I have this fantasy that just came to me of a person who we call Shakyamuni Buddha who lived in India a long time ago. I have a fantasy of that person sitting with an assembly of living beings bodhisattvas and that person who was called a Buddha or was a Buddha or is a Buddha that person is sitting in the presence of the assembly showing the assembly how it is to be a Buddha That's my fantasy.

[01:05]

The fantasy is the Buddha shows people, teaches people how to be Buddha. The Buddha shows people the way a Buddha lives, the way a Buddha is living. And the Buddha wishes, in this fantasy, the Buddha wishes for all the beings to receive this teaching of how to be a Buddha and to themselves enter into that practice as soon as possible and become Buddha. Furthermore, in this fantasy, I imagine that the Buddha understands that suffering is omnipresent.

[02:26]

The Buddha understands that and also the Buddha accepts that. and is not trying to get away from the suffering that is present now. And again, also understands that in the next moment suffering will also be present. And it's omnipresent in each moment and all over the place. But simultaneously with this omnipresent suffering is omnipresent Buddha. Buddha is omnipresent in intimate rapport, intimate, peaceful, compassionate rapport with suffering and with the understanding that suffering is omnipresent.

[03:36]

So this peaceful, joyful, compassionate Buddha is not separate from omnipresent suffering beings. I imagine that's the way it was a long time ago in India, and I imagine that's the way it is now. Buddha is demonstrating how to be Buddha, which is how to be how to be themselves completely in this world. And I would say that some of our ancestors, for example, the founder of the San Francisco Zen Center, Suzuki Roshi said, our practice is just to be ourselves.

[04:45]

completely in each moment. I don't remember him saying, our practice is just to be Buddha completely in each moment. I don't remember him saying that, but he might have. But I'm saying that what he did say could be understood as he's saying our practice is to be Buddha completely in each moment. And what that is, is for us to be completely ourselves. Right here, right now, completely. And then someone might say, yeah, but that's hard. It's hard to be completely me in the midst of suffering. It's hard to be me in the midst of the horrors that are being experienced in this precious life.

[05:57]

Just last night I was observing the story of America in relationship to the Holocaust. The way some Americans did not want to allow Jews to get out of Germany and come to America. Some Americans did not want that. It's so terrible that we can close our hearts to people who need our help. And that kind of thing is omnipresent. that closing our hearts to the suffering of others and closing our hearts to our own suffering, that's omnipresent. But simultaneous with that is not closing our hearts to our suffering.

[07:11]

It's opening to our suffering and feeling it wholeheartedly, wholeheartedly suffer. And, you know. Like, you know, a grandmother is a grandmother when she's suffering. A grandmother is a grandmother when her children are suffering. A grandmother wholeheartedly opens to the suffering of her grandchildren. That's a grandmother. Now if a grandmother isn't doing that, then she's not really a grandmother. She's not really a Buddha. But simultaneous with her inability

[08:11]

to open her heart to the suffering of her children, her grandchildren. Simultaneous with that is who she really is, who is open to it and wholeheartedly feels it. The Buddha is there with the half-hearted person who's not doing her job as a grandmother. And it's the same for grandfathers. This fall is kind of like fall now, right? Even though it's quite toasty, it could be called autumn. It's a lovely autumn day, isn't it? And we're here having a lovely autumn day with omnipresent suffering. It's here with us on this beautiful day.

[09:16]

And we have a chance to open to it. And this fall I'm intending to contemplate a life of ritual. A life of ritual in the sense of a life of making everything we do the Buddha way. And there are many rituals, traditional rituals, which happen sometimes and don't happen other times. For example, there is the ritual of doing prostration with an assembly to the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. That's a ritual, a ritual physical action of prostrating.

[10:18]

at the ritual way to pay homage to the one who understands and accepts omnipresent suffering. And in this understanding and accepting, this one illuminates and teaches suffering beings. So there's a practice of prostration to such a being that's one traditional ritual practice but also I want to emphasize that we have the opportunity to make every action all day long like the action of my moving my hand and my fingers whacking this microphone but now that I whacked it a few times maybe I'll be more careful and move it around But whatever I do, I wish for this motion of my hand, I want this to be a ritual enactment of the Buddha way.

[11:36]

I want to make my speaking to you now the ritual enactment of the Buddha way. I want this, my speech, to be the ritual enactment of Buddha's wholeheartedness and as we just chanted if I notice a lack in my wholeheartedness if I notice some lack in my wholeheartedness to make my actions the Buddha way then I will acknowledge that confess that and repent that say, I'm sorry that I noticed I was not really wholehearted in what I just thought, said, or gestured. And I have in the background the teaching that if I continue this practice of acknowledging and repenting my half-heartedness, the roots of half-heartedness will melt away.

[12:49]

wholeheartedness will come to be realized in this world. Buddha will be realized in this world by wishing to realize it and acknowledging when I get more or less distracted from wholeheartedly being this actor. But once again, I will also feel that the traditional forms of ritual the traditional forms can help us discover our half-heartedness and realize our wholeheartedness. So I'd like to look at a number of traditional ritual activities that will help us, I feel, that could help us be more wholehearted all day long, even when we're not doing, for example, prostrations to Buddhas. If we understand how to do that wholeheartedly, it may spread to our dish washing, and to our canopy setting up, and to our sweeping the ground, and to our picking up eucalyptus leaves, and to every action.

[14:09]

We're active all day. We got that down. We're nonstop actors, but Are we wholehearted? And sometimes it seems like not. But I want to be. And I want to notice when I'm not and say, oh, that was, yeah. That wasn't really wholehearted. I closed my heart a little bit to San Francisco. But I vow to learn how to not close my heart to San Francisco or Mill Valley. Or disassembly. That's my vow. So this attitude is the Buddha's attitude and it's also called Grandmother Mind.

[15:17]

To make every action for the sake of the Buddha way. To remember that every action is an opportunity. And I also know, I just want to tell you, I'm wearing a watch. Quite a lovely watch. Some people might say, do you see it? I'm not going to tell the brand because I'm not doing watch commercials here. It's quite, don't you think, kind of a nice wash. Very sleek. Yeah, appropriate for a Buddhist priest. Anyway, I almost never wear this watch because it's so nice and it's so fragile. I cracked it once already and it cost a lot to fix it. So I don't, I wore it today because I thought I'm not going to do any rough stuff today.

[16:21]

I think it's Maybe I can get through the day without cracking the crystal again. And now I can look at it and say, I've already been, we've been going now for a while here, and maybe have a little bit more time for me just to mention to you a topic which I will be bringing up here and also bring up at Green Gulch. We're starting a practice period there pretty soon. I'm going to bring this up, and I'm also going to bring it up in a series of classes today. under the auspices of the yoga room. Has that been announced yet? No. So it's a secret, but there's going to be a series of classes at the yoga room which may or may not ever be announced. And if nobody comes, I'm not going to come either. Anyway, the topic which I'd like to bring up are rituals, ritual practices, that had been taught for bodhisattvas, by bodhisattvas, for quite a long time.

[17:31]

Almost 2,000 years ago, this teaching was given. And the teaching was given in a sutra, and the name of the sutra is the Flower Adornment Sutra, Flower Adornment Scripture. And the main bodhisattva in that sutra is named Samantabhadra which often is translated as universal goodness or universal virtue. Samantabhadra bodhisattva. The bodhisattva of bodhisattva practice. And this bodhisattva in the sutra says it this bodhisattva expresses their vow, their vows, ten vows, which are also ten vows to do ten practices.

[18:36]

And now, if I bring up these ten practices and these ten vows, I want to tell you before I do it that I do not want these ten vows and these ten practices to distract you from you know, who you are right now. I mainly want you to just completely be who you are right now. So if I bring up these practices which are to help us be completely who we are right now, there's a danger that these wonderful practices will distract you from where you are right now. I don't want that. So maybe I won't bring them up. And I'll just leave you with yourself to be completely yourself. But if you beg me, I might tell you these things which potentially can distract you from being this bodhisattva you are now.

[19:45]

And if you beg me, you'll be a bodhisattva who begged to hear these teachings to help you be completely yourself. These teachings and these practices which help you maybe find out if there's any resistance to anything. Otherwise, I'm done for now. That's a lovely way to put it. Thank you. I hope that they help you be where and how you are now. It's like one of those late night talk shows where... Pardon? It's one of those late night talk shows where the band... Someone from the band... Yeah, someone in the band on the late night talk show has...

[20:50]

Yeah, right. So anyway, here's the ten. I'm going to tell you all ten and then if I live any longer, I'll go into detail of each of the ten, but not today. But today I'll tell you all ten. Are you ready? Yes. Number one, the Bodhisattva Samantabhadra vows to practice paying homage to all Buddhas in each moment. And you can pay homage by saying, for example, Namu Shakyamuni Buddha. Or you can say Namu all Buddhas. Namu means kind of like paying homage, honoring, lining up with, paying homage, like I'm lined up, I want to line up with all the Buddhas.

[22:07]

I want to line up with being completely what I am now in this world of suffering, which is what Buddhas are doing. I want to line up with that. I want to pay homage to that. That's the first practice. And the Bodhisattva says, I want to do that in every moment to every Buddha, and I will continue that practice to the end of all living beings. Till all living beings are awakened, I will continue this practice. But since there's no end to all living beings, there will be no end to my homage pairing. Sometimes when I give a talk at Zen Center, before the talk I offer incense and pay homage, I bow. So, you know, it strikes me, in this tradition, the teacher who's going to give the talk, the person who's going to offer this Dharma talk, before they give the talk, they pay homage to all Buddhas.

[23:16]

It's kind of, they start with, in a sense, being humble. but also kind of being, what's the word? Courageous. Because I'm not just honoring the Buddhas, I'm also saying, I want to join this program. I want to become a Buddha with the Buddhas for the welfare of this world. So in one sense it's humble, like we bow down, but we bow down to realize we're the same as what we're bowing to. What we really are, how we really are, is Buddha. And we bow to that. We bow down to that. But also we bow down to that understanding that we have the same nature as that. And the body of the person bowing and the body of the person bowed to, they're not two. They're not two. So we bow to realize that.

[24:18]

And in order to realize wholeheartedness, we need humility. I need teachers. I need the Buddhas. I can't do this by myself. I need the Sangha. I bow down to that. When I bow to the Buddha, I'm bowing to the Dharma and the Sangha too. I bow down to that. I humble myself before that which I aspire to realize. This is the first practice. And how to do that without distracting myself from being myself. That's the challenge. Next practice is to make offerings to all Buddhas. And one of the things you offer is prostration. but you also offer incense, and you also offer flowers, and you also offer candlelight.

[25:27]

We make these offerings to Buddhists. We actually do that, right? We do it here, we do it at Zenzen. We do it all over. We make these offerings to all Buddhists. And there's more offerings. You can offer food. You can offer vegetables and rice and cakes, you know, And you can even put sugar in the cakes because it won't hurt the Buddhas. Because they're not actually going to eat the sugar. They're just going to receive the gift. So you can offer the Buddhas also tea and also hot water. You can make these offerings. And that's part of the practice is to make offerings to Buddhas. You can also serve Buddhas. Like give Buddhas water. Hold parasols over Buddhas in the hot sun. You can make these offerings. And in the sutra, Samanta Padra goes into some elaboration of all the different kinds of offerings and basically finally says, and so forth, forever, infinite offerings to all Buddhas.

[26:35]

In order to become Buddha, we have to make offerings to all Buddhas. It's part of the deal of being wholehearted. And like, wait a minute. I can't make offerings to all Buddhists. Okay, well, that's fine. You're being half-hearted. Good. Confess and repent. Then you say, I can't make offerings to infinite Buddhists. That's not wholehearted. But we can work with that. And be sorry that I'm saying, there's a limit on how much I'm going to offer these Buddhists. Okay, fine. Go ahead. Limit it. And now let me know about your confession and repentance. Next, praise all Buddhas. And this one again is very tricky for people. In Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, Tibetan, Mongolian, Indian, in those training temples, in the past and in the present,

[27:49]

the people in those training temples, the monks and nuns, part of their daily practice is to recite texts which very rigorously praise all Buddhas. And these texts have been translated from those East Asian traditions, Sanskrit, Chinese, Tibetan, Japanese, They've been translated into English. And I have these texts in English. And I showed them to some of the senior people at Zen Center and asked them if they felt like, could we do these, could we recite these chants in praise of Buddha? And people said, no, no, it's just too much. Now, if you go to Japan or China or Korea now and you go to the monasteries, they're going to chant those things But you won't know what it says, so you won't think it's too much.

[28:51]

You think, oh, they're chanting something. But if you knew what it was, you might say, that's too much! And maybe some of those monks also don't even know what they're chanting. I mean, they're really highly praising these wonderful Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. And in the West, we may not be ready for that. But at least I can bring it up, and then you can realize, yeah, we're not ready. But that will help us realize we're not really wholehearted. We're like, no, that's like a cult or whatever. Or even, that distracts me from being who I am, even though who I am is somebody who says I'm not going to do that. Anyway, I'm holding back all the stories of resistance to that practice. Of what? praising all Buddhas. These great bodhisattvas says, I'm going to praise all Buddhas.

[29:51]

And that doesn't distract the bodhisattvas from being who they are, because who they are is just basically a praise being. That's part of who they are, is they praise Buddhas. It's not a distraction at all from being a great bodhisattva. It's normal. That's the first three. Number four. Confession and repentance. For example, after you try the first three, after you vow to do the first three, and then after you practice doing the first three, you probably have something to confess. Like, I didn't do those very wholeheartedly. I did them, but it was kind of half-hearted. It was kind of lukewarm. Those practices don't have to be burning hot, but not lukewarm, just warm, okay?

[31:06]

Warm. Warm. Okay, so we do those practices, and other things, other... occasions too in our lives, we notice we're not wholehearted. I didn't open my heart to these people who wanted to come in and receive my help, receive our help. I wanted to close it. I'm sorry. I was not wholeheartedly. And so the fourth practice is to confess and feel sorrow at not being wholehearted anymore. compassionate with all beings and with all Buddhas. That's number four. Number five is to rejoice in the merit of other people's practice. When you see other people being wholehearted, when you see that, there's a practice called

[32:13]

That's great. That's so great. That's so wonderful. I feel such a joy to see people being so kind to each other. That's number five. And by the way, if I do number four, it tends to open my eyes to be able to do number five. If you don't do number four, if I don't notice how half-hearted I am, sometimes, sometimes I'm half-hearted. If I don't notice that, then that closes my eyes to see how other people are doing quite well sometimes. And they could be doing quite well, but because I'm not doing as well as them, I do not see how well they're doing. But when I notice that I'm not doing very well, that opens me up to see how well they're doing, and then I see something to praise. And I really feel good about it.

[33:17]

I feel joy. But that follows from me noticing that I did not joyfully open my heart. I did not wholeheartedly pay homage to Buddhists. Number six. request that the Buddhas turn the wheel of the Dharma. Like Dhanan said, would you please bring these teachings out? Would you tell us about these practices to help us not be distracted by these practices? We need to request.

[34:21]

So we do. So people request people. Would you please give Dharma talk? Would you turn the Dharma wheel? And of course, sometimes people can say, no, no, no, no, I can't accept your request. I can't accept your invitation. So then you request again. So request, make a request that the Buddhas turn the Dharma wheel and that also people who maybe aren't completely themselves yet, maybe might ask some of them too. Request those who are completely accepting of the omnipresence of suffering, those who have realized that wonderful openness, request them to turn the Dharma wheel. That is number six. That's a vow, and it's also a practice. I vow to do it, and then practicing it.

[35:25]

Number seven, request the Buddhas to stay in this world of suffering. If it was just for the Buddhas themselves, they might say, I don't need to be here. to be a Buddha. I can go someplace else and suffer. I don't know if... I'm not particularly interested in just suffering forever in this way. If it's just for me, I've had enough. I mean, it's a big deal. Omnipresent suffering, also unlimited. Omnipresent means nonstop and all the places it's present. If it's just for me, I think maybe, can I go? And so we have to say, please stay here.

[36:29]

Don't go. That's number seven. Number eight. Which is kind of referring back to the previous ones. Number eight is do all the practices that Buddhas do, have done, and will do. In other words, copy the Buddhas. And what do Buddhas do? Well, Buddhas pay homage to all Buddhas. Buddhas make offerings to all Buddhas. Buddhas praise all Buddhas. They do that, and they have done that. for a long time before they became completely themselves. So number eight is to basically do all these practices and do them to the full extent like Buddhas do them. Number nine, accommodate and harmonize with all suffering beings.

[37:42]

which I already talked about. Be wholehearted in all your relationships with every living beings, every human, every animal, every tree, every rock. Be wholehearted with all living beings. Accommodate, adjust to help them, to teach them how you are settling into yourself. Do it in a way that they can learn it with you. That was number nine. We're almost done. Number ten. Dedicate the merit of all these nine practices. All the goodness and virtue that comes from these practices. And again, this bodhisattva's name is universal goodness, universal virtue.

[38:49]

This bodhisattva, then the tenth practice, is to take all the virtue of this practice and give it to, for the welfare of all living beings. So we first of all start by giving ourselves to the Buddhas, and that brings a lot of merit. which we then can give to sentient beings. The Buddhas don't really need us to give them any merit, but we give it anyway. And that generates more wholeheartedness. The Buddhas don't need us, or maybe they do, need us. Let's say they want us to give us their wholeheartedness, but if we don't, they can practice with us being half-hearted. So they do need us to do it. Their job is to help us do this practice.

[39:52]

But if we don't do it, they still can carry on. Just like we can carry on with people who are not being wholehearted with each other and us. We can continue to practice with them, even though we need them to learn this. We need to respect all beings. And we need all beings to respect us. and each other. We need that. But if they aren't doing it, we need to practice with them anyway. We need to practice with an ocean of unrespectful, disrespectful living beings. We need to. And when I say we need to, I mean we who are Buddhas need to. So those are the ten. And for the rest of the year, I'll go into detail. And people will bring up probably something in response to these great vows of Samantabhadra, which again, watch out that you don't get distracted from just being who you are right now as you contemplate these practices.

[41:08]

First of all, be silent and still. Okay, now that I'm here, oh yeah, I want to be here wholeheartedly. Maybe contemplating and discussing these practices will help. If not, take a break and come back to just being. Excuse the expression, Joe Schmo. Do you know the expression Joe Schmo? You do? Wow. Your English is really good. Do you know Joe Schmo? I don't know what it means. Huh? Yeah, Joe Schmo. It means like being an ordinary person. It's a little like John Doe. Joe Schmo. There's a similar expression. Excuse me, Charlie. Yeah? Did you raise your hand? I did. Yeah, just a second. Let me Leonid tell us. Yes? In Russian there is an expression which I think came

[42:15]

Yeah, it might be, yeah. It sounds like... Charlie? I have a confession. I can't remember all ten of the practices you just said. Okay. And where could I go, like, read about those? Well, excuse me for saying so, but Google. Just put in Samanta Padra's ten vowels, and there they'll be. They're in the Avatamsaka Sutra, but it's easier to Google them than the page. The English translation of the Avatamsaka Sutra is 2,100 pages. It's at the end. So the first bodhisattva in the Sutra is Samantabhadra, and the last bodhisattva is Samantabhadra. And at the end, Samantabhadra offers these great vows. But you can also... And also, yeah, I think you can do it with the internet now.

[43:22]

You can find your own access, and you'll probably find different translations. I know of four or five translations. There's probably more. And see which one is most in accord with where you're at now. So anyway, it's high noon, and we could stop now, or if there's some offerings you care to make to all Buddhas? Yes, a question asked. If suffering is on the present, how can a Buddha decide to go somewhere else? Well, if suffering is on the present, a Buddha can get up from her seat and go to the toilet. Buddhas can walk around. Suffering is still there. Huh? Suffering is still on the toilet. Yeah, right, suffering. But I mean, they can go away from us.

[44:26]

They can go away from us. Where they go is not going away from omnipresent suffering. It's just like, I've had enough of this. I've had enough of this. But he's saying, please stay. Okay. For me, for me, I've waited long enough for lunch. You know? I've had enough of being hungry. For me, I'm ready to go eat. But if you want me to stay longer, for you, because you're also hungry, I'll stay for you. But for me, I've had it. But now I'm going to go have lunch and... Suffering will be omnipresent at lunch, too. But you don't want Buddha to go to lunch sometimes. Don't go to lunch. Stay here a little longer and turn the wheel a couple more times, please.

[45:30]

Okay, for you I'll do it. But for me, I've turned the wheel enough in this way, I want to go ahead and turn it by having lunch. Or maybe even not having this body. But yeah, Buddhas are not gonna run away, they're just gonna go someplace else. And we're saying, stay here please. We want you to stay. And part of the reason we want you to stay is because you're not running away. And we want to learn that from you. Okay? And I wasn't trying to get you to let me go to lunch, by the way. I don't even know if there is a lunch. There might be a lunch for me. But if there isn't, I know where to beg one. I think some of you are going to have good lunches that I could beg you for. Right? Some of you will share your lunch, I'm sure.

[46:32]

So I'm not trying to get out of here, but is there anything else you want to bring up? Yes, Homer? I have an objection to what you said, and that is... Okay, that'd be fine. And so when you accept omnipresent, there's no me and you. Yeah, and that's Buddha. From Buddha, there's no me and you, and that helps them accept the omnipresence, and vice versa. accepting omnipresence helps you realize there's no me and you. Buddhas don't think there's Buddha and you. Buddhas know that you might think that, but they don't agree with you. However, they open their heart to you who think you're not Buddha. In and out, me and you, and those hinder

[47:48]

accepting. Those, me and you, in and out, those make it difficult for us to accept omnipresence. To see and accept it. To accept and see it. But if we accept and see it, that frees us from me and you. If we accept omnipresence and suffering, we accept that the people who are seeking refuge from their their countries to come here, that they're not you. They're not me. They're us. They're what we really are. And that's difficult. Is that enough for this morning? Linda? I just don't want the discussion to end, so... requesting you to stay here while I make up a question. Okay. Thank you.

[48:50]

That was a wonderful offering. A couple of things I was responding to in your talk. Of course, the ritual, that deep dive into ritual, going to bring forth a lot of argument, made me think of of the story where the person is so involved in making the garden absolutely perfect, and perfect, perfect, and then the master comes along and says, there's one more thing he's done that shakes a tree and makes a mess. So at least I'm glad you mentioned the danger. There's a lot of danger about getting deeply involved in ritual. In a dangerous world, it's dangerous to get involved in ritual.

[49:53]

And one of the main dangers would be if the ritual would distract us. That's one of the dangers. Maybe there's some other ones too. So first of all, I try to practice, and it's already pretty hard, the other thing, to be yourself. Mm-hmm. I suppose it would hurt to do the rituals that you suggest you do. It doesn't hurt, I guess. But even if it doesn't hurt, still there's a danger that it would. Yes. There's a possibility that it would. Anyway, so, at Zen Center we're doing these rituals and I'm going to, rather than do them and have people then resist them, I want to bring up the resistance right away and get into it. to focus on the rituals more than usual. Not to do any more than usual. I don't see us adding a bunch of rituals to the ones we've already got.

[50:58]

Like here we did a ritual, two rituals, right? We recited an ancient text and then we did a ritual of acknowledging each other. That's a ritual. Which we did. I'm not thinking of doing more rituals necessarily, but rather like doing them and then welcoming people's half-heartedly revelation of half-heartedness. I want to do the rituals. I want to help the community do the rituals more wholeheartedly. And the path to wholeheartedness, it walks through fields of half-heartedness. But it doesn't just walk through them, it acknowledges them and notices them and reveals them and feels something about that. That's the path to wholeheartedness. The Buddhas, even the Shakyamuni Buddha, said that in the past he was somewhat half-hearted on certain occasions.

[52:00]

And he was embarrassed to be half-hearted, but he was. But then he told us he was half-hearted. He demonstrated, confessing his half-heartedness. And he felt that he was silly to be half-hearted, but he was half-hearted. The Buddha was. So if the Buddha was half-hearted, we also will be half-hearted sometimes. But the Buddha told us. The Buddha noticed it. And sometimes we might not notice it, but our friends might look at us kind of like, with a question in their face. Maybe they won't be pointing a finger at us. You are not being half-whole-hearted. But they might look at us like, hmm. You say, what does that look on your face mean? Well, I was kind of wondering if you felt wholehearted about what you just said. Well, thank you.

[53:03]

So we can notice ourselves, but we also need to do these things with others so they can also help us see things about ourselves that we cannot see. And the way they help us is by questioning us. And we can help others by questioning them. For example, we could say, do you by any chance want to be wholehearted? And some people will say, I asked somebody that recently, are you ready to be wholehearted? And the person said, I'm not sure. But I help by asking, are you ready to be wholehearted? The person says, I want to be wholehearted. Okay, great, are you ready? I don't know. Okay, but there's the conversation. I can't force you into being wholehearted. And you can't force yourself. But by looking at it, and wishing for it, and conversing about it, we will find this wholeheartedness.

[54:04]

Because it's really who we are. Yes? which was brought up, form and emptiness, emptiness is formed. Yeah. Well, all these rituals are formed. They're things you can see and hear and touch and smell and taste and, you know, touch. And you can think about it. And the thinking is emptiness. The seeing is emptiness. The seen is emptiness, the heard is emptiness, the hearing is emptiness, all this stuff. But we realize the ultimate truth of these things having no substantial existence. We realize freedom together with all beings by being wholehearted with these forms.

[55:10]

If we're not wholehearted with the forms, we have not yet reached their emptiness. In the wholeheartedness of forms, their emptiness is realized. So, the Heart Sutra, the bodhisattva of great compassion is a wholehearted being and that bodhisattva is wholehearted with form, feeling, perception, and so on. And therefore, that wholeheartedness really that wholeheartedness realizes emptiness. We maybe say the bodhisattva realizes emptiness. But the bodhisattva really, this great bodhisattva, this advanced bodhisattva, is just wholeheartedness. Bodhisattva means a being of awakening. A being of awakening is a wholehearted being. And that wholehearted being

[56:12]

is wholehearted form. Therefore, it realizes emptiness of the form. And then everybody's free of suffering. However, we might continue the forms so that more people can join the freedom from suffering by doing these forms and learning how to do them wholeheartedly. But again, we find that wholeheartedness by dealing compassionately with our resistance to them. And two forms of resistance, one is to be too enthusiastic and try to convert everybody else and get everybody else to do it, or too enthusiastic and think other people are worthless because they aren't as enthusiastic as you are. The other is to resist and rebel. There's two kinds of resistance. To be late to the zendo for sitting, or to be early and think you're better than other people.

[57:13]

That's resisting. Okay? Denise. So, would you say that the rituals are active zazen? Pardon? Would you say that the rituals are a kind of active zazen? Yeah. And zazen is an active ritual. Zazen is one of the rituals. And real zazen includes these ten rituals. wholehearted zazen is homage is praising Buddhas we praise Buddha by sitting like a Buddha we make offerings to Buddha by doing Buddha's posture so those ten are actually what zazen needs to be those ten and those ten they don't need to be zazen they are That's what we mean by Zazen. Zazen is a short term, and even a shorter one is Zen.

[58:18]

But even another short one is Za. Za means sitting, so we can just say, sitting. In our school, Za. Our school is the sitting school, Za. Za is these ten great vows and these ten great practices. That's what Za is. And it's easy, just two letters, za, rather than vadrayana or vipassana or bodhisattvayana. It's just za. But za includes all these infinite bodhisattva practices. It seems like a lot of persistence could melt, thinking of it as like... Thinking of what? As rituals, not za. As za. Let's melt away. May our melting extend to every being in place with the true merit of Buddha's way.

[59:22]

Beings are numberless. We vow to save them. Dharma is not possible. We vow to mend them. Dharma is not numberless. We vow to mend them. Buddha's way is unsurpassable. We have to come. So now, maybe there will be a lunch. And I hope it's delicious and nutritious, so you can practice after lunch. Somebody said, made an interesting observation, that there's eating before and after enlightenment. Some people think, oh yeah, you get enlightened, you don't have to eat anymore. Not in the Buddha way. In the Buddha way, you keep eating.

[60:21]

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