Good morning. I'm very happy to introduce today's speaker, Ryushin Andrea Thatch, who is a Sodo Zen priest ordained by Sojin Roshi and a long-time BCC practitioner. She was Juso in 2009. She is also a physician at the Over 60 Health Clinic as part of Lifelong Medical Care. I also know her to be a great lover of the earth and of animals, and a person with an extremely mischievous, edgy, and very funny sense of humor. We'll see what manifests. Thank you, Ryushin. Thank you, Christy. Good morning. It's a perfectly beautiful morning to be sitting here together practicing the Dharma. This is the first week of our fall practice period. We have a small fall practice period in which this year we're studying the Sodo Zen chants that are typically done in American temples using a commentary

[01:07]

by Shohako Okamura in a book called Living by Vow. Along the theme of exploring one of these, I'm going to be talking today about refuge and taking refuge. The title of this talk is something like Shelterless Shelter. As I've been preparing for this talk in just over the last 10 days or so, I have found that I've been very much in the presence and the teaching of Myogen Steve Stuckey, who is one of the abbots at San Francisco Zen Center. As some of you know, he was diagnosed recently, just a couple of weeks ago, with advanced cancer. Steve is a big-boned, big guy who grew up in Kansas. He's a farmer who followed the wheat harvest up through the Midwest every year when he was a kid. He was

[02:11]

the person who ran the horse plow at Green Gulch Farm when they first opened. Some of us who did the practice period with him a couple of years ago have memories of him riding his bicycle at full speed up the steep, unpaved road out of Tassajara. Steve's larger than life in a certain way, and I would say in the full July harvest of his Dharma wisdom. So, the news has been sad for many of us. Steve gave a talk about 10 days ago in which he talked about gratitude, and I found that what he had to say had a lot of resonance with what I was working with as I was thinking about this talk. Steve says that he wakes up every morning and he gives gratitude. He doesn't know what for, because he doesn't know what the day is going to bring, but he just expresses his gratitude. He said, I guess

[03:20]

today it's cancer that I'm grateful for. The foundation of our teaching is that everything touches our life, is our life, and nothing can be excluded. Steve spoke about health is wholeness, and indeed wholeness means that we keep everything. When we take refuge, we accept everything as Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, even the ending of life. So, if you hear nothing else in this talk, I think you've heard the main message in Steve's teaching there. When Laurie and I were talking about him a little bit, she said, you know, it's such a crapshoot. You don't know what's going to happen. It doesn't depend on whether you did something good or bad. Things just happen in life. You don't know. And I think we have to take refuge as a result of that, not because bad things can happen and we need some kind of protection,

[04:26]

but because, as Laurie said, you better know where you stand. You better know where you stand. So, that's my introduction. This, you know, we're a week into the practice period, and it's been really wonderful to hear different ones of the senior students talk about their relationship with the forms or chanting or the robe chant in particular and to have conversations because we all understand that we have different relationship to the forms as we practice them and that they've matured over time, that they've changed and how we started or some resistance or relationship that we had has metamorphosized. And I chose to speak about refuge because it's actually been something that's been quite difficult for me. It's a little embarrassing to say as a priest that I haven't really felt comfortable with the notion of taking refuge

[05:27]

until fairly recently. So, that's why I wanted to speak about it. The refuges are very simple. We say, I take refuge in Buddha. I take refuge in Sangha. Excuse me, I take refuge in Dharma. And I take refuge in Sangha. And we take the refuges whenever we do a ceremony of any kind. We did it today before the meal chant. We do it in the Bodhisattva ceremony every month. We do it with our precepts when we receive precepts either as a lay practitioner or as a priest. We also do it at the end of Sashin. The first time I ever heard the refuges, I had just started Vipassana practice. And in Vipassana practice, you sit very silently for the entire day. There's not a sound. Maybe there's a Dharma talk, but there's really no other noise and the practice is very internal.

[06:27]

So there's not a lot of relationship that's manifesting. So your mind is fairly quiet. We all stand up at the end and we chant the beautiful Pali chants. And the feeling of that first night ever when I stood up and heard those chants, said those chants for the first time is still with me. Blanche Hartman says that the foundation of our life as practitioners in Buddhism is our

[07:30]

faith, vow and practice. Practice is kind of obvious. It's the fuel, the sun, the water, the soil that grows our faith. It's a necessary condition that makes the accident of enlightenment more possible. Vow is something I think is a little easier for us to relate to. Vow usually perhaps is an intention, how we start or come to practice, an aspiration as it matures into something that we hope or wish for in practice. And eventually I think a kind of attitude, a way in which we enter our life and it fuels the activity of our life. Vow is choosing to enact positive karma. The faith side is maybe a little bit more difficult to understand that this is a part of practice. But I understand faith to be the heart of taking refuge. And I'll come back to that at the end of the talk. I also see refuge as kind of the flip side

[08:37]

of vow. Since we're studying the book Living by Vow, it just seemed obvious to focus there a second. I think of vow, you know, vow is the great activity that we see in our daily life. It's the bodhisattva activity that we want to manifest. But I see refuge as kind of the man behind the curtain and the wizard of all else. It's what really fuels or allows us to manifest our vow. And I'm coming to find that the strength of vow, that is the ability to fulfill these decidedly impossible vows is related to how I take refuge. And by that I mean to the sincerity of my surrender of my egoistic self. So the greater to the greater the extent that I can actually release into accepting taking refuge in Buddha, Dharma

[09:37]

and Sangha, the more I can come forward in selfish selfless activity to be of help. I'll touch on that again a little bit in a minute. Indeed, the Dogen Zenji said that the essence of the true transmission of Buddha Dharma is in taking refuge in the triple treasure. It's the foundation of the precepts and how we live our life, actually how our life naturally manifests when we're in harmony with it. So that means that everything we do here in the Zen Do, all the forms that we're studying, how we chant, bow, eat together, sit sa Zen, how we're listening to lecture right now, everything is taking refuge. It also means that everything we do in everyday life is taking refuge. Being sick, as I was recently returning home, returning back to work from a vacation and finding a condolence card to

[10:40]

sign with the name of a patient I was very close to, surprise, that's taking refuge. So is doing the laundry. We think of refuge as a place to run to. But refuge is not running to or away from anything. It's not looking for a place to hide as from bad weather or wild beasts. When we have the wake-up call, by that I mean we all are here because we're looking to make our lives better in some way. We're suffering or we're uncomfortable or we know that what we were chasing after with is not it. Or maybe we look around us and we say, you know, the way society normally works, it's not where I find my meaning. And when we start to pursue that, we recognize that there is no place to hide. There's only

[11:44]

more to be revealed, more light to shine, even if that reveals our dark sides. The word we translate as refuge is taken from the Japanese term, Namu Kiei, or Namo in Sanskrit. Namo means full devotion or throwing oneself away in body and mind. Kiei consists of two characters. Kiei means to unreservedly throw oneself into, no holding back, no way out, no safety net, no harness, no rope. That's the way a parent rescues a child who's in danger. The parent doesn't think about himself or herself. The parent doesn't hesitate for a second, just throws herself in. The second character, Yei, literally means to rely upon

[12:45]

in the way that a child leaps into a parent's arms, trusting unequivocally. So when you take refuge, when we take refuge, we throw ourselves into Buddha's arms. Or as Blanche says, you throw yourself into the house of Buddha. Suzuki's Roshi says that taking refuge is the full devotion or adoration, and it's with that spirit that we take refuge. It's like the out-breath in Zazen. When you sit and you breathe all the way out, letting go of everything, you give your full devotion to that experience. That's how you take refuge. Taking refuge is grounded in accepting karma. Now we're always creating, karma is volitional action and our actions are always creating effect. And oftentimes that effect is not

[13:50]

so positive. Sometimes it is, but oftentimes it has something sticky to it, something that has an effect that maybe we didn't intend or maybe we did, and certainly that we don't necessarily know about, meaning we don't always know the impact of our actions. And so we have to take refuge. We have to take refuge because we're always falling short. And whenever we do the ceremonies, the precept ceremonies or the Bodhisattva ceremonies, the very first thing we do after we avow our karma is we take refuge in Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. So what are Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha? Not some statue up on the altar or a stack of books that are on your shelf, or even just the people here in this room. We take refuge

[14:52]

first in the example of Buddha, of Shakyamuni Buddha, but of anyone who behaves in a way that is inspired and is transformative. The greatness of Buddha is beyond good and bad and beyond the confines of our ordinary experience of our lives, beyond the way that we usually imagine our lives. That's us. We're Buddha. We take refuge in our own inherent capacity to respond in that way, in a way that's not self-centered, in a way that meets what's happening. Each of us has that capacity. Each of us behaves that way when we're out of the way. So we take refuge in our own inherent Buddha nature. That means, by the way, that we take refuge in all of us, all of it, meaning even those parts of us which we wish would

[15:56]

go away. There's nothing in our practice that says that we will become something that we're not already. So taking refuge really means accepting all of yourself and understanding that all of that is a part of Buddha activity. Everyone will be Buddha. That's the teaching of the Lotus Sutra. Everyone in this room, even Devadatta, even the person who betrayed the Buddha, Buddha predicted would become a Buddha. So we can be no exception to that. Even arousing the thought of enlightenment, the thought of coming here and wanting to wake up, that's a manifestation of our Buddha nature. But let me say it again. It's not about running away from yourself, but turning toward and accepting all of yourself. It means to live your life as it's been given to you. Taking refuge in Dharma. That means taking

[17:03]

refuge in the teachings. Of course, they make sense to our lives. They're good medicine. We read, we come and listen to talks. We read different commentaries. We read the sutras and we say, this is good medicine. This helps me. I understand my life and how to proceed a little more clearly. We also take, beyond that, we take refuge in the truth of the teachings. And by that I mean how we actually see them and experience them in our everyday lives. How we notice them. We take refuge in the Four Noble Truths. We take refuge in the reality that suffering is created by the activities of our mind of greed, hate and delusion and that there's a way out of it. That's what we take refuge in. We take refuge in the codependent arising of activity. We recognize that there is cause and effect. And that we can have

[18:09]

an impact, that we can have effect on how the world manifests our own and those of people around us. And we do it in a way that promotes our humility, our knowing of our proper place. A few years ago I went to one of my teachers. I went to him and I said, you know, I've been a vegetarian since the time I was 19 and now my health isn't so good and I'm feeling like it would be helpful to have a little bit more, a little animal protein. And he looked at me and said, that's right, that's what the meal chant says, may my virtue and practice deserve it. That was his answer to me. He gave it back to me. He said, look at what you're doing and why you're doing it. Understand your place in the cycle of cause and effect of life and death and examine that and take care of yourself. May my virtue and practice

[19:14]

deserve it. I took refuge in that teaching. We take refuge in the Sangha. We're all here today. We're really happy to see each other and be with each other and have tea and cookies in a few minutes and know that there's a group of people around who care about similar things that we do. We help each other. Sometimes we help each other materially. Sometimes we help by providing a ride or food when someone's sick. We help each other in actions and sometimes we help each other in ways that may not seem quite like they're helpful. Some years ago I was in conflict with someone else. I think we were both considered problems here at that point in time. And at some point after a while, this person came up to me and said, you know, came up to me and said, thank you very much for your help. And she sincerely meant it.

[20:21]

And I think her practice was very sincere practice. So she looked at what came up between us and she saw herself in it. And she used that in order to find a different way. We help each other that way. That's one of the aspects of community life that's so important that we're all committed to living according to Buddha's teachings. And when things come up, we don't just turn to and blame the other person or think the problems outside. We look at what has arisen between us and examine it and do our own practice. See what it is about our own behavior that we can learn from and change. And because we're all committed to a certain stability and presence and how we approach our lives, we help each other. We don't entangle more deeply, at least eventually we untangle and we help each other.

[21:27]

Suzuki Roshi said it's like, he called it potato practice. You know how you clean potatoes, you put them all in a sack and you shake them and they rub off against each other and the dirt drops off. That's what we do here together. So when we take refuge, we're making a statement that we're willing to take a risk to be seen, to set aside our secrets and to become visible. I think part of the Sangha taking refuge, at least it has been for me, is taking refuge in my teacher, not as a father or a savior or an unblemished being, but as someone who's willing to continue to practice with whatever is given to him or her, no matter what, with humility and integrity. So in the example of your teacher, any good teacher continues

[22:34]

to learn from their students and the students from him or her. We also take refuge in everyone as our Sangha. Kategiri said we have to accept ourselves and everyone. To be a disciple of a son or daughter of Buddha means that we are people who accept the lives of all sentient beings as the contents of our own life. So that's really very deep, that what passes in everyone else's life is also a part of my life. And so their distress, their behavior, their point of view or attitude, their behavior, their even if they're obstructing laws in Congress, that's a part of my life somehow too, and I have to accept that. That means our families, our communities, our nation and everyone in

[23:38]

our world is part of our Sangha. When we take our vows, we vow with all of them. That means we can only wake up with all of them. We vow and take refuge with everyone. So what does taking refuge really mean in our life? I think it's an expression of faith. It's like Buddha on his enlightenment night, touching the earth and remembering. Taking refuge is a kind of remembering of who we are. It's coming back to know our true nature and our wholeness, knowing that we are Buddha. Taking refuge though is not found in any place, any safe place in particular. Some years ago I had been here for a relatively short time, but I had settled enough and found really some ease and comfort being with people here

[24:39]

that I felt delighted. I went to my first teacher May Lee Scott and I said, I'm so happy I've realized I can depend on practice. I've found something I can rely on. That's one way you might think of taking refuge. And she said, you can't rely on anything. Oh, so what's that? So what does that mean to take refuge? Trumpa Rippesha says, by taking refuge we become homeless refugees. The meaning of taking refuge is that you are the one who's going to do it. You commit yourself as a refugee to yourself, no longer thinking that some divine principle that exists in the holy law or holy scriptures is going to save you. It's very personal. You experience a sense of loneliness or aloneness, a sense that there is no savior

[25:44]

and no help. But at the same time, there's a sense of belonging. You belong to a tradition of loneliness where people work together. So here we are. That's what's taking refuges. And so we take refuge in a spirit of appeal. It's a spirit or attitude of asking without knowing the answer, without looking for something specific, but knowing that something you need or want is missing. Something is missing. You don't really know what that is, but you're incomplete without it. It's the triple treasure as the expression of your own life, your own best self, your own best understanding, your own best presence. I think it's something like prayer. In Christianity, people pray to God. In Shin Buddhism, they pray to Amitabha.

[26:48]

In Soto Zen, we take refuge. I think that's our form of prayer. So the meaning of taking refuge is not found in words. I think we all know that, don't we? When you're bereft and you have nowhere to turn, you just sincerely give yourself over to something. Please help. You don't know what that is, but please help because there's nothing else to do. You also take refuge out of joy or deep gratitude, whether it's at your college graduation or the birth of your child. You give gratitude to your teachers, your parents, the circumstances, everything that brought this forward. That's another way of taking refuge. It's not intellectual. It's hard to talk about. It's a connection. It's a communion. We think that this is some

[27:53]

ideal state of mind or group of people or beautiful place, but it's not. It's right here in the middle of our messy lives. How does that happen? It's actually in the simple task of bringing our attention to what we do. I was thinking the other day of Sojin at the altar. People often comment that he goes up there and he rearranges things. I think sometimes people think that he's correcting them. Oh my God, he moved seven things. I just made that many mistakes. But actually what he's doing is he's lining up his mind. He's the coming into alignment. That's what we do when we bow and chant. That's what we do when we fold the laundry and set the table and chop the onions. When we show up, we come into alignment and in that we take refuge. So bringing our awareness to the relationship of Buddha,

[29:01]

Dharma and Sangha grounds us and guides us in our everyday lives. Taking refuge is being in the here and now. It's really that simple. Taking refuge in this present moment, accepting all of it no matter what it is. Some of you know I have a very old dog. I have a very old dog. She's actually 20 this month. She's been frail for a long time. We're in a routine these days where I can count on her being up at night several times. She doesn't always know what she's up at night for. Sometimes it's to drink water again. Sometimes it's to relieve herself or sometimes she's just up. One night a couple of weeks ago we were

[30:06]

in one of those nights where it had been about every hour or so that we were up and I woke up and the kitchen was filled with stool. She had been incontinent and I just picked her up, she's 50 pounds, it wasn't easy, and carried her out to the backyard to finish down the steps, picked up the chucks, wiped up the floor, rolled them up, put them out, took a damp towel, I have a bunch of these around, wiped down the floor, threw it in the washing machine, rearranged her bed and went back to get her. I actually didn't think anything about it. Now those of you who are parents probably have this experience many times. I didn't think anything about it. It was just what was happening. I was just so connected, I'm so connected with this routine and with her. I just responded to her. And

[31:11]

I realized it was taking refuge. There was nothing else I would have done. I might have wanted to be in bed but actually there's no other place I would have wanted to be but to take care of what was happening. Dogen says we take refuge because it's the final place to return to. There's nothing else to do actually besides just that. Refuge is like the invisible umbrella in the storm. And so Steve in his talk said, this practice will sustain me until the last moment of consciousness. And I think that's right. When we're really able to accept our circumstances, causes and conditions coming together and open to the reality of our lives, this practice will sustain us. So that's what I have to say. I'd like to hear if Sojin Roshi

[32:21]

has anything he'd like to add. I don't have anything to add. You said it all. Thank you. And I'd love to hear from other people, their relationship to refuge, what came up for them in the talk, anything else that you might want to add or experiences you've had. I see lots of familiar faces and lots of new faces too. So this is wonderful. Laurie, please. You said that you had difficulty but you didn't ever mention what your difficulties were. You said that you recently kind of settled into it. I heard at the beginning you said yes. I had a resistance and I think I took Meili's words to heart, that I had a resistance in thinking that I needed to rely or depend on anything. So what is this Buddha, Dharma

[33:23]

and Sangha? I just rely on practice. But that's opened up for me to see the different nuances in my life that connects me with people in a different way. And I think that really has to do with a certain willingness to let go of the Protestant bootstrap-pulling, striving self. So you felt that you didn't want to be offered something to take refuge in, in a way. I mean, it wasn't like, oh, thank goodness there's somebody to take refuge in. It's like, why would I want to do that or something? I shouldn't have to need to do that, is more that kind of idea, which I sure know I'm doing. What's it like for you to take refuge? Kate, and then Eric.

[34:30]

Thank you very much for your talk. It reminds me, when I was brand new to all of this in about 1971, and Ed Brown was sitting in on Dwight Way, and I went to talk to him, and I was also very new in recovery, so I was feeling very fragile. And I don't remember what my question was to him exactly, but I remember he said sternly, he said, there's no salvation. And I felt bummed off at, because where I was at that time, there better be some kind of salvation, because I was on my way down the tubes, you know. I have a very different understanding of that now. But at the time, I needed something to rely on. And I think for me, there is a sense of reliance on the universe in some way. I'm not really sure

[35:37]

how to put that, so let me ask you. Yeah, I think that you really kind of hit the nail on the head of some of my resistance and pull also. The teaching of the practice, the kind of hard-edged teaching of the practice is that you don't rely on anything. You find your strength within your own experience in this practice, and yet the truth is that we're completely supported by everything. And when you wake up, you see, you understand, when we let go of our, kind of the world is this close up and everything I see is me, kind of point of view, we recognize that everything is supporting our lives, and that we support everyone else's lives, that there's that flow that's there. But you have to be out of a

[36:41]

lot of that, I think. Yeah. Linda? Yes, you Linda. I didn't initially have something to say because I uncharacteristically agree with everything you said. No, I did something wrong. When I leave out. You know, you said, what is taking refuge like for you, so I thought I'd say something about that too. And also about what you just said. You just said that you can experience that everything is supporting us, and I know what you mean sometimes. But also sometimes the world, there's something really, there are things that are so horrible happening that it would be hard to experience that as everything supporting us or others. So there's a kind of gap that we work with. But I wanted to add about what my experience of taking refuge is to yours.

[37:43]

You talked about a kind of like calm and very, those moments when we understand quite a bit, understanding of refuge. Sometimes what I would do, something like that, when I'm in a really, one of my really difficult states, the states that are just so habitual and lifelong, and it's a kind of breaking the spell. It's a kind of saying, opening up the door of not knowing. I'm not sure I kind of tracked the, in the more turbulent states of mind, you come to take refuge and you find the door of not knowing, is that? Yeah, turbulent, compulsive, out of control. I don't have that calm, wise understanding of taking refuge that you talked about and that sometimes I have. Then if I just say it, even though I don't get it, it helps to break the spell of that state. You know, I understand that very clearly from

[38:47]

this point of view of something's always missing. We take refuge in part because something's always missing and when we're kind of bound up in a knot around something, there's something else there. What is it? Help, what is it? I know you're out there. I also wanted to say, this may be too facile an answer, so push back to me if it is, but when unthinkable things are happening and those things that make it hard to actually see how is this supporting my life, how am I supported by this? I recognize that those help me wake up, those help me stay connected, that whatever is going on actually is a part of my world and my circumstance somehow too. It's easy to fall asleep, especially in Northern California, white middle class, easy life that some of us have.

[39:51]

Other thoughts or reactions people had? All seemed like familiar, easy answers. Deb? I'm in some ways still fairly new to Buddhism and I will never shake the Methodist upbringing that I had, but in all of the shoulds, and I'm sorry, I may every week want to refer to scripture as a frame of reference, but I think of all of the shoulds, I think of all of the shoulds of how to find salvation, the scripture, whose number I have no idea of or chapter, that has always resonated with me since a child, is that you must work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. To me that has always pointed to a place of emptiness and also fullness of presence with whatever is.

[41:15]

To me, this is the first time I've heard a talk about refuge. I heard reference to it in the practice discussion on Thursday and was looking forward to hearing about it. Thank you very much for the talk and for bringing together those worlds in teaching. Yeah, you're welcome. I was raised Methodist too and every night from the time I could do it until sometime in my teens I said the Lord's Prayer and went to church. I don't know scripture as well as you, but I do know that those early teachings and experiences still inform me and that that's not a bad thing or a non-Buddhist thing. It's part of who you are. Finding your own truth in those words of working out your own difficulties with fear and trembling, over time it will be interesting to see how you relate to what that means. Yeah. Yeah. Please.

[42:22]

Can you talk a little bit about how daily practice can prevent falling asleep in a moment when things aren't so troubling? Uh-huh. How'd you wind up coming today? I slept in and missed the bus or the BART to San Francisco. I feel sorry for you. You wound up here instead. There's some reason you came. There's some reason that even though you missed the bus you didn't roll over and go back to bed or go off and get your latte for the day. Yeah. So there's falling asleep, but somewhere inside you are awake and a daily practice

[43:34]

allows you a chance to see that, to have that come to the surface again and again and again and again. And after a while it becomes irresistible. You think you want to fall asleep or go off or do something else and you really have no choice but to come here even though you missed the bus. I don't know if that meets you or not. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, Sue. Angie, this was such an informative talk and I kept finding myself thinking, oh, that's really a good point. I want to think about that. But she's still talking. So I'm hoping that you will provide us a transcript of it.

[44:35]

Oh, thank you. Thank you. It's a problem I have, jamming too much into these little talks. Thank you. Yes, please, Fulani. Well, I have something to say. I think you took refuge years ago. I had cancer and I was going to highland. This was years and years ago. And they were just not really hearing me and I would be there for three, four, five months. And finally, you found out about it and somehow that you told, you said something, bam, everything happened. And I remember for years, I thought you were some kind of high priestess and I thought you had a different idea. And I was so, I really learned gratitude and humility from that. It just completely changed my life. And I just want to tell you that I thought you were a nurse. I didn't know. Years later, I said, yeah, nurse. And then you look at me and say, I'm not a nurse, but you never told me what you were. I'm looking at a book, I need a doctor. And I'm looking

[45:40]

and I'm like, what? Anyway, I'm just going to have to say that. That's so sweet of you. You know, as you started to talk, I thought, well, there's me being pointy headed and terrier-like with things again. And, you know, I probably created some waves and clearing the way for you. So you never know when your bad behavior can have some small impact. Well, time for Sangha, taking refuge in Sangha and tea and cookies. Thank you very much.

[46:24]

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