Zendo Lecture

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SF-03077
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our intention
furious of work
and
scuse me while i reach

here's my talk
work which arm
which are most people have to do i'll have to do in order to survive
wasn't always such a wasn't always favored in buddhism in fact apparently the buddha insisted that the monks of the sangha do no work as a way of preventing any accidental killing for example like if you're working at a garden you wouldn't want to accidentally kill
a being
and he with much as i've heard about what you thought about work but they they didn't work in fact they they they lived on the kindness of those around them they would grow up begging every day for their food really where we go out in the morning and what they got in there rather big ball
ha
it's more like a pot
because what they lived on that day if they got a lot they ate a lot to got nothing they probably ate nothing
although they might have shared will i got back by much sure about that either but the important thing is that the of you they were discouraged from working and and probably learned kindness by by being so dependent on others on others well and that was an india and apparently
about thousand years later a thousand years later when when buddhism went to china is ah
a culture to wear that kind of begging just wasn't acceptable it would be like buddhism coming to this country and i'm begging is not acceptable in our in our culture
because in china
currently very practical people and that you issue didn't work you didn't eat you weren't paying your way and so in chan zen our school it was it became quite of thing to wrong
to do to spend a lot of time working manual physical labor
and instead of courses from where we are today
and
there is that practical approach of everyone wants to pay their way i think every every one of us does when it's very difficult i think actually to beg are in fact
oh how bunch of us were in japan for a little while current thing the zucker oh temple and we went out on begged
dressed up in are no buddhist close with our big eyes big round eyes going downtown downtown and geyser japan which thankfully the suzuki roshi his son who was temple it is you ut took us so he'd be sort of paved the
way before us
i'm telling them by think probably not be afraid
so we've marched us through the town were ringing our little bells and chanting chanting something injured in japanese
and the the people who had come out of the stores and put them up put money and out into our little bags that were carrying for sort of like come trick or treat and that way
that was mortified pretty much for the whole thing
sort of traipsing through somebody else's town asking for their money
so i can see that them
that
this this quite a teaching in that to be able to accept the charity and kindness of others in that so visible and public away public display
ah yes well back in this country road we don't do that so much
and
so that the what buddhism what happened i think in china was something very very very radical happened to the the whole idea of work it wasn't just it just wasn't doing your part doing your share it actually became a practice
where a transformative practice spiritual practice like counting your breaths or chanting a mantra or
sitting it was a ritual it became a ritual transformative
the bat
and i think come
and i hope it is for us here to otherwise we're sort of wasting a lot of our time during the day
in the winter we don't work so much we mostly spend our time here and the zendo until after lunch and then we'll worker
was a two three or four hours
two three hours in in the afternoon and then we're back to this end on evening
but in the summer time it's much more as much more traditionally monastic and in the japanese sense where as a little time in the morning and the zendo and a little time in the evening in the zendo and the rest of time is is working which usually means sweeping for a japanese far as like
could tell sweeping all day
sweeping places are they need to be swept so obviously it wasn't goal oriented whatever the work in fact when we're in japan we did that too we were given a are brooms are
bamboo rooms which are really need and we just swept what we have swept the day before and often there wasn't anything there but he just did it she is did it and it was a
it was nice
so
yeah
so
the buddha
from what i hear after after he awoke after his enlightenment after he saw the true nature of reality continued to meditate does that make sense to you that it might not somebody who's finally made it was finally gotten to the top
become the ceo of meditative practice why would they need to continue meditating well he did and
and still practice
dogan who is the the founder of this particular school in japan he got it from china they brought it to japan this school
ah mister minute my mind is wandering hold on
ah well never mind about that i don't want i wouldn't say
oh well whatever whatever the buddha the buddha kept practicing because that's what to put it does when i boot it is enlightened buddha does enlightened it lives enlightened after that as well and the way you live enlightened after that as well is to continue to practice is to continue to sit
is to continue to follow or be the precepts
continue to lead a wholesome life so there really isn't a big surprise in that
oh dogan and i remember what i was going to say key here the big the big matter for him to solve was why if you are if you are a buddha why do you have to practice why do you have to try to find that a buddha so it's the same thing
that we practice because we are that is our true nature we are buddha and the way that shows in the world is by practicing
net great silajdzic will
now
right here's my point
i think it all boils down to two thousand
the whole business that seems to have been the thing that that finally opened the boot eyes to the nature of reality
and
and it is the core of our practice is just and there's not much to it as most of you know who portrayed it in fact is there's even less to it than you'd think just sitting in an upright fashion facing the wall and watching your mind and watching your body
what could be easier than that
so from what i can tell where were the radical change comes in in work as practice when work is actually practice is that we take this as in mind to it and and it doesn't matter what work at the in fact it doesn't really matter what you takes us in practice to it can be
work it can be going to the toilet it can be driving in the car it can be getting ready for bed any
any activity
and the enzyme didn't mind
is
having your eyes open and being upright
having your eyes open in the sense of being a beginner a beginner
i know what it's like over the hill out there and to be a beginner is frowned on
that there's something to be ashamed of if you knew better you would you'd be an expert
ah release that's that's what i got
in my training but when i got to get the sense that it took for maybe three or four years before i realized that it was okay to be a beginner actually were encouraged to be beginners since we were and to make it even more poignant we're always well we start what's always put in a job that
and didn't have a clue on how to do
mass
and have no skill for so they either went crazy or got sick or left or
adopted beginner's mind
ah yes and that's our secret that it's okay to be a beginner
and then so that means not to be not to be an expert when it's really it's really interesting when folks come who have been trained to be experts and or tour at least early to seem that way because it gets kind of painful because i'm as something
this that does this mean know the story of the zen master where the where the professor comes and i must ask questions of the zen master and the zen masters as would you like some tea
and the the and the professor holds out his car from the and the teacher pours tea and keeps pouring and it overflows and guess on the floor and and professors that what it what are you doing and the master said well this cup like your mind is to fall
mr for
there's nothing i can give you another one so so i guess maybe the the more open and unassuming and willing we are i guess that the better off
the better off things are here at least here
so this eyes open and upright means to notice when you're wobble to notice when when delusion comes in
spank think you an example
see there
the kitchen is is the best place for me to think of examples of delusion or trouble
like how to gotta cook the soup for example can you know i mean who hasn't cooked soup
probably all of us if cook soup so we know how to cook soup right we're not a cook soup and so then so we we come to a of our kitchen and someone says what you would you help cook the soup and we say will sure
and i'll do it my way let's assumed isn't it
and so the tens our the the forgotten comes binds as own
lol please
oh gosh
so then placed onto that when we do that we do that little little just a little differently
and it course the person oftentimes and if any kind of bomb any kind of instruction is is experienced as criticism
and and defensiveness arises immediately so you learn to get adroit in in correcting people who are already or your get into big trouble with people and so so you keep coming up against folks will and it's sometimes it can become the book curtains well against the them
person in the kitchen and working will
so anyway so in terms of practice to be able to sit to be able as stand there and to notice that oh my goodness i i read i really want to do this my way i really want to do this my way and then take a deep breath and come back i asked here i go now it's to it is
to continually come back to what's actually happening
to to notice that the for notice this gigantic story or even a small one has has come up and and starts to pull you starts to pull you over or if that person breathes that way one more time i'm going to have to get up and leave and then on back to my breath back to my posture
so i think
ah
we also have a thing about goalless goalless activity activity without a goal and that's always very difficult to talk about because it's so easily misunderstood or misinterpreted
but just just to do the job just to do the job
i think anybody who really loves their work does that why do you do it because you do
and why do you do it because i love it because it expresses me and it's something that i really enjoy that's pretty easy i think to but it's but it's more difficult when it's something we don't like to do like gum
ah
well i can't think of anything i don't like to do
what
why don't mind the dentist's chair and washing floor tiles needed well maybe
but so the next time whatever you do cfr
if you can just do it just just to do it not to get it out the way or just do it to to get money for something else but just to do it just to do it
it's actually quite satisfying and that would be doing it as a practice that's that's work as practice that's working as an enlightened being just doing it because it's there and doing it wholeheartedly
so
instead of saying when somebody asks you to do something instead of saying
oh i don't i don't think i want to do that
to which would be embarrassing here but it would be how would you like how you like me to do that how would you like that done
and you know where i learned this the most
where i learned this amount of the most was during work periods with professional carpenters
well i never really seen them before
ever actually been never
until until living here and they i would watch them they will they would come in with with the with their tools and they they would jump they'd work and they'd be very concentrated they'd take a break they take the fifteen minute break for
fifteen minutes
instead of an hour
and they'd come back to work and then they've been very focused they would they were ask how we wanted it and they they do it now and then at the end they weren't done what you call it to clean up
they clean up without their mother being there
well i think it was the first experience i ever had of actually seeing somebody clean up when you didn't have to know when somebody wasn't watching when your mother wasn't watching
so they think they really i learned zen work from them from those folks
so hopefully we were going to be staying here for the summer i can look at work which will have a lot off as as as a religious spiritual and true in the real thing
practice
and what will help that to happen is if we actually do make it to the zendo before and after of in the morning and in the evening without us and we don't have the the actual spiritual practice of keeping our eyes open and being coming upright coming back to upright
just just that brief time an hour and forty minutes
i can help quickly in in taking it to our work
that's all i have to say

there's some about rigid ten minutes does anybody have a and in comments

trevor

yeah right
a disaster and just

exactly
yes ma'am school
that it's like it's pared down as know it's like having having one of these will help the town that coordinate tassel on it i think that's the first like the hot fudge sundae without the hot fudge maybe shrimp
i'm like what like what
well it's simple isn't it
and i think if i think it's the core i think it's the core activities that are buddha does
and again it's not it's not really the what it's the how
the how we how we do it how how how buddha manifest you know
hmm i don't think it's any different than working or going the toilet

comment
i find that
our work that
i
am much more prevalent in my life
focus
ah
that
maybe asked for me pray for pain
pain always helps
focus during his eyes and
ah so sorry
now doesn't matter it doesn't matter if your eyes are open and your keep returning to upright
that's enough
healthy
where else can you be
he puts that
you know this
you know this
everett
oh
well that's not work van is it
they say were worth being aware of running away from pans suffering let's not work that's running away and that's okay if you're going to practice running away as fine i'm talking about work as a spiritual practice you if you you can employ this doesn't mind to that and as fine than you know what's
happening what's actually happening i'm running away i'm not working
and that's and that's being awake

have you had an yes
but
forgotten
okay oh yes
hi
walking i
maybe
yes
walk
that's why i said maybe
maybe
should i don't think you have to go that far
don't think it's that complicated
i think a system sitting there with your eyes open watching your but your
aware of your breathing and aware of your posture always coming to upright i think that's all there is to it who doesn't really matter because i've put a nature is not a who and it's not a it so i don't really have to worry about all that
it's just becoming very still
amidst all of the motion
wow thank you all very much
really