Good evening. I hope the lights stay on. I hope everyone can hear me. I'll try to keep my voice up. Well, the Tassajara students and staff really appreciate having all of you here during this period of time, working with us and helping us get Tassajara ready for the guest season during this transitional time.

[01:13]

I can't tell you how much It helps us. And I also know that it gives everyone the opportunity to participate in some kind of practice at Tassajara. This particular time between the spring practice period and the summer is like a little crack in the Tassajara schedule that allows for people who couldn't ordinarily be here to be here. And we're really grateful that that can happen. This is a period which is a little bit loose. During the spring and the fall, we have practice period, which is very different feeling. The monks sit all morning.

[02:16]

They get up at four o'clock and sit all morning and work in the afternoon. And they do study and various practices in a very strict schedule. And to be able to have this kind of loose period is quite wonderful because it allows many other people to appreciate Tassajara, although the practice is very different. And then the summer is also different. There's more of a schedule and lots of work. So sitting Zazen and working are two aspects of our Zen practice. Master Pai Chang in the Tang Dynasty in China set up the monastic rules.

[03:21]

And part of the monastic rules was for Zen monks to work. Originally in Japan, I mean, excuse me, in India, the monks were not allowed to work. They begged for their food and spent the day in various forms of meditation. And when Buddhism moved to China, at some point the situation changed and the Zen monks took part of their day to work, to till the fields, and to take care of themselves, rather than depending so much on people to support them. So that was a different kind of attitude.

[04:25]

So Master Pai Chong said, a day of no work is a day of no eating. very famous saying of Master Pai Chong, day of no work is a day of no eating. And when he was an old man, they took away his tools because they thought that if he went out there in the heat and started working, he'd probably keel over. So he didn't eat. So they had to give him back his tools. So this is the spirit of work practice for Zen monks. Work is actually meditation practice. It's not just trying to accomplish something. And this tradition has been going on ever since. We're very fortunate in America

[05:33]

that we're still on the frontier of developing our practice, and we have a lot to do. As you can see, Tassajara is just in the baby stages of being developed, and our work practice will continue for a long, long time. In some place where the practice is, where the monasteries have been developed for many centuries, The work is a little different. A friend of mine who has been practicing at Ryutaku-ji, a very famous temple in Japan, said all day long the monks sweep the grounds. That's their practice. They sit zazen and sweep the grounds and work in the kitchen. But all day long they're sweeping. every day.

[06:35]

And I visited him last year, and I was sleeping too. But it was nice, very nice, beautiful place. But we have a different kind of practice in America, where we're actually building our own practice places And it's a wonderful opportunity to integrate our practice with our work in all of the aspects of it. So there are two aspects of work.

[07:53]

One is that you want to get something done. The reason people go to work is because they want to accomplish something. You want to build something or you want to feed people. whatever it is that we have to do, there's something we want to accomplish. That's usual in work. But there's also another side of work, which is not to accomplish something, but it's rather the quality of being, the quality of existence. the quality of existence itself, the quality of life itself. Often, in our usual activity, we become so concerned with the result that we tend to neglect the moment-to-moment activity that we're engaged in.

[09:04]

So if we want to accomplish something, we have this goal in our mind. And we may not be so concerned about how we go about doing it, how we go about accomplishing what we're doing. But as a meditation practice, as a practice of zazen in our daily life, the quality of our activity is just as important as the accomplishment of some goal. So zazen, sitting zazen, establishes the quality of our activity. And our activity, as it's extended from zazen into our daily life of work or whatever, is the main goal of our life.

[10:19]

So we don't neglect accomplishment, but we also don't neglect the quality of moment-to-moment activity. So it's always a balance between getting something done and doing it with careful mindfulness and attention to detail, and attention to how something is being carried out, and attention to how we harmonize with our surroundings when we're doing something. to be totally in harmony with our surroundings in all of our activity, in harmony with the people that we're working with, in harmony with the materials that we're working with, and in harmony with the tools that we're working with.

[11:29]

This aspect is called samadhi. Samadhi is not some special magical state of mind. It's simply being totally connected on each moment, totally at one with your activity on each moment, in harmony with whatever you come into contact with. So we have this opportunity to create any kind of situation that we want to create. Happiness and unhappiness are totally up to us on each moment. So to be in harmony with our surroundings moment to moment is called one-act samadhi, or one-action samadhi, or on each moment's activity, total connection, total presence.

[13:15]

So for a Zen student, this is the most important thing to be aware of. And in the course of our activity, anger arises, frustration arises, attachments arise, jealousy arises, competition arises. All of these qualities arise, which are actually hindrances to harmonious activity. And sometimes we become very attached to these emotional qualities that arise. So the practice of a student is to let go and not be caught by these emotions as they arise, to recognize them, to acknowledge them, not to judge them, but to step back and make some effort to re-enter harmony, to re-enter oneness, to actually step back into zazen so that the practice of zazen is continuous.

[14:51]

So the practice of the Zen student is continuous. It doesn't stop. There's no end. And no matter what state of mind arises, one is aware. But one is always making the effort to step into harmony, to return to clear mind. And we learn that through zazen. In zazen, we make an effort to maintain a clear mind, but something's always coming up and carrying off your attention. And so we let go of that and come back to clear mind. And then something comes up, some thought, and carries our attention away. And then we let go of that and come back to clear mind. So we're continually coming back to clear mind, letting go and coming back to clear mind.

[16:01]

This is a continuous practice of zazen. And we do it when we sit, and we do it when we work, and we do it when we play. Yes, there is zen play. It's called work. If you know how to work that way, then work is fun. It should be fun. And our life can be very playful when we let go of our attachments. I was talking to William today and he said that when he was working at Green Gulch with this very wonderful Japanese carpenter who was teaching at that time, he said they would work for two hours at a time in a very concentrated way and then they would take a break and then they would work again for two hours at a time in a very concentrated way and he said

[17:42]

He was always so disappointed when the break came. It was great, you know, they served nice tea and cookies and everything, but it was so wonderful just to do the work that the break was a kind of an interference in a way. If one can generate that kind of work, that kind of attitude toward work, that's what we call practice. And that's what we should be striving for in our practice. Master Dogen put a lot of emphasis on how to work in the kitchen. Kitchen is a very wonderful place to work for Zen students. And it gets a lot of attention. The reason the kitchen gets so much attention is because everybody loves to eat.

[18:45]

three times a day or more. And all these wonderful things come out of the kitchen. So we're very dependent on that building. And it's the heart of the Zen monastery, except for the zendo. It's the other heart. It's the stomach. The monastery is like a body. The various parts of the monastery are like the various parts of the body. So the zendo is the heart and the kitchen is the stomach. And he talked about, he wrote this Tenzo Hyokun, the rules for the head cook in the zendo, which is very wonderful. how to practice in the kitchen. So we put lots of emphasis on that, you know, how to harmonize and so forth.

[19:49]

But often the other areas of the monastery get neglected. They don't have so much attention. For instance, the shop. The shop is like this tough guy who's always putting out but never gets taken care of because everybody's too busy worrying about other things. And in the history of Tassajara, the shop has been taken care of, but it hasn't had the attention that the kitchen has had. It doesn't have the focus that the kitchen has had. But we're beginning to actually take care of the shop right now.

[20:51]

Some attention right now to really take care of the shop and make it a real practice place. And to make everybody aware of how to take care of tools, how to take care of materials, how to use materials in the best way, how to become one with the material that you're using, and how to appreciate where things come from, and how to appreciate where they go, and how to really take care of things. In the practice of the kitchen, you're supposed to take care of the pots like your own head. Dogen says, you should take care of the pots like you take care of your own head. You should not waste a grain of rice. Don't waste one grain of rice. And so he talks about how to really be careful about each thing.

[21:58]

And the same should go for his shop. I mean, why shouldn't every place in Tazahara be like that? So, we really want to put some emphasis on this kind of practice, so that the practice in the shop is not just practice to accomplish something, but a place to practice. And it's a wonderful place to practice. Just in the last couple of days, we've been making rules for how to take care of the shop. That each morning, the people who work in the shop will offer incense and bow in, and at the end, bow out, and just before the end of the day, to clean up the shop completely.

[23:02]

Surprisingly, it only takes 15 minutes. and to actually get into the habit. And once you get into the habit of taking care of things a little bit, pretty soon you begin to see more and more and you begin to take care of things like your own head, like your own body. So the way a place is taken care of indicates the quality of your practice. When you see a monastery where things are really well taken care of, you know that there is good practice there, attentive practice. People know what to do and they know how to practice. I think one of the most fulfilling times for me, for my practice, was in the summer of 1970 when I was Suzuki Roshi's Jisha, his attendant, and there were several of us who were moving rocks, building a rock wall over by the

[24:48]

the Kaisando, what's now the Founders Hall, which wasn't there at that time. What was there at that time was Suzuki Roshi's cabin, and we moved that out of there. But working with my teacher every day, moving rocks, moving these huge boulders, He knew exactly what he was doing, and he knew how to work, and he knew how to use his body, and he was just this little guy, four feet high, and he could move rocks better than anyone, and he was not very strong at that time. But somehow, working with his state of mind, his calmness and his carefulness, was one of the greatest teachings for me.

[25:52]

And we would move a rock, take all day to move one big rock in place, and it didn't work until we'd move it out again, and then move it back again. It's not that everything had to be perfect. It just had to be right. It just had to work, work right, not perfection. Perfection means that something is working right, correctly. So, I enjoy working in a place where everyone feels the same way, has the same attitude toward what they're doing.

[27:00]

And there's something about offering incense and bowing in in the morning which sets a tone for the harmonious activity throughout the day. And everybody feels like they're supporting each other and there's some kind of wonderful feeling in the air that is very crisp and exciting and full of energy. And it continues all day. And at the end of the day, everybody feels very good about each other and about what they've accomplished and about the tone and the quality of living their life moment after moment. Suzuki Roshi used to say, Zen practice is simply living your life completely, moment after moment, one moment at a time.

[28:04]

I think this is what I'm talking about, is the quality of living our life one moment at a time, living it completely on each moment. This is called the samadhi of moment after moment, of the present. So you can either make your workplace a hell or you can make it a heaven. Everything is just what we make it. But we know that life is not that easy.

[29:30]

But... It's important to have some kind of vision and know what you want to accomplish. If you know what you want to accomplish and really work for it, you can accomplish it. So in Zen practice, we want to accomplish enlightened practice. We want to have enlightened practice. We want to have an enlightened life. And if we want an enlightened life, we should work for that, work toward that, not just be complacent.

[31:02]

So I feel very good about what we're doing right now. And I'm very happy about Tassajara. And it feels very harmonious being here right now. Tomorrow I have to go back. I'm leaving in the morning. I know things will continue as they are. Does anybody have a question? Yes? I'm curious, what do you think and do you tell yourself and realize you've fallen away from the connection with your day or with the materials or the people?

[32:26]

Do you give yourself a lecture or have some way of realigning yourself? Yeah, that's a good question. How do you realign yourself? How do you get back? How do you find the connection? Right, right, right. Well, you know, in Zazen, We always breathe very deeply. Our breath is down here in our belly. And when we sit, that's where we breathe from. And then when we get up from zazen, we should continue breathing from there. And whatever we work with, we should work in harmony with our breath. And there's various meditation practices involved with breath that involve, with each step, one is aware of breathing with that activity.

[33:32]

And if you work with that, it becomes, I don't want to say automatic, because our life shouldn't be automatic, but it becomes a habit, habitual. And you're aware of how you breathe with what you do. And that keeps you grounded here. And it keeps you centered here. And if you're grounded and centered here, you usually don't get off so easily. You get off when your breath is up here, because you get top heavy. But when the center of gravity is very low, it's much harder to get knocked off. to get pushed off. Zen practice is to keep the center of gravity really low. There's a saying, you should have warm feet and a cool head. So when you get tipped off, when you get pushed over, the weight

[34:43]

is on the bottom, so you come back up. You know, there's a Daruma doll, have you ever heard of a Daruma doll? There's a Bodhidharma, you know, and there's a weight on this little doll of Bodhidharma, and there's a weight on the bottom of it, and you push him over, but he always comes back up. So, this is what gets us off, and this is what brings us back. So, we should always have our mind down here, and be always working from the solar plexus, from the guts. But also, when you get off, if you have a sense of practice, then you remind yourself, wait a minute, stop and come back to your breath. Stop and just come back to stillness and then start over again. It's really important to be able to stop and start over again.

[35:47]

But people don't like to stop. They say, well, I have to continue this thing through. I have to see this thing through. But usually, and quite often, you don't have to see it through. Because seeing something through means you just keep creating more and more stuff. And we get very attached to our anger and our frustrations and so forth. And we want to keep, and we just keep building it up. And we can't stop. So it's very good to be able to just stop, whoa, take a deep breath and start again. That's called zazen. Continually starting over again, moment by moment. Every moment is a new moment. It's an opportunity to start again. You don't have to carry out all the stuff that's eating you. and told the story about William working with the carpenters and they worked for two hours and then took a break.

[36:58]

Well, before they got to the point where they got very tired and started missing the nails and stuff, you know, so they get to the point of frustration. And then I was also thinking about, well, about how practice matures. everything that you're saying is about maturing practice rather than the beginning. You know what I mean? It's always beginning, but this sense that, I mean, I find that my breath has moved farther and farther down in my body, the more open I can be, rather than say, oh, you know, open completely from the beginning, which I think doesn't allow certain processes. Right. Yeah. So, but each one of us is different. And so a talk is just a talk, you know. But each one of us has to find where we come in on that line, right?

[38:01]

Each one of us has to find, well, where am I? He says this, well, where am I in that, right? So we're all in a different, each in a different place. So each one of us can apply it to ourself according to our propensities. But it's true. It's good to stop, anyway. Sometimes I feel that we take our breaks, you know, like 10 o'clock in the morning. It's a little much, but we don't work that much. When I used to work, you know, we used to work all day long, you know. But I think it's fine. So you don't start getting off and hitting yourself with it. But still, if one is very concentrated in your work, you're doing everything in a relaxed way.

[39:03]

When we're working, it's really important to find how to do something with calm effort. the least amount of effort to do the most amount of work. That's what we should be looking for. And so, to do the least amount, the most work with the least effort. So that when you do things, your body is relaxed. Your body is at ease, even though you're working continuously. That's the art of working. not to get tense, not to be tied up, then you get very tired in your work and your back gets sore, but to be relaxed.

[40:07]

If you know how to sit zazen in a relaxed way, which means to sit with very good posture, very straight, but without any tenseness, You carry that into your work. When you work, you let the tools do the work. When you hit a nail, let the hammer put the nail in. Then you can work all day, and of course, everyone gets tired, but you don't get overtired. And you enjoy the rhythm of your work. You really enjoy the rhythm of your work. to find a rhythm and find out how to do something in a way that has a rhythm, and you're not going slow, and you're not going too fast, and you're doing something just right. That's wonderful.

[41:11]

Then work is play. And your life becomes enjoyable. You know, my position is abbot, so I have a lot of stuff to do, you know, that doesn't have to do with physical work. But I so much enjoy physical work because it's so enjoyable. Working in the kitchen is so enjoyable. I just love it when I have the opportunity to do that. And working in a shop is so great. Yes. Hi. Can you elaborate a bit on the difference between setting goals and accomplishment and a gaining idea?

[42:15]

Well, she wants to know what the difference is between setting goals and accomplishment and a gaining idea, right? Yes. Gaining idea is something that Suzuki Goshi used to talk about a lot, which means getting something that we don't already have, working for something that you don't have. So in our Zen practice, we don't work for something that we don't have. We don't want work to get something. Our effort is not geared toward getting something. Our effort is toward being where we are with what we have and bringing forth what we have. So it's not a goal-oriented practice. It's a practice of... Our effort is for being where we are with what we have and bringing forth what we have.

[43:18]

So it's not a goal-oriented practice. It's a practice of manifesting our self, true self. So you can call that accomplishment. You can call it accomplishment. Accomplishment in the present. Accomplishment means manifesting in the present. gaining something, or accumulating something, or getting something from the outside. It actually means letting go of anything that's not already yours. This is why Zen monks have nothing. So that they're not dependent on something from outside, except food, of course.

[44:30]

But very little. What do you need to sustain you? And what do you depend on? So when you let go of things, you find out what it is that you depend on. That's the purpose of letting go of things. So, one has great faith. When you let go of everything, all you have is great faith. And that's sustaining. And you realize that the universe sustains you. and you feel gratefulness for everything.

[45:35]

Gratitude is... continuous gratitude is a reflection of enlightenment. One who is always dissatisfied is not showing what he is. When you can let go of everything, then whatever comes is wonderful. When we breathe, we let go of everything. When we exhale, we let go of everything. And then when we inhale, it's wonderful. Isn't it?

[46:36]

Oh, that's wonderful. And then we let go. And we're dead. Isn't it wonderful to come back to life? That's all you need, basically. But we take everything for granted. So, study the breath. If you want to know the meaning of our life, study the breath. If you want to understand the meaning of birth and death, study the breath. Each moment. Exhaling is letting go. Inhaling is coming in. These are two aspects of one thing.

[47:39]

Yeah. Life is getting more and more complex. The system is getting more and more binding. It gives you very little space to move. We didn't worry about such things 30 years ago.

[49:29]

Really, it hasn't gotten into the problem somehow. But now it's a big problem. I think you have to know what, where your integrity is. And go with your integrity, even though you may risk something. To go with what you feel is right for your own personal integrity. That's what I would do. Rather than feel safe. I'm not saying that's what you should do. But that's what I would do. Because I wouldn't want to compromise my personal integrity. over safety, over security.

[50:35]

People can be intimidated. The whole nation can be intimidated over security because of their personal security. That's how we become enslaved, is because there's a system that We will keep you in this position because we know that you are worried about your security. It depends on what you're willing to give up for your integrity.

[51:48]

perfection.

[52:10]

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