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. Welcome to Beginner's Mind Temple. Can you hear me? Okay. I'd like to see if there are some people who've never been here before who are here for the first time. Would you raise your hands? A few? Well, a particular welcome to you. I hope that something today makes you feel like it was worthwhile for you to come, that you enjoy or benefit by something that happens this morning. Today we're doing... Well, excuse me, I'm going to say my name.

[01:02]

My name is Rosalie Curtis. And today we're doing a one-day sitting. So we, about 70 of us, started sitting this morning at 5.40 and we'll sit until dinner time. And the sitting is the first one of the winter practice period, which I am co-leading with Tova Green. Where is Tova? There? Okay, hi. And I'm thrilled to be doing that. I'm really excited about the practice period. and the people who came to participate in it, and the theme, which I'll tell you about in a minute, and the study materials that we're going to work with and teach.

[02:11]

So the theme of the practice period is waking up in the midst of our lives. the way of the bodhisattva. And so the practice period will be about being a bodhisattva and what that means and how to do it. And although I'm really interested in what we're going to teach, I'm also that not everybody necessarily wants to be a bodhisattva who comes here. Maybe even people who signed up for a practice period with that theme might have qualms or doubts, because it's pretty demanding. A bodhisattva is someone who vows to live for the benefit of all beings.

[03:18]

even to the point of putting others' welfare before one's own. And vows to save all beings. So at the end of lecture, we'll chant our vow to save all beings, and we just do it. Nobody seems to complain. But the idea of saving all beings, I think for many of us, has a lot of Christian overtones. And we're not quite sure what it means in a Buddhist context, maybe. So sometimes instead of saying save all beings, we say awaken with all beings. I find that more comfortable myself. And I acknowledge that much of the time we're just struggling to get through the day and do the things that we need to do to keep our jobs and take care of our loved ones and make ends meet.

[04:45]

And that can seem like quite enough already. So saving all beings or even awakening with all beings will at times seem impossible or overwhelming. I'm reminded of the disillusionment I used to feel about the Christian admonition to love your neighbor as yourself. Because I knew... myself well enough to know that I didn't love others as much as I loved myself, but actually I cared more about myself. And I had no idea how one would get into that space. So I was really happy that Buddhism comes with a toolbox, a guidebook,

[05:57]

a map, a compass, all of the above. So I think that being a Bodhisattva is probably not the idea that most of us had when we first came to Zen Center. I think actually most of us come because we're suffering in some way. and want help. Maybe we come to learn to meditate because we've heard that that will help us with the difficult parts of our lives. Help us to cope with stress. and possibly to learn to concentrate better and focus better so that we can be more successful in a worldly way.

[07:07]

Or we might come because we hope it will make us easier to get along with. Or we may have the idea that a religious practice will make us a better person. And I think all of those ideas are perfectly laudable reasons to begin to practice. But they're also self-referencing. They're about us. They're about who we want to be. And they have a tendency to think of... We have a tendency in those... to think of ourselves as individuals, as separate. So the teachings about being a bodhisattva tell us that we need to be ready to give up everything connected with ourself, to give away our belongings,

[08:26]

to give time and energy, give up our status or reputation, let go of our attachment to loved ones, our body, our health, even our life, if it will benefit beings. Well, that's a pretty tall order. How many of you are ready to sign on to do that? You don't have to raise your hands. But through the teachings and through our practice experiences and our life experiences, we realize, if we're practicing Buddhism, I think, this truth is... brought home to us frequently that we're going to have to give up all these things anyway no matter what.

[09:31]

Life will take them away from us. Time and impermanence will take them away from us. And what do we do then? Can we be graceful with those changes or are we devastated by those changes? So I think that's what we practice with, is how can we face change and impermanence and the fact that we have no real control or ownership over our lives and dance with that in a way that makes our own life joyous and helps other beings as well. We have to kind of overcome whatever training we got for success, which usually means something like if things are going well and you're getting the things you want and need, then you're probably doing something

[10:51]

most things right. You're probably doing okay in the world. And if you're having a hard time, if you're not getting what you want and things aren't going so well, then maybe you should look at what you're doing or see if there's someone that might be to blame for the difficulty. So I think this Bodhisattva ideal is only persuasive when we can really believe that it is the path to freedom and happiness. And I think most of us believe it sometimes, and we have our moments when we're not so sure. So we cultivate that belief. We cultivate... an awareness of how things are, how the world really is. And as we don't necessarily have complete faith at the beginning, we proceed along the bodhisattva path step by step.

[12:07]

We come from, we start where we actually are. as who we actually are, and we practice as best we can. So as part of this practice period, Tova and I will be teaching a class about practicing as bodhisattvas and why you would want to do that and how it is actually possible. And there will be at least two main texts for the class. One is Teigen Leighton's book, Faces of Compassion, Bodhisattva Archetypes and Their Modern Expression. So last week, Tova talked about Martin Luther King as an exemplar of Samantabhadra.

[13:10]

And that's one of the ways that we'll be approaching the Bodhisattva ideal during this practice period. And Taigen is a Zen center priest who many of us know and have practiced with. And he'll be here in March to give a Dharma talk, which I'm really happy about. It will be great to see him and have him talk about his book. So the division of labor that we've worked out in the practice period, is that Tova will talk about that book. And I'm here to tell you about my book. So the book that I want to talk about is Pema Chodron's No Time to Lose, which is a commentary on Shantideva's Way of the Bodhisattva. In Sanskrit, the Bodhicharya Vatara. And I love this book.

[14:15]

I find it very helpful. I originally got interested in its most famous chapter, which is Chapter 6. It's called Patience. And it's about being patient with not getting what you want, with frustration. And it talks about how to work with the afflictive emotions, anger, hatred, resentment, jealousy, envy, frustration, good stuff. And it's really helpful. But we're not going to talk about that chapter today. We're going to talk about generosity. So this book is full of practical advice and new points of view that really turned my understanding of how to live in the world upside down.

[15:16]

And I'm very grateful for it. So I've been wanting to teach it for a long time and finally tried it out on Saturday's Sangha. And they seem to appreciate it. So here it is. And I want to talk a lot about the book today in the hopes of perhaps interesting you in the class or interesting you in studying this on your own. I think it's a very worthwhile thing to study. And having said all that, I want to apologize for the Bodhicaryavatara. Isn't that arrogant? this brilliant work of Shantideva, this 8th century Buddhist master, and I'm apologizing for his work. Because when I think of teaching it and when I reread it and think about what I'm going to say about it, I get embarrassed.

[16:19]

Because Shantideva is so passionate. So the good parts, the happy parts of the book, are these extravagant, over-the-top descriptions of the beauty and wonder he experiences in the world and his gratitude and appreciation for each moment as it unfolds. And it's... wonderful to behold, to listen to him. And also he describes in the same way states of mind that result from practicing as a bodhisattva. So it sounds really persuasive if you're willing to be persuaded. But He also is a fire and brimstone preacher, and he uses fear a lot to motivate us.

[17:29]

So there are many uses of words like hell and sin and repentance and confession and merit. and words that we may have a negative charge about. And the whole text has a kind of preachy, churchy, archaic tone sometimes that you have to get past to find the wealth of truth it contains. So you have to be willing to accept its tone and its format and see what it has to say. And it has a lot to say, but it's really different from the way we usually think, I think. And also, he presents extremes of the difficulty of human life.

[18:42]

So, for example, there's a description of the state of mind of a poor person who's awaiting his execution. And we really recoil from reading something like that. But I think it's fair... to demand of religion that it meet the extremes of difficulty in life. If we can't believe that it's going to see us through our darkest hour, then we can't have faith and belief. And we need that faith to energize our practice, to keep going, to feel certainty that we're on the right track. So I accept the text, and I love it, and I hope that you explore it.

[19:47]

It's written as a series of gathas, hundreds of gathas. And a gatha is a four-line verse or a short verse that we may memorize or we may write. And we keep it in mind and bring it up at certain moments to remind us of something important. It's sort of like ringing a mindfulness bell and taking three deep breaths or putting post-it notes on your computer that say breathe. But this is more specific and it covers more ground more specifically. It helps us with a lot of different So I think one of the wonderful ways to study it is to pick out the verses that are most meaningful and helpful to you and memorize them and carry them around in your mind, in your life.

[20:55]

And I want to quote Shanti Deva's opening gatha, which is an expression of how he himself... uses these gantas and why he wrote them. What I have to say has all been said before, and I am destitute of learning and of skill with words. I therefore have no thought that this might be of benefit to others. I wrote it only to sustain my understanding. So this book is about something called bodhicitta, which is a quality that all aspiring bodhisattvas have to some degree. And it's about how to develop it in the first place and how to sustain it and how to have it grow so that it becomes our default way of being in the world.

[22:08]

so that it's just how we naturally are when we're being ourselves. So that takes a lot of practice and reinforcement. And Shantideva is willing to hold our hands while we do that work and help us. So the word bodhi means awakening. And... citta means heart or mind. So bodhicitta is the thought of awakening or the heart or mind of, actually the thought of enlightenment or the heart or mind of awakening. And it's our wish for universal awakening. for ourselves and all beings.

[23:12]

It's the capacity to hold others equal to ourselves, which is what was expressed in that Christian admonition to love your neighbor as yourself. I think that's an ideal in all religions, but I'm grateful for tools to try to arrive at that point. And bodhicitta is the intention to always do good. Of course, we can't always do good, but if we have that intention to always try to do what's good, that's a very strong practice, and it will help us to develop strong bodhicitta. Shantedeva has very helpful advice and suggestions for how to see things differently in a way that's transformative for us.

[24:22]

And I think that we don't transform ourselves by making a commitment to not do bad behavior or to force ourselves to do good behavior. bring willpower to it. We actually succeed when we change our point of view, when we have some understanding that makes a certain kind of behavior natural and just what we know we should do or we know we can do. We know it will be beneficial for us as well as other people. One of the classic tools to practice the Bodhisattva Way is the six perfections or the six paramitas. And they are generosity, morality, patience, energy, meditation, and wisdom.

[25:28]

And each of these six has a chapter in the Bodhicaryavatara. But this morning I'm going to focus on generosity or giving because I think it richly demonstrates how to use Shantideva's help to practice the Bodhisattva way. And it's so rich and helps our lives so much. It's the first of the paramitas, the one that's traditionally practiced at the beginning. And so in some sense, maybe it's considered the easiest. But of course, we practice them all together. And as becomes possible, they're all infused with wisdom. So one of the ways that Shantideva outlines to cultivate bodhicitta is to do various practices.

[26:43]

And the first one is to make offerings to Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. So we make offerings to these beings that we venerate. these beings that we respect and have a good feeling for, that it's easy for us to give things to, to want good things for. And we make these offerings, and then we request their support and help in our effort to be bodhisattvas. And the things that are offered in this text... are often things that can't be owned by anybody. Parts of the natural world, the ocean, trees, grass, the sky, the sun, the moon.

[27:45]

Or they may be things that we imagine. And remember that the people who are hearing Shantideva recite this text are monks. They don't have anything. So they may imagine opulent palaces or fine clothes or food and give those as offerings. So I want to read a few of the verses about that. And I'm kind of aware of the perils of reading aloud in a Dharma talk. And in my defense, I want to say that it's actually traditional to read this text aloud. And the reason is that you hope that children who are playing nearby or babies in the womb or squirrels or bugs will hear it.

[28:49]

And even if they don't get it or understand it right then, somehow it will sink in and they will benefit by it. So that's what I'm doing. I offer every fruit and flower and every kind of healing medicine and all the precious things the world affords. With all pure waters of refreshment. Every mountain rich and filled with jewels. All sweet and lonely forest groves. The trees of heaven garlanded with blossom. And branches heavy laden with their fruit. I hold them all before my mind.

[29:50]

and to the supreme Buddhas and their heirs, will make a perfect gift of them. Oh, think of me with love, compassionate lords. Sacred objects of my prayers accept these offerings. For I am empty-handed, destitute of merit. I have no other wealth. But you, protectors, you whose thoughts are for the good of others, in your great power, accept this for my sake. So Shantideva is offering to others his best experiences. He's wanting to share what he loves with other people, and that's a very natural thing that we want to do.

[30:56]

If we love someone and they're not with us, we say, oh, I wish so-and-so could be here and share this with me. So it's a very human thing to want to share our experiences with people we care about. And also, this is a way for him to notice and record his own gratitude and appreciation for the experiences he has. So sometimes we barely notice the beauty of nature or the comfort of our own bodies. But if we're offering it in this way, we focus on what gives us pleasure and appreciate that pleasure. So another way, there are three ways that Shantideva talks about being generous and giving.

[31:58]

Another way is to be what is needed or helpful in the world. Can we, for example, be a listener? Can we listen to our friend who needs to tell us something? Can we be a healer or a masseuse, a companion or friend, a confessor or advisor or teacher? These are all roles that we can play for each other. And it doesn't mean we just try to be all things to all people, I think, but we can be on the lookout for what we have that we can offer that would be helpful. And I want to read some more verses about that. May I be a guard for those who are protectorless, a guide for those who journey on the road.

[33:15]

For those who wish to go across the water, may I be a boat a raft, a bridge. May I be an aisle for those who yearn for landfall and a lamp for those who long for light. For those who need a resting place, a bed. For all who need a servant, may I be their slave. So we may have some resistance, maybe to all of that and at least to the last line. Slavery has very negative connotations, of course, and it emphasizes the idea that we're giving up our own well-being. Well, I don't want to say that. I don't think it's true. That we're putting others' needs before our own and trying to be what is helpful. And there's a limit to how much we can do that, so it has to be infused with wisdom.

[34:21]

But I think we can stretch. I think it's a way of educating ourselves to the fact that we're not some fixed, narrow thing, that we can be many things. We can be many different people. and help in many different ways. So it helps us to expand our view of ourselves and make it more fluid and more connected with the world. So I think it's a wonderful practice to explore. It also gets us out of scarcity mode. All of these practices are bottomless. it's not like there's an account of merit that you are going to use up and not have any left. And we'll especially notice that in the next one. If you are imagining it to begin with, you can just imagine more and more and more, and you can keep giving and giving, and you and others benefit from that exercise.

[35:33]

So the final and perhaps most important way that Shantideva talks about generosity is in dedication of merit. So every morning during morning service, we dedicate the merit of service to the Bodhisattva way or ancestors or Buddhas or... or suffering beings. Anyway, we always dedicate the merit of our service. So the idea is that when we do good things, we accrue merit. And instead of keeping it in an account where it doesn't do anybody any good, we give it away. We don't hang on to it. And... I want to read some more. How are we doing?

[36:46]

Okay. So, it's traditional to dedicate the merit to suffering beings. And that's where he begins. May beings everywhere who suffer torment in their minds and bodies have by virtue of my merit, joy and happiness in boundless measure. And then he directs a dedication towards hell beings, people in different parts of hell. May those caught in the freezing ice be warmed. And from the massing clouds of Bodhisattva powers, Bodhisattva's prayers, may torrents reign in boundless streams to cool those burning in infernal fires.

[37:54]

Now, people who are in hell may have done something terrible. So... These offerings or these dedications are not about who deserves to get them. They're about who needs to get them or who will benefit from them. We're willing to offer merit to everyone. And the last one. These are just... human kinds of suffering. May those who go in dread have no more fear. May captives be unchained and now set free. And may the weak receive their strength. May living beings help each other in kindness. So that's his prayer, is that we will

[38:57]

be what we can for each other, that we will give when it's helpful, that we can treat each other with kindness. That's a gift. I want to talk about, in my personal life, an example of giving. I have a friend who makes beautiful altar cards, and they have Dharma content or pictures of bodhisattvas or some teaching, and they're so beautiful. And I know that my friend enjoys making them and collects materials for this and gives me these altar cards, and I put them on my altar. And they remind me of the teachings, and they remind me of my friends' love and care in making this.

[40:00]

And one of the things about giving is that it's not like you give something up, that something moves from you to another person and you don't have it anymore. You give and you both have. So she has joy in my receiving it and in her making it and in the teaching it contains. And I have the joy of its beauty and the reminder of the Dharma for me and the reminder of her love and friendship. So I think that's the message of this text, that when you give, the giving grows. When you imagine... things that you can give, that's endless. You know, you're not going to run out of things that you can give. So this chapter on dedication goes on and on, verse after verse of different categories of people that he's offering merit to.

[41:10]

And that's how giving is. It goes on and on. And the... boundaries, the thingness of what's being given or our outline or the outline of the receiver all melt away and there's just more happiness. So that I think is the burden of this text and I find it really inspiring and I hope you will. So I want to dedicate any merit that this talk might have to all of you and everyone you know and everyone you don't know. Thank you. Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma talks are offered at no cost and this is made possible by the donations we receive.

[42:12]

Your financial support helps us to continue to offer the Dharma. For more information, visit sfcc.org and click giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[42:26]

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