This morning I want to talk a little bit about case number 50 in the Blue Cliff Record. Kumon's particle after particle samadhi. Sometimes it's called dust samadhi or sometimes it's called Adam Samadhi, something small, a particle, a piece of dust. Samadhi is a small particle of time, a small particle of space and time. The gist is, how do you maintain samadhi moment after moment?

[01:11]

That's the gist. What is samadhi? Who can tell me what is samadhi? Awareness. Concentration. Concentration is very close, most close, literally. Samadhi is absorption, concentration or absorption. Absorption is pretty good.

[02:18]

To be really there. To really be where you are. There's concentration and there's absorption and there's equanimity and so forth. to really be where you are. And samadhi, though, is a little different, a little more special meaning. There's absorption and concentration are definitely factors of samadhi. And in our ordinary everyday life, everybody has these. Just driving our car, you know, we have to have absorption and concentration.

[03:29]

But samadhi is more like a kind of concentrated absorption where you disappear in the activity, and are completely the activity itself, which is not a trance. And it's not exactly forgetting yourself, but it's un-self-consciousness. Self-consciousness comes up when you hesitate.

[04:39]

So it's without hesitating. But it's deeper than just ordinary concentrated activity. You can go to a movie and have absorption and concentration and be completely involved with the movie, live the life of the movie. but still remain in the realm of duality. So samadhi is when we're absorbed in the realm of oneness and at the same time expressing that oneness in the realm of duality.

[05:51]

So when we sit zazen, when we sit sasheen, through zazen we're completely absorbed in the realm of oneness. And our activity in that oneness is always being expressed in our dualistic activity. That's the purpose of Sashin and purpose of Zazen and purpose of Zen training. Quite often we sit Zazen and then go out into our daily life and we wonder why our life doesn't work because we're sitting Zazen. We wonder why we get into so much trouble even though we're sitting zazen, even though we practice, even though we may have good concentration.

[07:16]

So samadhi is not so easy to explain or to express. or to maintain. It's very hard to maintain a concentrated state of mind, not just concentrated, but where a state concentrated absorbs a state where we don't lose our equanimity, as Bill says. equanimity, meaning no matter what happens to us in this dualistic realm, we don't curse our fate. We don't feel like we're a victim of life.

[08:32]

And if you have true samadhi, you never, you will not feel that the world is against you. So, that's the title. a particle after particle, a moment after moment, samadhi. Wow. Ngo introduces the subject and he says, transcending all ranks, rising above all expedience, spirit corresponding to spirit, words answering words, unless one has undergone the great emancipation and attained the great use of it, How could one rank with the Buddhism be a faultless exponent of the teachings?

[09:44]

Now tell me, who can be so direct and adaptable to all occasions and have the free command of transcendent words? See the following." And this is the case. That's his introduction, main subject. A monk asked Umang. Umang was a very famous Zen master. What is particle after particle samadhi? What is moment after moment samadhi? Uman said, rice in the bowl, water in the pail. And then Setso has a verse. Rice in the bowl, water in the pail. Even the most talkative can add nothing to that. The north and the south stars do not change places. You could also say the North and South stars are just what we call those objects in the sky.

[10:49]

Heaven-touching waves arise on land. If you doubt, if you hesitate, though air to millions, you don't have any pants. This is trouser-less. You lose your pants. Losing Your Pants refers to the story in the Lotus Sutra of the prodigal son who went away from home, he left home and wandered around. It's the story of everybody. The son who leaves home and wanders around and then one day passes through his father's town, and his father recognizes him. But he doesn't recognize his father. And his father, of course, is the king of the town.

[11:54]

I forgot to mention that. And has all the wealth. And so when the father sees the son, he says to his attendants, when he leaves, Go offer him some food and a place to stay in the barn and a job. So his attendants went after the son and bring him back. Offer him a job as a gardener or actually kind of an attendant in the barn. and some straw to sleep on and a few coins. And the son stays there, and after a while, begins to take on, take it on. And eventually, the father reveals to the son, when he gets to a certain point, reveals to him that he's his son.

[13:01]

He is his father. He inherits the father's kingdom. This is a story from the Lotus Sutra which illustrates, a very famous story, illustrates the return to your own kingdom or to your own sovereignty. which you left at some point, and which is what this study of Dharma is trying to help you maintain or return to. So, Last week, I went to Tassajara.

[14:07]

And Tassajara, I always feel quite wonderful when I go there during practice period. The practice period is quite different than summer. Summer is very hot, and people swim and go to the baths and wander around in this kind of wonderful place. And in the autumn, As soon as guest season is over, all the guests leave and it's just kind of quiet. It descends over Tazara and the leaves start to fall and there aren't so many people. And eventually it starts to rain and then it starts to get cold. And being there in the rain and the cold is very different than the summer. And everybody gets up at 3.30. Wake-up bell is 3.30 in the morning.

[15:10]

And Zazen is at 4.00. And every day you get up and sit Zazen. And there's a lot of Zazen, a lot more Zazen. Two Zazen periods in the morning, and then service and breakfast, and then there's a study period. Everybody studies together for an hour. And then you go back in the zendo and sit zazen again. And then after that there's a work period and then lunch. And by that time, by the time work period, it's already pretty late in the morning. So the morning goes by very fast. It's really amazing how fast the day goes by. And when I go to Tassajara, I'm usually talking to people during the morning zazen and evening zazen. I have two periods of zazen in the evening after afternoon work.

[16:14]

And that kind of close practice is designed to help you maintain that absorption in samadhi. You only have to take care of certain aspects of your life. Of course you take care of your whole life, but the monastery is arranged in such a way that each person has some task. A monastery is like a small, in a way it's like a world, like a particle of dust, like a whole world contained within itself, somewhat self-sufficient. And each person takes care of some particular area

[17:24]

are working on stone work, then you don't cook. And if you're cooking, you don't work on stones. But each person's task adds something to the whole. And that kind of co-operative way of living gives you a kind of total experience of how to take care of yourself and how to take care of others. It makes it very easy for you to be totally involved in what you're doing. because there are very few distractions. And when there are distractions, small things become very vivid in our life.

[18:35]

We tend to let a lot of small things go by because our life is so busy. If you notice your life in the 24 hours, you know how difficult it is not only to take care of everything that comes up, but to actually focus on things as they come up, and how to follow something up. Various feelings come up in that time, which we just can't even bother with. So when our life is simplified in that way, a larger significance. And you begin to see how your mind works.

[19:36]

And you begin to see what the things that really bother you about yourself and about other people. It's easier to start to work on work with those elements. In our daily life here, I feel that we really have a hard time doing that because our lives are so complicated, so complex. We can go on and on for long periods of time and not really take care of things because we're constantly being called to something. But... In a place like Tassajara, it's very convenient.

[20:46]

You know, you get up and you do Zazen. You may have some resistance. By the end of the day, everybody's very tired. And they sleep about six hours, more or less. And it's very, you know, very cold when you walk around and sometimes you're in the rain for a week. It's raining for a week or two weeks and you feel it. It's never done anything but rain, you know, there's no relief from that. It thaws in, work and so forth, but you're always there, always there in that very close to nature, very close to the environment. And sometimes their matches don't work because they start getting kind of damp. The lamps don't burn very well. You really feel the effect of that kind of close living to nature, and it feels like you're underwater sometimes, and it just rains continuously.

[21:52]

So those kind of things wear on you a little bit. toes are always cold, stuff like that. But you become very much aware, you know, certain aliveness and awareness that you don't have in your ordinary life. You can't come home and turn on the TV. When it gets dark, when it gets dark in the wintertime, it gets dark very early, and you have kerosene lamps, But they don't light up like when you turn on the lights. So you have the feeling sometimes you're living in a cave. It's kind of a cave-like feeling with dark corners. Interesting. But you can't rely on the things that you usually, usually, we usually take for granted. You can't go in and into the icebox or the refrigerator and get your

[23:01]

cold chicken if there's anything you'd like to eat. So I really recommend it. I highly recommend it for everybody. I would like to see people go to Tassajara for at least one training period. At least one practice period. It's good to go for longer, you know, but I don't want to lose anybody. But I think for one practice period would be very good. I think it's more opportunity now than it used to be to do that. Just to have the feeling of being able to let go of everything and just do that one thing. and allow yourself to be absorbed by it.

[24:06]

And it gives you some foundation in a way that you wouldn't experience otherwise. Sometimes I compare a little bit of practice of tassajara with practice in the city, or our practice. And I really appreciate people's practice here. The fact that people will get up early in the morning and drive their car to Zazen, or ride your bike, or whatever, to make that effort to come early in the morning to Zazen. It's not so convenient. given all of the things that we have to do, and all the obstacles, and all of the things that stand in your way.

[25:15]

It's just, I find it very incredible that we actually have this practice here. To me, actually, that kind of practice is what, after tassajara, people should do that kind of practice. And we should be able to go back and forth. My feeling about tassajara is that it's the kind of place we should be able to use as a retreat. We use that term retreat. pretty common, but I think that we should be able to do that more often and more freely than we do. In the past 10 years, 12 years or so, Tassajara was geared toward people who would stay there for 4 or 5 years, 3 or 4 or 5 years.

[26:32]

and you become absorbed into Zen Center as well as into your Samadhi. But I think there's more opportunity now to go to Tassajara and then come back and use it as a retreat rather than become a professional Tassajara resident. And it will help our practice here and help everybody to be able to do that. Once you have that experience, then you know, you're more able to gauge, should be more able to gauge how to practice here.

[27:35]

One of the good things about being able to practice at Tassajara is that you really leave behind everything. If you're a poet, you leave behind your poetry. If you're a musician, you leave behind your music. If you're an artist, you leave behind your artistry. Whatever you do, you just leave that behind and kind of start life in a new way for that period of time, not depending on anything that you depended on before. So it puts you in a kind of funny position because at first you kind of broke around for the things that you depended on and they're not there. But one of the things about going to Tassajara is that we don't let people go to Tassajara unless they have some sense of practice first so that they're not just don't just fall into a hole, but you start to depend on zazen and your practice, which you develop before you go.

[29:29]

But you do leave behind the various professional things that we're so attached to in our life. When you come back, you can take those up again. But when you're there, you just forget them and you work on something else. And that's very vital, very important. When we're here, we kind of get stuck or attached and it's hard to get out of that, hard to let go, or leave our sense of self which is so involved with what we do. Our sense of identification, identifying with our tasks, our career, our propensities,

[30:46]

So in a sense, sometimes we have a very rough time. And that's why it's good to go more than one practice period in order to really get free. But anyway, I think one practice period is good for everybody, anybody. Not so easy to do, you know, because You have to leave your room or your place where you live and make some arrangements with your place where you work and family and so forth. So it's not easy. It's hard to do. Hard to do that. Much harder, you know, to do it for a year. But maybe for three months, you know, some people could do it. The thing about samadhi, as distinct from just absorption or concentration, is that samadhi is absorption or concentration without attachment.

[32:12]

Maybe that's the distinguishing feature of samadhi. It's to be completely one with something. without attachment. And in the monastery, you get the training, is to be able to be completely absorbed in whatever it is that you're doing, be one with what you're doing. But without any attachment, you can, when it's time to leave, that you go to something else. And this is really very essential. I talk about this a lot. It's very essential in our training. You know, we say, there's no place to stand. Bring forth the mind that stands nowhere. It has no place to stand.

[33:16]

If you can do that, it means that you can let go of anger, you can let go of resentment, you can let go of any kind of hindrance, and you're ready to do anything because your energy is released. You can do anything without worrying about it. You notice a well-trained person is always ready to do something for somebody or ready to take up something. That readiness, that open, empty mind, is the mind of samadhi, actually.

[34:46]

Samadhi mind. Empty and open. When there's nothing to do, it's just content to not do anything. And when there's something to do, immediately, response. Immediate response. That's a characteristic of a good Zen student. Not, oh jeez, I did that yesterday. This is taking up my time. That kind of attitude is not samadhi mind. Always ready. Nothing holding you back. Always ready to give up your place. And at the same time, knowing your place.

[35:52]

Being in your place. Completely filling your place. So how do we maintain that particle after particle samadhi, moment after moment samadhi? Not just in the Zen, though, but all the time, 24 hours. A monk asked Joshu, how should I use my mind during the 24 hours? And Joshu said something like, you're always used by things, by time.

[37:02]

You are always used by time. Whereas I use time. What are you talking about? Anyway, what is this time that you're talking about? We can use time, you know, Always being ready, being empty and ready and stepping forth without hesitating. That expresses our freedom.

[38:04]

But if we're always holding back and always thinking it over and waiting for something good to come along, We just are used by the 24 hours. The victim of time. But it's hard to know how to give up. Very hard. It's what Dogen means when he says, drop body and mind. Do you have any questions?

[39:36]

Yes? Would you say that the only way you could achieve an attachment to meditation is because you can't just dissolve and all be now attached? Would you say that was the... The easy way. Let's see. Zazen is the easy way, the comfortable way to do it. Is this the way that, by the non-attachment, sort of erases the dualism? Well, you can't erase dualism. We live in a dualistic realm, you know? But we also exist in the oneness of that dualism. And Zazen helps us to get a handle on that oneness. as well as how to express it. Yes?

[40:44]

I've been thinking about this particular topic a lot lately. And the thing that I guess that what I would very much like to is in the moment-to-moment samadhi. But lately I've been thinking, even in my complicated life, but lately I've been thinking that my life is too complicated to do that. And that I have to get my life less complicated somehow. That there is a line where my life is too much, really, to be able to do that. What do you think? Well, be careful. Because, you know, you may think, geez, my life is too complicated, and you start cutting off all the... You know, sometimes a tree will grow, and we start pruning it when it's very small. And so it grows into a nice shape. If you let the tree grow too old, you may start pruning it very hard, because everything's attached, too interconnected, you know?

[41:57]

and you may prune away to make a crack. It's very hard to do that. So we have to be careful how we prune, that you don't cut into some real, an artery somewhere that would be worse than good. So be careful. But we can still prune. I guess, I'm listening to people talk about, like, which is one level up. I know that it's also complicated in its simplicity, and that it's illusion to think that it's just simple, but last week Linda Katz talked about her life, and about ordinary mind is the way, and about basically the same sort of talk, same ideas, and about cooking and eating dinner, and thinking if I could cook,

[42:59]

and eat dinner and do that. But that would be one thing. Or if my only interruption was one or two interruptions to try to be flexible with that. But there's hundreds of interruptions in my life and in my work and all of that kind of balance that I think a lot of us are trying to do in lay practice. And that's where it comes up about interruptions are not necessarily interruptions, we just call them interruptions. And being able to keep a very calm mind when something comes up that My work is that.

[44:05]

That's what it is. Somebody called me on the phone and said, are you busy? Are you busy? And I said, are you doing something? Are you doing something? Well, I'm always doing something. That's right. Always doing something. Something's always interrupting it. You know? When I probably told you this before, but when Daniel was born, I just decided that Whatever he did was not going to be an interruption. I could make it into an interruption. You got to change the diapers and all. There's always something coming into what you're doing that means you have to stop and do this. And so I always stopped and did it. But I didn't think of it as so much as an interruption. I just said, well, I have to lay this down now and do this. So far, it's never caused me any problem.

[45:08]

I mean, there are problems, little problems. But it hasn't been a big problem. And I really feel that it's because I never thought of it as an interruption. But I could have. And people do. When you just reach a point where you get kind of overwhelmed, I think. So the other point is that you just have to make priorities. Because our life is endless. endlessly reaching out. And especially the nature of our particular society is that everybody wants something. Everybody wants to give you something and take something. It's a country of merchants at one time or another. And everybody's trying to sell you something and take your attention and your money. So your attention is being pulled in many, many different ways. And if you're in the middle of, say like your job, which is very, for people.

[46:11]

And everything you do, I mean it's so complex, if you stop to think about it, it's so complex. that it's almost, it's mind-boggling because, and I see this happening to people all the time, they'll start to have some foundation for their life and they'll think they're okay and then they get interested in something. And that something that you get interested in is a whole other life, but you don't know that until you start getting into it, you know, like cameras or electronics or, especially nowadays. things and it's ever-expanding, so that becomes a whole life in itself. Plus, something else is coming in over on this side and says, why don't you try me? And you try that, and then it starts expanding and it becomes a whole life in itself. So you're living five or six different lives and then getting the input and putting out. And the person says, God, I can't stand it, everything's interrupting everything else.

[47:16]

And to be able to lead a simple life is very difficult because everything's going on around you and you're not taking part in it. So you feel very lonely. So we practice that. You don't have to feel lonely anymore. It's okay to just have a good job. That's another world. But that's right. Complicated. What happened to say that? Well, I was saying, as you're talking about, you know, always being ready to take on whatever comes. Take on? Respond to? Respond to it. It feels like taking on. Right. I mean, to be there. It's kind of what she's saying, too, is our life is so complicated, you know, and I was thinking, well, if that were really true, if you really did that, you know, then that would probably be almost impulsive type behavior.

[48:22]

And that's not very practical. Well, it's not impulsive, but being there for whatever is there, you can dismiss it. You know? You can... Suzuki Roshi used to talk about it like the frog. The frog sits on the rock. He's completely silent and still, you know. And then the fly goes by. Time goes... If he likes the fly, he'll eat it. If he doesn't like the fly, he goes... Right away. So you can either eat the fly or spit it out. Eat the frog too. Frogs eat frogs.

[49:28]

You don't have to be overwhelmed by everything or be dominated by anything. So you have to be able to exercise discrimination. The fact that you can face whatever's there right away is that you're non-discrimination. And then within that non-discrimination, you have to exercise discrimination. So you have both at once. It's not always easy to do. I just remind you that we've had this conversation so many times, but I remember you saying to me one time something about feeling very overwhelmed, and you said, Well, you just need to clean the desk. Clean the desk? Yeah. Clean the top of the desk, you know. Everyone's trying to go through the mirror. Clean the top of your desk. That's very practical. Yeah, I do that myself. Really helps.

[50:32]

But then, you know, next moment, something else starts coming in. One way is to not have any level surfaces. Horizontal surfaces always collect stuff. Even if you don't, it all collects on the floor. So anyway, it's not a formula and it's not a You know, just kind of indicate what I'm talking about, just kind of indicating an attitude. And it may cause problems too.

[51:37]

You know, like you may come to practice Zen, it causes you a big problem. This is a big problem. Because the thing about Zen practice is the demands of time, you know. Well, to talk a little bit more about the time, I mean, the issue that I find with it, I find it's the work period, is that time is the issue. Time is the issue? Well, that so much has to be done in a limited period of time, and then Any interruptions do indeed seem to be interruptions because they're edit-on things and these other things have to get done. Well, there's a feeling that things have to get done. And then something comes and interrupts, you know.

[52:38]

But maybe it won't get done, you know? It's alright if it doesn't get completely done. What interrupts? People? Sometimes? Sometimes... I mean, there just need to be things that need. You can't leave all the cushions out on the porch. Right. Well, then we just have to wait until it all gets done. Everybody has to wait. It's OK. There's got to be some solution. Something has to give somewhere, right? So everybody just has to wait until all the cushions get back in. They don't have to wait. They can help bring them back in. If they were really ready. they would see the situation and say, oh, the cushion starts to get back in.

[53:51]

They just pick up the cushions and start putting them back in. No problem. I mean, I understand your problem. But there are ways of dealing with it, you know, on that level. If you see, if you're walking down the path and you see something in the path, you know, do you pass it up or do you pick it up Do something with it. If you're really ready, you pick it up. Do something with it. Sometimes we're not ready, you know. But... You may think about it. Well, should I pick that up? Should I pick that up or should I just leave it laying here? You have to make some choice. But... I think the main thing is that if you're doing what you're doing the best you can, even if you're late, things aren't going right, some solution will happen.

[54:56]

That's my feeling. Some solution will happen because of the energy that you're generating. I'm an optimist. Thank you.

[55:27]

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