You know, the kind of story I talked about yesterday… Can you hear me okay? The kind of story I talked about yesterday doesn't have exactly what we could call a meaning, but if we want to ascribe to it some identification, we can say it has a use, and its use is in teaching Zen. But its use won't be clear to you either, unless you use it. Sometimes

[01:03]

you can come across a Zen story, and maybe it's clear to you immediately, and you haven't used it, but actually, usually it means you have in some way practiced with that kind of situation. That's why you understand the story. So its meaning, then, is its use, and its use depends on your using it, how the patriarchs tried to teach Buddhism one to another. But the real meaning of these stories can't actually be known till you

[02:16]

give up your life. The stories are easier to know than your life. We think we know our life, and that's why it's so difficult to give it up. I wish I could convince you give up your life. Maybe if I could practice better myself, I could convince you. But

[03:23]

also I can't really see why you'd want to. It's pretty difficult for me to see any way to convince you. It's not that life is so attractive, but it's all we know. There's no way to make sense of giving up our life. And I don't mean to, you know, some people talk about death or suicide or ending the difficulty they're in, lack of any meaning

[04:25]

for them. But this is not what I mean by death. Actually, that's just an interruption of your superficial life, of the movie on the screen. And according to Buddhism, theory of reincarnation, anyway. Interrupting that life is only to continue it with more force again. Anyway, meaning is we can't get free except in this life. And each of you will have this experience. Even if we can't do it here in our zazen,

[05:59]

you know, we're quite connected, all of us. My practice and your practice are so closely connected. And we can practice, I can only practice, actually, if you practice. So to practice, we must have some great practice together. But even if we don't, can't have this giving up our life in our practice, in our life, you will have it when you die. You'll have that, this great opportunity when you die. Somehow life has given us an

[07:19]

unavoidable great opportunity. And each of us will actually die, and you'll feel your consciousness going out of your body. Often it starts in your feet, and you can feel your feet getting cold, and then your calves and legs and thighs. And if at this moment you cling to your life, it will be terrible for you. But if you can let it go, you know, like an interesting movie slipping off the screen, you can know what Suzuki Roshi used

[08:27]

to call your big screen, or even your no screen. But you don't actually have to wait until you die. You can have this opportunity in your practice, letting go of the movie on your screen, letting go of the images, not so involved in the plot. We get completely

[09:29]

involved in the movie, you know. Maybe Zazen is a little bit like the short subjects, you know, sort of on world travel or visiting India or something like that. Maybe this one's visiting Japan. Usually the short subjects are not so interesting, so you can realize you're sitting in the movie seat, you know, and you can not be caught by it so much. But then when the movie comes on, you're caught immediately. And if not the movie, when the news comes on, you're caught. Oh, you think this is real, the Vietnam War, or some automobile

[10:29]

accident. It may be real, actually, but it's already over. By the time you see the movie, it's already over. It's too late to participate in it. It's dead. Maybe you want to participate in the movie completely. You don't want to be detached from the movie. If so, you know, to participate in the movie completely of your life, it also means to participate in the screen. You can't eliminate the screen. And for the screen, you know, the movie is

[11:43]

quite effortless. All the struggle is in the plot and in the images. But for the screen itself, it's quite effortless. Like Suzuki Roshi's story about the water falling off the falls at Yosemite, and the drop separating and just falling, it's quite effortless, that separation. It's not climbing up the mountain, which is such a struggle, but just individual drops being separate for a while and falling effortlessly. And although we get caught in the plot of the movie, what do you suppose the plot of the movie is to the screen? The screen just stays still, one, four, five, hundreds of movies, one after another.

[12:44]

It never moves, and the events keep going. If you know the screen, your experience, actually, the plot is quite different. You begin to see interconnections that aren't there when you just see it in some linear way. When somebody stands before you, you know, what do you see? Actually, what you call the present, what we call the present, usually, is already past. It's already over. By the time you've seen it, it's over. By the time your sixth senses have apprehended the situation, it's over. It's like arriving, as I said yesterday, in an accident. I mean, it's useful to see when things are over, like our movie, or like

[13:53]

a car accident or something. You can go and help, as Zen Center helped with the building when it burned. But how can you participate with other people when what you see is already past? When you've given up your life, you know, it means to live in the real present, the present where things are just forming, where it's still just a kind of light, where

[15:04]

it's quite fluid, where anything is possible. The Lankavatara Sutra says, consciousness arises instantaneously or by degrees in every sense organ, even in its atoms and pores of the skin. And the sense field apprehends like a mirror reflecting objects.

[16:22]

Or the ocean stirred by the wind. And the mind ocean. And likewise, I guess it says, O Mahatma, and likewise, the mind ocean is stirred by the wind of objectivity, cause, cause, deed and effect, endlessly conditioning each other. How can you start each moment like a blank screen, no screen, so that you see the wind that arises, that stirs everything, that creates everyone. Certainly not if you're caught in some idea of an identity.

[17:34]

I don't, I don't like to give such serious lectures, excuse me. Because I'm quite satisfied with you, actually. It sounds like I'm saying you should do something, no? Of course I'm saying that. Because I feel that's what you want. And what I want. Let's see. Do you have any questions? Something to talk about? Yeah.

[20:20]

Rishi, would you say that role playing is a way of not being caught by some identity? Okay. Did you hear what he said? Or we could say the same thing by saying, roles are the usefulness of identity. Do you understand what I mean? No. That was quite clear. Roles are the usefulness of identity. What I mean is, everything exists. If we have the ability to form an

[21:26]

identity, it must exist for some reason. When we try to, you know, turn it into concrete, or think of it as real, we have trouble. But when you think of it as useful, for this situation, or as someone said recently, for this realm, or that realm. Actually you can't be caught in some identity. Identity, no matter how wide, is too small for you. So the reason you have trouble is you're always overflowing your identity. So you need lots of little catch basins called this role and that role. A way, a kind of way, a kind of

[22:44]

loving way even, of being there for other people. If you're there without any role or identity, no one can make use of you. So to make yourself useful, now I'm a husband. Now I'm a teacher. Now I'm working in the kitchen. Now I'm a taxi driver. Yes? I over believe you when you say, I'm satisfied with you and me. But I do believe you when you say, give up on me. Thank you very much. Well, you believe what you want to believe, and I'll believe what I want to believe.

[23:48]

I understand, from your point of view, that's true. From my point of view, I have to make a big effort to say something to you like, give up your life. Because actually, I don't want to disturb you. I'm like an old lady, actually, and I try to hide it, but I'm always plucking over what happened. Oh, that was really nice. That happened, and then this happened, and oh, the flowers came out today. Look, so-and-so is walking about Tassajara, and they're not sick. I feel that all the time. I feel so embarrassed. I have to control myself. I never look at the future, but I'm always looking at the past, and oh, isn't that nice. So I don't want to disturb things, because they're quite nice as they are. But

[24:57]

I actually know that that's not so good. That's some bad habit of mine. So I have to stir myself up, say, come on. Actually, I'm a little selfish, too, because if you're stirred up, it helps me. Oh, see? You believe me, but you don't understand me. You said two things which to me seem very different, but maybe you're saying that they're not so different. So could you explain in terms of the way we perceive what we're doing, what it means to give up our life, as we're doing about our life now?

[25:57]

He's quite right about what I mean. I don't want you to get caught by some movie called giving up your life, or being satisfied with what you are. I always fall back on saying, you should be able to do two things at once that seem opposite. Or Suzuki Roshi always said, two and yet one, one and yet two. But actually what I mean, I can't say. I mean, I can't quite say. We can't, as the story said yesterday, if we want to say something

[27:07]

that's true, that's not already past, even though we think it's present. If we want to say something that's still that wind. We can't say absolute, this is such, or we can't say relative. What's alive is neither relative nor absolute. So it has to be rather vague and obscure and difficult to practice. I'm sorry, I'm not making it that way, it's just the way it is, or at least that's the only way I know what to do. Eric? The past few days, the questions from people?

[28:10]

What it means to cut off? Now you see it, now you don't. That's the way it is, that's why we can't, there should be some gap for your question

[29:25]

to come back again. And you should settle on it, you know. Not separate it from your question by anything. Not a hair's breadth that sets it in sutra. Most of the time, it's pretty easy for me to see what kind of role I can use. I mean, sometimes when I'm going here and there, I'm not thinking about it, I don't know what I'm doing. And it seems to me maybe I'm in some role, but I don't know what it is. And Is that like, as you were talking yesterday about moving up, where everything you do is

[30:29]

moving, or maybe you're just kind of conscious of it. Or is there some time when you're not, you're just not in a role? No, there's no time when you're not in a role. A role doesn't, you don't have to limit your roles to those you can label. Now I'm cook, now I'm, you know. Your roles are flashing each moment. When you see how completely everything changes, then the idea of an identity is meaningless. But what's there? What do you do when you're dissatisfied with your practice? Me? Yes. Now or used to?

[31:32]

Now. It's more difficult to answer. I just, it just keeps falling away. I used to mind, you know. It's just the same as being dissatisfied with my practice, I guess, but I don't expect anything. So I've found that if I had that feeling of being satisfied, right, I immediately start

[32:40]

sliding back down the hill, right? So I don't feel satisfied either. I just keep trying to enjoy myself. Anyway, yes? If I try to cut off where it's not fun, like if you use a particular type of art, a particular type of movement, like I'm thinking mostly about three different things, and those things have, when I think of them, I know I'm thinking in front of anybody. I know I'm thinking. So if I think of them doing good, and they come up, and I try to cut them off, and then I think about them, and I'm wondering if the method that I'm using is somehow, like, I

[33:55]

have the idea of what the question is saying, and I wonder if it's right in this context. Could you hear her? Sounds like you're saying that there's three particular thoughts that you, that stand for all thinking for you, or something like that. Is that right? Well, I'm using them. You're using them, that way. For some reason, they do stand for all thinking, and you're trying to see if you can eliminate those three, for some reason. What about the thought about why you picked those three? You can try that way, you know, but actually you can't take a piece of cloth and trim

[35:17]

little pieces out of it, these three pieces. It doesn't work. As you say, the fabric will mend itself at night. And I've talked a number of times about suppression and repression. Of course, we don't want to suppress or repress. There's really, I think, we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that our fundamental practice is zazen. In the end, we go back to zazen, and every day we come to zazen. And all the other practices you do are some experiment or some effort, but you can't depend on such practices. You can depend on zazen.

[36:27]

And in zazen, we just let our thinking come or go as it does. It may be useful to try to cut off some particular thought, but as a kind of practice or experiment, but our fundamental practice is to see how our thinking arises, to be there for your thinking. If you concentrate on this, that, or that part, you miss where those thoughts

[37:43]

came from. Why you concentrate on those three? Maybe you should cut off that. So in the end, you can't figure out which one to cut off, actually. And so all you can do is look at the whole fabric. What happens, of course, is that the fabric may almost stay there forever, but the weave, you begin to see more and more spaces in the weaving until you can pass right through. Thank you. Did you?

[38:58]

All of us are down there at the bottom of the hole waiting. Come on. Come on in. Well, when you're climbing up this hill, you stay with going up the hill, don't you? You faded up there at the end.

[40:12]

I think the question is more like putting your hand out again on another stone. Again and again. Yeah. Okay. Do you realize how difficult a question you're asking? What is the question? Yeah, it says, we use the words mind and consciousness and put your mind in your hara. Is there really

[41:43]

any difference between these words, mind, consciousness, hara, strength, can? What do you think? Well, there is. When I started, I didn't want to do it. I was trying to find it. I'm trying to do what you're saying. Put your mind in your left hand and then forget about.

[42:57]

Oh, forget it. Since we experience ourselves as divided, we have to make an effort that's divided to get started. If I say to you, make a whole effort, so where do you start, you know?

[44:03]

Okay, start by putting your mind in your left hand. We have to start. Since we experience ourselves as divided, there's no way except to talk about energy or mind or something. If you don't experience yourself as divided, you don't have to use such language. But the expression of ourselves is divided, this role or that role. Yes, ask further. Why won't you let them be different?

[45:13]

If you do one, you're doing them all. Sometimes in some situation, you want one emphasis. Sometimes in another situation, you want another emphasis. If you're driving the truck out of Tassajara, I don't want you to put your mind in your left hand. I'd prefer you chose some other way. And especially, don't forget about it. That's all. Yeah? Is it possible not to give up your life? Is it possible to do something? A little box, something? What do you mean? I make pretty rigorous efforts to keep something to myself.

[46:41]

But it's very unsatisfying. It's what I know, but it doesn't work. And I feel like it's really true that what I really want is this to give up my life. But I don't know it in the same clearness that I know in the other. These seconds on scrambled eggs. Yeah, that's pretty easy to feel and taste. But I do believe you when you say that usually what we really want is to give up life. How, in the meantime, you know, how do you cope with this selfishness?

[48:00]

The seconds on scrambled eggs is also the dharma. Your selfishness, you know. You can't put your selfishness aside for some later use. But I like your question. It's very... It is true that something like seconds on scrambled eggs is much clearer. Than sort of abstractions about practice. Is it possible to recognize...

[49:31]

Is it possible to recognize what it means to give up your life when you're doing it? Well, right now you say how to cope with selfishness until you give up your life. And that's... All you can do is cope with selfishness. Cope with your scrambled eggs. And try to give up your selfishness. And I'm... As you say, we try pretty hard. It's interesting, you know. Even if it becomes clear to you.

[50:37]

And sometimes it's clear to us. For a moment. That this whole business of working out our destiny is, you know, a waste of time on a minute stage. Just forget who you are. And throw yourself on the junk heap. And give up your life to everyone. You can know that. You know, for an instant. Even if you know it, you know. To actually do it is so sticky. And we can know even, most of us maybe don't, but we can know even that in the end it's the only thing that is satisfying. That allows us to live as a whole being. But we can't do it, you know.

[51:44]

Maybe the transition is the most difficult time. Because it's when we give up what we hoped for. When you still have some hope, you know, it's quite... Our life is quite... In a way it's quite beautiful, you know. And it's very funny too. All those things you once thought were important to you, they're no longer important to you. It's what the whole world turned around at one time. It's rather sad, actually. But then when that turns sour, because somehow you've seen through it. Then too, it's still, even though it's sour, it sticks to us.

[52:48]

And somehow no amount of effort will shake it. I picked up a great big banana slug, a green goat, and carried it to a safer place. And then my... I don't know, it was the messiest one I've ever seen. And I just had this stuff all over me. And I went to wash. And I washed, and washed, and washed. And I used soap, and ivory soap, and I used every modern miracle detergent I could find. Literally none of it would come off. Finally I found a way to get it off. I took Kleenex and toilet paper and things like that, and I stuck it all over, and I peeled it off. I was really... But no matter what I did, it wouldn't come off. And our ego is like that. Some big banana slug. It's got us, you know. And we put Buddha's robe on even.

[53:57]

And that banana slug peeps out. It's really difficult. So you have to learn to sort of get with that banana slug, and sort of creep along with it. Anyway, maybe to become a banana slug is our practice. To sit here, you know. To sit here, you should say a frog, but I think a banana slug is better. If you could help me be a banana slug better too, I'd appreciate it. Buddha's robe.

[54:46]

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