Good morning, everybody, and welcome to Burpee Zen Center. I'd like to welcome our speaker today, Bob Rosenbaum, my dear old friend, who's been practicing Buddhism for three decades now, and is inspired by lay practice and recognized by our teacher Sojiroshi as a lay teacher, hence his green rakkasu, and member of our senior community here at BGC. Bob is retired. from Kaiser Hospital as a psychologist, and he earns his keeps with that retirement of hard-earned pension as well as... He's a Qigong teacher, and is very much interested in Eastern thought, which runs concurrent with our practice here. He's a lover of the outdoors, and he also The most profound experience.

[01:07]

Can we go to eleven or eleven ten? Forget on the new schedule. That's five eleven five. OK. The middle way. So this is case 9 from the Blue Cliffs record. And I'm just going to read the main subject. It's very short. A monk asked Joshu, what is Joshu? And Joshu said, the East Gate, West Gate, North Gate, South Gate. That's it.

[02:08]

So, Alan Hozon asked me to give this talk as a way of kind of starting off aspects of practice, which is going to begin with a one-day sitting tomorrow. And I thought that's a good intro, because aspects of practice offers many gates. If you look at the sign-off sheet outside, for this next month, at every sitting, there's going to be a senior student. Practice discussion will be available at every sitting. There'll be classes, there'll be sittings, there'll be teas, So there's a whole bunch of things that you can do, and I really encourage you to sign up if you haven't already.

[03:17]

But I wanted to say, ever since I came here, I've had problems with the word practice. I remember when I first came here, and I said, people keep talking about practice, practice, practice. What are they doing? What is this practice business? Because practice can kind of mean in our society a kind of rehearsal for the real thing which comes later. And that's not what we mean when we talk about practice. Practice is not preparation. Practice is a gate. A gate to the Dharma, a gate to enlightenment. Really a gate to being yourself fully, together with all beings. Practice is a kind of container which gives structure to your life. And rather than the word practice, I kind of like the word exercise.

[04:23]

It's a kind of exercise which exercises you. It's a form, and by doing that form over and over, whatever form you happen to choose, that form in forms you it's kind of a vessel that you pour yourself into but you're the vessel that you're pouring yourself into it's not hidden it's not a cult or despite what your parents or friends might think it's not a cult it's nothing special It's just the means that you find to express yourself fully. So aspects of practice is actually... It's not an event. It's not... It's certainly not a requirement. It's not a thing. It's simply composed of what we're all doing.

[05:26]

And it's composed of the people who are doing it. It's an ongoing composition. If you are part of it, it will be different than if you aren't part of it. The aspects of practice is just you being yourself and us being ourselves all together. It's not really what you do so much as how you do it. Sometimes we mistake our practice for the things we do, but then there are times when we can't do the things that we associate with practice. Practice is actually what you do when you can't practice. These last two months I've had some difficulties. I injured my back, which It's kind of a, I have to be careful about it.

[06:28]

But I've been in more pain than I've been in for about 15 years. And I really couldn't sit. Well, I could sit, and I actually wouldn't feel much pain when I was sitting, but it became clear very quickly that sitting made the problem worse. And so I was faced with the issue of, well, how do I practice when I can't sit? And I got depressed, you know. And I said, well, how do you practice when you're depressed and you feel lousy and you can't concentrate? Or I can't concentrate. And the only thing I can say is when I'm in that situation, from the years of practice that I've done, there's a sense of a foundation there that I keep coming back to, even though I can't put a clear word to it or say it's exactly doing this, that or the other, but I know it's there.

[07:34]

We sometimes talk about reaching for the pillow behind your head. It's reaching for the earth underneath your feet in the sky above your head, and it's there. How do you access it? Practice is continuous. It's the... running stream of our lives, really, and we're a vehicle for it, and it carries us along. Well, during this practice period we're going to be studying Pali Sutras, and in particular we're going to concentrate on mindfulness practices. And I wanted to talk a little bit about mindfulness before we start delving into the Satipatthana Sutra and some of the other associated sutras because mindfulness, I think, is often misunderstood.

[08:35]

I recently published an article in a psychotherapy journal about mindfulness practices, because as some of you might know, mindfulness-based stress reduction is kind of big in the field right now, and it's often done without any reference to the Buddhist underpinnings. And it can be very useful, and it can be quite wonderful, but I left a few copies of the article outside in case you're a therapist and want to look at it but basically I think it's a mistake to think of mindfulness as a technique if you start thinking of it as a technique it becomes objectified it's a way of controlling your mind and there's you and there's the object of your awareness

[09:40]

and then you use it to kind of get less neurotic or feel less stress and that's good and it's nice and in fact we're going to be reading in a couple of other sutras how to still your mind how to deal with unwholesome thoughts very useful kinds of methods but I really think at its core At least for our practice, mindfulness is a way of discovering who you really are. And as you start becoming aware of all the different elements which are rising and falling and coming up and passing away, you start to go, well, gee, I thought that was me. And it's, where is it? Who am I? That's the question for Joshu.

[10:45]

It says, what is Joshu? Who is Joshu? Well, what are you? And I think if you really examine it carefully, you'll find you're a gate. opportunity and challenge. Today I was meditating before the lecture and I was thinking, so how can I be a gate for people during this lecture? And then I thought, well, they were all gates, so I don't have to worry very much. And then as I was walking to come into the Zen Dojo, I looked out and I saw the gate to the Zen Center was open. Now Sojin always says, please close the gate. But I thought it was really kind of nice that it was open this morning. Good start. But we should close the gate.

[11:47]

I thought I'd give us a little preview of the Sakyapatthana Sutra. And I looked at four different translations of it, because I think it's often very helpful to look at different translations. And when you see how they differ, you start to get at what's at their core. Sometimes, in this Atama Sutra, it's called for arousings of mindfulness, for foundations of mindfulness, or for frames of reference. in the one that we're using. Kind of different. Kind of interesting. And the four are generally called, everyone agrees, body, feelings. Third one, mind, or sometimes translated consciousness. And the fourth one, mental qualities, sometimes translated mental objects, sometimes translated the dharmas.

[12:59]

Significant difference. But to be a little bit more coincident to a little bit more depth, I'll just read the very beginning. I've heard on one occasion the Buddha was staying in the Kuru country and there's a town of the Kurus called Kamasadama and there the Buddha addressed the practitioners saying, monks, practitioners, let's go. Yeah, Lord. And Buddha says, this is the path for the purification of beings for the overcoming of sorrow and lamentation. for the disappearance of pain and distress, for attainment of the right method, and for the realization of unbinding.

[14:05]

In other words, the four frames of reference. Which four? Okay. And here's where I want to concentrate for a little bit. In Somatera's translation, he says, here a practitioner lives contemplating the body in the body. Okay. Tanisara says, here a practitioner remains focused on the body in and of itself. And Ujjhotika and Daminda say, here a practitioner dwells perceiving again and again the body as just the body, not mind, not I, not self, but just a phenomenon. Well, kind of interesting. A little different, huh? How do you live contemplating the body in the body?

[15:10]

Do you focus on it? Do you go to the gym? Do you make a cult of it? Do you try and perfect it? Well, actually the sutra goes on and says So the practitioner remains focused on the body in and of itself ardent Clearly comprehending it and mindful of it That's soma-tara tiny sorrow goes ardent alert and mindful Well, you know, these are supposed to be instructions for being mindful. So it tells us to be mindful. There's actually a lot of that in Buddhism. Or Ujjyotika Udaminda say, with diligence, clear understanding and mindfulness.

[16:15]

Okay. And then Sumatera, having overcome in this world covetousness and grief, which makes it sound like you already have to have overcome the suffering that you're doing the practice in order to overcome, or Tanisaro Bhikkhu putting aside greed and distress with reference to the world, which says, well, this is something that you do while you're doing it, you kind of work at putting aside these things, and then ujjotika-nudaminda, thus keeping away covetousness and mental pain in the world. Somehow doing the practice will somehow alleviate or prevent us from getting this pain. I mean, I think it's just interesting to see these slight variations that go, hmm, what does this mean for your actual practice of it? Being ardent alert putting in effort, being conscious, being aware, it's tricky.

[17:18]

How do you focus during meditation? What is contemplation? What's attention? A lot of times mindfulness is defined as being just really attentive to what's there. Now, I'm a... worked many years as a neuropsychologist. And I can tell you that as neuropsychologists, we don't understand what attention is. I have a specialty in attention deficit disorders, which is really a misnomer. But if you just take something really simple for a moment, if you look at attention, back in the 1960s, there was a neuropsychologist who said, well, if you think of attention as a kind of beam of light, the beam can be very focused or it can be very wide the being can be stationary or it can be moving along so already you've got four kinds of attention now in buddhism that kind we pay attention with each of the different senses so you've got those four kinds in touch taste smell etc so you've got 20 kinds of attention plus you've got mind attention

[18:40]

So, however many. That's a lot of different kinds of attention. So, how do you pay attention during meditation? Mindfulness is not quite so obvious. It certainly goes beyond just being, OK, what am I doing now? And it gets more complicated in Zen practice because we have this whole thing about mind, you know. If you look at case 30 from the Mumonkan, a monk asks Matsu, what's Buddha? And Matsu says, this very mind is Buddha. And if you look at case 33 from the Mumonkan, another monk asks Matsu, oh, so what's Buddha? And Matsu replies, this mind is not Buddha. So what is this mind that we're working with in mindfulness?

[19:42]

We'll look at one Pali Sutra which involves, gives us instructions for stilling the mind. But then we have this koan, famous koan, where Taiso Eka comes to Bodhidharma and says, oh, I can't pacify my mind. And Bodhidharma, who's kind of curt in this interchange, sort of goes, all right, bring out your mind before me, I'll pacify it for you. And Taiso Eka goes, well, I can't grab hold of it to hold it out in front of you. And Bodhidharma looks at him and goes, there you see, pacified already. So much for stilling the mind. Actually, in our practice, it's a common saying that using the mind to catch the mind is a big mistake. Big mistake. but that's kind of what we do in mindfulness, or is it?

[20:48]

And then there's Dogen saying, well, so when you meditate, just drop body and mind. How do you do that? Sounds intriguing. How can we put all of this together Well, I think we get confused, we confuse big mind with consciousness and with small mind. Dogen in the Ehe Korokku says, you know, there's very few who understand this very mind, big mind. He says, big mind, it's not the first five consciousnesses. the five senses. It's not the sixth consciousness, mind observing objects. It's not the eighth consciousness, storehouse consciousness. It's not the ninth consciousness, the purified consciousness.

[21:56]

And it's certainly not the seventh consciousness, which is kind of self-consciousness. It's not the elements of mind It's not thinking, knowing, memory, sensation. It's not views or understanding. It's not spiritual knowledge. It's not clarified knowledge. Excluding all of these, what mind is there that we can call this very mind? The mind is able to make everything its object, but these varieties of mind are not the teaching of Buddhas and ancestors. What's left? He goes on. Big Mind is beyond one or two. It's free of error. It has thinking, sensing, mindfulness, realization, and it's free of thinking, sensing, mindfulness, and realization. Big Mind is fences, walls, tiles, and pebbles, mountains, rivers, and the earth.

[23:02]

Dreams and fantasies, flowers in space are the mind. The spray of water, foam and flame are the mind. Each moment is the mind, and yet it can never be broken. At just this moment, what is it that appears directly in front of you? Mindfulness, the practice of mindfulness is realizing what appears directly in front of us, which is our true self. Big mind can never be broken. I was talking about how during difficulties, There's a... you can find this sense of the foundation of mindfulness.

[24:04]

It's that mind which can never be broken. It's birth and death. It's beyond birth and death. But how do you realize what's directly in front of you? Well in order to do that you have to let go of your usual habits. You have to let go of conditioning. And basically, when we talk about dropping body and mind, all we mean is dropping self-centered perception. It's just letting go of self-centeredness. It's not a big deal, except that our small self fights it like mad. In February, I'm going to teach a class on Taoist roots of Zen, so I've been studying the people, the Tao Te Ching and Chuang Tzu. Chuang Tzu says, when a man does not dwell in self then things will of themselves reveal their forms to him so to discover big mind you have to go to the if you go deep into perception you go beyond it

[25:28]

At a certain point you discover, I'll read you verse 12 from the Tao Te Ching. Five colors blind our seeing. Five notes deafen our hearing. Five flavors blunt our palate. Hunting and racing hurry us, madden us. Hard to get goods tempt us to break our journey. We're distracted. You know, we grasp at things and as soon as something arises we go, okay, there we are. And then that obscures what's really there. You know, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet are the colors of the rainbow, right? Seven colors, right? We all know that. No. The reason we have seven colors is because Newton, when he ran light through a prism, had a thing about music, and he decided if there were seven notes in the scale, there had to be seven colors in the rainbow.

[26:35]

It's purely arbitrary. There's billions of colors in the rainbow. There's billions of colors in every thought, in every feeling, in every sensation. if you don't get trapped into thinking you know what it is. Well, how do you get to know what it really is? How do you drop yourself? Basically, stillness is the key. Verse 16 from the Tao Te Ching. Reach the pole of emptiness. Abide still at the center. Countless things co-arising see them turn and return, return to their roots, at their roots to be still, in stillness recover, revive, and endure.

[27:42]

Sometimes when meditating, one practice I align with is something arises and not pushing it away, not pursuing it, I try to go to its center. It's hard to put into words. When you try to go to the center of any experience, something blossoms. but it's different than what you might expect. So in stillness, Zhuangzi says, look into the closed room, the empty chamber where brightness is born. Let your ears and eyes communicate with what's inside. Put mind and knowledge on the outside. The sage is still, not because she says stillness is good,

[28:45]

So don't do it because I should be mindful, I should be still. Rather, she's still because none of the 10,000 things are able to agitate her heart and mind. The sage's heart and mind in stillness is a mirror of heaven and earth, a mirror to the whole world and the looking glass for all the myriad things. And the Tao Te Ching gives us instructions on how to do this. You can do it right now. I'll read you the instructions. Okay? It's verse 10. Try it. While carrying on your active life, while listening to this talk, can you embrace the quiet spirit in your arms without letting it wander away? While being fully focused on your breath, can you let it be soft as a baby's?

[29:53]

In clearing your inner mirror, can you wipe it free of dust? At the opening and closing of heaven's gate, Can you be like a mother bird? In loving people, can you lead without imposing your will? Can you govern all states, feelings, sensations, thoughts, without effort? Being enlightened, comprehending all, can you light up the world without knowing anything special. Give birth, nurture, but don't claim you own them. Protect, keep them, but don't possess them. Cultivating, growing without excessive self-centered controlling is a fathomless virtue beyond light and dark.

[31:11]

when you do this you become experience flows through you and you become a river for the world you become a you discover you're a gate and experience you know open close open close as the experience flows through coming and going arising and falling sensations feelings consciousness sleep When I used to teach mindfulness-based stress reduction, while teaching it as a technique, I liked to say to folks, you know, you can be very, very mindful. You can be very, very mindful. You can be very, very mindful. What's the form that you give to it?

[32:19]

I did put a handout out there of something that I used in the class. When you're practicing mindfulness, first step, non-judging. Just drop judging, suspend it. Not so easy. Sometimes I would have people say, OK, can you do two minutes without judging? I often find, you know, 30... well, I started practicing 1972, 1973, I was in a Rinzai Zendo, and a monk came up to me in Japan and said, so, when you meditate, pretend that someone has just hit you over the head with a stick, you know. Stuns you, and you go... Yeah, it's very Rinzai. when you relax and open to the world the world is stunning the world within and without shocks you but you need to accept it all and the problem is we want to accept this but not that how do you accept it all?

[33:32]

you need to let go how do you let go? you need some kind of steadiness which maintains that you cultivate beginner's mind, and then you have to trust. Trust is not so easy. To trust that there's something within, beyond your control, your comprehension, that comes forth, so that you don't have to strain, so that you put forth effortless effort, just the right amount, and you're patient Not in the sense of waiting, but in the sense of being completely present. Really, it's our natural mind. It's being natural. My Qigong teacher sometimes just says, you know, we're working at some movement.

[34:36]

He says, just natural. You know, he's been doing it for 50 years and it's just natural. You go, how do you do it? It's just natural. And then you do it, and you do it, and then at a certain point you go, just natural. Oh yeah, right. Like that. So, here's a description. Verse 15 from the Tao Te Ching. Just be like this. Be careful, like crossing rivers in winter. Mindful of neighbors, respectful as a guest. Be as ephemeral as melting ice. Simple as uncarved wood. broad and open as a valley, be muddy water in transparent glass. I really like that. Muddy water in transparent glass clarifies itself in stillness, at the center of stillness, arousing to life. This way, such a treasure, there's no urge to feel full when you're not trying to fill

[35:42]

You won't be worn out, but always renewed. So this is the Gateless Gate, Joshua shows us. Who are you? You are your practice, a gate to yourself, a gate to all around you, all the people, all the things you touch and are touched by. What's your practice? It's a way in. Our discriminating mind names everything, puts it into words. But the way that we practice, ultimately, well, first verse of the Tao Te Ching, Ken wrote me saying, he's got 50 translations of this, something like that. 175. 175 translations. So I'll make a mistake on purpose and add one here.

[36:48]

This way that we practice of mindfulness, the way that can be spoken of is not the eternal way. The name that can be named is not the immortal name. You have to go beyond names. Nameless is the source of earth and sky, but names engender everything. You still need names. Unfettered by desire, the mystery reveals itself. Wanting this gives rise to that, but beyond named and nameless, reality still flows. Unfathomable, the arch, the door, the gate. Who's Zhou Shu? What are you? North gate? South gate?

[37:48]

East gate? West gate? I think we have time for some questions and discussion. Peter. Thank you so much for exploring for us this question of what are the instructions. And I've been thinking about this, actually. begging and sits down and places his attention to what is before him. Which I think it also says in the Sakyapitama Sutra in the introduction. If it doesn't say it in the introduction, I'm sure it says it someplace. It seems to me that's about as far as you get in terms of a suggestion about what to do. Everything else, including the Mindfulness Sutra itself, is sort of what it's like.

[38:53]

Yes. And it sort of points to the fact that you can't actually do it. Right. Right. Right. So this is, I've been playing with this and I kind of just wondered if you kind of, I mean, you've been talking on so many different sides of this, but just, I just want to throw that out and see what, if you want to just say something more about it. I just remember when I was early on in meditating, I would pick up a book and go, okay, this one's going to tell me how to do it. And I was always disappointed, you know. I mean, you can get instructions, but the deeper you go, the more it's, so what are you left with? I guess what I'm wrestling with is, on the sub-side of this, there's something to do. But you start talking about it, and it gets Yes. But there's a lot of talk about what it's like, because maybe that's not so hard.

[40:00]

Right. Well, how do you play a piece of music? Now, you have to practice the scales, you have to practice the instrument, or sing, and, you know, you have to learn these things. But once you've gotten past that point, it's, well, but how do I bring out what's really there? It's not just music, it's, you know, carpentry, or therapy, or gardening, or anything you do. So, you know, you have to learn how to sit. Whether it's in a chair, or, you know, with my back problems, lying on the floor sometimes. There's practicalities that one has to get into and at the same time I think you have to just say I'm just going to be open and let it happen and actually you know where else I sometimes have a problem is sometimes you have this really wonderful experience or you know you have a really good meditation and then the next time you sit down you go okay I want to do that again and it never works never

[41:19]

I actually think that some of the deistic or theistic faiths, you know, when they talk about, you just have to open yourself to it, you just have to surrender to it, are talking about something very important. So, yeah, there's practice, and then there's letting the practice do you. There's... Sojin has said, you know, it's a big mistake to think you're doing zazen. But, as you said, you have to get the cushion, sit down, and make yourself available and willing to meet it. I think it's a meeting. That's why it's a gate. Sometimes when I sit down, my energy is even and low enough so that to make the intention to pay attention is not necessarily easy, but more easy than the times where I sit down and I'm like reeling, and I feel like in those moments I don't really have that much autonomy, I don't have that much say in how much attention is going to be happening in my body.

[42:43]

So what do you do when you don't really have that choice, or when you don't really have that much power to pay attention? Fall in love with powerlessness. So I just reel along? Early on when I was practicing here Sojin actually we didn't know it at the time he had a mild medical problem and in the mornings you'd see him I remember sitting there just waiting for him to fall off. What wakes you up in the morning? Whatever it is that wakes you up in the morning wakes you up in the middle of your meditation when you've lost all of your attention and lost all of your power.

[43:48]

And sometimes it pays a visit, and sometimes it doesn't. And they're both okay. Linda. Well, a few responses to your lovely talk. Peter, when you said, I don't know, but it talks about what it's like, but doesn't really I thought you were referring to the poetic metaphors, but I don't think that's what sort of several degrees removed. I think those poetic metaphors are closer than the conceptual, or they aren't just what it's like. They're so powerful, and they open up gates for us. When you were saying you have to make yourself available, there's an Indian poem called that says, winnow when the wind blows. You can't make the wind blow, but you better have your winnowing basket ready and stuff.

[44:57]

It's a great image, was it? And the last thing I want to mention was a discovery I made during your talk. I noticed for the first time that your ear, at least that left ear, has sort of a little pointed thing in it makes you look a little bit like Mr. Spock. It was long and prosperous. It was a surprising and pleasant experience. One other question I think we have time for. My question kind of ties in with what Matt was asking. It has to do with memory. Yeah, it seems to me like we're sort of wired to have memory to survive. And memory is tied up with feelings and mostly feelings, really. And images. And oftentimes I find myself, when I'm practicing, it's really the memories that I'm trying to conquer.

[46:08]

Either to squash or to give blossom to. And it's sort of something happens in the middle there that makes it... I don't know how to explain it beyond that. But for me Zazen has a lot to do with sort of dealing with memory. Of a feeling or... Oh yes. I once spent some time where while I was meditating mostly what I did was just pay attention to I called it thinking backwards memory or anticipating which I called thinking forwards as a way of trying to find a way to center more here

[47:12]

It's kind of obvious that when we anticipate and look ahead, that that's fantasy and that it's not real. It's just a memory. Right. But memories, I can tell you as a neuropsychologist, one of the things that I discovered, which is really fascinating, basically all of our memories are false. If you tell me a memory today that you have of a specific event and I were to write it down and I were to ask you for that same memory two years from now, the likelihood is you would tell me something different. And it would feel real. And people get very attached to their memories. And they also argue about it, you know, with their spouses. That took place there. No, that took place there. No. And I've just stopped doing that because I know that memories are illusory. If you look at eyewitness memory, like in courts, it's really horrifying how incredibly

[48:20]

fluid it is, and how people feel like, OK, I saw this. Well, you might think you did, but not necessarily. They're very, very, very malleable. So it helps me when I'm getting trapped in memories to go, well, maybe. Do we have time for one more scene? Sure. Okay, last one. You were discussing about in your sitting meditation and not pursuing and not pushing away a thought, but then getting attention to it at some point. You mentioned that you couldn't describe it, but you kind of drilled down into it a little bit. Can you give us some kind of example? I found it intriguing that actually

[49:22]

you make that pause, and instead of maybe hearing about, well, let it kind of pass away like a cloud, or try and push it away, and that is some mental work as well, but you're taking another approach to it, which I found intriguing. Yeah, it's really hard for me to put it into words. There's a kind of simultaneous sense of expanding around it, and simultaneously going down into it. And it's easier for me to describe it with sensation than with thought. You know, when you feel something in your body, again, as a neuropsychologist, I can tell you the nerve fibers which tell us where we have sensations are fairly inaccurate a lot of the time. If you think, for example, that you're, well, just a few months ago, I thought, oh boy, I'm really sitting well, I'm really, you know, sitting centered, and Sojin came, and I was sitting something like this, and Sojin came and went, I'm going, I'm really all centered now, and if you look in the mirror, you go, oh gosh, I'm uncentered.

[50:43]

So, so knowing that those sensations are, can be misleading when you go into the sensation it um it's kind of like going like like this you know if you go and you look at the center of your palm and you look at the center of your palm and you go into the not just the skin but into the center of the center you can see it and then it's like an acupuncture point the world opens up So it's kind of, it's very hard to put into words. But play around with it. Play, really good thing. Have fun doing aspects.

[51:37]

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