I am bound to taste the dread that lies at the back of those boots. When we look at what's fundamental in our practice, I think we have to take a look at our bodhisattva vows.

[01:06]

Bodhisattva vow, according to the way we translate it, says, beings are numberless. I vow to awaken with them. Delusions are inexhaustible. I vow to let go of them. The Buddha Dharma, the Dharma gates are boundless, I vow to enter them. The Buddha way is unsurpassable, I vow to become it. This is one way of translating it. There are many ways of translating the Bodhisattva vows. The first one to sentient beings, or beings, Sometimes we say sentient beings, sometimes we say beings. Beings is more inclusive.

[02:10]

Sentient seems to be more limited. But actually, in Buddhism, in Mahayana, we say everything is sentient. Everything on this side is sentient. rocks and water, all the elements are sentient. But we usually think of sentient beings as people and animals and we have a demarcation. But plants are sentient because they have feelings. I don't know what a rock feels like. But as I often say, if you watch Sesame Street, you'll see that the rocks talk. Where are you? Anyway.

[03:11]

Beings are numberless. I vow to save them. So that's the original. Saving is the original translation. But we say, awaken with. The reason why we say awaken with is because saving sounds like I am gonna do something. How am I gonna, seems like this impossible task of saving all beings. And it also has a kind of self-promoting characteristic of I am going to do something for you or for everyone. But that's good. It's altruistic. Awaken with has more the feeling of, when I awaken, everyone is awake. This is more like when Buddha was enlightened, he said, I and all sentient beings, after I just woke up, and I realized that all sentient beings, including myself, are the Tathagata.

[04:20]

So, I like experimenting with various ways to say something, because there's no one way that says everything. And yet, any term you use says everything, if you understand it. So, saving all sentient beings, it's understood that it doesn't cover everything, but we use it as a term to mean it covers everything. Awaken with is the same, or any term you use. As a matter of fact, in Zen parlance, we just use words indiscriminately, because any word you use will convey the meaning if you understand. So you can say yes to mean no. You can mean no to mean yes. if you understand how it's used. So, in the Platform Sutra of the Sixth Ancestor of Zen in China, someone asks him about the impossibility of saving all beings.

[05:39]

And the sixth ancestor, Hui Nung, says, it doesn't mean that I, Hui Nung, am personally going to save every being. He says it means to save the beings, the sentient beings of my own mind. To save all sentient beings means to save the sentient beings of your own mind. What are the sentient beings of your own mind? the delusive mind, the angry mind, the malicious mind, the greedy mind, and so forth. So we do this for the sake of all beings. I save my mind from anger for the sake of all sentient beings. So, how do we do such a thing?

[06:50]

You know, many people, in my years of practice, I've run into many people who say, I can't take those vows because I can't live up to them. But that's partly because of misunderstanding of the meaning and partly thinking that there's a certain kind of perfection that you have to do everything always right all the time, otherwise you can't practice. If that were the case, there wouldn't be anyone practicing. So we have to be careful about our idea of doing something in a perfectionist way and realizing that what we call bad is only a part of our practice in the same way that what we call good is a part of our practice.

[08:01]

So what are some of these sentient beings of our own mind that we have to deal with? So I made a little list here. I think I read it once before. You may or may not remember it. Sometimes people come up to me and say, why don't you talk about this and that? And I think, well, I talk about that all the time. Why don't you hear that? Anyway. Suzuki Roshi always talked about the gaining mind. The mind that wants something. The first noble truth is sentient beings are subject to suffering.

[09:13]

We can't avoid suffering in our life. And the second one is, what's the cause of that? And the stereotypical answer is desire. But we say delusions. And I remember, Somebody asked Suzuki Roshi once, don't you think delusions is better than desire for a translation? And he said, no, desire. Because desire, although, desire has many different meanings. There's desire for something harmful and there's desire for something good. So desire in itself, is not good or bad. It's simply how it's used or how we're caught by something.

[10:20]

So desire in itself is rather innocent, but there are various provocations that create desire to come up and become attached to the object. So in our present day society, we're inundated with things that we're supposed to desire, and we're bombarded with advertisement, seductive advertisement. to become attached to one thing or another, or many things all at once. And then, of course, these desires lead to a dead end, or the objects of these desires lead to a dead end. So when Buddha is talking about desire as being the cause of suffering, he's talking about being caught by something,

[11:34]

not being free enough so that we can put our attention into wholesome activities instead of being caught by objects which are dead ants in themselves. It's like going through the maze, actually. This is why mazes are so interesting, because there's all these dead ends called desire, objects of desire. But there's one way that goes through the maze and comes out the other end. And that one way, one path, is the path that's not caught by objects of desire. That's actually what the meaning of Buddhist practice, or the way of Buddhist practice, is not to be sidetracked or caught by objects of desire, so that you get sidetracked and fall into dead ends.

[12:55]

So there's a little quote I have from Suzuki Roshi about gaining idea. He says, real practice has orientation and direction, but it has no purpose or gaining idea. So it includes everything that comes along. So gaining idea, it means that we want something from our labors. We live in a comparative society, society of comparative values. So whenever we choose something, we're always comparing it to something else. We compare good looking to bad looking.

[14:05]

We compare tall to short. We compare good to bad and so forth. So this is one level of how we live and how we develop ourselves. It's exchange value. This is worth something and this is not worth so much. I'll pay so much for this and not so much for that. So this is the world of exchange value and comparative values. But practice is free from the world of comparative values. It's like not getting caught by things. Thinking that we actually have something. So, When we awaken with all beings, it also means to free ourself and all beings.

[15:07]

To find perfect freedom from being caught by things. But what do we do if we're not caught by things? Where is the joy of life if we're not caught by it? That's an interesting question. Where do we find our satisfaction if we're not caught by things? if we're not captivated, seduced. So, there are not so many people that are interested in this. Even I am not so interested in this. But I know that it's the truth. So I have to Be careful. So, sometimes people think of gaining idea as, well, you know, if I eat an ice cream cone, is that a gaining idea?

[16:16]

Or if I get paid for my work, is that a gaining idea? That's not what he means by gaining idea. Gaining idea means that in the realm of non-comparative values, you don't get something other than what you do. You don't get something besides what you are involved with. The satisfaction comes from our activity itself. It's like going to work, and your work is very satisfying, and then at the end of the week, there's a check, and you say, what's that for? Oh. So, in practice, there are benefits.

[17:17]

but you don't practice to get benefits. You simply practice for the sake of practice. We simply practice for practice, then we know what we're doing. As soon as you have an idea about practice being beneficial, then you lose, it's easy to lose the reality of what practice is. Soon as you want to get something from it, or obtain something. So practice is letting go. It's not getting something. So it's very hard to let go of that idea of gaining. If you sit zazen, very nice things will happen, but you don't practice for those nice things to happen. And if you practice because those nice things happen, you get seduced by practice, or you get seduced by your gaining mind.

[18:29]

So it's very hard to simply practice for the sake of practice. That's why we say, don't practice, don't get caught by your feelings in practice. we have to practice through our intention. Intention is our decision, our vow of practice. Vow of practice is our intention. So it doesn't matter whether we're feeling good or feeling bad, or whether practice is good for us or not good for us, we just do it. That's pure practice. As soon as our feelings enter into it, not that we ignore our feelings, but as soon as we include our feelings in our vow, in our intention.

[19:31]

But feelings have a way of diverting our intention. Oh, I'm not feeling so good. I'm tired, or gee, that hurt, or I have something else better to do, or I'll do that tomorrow, or because I'm feeling bad, I'll sit zazen. Because I'm feeling good, I'll sit zazen. These are all distractions. If you're feeling really bad, maybe you should stay home. or maybe you should sit zazen. If you're feeling good, maybe you should do something else or sit zazen. But our intention, our vow of practice says, this is the time to sit zazen. So if I listen to all these other voices, I won't sit zazen. I won't practice if I listen to all these other voices. And these other voices are very seductive. Very seductive.

[20:36]

Practice it really hard because of our intention, because it depends on our intention. And in the world of seductive values, we don't even realize what they are because they're so pervasive. And because Zazen is not that interesting, the world is full of interesting things, and more and more interesting things appear. I can't believe how more and more, as technology becomes more advanced, so to speak, or decadent, or whatever you want to call it, there are more and more distractions and more interesting things, more video games, And it's so easy to get distracted.

[21:41]

And they're really good things, too, to get distracted by. Really good things, wonderful things. And here we are doing this practice, which is like tasteless. So hard. So it's hard to let go of gaining mind. If I put in this effort, I want something back. As soon as we want something back, we lose our pure practice. But if we have pure practice, Our intuition becomes very strong. Some people don't believe in intuition, but our intuition becomes very strong and we can see things very clearly. We have some clarity because our mind is clear.

[22:47]

clear mind, like a blank sheet of paper. People ask me sometimes, well, how do I practice in the world with all these distractions and all? How shall I prepare for something? In our practice, non-preparation is the key. I am not prepared for anything. which means I am prepared for anything because there's no idea in my mind about what I'm prepared for. Simply, the mind is open, totally open and blank. When I say blank, I don't mean there's nothing there, but without expectations, without a plan. We need a plan. Oh, we need a plan. That's good. I can't say that you shouldn't have a plan, but without a plan, you can respond to everything just as it arises, just as it is.

[23:57]

Because your mind is not hindered by thinking and planning. I know that sounds weird. And you probably say, well, that's because he's so stupid. He's not very smart anyway. And that's true. I agree. So somebody like me, you know, planning is not so good. Because I probably make big mistakes. But anyway, this is how a Zen student practices. without, you know, when you're always at zero. You're always in that place of zazen. And then when something presents itself, you're right there. It's like a cat and a mouse.

[25:02]

The cat is just sitting there, waiting at the door. without moving, doing Zazen. That's why people love cats. They worship them in Egypt, but the cat is sitting Zazen. As soon as the mouse presents itself, boom, without any hesitation, boom, catches the mouse. That's Zen practice. Not that you catch something, but you're not caught by something. You're always at rest. In other words, you're always at rest. And then when you need to do something, you do it thoroughly. I'm not very good at it, so I'm not a very good example, but that is our practice. That's non-gaining practice.

[26:11]

Simply practice in order to be yourself. You know, often we compare ourselves to others. In the world of comparative values, we do compare ourselves. So-and-so sits so well, and I sit so badly, and they're not so good, but I'm better than they are, and this kind of thing goes on all the time. So we have to be very careful about comparing ourselves to others. Each one of us is in a different place in our practice. So if we relate to each other by comparing our practice with someone else's practice, or comparing one person's life, somebody that we don't like with somebody we do like.

[27:21]

We can't help doing that, but we have to be careful not to be swayed by that. We can't help comparing. but as much as possible to let go of the idea of good and bad. We may see somebody who we think, God, they just do something bad all the time. But how do we relate to that without being attached to the fact that they are always doing something that we don't like? without being, if we get caught by, attached to that idea, then we're caught and we can't see things clearly. We can't get beyond the idea that I don't like this person because they do this and that and the other thing.

[28:27]

we have to be clear and see, oh yeah, they do this and that and the other thing, but I'm not caught by that. And I can go around the other side and see, well, there's something else here that's not just that. So if our mind is clear and not caught by this, this, then we can address each person in a way that addresses their nature, their deep nature, their Buddha nature, their Buddha, rather than just their person. So as we know, each one is half Buddha and half ordinary. So it's the ordinary one that gives us the problem. It gives us our problem. But if we address the Buddha side,

[29:30]

always addressing the Buddha side. It's not ignoring the other side, but addressing the Buddha side, then it's more likely that the person will respond from the Buddha side, their deeper self, and not just the self that they're caught by. This is how we save all beings by addressing all beings as Buddha and not just simply as ordinary. So there's no need to compete because each person is in a different place. You know, on one level, on the horizontal level, we're all the same. We're all the same. On the vertical level, we're all different. on the hierarchical level, so to speak, each one of us is different and in a different place and have different problems that we're working with.

[30:33]

So how can we compare? We want everybody to be the same. We are all the same on one level, but on the other level, we're not. And the level that we operate on usually is the vertical level, the level of comparison. And our understanding has to be based on a level of horizontal, that we're all the same. But we're not all the same. We don't all act the same way. It's just that we all have the same nature, basically, intrinsically. But it looks like we all have different nature, which is also true. So where those two meet, the vertical and the horizontal, is where we live. I'm the same as you, you're the same as me, but you're different than me and I'm different than you.

[31:36]

You have your problems and I have my problems. And sometimes your problems affect me, sometimes my problems affect you. It's true. But, you know, I've often talked about the simile of when you shake a stick at the dog, you can get the dog to follow the stick, right? But when you shake the stick at the lion, the lion doesn't go for that, he just goes for you. So we shouldn't be caught by the stick. And that stick is all that personality stuff that, you know, glitters. And we just get caught by it. We get caught by it. Our emotions get caught and our feelings get caught. And they do.

[32:37]

But in retrospect, to be able to let go of that, oh, I can see that I'm caught emotionally. Something happened to me this morning. Somebody said, oh, well, it's something that I didn't like. And I really got caught by that. And I knew. I said, well, I'm going to give this talk about getting caught. And here I am, caught by my feelings about this. So it's OK to have this feeling. That's Buddha nature, is to have this feeling of, I don't like this. I'm disappointed. That's true, but that's not the only thing that's going on in this world. So, okay, I recognize that, I acknowledge it, and I let it go. But what we do is we hang on, and it stays with us all day and all night and all week, and we keep building up and building up and building up.

[33:41]

So how do you let go of something so that it doesn't build up? And then, it's not so important. What we think is important is our feelings. That's what's important. The incident is not as important as what we think of our feelings as being the most important thing. So we hang on to this feeling, and it's an indulgence. We indulge in our feelings. Just letting go of the feeling. Okay, I acknowledge that. I have this feeling. I don't like it. But what's next? So we're always coming back to zero, not hanging on to that thing. Then, coming back to it, it doesn't have the same charge, doesn't have that same compulsion.

[34:44]

So what are some of these minds? One is the gaining mind or the competitive mind. Another is the clinging mind. Clinging mind is clinging to something that we think is right or something that we think is wrong. Or clinging can also be clinging to something that we have. It's security in a way. In a world where there's really no security, there is none, we want something to hold on to, to feel secure. So we have religion, we have God, we have Buddha, we have all these various automobiles and houses and distractions. there's this level of activity.

[35:57]

And if we keep the activity going, we're okay. But as soon as it stops, uh-oh, what have I got to hang on to? It's like when we have a conversation going and everybody's involved and so forth, then suddenly it all comes to a stop. There's this embarrassing silence, which is reality. But there's nothing to hold on to. So everybody feels, let's start the conversation again. Keep this thing going. But if everybody would just stop and just feel happy, with that silence, with that embarrassing silence. No need to be embarrassed. Just like, oh, we suddenly fell into, what's embarrassing is the fact that we're all revealed as we are, instead of this facade of talk and thought.

[37:09]

We have this facade of talk and thought. And then when that stops, we're all revealed as we are. So we don't, but it should be fine, you know. This is what we do all day in Zazen, right? We don't talk to each other, we just have this embarrassing silence called Zazen. So, you know, there's only space and we hang a nail in space, we take a nail and we drive it into space, and that becomes our focal point. And from that focal point, we create a society, or we create a way to relate to things. Okay, this is, I know, that's orientation. So we do have orientation,

[38:13]

but there's really no place to go. As he says, real practice has orientation and direction, but it has no purpose or gaining idea. So, Kadagiri Roshi used to talk about religious security. What is religious security? Well, when there is no security, and everything is changing, and our person, our persona, is actually a non-persona,

[39:17]

I know self. Self is not a real self because it's always changing and doesn't last, right? So this body is not mine. This mind is not mine. It's just the universe acting itself out as you and me. Buddha nature, universal activity, acting itself out through all of us. But that's our security. is in change. But we think of security as being something solid that doesn't change. But what doesn't change is change. So we have to have some faith in the change as well as in the stillness. So within stillness All the change, all the stuff that's happening, is happening within stillness, like the conversation that stops.

[40:21]

The stillness is there all the time. The quiet is there all the time. And when the activity stops, there it is. to realize that the stillness and the quiet within the activity is our security. Because everything comes out of that stillness. All activity comes out of that stillness. But when we only identify with activity, we think that we're gonna lose something. But we never had anything to begin with. It's just phenomena rolling on. Basic Buddhism. Not that we don't get involved with it or feel responsible. We play out the game according to our understanding of it.

[41:27]

That's what happens. Everybody understands it in a different way. And we play out our play, our drama, according to our understanding. and our desire, and so forth. So some people get really involved with it. Some people don't get so involved with it. And some people stay centered in the stillness. Because it's It's staying awake in a fundamental way. So, the next sentient being is the angry mind. The mind that is always upset.

[42:31]

And upset obscures, of course, ripples the water. And angry mind creates delusion and attachment. Of course, angry mind is what creates one of the main creators of a self. As soon as anger arises, self arises with anger. And then we create more and more of a solid self with the anger. And anger is like a balloon, you know. Most of these kinds of emotions are like balloons. Anger is like a balloon. It's not very big, but we'll see how big we can get it. Sometimes it comes out with fingers and little heads and stuff. But all anger is not bad. Anger is simply an emotion.

[43:36]

that we feel. And so anger is also Buddha nature. But how we cooperate with it or how we create an attachment to it is our problem. So we say, in the precept, don't harbor ill will. It doesn't say ill will should never come up, because it does come up. It comes up all the time. As soon as you start thinking about something other than what you're doing, ill will comes up, anger comes up. But to not let ourselves be caught by anger is to stay centered in the stillness of zazen, which means that you don't ignore it, But you don't indulge yourself, because anger's really easy to indulge in.

[44:43]

It gets the blood flowing. It's the opposite of love, you know? Love gets the blood flowing. The world blossoms out in beautiful flowers, and then when that's not there, the world looks like a gray mass of mud. When your lover leaves you, the world turns into mud. But when the lover's there, the world's all full of flowers and blossoms. So it's all just feelings. It's all feelings. And when we get caught by one or the other, we have suffering. But it just depends on what you want to suffer with. You want to suffer with love, or you want to suffer with ill will. Because both of them cause suffering. And I think a lot of perversion, a lot of the ill will is created by people who have been so hurt by the lack of love, or by love, or whatever, that they've opted for ill will instead.

[45:59]

I think so. If we could examine the childhood of all the people who are creating so much ill will, we'd find that there's big emotional problems in their childhood, and they're taking it out on everybody else. It's very interesting. It's just the way things go, anyway. And then there's the resentful mind. Resentful mind is the mind that can't let go of something that happened by somebody else. You did this to me and I'll hate you forever.

[47:06]

I can't let go of my ill will toward you because of what you did. So the way to get out of that is forgiveness. Forgiveness is the way to release ourself. Someday I want to give a talk on forgiveness soon. But forgiveness is a big subject. But it's not like, now you're okay. And that's not forgiveness. It means that you come to a place where you realize that this is untenable to maintain this feeling toward this person or whatever. And so you release them and you release yourself because your resentment is what you're caught by. So you lose your freedom through resentment.

[48:07]

You're no longer free because you're chained to the person that you resent. It's kind of like two prisoners who are handcuffed together and they escape from the prison, but they can't get away from each other because they're handcuffed. So it's kind of like a truce in a way. It's like, you go your way and I'll go my way and I forgive you. And you're free and I'm free. So that's big-mindedness, is to free the person, you don't have to punish them anymore. You don't have to punish yourself anymore. We don't realize always what punishment is because we enjoy the feeling of resentment. We really enjoy these feelings.

[49:12]

Otherwise, we wouldn't have them. But still, we have to feel that. We have to feel the resentment. It's okay. That's Buddha nature. Resentment is an expression of Buddha nature. But it's also an expression of Buddha nature to let it go. That's bigger mind. Then there's the divisive mind, which is always in opposition to things. You know, when something comes up, Oh, I don't like that, or I don't think we should do that, or how come you're doing that? It's the mind that doesn't allow us to agree. I can do that better. There's a place where we have to just go with things.

[50:20]

Other people have decided that this is a good way to go. So am I gonna go or not? Well, okay, that's acquiescence. Even though it's not, I don't think it's so good, it'll probably be okay. So I'll help, I'll do what I can and let go of my oppositional feeling. or I can just always be oppositional. So it's okay to not agree and to oppose things, right? But if you see that you're always opposing things and you're never agreeing, that's oppositional. And there's some problem with never agreeing with things and always being oppositional. And sometimes it's a way of feeling that you're more intelligent, or you know and they don't, which is a kind of arrogance. And also it can easily be a way of not trusting.

[51:31]

I only trust myself, but I don't trust anybody else. So that's a burden that we carry around. the burden of not trusting others and only trusting myself. We should trust ourselves. And sometimes we don't trust other people. But if we're always doing that, then there's a problem of insecurity. Insecurity and going along with things. And I'll maintain my, you know, hang on to my righteousness. So I have to be careful about that. And then people get tired of you. Sometimes your oppositional stuff is good, and people take it to heart, that's good. But if you're always presenting that end problem, and you're caught by your oppositional stance,

[52:35]

And then there's the covering mind. Mind covers, mind cover. Mind cover is the mind that says, I don't like you, but I'll never tell you. I don't like what's going on, but I'll keep it to myself. And then stuff starts boiling and churning, and then you act out in various ways. Why is he doing that? Why is she doing that? But actually, there's all this stuff going on that never comes out, but it does come out, because everything is expressed in some way. So we can read each other, even though we may not know exactly what's going on, but we can read each other, and we know, well, something's going on there. What's with this person? So it's good if we can be, say what we think, say what we feel, which may cause some problem, but at the same time, it doesn't cause the same kind of problem as something that we harbor, some problem.

[54:04]

some harboring, which becomes, you know, if you have a little thing that you harbor, the longer you harbor it, the more interest it's paid. It's like money in the bank. You put a little bit in the bank. Of course, these days interest doesn't mean anything, but it used to. But we put this thing in our bank, and then it creates more and more interest, interesting word, and pretty soon it becomes much bigger than what the thing actually is. And then when it comes out, you say, well, that wasn't so much. What was I so, you know, whatever it was about? This happens a lot. So, this is saving the sentient beings of our own mind for the benefit of all beings.

[55:06]

Awakening with all beings. So, constantly waking up. That's, the essence of practice is to constantly wake up. In Zazen, the practice is to continuously wake up. And when you sit Zazen, you see how you're continuously falling asleep, continuously drifting, continuously fantasizing. And Zazen is moment after moment, as soon as you recognize what's happening, you wake up and come back. That's practice. Zazen is our practice in this confined freedom. And that's the practice in the world as well, continuously waking up to what's going on in your emotional and thinking mind, so that you recognize right away what's happening, or at least you make an effort to recognize what's happening, and you come back to waking up.

[56:22]

Oh, this is what's happening. What can I do about this? How can I let go of this? How can I deal with this feeling without being captivated by the feeling? How can I find my freedom? So in zazen, it's how can I find my freedom in this? How can I find perfect freedom in the most confined posture? How can I find perfect freedom in the most confined posture, even though there's pain, there's emotion, there's thought, and so forth? Same thing. When there's no difference between out of the zendo and in the zendo, then you have pretty nice practice. And then you just simply practice for the sake of practice, and you realize that's the benefit, is gratitude for the practice of not gaining anything.

[57:38]

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