Great. So, thank you, Ellen, for your introduction. Today, I want to talk about not knowing, or also called don't know mind. And I was reminded of this teaching again during Rohatsu. I was sitting in the Seven Days Sushi in December, and on... The sixth day, at this point, I'm very open and quite vulnerable after so much sitting. I heard a conversation in the community room. And I immediately thought it was maybe about me. And I was thrown into quite a turmoil. It was just an old, emotional, ancient feeling of being left out and not noticed. you know, like I was a seven-year-old again, but it was quite, and I think just being so open and available, I was quite thrown off my balance.

[01:08]

And before going to sleep that night, I did kind of recognize that this was not a present moment thing, that this had to do with something very old, and I was able to sleep. And the next morning, I just recognized I had just made up this entire story about it, that I actually didn't know what their conversation was about. And it made me think of the not knowing mind. And I was going to give this talk in March, but the Saturday that I was due to talk is the first Saturday we closed down because of the pandemic. But as I looked again when I got my new date, I saw that the talk is still very active and ripe for me to give, particularly, maybe even more so, given what we've been going through the last four months with the pandemic and the social justice uprising.

[02:17]

It really reminded me so much how we don't know. So I got to thinking about where does this knowing mind come from? You know, there's the mind that we have the knowing mind, the not knowing mind. And then there is, of course, the mind that has to function in the world, in the relative world. So I'm not talking about that. We have to have knowledge. We have to get around. We have to do our work. We have to take care of our children, our family, the society. So we have that. And we need that to live in this world, this relative world. So this is another kind of knowing mind that blocks the not knowing mind. The first piece of that I saw was emotions so clearly that I felt during Rohatsu that those strong emotions just can grab us, can grab me.

[03:20]

That was sadness and loss and fear, but anger. even boredom, all of those emotions can get in the way. And then there's this whole other unexamined categories, like my beliefs, my strongly held beliefs, and all the ideas and preconceptions I might have, or my judgments of myself and others that I just cling to. And there's my prejudices, discriminations that I think have really been showing up now and then there's my strong preferences for my likes and dislikes and all those dear things that I've held on to so long and don't want to give up that are in the way and my point of view that I so love comparing myself to another

[04:24]

a lot of opinions and fixed ideas and of course a big one is my self-centeredness when I'm thinking about me me me you can't really let anything else in just about me and a particularly strong one for me is my comparative mind comparing myself to others and even to myself And I read somewhere that the Buddha said that this is the last thing to drop away, comparative mind. So there's a lot of expectations, and I'm wondering where did these come from? Where do all these expectations of myself and others come from? And, of course, because we're familiar with those attachments, the things I really don't want to change.

[05:27]

And then there's the inversions, the things I just want to push away. And really, this is not even an entire list. These are just the things that I came up with that I grab onto. And then I started to look and see, well, where do all these things come from? This knowing mind. Well, some of it's from my family, just the way I grew up. You know, we're so vulnerable and impressionable. And those beliefs are so ingrained. It takes a while to really examine them and see, well, maybe this isn't so real. Maybe this isn't my experience anymore. And my experience as a child, for example, what happened to me in Rohatsu, That's from a very old time. But I could see there was still energy there. Still something I'm getting caught in.

[06:29]

Or maybe I believe someone. I love doing this. Rather than doing the research. Just, oh, is that? Hearing someone else believe. And then I'll take that one on as my own. Not even examining it. And most definitely. the stories I tell myself. And I don't know where they come from. I can just weave a story. And so any of these things too are not just one belief because it's kind of like an onion. I unpeel that belief and then there's another one and another one and another one underneath it. So it's quite dense. And some other big aspects for me in this knowing mind are things like, well, I don't want to feel stupid. I don't want to appear like I don't know.

[07:31]

And in my mind, I'm thinking, well, I should know. I need to know. So I guess I'll have to pretend I know. Just look as though I do know. course I don't want to lose control so I've got to cling to these but it's so silly because we really it's like fooling myself is this as though I had some control of our life my life given some of the things that have happened to all of us and then and then there's that control about really wanting to to know the answers Wanting that certainty. I don't know what that is. It's just our human nature, I think. Just wanting to know. And all this is really coming from my head. It's up here.

[08:31]

All this thinking. Feeling. And then I've got to look and see all the things that I'm adding to it. We hear that phrase in Zen. Don't add anything. And some of this. The consequences to knowing all of this is, well, of course, it closes my mind down. And I get very narrow and shrunk. You know, it's just like tunnel vision. You can only see so much with all those barriers, really, in the way. It's very narrow, shrunk. And it becomes fixed. I can really get entrenched in that. So nothing else can come in. Now I want to talk about, that's the knowing mind, let's talk about, I want to talk about the not knowing mind.

[09:34]

And first I'm going to read this koan from the Book of Serenity, which is a translation by Thomas Cleary. And this is, Dijon's nearness. Case 20. So Dijon asked Fion, where are you going? And Fion said, around on pilgrimage. Dijon said, what is the purpose of pilgrimage? And Fion said, I don't know. And Dijong said, not knowing is nearness. Nearest. Not knowing is nearest. I'm going to read another translation, which I particularly like.

[10:40]

And, of course, again, case 20. And I believe the translation is by Yamato Koum. So here they have different names, so different language, I guess, Chinese or Japanese, but Dizong is Chizou. You'll get the feel of it. Chizou asked Hogan, where are you going? And Hogan said, I am wandering at random. And Chizou said, what do you think of wandering? And Hogan said, I don't know. Chiso said, not knowing is most intimate. And at that, Hogan was suddenly enlightened. So that is nearest, not knowing is nearest.

[11:44]

And in this translation, not knowing is most intimate. Not knowing. So I'm imagining what that was like for Fionn, his enlightenment. He was just wandering, and I think in that moment when he was told that, not knowing is most intimate. He must have been so right there, just... feeling his sandals and his feet in his sandals and maybe hid the robe against his skin and what was around him, maybe trees or flowers, insects. But he was awake and not cluttered in his mind. It's really like a newborn.

[12:48]

Have you ever observed a newborn? they're just there. They're not thinking. They are just present with all their senses. They want to taste. They want to feel. They're hearing. They're smelling. Just looking around like just a new, that is a newborn. Expressing that unknown, the not knowing mind, not thinking. And Suzuki Roshi, as we know, called this beginner's mind, always returning to bigger's mind. He said, its beginner's mind is wide open and accepting and allowing the vast realms of possibilities.

[13:51]

And that's where our Zen practice really begins with, is I don't know. Right there in our Zao Zen. We're opening up to I don't know. You know, this teaching is so practical, too. It's a practical teaching because you can always fall back on it. It's right there. Nothing to figure out, just... Drop whatever's been going on. And then you can just engage in the next moment with a clear, uncluttered mind, just open to see what is next. And it's grounded right here in reality. Because really, in reality, we don't know what's going to happen next. We've all had that experience now recently with the two things I mentioned, the pandemic and the social uprising.

[15:06]

We don't know. Or if you're going to lose someone in an instant. We just don't know. So in Zazen, We've become very intimate. You know, it's most intimate practice because we're getting intimate with our breath. You know, we're returning to our breath time and again, becoming intimate, which really is our most precious gift, is our breath. always return to it until our very last breath and become intimate with that my yoga teacher told me that she's been seeing she caught the Dalai Lama on Facebook I guess the last few Fridays and she said that he is teaching about pranayama

[16:19]

which is breath practice which it's like well yes we that's what we do but he's encouraging people not just of course he's talking to the public on facebook so it's like practicing breath all the time and i know that some people were doing that and exploring in it bcc as i saw some of those emails but it something we can always return to especially in this time when we feel the stress or whatever things are being brought up for you being closed in or not being able to see your family let's return to that breath which is so intimate kind of just going back down to our very core And the breath is our home.

[17:24]

It's the home base. Always be there. Closer than our real home. So I want to talk about another teacher that talks about, he calls it don't know mind. Give you a different slant on it. And his name is Soong Song. He was a Korean Zen teacher from the Kwon Oom School of Zen, and he had a group back east. And I perused a few of his books, and every talk he gave, every letter he wrote to his students, he always ended with, only don't know, just go straight. only don't know just go straight he said if you don't understand just go straight don't know try try for 10 000 years soon get enlightened and save all beings from suffering

[18:41]

And he's also said, which I particularly like is, don't know mine is your most precious gift, your most precious treasure, actually. He said, it is your most treasure, most important treasure. Most important treasure. And I know often we wanna know, but really, Life just wouldn't be very exciting or rather boring if we knew what was going to happen in the next moment. We try. I try to predict it. And I'm after time. I'm reminded. Oh, guess it didn't turn out the way I thought it was. I was planning it. I had a dream that really reminded me of the song. This was a couple months ago when I was looking at his teachings.

[19:49]

I was returning from Berkeley. I was in my car, and it was pitch black. No lights, no stars, no lights on the bridge, no lights in my car. And there were cars behind me, and they didn't have lights on. So it was black. I'd never been in such blackness. And if you've been on the San Rafael Bridge, you know, sometimes it goes high and then it goes low. And one day, with climate change, that water is going to rise up to the bridge for sure. And in my dream, it was. It was right next to the bridge. And, of course, there's only one narrow lane, so if I even just made just a little turn, just a... slight, not even an inch, one way or the other way, I would die because I would go into the bay and I would die.

[20:54]

At least in my dream. Well, this brought up so much fear. I was so afraid that I woke up. It was that frightening. And I thought about that. And I thought about Soong San's teaching. Just don't know. Don't know mind. Just go straight. And I thought, well, just go straight. Don't know. What does that mean, just go straight? Well, you know, sometimes it's straight. It doesn't feel so straight. It can be a little wobbly, shaky, and certainly uncertain. They kind of veer off to one side or the other side.

[21:58]

And certainly can feel very uncertain and full of doubt. when I'm in that dark, you know, I couldn't see, not to see anything, not to know what's the next step. It's scary. I think the important thing was, okay, as Sojin Roshi reminds us, just start, take the next step, even if I don't know, just taking that next step. And this is really what Buddha did. He left the palace, that wonderful, comfortable, luxurious life. His family, his child, his wife, he left it because of his own dissatisfaction.

[23:01]

He wandered all those years, or I'm assuming it was years, trying all those different practices. And... Finally he had to give up and just sit down under the Bodhi tree and see what happens. Let everything, all those beliefs and all those ideas, all those practices, let him go and then let Mara come in and tempt him with all his strong held beliefs and attachments. and finally let go of it all, so that he could really just see how clearly, clearly, how things really are. And also Bodhidharma. Bodhidharma, when he was in front of the Emperor Wu, who asked him, who stands before me?

[24:07]

And he said, I don't know. Some teachers just make this their practice. It's all in our practice, but their main practice, like Bernie Glassman, who started the Peacemaker Order. One of the things that they live by is they say, live in the state of unknowing or not knowing. That's one thing they vow. Penetrate. They say, he calls it vowing to penetrate the unknown. And then another tenet is bearing witness. It's like you have to have the not knowing mind in order to bear witness. Really be present.

[25:08]

Gotta get everything out of that knowing mind to really be present. I just want to talk a little bit about the ways that I am working and cultivating this don't know mind. First of all, with great humility. Oh, so many times I'm just brought to my knees when I think I know something, it turns out to be so wrong. I thought I was going to have the life I had been planning, and suddenly my husband died. Everything changed in that one instant. So it's a lot of humility. And second thing is if there is something I think I know, and often I'm not quite sure, this is a really good practice, to just ask myself, is this true? Can I verify this?

[26:11]

Or am I making this up? this my story so asking those questions just stepping back and maybe just maybe there's something here some bias or discrimination I have not seen so not to be so certain and this not knowing really requires deep listening like Bernie Glassman talked about bearing witness, not listening. I mean, I'm sorry, deep listening. Because you can't really hear someone listen that deeply if our mind is cluttered with our own beliefs, et cetera, those things I mentioned, all of those things. Have to drop all that. And even then, never going to be able to know completely what that person's experience is.

[27:18]

Maybe he has similar experiences, but you can never really know everything they've gone through. You know, I'm always surprised when, you know, I might be talking to one of my siblings, and we'll be talking about something that happened to us as children. And, you know, they'll describe their experience, and it's so different than mine. In all these years, I think, you don't remember it that way? And just so surprised that, well, of course, they have their own experience. We're in a different place in the family. I like this I read about Gil Fronsdale, who's one of Sojin's students. He has a practice where he says that after every thought, he adds, I don't know.

[28:21]

So it does make me ask myself, really, how much do I really know about this life? Last part I'm going to talk about is what do I rely on to live in this don't know mind? Well, of course, first and foremost is zazen, because that is the place of intimacy. Not knowing is most intimate with the breath, returning over and over to our breath, watching those thoughts come and go. So that is studying the self in that way. It's very intimate. I mean, this just feels like you kind of just keep moving in, in, in deeper. And second thing is you have to have great trust and great faith. Jerry talked about the great faith it takes in this practice.

[29:30]

Trusting, first of all, ourselves. And then that trust is really trusting this bigger mind, or Buddha mind, and trusting our intuition. Now, my intuition is really more down in my heart. Yours might be further down, but it's not in my head. That's the thinking part. And the intuition can only come through for me when I don't know, when I'm unblocked. It's the only way this deeper wisdom can come through, and that takes trust and faith. And this one teacher, Bone Song, I guess he practices at Empty Gate, he said, the biggest wisdom comes from not knowing because if you admit to yourself,

[30:35]

you don't know, then you're willing to look. When you know, you can't look, right? Another thing I rely on, of course, my vow and my intention and commitment to help others. And the vow to come back to not knowing. And all of this really helps with the attitude, my attitude. Of course, my attitude has to be in the not knowing mind. Because if I'm knowing, that's a certain stance I'm going to be taking. I can't let anything else in. But when I'm not knowing, my attitude is much more open and available and fresh. And I can be honest with myself. And then some freedom, too. It opens up freedom. And I can't underestimate how much courage this takes.

[31:48]

It really takes courage to do this practice and live in not knowing. Because you have to be willing to be vulnerable. You have to be willing to be vulnerable. And, of course, I've got to be willing to be intimate with my fears and my sorrows. Even being overwhelmed to question all that. All those things maybe I want to keep at bay, but it's the only way that I can move to this not knowing intimate space. So yesterday I was looking around at my clutter on my desk, the little piles. I just saw this piece of paper here, and this must have been a colon I wrote. I don't know how long ago. I thought, well, here it is, still here. It says, how am I practicing right this moment?

[32:51]

And I thought, well, that says it all. Just bring me back right here to this moment, fresh. Drop whatever's going on. Was I in a story or a dream? Just bring myself to not knowing. So really this practice of not knowing is our basic practice in Zen, which is letting go. Letting go, letting go. When we let go, we don't know. So we take refuge in the three treasures, Buddha, Dharma, Sangha. Now I'd like to add, I'm taking refuge in the not knowing mind. This is quite comforting. I think I'll stop at that and see if there's any questions or comments. Thank you, Carol.

[33:55]

I'll just have a comment about questions. And... There's two ways to ask questions. The first is to enter the question in the chat box at the bottom of your screen, and I'll forward that to Carol. The second way is to raise your hand by clicking on the hand in the participants icon at the bottom of your screen. And we want to hear from as many voices as possible, so after you ask your question, we ask you to limit yourself to one follow-up question. just to keep things moving along. Thank you. Thank you. Ross, do you have a question or a comment? Hi, Carol. Thank you so much for your talk. Thank you. I really appreciated that dream that you shared about going over the bridge and just your comment a moment ago.

[34:56]

about keeping your questions or issues at bay. And you made a reference of going off to the side, perhaps, in the bay and dying and that fear and fear. So just to highlight the dream and that comment that you made, they really go together. Just go straight. Thanks so much and have a great day. Me too. Thank you, Ross. Yes. Ben, do you have a question? Hi, Carol. Thank you so much for your talk. I found it very inspiring. And I just want to say I enjoy practicing with you very much. When you were talking about beginner's mind, it brought up a couple of things for me quickly. One is that I feel like I have that experience when I've traveled abroad, gone to a new country for the first time. It's sort of. It changes your mental state because everything is so new and you don't know so many things. And I feel like that's been a glimpse of maybe the power of that not knowing mind, which I find more.

[36:03]

It's more difficult to access it when you're in your usual routine and space, even though everything is different all the time. It sort of looks the same or you decide it's the same. So that came up. And then I thought about Suzuki Roshi coming and bringing Soto Zen practice to. Americans and how I would just guess that must have been a very powerful thing for him because he was leaving his context and entering a new one and so thinking of those two instances where changing your place and context so much can spark this newness of experience freshness of perspective this not knowing mind how do we get that freshness and total openness when we're not changing our context not going somewhere else and we're just here that um that's my question yeah thank you ben well i know what helps me is nature when i'm just getting you know imploded everything i don't even notice things you know

[37:20]

I'd noticed this piece of paper for years. Things get old. But for me, getting out into nature and just taking a walk and looking around takes some concentration to just not see things. It takes effort. It takes effort. But in practice, particularly maybe in one's home, We've seen things. And just to stop, notice. You could develop a practice, too, maybe while cooking. You know, one thing. Where am I going to really just be here present? And watch yourself chopping. Examine the beautiful fruit or vegetables or grains. There's so much beauty, but, you know, it takes a lot of effort to let go of everything. For me, that thinking mind, I'm thinking of the next thing. It reminds me of, you know, Dogen saying, you know, there's nowhere to go.

[38:30]

You just have your room, and it's all in your room. You don't have to hit the dusty trails. But I think travel is good, too, to fresh up the mind. But now we're not doing that, so how can I freshen up my mind here? So. if you can find a practice that might help. Excuse me, Carol, we have a question in the chat box from Ed. What role do feelings play in not knowing mind? Well, I think like so many, you know, feelings, feelings or emotions, we want to have those as humans. We want to feel them, but I do. But I don't want to get stuck there. I think that's what happens if we hold on to a feeling, whether it be sadness or even happiness. It's the clinging that stops the not knowing mind.

[39:32]

And so we just have to let that emotion pass on. It took me a while to get over that emotion. Sometimes they cling a little more, sad or happy. We don't want to get stuck in that fixed position. Hope that helps you, Ed. Hosong, do you have a question? I wish it was a question. It's more of a comment just to say I was really taken by your first story. the story of overhearing a conversation during Sashin and then carrying that with you, and you asked, where does that come from? And then, I mean, I feel like not knowing is the enlightened side, but if anyone, just plugging the class that's about to come up, which is going to actually investigate the deceptive,

[40:48]

way that we think we know and in in more detail actually in Buddhist psychological detail how that knowing arises and how it works and that gives that gives us a practice hopefully to let go of that and enter into the not knowing which is really more the awakened state so I really like the balance that you were striking there. Thank you. I recently, Karen Sondheim, led our group in that. It is so rich, the levels of consciousness. I could do it all over again and again. Well, you're welcome to. Thank you. I wish I could, that Monday night's not good for me. Okay. Thank you, Hozai.

[41:49]

Sue Moon, you have a question or comment? Kind of both. Yeah, thank you so much for this really wonderful talk and I so appreciate your honesty and sincerity and that first, I want to refer to your first story too, which I particularly appreciated because I myself have had that experience quite a few times where I can get completely out on a limb with some misunderstanding of thinking that somebody's mad at me or something like that. And then later you were saying how one of the things we can rely on, which I really believe this too, is our good intentions and our intuition. And so I'm just curious about the balance between thinking you know what somebody meant when they said something to you, and trusting your intuition and your good intentions.

[42:54]

And it's definitely two different things, but how do you know that, and how did you know? In your story, I was impressed that you woke up the next morning in Sashin, I guess, and you realized that you had made the whole thing up. Well, in my experience, I sometimes... don't realize I made the whole thing up, and I even have to go say to somebody, I'm really sorry I said that thing. I hope I didn't get you too upset. What are you talking about, the person says. So I don't always get there by myself, but you did, and I'm interested in how you were able to do that. Well, actually, I didn't get there all by myself. I did go to see a senior student that evening. I just said I was stirred up. Yeah. Got a little clarity, but I think just sitting with something. Yeah. Yeah. And just maybe going through that.

[43:56]

Is this true? How do I know this is true? Or am I making it up? And that doesn't just happen immediately, especially if there's strong emotion attached to it or strong clinging of some knowledge. Just going back to that. So don't have that expectation. I've got to figure this out right now. Because some of those things are pretty deep in this body. So it may take feeling a few layers. Yeah. Sometimes, though, oh, never mind. Go ahead. Take the next question. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Dean, do you have a question? Yes, Carol, thank you. So uncertainty and unknowing is with us all the time. But with COVID-19, it's become, I think with a lot of people, it's become much more clear to us or we're witnessing it much more regularly because of, you know, it's what happens.

[45:08]

So I'm sorry, there's these two squirrels chasing each other and it's a little noisy. So what I'm wondering about is I know that with me, uncertainty visits me constantly because I'm living with someone with dementia, and every day something new happens. She either figures out how to get the can opener out, open a can of tomatoes, or she does something that she's never done. So I have it all the time, but how... Is there a way that when that knowing what we don't know goes away or that we forget that everything is uncertain, to sort of bring it back really easily and quickly? Because when you said to someone, well, when you're chopping, you know, just chopping, and that feels like sort of a global suggestion.

[46:12]

And I have to remind myself, you're just chopping, so just chop. And I'm wondering if there's anything that you have found which is more of like just a phrase or a moment that pops you back into the uncertainty and the acceptance of the uncertainty. Does that even make sense? Uh... Well, I just, just letting go and recognizing I really don't know. But it's going to be different for everyone, what they draw upon. And I have to say, Zazen really helps just sitting down. Just coming back to my breath, you know, sometimes can just calm the mind.

[47:15]

And yeah, this is the thing. During this period, and I understand what you're doing with really moment to moment, what you're dealing with with your mom. And I don't have that experience. So I can just imagine... It's like a test. You're probably being tested every moment and just having to let go. And maybe in your case, you have to just, if you can, step outside and just breathe and come back fresh. I know you can't always do that because it requires being around 100%. You know, humor is good, too. Well, actually... Humor. Actually, you know, something you said in the very beginning is you just and you've said this several times is we really don't know.

[48:24]

And that struck me because I thought my mom goes and does something she's never done. And, oh, this is the new thing for this hour. It's sort of like instead of my mind going to what's going to happen next and what can I expect next is is I just wrote it down is we really don't know. And I guess that's the thing for me, that's the phrase, is every time I have this idea or supposition or whatever, it's like, you really don't know. So thank you. Thanks for this being the topic. Maybe you can just find some way to laugh at yourself, laugh at your mom, just to lighten up the moment, if you can. We do. We spend some time joking, so... or at least I make up the jokes. One of the things I do is when she does, she forgets my name or maybe who I am and I'll explain to her, I'm your daughter. Oh, I have a daughter.

[49:25]

And then I'll say, and you have four kids in all. And she'll say, I have four kids. And I say every time now, four kids, but I'm the best one. So we get to laugh. That's my big one now. So thank you very much, Carol. It's good. Excuse me, Carol. In the interest of time, looks like we have time for one more question. Okay. Ron, do you have a question? Yeah. Hi, Carol. You grew up, my understanding is you grew up in a large Catholic family. Is that so? Yes. Okay. Okay, so I don't know what your orientation was when you were a kid that way, but was there some shift in your belief system that you can remember, some incremental shift in what you believed in growing up with a strong Catholic faith in your whole family and social life?

[50:32]

Can you remember what that shift felt like and how you navigated that? Well, I think in my case, it was a gradual shift. Can you remember anything about what it felt like? It was kind of amazing to think that what I believed all my life really didn't have much bearing for me. It really wasn't true for me any longer. narrow you know it was pretty narrow um and then i also saw too it was based on a child's impression and innocence and vulnerability so it was just a gradual thing that there are there this isn't the only way to see things and also that it was binding

[51:39]

And I just had to loosen myself up. But it took quite a long time for me to let go of those beliefs fully and get certain images out of my mind. So, you know, it just felt more free all the time, more and more let go, just freer, freer, freer. Yes. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I hear that. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Ron. Can I say something? Oh, please. I didn't know you were here. There's my picture up in the lip. I appreciated the dialogue between you and Dean. I thought that was a really great dialogue. And it reminded me of Noiriroshi in Japan, a great teacher, contemporary. His practice is to keep all of his students off guard. so that they never knew what he was gonna do next, which is sort of like Musashi, the great swords person.

[52:48]

Nobody ever knew what he was gonna do next, so everybody was on their guard and attentive without thinking anything, so they could be open to saving themselves. So Dean, your mother, is your great teacher, great Zen teacher. What a great opportunity. That's good. Thank you. Thank you, Soju.

[53:22]

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