Morning. Morning. I'd like to thank you all for being here. You know, no one of us can make a sasheen. Even two or three of us can't make a sasheen. It takes all of us together to make a sasheen. So I'd like to thank each of you for being here, for your effort, for your intention, and for your support of each other, and me. This seshin means to gather the mind, or unify the mind, to To unify yourself, to bring yourself all right here.

[01:05]

Cutting through your distractions and diversions and coming to sit completely on this cushion. Body, breath, and mind all here. This practice sounds so simple, but it's so hard to do. So we keep making our best effort over and over and over again, or continually without stopping. to settle ourself on ourself and let the flower of our life force bloom. What is this self we settle on?

[02:14]

I asked you, if you could, to read Suzuki Roshi's lecture in the spring 86 wind bell. It was the lecture at the last session which he taught, which he led. And, you know, I said we would study it together. I'm not sure what I can add to it, but I really wanted you to read it all, and I didn't want to sit up here and read it to you. But he talks about you know, becoming completely yourself, whatever that is. And he talks about breath, breathing. Breathing on the exhale, just breathing into emptiness. You know, that's our way to

[03:25]

We have all kinds of ideas and explanations and trying to make sense of this life. But we can't really understand our life in that way. We can't make sense out of it, but being human we make all kinds of explanations. But our way is to leap free of all the explanations and land in emptiness. But what is this emptiness? I don't know. Every day, I don't know. Every breath, I don't know.

[04:30]

And yet we continually make this effort. This effort to settle completely on fundamental ground of our being, or whatever it is. There's some reason that we're sitting here. There's some reason we're making this effort. We have some confidence that leads us to sit here, to undertake to sit here for the next five days. But we don't know exactly.

[05:38]

But that's okay. That's okay. It's not something that we can know in the way that we know facts. But just with every breath, just sitting here and breathing into emptiness. On each exhale, not worrying about whether or not there will be an inhale.

[06:51]

If we're alive, there will be an inhale. But again, very simple, not so easy to do. I find that I'm usually very interested in, will there be an inhale? Sometimes I'm so interested that I have to reach out and grab it because I'm afraid to wait for it. It's okay. The first time I went to Tassajara, I remember someone telling me, as long as you're making your best effort in the zendo, you can't make a mistake.

[07:59]

And it was very reassuring to me because I was fussing around wanting to do everything right and worrying about was I going to do something wrong and what would people say and what would people think of me. And I was just fussing and worrying and fluttering about and being all nervous. It was very reassuring. But the next thing I've discovered after some years of sitting is each of us is always making our best effort. Each being is always making its best effort. In any moment If we could do better, we would.

[09:04]

In this moment, this is the best that I can do. That's also very reassuring to me. It's very encouraging that I can have confidence that My effort at any time will be the best that I can do. It doesn't encourage me to slouch and slide by and say, oh well, but it encourages me to continually say, is this my best effort? What is my best effort? Why should it be such, require such effort just to be ourself?

[10:11]

Just to be ourself it seems like you could just kind of lie back and relax and there it is, but we have so many ideas. We have so many, you know, such a cupboard full of concepts about how we ought to be or how somebody else ought to be or how it all ought to work or that just to be who we are in each moment is really very difficult. We trip ourselves up with ideas. And often we're not so familiar with what all of these ideas are. One of the things that happens with us when we just sit still and don't try to do anything and just try to be here is we bump into some of the ideas that we carry around.

[11:25]

They're so habitual we don't even notice them until we quit rushing around and sit still. We're always so busy trying to do something. I myself have a very pernicious habit of trying to fix everything. Trying to make it all right. My big practice nowadays is to practice restraint. and not try to fix everything. Just see if I can let things go as they go and have some confidence that even though it doesn't fit my idea of how it ought to be, it's making its best effort, it's okay.

[12:25]

I don't need to fix it. I find it extremely difficult just to leave things alone. I always want to get in there and meddle. Even though I know that All being is Buddha, right now, just as it is. I want to fix it up a little bit, you know?

[13:37]

Maybe none of you have that problem. I find it very pernicious in me. When I was Eno at Green Gulch, you know, it was my responsibility that all the bells should ring on time and ring right, you know, not too loud, not too soft, just right. Not too fast, not too slow, but just right. There should be somebody to do each of the myriad details that go together to make a session. And I should be sure that everybody was doing what they were supposed to be doing when they were supposed to be doing it and so forth. It just fit right into my busyness, you know, and my tendency to try to fix everything. So now I'm not Eno anymore. And there's somebody else who's Eno and she's very competent.

[14:41]

And it's taken her quite a while to train me to just let her be, you know, you know, let her do it. If I come in and find out that the Doan hasn't lit the altar, just go on in and offer incense and sit down. Don't worry about it. Let her discover that, oops, you know, I forgot. And that is really hard for me to not do it. To not think, I can do it better. To let her do her job and let me do what I'm supposed to do. She's actually very good and usually everything is taken care of. But there are always mistakes, there are always slip-ups. And I don't have to fix them all. Hard lesson to learn. So how to be not so busy doing all the time and find out how to just be who you are.

[16:06]

I know Mel, this isn't a new subject, I know Mel talks a lot about being and doing. And of course we do what's in front of us, we take care of what we have to take care of. Each of us has our own function and we take care of our function as best we can. But everything that we do is based on being. And Zazen is to help us take care of being. It's to give us an opportunity to not be busy, to not have anything to do, just to sit here with nothing to do. We don't even have to breathe, breathing will breathe. We don't have to sit Zazen, Zazen sits Zazen.

[17:09]

We just have to be here. We just have to keep making effort, moment after moment, to be completely here. When we are completely here, We will take care of everything that needs taking care of. We will respond as necessary to whatever needs our response. It's hard for us to have real confidence in that. Can we just lie back and relax in Buddha's lap, you know?

[18:25]

And if we If we're daydreaming and don't notice something, our friends will tell us. That's what Sangha is for. That's what Sangha is for. That's the jewel of the Sangha. The jewel of the Sangha helps all of us to be Buddha. We support each other in that way. And our friends will tell us when we're not doing what we should be doing and when we're doing what we shouldn't be doing. This is Foo telling me, I'm Eno now. You don't need to do it anymore. Finally, she got me to notice what I was doing. I'm very hard-headed and thick-skulled, and it took her a long time, but she's very persistent.

[19:47]

But we can trust our friends with whom we practice to help us see what we're not noticing. And we ourselves, our job is to let them see who we are completely. When we let all of our friends see who we are completely, when we expose ourselves completely, we get to see for ourselves. Lots of things that we just aren't noticing when we're too busy rushing about. As Suzuki Roshi mentions in this lecture, when we're all doing the same thing, our differences are very apparent.

[21:03]

What is particular to us is very apparent when we're all just sitting zazen, just bowing, just chanting, just eating. We're all doing the same thing and yet each of us does it very distinctly. And for us, when we do the same thing day after day, period after period of zazen, bow after bow in service, When we're doing the same thing over and over again, then we get to see subtle differences. One period of Zazen is never like the one before or the one after. One breath is not the same as the one before or the one after. We get to see more and more subtly who we are the less we're doing.

[22:14]

So we make our effort to sit entirely still. And then we see what happens. When we have to move, we move, and then we make our effort to sit entirely still. continually renewing again that effort to be just sitting here, breathing into emptiness, being who we are completely. Being who we are completely

[23:30]

We develop a very inclusive feeling. When we become very intimate with ourself, we see ourself everywhere. Bowing to each other, we see ourself in each other. appreciating each other and each thing. We see ourself in each thing. Nothing is excluded. The self we are is very big. It includes everything. When you start, begin sitting, each period, you should give yourself Zazen instruction.

[25:00]

Each period you should arrange yourself. Is my back straight and long? Am I supporting myself from the bottom of my spine up through the top of my head? Are my shoulders soft, just being supported by the spine? Is my nose in line with my navel? Are my ears in line with my shoulder? Are my eyes open? Is my mouth closed? Teeth together? Tongue against the roof of the mouth? Is my mudra soft and round? Are my elbows loose and not held tightly. The whole thing, each period.

[26:06]

And if you notice yourself from time to time, you go through a whole checklist again during the period. And then return to breath. If you feel sleepy, there are various things you can do. I'm an expert at what to do about falling asleep. I've struggled with it for 20 years. Oh no, probably I didn't fall asleep for the first two or three years. My legs hurt too much. But there are several things that you can do to help you when you're feeling sleepy. Take a deep breath. A couple of deep breaths. Get a little more oxygen in there. Open your eyes a little more. Don't look down. Look a little further out instead of down so much. Notice if your mudra has collapsed.

[27:20]

If so, bring it back in contact with your body. Kadoguro once said, sometimes I pinch myself. He says, sometimes I pinch myself so much, I turn all green. He says, if I really have trouble, I pinch myself. If you find a lot of tension developing, usually that happens when you're feeling uncomfortable and you start to push it away. And then you build up more and more tension trying to push it away, and then of course it hurts more.

[28:23]

So it's useful to try to, when you first notice some discomfort, More have the feeling of softening and opening and trying to include it if you can Accepting and including that Whatever Strong sensation is happening and see if you can soften wherever the difficulty happens to be and Have some feeling of allowing it just to include it and not try to push it away. If you find some tension, you can also, in breathing, offer your breath to the tenseness and see if you can allow it to open more.

[29:33]

We don't try to remain still by holding still. It's not a holding feeling. If you find yourself clenching somewhere, try with breath and attention to unclench, to soften. Our effort is just to be here completely, including all of ourselves, not leaving anything out. To expose ourselves completely to each breath, If you find your posture is drawing back and you're hiding by pulling your chest back, see if you can lift from the bottom of your spine again, lifting all the way up your back to the top of your head.

[31:01]

It will allow you to open. This posture and breath are all about opening. Opening to ourself just as we are. Opening to everyone and everything just as it is. Appreciating. Each thing just as it is, appreciating each person just as they are, appreciating ourself just as we are. No, I forgot to look at the schedule and I don't know what time I'm supposed to end.

[32:19]

I'm counting on Ross to let me know. What time is this talk supposed to end? So there's a few minutes for questions if anyone has a question. Yeah? They asked me recently a question I used to ask a lot I don't know, but we like to do it, don't we? Well, I think it's a little bit.

[33:25]

I mean, that's really my answer. We like to do it. There's something about it that has a nice taste to it. But if that's not satisfying, perhaps I could say a little bit more. And a little bit more has to do with what I was saying. When we're doing the same thing, over and over again, just being here, not trying to do anything special. We get to see more and more subtly what some of our habits are, what some of the ideas are that we're carrying around with us that obscure us from ourself. When we're more active, it's easier to ignore some habits. And the less we try to do, the more we see some of the subtle things that are particular to us.

[34:29]

So it's like, It's like, you know, you look at a flower, and it's just wonderful. And it's fine the way it is, and you don't have to do anything about it, but sometimes you get really curious. So you take a magnifying glass and you look at it really, really carefully, you know? And you begin to really appreciate how incredible it is, you know? In all of its marvelous detail. But that doesn't mean that you can't just look at the flower and say, wow, that's wonderful. Just without all of that examination. But sometimes it's fun to just look really carefully and really closely and see all of the incredible detail of ourselves.

[35:35]

Yeah, yeah where you said I was talking about precepts precepts is not to improve your personality Or make you a better person precepts is not like that precepts is just it's just how we express Buddha life in the world. And he said, you know, when you discover that it's completely your responsibility to manifest Buddha in the world, naturally such a person sits down for a while. Thank you for reminding me. I like that very much.

[36:47]

But it's true. This jewel is the one through which we manifest Buddha. Each of us is a jewel, like an Indra's net. But this one is the one with which I manifest Buddha in the world. This one is the one with which you manifest Buddha in the world. And sometimes it's nice to sit still and see The beauty of it. Any other questions? Yeah. Can I ask you a question? It's a little bit, um... It's a lot of rocks. really forced me to see myself again. Being with each stitch recently, that's what's really, you know, slowly down, slowly down, to be with each stitch.

[37:55]

Parts of it that I know about, that I've dealt with or something. It's really funny how, again, just taking time away from a normal routine to be still with yourself. does allow things to surface and to be observed and dealt with or not dealt with and laughed at. It's hard to explain to somebody that you're going on a retreat, well have fun. Well, it is fun, isn't it? For sure. Somehow, through these forms, we get a taste of formlessness.

[39:15]

Hm? Of formlessness.

[39:20]

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