Good morning, everyone. Can you hear me? Yeah. Can you hear me out in the Zendo? I apologize. My stomach decided to be very challenging this morning without going into further detail. So I'm up in my apartment instead of being in the Zendo with you, which is what I had preferred. But I want to introduce my friend Ben Connolly. Thank you for attempting to make the journey here, Ben. Ben Connolly is a Soto Zen teacher and Dharma heir in the Kategori Roshi lineage. His most recent book, which he's going to speak about or from today, is Vasubandhu's Three Natures, which is a wonderful book, and it's teachings that probably many of us are not familiar familiar with, but extremely useful.

[01:03]

Ben also teaches mindfulness in a wide variety of secular contexts, including police training and addiction recovery groups. He works with multi-faith groups focused on intersectional liberation, racial justice, and climate justice. Ben serves the Minnesota Zen Meditation Center and travels to teach across the United States and has written for Tricycle and Lions Roar Magazine. He's also the author of Inside the Grass Hut, Inside Vasubandhu's Yogacara, and Mindfulness and Intimacy. And we'll put in the chat later sort of a direct link for where you can get Ben's new book. But it's not hard to find them variously online. So welcome, Ben, and we look forward to your sharing with us. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for the warm introduction, and I'm really grateful to be with you.

[02:08]

I'm at Tassajara, and I was planning to come and be with you in the physical space of the Berkeley Zen Center, which was something I was really looking forward to. But the road here is kind of rough because there was a lot of rain, so I was asked to just stay a couple extra days. So people wouldn't have to come rescue me. So I will be heading out soon. And, you know, call what I'm doing, traveling around, talking about a book. You could call it a book tour. But what this is about for me is about making a deepening connections with people, because I deeply believe that liberation is something that happens collectively. Or as Audre Lorde said, without community, there is no liberation. And, you know, the only way to end up with community is actually to be together. I mean, ultimately, the community is always there because there's only interdependence. But as a condition being, I kind of need to actually meet people to sense that.

[03:13]

So I'm sorry I can't come into the space. I'm hoping to drop by if I'm still in the Bay Area. In a few days, just to have a sense of how meaningful the Berkeley Zen Center is to me. I was really excited to show you Mel Weitzman's memorial tablet in the Kaisando here at Tassajara in the Founders Hall. And, you know, one time I came to the Bay Area and there was nothing going on at Berkeley Zen Center when I was in the East Bay. And I just came over to just look at the building. I came over to just look at the building. Because what you do and what has happened there, I know it has already deeply impacted my life. So, so appreciative of your practice and what you're upholding. So, I'm going to leap into the material of my talk, which is Vasubandhu's Three Natures. I'm aware that those terms may be pretty impenetrable at this point, but hopefully I'll

[04:17]

start to open the door to why there's a value to investigating these teachings. So Vasubandhu was a 4th or 5th century Indian monk who was enormously influential on Buddhism, Indian Buddhist monk. So he created a very large body of text, which is how we know him. Pretty much from that era, we don't have much beyond physical objects and then texts. And the texts that he wrote have really impacted a wide variety of Buddhist traditions, East Asian and Tibetan Buddhism traditions in particular, and very much Zen and Soto Zen. Although sometimes it's like the line of transmission gets kind of murky. But Vasubandhu is in all Chan and Zen lineages. So we chant his name at our Zen centers, great teacher Vasubandhu. And... He's considered one of the six ornaments of Tibetan Buddhism, one of the five great ancestors of the Jodo Shinshu tradition.

[05:19]

So his work has been revered and studied in many ways. So a lot of the things that he was bringing to the fore or innovating or communicating or refining are things that many of us would understand as just being Buddhist ideas. And that is true, but they were not Buddhist ideas or very well articulated until Vasubandhu really brought them into the culture. So it's like even though you don't, as Buddhists, we may not know the name Vasubandhu, in some ways Vasubandhu is living in how we practice and see the world. Yeah. So Vasubandhu is associated with a couple of different Buddhist movements. I tend to focus on his work in an area called Yogacara, which just means yoga practice. And Yogacara could be described in many ways. But I think one of the simplest ways to say is that it was a movement that was about integrating early Buddhist psychology with the Mahayana...

[06:24]

emphasis on collective and universal liberation. So psychology and early Buddhist processes often tended to look very inwardly at personal transformation and the attainment of individuals of nirvana, which is wonderful. But then in the Mahayana, we get this emphasis on like practicing for all beings, practicing more in the world and more externally focused practice. And Yogacara teachings really say these two will be more effective if married carefully than if one is overemphasized. And their argument was that people in India at the time were kind of taking sides and overemphasizing one or the other. So that may sound kind of heady or scholarly. So if you'd like to put it this way, the reason I teach this is because I want to help people to be able to engage in social change movements. that take very long times with problems that are very, very persistent, like racism and patriarchy, climate change, anti-Semitism, these kind of things, Islamophobia, be able to engage in those in a way where they and the people they're working with can be cared for and healthy.

[07:35]

Or another way to think of it is if you want to be involved in the world and really face the suffering and not be completely burned out, I think Yogachara can help. So one of the reasons that I teach this material, beyond just that sort of internal calling and sense of how it has supported me and people I know, is that Yogacara creates kind of the philosophical backbone or underpinnings of the movement that Thich Nhat Hanh is. called his movement of engaged Buddhism. So you can see he self-consciously looked through vast bodies of Buddhist tradition and literature and really saw Yogacara as creating one of the strongest frameworks for that movement. And then he taught Yogacara extensively. And many of you may be interested in one of his greatest books is called Understanding Our Mind. And it's just a straight... Exposition of Yogacara Teachings. Quite beautiful. Understanding our mind. So because Thich Nhat Hanh has been such an inspiration to me, my work in Yogacara to some extent is just trying to carry forward and extend his vision as best I can.

[08:45]

So the topic at hand is the three natures. The three natures is one of the main teachings associated with Yogacara, like distinct teachings. along with the idea of the alaya vijnana, or the storehouse consciousness, which some of you may have encountered. I won't be talking about that very much. I'll be focusing on the three natures. The three natures is pretty philosophical, so get ready. And, you know, some people think, well, philosophy, what is that? That's just all in your head. But, you know, philosophical thinking is intended to transform how we view the world. And it is clear... throughout Buddhist literature, that how we view the world has a huge impact on what we do, on what we create in the world, the wellness that we experience, the communities that we create. So this gives us some tools for looking at the world. So the three natures, the idea is these three natures, which I will be laying out, it's useful to view each thing, or you could say it's useful to view everything,

[09:52]

as having these three natures. Or you could say it's useful to view everything as being of these three natures, or we could say having these three characteristics. Sometimes the term lakshana instead of sabava is used to describe the three natures. So you can look at something and be like, oh, this has these three aspects. And the claim is that will help if you're interested in being free from suffering and promoting freedom from suffering. So the three natures are the imaginary nature, the dependent nature, and the complete realized nature. So the imaginary nature of things is what you think they are. The dependent nature is that they appear the way they do, dependent on other things. And the complete realized nature is that they are not what you think they are. So in some sense, kind of straightforward.

[10:55]

You may think, oh, okay, it sounds kind of Buddhist. It's actually pretty radical. Once you start to take this in, it's pretty challenging. So we're talking even at the most basic level of experience, like, what is myself? Well, it's not what I think it is. Who are you? Not what I think you are. What is this cup of tea? It's not what I think it is. And then instead of being like, oh, we'll get to like some absolute objective truth about what those things are, we just say... What we know is it's not what I think it is. So this can really open up some openness, humility, quite wonderful. Now, one of the main challenges in teaching this material or any, it's actually pretty similar. You may hear threads of other types of Buddhist teachings you've heard, especially if you've heard teachings about form and emptiness or the two truths of absolute and relative nature. Pretty similar teachings. When we say that everything isn't what you think it is or everything is empty of separate existence, oftentimes people think we're saying that things don't matter.

[12:01]

And that is definitely not the case. So what I will try and present here during this talk is that the fact that things are imaginary in the three natures, they say they're imaginary in order to point out that we have agency, that every moment we have power. that we are actively involved collectively in creating the world that we live in. And so every single thing we do and the quality with which we do each thing has impact. So I'm going to read a little passage from this book. So I wrote this book called Vasubandhu's Three Natures. It is a new translation with my translation partner, Wei Zhen Tang, who's a professor at Dharma Dharma University in Taiwan. A new translation of Vasubandhu's treatise on three natures, which is 38 short verses in Sanskrit. And then each chapter of the book is a commentary that I wrote on one of these short verses.

[13:03]

So I'm going to read to you from the introduction. Every aspect of what we would conventionally call experience is of these three natures. All sights, sounds, smells, tastes, physical sensations, thoughts, emotions, and our sense of being a self. For example, the cobalt blue car that I can see outside my window is of an imaginary nature. Whatever I am experiencing it to be right now, a memory as I'm currently looking at letters on a screen, or now as I turn my head to look at the car again, Whatever I think it to be is a construction of habits of consciousness and imagination. I suspect it will take some time for you to consider this a reasonable or useful claim. And so, dear reader, that's why I'm writing this book. That car is also of a dependent nature. Countless conditions that are not the car create the appearance of a car. Reflected sunlight, ocular nerves, supply chain software, oil refineries, the desire for wealth.

[14:09]

And so on. This car is also of complete realized nature. It isn't what I think it is. Recognizing that things aren't what you think they are can radically disarm the patterns of your mind that cause you to suffer and cause suffering. For example, in order to see the car in my normal way, I am usually ignorant of or ignore a vast array of conditions on which the appearance of the car depends. Conditions that cause suffering in this time of climate crisis. These teachings are to help us move beyond this kind of ignorance. The so-called knowledge that white people are inherently superior to black people and the purported fact that race exists as a biological phenomenon were confirmed by 19th century scientific experiments which have since been disproven. This caused and causes incalculable harm. This so-called knowledge is imaginary.

[15:11]

It arises from conditions, and its complete realized nature is that it is not real. And yet millions of people thought and still think it is true. Although many of us do not, the impacts of this view are pervasive. It affects where people live, the jobs we have, the wealth we inherit, our access to education, and so much more. They are alive in how I experience the world. This teaching is here so we may continually grow in our capacity to end and transform harmful patterns of which we are often unaware. By learning to see the three natures of the ideas that maintain harmful systems, we open the way for liberation. The three natures can be misapplied and easily misunderstood. Understanding the imaginary nature invites humility, not grandiosity. It affirms agency. It does not deny experiences. Understanding the dependent nature affirms kinship with all things.

[16:15]

It does not deny differences or boundaries. Understanding the complete realized nature brings faith, compassion, and joy. It does not deny suffering. The three natures provide medicine for our ongoing daily sufferings, no matter how small. So just to make explicit, you know, the examples I gave to which we analyze with the three natures, the car, we're saying that we when we imagine it, we generally imagine it from the point of view of utility to ourselves. So we objectify something and then the way we think about it, the way we even perceive it with our senses is about does it do something for me that I like or do I not like it? And can I get some more of it or not get some more of it? So you can probably hear the basic language of the process by which samsara is created in Buddhism. So by seeing the real web of dependencies that brings this thing into view, we get much closer to being able to act in relation with it in a way that's less harmful.

[17:23]

So maybe we could have a world in which we don't have cities that are basically built for cars where people get to go every once in a while. But have a world that's built for animals and plants and people where we happen to have vehicles every once in a while. Likewise, with race, although it's well established that race is not an absolutely real thing, it's a fairly recent social construct. So it is imaginary in this sense. It's socially constructed and personally constructed in how people view the world. Its impacts are enormous. So this is the basic analysis of the three natures. We see that something isn't absolutely real, but we acknowledge that its impacts are there because we are believing in it, whether we know it or not, even if we're unconscious that we're believing in it. So that makes a nice pivot. I'm going to talk about each of the three natures in turn. So I'll start with the imaginary nature. Yeah, so one of the, you know, really common ways in Buddhism, you know, people, there are many texts that say things like the world should be regarded as a dream or a dew drop or an imagination or an illusion.

[18:36]

And oftentimes those are very simply... kind of help us just put down some anguish we're carrying. So for example, you know, you've probably had experiences where you were very upset about something. And then like a week later, you look back and you're like, why, why did there have to be so much suffering? That was not that big of a deal. And so we just see that the process of how we were conceiving of and imagining the thing is what produced our suffering. So this can be, you know, really good medicine sometimes. But it can be kind of dangerous if we start just being like, oh, it doesn't matter. It is what it is. So this idea that things are imaginary in the Yogacara has a much more important impact. Because in the Yogacara system, the idea is that what we imagine, which is identical to saying what we experience, is created by the tendencies of consciousness.

[19:40]

And so the basic mechanism is that every action with the body or action of emotion or thought, sometimes we'll say this in a more conventional Buddhist way, every action of body, speech, and mind, every action, even tiny little instance of action, plant seeds, and each time you plant a seed, a similar fruit will come up at a later time. So, for example, people practice playing musical instruments, and maybe they play their scales, and they plant those seeds of being able to play that scale, and they plant many seeds, and pretty soon it's very, very natural. And then, not only do they learn to play the scale, but other people learn to play the scale. In order for anyone to be playing scales now, lots of people had to play scales in the past. So, this... Planting of seeds is not just like individual, but collective. But that's, you know, we could take any cultural form or embodied expression that people have that's repeated and see it through that lens.

[20:47]

But also the way we feel. This is really important, right? If you keep every time you see someone, you always just go, what? That guy's such a jerk. And you get really mad and riled up, you know. You're planting seeds so that every time you see that person, you'll think they're a jerk and feel riled up. That's how it works, right? And likewise, if you see someone and go, oh, I wonder how I can just understand them and listen more deeply and just be present to them. It plants seeds of compassion and mindfulness and care. So this process, by the way, is called karma. So in a large sense, the idea of the imaginary nature and this process that creates it in Yogacara is a way to really sort of reclaim and make sure that there's a good explanation in Buddhism. If everything is empty of separate existence, why our actions matter? Because karma just means action in its most simple term.

[21:48]

But the emphasis, it is important to note, the emphasis is on the action of sentient beings. So instead of a, I shouldn't dwell on this, but a materialist worldview where we think there's like an absolute material reality that happens to produce consciousness, which is cool. It's a cool worldview. You can have that. The idea is to emphasize, not because it's absolutely true, but to emphasize because it is helpful the way we act. Because that reminds us that we have power and our actions have impact and we are collectively creating the world. that we live in and that other people we live in, and that the way we live in it has come through a collective process of action. Okay, so the implications of this are quite broad, by the way. But, you know, in simple terms, it's like you have power. You have power. Another way, this is like a reminder that every single instant...

[22:50]

Any person anywhere has the capacity to do something that's beneficial or harmful. It doesn't matter how advanced spiritual attainments they have. There's a moment and they're planting seeds. And it's the same thing for you. There's not a moment when you're not planting the seeds that create the world we live in. That's why in a Zen temple, it's like you have admonitions to offer the benefit of your cleaning to all beings when you clean your body. To brush your teeth for all beings. Because you realize, I want to plant seeds of this aspiration that we can all be free. And I want to plant seeds of mindfulness and deep attention to the body. Because that will ground awareness in what's here. Yeah. And... I can't really get into the mechanics of this, but I just feel like I shouldn't leave any talk about Yogacara without saying this, that at root, one of the most key basic practices suggested is when internalizes these three natures is the practice of knowing the physical sensations of the body and whatever emotion is present.

[24:06]

the physical sensations of the body, and whatever emotion is present. Not the body as an object to be manipulated, controlled, or judged, but actually what is the feelingness if you draw your attention down in there? And then what is the emotion that is present? And the impacts of this are quite broad and kind of beyond the scope of this talk. But, you know, because to introduce these can seem kind of heady. important to just point back to what is really basic. So things are of dependent nature. They're of imaginary nature and they're of dependent nature. So things have all these qualities. It's not like you're going to get to the complete realized nature and leave all this other crap behind. It's like, oh, everything already has all three of these natures. So things are of dependent nature. And this is, you know, idea runs through all Buddhism, and it's really one of the central things that makes the whole body of tradition work, at least in terms of a thought system.

[25:19]

So, yeah, in Yogacara texts, sometimes we'll talk about the practice of conceptualizing interdependence. So this is one that Thich Nhat Hanh is very famous for, you know, just taking an object and saying, well, let's look at this cup. I don't have a cup. Oh, I have a really empty cup. But anyway, I don't have any objects in here. It's kind of a bare room. You take an object and you say, well, let's see. What does this depend on? And we can see that this book depends on I can tell you it depended on a little effort on the part of one human being, but actually on the part of many human beings. And not only like the people I know, like the editor and the marketing director, but what about the people who drove the truck and the people who manufacture ink? And then it's like, well, how do you end up with those people? They had to have food, which comes from the soil. So you have to have worms and you have to have long term processes of mycelium within the soil, which is communicating.

[26:23]

And that is like communicating with plants that photosynthesize. Okay, so you get the idea. You know, people say, I've heard that conceptualizing the interdependence before. Actually, I recommend doing it very frequently. It changes the way you see the world to remind yourself that the things that appear to be these distinct objects who, whether we know it or not, are constructed by our tendency to want to have objects to manipulate, we can see that they're way beyond that. All right. and we see a world that's all relationship. So one of the most natural ways people come to a sense of the dependent nature of things is through very simple meditation practices, in particular, in my opinion, zazen, which is a very simple form of meditation where we are just allowing the mind to be less divisive. So dependency is seeing a less divided world, a relational world, a world where the past isn't separate from the present, and the present is not separate from the future, and the me is not separate from the you, and the sky is not separate from the earth that loves it.

[27:40]

And when we practice meditation, people, just whether they know it or not, they often report this. They just go, geez, I don't even know what I'm doing. I thought I'd learn how to meditate. I came to your Zen Center. And then I sat meditation a couple times, and I was just sitting with my family in the kitchen at breakfast, and I just felt so connected to them. And, you know, so many mornings I'd felt so frantic and trying to get people to do the right thing and get out the door and get it done. And I just had this sense of just like, I'm here with you. And it's very common that they say something like, and I felt how much I loved you. When we realize the dependent nature, we realize naturally a kind of a love that's not some fancy feeling. It's just that we're together inescapably. So it can feel really good, a really good thing to start to really view the dependent nature.

[28:44]

But it can also be very painful. So one of the implications of the fact that everything is of dependent nature is that no one can ever be separate from any suffering anywhere. And this definitely does not mean you should try and, like, take on all the sufferings everywhere and just inundate yourself with it. But oftentimes the process of understanding the dependent nature involves a lot of pain. Or, you know, I will say it seems to me Joanna Macy in her ecological work often starts by saying we just have to acknowledge. You know, you start to look at the impacts human beings are having on the environment and then it's very painful. So it's it doesn't have to be painful, but it really often is. And the thing is, you're just opening up to what's true and that can be hard. I've had the same thing just in my family when I was doing really harmful things.

[29:46]

hopefully not too much lately, and people have pointed it out, and I get closer, but it's hard. It's painful to see that truth of the impact of things I've done. Or very frequently, if you're doing anti-racism work, things get surfaced that are really raw, really raw. And people, then, for white folks like me, you've got to look out, because I could be like, ooh, yeah, racism is something that happened in the South. Or it's something that some bad people do. Or, you know, it's something that, you know, somewhere else. We want to hold the systems that cause harm at bay from ourselves. And it's very powerful. I don't have to be like, I am racist. I don't have to do that. I could do that. That's fine. But... To just take in that I am inseparably connected to the process that is harming people. And that can be painful.

[30:48]

Oh, I'd rather blame it somewhere else and just say, I'm part of this thing. I'm part of this thing. And this is the beautiful thing about the three natures teaching is like, I'm with you. It's a mess. People are harmed. It's real. And I can do something. Because it's of imaginary nature, which means I can plant seeds. I can plant seeds that can be part of making a different world. So we don't have to keep doing the same thing again. This is the basic idea of Buddhism. There's suffering and you can do something about it. But you got to look at the suffering. Yeah. So I'm not trying to bring you down. I'm just saying... Part of the process of opening up to how beautiful and deep and vast our relationship with the universe is, is often these moments of like, ah, oh, that's hard. But, you know, we get some support, pause, take care of the body, notice the emotion that's here, do some nurturing for what we need, and we can keep going.

[31:54]

I want to read you a little passage. Short passage from this book about dependent nature. I will say, you might be like, I'm not sure if you're talking about the dependent or the imaginary here. What's going on? So Vasubandhu, this is very characteristic. This book is all centered on the non-duality of concepts. So any duality isn't absolutely true. So even though he says the imaginary is like this, the dependent is like this, the complete realized nature is like this, then he says, oh, by the way, they're all identical. So you might... notice a little bit of blurring of lines. So that's part of the deal. We don't passively, excuse me, we don't passively receive the reality of the world through our senses and then respond to it. The world we experience is created. In the text it says, it is the active cognition of seer and seen. Our life is created by our karma and we create karma in every moment.

[32:59]

We have the power to plant seeds that will create a better world. This body of teachings emphasizes the impact of each moment of intentionality. Our power lies in the quality of heart and mind we offer to the moment. Why do I think this worldview is more effective than materialism for healing our suffering and freeing us from collective modes of violence, oppression, and destruction? I will answer with some lines from a Chinese Chan nun named Baoqi, who wrote, The vastness of karmic consciousness is hard to prove, but when Mr. Zhang drinks, then Mr. Li gets drunk. And before I move on, I think it may be useful to note that I'm a recovering addict and alcoholic who's been sober for a long time. Sometimes I get a call or I see an obituary telling me that another friend of mine has died from addiction.

[34:01]

I've lost a dozen friends so far, and I can never know what part my enabling of their intoxication played, or the impact their deaths and addictions will have on future generations of their families. The web is too complex to map with materialist tools. I can never know the impact of the thousands of hours I've spent working with addicts in recovery, either. I have witnessed the awakening of so much freedom. One of Baoji's inspirations, the great Chan nun, Miaozong, wrote, When outside the diamond door he glowered, inside the stable the wooden horse's face turned red. In the verse above, there is no physical connection between the man's glower and the wooden horse's face, and yet there is reaction and connection. We cannot ultimately know when or where the results of any karmic seed will manifest, but manifest they will. Miaozong wrote her lines in a Chan compilation she created in the 12th century.

[35:05]

But could she have known that in the 17th century, Bauchi and her Dharma sister Zhukui, looking to revive the rarely recorded teachings of a female master of Chan, would pull them from obscurity and write their own commentaries? Or that Vyata Grant in the 21st century would again revive them in English? I believe that buying a chunk of an animal killed thousands of miles away or offering a caring smile for a person on the street, as well as each tiny moment of anxiety, desire, or compassion you cultivate has an impact on every living being. I can't measure it. Miaozong says the wooden horse's face turns red. A wooden horse is a classic Buddhist metaphor for something that has no reality or causal agency, like the horns of a rabbit, a wooden man, or a stone woman. Miaozong invites us into a worldview of mystery, where we don't know or see what is ultimately real, but where an angry glare causes suffering we can't calculate, where a smile has radiance beyond the limits of our knowing, where our actions really matter.

[36:13]

All of this isn't real, but it's as real as it gets. So everything is of complete realized nature. This is good news, people, because the idea is, We suffer because we see a world of objects and then we think I can get that object or I can get rid of it. And they're not actually objects. That's just an imagination. And so those things are already liberated from whatever we've turned them into. Basically, you could say that what makes a Buddha a Buddha is that they don't suffer. They don't cause suffering and they see what is real. So in these teachings, we're saying the complete realized nature, which is that things are not what we think they are, is what is real. So it's not an objective truth. It's the truth that leads to liberation from suffering, which is the kind of truth Buddhism is interested in.

[37:18]

So everything is already like this. And you might think, really? Really? Because I definitely got my suffering right here in my lap. So, yes. Yeah, the way we imagine things matters. But we can also begin to open this to this other side of things, that things are of complete realized nature. So in talking about this, Buddhist teachers will often talk about the complete realized nature of what we would think of as ourself and the complete realized nature of what we usually think of as other. So at the end of the 30 verses on Consciousness Only, Vasubandhu says this. And it's hard to gesture on the thing. I'm waving at the space I'm in. This is the inconceivable, wholesome, unstained, constant realm. The blissful body of liberation, the Dharma body of the great sage. So I'm using my hands to gesture what I perceive to be the realm and this body. But we could do this like the hokey pokey. And you could wave your hands around and say, this, your inconceivable realm is wholesome.

[38:23]

And your body is the body of liberation. Now, this may sound kind of fancy, but Hakolin essentially paraphrases this in his last line of the Song of Zazen, where he says, this very place is the lotus land, this very body, the Buddha. He's not just talking about for him. The idea is you chant the text and you acknowledge that things are of completely realized nature. When Dogen Zenji invited, he said, I'm going to write my basic text on meditation and transmit this. And now we translate this. We chant this at Zen centers all over the world. It begins in the Fukan Zazangi, the universal recommendation for Zazen. Begins thus. The way is originally perfect and all-pervading. How could it be contingent on practice and realization? The true vehicle is self-sufficient. What is their need for special effort? Indeed, the whole body is free from dust. What is the use? Who could believe in a means to brush it clean? It is never apart from this very place.

[39:25]

what is the use of traveling around to practice? So he says the reason to practice Zazen is because the body and the world are of complete realized nature. Pretty good. So for a lot of people, this seems like kind of a stretch of the imagination, but maybe you can feel it a little bit. I'm telling you, I'm part of a religious tradition. That is my opinion. And there's nothing wrong with a little bit of faith here and there. I'm going to conclude my talk with two short readings relating to the complete realized nature of what we would usually think of as the self, and then another about the complete realized nature of what we would usually consider the world we are in. So, this is from a chapter called Already Buddha. When I came to Buddhist practice, I was seeking something else. I sought an escape from the anguish I experienced.

[40:25]

My therapists told me it was the anguish of trauma from the past reproducing itself. My psychiatrist told me my brain didn't process serotonin properly. My addiction recovery friends called it defects of character, self-will, run riot. My Buddhist studies called it afflictive karma. All these ways of looking at it have their utility, and I am deeply grateful. for all who have supported me in finding the wondrous, joyful existence of today. When we suffer, when we see the suffering of others, it is right to seek wellness, to seek something else. However, it is also true that there is not something else, that you and I are not and cannot be broken. For if there is brokenness, there must be a wholeness that is elsewhere. This is a duality. And duality is just a habit of mind. And regarding this very place, it's the Lotus Land.

[41:35]

Recently, I heard a talk by a Dakota elder named Bob Klanderud. He spoke of the total kinship of all life. He told us that the confluence of the Mississippi and Minnesota rivers Near my home on U.S.-occupied Dakota land is called Bedote. For the Dakota, Bedote is the origin of the universe, the land of Genesis. In his words, it is Eden. He asked us, now that you know you live in Eden, how will you choose to live? So thank you for your kind attention. I'm going to shift to hopefully hear some other voices here. You're welcome to ask questions, any kind of questions.

[42:37]

It can be like kind of fancy Buddhist technical questions, if you like that sort of thing, or just very simple ones. Like, what do I do? I'm so sad. I don't know if I'll have a great answer, but any kind of question is welcome. And also, if you just have comments, that's cool, but there are quite a few people, so short comments are probably optimum. And there are a lot of people, so I think hand-raised function would be helpful, and I can call on you. Then I'll take care of the calling on people. Okay, great. A question in the Zendo from Raghav. I appreciate your other book. I wanted to clarify the third aspect of nature.

[43:39]

Would it be accurate to characterize it as the absence of the first and the second nature is basically the experience of the total nature? Yeah, not quite, but it's a good question. It's actually similar to the way Vasubanu frequently phrases it. So actually, the dependent is what appears, and the complete realized nature is the absence of the imaginary from the dependent. I know it's going to sound really abstract, so I'm just going to give you a brief way of experiencing this, perhaps. So in this moment, it seems like there's a bunch of stuff. My guess is you kind of feel like you exist. You're looking at some things and hearing things. There are sounds that are different than the sights, and there are a lot of different things that are seen that have different characteristics and so forth.

[44:41]

So all those things that are different things, self, other sights, sounds, that's all like the stuff that isn't absolutely true. But the complete realized nature is that there's something here. Something has risen dependent on conditions in this moment. Something is not a great word for it because it has a thing in it. It's not a thing. But it seems like a thing to us. But if you were to subtract all the belief in all the separations, divisions, and dualities within this moment, That's the complete realized nature. And it's already, that's how it already is. Those things aren't absolutely true things. So it's a kind of a tough question, but hopefully I gave you something for your inquiry. Thank you. I'll read your book. Thank you. We have a question online from Kabir. Thank you for this wonderful talk.

[45:48]

As a trauma and addiction survivor, I do agree with you. There is nothing broken. Nothing will ever break. Just like the Thunderbolt, like the Fajra, were indestructible. Thank you. Thank you for sharing that. Yeah. You know, sometimes through deep suffering, we can realize a profound strength. So thank you. Yeah. And I will just say briefly that these yoga chart teachings very closely track with the current and developing understanding of trauma, which is something I address a fair amount in the book. Thank you. Other folks. It's a question in the back of the Zendo from Salvador. Thank you.

[46:53]

I just wanted to hear your comments about suffering. How can one suffer but not dwell in it and live with themselves and live with others? Thank you. That's a rich question, right? And hopefully, when I'm hearing these questions, I'm always hoping I'm hearing what you're really asking, but I'm sure I often miss. But using these teachings, the reminder is always to try and draw attention, starting with the body and the emotion. And so, yeah, if there's something we would usually call suffering, something like a anger or sadness or irritation or maybe fear, anxiety, you know, we can't just notice it.

[47:56]

We can just notice it. Now, just noticing it isn't like the whole thing and all we should ever do, but is such an easy step to miss that we emphasize it in this tradition. And trusting that just noticing is powerful. So just like if someone comes to you and they're telling you about something difficult, being able to just hear them is a big deal. And we can plant seeds of compassion in this way, not by sort of saying, oh, it's okay to do like, oh, I'm taking care of you and that kind of feeling, but actually just the space of awareness that we can develop through meditation practice that allows the emotion to arise and be seen. And not manipulated in any way. It is profoundly healing. And through that process, we can often start to see that it's like the suffering comes through. It does not destroy me. It doesn't need to overtake me because it's just part of the phenomena of this whole field of awareness that includes sights, sounds, bodily sensations.

[49:04]

And it will always pass on and change. So that is like one of the... root practices we have here. But then, you know, you can also just use your discernment. This is a body of teaching that says we want to be discerning and discriminating about how to take care of ourselves. So then it might be like, oh, I need to go talk to someone about this. I need to take a bath. I need to turn off the news and stop doom scrolling, whatever it is. I need to disengage from this relationship that's overwhelming to me. I need to put down the work that is important to me, but I can't quite do. So we can have all those boundaries as well. But kind of starting with that boundaryless moment of just bringing caring attention to the feeling itself is very powerful. So those are some ideas for you. But it sounds like a lifelong koan, and I'm glad we're doing it together. Thank you. Thank you. There are two questions online, first from Hozon and then from Sue Moon.

[50:05]

Thanks so much, Ben. I'm really interested in this stuff. My question sort of picks up from the last one. When we teach the four foundations of mindfulness, You were speaking of the quality of bare awareness that we bring to our experience. But it's also true that when we get to the fourth foundation of mindfulness, we're actually applying, we're looking, we're consciously looking through different lenses at what we perceive. And I just wonder if there's any resonance there and how you see those things map on each other. I actually take them as quite literal and useful tools. It can sound abstract, but it's something I use.

[51:11]

You have some thoughts? Yeah, I'll just bounce here. And like I say, I'm not sure I will... quite get to where you're going but you know it does seem like the four foundations of mindfulness processes when we start by bringing it's like ground your attention in the body look at phenomena that you associate with the self your feelings and then we move actually in the from when we say mindfulness of mind we're like looking oh my mind is like this and then we can start to see like oh my mind is like this it's a mind with desire And then we can go to the fourth foundation, and we can say that desire is a phenomenon. So there's a disidentification, which can be really powerful. But we can really notice, like, are you able to see a feeling as just a feeling? Or does it feel like it's a feeling that pervades the whole way you're looking? And then you can just say, I just noticed that. That's enough. But you may be able to move it from pervading the way you're looking to something that is seen.

[52:15]

But the general direction then continues to open. I think this is what you're pointing towards to like, now that I've had a look at like how I am, so I'm not just unconsciously producing my habits, I want to look at the world and think about in a world that is in a way that is liberative. And actually, that process is embedded not just through the series of the four foundations, in my opinion, but even in the earliest stage, because in the first foundation, mindfulness of body, we say, notice your breathing internally and then notice other people's breathing. So the general rhythm of like this, checking out where you're at and then opening up is really helpful, really helpful, especially if you want to go to a meeting and work with people and they're all getting grumpy. So anyway, those are some ideas. Great. Thank you. Thank you. Sue Moon, do you want to ask your question? Yes.

[53:16]

Hi, Ben. Sorry not to see you in person, but thank you for coming from Tassajara all the way through the air. And this is so inspiring. I really... appreciate the way you connect to these ancient teachings to concerns of the day. And I really appreciated your remarks about how these teachings apply to working with racism, among other things. And this is a kind of literal-minded question, but could you say more about how they apply to working with climate change? It seems more of a stretch than working with racism, which happens a lot in our minds. But climate change seems to not just be happening in my mind. I don't know. Yeah. Well, to my mind, thank you for this question.

[54:18]

I could go on and on about how your work has influenced my life, but I'm not doing that right now. So I want to say to my mind, you know, racism and climate change, they're produced by the way we view the world and the choices individuals make. But they're clearly completely out in what we would conventionally understand to be the physical reality of the world. Both of them. Absolutely. And both are intractable. People have been pouring their lives into liberative movements for a long time. So I want to be part of movements. that enable us to keep going, even when it seems like what we're doing doesn't matter. That's exactly the model that karma gives us, because it says you never know when a seed you plant will bear fruit. So the thing is, we can never really understand the impacts of the nonviolent movements of the 20th century, the civil rights movement. You can say, yes, we got the Civil Rights Act and you got the Voting Rights Act.

[55:21]

But something much deeper and transformative was planted through that commitment to facing the suffering and embodying nonviolence in that place. And zazen is the act of facing the reality of how we are and embodying nonviolence in relation to it. So we can basically, in any moment, we can meet what is there and then embody that commitment to non-dominate, in the language of bell hooks, non-domination. non-control, non-violence. And then it's like I can show up for all the climate change work I do. And sometimes, you know, it's like a big non-violent direct action and the police are doing really pretty violent things. And, you know, we tried to stop a pipeline, the pipeline pumping oil. But I still have total conviction that the time I spent sitting in circle with people following the leadership of indigenous women in northern Minnesota planted seeds that matter. And I may be wrong. I may be wrong.

[56:23]

But the thing is, I'm just trying to find a way to help us all keep going together because it's not going to help me or anyone to give up. So anyway, thank you. Thank you all for for all your attention here and for all you're doing. I'm sure I could sit down with you and learn a lot from each one of you if we turned this conversation around. So thank you so much. Thank you, Ben. We'll now have the four vows. Things are numberless. I vow to awaken with them. Delusions are inexhaustible. I vow to end them. festival.

[57:24]

of all.

[58:00]

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