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. So here we all are, somehow, miraculously, I'd like to say, gratitude is for the opportunity, for the invitation from Abbot Mako and Betanto and Leslie and so many others who are caring for this place. And for Stone Creek, this is our, I think our third year and our fourth trip for Sangha Week. And it's really wonderful. I just want to say that.

[01:01]

It really is wonderful to be able to come and experience residential practice and then be able to carry that back to our sangha in Sebastopol. It really strengthens everybody, even the people who don't come. They feel the resonance of the practice here that ripples back. And we've also found it's a way that people within the sangha can bond and understand each other and get to know each other on a much deeper level. And different people come every year, so eventually maybe everybody will get to come. But so much appreciation for all the care and continuity in holding this, and it's just a joy. to be relating with everyone here. So I want to thank you so much. I've been thinking a lot about the world and Zen practice and sitting and

[02:25]

San Francisco Zen Center and what is Zen practice in the world today? What does it mean to hold these practice places? The other day I went to speak with Zoketsu Norman Fisher, one of our beloved elder teachers. And we were talking and he said, you know, in the 60s, a lot of people came... to Zen Center to be with Suzuki Roshi. And he said, yes, coming to be with Suzuki Roshi, but also it was the 60s. So a lot was happening culturally that brought people to practice. And watching the world and Zen Center go through different phases, different times, I may have mentioned this last year when I was here, but I first came here in September 1994.

[03:28]

And it happened to be the last practice period that Tenshin Roshi was leading as abbot. And nobody knew if he was going to keep teaching or not here. So everybody wanted to be here. So there were about 90 people, if I remember correctly, if that's possible, in the valley, and 11 were former Shusos. And it was just this very intense practice period, and I sat right there. And I thought all practice periods were like that. And I had signed up to stay for two practice periods, and then... work the summer, they kindly let me do that to retroactively pay for my practice periods. So the next practice period was very different. And it was with Sojun Mel Weitzman, a wonderful teacher, but very different.

[04:30]

So suddenly, like, everybody left, or it felt like that. And a few more people came. And... There was a lot more work practice because Sojin Roshi really enjoyed work practice. And then also I was asked to be in the kitchen, which I hadn't expected to do and didn't really want to do, but it turned out to be a pretty good thing. And did a few more practice periods. Life sort of rolled along. And I haven't done a practice period in a long time, but I've come back every summer. pretty much except for COVID times. So I've been coming here for 31 years. And every time coming into the valley, there's just such a deep intimacy of place and practice. And I keep getting that feeling of like, oh, it's like the place, the valley, the zendo, it's like my own body almost, you know.

[05:34]

And I could, I took a little time to rest this morning and I almost felt like the place working on me, like massaging me, sort of helping me remember, like, oh yeah, I know, you know this. But then as thinking again with my conversation with Norman, as we were talking about various things, he said, you know, he said this with such conviction. He said, the Dharma is strong. The Dharma is strong. And he said, and when there's a strong Dharma being cared for in a place, somehow, mysteriously, the word gets out. And people find, and people find their way. So something called you here.

[06:40]

And you might be able to recognize it in yourself or name it or it may be kind of mysterious or maybe it just seemed like an interesting thing to do. But I believe we each have this inner voice and sometimes can hear it more strongly than at other times. And of course there's suffering. There's suffering, our individual suffering, our particular suffering, the suffering of the world, which is always there, although we seem to be in a particularly anxious and uncertain time now. And this is really what dharma and practice were made for. But sometimes there's also a sense of I had come across this from John Donahue, the late poet.

[07:45]

These things that we sort of know, but not totally in consciousness. He says, it is strange to be here. The mystery never leaves you alone. Behind your image, below your words, above your thoughts, the silence of another world waits. A world lives within you. No one else can bring you news of this inner world. So somehow, some echo of that resonates and we come and we sit down so we can find the news for ourselves. And then I found this from Mary Oliver who says, truly, truly, We live with mysteries too marvelous to be understood. Let me keep my distance always from those who think they have the answers. Let me keep company always with those who say look and laugh in astonishment and bow their heads.

[08:55]

And then there's what's talked about in Buddhism, this thing called bodhicitta, which is the thought, the mind of awakening. It arises somehow and it set it to be like a little candle flame initially. And then you protect it and then it grows into a much stronger flame. So again, this is the heart, mind of awakening and awakening for the benefit of all. And I think of this place as a place to care for that flame, that place of listening, that place of letting all of this grow a bit stronger. So then when you do venture back out into the wide and busy world, it doesn't go out. And you don't lose the thread of that voice.

[10:10]

This morning sitting in Zazen, I thought of the Genjo Koan. which I've heard as actualizing the fundamental point. You know, when you hear these things all the time, sometimes it's hard to hear them freshly. But I had the thought, I thought, well, what is the fundamental point after all? And what does it mean to actualize it? And then we chanted it, which was helpful. And it is helpful to chant these things over and over and over, years and years and years. Then they just kind of get in you. And then they bubble up in interesting places. And my first year here, way back when, I somehow got the notion that I wasn't going to read anything but Dharma. And that also was helpful, just to kind of stew in it all.

[11:23]

Although when I finally read a novel, That was pretty wild. It was like, these characters are living in my head, and you're like, whoa, this is powerful stuff. Actualizing the fundamental point. Nishiari, Boksan, who was the great scholar of Dogen in the Meiji period, he said, the lifetime teaching of Dogen, so the founder of Soto Zen, 13th century, who wrote Genjo Koan and many other things, Shobo Genzo, he says, the lifetime teaching of Dogen is all in one phrase, Genjo Koan. The lifetime teaching. in actualizing the fundamental point or according with reality.

[12:26]

And he says all of his other teachings, all the other fascicles in the Shogo Genzo are just offshoots of this. And the manuscript sat in Soto Zen monasteries for 500 years, just as kind of a ritual object connected to the past, but nobody actually read it. And it wasn't actually brought into print, along with the show Bogenso, till 1811. And this is from the 13th century being written. And the great poet, Ryokan, who lived 1758 to 1841, he said, For 500 years it's been covered with dust, just because no one has had an eye for recognizing Dharma. For whom was all his eloquence expounded? Longing for ancient times and grieving for the present, my heart is exhausted.

[13:31]

It's kind of a miracle, really, that somebody, it survived all of those centuries and also didn't just fade away, but someone, maybe recognizing true Dharma, brought it out to the light. So this is part of what we're doing here is we're caring for this very long tradition when there are many other things to do in the world. So perhaps it was expounded for us. Perhaps he wrote all of this for us. And do we have an eye for recognizing dharma. And somehow we've created this space that we can even ask that question. So he says to, Dogen says, to carry yourself forward and experience myriad things is delusion.

[14:48]

That myriad things come forth and experience themselves is awakening. Seems like there are maybe a few too many words in that, that it could be simpler. But to carry yourself forward and experience myriad things. It's so easy... even though we go to a lot of trouble to create this space and do all these things, it's easy to fall back into these deep habits of just how we normally go through the world. You know, I like this. I don't like that. I'm going to do a practice period. I took a bath yesterday. You know, I'm talking to the Blue Jays, whatever it is. It's like I'm doing this and just life is just going on. And that seems really natural. But he's saying that's not really, that's just one story. And if you think that's how it really is, then we're off.

[15:50]

It's more that all of these things come together and create and experience themselves. It just looks like we're all separate doing our thing. I am not giving this talk. I am not. This is a vast, amazing, incomprehensible, Dependent co-arising. It's wild. I don't know what's going to happen. But we're here. And everything is like that. You know those moments when you have a mind, you have your mind on something? and then you just randomly pick up a book and you randomly open the page, and you're like, oh yeah, that is really helpful. I got something, I think it was like that here. So it was in my beginner's mind. It says, you cannot practice true zazen. You cannot practice true zazen because you practice it.

[16:55]

You cannot practice true zazen because you practice it. But if you don't, if you don't practice it, then there is enlightenment and there is true practice. I did hear a story once, I hope it's true, of Blanche Hartman going to see Suzuki Roshi and saying something, you can correct me if you know differently, but going to see Suzuki Roshi and saying something about my zazen, da-da-da-da, and him stopping her and saying, don't ever say that, don't ever say my zazen, don't ever say your zazen. Because then, you know, as he says, here you are on the right side and here is Zazen on the left. So Zazen and you become two different things. But they're not two different things. He says emptiness means everything is always here.

[17:59]

Our whole being is not an accumulation of everything. It is impossible to divide one whole existence into parts. It is always here and always working. This is enlightenment. I think this is the fundamental point. So coming here, there's some opportunity to shift the frame pretty radically. We're coming to remember who we really are. You know that. It got you here. And Joanna Macy, the environmental activist, thinker, Buddhist teacher, said, you know, realizing, remembering that we are part of a net from which we cannot fall.

[19:06]

We are part of a net from which we cannot fall. So in practice, we're going to the root, the root of the confusion. the root of thinking I'm here and you're over there and I can protect myself and just those I love and make things safe and permanent when it's not really like that. But what we can open to is this vast interdependent unfolding that we really are.

[20:10]

And then we can play. And then we can really love. To study the Buddha way is to study the self. So first we sit down, we pay attention, what's happening here? What's going on with the mind? What's going on with the body? Who do I think I am? But then to study the self is to forget the self.

[21:14]

To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things. Actualized by myriad things sounds sort of strange, but we are created by everything. We are nothing but the creation of everything, everything creating itself. Pichet on the Han, it says something like, great is the matter of life and death.

[22:51]

Time passes swiftly, opportunity is lost. Awake, awake, do not waste this life. I don't know if they still do this or not, but is there still a collection of ping pong balls? Where you could drop the ping pong ball and it goes, Bum, bum, [...] bum. And that's how you teach people to do the Han. Because it's that ta, [...] ta. And there's something in our body we feel that, right? In a way everything is vast and unborn and lots of spaciousness and lots of time. But there's also this urgency. Like cha, cha, cha, don't miss it. Don't miss it. Things can change so fast. He says, you have gained, you, we, you have gained the pivotal opportunity of human form. Do not use your time in vain.

[23:54]

Do not use your time in vain. And so we come in, we sit down, we try to be kind and take care of things and people and hold the door open for others to come through. I think of Tassajara as the actualizing the fundamental point place. And I think of Tassajara as the remembering who we are place. And I think of Tassajara as the place for truly coming home. And I feel fortunate beyond words. that this practice has been the basis of my life. So we have a few minutes if anybody would like to share anything.

[25:07]

And I'm also happy to wander off into the night in silence, but happy to talk if people would like, or if anything in particular resonated. Yes, please. A few what, I'm sorry? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I don't know if I can answer that.

[26:11]

I don't think, I wouldn't say something's missing. Although I think there may be a human wish to engage in various ways that are hard to do at Tassajara if you stay here for a very, very long time. And I think any, I love Dharma places, and I'm rearranging my life to come back to Dharma places. And I'm glad I wasn't just in a Dharma place for decades without stepping out, because I felt that there were ways I needed to encounter the world and encounter myself in different challenges, that this was such a strong base. six practice periods I did here, I really feel were the basis of all of my life, practice life. And I keep wanting to come back and help share that with others. But if I had just stayed here or just stayed at Green Gulch, I think I could have gotten dull.

[27:17]

There was some edge I needed to really encounter. And when we have the departing student, departing monk ceremony, Sometimes we can say returns to the marketplace with gift-bestowing hands. So there's something about what is going on in the wider field that also can become the Dharma field. And then I think when people come back, they bring that also. Thank you for your question. Please. You mentioned something to the effect of the practice and not practicing. I almost wanted you to repeat that. Sure, from Suzuki Roshi. And then the piece about dancing. I don't quite remember the dancing, but I'm sure I said something about dancing.

[28:20]

Oh, yeah. Sure. So the part about not doing zazen, you can't do zazen. If you have an idea of I am doing zazen, then you have these three different things. You have a subject, you have a verb, you have an object. And the whole point... as I understand it, of practicing and seeing is realizing that those separations are only conventional. They're not real. They're useful. But if you're still in, I'm doing this thing over there, then it's not the zazen that's being pointed to or suggested or invited. So the zazen is actually letting go of that or seeing through that.

[29:23]

That's also the sense of one cannot get enlightenment because it's an oxymoron, that sense of you're seeing through that way of talking completely. And then it's just this, well, things are already a dynamic field, but it's softening into being the dynamic field. It's that now. And we're just like, oh, we can wake up to that. It's always the way it is. It's not like we have to get there and make it happen. It's just, oh, oh, okay. Okay, thank you. Yes. Mm-hmm. I feel like stories can also create the other and create this noun, subject, verb thing of trying to solidify something.

[30:44]

How do you manage that interplay between the power of storytelling? Thank you. Yeah, I love that question. Actually, the scholar David Loy, Buddhist scholar, has written a book called The World is Made of Stories, that we are story-making machines in a way, if you could say that, or humans. We have to create the world through stories. And we need language. And we need... different names, and we're at Tassajara, and this is California, and my name's Meg. We need all of that to be able to function. And stories also are very powerful in that one thing, we tend to perceive and make choices according to the conscious and unconscious stories that we tell. So what story we're telling will change how we perceive the world and our actions, our choices. So we need stories, and part of it is seeing through.

[31:52]

That is more the relative or conventional, but they're emergent, and they're not set, and they're not absolute and unchanging. So we can enjoy our stories, be supported by our stories, but not be trapped in our stories. Thank you. And so it's good to listen. And like, what are the stories you're telling unconsciously and consciously of who you are, what's going on, what's important? Lisa. Thank you. I've really enjoyed teaching more widely in the world, and I've been fortunate that most of my work has been ways to bring Dharma and various other forms out into the world, and so I found it very gratifying, and I believe in that work.

[33:08]

And I really missed being in this full, rich world Dharma field with the bells and the bowing and reciting Genjo Koan and being able to be with people who were hearing something and coming specifically to this and using the whole Buddhist toolbox in a way to share and to be able to go deeper more directly. And I wanted to bow more, I think. Honestly. Yeah. You can do a lot in a corporation, but not so much full prostrations. It doesn't go over so well. And so I wanted to invite people to bow. And so I think there are elements of our human being psyche, partially with the ritual and ceremony, but bowing and the way we relate with each other and the silence that there are so many layered things.

[34:13]

and to care for a place and invite people into a place where that full offering can be done. And I do think San Francisco Zen Center is an important place to care for this, that there are many different ways to share Dharma. But as someone recently in the Buddhist world was saying that... Many different places can do the adapted versions, but there are very few places that can care for the forms and the depth and the tradition in the way that can happen here. And I feel that there's a certain responsibility here. And after a certain number of years, it just gets in your bones. And I want to come play in my home field. Okay, anybody else? One more. Is there something like that in that?

[35:44]

I would say yes, but not necessarily Zazen. It's wonderful we all come and sit together in the same room, but I don't think he was referring specifically to we all need to sit together, collective type, but more the sense of the... It's the whole, everything coming together in a very interdependent way when a person sits down. And to say an I or a name is just a temporary designation. And so to understand that, that it's already that, but we get confused and think, oh, I'm just a small separate thing here. But we're not just a small separate thing. So it's opening to that. In a way, that's collective. Thank you. 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.

[36:48]

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

[36:57]

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