Let's just see if your mic is working. Say a word. Okay, so testing. Testing the mic. Yeah, we've got those. I'm very happy to introduce Mushma Kedah. I've been practicing Buddhism forever since 1982. Let's take my instruction. Oshima Keita has been practicing Buddhism since 1982 in a variety of traditions of which we have shared and all of us share, including Korean Zen and Japanese Soto Zen. Korean kind of Soto Zen. In 2007, she was a founder of She's a writer and poet, a mother of an adult child, volunteer in Oakland schools.

[01:11]

Thank you so much for coming. Thank you. Such a warm welcome. surpassed penetrating and perfect dharma it is even in a hundred thousand million kalpas having it to see and listen to to remember and accept I vow to taste the truth of the So I'll request, I see there are six people on the Zoom, high Zoom people, and quite a few people here at the beautiful Berkeley Zoom Center.

[02:24]

So I'll request, if you'd like to do so, to EP after me, This is sometimes called Shanti Deva's Prayer. It is kind of my heart text that I've been with for quite a while. And it is from the Bodhicharya Vatra, the guide to the Bodhisattva's way of looking. So just a short passage, please repeat after me. May I be a protector. May I be a protector. To those without protection. To those without protection. A leader to those who journey. And a boat, a bridge, a passage. To those desiring the further shore. May the pain of every living being be completely cleared away.

[03:31]

Be completely cleared away. May the pain of every living being. May the pain of every living being be completely cleared away. Be completely cleared away. Thank you. Beautiful practice. We now have a period of time in our session. for the Dharma talk and discussion. And I'm very pleased to be here with you. I was saying to someone when I arrived that I had been in person here to Berkeley Zen Center for, it was way before the pandemic started, so it's been many years.

[04:31]

do something online, I think when Hozan, Alan Sanaki, had a, so I watched that, participated by Zoom. And I can just, I can really feel the practice here, so I want to thank each and every one of you for your heartfelt efforts, for your practice, and for that helps to create the, I don't know, I just feel this place is really like soaked in bodhisattva vows, in practice, and in sincere effort. This practice does take effort. So thank you, much. I'm going to be 70. in not too long from now.

[05:36]

Actually, my birthday is January 1st. I am a birthday baby. And I grew up in Ohio, and I was my parents' first child. I'm a Sansei, or third-generation Japanese American, which means by our count that my grandparents immigrated from Japan. My dad's folks ended up in Indiana. They were folks in Hawaii. They are Buddhist. And so there's that I feel that I want to in part at this age, and it can all be said pretty succinctly. So I'm just going to put this out for your, think about, I wrote it in an email to a couple of people I'm working with.

[06:45]

And one was saying, well, where would be a good place for me to start doing meditation retreats? And another person was saying, I'm thinking of ordaining and taking formal vows of one sort or another. and what you have to say. So, of course, this is only my opinion. And I said to them, of course, your path will unfold according to your life. And this is my advice. This would be my practice recommendations is to first, like every single day, every single day to, when we're fortunate enough to wake up, if we're fortunate enough to be in a safe enough place, which not everyone is, if we're fortunate enough to have that basic stability, housing, food, to be warm or cool enough

[07:58]

The basics of what we need, not perfectly. So every single day when we wake up to say, what are my goals? And you can drop like all the Buddhist stuff. Or not. So I really mean this in the existential sense. We're picking up some space and some air here. and resources, so what are my goals, my personal goals as a human being? Number one. Number two, since this was within a Buddhist context and with spiritual people, practitioners, number two is what are my vows? Number three is what are my precepts and how am I holding them? Those are ethical guidelines. This is individual.

[09:01]

Of course, we're all part of communities. And then number four is what are the secrets that I'm not telling other people? Distinguish between secrets and privacy. Privacy we all need. But just do a little personal inventory. What are the secrets? that I'm too ashamed or whatever, too suppressed to share with other people. And then fifth, what are the secrets of myself? And sixth, am I learning and growing? Life contains all kinds of experiences, thoughts, memories, so forth, that we don't like.

[10:10]

That's dukkha, that's suffering. And the question we might ask is, okay, given all of this, things I like, things I don't, things I don't even care about, which we normally don't notice. However, there are things we don't care about. It's interesting to look into. So given all of this, am I learning and growing? That's the key question. That is the key question as far as I'm concerned. Am I learning and growing? And of course, there can be times of stagnancy and dark night of the soul and that kind of thing, which is good to notice as well. If nothing's moving for a long time, that may be a good time if we'd like to do so to acquire depressed or there's some physical condition that we need to to address if we just feel stuck. So that's that's kind of my heart sharing with you since I'm fortunate enough that you've invited me to be a self-identified women's session here at Berkeley Zen Center.

[11:26]

And switching now a little bit from that more broad existential mode into something more Zen-ish, the Berkeley Zen Center, I'd like to just spend a few minutes talking about a topic that I see pretty much everywhere, not just in the Buddhist traditions, in all of the spiritual traditions. I do quite a bit of I like faith work. I like to have spiritual friends from different faith traditions and atheists and a diverse group of people. And elsewhere we can say How now can we be practicing in the fire of our times?

[12:31]

I'm seeing this in various iterations, right? I see some nodding heads, right? So Zen Buddhist practice is full of pithy slogans, and one of them is this that I've heard. Practice as though your head is on fire. And sometimes as though your hair is on fire. So practice as though your head is on fire or your hair is on fire. And that to me conveys a sense of incredible, of course, urgency. We're not fooling around here. We're not sitting around on our butts. thinking idle thoughts. Sometimes that happens. However, that's not the purpose of the practice, as I understand it.

[13:33]

And paradoxically, life is full of contradictions, which Xenia, with all of its faults, is pretty good at accommodating. Right? Like Xenia, so much I think that... has been wrong with it in terms of how it's played out socially with teacher abuses and terrible things. And there are many good people, present company included, who are sincerely and genuinely using the various practices we have, which are practices of meditation in Zen, working together, working, cleaning, this place is so nice and clean, lovingly maintained, very, very important. And the most difficult, I think, practice of all, Sangha practice. In other words, annoying people. It's great to be people we vibe with and then inevitably

[14:44]

It will always be that difficult person. And in the long cycle of practice, we ourselves usually rotate its position. It's that position at some point. It's like, oh, damn. Everybody's disagreeing with me. I'm irritating everybody. I'm just trying to say what I think is right. Why me? Why me? Why am I a difficult person now? I've been so good before. And yes, the Sangha practice. Sangha practice. And we can also diversity, equity, and inclusion consultant, often for Buddhist groups or educational institutions. And we say in some of the diversity, equity, inclusion, access communities that I'm very fortunate to be part of, Gather together in any kind of group. So here we are. Hi, Zoom people. You're part of this.

[15:46]

When we gather together in Sangha, in spiritual community, whatever name we're going to use, we can ask ourselves, how do we create the community in which we live? We're all co-creating that. Of course, there are usually leaders and there are in Zen. like your Zendo officials and there are so-called teachers. And my understanding is co-creating, whatever we're co-creating, whatever's happening within the community all together. Everyone has responsibility. Everyone has accountability. We all play our part. And so how are we going to imperfectly create the community live, which we want to take care of our elders, our dying folks, people with chronic illnesses, disabilities, chronic pain.

[16:52]

How do we take care of our children, grandchildren, younger people? How are we taking care of one another? to try to create the communities in which we want to live. In that way, we can see that what we call the Sangha is a microcosm of whatever we say is outside the Sangha. This is kind of, I always think of spiritual community, it's like a laboratory in which we try to practice peace, we try to practice harmony, we try to practice how we can coexist without devolving to what we're seeing in so many places in the world.

[17:55]

And that's practices though your head is on fire. That's a pretty good assignment, I think. Considering that, as I understand it, the word nirvana, Sanskrit, nibbana, pali, means extinction, dying out of the hot embers of passion and delusion and being attacked on social media and arguing with snarky teenagers, whatever it is. Whatever it is, that's making us irritated. My understanding is that the word nirvana or nibbana means this cooling off. It's cooling off. It's not only cooling off, I think. It's actually, if we use the metaphor of the fire, that it's not just cooled off.

[19:03]

And that we don't see any flames or smoke. it means that there's not even one tiny buried ember left that if we blew on it and put some dry grass or something like that, it would burst into flame. I mean, that fire is out, stone cold out. So really just, I think, being cool in some kind of ultimate, fabulous Zen way. Why should we practice with such suit and such urgency? What is this all about? Practice their fellow heads on fire. This is being recorded and today is November 19th in the calendar year 2023. And to look at this is that as though one's head is on fire is really, I think, pretty small potatoes.

[20:10]

Because, at least according to the scientific news I've been reading, we are now practicing meditation and being in self-defined women's Sangha together as not our heads, But our entire planet is burning with wars and climate crisis. So we don't actually need to practice as though our head is on fire because we're on a burning planet. Which first and most massively communities with the least wealth, the least power, the sufferings of structural racism and its many corollaries.

[21:23]

In other words, practice as though your planet is on fire. So I don't know about you, but this is a really bad assignment. I actually didn't sign up for this. I didn't. I didn't. And I am the mother of an adult child who lives with me, who grew up as a Buddhist. I said, I try not to be like missionary because we And he said, are you kidding me? It was just everywhere. Too bad. That's the way it is. And I am very fortunate to have Sangha friends who have babies or babies or toddlers. Pandemic, very, very tough on the preschoolers and the really, well, on all the kids I know.

[22:30]

And even though I didn't sign up for it, this is how I perceive it. So practice as though our planet is on fire. If we feel this to be true, and not everyone might, what is it that we're doing here? Individually and personally? Do we have a fire extinguisher in the zendo? And when I was doing a kinyin or walking meditation, I saw there is one right in the corner. Oh, and there's another one on the wall. Great. So we have a fire extinguisher. Any place that we're in, that would be a good thing to think about. And hopefully as Thich Nhat Hanh says, what does Thich Nhat Hanh say?

[23:41]

Something like it's not all suffering either. So in other words, will there be tea and cookies, which I understand there will be. And what will we do when we leave Berkeley Zen Center or log off from the Zoom? are not trick questions, and I do not have the answers for any of you, nor am I trying to ruin anyone's day, including my own. I'm simply using this very brief platform to try to connect to each of you. I'm a Buddhist, and according to my Buddhist beliefs, I don't think there's any mistakes in terms of whatever karmic conditions have brought us here together in this time, in this place, in this way, that will never be repeated again. I always say to people, even though the exact people we could say, same social security numbers, gathered together a year from now, or it could even be a month or a week from now, actually, and the same folks on the Zoom,

[24:58]

We would have aged. We might have gone through some life-changing experiences or smaller experiences. Every day, our bodies are changing. Everything's always in flux and flow, hopefully growth. And therefore, our being here today is a very special intersection of causes and conditions, most of which I do not know. So I'm very curious when I look at all because it's always kind of miraculous. It's always very miraculous. To connect to all of you and to all of you who are listening, Since we don't have American Sign Language interpreting, I'm assuming we're all .

[26:04]

And that would indicate a possible direction for growth. I'm sharing my heart practice, my so-called heart teachings with you, in order to propose what in Zen is called in Japanese and called the koan, K-O-A-N, which is a medication question that requires some sort of quantum leap if we are to quote unquote or really just do something. I've done koan practice and no one never told me, wow, wooshim, He just passed this koan, good on you. I never got that. And it seems like . So I'm just, I'm really curious. Like, what the heck?

[27:06]

I never did. Usually what would happen is the question would change. The teacher would say, okay, now koan is, or there'd just be some kind of . I would flounder on. Therefore, I'm going to propose what in Zen is called the Koan. And it's something that I came up with several years ago with a very small group of people I would call advanced practitioners with. And it has a catchy acronym, which is WITMIT, W-I-T-M-I-T, capital letters, WITMIT. And WITMIT stands for what is the most important thing. So if you take up WITMIT practice, it's not the most important thing for me, Mushim, or anyone else you know.

[28:24]

It's for you. It is for you. What is the most important thing? Right now, for you and you alone, we don't get to decide this for anyone else. And considering that in Buddhist belief, each of us who has been born will die usually. We don't know when. Considering that, What for you is the most important thing? If you're so inclined, can you plant this question deep in your heart-mind? As we know in Zen, Mahayana Buddhism, we don't say body,

[29:27]

and mind. We usually say body-mind, mind-body. It's all one word. It's all one word. Because I believe that's a true reflection of real. If we can look at our mood, our thoughts, our capacities to act when we're feeling great and then when we're feeling really sick or have a terrible pain, Usually those are two very different things. So body and mind are not body and mind. It's mind, body, body, mind. And we also say heart, mind. And that is, as I understand it, is the translation into English. In Japanese, then it's in my original lineage, Shin. So that's my name. that was given to me in 1983 in Zen Buddhist temple Tarakta, which is a Korean Canadian Zen Buddhist temple.

[30:38]

And it's from the Heart Sutra. It's from the Heart Sutra. When we chant using whatever translation, no eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, no body, no mind, it actually means no heart mind, because the character is xin or. And mu is the big mu, which is translated very inadequately into English as no, not negating. So in some translations, Muxing or Muxing is no heart, mind. It's kind of a pretty, I think, high class. I don't know a name. And no kidding, when I received it from my teachers at Master Sahu Sinan, I just thought, oh no. This really means he's going to expect me to do a lot.

[31:41]

Really, I just thought, yeah. That's really what's, and it was true. My heart just sank. I thought, oh, no. We don't get to bargain with the teacher. I don't like that name. I would rather be called something very nice. I don't know, Blossoming Lotus or something like that, but nope. that became the most important thing for me, is to become mushing. And I'm still working on it. So can you, if you'd like to do, plant this question, what is the most important thing deep in your heart, mind, like the most potent time management strategy ever? Every day. whenever we're conscious, we do have choices.

[32:47]

We have choices. I mean, of course, there are things that we have to do, and we have the choice of how we're going to do it, what attitude we will bring. Intention. We have a great deal of freedom in how we choose to spend our time. What is the most important thing for you right now? What is the most important thing for me to be doing in this moment? I've chosen to be here. You are gracious enough. And I thought it over, and I thought, okay, I'd like to do that. And for us, as I said, in my point of view, what a special time this is.

[33:56]

What a potent meeting of talents, of experiences, most of which is unknown to me. would become quite well known if, and I don't mean to say one, I'm saying what I think is an obvious scientific truth is the land on which the Berkeley Zen Center is located is, geologists have been saying for many years, is really quite overdue for what the Bay Area In other words, a major seismic event or an earthquake. And if that should happen, though some of us know each other to a greater or lesser extent, some of us don't know each other well at all, we would find out.

[34:58]

We would find out who under stress and in emergency as to how we can take care of one another. and figure out what to do. In other words, the Cohen process is not something intellectual. It's not something that's extraneous. It is a deep reflection of our very life circumstances in each moment. So what are we doing together that fulfills our and connective potential in this moment in history. I was trained as an artist, as a poet, and artist communities and arts creatives, they call it these days, to expand it for

[36:09]

for a very long time. And something that I really enjoy about being together in artist communities and people is you never really quite know what's going to happen. And it can be really fun, it can be really boring, it can be really stupid, it can be quite profound. However, out of this connection of creative potential, of experiences, of views, of intentions. There is something that is quite unique and powerful about the group that is assembled here at this moment in this retreat. What is it? This is a Zen Buddhist intensive, a concentrated retreat space called Session in Japanese.

[37:19]

And I guess maybe the equivalent might be Youngman Junction in my original lineage, which is Korean song or Zen. And as it's usually said, let us use this time. I am assuming, I believe, I feel pretty confident that we are all smart. It means intelligent and caring and really pretty incredible women. However, we define the term woman as we choose. That's my faith, actually. We are all, in this moment, we are all smart and caring and incredibly talented. Women. So what is the most important thing we can be doing together right now? And can it be fun?

[38:22]

Yeah, yeah. Some Zen Buddhists in the United States, I am a citizen of the United States, serious practice, meaning committed practice and practice to be serious as in no fun. Like really like grim. Which is, it's just kind of weird from my point of view. I have practiced in Korean monastery in 1987 for eight months in the mountains. of Northern South Korea going up towards the DNC. And I don't know, they're just, they're not like that. They're not grim. There might be grim individuals.

[39:27]

However, the Sangha, the people as a whole, the monks and the nuns and the committed lay people who live at the temple or come often, there's a great thing. and there's fun, and there are parties. Because human beings need this. And fun can be extremely inspiring. Black radical activist Marie Brown, author of Emergent Strategy, Shaping Change, Changing Worlds, a small book which I read we do recommend to all of you. It has, I think, I forget, nine or 12 principles and I have them up and print it out and I keep it right next to my computer at home and look at it often. So Adrian Marie Brown, second book I believe is called Pleasure

[40:39]

Politics of Feeling Good. And Brown says, how can we make working together for social justice, we could say liberation, the single most pleasurable thing we can think of. So how can we make being together hopefully trying to go in the direction of the profound liberation that Buddhism posits. In my circles, I am a social justice. How do we make that just the most pleasurable thing we can think of? And if we think of it that way, we can easily see that people would be flocking. I mean, we'd have to have guards to keep people and don't, right?

[41:41]

Because he would be trying to pound in the door saying, we want to get in because there would be so much pleasure in being together with all of you. And we could say, well, you know, this place is kind of small, so form your own group. And whatever it is that you want to be doing. So how can we make being together the most pleasurable, single most pleasurable thing we can think of? And I don't know if some of you have seen the Barbie movie. As Barbie says to Ken in the Barbie movie, he says, you know, what are you doing tonight, Barbie? Can I come over? And she says, oh, I don't have anything big planned. Just a giant blowout party with all the Barbies and planned choreography. and a bespoke song, you should stop by. To which Ken replies, so the question, the koan, the burning practice question again, what is the coolest, most liberatory, most quenching of the fires of greed, hate, delusion thing we can be doing right now?

[42:58]

I'm very curious. Because there really is no time to waste, in my opinion. And as my adult son, I'm going to piece that up just a tiny bit. The American man I've raised from scratch says, the thing with the Zen is, it doesn't F around. using time well being mindful of what we what it is we intend to do together and what it is we are doing together is again it's built into as far as i can see it's built into the various forms of sin practice as i think it's called the verse of the han right it's it's

[44:05]

written on the, this is Japanese, and there's various percussive instruments, and there's this wooden board that's suspended by ropes, so that it's swimming freely, and you practice. Someone stands there with a wooden mallet and strikes it. I really like that sound of the Han. If you're in a rural area or on the mountain, it echoes. out into space and very natural sound. And I think the verse that's written on it in English says something to the effect of great is a matter of life and death. Meaning those of us who have been born, we only have some kind of duration and then at some point we will die. Children, people die at any age. So, great is a matter of life and death.

[45:07]

Wake up, wake up. Don't waste time. Don't waste time. In 1988, I went through the first level of non-ordination, bhikkhuni. victory, not ordination. On Toksun Mountain, a famous sacred mountain in the northern part of South Korea. At the top of the mountain, you can overlook, you can look at the China Sea. It's really beautiful. And it has the headquarters temple, which is more near the mountain. or toward the base of the mountain is called Sudoksa, and there are, I think, about like 10 temples on the mountain.

[46:10]

There are monk's temples, there are nun's temples, there are a couple of hermitages, which were reserved for monks, and lay people who would come and do, live, live at the temple, and some of them had been I think were there for years. They would, in some cases, do the cooking and a lot of work around, and they just would be ordained. They were happy as they were. Sometimes older women who had finished with their duties of raising their kids, and they were retired, things were financially squared away in their homes, and they would just come and live at the temple. community on the mountain. Sometimes we had children who would come for Dharma classes and on the weekends the temples are like sort of like national or state parks and tourists like to come and hike around the mountain and architecture and enjoy everything.

[47:23]

And when I was there Every weekend, it would just be thronged with tourists. I was in the meditation hall doing initially the three-month, what's called the Snows Retreat, which was a meditation retreat, so in silence for three months. And on Saturdays and Sundays, we'd be sitting in the meditation hall. And sometimes tourists would come up and bang on the windows and open the door. We'll peek in and say, like, you know, like, what's going on in there? What does it look like that these Zen meditators are doing their thing? You could just hear them swallowing around outside, and they littered everything at that point. That was before, I think there's probably more environmental consciousness now. They would hike on the mountain, and they would eat a lot of snacks and just, like, throw it around.

[48:28]

It's a very vital practice space. And in that tradition, there is, I don't know, all the time. However, during the three month, the three month, there's a snows retreat in the winter and the three month snows retreat in the summer. And then there are three months between those periods in which it's That's when monastics go to doctors and dentists and visit their friends. It's a tradition there, I believe, that for the Zen practitioners, if they get permission, monastics, that they get permission to travel around and test their practice with various... Because we can, in my experience, we can develop habits. of how we interact according, of course, to the culture of our home group.

[49:33]

And then when we go to other places, their culture may be different or, in fact, very different. And then it becomes a question in our practice of can we flow and adapt or can we judge and get stuck and think, oh, we don't do it like this, and fill in the blank of the place. They have built into their system if one can get permission of wandering around and meeting various teachers and meeting various practitioners and seeing how we do in interacting with different people, with different ways of practicing, of being, of questioning. So during at least the three-month retreats, there is the entire monastic sangha on this mountain. There wasn't room for anyone else.

[50:35]

There was basically barely enough room for all of the ordained monks and nuns. Together on the full moon and the new moon for a day of a Dharma talk, usually by the Zen master of the mountain. In this case, it was Wanda Kun Sinim, who had been there, I think, since he was a very young person, teenager, maybe a little boy. And there would be a Dharma talk, and everyone would be packed into the Buddha hall, which was a national treasure, very old, all made out of wood. And then after that, a nice lunch, and then you would have the rest of the day to wash your clothing, to go to the local hot springs, and have a nice bath, and have some time off. So it's a very, very precious time in this highly structured system of up at 3 every morning, lights out, we're 9 p.m., and that was 365 days a year.

[51:46]

for the New Moon and the Full Moon gatherings. In 1988, there I am packed into the ancient Buddha Hall of Sudhaqsa and a very highly educated, at that time, Sri Lankan Theravada monk, really, really senior monk, was visiting. And out of courtesy, the leaders on the mountain invited him to give the Dhamma talk from the high seat. And he began in good Theravada style to give a kind of scholarly lecture. He was speaking in English. He was fluent in English, which was great for me. And there was a Korean who translated from English into Korean. and so I don't know what he's talking about but you know it was like the Buddha taught this and the Buddha taught that and you've got the hindrances and things are very mapped out in the Theravada which I really appreciate because in Zen they often don't give you much of anything at all right that's kind of a style I was practicing in Santa Fe years ago

[53:14]

I guess, 85, 86. And there was now the Upaya Zen Center. And previous to that, it was where Richard Baker Roshi from San Francisco Zen Center kind of went into exile with some of his people. So there was an exquisite little zendo. It was made out of Adobe. There were no windows because it gets really hot. They're really cold. So they're kind of nicely insulated, very dark inside, and lit by a few candles. And so the first time I practiced there, we did the zazen, we did the zen sitting, and then it was time for the service. And a Buddhist priest named Robert, bless his heart, he passed from cancer some years ago, sidled up in back of me and gave me a chanting card. And then he whispered in my ear, he said, the good news is you get a chanting card.

[54:18]

But that, it's too dark to me. I just thought, then what can you do? However, it is not thus in some other places or lineages, and people do explain things to you and they do not things. Sri Lankan monk was very nice. I mean, he was just giving this very nice Dharma talk. It was quite logical. It was all laid out. And I could feel the monastic Sangha starting to get restless. I mean, there wasn't shifting around, but there was just this kind of energy. Energy. And then suddenly, from the back of the Buddha hall, one of the hermit monks, one of the hermit monks, who I think was an accomplished artist also, standing there, because there's no place to sit, totally in violation of fire rules, I'm sure, but, you know, we had to get in there.

[55:28]

After about, I don't know, five to five minutes, a shout rang out from the back of the Buddha hall, and this hermit monk yelled at the top of his lung. Who is this Buddha you are talking about? We just shouted it out really aggressively. And the teacher probably thought, are these people idiots? I mean, these are Buddhist monks and I don't know who the Buddha is. However, he was really a nice person. So very respectfully he said something like, well, we're talking about the Buddha Shakyamuni who lived around 2,500 years ago in India, and he was doing this kind of college professor type thing, only to be rudely cut off when the hermit, who I think was also an artist again, yelled again, no, who is this Buddha?

[56:33]

which those of us who have done practice recognize it's called Dharma combat. Right? That's that creative, again, that creative potential, really just bursting out. Like, it's the basic question, okay, we've got all of this Buddha hall and architecture and infrastructure, we've got all this chanting, we've got all of these forms. And... And really, what the heck is it all for? What the heck is it all for? Hence, putting to the question, it could be put in many different ways. However, who is this Buddha you are talking about? Thoroughly confused, the Sri Lankan monk remained silent for, I think, one, two, three.

[57:39]

It was just a suspension of time in the room, totally silent. And then without conferring, without any kind of talk, as one body, the entire monastic sangha in full formal robe together and ran away from the Buddha hall. with incredible swiftness. Because it was time for lunch and that was the most important thing. They all just decided to waste their time with this. And that is not an easy thing because the Buddha Hall was elevated and To go into it, one had to take off one's shoes, which, for the Korean menace, all looked the same.

[58:41]

They were these rubber slippers, and you weren't allowed. I was initially there with a group of English-speaking people. Some were Korean, most were not. Most of us were not. And you weren't allowed to, like, write your name or anything like that. And so when the shoes were left in groups outside the Buddha Hall, if you took someone else's shoes by mistake, that was a really big deal because then they wouldn't have any slippers or shoes when they came out. Each person coming out of that hall had to come out through, there are a couple of pretty narrow doors, step down onto a stone, and then there would be all of these white slippers. shoes, monastic shoes all over the place and you'd have to know exactly which were your shoes and put them on. So for most of us, it would take a while to exit with that many people.

[59:46]

It was just like a vacuum. They just sucked out into the space outside of the Buddha Hall and they just evaporated. They were completely gone. I'm not Korean. and not capable of that. I would have to kind of look around and think, oh, I think I cheated. I put a little dot on my shoe in a place where I hope no one would notice it. And so I didn't run out as fast as everyone did because I would have tripped or something that would have impeded the flow from the Buddha hall. And I was left behind and poor Sri Lankan monk and the translator were there and just in a state of confusion and bewilderment and what just happened at all. And everyone else was gone. Because that particular Dharma talk was not the most important thing.

[60:51]

It was not the most important. story, and then we'll just have a few minutes, in order to emphasize that it is part of our extended tradition. As Zen Buddhists, I felt, I thought, wow, this is like something from one of those Tang Dynasty stories. It talks behavior. Those aren't just stories. This is something that actually happened. Again, it was in 1988. No one talked about it afterward. And the community as a whole was very, very clear about what the thing for them was. It was surprising. It was quite wonderful. Thank you very much.

[61:59]

for community sharing. Thank you, Nisha. Often we do stop recording so that if there's anything people want to say with confidence and not have it in public.

[62:19]

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