Well, we just completed our bodhisattva ceremony, which actually is called ryaku fusatsu in Japanese and means short repentance ceremony. Repentance is not exactly the right word, but we avow our karma, which means that we acknowledge our endless karmic life. And then we re-establish our life of intention, our intentional life. So there are two sides to our life for Zen students. One is karmic life and the other is life of intention or vow, a vow of practice. So I want to talk about these two things today and how we bring that together, bring those two elements together.

[01:14]

So, first in the bodhisattva ceremony we acknowledge our ancient twisted karma, which is beginningless and endless. because life continues endlessly and the forms of this endless life produce each one of us, produces each one of us. The karma, that beginningless karma has produced each one of us and continues to produce each one of us in various forms. endlessly. So first we acknowledge this. We don't confess our sins. That's not what sange is, or confession is.

[02:23]

It's not like confessing all of your sins one by one. It's acknowledging your karma. facing your vow or renewing your intention to practice. We're not interested in what you did yesterday that was bad. So our life is a combination of good things, bad things, and neutral things, neutral acts. And we're continually transmigrating through the six worlds of karma. And I'll talk about that in a minute.

[03:24]

But what I'm getting at is that this ceremony is a ceremony of returning to our non-dual nature. Our nature of the karma, our karmic life, separates us from realizing our nature, true nature. Our practice harmonizes ourself with our true nature in a non-dual way. So life of karma is a life of discrimination. Life of vow or intention is a life of unity, ideally. So when we do this ceremony,

[04:32]

We bow, I think, about 45 times, give or take a few bows. I think it's about 10 times 3, 30, plus 6, 36, and 33, 42, 45. Anyway, what is the bow? What is this bow? Each time we bow, this brings together all creation in this one act. Bowing is an act of non-duality. So our practice is actually quite simple. To return to our true nature, is actually quite simple.

[05:33]

Every time we bow, we have that opportunity. So, Dogen Zenji says, as long as we have bowing, we have real true practice. Practice will continue forever. So, although bowing is a kind of exotic act for Americans, unusual act, it's becoming more common. And for anybody that's been practicing for any length of time, it's just the most natural thing to do once you get used to it and accept it. So it's possible to return to your nature at any moment. It means stepping outside of karmic life and entering into life of non-duality.

[06:44]

So when we bow to all the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, we become one with Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, and Buddhas and Bodhisattvas are actually ourselves. We bow to the three treasures, Buddha, Dharma, Sangha. But when we bow to Buddha, we're actually unifying ourself with our true nature, which is Buddha. We're unifying ourself with our true nature, which is Dharma. We're unifying ourself with our true nature, which is Sangha. These are not something outside of ourself. If you think that these are Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, it's something outside of ourself which we're bowing to. That's dualistic understanding. Each one of us is the three treasures, Buddha, Dharma, Sangha. So we unify ourself with ourself, and we unify ourself with each other, and we unify each other with each other.

[08:03]

with the whole universe, which is nothing but Buddha, Dharma, Sangha. So it's more than you can figure out. It's just doing something completely and wholeheartedly. So we say when we bow, we bow to ourself. That's the koan of bowing. People say, oh, that's very egotistical, to bow to yourself. We have to understand what our self is. We bow to our self, realizing there's no self to bow to. When we take precepts, which we just did, we just chanted precepts.

[09:25]

Precepts is a life of vow, intentional life, which is very hard to maintain because our life of karma is so strong. In the Heart Sutra, the Heart Sutra says, in the six worlds, all Buddhas depend on Prajnaparamita, Anuttara, and attain Anuttara Samyak Sambodhi. Anuttara Samyak Sambodhi means complete perfect enlightenment. Japanese says Anuttara Samyak Sambodhi. Our old sutra used to say Anuttara. We didn't like to translate that, but now it's translated to complete perfect enlightenment, which is about right, but not quite. In the six worlds, all Buddhas depend on prajnaparamita, which is non-duality, oneness of self, oneness of self and other.

[10:37]

So we know what the six worlds are. The six worlds are the heavenly realm, the realm of fighting demons, asuras, the human realm, the animal realm, the hungry ghost realm, and the hell realm. Did I leave one out? No. These are the six worlds of which we're continually through which we're continually migrating. One moment we're a fighting demon, the next moment we're in hell, and then a little later on we become like an animal. Through desire we become a hungry ghost, and sometimes

[11:46]

We even feel like a human being. Human being is very high, actually. High state. But these are the karmic realms. Karmic realms of our life. Life, which means life driven by desire. Driven by desire. And then there are five other realms, which is the Buddha realm, the Bodhisattva realm, the Pracheka Buddha realm, the Shravaka realm, and in order to balance it, the heavenly realm, or the realm of the devas. So when we bow, when you put your hand in gassho, gassho means putting your hands together.

[12:47]

We have Buddha realm and human realm and we have Bodhisattva realm and Preta or fighting demon realm and Pratyekabuddha realm, and the animal realm, and Sravaka realm, and hungry ghost realm, and hell realm, and heavenly realm. Oh, heavenly realm and hell realm. They put the, even though the heavenly realm is one of the six worlds, it has to be put on this side in order to balance ten fingers. But it works. So, when you put your hands together, you're bringing the karmic realm and the realm of vow together.

[13:57]

Those ten realms come together in gassho. In each one of the karmic worlds, if you've ever seen the Wheel of Life, the Tibetan Wheel, sometimes that within each realm they'll have a bodhisattva in a little circle within that world. Which means that within that world of karma there's also a realm of vow. There's a bodhisattva within each realm. But here we say Buddha human realm. is within the human realm. Bodhisattva in the fighting demon realm. And these complement each other. And when you bring your palms together, you're bringing together all the worlds.

[15:04]

All the worlds that come together in this Kasha. So every time you put your palms together in gassho, you can think about bringing all these realms together in oneness. And yet each of these realms exists both dependently and independently. So even though we do live a life of vow, we're still within the karmic realm. to practice our vow or life of vow or life of intention within the karmic realm. This is a Bodhisattva practice. This is Mahayana practice. Hinayana practice is to separate the karmic realm from the realm of intention or the realm of vow.

[16:11]

So when you do that, then you confess all of your sins because you want to be free from the realm of karma. And so you keep the two really separate and you don't do anything in this realm except eat and sleep and just the most basic kind of activities until you're no longer part of this world. But that's Hinayana type of practice. That's dualistic practice. Mahayana practice is non-dualistic practice. Within the six realms of karma is where our life of vow takes place, which is much more difficult, but it's more realistic. You can't really escape from this world. when you're in it, but you can find freedom within it.

[17:20]

Life of vow is to be able to find your freedom within your situation. So, you say, Find your equanimity. Find your... ...settlements within. Find your calm mind within the... ...surging waves of this life. It's really easy to find your calm mind in a calm situation. You know, when you quiet all the waves, when you're sitting out there on the boat, what's the problem? That's not hard, you know. Although, it may be the most difficult.

[18:26]

But to find the calmness of your mind within the turbulence of the situation of your life, that's where you really need to practice. But I will say, sitting out there on the calm ocean, without any disturbance, will also drive you crazy. Unless you know how to do it. Either way, it's a problem. That's why we have so much problem sitting Zazen, when we begin. It's too calm to, you know, now what? The mind needs something to grab, or grapple with, something to engage with besides just this. So, although it's very simple to return to our true nature,

[19:40]

our non-dual nature, it's very hard to sustain, really hard to sustain. So over and over we train ourselves to sustain, and over a period of time it becomes easier to sustain calm mind We're both in Zazen and in our daily life to maintain our equilibrium, to stay grounded in Big Mind, not get turned around, pushed around by the elements of the six worlds. Actually, not to get pushed around by our desire. There's nothing out there that's really pushing us around. what's pushing us around is our own desire.

[20:42]

So the realm of karma is the realm of being pulled around by our own desire, being captivated by our own desire. The realm of vow is using desire as a basis for practice. It's not that we get rid of desire. It's just that you use desire instead of being used by it. So being used by desire is called bondage. Using desire is called freedom. There's a very famous saying by Master Joshu to a monk. He said, you are used by the 24 hours. I use the 24 hours. A very simple way to always return to your non-dual nature is just to put your hands in gassho.

[22:21]

There are several ways of gassho in our school, We don't really talk about it so much, you know, we don't differentiate so much, but strictly speaking, there's a gassho, which is very formal, where you put your palms together and your elbows are more out, you know, and your fingertips are below the bottom of your nose. And you don't, like, this is more Hindu stuff. below you, the boundary node. And that's kind of formal style where when you're bowing to objects. When we're bowing to each other, it's less formal style and not quite so stiff, you know, and a little looser because there's the human element.

[23:28]

That's called one, no mind. BOW. BOW NO MIND. BOW NO MIND is non-dualistic bow. Where you completely give up yourself. There's no ego in it. And you take your time. I was having doksan with a young girl at Tassajara last week. And she was kind of scared, you know. And so she came in and all of her actions were, she could never really settle down. You know, she was always, she would bow and she'd sit down and kind of squirm around a little bit and we'd talk and then she'd get up and

[24:33]

And she kind of half-bowed, but she was already out the door. I was not criticizing her. I wanted to say to her, before she got out the door, she left too fast. I wanted to say to her, when you stand here, just stand here. Just completely stand here. Just be there. When you bow, just Do that. Take the time and the space to just be there. And when you stand up and adjust your cushion, just do that in complete calmness. There's nothing else to do. There's no place else to go. And then when you get up, just completely do that. There's nothing next. But yet, you come back to life again. and do the next thing.

[25:34]

So when you do this, you just completely let go of everything. It's like breathing. When you inhale, you come to life, and when you exhale, you let go of it. So bowing is kind of like exhaling. The same as exhaling. You just let go of everything and just exist in that freedom of that moment with everything. just for a moment, and then it's just like letting go of your breath. You could die, but there's another breath, and you come back to life. You bow and let go of everything, and then you come back up, and then there's life again. So you just respond to it. So you don't have to plot out your future. so much.

[26:36]

It presents itself, and then you can just respond to it with an empty mind. So in Sashin we have this opportunity, you know, because we don't have such a complex life here. And you can just let go, and then take up, and let go, and take up, and let go, and and let go is to empty everything out. Every time you exhale, just let go of everything. And then when you inhale, it's so wonderful to come back to life. When you bow, just let go of everything. And when you stand up, the world is all new, completely new. And when we do prostration, You know, we touch our elbows and the back of our hands and our forehead to the ground at the same time.

[27:45]

Even though, technically, one knee goes down first, one elbow goes down first. But it's so subtle, I don't pay attention to that. I just go down, best I can. But when I do bow, I try to do it as carefully as I can. And when you do it that way, thinking about your balance and how you're going to stand up and what does it take to stand back up again? What do you use to come back to life with? Once you're down, you're letting go of everything. And then when you stand back up, you have to use your balance and your muscles and your thought of standing up And how do you do that? What's the best way to do that? You should be thinking about that. That's all there is to think about.

[28:46]

And you're just completely present. And when we put our hands down, like with our fingers and thumbs together, and you raise your hands, about up to your ears, no higher than your ears, not like this or like this, because symbolically you hold your Buddha standing on your hands and you're raising Buddha up above your head. So it's that feeling of offering or raising something. above your head, but you only bring your hands to your ears. If you go... I've told you this about 500 times. Tathagatagarbha used to laugh and say, you go like this, and Buddha's going... And yet, as many times as I've said this, we continue to do it.

[29:59]

Sometimes people go like this. But it may feel funny, you know. Oh, Buddha's hands above my head. Wait a minute. What kind of idolatry is that? It's a good question. Well, then who is Buddha? That's a good question. That's a big koan. Everything's a big koan for us. This is genjo koan. Our practice is genjo koan. means that everything we do presents us with a koan. It's the koan of daily life, the koan of moment to moment existence. What do you mean, raising Buddha? Who's Buddha? What do you mean?

[31:07]

Exhaling is dying. What's dying? What do you mean inhaling is coming back to life? What's life? What's birth? And we say, when you bow, you bow to yourself. Well, what's myself? That's the big go on. So, there's the bow, which is obvious, you know, and there's the bow that's not so obvious, which is, in everything you do, there's the bow. How do you bring these ten worlds together in whatever you're doing?

[32:19]

There's the bow that doesn't look like a bow. So, we exist within the karmic world of the six realms, and yet our life of, our intentional life, our life of vow, life of precepts, is always in dynamic relationship. And karmic life starts to take over and then we remember our life of vow and we return to it. And then we get off again, and we return to it, and we get off again. That's life. You know, this dynamic of getting caught by karma, and then letting go, or returning to a life of freedom, which doesn't always look like freedom.

[33:32]

In Tassajara, there was another young girl who said, I'm not sure that I want to be a Buddhist. I kind of like to explore paganism. And I thought, that's great. We all want to explore paganism. She's 20 years old. This is about the right age to explore paganism. But there's this dynamic, you know. Part of us wants to just be completely sensual and free in that way. And the other part of us says, you can't do that. Even though you want to do it, you can't do it. There has to be some control and some balance in our life. If we do whatever we want, we realize it's not freedom, and we get caught by it.

[34:42]

But we have to go through that, you know. Often people come to practice, and practice for a while, and they say, well, you know, I have other things to do. And I say, yes, please go do those things, you know, because you have to go through those things in order to come back to practice. And five years later, somebody shows up again. So now I'm ready to practice. So, do you have any questions? And this practice, like the bowing and the meditation, seems to just take care of yourself.

[35:49]

However, this karma thing takes a leap of faith. And sometimes I have it, like this morning I don't. Like when I die, now the volcule just evolves and become other things. How do I know that? But this morning I totally don't have this faith that it will go on and there is beginningless and endless. And I don't have it. Yeah. What do you do about it? Well, what you think, what you would like to have go on is your consciousness and this body, right? I mean, what you would like to have go on is just the way things are now. But you know that Although life continues, the forms change. So, there's no form that's going to remain the same.

[36:50]

So, in order to find some peace, we have to allow ourselves to take other forms. What we don't want to lose is our consciousness of the way life is now. And so we feel that this is the great life, and all other forms of life are lower forms. That's our feeling. Well, every other form of life is a lower form because it's not conscious. That's just our idea. But life takes care of itself. And you have to be able to trust that life is taking care of itself, just as you trust that life is taking care of itself right now.

[37:56]

But we call it me. That's just our idea. We have this idea. This is me. But it's just life taking care of itself. And life will always take care of itself. We have to trust that. You have to have that leap of faith that says, well, life will take care of itself. It may not take care of me the way I think of myself. In the Bible it says, God is not a respecter of persons. That's right. So we have this deep attachment to this person, deep attachment to this person, which is normal. Normal to have deep attachment to this person, but we also need to have non-attachment.

[39:04]

to this person at the same time. Because it's not, this person is a passing phase of life. Passing phase of life. But how do you know that, as what Kuala Lumpur is saying, what I hear Kuala Lumpur saying is, how do you know that these molecules, whether they're of yourself or not, just anything, How do you know that that's just something that evaporates and nothing? You don't need to know. There's no need to know. So we should just accept it because Buddhism says so? Well, what would you do? What else would you do? Investigate. Okay. Investigate. But you're the teacher, I'm asking you for help. No, you didn't say that.

[40:05]

You said that you would investigate. Ah, but, with your help, I'll investigate. All I do is that I don't believe in karma. Ah, you don't believe that karma is cause and effect. So, when there's a cause, there's an effect. You don't believe that? Well, yes, I believe that. But the ancient, twisted karma... Oh, ancient, twisted karma... is not necessarily your personal karma. It is and it isn't. There's the ancient twisted karma of the human race, which has produced this human, which continues to produce and develop this human being over and over again.

[41:08]

It's called development. And the way we live our life now determines what the next production is going to be like. So it's personal and impersonal at the same time. There's, you know, your own personal karma, which is Kuan Lam. But Kuan Lam's just a name, you know, a human being. Human being's just a name, but they both exist and they're both illusory. And if you want to reduce it to molecules, you can do that.

[42:15]

This is just molecules. This is just Dharma. This is ancient Buddhist teaching, that everything is just molecules. They called them atoms, actually. The atomic theory of the Buddhists is very ancient. It's just particles. Everything is particles. That's just old-fashioned teaching in Buddhism. And if you study Abhidhamma, it's the study of the analysis of the psychophysical constituencies of a human being. That's what Abhidhamma is. Very analytical. And they've figured out everything. And it's all there. You can study that. And Ron can study that, too. And what it does is reduces the psychophysical combinations down to atomic particles.

[43:18]

And so there's no human there. There's no ego there. The reason they did that is to show there's no ego. That there's no inherent self. That's the purpose of doing that. And which doesn't mean that there's no life. I mean, because there is no inherent self, there is what we call an imputed self. That's what you think of as Quan Long, is the imputed self. So we have the five rivers of form, feelings, perceptions, mental formations and consciousness. These are called the five skandhas. And these five skandhas all interact with each other in a marvelous way. And consciousness creates various levels of understanding of what that is.

[44:29]

There are various levels of consciousness which determine what this conglomeration of five rivers is, and the seventh level of consciousness says, this is myself. That's ego consciousness. Without ego consciousness, things just work by themselves, without that sense. So Buddha doesn't have the seventh consciousness, or the seventh consciousness is transmuted to its original form, which is conveying messages from the eighth consciousness to the other six. So, it's a complex study, but you can study both Abhidhamma and Abhidhamma Kosha, which explains how all this works.

[45:36]

So it's all explainable. But you don't feel that. You feel lost in the world. You don't want this thing to come apart. So we have a lot of fear that this thing will come apart. And then what? Linda? The statement that you cited from the Bible, God is no stricter person Yeah, that's right. The universe is also a respecter of persons but not in the way you want it to be. That's what it means. When you were talking about the six realms of existence, it appeared to me that five of them were very much preoccupied with a way of being that kind of defined who they were.

[46:53]

And the sixth one, the human realm, didn't have any specific quality, and is that the highest realm. And I'm wondering, is that, is being like truly human seeing the other five as as yourself and that one moment you're... Well, human realm is the realm of normalcy. We say the... You know, Buddha describes enlightenment as the norm. He describes the life of... What we're trying to find is the norm. If you read the Pali Sutras, they're always talking about the norm, what's normal, not something extraordinary, or abnormal, or supernormal, or something, but just what is correct as the norm.

[47:59]

And so, human beings, A true human being is normal, but what normal is, is maybe not what we think it is. Everybody has a different idea about what normal is, but that's a big thorn. What is the norm? What should we be? How should we perceive and act? in order to be one with the norm. So, you know, Buddha says about some enlightened person, they've set down the burden. The first thing he says is, set aside the burden and has resumed to the norm.

[49:03]

Way down the burden is a very big one. Yes? When you started speaking, you spoke... I heard you say that one of the... I don't have the right words to quote, but... The idea of Buddhism is to maintain a sense of calmness. Yes. And oftentimes in my experience, I'll go to work and I will intend on being calm. I'll have everything together The best way is to sit Sashin, to have the experience of really sitting Sashin without moving. If you sit Sashin with all your energy, maintaining posture, following your breath, and not letting anything bother you,

[50:24]

Just completely sitting still, no matter what's happening, you will attain calmness of mind. I can say various things to you about how you might do it, but that doesn't mean you'll be able to do it. So that's exactly what Satsang is about, is maintaining calmness of mind no matter what's going on, no matter what happens. That's how you maintain calmness of mind, and that's how you let go of your dualistic thinking. That's exactly what it's about. So you go through a lot of pain, you go through excruciating states of mind, and you maintain the calmness of your mind through it all. Don't let anything upset you. You don't wait for the bell. If you can do that over and over, then you will have calmness of mind.

[51:39]

You may not. But you may. That's the way that you develop it. Last Sunday at the wedding of Karen and Paul, we talked about, and I'm not sure if these were vows, but they might have been, about caring for each other. And I realize that I'm not quite sure what that means. Yeah, I'm not either. So it's something you have to keep working at all the time. It's just something, that's another thing to go on. What does that mean? How do you do that?

[52:39]

A lot of it means giving up your own selfish way of looking at it. which is not always easy. So we're always dealing with that, you know. What do I want? And then what am I willing to give you? There's an idea in there of an aspect of no limits. Well, everything has limits. Going beyond the limits that I have. Expanding. Yeah, that's good. And, uh, you know, that moves the feathers and it moves out on the reciprocity. Right. You may be doing too much and not getting enough, right? Yeah. But that's good, to do too much and not get anything.

[53:49]

That's good. That's good for us, even though it's not what we want. Yeah, I think that sitting is a way of, for me that's a very common feeling, like I'm the one doing too much. And when I look at the people, the residents who live here, I wonder how they handle that custodian would come up constantly because I think they give so much as part of their residency. If you don't think so much in terms of limits, then it's not so bad. It depends on what you want to do with your life. If that's what you want to do with your life, then it's not a problem. But if you're not doing that, and you see other people doing that, you say, wow, they're giving so much. But giving is a way of life.

[54:54]

That's true. Yeah, so that's nice. I appreciate the generosity of the residents. Yes? I just have to respond, because that comes up over the years I've been here, people appreciating the residents' efforts and all that, and I sincerely feel that Suzuki Roshi said that if you get angry and you're not supposed to get angry, that's breaking the precept.

[56:15]

But if you're supposed to get angry and you don't, that's also breaking the precept. And wasn't it Joshu who said, an appropriate response? So how does that work with colonists of mind, if you were talking? The way it works with colonists of mind I was talking about is That one way, anger is using you, and the other way, you're using anger. And in calmness of mind, you're using anything that comes at hand, but without being upset. So even though you're angry, you're not attached to the anger. That's calmness of mind. So calmness of mind is first. Perpetual. Perpetual. It's a state of being. And then anger comes up within, comes as a mind.

[57:17]

And then if it needs to be used, you use it. It's a tool. Yes? It reminds me of a story, one of those old Chinese stories, a Zen master's wife dies or something, in a violent way, and he just shrieks, this shriek that can be heard across the temple. So you'll probably say he does that out of a compass of mind. Well, there's also, who was it? Kanto, who was murdered by thieves in his temple. And he made this tremendous shout that was heard all the way to the next town. And this was a koan for Hakuin for a long time. Why did he do that? That was a big koan for him.

[58:20]

Why did he do that? There's also a story of the Zen master who said, I don't want to die when it was time. You know, we think that everything we say is absolute, but we're talking about attitudes. We're not talking about how to absolutely be in every single situation your whole life, you know? Like, we... calmness of mind is like an attitude. Sometimes we lose it. You know? Everybody loses it. Sometimes anger pulls us around. Sometimes I get pulled around by anger. But my basic attitude is not to get pulled around by it. My basic attitude is to reside in calmness of mind.

[59:28]

But that doesn't mean that I don't get angry, or pushed around, or tipped over. But then I get back up. That's our practice. You get tipped over, but you get back up because you know what your path is. You know where the tracks in the road are. So some people are very good at it, some people are not so good at it. Sometimes we're real good at it, sometimes we're not so good. So this is human life. It's not that you're always perfect. Can we go back to the math? To the math? I think one has skipped to the six realms. Yeah. Five fingers. Which one is amiss here? Which one is? Amiss in the six realms.

[60:28]

Yeah. You have five fingers. Which finger? That's six realms. Yeah. So one of them is missing. Oh, no. One of them is over here. I've got five over there already. No? Yeah. There are six realms. That's 11, right? Uh-huh. But the fifth one over here is the sixth one from here. See what I mean? So the heavenly realm is put over on this side because it balances the hell realm. So half of that hell is the same. Heaven and hell counteract each other, are opposites, right? Complementary, so to speak. So that's why I said at first, they took the heavenly realm and put it over on this side, because it balances out, complements the hell realm. And so it can go over there.

[61:30]

Even though, strictly speaking, the heavenly realm is a karmic realm. But they call it the realm of... Huh? That's still the Southern Realm. Still what? Oh. They call it the realm of the Devas, in this case, which are the heavenly beings, you know, who don't really create karma. They're kind of above the karmic realm. But if you include the heavenly realm in the six realms, The heavenly realm is a karmic realm. It's a place where we like to get to. It's a desire. Everybody wants to get there, you know. But yet, the karma runs out and then you flow through some other realm, right?

[62:27]

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