Good morning. Good morning. Good morning. We have our kids, Zendo, first before the adult talk. So, hi kids. I'm going to talk to you guys. So, maybe you can just say what your names are. My name is Luis. Luis. My name is Enrique. Bennett. Bennett. Benny. Benny. Phoebe. Phoebe. Phoebe. Hi. So, today I'm going to talk to you about depends on. Do you know what that is? Depends on. It all depends on you. It all depends on me.

[01:01]

You ever heard that before? Yes. For instance, see my glasses up on my face? They depend on my ears and my nose. They are my face. So, you see my head? What does it depend on? Dependent. Dependent. On your body? Your body? Body. Body. Oh, my body. Yes, what part of my body? Um, your, um, um, um, your neck. That's right, it depends on my neck. So, let's start from the top. What does my neck depend on? Your body. Well, what part? On your chest.

[02:03]

My backbone. It depends on my backbone. My backbone, everything depends on my backbone. What does my ribs depend on? On your waist. My backbone. What does my backbone depend on? Your waist. Yes. Your waist. My waist. My hips. Right? So let's start from the other end. My toes. Your toes. What do my toes depend on? You brought your brain to love me? My ankle. It depends on my ankle, right? My toe bone is tied to my ankle bone. And my ankle bone depends on my calf bone. And my calf depends on my thigh.

[03:09]

And so the tops and the bottom meet in the middle. They meet in the middle. That's called my waist. So, all these parts depend on each other. Otherwise, we wouldn't be able to move or do anything. Right? So, what are you sitting on? A cushion? Yeah. Yeah, you're sitting on a round black cushion, right? I'm sitting on a black cushion. And so, what is your cushion sitting on? What is that cushion sitting on? This? No. It's sitting on that other cushion. There's two cushions there.

[04:10]

One is round and one is square. Indeed. Actually, that's resting in your... So, what is your square cushion sitting on? Do you want me to tell you? It's sitting on the floor. Right? sitting on? The floor is sitting on the foundation. And what is that foundation sitting on? Sitting on the ground. And what is the ground sitting on? It's the world.

[05:21]

It's sitting on the world. You are sitting on the world. You're covering the whole world. Oh my goodness. You're dangerous there. That's okay. She finds it funny. That's good. You know what? Your mommy's sitting back there and you're depending on your mommy a lot. You're all depending on your mommy. So my lesson today Everything depends on everything else. Yeah, what do the mommies depend on?

[06:27]

Yeah, what do the mommies depend on? The mommies are depending on you to be good boys and girls. our world? You know what the shape of our world is? You must know that. Is it square? Is it square? What shape is it? Circle. Circle. That's right. Circle. It's round. So we're sitting on the circle.

[07:28]

Do you know that if you're sitting on the circle, somebody's on top and somebody's on the bottom. Right? How come the people on the bottom don't fall off? Why? Because of gravity. Because of gravity. It's okay. So the world is sitting out in space. You know that? The world is in the sky, in space. How come it doesn't fall down? Because it orbits around the sun. Because it whirls around the sun. How come it doesn't get burned off? Because it's far away from the sun. It's far enough away from the sun that it just doesn't burn up until it gets really hot. So, the world depends on what?

[08:32]

The world depends on parents? What? Depends on the sun? Yes. The sun is right there. It goes up like this. And it has a big shadow. Yeah. And it looks like a candle. Then it's going down. Yes. Then it will be dark. Then you will go up. Uh-huh. That's what happens with the sun. Oh. Well, that's very nice. Can you turn around and tell people that? Turn around and say that to people. You can stand up and just tell people what you just told me. Okay. Over here. So the sun is going down. Then the darkness will be Well, I think that's pretty good for today. Thank you all, kids, for your kind attention and your marvelous understanding. Yeah.

[10:03]

Try the mic on the mic. Well, the mic is on. Yes. Oh yeah. Yeah. Maybe that's going on. But this is not working. It's not now. It was for a moment. It's like a loose connection. Yeah. That's what it seems like. Check the battery. Let's change it. Anyway, I'll start talking loud. Well, as most of you know, or many of you know, I and a number of people from Berkeley are going to attend the practice period of Tassajara this fall, the three month practice period.

[11:40]

Ever since the 80s, I have been doing practice, leading practice periods, Tassajara, which is our monastery, Big Sur, near Big Sur, Carmel Valley, between Carmel Valley and Big Sur, and about 14 miles into the mountains. The last practice period I did was 19, It was 2005 and I haven't done one since then. I told the abbots at Zen Center that I would be willing to share a practice period with one of the abbots. The abbots do lead the practice periods at Zen Center. as a former abbot.

[12:48]

Sometimes former abbots also lead practice periods. So I didn't want to be away too long. So I said I'd be happy to share a practice period if one of the abbots, you know, had to do other things while they were leading the practice period. So the present abbot, Steve Spooky, I said, well, I'd like you to share the practice period with me. And so I saw that as a nice opportunity, and I said, I'll be happy to do that. As it turns out, he's not really going anywhere, but he would like to have me share the practice period with him. So I'm going to do that. I'll do half the practice period, which is about six weeks, because the practice period is three months. And it's not usual for people to come and go in the practice period because it's a monastic practice.

[13:53]

So I will be coming back and forth a bit. Maybe half the time I'll be here. It so happens that Rinzowin, our parent temple, Suzuki Roshi's temple in Japan is having its 500th anniversary at the end of October. So I've been designated to attend, and Blinds Hartman and myself. And so we'll be gone for about a week doing that. So that will extend to October a bit. But I wanted to talk about What is monastic practice and why? I know many of you have been to Tathagatagarbha already and have that experience. I was looking at a, I think it was a Buddhadharma magazine that came out recently and the theme was, why monastic practice?

[15:13]

What's the purpose of monastic practice? And do we need monastic practice in America? Or will there be a monastic practice in America? And so it was a kind of question and answer by a number of people. I haven't read the whole article, but I just want to talk about my view about what the purpose of monastic practice is. You know, in America, when the teachers came to America, most of the teachers that came to America from Japan, especially Japan, were, although they were priests, they were also married and had families. And monastic practice is usually, in most societies, a celibate practice for monks.

[16:19]

But in the Meiji period, in Japan, the monks were allowed to marry and were actually encouraged to leave the monasteries and preside at local temples. So, over time, the monastic practice was kind of weakened, and the temple practices, Zazen, monastic style, was watered down a lot. So when our teachers came to America, they wanted to present us with something, a vital practice. I'll speak about Suzuki Roshi, my teacher, when he came to America. Actually, he didn't have anything in mind. He said, when I came to America, I didn't look at a map of San Francisco.

[17:29]

read books about San Francisco. I just wanted to experience San Francisco through my own eyes without any preparation, so that I would have a clear view without preconceptions. He was invited to come to Sokoji Temple by the Japanese congregation. That was his how he actually arrived here. And then people started sitting with him when they learned that there was a Japanese Zen priest at Sokoji. They were calling him up on the telephone because they had seen the advertisement, not advertisement, telephone number in the telephone book. And little by little, people started practicing with him. And that was around 1960.

[18:43]

He came in 59. And then I came in 1964 to Sakoji to practice. And around 1965, there was maybe 20, 30 people who were members. And some of the students were starting to think, well, wouldn't it be great to have a monastery? teacher and they were kind of encouraging Suzuki Roshi and he took up the encouragement and they actually started looking for a place to start a monastery. This would be the first Buddhist monastery in America. So we looked at various places, various And of course, Richard Baker, who was really good at doing this, found Tassajara, this place, 14 miles into the mountains, in a town of wilderness.

[19:58]

It was already a resort of sorts, an old resort, actually, with hot springs and little buildings, little wooden shacks. and some stone rooms. So, after some negotiations and raising some money, which Richard Baker was really good at, we actually bought this place, Tosa Horace Hot Springs. It was an old resort. We have pictures of the stagecoach coming from Salinas, carrying guests over this road, dirt road. And with the stagecoach, they would tie a big log on the back so that it would slow down the stagecoach as it was going downhill.

[21:09]

And there were people, actually, I remember back in the 60s when we first opened Tons of Heart, there were people who had come in the stagecoach at that time, actually. And of course the whole thing was built by Chinese laborers. The top is called Choose Ridge, you know. The Chinese laborers were so much really good constructionists. So anyway, this was the first monastery, and nobody had ever done that practice before, you know. It's a bunch of old, a bunch of young, enthusiastic people from various walks of life. And I remember, you know, people would wander in, they'd hear about this thing, and many of them would stay. So, Suzuki Roshi had been, of course, his education, his monastic education was at Eiheiji Monastery in Japan, but he was principally a temple priest.

[22:34]

So he had both of these sides. He had both the monastic side and the temple side. And so his experience really was with lay people and offering, you know, practice to lay people. And when he came to America, everybody was a lay person. He ordained a few people to begin with, but mostly it was a lay practice. The people who were starting the monastery were lay people, mostly. And by the time he died in 1971, he had ordained 15 people, something like 15 people. And then when he died, Richard Baker took over as abbot, and we were creating this monastery.

[23:36]

little by little over time. And then Tatsugami Roshi was invited to come and set up the monastic practice in the way that it's established now. So, you know, in America we have a kind of combination of priest practice, lay practice, temple practice, and monastic practice. Very inclusive. And over a short period of time. We started in 1967, the same year that we opened the Berkley Zendel. Forty-five years, something like that. Forty-seven. I don't know. My math isn't so good. So it's been a pretty long time, but a lot has happened in that time. So, when I started the Berkeley Zendo, with the blessings of Suzuki Roshi, I modeled the Berkeley Zendo after the monastic practice.

[24:53]

So, our practice here is a kind of quasi-monastic practice. Like, we have a morning and evening schedule of zazen, and we have and the practice just goes on year after year, day after day, week after week, kind of relentlessly. At Tassajara, there are like two three-month practice periods, and then the summer is guest season, which is a different kind of practice period. It's a practice period for the students to take care of people. not as much zazen and more work. So work is part of practice. So when I set up our practice here, with the help of many people, of course, it was to have a full practice, which means not just zazen, but steady work.

[26:03]

and cooking, so that when we have sashimi, it's not just sitting zazen. Sitting zazen, of course, is the center. But there's also, we do our own cooking, which is practice. We do our own work, which is practice. So it's a kind of full round practice, which takes in all of our activities. I think many Other kinds of monastic life that I've seen around is simply based on sitting, and then you have people cooking for you from the outside, and you don't do any work. Well, that's good, but I can't say it's good or bad, but it's not really a full practice full-life practice. So monastic practice is a full-life practice.

[27:08]

In a Zen monastery, monastic practice is a full-life practice. In other words, cooking is practice, work is practice, zazen is practice, study is practice, and there's nothing that's left out. We don't hire people to do our stuff for us. So The purpose, I feel the purpose of a monastic practice is to generate what practice is. It's like the center of, we always think of Takahata as the center of all of our practices, of the practice of everybody who practices this style. Zazen is the center. And then we have the city center, and Green Gulch, are spiritually associated.

[28:10]

So, in our monastic practice, it is always going on in a certain way, and it's a full time, full life practice, and it gives you the opportunity to devote yourself totally to one thing for a period of time, without having to deal with what we would call distractions, and devote yourself totally to one practice for a period of time. Now, in many monastic practices, one enters the monastery for life. But in our practice, we enter the monastery for a period of time and then go back into the world.

[29:15]

So I've always envisioned monastic practice as the way to really experience full-time doing something. and then to leave and enter the world, and to express yourself, express your practice in the world, and from time to time to go back and renew your monastic practice, and then come back and express your practice in the world. To me, that's kind of full practice, so that you go back and forth. So, in many ways, I kind of like the way of, when I say this is a quasi-monastic practice, it's like you're not going anywhere, but you go home and you come back and sit dazen and practice together as a sangha. And then you go home daily instead of periodically.

[30:20]

So a daily practice. So this is a kind of temple the way we do things in the monastery, except that your monastery includes your work, driving down the street, associating with people you never saw before, taking care of all of the aspects of life that we experience outside of the monastery. To me, the monastery is like the essential practice. All the essential practices are there. Because monastery is like a small microcosm of the world. People think, well, all the people in the monastery must be really nice. I always find it funny when people come and they look at

[31:26]

people who practice here, and they say, gee, they don't look happy to me. So we take all the unhappy people and make them happy. So the monastic practice, day in and day out, you're working with people, the same people, the same people, day in and day out, and you become very familiar with everybody. Whoever you are, you can't hide. There's no way to hide. Even if you think you're hiding, the more you hide, the more you reveal yourself. So, you have to be open. And when you're practicing, everybody has rough edges. And the more you mix with each other, the more, the longer you do that, you come up against everyone's stuff. But little by little you wear off the rough edges.

[32:29]

So it's like one kind of description is you load the cement mixer with ordinary rocks and then the cement mixer grinds away on the rocks all day, all night. Ordinary, nothing special, rocks alternated with wonderful polished jewels. So that's monastic practice in its ideal way. Not everybody comes out polished. That's the ideal. By practicing together with the same people over and over, day in and day out, with no place to go, no place to hide, no place to escape to, nothing to hang on to, your ego finds its rightful place, finds its balance in your life.

[33:52]

You know, we talk about not having ego, But of course that's not possible. Not having ego is a kind of way of speaking. But ego has a purpose. Otherwise we wouldn't have it. That's the purpose. But usually it takes over. So when we talk about not having ego, we mean don't let ego lead you or take over. That's the problem. Ego is very precious. Precious and necessary. But the problem is it doesn't know what to do. So it needs a leader. It needs to be educated. You know, listening to you talk about monastic practice, I'm wondering how, if this is sort of like a micro monastic practice, how do we adjust here, which is in the middle of a city, with that monastic practice when, for example, and I'll give you an example, this morning in the first five or ten minutes of

[35:36]

of our morning service, there were four different conversations in the zendo. Well, one of them was on the zendo porch, but they weren't just one word exchanges, they were brief conversations. On one hand, our society is a very chatty society, and with this whole social stuff, communication is a big thing. On the other hand, part of my understanding of monastic practice, or this practice that's expanding ourselves so much. So how do we reconcile with that our society does leak into everything, but containing what we do here and not being rigid and yet, you know, allowing the change. We do the best we can. I'll explain to you this morning. I came a little late this morning and I had two people to see in Dokusan. And when I walked into the Zendo, the first person was not there.

[36:40]

But the second person was there. And then there was a third person, who I didn't expect. So there was a lot of confusion. And so I was trying to straighten it out. It wasn't idle chatter. Maybe it was. Yeah, it was kind of idle chatter. But I was trying to straighten it out. So if you could have been doing that, I might have noted that. But I wouldn't have let it affect me. I would have thought, well, you know, this is happening now. How am I going to deal with myself? You know, I remember when we opened Page Street, Zendo on Page Street in San Francisco, the traffic was going up and down the street all the time. And at that time, there were a lot of prostitutes on the street, and drunks on the street, on the street. It was like the neighborhood was not like it is now.

[37:42]

And there was a lot of yelling and shouting and chaos going on. And we were sitting outside the window. So this is how you practice. The best place to practice is in that kind of environment. That's the very best place to practice. It's nice to go to the mountains, you know, where the birds are chirping and the blue jays are taking your sandwich out of your hand. You know, that's my word, right? Out of your mouth. So the best place to practice isn't it, when all this stuff is going on, chaos is going on around you, how can you keep your composure, not lose your composure? That's what practice is about, not losing your composure.

[38:47]

But what about the whole thing about having an intention and maintaining it in here, as opposed to, you know, I want to tell someone here, so I'm going to do that. That's, I think, more of what I'm talking about. So does that mean I don't really need to make a huge effort? No. If I want to say something to someone, I can? No, it means that you should take care of your practice and not criticize others. So Bodhisattva way is to pay attention to your own hard practice and to be compassionate to others. So, yes, we all have some complaints, you know, but if you let the complaints move you, turn you around, then you got a problem. You're allowing your ego to turn you. You may not think that's your ego, but it is.

[39:50]

So, yes, you know, all this stuff is going on that you don't like, but you're allowing it to affect you. If I allowed everything to... I see, not only do I see what you see, I see more than you see. And feel more than you feel. And feel more, you know, disappointments, and if I end here, I'm carrying it out. I can't allow myself to get inundated by that. That's just, you know, Picking up something, okay, I realize this is going on, and then it's gone. If I hang on to it, then that's the source of suffering. This is called affliction. We create our own afflictions by hanging on to the stuff that we don't like and letting it worry us.

[40:57]

This is a response to the conversation between you and Ninjas Now. I was remembering one of the old Chinese stories that I remembered from early days at Zen Center, where these two monks are walking along and they're looking for a place to practice. There's a pretty nice monastery there. There's a little river, like Tassara Creek. And then they see a couple of radishes floating downstream. And one of them says to the other, this is not a good place to practice. Because they could see from that that the practice wasn't being maintained with integrity. So I just wanted to respond to Dean by hearing, you know, well not just if you feel disturbed by things that it's just a problem with your ego, or you should just take care of your own practice, but I'm also hearing from her a request or a feeling that she wants us

[42:04]

to take care of our practices well, or else she might be discouraged and leave. I do understand that. Yes, I understand perfectly well. And I love Dean, and I appreciate her to the sky. But my advice is, please set a good example. I will follow your example. Thank you very much for your talk. Would you repeat the sentence you said a few minutes ago about we hang on to affliction by... You said we hang on to affliction by... Yeah, we hang on to our afflictions instead of letting them go. In other words, by, you know,

[43:05]

somebody does something and it bothers us. And so we hold on to that. And that, by holding on to it, it allows... we become afflicted. And then we hang on to our afflictions instead of letting it go. So, you know, renunciation is to acknowledge something and let it go. moment by moment. If I hung on to everything that I see as that bothers me, I'd just be totally afflicted. But I always managed to smile. Sometimes I look dour. I'm not. I'm allowing myself to flow. in a way that's... I don't like things that seem to hinder me.

[44:11]

But I see what's going on. I see all that. But that's life. You know, it's important for us to suffer. If you can't suffer, you can't... I know. If you can't suffer, you can't get enlightened. Now, would you say that being an Abbot is more like monastic practice or is it more like practice in the world? Or either and why? I can only talk about here. This Abbot. Yes, please. My practice encompasses... it's not stuck in any one place. It's not... I'm not stuck in any... If I go to the monastery, I'm just there and I don't even think about Berkeley. When I'm here, I just think about being here. I don't even think about Tassajara. I'm just where I am, doing what I'm doing. So I'm comfortable.

[45:13]

When I go to Tassajara, I just fall into place. It's wonderful. It's like going home. When I come here, I just fall into place. Some people have trouble going back and forth. They say, oh my god, I don't know what to do now. Just wherever you are, that's where you establish your practice. As a lawyer, that's where you are and that's where you establish your practice. So, when you leave the zendo, the monastery or the temple, you extend the temple to wherever you are. You extend the zendo to wherever you are. And so, it doesn't look like zendo, but you have to create the zendo wherever you are. Not literally. Essentially. Would you say you feel like you're in the world when you're here? You're always in the world. It's just that this is this world, and that's that world.

[46:15]

And every day it's a different world. Every moment it's a different world. We all step outside, you know, outside the door. And then, if we're really practicing, you extend the practice to wherever you are. So, George, you said that when you go to Tassajara, it's like going home. Where were you before? At home. When I say at home, it means that I just fall into it so easily. That's what I mean by home. It's a place that I fall into very easily. And then when I come back to Berkeley, I think, oh, this is just feeling at home. And when I'm on the road, it feels just like home. You left that part out about Berkeley, I thought it was curious.

[47:19]

Oh, no, I didn't. Yeah, I thought I mentioned it, but maybe I didn't. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I'm at home here. I was just saying, I think I relate to you a little differently when you're wearing civilian clothes. That's true. Instead of my army clothes. And yet, as I've gotten to know you, I assume you're always wearing civilian clothes. Yes, that's true. Because it's all the same. To me, it's all the same. I remember when I was going I had a sweater that I wore every day for years. I always got my clothes at the Goodwill. I never imagined walking into a clothing store and buying something. Anyway, he took out the collar and said, this is your robe.

[48:24]

Chino-sensei, Chino Roshi, Koban, he used to say, even though when someone is practicing, they wear the invisible robe, whether or not they're ordained. Do you know anything about the Japanese-American community that brought Sojin over? I mean, Suzuki Roshi over here. Zazen was not their practice. And it never has been for Japanese congregations in America. It's a social club. It's a social event based on Buddhism. Back in the Meiji period, everybody had, even before I think of order in the country.

[49:41]

And so all those people weren't practitioners, they were congregants. So even though there are thousands of Soto temples in Japan, most of the people are congregants. And they have their parties and their social events and some teaching as well. by any means. Even the Soto Zen representatives would come over to Sokoji and ball Suzuki Roshi out and say, what are you doing? I mean, when he was teaching. We were doing Zazen with people. This is nothing like the practice in Japan. Not that the practice in Japan is bad. It's just not like this. Each of the temples have zendos, but they're used as storerooms.

[50:49]

So was that hard for the Japanese-American community when there were all these people who were coming in? Yeah, it was a problem. They were very generous. They had the Sokochi Temple, which was an old synagogue. Probably the first one in San Francisco, maybe. And they bought it after the war. They allowed the Americans to be upstairs and have that Zendo. Originally Suzuki was sitting in the pews and people would sit there with him in the pews. Then they gave us the Zendo upstairs, which is a beautiful room. We loved it. But, you know, it was two separate things. Two separate things. The only time we ever got together was sometimes during a festival or something. And they would invite us to have lunch with them, you know, chicken dinner. I remember we were sweeping and the old ladies would say, over here.

[51:58]

OK. One more. Yes. I was just thinking about the social club thing. And contrarian that I am, wouldn't you agree that whenever there is a sangha that's communing with each other, there's true practice? There is a practice of communion. That's good. That's nice. But what happens is people like to show off their jewels. It becomes a kind of competitive thing. But I'm not criticizing that at all. I think it's what it is. And who am I to criticize that?

[53:02]

So I don't. Some people do. I mean, we have a tendency to say, gee, our practice is the real practice. You know, blah, blah, blah. But I think I withhold judgment on that. Although I have done that myself, I withhold judgment because people are doing what they need to do. And I can't say whether it's good or bad or whether our practice is better. I remember Suzuki Roshi saying to people, you know, someone who was had a family and they were neglecting their family by coming to Zazen, you know, and saying, the real, you know, you're sleeping while I'm, you know, going to Zazen, you know. And Zaziger, she used to say, you think that you're doing something really wonderful by sitting Zazen while your wife is sleeping in bed, but actually she's doing Zazen in bed.

[54:07]

while you're wasting your time here." Actually, that was my twist. But he did say, you know, she's sleeping, she's doing sounds in bed while you're here doing what you're doing. Don't criticize. Don't think you're doing something special and wonderful. So his Suzuki Ryoshi's feeling about what he communicated to everybody was, this is nothing special. You're just doing Zazen. It's nothing special.

[54:52]

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