As I mentioned a few days ago, if possible, I would like to study with you and meditate with you on the teachings about the nature of phenomena, teachings which are offered to assist us in developing perfect wisdom. And the day before yesterday I sort of started setting the table for this study and by first of all suggesting a kind of spiritual context or a spiritual frame on our activities here at this Zen training place. spiritual contextualization of the study of the Buddha Dharma, where we listen to the suggestion that Buddhas do not practice alone, but they practice together with other Buddhas,

[01:30]

And they practice together with all living beings. And all living beings are actually living in this beneficent environment whether they realize it or not, whether they believe it or not. I suggested that to you. I also said I wanted to talk to you about this expression, grandmother mind, and I would like to do that, but there's something that maybe I have to spend a little bit more time on with you before we go into that. And once again, the kinds of things I'd like to study with you and learn about with you are what we call wisdom teachings, which are the topics of wisdom meditation or insight meditations.

[02:40]

But I also mentioned that another important branch of the Buddha But the Buddha's meditation is the branch of tranquility or concentration meditation. As a matter of fact, as you probably know, what most people think of as meditation is actually tranquility meditation. And many of you are actually working on tranquility meditation. now and have been doing so for most of your time at Zen Center, which is part of our practice. But I wasn't intending to have that be the main topic for this practice period. At the beginning of wisdom meditation, wisdom meditation looks more like learning or studying or investigation or analysis.

[03:46]

It looks more like being in school and learning about something, which most people do not think of as meditation. But the beginning of wisdom meditation looks like that. At the end of wisdom meditation, it becomes unified with tranquility. And then it maybe looks more like a wise person doing what most people think is meditation. Some people have already started to talk to me about their tranquility meditation, and I just wanted to say a little bit more about that at the beginning. So I propose to you that the actual what actually realizes or what's actually necessary in order to realize fully the serene nature of mind or to realize fully the mind's potential for tranquility, what's necessary is to, for some period of time, train the mind in giving up discursive thought, giving up thinking.

[05:16]

It doesn't mean destroy it, just let go of it. Usually our thinking, our discursive thought, our wandering thoughts, when we get involved with them, they distract us. We get involved with them, we pay attention to our thinking, and it's hard for us to actually see, appreciate, and physically and mentally understand and manifest fully serenity. In other words, we get involved in our discursive thought means our discursive thought is a distraction. We become distracted because we're involved in it. it is not ultimately necessary to be distracted by discursive thought but in the to a large extent in the process of developing tranquility we have to give it up because we don't know how to be involved with it without getting hooked on it and distracted in the process so what really is calming I suggest to you is to

[06:46]

pay attention to letting go of your thinking, letting go of your wandering thoughts. That's really what calms, I suggest. However, there are instructions which most of you heard about for tranquility which suggest to people to follow the breath or count the breath. And there are other ways, too, of picking some topic and then, in a sense, focusing on the topic. And then people think, quite naturally, that what's calming you is to focus on this thing, focus on the breath. But I suggest that it's not focusing on the breath that calms you, but the giving up being distracted. So, in fact, if you are looking at the breath, seem to be focusing on it, you might be actually giving up getting involved in the thinking that's going on or could be going on all around the breath.

[07:57]

But still, and I often use the example, but still, using the breath in that way, some people seem to stumble upon letting go of their breathing. While they're trying to focus on their breath, or focusing on the numbers, counting the breath. In the process of trying to do that, they inadvertently give up being involved in their thinking. Or even they could say, what some other people do is when thoughts arise, they say no, or they try to cut them off. And that is another technique. But the problem with these techniques is that they're a little bit discursive. And as you proceed in tranquility, you have to give up these techniques because they're discursive. So trying to follow your breath, and what a lot of people say is, I follow my breath, and then when I wander off, in other words, when you get involved in discursive thought, then I bring myself back.

[09:06]

But when I hear them say, bring myself back, or I come back, this coming back is wandering thought. Bringing yourself back is more thinking. So it may be somewhat better than what you're off thinking about, but the bringing back part is another example of discursive thought. So that has to be given up eventually, this bringing back. So I kind of question whether you should get into it in the first place. But if you want to, I understand but you feel it may be necessary, so it's certainly all right. And I've used the example repeatedly of the duck who was separated from his mother at birth, and then he was walking by a pond where there were several ducks swimming, and the duck said to him, hi, come on in. And he said, I can't. They said, why not? He said, I can't swim. They said, sure you can, you're a duck. He said, I'm not a duck. And they said, oh, okay.

[10:13]

And then a wise old, a kind old duck came up to the little duck and said, you want to go swimming with these other ducks? Here, here's a skyhook. Just hold this little skyhook, hook it onto the sky, and that will hold you up above the water, and then you can swim around with us. So the little duck took a hold of the skyhook, hooked it onto the sky, and then went into the water and swam around with the other ducks. And then one day, he was playing on the banks of the river or the pond with the other ducks. And some fox or something came along. And all the ducks jumped into the lake, jumped into the pond. And the little duck jumped in with them. And they were all swimming around for a while. But in his fright, he forgot to bring his skyhook. So he was swimming around with them, and then the other duck said, where's your skyhook? And he said, I forgot it.

[11:13]

And he said, what are you doing? He said, I'm swimming. So it actually is, in the end, you don't need this skyhook. You don't need any kind of device or technique to be calm. But you may feel you need one. But the problem is that when people use these devices, they keep forgetting to use the device and sinking. So rather than not having the device and saying, I'm swimming, they say, I lost my device, so I'm sunk. And they get very upset because they keep forgetting to use their device or their technique by which they think they get concentrated. But you have to give up these techniques So it's a struggle between using them and forgetting them and remembering them and feeling good, I remembered it, I remembered it, I'm doing fine, I got my advice, I must be concentrated. This kind of thing should be given up, this kind of discussion. And you might give it up eventually in this way of using the technique and thinking you're concentrated, which is fine, you are, and then forgetting it sometime and finding out you don't need it.

[12:22]

So I'm not exactly losing my patience with you or anything, but if you want to use a device, that's OK. But then remember that you're the one who wants to use it. And if you don't want to use it, you don't have to use it. But what a lot of people do is they pick this device and then they actually don't want to use it and they come and they complain about how they're not using it and they want me to help them use it more. And they don't want to use it. And I don't want them to use it either. But they think they need it. So it's kind of a mess, this kind of practice. But, you know, okay, go ahead. Bodhidharma said that he said, please pacify your mind, pacify your heart, calm your mind with no contrivance.

[13:31]

Don't use anything to calm your mind. That was his instruction. Because anything you use to calm your mind will later be just something that's going to get in the way of your calm mind. So without using anything, calm your mind. In other words, give up using something to calm your mind and give up using something to disturb yourself. Just let go of your thoughts. That's all. And don't even use that after a while. So that's really what I would recommend. And if you want to use some other technique, it's okay. Skyhooks are allowed. But if you don't want to use your skyhook, which most people don't actually, they're just using it because they think they need it, And then after a while they say, I don't want to use the skyhook. So then they go do something else. And then they get up, down on themselves for not using the skyhook. If you don't want to use it, fine. You don't have to. Just let your mind be pacified.

[14:36]

Let your heart be calmed with no device. Simply let go of discursive thought. It's all that's necessary. Including discursive thought. I wish you'd check to see if you're giving up discursive thought. In my first practice period, I've told this story before too, I did counting and I had a and I had a system to check to see if I was doing my counting, just because I noticed that I thought I was counting sometimes, but I really wasn't. So I had ways of checking to see if I really was. And usually when I checked my counting, I found out I wasn't. But then finally I got to the point where I I checked on my counting and I checked and my checking showed that I was counting and actually I was counting my breaths and I've managed to actually use the device consistently with no slips.

[15:50]

I finally got to that point and when I got to that point I was not happy and not calm. I was just totally under control. But I was using discursive thought to keep myself from viewing any discursive thought except counting my breath. And it really wasn't my breath. I had to think to check on that, which is another thing I did. And then checking to see if the counting was right. And then I wasn't just dreaming that I was counting. I had it all set. But I was still involved in discursive thought. And my mind was coarser in some ways than usual. But it was not involved in any kind of, nothing to do with anything but following my breath. I was totally focused on my breath and checking that I was focused on my breath. And it wasn't good for me. But if it's good for you, fine. But if it's not good for you, don't do it. Just give it up, along with everything else.

[16:53]

And you will become calm. So I think being calm is wonderful, but I don't know how good it is to be beating yourself up trying to get calm. I don't know how good that is, although I know it may be part of the course of finding your way. Bodhidharma also said to his disciple, the second ancestor, he said something like, translated into English, don't activate your mind around external objects and inwardly have no involvements. And I've gone back and forth about this instruction.

[18:05]

Sometimes I felt like it's instruction in tranquility. But then considering the rest of the story about this instruction, I thought, no, it must be insight meditation. Now I think actually the first part of his instruction is tranquility instruction, and the second part is wisdom instruction. So apparently some of you need a nap now, so I'll just stop talking until you've finished your nap. Let me know when you're awake. Pardon? What did he say? One translation is don't activate the mind around objects or outwardly. Don't activate your mind around external objects.

[19:08]

And inwardly, have no involvements. That's one translation. Another translation is, excuse me, I got it wrong. Outwardly, don't activate your mind around objects. Another translation of that is outwardly have no involvements. And inwardly, no coughing or sighing in the mind. No coughing or sighing, another translation was gasping in the mind. So my current understanding about that is that when you look at objects, Now, these objects could be the sound of blue jays or light or feelings in your body, but also could be objects, thought objects.

[20:16]

So it basically means don't think about them. Don't activate your mind around the objects. Don't get involved with them. In other words, give up discursive thought in relationship to objects that you're aware of. That way of dealing with objects, if you train that way, that comes to fruit as the realization of tranquility. And inwardly, no coughing or sighing. And so I thought about that more and did some research on the words sigh and cough and gasp. And all those words had to do with breath or breathing. So what I think he's saying is that when it comes to seeing things, give up thinking about them, give up discursive thought about them.

[21:21]

And then when it comes to dealing with your basic energy, don't grasp it, don't catch it, don't pull it like the word gasp. means to draw in or catch the breath. And sigh means to like release it or as in shock or sorrow. And cough, of course, is to kind of push your breath around to move some particles out of your lungs or throat or nose. I think what's being suggested here is don't mess with your energy. Don't constrict it. Don't distort it. don't block it. Let, in other words, positively speaking, let your life energy flow as an inward practice, which I think means give up the kinds of discriminations that cause a kind of constriction or distortion of your life.

[22:35]

Discriminations like self and other. To give up the discrimination of self and other which causes your breath to be choked, held, expelled, moved around in any unnatural way. So that's the wisdom teaching that Bodhidharma gave. But his tranquility meditation is calm your mind with no contrivance, pacify your heart with no contrivance equals give up all kinds of involvements. And also the word involvement could also be translated as stories. Give up stories about objects. Like you look at one person and say, oh, that's a really nice person. I'd like to be that person's friend.

[23:41]

And this is really not a nice person. I don't want to be this person's friend. This kind of commentary and involvement with objects Have none of that. Just see a person, see another person, see a blue jay, see the sky, see the sun, see the moon, whatever you see, that's it. And this other stuff which you can do and we all can do, give it up. That's the tranquility type of meditation. The other one is similar in terms of giving something up, but what you're giving up now is the discrimination between the different objects. such that your breath becomes stuck and blocked. And that's the type of meditation that I want to emphasize more in this practice period. Do you have any questions about the tranquility meditation?

[24:48]

In Zen Mind Beginner's Mind Sukhara she says something like, concentration is not trying hard to watch something. Concentration is freedom. Concentration is forgetting about yourself. When you forget about yourself, you'll naturally be following your breath. When you're naturally following your breath, you forget about yourself. This hard focusing on things is not really even possible for more than a few seconds. But giving up discursive thought, you can be quite consistent with that. Yes? That is not a full enough description to be qualified for the lofty title of just sitting.

[26:30]

When you're sitting, the way you actually are is just sitting. Actually. But to realize the practice of just sitting, it is necessary that you actually understand the nature of the sitting that's happening. And to know, for example, that you're sitting does not necessarily mean that you understand what that sitting is. Most people, when they're sitting, they have an idea of what sitting is. Does that make sense? In other words, when they're sitting, they think that they're sitting, and what they think they're sitting is is their idea. And if they get up and start walking, then they think, I'm not doing what is in correspondence to my idea of sitting.

[27:38]

Does that make sense? So you can tell the difference between walking and sitting that way because you use different ideas for those two things. Does that make sense? Walking is walking and sitting is sitting. But in both cases, in one case you have the idea of walking now being applied to the walking, which is different from the idea you use to apply to sitting. And you look at the two ideas and you say they're different, and that's how you tell the difference between the two things, right? In other words, you use your ideas about these two activities to tell the difference. Do you know what I mean? But your idea of your sitting is not your sitting. It's an aspect of your sitting. It's called the imaginary aspect of your sitting. Or the idea of your sitting is not your sitting. And the idea of your walking is not your walking. Just sitting includes that you understand while you're sitting that the sitting is not just your idea of your sitting. But to be sitting and think, oh, I'm sitting, usually what you're noticing is your idea of sitting.

[28:45]

You're not actually seeing the actual sitting, which is the basis of your idea of your sitting. When you actually understand when you're sitting that your sitting is not your idea of your sitting, when you actually sit and understand that what appears as your sitting is actually imaginary and you're not caught by that anymore, then you start to realize just sitting. In other words, just sitting means realizing the way you're sitting which is free of your ideas of sitting. And same way if you can hear a When you hear a blue jay and you understand what that blue jay is, free of your idea of blue jay, even though you still have an idea of blue jay floating right there by the blue jay, when you understand that, you are also realizing just sitting. One who is just sitting understands sitting and blue jay are not actually our ideas of sitting and blue jay.

[29:51]

If you're sitting prior to that understanding, you are doing the form of sitting, and the Buddhas are sitting with you, and they're kind of assisting you to learn actually the actual nature of your sitting, which eventually will be realized. as you proceed in developing wisdom. So actually the practice of just sitting could be understood as the form of it or the actuality of it. And the actual just sitting is the actuality. So one person sitting and realizing just sitting and the other person's sitting, and they're just sitting too, but they think incorrectly that what the just sitting is is what they think is happening.

[31:03]

They believe that their thinking actually applies to something other than just an image. But it doesn't. That wasn't a question about tranquility, but that's OK. Any questions about tranquility? Yes. So the perception I had from your description of, say, some sort of breath meditation practice versus what you're calling wisdom meditation practice, it seems like you're putting breath meditation very firmly into the category of tranquility practice. No. It seems that your quote from Zuckershi, if you remember another quote from Zuckershi where he said something like, if you're really just concentrating on your breath, then that is itself. So it seems that there could be another way of doing it that's not this sort of grasping with the mind itself.

[32:15]

Yeah. If you look at the breath, it can be an object which you look at. as a kind of an emblem of tranquility practice. And then the way you work with the breath is you look at the breath, and while you're looking at the breath, you give up discursive thought. Then you look at the breath again, and you give up discursive thought. And you hear the blue jay, and you give up discursive thought. And you feel a gurgle in your stomach, and you give up discursive thought. Then you feel your breath, and you give up discursive thought. You feel your breath again, and you give up... This kind of continual giving up of discursive thought, you realize tranquility. Now, another way to relate to the breath phenomena is when the breath arises, you actually look, you don't give up discursive thought, you actually use discursive thought, and you actually think about that breath. And you think, for example, this breath appears to me as my idea of the breath. But that's not actually the breath.

[33:17]

This breath is actually a dependently co-arisen phenomena. And you start to apply the teachings about the nature of phenomena to the phenomena of the breath. And when you realize that the breath is free of your idea of breath, that's Shikantaza. So if he says, when you watch your breath wholeheartedly or something, is that what you said? But if you really wholeheartedly watch your breath, you will realize that your breath is not, quote, your breath. When you realize that your breath is Or even your quotes breath is not your quotes breath. When you realize that, that's Shikantaza. Shikantaza is wisdom in a sitting posture. Does it have to be accompanied by this active realization? Yes. It's active. Would it be possible for someone to be sitting in Shikantaza without ever having heard, for example, the specific thing you're talking about in terms of realizing the breath is not the idea?

[34:20]

I don't think so. I think that if someone is a Buddha, but the Buddha has heard the teaching of the Buddha. Buddhas relate to sentient beings, and sentient beings are beings who actually have not yet realized Shikantaza. So a sentient being has to hear the teaching of Dharma to correct their basic misconceptions. So we naturally, as sentient beings, we naturally think that things exist independently. They look like that to us and we naturally believe it. That's normal for a human being, innately to think that something, that things exist on their own, cut off from conditions. That's the way they look and we believe that. We need to hear some instruction from someplace that says, uh-uh, things aren't that way.

[35:26]

But actually, most of the instruction we hear from childhood is things are that way. So they look that way to us. Plus our mommy and daddy say, this is your toy. These are your toys. You're you. And your brother's your brother. And you're related. But really, these are your toys. And this is your bed. And that's his bed. And they reinforce this sense of things exist separately. but you don't really need it much, because already you believe it. Then you start to suffer, and then you start to practice Zen, and then you hear the teaching which says things aren't the way they appear. They have an appearance, but that's not the way they are, that's just fantasy. I think you need to hear that in order to come to that realization. I think you need to hear that too, but I'm wondering, I fear perhaps that my perception that things are the way I think they are might be replaced with the perception that things are not the way I think they are, as opposed to just being replaced by the things themselves.

[36:32]

It's not that things are not the way that you think they are, it's just that the way you think they are is, what do you call it, is imaginary. And it's not that things do have that imaginary way of being, but it's imaginary. And they have another way of being which is called dependently co-arisen. They have this other way. And plus they have another way called emptiness, which is that the way they really are is that they're free of your ideas of them. So they're not the way you think they are. They're not how you appear they are at all. That's totally imaginary. There's nothing which is the slightest bit cut off from all the conditions which give rise to it. There's nothing like that. So things are not that way, but things appear that way. So that's part of what's going on for us in this life. But there's another way that they are, which is not necessarily better. It's just that it cures us of the belief that they're this other way. But they're not really that way either. Because that has to be also a kind of thought construction.

[37:37]

So it also doesn't really have an independence to do that way either. Yes? So when we talk about pacifying the mind, is that also a technique that we let go of? Is it the idea of mind as something that we help let go of the value? Well, first of all, in terms of pacifying mind, once the mind is pacified, you're encouraged to actually stop doing the... Then you can stop giving up the discursive thought because your mind is... Once you've realized the tranquility of mind, you don't have to train anymore for a while. You only have to train that tranquility of mind when you've lost it or when you're out of touch with it. It's always there. So once you're tranquil, you've done that work, now you can go do wisdom work if you want to. And wisdom work, then, is the work where you actually start to understand the nature of mind. Tranquility work, you don't necessarily understand the nature of mind.

[38:39]

The Buddha was very good at tranquility meditation, very good at giving up discursive thought, but he didn't understand the nature of mind. until his enlightenment night. Then he understood how the mind is created. And when he understood how the mind is created, he realized that the mind is actually not reached by our ideas of mind. Well, it can be reached by giving up belief, false beliefs. Then you realize it because it's already with you. The nature of your mind is always with you. It's just like because we have attachments and misconceptions, we don't see it. So it's not like we have to make it happen. It's already there. But we have this big job of giving up misconception and attachments. And we need to, since we are ongoingly imagining things and believing these imaginations, we need a collateral dharma station to be

[39:51]

piped in to have a conversation with our deluded ideas. So this debate goes on between our belief in independent existence and the teaching of interdependent existence. Those need to be interfaced until we give up the misconceptions and then realize the Dharma. Any other questions about tranquility practice? Yes? Yes. Letting go of your ideas and your beliefs is slightly different than letting go of your thinking.

[41:22]

You could be doing thinking simultaneously with letting go of your ideas. So letting go of your ideas is like letting go of your beliefs. Letting go of your belief that your ideas actually reach phenomena. You could be doing thinking at the same time. So the vipassana is actually using your thinking to refute and give up your misconceptions about things. There has to be some tranquility, otherwise you wouldn't be able to apply the teachings. If your mind's too agitated, you can't tell, you know, which is the teachings and which are the phenomena they're supposed to be applied to, so you maybe start applying misconceptions to the teachings and things get pretty balled up if you're really upset. You can start using the teachings to justify all kinds of strange things because you're so confused.

[42:30]

So some level of calm is necessary to actually hear the teachings and apply them properly. But you don't necessarily have to have really deep calm to hear some of the teachings and understand how to apply them and actually apply them. However, if you are So sometimes in some texts, first they have you do tranquility, then they have you move on to the insight. But even in those, after you do some insight work, then they have you bring the insight back to the tranquility again for deeper insight. So at the beginning, tranquility and insight are somewhat different, but gradually they enhance each other. after a while, and many people actually who are trying to practice tranquility, they're very unsuccessful at it, and they start doing insight work, and somehow in the process of doing insight work, which is using discursive thought to listen to the teachings, understand it, and apply it to phenomena, in the process of thinking that way, they actually let go of their discursive thought more

[43:45]

and they're using the discursive thought than they do when they're trying to let go of discursive thought. So some people get more calm doing insight work than they do when they directly try to do tranquility work. Just like some people, a lot of people actually, can get more calm doing tea ceremony than they can when they try to sit in meditation. Or people can get more calm playing the piano than they can just sitting meditation. quietly because the involvement the hand-eye coordination necessary in the discursive thought that's necessary for to play the piano also involves giving up other kinds of discursive thought like you have on your face and whether people like you or not and, you know, what for lunch. This kind of stuff, in order to play the piano, sometimes you have to give up.

[44:46]

So then all you're doing is just doing some mathematical calculations in relationship to your fingers, and that, for some people, a radical reduction in involvement in discursive thought. So they feel much calmer, even though they're doing this complex mental activity, because a whole bunch of other activities which agitate them have been dropped. And some other people, again, they've heard insight meditation. When they try to do it, they get very upset. But they've heard it, and they don't understand it. But then they sit in meditation of the tranquility type, and when they calm down, suddenly they go, oh. I get it, and they understand the insight instruction, which they couldn't understand when they were actually trying to do insight instruction, but they understood it when they were doing tranquility meditation. So a lot of Zen students have the experience, I think, actually, of while they're sitting practicing tranquility, understanding the Dharma teaching which they heard.

[45:54]

And then they think that they just realized it through practicing tranquility, but actually they forgot that somebody told them that thing, and they're just finally hearing it. You know, it got lodged in them in a state of education. They didn't even think they heard it, but actually it was registered, and suddenly they think, oh, I... That can happen. Yes? Yeah. Yes. Yes. Uh-huh. What time is the kitchen leaving? 10.15?

[47:01]

Okay. You started by saying sometimes your mind is, or your attention is facing out, looking out. Your mind is over there or it's looking over there. It's seeing something over there. So the usual state of cognition is a sense of a mind or a subject which means a subject to consciousness knowing something. And then what is known seems to be out there. Even if what's known is like a feeling, it's like there's a kind of like, even though the feeling might be inside my body in a sense, there's a sense that there's a knowing of the feeling and the feeling is out there vis-a-vis the knowing. That's the normal way things appear. is they appear out there and then the knowing is over here or in here.

[48:07]

That's the normal dualistic way of experiencing things. Okay, and then you're saying that sometimes when you're looking at that, something turns around? . Yeah, so one possibility is that when we notice, when we become aware that there is a sense of in here being aware of out there, when you start to sense that duality, that subject-object interaction. So the subject-object interaction is affirmed in the Buddhist teaching that there is a subject-object relationship. And the tradition teaches that people feel like the subject and object are substantially separated. But they're not substantially separated is the response to that.

[49:13]

That's an illusion that they're really two different things. They're different but not in being. When you start to become aware of that feeling, the feeling of the difference, and then the feeling of the difference in being, that's a step in meditation. And then maybe what sometimes people feel is that when they start to notice, oh, this is kind of like the awareness side, and then there's this thing out there which is not the awareness side, but it has something to do with the awareness because it's what I'm aware of. and you come back and say, this is the awareness side, and then it's almost as though you're aware of the awareness. And there's basically two views in Buddhism on that. Some people feel that you can't really be aware of the awareness. Other people say you can. The people who say you can't be, they would say that as soon as you become aware of the awareness, really what you're doing is you're making your awareness into a concept. of the awareness.

[50:15]

And then you have the subject, which knows the object, which is the idea of the subject. Other people say, no, you can really turn around and look at the mind. So those are two possibilities. That one is that the mind can actually be self-aware. That's sometimes called apperceptive cognition, that the mind can know the mind. The other would be, no, the mind can't know the mind. The mind can only know the mind as it's seen as an object, as a concept of the mind. But still, that kind of experience might be quite different when you feel like you're, in a sense, that you're turning around and looking at the mind, whether it's an image or an idea of the mind or the mind itself, it's quite different than looking at things as though they're out there. So, in a sense, you might feel like maybe you had a taste of nonduality there, that actually you had a little slight of the thing called the cognition or the understanding that phenomena are actually just the mind.

[51:36]

And this is a cognition which is talked about as basically samadhi, when you realize that what you're aware of is really one-pointed with mind. It's not really out there. Maybe that was a moment of samadhi for you. Anything else on tranquility? Yes? Yeah, uh-huh. Yes? Yes? I don't know. Pardon? Yeah. Wisdom work is to use discursive mind to go beyond discursive mind.

[52:46]

But not just discursive mind, but dualistic mind. Discursive mind is the mind which runs around among duality. It's a thinking mind. But there's also a basic misconception or ignorance which discursive mind can be based on. So you could say you can use discursive mind to become free of discursive mind, but you can also say you can use discursive mind to become free of dualistic mind. Bogan also says that words and phrases are discriminating consciousness or dualistic consciousness. And you can use words and phrases to liberate dualistic consciousness. another way to put it. Words and phrases require dualistic consciousness and really are dualistic consciousness.

[53:50]

But they can be used to liberate us from dualistic consciousness. And you need discursive thought to apply words and phrases usually. You need discursive thought to make sentences. Well, I asked if you wanted to have any questions about tranquility, but so far I have heard almost no questions about tranquility, which is fine. Looks like you want to study wisdom teachings. Even though I myself will also spend part of my time practicing tranquility, I actually do it quite a bit. I just don't use any contrivance. And it's a good practice, good to do, but it looks like you either understand, aren't interested, or are embarrassed to ask questions, which is fine. Yes?

[54:54]

What you just said, you do it without contriving? Yes. What do you mean by that? I mean, I don't do anything. really, to practice tranquility. I just sit and let go of discouraged thought. I don't really do that. I just don't get involved. It's like I don't go to Monterey. And that's how I calm down. But that's not really something I really do. So again, what is it... And that non-involvement can extend itself to insight meditation, too. Yashan was sitting in meditation one time and Shirtel came up to him and said, What are you doing? You know that story? No. He was sitting and his teacher said, What are you doing?

[55:55]

And Yashan said, I'm not doing anything at all. And Shirtel said, Well, then you're idly sitting? And Yashan said, if I was idly sitting, I would be doing something. And Shirito said, you said you're not doing anything. What is it you're not doing? And Yashan said, even the 10,000 sages don't know. So that can be a tranquility meditation and a wisdom meditation. But basically, I don't do something to realize tranquility. I used to, but I don't anymore. How is that helpful for me to hear that? Like, I'm trying to tell if I'm trying to get a hold of some kind of tranquility practice, but it seems like mundane minds,

[56:59]

running and chasing after things happen. Like, I'll be thinking about something that I need to do, and I get excited about thinking about it. And then all of a sudden, I'm excited. And I realize that I'm excited. And then I take a deep breath, usually, and then come back to the sort of calming thing. You know? But that seems very, like, that seems like, like, come back to your breath seems like doing something. And what I hear you saying is that You're not doing anything. Yeah, I don't come back to my breath. If I notice I'm agitated, I don't come back to my breath. What do you do when you're agitated? If I was agitated, I would just say, oh, I'm agitated, and that's it. That'd be it. I just notice I'm agitated, and that's period. And that calms me. But if I notice I'm agitated, and then I drag myself over to be a meditator, that agitates me again. I just let myself be where I am.

[58:02]

I don't drag myself over to be someplace else so I can calm down. In other words, I don't seek tranquility if I'm agitated. I find seeking tranquility contraindicated for tranquility. I find breathing in and out and being in physical sensation of breathing Okay. It's not a hundred percent, but there's something helpful in that for me. I don't count it, but I guess I'm trying to... I don't know what I'm trying to do, but it's... You said you find... You find... What did you say? You find... Like breathing in and out and being with a physical sensation? You find breathing in and out helpful, right? Okay, well, most people do.

[59:03]

Okay? And then you could say, I find breathing in, period, and breathing out, period, helpful. You're usually breathing in and breathing out, right? But so one way to reinterpret what you said was, I find just breathing in when I'm breathing in and just breathing out when I'm breathing out helpful. Because usually when I'm breathing in, I'm planning various things along with my breathing in. In other words, I'm involved in discursive thought. I'm caught up in discursive thought while I'm breathing. But when I'm just breathing when I'm breathing and not being discursive about it, I find that helpful. So I think what you find helpful is giving up discursive thought, not the breathing in and breathing out which you're doing all day long. The special thing that you find helpful is that sometimes when you're breathing, you're not doing discursive thought.

[60:05]

And then when you're not doing discursive thought, you might notice you're breathing a little bit more than when you are doing discursive thought. That might happen. But you wouldn't necessarily notice it, but you might. Like I said, when you forget about yourself, you may notice that you're breathing. because, in fact, you are all the time. It's always there to be noticed and enjoyed. But to direct myself over to it has the potential to become addictive in the sense that I think, you know, I've got to do this to have my life rather than I'm breathing anyway, and all I've got to do is give up distraction and I'll just be a breather. So I think that's what you described, I think, is that basically you didn't do anything. You just were breathing without doing anything, and that's what you found helpful. It's that you were breathing and you were with what you were doing without trying to do anything with it.

[61:13]

That, I think, was what was helpful, not the breathing, which is the basic thing, of course, that's helpful in the sense of being alive. But then in terms of helpful for tranquility, I think, was you gave... you give up discursive thought there for a little bit. And it's immediately calming, maybe, to give up discursive thought. But then after you do it for a while, you get even calmer. So then you can even start doing discursive thought again and still feel calm. Does that make sense? But when you're just following your breathing, if it's really helpful, I don't think you're trying to do anything. If you're trying to do something, I would say that that would be breathing in and trying to do something about it and breathing out and trying to do something about it. That extra thing you're trying to do is discursive and I think is antithetical to calm. Giving up trying to calm down is conducive to calming down.

[62:16]

Seeking calm is antithetical to it. Giving up trying to calm down is giving up a form of discursive thought. Seeking calm is involving yourself in a form of discursive thought. It's jerking yourself around. But just breathing, without even mentioning it, you've given up discursive thought. Without even trying to give up discursive thought, you just have, in fact, given up discursive thought. Does that make sense? It's like that Don Juan, pardon? I also do think I'm jerking myself around because I'd rather be calm than agitated. Yeah. To be agitated and say, fine, I'm agitated, that's calm. That's what a calm person does. Calm people, when they're agitated, say, yeah, that's me, Mr. Agitated. Hi. Agitated people, when they're calm, they're agitated.

[63:24]

Because they're, oh my God, somebody might take it away. What's going to happen to me? I got to keep it, you know. And when they're agitated, they say, this is really terrible. I've been trying to get calm and I'm just getting more and more agitated. This is like horrible. I'm just getting worse and worse, you know, rather than, hey, I'm agitated. That's what's happening, you know. Anybody agitated here? Yeah, me. It's like, that's what calm people do. They're like, they don't have a problem being agitated. It's like, Hey, this is my house. I'm agitated house. You know, it's like night, wherever you are. You know that story of Don Juan and Carlos Castaneda? It's probably not a true story, but it applies. You know, you're supposed to find a spot. You know that one, the beginning, the first book? You're supposed to go find your spot. See you later. And so he spends a whole night just, you know, totally a wreck, you know, looking for his spot.

[64:28]

And then he goes to see Don Juan in the morning, and Don Juan says, find your spot. And he said, no. He said, where did you go to sleep? I said, over there. He said, that's your spot. It's where you just kind of give up and stop trying to make yourself into a great meditator. That's when you become calm. And when you do insight work, you're still not supposed to be trying to make yourself into a great meditator. You're supposed to understand what's going on. You're not trying to make yourself into something. You're actually interested in what is going on. Lauren? I'm not exactly advising.

[65:31]

I'm just telling you what I think is actually In other words, I'm saying this is swimming and this thing here is not swimming. But if you think this helps you to swim, okay. But I just want to make clear that's not really helping you swim. That's actually hindering your swimming. Except if you refuse to get in the pool without the skyhook, then use the skyhook. Fine. But I'm just trying to make clear where the actual pivot of the tranquility process works. That's all. I'm not telling you not to do these other things which don't really relate. So, for example, also like, I don't know, if being paid to meditate would help. Fine, but the actual money doesn't help you calm down necessarily. It's the actual, when you get the money and you feel, hey, I'm rich now. I don't have to worry. And you give up worry, then it's the actual giving up the worry that did it, not the money.

[66:32]

Some people, if you give them money to meditate, then they spend the whole time being afraid somebody's going to take it, so it doesn't work. So I'm just trying to point out what actually is the key. But I'm not telling you not to use other things which aren't the key. You can do it and find out for yourself. But also I'm saying to you that when you do these other things and you don't like them, it makes sense that you wouldn't like them because they're not really appropriate. So don't be upset if you're trying all these techniques and they don't work because they don't. They're actually distractions which are slightly better than some other kinds of distractions. If it wasn't that good, I say, sure. Like also Dogen said one time in an interview on TV, Japanese TV, he would ask, well, what do you recommend for your students? He said, just sit. And And you mean you sit and you don't do anything?

[67:36]

He said, yeah. He said, that accomplishes the way. And he says, yeah. And he said, what about koan study? He said, that's good too. And he said, the interviewer said, well, I thought you said you just tell your students just to sit. He said, I do, but some of them won't sit unless you give them a koan. So some people won't sit without a skyhook. Some people won't give up discursive thought without getting paid or whatever. In some places they, you know, they have other things they do, but really the thing that makes it happen is just giving up the discursive thought. That's what I'm saying. I'm not exactly advising you to do insight meditation or tranquility meditation. I'm just saying it's good and this is how it happened. Okay? But trial and error may be helpful for you to, like, be sure But these other methods actually aren't necessary. Dova? Almost since the practice period started, my mind has been extremely agitated.

[68:43]

And I sit here almost every period of the day trying to figure out how to do this or that. Problem solving, basically. I'm not used to that happening. And so I've been having difficulty having an exercise mind. Yeah, maybe you should change your seat. Would you be willing to change places with her, Anna? Of course, that whole neighborhood there is kind of agitated. So you're not used to meditating and agitation. Right. Yeah. That's why we didn't make you Eno the first practice period. I think I'm kind of attached to having a calm mind. And some people tell me I'm a calm person. And so being so educated is really uncomfortable for me. So I think what I'm trying to say is just accepting that I have an educated mind right now.

[69:55]

Definitely. If you have an agitated mind, I recommend if you have an agitated mind to accept that you have an agitated mind. It's a real good idea. However, I'm not saying agitated mind itself is pleasant. I'm not saying it is. I'm just saying if you've got an unpleasant state of mind, why make it worse? Don't you have enough problems? You know? Most people do, don't you? You seem to. So now you've got problems, why don't you relax and be calm? Now that you've established that you're really upset and agitated. Or do you think, no, I'm upset and agitated, so I should continue to be miserable and agitated. Fine. No problem. Can you enjoy that? Yes, you can. Yeah, it's a new experience.

[71:00]

Hakuin used to, I think it was Hakuin, he used to take his monks out of the zendo, get on horses and they'd ride through the crowds in Tokyo to see if they could continue to become in the, in the, that situation. And some of them said, you know, that was, that is a test to see if, you know, and you may feel like, well, so far this is like, this, you know, test is, the test is, I have, the agitation part has happened, I got that part down, which, which is, you know, were you warned about this, by the way, beforehand? Yeah. You weren't? Oh. Who offered you this position? Who offered you this position? He didn't tell her? That she was going to be agitated all the time?

[72:05]

You forgot to tell her that? Did you know about that? So anyway, he's sorry that you didn't tell her? He's sorry. Hithari didn't tell you, you should have been warned beforehand that you'd be entering into the marketplace in a situation where you usually think is like being in the calm, deep mountains. But now actually you're like in the ghetto. You know, you're in central L.A. And now, whatever happens, Tova, relax. whatever. We don't need you to get upset about all this agitation. Right? We don't need her to get upset about the agitation, do we? No. It's okay if she's agitated. We accept that, don't we? And we're relaxed with your agitation. Well, some of us are anyway. Maybe the Dolans aren't.

[73:07]

But basically, you can be agitated. We're relaxed with you being agitated. We love you. You can relax too. Okay? I'm sorry you didn't know beforehand that you were going to be in this situation, but now you know. Somebody else who recently became Eno was actually told beforehand, I believe by the abbot, that she would be in a new environment during meditation, that the bliss of meditation might not be available in the form that she was used to. And I believe that the term personal practice was used, that her personal practice might be out the window. But, you know, I said, well, personal practice? That's not really what we're doing here. So, anyway, you have your own experiences like agitation, but This job, in many ways, one of the great opportunities of being a doan is to see if you can be calm and take care of the zendo in the midst of, or be calm in the midst of the agitation of taking care of the zendo, of time and space and all the events that you have to take care of.

[74:37]

Can you be calm in the midst of all that? And so that's the opportunity. And so that's possible, that you will be able to relax with all this agitation, all these changes that are happening moment by moment in the Zendo. Yes? You're agitated with the Eno? Do you mean you join her agitation? Yeah, you're part of her agitated life. You're part of her agitation. She's part of your agitation. Yeah, zero. I didn't quite follow the thing about, you said something about tranquility, technique, and then you said something about inherent existence.

[76:12]

Yes. Yes. Did you say someone's counting their breath, for example? And did you say that counting the breath is based on belief in inherent existence? Did you say that? I didn't quite hear you. I agree. But I just want to point out that if you don't believe in inherent existence, if you don't believe that anymore,

[77:19]

that fantasy, you can count your breath without, you know, no problem. And if you do believe in it, you can also count your breath. In both cases, you can count your breath. Right? Does that make sense? Just I'm thinking about this idea and reality of agitation. Yeah, by the way, there's an idea of agitation, and there's the reality of agitation. Yes? I mean, the teachings seem to say that subjective emotions rise based on clinging to the idea of . Right. That's what they say. But you can be calm, even while still believing in inherent existence, you can still become very calm.

[78:31]

So the Buddha is the example. He became very calm and he had some friends who also became very calm. They were very good at tranquility meditation, but they still were ignoring the lack of inherent existence of phenomena. So you can become very calm while still believing that things inherently exist. However, the mechanism by which you become calm is that you give up the discursive thought which emanates from your belief in inherent existence. And if you don't believe in inherent existence, you can also practice tranquility, and that still involves the giving up of discursive thought. However, in this case, when you don't believe in inherent existence, in other words, when you're not ignorant anymore, You can still have discursive thought, but your discursive thought is not based on belief in inherent existence. It's now discursive thought, which is coming from wisdom.

[79:34]

You can still have discursive thought, but whether you're a wise person or not so wise, still, in both cases, if you give up discursive thought, you calm down. If you relax with your discursive thought, you realize your tranquility. Does that make sense? It doesn't look like it does. Yeah, you're thinking that's the problem. You look like you're thinking something else rather than listening to me. But I know probably what you're thinking was equally interesting. It's hard to listen to both channels simultaneously. And I didn't have to listen to yours. But what I said really was brilliant as on tape. Yes? By the way, I want to say, now that we're getting into the twilight zone here, that when these discussions get long, if you need to go to the bathroom or see a doctor about anything, if you need what are called root canals or anything,

[80:55]

Please go ahead. Take care of yourself. Don't feel trapped in the prison of this talk. Okay? Yes? ... [...] Do you say lose it? I don't know about losing it. I don't think you really lose it. I think you just can let go of it. You can let go of it. You can stop believing it. But I don't think you lose your ability to imagine this thing. Stop believing. That's it.

[81:57]

All I've got to do is stop believing this wonderful totally impossible idea of independent existence. Just stop believing it. Well, if we say that, as if it's just stop believing it, it's like believe it or don't believe it. And we have to experience as if we experience it, that we see through it, we stop believing it, we don't believe it, we think we don't believe it, and then we experience something and we don't believe it. That, what, that, that distorts the quality. Uh-huh. Well, I think, you know, well, it's just like somebody, maybe somebody, you think somebody's not your friend and they tell you, no, I really am your friend. And then you say, oh, I see. Oh, I get it. And then the next day you think, no, I don't think he is my friend. You know, and then they say, now you're acting that way again. You don't look like my friend. They say, no, I really am, blah, blah, blah, blah. And you say, oh, I get it. And you're back and forth, back and forth. And then finally someday you finally get it that no matter what they do, you're never...

[82:57]

you're never tricked again. You always remember, this is my friend. Wisdom can be deepened indefinitely. Now, there comes a point in the process where certain levels of reversion don't happen anymore, but even then it can go deeper. So all of this basically heard the teaching and it makes sense to us that, of course, everybody knows things depend on conditions for their existence. We all know that. But our mind says, fine, you know that, and then it puts something, but this thing here exists by itself. It put that out there. And we're also like, yeah. So that's going on. That's been going on for a long time. So this other thing is educational process We're listening to this teaching over and over, and the more we listen to it, generally speaking, the more it makes sense, the deeper we believe it.

[83:58]

But it still hasn't really like totally been strong enough so that we don't slip back into believing this appearance anymore. I mean like really not believing it. Maybe some little breaks, which is great, but then the next day we seem to be believing it again. So that's the gradual side of practice is to like, go from suspecting that maybe the way we see things maybe isn't right to actually really be convinced that the way we see things is not correct and that the way we see it and to actually see how we see things independent, to get a feeling for that, and actually see also how that's painful and frightening and all that. And you can see, even before you stop believing false appearances, you can see that your misery arises from them.

[85:02]

That can be seen early in the process, how your self-concern and pain and all that stuff comes from this belief in the way you seem to be separate. But to give it up really deeply takes a long time, right? Apparently. We're taking quite a while to get over it, right? Maybe that's enough for this morning. What do you think? Everybody had enough? May our intention equally penetrate every being of grace.

[85:50]

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