Good morning. Well, you should be up here sometime. Maybe most of you will at some time. I think Zen training has three aspects to it. One is the Zazen and relationship with the teacher. Two are the forms and teachings. And three is the cultural connections, psychology, communication, ways in which the culture communicates. And these three things could also be looked at as Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. And even though I would say that number one is most important, if you don't have one of them, you need all three.

[01:23]

In the past couple of months, three books of mine have been published. And I thought I'd push them a little bit. But also, they touch upon these three aspects. And then, of course, beside the three aspects, there's something called Zen Center. The Zen Center in some ways carries the practice. In other ways, it's carried by the practice. And as with the three aspects of Zen practice, the institution needs to take care of three things. teachers and the meditation, the teachings and the forms, and find an appropriate cultural way to connect.

[02:42]

We get into trouble when we start arguing for one versus the other. The first book It's called Dharma Days. It's a calendar book. And each month I have a little teaching. And the book is full of pictures from the Asian Art Museum, statues, and about a dozen that I did. I sort of would like to read about the sort of the introductory one. Thank you. Kindness and compassion are at the heart of Buddhism.

[03:51]

Throughout its history, the Bodhisattva of Compassion, Avalokiteshvara, Sanskrit Kuan Yin, Guanyan in Chinese, and Kanan in Japanese, all of these literally mean the hero of the cries of the world. There it goes. And then, I'll skip, and then in teaching, His final class at the Department of Eastern Asian Language and Cultures at the University of California, Professor Lancaster made the following comments on the many forms of Buddhism, what they have in common. How does a Buddhist act?

[04:52]

Do I live like a Dharma bomb, believing in some form of renunciation and not oozing? up for things of the world? Would I have to give up shopping, meat, sexuality? The frustrating thing about the Buddhist tradition is that at every level, whenever we define it, we have already lost it. I ask myself how people can know that they are Buddhists. The one thing that all forms of Buddhism hold on hold as their highest ideal is compassion. This seems as close to a universal answer as I can find. Buddhists, when they talk about compassion, say that if you are enlightened, you will have a deeper response to suffering. If insight does not lead to compassion, then it is not what the Buddha experienced. Sometimes when we get involved in practice, we want to do the right thing and not the wrong thing.

[06:09]

But compassion is throughout the right thing and the wrong thing. Chinese Zen Master Shen Yang, who died recently, in one of his autobiographies, I think he's got a couple, Footprints in the Snow, told him about when he was with his teacher, and his teacher gave him a task to replace the tile in the room. Three tiles were missing. So Shen Yang right away went to a tile maker, got three similar tiles, And the teacher said, no, they're not the same tiles. So he went and he got a similar, the same kind of tile, but it was from a different batch. And the teacher said, no. Finally, he came back to the teacher and said, I can't find one.

[07:20]

And the teacher said, you can't find one? And then two months later, he said, by the way, I found those three tiles. So, if you were Shen Yang, you might have been very frustrated at the teacher. I'd be surprised if you weren't. But Shen Yang was being taught to be a good Zen priest, is good. But that's not all practice. Having the right answer is better than having the wrong answer. Maybe. But you may learn more from the wrong answer. Shen Yang, he doesn't say so, but

[08:25]

I got the impression that he learned about how much he wanted to impress the teacher with how good he was. When I used to do that with Kategori Roshi, he would be very mean. He was a very kind person, but if I tried to impress him, he'd be very mean. And I got the point. So at Zen Center, we wanna make the perfect Zen Center, and of course that's right. And we wanna go deeper in our practice. Maybe Zen Center's fundamental purpose is to create teachers. Or maybe to create a field of teaching. And that means not ignoring sasen, not ignoring the teachings, and not ignoring the methods, the institutional wisdom.

[09:43]

And to make the mistake, or you can't do something, realize it's a good antidote to your arrogance. Something that came out a couple of months ago was commit to sick. collection of essays that appeared in Tricycle about sitting. My essay, which they put in the back, maybe so that no one would see it, was about the five perfections. This is a different perfections that we usually talk about. It's the perfect time, which is

[10:50]

Did you read the book? The perfect place. The perfect teacher. The perfect teacher. The perfect teacher. And the perfect student. And actually, the most important one is the perfect student. No one can teach you but yourself. give ourselves excuses. If only I was married. If only I had a good job. If only I was in Tibet. Then I would really practice. Well, I don't have to talk about that one. That one's pretty clear. And...

[11:55]

Sojourn Mel Weitzman had his very 80th birthday. And some of us got together and collected essays from people who he's given Dharma transmission. And he's got a lot of people, so it's about 18 of us. And at first I thought, this is a good book for Mel. We'll see how it's appreciated. It'll look and feel good. And then when I started to read the essays, I realized, look it up like the disciples feel good. The danger of having a relationship with a teacher is you try to get your strokes from being a disciple of this teacher.

[13:09]

So my teacher is the best teacher, which means I'm the best student. But that wasn't true. There was a little hint of that in the stories, but mostly people were very straightforward in telling about what the relationship was. It was not about Mel or about the disciples, but about the relationship between them. And how it was a transformative relationship. I first saw a writer at the Sendero and Dwight Wally in the late 60s. He had a wild look in his eyes. Lots of air coming out of his ears.

[14:12]

I don't know if that was related or not. I didn't have much contact with him, but he reminded me of Bodhidharma. He seemed to epitomize Berkeley, while most of the other Zen priests in the day seemed more buttoned down. I still don't remember very well when he was asked to be at the Cousin Center in 1988. The primary practice place was to be the city, and they wanted to know who he was. Paul and Pat and I, at the time, were overseeing the practice together. I watched Mel closely, and he welcomed this scrutiny. He seemed to accept whatever came his way. I found that I could be straightforward with him and we could disagree and not weaken the relationship.

[15:23]

There's more, but the thing I was struck with when we had several get-togethers with Nell was I say most of the time, when you get together with a teacher, all the light goes around the teacher. The whole light leads the room to the teacher. But with now, in us, life through the room, it was shared. the other disciples were very moving and talking very straightforwardly about what they learned so actually this book I think is an important book whether you know Mel or students or not I think I'm going to go to Cezanne

[16:51]

I can get there from here. I think I'm going to have to do it. for a while.

[18:17]

So each one of us And their life is in the perfect place. You may not like it. And that's okay. You don't have to like it. But don't like excuses. If you have to move in the middle of Zaza, don't say Michael told you to. find your place, your seat, in which you learn from your mistakes and are open to whatever arises.

[19:55]

And you keep experimenting. So many of you are a little bit intensive. And you may be wondering why the heck you're doing it. somewhere. And if you're still invulnerable, that means retention is a success. That means you can learn. If you're invulnerable, nothing affects you. There's an aspect of Zen training which you don't know.

[21:33]

And you're comfortable with that. One desires pleasures and fears a hard life. These are sentiments one entertains before leading the so-called pleasurable or hard life.

[22:34]

After one is in it, One tries to think of the envy and the fear and finds that they are gone. Then where are the pleasurable and unpleasurable thoughts after they are passed? These seem to be like a sound, a shadow, a breeze or a dream. Even these things are somehow more tangible. Besides, how is one ever going to find happiness in by countering one illusion with another illusion. I wish I could express this deep truth to you, but I cannot. Sutan Po in 1088 So I'll be in the back of the dining room to take questions and to sign any of these books if you'd like to buy them.

[24:09]

But my wish for you today is that you find your place where you are. To be able to criticize yourself and others and And accept yourself and others. Someone asked me what was change recently. And I said change had to do with acceptance. If you don't accept where you are, you can never change. Well, maybe not never, but... So my wish for you is that you find your place where you are. If you're in the middle of the intensive and are wondering how to get out of here, take a breath. If you're not in the intensive and wish you were, sign up next time.

[25:22]

I've been practicing at Zen Center for 37 years. Now, you won't think that's impressive or you won't think that's pathetic. But there are many people who have practiced a long time here who have a lot to give. And we're all trying to get deeper and wider. to honor the three aspects of Zen training. Zazen and relationship to a teacher. Zazen is a way to free yourself of your habits and your usual tape loop of thinking that goes round and round and round.

[26:33]

A teacher is a lifeline out of that loop. The forms and teachings or ask their ways to correct our habits. And we're going to our fellow practitioners and to the wider world. not to dismiss it as not being sazan. Several years ago, there was a magazine, U.S. News and World Report, and they wanted to do an article.

[27:35]

I talked to the guy and I said, okay, come down. And one of the senior people here said, does he sazan? And I said, no, then we shouldn't talk to him. But I talked with him, and he put me on the cover of the magazine, which is not necessarily a reason to do it. But we need to use the culture and learn from it. Not to feel that we do zazen and therefore we're superior. We do zazen and therefore we listen harder. Maybe. So my recommendations for this week are do zazen.

[28:54]

If you want to know when to do zazen, whenever you ask the question, do zazen. If you want another cue, do zazen before you go to bed and right after you wake up. Find a teacher. It's not that the teacher is so right or that you have to get the perfect teacher and therefore you get your own strokes. But find someone who you can breathe with. Learn about yourself in the conventional Western sense. Don't dismiss psychology because it's sometimes limited and thin.

[30:08]

But take what you can from it. Communication techniques, diversity training, whatever. Okay, maybe that's enough. Thank you very much.

[30:43]

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