Well, it's very good to be with all of you this morning. You are sitting there and I'm sitting here. And you're listening for something. And I'm speaking about something. But maybe the most important thing is that we're just here. We may have various thoughts in our mind about what we're doing here, or we may just have various thoughts in our mind, but the actual fact is that here we are. And our whole life has led us to this point.

[01:05]

for some reason, we're all together here. It may or may not be significant, but it may or may not be significant in the doing of our life, but it's very significant in the being of our life. Doing and being are two sides of our activity. And sometimes the doing obscures the being. Of course, doing is being and being is doing. Without doing, we don't feel like we're being. But our life easily becomes materialistic when we put so much emphasis on doing and gaining and gathering and accomplishing.

[02:36]

So for a Zen student, the most important accomplishment is the accomplishment of realization, of being. which is not so much an accomplishment in a materialistic sense or spiritual sense. Spiritual and material are not two different things. The quality of being exists within our material world. but how to express that being in its pure sense may not be so easy. When I come to Green Gulch and I look down on the garden, I'm always, I feel the quality of being

[03:45]

expressed through that wonderful mandala of the garden with its four gates, East Gate, West Gate, North Gate, and South Gate, which reminds me of an old koan. A monk asked Master Joshu, who is Joshu? Choshu said, East Gate, West Gate, North Gate, South Gate. This, to me, mandala in the garden is a great expression of this practice.

[04:57]

Working so closely with the earth and yet this activity of working so closely with the earth is a great spiritual expression. And it expresses the Buddhist understanding of no separation between the spiritual world and the material world. We say lotus grows in the mud, in muddy water a lotus grows. The spiritual grows out of the material without The muck and slime of life, there's no flowering. Master Nansen,

[06:11]

said one day to a friend, pointing to a flower, he said, people nowadays see this flower as in a dream. What is the reality of this flower? He was saying this in response to a poet, Rico, who was quoting, who was inspired by a Buddhist philosopher who said, the earth, the heaven, earth and I are of one substance. We all come from the same root. Isn't that wonderful? And Nansen said, pointing to a flower.

[07:17]

People of today see this flower as if in a dream. Dream means to be cut off from reality, without an abiding place. When we talk about ghosts, I wonder how many of us believe in ghosts. But a ghost, even though we may or may not believe in ghosts, a ghost is a disembodied spirit. Spirit which cannot find a place because it's cut off from reality. cut off, lost his connection with the universe. So, ghost may not be something that looks like a white sheet in the dark room, but many of us have ghost-like qualities.

[08:31]

Don't you think so? Wandering around, cut off, not able to connect with our self, I remember when I first started to garden, something compelled me to want to do that. I was brought up as a city boy, and I didn't have so much connection, except when I was a kid, I used to play in vacant lots, and I did have a connection to the earth. But after There was a long period of time where I didn't connect with the earth. And one day in my early 20s, I started a garden. And taking off my shoes and stepping on the ground, I could feel the warmth underneath the surface of the ground.

[09:37]

And immediately I felt connected to the earth again. And after that, I had many gardens, but I always noticed that as soon as I entered the garden, as soon as I put my hands in the ground, I could feel the weather. I felt connected to the sky, and I felt connected to water. and I felt connected to fire. In Buddhadharma, we say there is no inherent self. Human beings have no inherent self.

[10:40]

Nothing in the world, nothing in the universe exists independently. And all things are part of one being. All entities, all existence is part of one tremendous being. And each entity is an expression of that being. So how do we know ourself? The purpose of Buddhism, Buddhadharma, is to know ourself, to know our real self completely. And Dogen Zenji says, in order to know, in order to study Buddhadharma, in order to know ourself, we have to drop ourself, drop our conception, drop our so-called ego self, or partial idea about ourself.

[12:02]

This is what nonsense means. when he says, people of today see this flower as if in a dream. In order to see this flower, we have to drop our idea about this flower, drop our notion about this flower, become this flower. How do we commune with a flower? Joshu Sasaki Roshi said, in the Japanese temples, they used to teach the children not so much A, B, C, D,

[13:04]

E-F-G-1-2-3-4-5-6, but when you see the moon, be the moon. When you see the sky, be the sky. Our intellectual understanding is overtaking our sense of being, our sense of who we are. We're very unbalanced people. We rely a lot on our intellectual, on our conceptual understanding of things. So we become very unbalanced. The purpose of Buddhist practice is to regain our true balance in the world. Our head plays a part.

[14:10]

Our heart plays a part. Our body plays a part. Thich Nhat Hanh says there are five streams. Human being is five streams. There's the stream of form, there's the stream of feelings, there's the stream of perceptions, mental formations, and consciousness. And these five streams are what we call human being. And to harmonize these five streams is to live our life in reality. Realizing that these five streams are just five streams, but there is no person. What we call a person is the feeling that these five streams belong someplace.

[15:20]

In the four gates of the mandala of the garden, life goes in and life goes out. In spring, right now, the flowers are blooming miraculously. In the summer, the bees and the birds will congregate and we can enjoy the wonderful smells and fragrances. And then in the fall, it will all start to fade, die back. And in the winter, very little. Everything is going to sleep. Then in the spring, it will start again. Each phase is a wonderful expression of life. Life going in and coming out.

[16:34]

Going in and coming out. But the four gates always are there. Each activity in the garden has its own wonderful expression of life, always in harmony with the way things go, in harmony with the sky and the rain and the sun. there is no such thing as this garden. This garden only exists in relation to sky, sun, water, air. And we, each one of us, only exists in relationship to sky, air, water, sun, and each other.

[17:36]

So, When we think about ourself, we don't exist apart from our activity. None of us exists independent of our activity. None of us exists apart from the things around us and the people around us, the animals and the grass and the buildings and the traffic. This is our life. And when we engage, whatever we engage with brings us to life. And we bring life, we bring the things around us to life. This understanding is what our practice is about. how to bring life to life, how to engage.

[18:47]

But we easily get caught up with trying to produce something, and we lose sight of the quality of this engagement, quality of life. And we forget that, easily forget that life itself is being expressed through us. When we say, oh, what is the purpose of our life? And then we want to do something. But actually, it's enough to allow life to be expressed through us. Each one of us is a vehicle for allowing life to be expressed through us.

[19:53]

Sometimes people don't understand what zazen is when we sit. Zazen is our offering to life. and are allowing life to be expressed through us. That's really all it is. And then when we extend our activity from Zazen, our activity is an offering to life and allowing life to be expressed through that activity. So this is quality of being. through our activity. And mindfulness is to never lose sight of this fact. So in all of our activity, mindfulness is to always be aware of the quality of being, the stillness within the activity.

[21:11]

When I look at the mandala of the garden, it's just sitting there very still. But when you get very close, it's humming with activity. It's shaking the earth with its tremendous activity, which is constantly being expressed through the four gates. When we sit Zazen, it looks like we're just sitting very still, but there's tremendous activity. When you look very close, it's tremendous activity, which is being expressed in all directions, the quality of pure being. And so, since all life is interconnected, that expression moves in all directions and affects all being.

[22:25]

So we may feel that our life sometimes, that our life is insignificant and that we're very small when you compare yourself to the universe. But the other side is that you yourself are the whole universe. And your actions are extremely significant. Every one of us affects the whole universe. And especially as our surroundings become closer, We have tremendous power to affect everything around us, whether we do something or don't do something. So we also have great responsibility, puts great responsibility on each one of us, how we act in this world.

[23:33]

because each one of us really counts. If we think we don't count, it's just letting go of our responsibility. Responsibility is maybe like the ability to respond to the circumstances around us. We're constantly moving things and being moved. Moving and being moved is our life. Affecting and being affected. So it's important always to keep in mind the quality of being.

[24:44]

Quality of being has no particular purpose. When our life has too much purpose, we maybe need to look at it If we have too much purpose in our life, it's easy to ignore the people around us in order to accomplish something. And maybe we don't see how we affect or hurt the life around us. It may be enough just to be aware of taking care of the life around us, taking care of the earth, taking care of the people, taking care of the animals, taking care of the environment. I think humanity, human beings are running headlong into

[26:08]

a kind of disastrous place with greed, hate, and delusion. Not able to stop. Not so concerned about the quality of being as about just accomplishing something. So our life is like one piece of cloth. When we pull it this way, on this corner, the other three corners come along with it, are affected by it. When we try to take everything to ourself,

[27:17]

we don't realize that the rest of the world is also ourself. So when we do something at the expense of the rest of the world, it's just smashing our toe or hitting our finger. So there are many Buddhist practices, many ways of thinking about dharma, but main thing is to realize our interconnectedness with all of life.

[28:20]

There is no special individual person called myself. outside of all of the rest of life. And when we have that realization, that's our enlightenment. And when we act out of that realization, then we have enlightened activity. So how to take care of one thing at a time? In our Zen practice, we learn that when we take a drink of water, we use two hands.

[29:36]

Even though we can do it with one, we use two. Two hands. We use our whole body and mind to do this one simple act. This is quality of being. Quality of being, one with a glass of water. We say, I'm thirsty. So if I'm thirsty, all I need to do is quench my thirst, right? But actually, I'm just using water, not appreciating water, not connecting with my whole self, just quenching my thirst. But this water is myself.

[30:41]

bigger part of myself than just this body. So I handle it with some appreciation and in some dignified way. And this glass is also helping me. So quenching my thirst is one part of this activity. We may say it's the main subject, but actually it's only one part. The rest is, how do I relate to this glass? How do I relate to this water? How do I meet this?

[31:48]

It may seem insignificant, but our life is made up of insignificant moments, just like this. Most of our life is made up of insignificant moments, just like this. And how do we connect with life? We think of wonderful things to do to excite us so that we feel alive. If I'm always in excitement, then I'll feel alive. But how do you feel alive with a little glass of water, which is life itself? How do we appreciate just breathing?

[32:53]

If we have asthma, then we learn to appreciate breathing. We really can appreciate breathing. If you're underwater for more than five minutes, you really appreciate breathing. But how do you appreciate breathing just ordinarily? What is breathing anyway? Do you breathe? No. Breathing breathes you. Do you live life? No. Life lives you. We always see things from one side, the side of I. And when we see things only from the side of I, we don't see it.

[34:00]

That's called not seeing this flower as it really is. I can appreciate this water because I am water. Scientifically it's true. Mostly water. Water meets water. So Zen training is to help us appreciate every moment of our life, and especially the insignificant moments.

[35:09]

If we have too much excitement in our life, then we tend to easily ignore the insignificant moments. And if we're always craving something, then craving fills our mind. And everything else in the world seems insignificant. But when you put yourself in a position of deep calmness and deep quiet and stillness, then the most insignificant thing becomes quite wonderful. And you can connect your life with life. Maybe for many of you, this meeting that we're having will be the closest that you'll ever come to sitting Zazen. But at some point in your life, please take the time to be very still, very calm, without any desire, and allow yourself to be completely one with life.

[36:38]

Thank you very much.

[36:53]

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