I often wonder why it's relevant to talk about Buddhism. I guess what I'm implying is that it's actually relevant, of course, in every circumstance, but you can't make it relevant for someone for whom it's not.

[01:03]

When I find Buddhism most relevant, I wonder how it could possibly be relevant to anyone. Because it's so... It's so common and rarefied. And it comes down to what we are already doing, so that should be enough. But for it to genuinely be enough for us is deeply pervasive ideas of self, of existence. This story, again, of the group Reflections, raises this kind of question. Holding up a husk of millet seed, what is a husk of millet seed? You know, this is the prajna paramita.

[02:43]

What is Dharma? What brings one, if it's interesting, to ask oneself this question? Sometimes it's the extremity of suffering. And suffering is usually the outcome greed, hate, and delusion, or extreme responsibility, some excessive sense of responsibility. So you look at the suffering in the world, the situation of various people, and what can you do about it? And you ask yourself this question, maybe having accepted a sense of responsibility, because why should you concern yourself with it?

[04:17]

I don't know, I don't want to speculate about this problem too much, but I want to talk about it a little. Not to say something about it, but rather to awaken you to a practice of Buddhism, to this kind of consideration. Now, when you try to sincerely

[05:27]

to someone. You are brought to this kind of consideration. What is? What is it? What? What? What is it? Pick up a cup, or you look at your hands. You know, you find yourself suffering, so you look at your hands. What is this thing that's suffering? What is this? What should I do? What should this thing do? What is this thing that is going to do for us? When you examine in this way, everything more or less collapses. And yet, when we try to find out something, we tend to reduce it to elements. That's one thing that Buddhism points out,

[07:09]

isolated events, phenomena. There's no perception of an element. There's no way to perceive your hands as an object. So, Sepo holds up this husk of millet and says, what is this husk of millet? But there's no way to perceive that husk of millet. And he says, if you throw it down the question, how then do we act in this world? If you're sincerely trying to act in this world, what act do you produce if there's nothing which can be perceived? This kind of problem is very abstract, you see. But if you're genuinely suffering sometimes, with no end in sight, you come to this kind of discussion with yourself. And yet, and Buddhism has tried to resolve this discussion, and yet a mind which cares, a person who cares about it, can't discuss it. You can't... It's very interesting.

[08:43]

That sounds like a contradiction. A person only gets this point who cares tremendously, but if you care about it, you can't see anything. So, again, maybe at the extremity of suffering, when you don't care anymore about anything, or on your deathbed, when you don't care, you can see quite clearly. So that's surprising in Paramita literature that over and over again there are no suffering beings. There's no suffering, no suffering being, no suffering to see. And yet we not only don't really believe that, but it's almost immoral to believe that because it's so apparent that there is. Maybe Buddhism is a practice, Zen Buddhism anyway, is a practice for those, not just for those people who are suffering and want some relief, but for those people who are willing to act, actually act in the world, willing to want something and try to get it.

[17:01]

If you want to end suffering, if you want to help somebody, if you want to get rich, if you want to satisfy yourself in some way, if you genuinely want and you follow that want out to actually try to do it, you find nothing exists that you can get hold of. The futility of it is enormous. When you are overburdened by the world systems and suffering and complexity and the husk of militancy which represents the whole world, what is it? It's your own attitude or view. And even in that instant which is causing suffering. So again, the idea of Dharma has the idea of realization in it. So it's a spiritual view, we can say, that's what a non-Buddhist would say, a religious historian. The idea of Dharma is not scientific, but a religious view of the world, because it has in it the idea of realization. Because when you see that, you can't

[18:29]

You know, there can't be a science really of just matter, because mind is there. That which studies it is there. That which observes it is there. And so, when you see that there's nothing that you can perceive or act on, you are thrown back on some mystical experience, or religious experience, because there's no way to define out your, you know, your, again, a black, black or pale. There's no way for you to grasp what a Dharma is, or what your life is. So, it's realization, or it's wholeness. The intent of the entity. So practice, realization is one with an accurate observation of this which we are in the center

[19:47]

So, when the Prajnaparamita Sutras say that the Tathagata is not to be known by his marks, it's just by simply saying the whole world is not to be known by his hasti, To really see this is freedom. Everything is being held up. Each person you meet is a husk of milk being held up by you, by Buddha. So this entire Dharma, you know, we call Dharma body, Buddha, for the nature of it is

[21:23]

is realization. So this Manjushri is a husk of milk, held up, you know, this kind in the shape of Manjushri, so that we can recognize that the nature, open nature of reality is realization. So supposing ultimate nature of reality is realization. So, then Engel goes on to say, when you are trying to point out that the ultimate nature of reality is realization, there must be no roaming eyes or hesitating hands and feet. Form and reality must be one. Guidance and temperament And that one, or zero, is the intent of meditation practice.

[22:42]

So when you hold up a husk of millet seed, or sephpo, the teacher, do you see his transgression? Do you see a millet seed, or do you see Buddha? For a Buddhist, you see Buddha. And that kind of vision allows you to allowed by meditation practice. First, it's rather difficult to, you know, even hearing these kind of words, which I think are, you know, too philosophical and abstract, but much of our thinking is philosophical and abstract, and much of our Justification for our actions is our philosophical and abstract rationalization. So some such discussion like this is useful, I think. But meditation practice gives us some sense of concentration.

[24:29]

some not being so disturbed by our senses. And we feel some feeling. But this also can be an addiction. And so some of us either retreat into practice or into some kind of isolation to hang on to this addiction of concentration. We don't want to meet anybody because if we speak we lose our energy. We don't want to leave Zen center or leave Zen life because we lose our energy. It takes various forms, but it's a kind of addiction, a kind of clinging to our own secrets, as if Seppo possessed some secrets by seeing Tokusan, Tokusan carrying his bow.

[25:32]

We have some secret in Buddhism because we carefully think that realization is our own possession. That our misery and karma is our own, so realization and some secret we must protect because it's the only thing which will balance the teeter-totter. So we keep a secret or promise of enlightenment on one side, trying to hold up our karma on the other. So you're rather protective of your concentration and the practice. Afraid to Give up your belief that you yourself are an entity which has a destiny which will realize something, which can be perfected. Realize. There's no person there even to realize. The Bodhisattva is all of us and everything, the Dharma body itself.

[26:56]

And as I started to say, you know, at first it's rather philosophical and inconceivable and unbelievable to think that you can't actually perceive something as an object until you keep making an attempt to in various forms. You try to perceive your relationships with people as an object which can hurt you. or you don't like yourself. So you perceive someone who could like themselves and you do. Okay. But for some of us it's necessary to thoroughly investigate this until, as in Buddhism they say,

[28:02]

horns of the rabbit or flakes in the air that you see because you have an eye disease. You don't actually concern yourself about the horns of a rabbit because you're quite sure rabbits don't have horns. So when you're quite sure that you can no longer perceive you know, an object, you no longer concern yourself with it. Though you may get caught up again and again in perceiving some situation as an object which, except, you know, and it exists in maybe karmic terms. But eventually you find that you thoroughly know by your meditation practice, by jhana and by prajna, by wisdom, you thoroughly have experienced and know that there is nothing that can be perceived or acted on in that sense. And from that moment you are in a different kind of world.

[29:24]

So the problem is not with the world, but with your views, your own views and attitudes. And your own views and attitudes are the subject of meditation. But that includes stop those protective views.

[31:24]

Is there anything you'd like to talk about? Something seems to be working for her. She's laying on the grass for some time. Seems to be, um, I think, a correct process. I just thought I would see my mother. She was cutting down a lot of trees as well. She's not here. He has his electricity here in Attenda.

[34:01]

Yeah. Yeah. Doesn't discrimination have its place because it allowed us to choose to do better? How? I don't want to respond. Yeah. I don't understand when you say that nothing can be perceived as logic, that there's something logic, that everything can only be perceived as logic.

[35:54]

Actually, you have to come to the point where you You need to see that to see it. You know, I can't answer your question actually, it's just talking. When you're at the point where you're completely, what is this? Then you see there's nothing to perceive. Then you can ask yourself, what is that process that asks what is this, that attempts to perceive something? and that process needs to wither away.

[37:31]

This kind of discussion, I mean, that's too abstract for me, actually. Excuse me for doing it. But many of you need to do it, actually. If you could carry through, you have some difficulty. But if you could carry through a process that you're that you think is your difficulty, instead of stopping it and then worrying about it, you would come to the conclusion, you could resolve it. But this kind of thing is quite intimate. It can't be talked about like this, really. So I'm only suggesting something about what Seppo was doing, saying, what is this, which is as hard to find as a lack of tail in the dark. And in that commentary by Setsho, the line I forgot was just a kind of repetition of before, he says,

[39:20]

beat the drum and search everywhere and you still won't find anything. And then for whose sake do the hundreds of spring flowers bloom? The particular problem of how you discriminate something, do you cut down, do you look to create a clear space for a building, or do you govern? You can reduce it to some... It's the subject of this story again, you know, how do you do something on purpose? I have a question for you, Mr. Chairman.

[41:10]

Well, two ways, a positive way and a negative way. One way is to go along with it, do bullshit too. So completely that it's obviously bullshit. And that can be helpful. Or you are rather not putting down enough. You don't allow yourself to be caught by this experience. That's it. That's practically speaking what she thinks. Actually, the bullshitting with people is more effective. If people too easily perceive, bodhidharma, and then they can too easily just become a member of nature. So people have to play out their situations.

[42:42]

critical, but not caught. In some states, what we're talking about is realization. If you act in a way which is holding up the North Sea, then there's no alternative, there's no specific action that's possible. But that's almost impossible to see, and yet impossible to avoid. What do you mean by chakras?

[44:07]

What do you mean like you look at the, you don't look at any one ball? Okay. Hmm. What we're... I find this kind of conversation that I'm expressing rather frustrating because it's extremely important, but as unable to be,

[45:43]

It's very intimate and it's only able to be conveyed really by our mutual association. How you actually drop your ideal self and yet act in the world is something quite intimate. How you actually participate with people and not be critical. And no matter what I say, Let's know it. But maybe most fundamental is that you don't compare, and you don't have a critical attitude. Genuinely, you're not critical. And yet, I don't know what to say.

[46:48]

I mean, specifically he's collecting his tapes. If the tapes didn't exist, he couldn't have been impeached. These are the kind of results, something that happens, that makes it out of the everyday world. We become active, we become somewhat able to take preconditions. Like what do you mean by preconditions, for example? Oh, pretty much so.

[49:31]

In fact, I hear it from people. They can spot a Zen Center student from a mosque. You know, a thousand faces or something. Or some people remark they've seen several of us. With hair, too, you know. In different situations, you know, different places in a room, something similar about all those people. But that's more true of, you know, I remember pictures of Mike Dixon, do you remember Mike Dixon? I remember pictures of Mike Dixon's wedding, first wedding too. There's these pictures of all these guests, and then there's the pictures of his end students, particularly Mike. And there's the situation, everybody has half-lowered eyes, You can, it's just wonderful, you can look out and spot everybody who does that other than Alessandra. But that's more or less true at first, and after a while it's not so true. Anything you do, of course, affects you, you know, but eventually...

[50:51]

Usually not so, you can't. For somebody whose practice is quite mature, it's not... it's not so observable. I can't see if there's conditioning in practice. How is it not self? Can't see if there's... If there is conditioning in practice. Why there's no self? Yeah, from the point of view of karma, there's some kind of... karma. But from the point of view of... Oh, God knows. It's true, but it's difficult to express it. But from the point of view of that which is no point of view, there is no karma. But how you take that point of view, which is no point of view, I mean, maybe we simply say stop thinking, but it means no longer having the, in your actions, various kinds of patterns and attitudes. And it's actually possible, through insight and meditation,

[52:30]

drop those patterns. But it means you have to drop your desires too, because those patterns are reinforced by our desires, as well as our habits of karma. Then the question is, why bother? Some of us bother because we get so messed up, you know? And some of us bother maybe because we have a taste for it. Or if you are genuinely greedy, you'll practice Buddhism. If you're really greedy and really want things, you'll find out the only thing you can get is Buddhism.

[53:34]

There's nothing else. Yes, it's a good question. I'm not sure. Often times, I don't think, at least in this period of time, I don't think that's a problem. But later in the day, he became a lamb of God.

[54:47]

Now, that one, you have to make your way through the gate and you have to walk through it. And that one is very, very difficult. What has been critical, you have taken it away from me. What do you think? Q. No, no, no. I hope your bags are alright. You know, we're not trying to come to any conclusion here.

[55:56]

Well, as you know, it doesn't help much to point out the cause. They're the same. The cause and effect, in that case, are the same. Unless the person really wants to put themselves in the position of finding out for themselves. So anyway, you can try various things. You can also offer the person a cup of tea. It's very hard to drink a cup of tea while you're banging your head. Or you could join the headbanging. You could sit beside them. You know, they might say, well, Harry, why are you banging your head? Or you could say, now you really don't have enough force in that, and you could grab them. So it really hurts, you know. Your example is not foolish. I know some extraordinary situations, actually, where people's karma has been in just that kind of situation.

[57:26]

And their whole life reinforces the need for that headman, which also has some good effects. And their life won't let them get out of that headman. And I've seen, you know, often I've seen situations of that are quite terrible, which is quite clear to the people involved that, you know, I wouldn't do that. But yet, they don't mind my participation because I am not comparing. And yet, they include me or us as incentives, and I say us as incentives, sometimes included, what I'm talking about.

[58:29]

because of some reminder to himself Anyway, it's... These questions, the level at which they exist, we can't answer them, because the way we actually participate with other people is not on this level of form. You don't see those who see the Bhagavad-Gita there. Eyes have not seen them. When you see a situation like that with your eyes, you don't see it. And maybe one of the elements is you don't care about the person's headache. You do care, but actually in some way you see such things aren't important. So you can act. I don't know how to explain it. But...

[59:49]

Another way of saying it is that Dharma, or elements of matter, is seen as a kind of commotion. And by doing Zazen, you reduce your commotion. And so you reduce commotion everywhere. And to stop the world, or to stop suffering, means to stop the commotion. So by your activity, you stop the commotion. Even if you stop it a tiny bit, you stop the commotion. So there's no way to stop the commotion completely. You can't grab something and stop the commotion. And you can't be separate from it and stop the commotion unless the person is, the negative way doesn't work, unless the person themselves wants to stop the commotion. So for a person who doesn't want to stop the commotion, the only way to stop, to reduce, since we're practicing Buddhism and there's a sense of realization that we have some sense of that as an effort, we sense it through our practice, the ease of reducing commotion. So we have a tendency to want to reduce the commotion. So let's maybe

[61:23]

you, like anyone, if you, the only way to do that with a person or a situation which doesn't want to reduce the commotion themselves, who hasn't been turned around to see that you should reduce, that it's beneficial to reduce the commotion. The only way to do it is to join the commotion. Because to be part of it, separate from it, does nothing. So if you join the commotion, you by your practice, without doing anything, reduce the commotion. So, there's some trust that has to occur. As long as, maybe this is like non-doing, as long as you're trying to do something, it doesn't help that this increases commotion. So, how to join the commotion and know that you're joining it reduces the commotion, is to not compare. And when you're like that, people genuinely will trust you. even though you're not participating or wouldn't do it yourself. So normally it's a view that we don't want that person around because they're critical of this way of life. But if you're a person who does not compare, but really they don't mind your being around even though you don't do it, because there's no record being kept in you of it as in a comparative way, you understand?

[62:50]

So, you're not excluded from situations, which you would be if you were critical. So, you don't... so you're able... I am joining your commotion. And if what you see is me, if you see the commotion, you're not perceiving what you really feel. That's the second principle, so you shouldn't be. So the second principle is not just form, it's form from the point of view of Buddha. So the second principle is used in Buddha. So this story is about the second principle. So I don't know how to convey to you, but at some thoroughgoing, deep way, you can realize your own commotion and, which we could call irrelevant, and the absolute, the background or emptiness on which that commotion

[64:21]

Reducing that commotion, because there's no separate body to perceive, actually, reduces the commotion everywhere. So when you fully see that, you no longer have the question, or bothered by the problem, am I really helping people by doing zazen here? What he's saying, Seppo is saying again, is what we need are people who have reduced, eliminated their own commotion. This is the only way to eliminate the commotion of the world, because it wants this commotion. So we eliminate our own commotion and yet join the commotion. As long as we're alive, there's some commotion, but if you have practiced well enough, if your practice is mature, that commotion is not you any longer. That commotion can't be described.

[65:43]

that commotion just arises according to particular circumstances, in tune with particular circumstances. Form and reality are one. Expedience and the real are together. So right now, maybe some of you have been sitting for a long time, you have some commotion in your body and mind. Where is that commotion happening? Now is some chance to

[66:38]

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