Welcome to BCC's Sashin Lecture. A few reminders. We ask that you keep your microphone muted. When it's time for Q&A, I will let you know how it works. If you need to communicate something, send a text message to me in the chat. Today's speaker is... And I'll highlight, Hosan, our abbot. The speaker will lead the chant. And unsurpassed, penetrating and perfect dharma, Israeli, even in a hundred thousand million kalpas, having to see and listen to, to remember and accept, I vow to taste the truth of the Tadagata's words.

[02:23]

Well, good morning, everyone. It's good to see you. It's really a late fall morning here in Berkeley. And I'm glad to be here with all of you in Sachin. This is the first day of our five-day online Sachin. and uh sishin as most of you know means literally to touch the heart the heart mind that is to essence to touch the fundamental in oneself uh which means to bring oneself to unity, to return to oneness.

[03:45]

So today and also tomorrow, I believe, is going to be continuous practice. There's the fascicle, the longest fascicle in Dogen's entry. is Gyoji, continuous practice, and I'll speak a bit more about that. And in the course of my talks this week, I'm going to pick up on what I was doing earlier in the year before aspects of practice, which is to parallel something that... we saw so often from Sojin Roshi, just for all the years that we practiced, he was again and again going back to his teacher as a source and commenting on talks by Suzuki Roshi on

[05:07]

In my McKinner's mind, or not always so, or the many unpublished lectures which we have in transcription. And so what I've been thinking about over the course of the year is the wealth of material that we have from Sojin Roshi and commenting on his lectures. We have, there are more than 2,500 lectures. They've almost all been digitized, which means we have a digital audio of his talks. And some have been transcribed, quite a few, but many, many more, much the majority, have not been transcribed. So that's something that's ahead of us.

[06:10]

And what I'm working from here today and this week are some of the lectures that have been transcribed and edited for use in his forthcoming book. Ron and Kika and Raghav have been putting together and I've been helping them and is just about actually ready to go to the publisher. So anyway, that's kind of what I'll draw from. But I wanted to offer a few suggestions first for how we do Sashin. Since our days are short online, I really invite you to how you spend your mornings and evenings.

[07:13]

We're starting at 7.50 and we end at 5 o'clock. And the session guidelines that Gary read after the first period, you not to read, write, or use electronic media. This may be beyond the realm of reality for all of us. Make a suggestion. The important thing is to keep Sushi in mind. And that's, of course, what we'll be talking about when we explore this matter of continuous practice. So your best to maintain the spirit of sashin, the spirit of continuous practice.

[08:15]

What you could do if you have hours stretching before you, of course, you can always do zazen on your own. But if you're going to read, read a Dharma book. Don't pick up a mystery or a diverting novel. Pick up a Dharma book. Maybe pick up a book that you've always wanted to read and gotten around to. And that's fine. That's actually also in the spirit of our practice, particularly in these shortened days. And I would say the same thing goes with any electronic media use. Keep it in the realm of Dharma. And if you can, avoid any unnecessary emails or texting, or God forbid, Facebook or Twitter.

[09:33]

And I think what you'll find also is how much a temptation it is, how much the pull is towards those media, at least for some of us. And also try to avoid unnecessary conversations. It's fine to have... that you have to have or, you know, quiet, polite conversation, but try to contain yourself in the spirit of continuous practice. So that's kind of my, that's my suggestion. And I do this myself. I promise you that. So in his fascicle Gyoji, or continuous practice, by its beginning, it says, the whole universe is the monastery.

[10:57]

And conversely, that means the monastery is the whole universe. So we may not be ready to accept the fact that the whole universe is a monastery, but in the context of our practice, like it or not, it is. And now, this week, the whole universe is our Zoom screen. And that's another thing that we may not be thrilled about, but it's what we're being given. So this is the practice that we have at hand right now. And continuous practice means meeting whatever is at hand with the mind of practice.

[12:05]

Taking care of it. taking care of, you know, I just see all these wonderful faces in front of me. I keep the gallery view on because I don't need so much to look at myself. But I am moved to see all of your faces. And that's my monastery. And in this moment, That's my universe, the universe that we're right now. So I'm going to turn to one of the lectures that Sojin gave. And this was, I think all the lectures that I'm going to reference were lectures. And this one was taken

[13:12]

from the sixth day of a Rohatsu Sashin, and I'm not sure what year. You know, and he says, we've been sitting zazen, doing kinyin, eating meals, serving each other, which I really wish were the case, but that will come. And he says, moment after moment, we've been dealing with our silent dramas. dealing with our not-so-silent traumas, with our complaints and our doubts. This is continuous practice, a very concentrated time of continuous practice. Then he says, during this time, two questions come up. One is why, and the other is how.

[14:14]

This is kind of a steady refrain or teaching. If I had to single out key teachings from Sojin, I think in the top 10 or the top five would be to raise up the question of how. Meaning, how do I do this? How do I practice? How do I sit the gene? How do I live? And within that, I think another really compelling message, four words. I mean, this was,

[15:18]

This is sort of my gloss on this. The premise of the question, how, is you can do this. You can do this. And, of course, that brings up the question, how do I do this? So... So... Sashin is pretty difficult. It's difficult to stay in our seat, dealing with painful legs, painful mind, listening to the loop of our thoughts, continuously going round and round. Which is interesting. The two words that go together in Gyoji are... And again, I'll talk about this more tomorrow.

[16:19]

Gyoji Dokkan. Dokkan means circle of the way or way ring. And I don't think that's what Sojun means when he talks about our thoughts continuously going around and around. That's maybe that's the way of the way ring is not the is not the ring of perseveration or obsessive thought. You know, it's it's something else. It's really following the way. But but still, we all about these thoughts continuously going around. When I, I think the first time I said Tangario at Tassajara was when I was there for a short practice period in 1985.

[17:31]

And Tangario is your, it's traditionally when a monk would show up at the temple gate for a practice period, they would be They sit by the gate for a long time, maybe a week, and to show their sincerity. And after that, if they persisted, they would be led into the temple. So the first time I sat Tangariyo at Tassajara, I had this, just this mind worm of a song going around in my head for the whole of several days. I think we sat for two or three days because it was a short practice period.

[18:34]

And the song was, actually the song was a song by Bessie Smith, the great classic blues singer. I'm sure some of you know her. But she sang, and this went on and on in my head. It was, I've got what it takes, but it breaks my heart to give it away. That's it. It's like, you know, I could see this is completely the right message, the right critical message about myself. But, you know, it was driving me crazy. It was just going around and around. So that's the loop of our thoughts. And that happens to us in Sesshin. So it says, it's sometimes difficult accepting the various emotions that come up.

[19:39]

And we all know about that. It's difficult. and not get attached to the nice states of mind which might occasionally appear. But then he says, as the truth at the heart of our Soto Zen approach, the state of mind one seeks in Zazen is no special state of mind. When we first read about meditation, it's very intriguing. We're lured into activity, hoping to reach nirvana. We don't understand that nirvana is the pain in our legs. Sorry. That's quoting Sojin.

[20:44]

Ghazani says, so it's natural to look for something special to bring home. We sit here for a week. What happened? Nothing happened. It all went by in a moment. What happened after seven days? Nothing. Just painful legs. Sawaki Kodo Roshi, I was reading... I was reading a commentary by him on the idea that, again, is just a key idea in Soto Zen, in Suzuki Roshi's teaching, in Sojin's teaching, the idea of no gaining mind. This is actually, I found, there's a Japanese word for it, which is musho toku.

[21:54]

But in his commentary on this, Koro Sawaki, one of our 20th century Zen ancestors, asserts very strongly, Zen is good for nothing. good for nothing you know this is what we're trying to understand nothing you know so that give us a better understanding even though it's not a thing it's no thing so no thing happened to us in the course of sishin I think we have a BCC banner that we unfurl for some time during some time during some of our special events.

[23:01]

And I think I wrote the motto. We did it for our 50th anniversary. And I think if I'm remembering right, it said, accomplishing nothing for 50 years. And that's pretty good. If you can really, you know, if you can really settle into it. And so it goes on. So the Seshin state of mind is no particular state of mind. What we get is no special thing. That might be a mistake, be careful. So what are we doing? So it says it's seven days of letting go. I would, coming from a slightly different angle, it's seven days of, it's seven days of letting go of any idea that you have

[24:19]

but it's seven days of accepting whatever comes. It's seven days of total receptivity. If your legs hurt, that's what's coming. If your thoughts go round in an incessant loop, that's what's coming. If you sit, and this is often what I've been doing lately as I sit, just try to open my senses and hear, particularly here, whatever is coming in. So sitting at Zendo, I can hear a train whistle. I can hear the sound of the birds. I can hear the wind. I can hear... Somebody driving by with radio.

[25:20]

And all these things just pass right through. Blowing through a hall. And being receptive. This is the mind that we cultivate is a mind of the open awareness is a mind of complete receptivity. And That's continuous practice. At the end of this paragraph, Soja says, the most difficult thing of all is just to stay in your seat. And that means, I think, literally and figuratively. Literally, to stay in your seat. might be easier than figuratively to stay in your seat because in our moment we can wander a thousand miles away in an instant and be off feeling something or thinking about something and also

[26:46]

looking for, as Sojin says, we look for the next comfortable position, the next interesting thing. It's very hard to stay where we are, to stay in one place. Any of you who have experience of Sashin will know that you're sitting there and your legs hurt And you may think, I'm just going to move a little. I'm just going to shift this leg. I mean, I've learned the hard way, and I'm sure many of you have. As soon as you start moving to find that comfortable place, you can't stop. You know, sitting there 20 minutes and then moving, shifting positions.

[27:54]

Well, the next time you move, it's going to be five minutes from now. And the next time you move, it's going to be one minute from now. You know, once you start moving, you're following a different, your mind is going around in a different way. It's hard. But it's hard also to sit there with the pain. You can breathe into it. You know, you can try to let it go. And if it's really painful, you can bear down a little harder with your breath. And I would say, As I was speaking, if you're actually concerned that you might be doing yourself some injury, then move.

[28:58]

But just know, once you move, you may have started something that is hard to end. So in this lecture, Sojin goes on, we have these two questions. First, why do we do this? So when we start to sit, we instinctively... It's beyond our reasoning, but somehow we know. This is way-seeking mind. We know why... But sometimes that is completely beyond my understanding. I just accept it. I accept that there's some reason if I don't understand it.

[30:13]

His metaphor is, it's like taking a boat ride. We know we enjoy going out, but then a big storm comes up. Pretty soon the boat's leaning over and the sails are starting to rip. The waves are coming over the gunnels. We say, why did we ever do this? But it doesn't help. The real question is, how do I deal with this? So he says, how is the practice question? Why is valid, but it's secondary to how. Take your life, for example. Why was I born? Here you are. And the real question is, how do I live in this life? How do I deal with this situation?

[31:19]

He says, when we hold this question of how, that's continuous. That's the koan of your life. How do I do this? How do I live? At a certain point, we will ask ourselves, How do I die? And again, I come back to this underlying reality. You can do this. You can do this because demonstrably everyone in history up to this point has done it. Everyone has lived and everyone has died. And so I think then you come to a question, you come to another aspect of this question, how?

[32:36]

How do I live? How do I function in this world, in this community, in my family? How do I want to be? And again, for me, the how goes back to the very method of which I would describe as one dimension of it being receptivity. and the other dimension being activity. We always have this in, again, in our soto practice, we know that our ancestors were steadily speaking about what we call practice, which means that we practice

[33:53]

to express our enlightened nature. And so this one side is just the receptive, the taking in, the allowing everything to penetrate us. And then what flows from that is the appropriate response, the activity. So in sashin, the appropriate response is to sit down. If we were doing, but it's also important to recognize that sashin, the model that we have of sashin is a kind of conscious, structured version of everyday life. So in Sesshin, we sit, we walk.

[35:00]

Usually we would be eating our meals together. And some of us would be cooking and serving. We have work period. We listen to a Dharma talk. So we do some, that's some intellectual aspect of things. It's like the whole day. Nap during the break, maybe. Though some places they prohibit you from taking naps. But we're not that tough. And also some of us are of an age where we need a nap. So it's like a whole day. Which includes a significant amount of sitting. So how we live is first allowing ourselves to be as receptive as we can and then to express our enlightened nature with our activity.

[36:17]

And this is not easy because we always want to know. We want to know about what we're doing. We want to know about what's going to happen. And Sojin says, how do I stand in this place right now? How do I sit in this spot right now? Totally. And he says, actually, I had forgotten this, relevant to what I just said. He said, this is not just about sitting zazen, but about walking, moving. How do I harmonize body, mind with the universe? That's our practice. When we sit, we harmonize body and mind with the universe without discriminating. using. How do we harmonize the intellect with the heart?

[37:34]

And that's interesting because the Shin part of Se Shin is the character for heart-mind. And in that understanding coming from the Chinese Enneagram, heart and mind are one thing. And this is different from much of what we've inherited in the Western intellectual tradition, where heart is here, here and uh somewhere there's some mysterious relationship between the two of them but we don't understand it because we think of them as two things but in our understanding in our zen understanding they are not two things

[38:47]

What Sojin says, when we find our center, our heart, then the mind is under control. The mind is under control because the mind is not separate from the heart. If we can locate the heart, then we're locating the mind. Sojin goes on, if the mind is not under the control of the heart, it becomes from humanity. it begins, the mind, it begins to exaggerate its own importance and becomes what we call evil. And he goes on to a riff here, which is actually fun to read, about comic books. He said, comic books are archetypal stories which represent the real battles of our time. Batman, Superman, Spider-Man. In comic books, there's always an evil one with a big head.

[40:07]

He has all the technical control at his command, and the hero has spiritual strength. This battle between the head and heart is actually the battle of our time. I would say it's the battle of our... so-called modern or postmodern civilization. It may not be the battle of indigenous societies that still exist in our world. But it's being what we're being sold day after day in our literature, in our movies, in our comic books. So he says, this battle between the head and the heart is actually the battle of our time, between the forces of technology, brain power, and the spirit struggling to bring these under control.

[41:12]

The tensions of our time arise because technology and brain power are easily cut off from the heart, from the solar plexus, from... center. So what we're doing, again, Tsashin, to touch the heart, mind, is to unify these, to recognize that they are, not to unify two disparate things, but to recognize that we've kind of, we've been misguided or we've been sold a bill of goods. In comic books, the hero is always trying to keep it together. This same battle goes on in each. When the mind is divorced from our vital center, it leads to cunning, to domination and unrest.

[42:19]

The world is in a terrible state, a state of terrible unrest and getting worse all the time. practice is to harmonize the mind and keep it under control so that it can work in harmony with the heart and the rest of the body. The mind should be working for humanity, not just for its own satisfaction. The heart, what I think is that the heart, as we talk about it in Zen, permeates the body. And you could say this whole body is our universe. This whole body is our monastery. And, you know, in China and Japan, when they built a monastery, the model for that monastery was the body.

[43:30]

If you look at the architectural layout of a monastery, it has all of the different parts of the body. And just like the body, they all cooperate. If one piece is not cooperating, we're in trouble. So Sojourn says, we sit up straight and harmonize all this in one act. We don't care so much about intellectual speculation. Instead, we care about it. Just to say, intellectual speculation can be grounded. Intellectual, the mind, the work of the mind is not separate from the whole of reality. Habitually, we kind of see it as separate, so we have to be careful.

[44:34]

And he comes to something that I would say is another one of the top ten of Sojin's teachings. I drink tea here. And he says, when you pick up a cup of tea, pick up the cup, With both hands. Drink the tea with no separation. The cup and the tea. The cup is not an object. The tea is not an object. And I would add, you are not an object. There are no objects. This is another one of... key things that I try to remember of Sojourn's teachings don't treat anything like an object.

[45:39]

Now, it's relatively easy to apply that to the because it doesn't talk back. The problems arise It's trickier with people because they kind of argue with you or they want to do what they want to do. Wait, you're going off in your own direction. How do we see that as part of the reality that we're living? And the wonderful thing about seshin is that's what we're doing. Seshin is one body activity. big body. When we let go of everything, no one thing stands out.

[46:43]

The center of yourself is the center of everything. When we sit zazen, we bring the whole world into harmony. This is called saving all beings. I discovered in the course of discussions over the last few months that saving might be a trigger word for some of us. Perhaps it's because there are resonances with Christian or other religious traditions that we may have difficulty with. But I think I like the word saving. And in fact, I like the fact that it's a challenging word for me.

[47:50]

What does it mean to save? And Sojin, this challenge in this next sentence, he says, even though people are still out there killing each other, the influence of your continuous practice has far-reaching effects, which you can never know. Looking, you know, I'm sitting in the abbot's office, and it's full of Sojin's books, which are themselves full of his penciled notes, some of which are quite cryptic. Looking at one of his translations of Dogen to see if he had, you know, maybe he has solved the mystery of Gyoji, of continuous practice.

[48:59]

And I opened it and found the fascicle. In pencil, next to Gyoji, he says, Gyoji slash continuous practice, that's the translation. And in pencil he wrote, is faith. So actually, he did solve that question. Continuous practice is faith. The influence of our continuous practice, the far-reaching influence which we never can know, is a matter of faith. And what he says at the end of this lecture, in order to bring the world into balance, we start with ourselves. This is our way of saving beings. and it brings to mind something I've been talking about for years, the version of the Bodhisattva vow that the sixth ancestor of Zen Winning speaks about.

[50:17]

We chant, sentient beings are numberless, I vow to awaken with them or save them. And in this translation from the Platform Sutra, Wineng's verse is sentient beings of my mind are numberless. I vow to save them all. So this is where I will leave you in the context of continuous practice with the thought. The sentient beings of my mind are all of the impulses, are all of the memories, are all of those beings that arise in our mind. But it's also every one of you here on this screen at this moment is a sentient being on my mind.

[51:22]

And the same is true for each of you. the universe at this moment. This Zoom screen is our monastery. The whole universe is our monastery. That's what we're doing this week. Tomorrow, I hope to go a little further into kind of understanding of continuous practice. But let's leave that here for now. And I'll hand things back to Gary to sort out questions. We have a few minutes for questions. Hi. Yeah. Let me highlight myself.

[52:26]

If you can raise... And I'll call on you and ask your question. Or if you would like, you could put the question in the chat box. So I'll look in the participants and see who's raising their hands. Thank you. Hannah? I've been inspired for a number of years by a Japanese, as I understand it, teaching to handle small things as if they're large or light or heavy and large, heavy things as if they're light.

[53:47]

And I'm wondering, That seems to focus on seeing, feeling, being present with the thing, but I'm wondering how to put that together with what you said today about objects, of course, not being separate. I have to think about that. You know, I also think about in... Tenzo Gyokun, instructions to the cook, Dogen gives an instruction about where you put things on the shelf according to their size and weight. And I'm not exactly sure it's the same as what you're talking about. I think that what he's talking about is that there's a place for everything.

[54:50]

what you're talking about is that there's a way to meet everything. So, I mean, what I would say in a kind of in human terms, sometimes, you know, we're going to have a meeting with somebody and we have some anxiety or fear because there's a pattern that we think has been established that means, oh, I'm anxious because this could be really hard. You know, so that's treating a, that's, you know, treating what, it's like what you think is everything. What's really good is to treat it as a light thing, which means I don't, you know, let's just see how this goes.

[55:53]

Let me treat it lightly. I think that's, to me, that's the kind of appropriate, that's a useful interpretation of that teaching. Fine for objects, but I think it's more important, and the reciprocal side is also more important. How many times has any of us felt that you go to somebody in some position of authority or leadership and they don't take you seriously? Because somehow you feel, well, you may feel I'm being treated like a light thing. a heavy thing. I may be treated dismissively rather than as somebody whose perspective and thoughts is of equal value and valence to that person.

[57:07]

I mean, I will say I've experienced this in my life and it's quite painful where I feel like I've been dismissed and then You know, then I appear, say, in my priest robes or my teacher robes, and all of a sudden I'm treated differently. I do not appreciate that. And what I've learned from that is, okay, I don't want to do that to anyone. So I think that's the, to me, that's how I apply or turn what you're asking. We have Andrea Thatch, or Ryushin. Thank you. It seemed to me that at one point in his teaching career, Sojin would talk about not what, but, or not why, but what.

[58:22]

And later in his career, he didn't talk about what so much, he talked about how. I've thought about that as an Originally, an encouragement to be curious or open or fully present in the moment. What is happening? And more recently, it's more about how do I meet the moment? I wonder if you noticed that change also and how you understand it from your own practice, what you want us to understand about it. Well, thanks. That's two questions. First, I'm not sure that I noticed that. And maybe I missed something. I just, I have long memory of it now. But to respond to your question, the context in which that makes sense to me is, you know, what I've talked about and others talk about, is actually in...

[59:27]

the three tenets that we get from Bernie Glassman, that the first tenet is not knowing, and that's beginner's mind, right? The second tenet is bearing witness, and that's what. It's like, what's going on here? You know, and then the how is the third of an appropriate response. So before you have an appropriate response, I think that the what is really important. So long as it's intimately connected to the how. That it's important that we just don't... We don't just react to things, but we investigate. Investigating the... is one of the factors of enlightenment, right?

[60:31]

And I think that's the what dimension. And I think that there's curiosity. There's gotta be big curiosity in what as well as in how. But I think they go to it. I think that's a really useful point. Yeah, thank you. They both seem to me about showing up completely to the present. Right. not making some assumption. And, you know, one of the things, I'll say one of the kind of ongoing discourses that I had with Sochin was about intuition. As much as anybody I ever met, he really trusted his intuition. And I trusted his intuition. Uh, At the same time, my understanding of intuition is somewhere in the heart and mind, everything that one ever experienced is in total dynamic and your intuition arises from that.

[61:51]

Even though you may not understand it all. your response may be the correct one. Your response might be quick. You might come to a what and how quickly, which is right. Pause a moment and reflect. Thank you. I see Joel's hand. Thank you. Beautiful talk. Okay, this is great talk. The question is about the very beginning, how to practice in the short session. And the question was, you know, my wife is wonderful and very supportive of my practice, but she herself doesn't practice very much.

[63:05]

And so the question, uh, talking with her, I mean, it feels very strange not to, um, you know, we have dinner, we walk the dog. Um, so any advice about, um, uh, you know, this practice obsession as including that? Yeah. I mean, that's part of the circumstance of your life. Yeah. And, you know, but you can ask yourself, what is practice and what is extra? Yes. For me. Yes. For, you know, for you and and just be careful with that, you know. Just as continuous practice is about regulating our life.

[64:12]

And regulating our life also means regulating our speech. Yeah. So see how you can do that without being somehow brief or incomplete. Exactly. That's fine. Yeah. Well, thank you. Thank you. So we have time for maybe one more if there's another question. So Nathan, you will have the last question or word. Thank you. At the end of the spring practice period, you said that one of the... three defining characteristics of our tradition was including everything. I've often wondered since then what that means and how we include everything.

[65:15]

And listening to your talk today, I found myself thinking that continuous practice may have something to do with including everything. And I wonder if you would say a few words about that. including everything is our continuous practice, and continuous practice is the practice of including everything. And that's very hard work. What does include mean? You know, that's a really interesting question. You know, if you... If you read the Vimalakirti Sutra, you know, Vimalakirti talks about, you know, the practice of going to all these terrible places and places that we would think of as degraded or polluted, you know, to brothels

[66:30]

charnel grounds and hells and all these these are not things we would ordinarily particularly want to include in our life and so the question is you know how when he went to these places you know this and that i really you know i think about that uh You know, how do I include even the aspects of greed, hate, and delusion that I experience? Does include, I think, doesn't reign. Maybe it means recognizing that they are human capacities that I am not beyond.

[67:41]

And so those realms, I mean, I should step into those realms carefully and ask myself, how do I want to be here? So how to include everything is actually a wonderful question. And that's what Sojin says elsewhere in this talk, that how is really, it's a really live question. It's a very live practice. And it's endless. So good luck with that. Let me know how it goes. I think we're going to end here. So thank you for your attention. And thank you for your practice in this session.

[68:46]

And we'll continue. Okay, we'll chant the bodhisattva vows one time through. Please do not unmute yourself for this. Meings are numberless. I vow to awaken with them. Delusions are inexhaustible. I vow to end them. Dharma gates are boundless. I vow to enter them. Buddha's way is unsurpassable. I vow to become it. Thank you. Okay, thank you. I don't think I have to read announcements, do I? Yeah. Five, so let's do Kinhin for five minutes.

[69:52]

Thank you. And if you're not interested, Please just leave silently if you can. Thank you.

[70:02]

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