Good morning. Well, today is the last day of Sashin. Can you hear me? Today is the last day of Sashin and we're almost at our last a few periods of zazen. But I think we should remember that until we get to the very end, it's not the end. As Yogi Berra used to say, it ain't over until it's over. So I want us to keep our energy and our effort consistent to the end.

[01:03]

This is a characteristic of Sashin. From beginning to end, no matter how we feel or what's happening, we continue. And this is a very important characteristic of Buddhist practice and especially Zen practice. we begin something and we finish and in between all hell can break loose. So to practice within every changing state of mind and body So when we make a commitment to keep that commitment, and this has been the basis of our practice period as well, I ask you to make the commitment which you can make, and then

[02:31]

To keep that commitment is the basis of practice. So he asked. I did ask. So we will have lunch, and then we have a break, and then we have a work period. And then we will have show song. We're going to have show song before show song. Yeah, whatever. Yeah, Zazen and then Shoshan.

[03:47]

And my point is that during the break and during the work period, we should act like it's still Zazen, it's still Shoshan. That's my point. Sometimes we see ourselves getting to the end and then we have a break and then we have the work period and everybody starts breaking down and talking and acting as if, well, you know, it's just about over. So I would like us to be mindful of that and not break down at that point, but to continue in the same spirit all the way through to the end. So the last thing after our Zazen period will be Shosan. And you ask me a question and I will respond to your question the best way I can.

[04:55]

And I will try to be as succinct as possible in my response. And you may inquire a little further If it's necessary, and I will respond again, but we don't want to end up in a long conversation, or even in any conversation. Simply questioning and responding. We have a lot of people to go through. and to ask questions and that's the spirit of Shosan. Spirit of Shosan is questions and response and make it very succinct and try to get to the essence of what it is.

[06:02]

Tomorrow, I mean Monday, not Monday, Monday night, we will have the shuso ceremony. And Ross, the shuso, will be responding to your questions. I just want to say that shuso ceremony, the questions should come from the people in the practice period. should be limited to people in the practice period. If someone's in the practice period, not in the practice period, but they want to ask a question, they should ask Ross if it's okay first. Then he may say okay or not okay. But it is limited to people in the practice period. So the same applies

[07:10]

to the shuso's questions. Sometimes the shuso will start, will get caught by the questions and start explaining things. So when the shuso responds to your questions, it shouldn't be explanations, long explanations. And then you ask more and then he explains more and pretty soon the whole thing is lost. The important thing is the spark between the question and the response, even if it's the wrong response. The important thing is the immediacy. That doesn't mean to just say something off the top of your head or immediacy for the sake of immediacy. Sometimes a question should be thought about first, or the response.

[08:18]

But the response should be at the end of the point. And it doesn't matter whether you understand the response or not. Me or them? You're the responder. It doesn't matter whether you understand the response or not. If there's some satisfying response from the shuso, that should be enough. And then you can think about what that means. Actually, to leave us with a question is not so bad. to satisfy us in a superficial way may not be so helpful. If we just continue to satisfy with dualistic responses, the meaning gets lost.

[09:22]

So it's not like an ordinary kind of, please answer my question. We sometimes call Dharma combat. But combat is not, I don't like the word combat so much, but engagement. Engagement is what's important. If you want answers, you can read them in a book. You can get tons of answers from a book. This is not about getting the answer, it's about getting the shoe sole. It's more like not head stuff, but gut stuff. So the shuso should be careful not to just answer from the head all the time, but answer from some deep place.

[10:29]

But however it works out is the way that it works out. So please think of good questions and do some work with the shuso. And there's a certain point at which you shouldn't just be satisfied with the response. If you're satisfied, that's good, but if you feel something missing, then say something again. And then the shuso should be able to pinpoint it a little better, but not to go on and on. The biggest problem with shuso is it's getting caught giving you a

[11:33]

As soon as the shuso starts explaining things, he's lost. Do you have a question about that? I remember in years past, you have been kind enough to take a moment during the ceremony to remind people. I think because there's so much invested in the ceremony, because it's just once a year here at Berkley Zen Center, there's a nice feeling about it and part of it, part of us I think wants this to go on forever. And it's also, it starts at 7.30 and there's a lot of people and it goes into the evening and there's a Well, here's what happens.

[12:47]

In the beginning, the shuso is very nervous, and people ask the question, and he gives the answer, and he goes, boom. And doesn't give the questioner a chance to come back. And you've gone through 10 or 15 people, and then you realize that you have to wait, you know, to cut them off. Don't cut them off right away, but wait for the next response, if there is one. Just give that moment for a response. If there isn't, don't, boom, cut them off before they've had a chance to respond. That way you can monitor it yourself. If you do that yourself, then you won't need the rest. That's the main problem. And then, it's really controlled by the shoe soap. should be in control of the whole thing. So the only time I would say something is if... I've lost control.

[13:52]

It's going on and on and on. Thank you. Another thing I've noticed, and you've commented on sometimes, is people getting into giving speeches of appreciation during the ceremony. Oh, that's okay. I remember one shuso ceremony at Green Gulch, when, I think it was the shuso who invited people to, said, please, let's discuss the dharma. And that set up a tone for discussion, and the thing went on forever. And then everybody said, oh, you're so wonderful. 500 words or more. Can you say a few words about your first shuso ceremony?

[14:57]

My first shuso ceremony? Maybe there's only one. Yeah, there's only one. But a person can be shuso more than once, actually. It's possible. We don't see that so often here. But at Zen Center, there are people who have been shuso twice. So you can't have more than one opportunity. But my first shuso ceremony was at Tassajara. My shuso ceremony was at Tassajara in 1970. And Tatsugami Roshi was my teacher. We'd invited him to come to Tassajara to set up the monastic system. And I was the shuso. He couldn't speak English and I couldn't speak Japanese. But we got along really well and he would talk to me in Japanese and I would understand what he said even though I could not tell you what it was.

[16:00]

I could still understand what he meant most of the time. And the way he set up the shuso ceremony was that I was not facing the people. He said, it should be like questions coming from every direction. And it's not a matter of who you're talking to, just a matter of addressing the question. And so I was sitting facing this way. And then, of course, I knew who it was, because I go like this. And I remember at the end, Connie Gary wrote, she said, oh, what did you think of your shusa ceremony? And I said, I said, what did you think of it? And he said, oh, half good and half bad. No, he said, some things are very good and some things are very bad.

[17:03]

Your neck must have hurt. My what? My neck? but sometimes I wonder if it's the same kind of exchange. Well, it would be nice if it was. But doksan is different because I see somebody once a month, or once every two months, or six months, and it has to be different. It's a different kind of meeting. So shosan is actually group Doksan. And that's the time when we can do that, you know, just that repartee, quick repartee, right? But ordinarily, I mean, if you came in, you know, and we did that for one moment, you say, well, let me see, we didn't talk about all the rest of the questions I had, right?

[18:23]

So, Doksan takes half hour. or 20 minutes, or 40 minutes, or whatever, because we have to talk about your life, you know, once in a while. It's the only time we get to meet. So it's different than Sashin, Rinzai style Sashin, where dokusan is four times a day because you're working on your koan. Different. But, In my recent sesshins, I've been saying 10-minute dokusan, which actually is really good. And last sesshin, I said 5-minute dokusan, which was even better. So I like that a lot. If we have 5-minute dokusan during sesshin, it's a different kind of dokusan. And you can have dokusan more than once because we go through everybody more quickly. Really? I recently was visiting with a teacher.

[19:27]

It's not this kind of discursive discussion. It seems like an interesting testification. Yeah, that is good. In the old days in China, when they would give a lecture, the monks would all stand up. Do you really want to come to the lecture or not? Well, there are many different ways of doing something, and I'm not adverse to experimenting with them. So, Jin, I'm wondering, I don't know if it's said that the shuso face outward, I guess it's up to you and Ross, Is that right? It's up to me.

[21:06]

It's up to you. It's not up to him. What if the Shusod faced the wall? Well, it'd be hard to hear his answers. And people would be talking in the back of his head. Couldn't we be on the other side of the wall? That's the only time we ever did that. Well, I think there might be some merit to it, and I think it might eliminate some of the... A lot of the conversational... Yeah, the exchanges that are really extraneous. Yeah, I don't know how to manage that, but it's an interesting concept, I think.

[22:12]

It is, yeah. For what it's worth, I would be willing to try it. He would be willing to try it. Only if there's a mirror. There is. And some smoke. We've got the mirror, we've got the smoke. Yes. I heard someone say yesterday that speaking from, just to say the first thing that comes to one's mind. Actually, he was referring to the shuso and just the first response is the appropriate response. As far as asking a question from one's hara. I mean, what if something, I always worry that something

[23:19]

An inappropriate will be said. In my opinion, if I say something, if I say anything at all, or ask anything at all, it just seems like it would be wrong, or it could be wrong. You have to edit it first. Too much editing is the wrong response. You want the wrong response, even if it's what you don't consider logically correct. As Lao Tzu says, the greatest eloquence is like stuttering. So sometimes you can't really put your most eloquent thought or feeling into words. And the more you try to word it, the further away you get from it, because You know, it's not it anymore.

[24:23]

So, maybe better to just... First thought, you know, is taking a big chance. And, you know, it may just be crazy, right? Crazy thought. So, first thought doesn't necessarily mean the first thing that pops into your head. But it means the unedited first response. Or first question. Or whatever, yeah. and for Ross, I mean, it's sort of like giving us, you can sit, I sort of gave us the assignment, or even a question, and it's sort of like I'm checking, it's preparing, like to prepare for Dogosan, so you don't waste that time, and so... Well, you don't have to sit there thinking up a question.

[25:40]

Okay. When you sit down for either Shosan or the Shuso ceremony, that's when you start thinking of your question. When we've had shosan in the past, it seemed like people were asking you questions about the dharma, and you were giving responses, and it seems like your suggestion for a shuso ceremony is different. It's to get a shuso and not a response or an answer. No, same. That's what I was going to ask you. Should we bring the same approach to both ceremonies? Yeah. It's good to ask the so-called dharma question. Sometimes people say, what are we having for dinner? That's OK. But the shuso should be able to turn it into a dharma response. Somebody did ask that question. They do it all the time. The shuso should be able to turn it into a dharma response.

[26:41]

So whatever you toss, he should be able to toss something back at you, which who will stop your mouth. We say, cut off the tongues of everyone in the world. Never. Never make the other person appear foolish. Make the other person feel as foolish as they are. Yes, that's quite different. The response is a mirror.

[27:45]

The response is a mirror to the question. And so you see your question mirrored as a response. If it's a foolish question, you may get gold instead of, you know, in return for mud. But who knows? What's a foolish question? Oh, leaving.

[28:47]

That's a good question to ask. What did you do during Sashim? What I try to do every day. What's that? Pay attention. To what? Whatever's coming up. What the heart highlights. You've answered your own question. I think what he's asking is how do you keep away other forces? Keep away other forces? From paying attention. From ruining your mind? How do you protect yourself? What do you use to help you to pay attention? Well, if you practice Zazen every day, that helps you.

[30:04]

If you study a little bit every day, that helps you, because that gives you some question. Also, if you think about the precepts, that's helpful. There are many aids, you know, or supports for our practice. Keeping your mind focused on practice. So if you pay attention to breathing, paying attention to breath is the most basic practice. So that you breathe in harmony with all of your activity. So zazen is the harmonization of body, breath, and mind. And activity is the harmonization of body, breath, and mind.

[31:12]

You breathe with all of your activity. Breathe into your activity. Harmonize the breath and the activity, so that when you're doing something, you're always doing it Do you know how your breath is harmonizing with your activity? And you know whether you're breathing shallow or breathing deeply. This is very important. Is this a shallow breath or is this a deep breath? If you keep a deep breath all the time, then you're always centered. You know whether you're breathing deep or shallow. I often say to people, where's your breath right now? I don't know. You should always know. There should never be a moment when you don't know whether your breath is deep or shallow.

[32:16]

And from time to time during the day, You know, we go from one movement to the next. We make a continuous movement of our life. But actually, there is space between activities, and sometimes you should just stop between activities and breathe. Pay attention to re-establish your breathing, and just be quiet for a minute, and then go into the next activity. So this is not intellectual. You don't have to read anything. You don't have to study anything. You just study the Self. You just pay attention. That's called studying the Self. Studying the Self is paying attention to where the breath is, paying attention to how the body moves, paying attention to how the emotions come up.

[33:22]

paying attention to how the feelings appear and paying attention to what it is that the mind is thinking about. What kind of thoughts is the mind thinking about? So this is observation. That's how we practice and remind ourselves So the mind is wandering and we remind it. There's a question that my son, Daniel, asked to various Shusos. One was a Shuso and one was... And his question was, if We say, to get rid of desire.

[34:25]

In Buddhism, they say, get rid of desire. But isn't the thought of getting rid of desire also a desire? The desire to get rid of desire is also a desire. What about that? Which is a really good question. The desire means desire for ego satisfaction. In Buddhism, that's what desire means. Desire means desire for that which is not good for you. And the desire to get rid of desire is not exactly the same kind of desire. That desire is called way-seeking mind. Just a minute. That desire is called way-seeking mind instead of desire. But it is a desire. So desire for ego satisfaction, which is self-centered, is not the same as desire.

[35:35]

It's the same impetus, it's the same impulse. But when it's turned toward dharma, it's called way-seeking mind instead of desire. Can't you want to get rid of desire because your ego finds that it hurts to desire things, so you're just trying to help your ego out to deliver? Yeah, we don't really get rid of desire. That's the point. We turn desire toward freedom rather than enslavement. Desire for freedom, which is different than desire, see, because we don't realize That's why it's called delusion, because we don't realize that the desires for ego satisfaction is actually enslavement. We keep putting ourselves under suppression by thinking that we have this freedom.

[36:41]

That's the delusion. And we're all subject to it. That's the difficult part. That's what we're always dealing with all the time. I want this, I like it, and it's not good for me. And the more I do it, the more I'm enslaved to it, the more I have to do it. So we become habituated to our desires. And although it's nice, In the end, it crouches on our freedom. And what looks like nothing is freedom. Once you explain, which has been very nice for me to remember because it's very simple, it's egocentric versus buddha-centric. Buddha-centric, yeah.

[37:43]

To be centered on Buddha rather than centered on ego. It also seems like where you're seeking mind isn't a place to get to, it's a practice. It isn't a place to get to, it's a practice. It's a practice, yeah. It's not a place to get to. It seems like, you know, there's that invitation in practice to shift the focus from getting that place to accepting that we have to practice with that forever. Right. We do. That's right. I think that the difference between desire and a vow is that a desire has an object, and when we vow to end delusions, it doesn't have an object, because they're numberless. Yeah, the difference is called living by karma or living by vow. Living by karma is to just allow yourself to

[38:46]

allow the karma to accumulate through habit energy, through your actions, and to continue that cycle. And living by vow is to turn the karmic activity to activity which does not produce That's a simple way of saying it. Simplistic way of saying it. Yeah? Do you approach both, what was it you called it, the mind desire versus the desire for self, in a neutral fashion? That is, you don't emotionally, when you see it, you don't... I think if I understand what you're saying, vow or non-karmic activity is intentional and then when the intention

[40:22]

is facing practice or dharma, then it flows that way. And when desire is just allowing karma to determine your life, then it flows that way. Well, that's a good point. What I was thinking of was, I'm going to Tassajara after this until the 4th of July. And then when I come back, I was thinking of setting up more classes for the people who wanted to come and just go on for a while.

[41:26]

There should be an end to it. It shouldn't just be open-ended. I don't know what that end is yet, but after I come back I'll set something up.

[41:36]

@Text_v004
@Score_JJ