I think most of us are, even if we have an experience of our real body, senses, mind and body without being conditioned. Even if we have a sense of that, our sense of that is rather fleeting and we lose it very quickly and are again confused or caught by seemingly unimportant, but very pressured events. And so we come back to a session of zazen every day,

[01:24]

Because, I think, for most of us it's necessary to renew that sense of being which is not conditioned. But just to continue practicing, as if by osmosis or something subtle you were going to Realize yourself is also foolish. You can practice that way for a billion years, as long as you have some doubt of why you're practicing, why you're sitting. You have to confront your consciousness, or lack of consciousness, or seize your situation. When you have no questions, then maybe to just continue to practice this.

[02:52]

practice, but to just continue when you have many questions or some doubts, isn't enough. There must be some effort, confrontation of the dark spots in your life. In session, I always feel like coming back, particularly the first day, there's a necessity to come back to our body, speaking about our body and our physical practice. There's a great deal of Zen lore, you know,

[04:00]

that's passed from monk to monk, practice of the practice of your monasteries, that never gets into focus, or very seldom, about your body, your aura, and your breathing. There is much more But I'm afraid if I talk about this kind of thing too much, for you it will be the source of your practice, or reality, or some new fabrication. You know, we're trying to get away from the fabrication of our mind, which mostly, our consciousness lives in our mind, know that, but still to notice it again and again is refreshing, how amazing it is. We want to live in the fabrications of our mind. We keep creating things, thinking of things, to then think about.

[05:40]

We think of things that then exist within, thinking of some world and then deciding how we are in it. But we can make that same kind of fabrication with our body. But the important thing in a machine Take the opportunity you have to shift your consciousness away from your mental fabrication, so that it is body and mind. And you'll find, if you become more conscious of your posture and your breathing, that there are aspects of your physical body that are not conscious. You can compare your right cheek to your left cheek, say. And you'll find, if you're sensitive enough, that there's a different kind of consciousness in each cheek, or each shoulder, or each temple. And it's quite unexplainable why there's some difference.

[07:08]

And you may feel some bands, visible bands, linking together some parts of your body, but not linking together other parts of your body. Linking some together on one side, across, not on another. And often, when you first notice that kind of thing – and again, I hesitate to mention it – when you first notice it, there's sometimes quite a feeling of terror. Again, it's hard to explain why we feel that terror sometimes. This recognition of something beyond our control. Some karma that we feel, seem to be stuck with, like finding yourself in jail, accused of something you don't know what you're accused of.

[08:30]

It seems hopeless when you first recognize these bands, areas of unconsciousness. But with some detachment you should be able to practice and just and maybe sometimes form a recognition or question about it. Why is this side dark and this side light? Does this side feel easy or accessible and this side feel closed? involved with itself. So in such a process, you become more conscious throughout your body and throughout your breathing. And your consciousness won't be just located in the fabrication of your mind.

[10:10]

But again, then you have a new kind of location, physical location of breathing and posture. And there is a tendency to control your mind by your breathing and your body. And your mind, through some design, trying to control your body to control your mind, value. But if you sit quite still, your mind becomes relaxed, and your body becomes relaxed. Even though you notice certain kinds of unconscious activity in your body, you can be relaxed and accepting of your body, not anxious about it. Your body too will

[11:44]

far, drop away, and you will find you have no consciousness of your body, of its position. And then you'll wonder, am I sitting straight or crooked? There's no way for you to tell how to sit If you don't have a consciousness of the position of your body, posture of your body, then how do you tell if you're sitting straight? Or does it matter? Being relaxed again in this kind of physical situation, you can find some way to be relaxed when you lose mental, your mental posture, your mental consciousness, when causation is gone, when the usual feeling of space and time is gone.

[13:04]

Then we find we express ourselves through what we could call three identities, roughly. Buddha, Dharma, Sangha. These individual sense and Sangha in everything. And sangha is something in between your deep experience of yourself, which may come from samadhi or some sense of Manjushri or Buddha, some deeper sense of yourself. casting away that limited-sense, conditioned self that gets caught and irritated, doesn't care what others think. Somewhere between that deeper sense of your identity and everything at once,

[14:43]

is sound. And that is an identity. I'm using identity today. I could call it something else. But that identity is pretty difficult, I think, for us, partly just because we are Americans. that there's no political reality to that which is in between all and the individual. So we are taught that the basic unit of society is the individual and society. This is a republican democrat. But for a Buddhist, giving up a

[16:12]

location, you find that you express yourself through other people. When we talk about realizing ourselves, we mean realizing Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, not So we realize ourselves through and with others. And we realize ourselves through ourselves. And we realize ourselves through everything. Each of these three is absolute and inclusive.

[17:20]

Before we can know this kind of freedom, we have to be comfortable with our own mind and body, and be able to drop off Speculation, fabrication, drop-off is limited. Sense by which we refer everything. So a good teacher, like Suzuki Roshi's teacher, Gyokujin, so on, or Rinzai, or Munmong, they all constantly railed at their disciples. And the more they could do it, the more it's a kind of confirmation.

[18:52]

that there's no one there to make angry, who can be described as such and such. And in the sashi, there should be some difficulty of this falling away. There's no cleansing ourselves of the confused existence. I almost can say contamination, because that's how it's experienced. It affects us until we have an eye which sees through it. There's no freedom from these without some pain.

[20:09]

What society, by its culture and by its morality, is trying to show you, lead you, is known by us to practice death. before culture, before morality. That one was morality. Consciousness and consciousness. So, closely related. So we have a direct experience of why, how we exist, how society exists, how each one of us exists.

[22:04]

One purpose, we might say, of Zen practice is not to be a follower of society, but to find out how we actually exist. Not just exist in the right way, It may be exactly the same kind of existence, but we find out for ourselves. through the depths of our need to feel that testimony. I feel very lucky to be back here again.

[24:10]

sitting with you from Japan. Japan is a wonderful place, but here I have a chance to practice Peace, God bless.

[25:15]

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