Thanks very much. Good morning, everyone. So let's see what kind of track we go on this morning. I notice that this clock says 9.25, so we have a very long lecture today. So, I wanted to talk about our vows that we say and renew again and again. At the end of the lecture, we chant, for those of you who haven't heard them before, Beings are numberless, I vow to awaken with them.

[01:07]

Delusions are inexhaustible, I vow to end them. Dharma gates are boundless, I vow to enter them. And Buddha's way is unsurpassable, I vow to become it. And some years ago, I started thinking about what am I saying when I'm saying those things? They're kind of ambitious, aren't they? But when we vow something, those vows change us. And while we never know exactly what we're turning into, it's helpful to know what our intention is. And I actually had a little bit of a problem with the vows, with certain pieces of them, so I've come up with a kind of different phrasing of them for myself.

[02:14]

And I think it is important in whatever practice we do here for each of us to come up with our own way of doing it within the form that we have. So we all bow to our cushions, but every single one of us bows a little differently. And you have to find the bow which really expresses yourself fully and meets the cushion fully each time. Well, vows are the same thing, actually. Come to think of it, when you bow to the Christian, that's a bow. So, starting with beings are numberless. Well, it's not an issue that there's lots and lots of beings. I don't think, for me, that that's what

[03:19]

the vow is saying. Because there's a kind of trap there. If you think that you're talking about lots of beings, then you start to think that beings actually exist. And that's not what the teaching is. And it's not what the truth is. If you think that beings exist, you start thinking I exist. And of course, we exist, but we only exist in relationship to each other and to everything around and within all of us and what permeates us. So right now, at this moment, I exist in relationship to this cushion to the stand that I'm sitting on, to this microphone that I'm speaking into and all of you constitute me and I'm constituting you.

[04:33]

I kind of like the words my being is appropriated to yours and yours to mine. And of course, my being is appropriated to all the millions of cells which are living and dying and being sloughed off and appearing and disappearing. And when you start to think of beings in this way, they're not only numberless, but their boundaries and their very existence of what a being is changes. So instead of saying beings are numberless, I like to say beings are not numbers. We're not digits. We're not countable. We're accountable to each other, but we can't count people in the way that we count things.

[05:38]

Well, if beings are not numbers, How do we awaken with them? Well, part of the awakening is realizing that they're not, and we're not, numbers. The original, in many Zen centers, the vow goes, beings are numberless, I vow to save them. And Sojin Roshi said, you know, he kind of likes that original form because it's impossible. How can you save all beings? but that's what our practice is we vow to save all beings and then people thought well that's a little arrogant and there's a little bit too much of I'm doing this for you so I'm going to say I awaken with you I like that but what does it really mean well I like to say my vow actually before I get into that there's the whole issue of I vow.

[06:44]

Who is vowing? If there's no beings, and beings are not countable, who is it who's making the vow? Well, vowing is making the vow. When we do zazen, Sojin says, and I certainly agree, big mistake to think you're doing zazen. Zazen is doing Zazen. The practice is doing you. Tozan says, I am not it. It actually is me. So, to kind of remind myself of that, instead of saying, I vow, I like to say, my vow is touching all in each. What does that mean? The whole universe is present in every moment of experience.

[07:51]

Your whole life is on the line every moment. And the way I like to relate to people is this is the unity, the oneness, the buddha nature that we talk about, but it expresses itself in a different way in each person. But in each person I want to touch that universality. Sometimes this is called leaping clear of the many and the one. Well, how about delusions being inexhaustible? I think there's a potential problem with getting into a dualistic frame of mind here and thinking delusions are somehow different from enlightenment.

[08:57]

And then you have to eradicate them. And delusions are definitely different from me. I mean, yeah, I've got delusions, but I've got to get rid of them. Well, samsara, nirvana, your everyday life, your every action, no different from enlightenment. And I think there's a danger of us treating something as delusory and therefore other or bad. So, I like to say delusions are myself, awry. so that every delusion that I encounter is another part of me another form in which I appear whether it's a delusion that's bubbling up in my stream of thought or sensation or something that I see in someone else I've written very important

[10:09]

therapist, amongst other things, and if you're working with, say, a person who's molested a child, very important to see that you're also a child molester yourself. Each of us contains everything, and sometimes it's just by our good karma, conditioning, luck, that, you know, I'm not in that situation where that part of me might have come out. It's pretty humbling to recognize that in yourself, but I think it's crucial. But for me, a delusion is just a bend in the road. And, you know, in Zazen we sit up straight. There's a saying in Japanese that the crooked cannot hide the straight.

[11:10]

So, we don't try to eradicate illusions, but we try to align them with the truth. So, I like to say, delusions are myself awry. My vow is unfolding. never quite sure when the next fold comes out what it's going to look like. If any of you do origami, you know it, oh it looks, it's a crane, right? But you unfold it and there's the original paper. Our original mind, our original self. And so we fold it up and we appear to each other in this way or that way. But my vow is unfolding it. Dharmagates are boundless. I remember when I was first learning to meditate and I read Dharmagates are boundless, I vow to enter them.

[12:14]

And actually, I think one of the first books I read was The Gateless Gate. I really worked very hard to find The Gateless Gate. How do you enter it? And I caused myself all kinds of problems with that. somehow boundless again has this kind of concrete sense of oratory big you know which is true but it's also infinitely small I like to say dharma gates are here and now every single moment is a dharma gate every single conversation every single bow you don't have to look elsewhere to find a dharma gate Well, so if that's the case, how do you enter it? I like to say my vow is walking.

[13:16]

Laying down a path by walking. In Shosan once, I stood with one foot in the zendo and one foot out of the zendo and I said to Sojin, kind of copying a koan, I said, am I in or out? And he said, just turn around. Keep turning. And that's what we're doing. We're always turning. We're always walking. There's a poem I really like by Antonio Machavo. I'll read it in Spanish first, and then a translation, just because it sounds really nice in Spanish, and maybe some of you know Spanish. It's short. It goes, Caminante, son tus huellas el camino y nada más. Caminante, no hay camino, se hace camino al andar. Which I'll translate loosely as, O wanderer, the road is but your footsteps.

[14:23]

O wanderer, No road except the road laid down in walking. Al andar se hace camino, al mover la vista atrás, se ve la senda que nunca se ha de mover a pisar. Walking the road appears, look behind you and you'll see a path once tread, forever after to you is barred. Caminante no hay camino, sino estelas en la mar. Oh wanderer, there's no road, just the frost of the waves and the stars. So, walking. And then Buddha's way is unsurpassable. I vow to become it. I had two problems with that. One is living in a country where people will sometimes proselytize and say, my way is best, even though I don't think that's what this vow means to say, there's a little tinge of it in Buddha's way is unsurpassable.

[15:40]

So I like to say Buddha's way is ungraspable. But what's Buddha's way? Well, it's liberation. It's liberation from suffering. That's all it is. So, liberation's way is ungraspable. That kind of makes sense, doesn't it? If it's graspable, it's not truly free. Liberation's way is ungraspable. I don't want to vow to become it, because that seems to imply that that's going to happen in the future. And every One of us, you, me, the cats, the bells, are enlightened this moment. When Buddha was enlightened, he didn't say, ah, got it. He said, oh, I was, am, and will be enlightened together with all beings.

[16:47]

Well, liberation's way is ungraspable. I like to say my vow is embodying, because I see that as kind of my job. How do I embody the truth of enlightenment along with everyone else? Well, embodying kind of brings us to a koan that we often talk about here. And I just recently got this book, The True Dharma Eye, Zen Master Dogen's 300 Koans, with commentary and verse by John Daido Lurie. And I really like it a great deal. And there's a koan in there, which I'll just read to you, because it's a koan of embodying.

[17:55]

And it's the koan of our vows, I think. So, Ungan Donjo once asked Dogo Enji, What use does the bodhisattva of great compassion make of his or her ever so many hands and eyes? Bodhisattva of compassion is often depicted with a thousand hands and eyes. And Dogo replied, It's just like a person in the middle of the night who reaches back behind himself, his hand groping or searching for a pillow. And Lungang remarks, I get it. I get it. Another translation says, I understand. So I get it, and Dogo says, What did you get?

[18:57]

Or, how do you understand it? And Ungon said, Ah, his whole body is hands and eyes. Or, all over the body are hands and eyes. And Nogo says, What you said is alright, it's well put, but it only expresses 80 or 90% of the matter. So Oongan says, well, so much for the likes of me. Or another translation, I'm like this, senior brother. How do you understand it? What do you make of it? And Dogo replies, his whole being through and through is hands and eyes. Or her whole being through and through is hands and eyes. Well, the four vows that we make are vows of compassion.

[20:07]

They're basically saying, what use can we make of our thousand hands at eyes with this practice? And Dogen, in his fascicle, commenting on this koan, says, you know, Kanon's not out there. Kanon is present in Ungam, who's been experiencing this together with Dogo. And there's not only one or two Kanons, or Avalokitesvara's, but there are hundreds of thousands of Kanons experiencing the same state as Ungam is. So, all of us, right now, are Avalokiteśvara, or Kanon, experiencing this same state of, okay, you've got a thousand hands and eyes, what are you going to do with them?

[21:12]

What's your vow going to take you to? Well, what does that mean? Dogen comments, first of all, that the phrase, you know, what use does the bodhisattva of compassion make of his ever-so-many hands and eyes? Ever-so-many does not mean 84,000 hands and eyes. Beings are numberless. They're not countable. Ever-so-many is, I'm quoting from Dogen here, ever-so-many is synonymous with beyond count. ever so many is not limited as to what sort or how many and since it's not limited to any sort or amount you should not limit it not even by calculating it to be an unbounded limitless amount you have to get past amounts because it's already gone beyond the bounds of the immeasurable and the unbounded well

[22:22]

Like someone searching for the pillow behind their head. Searching in the night. Duggan says, in the night is a way of saying being in the dark. And this night time, we need to examine it from the perspective of a time that is neither day nor night. Do you know the Wendell Berry poem, To Know the Dark? To go in the dark with a light is to know the light. To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight. Find that the dark too blooms and sings and is traveled by dark feet and dark wings. So we need to go to the dark, beyond dark, to the wisdom, beyond wisdom.

[23:30]

And David says, well, even a pillow has some shape or design that needs our inquiry. And I think a quote here, when you're reaching for the pillow, there's this idea, again, that you're going to find it some place. But, quoting Huang Po for a moment, If it could be pointed out, it would be a place existing in space. And therefore, it would not be the real place of precious things. All we can say is that it's close by. Or as one Zen master said, I'm always intimate with it. I can't tell you where it is because there's no here nor there about it. But that reaching is part of it. So, Ungon says, I get it, I get it.

[24:36]

Dogen says, and Dogo says, what did you get? Dogen says, basically that means, I've got it, And you've got it. I understand, you understand. Could it be other than eyes understand, hands understand? Or another thing Dogen says here, just to confuse you. While the understanding implied by I get it is synonymous with the I, you need to consider there's a you in what did you get. Don't get stuck. The meritorious activities of hands and eyes is beyond the sort of seeing, behaving, and expressing that judge's rightness. Our vows are not a matter of being holy or sacred or right or moral.

[25:46]

I was talking with the folks who are sewing rakuses about precepts recently, and it occurred to me, once you take these vows, you can't not live by the precepts. Not living by the precepts is like trying to drink soup with a fork. I mean, your life just goes along in line with them. But the building up of good and evil involves an attachment to form. We have to go beyond good and evil to realize our vows. Or as Dogen says, not only is it like the whole body being hands and eyes, it's like giving voice to the Dharma in order to rescue sentient beings, and like letting loose the light throughout the nations. These are our vows, yes? That's what our vows are about. But, Dogo says, well, well put, but only 80% of the matter.

[26:53]

Well, there's a very nice, I think a lot of us feel, oh, I'm not enlightened because I, you know, I'm only part way there, or I don't quite get it. There's a very nice saying by Dogen in Uji, the time being. You don't have to be special. Dogen says, the truth merely manifests itself for the time being as an ordinary person. Because you think your time or your being is not truth, you believe that the 16 foot golden body is not you. or Avalokitesvara is not you, but your attempts to escape from being the 16-foot golden body are nothing but bits and pieces of the time being. And the time being half actualized is half of the time being completely actualized.

[28:01]

When you're getting at 50%, you're getting at 50% completely. And a moment that seems to be missed is also completely being. When you miss, miss it completely. That's also part of our vows. So, his whole being through and through his hands and eyes, Dogen says, what he's saying is one's whole being through and through his hands and eyes, But he's not saying that one's body is what hands and eyes are. His whole being through and through is whatever he is doing. When we taste something, we have an eye in our tongue. When we hug somebody, we have an eye in our heart. His whole being through and through is whatever he's doing.

[29:08]

Or in the Genjo Koan it says, when you find your place where you are, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point. When you find your way at this moment, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point. Our vows are actualizing the fundamental point. So let me just go back to the koan and give you Daido Luri's little pointers on it and then stop. And if this clock is right we'll have time for questions. So Yunyan asks Dao Wu, how does the bodhisattva of great compassion, Avalokitesvara, use so many hands and eyes? And Luri Roshi says, why does he ask? Out of curiosity? Or is it an imperative? When you examine the way, are you doing it out of curiosity or because your whole life depends on it?

[30:13]

Dawu said, it's just like a person in the middle of the night reaching back in search of a pillow. To which Lurie says, hmm, miraculous activity. Not to be taken lightly. That's what our Zazen is. And our walking and eating and going to the bathroom. Well, Yun-Yun says, I understand. And Lurie says, that's exactly the problem you had in the first place. Stop understanding. And Dao-Wu said, how do you understand it? And Lurie says, I'm not going to let him get away with it. And Yunyan said, all over the body are hands and eyes. Liri says, many Zen practitioners fall into this pit. Dawu, what you said is roughly all right, but it's only 80%. It's because he understands it that he only got 80%.

[31:21]

When you're really, when Dharma fills your body and mind, you know something's missing. Yunyan says, senior brother, how do you understand it? And Lurie says, make it your own. Don't rely on another person to support your life. And Dao said, throughout the body are hands and eyes. No gaps, but did he really say it all? If you say he did, Wrong. If you say he didn't, you've missed it. What do you say? What do you say? When you say your vows, what do you say? Maybe you have some questions. In the Sandokai, it tells us, hearing the words, understand the meaning, do not set up standards of your own.

[32:42]

Do you think that there is a danger with relying too much on your own interpretation? Who else's interpretation are you going to have? the community's interpretation? Then it's not your own. Even if you're actively participating in the community? Actively participating in the community means having great compassion for the community's inevitably wrong interpretation. Hi. Hi.

[33:44]

My question is very personal. You place an emphasis on no self very strongly. You work as a therapist. people who are believing in the individual self. Yes. So, how is that? How do you do it? Well, it's a koan, for sure. Knowing that their belief in the individual self is part of what traps them helps me see avenues of liberation. Now, I don't say to people, oh, you're just being silly. You don't really have a self. But people's ideas of themselves are much narrower than who they actually are.

[34:50]

And I will sometimes say to people, you know, I don't I don't think that you are who you think you are. I think you're more than that. And people will often respond to that. And sometimes a little crack opens up. And I'm remembering a woman, I talk about her in the book that I wrote on Zen and psychotherapy. who had this terrible past that suddenly came up and bit her and all she could do was go over it and over it and over it and I did all the usual therapeutic things and none of it worked and she just kept feeling soiled and dirty. She'd been abused and sexually abused and traumatized but she felt soiled and dirtied and one day I said to her And I said it just because I couldn't think of anything else to say.

[35:55]

I said, you know, you're making a mistake here. I know you feel like a piece of shit. But you know, if you put a piece of shit in front of a mirror, it looks like the shit's in the mirror and the mirror is full of shit. But what you see here is, even though you've suffered a lot of shit, you're the mirror. And the mirror does not get stained or soiled. And the person who I was working with, who was not philosophical, was not particularly, you know, bright, intelligent, intellectual, for some reason that came through. And she just, you could see this weight come off of her and I'll never forget what she said. She took this big breath and her eyes opened wide and she said, I'm me. I'm not what happened to me. And I found that incredibly touching. Yeah.

[36:56]

Susan. Thank you, Bob. I love the way you're showing us how to make the vows our own. One of the reasons I love that is that I hear, in the first exchange, I hear that question, well, how do you reach out in compassion? And I hear the answer, like reaching for a pillow in the middle of the night, is saying, you don't even have to think about it, it's just an automatic response, and you might still be asleep, but you're just reaching for the pillow, and it's coming from your We do, so trust yourself to be able to reach out for compassion. It's not a big deal that you have to worry about. You're going to do it with your heart.

[38:00]

Yeah, thank you. I really agree with you. As you were talking, I remember that once in Choson, Meili, who some of you knew, asked Sojin, where does compassion arise from? I don't remember Sojin's response, but I think it's exactly what you're saying. I don't know where it comes from, but it bubbles up. And when I encounter suffering, I don't know what else to do except allow the compassion to bubble up. And I'm profoundly grateful for the fact that this does happen in this mysterious way. and it's what binds us together, and I think it's what helps us make the vow. It just comes from some place, and it is like, well, not sure where it is, but I'm always close to it, or it's always close to me, if you can just open to it.

[39:14]

I'm interested in the story that you just talked about, the client who had an enlightenment experience and went into a situation and how she hadn't understood who she really was. But then it seems like the thing is that the breakthrough, but then there's the habit formation of this repeated story, and everybody has their repeated stories. Not like that, but they get very reinforced by resurrection. So, specifically, I was wondering then how someone like that, I think we repeat ourselves, this is what he was looking at, in one way, and I'm wondering how, with an individual person, how do you practice

[40:46]

like, say, lessening the effect of that inner tape or wearing it down, or how do you say? Sure. Well, it's certainly true that as we repeat our story, any time you repeat something, or every time you repeat something neurologically, the channels are strengthened. fortunately it only takes a little bump to disrupt that channel a little bit and sometimes literally putting on a different color pair of socks will be enough to interrupt the story and some people need help finding little ways to kind of bump the story but I also need to say and this is profoundly mysterious to me but sometimes you have all this habit energy and conditioning and something will dissolve it and it's gone and

[42:13]

I think therapists don't take enough account of that. I can think of a personal example. I used to have a really bad temper. I just would get very, very angry very easily and indulge it. And that went on for 30 years. And one day I was in couples therapy with my wife. And I remember the therapist turning to my wife saying, the next time Bob gets mad like that, just say to yourself, because she was kind of sensitive to it, he said, just say to yourself, oh yeah, Bob's having a tiff. And I went, what? What do you mean, a tiff? He said, yeah, it's just a tiff. And from that time on, whenever I started to get mad, I just started feeling, I'm having a tiff. And I just couldn't get mad anymore.

[43:20]

It just dissolved. Now, how that kind of thing happens, I don't know. There's a kind of grace to it. But I think our practice has a sudden side and a gradual side. We need to practice both ways. Being open to the sudden dissolves and going steadily, steadily, steadily. And of the 80,000 arms and hands of our fellow Kirteshvara, those are just two, sudden and gradual. You've got another 81,998 ways for your life to embody the Dharma. Just have fun with it. Are we out of time? You had your hand up? Well, there's something that I was thinking.

[44:39]

It's the old thing about how is it since compassion is this necessary part of us all that bubbles up, how is it that people become so damaged by life that they go through a life of creating cruelty and insensitivity and seem to be pretty much proof against compassion? Yeah. Those are the people who need our compassion the most, because they're wounded very badly. You know, some infections fester. That's just true. You asked How does that happen? Well, actually, partly what I was thinking of was if we're all enlightened, you know, then how does a thing look so enlightened?

[45:52]

Because we get really attached to our suffering. I mean, that was one of the most shocking things that I discovered at a certain point in my practice was how attached I was to my suffering. Then you go, oh, gosh! So we hold on. I mean, that's the basic problem, is we hold on. There's a lovely quote from Wong Po, which is maybe a good place to end, if I can find it. He says, you know how Sojin just says sometimes, just let go completely. Wong Po's version is, open wide both your hands like one who has nothing to lose. And the other side of that is our vows, which is putting both our hands together, realizing that since there's nothing to lose, this moment and this place is incredibly, immeasurably precious.

[47:03]

So maybe we can say our vows that way.

[47:07]

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