Zen flesh, Zen bones. This is one of the first Zen books from the 60s. And it's a compilation of stories, plus a translation of the Muban Khan, and a few other things. And it was a very popular book in the early 60s. because of the stories. Nyogen Sensaki actually was the author and Ruth McCandless helped him to translate and publish the book and so forth. But Nyogen Sensaki is really one of the first Zen masters in America. He had a really good perception of how to present Zen to Americans.

[01:17]

So this little book, after all the books started being published about Zen and Buddhism in the 60s and 70s and 80s, this little book kind of got lost and maybe trivial. But actually, as I come back to it, I begin to understand it better and see its real importance. Anyway, the first little story, 101 stories, the first story is a very important story because I can see why he puts it first. I'll read it to you. It's called A Cup of Tea. Nan-in, a Japanese Zen master, during the Meiji era, received a university professor who came to inquire about Zen.

[02:22]

Nan-in served tea. He poured his visitor's cup full and then kept on pouring. The professor watched the overflow until he could no longer restrain himself. And he said, it's over full. No more will go in. Like this cup, Nanen said, you are full of your own opinions and speculations. How can I show you Zen unless you first empty your cup? When I think about how to present our practice to people, thinking about that this morning, how to present our practice. We talk about, every week I give a talk about something, but yet really it all comes down to this.

[03:26]

How do we Usually when we go to study something someplace, the point is to learn as much as we can. So we get out our notebooks and our texts and our pencils. Usually education means for people to cram as much information into your head as possible. But the actual word, meaning of education, means to elicit something from inside, to draw, assuming that everything we need to know is within us. Education actually means to bring forth what we already intrinsically know, and that we have the same assumption in Buddhism that somewhere in there is Buddha.

[04:36]

And what we need to do is draw Buddha out to bring out the Buddha that's already there to educate. So that Buddhist education or Zen education Buddhist education can be various things. We have all the sutras and commentaries and hundreds and hundreds of texts about Buddhist education. And there's no end to learning about Buddhism. Absolutely no end. You can spend your whole life studying about the texts of Buddhism, and you find that when you start studying one area, it starts leading you off into another area, and then that area starts opening up bigger and bigger, and then you find something within that that leads you down another corridor, and then that starts opening up bigger and bigger.

[05:46]

Pretty soon you're in this labyrinth of learning Buddhism, which is wonderful. I mean, it's great. But it's putting information in your head, which is okay. Information is fine. But primary thing is to let go of everything. Zen, education in Zen, is let go of everything. That's the first requisite. So most education systems start from ignorance and work their way up to knowledge. And even in Buddhism, we start from ignorance and work our way up to enlightenment. But in our practice, we start from enlightenment.

[06:51]

Our practice begins at enlightenment. doesn't work toward anything, but only refining our enlightenment. So, the beginning, everything is at the beginning. The whole thing is at the beginning. When you first step into the zendo and sit zazen, it's all right there, but we don't recognize it. So recognizing our true face, so to speak, is realization. So realization means to realize something. What do we realize? We realize what's there. We realize what we have.

[07:53]

That's called realization. So when we first begin to practice, it's different than most places you go to learn something, because we're not handing out information, we're not asking you to study something, we're not particularly friendly. We are friendly, but not particularly friendly. We're not giving you something that you can... to mislead you. Actually, we're there for everyone. That's a practice, actually. When you have mature practice, it means you're there for everyone. But the old saying, you know, you can lead

[08:58]

a horse to water, but you can't make the horse drink the water. The drinking has to be done by the horse. Sometimes you open the horse's mouth, squirt a big... if the horse is sick. But nobody wants to feed horses, you know. Who wants to do that? If they want to eat, they eat. If they don't want to eat, go away. Do something. Find out what you want to do, horse. So, when we come to the zendo, there's just, you know, cushion, and you sit and face the wall. Some people understand it right away. Some people don't understand it at all. Some people understand it a little bit, But mostly, when we come, we don't know, really know what it is that we're doing.

[10:11]

Except that we know exactly what we're doing. You know, when you sit and face the wall for the first time, you know exactly what you're doing. But you don't know anything about it. And you don't necessarily believe it. what your mind, what your intuition tells you. Sometimes we do, but for most people we don't understand it, we don't allow ourselves to believe what we really see. So it takes time to, after the initial opening up of our perception, to come up to where our perception actually is. It's like, sometimes we have insight, wonderful insights, and insight is like a curtain opens up and you suddenly see everything. And then the curtain closes, and you're looking around for the entrance.

[11:22]

I saw that, but I can't find the entrance. kind of like open sesame. If you have the right word, the door opens sesame, the door opens, then closes, but you can't find it after that, unless you have the password, open sesame. And so we spent, you know, a long time coming up to that initial opening, finding a way to that revelation, I think we all have some kind of revelation, otherwise we couldn't continue practicing. Something opens for all of us at some point, but it doesn't necessarily stay with us and we can't necessarily be one with that perception.

[12:30]

So we spend a long time practicing in order to not find that perception, because the perception itself is like a dream after it's over, but in that direction of that perception. And at the same time, that we're looking for that perception, for that, what we might call Kensho or enlightenment or awakening. We're actually walking on top of it, you know, it's like a thin veil, like a street. And we study, we do various things to help us

[13:57]

to develop, I guess you'd say, develop our... from that perception. But the goal that we have, you know, the kind of path that we have, it comes right back around to that original perception, which is to be an absolute beginner. When we sit down in Zazen for the first time, our mind opens up, because we don't really know what Zazen is. We have no idea about it, no conceptions. Sometimes we do, but... So our mind is not in a knowing or conceptual mode, and our experience is very direct.

[15:10]

But at the same time we're in a kind of sea, you know, kind of lost in a sea, because even though there's some direction, a little bit of direction. In order to continue, we need to have some kind of guidance so that we don't misconceive what we're doing and so that we don't fall into some perverted way of practicing. In this story of the professor, it's not criticizing professors, but it's very obvious, obviously talking about letting go of any kind of idea we have.

[16:26]

Any kind of idea we have about what what Buddhism is, what Dharma is, what Enlightenment is, what Kensho is, what the goal of life is. You know, everything, what he's talking about is taking everything away. And we keep practicing until that finally happens. So we have an initial opening. which allows us to begin practicing which gives us some faith in practice that's from the beginning of when we sit and then we practice for a long time with doubts and ideas and opinions and until we come to the point again of nothing not knowing anything and that's like

[17:31]

the next step, which is really the original step, but it's mature. But it's because of the practice, the effort that we put into our practice. But it's hard to get to that place for a lot of people, because we really want something We really have an idea about wanting to get something. And the idea we have of wanting to get something, or to know something, sometimes we think that enlightenment is knowledge about everything. When I'm enlightened, I'll know everything. We have that idea. That's just a materialistic viewpoint.

[18:41]

Wanting to know something is just a materialistic viewpoint. So materialistic viewpoints are a big hindrance to enlightenment, even though materialistic viewpoints are also included in enlightenment, but to have an idea of enlightenment from a materialistic viewpoint is strictly delusion. So it's a kind of bind. We want to practice and have enlightenment, but if you want to practice and have enlightenment, you can't have it. You want it, but then if you don't want it, what is that?

[19:47]

So either way, it's a bind. So it's a big koan for us. If you say, I do want it, that's honest, but it's materialistic. If you say, I don't want it, well, that's very nice, but it's not honest. So how will you approach this? So in our practice, we need to have some guidance. And we need to know, you know, check on ourself.

[20:51]

How are we doing in our practice? And so it's important to... There are three... There's several areas of our practice. I don't know how many, three or four. One is sitting zazen. Another is studying. Another is listening to Taisho. And another is working. And another is having doksan with the teacher. So I want to talk a little bit about doksan with the teacher, or interview, or whatever it is. The style that we have of doksan, doksan means face-to-face, one-person-to-one-person interview.

[22:03]

And in a certain idealistic sense, Say, in the Rinzai school of Zen, it means that your teacher gives you a koan, and you come in to the dokusan room and present your koan, present your understanding of the koan. And then, if you have some kind of dialogue with the teacher, and the teacher sends you away every time because you don't understand the koan, dokusan maybe lasts two minutes, or five minutes. But in our style of doksan, usually lasts about, average about 40 minutes. And we talk about various things. Sometimes we look at your practice as a koan.

[23:09]

Sometimes we look at your life as a koan. And I try to point out to you what the koan is in your problem that you're having in your life. I don't try to solve your problems for you and I don't try to give you answers but I try to help you to see what your real question is. So sometimes people come with a question and we'll talk about your daily life, your problems in your life. Sometimes people come and want some psychological help or present their life's problems in a psychological way. And sometimes we just, it's just nice to see somebody and we just laugh or cry or

[24:16]

But we're always trying to get down to, what is this? Sometimes people come to me, I don't have a question. I don't have any question. Fine, you don't need to have a question. What happens when we look at each other or when we come together? Usually somebody who says, I don't have a question, means there's a question under the surface of their mind which is covered over and they can't think of it because it's so meaningful to them. That's quite usual. If you feel, I don't have a question, usually, maybe you don't, but usually there's some question which is underneath the surface of consciousness. And when you say, I don't have a question, that releases your, it opens up your mind so that the question can come. I don't know is always a real opener.

[25:24]

I don't know is empty mind. Whether you present it as that or not, it's always empty mind. I don't know. And in the space of I don't know, anything can come up. It just opens up a whole area of what's the question. Sometimes, you know, if you have a lot of stuff on your mind and you'd like to talk a lot, it's hiding the question. Sometimes we're very verbal or very erudite or knowledgeable. You can't really get a deep question. Sometimes I'll give a person a koan, which when I see the right opportunity, I'll say, that's a koan.

[26:40]

you recognize that and work on that as a koan. I don't usually give somebody a koan from a book, from the Blue Cliff Record or the Mumbaikan, sometimes, but that's not my style, or our style. Style is to see the koan in your life, Koan means to come to the fundamental point of what your life is about in both a relative and absolute sense. So sometimes people talk about life and death.

[27:44]

Sometimes they talk about the problems that they're having. Sometimes they don't understand what practice is about. Sometimes, just come and talk about your posture, or about your breathing. For new people, or anybody, actually, those kinds of questions are very good, because they're focused on dharma, in a sense of something simple. Certainly so, but everything is dharma. You know, everything in our life is dharma. In Genjo Koan, the opening statement is when all dharmas are buddhadharma. So the point is to be able to see all dharmas as buddhadharma. And all of the problems in your life

[28:44]

as through the spectacles, through the glasses of Buddhadharma. Then, you know, we have some way of understanding our suffering. It all comes back to the First Noble Truth. What is our suffering? ill at dis-ease, or unsatisfactoriness, or frustration. You know, life has got this quality that it's never settled. As soon as we start to settle it, it all falls apart. So we're always in a kind of transition of discomfort.

[29:47]

How do we settle with that? How do we deal with that? That's what Buddhadharma is about. And it has to do with how we approach our life through desire, through self-centeredness or materialism or spiritualism. Anyway, there's an unsatisfactory quality to our life. And no matter how nice we make it, there's always a fly in the ointment, you know. There's always something. How do we deal with that? So, you know, who are we?

[30:53]

That's the basic koan is, who are we? Who am I? When you get down to it. And sometimes I give people that koan. That's your koan. When we start looking at somebody's life and getting down to it, it's like, well then, who am I? That's right. That's the basic koan. Who am I? But I don't usually give I like to give people a koan, who am I? Because it's okay. Mostly, I like to give the koan of what am I doing? Because who, although who is a good koan, how is really more appropriate. How can I do something? What am I doing?

[31:53]

Rather than who am I? Because who am I is what I'm doing. Who am I is completely connected and inextricable from what I'm doing. So if you know what you're doing, then you know who you are. But if you try and figure it out from who am I, you stop doing something and just become introspective It feels like, who am I? You can do it introspectively. You can analyze your whole being and come up with zero. You can take yourself completely apart and come up with zero, which is the analytical way, which is fine. But, what am I doing is more active way. And if you know what you're doing, in a real sense, you know who you are.

[32:59]

So either way, you can come at it from either way. So what am I doing is mindful practice. Practice mindfulness practice. What am I really doing? What's really happening here? over and above what it looks like. Above what it looks like is the skin, you know. Skin, flesh, bones and marrow. But the skin, you know, is also important. The superficial aspect of our activity is just as much a part of reality as The deepest marrow. So skin, flesh, bones and marrow. All equal.

[34:05]

So you can know who you are from the most superficial task that you're doing. Sometimes we know who we are when we sit zazen. That's the marrow. And sometimes we know who we are when we're playing cards with somebody or on the Ferris wheel, drinking wine and laughing. But our koan should be with us all the time. It's something that you never forget. What am I doing? And of course, a real life is to lose yourself in what you're doing, right?

[35:12]

You can, if you completely lose yourself in what you're doing, the koans already resolved. There's no inside or outside. No self-consciousness. So It's helpful for me if the members have doksan once in a while. It's good to have doksan once in a while. How is your practice going? How is your practice going? Oh, well.

[36:17]

So I would like to invite those people who, newer people, and especially not to feel intimidated by doksa and to see it as a kind of opening rather than sometimes people come and say, oh I'm so frightened or I'm shaking. So the idea of coming to see a teacher in Doksan is, well, you do have to think about what you're doing. And when you think about what you're doing, in a way that it sets up a kind of intimidation for yourself. And in a sense, that's good.

[37:18]

Because you have to really think about what you're doing You have to think about your question and what kind of response it will bring. So you do get a little bit intimidated. But I don't want you to feel that I'm intimidating you. And you don't have to have a question particularly. But I think our first doksan is just to get acquainted. It's a good way to get acquainted. And not to feel that... Well, I won't tell you how to feel. Feel the way you want to feel. But it's good to get acquainted that way. And then to find out how to continue. Because it helps your practice. And it also helps me to know you.

[38:20]

Do you have any questions? What's the confidentiality? To what? Confidentiality. Confidentiality? Well, for me, I never talk about to anybody else what somebody talks to me about in Doksan. It's completely confidential. And sometimes people talk to other people about what they talk to me about in Doksan. But I don't think that that's a good idea. Although, if they do it, I'm not going to tell them not to. or I'm not going to criticize them for it, but I think it is a kind of confidential way of act.

[39:36]

And it should stay that way. Yeah? How do you do that? Well, there's a sign-up sheet on the bulletin board. I'm not a bulletin board, but in the porch. community room, just as you step on the porch, and then you see where, usually it's every morning, and Monday evening, starting from 4 to 6.30, and you can sign up in one of the spaces. But I'm thinking of putting in some arbitrary times to give more space. on certain consecutive days, but just arbitrarily, days that I can manage to do it more in the afternoon, because I think that a lot of, there's so little opportunity in the afternoon, I think we need more space.

[40:40]

So, I want to do that. But that's how you do it, just sign your name, and then you come on time. Try and be on time, although sometimes, you know, if there's a half hour or so of, time to talk to a person, we go over a little bit, so you have to wait sometimes. So, just be patient. I think you need to say where to go. Oh. There's some instructions by the way. Yeah, there is. There's an instruction sheet that tells all that. That little hut in the back there is my tux on hut. So you just go over there. And knock on the door. I'll ring a little bell when I'm ready. And you come in. Suppose that you go and you are about on time and you see that there's somebody else there. You would knock on the door to let you know, even though you know you wouldn't be going in?

[41:45]

You could. Yeah, if it looks like things are going rather late, that might be a way of winding things up with somebody. But usually people wait. They see the shoes, two pairs of shoes. It's not so easy to wait sometimes. Sometimes people have to pace. It's the usual dog song. Because of the situation here, we don't have a waiting place. It's closer to there, right? But usually, in Dogsan, people wait in Zazen. Four or five people will wait in Zazen. And they just stay in Zazen, you know, until it's time for the next person. So there is no time limit like I have. So I try to do it in a certain amount of time, but usually there's no time limit.

[42:48]

And people just wait until... Or almost. Well, I missed that one. Almost. Anyway, yeah, you could give it a little knock. Yeah, knocking is only for the afternoon or in the morning as well. In the morning as well, because sometimes people come in before I'm ready. So it's better to not. There's also, at various times I've seen you posted newsletters, opportunities to talk to senior students. How is that like or different from those of you?

[43:50]

Well, I've asked Mailey and Fran to have talks with people. It's called practice instruction. They're not the main teacher, but they can help you with your questions and your practice. Give them a call. They're good people to talk to. They've been around a long time and they have a good sense of practice. And they can help you with just about most of your stuff. I highly recommend both of them. Jai Shreem Brzee, Jai Shreem Brzee

[45:04]

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