1989.08.27-serial.00069

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EB-00069
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good morning

huh

what the
when i guess there's no help for it i have to start talking
me
ones and teacher after he hadn't given a talk for a long time
one of his attendants or hadn't run came to him and said it hadn't given a talk for a long time
why don't you give a talk
so he said alright hit the drum
everybody together
then he went and sat down like this and after while he got up and walked at
so then i'm afraid in my case if i was to do that which has been not because i had something very important not to say or because sainz not saying something is very important kind of communication oh were you
can listen to yourself and see for yourself
but i would just get up and walk out because you know i was little too shy or scared i think
add that happened one time in a class branch save me she said could you all the place
so then i can stay

raider the when the head monk went to the teacher and said why didn't you talk to you said you were going to give a talk and and you didn't say anything he said i'm a zen teacher
if you want to talk you can listen to prepare for some price
it's their job to give tax
it's not my job to give tax
m
when i was in college my brother seventies and stories right so i got into his business

my brother is a student at sensor
since then he's become an episcopal priest
and he's been born again
so it kind of runs in the family

have a job
anyway he sent me at that time he resents to and he sent me stories from sensors and balance it was one of the few van books were in those days
yeah early sixties
ah one of the stories he said it was a ballet said that her son wrote home to his mother and said i'm doing very well in school i helped all the other kids with their papers and studying protests i'm doing really well
his mom wrote back and said
son i didn't raise you to be a walking dictionary
why don't you go to the mountains and attain true realization that that's for me
and then a few years i was it does her
and maybe it something to do with you know the power of deciding things like that i don't know it's very mysterious how we end up doing what we do isn't it
mary the people will marry having the job we have
it's not something we figure out ahead of time something we kind of fall into and certain way that we'd make decisions to make that decision as for me
another one of the stories was the zen master buzzer short story said mr i said mind itself is buddha
i'd stand in story
but of course they are many good and stories this commentary
and the commentary said whoever understands this story must be living in buddhist house eighteen buddhist good were in good his clothing
he must be buddha
i thought oh
that's interesting
i'm using
to understand
hmm so i thought today after i'd bet today i'd talk about a little bit to start with anyway i would talk about mind itself is buddha
it turns out that this expression is some people consider
to be the key keynote expression of soto zen
of course if we could take some looking at know why would somebody say such a thing
how and it makes me wonder what kind of person
what kind of person are you
what kind of person am i
do we say buddha or do we say i'm just another average joe
kind of insignificant person
so we're each and you know in some worthy terms success or failure
our variant successes various failures are things that were things that didn't work
there are times we did well times we didn't do the well by some measure

ah so for yourself to say the mind if you would say about your mind you're being
buddha you call yourself a buddha
i know most pay we think well i don't think so
so why it why not or what would make mind the or anything but what then go to have to what is something have to be like to call it murder
has the right away we say that we can understand that in some ways we live in two different worlds
how we live in a world know
our differences and a world of sameness
and we live in a world where we identified things by their differences
and there's another world where things are no longer identifiable by the differences
and they have an identity
so one of buses contemporary ticket to
said
mind itself is buddha
mind buddha sentient beings affliction enlightenment are all different words for the same thing
mind itself is better
mind booted sentient beings affliction enlightenment are all different words for the same thing
so when why don't we say mind itself is sentient beings mind itself is affliction
i would be say why with bus has a mind itself is buddha
a ball the different words are just different words for the same thing
what does the buddha have to be to be a buddha
what is the buddha had to be like

and how is it will decide
on what basis do we decide or what kind of person in my
am i someone to like something to dislike
i'm i somebody like the buddha where they are respect and veneration
i my somebody attention being
worthy of this respect and
insults
and if a buddha receives insults does that mean the buddha is in the buddha
i think sometimes people must insult of period
but boudicca have been prudent or anything
huh
i so you know there's a home
great fact and in buddhism
i restated
most of my bags years there's a new kind of statement of the great fact know that everything is not great workout
the way you want it to
everything will work out the way i'd like it to be
are you can say
everything's not going to come out okay
but then there's his second grade back in which is like saying mind itself something buddha everything will come out okay but that's ok
do you believe that
see now this is where actually and buddhism there's this little element of paid
it's not so little actually there's a large element of faith
is it ok or not
and if you're going to take it on faith that this is okay
you know
hired somebody recently saying about i was reading a book actually someone said we should trust yourself but don't tell anybody who trust yourself
does you tell him if you'd tell anybody that you trust yourself because they will why why would you trust yourself
and then you'll try to think of some good reason and then you probably won't be able to
and then you'll try to think of something in are you did that was really a great accomplishment and then you tell him about that but really you find it is no good reason to trust yourself
if you have to explain it to somebody and of i have to explain to you why it's actually okay in i'll be in the same predicament
so it's just a matter of trust
i gave a talk one time and i said everything is perfect just as it is this is another way with tradition says in fact hear somebody up the time came up and started yelling at me right it's not you shouldn't tell people that there's ah
all this terrible suffering out there people need help you don't want to tell them it's all ok then they won't do anything to help people
so you have to understand we're talking about
no kind of two different world the world of differences and the world of sameness
what are the world did
conscious mind and the world of unconscious mind everyday reality and and what's underneath
on form and emptiness
what this is an important truth about spiritual practice i think to understand that we don't practice
a spiritual practice in order to
make everything work out okay and that if you do exactly what you're supposed to do everything will be okay
except in the larger sense
you know if you do everything is prostitute is it actually work out
he's very strange
do everything you're supposed to do and then somehow life is set out of you into strange way
right this kind of brittle and lifeless
very strange or else you feel kind of betrayed because you do everything is supposed to do and then what happens is still can get cancer
you know children's still get hit by cars
when things happen
and we live a good life for know basically are good people
whoa along with the question of what makes a buddha buddha we have to
we might look at what his mind
i don't think i can answer that for prayer

ha that in itself this another a car what his mind another
kind of deep an inexhaustible question in summary
but obviously mind has this are different shapes it takes
a man and woman
ah
and mind
mine will act in various ways or have different characteristics and also mind is not a thing
her mind isn't any of those thing
ryan isn't any particular person or activity
huh
set aside the
ah no characteristics
the distinguish one mind from another in mind and wholesome mind are great in mind loving mind kind mind joy for mind hate from mine
if you could set aside the characteristics
how would you say mind is buddha
how did you say that
her because in order to same mind itself is buddha we have to be able to set aside
a characteristics
the things that characterize mind momentarily
ah instantaneous temporarily
how they will be some characteristics that identify mind
and we can say a racing mind strong line
huh
huh
how so there's this or mind that
we have one mind in a sense that we try to do what we're supposed to do and then there's another mind up and times it doesn't
doesn't the way were supposed to do
friend of mine told me a story recently this is
i'm
about her experience it as she said it was a very important experience for
it's very interesting how this fact of things not working comes to people
because they're she was it as and this was she said oh i don't know about as this an organization or
whatever but i had a very good experience in training
ah and
she said they had a young trainer fairly young man who would pay energetic
and talkative late one afternoon he finally said to them
don't you get it
i can just sounds perfect as
don't you get it your turkey's used another word
it's not supposed to work
when he knows he said well what are we live
you know that she was overjoyed it was such a weight off of her and she was so exhilarated inertia got it and big weight off her back no more he knows struggling to be perfect no more striving to be a wonderful
good person kind and loving no more always trying to make everything work out the way it's supposed to
and then continually failing and then continually a laboring oneself
look what you did it's all your fault
don't you know you're not supposed to say such things that people aren't you know your not positive what a despicable person you are
you should try harder
how do we live
it's not supposed to breathe
how but the other side of this than in the senses mind itself in the buddha
another way of thinking about this is you know we haven't we haven't outer life and we have an inner life
and in the outer world
it seems necessary actually to in the outer world we have taxi be able to differentiate to distinguish
among things it is essential things
ah enlightenment division
who we are going to work with the we aren't going to work with the we live with the we don't live with
what am i going to do today
oh it's all the same
it doesn't quite work and get up in the morning to
just be stuck in one kind of world
it's all the same
you won't get much done
and the extreme of it is you stop eating routes saw the same to eat and nodded and stopped doing the decent step answering the phone
and great
i've heard stories about this i know about this place but anyway
so in the everyday world or the outer world the world that everyday reality we have to be able to make distinctions at least temporarily know for today for this moment for this morning
it makes a difference
do i stay in better can be green cards
there's a difference
how baroness and another world
in this sense in the inner world there is no difference
here's difference in yet there's no difference
so do you get stuck in the realm of differences than you wonder why when we get stuck in the realm of differences we wonder why we can't work everything out what's wrong with me and i can't resolve all these differences i can't get them to fit together to come together to work out to be the way i'd like to be
if you're stuck in the world and same as it's very hard to do anything
when that happens to it
there's no basis for it
her
so the spiritual life should have
know be able to relate to the other world and to being a world of be able to relate outwardly and relate mvp
i made to our differences and sameness
he and in some ways of course in a spiritual practice to they have a spiritual practice in a kind of formal sense of
coming in sitting meditation is to have
a kind of refuge
some the outer world
our where we can not go and same thing so much in stark differences and begin to appreciate sameness
and out there fundamentally basic way we relate to any new phenomenon
in our life
huh
huh just in the world in the realm of differences you know there's parents have not been any way to work it out i used
that the as upon by a kabir
it was it
something of a renegade muslim is islam islam hindu
lived in india in the fifteenth century
kabir said a friend what do i do about this world i hold on to and keep spinning out i gave up soon clothes and wore a robe
one day i noticed the rope was finely woven
so i got rid of that and work burlap
but i still toss it elegantly over my left shoulder
i say it says
ha
the deserving my grade and i noticed i had a lot of sexual desire
and i go there and founder is angry all day long
finally let go of my anger
and now i'm proud of myself

what shall i do about this world
i hold on to and keep spinning out
and they are very few who find a way
this world we hold onto and keep spinning out this is the outer world
that we hold onto and we keep trying to work things out in that world
it's not possible to work things out
this is tremendous suffering
have you try to work it out in those terms it's like trying to make you know your dream come true
and always been the dream comes true it's different than you dreamed and there's some other details that weren't in your dream
you married the man or woman of your dreams i don't stay in the dream
and the spiritual life is like that we dream and spiritual life when it will be like and actually it's not like that
ha so we have the
recidivism opportunity in meditation or we have been occasions where it's somewhat more said
or there's a refuge from the world a kind of container and we can let go of the outer world and focus on the a world and change the basic way we relate to things
i'm stop trying to fix everything and stop trying to make all the characteristics
the way we would like
hey so when you sit down and to sit cross legged what happens
right after while your knees hurt and then you're back bothers you and you feel restless and bored is that what you wanted and spiritual practice
no you didn't he didn't ask for that
that's all the distraction as as a distractions from and the real spiritual life
hey
right you can call them distractions you say are you can call them buddha
so in come into spiritual practice if you start out in whitson faith in his day mind itself is further distractions themselves and buddha
anyway it's some small way to encourage you to begin to look at things a little differently and not just in everyday terms of what's right
when it's a chance for what's what's been under needs to come to the surface into the harmonized
with the inner in the outer to harmonize
and it's a chance to transform basic way related things so if you're sitting and your legs are bothering you and those things are happening in venue think it would be so nice to be outdoors and can walk down to the beach
maybe i would need a nice person and garden most interesting beautiful handsome person
i can see it now
green gulch is really a nice place to make pay for his minute
then maybe we could walk down to the beach together
so this is called the know this is a kind of distraction isn't it
so what does is italia you know just think you can make it come true
i'll get up right now in and out there
will everything be okay now
you know you can have way down to the beach than anything oh i really ought to be back there sitting

this person in the garden is how it all i could
a
huh so what does it say about and our basic way related things
so we can learn from my distracts me it were distracted if we have the distraction by you know visible ideas and france
have you say mean something like going out doing things in a very joyful rain
why not
don't we take the differences too seriously
was a big based on these differences i can and i couldn't enjoy sitting meditation where i couldn't enjoy just walking i couldn't enjoy during the dresses
or i can enjoy schoolwork while i can enjoy my job
and we have we say well i can enjoy and then we'd fill in blank
so is the are those differences inherent in the objects were meditation person me i can enjoy myself i can enjoy my breath is the breath enjoyable and not enjoyable
inherently isn't have any characteristic inherently the breath
how your cheeks do they have any inherent characteristic
sometimes they smile sometimes a fan
but inherent
been going on continuously
so we make up our reality and this way we say i can enjoy my bread
i can enjoy meditation and then when we go to meditate we think about something more enjoyable somewhere else
some are we think about something more enjoyable because and we could enjoy that because it's a fantasy and because it doesn't include the aspects that are disagreeable ccc to enjoy fantasy with doesn't have the disagreeable aspects right there in our life
we spend oliver time not enjoying your life and then thinking of that we can enjoy which don't have any disagree with characteristics rent goes on endlessly desert
can you think of a better one
when we have to think a better and better tennessee's you know to keep yourself amused there's no end to it and then if you try to do on of those things you know as though to actually do them was the way to resolve that are satisfy it does it help
i tried
oh i'm convinced i don't know about you i'm convinced it because it work
it's it's really a shame because
the basic process of fantasizing things and then going out and doing them is it's wonderful you know it has it it has a really nice you know kind of push to it and kind of it's selling engaging and in a wonderful or in itself kind of powerful and you know a certain way but it actually doesn't say
to resolve anything
and then one can maintain this kind of idea
that a reality being rail
characteristics been in heron
when meditation isn't
happiness or pain and pleasure and happiness and satisfaction in board and meditation isn't it because it's how you do it
so if you say well i'm tired of meditation since i'm i'm tired of doing meditation we have been doing it okay well that makes him and you're tired of living with somebody or living with his i'm tired of myself i am too but
what does it mean is there any may actually there to be tired of now i'm tired of the way i've been living
the way i've done it the way i see things the way i categorize things were responded things
i'm tired of not letting things come home to my heart
well i'm tired of i'm feeling kind of distance from my life
some of those things make sense to how do you change in in the detroit go out and try to change the characteristics well maybe sometimes you need to give yourself a fresh start maybe you should start in know maybe you start the in meditation
when you start doing meditation
zen center it's a weird place

but the basic changed the made in our view
mind itself is buddha
when he means mind is buddha and itself the things in her life
you know the clothes we wear
and the the things your glasses
the food the plants the world a cushion the floor
is it possible in automated come to you as well it's murder
who says different than saying the war is just a while
that's the world doesn't do anything for me thank you very much but whilst and do nothing
i do but whose whose as if the was doing something for you or is it the way he received the was
how did the walls come to you how he received them
so dog and sentences let your mind go out and abide in things read things return an abiding in line
how is that possible
where there has to be some kind of basic trust that it's it's gonna be saved to do that
when your mind goes out to abide and things your mind has to be open and settle and sobbed
it has to be able to take the shape of the things out here
her things to return an abiding your mind your mind has to be receptive and open said things can come there
what is a convenient word for us and british is this word for something that it said to do this with we can we can actually go out to it it can put our mind out and we can have things returned in abide in mind
this is our own thoughts and feelings too
physical sensations thoughts feeling mind consciousness
where we can receive
with some respect
a kind of respect like we wait for the buddha
something in their life that's finally worth honoring both receiving
with bowing to
what is it it's worth bearing to it's not gonna be in those characteristics you'll always find some bob
something disagreeable some reason why you can't respect to buddha why you can't respect some cursing
what's wrong with those walls anyway we'll look at those spots cobwebs
so to look at things with some
gergen scissors i don't see things with an ordinary i
i don't do things in your own no way
i don't see that don't take all the differences have been fundamentally in handy rail all these things will tell herself
still there's something to respect and something to honor something to bow to in each thing
how each person
and is a says
activities action doing
what's thing we do has this quality
when so this is a quality that it's not in comparison to other qualities
walking standing sitting going to the bathroom waking sleeping
working moving digging shoveling
cutting peeling washing
so to to allow our mind to go out to these things activities and the activities can engage in her mind
if there's a lot of distractions
it should be some help or as we can make it
more help
if there's all these distractions about perishable things that you can do what does it say about the way i do things normally
it says to me
cheese you you are set to i wouldn't want to hang around you you are such a stick in the night and your eyes is doing things just the right way you're not having any fun at all it takes is also seriously
cigarette will quench it does us and with me you know come and do meditation with me know thank you so much more fun out here i've gotta tell you
i don't like a around a bit while like hanging around with you the yours just don't have a good time we never take anything seriously so don't i still need to get together
i they need each other and they actually study and lanes in each other
and especially the the usual one that we identify with the serious run needs to learn from the other one
about the way i do things about how it serves the i take things about how i get over the concerned about things
so finally you have to say something like well listen if you don't like the way i do says and we're not going to place and she's show me how you do it
no you happy is no set of tom sawyer they're going to thing
to get your distraction to come and show you how to live
but in some kind of context you know it helps to do this in some kind of context and not just in the context of
the distraction gets to go off and you're going to go along with the distraction you know off down to the beach really talked about how that's not doesn't work
i i didn't work
ah it turned out it wasn't all that much fun
maybe because the person who was sitting in the zendo came along on the trip
mr down at the beach and and the person who wanted to go out there says i wouldn't you doing here could have had such a good time if you hadn't come along
well why don't you do this as and then you don't like the way i'm doing it you're mad at me about the way i've been doing meditation and whenever are you do it then it's pretty energizing
well so if it's you know if we want to enjoy your breath learn your being in your body and mind when you said it's written you can do that and if you want to feel angry he turned over to your anger and you sit with much more intensity
and much more energy and uprightness escape
i am
so we need to study with their distractions this is and these facts and statistics much later but the fact that they really doesn't mean that in you should read good and browse through around completely and say
you think i'm brittany a come to the beach with me
i mean you know to be the presenting to be buddha doesn't mean we have to you know we have to give up any common sense or just turn herself over you know like it some kind of slavery to you know the great being and the great master and just do whatever this character says
usa or but it's buddha
ah yeah but near buddha to buddha in buddha
why did you turn to boot over to put it was the you know everybody's going to see a cancer so to say well i'm going abandoned myself to you you know in the baron yourself to be a distraction searches and transform anything or solve anything that's not what it means mind itself is burger
so in a way for this kind of spiritual practice to work is senses what they have a kind of container a kind of place is can impact is like meditation is kind of grace
what kind of place where you can stop the outer world i go on the outer world and the world and differences
and begin to work on just a basic way it i related things that you integrate the things each thing is that arises how to relate to it
try to grab it try to push it away
get tired or not you again
another sound i have to put our with
i'm read things let mine go out and inviting things that things return and inviting the mind
a dog in century or so says
when you sit in practice meditation i don't think again
don't think evil
set aside all affairs since made things
read many things says
stop trying to work things out
the essential our he says is
you think i'm thinking not to think
hi so in the context of meditation and are you couldn't think about it also is that surrender
i give yourself over to your beating at your mind
give yourself over to these things
give yourself over the breathing that yourself let the sounds come in that the sites can have the feelings can let the bad scamming
what happens in is you know it kills you
honey anybody is
in a practice annotation at all
it must know that
huh
when i read your palm to and he said the cat
huh
ha
this is a poem about eyes upon by rooming and was a said know it
at thirteenth century about the organs time
hmm
huh i don't think i'm gonna try to tell you why this phone has something to do with writer have a he can figure that out
hmm i borrow the beloved's eyes
laura the beloved's eyes
look through them and you'll see the beloved space everywhere
no tiredness know jaded boredom
i shall be your hand
and you're loving and your eye
let that happen and things you have hated will become helping
a certain creature always praised long and with enthusiasm for thieves and muggers
get attack people on the street
mercy mercy lord cover their insolence
he doesn't pay for the good but only for the blatantly cruel
why is this is congregation as
because they've done me such generous favors
every time i turn back through the things they want i run into them
they beat me and made me nearly dead in the road
and i understand again it what they want
does not what i want
they keep me on the spiritual path
that's why honor them and pay for them
those that make a return for whatever reason to god solitude be grateful to them
worry about the others
forgive you delicious comfort
i keep you compare
friends or enemies sometimes an enemy's friends
there is an animal called a new score a porcupine if you hit it with a stick it extends it's quills and gets bigger the soul is a porcupine made strong by stick beating
so a profit saws especially affected because it has to become so powerful
a hide is soaked in tanning liquor and becomes rather if the attendant did not ribbon the acid or hide would get foul-smelling and rotten
the soul is a newly skin hide ready and grows work on it with manual discipline and the bitter tanning acid agree
and you'll become lovely and very strong
if you can't do this work yourself don't worry
you don't even have to make a decision one way or another the friend who knows a lot more than you do for bring difficulties angry and sickness as medicine as happiness
as the essence of the moment when you're beaten
when you hear me
and you can find they say
about sitting
about work about living i trust you picture me
huh
huh
huh
has this process of as better work
it's not so much a process of conscious endeavor
ha and more way
i can see things as buddha and not have to
act out everything
this is our spiritual growth
the same time is doesn't mean to
no cease functioning the outer world and then on the whole emphasizes been able to function in ruby alphabet the same time
i've been able to get up in the morning and go to work and carry out one's responsibilities and at the same time
letting go of the differences
acting on the differences at the same time is running go with them
let letting go the differences at the same time is academic
ha and this or each of us his life as and this unfolding has its own pace
which weekend
i see to
fatima
huh
huh
as suppress any or any moment any occasion you have
an opportunity to receive your experience as kruger
ha as some teaching
as somebody has something to study
how as something that can give you a sustenance
and supporting your life
the wisdom
compassion
in the simplest things in the simplest activities
her in a simple moments of no significance we can still receive a broader
and you can i wear his crowds
i live in for this house
he'd notice good
and you'll be buddha