Good morning. As Many of you know I got sick or caught a cold or a flu while I was outside of Tassara. And I think it might have been because I was with a lot of little children, one of whom I found out later had a fever. And I attended a family event with... lots of children under four.

[01:04]

So, the best laid plans, I had many meetings, and , and very full schedule, and let it go, had to let it go. So practicing with not feeling well, with having pains of various kinds, headaches and body aches, but very mild, knowing not life-threatening, not, you know, some dire consequences, just regular old, cold flu thing. And realizing even with that mild, kind of a mild encounter with non-well-being, the challenge to practice, to continue practicing.

[02:21]

So it was a good reminder to me that you know, wanting to practice until my last breath, that it's not easy. It's not easy when we're not feeling well. When the causes and conditions shift, our usual way shifts, how are we going to practice? to begin our Sashin. We are beginning. It started last night. Sashin starts now, was said. And I just want to say something about nine-day Sashins. I would like us all to forget about the number nine, to not count, just to forget about it.

[03:35]

It's just every day there'll be a wake-up bell. and various, the soundscape of Sashin, and we come to Zendo, we sit and practice, and there will be a time when it will be the last period. That's all. I think many of you who've had seven-day Sashins might have had the thought, it would have been nice to sit You know, I finally, I feel like I arrived, you know, and I have a kind of steady engagement, and it's over. And at Green Gulch, I think it's almost like six and a half days. We end usually a little early so people can get home. So I think a nine-day sesheen is not so usual. We can't really do it so easily at City Center or Green Gulch because of our schedules.

[04:40]

So it does are we have this chance to sit longer than other places at San Francisco Zen Center. I think spirit rata's 10-day vipassana retreats is a kind of standard, so it's not so unusual. And... a feeling, you know, of forgetting about what day or what number. I think that goes for seven-day sessions as well. But for sure with nine-day, because it's, it may have set up a kind of, ooh. Actually, I just read about a Zen master who, whenever anybody came to see him, he went, he put his pad in his mouth and went, ooh, ooh, ooh. That was really great. Woo-woo.

[05:41]

Anyway, we might have a little woo-woo about nine days, which I would like us to just relax and forget about it and just enter completely. Don't look back. Don't look forward. Stay with each period as if it were your last. Or you're first. And not to expect anything. You know, those of you who've sat countless Sashins, meaning you really lost count a while ago, you know, and all of you know, that you don't know what this Sashin will be like. Just like our five-day became what it was with the ordeal of our live friends who joined us.

[06:42]

We don't know what this session will be. You don't know, I don't know what will unfold for you or for all of us. So to reel the mind back to just this moment without or speculation, or what if, or, I don't know, congratulations, or worries, or just relax. Let us just relax. I wanted to say a few things about Can you hear me okay? My voice is kind of on the low side, low in volume, I can tell. I would like to try and see everybody during the session since we have longer time.

[07:48]

There's the rotating group that I've been seeing, and then those of you who I haven't seen since the first time around, I'd like to see everybody. So just to let you know that. And I would like everyone to see at least one person during the session. the time. One or two people, Linda, our beloved director, will be gone for the middle part of the Sashin for about four days. Unavoidably has to do something up in the city that will be of great benefit to Zen Center. Leslie will come in in a couple days. please at least see one person at one or two people, maybe during the nine days. I would, my sense is to not see lots and lots of people, like every day or something.

[08:49]

I think that can be distracting, actually. You can be out of the Zendo, coming in and out. But everyone should see somebody, so at least one or two people. I hope by now anybody who doesn't want their posture adjusted has mentioned to the jisha. So we'll work on our posture together and refining, really, refining over the days because your body will change, as you know. You'll need more height, less height, support cushions here and there. into a chair on higher, lower. This is. We're lucky that we don't have just one-size-fits-all mentality about our Zafus or sitting setups.

[09:56]

Please avail yourself of changing your cushion height, hardness, softness, according to what's going on with you, your unique situation. The forms of Sesshin, you know, are very streamlined and simplified, and this is to allow us to not have to think about so many things, you know, Umpans and Han echoing each other and... different drumming, and it's just streamlined. It's just as simple as we can go. It probably could be even more simple. We could probably have nothing, just wait, and the food comes in. But our form is simplified form to help us not have to take care of so many things.

[11:03]

And same with all the other admonitions. of not writing, reading, talking. These are all to help us to gather body and mind, as it says in the admonitions, into one suchness, gathering body and mind and conveying a gathered body and mind to one another in everything we do. So all the forms are... simplified in this way to help us. There's something I'd like to ask everyone to join in with, which is, I've noticed in our chanting of the rope chant in the morning, there's one place where we're not in accord, and it's at the syllables, he, boo.

[12:08]

your eye, that place. And there's a tendency, and I think in different practice places, the he begins to be pulled out longer, given more, but it's just he, boo, y'all. They each get just one beat. He, boo, rather than he, boo. So if we could all, I've been hearing that, not in accord voices, we come together afterwards, but if we could all try to remember the heat. And also, this is something also that gets forgotten, which I'd like to revive. And this is something when Katagiri Roshi was asked, when he was at Zen Center, he's not alive anymore, but after Suzuki Roshi died, Katagiri Roshi stayed at Zen Center and helped. teach here and was Abbot for a year in between when Rep took his leave of absence.

[13:14]

Actually, excuse me, it was after Richard Baker left. Katagiri Roshi was Abbot for a year. Anyway, he was asked, what would you like us to be working on or what is it that we're not doing that you would like us to see more attention paid to, and I think people had some idea he would be talking about ourselves in posture or something, but what he said was, he asked that when we're chanting at the end of a chant, that the last syllable, like so, mo, ko, that we hold out the last syllable until it gets softer and softer and softer. So we don't end the chant with so-mo-ko, but to pull it out. And then the kokyo is also pulling out that last syllable, and they come in right on top.

[14:18]

So it's like one continuous sound. Wow. So if we can remember that, to hold out and soften, pull out and attenuate maybe that last syllable all together. a small point, but I think it has a beautiful quality to it in our chanting and this one continuous sound. An unexpected thing happened while I was away. I've been having trouble with my right knee for almost a year now. I don't know. I didn't do anything to it. I didn't twist it or fall or do some weird torquing of it.

[15:23]

I woke up one day with this problem, which has been affecting me the whole practice period in my bowing. And in yoga, I have to be really careful. Anyway, after being at this family event, I realized my knee didn't hurt anymore, my retina. And the only thing I could think of is that I wore heels for two events, like two evenings, which I never wear, you know. And they weren't even that high, but they were heels. And I think I wonder if that had something to do with it. Very unexpected. Really amazing. I've had acupuncture. I've been taking herbs. I've had massage therapy for this poor right knee. And, you know, just wear heels for a couple evenings. Seem to do the trick. I don't know what to say. And dancing a little bit in the heels.

[16:25]

I wonder... do you care where I was for this family event? I was at a bar mitzvah for my sister's grandson. Bar mitzvah is coming of age, coming into the Jewish temple community as an adult. And he did a beautiful job with the Hebrew that he learned and the chanting and also his commentary on his portion that he was assigned for that day of the month, day of the week. Anyway, so I just wanted to tell you, sometimes we never know when it is that we will do something that will be helpful, and when we'll do something that causes us some kind of pain. You know, it's very unpredictable, unpredictable.

[17:28]

And the same with the sasheen. It is not predictable how your sasheen is going to go. So that's why we have to take very careful, pay attention to how we move, how we get up and down, to stretch every day, either in the yoga rooms or... in your own room, to take care of your body with loving thoroughness. Also, you know, we read the Fukanza Zenki this morning. When you arise from sitting, move slowly and quietly, calmly, and deliberately. And I would suggest that rather than leaping off of the tan, or up from the floor ton, that you move slowly and quietly, calmly and deliberately, which would be rocking the body in little arcs, right and left, and uncross, and also you can give your legs a little massage or rubbing your legs.

[18:54]

I think that's... pretty standard, you know, to help with your legs and knees. Yeah, I just want to offer that as if you're accustomed to leaping off your cushion, to spend a little more time slowly and deliberately, calmly and deliberately. Do not rise suddenly or abruptly. And I think this is not only taking care of your is taking care of your body-mind, I think, coming out of Zazen, coming out of sitting still for 40 minutes or however long, to honor that in a way with moving out. We move into our position with care and to move out with care. All during this time, we will be practicing awareness.

[20:12]

We will be practicing, each of you maybe has your own, what you're practicing with, following the breath, counting the breath, posture. I would hope everyone starts with posture, and then you may be practicing just sitting with no... object of concentration or object but no just all subject you know just all the 10,000 things are the true reality of which you of which we are So whatever we see, whatever we hear, is not an object outside of ourselves, is one more instance of just this person.

[21:17]

Only a Buddha and a Buddha. I was sorry to miss Leslie's lecture on only a Buddha and a Buddha. And we'll be talking about that more during the... This teaching of each and every being, each and every thing is the reality, the true reality of all existence, the true reality of all beings. And only a Buddha and a Buddha, those two things, how they... come together in our practice of just sitting is what I want to be turning with you. There's a Zen story about Xuansha, Xuansha Shibei, who was called asceticbei, asceticbei because he, kind of over and above the usual admonitions, he took on things like

[22:31]

He was Chinese, ate 35 to 908. He didn't take the evening meal, didn't take medicine bowl, and did other ascetic things, so he was called ascetic bae. But a monk asked Xuanzha, what is it, and why is it so hard to realize? What is it? What is it? And why is it so hard to realize? I imagine he said it more like that, maybe. What is it? And why is it so hard to realize? And Swansha said, because it's too close. It's too close. And as it says in Only a Buddha and a Buddha, Yui Butsu, Yobutsu, Dogen, we were looking somewhere else for it. We were looking. up there to get something.

[23:33]

Why is it so difficult? Why is it, what is it, and why is it so hard to realize? Because it's too close. And later, Fayyan said, it couldn't be closer. Actually, it's the monk himself. just this person. What is it and why is it so hard to realize? Because it's too close. Too close meaning everything we do, see, speak, breathe, eat. Everything. is it, each and everything.

[24:38]

But it's hard, it's hard, because we keep looking for this thing, and maybe in the 90s she maybe will get it, whatever it is. We think this way, I know. We want to use things in leverages of various kinds, contrivances, tricks maybe even. Tell me your trick. It couldn't be closer. Actually, it's the monk himself. As Tsukiroshi says many, many times, the eyes... I cannot see the eyes. It's that close. So our nandeseshin, or our non-uncountable seshin, is a chance to express that, live that out.

[26:00]

Whether we realize it or actualize it or not, we can take our seats, turn the light back, and sit and see. See, not seeing like that, but experience, realize. our very life. Our unique life, unrepeatable, never before seen, never will be seen again, life which is interconnected with every other thing and being that has come to be or has not come to me. Another thing I'll be bringing up together with you is, which I mentioned earlier in the practice period, is spiritual bypassing.

[27:26]

And just a note on that, you know, we're right, we've just finished our mid-practice period ceremony and we're a little bit over the middle, I think. I think we have less than half of the practice period. to go. And we're all really settled, very, very settled. And, you know, the mid-practice period ceremony, I always marvel at the intelligence and creativity around satire and spoofing and fooling around with the teachings. Because what's presented and what makes it so funny is that the understanding of the teachings is there, and that's when you can turn it upside down and play, and play with it, and spoof it.

[28:29]

If one didn't understand, it wouldn't be so funny. You'd miss the mark. But that's the beauty, I think, of a mid-practice period ceremony is seeing the understanding of the teaching through this topsy-turvy way, how people really get it and are practicing with all sorts of dharma. Yeah. So I do call it a mid-practice period ceremony rather than skit night because it gives us a chance to play in that way. So we're settled. We have, you know, these precious, really precious weeks together.

[29:32]

And this, you know, the Han, don't waste time, don't waste time. You know, even going up for the week and being bombarded by what's going on in the news and hearing, you know, first-person accounts of what's going on in Syria and Liberia and St. Louis Ferguson and just... and the... the pace and the... At this family event, I was in a hotel and watched a little TV, which we don't have TV at Greenville, so I don't watch it very much. And it was, I just heard on NPR about the obesity rates in the United States are just skyrocketing, especially with children.

[30:39]

And then going to the TV and seeing, I don't know how many commercials about different snacking foods, you know, and, you know, just the whole thing seems so kind of bizarre, really. And here we are in this Sambokakaya Valley, given this opportunity to practice together and sit together, get to know ourselves, as thoroughly as possible, in quiet. So, all of that is wonderful. And the spiritual bypassing, as I was bringing up, I kind of had a big divergence there. There are issues each one of us has that we're either familiar with,

[31:46]

slightly familiar with or blind to that need attention. You know, those may be issues around our emotions and our ability to practice with in a skillful way when our emotions rise up strong. And I say rise up because it often feels like they rise up into the head with all sorts of things, anger, jealousy, losing our tempers, and sadness, and all sorts of emotional, our emotional life, the movement of our emotional life, and our relationships with one another. These are areas that, in this, spiritual bypassing, there's a tendency to avoid working on those, avoid dealing, avoid accepting and facing some pretty basic things that need attention in our lives that are painful.

[33:05]

And turning towards or, you know, diverting, that's the bypass, kind of a little detour into spiritual practice. And we don't need to detour. It doesn't need to be a detour. We can do those things together. In fact, I think that's the only way to be looking at and practicing with all the parts of ourselves, not just our spiritual inclinations. and, you know, achievements, maybe you could say. How about our relationships with one another and with ourself? In intrapsychic and interrelationships cannot be, you know, jumped over.

[34:09]

Or we will find ourselves in hot water, you know, or causing harm. Yeah, causing harm and also not just harm with that one person in relationship, but our actions and words affect everybody, everybody who knows us. not just we have a beef with one person. So, I'll be touching on that as we go along together. A monk asks, Xuansha, what is it?

[35:18]

And why is it so hard to realize? Swanchas said, because it's too close. Vayan said later, couldn't be closer. Actually, it's the monk himself. It's the monk herself. That's how close. I wanted to end this first talk, and hopefully the coughing and my energy will come up during the sitting. Actually, I came upon one of our ancestors after Gahasanjo Sekhidai. I think it was Gahasanjo Sekhidai. Tai, Yosho, Tai, Yen, Soshin.

[36:19]

Who's after Tai, Yen, Soshin, [...] Tai, Yen, Soshin. Anyway, one of the ones that we chant, but I don't know very much about it, but I came upon this, I guess, admonition to us monks who, some of them were sick, they had fever, actually, which is why it jumped out at me. And he said, go to the Zen. I think he had them sit day and night for seven days for their, take care of their health. Anyway, so this is Hongzhu Song of the Grassroot Hermitage. In the book, it's by Sekito Shurto, but it's in Taigen's book on Zen Master Hongzhu. So Sekito, you know, wrote Harmony of Difference and Equality, and he also wrote this Song of the Grassroof Hermitage, which seemed like a wonderful poem to start our time together in Sushi.

[37:35]

I've built a grass hut where there's nothing of value. After eating, I relax and enjoy a nap. When it was completed, fresh weeds appeared. Now it's been lived in, covered by weeds. The person in the hut lives here calmly, not stuck to inside, outside, or in between. Places worldly people live, he doesn't live. Realms worldly people love, she doesn't love. Though the hut is small, It includes the entire world. In ten square feet, an old man, an old woman, illumines forms and their nature. A great vehicle Bodhisattva trusts without doubt. The middling or lowly can't help wondering, will this hut perish or not?

[38:45]

Perishable or not? The original master is present, not dwelling south or north, east or west. Firmly based on steadiness, it can't be surpassed. A shining window below the green pines. Jade palaces or vermilion towers can't compare with it. Just sitting with head covered, all things are at rest. Thus, this mountain monk doesn't understand at all. Living here, he and she no longer work to get free. Who would proudly arrange seats trying to entice guests? Turn around the light to shine within, then just return.

[39:48]

the vast inconceivable source can't be faced or turned away from. Meet the ancestral teachers. Be familiar with their instruction. Bind grasses to build a hut and don't give up. Let go of hundreds of years and relax completely. Open your hands and walk Innocent. Thousands of words, myriad interpretations are only to free you from obstructions. If you want to know the undying person in the hut, don't separate from this skin bag here and now. Let go of hundreds of years and relax completely.

[40:55]

So, in our breathing, we don't want any contrivance, any tricks, any... pressures, we want relaxed alertness. Relaxed alertness, not effortful breathing. Let go of hundreds of years and relax completely. So our volunteer kitchen crew is going and we have our regular kitchen crew here.

[42:04]

Please today find, make effort, an effortless effort to find your seat, find the posture that supports relaxed alertness, relaxed and effortless breathing, and your posture and your breath are unable to be pulled apart. If you're slumping, it will be hard to breathe. If you're overarching, it will be hard to breathe. If you're holding your belly tightly, intensely, it will be hard to breathe. If you're holding your shoulders up, it will be hard to breathe. taking care of our bodies, making it this, not assuming I know the right posture, but finding it each time.

[43:17]

And there will be movement there, movement as you breathe, movement in your body throughout the day, before bath, after bath, evening, morning, after you eat, find your posture anew each time relax completely and open let go and sit free walk free relax completely and nothing can hurt us that that feeling of practicing in that way, whatever comes is Buddha Dharma. And I will practice with it, whatever it is. Pain comes, Buddha Dharma in that form. This is a soft, flexible mind.

[44:26]

how close thank you very much 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 visit sfcc.org and click giving

[45:02]

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