Good evening, and welcome, everyone. Somebody asked me a really good question, which is how to listen to a Dharma talk. So this is something we create together, and Dogen, the founder of Soto Zen in Japan, for example, says that Buddhas sit and listen to Dharma talks, equally with sitting up here and speaking them. So you're welcome to sit formally if you'd like, like this, and you're welcome to sit facing just forward if you'd like, but you're also welcome to angle yourself facing towards me or towards the speaker if you'd like. You're also welcome to put your legs up if you need to or sit informally, but still there's the spirit of sitting upright and actually contributing to the Dharma, the teaching of

[01:00]

reality through your listening. So thank you for your help in this Dharma talk. So it happens that tomorrow in my class in Zen at Loyola University, I'm going to be talking about Hongzhe, the 12th century Chinese Soto master who was very important influence on Dogen who brought Soto from China to Japan, and his practice instructions are quite delicious. They're very poetic and full of nature imagery, and yet he's speaking from this very deep place of samadhi, of settledness and illumination, and I translated them in this book, Cultivating Empty Field, more than two decades ago. I usually get them out for longer sittings sometimes, but I just thought, okay, I'll

[02:04]

take a couple of them tonight and see where we go with it. I do want to have some discussion. So I picked a couple that I sort of felt were up for me now. So the first one is called The Mind-Ground Dharma Field and the Single Seed. So I'm just going to read these, but then I want to comment on them a little bit, and then again, I hope we have some discussion. So he says, The field of bright spirit is an ancient wilderness that does not change. With boundless eagerness, wander around this immaculate wide plain. Well, I guess I'm going to comment in the middle of reading this. They're not that long, each one of these paragraphs, but this idea of this ancient wilderness, this ancient wilderness beyond the change of the world, which we all know, but there is something, this field of bright spirit, which we touch in our sitting, in willing

[03:08]

to be upright and present in our body and mind. Well, of course, our ideas of the world and of ourselves are here, too, as we sit, but also something else, this ancient wilderness. So he says, With boundless eagerness, wander around this immaculate wide plain. So even as we're sitting, we are studying this experience of being ourself. With boundless eagerness, wander around this immaculate wide plain. We sit upright, but relaxed, present, and with this sense of exploring what it's like to be this person, this body and mind, on our Kushner chair tonight. So he says, The drifting clouds embrace the mountain. The family wind is relaxed and simple. The autumn waters display the moon in its pure brightness. Well, it's the wrong season for this one, but anyway.

[04:09]

The drifting clouds embrace the mountain. So most Zen imagery has to do with mountains and rivers, and that worked in China and Japan and California, and I've talked about this before, that we need a new Zen imagery for pastures and plains and lakes and skyscrapers. But anyway, this image of clouds and mountains, drifting clouds, is an image for Zen monks or for Zen practitioners, and mountains for temples or teachers. So he says, The drifting clouds embrace the mountain. The family wind is relaxed and simple. Which tells us this image of the scene, this ancient Chinese landscape, and the family wind, the style of this teaching is relaxed and simple, and it is. So the point of this style of Zen practice is not to push yourself to achieve some particular

[05:11]

understanding or state of mind or state of being or whatever, but to just steadily relax and simple and display the moon in its pure brightness, each one of us on our Kushner chair. Then he says, Directly arriving here, you will be able to recognize the mind-ground Dharma field that is the root source of the 10,000 forms germinating with unwithered fertility. These flowers and leaves are the whole world. So we are told that a single seed is an uncultivated field. Do not weed out the new shoots, and the self will flower. So you may have heard the ancient Buddhist teaching of non-self, of anatman in Sanskrit. This doesn't mean to get rid of yourself or to get rid of your ego. It means to allow the true deep self to sprout and flower.

[06:16]

It means to actually allow yourself to be yourself without some story that we've concocted about our world and our self. This involves going back to this mind-ground Dharma field. What is it here on the ground? What is this mind that's beyond our personal grasping and greed and whole attachments? This mind-ground Dharma field. This field of reality that is the ground of our mind. So this relates to this idea that developed, well it started in India, but developed in East Asia, of Buddha nature. That there is this capacity that we all have already, right now, to be awake,

[07:17]

to be kind, to be aware. It's not something that we have to get from somewhere else. It's right under your cushion or chair right now. So directly arriving here you will be able to recognize the mind-ground Dharma field when we settle down, when we reach this ancient wilderness. Maybe this is why I talk about this more in longer sitting, because it takes a while to settle. It's not that much. And yet I actually believe that in just one period of sitting, there's some taste, some glimmer of that. Even if it may be that your mind was wandering and there were lots of thoughts going through your head during the meditation. We have several people here who sat for the first time tonight, which is wonderful for all of us. And if you feel perplexed because your mind was wandering around

[08:20]

and there were lots of thoughts, you probably weren't the only person doing that in this room. One of the things that happens is that our mind continues to generate thoughts right in the midst of this Dharma field. And yet we don't try and do anything with them or arrange anything or manipulate them or manipulate the world. That's our usual way of thinking. And if we see that we're doing that, okay, just come back to uprightness, breathing this ancient wilderness. He says that this mind-ground Dharma field is the root source of the 10,000 forms, the whole phenomenal world, germinating with unwithered fertility. So this is the time of year when things are starting to, not quite yet, but we can feel somewhere in our bodies that something is about to burst forth.

[09:23]

The trees haven't yet started to have little buds, but it's getting warmer almost. It's not down in the teens anymore. And we can feel this arising of energy. So I'm going to be talking about this much more this Sunday. We're going to be sitting all day, but you're welcome to come to the Dharma talk. I'll announce that later. But this germinating with unwithered fertility, where does this energy come from? Where does this, our heart's desire, where does this deeper self, how does that come forth from this stillness? Maybe even from our sense of starkness, our sense of the difficulties of this world and our society now, our own life.

[10:24]

And yet there's some energy that is available. So this is related to this idea of Buddha nature, that the nature of reality itself is awakening, is arising, is coming soon to an inhale or an exhale near you. So we are told that a single seed is an uncultivated field. And yes, from one seed, many things can come. So each of those thoughts that arises in our mind is also a seed. And, you know, it has maybe positive and negative aspects if we want to evaluate it that way. But from a single seed, there is an uncultivated field. And he says, do not weed out the new shoots and the self will flower. Allow yourself to be yourself. Pay attention. Be present with the whole process.

[11:25]

But allow these new shoots to come up and the self will flower. So this self is the self that is expressing this ancient wilderness right in the middle of the confusion of our mind and our world and our everyday activity. How do we allow this spirit to be present? So that's actually, I wanted to talk about two of these practice instructions. And that's the first one, this idea of finding that place where we can settle and allowing the energy to come forth. But then I wanted to talk about another of these practice instructions of Hongjus that relates to our practice together, at Sangha, of community. And it particularly maybe relates to our community since he's talking about dragons. So I'll read it to you. In the wind abode, clouds and dragons harmoniously follow each other.

[12:31]

Very naturally from the first, they do not need to express their intentions to each other. Similarly, Zen practitioners are accommodating and based on causes and conditions can harmoniously practice together. Arriving without display, emerging unconcealed, the wondrous clouds and dragons enter the whole scene and cannot be confused. Casually hanging above the 10,000 features, each distinctly presents a spectacular image. Complete without a hair's difference between them, springing forth the spontaneity, they clearly exemplify coming home. But still must investigate until they have eaten their fill. The clouds disperse and winds die down. The autumn sky clears and the moon sets. The waters of heaven are limitless. Where the ground is on its own, the brightness begins to be realized. So that one I read all the way through first.

[13:34]

Now I'm going to go back. In the wind abode, clouds and dragons harmoniously follow each other. So I mentioned the clouds there is an image. Of course, all of this Zen poetry has to do with just the literal scene as it is. So when he's talking about clouds and mountains, he's talking about clouds and mountains or dragons as the case may be. We don't know exactly which dragons he knew about in China, but clouds are an image for practitioners and dragons for enlightened beings or maybe vice versa. Anyway, in the wind abode, clouds and dragons harmoniously follow each other. So this particular practice instruction is about our practice together as Sangha, as Dharma community. How do we harmoniously follow each other? He says very naturally from the first, they do not need to express their intention to each other. Similarly, Zen practitioners are accommodating

[14:37]

and based on causes and conditions can harmoniously practice together. So what is this? They do not need to express or they do not express their intentions to each other. Part of what we trust when we come home to Sangha community is that everybody here is in some way has this intention. We chant the Bodhisattva vows at the end of our Dharma talks, but something brought us here. Even if you're coming here for a class assignment or whatever it is that brought you to that class, something brought you here to actually consider the quality of how it is that we are in this world. So this intention, it may be muddled and confused and we may have many intentions, but there's this basic trust. We're here to try and support each other in this process

[15:38]

of being ourselves, each in our own way, of finding this space of this ancient wilderness. So he says from the first, they do these clouds and dragons do not need to express their intentions to each other. Of course, we bump into each other and all of our stuff comes up and it's difficult to be a human being. And so this is a practice not just for clouds and dragons. We practice this as human beings, not as special sacred masters or something like that, but as just ordinary folks. How do we find our way to see this situation we are in and be willing to sit upright or be present in the middle of it and face it and do that together? So this intention is very sweet and noble

[16:40]

and we trust that. As much as our stuff may come up and we may feel, now this is what's difficult about this practice, more than getting your legs into some funny position, but we see these thought patterns and our own patterns of grasping and fussiness and aversion and fear and confusion and longing and all of that stuff, sadness. It's not about getting rid of that. It's about being willing to be actually present with who you are. Radically, who we are is okay. How do we allow the shoots to flower? So he says again, from the first, these clouds and dragons do not need to express their intentions to each other. Similarly, Zen practitioners are accommodating and based on causes and conditions, can harmoniously practice together. So it sounds like very simple, the way he says it,

[17:40]

but of course we know that to actually take care of a Sangha, to take care of the situation, make this practice available, it takes some work. It takes some effort. Still, here we are and he says arriving without display, emerging unconcealed, the wondrous clouds and dragons enter the whole scene and cannot be confused. Casually hanging above the 10,000 features, each distinctly presents a spectacular image. Bless you. So each one of us in our own way is presenting a spectacular image. Each one of us by being willing to be present and upright in our lives in this body and mind has this opportunity to um express the wholeness of this mind-ground dharma field. He says complete without a hair's difference between them, springing forth with spontaneity, they clearly exemplify coming home but still must investigate

[18:41]

until they have eaten their fill. This coming home is very important. We have this practice here of taking refuge and some people do that formally and take precepts and receive Buddha's name, Buddha names but all of us, but just by showing up or in some way coming home, turning towards well, sometimes we call it Buddha, turning towards this deeper self that we have a little taste of and then maybe we don't trust but still there's something about it that brings us here and that has brought some of you back many times. This turning towards home, this coming home, to our true home, not to our patterns of addiction and confusion and fear and you know all of that stuff, that stuff is there too but how do we see beneath that, this deeper intention?

[19:42]

Still we must investigate until they have eaten their fill. So even though just the fact of your being here deserves great congratulations, great, great congratulations, there's this investigation, investigating how it is to be this person here on my cushion with all my confusion, still in some way expressing this spectacular image of clouds and dragons. So he says, clouds dispersion, winds die down, the autumn sky clears, the moon sets, you know, he has this very poetic way of expressing this deep peacefulness that he has experienced. The waters of heaven are limitless where the ground is on its own, the brightness begins to be realized. How can we allow the ground to be on its own? How can we allow ourselves to be just as we are?

[20:49]

So this is, you know, for those of you who are here for the first time, this is, you know, kind of very advanced teaching and yet, you know, it's kind of a style of sotras that we throw you onto the top of the mountain. So enjoy the taste of this mind-ground dharma field, allow the seeds to sprout up, allow your mind to play with the images of clouds and dragons. This is maybe the end point and also the starting point of our practice. And then there's the work of how do we, you know, work together harmoniously to allow each of us to in our own, each in our own quirky way to present a particular image of clouds and dragons. So as some of you know,

[21:56]

I could blabber on for a while, but I'm going to stop now and just see if anyone has any responses or comments or expressions or questions about anything. Please feel free. So Jim, do you have some poetic response for us? He knows the silence is the most profound response, but you can say something else if you want.

[22:56]

Ah, no? Oh, later perhaps. Okay. Anybody else? Douglas? Well, I think something you see very often in Humphrey's poems are images of open space, either sky or fields. But he doesn't, it's not, it's never something that's empty. So he wants you to be aware of the seeds and the sprouts for the dragons in the sky and the clouds in the sky with that sense of harmony at the same time. And it resonates with me always as the mind is sitting where with attention you do open up and yet you can have all of these emotions and thoughts and feelings going on. But in that awareness, there's a sense of how it's okay.

[24:05]

I don't know whether I feel it as harmony always, but it's something you can deal with in the middle of that awareness and that sense of being right here. Yeah. Well, you know, two words that you mentioned that I want to pick up on, space and harmony. So harmony, we have some idea of as a kind of, you know, things fitting together in some way that we can, you know, kind of identify as everything is nice. Harmony is actually more alive than that and maybe more messy than that. And yet there's a way to see this space as fitting together somehow. So sometimes there's a different passage in Hong Cho that's kind of a meditation on space. But, you know, we have these nice high ceilings and there's, you know, kind of little different shapes here and there. And there's these things whirling around there.

[25:11]

And, you know, there's anyway, people are in this kind of circle on the outside and people stepping around above us and all this stuff going on. What is it like to actually inhabit this space? What is the harmony of this space? How do we feel that? How do we feel the harmony of our own space on our own cushion, this body and mind? And then, you know, the circle of all of us together. And I don't have a name for that, but we can breathe with that. And then we get up and we're going to go have tea and cookies and, you know, more things will come up. But anyway, there's a kind of subtleness that's possible, a kind of, I don't know, anyway, a sense of space rather than kind of restriction

[26:18]

that is possible when we're willing to just be present. When people are here for the first time tonight, do you hear from some class assignment or you're just here? Or if you have some, you know, any kind of question about practice or Buddhism or teaching or Zen or anything, you know, feel free also. Well, I got here because, one, it was just very random. It was just wonderful. But I was shopping at Fleet Feet and then somehow this question came up about teaching yoga. So I started to teach yoga, just a few classes. And then Dawn was in my class, and so she was just going to come here. And so I got here and I was just like, yeah, that sounds good. You know, so just one thing led to another, completely random. And that's how I'm here. And I really responded to the first reading about the part of accepting the new shoots

[27:18]

being important for the self, just in terms of aging. Like sometimes we want to hold on to the old group of friends and the old memories, but just to go forward, to allow yourself to be who you are right now, it's where those new shoots are important. You don't want to kill those, but the mind wants to. Yeah, we have this very deep tendency to kind of control things, you know, and like things to be in nice packages. And actually reality is more wild. And how can we allow it to grow in the way that it feels? So thank you for being here. Yeah, we all have various strange costs and conditions for showing up. And, you know, one of the things that Hongzhe and all the Buddhas and ancestors emphasizes, then just to kind of continue, how do you sustain the gaze of being present? How do you sustain a practice

[28:19]

of being upright and paying attention and being kind to yourself? And allowing yourself to be yourself and not cutting off the shoots of change and goodness. Well, I love the analogy of the mountain. I feel like that's a perfect analogy for a person where, you know, it shifts and it changes, but you're still on the mountain and you've got these clouds, like what I was talking about, all the thoughts come past you and they're just kind of surrounding you and you take what you want and let others go, you know, keep moving no matter what, you're still there. So that was great. And I came here, this is my first time. I decided this year that I was going to do something called 52 Weeks to a Better Life and kind of explore like every week I would do something different to kind of challenge myself. And this is part of it, I was walking past Raphael and was like, oh, I think I'm going to try this. And I had a really cool kind of out of body experience while meditating in a yoga class. I ended up in a car accident and went to try and release

[29:21]

a few things after that. And it was really helpful. So I wanted to just kind of see what this was like. Good. Well, while you continue doing new things each week, feel free to come back here and, you know, allow this to be one of the old things that you, you know, supports all the new things. We have this mix of change and that which supports change. Thank you. Sure.

[30:22]

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes, the sky is bigger here than I've lived in mountains, you know, you can't see. The sky is wide, even in the middle of the mountains. So where I live out, sort of further west, it's very open. The sky is very large. And yet, you know, we, somehow, with each step, the earth is there to support us. Not so many earthquakes here, is where I came from. I have a question.

[31:46]

Yes. About this pan. Yes. Yeah, there, in fact, that story is an ancient story. Well, you know, how many people here are left-handed? Just one. It's, you know, in some of my classes, it's a very small number of people who are left-handed. But anyway, for most people, the right hand is kind of the more active side. So the left hand is to kind of settle it. So we put their left hand above the right hand. I've seen images of Buddhas the other way around, but I think even if you're left-handed, you can put the left hand on top. It's the traditional way. But it's, you know, this, thank you for asking,

[32:48]

because this is very important in our practice. So maybe I'll just say a little bit about, sometimes it's called the Cosmic Mudra. And sometimes it's suggested that we hold our mind in this. And it's very helpful, actually, in what, during sitting, because we can notice at some point that our thumbs have come apart or that they're starting to press together and make more of a triangle. So it's always good to just bring it back to this oval. But you actually hold it against your belly. So you can feel your left, you know, the little fingers against your abdomen. We say below the navel. You know, it's a little different how high or low it is. You might experiment with moving it. Just a little difference makes a big difference when you're sitting. Sometimes it's resting on your, it may, for some of you, be resting on your lap, but you're actually holding it there. But there's a practice of just feeling your mind in your mudra, that you're actually holding your mind.

[33:49]

So when we say mind, we think brain. The Japanese, Chinese and Japanese word for mind, actually, is also the word for heart. But also they say that in some ways our mind is right here in our gut. So this is a center of the body, yogically. So we hold our heart mind here and take good care of it. And then also there's, usually we say here just to breathe naturally, to feel, inhale and exhale. But for some people, and some teachers emphasize this more, to breathe into your aura, into your inhale there and exhale from there. And you can do that as a way of settling when you first start to sit, if you'd like. But anyway, there's also,

[34:51]

in traditional instructions, left in half lotus should be left foot on right thigh. A lot of you sit in Burmese. I do too right now. It's okay to do it the other way around though. But I think that also has to do with the right side being more active. So kind of to settle. Anyway, I don't know if that responds. Any other comments about Mudra from anybody? Yes, Tom. Somebody had told me that to keep ourselves to receive the Dharma that you said this morning, the speaker, the teacher, and the Buddha, talk with your right hand. It's more active, the way you said it, and so we're carrying the teaching instead. And so that a Buddha would sit with the right hand on top.

[35:55]

Maybe so. I think there's certain Buddhas who do. I'm not sure. But you were reminding me that I once lived with a cat who would come and sit in front of me when I was sitting, and she would put her paws in my mudra. That was kind of nice. She was a Zen cat. Well, if there's any last comments or questions before we end. Jim, did you have something? I thought I saw. I would just sort of move a footnote. Oh, good, a footnote. Yeah, yeah. Some of the different people and temperaments. I remember, we were drinking years ago. He had, he was very concerned about people wrestling with their hands and their abdomens, and he felt it should be as if a mode of awareness held slightly out from the body.

[37:00]

And just to keep from getting too too relaxed. Turn the hand slightly outwards. With the thumbs away from the body. Yeah, so that was Lu Richman, you said? He's an old friend, and I sort of disagree. Extra aware and extra. There's a little bit of stress in it. Yeah, I think that's, you know, that's maybe his kind of Tibetan side or something anyway. So I would agree with part of that. I still think you should hold it against your belly. But, you know, you can experience, to some extent, this practice of sitting in Zen is something that you have to find your own seat, your own way of sitting. You know, how high or low the cushion is, how hard or soft. It's very individual to find your seat. So for some people, but I feel that's a little too aggressive

[38:01]

to hold your hands away from your body. But I do think that maybe holding, moving your thumbs forward might be good. So anyway, it's, you know, I'll have to talk to Lu about that. Maybe in that week. Yeah, and I might say something different another week too. So we have to keep seeing what is alive right now. That's the point.

[38:25]

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