Zendo Lecture

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the

one
homework homework homework karma karma traumatic effect
journalists for

no bodhidharma girl
student the
the worker right that the material but every language
oh
he was the one in order to prove himself arrived devoted armas
stood in the snow all night
until the morning
ha a dharma apparently didn't notice so a came back
with his arm
but he had cut off which i was thinking that's my probably affected the shape of his mother by about fifty percent
and
so when bodhidharma saw this he said okay getting twin
and
eight years later
hecker said to bodhidharma
i have ended all karmic effects
bodhidharma said
are you sure that usually happens when you die are you sure you're not dead
and becca said
the clarity of the awareness is beyond the power of words to describe
and apparently he said that in such a way
and maybe in such a tone that and bodhidharma looked at him and said the words that tongue
i suspect every teacher belongs to say to be able to say which are
you are my air
a very powerful
so he ended the and karmic effects so karmic effects
two questions what are they were certainly been looking at it and where do they reside
certainly you can see them on a personal level
i seem to come from our conditioning
hi for example if you do something if you could fit you perceive as mistake you might say oh you did it to yourself thereby causing
and effect amateurs diverse decay and hard to get out of very hard to get out of
well you can see it in a inter personally like kick dog dog bites
the immediate immediate effect
how you can see it the families where it's almost like each family has its own particular prejudices certainly it's own stories found a the family of where the family came from some of the am
early relatives and the way they were which which helps understand how we are we are we are this way we're not like them we're like ourselves i see it down i've seen as the most strongly in
dealing with individuals who as the telling their story or you're getting to know them did notice that they carry
more
more than ah
people need to one person needs to do not mean
ha i noticed that job for example fit that their grief that they feel on much of the time is more than one person should have and what i've wondered and certainly checked out with them is what is that what does that come from are you carrying on your family's grief because he had especially in
holocaust survivors were often one person will carry an immense grief grief of the whole family the greater the whole story
you can see a karmic effects on nationally for example most acutely in times of war
where
i'm thinking about this this morning how how does it come to be that we can go over next door to somebody plays and start destroying their property and and killing them to it seems that's what you have to do in order to retake to do that is too
first have is subtle
sounds maybe not so subtle that junk food they have something i don't have
and we wanted
and then it's a titans a bit
we needed they don't deserve to keep it all and then
they have you noticed they aren't like us they're different from us in fact if you notice how they must treat and of the rest of the world and even each other
we think they're evil
so we should come in
and as ever
a side bonus collect what it is that we wanted in the first place
i think they are the commuter with his son
making it a way they have them they are not they are not mean they are not asked
and
so what i have come to conclude the hum of it's true and i surely don't know a fun bodhidharma say so because he probably didn't have the word but i think in in western terms i think can eat them karmic effects reside in the ego what we call the ago since herself to the condition self
ah the one that knows it's right or the really right and the one that knows whether it's really wrong know very false flag do
so it seems to me that done whenever we are doing with the ego that's where we will meet our that the strongest karmic effects
one of the things usually happens this was point in the practice period in some we share a lot about the were honorable were feeling vulnerable i'm chilling vulnerable
you know the the root of that word is latin volvo narrow which means wound wound
and i think can often it feels like a wanted woman's i'm supposed to happen
am it's it's like an opening for the by either deliberation mistake it's not supposed to be there that whole that opening isn't usually there
but then i'm thinking more about that time i think probably this whole setup here that we live the way we live is designed for that purpose to enable us to open
i think while it's happening it feels like wanting
and as which isn't to say it doesn't hurt because i think any opening hurt
so i think what happens then when we're feeling vulnerable and open a crack appears when the we go a crack the he goes you usually miss mine
it is rather strong i'm relatively speaking there are certain areas where
just like that i won't happens know you know those areas those words or that look
that causes a woman that you receive from somebody else
when i wonder is it may be that the fuel that maintains of the ego of a sense of obama suffrage
self which needs to be protected above all costs i think they are what maintains that shell is our friends great hate and delusion
strangely enough
i say
with greed
i will be stronger
if i if i only have this with hate i will be stronger if i can only fend them off with delusion
if i only do this they won't see me

it's funny that dumb
this time during the practice period that our defenses get really low i maybe it's just because we're running out of gas i'm an hour and just plain energy
maybe we're too tired to be greedy people are delusive and now
but done
ha still shoot a condition nature of defense often weeks out
either either with a harsh word
which people at the moment you say it
with periods control know why i say that
ah aura or to i'm run and hide or to disappear
it's really interesting i'm sitting out facing have probably noticed that
when i when i first started all this
this life phone by figure them if i weren't there they wouldn't see me
but it's a it's not like that now my look out for this morning as say where is so as i know and know who i'm thinking about
i can say that right now
i have been so there's no place to hide
so i'm so sorry title echo comes and says i have ended all karmic effects well
that's nice but how do we how do we and karmic effects
the thing that we chant thumb
sockets come on
hints at it
canadiens it gives explicit directions
quietly explore the farthest reaches of these causes and conditions
reprinting i the repenting in this way when never fails to receive profound health by revealing and disclosing our lack of faith for the buddha we melt away the root of transgressions by the power of our repentance the root of transgressions the root of karmic effects so
yeah so by quietly exploring the causes and conditions will make sense i hope ah
works has come from well i'm just not us what about that
surface exploration because i mean we all know that penetrating with the cognizant of thing because and conditions is endless but sometimes it's it's so easy to get them the most obvious ones
and as an example of that i was thinking
about helping others so called helping others and the disastrous karmic effects that can cause
i know my training
as a pastoral counselor
we were warned about trying to help
about trying to help them
why i'm machine and if the earring one chair they are in other chair and if you're thinking that there's something broken in them that you are going to fix to help
that's treating them like an object don't close the time i think we don't like that so much being treated as an object as a thing especially appropriate thing at that

oh so ordinary so helping others for example like here you see somebody preferably new they've been here awhile
to make an infraction of the of the rules
immediately cause anxiety arises inside oneself and discomfort of for many reasons but there's a discomfort and the way to ease the discomfort is to fix them to help them
like by correcting them
and that feels waste hiram as i recall how that feels really good to do that too for somebody
however i've since come to find out by talking to the correct the are listening to the correct d that it was a very painful events
so if this is a secret i would love to make it known that whenever those in with the with the designated authority you know like you know tanto you know those guys
me of course
it
what
whenever somebody other than those designated ones who are because the burden of that correction is placed upon them the designated ones and and it's really a burden once you've done it enough i realize how painful it is and how precarious and how often personally dangerous
potentially dangerous it it it could be fun
so whenever
i think i forgot the end of the sentence when ever
oh well i think they should be an earl
which is anybody who hasn't been here for at least five years should not correct anybody else help anybody else
lot of the pain and the anguish and well paying anguish suffering distress comes from just that very thing sprinting up to wonder what if you knew that you probably know personally
but there's one thing one phrase i learned or up very early on from the in green greenhouse much respect as period she said something to me when i trying to be helpful she said we haven't we have expression has come doing your own practice
i thought i was rather something
but then she went on to save at some really hot can tend to your own self the others are doing the best the can there and less not like the best they can watch how pitiful it's the best they can how perfect perfect
for they are who they are when they are
so was the last one live because of comic effect by trying to help others but really by helping yourself
ah sometimes
i think if we're really lucky i like spending time facing a wall
the
sort of intimate marriage comic effects you know the ones that take years and years to surface because they're so scary i know the first place start to emerge it's almost as if
they say oh you are you willing to listen now how can we come up now for to be healed
because just because we're keeping quiet and pressing passion for help
so sometimes they come up to be healed for example on
what was the father and told this public before but then my first practice parent here blanche was there
apple juice yeah she was there
and i had the because during a machine first machine and i had this dream about this
like two year old volvo kid who was all bruised and banged up and smashed and part of a pervert left leg was missing and it was rather than face all paul broken and this was child who was walking towards me and i was repulsed
ha ha i was disgusted and tried to make a go away
can i say that was a dream that was a dream and then the next day
i'm sitting here again
what who knows over there now sitting down with this disfigure came up again and i realized oh my god it's me was me and the thankfully was able to say a hawk you know my heart went out what i think it's
was not as the m fundamental response to somebody obtain and my heart went out and down for the rest the day i cried and i don't cry easily all
ever and so i did all day and somehow hung by the next day i noticed that something in my life was missing
i'm all for forty years i'd always been a very angry person
like there was a furnace inside always always burning just read a just waiting to r to lash out
and why found that next day was the fire had gone out had gone out
so it seemed like come when you walk into a are familiar you familiar living room and and as your trip over that stool are always someone that you walk in and stools gone
best that was what was like
i'm which isn't to say that them some of the habits of that anger don't linger in fact
i seem to be finding out more and more
the that they have remained for example if i may profess
ah sarcasm
which to me has always been a delight for me
and i it's no secret that i knew the sarcasm is somebody's calling for language of the powerless
when was the powerless
and being reminded the other day that
i still use it fact i don't even know anymore
i don't think i correct and recognized for easily but didn't i realized my goodness gracious we're still doing that and i don't feel powerless anymore in fact pretty much the opposite
so so it if i may invite any view of who who run
hear hear me do that sarcasm please let me know please let me know i don't i i don't really notice it so easily
and if i do it too much then i can tell you about the time anymore okay
hello i'm so i'm from san partner and
no
no seriously please please do
ah
ha
zzzz mind is one thing we can do with karmic effects i'm sitting here early on i i read somewhere that by doing size and karma is is erased he imagined such a thing and maybe it's like bad experience i don't know but the in having zones and mind which as far as i can too
hell is having an open mind and had with a forgiving heart but anything that enters into that field is miss it resolved

he goes on to say dog home since it goes on to say in that tongue sutra that we melt away the root of our transgressions by the power of our repentance repentance
one is if i don't think that's such a good choice of words especially if you can for a christian background as i do over contests
that that reminds me of like ashes sat class flagellation and stuff but i know think i don't think that's what he has a mine don't get what he says that i think he just means admitting what actually is the case
and and perhaps dwelling another story
i don't know who sent this and i usually get the details wrong about that i do remember the point
and so there's a young monk who has had an awakening experienced who goes to this new teacher
so man
no one on don't know probably old man but done so and he says the old man says the the fisher says i haven't been see me so much why is that we haven't come to ask me any questions what was that and the young man says well i don't really need to i hadn't had such an amazing awakening exp
variance with
because it's down the street
haven't really needed to and the teachers had awful really what was what was the turning prayers for you
and the young man lee amongst us on the lamp boy seeking right
and the teachers said ah what is that what's that mean to and i am i don't like went on to say well you know a lamp oil has a has allies may have it has the buddha nature why doesn't go out looking somewhere else for it
and the will teacher says with ah just as i thought you really don't understand
yeah like says how what and huffs and puffs and leaves
and so is walking away from the monastery and if suddenly had sent oh wait a minute wait a minute this guy has a stellar reputation and supposed to be a really good pitcher he must be trying to tell me something
so he turns around locks bash goes back who says the teacher
and he
bows profoundly
and the teacher says
what
and the young like certain some
please tell me the essence please tell me the truth vs essence substantial and the teacher says a lamp voice shaking wage
and he has awakened
truly awakened
so you get a dontcha
what's different was different between the two white boy things
he comes back and he totally surrenders he apologizes completely
so perhaps the power of apology
here's the good things and like that escape us the power of true apology when one thing am i can never apologized ever before i came here were there was no need it was a close their fault
for once once i learned here which is very easy to learn that thumb know if you as yourself it became increasingly user for practice and a grueling practice to to say hope i'm really sorry
i'm in
yeah so that done so that's one way of dealing with karmic effects through apologize and surrender completely
of course comic effects occur in the lower level diego
nico doesn't like that he doesn't like that kind of from vulnerability that kind of opening to threatening
alicia practiced with it
yesterday
but that's not the whole story
he dug and goes on the same by revealing and disclosing our lack of faith
that's where the power comes in by revealing and disclosing a lack of faith will face what faith in what prison life
i drunk know homeless dakota
could also lucky roshi
his his air which yama amorosi who is now dead
the koto founder and are some of you may have heard of that
anti g
said too much anti j
we fun they have no fun no services nothing wrong awful voice
but eric dumb gucci amorosi may don't make this book
called the teaching as in teaching a homeless cotto cotto so accuracy was called homeless because he didn't have a pot and pretty much most of as most of his life by choice
sodium so uchiyama kingdom talks about to
no use
so i can grow she says what is the use of doing zazen
there is no use doing zazen
until this penetrate your thick skull and you are really doing zazen that have no use it is really have no use
i love this guy
luciano responds by saying throughout his life so after oh she said there is no use in doing zazen
but damn good yama who was no fool asked tom dakota
roshi if i study under you and practices and for as long as you are able to teach can i become a stronger person
that's the kind of question that hugo and tasks
can i improve myself can i become superman
well cotto immediately replied no you can't
no matter how hard you try i did not become the person i am because of zazen by nature i am this way
haven't changed a bit since my youth
he goes on sale so wacky roshi was unconventional and dynamic

so pajamas islam when i heard his response to my christian i thought i can be a stronger person through eyes and
he said otherwise but that was just talk
and then it goes on to say with this belief i served him and continued practicing as as and until he died thinking back to my past i now understand that there is no use for doings us and i am still a coward and never became even a little like so roshi
violet blossoms as a violet and a rose blossoms as arose for violence there's no need to produce rose blossoms
what bad news that is and how happy it made me when i read that
let's let you notice how the same thing keeps coming up in your lives
i think this is we have supposed to be like that you are the way you are because the way you are
cool in other words mean there's no really there's no need to fix me know i'm not broken well currently not
so i t roshi was unsafe everyone bears his own karma but it is important that we are all led by buddha casting aside body and mind means that we throw away our egos believe believing buddhist teaching and being led by buddha
the bistro which we throw away or egos sinclair i think there's the link that's the missing piece
ha
oh so maybe it maybe having faith is in knowing that there's something else maybe our true nature getting a glimpse of it as it doesn't sneaks out the crash grow the crack and our ego which would hate so much that hurts so much perhaps that's not only were some of our nasty behavior leaks out
where our true nature week so
excuse me our true nature being of compassion and wisdom and joy and love and wonder
so i think we've be really careful when we're feeling vulnerable in fact i heard that realm
sayings said as someone asked what can we do when we feel vulnerable and he said become more vulnerable what a stupid thing say
but perhaps that is the key perhaps by tending to ourselves very very carefully and not weekend now smacking somebody else who annoys us
maybe are that fine ah
approaching their whole are being with that opening we of tenderness maybe that's where we can start
cultivating com
awareness of our true nature
ah
yeah well i'm so beware the ides of march
does anybody know where that comes from
it's some
when julius caesar
the original caesar
crack about caesars palace just went your man but i'm not going to do that caesar
caesar was assassinated on and on the fifteenth of march the middle of march the ides of march and since then for two thousand years
the there has been the same beware the ides of march the ides of march is an in-law fishes time
and so
our government is planning and operation
on the ides of march apparently
what are they thinking
so what can what are we do here
what what do we do what do we do
you know i think whenever i visited them contemplative monasteries will have a lot trying to find the right one
ha i noticed that when i when i arrived there's if there's something about the place there's a there's a church in the next to in san francisco next to san francisco state on the hill central okay
he was that that's right and there's this big church the jesuits build on com st ignatius which is
a fantastic monument to power
i just walk in and say whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa
so i have of next door who cross the street is this little little bit of replace them for age they had some money given to them i suspect are they
caramelised the carmelite nuns and they're enclosed
we never see them except for one the the next turn she she sits in the back
doing beads and ten years or so
at her up south korea i think animal issues therefore admitted to protect question from must do our furniture i don't know but
was like sarcasm
it's not
it is a little business well i don't mean it that way
cleantech because she's done is being very sweet get very quiet person today image they don't see it'll see them and sometimes when you go in there having a service and they they set off the this gigantic also they sent off to the side behind a grill grill work and you can hear their voices singing that the office
which is quite a treat but but you want the thing is you walk into that space from outside and oh my goodness gracious what is this you can feel it is the these silence is palpable
palpable you can feel it we can taste it you can touch it there's something about it is a powerful a whole this is like the in between the in between place between the way we live outside and via the
no word the m know the whole works
the whole works is the has like the in-between place between those two
and that's what i found with them with lot of the contemplative monasteries ones that they don't go out they don't know trying to fix things are help things they they lived the life of found prayer and and quiet
this places like that
may not seem so to live from have to live here or may especially in the summer when the guests come down to say office is so peaceful and usually is my responses google hatch
this is beast been presented is for them it is and if song that which sometimes it's very life changing now for folks who come here and even during the summer rancho it would be in the winter
iv spooky but but they can feel it they can feel it
i think and i think we live by doing zazen ah i think we live and that in between replace happening between between the world outside
and between end
buddha if there isn't children
i think i think that's where we offer it and
i think come my impression is that dumb
places like this are the heart of the world
heart the world and that our practice is what keeps the heart beating i think we are actually the heart of the world the heart because what what can we keep alive
we try to face and see through the illusion of greed hate and delusion which pretty much runs the rest of the show over the hill
by generating
we do this by generating compassion compassion meaning from to being open to what is and wisdom which is the ability to see what is so those two things i think we keep alive
at war as i said earlier the work with the way war works is to destroy compassion and wisdom
i see only way i can work with compassion you can't kill another ring and with wisdom
you see too much receive a truth too much so for war you have to close off yourself from everything else from others and pretend that's true
find yourself
so i think that what we do is actually healing the world
i'm keeping it alive
so
so i guess what i want to say why some don't don't give up on i think if i don't know i may have talked to the powers that be when they return whether it might not be helpful but if the first thing that has come off for the support business that time
pedro shaw get together for the dining room and and talk about we did that at them but i'm during the nine eleven
event sometimes helpful
so
so i wouldn't say is i don't give up and for god's sakes don't slough off slack off or goof off
each of us each of us here is important than keeping hard alive for the life of the world
so especially when it
i was thinking of will while go how how on it is the expression is when the cat's away the mice will play not so here when the cat's away the nice disappear
for some of them and when they can't return of my pouch
no offense to
mice
as well sign outside over the hill far government is about to
set everybody else's hands on fire
and so i think it behooves us to really
come together knuckled down as the expression local down
and practice diligently
for real
hamas for real because it is life and death for real always was but sometimes does not that way
so far as i can tell our job is to sit on moved and resolute
where the karmic effects that arise confusion anger hate sorrow fear the whole works
the simple those effects meeting each one with an open mind and a forgiving heart
not for our own benefit you may not have noticed but on the fine print very fine print of your application is this remember you're not doing this for yourself alone
thank you
me