I'd like to talk about chanting a little bit. We seem to have more difficulty chanting in this zendo, in this room, than in the zendo at Tassajara or the Buddha Hall or a zendo in San Francisco. Although everyone thinks, and it seems to be true, the acoustics are much better here. At least that's what musicians who have played here have said and that's my own experience. Speaking, it's much easier to be heard here than in the other places. But maybe the acoustics are too good and it's intimidating. You're afraid to make a mistake because everyone can hear. So if the slightest person gets off, everyone hesitates, because you can hear it off immediately. And anyone who's off or a little louder affects everyone quicker. I don't know much about acoustics at all, but my impression is a good concert hall. Actually, the music

[01:27]

You don't get, like sitting in front of a hi-fi speaker, one violin note or something. You actually get a number of bounces around the room. So our ears, my impression is, our ears are made to put together a sound from various locations. So it seems to even affect the Kokyos. they, leading the chanting, seem to start out strong and dwindle halfway through the line. If we all chant completely together, it seems to work very well. I don't know what the answer is. Maybe we will have to start building a Buddha Hall next door for chanting. Or maybe if we had tatamis all over the floor, like in a Buddha hall too, it would soften the sound and you could put more energy into your chanting without it interrupting everything. It's even difficult for me to hear many of the older students chanting, who usually I can pick out. They seem to keep their voice even lower than usual.

[02:52]

So anyway, chanting falters here more often than any place else, and in fact it seldom happens anywhere else. And especially during Sashin, usually our chanting is more together. Thanks to that, because that continuous strong feeling from our stomach in chanting is a wonderful part of Sashin and chanting practice. And here it seems we can't do it, or we don't do it. One aspect of the Blue Cliff Records story, number 11, that I've been discussing, is the idea of time as discontinuous, or starting always from zero. Suzuki Roshi used to recommend always that we did

[04:22]

Not with the idea, I have seven days session to do, but I just have one period zazen to do. We can understand time, of course, as continuous, and sometimes we understand things in that way. But more basic to our practice is the understanding and the use of time as discontinuous. And time is much more your possession. you view it as discontinuous. To view time as continuous, Suzuki Yoshi's example he used a number of times was as a horse pisses. He used to get rather embarrassed trying to explain it in English because he wasn't sure if he used pee or piss or how to explain it. They have some expression in Japan, which means the way a horse stands there, you know, without moving. And, as Sugrisha said, used to say, the stream comes out quite a long time, very continuously, without stopping. Anyway, that's time as continuous, or practice as continuous. So that is a horse. Or also, like an alcoholic.

[05:52]

is another example Tsukiyoshi used. Time is continuous, it's like an alcoholic who always drinks before a meal, or is always a little drunk. Engo's comment about when you use buckets, the buckets are too small, but when you use a cup, when you drink it, one cup is enough, is the same kind of understanding. This is the positive view of sunyata, one whole year, one whole day, one whole moment, we always have just one thing at a time, or starting from zero. There's an expression that Nagarjuna uses,

[06:57]

not to practice as if eyes are enough. We all have eyes, but without the sun there wouldn't be anything. But the understanding, Amida Buddhism understands that as, emphasizes, Buddha, Amida Buddha is like the sun and everywhere at once. But Zen, the emphasis is more on the sun is always arising we arise and sun arises. So with this kind of understanding we do a sashimi. Just you do kinhin and after kinhin you do one more period. That's all. And of course

[07:59]

The aspect of Zen practice which I've been emphasizing is the thoroughness with which you hold such an idea. This thoroughness is essential to Zen practice. Only by this thoroughness can you change your personality, which in one lifetime is impossible, virtually impossible or impossible to change. But by Zazen you can change it. change your personality. For Suzuki Roshi, there is not much context between Suzuki Roshi as a young man and Suzuki Roshi as the person we knew, we know. You can't in a simple way trace psychological history. as Zen teachers, who were quite different people. Hard to understand what they were like as children. No way to understand how they became what they did become. So this is the understanding of time as discontinuous.

[09:27]

Wang Po saying, there is no teacher of Zen. You are the successor. This understanding pervades Buddhism of time as discontinuous. And your breathing cannot be really still until you see time as discontinuous. When you think this breath is leading to the next breath, your breathing is not calm. But when you are fully concentrated on this breath, without any other disturbance, it means you view time as discontinuous. The deep thought with which we, as many sutras say, the deep thought, the fixed mind with which we begin practice, which is the same as ordination, is the same as this stillness. Our breathing practice and stillness in Satsang allows us to develop this fixed mind, and this fixed mind allows us to

[10:55]

still, calm way of life. So there may be many disturbances, but like silt in a glass, it will settle and the water will be clear. And when you find stillness in your zazen, it's not like you are forcing stillness. or you were holding yourself still. Suddenly stillness will take you over like a more fundamental state and it will take over your breathing and your mind as again like silt settling in the glass. Suddenly you see the water was completely still. All the movement you saw was the silt. but we are constantly stirring up that silt. Again, as Nagarjuna says, we return to the determinate mode of existence. Or he says, the Bodhisattvas or Buddhas will come and exhort you, don't think that you have attained something. Return again to

[12:20]

the determined mode of existence. Enter again the five passions. Confuse yourself again. Don't give in to the temptation to efface your individuality. By your individuality, when you are irreversible, technically we say when you're irreversible, but by your individuality, you will awaken zazen in others. By entering it from their point of view, you awaken wisdom in people. By entering the determinant mode of existence. And it means that enlightenment is not complete until you enter every mode of existence. giving up your control, giving up your zazen practice. If you practice, as Zakyoshi said, like an alcoholic, that's not practice, just practice, just doing it well. You should again enter modes of existence which you don't know how to cope with. And we need this broad cultural base, broader than Buddhism or

[13:46]

Buddhist culture or Japanese culture or American culture to enter with each person So we're always starting from zero Giving up even our practice It's translated to giving up all hankering for the Dharma So genuinely, by your compassion, this is the only way compassion is genuine, by your compassion, re-knowing, re-doing your own enlightenment, re-doing your own practice. This is Mahayana way, this is not doing the so-called Theravada way of walking on the water across the street. one other story about going back to the beginning. When, that is part of this story, Blue Cliff Records story number 11, is when that official Pei I told you about, Pei Shi, I believe his name is, first met Wang Po. He later became Prime Minister of China.

[15:21]

after the emperor, the highest person in China, and was quite famous. And famous partly for not being, not following the letter of the law in a Confucian sense, making etiquette and rules exact. He was rather lax in the way he collected the taxes and such things, and so was very popular. Anyway, he was a great follower of Wong Po and helped him and built, I think, three monasteries for him, trying to get Wong Po to follow him when he was in a different district. He met Wong Po, I believe, when Wong Po was pretty old. Anyway, he went to a temple in a large city, a major temple, called Dragon Ascent. and he was being shown around the temple by a Zen monk, and he saw a portrait, they did portraits of Zen teachers, like the statue of Suzuki Yoshi, usually when they have died. So anyway, they

[16:46]

came to a picture of a Zen master, all beautiful painted picture scroll. And Pei Shi said, who is this respected teacher? And the monk said, that is a picture of a respected Zen teacher. said, I know that, who is it? And the monk didn't say anything. And he said, isn't there some good Zen teacher here? Isn't there some Zen teacher here? And the monk said, only one. And he went and got a man who was in the courtyard sweeping. And he said, this is our sweeper. And Pei Xie said, he looks like a Zen monk. He has the attire of a Zen monk. Who is this? And he pointed to the picture. Who is this respected teacher?

[18:16]

the sweeper monk said Pei Shi in some voice that affected him and he looked up and the sweeper monk said where is he and he realized official Pei realized that the sweeper monk was this man in the picture and it was Huang Po who had come to another monastery, even as a pretty old man, I think he was 60s or older, and was living there in seclusion, just as a janitor. And he was head of another monastery somewhere else. But to escape from, I understand it very well, to escape from his monastery, this janitor had another

[19:16]

So, he was quite impressed and from that time on he became the disciple of Wong Po. There is, I'll tell you another story about him, just a little different. There's a famous tennis player, this is just an aside, there's a famous tennis player named Torben Ulrich who's been here once or twice and he's quite interested in Zen and he's a close friend of Sheila Campion who comes here sometimes, was here last summer. Anyway, they had never heard of Zen Center or anything at this time and they were in New York City and they wanted to hear this lecture of a Zen teacher named Suzukiyoshi that was on a poster announcing it, that Peter Schneider had put up. This was in 1966 or so. So they got the date mixed up and went one week early to a large church, I believe it was. Suzukiyoshi and I were giving the talk

[20:43]

It was a large Unitarian church or something. And they could not find any door open. And it was all closed up. And Torben assured Sheila that this was the way of Zen. So, they finally found a side door down the alley that was open and they went in. was all dark and they wandered about and found the janitor and insisted that he was the Zen Master and asked him, you know, many questions. Another story about One more story from Lu Pu's records about Wong Po. There was a prince who was forced out of his place by his father's, his brother's, his uncle's son.

[22:12]

Anyway, that's not quite right, but I have no need to straighten it out. Anyway, so he was exiled, and he went to live in a monastery in disguise. But everyone suspected him of some unusual birth. And he later became emperor, but he one time met Huang Po, who was bowing. This is a pretty well-known story. He was bowing before Buddha. And he said to Huang Po, there is just emptiness, etc. Why are you bowing before this Buddha? And Huang Po got up and slapped him. And he said, how rude! How, who are you to speak of rudeness and refinement? Anyway, this sense of time as discontinuous is very helpful in zazen practice.

[23:54]

and in your breathing, so that you take each breath without your mind and breathing rushing ahead. And this attitude, this acceptance of time as discontinuous, which will help your breathing and will come from your breathing, will allow your breathing to settle. And Zazen breathing should be, maybe shouldn't say should, but Zazen breathing is most effective when it's quite slow. I don't mean it often has to be slow, but sometimes you should be able to sit with your breathing very slow. Maybe two breaths a minute, or three, or four, or one, not very many. And that means that you have to be quite strong through here. Your muscles here have to be developed. And it takes time. But until you have some strength through your stomach all the way around, you cannot... And your posture is good. You can't breathe.

[25:21]

very deeply so it penetrates and calm. First your breathing has to become very steady, not jump. So very steady and then as you don't think so much and your physical activity is very little, your breathing can slow way down. And it's helpful to hold your exhale slightly. So as you exhale, I again don't say, I'm not saying to do this all the time but sometimes when your breathing has become steady you can hold your exhale for part of a period or one period mostly just let your breathing do what it does but sometimes you can guide your breathing or encourage it in this way so as you're exhaling I don't want you all, by the way, to be sitting there, blue in the face, gasping with a stopwatch. One minute. Just as it comes, naturally. But, as you exhale, when you're all the way out, and you're breathing from down here smoothly, you just hold.

[26:49]

let it come in naturally this will tend to slow your breathing down and make your body and breathing steadier Okay.

[27:58]

Is there something you'd like to talk about? Yes. It's about being... I kind of had a taste of the kind of thing you were talking about, that you see, she wanted to be able to relax a little bit, but all this time, you know, you know, so she gets her people, and I'm not relaxing, I'm just trying to survive. I'm just trying to, somehow, Then I kind of give up the hope of having that kind of breathing. Well, the question is, can you still have that kind of breathing, even when you still don't want to see anything? Can you hear what she said? Did you hear back there? You did. OK. Well, as long as you have to cope, you just have to cope. But if you thoroughly know time is discontinuous, and the bell is never going to ring, you can sit through your pain. And when you do that, often, anyway, that kind of breathing will take over immediately.

[29:47]

In fact, it's the best time sometimes to experience stillness. It's in the midst of that kind of pain. Finally, you can't stand it, so you either have to run out of the zendo, or give up. It's horrible. Yes? Yeah, you could say 1, 1, 1. That's one reason we stop at 10. We don't go to 100 or 1,000. Any breath can be 1. Yeah, that kind of exercising your breathing I would suggest you do at the beginning of the period, and a few times. You can take a very deep breath, but not so much a deep breath up here, but a deep breath in which you keep lowering it. And you can lower it in stages if you want. It's pretty difficult to lower it in one continuous movement when you're doing this exercise. But you inhale and hold it, and then inhale again and hold it, inhale again and hold it, each time a little lower.

[31:17]

You can go much further that way than in one inhale. So you do that several times, each time, pushing down here. Then after you feel thoroughly opened up here, maybe two or three times, then again, just let your breathing go. You can do it in stages. It will also help to straighten your posture. It will immediately bring your back and shoulders into alignment. Yes? When breathing deeply, very low, is there also foam intake of air from the chest? Yeah.

[32:18]

But you don't have the experience of your... Physiologically, I don't know exactly, but I think what it feels like and I think what's happening is the movement is all here, what movement there is. and your chest is open already, so it's not matter enlarging your chest. Your chest stays enlarged. I seem to breathe very much, my whole stomach fills up, but all of a sudden I have a gap. Yeah, but you haven't been doing it for very long. Anyway, your chest stays rather still and doesn't move, and just there's some movement.

[33:21]

That's okay. Sometimes you can add in between the numbers, slowly, or Buddha, or... Sometimes I can feel it, and it's going down. I'm going to do the exercise. It's going down, and then it just goes up, and [...] up. Yeah, that's right. And it's helpful, you may have noticed, to inhale as you stand up. If you inhale as you stand up, your inhale will lift you up. It's quite difficult to maintain your balance if you have no volume of air. If you've exhaled and are trying to stand up, your balance is precarious.

[35:15]

No. Why do you care? Yeah, that's what the story is about, distinguishing between snakes and dragons. That part of the commentary I haven't told you yet. That's not important. Everyone got it. Paso shouted. Why have you done it? Yes, sir. Thank you.

[36:59]

This is an example of a discussion between two completely enlightened people. There's another version of this story. See if I can remember. Wang Po says, after the silence, we are not supposed to let the transmission, the Dharma transmission, dribble out of our hands or something. We should not let our sons and grandsons lose the transmission.

[39:04]

Yakujo says, you are the one who will lose it. And so, Yakujo gets up and goes to his room. Wong Po follows him and says, but I want to. I want to perceive the teaching, I want to realize the teaching, something like that. And Huang Po, Yakujo says, then you better not disappoint me in the future. This is the same story, even though the sound of it is different. time as discontinuous. Can you do it? In time, in discontinuous time, you can find your freedom from ignorance and desire.

[40:38]

and you can join others in their ignorance and desires and free them too, from it. If you really know the time has discontinued. What does it mean to surpass your teacher? Just when I say, you have to be better than me, twice as good. Otherwise, as Yakujo says, the effect of the teacher is diminished by half. If the disciple is only as good as the teacher, equal to the teacher, soon that lineage will disappear. So we have to renew the way completely.

[41:46]

The Bodhisattva is one who establishes the way and treads the way. And this means you're always re-enlightening yourself, or supplementing, renewing your practice. Again, giving up and starting again. So you can't depend on your teacher, you have to start completely and create Buddhism yourself. I'll be greatly relieved if you're all much better than me. I'll be able to sleep easily and die easily. Yeah. I want to ask you a question.

[43:16]

Is that considered what? You mean, are you going to, if you practice long enough, have to resist the impulse to walk across the pond getting to the chickens? Is that what you mean? Yeah. I actually want to ask if you can do that. Not if I'm an instrument of the Mahayana, I can't admit it. It means that if you practice, you get some ability to do things pretty easily. But it doesn't help people to do it.

[44:47]

And it means too that your students will expect you to be perfect, and the ones that expect you to be perfect the most, who are rejecting themselves, you have to make mistakes in front of them. They'll make you make mistakes. It means samsara and nirvana are the same, in actually how you function, not just some that it doesn't make it from the point of sunyata, real understanding of sunyata, foolishness and excellence are the same, if you're not caught by it. What example? I think, you know, that's like from reading. My experience with teachers is not like that. But that kind of belief

[46:21]

can be helpful, there are many practices, not just Buddhist, which have that kind of view. But Zen does not. Zen is always referring back to you can do it. That's the point of this story. You don't depend on a teacher, and a teacher who makes you dependent on them, you need some power from a teacher or something, is completely alien to Zen. Just time has discontinued. just one thing at a time, that's all. No ideas, no Buddhism even, just a kind of experiment. Again, skillfulness of the bodhisattva, Nagarjuna says, with the ability to invent or innovate ways or modes of existence for us. Yes? I can't hear you.

[47:26]

It's the essence of Catholic thought that teaches us how to be good. To know completely, to be filled with it. To teach the shortcomings, to have them on your conscience, and to continue. I would like to know a response. A response? A response. If that's what happens in the future, I'm not a Catholic. She said, not a Catholic. She's not a Christian Catholic. She's not a Christian Catholic. She's not a Christian Catholic. Oh, and she also says she's not an ordinary Christian. She's not an ordinary Christian. But she said, you know what? I think I'm a Christian of life. You know what I'm talking about? She's not a Christian of life. [...] She

[49:32]

I want someone to throw a life raft to me. You're trying to work it out too much. Your feeling is enough, or your not mentioning it to yourself is enough. If you understand your teacher completely, that's good, but you still have to start again from scratch. Just to have your teacher's mind is not enough. practice, I can't deny it, is something mysterious. But it's mysterious in the absence of the silt in the glass. It's mysterious in the absence of your confusions. And some power will be there, quite naturally.

[51:30]

just what everything is anyway. So it can be confusing whether we're talking about attainment or not attainment. This practice is not something that can be attained. Just the most ordinary way and most ordinary state of mind is how we practice. And today I'm emphasizing a discontinuous time.

[52:18]

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