I vow to taste the truth and to talk it to its roots. Good morning. When we are sitting Zazen, there are several conditions, I guess you'd call them, that lead to discomfort. like the pain in your legs, or the pain in your back, or something you forgot, or the thoughts that are always coming into your head which you can't stop.

[01:09]

So, Here is a case to contemplate that has no introduction except the one I gave you. I haven't talked about this case for some time, so maybe some of you haven't heard it. This is called Joshu's Newborn Baby. Joshu, of course, is one of the most well-known Zen masters. He lived to be 120. I think he started practicing when he was 60. But who knows? Who knows? So, here is the main subject. A monk asked Joshu,

[02:20]

Does a newborn baby possess the six senses or not? This could be also construed as, does a newborn baby have the sixth sense? There are six senses, eye, hearing, seeing, smelling, tasting, touching, and consciousness. Discriminating consciousness. Discriminating consciousness, which is the sixth sense, which discriminates between the spheres of sense. So the sixth consciousness says, knows, oh, this is seeing. Consciousness of seeing or consciousness of hearing, consciousness of tasting, touching, feeling.

[03:24]

So those are the ordinary or the first six senses. So the question is, does a newborn baby have these six senses or the sixth sense? So I'll talk about that a bit. So Joshi said, it's like throwing a ball onto a swiftly flowing stream. Then later, the monk went to Tosu, and he asked Tosu, what is the meaning of throwing a ball onto the swiftly flowing water? Tosu said, moment after moment, non-stop flow. And then Setjo has a verse.

[04:29]

He says, the question, the six senses, purposeless, well acquainted with it, the masters, a ball thrown into the rapids. Do you know where it goes? Where is it going? In order to explain this, to talk about this case, I have to explain a little about the the consciousnesses, the eight levels of consciousness, a little bit. I've talked about this many times, but I'll go over it. I mentioned the first six senses, and of course, in order to have consciousness, there has to be a subject,

[05:39]

There has to be an organ and something that the organ relates to in order for consciousness to arise. So we say, I see the ball. Well, I don't see the ball, the eye sees the ball. The eye sees the ball. The ball is something seen and then consciousness arises and then something is seen. If consciousness doesn't arise, nothing is seen. If the object isn't there, it's not seen. And if there's no I, it's not seen. It has to be three elements. So, actually, what sees is consciousness. The mind is simply a... I mean, the I is simply an organ which transmits information to... Consciousness and consciousness names. Consciousness will name it, say, oh, that is a ball.

[06:52]

And the reason that that is a ball is because when I was a little kid, someone told me, that's a ball, and I believed him. And I believe that ever since. So my consciousness became my consciousness. because I knew that was a ball. And when I said that I knew that's a ball, that planted a seed in my eighth consciousness, which is called the alaya vijnana, the storehouse consciousness. Vijnana means consciousness. The storehouse consciousness, which is the repository of all the seeds of our actions. So every time we have done something, no matter what it is, a seed is planted in the alaya consciousness. The alaya consciousness is like this big seedbed, and it doesn't have a mind of its own.

[07:56]

It simply is a repository of the seeds of our activities, and when there's a cause, the seeds sprout. So this is what produces habit energy, or the energy produces habitual activity. Because as we do something, the seed is planted, and then when it's watered, and the conditions are right, the seeds germinate. And so we keep planting seeds, and the seeds keep sprouting. This is called conditioned co-production. And it's termed the wheel of life because we keep producing activity which produces seeds, which sprout, which produce the same activities over and over and over again.

[09:00]

And this is how we get caught by attachment. where we become attached to this activity and we can't get out of it. This is what Buddha's talking about, is the cause of suffering. One of the causes of suffering is not being able to get out of our habitual way of creating problems, suffering. So, causality, this is the basis of causality. the effect is in the cause, or the effect is, even though it's in the cause, maybe down the line somewhere, the fruit will mature of our activities, either immediately or down the line. So the alaya vijnana is somewhat responsible,

[10:06]

all of our potentiality. And it's the way that karma works. So, when we're not careful, we participate in inactivity which keeps creating these seeds which perpetuate our karma. So the question here, the monk is asking, he knows about this, so he's asking Joshu, does the baby have the sixth consciousness or the six when the baby is born, it's just totally open, right?

[11:14]

So, what he's saying actually is, does the baby have discriminating consciousness? Baby doesn't discriminate. You know, it puts whatever he wants into his mouth. It tests everything and tastes everything. Well, I kind of like this, even though you wouldn't like it, because he hasn't learned not to like it. So, baby's totally open. So, are these sense consciousnesses, are they working or not working? Is the sixth sense consciousness, which is the discriminating consciousness for telling one thing from another, working in the baby? Well, yes and no. But it's really not about the baby. It's about the Zen student.

[12:16]

Does the Zen student, discriminating sixth sense, sixth consciousness, does the Zen student have the sixth sense consciousness, or is it what's going on there?" And immediately, Joshua says, it's like throwing a ball on a swiftly flowing current. throwing a ball in a swiftly flowing current. If you have ever studied the 30 stanzas of Vasubandhu, where he talks about these levels of consciousness, he says, the alaya vijnana is like a roaring torrent that never stops.

[13:21]

It's not permanent and it's not impermanent, but it's continuous. So sometimes, sometimes we sit in zazen and we think, gee, I can't, no matter how hard I try, you know, I still have all this stuff going on in my mind when I'm sitting zazen. It's like standing by the shore and watching the tide come in, you think, I wish the tide comes in, no matter what I do, I can't stop it. Or you're standing in a flood and six feet of water and you think, gee, no matter what I try to do, I can't stop it. Well, no, you can't. So rest easy. You can't stop this flow of consciousness. It's continuous. The mind, the seeds are continually popping.

[14:28]

And we sit there and think. And then as we think, the seeds are popping and they're being deposited and they're popping and this flow is going on all the time. So what do we do about that? Is that good or bad? Is it right or wrong? So, over and over again, Zen students come to me and they say, well, my Zen Zen, you know, my mind is just going on and on, bothering me, just going on and on. And I always say, don't let it bother you. If you're bothered, then it's a problem. If you're not bothered, it's not a problem. So how do you not be bothered? You can't ignore it, and you can't become attached to it.

[15:35]

I mean, you can, but how do you not become attached to, how do you let go, not of the thoughts, but how do you let go of your attachment to your thoughts? When you're sitting Zazen, this is the whole world. The whole universe is right here. Even though there are all these other things going on in the world, death and destruction and wars and all kinds of things are going on in the world, and you're sitting right here and thinking about, how can I deal with this stuff that's going on in my mind? No matter what you do, that will always be going on. All the things that are going on in the world will always be going on. I don't say, don't do something about it. Yeah, do something about it.

[16:36]

But right now, this is what's happening. This is your life right now. So how do we let go? How do we not be attached? How do we find baby mind? We cannot become a baby again. That's too late. You cannot be childish, but you can be childlike. They're two different things. I think I talked about this once at Tassajara, and I said something like innocent, and somebody really challenged my term innocent, but I think innocent is a good term. means something like without guile, are free of conceptions, and free of opinions, and free of that which drags us down, or that which holds us down, which holds us back.

[17:52]

To regain that I don't like to use the word purity, but I will. There's a, someone, gave me a calligraphy once and it said, the cool wind blows through the empty hall. What a great calligraphy, you know, what a great saying, the cool wind, the cool breeze flows through the empty hall. You know, we are transmitters.

[19:01]

We're like a kind of transmitting station. Stuff comes in and stuff goes out. And stuff passes through, just passes through. But a lot of it we collect. We're great collectors, we're pack rats, you know, pack rats of consciousness, of thoughts. Someone said, we have six mouths that are continuously eating, the mouth of the eye, the mouth of the ear. the mouth of touch, the mouth of fragrance, smelling, and so forth, and the mouth of consciousness. And so, as not just material things, but all the mental stuff that flows on, you know, we can pick and choose.

[20:07]

But we're very greedy for this eating through the senses. The senses are continually wanting food. And the habit energy, the seeds that are produced, create this desire for stuff, for feeding the senses. Really hard to deal with. So how do we allow the cool breeze to blow through the empty hall? When something comes through, do we need to hold on to it? Do we need to grasp it? Do we need to tuck it away in our closet? So The monk later asked Tosu, what is the meaning of throwing a ball onto the rapids?

[21:14]

And Tosu said, moment after moment, nonstop flow. How do we let that flow be free? So Zazen is the activity of letting the flow go on freely. without collecting anything or keeping anything or using anything that flows through consciousness. Someone said, and this has happened before, since I'm a writer, I get these ideas in Zazen, and so I start thinking about them, and I don't know what to do about that. So I said, well, get a little pad of paper and pencil and then write down your thought in shorthand, just some indication so you wouldn't forget it. And then just continue to do zazen so that you free your mind.

[22:19]

This is not my own idea. This is actually something I read a long time ago of Hashimoto Roshi. It's a little book about Zazen that we used to read. In the old days we had no books about Zazen. And that was kind of a wonder of a little book, very good too. He said, if you really need to, you know, get rid, to relieve yourself of some thought, Suzuki Roshi said, dazen is like going to the bathroom. Just write it down and then continue. So I don't want everybody to get it. Bring your computer. But free your mind.

[23:24]

It's not like, you can't get rid of these thoughts. You can, you know, you can really put yourself in a position where it's possible to get rid of thoughts. It is possible. For some time, you know, there are yogis who are probably pretty good at this, but Zen is not being a yogi. Zen is not rejecting thoughts and not clinging to thoughts. When a thought appears, there it is. This is your life, right in front of your eyes, the life of your imagination that is, right in front of your eyes. Oh, next. Oh, next. Oh, next. Oh, this one's really good. Next. Oh, this one's really bad. Next. So how do we stay where we are in this moment with whatever's there?

[24:33]

Does the newborn baby have the sixth sense? So you are the newborn baby being born moment by moment. This is what sadhana is, actually, being born moment by moment, being born and dying moment by moment, in nirvana, which means no birth and no death. Totally, moment by moment, being reborn in the realm of no birth and no death. That's the koan. How are we reborn moment by moment? in the realm of no birth and no death. As Dogen says, there's no nirvana outside of birth and death, but nirvana in that sense means no birth and death.

[25:41]

This is what we're always working with, all the time, when we think about, well, what is my life and what is my death? And yours as well. What is this thing? So, in Zazen, moment by moment, it's like we just experience the flowing the ball flowing on the current. Where is it going? Where is it going? Well, the question, here's Cedro's verse, the question, the six senses, purposeless, well acquainted with it are the masters, meaning Joshu and Tosu. A ball is thrown into the rapids. Where is it going? Do you know?

[26:46]

In the understanding of the Yogacara school, in the Ilankavatara Sutra it talks about the eight levels of consciousness and the four wisdoms. and how the levels of consciousness are transformed into wisdom. So, the alaya vijnana is the seedbed of consciousness, and all the consciousnesses, the various levels of consciousness, are related to it, as well as to each other. And the sense consciousnesses are doorways to the alaya, and the alaya is the access of activity flowing through the sense organs.

[28:22]

I talked about the sixth level of consciousness, which discriminates between the various senses and the laya vijnana, but in between those two is the seventh one, which you know is manas, which is ego, or the false sense of self, consciousness, consciousness which arises through grasping and attachment. and it's called myself. The Buddhists have located the ego. Oh, there it is, it's the seventh consciousness, which is a kind of consciousness which has a function, but its function becomes distorted, because its original function is to send messages between the Alaya Vijnana and the other consciousnesses. So, this is the messenger, this is the link, is self-consciousness.

[29:34]

But self-consciousness expands and takes over, and that's called ego. Oh, you're so egotistical, means that your self-consciousness thinks that it's real. You think that I'm real. My self is real. And that's why it's called false consciousness. It distorts the true reality and then all the other senses become, consciousnesses become imbalanced. So how to harmonize, actually, is to reduce, how to harmonize the consciousness is to reduce the activity of self-consciousness to its proper function, instead of taking over.

[30:45]

So when ego takes over, we say, when that consciousness takes over, we say, boy, that guy's really egotistical, right? Big sense of self. which is false. And so you put a pin in it and it goes pew. Zazen is to let go of the seventh consciousness and allow it to perform its function. So, and Zazen is the receptor of Buddha's teaching. When we sit in Zazen, we're receiving Buddha's teaching. Because Buddha will give you pain and pleasure and thoughts and all kinds of stuff. And unless you know how to deal with all that, you can't be comfortable.

[31:49]

You can't find the harmony of body and mind. So how do you find the harmony of body and mind? Well, by letting go of ego, which is so persistent that we don't even know what it is. But it's discrimination of like and not like. Basically, discrimination between wanting and not wanting, liking and not liking, good and bad, and so forth. When you let go of all that, you can be comfortable, no matter what's happening. So Zazen forces you to do that because there are no alternatives except to give up ego.

[32:56]

Zazen is the washcloth that you squeeze your ego out of. And then you stand up and the whole world looks different. At the end of the day, the whole world looks different, of course. not because you're letting go of your conditioned responses and the way you see things. So you may say, I had a terrible time during that session, you know, nothing but pain, but you had a great time. Most beneficial. So we can't judge, oh this is good and this is bad. As soon as you start doing that, you're already lost. As soon as you start judging and applying values, you're lost. So when you start doing that, let go of doing that.

[34:00]

Just be there with what's there. So the ball is flowing down the stream. but at the same time, where are you? We have these eight consciousnesses, eight levels of consciousness, which are experiencing something, but there's no I that's doing that. as my old teacher used to say, is just painful legs sitting on a black cushion. Just be one with whatever is there.

[35:06]

Let go of judgment. Oh, this is good. Oh, this is bad. Oh, I really like this. This must be it. Uh-oh, it's not it. I used to think when I was first, oh, there are the sharks eating my legs. And you go through the litany of, let's see, maybe God will help me, maybe. And so you pray to every deity that you can think of, but nothing helps. Nothing helps. There you are. Now here I am. That's it. And with total acceptance. But the only way that there can be that total acceptance is when the seventh consciousness, manas, is very small and just doing its work. It's called, what I call, true humility, which I've been talking about a bit.

[36:13]

True humility means not thinking you're more than you are, not thinking that you're less than you are, just knowing who you are moment by moment. The question, who am I, is a false question. The answer to who am I is, this is who I am, even though you don't know. This is who I am, but I don't know who that is. If you don't know who you are, then you really know who you are. So, do you have a question?

[37:27]

Yes. Yeah, that's right. So, no one's free of karma. No one is free of karma. We say even Buddha's, even Shakyamuni's residual karma is still haunting him. Nancy? I was thinking of, I remember sessions where we were admonished not to write, and I felt so disappointed about that. No, not to write during the lecture. No, no. During lecture, I thought, but no, during Zazen. I remember that. But what I did during then, I found that there are always good thoughts.

[38:34]

I mean, you know, I mean, and the one, if you really have a hot one, it can wait until you can do your your shorthand during the break, real quick, because so many seem good, and there's always more coming. That's right, there's no end to the stream. I don't mind not writing down like that. If I were to start, I'd just be, you know, right next to somebody. Then you're not allowed to write. You're welcome. You got two in a row here, but I don't know who else to go first. Well, there's feeling and then there's emotion. And e-motion means to move the feeling.

[39:45]

Motion actually means motion, e-motion, move the feeling. And then you can have a big feeling, you can have a little feeling. So feelings, although they're wonderful, and they also are connected with intuition. more gut connected with intuition, but they're still in the same realm as thoughts. So we say emotion thought, which is a hindrance, but it's only a hindrance when you become attached. It's not a hindrance in good or bad about a thought or there's no good or bad about an emotion, there's no right or wrong about it, there's only how do you either let things come and go or become attached to them.

[40:57]

So the problem with emotion is not emotion, the problem is our attachment So therefore, emotions and thoughts are unstable and they arise like mushrooms, they're not dependable. Like, I can have a thought about somebody, it's wonderful. And then they do something, or I do something, or I find out something, and, oh my God, what was that? This goes on constantly. So emotions and thought are unstable. They're not dependable. So that's why we don't take them up. People say, well, gee, I love my emotions, I love my God. Good, but that's attachment, and it's not what we're doing. It's not right or wrong, good or bad, it's just not what we're doing.

[42:00]

What we're doing is Azam. That's all. And anything extraneous is not part of that. I mean, it's part of it, but don't get attached, because everything will run through your life. So we call that the scenery of Zazen, or the scenery of your life. Scenery of your life is the scenery, you just kind of watch it like a movie. And you can enjoy it, but then it's like the train going by, you know? Oh, wasn't that nice? Oh, look over there, the mountain. Oh, there's Mount Fuji. Oh, look, there's no clouds. And then you go by and that's it. but you have. Yes. Well those I don't, that anxiety happens every time I go to sleep.

[43:25]

Well, just when we have anxiety, to experience anxiety, when you try to get yourself free from anxiety, then you're creating more anxiety. It's the same thing, when we try to escape from our pain, we're just creating more, we make the pain into something more than it is. But if we just settle with the anxiety, just let it be there, then you're not creating an anxiety about your anxiety or when you try to escape from it or get away from it, it makes it bigger than it is. Anxiety is one of the worst things, plus breathing, those two things together are a double whammy.

[44:53]

So I'm talking about an attitude, I'm not talking about a method. But I remember Suzuki Roshi also talking about a man who had a heart attack and he was dying I mean, he was really, he couldn't breathe, you know, and Suzuki Roshi is saying, well, if he knew what our breathing was like in Zazen, he could have been more comfortable, basically. You don't mean that there isn't room for discernment? No. Oh, no. Because if there's feeling like you're not breathing and, you know, calming yourself down and letting go, and there's recognizing, you know, I fell off a raft one time, early in my practice, and there were rapids, and I was lying there, closing my eyes till I saw them, and everyone was terrified, because I was getting carried away.

[46:01]

I mean, you weren't, do you know what I mean? I mean, there is discernment, so there's times when action is required. Well, action is always required. and non-action are required at the same time in everything. Non-action doesn't mean not doing anything. It means while you're doing something really totally, you're not doing anything. And when you're not doing anything, you're totally not doing anything totally. I'm terrified every time this happens. And then some of it is just irrational anxiety. So you learn that if you just let go of that and you breathe through it, it's okay. And other times, there's something real that you need to take another kind of action. Well, you might not take a pill. Yeah. You know, sometimes it's good to take a pill for anxiety.

[47:04]

And the reason why is, it's like if you have a headache, Take an aspirin, because your headache will continue to make more headache. And if you just stop the headache, it will stop the karma. So pills are good. I don't say you should get attached to them, but they help. I wanted to just bring up the subject of intention. I guess, and this is kind of along that same line as Ben, is that as you approach anything moment to moment, as you approach living moment to moment, there's an underlying intention there. There's this debate of everything. Well, this is interesting because this is part of the question of where does it go.

[48:29]

When the commentators talk about it, the question is, hurry up or you won't be able to see it. So, although it goes, It's like there is a time when it's not going anywhere, which will be my next talk, but although everything is supposedly flowing by, are not going anywhere at the same time. Right. That's right, so there are two sides to intention.

[50:35]

One is continuous intention and the other is momentary intention. The momentary intention comes out of the continuous intention. So in continuous intention, you always know what you're doing, even though you may not know what you're doing. Momentary intention is like dealing with things as they come up. One is constant intention, and the other is momentary. And it's one thing. So that's why the constant or continuous intention is the most important, because then you can just do something without thinking, because your intention is always there, and it's always steady. That's enough, because we have to do a little zazen and eat our lunch.

[51:35]

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