I've been trying to, as I did last time, try to figure out what do I mostly want to say and kind of crystallize it right at the beginning. And I think the shorthand for it is your life is not like a building. It's like a plant. Okay, hold that thought. We'll come back to it. You know, I think I, and I think probably a lot of you sometimes get caught up in feeling like I should know where I want to go. I should know what I want to do with my life. You know, I should know what I want. I should know how to get there. I have to make this decision or that decision. And, you know, it's important. Why don't I know? Because I'm too confused. because they want me to do something else.

[01:01]

We have various reasons and ways that we put pressure on ourself in this realm of what is my life or who am I. And so I come back to, you know, we have a feeling like we should have a plan. Sometimes a small plan like I should know what I want for dinner. Sometimes a little bit larger plan, like I should know who I want to spend the rest of my life with, or I should know what I want to do with my life. And we have this feeling that if we could put together the pieces clearly enough, it would add up to something, and we could therefore proceed, you know, to get the building permits and all. and start to nail some things together, nail them down, kind of get this place in shape.

[02:06]

I don't think it works like that, actually. Not that we don't have wants and desires and interests and aspirations and revulsions and capabilities and incapabilities. We do have all of that, and they definitely go into making our life But it doesn't happen in quite the laid-out, you know, step-by-step way that we think that it does. Instead, I think it's more like a plant. It's more like there's a seed. Not a seed. There's a lot of seeds. And then things happen. You know, like the sun shines on it. It doesn't. and there's a rock over here, and a flood comes through, and various things happen, and the plant grows, and is alive, and grows in a certain direction, and in another direction, and eventually it also dies, of course.

[03:17]

So we have this wonderful thing called a genuine life. We each have one. It's in a quote by Dogen that maybe I'll try to remember now. This Dharma is such that it cannot be attained by groping and searching about. In the realm of seeing, knowledge perishes. In the moment of attaining, the mind is surpassed. When you turn the mind around, you acquire genuine life. By bowing and stepping inward, by bowing formally and stepping inward, you stumble into the realm of great ease. So this Dharma, this teaching,

[04:23]

is not such that it can be attained by groping or searching about. It's rather, when we turn the mind inward, you acquire, he says, this is Dogen, he says you acquire genuine life, but really we always, each of us, have genuine life. We have, we say, you know, we say we have a genuine life, but actually we have genuine life that's kind of proceeding. as long as our life goes. And it's not like one thing, but it is this flow of something. You know, this karmic body and mind experience more than it's experienced, because it's more than we can actually experience, but it's the life of this karmic body and mind. And it's there all the time. All the time it's there. We can acquire it. We can notice it by... by not getting caught up in so many of our habitual patterns.

[05:27]

It's a lot of our habitual patterns that keep us from noticing that our genuine life is going on. It's going on in the form of the breeze touching our face. It's going on in the form of our stomach grumbling, growling. It's even going on in the form of our worrying or our planning That's our genuine life happening. It's just that it's hard to notice it when we're involved in that. So this bowing formally, it can be bowing formally, like actually doing it the way Greg said and Kathy said too. You know, putting our hands together and bowing formally. It can also be bowing formally internally, just a kind of respect of... everything that's going on in our genuine life, including the worry, the planning, some respect for those things, that they are there in our karmic, plant-like, organic life that's happening.

[06:35]

I was thinking tonight of the first time I came to Tassajara. It was in the summer of 1973, and I had followed my to-be husband, Keith, some of you know him. He wasn't my husband then, but we'd been together for a while already, to Zen Center in 1971. So I'd followed him to Zen Center. He liked Zazen much better than I did. I thought, it hurts. Why would you do this? And he continued to like it better than I did or sort of leap ahead faster than I did. He did one-day sittings, he did seshins, and he wanted to come to Tassajara. So he came to Tassajara for, I think, three weeks as a guest student. Back in those days, you couldn't come to Tassajara like now. You couldn't come for the whole summer. You couldn't earn practice periods. The most you could come if you hadn't done practice periods was six weeks.

[07:40]

But anyway, he came for three weeks. And he didn't want me to be here the whole time, and I didn't want to be here the whole time. But by the time I came, two weeks after he'd been gone, I was ready to try it because he was here. I admit this as a... It's a confession. Even back then, it wasn't good. Anyway, so I was at City... We lived in the... the Page Street neighborhood near City Center, and I got permission to come down, but I didn't have a ride, so I and some other woman who I have no idea who it was, whether she's still around or not, I don't know, went out to Fell Street and stuck out her thumbs and hitchhiked down to Tassajara. I don't know. Maybe she knew the way. I don't know. Anyway, the thing that I remember, I don't remember any other... I remember going out to Page Street, I don't remember what happened after that.

[08:45]

Aliens. It's probably we were abducted by aliens. No. What I remember, the next thing I remember, is turning on, you know, where you turn onto Tatsahar Road, and you start going through these oak trees with the Spanish moss hanging down. It was starting to get to be evening by that time. Very gloomy. It was very gloomy. Like, where are we going? You know, down into these deep, dark trees. And by that time, we were walking, which is probably why I remember that. We'd gotten some ride, I guess, to Tassahara Road. And then we got out and we walked for a while. We got into these trees. And then along came a camper with a family in it, I guess. Anyway, we got in the back with some of the kids. And they took us. They weren't coming to Tassahara, but they brought us all the way here. So over the road, down to the end of the road. Didn't see any of it, right? Just got out at Tazahar. At, you know, evening time, I guess.

[09:47]

Anyway, I was here for a week. I didn't like it very much. You know, it was... There was a lot of a schedule. Pretty much you had to do what they said all the time. And I worked on cabins, which... I didn't like all that much. Later, I just have to say, later I loved cabins. I've worked on cabins pretty much every year. I've been here one way or another, and it's a good job. But at the time, I didn't like that so much. I really didn't like the food. We had this... The food might have been great, but the only thing I remember is this gruel-like thing that was pink. I know there was cauliflower in there, but it was all pink. So anyway, I just wanted my boyfriend back, go back to San Francisco. Little did I know, less than two years from then, I came here basically to be here for the rest of my life, it turns out, so far.

[10:50]

I mean, I haven't lived here that whole time, but mostly, and I feel very lucky to have done that. So I'm telling you this story because I want you to see how plant-like my life was, how much it was not my plan to join this weird place. And I wasn't abducted, actually. It happened quite organically, the change in my feeling to where this is really what I wanted to do. Not that I can say exactly how that happened. how I wanted to do it already. Back then, even when I didn't like coming to Tassajara, even when I didn't like Zazen very much, or maybe at all, certainly by the end of every 40-minute period, I didn't like it. It was terrible. I vowed never to come back.

[11:50]

And yet, we lived a couple blocks away, and I found myself coming to Zazen even when Keith wasn't coming, even when Keith was working, there I would be. risking my life to cross Fell Street to come to Zazen. So something in me, I think, knew that I needed it, that I needed something like this. And I think that Zazen is, it kind of manifests or enacts this bowing formally and stepping inward, this attitude toward our toward our genuine life that allows us to experience it. Now, let me say, first of all, no one ever guaranteed that our genuine life was going to be all pleasant. In fact, it's pretty much guaranteed that it won't be all pleasant because we have bodies, we have minds.

[12:55]

They degrade. Like a plant, they grow, then they die. So that at least, if not anything else, is bound to be a little unpleasant. And then there's a lot of other things too that might be a little unpleasant. So in this genuine life, we can't be confused by what we call good and bad, by this kind of made up, these categories, these made up categories of if it hurts, it's bad. If it's unpleasant, it's bad. If it's pleasant, it's good. If people smile at me because of it, it's good. If they frown at me, it's bad. Or maybe sometimes we think it's the opposite. If they frown, it's good. Any of those that we tack on to things are really confusing for us in this practice or experiment of

[13:58]

of paying attention to our genuine life. Our genuine life has to be broad enough. It can't be cut up into good and bad and then try to get rid of some of it. It's got to be broad enough that it includes whatever is there. And zazen actually enacts a way of doing this. To put it simply, it's like take a balanced position, either sitting, standing, walking, or lying down, And keep your eyes open. Keep your mind open. Notice is really just a way of including our mind. That's not the most important thing. The most important thing is openness. Just be open. Because we identify too much with our mind, we think noticing it would be the important thing. If I notice it, then I'll know what it is. Then I've got it. Then everything's okay. That's just me thinking I am my mind.

[15:01]

Actually, of all the myriad things that happen in our genuine life, billions of them we don't notice. Some huge percentage, probably, we don't notice that go on and yet are vital to our genuine life. And that's just fine. It's doing fine. It's part of our life. It's just for our peace of mind's sake. it's good to notice some of the things. Because if we aren't noticing them, we're probably noticing our delusions about them or ways to avoid them. So zazen again, either formal sitting zazen or walking around everyday zazen. Zazen mind is basically take a stable posture and try to be open. Try to be open to what's happening. Try to bow formally to... keep going like this. Try to bow formally and step backward and give what's happening some space to grow, to respond to the surround, to its surround at that point.

[16:15]

So this Dharma is... such that it is not... What's the next word? It's not... I've forgotten it. I have it here. This Dharma is such that it cannot be attained by groping or searching around. This groping and searching around is one of our normal habitual ways of trying to meet life. And by it we confuse ourselves. We We narrow what we're looking at. We start looking at just our idea of what it should be instead of actually experiencing it. In the realm of seeing, knowledge perishes. At the moment of attaining, the mind is surpassed. So when we're actually experiencing our genuine life, it's way beyond what we can actually know. Even just something simple like looking at the sky is so far beyond what we can know.

[17:31]

Looking at a flower or smelling the smell of the rain is so far beyond what we can actually know that our mind, if we open up to that experience, it's not like knowledge perishes and it's a terrible thing. It's more like knowledge perishes by bursting open to the smell of the rain, which is... beyond what we would think about it and especially because it keeps changing moment by moment so there is no time really in our genuine life for knowledge to regroup not that we don't have thoughts thoughts are a part of our genuine life and they're a very useful part and it doesn't really matter if they're useful or not we've got them so we have to deal with them and we might as well make the best use of them we can but don't be fooled by them don't think By my thoughts, I'm going to figure this out. I'm going to make myself into a better person. I'm going to be what I always was supposed to be or wanted to be or whatever.

[18:36]

Again, not that our thoughts don't have something to do with that. They do. They have a lot to do with it. They're a major part of it, but they're just, you know, a major part is not probably 50%, some smaller percent than that. If we... If you turn the mind around, you acquire genuine life. If you don't get too distracted by habits, by what we might look at and think, oh, this is what's going on, or there's the problem, I see it. It's either over there or it's over here. That's the problem, we should get this fixed. Don't be fooled by that. That problem is part of our genuine life. And to bow to it formally, to respect it, to give it its space, and let it just be there, allows our genuine life to go on. Not that we can stop it anyway.

[19:39]

Of course it's going on. Rather, it allows us to enjoy it, to appreciate it. I want to share with you a part of, I think it's actually part of Leaves of Grass. Walt Whitman. See if I can remember this one now. Till the sun excludes you. No. I can get it right. Excuse the noise. Not till the sun excludes you. I knew that wasn't going to come out right that way. Not till the sun excludes you will I exclude you. Not till the water refuses to glisten for you or the leaves refuse to rustle for you will I refuse to glisten or rustle for you.

[20:40]

So I suggest that this could be a vow that we could take toward our genuine life, toward our our genuine life that's external, and our genuine life that's internal, toward anything that comes into our life on the outside or on the inside, which in some ways is much more difficult. Those things that come up on the inside, which we think shouldn't be there, can be really disappointing. They can be really scary. They can be really depressing. Many, many things because we care so much. What are we like? Why do I have that feeling? Why do I have that thought? I shouldn't. But I suggest that we take this little vow that Walt Whitman provided us with.

[21:47]

Not till the sun excludes you will I exclude you. So if the sun stops shining on you or on whatever your favorite, non-favorite thing is, your anger, your dependency, your confusion, whatever thing that happens for you that you don't like, if the sun stops shining on that, then you can stop shining on it too. But until then... Not until the sun excludes you will I exclude you. Not until the water refuses to glisten for you and the leaves refuse to rustle for you. Not until then will I refuse to glisten and rustle for you or have you glisten and rustle for me. For this invitation to our...

[22:51]

and internal pieces, parts of us. We're afraid to do that because we think it's our job to make ourselves into a better person. And also I think we're afraid to do it for a very good reason. I think we don't want to hurt people, including ourselves. We don't want to hurt ourselves. And this is a good impulse. We don't want to hurt people. What we don't realize I think and but I invite you to try this and see if it works is that when we have this attitude of bowing formally and stepping inward and respecting these scary depressing various things that arise in us they they do not they are not nearly as harmful as they are when we are trying to get rid of them in some way, some way of ending them.

[23:56]

That kind of turns us into a harmful person. That not rustling and glistening, if you can follow my metaphors, for our internal states, refusing to shine on them, refusing to let them be, looking for some way to get rid of them, turns us into a harmful person. Either we start to hurt ourselves or we start to hurt other people. We think, I can't be around you because you make me feel this way. Or, I can't be around myself. I have to go hide somewhere. So I suggest that you try this kind of attitude of respect and for whatever arises internally or externally especially internally and see does it what I think it does what the way I say it for myself is it makes me able to stand to be me more makes me more able to stand to be me and if I can stand to be me

[25:15]

There's a lot more space for you to be you. And it's a more compassionate setting. I need to put in a disclaimer because often when I talk this way, people think that I'm talking about passivity. That this means... you know, something comes up and we basically sit down in Zazen posture and we sit there and, you know, whatever happens, happens. I think that passivity is actually not a possibility. We are always responding. We're always responding and our responses are always communicated. Not necessarily accurately. People don't necessarily interpret them accurately, but they get... communicated in some way. And if what we're feeling is, I hate myself, or I hate this situation, that gets communicated.

[26:20]

If what we're feeling is whatever we feel in response to things, and we will feel, you know, if difficult, like the oil spill that's happening, we have a response to that. And it might be really, you know, gut-wrenching response. And that response gets communicated. It's in our genuine life. And we do do things for them. We just have a lot better chance of doing something helpful if our response is just, I can't handle this. I can't live with this. Because, in fact, we are living with it. We're living with whatever happens externally, whatever happens internally, until we aren't. Until we actually aren't living with it. So to take this stable posture, sitting, standing, walking or lying down, and try to be open to our response.

[27:21]

And then, yes, respond. Sometimes that response means saying things. Sometimes it means doing things. But it's not from, or it's to some extent, not as much from our sort of habitual grasping or avoiding. So again, I recommend this vow of not until the sun excludes you will I exclude you. Not until the water refuses to glisten for you and the leaves refuse to rustle for you will I refuse to glisten and rustle for you. That kind of vow toward our... toward all of ourselves in the widest sense.

[28:26]

Just a few minutes if any of you have any thoughts, questions. Yes, Josie. Are they different things or are they one and the same? Noticing, opening, experiencing. Well, they're close to the same thing, I would say. Yeah, I would say they're close to the same thing. Maybe little nuances of difference. Do you want to say something more? how they seem the same or different to you?

[29:34]

I guess I would, you know... Yeah, they're words, yeah. Well, I don't know what you believe, but when I say opening, I guess I often mean kind of relaxing around. So we might notice something. And it's not always fast. Like after about 30 years of sitting, I started to notice, I think because I reached a certain age, I started having a lot of pain in my left arm. And after a while of noticing the pain, I started to notice that one place it was coming from was that in formal zazen, sitting zazen, I was pushing with this arm, like just tensing it up completely and pushing down, as you can see.

[30:51]

I didn't notice it for 30 years. I'd probably been doing it for at least 30 years. I didn't notice it. But I started noticing it because it hurt. And then the opening, I would call... sort of relaxing around it. You know, like, oh, my goodness, I am really tensing up there. Can I relax it a little bit? Well, in this case, I can relax it by, like, moving it up further away from anything I can push against, right? So just move up my arms a little bit, and they're much more relaxed. Some things, like, if your stomach is clenched, and you notice it is clenched, and then you say, can I relax this? And maybe it will relax, but maybe it won't. Or, like, you know... your neck or various places that are not so much under your control, then opening might not be relaxing, it might just be like what I call making some space around it, just letting it be there, but with some noticing, opening, experiencing, happening.

[31:53]

I think this pushing, just a little, had to do with the mindset of, so embarrassing, you know, like kind of like pushing time, like here we are in Zazen. Isn't it time for it to be over yet? Isn't the period done with? What if I just like push a little bit? Won't life move along? Anyway, it's very interesting. So those of you who are sitting, you might start noticing now, before 30 years, so you don't have to have this tension reflex. Anything else? Yes. No. I'm not going there. My life resembles a Leslie James plant. It's very unique. No, I don't have a plant that I feel like resembles.

[32:58]

This analogy has its limits. Uh-oh, Greg. Yes, Greg. You want to sing a song? Is that what you want to do? No, we shouldn't because, you know, we have a thing here at Tassajara about not singing. So we're not going to sing it because... I mean, I love to sing, but then those songs get in your mind and then they'll go around there for days. Yes? Oh, thank you. You had a point. You know, I'm wary of the...

[33:58]

the word love exactly but like trying to apply love to things because I think we we like try to make it up and I'm very against making up love but I think that interest respect openness softening actually lead to love so yes love has a lot to do with it And there are practices, there are Buddhist practices and other practices which actually, they don't actually start with love. I haven't actually studied them, the metta practices. But my understanding of metta practice is that it actually starts with patience, which is very much like zazen. In fact, in my mind, zazen is patience.

[35:01]

or patience is zazen. So with patience or softening and paying attention and therefore knowledge, or not knowledge, but not in this lecture anyway, openness, love comes, I think. But again, I recommend that you try that out and see for yourself. Thank you very much.

[35:34]

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