I vow to taste the truth of the Tathagata's words. Good evening. I'd like to introduce Gesheen Sensei. This is the second time that Gesheen has spoken here. Last time was like a year and a half or two years ago in the old Zen dojo. She's come here from San Diego. Gesheen is a disciple of Suzuki Roshi, who is the abbot of the Cimarron Zen Center and also Mount Baldy in Los Angeles. And she's been practicing with him since, I think, about 1967. And just in this last year, she's been separated from Cimarron formally and become a teacher in her own right.

[01:03]

has been traveling around the country as well as the world. She still has a relationship with Suzuki, which you know as a teacher. On Saturday, she'll be traveling to Europe to teach there for several months. So thank you for coming tonight. Thank you very much for your invitation and it is indeed a great joy for me to be here with you and a great honor to be asked to speak to you in this beautiful new Sendok. I feel very good here and very happy to see how you manifest your Zen practice.

[02:05]

That is what Zen practice is really all about. Buddhism is not a teaching, but it is a way of being in the world. It means for us, if we call ourselves Buddhists, which is really rather unnecessary, But if we use that term for a moment, it means a way of being human in the world. One of the great problems, among the many problems that human beings have, but for people that are on the spiritual path, no matter in what tradition it seems, has always been how to relate or how to unify in oneself or how to resolve the dichotomy between what people see as the spiritual of their life and the ordinary everyday human life.

[03:26]

And I remember many years ago when I was practicing together then with Catholic monks in a Trappist monastery they compared my life in some ways to that of Teresa of Avila because she was also in her time traveling through the countryside in Spain and making foundations of new convents here and there for her various disciples and this happened to me at a time when I was traveling a lot with Sasaki Roshi when He was founding various centers around this country in Canada and in New Zealand at the time. And I remember they gave me a book about Teresa's life. And I read there about her hardships, but what I remember most of all was the struggle she had with for a period in her life to resolve that conflict

[04:33]

between her spiritual life and that which she saw as the so-called worldly or relative life. Because in many religious teachings that is separated somehow. It is always held as being apart from our human or ordinary life, something divine, distant, maybe in another time and space. And the day when she was officially affirmed, or her insights, her enlightenment was affirmed by a priest that came through town, I can't recall his name now, and a laywoman who was an ardent supporter of Teresa, invited her over to her house to meet with this priest and he affirmed and confirmed her true enlightenment.

[05:38]

At that moment she exclaimed, thank God for no more gloomy saints, because she finally had found the oneness of the divine and the ordinary life. In the Rinzai Zen tradition, there are many koans, but ultimately all koans are actually formulated problems, ordinary problems of human life, and actually all of them deal essentially with this dichotomy between the so-called divine or otherworldly, transcendent, spiritual, true nature and my ordinary everyday self. The Master that I particularly gravitate toward and whose teaching I like so very much because he was very simple.

[06:49]

And also he apparently taught a lot with words. or through, with language, through words, was Master Zhou Shu of China. Perhaps you're also familiar with his life and some of his examples, but you may know that he was a disciple of Master Nansen, who was a great renowned teacher in his time, the Tang Dynasty in China. And Zhou Shu, it is said, was enlightened or experienced his first great enlightenment experience when he was 18, and it is also said of Master Nansen that he, at a very young age, maybe 18 or 19, had his first great insight. Joshu then had subsequent insights, but it is interesting, there is a question he asked Master Nansen after he was with Nansen, maybe for

[07:57]

30 years at least. And even though it is said he had enlightening experience at age 18, there was still somewhere remained some doubt. And one day he asked his master, how can one approach the way, you know, in China they use the word Dao, Taoism, how can one approach the Way? And Master Nansen said, if you try to approach it, it escapes you. If you do not try, then you live in ignorance. So what should you do? Then Joshu said, then how can I know about the Way? And Nansen answered, the Way does not belong to knowing or not knowing. And Master Nansen said, the ordinary mind is the way.

[09:07]

If we say the ordinary mind is the way, then to one who is not experienced in spiritual matters, so to speak, one who has no insight by way of experience, will misunderstand this to mean the ordinary, my ordinary, ignorant, dualistically functioning one is the way. And out of this has arisen a lot of misunderstanding and misconduct in the world, especially in a country like this, where we have such great freedom from social, maybe from traditions and things. very free to just about do anything we like. And it is dangerous for people to read such books and to think, ah, Zen means you can just do anything, you're free to do anything, wildly anything. And this is really why we need Sendos and practice centers like this, where we have a place where we can come to see the true meaning of these

[10:27]

sayings and the true meaning of myself. Zen means to get to know myself, my true self. And in a way that may look very selfishly in the beginning because I am not here to realize you or yourself. I am here to realize this self. But when we realize this self, I have realized yourself also. When Master Nansen said, the ordinary mind is the way, he meant by that the enlightened mind is our ordinary mind. It is our ordinary self. And not what we call ordinarily our self. that deluded, dualistically functioning self, which has a conditioning, a personal conditioning as its base.

[11:41]

But the enlightened nature, which we call in Buddhism our true nature, or Buddha nature, that is our ordinary mind, our ordinary self. And if we are not in that state, if we do not realize ordinary mind, then we are extraordinary, we are outside of our true state. Master Joshu was deeply enlightened by that answer, and it set the tone for his teaching. When he When Master Nansen said to him, the ordinary mind is the way, that means your everyday functions become the way. And so Master Joshu, when he was asked later on by a monk, all the multitudinous things return to the One.

[12:53]

Most people find it easy to follow this far. Yes, of course, everything returns to the One. I can understand that. And most of the time, unfortunately, they leave it at that. In many religious teachings it ends there. Everything returns to God, or everything returns to the Absolute, to the One, or to Eternity, or whatever they might call it. But in Zen, they ask further, what does that one return to? So a monk came to ask Master Joshua one day, all things return to the one. What does that one return to? And Joshua answered, when I was still living in the province, say, One day I made a hempen shirt.

[13:59]

It weighed seven pounds. Another monk asked him one day, what is the meaning of Bodhidharma's coming to the West? We all know that Bodhidharma came from India. And it is said that he brought the teaching or the practice that we know today as Zen to China. But on the other hand, Bodhidharma did not teach in China. He sat most of the time, it is said, facing a wall in the Shaolin temple, maybe in a grotto doing Zazen. He refused to accept disciples for a long time. And yet, and little is known actually, about the man called Bodhidharma. Little is known of his history. And yet, look what he started.

[15:03]

He is responsible for this Sendo. He is responsible for everything that is done in the name of Zen in China and in all the countries to which it went from there. So it is a classical question in Zen practice to ask, if there was nothing he brought, if there is no teaching, if there is no doctrine, then what was it that Bodhidharma brought to the West? What is the meaning of Bodhidharma's coming to the West? At that time, Master Joshua answered, the oak tree in the front garden. a monk who was new, a newcomer to the monastery, had, as it was customary, tea with the master.

[16:05]

And so Joshu asked him a probing question. First he asked him, what do you want here? The monk said, I want to realize my Buddha nature. I want to become Buddha. Joshu said, have you had your breakfast already? The monk said, yes. Then Joshua said, then go and wash your bowl. Most translations that you can find of this koan end there. But one time I came upon a more extensive translation of it and it said, actually, originally it does not end there. It went on to say, Joshua went on to say, go and wash your bowl and be gone with it. And that to me is a fascinating addition or completion of that sentence.

[17:12]

What does it mean, go and wash your bowl and be gone? I'm sure you have heard this many times and read it hundreds and thousands of times, always is said to be ordinary everyday life. And yet, we find it in the beginning so difficult to see that how, after we have been to a session, how it can be, how can I transform that into my everyday activities? How do they meet? And again, at Zen Center, today and yesterday, in some interviews, students here and there would ask me that. I understand the meaning of the practice, but when I relate with people, or when I'm in my job, still, it doesn't work for me. Josho said, go, after you have eaten, very logical, go and wash your bowl, and be gone.

[18:20]

All of our practice aims only at realizing what we call in Buddhism suchness, or the suchness of the Dharma, that which actually is, that which actually is taking place. And you know the Buddha said after his enlightenment, nothing has been attained by me. is a very difficult paradox for our intellect to deal with, to think that we make so much effort and endure so much pain and trouble and tiredness and upset just to attain nothing. It is to see that My nature and the function of the universe are one and the same nature.

[19:37]

The barrier is there where we seek this universal or Buddha nature apart or away from ourselves, apart or away from where we are now. because we have been conditioned to search always externally, to rely upon external sources for information, for guidance, for teaching. And up to a point, of course, that is necessary. The first teacher in our lives is the mother and the father, but maybe the very first one, the mother. And a child depends completely upon the mother at first. But then there comes a time of separation.

[20:42]

And the realization that we have to walk on our own two feet. The Buddha said, the light is within you. Look there. and you find the truth, you find the Dharma within. Master Rinzai said, just stop looking externally, stop seeking for it externally. Of course, we need teachers. Teachers are our guides, very necessary. It is very, almost impossible to begin practice without a teacher. But any great teacher will only be there to liberate us from ourselves and to to make us realize the Master within. Wash out your bowl and be gone. You have to wash the bowl and be gone with it, with washing the bowl.

[21:53]

It is relatively easy for us to understand this in things that we like to do. For instance, there is an American song. In the morning mist two lovers kissed and the world stood still. They are completely gone. There is no more world. So maybe it's easy for us to experience this state in situations and in activities that we like. But it's not so easy for us because we have dislikes to experience it there in any kind of activity. The Dharma activity consists of becoming and dissolving, of a constant process of expansion and contraction. In the Diamond Sutra,

[22:57]

there is the word, the help, by the help and the favor of the Tathagata. By the help means becoming, we come into being with the help of the whole universe. Events come about spontaneously and concurrently with everything. Such an event we call self. Each one of us is such a momentary event of many concurring circumstances and ingredients. It has almost no duration. It is so brief and instantly dissolves again and is being reabsorbed into that which we call the Absolute, or when it is personified in Buddhist sutras, it is called the Tathagata Garbha, the womb of the Tathagata, the womb of the Absolute, or of the Cosmic Buddha, if we personify it.

[24:10]

Whether we are in the state of dissolution, of no-self, of completely gone, or in the state of just evolving as self, as form, either way we are never outside or separate from that activity or from Buddha. So in the one phase we can see ourselves as being completely absorbed into Buddha or the womb, and in the other, the next moment, we're expelled, exploded out again into form. imploded and exploded constantly, or whatever your favorite, maybe, visualization or imagination of this process may be. And the Buddha said, if we identify with that process, which in Buddhism is called Dharma, then we have experienced what he called the deathless.

[25:19]

or what we might in the Western world maybe call eternal life. And Zen does not aim at anything other than for us to realize this very basic spirituality. Not to unify things, but to realize what lies before they are separated, and how the separation occurs, and to see that everything that, when it is separated, is again being unified into what in Buddhism is called emptiness, or nothingness, or a state of zero, of no form, of neither form nor not form, or a state of absoluteness, which is beyond the distinction of being and non-being.

[26:27]

So the masters, when they respond to Koans, and when Buddha spoke, they speak from that consciousness which is realized as this absolute consciousness and at the same time manifests as the particular, a limited particular of that absolute consciousness. The absolute is absolute, is beyond comparison, beyond grasping, beyond understanding. It can never be explained or talked about. And the Absolute in itself, you may call that God or Buddha, Tathagata, or the ultimate reality, has no need for anything, has no need to become anything, has no need to be affirmed. True nature is beyond affirmation and negation.

[27:35]

But the only way that we can come into the experience of the Absolute, of this ultimate reality is through form. It is exactly through our particular limited self that we can experience it. And it makes itself visible and tangible and tasteable and audible through form. It is indeed a great joy to one day realize that there is nothing we have to worry about, nothing we have to search for, nothing we have to complete or perfect, that indeed from the very beginning nothing has ever been not perfect, not completed.

[28:44]

It was only my incomplete seeing which made it appear imperfect. I know there have been a lot of problems in not only the center here in San Francisco but in other centers as well. And whenever there is an upheaval somewhere because many people are in the beginning phases of practice there's a tendency to be swept away by these big waves and emotions of things, and a tendency to lose sight of what we are really here to do, to be again swept away with our discriminating consciousness and our judgments, and to lose sight of what it is really all about, to lose sight of the essence. We are here to realize Buddha, to realize ourselves as Buddha.

[29:56]

And when we have realized self completely, we only see what Buddha saw. Namely, that everything exists as Buddha, or as he put it, enlightenment. That from the very beginning, the whole Dharma process is what we call enlightenment. And there's nothing that functions or can function outside of that or elsewhere. And that however it manifests, beyond all discrimination of what we might think right or wrong, it is just so as it is. You know Bodhidharma when he came to China, he was granted an audience with the Emperor. And Emperor Wu, you know, was a great Buddhist who had built many monasteries and temples in China.

[30:59]

And in those days, if one wanted to become a monk, one had to have the permission of the Emperor because one was supported, I suppose, by the Emperor, by taxes or whatever, donations from the court. So that Emperor Wu held himself to be a great Buddhist, a great protector of monks, and he expected due reward for that. When Bodhidharma appeared, he asked him, what merit will I get for all this work I have done of building monasteries and temples and ordaining monks? And Bodhidharma said, none whatsoever, no merit. It probably has happened to you too, like to me that when I was beginning Zen practice, a lot of my friends and people that I encountered would ask me what I was doing, and naturally they would say, gee, that's very interesting. What does that do for you?

[32:01]

And one time my doctor asked me, hmm, You look really very well," he said, you know, but I mean, aside from that, what does it do for you? I mean, all the sitting and meditation and things you do and spending so much time at it, there must be some kind of reward for it. And he said, I mean, if I did it, what would it do for me? Would it, for instance, would I give up smoking? But when he asked me, what does it do for you, I said, nothing. And he said, oh, come on. There must be something that's... I mean, would I give up smoking?" And I said, I don't know if you would give up smoking or not. But it's just one of those things that for once is not utilitarian, cannot be bought, it cannot be sold. It is, from the worldly point of view, from the commercial point of view, utterly useless. out of the realm of being sold and bought and out of the realm of rewards and that whole system that we have developed of the way we are in the world.

[33:17]

And you see, it's really not difficult at all. If you don't have a difficult mind, if you hold no useless things in your mind, if you just do that, If you do not seek for any great mysteries beyond that, and if you just do, for instance, what Joshu says, go and wash your bowl and be gone with it. If you practice your life like that, but without making choices, like the Third Patriarch said, the true way, the real way is easy, only it does not like to make choices. That means to practice suchness, to practice to realize yourself in the moment as the event, as it is, and then know that that is your real self. It cannot be grasped by way of belief either.

[34:25]

That is why we have to sometimes get sore knees and back positions. The only way it ever can be realized is by way of experience. And each one of us, we have to get our own spiritual experience. Our own inner revolution has to occur, which transforms us. And by that transformation, we become manifested, realized people in the world. And by that, we change the world. Because we have changed not the world with weapons, and with idealism and with going through the world and asserting our ideas, or a religious idea, but by having changed our way of viewing the world. And suddenly, what had been maybe a problematic and troublesome world to you, suddenly takes on a completely different light. And it is so simple then, and so at hand, and so direct,

[35:30]

The only barrier is our complex mind that is full of ideas and concepts of what it should be, of what we have been taught spirituality is or where it is. That we do not, cannot believe that it can be something this simple as sweeping the floor or washing our cup or tying the shoe when you go jogging. Every instant is a great opportunity for enlightenment. And every moment I become enlightened by everything. And the most marvelous thing in this practice, if we want to call it in this teaching, is that we don't have to learn anything, we don't have to know anything, but rather shed everything that burdens us. It is a way of becoming liberated from all that. And suddenly we can breathe.

[36:33]

Like Teresa said, thank God, she said, no more gloomy things, no more ideas. You have to be a certain way when you are a Zen student or Zen master. When Chakyamuni Buddha was enlightened and he walked out somewhere in the countryside, he met a man and the man said to him, He was very radiant and very beautiful. And so the man said to him, are you a god? And he said, no. Then, what, are you a saint? He said, no. Then what are you? He said, I am awake. That's what Buddha means. We just need to wake up more completely. But it doesn't come by just sitting around and waiting that maybe God or somebody will wake you up someday. It doesn't work that way.

[37:34]

We can sit forever and wait. But anyone, any human being, if you read their history and their way in life that has become awakened and realized is someone who has initially made some effort like that. Initially, effort is needed. You have to make some effort to come here tonight. I had to make some effort to come here. But once we sit, no more effort is needed. We have arrived. And more and more, in your practice, if you understand completely and get a firm grasp of this, that it is every moment we need to practice this. That means there is no special practice, but every moment of our life, every activity is it. then you are never out of practice. And then our life becomes in a way such that we are always at home in our center of gravity.

[38:43]

We are always in nirvana, in the midst of the world of turbulence. In the midst of this world, we are at home, and yet we are in the world, we participate in the world. Buddha did not remain on the mountain. He came back into the world. And even though he knew it was impossible to teach this or to even remotely approach the magnificent experience he had by way of words or language, it was impossible to convey it that way, he nevertheless came back into the world. And out of tremendous compassion, which comes naturally with insight, he taught In the Zen tradition, wisdom is usually practiced very much, especially in the Japanese tradition.

[39:45]

But compassion is also a very important part. And if we have only wisdom, our Zen is too dry, too cold. If we have compassion only and no wisdom, it's too hot. So in the true nature that is balanced, wisdom and compassion are in an equilibrium. And so we are in the world and of the world, but we never are away from our home. And so essentially the message that came from all masters to us is that to seek it there within, not in the external circumstances, not in the external, in the objective of a phenomenal world, but when we have found and realized Absolute Self, True Self, then we do realize it in the phenomenal world and we live it there, because that, after all, is the only place we have.

[40:51]

And the only time we have is this moment. And it is always this moment as it is. Now, if you let yourself think about this, naturally a lot of questions will arise. And the question that most strongly comes up is, and connected with that usually a great misunderstanding, if people do not pursue that any further, is that there is a question. how, if one is realizing Absolute Self, how does one function in the world? And even though it has been said and even though it has been demonstrated by the Masters, but until we have actually that concrete experience of that oneness, of that state of oneness, we will always fall back into the discriminating consciousness function and always raise questions again.

[42:01]

And there is no end to the questions and there are no answers. And no answer would be satisfying. And that is also what the Buddha experienced. He could not find answers to his questions in that way. From the absolute point of view, there is no time. It takes no time to realize. It's instantaneous. But from the standpoint of the relative world and from the faculties of our senses, it may take time. There is preparation needed of practice, of sitting, of chanting, of walking, of working. So in whatever way you can wake yourself up, through activity, through inactivity, Both should be in balance. Most recently I had wonderful encounters and experience with Vietnamese monks and Zen monks.

[43:15]

They are also following the Rinzai tradition. And I find that among the Vietnamese people, the way Buddhism is taught is really for the general public and the laity, by way of compassion. And they're among the most compassionate people I have met, from childhood. Children are taught compassion. And they have Buddhist music. We often think there's no music in Buddhism, but the Vietnamese have beautiful songs. I cannot understand the words, but the melodies and sometimes I ask people to translate they are like popular music like popular songs, not wild but pleasing melodies and almost all of the Vietnamese culture is Buddhist like Japanese culture, but different and so it is a good lesson for us to look at these different traditions and cultures and to see that we can also

[44:17]

develop our own Buddhist culture. When we realize the foundation, the essence, then we have the formless, that which is not formed yet, like the clay before the potter shapes it. And that, I think, is the great gift that Shakyamuni Buddha particularly has given us, because there were many Buddhas before him in the world, but maybe he was the first one that, as far as we know in history, that has given us, even in his sermons and even for those who only can go by way of belief, that every moment there is a fresh new opportunity. Every moment is a new beginning, because the way the Dharma works, it dissolves everything from moment to moment, and there is no residue.

[45:27]

Residue occurs in us when we do not let ourselves completely be dissolved. When we're not yet completely one with this Dharma function, then We partially go with it and partially let ourselves be dissolved because it is like partial breathing out and not completely breathing out. When you completely breathe out, you have vanished in the universe. And when you breathe in, it is a new self that occurs. That's how change comes about. That's how I get white hair. That's how we become old and fall apart, essentially. So the Buddha said, he said it in so many ways, and simple ways, but maybe they look difficult to us. But in the Diamond Sutra he said, only cherish the thought of no-thought.

[46:36]

Or maybe another way of translating that is, to cultivate the mind which does not abide anywhere, or to realize the mind which does not abide anywhere, which does not get attached anywhere, which does not latch on to anything or dwell on anything. And that, you know, is the phrase which enlightened the sixth patriarch, Hui Neng. When he heard that phrase, he realized what was meant by that. And then he went to seek his teacher, the fifth patriarch, and practiced under him. But you know, the Sixth Patriarch at that time did not do Satsang. He worked in the kitchen. He polished rice. And in a way he just continued to do what he already did before, splitting wood. So now he polished rice. But he completely could realize the wonderful activity of the Dharma. And that is what all masters

[47:40]

have realized, and when we realize that we are master of ourselves, the activity of the Dharma, the two-fold activity of becoming and dissolving, and the polarities of zero, of nothingness, of momentary rest. In Buddhist Cosmology, it is said there are, they speak, you know, in terms of kalpas. Kalpas are long, immeasurably long periods of time. And it is said the process of the universe is, and I think if there are modern physicists here, it might be interesting for them to know. Of course, you have to imagine it in cycles, but I know I make a cut in there and I start with one of them, okay? We could start with any of them. 20 kalpas of becoming, 20 kalpas of residing, 20 kalpas of evolving or becoming, 20 kalpas of residing, 20 kalpas of dissolving, and 20 kalpas of zero, of nothingness.

[48:59]

And then it starts over again. That's on the macro level. In the micro level, we can also experience that in ourselves. through the breath or the breathing process. And when we sit in Sarasen and just observe our breath, that is, you know, what the Buddha did under the Bodhi tree, we can have that same experience. We can enter into that experience of the Dharma function. And then realize that it is not I who do, but that I come about as a result of this cooperation of the whole universe, and that from breath cycle to breath cycle there is a complete cycle of birth and death, of one complete arising to a particular limitation, limited particular, and a rest, a neutral state, and a dissolution again into no form.

[50:10]

and into a rest and arise, but it goes very fast and there is no way or no place where it ever stands still and stays form. Now It sounds like this is very complicated and we went very far into maybe a philosophical or some way of talking. But Joshua said, wash your bowl and be gone. And you should explore deeply the great meaning of that. Pick up your fork and be gone. say good morning to your neighbor and be gone. Gone where?

[51:14]

This afternoon when we were talking in the garden here with Mel and some others, I said it's... people do not realize that wonderful simplicity of spirituality, of spiritual life, or we might call it Zen life, because we call it Zen in this tradition, how simple it is and how beautiful, and how the people, when they became realized in the past, how they discovered it in their most ordinary everyday activities. There was a great layman in China, Po Chang, who had practiced also under Master Nansen.

[52:24]

And then he would go to Doksan with Master Nansen, and then he would go home again to his wife and daughter and practice. They also practiced then, his wife and daughter, and they had many interesting mondo, especially the father and the daughter. So he stayed away for a long time once and was just really practicing deeply. And then a long time later, when he saw Nansen again, Master Nansen saw at once that Po Chang had some profound experience. He saw it in his face when he came down the path and he said, What has happened to you lately? And Po Chang said, Oh, nothing special. I chop wood and I carry water. How marvelous it is! The same as Master Joshua said when he was asked, what is all of this Buddhism about? And what is the meaning of Buddhas coming into the world or Bodhidharmas coming to the West?

[53:29]

He said, once I made a cotton shirt and it weighed, well hemp is very heavy, so it weighed seven pounds. Just a cold fact like that. You know, probably most of you have heard that Jesus said, the kingdom of God is at hand. But even in those days, people were dreaming of a new age. And they said to him, when will the new world come? And he said, that which you expect is already among you. but you don't see it yet. So right now, right here is nirvana, is the lotus land, the promised land, the lost garden of Eden, of paradise.

[54:35]

It's all here. It was never lost. We just have become temporarily blind. But right now, as we sit, and however we sit, it is it. Now, we feature a special posture in Sao Zen, which is important for our practice. But you can see, if you go to Japan, they already know what the future Buddha looks like. They have statues of Maitreya, or Miracle of the Satsang they call. And you know what it looks like? It's like that. Wouldn't you like to sit like that sometimes in the cinder? When your legs get tired. So we should never be attached to any form, because all form is impermanent, temporarily

[55:36]

we take a form, that of sitting when we are in ascendo. But if we become attached to that and say, this is the only way, we are mistaken. I'd like to conclude this talk with, and maybe it will seem to you that it has nothing to do with what I said before, But all things in the universe, even if they seem far apart to us, are closely related. And this is one of my favorite poems by Master Dogen about impermanence. You probably know it. It is called Impermanence. The moon reflected in a dewdrop shaken from the bill of a crane. the beak of a crane. The moon reflected in a dewdrop shaken from the bill of a crane.

[56:46]

I think it's a marvelous poem that in a few words expresses the brevity, the beauty, the magnificence, the magnitude and the impermanence of life. And two, it makes me shudder and realize how brief a moment is and how unique and how precious it is. And how it contains the whole universe all in one as Buddha said, grain of sand. And we know this is a fact today. We know that from one cell of our body, they say, scientists say they can clone, you know, a whole complete replica of ourselves. So the Buddha said, in one grain of sand, the whole universe is contained.

[57:52]

And we could see the whole universe as an expanded grain of sand. It's a grain of sand in its most expanded and maybe the universe in its, well, something smaller than a grain of sand, most contracted state. And why do they tell us all these things? So that we realize we should not waste this precious life, that human life is hard to come by, that we should not waste any life, and that we should realize the true meaning and purpose of our life, and that in a way is purposeless. And that is the great liberation. When we have no more purpose, no more need, we are really free to enjoy. We have arrived and we can enjoy life as it is.

[59:00]

No need to pray for anything different or better or otherwise. And also we are for the first time free to really be serving others, completely serving others. And if there's anyone here who has any problems or is depressed or has thinks a lot about things, go out and serve others. Find some old person that needs some help or service. There's a lot of things we can do. If you have time, if you have energy, if you're worried or have problems, that is the way to get rid of them. To give yourself away. In the highest teachings of Buddha, in the Prajnaparamita Sutra, where he's training Bodhisattvas, he talks about, and the highest moral, the Buddha said, is not one who keeps the precepts, but only the Bodhisattva, who does not discriminate between moral and immoral, is the highest and most moral being.

[60:14]

The One Mind, Absolute, does not discriminate. It is beyond all discrimination. It may discern things, we discern things in the human world, but in the absolute state there is no discrimination. So in the relative, in the particular world, in our particular events... In Europe, oh I'm sorry, in Europe I will be for three months and I'll be in Holland, Germany, England, and Switzerland. And if you'd like to know more specifically, I can get you a schedule. Mail, maybe, I don't have it with me. Until the end of August, August 21st, I come back to California. Will you be in Europe this summer?

[61:24]

No, France. Yeah, I can send you a sketch. I was thinking, we have a mindfulness class, like a study group, that we just began. It's once a week. Mindfulness to me, when it occurs to me to think of it as a practice most, is when I'm driving. Because that's our kind of transition times, are the times when I'm sort of the least mindful. And this morning I was thinking, when I was at a stoplight, when I was at a red light, that was a time that was like a kind of no form time, or a time when just like exhausting.

[62:32]

And then when it was me, it was like a time of activity, a time of going. And I was wondering, when you were here last time, you talked about when you first began practice, that you had a koan mood for a few years, and that you fixed on that koan constantly. And I'm wondering how practice and mindfulness works with koan practice. in your experience, and how do you teach that? Actually, I don't know where you got this, because I never had the Koan Mu. Satsang Hiroshi doesn't give the Koan Mu. But he gives Koans that are essentially Mu, but not Mu itself, but essentially the practice of Mu. I may have mentioned that in, I think, in reference to another somebody I know in Japan who had, you know, some monks who have this for years, six or seven years, that Koan.

[63:36]

But, you know, essentially, really, most Koans are Koans, you know, that deal with that realization of Mu. And they may just be formulated in different ways. But the way you practice Koan is in sitting, the Koan is repeated, invoked silently, over and over again, in a slow way, without thinking about it. And the way I used Koan in the beginning, I found it very helpful because, maybe I talked about that last year, that in the morning, for instance, when I woke up, I noticed This all came from my own experience. I was not instructed in that way, that about it. But I noticed that when you wake up, all the thoughts are sitting right there and waiting for you to rush back into your mind, right?

[64:38]

And all the doubts and all the things that, you know, why are you here? And, you know, especially if it's early in the morning and I went to bed late at night working in the center, beginning student, it was very hard. And occasionally the thought would occur, gee, you really don't have to do that, you know, I used to have my own place, I was an artist and I make my own schedule and, you know, you really don't have to be here, you really don't have to do that. So somewhere, maybe I read once or heard that you have to, when you have a koan, you have to really stay with that and grasp it. So I tried, immediately I would grasp my koan and run off into the bathroom, wash my face, run into the zendo, sit down with my koan. And then I, I learned that at night, when I went to bed also, I made that my last thought. In fact, I practiced to have the koan present or with me all the time. Traditionally, when you do Zen training as a monk in a monastery, you are in quite a sheltered situation.

[65:44]

You're not out driving cars in the city and doing things like that because you're just cloistered practically in the monastery. So, there you can make all kinds of mistakes, you know, without endangering your life, really. Or maybe you do sometimes. I mean, you can, if you're not careful in the kitchen or somewhere, you can really hurt yourself. But these mistakes lead us to insights. For instance, if you get so stuck on your koan that you're not aware of what you're doing. So, it means that You have to be always involved in the activity completely that you're doing. That's what mindfulness means, mindful awareness. But somehow, you know how it is that, for instance, you're in love. You cannot forget your lover. You cannot put the lover's image out of your mind. And somehow, when you're really in love and attached to a person, that person is somehow always with you and present in you. That's the way I felt about my koan. It was always with me, present, somewhere here, I would say.

[66:45]

necessarily in the head. And so you go about your daily work, and the koan goes sort of in the background, but it is there. And suddenly, some activity, it clicks, it concurs with that koan, and suddenly you have an insight, because you filter everything through that koan. You have to become the koan, the question. For instance, The koans are not there for their own sake. A koan is an example from life. And many of them have been created by masters, and they start like this. Life is like that. Da-da-da-da-da. And comes an example. A famous koan by Master Kyogen starts like this. Life is like this. A man is hanging from a tree by his teeth, from a branch. His hands cannot reach the branch. His feet cannot touch the ground. He's just hanging in mid-air just from his teeth. He said, life is like this.

[67:48]

He didn't say a man was hanging from a tree. He said, life is like this, as an example. Now, while you're in this desperate situation, you cannot do anything. You cannot move. You cannot go up. You cannot go down. You hang from your teeth. You cannot yell for help. A man comes under the tree, and he asks you this famous question, what is the meaning of Bodhidharma's coming to the West? Now, if you don't answer, it means you have no compassion, you ignore the questioner, which is very rude. If you do answer, you fall from the train, break your neck. So what do you do? Life is like this. It's always, isn't it, true? Either or. So you have, somehow you do different things with the coin. Maybe when you sit inside and you invoke it. Maybe sometimes you look at it. in your mind, you say, what does this really mean? But you know, that's why you need many encounters with the Master, because you try different avenues.

[68:53]

He doesn't tell you, no, you cannot do this with the corn or that. You try all the different things. And you go to San Zen, and you present your view. And I don't know, maybe it takes a long time or not, you certainly one day see. It's not the way to come to the answer, not the way we have learned to find answers to projects in school. We cannot find answers to the koan that way. It comes in a different way when we have completely merged with it, become it, become the situation, and then suddenly something happens that opens us completely up to the inside, to what it means. And that's why the practice of constantly repeating it silently, like a mantra in a way, invoking it, is very good. Because maybe one day, when you sit like in a session, long time with it, and you repeat, posture is important. You have to sit upright.

[69:56]

And you repeat, and you repeat, and you repeat. And suddenly you forgot yourself. You forgot the koan. It's all gone away. If you sit in bad posture this way, it's a posture that leads to sinking. We put pressure on the solar plexus and activate the nerve center and it begins to work and stimulate it. That's why drinking strong stimulants like coffee or what before Sazen are not good for our practice. So you learn through experience, what to do with it, in the end. Then the same Master Kyogen who created this koan, you know, you probably know that famous story how he could not answer for many years in the monastery, this koan, and he finally left and went into some mountain retreat. And one day, still he had not answered, this koan was with him, when he was sweeping, you know the story, famous story,

[71:04]

a little stone hit a bamboo tree and that sound suddenly cracked him wide open and he suddenly knew the answer. He went back to his master to present his answer. So that's how it works. It's something so different from what we're used to. You know, the way we're used to dealing with things, to finding answers by way of analysis or the intellect, understanding, and all those ways don't work in spiritual matters. Spiritual enlightenment goes beyond the realm or the domain of intellectual grasping. We cannot know God, but we can experience. God, or Buddha. Mindful awareness practice, what do you do in that, in the class? Well, in the class we start out by usually walking together, about 15 minutes, just free-form walking. Individual walking, or in...?

[72:06]

Well, in the same space, but in our own route. Each person by...? Yeah, or any pace. And then we talk about how that felt, And each week we do the same thing. And then also we talk about how that week went for us in daily life. We usually pick different areas, like maybe just be walking every week, and you focus on walking. Or it could be breathing, or it could be... You know, the Buddha said, mindful awareness, O monks, is useful everywhere. Certainly it's true. It certainly would have helped to prevent the Three Mile Island incident.

[73:11]

If you ever read the papers on that, you know how the unawareness of a few little things has caused that incident. And the more complex we make this world, with more complex machinery and weaponry and all that, the more awareness we have to have. The more dangerous it gets around us. But on the other hand, don't be worried or afraid. True nature is never touched by any bond. It cannot be added to by our practice, cannot be diminished by not practicing. It just is. Any other questions? If I ask myself, what is it that most seems to prevent one from realizing the Dharma process?

[74:35]

in the emotional states. And we've had a number of teachers here recently suggesting different ways of dealing with that when it comes up. One would be to name that state and to let it go. Another one would be to merge with it totally, which I'm not sure what that means. But do you have an answer? You know, the Zen way, and I'm not sure if that is the same in Soto as in Rinzai, but in Rinzai it's a very direct approach. In other words, some of these practices that you have heard, for instance, to name the state, I think is an interim practice, or maybe like a stepping stone. towards something.

[75:37]

And it may be alright for a while, but nevertheless there comes a time when you have to let go of that activity. Because if you continue to do that, it keeps you in a state of a dualistically functioning consciousness. And eventually they have to emerge, you have to transcend that or get out of that state. And if we do that kind of practice as as the only practice, or for a long time, even I've had students who have done this for a long time, they find it extremely difficult to get away from the activity of being observer. And then they become sort of conditioned again, you see, and it's a new groove, and again they're attached, they cannot get out of it. So Rinzai Zen never took that way, it does not involve itself in practices that you have to drop again. But I'm not saying that's invalid, you know, if it works for you only, I would say with the caution to do that maybe for a short while as a means to get through certain preliminary states.

[76:44]

But you see, ultimately, in the highest teachings in Buddhism, and the highest paths, they have never concerned themselves with that which is not real. Like, different from Western psychology, In Buddhism, we do not deal with that self, conditioned self, or so-called ego self, which is not real. In Western psychology, there is a way to go through that self. But we say from the very beginning, this is not, so why face something that's not real? And so they have taken a different approach. And what stands in the way as a barrier is the conditioned self, is the conditioning, as you called it, the emotional self, okay? It's our attachment to that conditioned self. And of course, different traditions have found ways to crack that, to disperse it, to dissolve it, to send you home with it, or whatever, to inflate it and then burst it, you know, different methods.

[77:53]

And in fact, not only different traditions. But within Rinzai Zen, we can see different masters, because each person, as they become enlightened, have found their own way of dealing with that. And I always like the way of pointing directly at what is. Look at that which really is, not at that which is not real. And so, like, you know, when you, maybe you read some of these koans, Uman, and Joshu, who always just point at what really is. And I think that is, there lies the value in practicing with a teacher, with one who is maybe more experienced than you are in the past. And my practice and study and training under Sasaki Roshi for many years, when I was in daily contact with him, we were working together and building the center together,

[78:55]

was an invaluable experience that way, because he never allowed my mind for one moment to swerve off onto something else. He immediately brought it back to me. And one time, after a Daiso Shinin, which I had probably some very good, you know, practice or insights with Koans, he, after that, asked me to go across the street with him. a big estate that now belongs to UCLA and is a library of English original manuscripts. And they have a beautiful garden. And there were magnolia trees and other magnificent trees in bloom. So he asked me to go with him for a walk there. And I was just so happy and overjoyed and I walked into his garden with him and I saw this tree of flowers. And I was just about to say something about him. Again, you think. So, I remember those moments, and I remember those moments in my practice when in the beginning, within everything he did seemed so mysterious.

[80:08]

I mean, everything, I was really aware, already wide awake when I came there, and I just watched every move he made. And I never asked questions because, first of all, I didn't have any time to think up questions. I was so busy just seeing what he was doing and following that, that I probably told you this story before, but one time when I was painting, fixing the ceiling in his sunset room, and he was cooking lunch, then he called me into the kitchen for lunch, and there were two bowls, two sets, at the table, but four teacups. A great mystery for me. So then he made the tea after lunch, and I remember that that must have been one of the very first times that I asked him a question. Not right away, I was wondering throughout the meal, why does he have two bowls and four cups? And the cups were lined up at the edge of the table. So finally, my logical mind said, there must be somebody else coming for tea. So I asked Roshi, do you expect anyone else? Because we were finished with the meal and I wondered if we should wait to expect anyone for tea.

[81:13]

And he said, oh, somebody come? Because he thought I was saying somebody is coming for tea. And he said, oh, somebody coming? And I said, no, I mean, Roshi, do you expect? No, he said. And he proceeded with the tea and poured four cups full of tea. Turns out she is a great mystery. Some mysterious, you know, ceremonial thing that's happening here. Well, I didn't have the courage, or maybe somehow it didn't come up this far, at that day to ask him further. And I went with this, and maybe in a way I sort of treasure trying to find out myself maybe, you know, it's always wonderful to discover these things through your practice, what that really meant. And I think it was two years later, that I got the big insight and one day we were all sitting around the kitchen table and one of the women was making tea and Japanese green tea by the way that was and if you know it's a some of you have had it it's a very delicate tea it's a tea that you cannot brew for a long time you know you pour just a certain right amount of water on the leaves and leave it for the just a brief time and then you pour it out or it will get bitter

[82:30]

So she was making a big pot full of this beautiful green tea. There were about maybe eight or nine people sitting around the table, the proper number of cups this time. So she poured the tea. And suddenly he said to her, oh, no, Donna, not good. Because she had filled the pot with water, but she only poured out maybe half into the cups. And she let the water sit on the tea. So she had made too much tea And if you let the water sit on the tea, it makes the tea bitter. Also, it spoils the leaf for further use, because usually he can brew that about two or three times, the same leaf. Suddenly I realized, that day he had made too much tea. And he poured, I mean, he had a big pot, and he put extra cups on the table, because he hadn't measured the tea into the pot properly or something, to pour the extra out into the cups. That was the whole mystery. So it's so practical and down-to-earth.

[83:34]

But see, we read all these things into it. We bring our conditioned self. I was in a very, you know, sort of spiritual, mysterious state of mind, and everything was a great mystery, and everything was very significant and, you know, out of this world. But they're the most down-to-earth people. And so when you, through your own experience, you become deflated from all this stuff, you Then you begin to see what a flat, direct statement that is. When Uman was asked, what is Buddha? He says, a piece of toilet paper, or the shit stick, he said, in China. What he wanted to say there is the most ordinary object. And the meanest and least thing of this world is also the manifestation of Buddha, because there is nothing but Buddha in the world. That's why they use such drastic examples and language somehow. And I failed to tell you earlier why I like Joshu, by the way, is because since you practice so-called Soto Zen, I assume that you have a kind of pure maybe Soto Zen practice, and you may know a little bit about Rinza.

[84:51]

And usually what Soto Zen people know about Rinza is that it's harsh or abrupt or beating and shouting Zen. That's the impression one gets when you read the books, because there's always somebody breaking somebody's leg or arm or, you know, and shouting and yelling and beating them, even if they give the right answer. So, and I like Joshu because he said he was a very meek little man, and he had no big voice, very softly spoken man. And here, when you look through the Hekigan Roku, It is full of Ka'al or Joshua's examples of his Koans. And of course he was the one that made the Koan move too. So I like him also because it usually said Zen is not in words or in language. But nevertheless we have to use language and words as a means to, as a pointer, as a way to point at it too.

[85:53]

And they said whenever Joshua opened his lips, It was like gold coming from his mouth. He had golden lips or a golden tongue, because whatever words he spoke were words of wisdom, and that were exactly down-to-earth truths. And somebody asked him once, what is Joshu? What is your true self? In other words, he said, what is Joshu? And he said, East Gate, West Gate, North Gate, and South Gate. Meaning in the old times, the cities were surrounded by a wall and they had gates in all directions through which you could enter. So Joshua has no limit, no barrier. From any side you can approach him, from any direction you can enter. Or like, there's like a big public bridge over it that everyone can go over it. Donkeys, horses, human beings, anything can go over it, anything can enter into Joshua. That's why I like Joshua. Thank you for your wonderful reception and for allowing me to be here with you and your beautiful new Zen Do and in your heart.

[87:17]

Thank you.

[87:25]

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