morning. Today, I'm very happy to introduce our speaker, Greg Denny. Greg came to BCC, I believe, in the 90s, and he served as Zendo manager as well as working on some important building projects. He met his wife, Marie Hopper at BCC, and they have two teenage sons. He's also led a Dharma group for 15 years. He was Shuso in 2005 and received lay entrustment in 2010, and he is now our buildings and grounds manager. So welcome, Greg, and thank you so much for speaking with us today.

[01:39]

How was that? Good. That's good. If you didn't already detect, it's a lot different. So I want to take it all in actually because I haven't sat here for a while. I haven't sat here since Sojin died. So I haven't sat here since the pandemic. I mean, in this seat. A lot less people than I remember. And then this, you know, I sit, I'm in the IT world, so I sit in front of a computer all day, every day. So for the work weekend now, to have this here, yikes. So thank you, Karen, for asking me to talk.

[02:51]

I really feel privileged and honored to be able to do it. Karen asked me to talk about right view, right understanding, and I'm going to do my best to do that. We have, so the chant at the beginning is an unsurpassed, penetrating, and perfect Dharma, rarely met with, even in a hundred thousand million Kalabas, having it to see and listen to, to remember it and accept, to taste the truth of the Dharma, of the Tathagana's words. After that, I always feel like I shouldn't say anything at all, actually. That would be the only way to actually fulfill that. So I want to talk about right view, right understanding in a kind of Mahayana way, maybe, as a koan.

[04:07]

that, and I believe it's in the reading from Thich Nhat Hanh, that right view is no view. The absence of view. And that's kind of how I want to approach it. So there's one way to look at that is within the realm of practice of zazen itself. And that is that the activity is to, shikantaza is to sit and watch your thoughts, watch your views, watch the stuff that goes across your mind and not identify, not attach to it. So that's, of our activity, of our zazen activity, that's kind of practicing right view or no view.

[05:18]

But I think there's a more holistic way too to understand that. So for me, then everything I'm going to say is my experience. I want to purpose that. I'll try to say I instead of we. Sometimes I'll fail maybe, like we or my understanding and my practice and my understanding of right view or no view. For me, practice is simple, but it's very radical. When I say, or when I think, believe that right view is no view, like I said, there's the practice of zazen and letting go of you, but there's also kind of an attitudinal aspect to it, and a kind of radical, for me, humility.

[06:40]

to take and practice with, so Thich Nhat Hanh in that says it's not only that they're not to have no views, he says that all views are false. Now that we can experience that as a practice or think that should be my practice, I use we. I can experience that as . But to hold on to, and to believe, and actually I do believe this, that that's true, that all my views are false, are contingent. They arise in the moment, but I really don't know what the hell is going on. And the world is mystery and awesome and ultimately daunting.

[07:57]

And that I am at a loss. Fundamentally, almost everything. And that is the ground of my life. And that practice, right view, is to start from there, moment after. And it's hard. It's hard. But for me, that is the true way to practice and to live. So, you know, we come from Suzuki Roshi's lineage and he wrote a whole book, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind. I think it's about that.

[09:02]

Right view as no view or beginner's view, not knowing, not knowing. Three sections, right, the book? And the last section is entirely devoted to right view. And there's one talk where he says, well, what should one believe in then? He says, you should believe in nothing. Same message. So again, so for me, there's sitting on the cushion and practicing that as shikantaza. And we have so many, right? There's mu, that's mu, right? There's think not thinking. And then, like I said, I'm trying to describe, there's...

[10:09]

in which and it's it's like zazen or zazen more holistically about how we live is to carry that attitude or that modality or that answer right it's a question or it's not even a question it's it's being in the realm of not knowing. That life at every moment is a question and a koan. And that, you know, there's that koan in the Mumankan, right? Man in a tree. You're in a tree and you're biting the branch and someone comes to you and asks, why did Bodhidharma come and preach the Dharma? If you answer, you die.

[11:13]

You fall from a tree and die. And there is no answer, right? The point, the practice isn't the answer, although we have to answer at every moment. We have to enter false view or our best effort to answer. at meeting the moment. But the starting point is actually in the tree, in the question, in the of not knowing. There's that, and remembering there's the other, it's a koan and a mumankan too. Is it tokusan and ryotan? Tokusan and ryotan. It's the one where, Tokusan, and he's talking to Riyotan. If I have the names wrong, someone can correct me.

[12:15]

And I think they're talking about the Dharma. And Tokusan has very sort of discursive scripture, sutra understanding of the Dharma. And he's talking to Riyotan. They're having Dharma discussion. And it's a really good discussion. And Ria Tan says, well, Toka-san, you can go now. Or Toka-san says, I have to go. And he looks outside. They've been talking so long, it's pitch dark. And Toka-san says, well, I can't see. I need a lamp. They light a lamp so that Toka-san can go back to where he's staying, I guess. And right when he leaves, Ria Tan blows out the lamp. And at that moment, Toka-san is enlightened. I love that story because for me it captures what I'm trying to describe.

[13:17]

It's that moment of blowing out the light. That's every moment of practice where we start. I remember, I kind of remember when I first came into Zendo and went to a lecture and what I was maybe looking for or thinking about or what my concerns are, why I was here. And I think I was looking for an answer or answers. And I definitely, you know, the first noble truth is solid, right? Life is hard. Suffering, maybe, you know, I don't want to get caught up in the exact words, but, you know, I felt it.

[14:19]

Life is hard. It's not easy. It's not freaking easy. And I was also, you know, around some things, but I also was, I was tired of myself. I was tired of my shit, my stuff, right? my person, my version of suffering. And I thought, maybe I kind of thought that a practice or in that Sojin had an answer, that Shaky Mooney had an answer, an answer, and that they didn't, they found a way, teachers, Bama Chauvin, whoever, they found a way, they got to a place where they have to deal with their stuff, right? But I don't think that's true, right? We all have our stuff, and we're all dealing with each other and each other's stuff, right?

[15:26]

And practice, and so actually is, or my stuff, I'm using we again. My stuff is, is the apparatus that I created, partly by choice, but kind of arose to deal with my suffering from very early on, and it kind of augmented, but I think it starts really early, that my psyche, my consciousness, myself came up with. consciously and unconsciously as the answer, right? As the way to deal with suffering, as an answer. Now, it's not like my stuff is all that logical a lot of the time. You know, it's not my neurotic, my neurotic, right?

[16:31]

What was it? Oh, and I think when I first, like, entered the Zendo and entered practice. And I think about Shaky Muni, right? Well, he didn't have that. But he was a dude. He was a person. He was a human being. And I'm sure some people hanging around with him sometimes say, Shaky Muni, just stop it for a second. You're doing your thing again, or something like that. Right? We all have it, right? I think it's really important for me to And to understand that as opposed to thinking that he had it all right. And part of me, the reason why I quoted the chant that we do at the beginning of this, right, is it's kind of like you enter the Zen down, you hear that chant, and everything's very, I don't know, put together, right?

[17:41]

So, like, I'm going to be like that, right? There's a place to get to where there's an answer. But it's a bait and switch, really. It's a bait and switch because the answer is no answer. Yeah. And so to sort of not just sit with it, but to live with that moment to moment. I think in cutting through spiritual materialism, there's a chapter, I think it's like the third chapter or something where he has his own sort of metaphor for describing

[18:44]

the self or what I guess we would call Suzuki Roshi lineage, the small self, right? Greg has come up with this answer, which is, like I said, it's developed over time as a neurotic apparatus to try to deal with my suffering. And his metaphor is that house with a monkey inside. And that you can only see things as a monkey, right? One can only see things as this monkey in this house, and this house has an architecture, right? And it's got its own windows and weird places and rooms and whatnot. But this is our mind, our small self, as a monkey in a house, trying to deal with life. And this seems quite important to me as sort of the essential struggle of my own, dealing with my own views, my own habit, mind and proclivities that put me in a place of suffering.

[20:15]

And that bring me out of living, I guess. So it took me a long time to experience this, but to understand that practice, this understanding of There's other terms for it, like taking the backwards step. Is that Dogen too? That to constantly let go of any idea about agency, control, and then seeing what happens, seeing who I am then. Roshi also says, like, when Zen is Zen, then you are you. that my, and it's another koan, that my true self, my authentic self arises when I have no idea of who I want to be or should be.

[21:33]

And so that my self, the true self, the big self, or not big self, but authentic self is only discoverable It's not constructed. It's just as Buddha or the universe arising in the moment and moment after moment of letting, of my letting go of all views, preconceptions, and responding as spontaneously and vulnerable vulnerable as I can. It's scary. It's hard.

[22:36]

And one other sort of feeling or dichotomy that it brings up for me is when I'm able to do that and experience myself, the world, Buddha, life the universe in that way that's when i feel alive actually there's and but so much of my life i haven't felt that way i i wouldn't i haven't felt alive because it was that other self it was the self of the monkey in the house, right?

[23:48]

Trying to and tries to manage my suffering from that neurotic apparatus. There's another con with this though too, right? For me, is that, so there's this kind of narrative in Zen, you know, you let go of your story, right? Let go of your neurotic, you know, I have this suffering because this happened to me and whatnot. But it's really been, well, several things I want to say about this. Because I have a story about my suffering and always have and always will, doesn't mean that I don't explore and investigate and understand it, because that is still my life.

[24:55]

What I want to say about this is hard to express and articulate. I love so many people in this room. I love my family. The love that I experience, it's not just because of when I feel alive and I feel like I'm not sort of identifying or operating with my neurotic self. It's because with my neurotic self, with my loved ones. And, what am I trying to say?

[26:06]

Our stuff is important, it's what ties us together too. You know, the love that my wife gives me and the support is because she can see my stuff and knows it really well, and she can help me with it. And it's precious, actually. And it's like you can't get rid of it. So that's a con too, is that practice so much of right view that I'm trying to describe is to not operate from those But at the same time, that's what we do and have done, more or less. And that my connections with everyone, with Sangha, with you, with my family, are with that and necessarily bound with that.

[27:14]

And so I think my relationship with myself There's a kind of, it's a koan again, or a dance. The way in which, I'm not quite sure how to put it. is that I'm dealing with both parts of me, there's more than millions of parts of me. This is like saving all, this is saving all sentient beings, is that in dealing with myself and others, is having a relationship with both the small self of everyone, but also that strand or that connection to their, their authentic self, one's authentic self.

[28:19]

And how, the connection is always operating on both levels in a way. And so that, for me, say, in beings feels like empowering or maintaining that connection with the authentic self, but also being with the one who's got the stuff, right? And being aware of both always at the same time. And so that, and this is enlightenment and delusion too, right? This is, I mean, just like authentic self and neurotic self, form and emptiness or absolute and relative, right? It's hard to talk about this stuff. It's very, I love talking about it.

[29:20]

So we go to 11.15. Often lectures end around 11. There's time for questions, but there's a lot of... Yeah, sure. Okay. I just want to make sure we leave time to talk. So... I mean, one other thing I guess I wanted to talk about a bit that relates to this is... I think the song is talking a bit about diversity and whatnot. And I think that what I'm trying to talk about relates to that in some way. That... that for me the practice is trying to cultivate in myself my expression, my individual, and I think everyone has, we all,

[30:58]

individualism is like a dirty word now, but that we're all, it's the moon in the dew drops and reflecting the moon, we're doing that even right now. This is all happening. We're co-creating this moment. I like our Sangha and I like our practice to be as much as possible cultivating and empowering everyone's individuality. I guess, you know, sometimes it used to feel to me that coming here and being here

[32:03]

I didn't, I never, I sometimes feel like I could express myself, that there were cues that, and I think there's truth in this, that part of practice is, subordinates oneself by getting over oneself, right? That inauthentic neurotic self. But I wouldn't want to, you know, that and sort of being aware of my neurotic self. I don't want it to detract from people having the permission and, I don't know, the empowerment of expressing their, you know, their alive self, alive self.

[33:20]

And so I would, I look forward to us contemplating The forms to me, I don't want to get too deep in the weeds on this. The forms to me are skillful means, right? And it's good to have conversations about how skillful they are and recognize that even with our own practice and our own forms, it's really healthy to do what I was describing is to let go of our views and take the backwards step and start from scratch even sort of as a thought experiment, as a communal thought experiment and ask like be serving the

[34:34]

nourishment of everyone's authentic self. And I look forward to having that with people, and I just wanted to put that out there. All right, so we're approaching 11 o'clock. I feel like I said most of what I wanted to say. Does anybody have comments or questions? We need to look at the computer online and maybe people there as well. Okay. I'll try to do that. So I have Laurie and Ron in the room and then I'm out there. I'll try to figure out who has questions next, after Lori and Ron.

[35:36]

Go ahead, Ron, I think you got your hand up first. Thank you, Gary. I like the tone of your talk a lot. It was a psychological, which I think is a good way to go. Early on, I was concerned that you were just going to come down on the other side of not knowing. then you shifted and you included the knowing side too, which I felt, and that's right. And so I would call that non-dualism, really. It's a stereotype word in Zen, but non-dualism in its best respect is just that kind of what you're talking about. And you mentioned several koans. The one that you mentioned where the two monks are talking all night and having a great conversation, and then they... I saw that from a different perspective based on your putting it up like that, that what made him so-called enlightened or having an enlightenment experience or realization, that he was in the light and he was out of the light.

[36:54]

It was a combination of both of them that worked. If it had just been dark all the time, It never worked. But he was, first of all, they lit the match and then they blew it out. So he saw both sides dramatically. So that's what I wanted to say. Well, thank you. So what do you think knowing is for yourself as opposed to not knowing? My mind is always churning out about what I'm considering and what I should be doing. I see. My cognitive process. And it's very necessary, but that's not all there is. But that's the way we get strung out on that. That's what I see is in my knowing side. Okay. Lori, did you have a question? I, what popped into my mind, and I wondered what you thought about this is when you talked about the neurotic apparatus, like in a certain way that that's just a collection of views.

[38:03]

Right. That's right. That's right. When you're saying for, I mean, and their views, they're embedded in it. They're not like super mental. Absolutely. That's what I meant to say. Yeah, which is interesting. And also just to add that, you know, I like what you said about how we love each other within the context of our delusions in some sense. And also we hurt each other. And some people are hurting. I mean, and that can go to an extreme. I mean, you're not a neurotic hyperbaratist can take you to an extreme of harming. So it's not just, it needs to be metabolized somehow, you know. which is not easy. And one of the things that I worry about is that, I mean, practice is one continuous mistake, right? That's Dogen, right? And so as a community in a Sangha, it's always continuously making mistakes.

[39:13]

And so to do it together, there's going to be some suffering. There's gonna be some messiness. And I've historically worried for myself and in the community about fear of messiness, our mistakes. And that sometimes has pushed us into views that, I should say, constrain our potential, constrain our potential. But you know, it's not like I have an answer because the place of not knowing, which I mean for me, Ron, knowing is what happens after not knowing or what arises. And so you can't know unless you don't know.

[40:16]

And so if we don't allow ourselves to not know, we're never going to know, right? We're never going to discover what wisdom is in the places of fear and risk, messiness. Andrea? Yeah, thank you, Greg. When speaking, I really appreciated a lot of what you said. I just wanted, what we just said now, I thought was so important to this whole process that we're embarking on, on seeing more deeply into what our unconscious biases are and how we make connection and how we make connection. There are times when we're going to mess up and it's going to feel uncomfortable and the only impediment to going deeper and transforming or becoming more open, is our fear of messing up.

[41:27]

And our fear of how we'll be seeing. Do you have any comment on that? Well, I do think it's... Greg, could you repeat the question? Sure. The question... how our fear of, for the Sangha, the fear of hurting, being hurt or hurting, constrains dealing with and processing relationships, events, situations, difficulties. And I agree with that 100%. And I think you stressed the fear of being hurt.

[42:29]

But I would also stress the fear of hurting, which comes, right? That's we want to be good. This is why we're here, right? We want to practice precepts and whatnot and be kind. But sometimes that can be a hindrance or a constraint. And I don't, like I said, I don't have an answer, but I do think that being open to messiness, being open to emotionally more demonstrative modalities and conflict. That is really important. You don't like conflict, right?

[43:31]

But, you know, I go back to, you know, kind of a core thing around my relationship with practice and my history with practice. is and i've already said it right is there is life is meant life is messed and now in this day and age you lost your mic oh and we probably got it but we can everyone can hear me so i can take this off right well yeah right why what happens Take it off and I'll fix it. We can hear you fine and you have three people online. Okay. Look, life, I mean, we live in a crazy freaking world, right?

[44:39]

It's not me. It's not me. And it's overwhelming. I want to hide in my practice. I mean, I have wanted to, I guess, historically, but that doesn't work. It doesn't work. That's not being alive for me. Go ahead. So Hozan has a question too. maybe i'll how do i get these i gotta click more you don't have to do anything they'll just you call on them just call on whom you want and they speak but who who has it oh the hands the hands kurt okay yeah go ahead kurt okay uh yeah thank you uh so much for uh a really uh wonderful talk and uh and the

[45:45]

I really appreciate the difficulty of talking about these things, like how hard it is to get you to be able to communicate it because you're communicating something that is kind of beyond conceptualization. So kind of being with that idea of right view is no view, for me, this feeling that no view is a view. So no view includes a view. And that really what I'm trying to do is include everything. Right. And that monkey in the room is okay, right? You alluded to that, like that's the stuff of your life, the fighting with your wife and then making up and loving your kids and being anxious. And so it isn't, For me, I'm feeling that what I'm wanting to do is include more, not separate things away.

[46:51]

And it's a little bit, I think Ron touched on that with, you know, the delusion and enlightenment, that that's kind of a dualism, too, that you can get, I can get caught in. Like, oh, no, I'm being neurotic. Well, yeah, I am being neurotic. Enter there. You know, it's okay. That's what I'm kind of trying to open to. And to other people's neuroses as well, right? It's sort of having that. So I'm wondering about that. I mean, does that make sense? Oh, absolutely. It's all included. We're including more, not removing. Right. Yeah, absolutely. It reminds me of like the Shenzhen Ming's about this, right? You think the first line is like, It's not difficult as long as you don't. That's right. Picking two. Right, but that's picking and choosing, right?

[47:52]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is the same thing you said about no view is a view, right? Yeah, so it's, hold on. And Jim, you're next. He's on mute. Do I unmute him? No, it's me. Sorry about that. Thank you very much for your rich talk. I feel like the questions and discussion so far perhaps answered my question. But again, you're dealing with this gap between. And it is hard to capture in language. But at one point you use the phrase stories about ourselves, which is a view about. our suffering, our life. And I wondered about the evolution of one's story through practice. I mean, how our story changes over time?

[48:55]

Yeah. Does our story change through practice? Is there a benefit? And is it just including more in our story? I don't want to give away the answer. It could be a bit of both. I mean, look, my feeling is we can't, we... we're innately intrinsically storytellers to ourselves and others, right? We can't understand our life. I can't, I said we, I can't understand my life without a story. And so granted, you know, there's some components or aspect of practice is letting go of my story. I mean, that's what I do. That's what we do is it's fundamental. And so my experience is that my story does change. it evolves, but that to always hold the practice reminder that it is a view. It is a view. I mean, this is why it's so hard to talk about because, again, it's operating that necessarily, unavoidably, I'm always operating both ways.

[50:09]

you know, within the story delusion, and hopefully with practice, some kind of ground, some kind of practice of consistently, moment to moment, taking the and being on the ground of no story, of no view. And that every moment is both it is a koan right it's like um and we i mean i can have that experience in zazen right all the time if we're seeing where they'll meet or where the line is or you know it's kind of like the five ranks that they're both happening in my relationship or the the sort of uh uh Dance between the two is always happening every moment.

[51:17]

Sue. Hi, Greg. You're talking about such essential, deep things. I really thank you so much. One of the things that gives me a lot that I'm curious what you think about that I've always wondered about is you're talking about the authentic self. and the neurotic self as kind of two sides. But also about when you are you, Zen is Zen. And even though we don't have a fixed self, don't we have a particular self that's different from all the other selves? Maybe it's changing, but it's particular. It's like the Gregness of you, or like when my two kids were born, before they... to anything in the first 24 hours, there were already different particular people that I could see somehow inherently that was there.

[52:19]

So what does it mean to say that Buddha nature is, that we don't have this, we don't have, and that our authentic self is when we remove all these kind of impediments. And also people used to say sometimes, well, When practicing Zen is like coming into the Sangha and having all the, being in a stone tumbler and having all the corners of your, like a rough stone, you get all smoothed out and the corners get rubbed off by the, which sounds good. But on the other hand, what about that stone with all the crystal, with all the different shapes and corners? Do we really want to get rid of the corners? So how does that fit in with what you're saying? Or what do you think about that? Oh, that makes a lot of sense. I've been trying to say is... I didn't think you were contradicting that at all, but how do we fit that in somehow to what our practices teach and what the teaching says about no separate self or no fixed self?

[53:28]

But everyone... So... We'd like to, so we'd like to think that like big mind, there's no separation, right? But everyone's big mind is their own even, right? That even that, even the, any expression or understanding, or I can't even find the words, experience of Buddha, one, whatever, unity, is completely individual right and exchange that it's like what uchiyama is like we can't exchange a fart we can't even exchange a buddha um and so i think even our most you know these words they trap me even our most enlightened authentic

[54:35]

I don't know, actualized expression is completely 100% individual. Yeah. Yeah. And then his finger, right? That's why Gutte cut off his student's finger because his student didn't understand that. It could be Gutte. Yeah. All right. Ross has got that. is there one more we haven't had a question sorry i think out of respect for time i'm going to let go of my view because it would open up a whole other area okay i appreciate that yeah okay nothing nothing is lost Put your hands together.

[55:38]

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