So has everyone made the acquaintance of our new dragon? It's really wonderful and kind of intimidating to sit in front of for the first time. So this is a gift from a friend of the Sangha on the occasion of the Year of the Dragon, which I think has just begun in the Chinese calendar in February. And I've forgotten, does anyone, someone know the name of the calligrapher? Yeah, as a contemporary calligrapher from Japan and that's a dragon and I think that it serves to remind us that the dragons are with us and very much in our midst and in fact they're within us and we're all dragons and

[01:08]

So part of what I would like to talk about today is how to be a dragon, how to find that place in your Zazen practice, and then what responsibility flows from that. I mean, why be a dragon? you could be some other kind of being. But I think there's something helpful about thinking of yourself, daring to be a dragon. The last, oh, six weeks or so, I feel like I've had two, I've traveled a little bit and had two significant experiences that maybe don't fit together so nicely but in my life it does.

[02:21]

I'll share them and we'll see where they go together. In early February I was in Thailand and I had a meeting to attend and then spent about a week along the Thai-Burma border, basically bearing witness to the lives of refugees and displaced people, mostly ethnic and tribal people, who have been pushed to the edge of their country and over the edge into Thailand by a despotic military regime in Burma. And I've been there, I've been to the border four or five times. This particular time was, was very powerful.

[03:26]

Um, possibly because I was better able to accept what I saw and, uh, also possibly because we were fortunate to go with somebody who had some resources so we were able to respond to meet some of the needs. But the needs that we met were just a small, the smallest portion of the kind of help that people need just in their daily survival and also in their quest for for democracy and freedom and human rights. Actually, I brought my photographs and I'd be glad to show them to you, share them with you afterwards if you'd like to see them. But it's a large responsibility to go to some place like that or to go into our own neighborhoods and bear witness to

[04:38]

suffering. And as one is doing that, to watch the flickering and turning of one's mind, to watch the point where you can really get with it, really be present, and than the strange fact of mind that turns away from staying present, that veers from it, sometimes with no discernible reason that you can really make out or make a case for. In the presence of refugees and displaced people, sometimes the pain is just momentarily too much. And so we bring ourselves back as we do in Zazen.

[05:43]

We go away, we notice we're away, we come back. I think sort of parenthetically, one of the powerful experiences that I had this time It was just a connection that I hadn't quite got before. I was trying to ask, why am I called, you know, why am I called to witness this kind of experience, to be with these kinds of people? What does that bring forth in me? And I realized, oh right, not so long ago, less than a hundred years. My own grandparents were displaced. They had to flee Russia and Eastern Europe. They were fleeing pogroms. They were fleeing, being forced into the army, which is some of the things the people in Burma are fleeing.

[06:53]

In that understanding, I realized that I had been making a basic separation, that I had been thinking of these people as refugees and me as something else. I come from, we live here in a fairly wealthy, privileged country. I live under, in circumstances of privilege, and I forget sometimes that that passed, those experiences are, boy, they're not very far back there. And I suspect they're not very far back there for many people in this room. And we're fortunate in our lives. But we're not so far from these kinds of experiences. And so they resonate. So that was one. significant experience.

[07:59]

About a week ago, I returned from a seven-day Sesshin in the state of Washington on Whidbey Island with a Japanese teacher, Shoto Harada Roshi, who is a Rinzai teacher. Our school is energetic and out there in their Zazen anyway. And yet, the forms are, everything is a little different, but pretty familiar. One of the major differences, we're all doing Zazen, we face the wall, they face in. This is not I don't think it's like suffused with a lot of deep meaning, which way you face. You can make a story about it, but the fact of the matter is at the end of a period of zazen, your legs hurt whether you're facing the wall or you're facing in.

[09:12]

And you do the same thing with your breath. You do the same thing with your mind. And so it was just a place to go to sit seshin. And I feel like I've been very fortunate in that Sojin has allowed me and encouraged me to go sample other kinds of practice. I think he has enough confidence. On the one hand, I think he has enough confidence that I'm not gonna get, you know, pulled into this or not shopping around. On the other hand, I think he knows, as many of you know, that my understanding is kind of limited, and it's not false modesty, and that I need all the help I can get. So going someplace and getting another kind of input or another kind of teaching, I find it very useful.

[10:22]

It was a very powerful experience. It was wonderful. I just sat every period of Zazen and I was struck by a couple of things that I'd like to share with you and talk about. One was that in the Teisho, in the formal lecture that we had daily with Hirata Roshi, what he was coming back to again and again, they put a lot more stress on realization or Kensho, some experience, some direct experience of emptiness than we do. We don't talk about it so much and we frame enlightenment as what is manifest in just the very fact of us sitting down to do zazen.

[11:28]

But what Hirata Roshi was saying, he was asking, what's the purpose of this enlightenment or this realization or this practice? And he said on a bunch of different occasions, is then to bring your realization back into society, that we live in society, and that the question that flows as the responsibility from any realization that we have is, what can we contribute back? And the the answer to that is what we can contribute first of all is our wisdom to whatever degree we have it. And this was very deeply moving to me because I had never actually heard a Japanese teacher say

[12:40]

Talk about the purpose of realization. Really the purpose is just the same as the first vow that we'll take at the end of this lecture. Beings are numberless. I vow to awaken with them or I vow to save them. But sometimes that has that kind of almost like a recitative quality. We don't get it in our bodies. And when somebody comes at it from another angle and says, well, the purpose is to contribute to society, and society is a society of beings, it's like, oh, right. And it was very moving to me to hear a very vigorous and rigorous traditionally oriented teacher emphasizing this. And then what he was doing throughout Sashin was showing and demonstrating

[13:53]

what the quality of realization is in our activities, in our zazen, and what we can do so that we have something really strong and useful to offer as a contribution. And that contribution is also, of course, to ourselves. I forget who was telling this story, but It might actually have been Ellen, I'm not sure. Someone was driving with their daughter and, is that right? Yeah, and was getting really wound up about all the traffic and just getting irritated. And at one point, daughter turned and said, but we're traffic. No?

[14:55]

Not you. Could have been. Or it could have been me. But we're traffic. But we're society. How we conduct ourselves, how we carry ourselves, the attitude with which we face the world is the attitude with which everybody, everyone is then affected and touched by that. That was what was being taught. And so I'd like to sort of go back now to, with that as a kind of framework or setting, go back to Zazen, because that's the place from which our realization and our practice proceeds. And so let's do something. Settle yourself and close your eyes and take, I'll show you how to do this, take three or four very long deep breaths.

[16:13]

Take, put the breath, build the breath from your belly or your hara or your Tanden or your Tantien, they're all the same places, kind of the place below the navel. Fill it from there on up through your whole body. Take a big breath. While you're doing this, position your tongue behind your teeth and your upper palate and breathe through your nose and then let it all out. And when it's all out, stop breathing and sort of contract your respiratory system a little more and let some more out. And then, you know, don't get caught running out of air. Just take another breath, even if you need to take a breath quickly and then do the same thing.

[17:16]

So let's do three or four breaths like that and make them as long as you can. When you get to the bottom of your breath, let a little more of that air out. Get all the stale air out of your body. So what I'd like to suggest is that every time you sit down to Zazen, you do this as a way of settling yourself into your practice.

[18:40]

What I noticed was even though many of us know this instruction, it's the way Mel always gives Zazen instruction, I realized I wasn't doing it. It's like a corner to cut. So the thing that I'd like to recommend to you is don't cut any corners. Why cut corners in zazen? This has a physical effect, settling your body into zazen, and you can think of it in a way as equalizing the air inside and outside your body. It's beginning to create a merging of those two. So I've been doing that. I did it all through Sashin and I've been doing it here. And I realized the places, the cutting corners, like when I sat down here to begin this lecture, I was just about to

[19:49]

like this and start, and I realized, oh, wait, I could settle myself by just taking a moment and having a few breaths, taking three to 10 breaths. And it focuses on our breath. And it also focuses on the tanden or the hara. To begin, it means that you can begin each period of zazen by finding some strength in your body. And it's not actually so easy at first. It's not easy for me to have a nice long very long, slow exhalation. You know, I see where my muscles are weak, where my breath is weak, but that's a good understanding your weaknesses is a really good place to start.

[20:55]

And that the weaknesses that you have now are not always there and that they can be transformed. You can also think of it as beginning the process in zazen of drinking everything down. Whatever thought or sensation comes to you, you just drink it down, and then you let it go. You drink it down with your breath, and then you give it back out with your breath. That way you're always returning to this strength in your hara. And when we sit up, we concentrate on our posture, and we sit in an open way, in a strong open way, then this part is open to the world.

[21:59]

If any of you have children or around children, watch them walk. They walk in this amazing open way. My chiropractor yesterday described to my dismay my posture, you know, and she showed me quite graphically kind of the curve and the protective, subtle but protective, hunching and bowing over. And she said, you know, why not just put your shoulders back? And that is what we're trying to do in Zazen. And we keep this place open so that we can really experience the world and experience our bodies and that meeting place. I had a, as you settle into zazen, you can really try to stay with your breath, whether you're following, whether you're counting your breath, which is excellent, counting it on the exhalations, or just following it on the exhalations.

[23:23]

Do that for a while. I mean, I think most of us are or should be doing that. The other, what I'd like to warn you about, and all of these warnings come from my own experience, don't drift. Don't just, we're often talking about, if you read some of the books, we talk about chikantaza, or just sitting. And I think that At times, I've personally confused for myself, Shikantaza are just sitting and drifting. Drifting is actually a waste of time. And all of the texts that we read give this admonishment, don't waste time. They don't tell you what you're supposed to do with that time, but they say, don't waste it.

[24:26]

You have to figure out what's not wasting it. But when you're drifting, you're wasting time. You're not doing yourself and you're not doing all beings the service that you could be offering. And so if you find yourself drifting, really return to this breath in a very conscious way and put some strength there. So I was doing that during Sashin, trying to do that. And sometimes enjoying it, sometimes not enjoying it, sometimes it was easy to do. Often it was really hard to do. And at times I found even when I was really enjoying my breath, I found as I was saying about bearing witness in Thailand, kind of mind veering away, I found my mind veering from the breath, just turning away for no good reason.

[25:34]

And I would think, wait, I'm enjoying this. What's the deal here? Why do I turn away? In Dokusan, with Hirata Roshi, I basically asked him this question. And he would engage you very, very strongly. You'd sit there, much as we do in Dokusan. And he would just kind of observe me for a while. And he would look right in my eye. And so I would try to look right in his eye. You know, really make very direct eye contact. And as with the breath, what I found, which was really interesting and perplexing, I found that there were sort of a flickering of consciousness that turned away from that intention and that attention.

[26:36]

Like it was too much to, it was very hard to stay present. And I thought, oh, he must be seeing this. And he probably was. I don't know. But then I went. Later, I went and found a mirror and tried to do it with myself. And it was interesting. It was at least as hard. And I felt like I couldn't see the actual, it wasn't like I was blinking or my eye was turning. It was something really about consciousness that was turning away. And I couldn't see it in my eye. He might have been able to see it. And that was pretty interesting to me. And I went in, in Doksan, and I said, well, what is this? Or how is it that it's so difficult to stay present? What he said to me was, your edge in Zazen is not ripe.

[27:48]

There's more energy and focus that one could be bringing to it. And I said, well, so how do I help ripen this edge? And what he said was, do not give a single thought to the future. And I think that's one of those sentences that will stay with me for the rest of my life. It's like, don't think about lunch. You know, don't think about when the period's going to end. Don't think about your children who are at home. When you're in Zazen, try to stay in the present. And when you, you know, when you do have a thought of the future, you kind of, you drink it down and you give it back.

[28:53]

But he didn't stop there. He said, do not give a single thought to the future. And then there was kind of a pregnant pause. And he said, we're all going to die, which is kind of the weightiest thought of the future that we might have and the thought that we really want to turn away from. And then he didn't stop there either. This really got me. So then he said, you and I will never see each other again. This was like the third day of Seshin. It was not what I planned on not seeing him again. He said, you and I will never see each other again.

[30:01]

And then he rang the bell. In that style, they ring the bell, you're done. You bow and go. And so I went and I just thought, Wow, does he know something? Does he know something about me? Does he know something about him? It made me nervous for like the first 10 minutes. But it comes back to this very simple and straightforward issue of Not giving any thought to the future. If you don't give any thought to the future in your zazen, then you can really have strong zazen. Any thought. Usually the thoughts are fairly mundane. This means not drifting.

[31:03]

It means settling your breath and body and posture. And watching. I mean, for me, I watch with bemusement the thoughts of the future that arise. There are a lot of them. They're in the realm of desire. They're in the realm of escaping what's happening in the present. But as I said, it's ironic because sometimes the present can be just... I mean, I can think of it as just fine. It's always just fine in a way. But I could actually be enjoying it and find myself turning. So watch yourself. doing that. I mean, everybody is not me and doesn't have the particular consciousness or things happening, but I think that there are some resonances here for many of us. So watch that, and when that happens, you know, just drink it down or bow to it.

[32:03]

Give it back up with your breath and return to your breath. Try to put some energy in that focus. And as you do that, I think you'll find that that gives energy to your life. And whether you have some big experience of realization, some big taste of emptiness, or whether you have the kind of slow ripening practice realization that we that we practice and talk about here, the wisdom that you have from that focus, from that not being lazy with yourself, but taking this matter as a matter of some urgency, will give you an energy and a vision so that you actually can

[33:05]

make a contribution. By settling yourself, you make a contribution, and then you also have energy to contribute back to society, back to other beings in different ways. But it begins here. It begins if you cut the corner, if you drift, if you allow yourself to think a lot, plan a lot, then as you're in society, as you're with other beings, you will probably have a very hard time staying present with them. And that will really impair the gift that you naturally have to offer. And impede the transmission and the reception of wisdom between beings.

[34:13]

That's kind of our natural mode of communication. So I think I'm going to stop there and You know, I'm just thinking a lot. It was a really powerful experience to be there and to feel some of this urgency. And I don't want to lay that on you. On the other hand, I really do want to share it because I think that, well, I've seen myself do too much drifting. And there's a joy in getting down to work. And I'd like to share that joy with you and I'd like people to be able to experience that for themselves. So it's time for some questions or comments. Joe.

[35:14]

Thank you very much for your talk. I very much appreciate your honesty. Most of what you talked about Yeah, I think that that's also having a thought of the future or having a thought about the way you want something to be rather than the way it is at that moment. So it's a very, when we talk, I was reading in a book called, I think it's called Zen Training by Sekida.

[36:15]

So when we're constantly following your breath, there's this interesting double process, that on the one hand there's an element of concentration, and on the other hand there's a very wide acceptance. The way Pema Chodron puts it, which I think is really neat, is that about 70% of your attention is on your breath, or 80%, I forget what number she ascribes. So it's not just a single-pointed concentration. there's a pointedness, but there's also an openness that takes in whatever is going on. So if you're trying too hard, then you're wanting a certain effect or a certain accomplishment or a certain result. And so you can just look at that wanting and step back, but return to just No special kind of breathing, but just place it in your body someplace.

[37:18]

You don't have to make a big effort. So speak to that. Thank you. I want to tell you, I thank you for your time. And I thought before you were talking about drifting, I was really pertinent, and I was wondering if you had any other ways of elucidating how you can tell when you're drifting. How do you perceive drifting? When you find yourself in a story or in a plan, then you're drifting. You know, your mind is going to be, there are all kinds of things that happen in here. You'll hear things outside. You'll hear the rain or the wind or somebody walking by with a boom box or you see shadows. Those things are not so much drifting. But when you start creating a story, you find yourself creating a kind of narrative in your mind. That's what I mean by drifting. You know, it's like sitting here and doing menu planning or, you know, is that what you're doing?

[38:21]

Or making up a story about the person who's sitting next to you. That's what I mean by drifting. You can't stop. Thoughts will arise and sensations will come in. That's fine. That shouldn't impede you. But just don't get caught in a story. And usually when we're having a thought about the future, well, it's not about the present. It's a story that we're telling. If you pay attention to the present and stay with your breath, you know, then you find the strength of dragons. Then you're a dragon. You have energy.

[39:25]

You have the energy to meet the world fearlessly. Dragons, for the most part, aren't afraid of anything. And that fearlessness comes from being settled, really settled in your body, settled in Zazen. Thank you for helping me bring that back around. I sort of lost sight of that. But that's the dragon nature. And I feel like This is an exhortation to us. Mel sort of put it up there. There are lots of other places. Well, there's some other places. There's not lots of other places anymore that he could have put it, but he put it right here as a kind of exhortation. Nancy? Could you say something about how that subtleness and that urgency from the sashim has now permeated

[40:30]

I can say one thing which is interesting is I'm really trying to look at people and be aware of my mind and aware of, and this is my particular personality. It's not everybody. There's something in me that sometimes the intensity of looking at someone is too much. And so I'm trying to stay with that. and really look and not just look away, you know, when it, you know, unconsciously when it gets too much. So that's one thing. And other aspects, I'm just trying to really renew my work with my breast. And that happens when, you know, even walking around and, you know, I'm still, there's still a lot of work to do and a lot of processing.

[41:47]

I find there's a lot of difference between looking and seeing for me. And that's whether I'm looking at people or looking at artwork that I'm working on. And I wonder if you can say something about your own experience of that, of looking and seeing. I think one is an active and one's a more passive process. And there's a place for both. sometimes you need to really look, which means looking, I don't know, I'm just thinking off the top of my head, looking that way, like say when I was sitting in Doksan with Hirata Roshi, he was looking at me, I was seeing him look at me, but I was looking at him. It was an active, a very active process of meeting his energy.

[42:52]

So it was like an energetic projection outwards. Seeing is stepping back a bit. Seeing is more like, okay. In this book by Sekida, he delineates two kinds of samadhi, positive samadhi and absolute samadhi. Positive samadhi is like the samadhi of concentration, the samadhi of working on koans, the samadhi of following your breath. It's the samadhi of going forward. Absolute Samadhi is the Samadhi of Shikantaza. To me, that's more like seeing. That's more like complete receptivity. So, actually, what we're doing is always a blend of those things. And that the balance is different at any particular time. Does that make some sense? Yeah.

[43:55]

Because sometimes I find it's much easier to look flavored by my desire. And to let all of that, and to really see and be receptive. Right. So, we have to find these balances and find out how to work how to work with them and find out what's appropriate. And always we want to be concerned with what's appropriate at any given moment. And sometimes the active principle is appropriate and sometimes the just, the receptive principle is appropriate. And they're never exclusive of each other. We have time for maybe one more. Ellen? And you clarified in my mind why that wasn't possible, because it really was the energetic need.

[45:11]

I was thinking of it as a feeling, it's not really exactly a feeling, but it's not a visual thing either. No, no, it's not a visual thing. The eyes, it's not really visual, it's energetic. Yeah, I think that's right. Yeah, it was flawed by looking in the mirror, but at least I could see. It almost felt like my eye was infinitesimally turning, and I didn't see that. But still, there was something else that was turning. Watching our consciousness that way, in that kind of minute way, It's very useful. It's really a way of turning inward and paying attention. Well, let me stop here. And thank you very much. And I'll just see if I can find a place if people would like to see some of the photographs from Thailand.

[46:13]

I'd be happy to share them. So, thank you. Kings are numberless.

[46:25]

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