giving my talks on the eight aspects or eight characteristics of an enlightened person. And today is the last one. I'll read you what the eight are, the eight aspects are. Having few desires is one. Knowing how to be satisfied enjoying serenity and tranquility, exerting diligent effort, not forgetting right thought, practicing samadhi, cultivating wisdom, and the last one is avoiding idle talk. And it's interesting that the last one should be this avoiding idle talk. Avoiding idle talk is your actions.

[01:10]

It's the result of all the others. The word idle has a feeling of still, or lazy, or useless. but it has many connotations. I think in here the word idle means that which is not useful or that which does not lead to any place or which leads to dead ends or So Master Dogen says, having realization and being free from discrimination is what is called avoiding idle talk.

[02:19]

To totally know the true form of all things is the same as being without idle talk. And then he says, Buddha says, when you engage in various kinds of idle talk, your minds are disturbed. Although you have left home, he's talking to the monks, and are still not liberated, although you have left home, you are still not liberated. Therefore, you must quickly abandon mind disturbing idle talk. If you would like to attain the joy of the extinction of delusion, you must first simply extinguish the affliction of idle talk. This is what avoiding idle talk means. And he uses this term, affliction. And the extinguishing of delusion.

[03:25]

Talking comes very easy to us. Our mind is continually chattering, even though we may not be speaking. If we're not speaking to someone else, then we're speaking to ourselves most of the time. And sometimes we're actually thinking. And sometimes our thought is directed, but so much of the time, our mind is really just kind of chattering away and often going around in loops saying, you can see this when you sit zazen. When you sit zazen, it becomes apparent. The action of the mind becomes quite apparent. And you see how the same thoughts are recurring over and over again. And you see the patterns, how they weave in and out of your thought.

[04:38]

And you see what's actually useful and what's not, and what's beneficial and what's not. And then we feel the need to express ourselves Some people are content to not speak so much. And some of us feel a compulsion to speak a lot. And some of us have a compulsion to speak all the time. And it's interesting when you have a group of people who are talking together, and then suddenly the conversation, for some reason, just comes to an end. And there's this silence. And everyone feels at a loss because of this silence, which is wonderful silence.

[05:45]

And the silence says so much. And yet, we feel that we have to say something in order to keep the continuity going, even though it's meaningless. Just say something to keep the thread moving. I think with Zen students, when the silence comes, you should be able to appreciate it. Oh, finally, we don't have to say anything. And it's OK. But Dogen says, having realization and being free from discrimination is what is called avoiding idle talk.

[06:49]

Being free from discrimination. Discrimination means to divide. To discriminate is to divide and compartmentalize. So in order to describe the world to ourselves and to each other, the world which is one piece, actually, we divide it up into smaller pieces in order to make sense of it. So our mind is continually dividing and analyzing and describing. And this is called discriminating. The mind is continually discriminating. And because the mind is continually discriminating for many reasons, we tend to overlook the unity

[08:03]

of all the discriminated parts. So we're seeing always from the point of view of this discriminating mind. And the discriminating mind is called saying things from the point of view of partiality. taking a particular standpoint and having an opinion about how things are. And then we're continually expressing our opinions about how things are, whether that's true or not. And you see how often we try to express our opinion as if it's the truth.

[09:05]

Truth is omnipresent, but very hard to see. It's the one thing that's so obvious, and yet so hard to see. So our talk often becomes divisive because of its discriminating, the discriminating way in which we see things. And we're always comparing this with that, black and white, yellow and red, good and bad, right and wrong. And it's very hard to use words which unify or which harmonize. I made a little list of words which are beneficial.

[10:09]

And beneficial words are helpful words. But sometimes we try to be helpful. It's very difficult. Sometimes our helpful words are more harmful than helpful. Helpful words. are words which are not coming from our own need to satisfy ourself. Beneficial words or helpful words are words which are not coming from a self-centered place or an egotistical place. If we look at why we do helpful things, we should look and see, am I doing it really for others or am I doing it somewhat for myself?

[11:16]

How much of self-interest is involved in helpful words? It all comes back to what is Buddhadharma? Buddhadharma is basically seeing how to alleviate suffering, how to get rid of suffering, how to not create suffering for ourselves and others. how to realize that there is no I or mine within nirvana, that I and mine are the basic causes of suffering.

[12:20]

If we understand the basic causes of suffering and uneasiness or dis-ease or unsatisfactoriness, we realize that it all stems from the notion of I and mine. And our words either come from the notion of I and mine, which is self-centered, or they come from the place of no I, or nirvana, which are unifying and helpful. So what is helpful? What is helpful in a fundamental way and what is helpful in a patchwork way?

[13:24]

Helpful words, useful words, gentle words, harmonious words, carefully crafted words, compassionate words, penetrating words, truthful words. These are words which come from... I say nirvana because nirvana is not some mysterious place. Nirvana takes the place of self-centeredness. When there's no self-centeredness, there's just naturally nirvana. That place which is called emptiness is actually also called nirvana. So in Buddha Dharma, emptiness and nirvana are the same thing.

[14:35]

And interdependence is also the same thing. So interdependence takes the place of self-centeredness. When I let go of I and mine, then everything becomes myself. And this is where helpful words come from. This is where truthful words come from. This is where compassionate words come from. Where helpful words come from. So one sees into the heart of things. In Buddhadharma, there are four, in the precepts, there are four precepts which deal with speech.

[15:49]

One is not to lie and to tell the truth. And the other is not to discuss the faults of others. and not to appraise yourself at the expense of others or to blame others, and not to disparage Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. And then there's also not a precept, but And there is a kind of precept which is not to disturb the harmony of the Sangha through false speech or through speech which is divisive. So then Dogen says, to totally know the true form of all things is the same as being without idle speech.

[17:25]

Well, what is the true form of all things? True form of all things is no special form. This is the true form of all things, no special form. And yet, everything has its own particular form, but only for a moment. Everything has its own Dharma position. Complete, but only for a moment. Next moment, a little different. Next moment, a little different. Nothing stays the same from moment to moment. This is the true form of all things, no special form.

[18:28]

And yet, all the forms are the forms of this thing, this it. When we understand the true form of all things, then we have correct speech. Because the true form is not centered on myself. And our speech comes from the center of being, rather than just from the head. So Dogen, you know, talks about speculative talk and bragging and this kind of speech where you want to impress people with your knowledge and your understanding.

[19:36]

In Buddha, If you're a teacher, Buddhist teacher, it's recommended that you wait three times, wait to be asked three times before you start to speak about the Dharma. Not to just kind of rush in and express your, try to express your understanding to people in order to impress them, but to be kind of dragged out. and asked many times before you actually say something. And then to say something that you can verify yourself, not just to talk about Buddhist ideas or Buddhist theory or Buddhist doctrine, but to everything that you say should be verified by yourself. As one teacher said, if you don't have the understanding about what you're talking about, it's just like a baby singing love songs.

[20:55]

Well, babies can sing love songs, but actually their little voices are love songs. And also, I think it's important that when we start to talk, are we disturbing somebody's mind? I heard a long time ago, when I was a kid, that in India, people are not supposed to honk their horns when they're, this is a long time ago, when they're driving down the street, because they might disturb somebody who's meditating. So we should be careful about how we intrude on people's thoughts or on people's minds with our speech, just because we feel we have to say something.

[22:14]

When you're with me, in some way, please don't feel that you have to say something. I'm perfectly content to mull over my own thought processes, which I can continue continually grinding out, being ground out. And I will do the same for you. And of course, sometimes our most powerful speech is silence. There are several famous stories about silence, but Vimalakirti, you know, the famous lay man in Buddha's time, who matched his understanding with all of Buddha's great disciples and

[23:36]

Perfect Wisdom Bodhisattva came to inquire about the Dharma from Vimalakirti. He just sat silently. And it's called the thundering silence of Vimalakirti. But that's a little extreme, but very potent. So this is an important way, important expressions, how we speak. And not to just use something that's such a powerful tool in such an idle way. You should realize the value and the power of speech.

[24:45]

and respect it and respect each other and try to make our words useful and not egotistical. So I would like to give you a chance to speak and discuss this And you don't have to be too careful. Yes? We hear weak ego is a strong ego. Yeah. And I would think a weak ego is somebody who has lost a sense of I and mine. But not somebody who has run. Well, you know, ego, in the sense that you're talking about it, Someone may be afraid to speak or not easily motivated to speak out of fear or out of weakness.

[25:59]

That's a little different. That person should be encouraged to speak out more. When someone is very reticent, we always encourage them to speak out more. And when somebody's too full of themselves, then we encourage them to take it a little easy, right? Calm down, don't talk so much. Put more attention to zazen. So there's always this balance. And then there's the norm. The norm is actually what Buddha Dharma is about. which means having the right balance and knowing what's appropriate at the right time and having the confidence to speak at that time and having the confidence to not have to speak at the right time.

[27:05]

So yes, some people are reticent to speak. That's not nirvana. Weak ego is different than no ego. But I just want to say another thing. There's always some sense of self. As long as we're alive, there's always some sense of self. Not weak ego or strong ego, but what's useful as ego is important. So that ego knows its place. The problem is our ego gets out of place. It gets expanded or contracted and doesn't harmonize with all the other aspects of our person, persona.

[28:07]

So it gets distorted and out of place. That's the problem. Somebody else had their hand up. Charles. We like to think that So even though we may think that one identical road is better than another, and then change our mind and take the other one that's really better, we can just let go of that before we tell the world which road is really better.

[29:12]

Well, I think the non-discriminating mind sees the qualities of each road. Even though they're identical? No two things are identical. But sees the intrinsic quality of each rose, no matter what it's like. And then the discriminating mind chooses, oh, I like this rose better than that rose. But before thought, it's all equal. And this is the non-discriminating mind which sees everything is equal because it appreciates the different qualities of each thing and doesn't compare them. And thought is what starts to compare things. And then thought gives rise to I and mine. I like, I don't like, this is mine, it's not mine.

[30:16]

And then the whole problem of discrimination starts. Barbara? When my mind or any person's mind, I believe, feels divisive in its own self. Anything that anybody says to me, I will use that to be divisive or to be agitated with. And it may not be so much the intent of the person that is speaking to me, it's in my how it is that I receive it. Exactly. And so then we use of the people that we're with as targets or as objects of our venom.

[31:20]

Am I reading you correctly? Am I reading you correctly? Yeah, except for, you know, I think that I'm concluding that everybody has to be more responsible for the keeping of their own mind. Yes. And even in the Sangha that we cannot blame another person for our own divisive or disturbed feelings. That's right. Because whatever happens to us just happens. And the way we receive it and the way we respond or react is a process of how it is that we process. That's right, yeah. And so we can either take something in and process it in a way that is like we take in the venom and we process it into honey or into nectar and that's what we respond with.

[32:38]

Or we can take in the venom and make it into poison, even more poison, and react with that. Or we can take in honey and turn it into venom. Yeah, but we don't want to do that. Honey is a little bit too sweet. Well, that's right. We really communicate with body language and with attitude. I can look at any one of you, any one of the students here, and immediately, just through attitude, know where they are. And most of us can, after we get to know each other pretty well.

[33:42]

And as soon as I see somebody, I go, oh, something's changed. Just tell right away. That language is very communicative. And it's more communicative in many ways than verbal speech, which tends to obscure or give second-hand information. But that immediate perception is very telling. have been who have a designation of having a mental illness. And I'm thinking about, I've been looking forward to Rohatsu and thinking of it as a way that I get away from my regular life and get quiet in time. And in our community meeting at work yesterday, on this community, at the town's hospital, a man who was schizophrenic and someone we've probably seen walking around the streets in Berkeley,

[34:53]

And much of his conversation is loose and delusional and he couldn't figure out what he was saying. Very clearly he said, well, part of the way we do it is we introduce each person who is quiet in there. And he said that he'd stop taking his medications and that his voices were driving him crazy. He'd go into the hospital so he could get quiet inside again and get back on his meds. It's funny because the response is laughter, and it's true, it was funny, and yet it's amazing to sit in a room every day with people who have been defined as having a mental illness, which they do, and yet see how much the processes are just at one end of the spectrum that's very much what we all go through every day. and are different than our internal voices have a great deal in common, but are just more extreme.

[36:06]

I don't know if it's a matter of degree or a matter of... It seems to me that, you know, with poetry, you seem to approach the mysticism which would be really non-discriminatory. But any time that you're using speech, it has its denotative. Speech in itself is discriminatory. In other words, it doesn't seem to me that you can escape from discriminatory mind in speech or in values.

[37:08]

Because, you know, I was talking to, each theology is somewhat closed. It has a value, a discrimination. words are a game in the lyrical now. As you speak, you draw your ladder up into silence. And also in the Jewish tradition, the reason they don't spell out God is because God is not manifest. It's in the mystical world. So the only way we're going to Well, you know, we should be careful though.

[38:17]

You know, Kali Giriraj used to say, just shut your mouth and sip. Sip still and keep your mouth shut. But, and that's good, but on the other hand, you know, speech is necessary. So, and, but we should understand what speech is so that we can use it. Even though it's dualistic, we have to, you know, be able to appreciate it and respect it and use it in a way that's not divisive or dualistic or discriminatory and make that effort. David? Thank you especially for that last comment. in our practice and deservedly so.

[39:18]

So sometimes we have to take the risk of saying something that doesn't feel so harmonizing or that actually does interrupt someone's samadhi in order to say something that we think is the truth. Even if we're wrong or if it's painful to say it, we still have to take that risk. Yeah, that's different though than being divisive. That's different than being divisive. That's being corrective. So we should always leave space for corrective speech. But I don't think divisive means trying to divide the Sangha, to actually make antagonisms. And that comes from various, various reasons people do that. Yeah, intention.

[40:58]

To try and speak the truth, or to clarify something, to get it out, even if it's not perfect. That's one thing. If the motivation is to harm, or to divide, or manipulate, or get something from oneself, It's not a clarified motive or selfish motive. Yeah, that's right. But you have to say to speak the truth or to attempt it is not divisive in the same way. It's not intended to divide, but to break back together. Yes. Einstein pointed out that the most persistent illusion that we have

[41:59]

is the notion of a past, present, and future. And all contemporary physics agrees with this. It seems to me this introduces a bizarre quality to human experience, and gives everything not only a mysterious quality, but an enigmatic quality. This almost negates the possibility of reason. And yet, at the very same time, physicists believe not in events, but in observations. And so, in a sense, they transcend human experience. How does this fit in with the notions of discrimination and human experience? I don't know about transcending human experience. What we're concerned with is human experience. Of course, the physicists are human and they have experiences, but what I'm just saying, what I'm trying to say, attempting to say, is that just human experience in its brute form and brute awareness of one event after another and one event preceding another, what does this do to

[43:18]

human experience in its most innocent form. Like bringing his mind, for example. Well, there is a state beyond human experience. Pardon? There is a state beyond human experience. But I can't answer your question. I think that what I have to bring it down to us, like, what is the root of suffering? Pardon? What is the root of suffering? To me, that's what we're, that's our basis. And how that, what your question relates to that is where I would come from. It's to compete and so forth.

[44:41]

It's all as good as evil. You have a bunch of educated dummies that have to have all this time A simple person can be very aware, know what's going on, but can't put it in words. It would have to be like Jesus, put it in parables. A person is so complex to understand. Yeah, well education, too much education in certain ways can actually obscure truth and reality and get us further and further away from the fundamental.

[45:45]

And we have to be careful. I was at a conference of scholars and practitioners, Buddhist scholars and Buddhist practitioners, the last couple of days, Wednesday and Thursday. And the last speaker was Robert Bella, who wrote this book, Habits of the Heart, and he was roundly condemned for writing this. He's a sociologist. Roundly condemned by the academicians for writing a book that actually has meaning. It expresses meaning in life. And the way the academic community is going, that cynicism expresses the highest intelligence. And that anything, any kind of expression that has meaning in it is considered lowly.

[46:50]

So he said the universities, in this country universities have only been active for about 150 years. We have colleges. What the university tradition is, used to be, was to express theology and humanities and the meaning of life and to carry that tradition. And now the tradition is to demystify and particularize and to reduce everything to nothing. It's a little bit like Abhidharma, a little bit like Buddhist Abhidharma, to reduce everything to its constituents, to actually no self.

[47:52]

But there's meaning in it. And so he said, if you ask scholars in the universities, like, what is the meaning in what you're doing? They'll say, don't ask me. So, meaning is not being taught. What's being taught is cynicism, basically. I'm not saying it's always true, but there is this overriding aspect that is very dominating in the universities. And the Buddhist scholars, they're reflecting the Buddhist scholars, which is a small segment of the academic world, and somewhat isolated from the rest of it. And they feel that they have to be very cynical about what they write, and they do. When you read a lot of these books by the young crop of Buddhist scholars,

[48:57]

which I know quite a few, their analysis and their writings are all very cynical. And I say, well, when we teach religion, Buddhism in the classroom, we can't say that we believe in it. That would be totally, you know, and so they're in a kind of bind because a lot of them do. A lot of them, but they, but, you know, if they start, what we used to call this, the Marines, you know, in the old days, when the Marines were in China, some of them would desert and go into the country. They would call that going Asiatic. They'd just get lost. So the scholars can't afford to let that happen.

[50:02]

Anyway, it's time to end.

[50:11]

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