200 or more years and then was subsumed or became part of the Linji School, the Rinzai School, but it was its own school.

[10:28]

And Yunmen was one of the first teachers to use anecdotes and Zen stories and questions and sayings and one word. answers to questions that were then, he didn't want people to write them down. The people were forbidden to write down his words, but one of his disciples fashioned or wore a paper robe and would write down things. You can imagine how great that robe looked, all covered with scribbles. So many of his sayings have come down to us, and many of those sayings and doings are collected in the Blue Cliff Record Koan Collection and Book of Serenity. And we know many of them. For example, one that we know very well is, Yun-men was asked, what is the teaching of an entire lifetime? What is the Buddhist teaching of an entire lifetime?

[11:31]

And he said, an appropriate response. These are stories that are told and retold. Endlessly, you know. This is Yun Min. And I thought I would say the koan and kind of go back a little bit more about Yun Min and then come back to some commentary or how it's affected me or how I've been turning it. So the koan is, I do not ask about before the 15th day. Try to say something about after the 15th day. And Yunmin himself answered for the assembly, every day is a good day.

[12:38]

That's the koan. It's Blue Cliff Record, Case 6. I do not ask about before the 15th day. Try to say something about after the 15th day. Yunman answered for the assembly, every day is a good day. So in the commentaries. The 15th day, this seems very, like, huh? You know, what? What's he talking about? 15th day, after, before. And sometimes with koans, it's like, almost like a little bit of a shutdown. Like, I don't know what this is about. I don't know what people are talking about, and I don't want to hear about it. That might be someone's response. But the 15th day, And this I just, in my own study of it during this time, this is what I found.

[13:51]

The 15th day in the lunar calendar is the day of the full moon. Each 15th day is the full moon day in the lunar calendars, which was what this is talking about. I do not ask you about before the 15th day. And this full moon, as I said just a little while ago, is connected with realization or enlightenment or realizing our true self, this full moon. So he's saying, I'm not asking about before, you know, from the time we turn towards our practice, maybe bodhicitta, the thought of enlightenment, the thought of wanting to live for the benefit of all beings, this thought that turned us around in an opposite direction than we were going, perhaps, before the fifteenth day.

[14:53]

He's not asking about that. Try to just say something about after the fifteenth day. What is your practice now, after the full moon? After some realization, what is your practice? And he answered, every day is a good day. So I want to just leave that in the room for you to just turn that phrase, which Some of you have probably heard this story before. Maybe some of you know that phrase and call upon it or draw upon it in your own life. And I feel like this koan met me or came to me to meet something, actually, this arising of this koan for today, for this time.

[15:58]

So just to backtrack a little bit about Yunmen, the teacher that he awakened under was Mu Cho. And this teacher was very, very harsh and very strict and forbidding. And he used to be able to tell by the footsteps of the students coming to his door their state of mind. Yun Min was at his monastery and came, wanted to speak with him. And he knocked on the door and Mu Jo said, who is it? And he said, Yun Min, it's me. And he said, what do you want? And Yun Min said, I am not clear about the Buddhist teachings. Could you please give me some instruction?

[17:01]

And he slammed the door. So then Yun-men came back again, knocked again, which to me takes some, you know, perseverance here. And the same thing happened. Who is it, you know? And then he slammed the door. And he came back again. Yun-men came back again. And this time, when Mu-chou, opened the door. Yun-men put his foot in there to keep the door from closing so he could get in. And Mu-jo grabbed Yun-men and shook him and said, speak, speak. And Yun-men was stunned. He couldn't say anything. And then Mu-jo threw him out of the door, but his leg got caught in the door. He slammed the door, and his leg was broken. These are one of these stories that we have in our in our wonderful treasure trove of stories.

[18:06]

And at that moment, what happened? Full moon for Yun Men, you know, he woke up. And ever after, he had a kind of limp and had difficulty sitting because of this broken leg that... So that's a story about Yun Men. And he was sent then to another teacher, Shui Feng, who he's... He is the successor to Shui Feng when you look at the lineage charts. Just another little note about Mu Zhou. During some upheaval in China at this time, it was very dangerous maybe to study Buddhism. He went back to his home village and took care of his old mother, which I was kind of happy to hear about because there's other stories about Zen teachers who refuse to take care. of their old mothers and kind of let them waste away. Anyway, he took care of his mother, and to support them, he made straw sandals for itinerant monks, and he would put them out in the street for people to take, and probably sold some too for support.

[19:25]

And there's a legend about this, which I didn't know was this teacher. I knew the legend, and I've told this story. many times, but it turns out it was Yud-Man's first teacher, or this Enlightenment teacher. He had another teacher before this one. So he made a great big straw sandal and hung it on the gate of their village to kind of advertise that he was a sandal maker. And as I said, during this time, there was a lot of upheaval in China, and these bandits or brigands came riding up to this village, and they were going to force their way in and ravage the village. But they saw this giant sandal hanging there. And they said, or the leader of the band said, oh, that sandal maker who gives away the sandals is a holy person. Let's not go in here.

[20:28]

This is a protected place. And they rode off. into the dust, and the village was saved. Every day is a good day. Every day is a good day. What does this mean, every day is a good day? I can imagine someone thinking, that's not true. Every day is not a good day. In fact, the other day was a pretty rotten day. And this and this and this happened. And I lost all my belongings. I had a car accident. And the stock market went down. And I got sick. And it was not a good day. It was, in fact, what's that children's story? Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. It was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. So how is it that Yun-men is saying, unequivocally, every day is a good day?

[21:37]

How is he compassionately showing us something, helping us to look at something, realize something? So every day is a good day does not mean when things happen, like we have a car accident, that, oh, we're not supposed to complain or say anything or be sad about it or something because every day is a good day. So that's just, I don't think it's saying that either, that we're supposed to disregard the ups and downs of our life, the vicissitudes, the slings and arrows. It's not disregard and Pollyanna-ish. Oh, well, it's really okay. I don't think it's saying that. And I also don't think it's saying that a good day depends on things going just the way we want them to go.

[22:48]

That's a very shallow... understanding of a life. And not only is it shallow, we cut ourselves off from the depth of our eternal connections together, our shared life. So every day is a good day. for me, is very different from gauging our life or thinking about our life or living our life according to what are called the eight winds. The eight winds are kind of this dualistic thinking. Pleasure and pain. Profit and loss.

[23:54]

Praise and loss. and blame. Good reputation, bad reputation. Those are the eight wins. Three Ps and a G. That's how I remember them. And, you know, we can look at our life and see, are we running after praise and running away from blame, pushing away blame, grabbing onto praise. Ooh, that was, ooh, I didn't like that. Ooh, ah. I'm sick. Oh no, I'm well. Ha ha. That kind of... This is a life that is like... I mean, it's called the eight winds because we are blown around like a leaf in the wind. Just blown from one thing to another and running from one thing to another. And what kind of a life is that? Where is the depth of our life if it's just chasing running away from or chasing after, pushing and pulling.

[24:59]

That is, you might say, the opposite of our zazen posture, which, you know, in zazen instruction, first day, we hear about it not leaning forward nor leaning back, upright, with the natural curves. It doesn't mean like a broomstick. Natural curves centered That zazen posture is our life posture. It's our attitude, not just taking a seated posture. So not leaning into our life and going after more praise, more profit, nor leaning away from sickness or dis-ease, discomfort, all these things. So sitting in the middle of our Zazen posture, every day is a good day.

[26:02]

We can't say, oh, this was a good... Sometimes you hear people say, oh, that was a really good sit. And to me, what is a really good sit? What does that even mean? Did it mean it's a good sit? Whatever that means, means you didn't have pain. What about if you had enormous pain? and you sat with confidence and calm, tranquility, and an open heart, is that a bad sit? Is that a good sit? I don't even know what that means when people say, oh, that was a good sit, sitting. I don't usually say sit. I say sitting. And, you know, I was thinking about our breath. Can you say—I think— When we say, we could say, every breath is a good breath, instead of every day is a good day, we could say, every breath is a good breath.

[27:05]

And we can't compare, like, well, that breath was not as good as this breath. What is, every breath oxygenated our entire body and every cell of our body, right? Even our last breath. Every breath is a good breath. And some of you have been there for a loved one, a friend's last breath. We can't compare. This good in every day is a good day. It's not a comparing of good, bad, right, wrong, you know, better, worst. It's celebrating something else. It's celebrating the actuality of our life, which is we can't compare it every day. Every day is its own unrepeatable, incomparable manifestation of the inconceivability of universe.

[28:22]

So we say good for short. Every day is a good day. Every day has value and equal value and can't be discriminated in that way and judged. You might say, well, that's not me or something. I don't do that. which is why the koan is for us, why it's been handed down and repeated over a thousand years, because our tendency is, this was a good day, and that was really a no good, terrible, horrible day. And then there we are caught in dualistic thinking, and we're not free. We're not free to meet whatever comes and accord with conditions. coronavirus comes.

[29:29]

You know, I think we might not say, well, that's a good day to someone who's sick. That may feel cruel. We have to be careful about when we take up our Buddhist teachings and what's an appropriate time to say words like that. But you may feel Every day is a good day, sick or well. It doesn't depend on that. I read a story about a woman whose mother had terrible arthritis, and she At the end of her life, she could barely walk. She could take maybe 15 or 20 steps only. And her daughter was with her, and her mother was kind of getting up to go and get something.

[30:40]

And her daughter said, no, no, let me. I went to get the object off the table. And her mother said, no, no, don't stop me. I love every step I take. I love every step I take. This is freedom. This is being free in the midst of terrible pain, a shrinking down of our abilities and our letting go of things we love, activities we love. right in the middle of that. I love every step. No, no, don't help me. So every day is a good day.

[31:53]

Some of you know, I haven't spoken about this in public and I think many of you know some of you know that last fall I was diagnosed with breast cancer which was a surprise you know it was maybe it's a surprise for everyone when you hear a diagnosis you know And my practice has been, during all sorts of doctor appointments and surgery and radiation and all sorts of physical events, and maybe this is why this koan came to me, to practice with each thing as best I can.

[32:57]

without pushing away, without judging, without wishing it to be other, but the effort to meet each thing as Buddha Dharma rather than a disease or a problem even. But this is Buddha Dharma. This is the truth of our life. arisen, like this, in this form. And it was very interesting to watch people around me, some family members, and like even the word, you know, that this word has this kind of vibrations around it of anxiety and fear and

[33:58]

concern, of course, and watching people and hearing people and making it a practice to allow what was coming up to come up and meet it. So in that way, you know, this is another of Yunmen's koans, medicine, And disease, you know, cure each other. It's another whole koan that I won't go into, but when disease comes up or difficulties come up, our practice and way of meeting it is the medicine. Medicine isn't that the disease goes away. That's not the medicine. Our medicine is every day is a good day. Our medicine is meeting... each thing feeling wind and moon in the same sky.

[35:08]

So each doctor appointment and meeting the caregivers and other patients who were there and appreciating, you know, what grew in me was gratitude and appreciation for the conditions that I live in here in Marin with such fine medical services and so forth. And, you know, that we have insurance, that I have insurance. You know, gratitude, just overflowing gratitude. And feeling, really feeling every day is a good day. Not kidding myself. Touching into this heart-filled, I offer these stories and this koan for you to turn and to reflect on and see if it meets you in your life.

[36:51]

Each one of our circumstances, whatever it's characteristics which are endless, is interfused with the source of our life, interfused with full moon, big mind, as Suzuki Roshi would say. Those difficulties that we get so caught in and our problems that are real problems, I'm not sweeping those under the rug. However, each one of those situations is

[37:59]

together by innumerable, immeasurable causes and conditions. And we're not separate from this interfusion. This is our life, this is Buddha nature, the interfusion of the myriad things In the midst of the myriad things, one single body is one of the commentaries to this koan. In the midst of the myriad things, one single body. So I think I wanted to end with this poem.

[39:17]

Some of you may know it, and then we'll have Q&A. This is a poem by Wendell Berry that somehow with this coronavirus spreading, and I'm sure there's concern, many of you, for you have older relatives, maybe people who have are more susceptible and these changes that we don't know. There's a lot of unknowns and fears maybe coming up. And this is a wonderful poem called The Peace of Wild Things. And it reminds me of Green Gulch, actually. And this practice that Wendell Berry brings up, we can do here. Doesn't have to be just in our minds. When despair for the world grows in me and I wake in the night at the least sound in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be, I go and lie down where the wood drake rests in his beauty on the water and the great heron feeds.

[40:35]

I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief. I come into the presence of still water, and I feel above me the day-blind stars waiting with their light for a time. I rest in the grace of the world and am free. piece of wild things. I'll post that on the bulletin board. So thank you. Are there any questions that we're not having a separate Q&A?

[41:22]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_98.04