So fall of 1969 at Tassajara. It's cold and wet. And Tassajara, some of you know, Kirosh has been there. It's in a valley. And in the winter, the sun never gets to the buildings in Tassajara. And where does the sun not get? On any of the buildings in Tassajara. It never gets sun in the winter. And in the summer there's a beautiful creek that runs alongside many of the buildings. And in the winter, it's like a raging river.

[01:04]

So we actually have two haams because you can't, in some of the cabin, hear the haam. The creek becomes this roaring stream. And there's no heat. And the cabins were built for the summertime. So there's just a board and then a thin batten. No insulation, nothing. Just board and batten. Do you know batten? So if you put two boards together, after a while there becomes a little wiggle. So you put a strip of wood over the wiggle. So there's no insulation, just boards. And it's like a summer camp. The windows just have screens on them. There's no glass on the window. So in the winter we put up a piece of plastic over the screen.

[02:22]

So it's like basically descending into a refrigerator where you live in a wooden tent. So one morning it's cold, it's wet, it's dark. And we had a position called Jikido. And the Jikido sleeps in the Zendo one night. And gets up and walks through Tassajara and lights all the kerosene lamps and the pads because there's no electricity.

[03:22]

You have to light each lamp. And then you light all the lamps in the Zendu. And the last thing that you do is you put out a foot towel. Like a terrycloth towel folded over at the entrance to the zendo. So beside the shoe racks, before you enter the formal zendo, you clean your feet off, dusty or muddy or wet, on this towel. And there's no heat, but in several places there are propane tanks and by the kitchen there's a faucet and you can actually get hot water.

[04:27]

So just before people come to the zendo, the beginning of the first round, you take a terry cloth towel and get the water very hot. So the towel is hot and then wring it out and spread it for people to wipe their feet. So this morning I turned on the hot water. There's no hot water.

[05:49]

It's ice cold. In Tassar we leave the water dripping in the sinks and the cabins because the pipes freeze. It's freezing cold water. I go into the kitchen. I think maybe I can get hot water in the kitchen. No hot water. The pilot light or something was out, so I'm just getting this freezing cold water. I rinse the towel and I put down this freezing cold wet towel. And as Jikido, you stand at the entrance in Shashu, each person enters the Zendo in front of you. People put their foot down, expecting a nice, steamy, warm towel on their cold feet from their cold walk, from their cold cabin, and it's ice cold.

[07:09]

And I'm standing there incredibly ashamed. And some people look at me like, what are you, some kind of idiot? What did you do? Some people don't look at me. They figure something must be wrong. But they step with one foot and then they step over with the other foot. So 45, 50 people, I'm the same thing every time. And then I'm prepared to be incredibly ashamed because Suzuki Roshi is coming.

[08:42]

And he puts one foot on the towel and wipes the foot. He puts his other foot on the towel and wipes the foot. And then he enters the center. What kind of experience is this? What kind of experience may we share with one another? Is the direction in our practice some idea of practice? What happens when our foot touches the icy cold towel?

[09:46]

if we enter each moment with an idea about what it's supposed to be like we may be disappointed annoyed angry blaming but if we enter each moment with a feeling this is where my life is taking place This is where I'm experiencing each moment. What's that like? And I tell you these stories about my first teacher, Suzuki Roshi. Uh... Because I think about him almost all the time.

[11:05]

And because if I can in some way share some sense of him with you, you can maybe know him too. And I don't tell so many stories about Baker Roshi. Because I don't want to rob you of your own story with Baker Roshi. Sometimes I slip and I tell stories. But it's about the insidedness of things. Where we are is inside this moment. Inside our experiencing of this moment.

[12:07]

And even prior to that, inside our relationship to the act of experiencing, in our relationship to, what did you say? In our relationship to? The simple act of experiencing. in our relationship to the simple activity of our experience. A kind of choice-less experiencing. If it's icy cold. If it's warm and welcoming. Before dividing the world up into what we like and don't like. Entering into an intimate closeness with the act of experiencing itself. So Dogen says in this is something recorded by his disciple whose name we chant after Dogen in the morning.

[13:59]

Through the dedication and the dedicated heart of the disciple. He says, sitting is the practice of the reality of life. What does that mean? Sitting is the practice of the reality of life. It's often said, Zen practice is everyday life.

[15:08]

It's everything we do. But I think it's more accurate to say, Zen practice is how we know everyday life. How we notice everyday life. How we're intimate with the reality of just this life. Known only through our experience of it. Confirmed only through our experience. Somebody once asked Suzuki Roshi, if a tree falls in the woods, does it make a sound? He said, it doesn't matter. It means each of us confirms practice. The insidedness of us prior to what we think we know or we don't know or what we're good at or what we're bad at.

[16:14]

Naturally not wasting any time. Pointing to the reality of life. And Dogen goes on to say And if you seek for this outside, no where will the Buddha Dharma appear. Outside. Outside. Seek for it outside our experience, confirming our experience.

[17:39]

Outside the self settling on itself in each particular situation. Außerhalb davon, dass sich das Selbst auf dem Selbst niederlässt in jeder einzelnen Situation. Ohne zu vergleichen, ohne zu verallgemeinern. Es bedeutet ein Leben der Unvorhersehbarkeit und Neuheit. Because regardless of what the experience is, that's our life at this moment. And regarding circumstances, of course, we need to make some intelligent choices based on that experience.

[18:42]

But the initial mind of yes that we talked about is intimacy with our own bare experience. Intimacy means not separating ourselves from ourselves. There's a verse from Rumi, for so many years I've been knocking on that ancient door. Only to discover I've been knocking from the inside. It's all happening inside. The sound of the bell is not over there.

[20:06]

If you think you're hitting the bell apart from the sound that's already in you, we're lost in an idea of self and other here and there, subject and object. hearing the voices of the world in ninja Excuse me, I'm Ryako Fusatsu. We could hear them in Nenju too, it's okay. Don't wait, we could hear them now. We don't have to wait. The voices are already in us. It's already our voice. Die Stimmen sind schon in uns.

[21:21]

Es sind schon unsere Stimmen. Das geschieht nicht ohne unsere Erfahrung, ohne unsere Innerlichkeit, unsere Nähe. An adept once asked the teacher Bai Jiang, what is this extraordinary affair we're engaged in? And he said, sitting alone on Das Wing Peak. Und er sagte, allein zu sitzen auf der Daswing-Bergspitze.

[22:25]

That's another name for Pai Jiang. That's where Pai Jiang, his temple was. Und das ist ein anderer Name für Pai Jiang. Das ist der Ort, an dem sein Tempel war. It means sitting alone on our cushion exactly where we are. Es bedeutet, allein auf unserem Kissen zu sitzen, genau dort, wo wir sind. And this alone, as a practitioner in Stephen Batchelor says, alone means alone with others. It means alone with others. as uniquely who each of us is. Particularly. Particularly. Yeah. So it means without comparison, sitting without a comparison, without generalizing.

[23:42]

And it means sitting in such a way which includes others. He differentiates between sitting with others, which is passive. Go to the Zendo and we have a neighbor and we kind of sit next to them. But the energy in this can transform it into sitting what he calls for others. But I don't think this goes quite far enough. Aber ich glaube nicht, dass das weit genug reicht. Also möchte ich, dass ihr die Möglichkeit in Betracht zieht, als andere zu sitzen.

[24:58]

Prior to dividing the world up into self and other. Noch bevor wir die Welt in selbst und andere unterteilen. here and there, before and after. It's the territory that opens up as we are able to take Dogen's backward step. Je mehr wir in der Lage sind, Dogens Schritt zurück zu machen. Sitting is practicing the reality of life. Sitzen bedeutet die Wirklichkeit des Lebens zu praktizieren.

[26:01]

Giving life to just this moment. Suzuki Roshi puts one foot on the ice cold towel. She puts the other foot on the icy cold towel. Simply experiencing just this moment. I'm very grateful for the chance to practice with you.

[27:06]

Thank you.

[27:07]

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