Good morning. I think I know most of you, but for those of you who don't know me, and I don't know you, my name is Peter Overton. I began practice at Berkley Zen Center in 1969 or thereabouts. Then I practiced at San Francisco Zen Center for residing there in one of many places until about 1984. Since then, I've been living with my family here in Berkley. Currently, most of my involvement with Zen Center I thought I'd try something new today. I brought some notes, so bear with me. I wanted to kind of meander around this idea of practice in everyday life.

[01:16]

We somehow have the notion in Zen that practice encompasses In reality, of course, practice is a small corner, a small illuminated corner of a vast, uncharted universe. I just wanted to, I didn't bring a book to read from, but then when Greg asked me if I had a book, I thought of something to read. And thank you, Ross, for letting me borrow this. It's a couple of lines here from Suzuki Rush's book. He says, here he says, We should establish our practice where there is no practice or enlightenment. As long as we practice zazen in the area where there is practice and enlightenment, there is no chance to make perfect peace with ourselves.

[02:26]

So this business about practice in everyday life is something that we bump up against all the time in our study of Buddhism. And it comes up... Well, it comes up because You know, when we first come and practice zazen, it's kind of difficult. You know, you have to figure out how to sit. Am I sitting straight or not? Or, you know, how do I sit down? Or did I bow too low this time? Or these kinds of things. And then after a while, you start to become comfortable with yourself. And you start to, although it never seems quite easy, you start to develop a kind of approach to sitting or entering the zendo.

[03:39]

But then, oftentimes, what goes on later or at other times of the day or night, there's no approach. It's just, there's this unending torrent of events and confusion. And so it's a sort of, you know, experience seems to be sort of... there's a lot of imbalance, a lot of... a lot of confusion and difficulty in accepting that kind of experience as... as just the way it is. So, there comes up this idea of how... how we extend our practice, our approach to being with ourselves, our approach to... practice and realization when it comes to situations in which we're not in our communal sphere where we have everyone to support each other. When you're here, or particularly say at Tassajara during the practice period, you know, you get all kinds of cues all the time about how to come back.

[04:52]

Everybody helps everybody else remember to be mindful. You know, there's this whole question about being mindful. How do you remember to be mindful, Will? We have a lot of tricks in our sleeves, and one of them, creating a space like this, where we all have some kind of agreement about how to act, how to behave, how to lead, come and go, that helps all of us remember. Now, of course, People have been trying to do this for eons, in the name of Buddha, for 2,500 years. And so there's a very rich tradition of tools, of practices that help us in approaching our lives from the point of view that we try to establish here in our practice in Zendo.

[05:57]

And just to name some of the more obvious ones, there are the precepts, you know, a disciple of the Buddha does not kill, steal, lie, abuse sex, indulge in intoxicants. Another one is a disciple of the Buddha does not slander. You know, in my work, I'm a commercial real estate appraiser and I call people on the telephone all the time and ask them about their money. You know, it's a little bit like calling them up and asking them about their sex life or something. It's that, in that realm. And, you know, I used to hate it. And then I began to develop some way to kind of talk to people about it. You know, if I had the right kind of respectful, patient, interested tone, you know, people would get the message, oh, I can talk to him. And then I started to find it kind of works that, you know, you could actually have these very interesting conversations about this topic, you know, when you're on the phone with somebody who's not getting paid to tell you all this stuff.

[07:09]

And it was kind of like, I can't, you know, I felt like, oh, you know, being open about these things and being able to talk about them, this is really right on, you know. It's a kind of, it felt very consistent with the way I thought the world should work. Of course then, you always meet people on the phone who don't share that view. And particularly people from other cultures or who, you know, I mean the world of commercial with white men, and there is this culture that it feels safe to share this information, but other people, when you call them up, it's not a sign of openness and maturity, it's sort of a sign of stupidity to talk about these things. And so, I'll be talking to someone and you'll get the feeling that they're insulted, that you even brought it up.

[08:15]

How did you get this number? And suddenly I feel incredibly challenged professionally, culturally, personally. And when I hang up the phone, it's so hard to not slam it down and scream. I could just feel the pain. That's all that's necessary. It's very hard. But remember not to slander, not to spend the next five minutes abusing that person to your co-worker. after they have just made your life so painful. It's very hard. But, the disciple of Buddha does not slander others. It's a kind of tool to bring ourselves back to, oh yeah, what I was doing there was really, I just wasn't accepting what was going on there. I just couldn't have it. I just couldn't. Now,

[09:21]

We also have other treasures that help us. The Dharma. People have been talking about Buddhism. There's only a minute fraction of the discussion that's been written down. For us, over the years, it's been translated into languages that most of us can read. But we do. It's great. I mean, they're wonderful things that we've been able to study. In our study, of Dogen's commentaries or specific sutras or what have you, we meet together and talk. And even within that talk, there's a question of, I mean, on one hand, we're hearing these words and reading them and understanding them, reading them to each other, and there's another level in which we are trying to work with, you know, what we commonly call Right Speech, a one leg of the Eightfold Path, as it's called.

[10:41]

Right Speech involves listening so that, and kind of an acknowledgement that you don't understand what's being said. So you listen carefully, and then maybe you say something, and the other person listens carefully. And then there starts to be a kind of resonance of, well, what does that word really mean? Did you say, you said practice, what did you mean by practice? And you suddenly realize that you don't understand each other at all. And then you kind of come back and forth, and you begin to build by listening and speaking, listening and reflecting, listening and reflecting, you begin to build a kind of shared understanding about a word, just one word. But that creates a tremendous support.

[11:47]

creates a depth of understanding which in fact throws into relief how much we misunderstand each other. Just talking about some concept in Buddhism like that to the point where you can kind of have a mutual grasp of this idea. And of course, Sangha is one of our great supports. Of course, in reality, we mostly encounter Sangha at the practice place in situations where we're kind of working together in harmony, or perhaps disharmony. The case may be. In any case, as Sangha, we have an agenda, whether you're just out with a friend to have coffee, or you're here in Sashin, whatever the situation is, you have an agenda which includes these notions of right speech and right action, not lying, not stealing.

[12:54]

In other words, it creates a frame of reference. These ideas kind of challenge us to create this frame of reference that allow us to kind of go to the heart of the matter, to not be distracted by these, to not create confusions. And so, having this space with other people, having sharing this practice with each other extends in various ways to other situations. I just have this little note in here on faith, which I thought was a little extraneous. It just came up while I was thinking about this. You know, when we relate to a teaching like the precepts or the Eightfold Path or something that really strikes us in a book like Siddhiqui Roshan.

[14:00]

We sometimes feel, yes, that's just right, you know. And then we try and put it into practice. We try to realize it and sort of like to stay with it and to kind of see how is this going to kind of unfold and illuminate my activity. It's a little bit like you kind of have to take this thing on faith and say, okay, this is really, I think this really, yes, this really makes sense. But in our practice, faith walks down the sidewalk hand in hand with doubt. They're kind of like this. And this is what gives faith its power. It's walking hand in hand with doubt. The thing about Sangha, which is so valuable, is for myself to see, or for me to see what I'm doing or who I am, I need other people.

[15:26]

Other people show me who I am. You get just so much clearer view of that when you're with people who are committed to trying to illuminate things or to not allow distraction to be the focus. Now, I tried to kind of talk about some of the ways, some of the ways we've had from our traditions, some of the ways we develop in ourselves. I mean, I think that among ourselves and sort of little devices we have, you know, the image is very common in Buddhism, the raft you use to get across the water, and when you get across the water, you leap the raft and go on. So we have all these devices that help us

[16:28]

You know, and there is, of course, problems with that as well. I mean, the flip side of it is that we over-rely on them. We cling to them. As Suzuki Roshi says, when you go to, if you only practice in the place where there is practice and enlightenment, it's not going to solve your problems. I don't know about solving problems, but the There's this other realm of extending practice to everyday life, of encountering ourselves, in which the devices are not there at hand. You know, there's always these awful situations that come up in everyone's life. Or, you know, you're going to lunch with a friend and somebody shows up at work with a huge plate of your favorite food.

[17:42]

Or, you know, all kinds of things like this. Or someone just did you a wonderful favor, you know, and you did not thank them. You spaced it out. You're too busy thinking about yourself. And you suddenly realize, I need that person to do another favor for me. I need that person. Things like this come up all the time now. Where is practice in this situation? What happens? Well, part of the value of these things is they kind of bring you back to, oh yeah, yes. Yeah, if I had been a little bit, just a little bit mindful, if I had been somewhat aware, if I had not been totally fixated on my next desire, not even the one I'm experiencing now. I would have remembered to thank that person, you know, I would have, I would have, I would have kind of just met them, you know. So the situation, there wouldn't be this kind of karmic axe hanging over my head.

[18:43]

But these things come up all the time and they bring us back and in a way they're kind of a wonderful, they're so unwelcome. but they're also a kind of wonderful reminder. You figure out how to be open to this unpleasantness, this pain, this sort of revulsion for yourself. Anyway, just the openness to these things as they arrive. There's an old Zen story about the monk who stubs his toe. And instead of yelling, oh shit, he yells, where does the pain come from? But then, aside from situations that bring you back to practice, there's entering.

[19:49]

you know, the sort of maelstrom of life, this sort of sea of stuff. Sort of, okay, now I'm going to, we're going to, we're going to, we're going to, Buddha's way is happening now, we're going to do my life. Where are the pieces here? Where does it come from? And so it's... What's the approach? Is there any kind of approach to this when there's no sort of... what have you around, no idea of how to approach this or anything? This is kind of the most difficult and in a way the most wonderful practice in everyday life. How do you really go to the heart of the matter without forgetting a single thing?

[21:03]

Because if you forget something, two minutes later you trip over it. Now in a way, we learn different modalities of practice in different situations. I sometimes think it's sort of How things develop depends on what your particular problem is in that situation. For me, coming to the Zendo, it's sort of like, is my clothes clean or am I getting there on time? If I'm going to work, I'm sort of wondering, you know. Something else that I'm worried about, or at home, I feel like, well, my thing is listening. I have to listen to myself, to the children, to my wife. I should always be listening. And all these different elements are, of course, present in every situation, but there seems to be more of an emphasis depending on the place you're in. And you sort of learn how to do one situation, perhaps, that you encounter regularly, you know, and you get that sphere sort of life that sort of works, you know.

[22:15]

It's kind of neat. That gets in the air, and you get another one, you know, and another one, and another one. Pretty soon you have all these different spheres going, you know. But of course as soon as you kind of get these things all working and they have a kind of rhythm and they're in and of themselves sort of consistent and they kind of... then another one appears. So then you have three or four and then you get pretty good at that and then suddenly another one appears and then of course you drop them all and fall on your face. And then you kind of get up and say, well, let's just try two this time. So there's that kind of relating to this problem of practice in everyday life. And then there's these places in between, like there's the space in between the balls. And, you know, like riding on the bus is one of those in-between spaces. You know, the in-between spaces are very much like birth and death.

[23:18]

They're the spaces in which you don't really have anything happening, you know, you're not just going someplace. And they're kind of wonderful. You know, commuting is probably like that too. I think it is, yeah. It's, I mean, usually I think of my life, if I have my life arranged really well, I don't have any in between spaces. But actually it's kind of wonderful to have that space where nothing is expected of you except to, you know, not kill yourself. And you can kind of just have a little space to yourself. So, in a way, these in-between spaces are an opportunity to look into this kind of approach to our practice in which there are no rules or props or reminders.

[24:47]

where you can approach with a very sort of a radical simplicity without any kind, and also at the same time there's this sort of kind of illuminates all the details. You don't have to forget any of them because you're not going anywhere. You know, just being at the source with the whole world and finding finding, you know, it's just walking to work. And sometimes you can even feel that way when you're in the middle of your busy self, too, that you can kind of just go right for the ground, kind of enliven that fundamental aspect of your existence, without clouding up anything else.

[25:57]

The rest of that, the rest of the world is all still there, right in front of you. And it's very hard, it's very... When I... in Zazen or if I take that path, I kind of wonder why anybody would want to do this. It's so... Sort of overwhelming, painful, wonderful. It's just... It seems sort of unsustainable. And yet, there's nothing missing. It's pretty hard. But, uh... It's always out there, beckoning us. It's always... Lurking. waiting for a moment when we're not busy. That it might occur to us to consider how great life is.

[27:06]

I think I should stop and ask other people if they'd like to comment or ask questions or whatever. Yes? I have to get a video of this sometime so I can study it. I have to get a video of this so I can study it sometime. Thank you.

[28:06]

Oh, I see. I think the distinction you're making is between doing something as preparation as opposed to in and of itself. But of course, as you know, that although you can see it that way, and obviously you all experience that kind of You know, you can understand the difference between sort of getting up and not getting up, or getting up and sitting and not getting up and sitting. You can experience the difference between that, and so you know that there's this difference. But actually get up and sit, you don't approach it that way, do you? You don't get up to prepare for the day. You get up to sit.

[30:27]

Well, I get up to prepare for the day. I feel a difference between when I'm doing that and hopefully that I won't lose myself quite so quickly. I can see there's bad motivation. I mean, I feel that myself. But what I'm saying is that when you actually sit down, that disappears. Just as you say, when you, that, you know, this is not everyday life. I mean, I think that's referring to what you were saying, you know. So what, I guess what I'm saying is that, is that same attitude, you can, you have to figure out where that attitude is, where, how you can, how to, to enlighten that attitude or to bring it forth. you know, five hours later when you're, you know, in the middle of something.

[31:30]

Enlighten that attitude? Well, you know, you're doing something at work, you know, so bring that, to bring that attitude of, okay, this is not everyday life, this is, this is the profound turning of the wheel. of the Dharma right now. That's just one door to approaching this question of Zen in everyday life. Another door is when in the Zendo or around issues having to do with Zazen, sort of the opposite, sort of like just being open to this idea of not shutting off your thoughts.

[32:32]

Oh, you started obsessing about something in the middle of your sitting. Well, I'm obsessing about something in the middle of my sitting. That's what I'm doing. Let's look at that. Whereas maybe in the middle of a crazy situation, this is, you know, the heart of Zen right here. You kind of flip side of that. Yeah, I mean, when you remember something, sometimes in the middle of a typical situation, you can remember something that allows you, okay, just settle in. Well, the same thing with the word everyday life.

[34:03]

It's a good thing to talk about. It could mean average American life, or it could mean your everyday life. Yeah. And it seems to me if you do something every day, that's your everyday life. If you sit in the morning every day, that's your everyday life. Right. But it's not the average American life. Well, oh, I see. sort of like we imagine what average American life is, and kind of wonder whether that's Zen. And in some contexts, yes, it's difficult to imagine. But really, it's true, we really are talking about our own lives. And it really isn't an issue if you're not practicing. I remember this.

[35:20]

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