Grandmotherly Mind

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good morning
it's a lovely saturday morning the first saturday of spring in two thousand and seventeen
two thousand and seventeen
for some reason i'm thinking member when we were women when nineteen eighty four was in the future
on the other hand
now it is arrived
all
anyway it's a lovely so lovely spring day

it's about a month ago i think was last time that i spoke
and when i was sir
that talk was really about
the attitude or the way we conduct ourselves
in our practice in our practice positions with each other
to some degree or two large degree
speaking to
the precepts of right speech
so that would be the precept of not lying
ah
not
speaking of the faults of others
of not praising oneself ah and downgrading others and not harboring ill will
ah
there is a positive side when we when we communicate the precepts
ah we transmit the precepts in are various ceremonies we also ah don't just speak to the prohibition but to the affirmation
so we say i resolved not to lie but to communicate the truth
that's the positive side
i was well resolve not to dwell on the faults or mistakes of others but to create wisdom from ignorance
i resolved not to praise myself and downgrade others
but to maintain modesty putting others first
and i'd resolved not to harbor ill will but to dwell in equanimity
so all of this
pertains than this was this is kind of the way i began that talk
to the refuges that we take particularly the refuge of saga
in that sense the
expression of that that we
let we often chances i take refuge in saga
before all beings
bringing harmony to everyone
free from hindrance
so today what i'd like to do is actually
emphasize and and tease out
the mind that goes behind these affirmations
i've been thinking about this a lot for some reason it came up i traveled to the east coast
and ah
visited a hand to sort of bus men's holiday visiting a different in san groups they also got to play some music which was great but of and i was thinking a lot about
ah this story the following story i'm going to tell you
so dogan she
oh we talk about incessantly and some people might think that we are actually the cult of of token and century that's that's him in case you're wondering who this guy is on
he
he brought then he brought soto zen and what we call soto zen from
china to japan in about twelve thirty to twelve thirty three that's that's a long chemical ah and
he had a monastery in the kyoto area and then in the early twelfth forties he
picked up his entire community which was quite large at that time and moved to what was that a very remote area ah to the yeah
on the west side of japan ah and in the wilderness he set out to build a monastery which which exists to this day and flourishes it's one of the headquarters of sand it's called ag to huge and incredibly beautiful minus
jerry and i know some people is from have been there
and he had a large compliment of ah
of followers monks had some nuns and lay people as he established himself in a at a hazy
and
he died relatively young he died at the age of fifty two or fifty three of tuberculosis
and as he was dying
ah
he's in twelve fifty three he spoke to his disciples
now his his second disciple who ah
we recite in the lineage that we chance we can to do this morning his first disciple was colin angel who had been him with him for a very long time and the
the cohen agios ah dharma brother at that time was tattooed guy
guy was part of what one of the things that happened it just before though been left kyoto what is this whole school of monks called the daruma shoe bodhi dharma school ah they came over
and joined his community and so guy was khatibi guy was was one of those monks and he practiced with dogan for for twelve years
and as he was dying dogan called his disciples to him
and spoke to them so you can imagine this was very powerful moment right
so to get a good guy he said who was who was later to become the third abbot of a haiti monastery he said you understand all of buddhism
but you cannot go beyond your abilities and your intelligence
you must cultivate grandmotherly spirit
the mind of great compassion and selfless concern
that
word in in japan in japanese is role by shin
you must cultivate grandmotherly spirit
your compassion must help all of humanity
you should not think only of yourself
the place yourself imagine yourself in this room with your teacher on his deathbed
giving you
this message
it's it's pretty intense
hum
so as i said geek i had been a member of dobyns monastic community for more than twelve years
and later he wrote that dogan had
chided him several times about his need to cultivate grandmotherly mind
and this message became a kind of go on for him
are the a question that he worked with ah
because he didn't quite understand why dogan was singling him out for this criticism
quickly add this to the critical moment

so i was thinking about this
as i observed the circumstances in other communities
but also i kept asking this question of myself
do i have am i adequately
cultivating grandmotherly mind
well
i'm not sure that's mind to answer
but if i had to answer
what i'd say is well sometimes yes and sometimes know
what i believe is that this is the mind
behind the relationships that we need to cultivate ourselves

i'm thinking of my own one of my own grandmothers
my paternal grandmother
grandma gin
who had been a musician
and very accomplished very bright came from a family of professional musicians
and she married my grandfather with whom i was very close
who was a brilliant and very accomplished businessman an engineer
and
she made a great sacrifice for that marriage
hi he was
diagnosed with of
pretty severe hypertension high blood pressure in the late thirties or early forties and at that point in time they really had very few treatments or remedies for this
and he was given basically a year to live because his heart was enlarged
and she just gave up everything
she gave up her music
she gave up or outside activities for painting her social work just to take care of my grandfather
then of course he lived another thirty years
she was she was it is that model of grandmotherly mind to me
where
the love was just wide and unconditional
it wasn't fierce
you know we we chant and the ceuta
just as a mother watches over and protects her only child health
that kind of fierceness protectiveness that wasn't that wasn't it was just creating this really wide field particularly for me as a grandchild to ah to flourish in

so i have a model for what dogan is speaking of here

in the kenzo kilcoyne which is the instructions to the cook dobyns spills out three mind three minds of practice that ah
he encourages people to cultivate
this is sir it's called sun shin three miles turn three shin mind
heart
so that character shin in sino japanese
has has this unified meaning of heart and mind
it's inseparable where we sick mind is here heart is here you know
heart is good mind is questionable
ah but you know there's no separation in that in that chinese character
ah so dogan speaks about
these three minds ah
i don't want to read you little of what he says
as i said this is in the the cancel kilcullen instructions to the cook
see trucks at the first mind is joyful mind
which is the spirit of happiness
you should consider that if you were born into heaven you would be attached to pleasures without cease and would not be able to arouse the thought of enlightenment
practice would not be feasible among the myriad dharmas the most revered and precious are the three jewels buddha dharma sangha now we have the good fortune to be born as human beings and to prepare this is instructions for the cook and prepare the food that these
rituals receive and use his is not a great comic significance
we should thus be very happy
i came back with a ten days ago or so from our teaching at upaya zen center where i ah
kinch a couple times a year in the chaplaincy training program and this time right across
i have a small room and teachers' room and then read across your is another room and for two months there was a
tokyo ricochet ah a young
monk from very very remote area of
nepal and tibet and tradition
dopo tutto with he's like thirty five he's half my age but
every encounter with him was an encounter with joyful mind
he had this lightness and this joy that was
that was rooted in his practice and everybody who encountered him got it and just you know you wanted to be around him ah it was
contagious
so that's this joyful mind the japanese word for that is kitchen

the third mind and i'll come back to the second cause that's the point i'm talking about his magnanimous my direction big bite
this is what suzuki where she's always talking about he's always talking about big mind the mind that is beyond this kind of
oatmeal textured stuff that's in that's within the bowl of your skull it's something bigger than encompasses everything
dyson magnanimous mine is in its spirit this is dabian like a great mountain or a great see it has no partiality and know factionalism
lifting and outs it does not consider is light hefting a stone he does not get it does not it heavy
being drawn by the voices of spring
it does not wander into the swamp of spring
although it sees the colors of autumn it has nothing whatsoever of the spirit of autumn
it contrasts the four seasons against the backdrop of a single view
as an emblem of this sameness
we can write the character great
you should know the character great
you should know that the great teachers of old were alike in their study of the character great
in connection with the diverse phenomena of this world
now to there are those who freely connect with great people and accomplished karmic conditions of this one great matter
and he's talking about training and that was something that i was talking about of the last talk how could abbott's stewards prefects and monk in training
entirely forget this kind of mind
so what he's saying is this big mind that suzuki roshi talks about
irrespective of season or condition is always accessible to us every moment
so the second mind
enough in his words to
in his words to get guy he calls it ruled by shin by i think by or by his grandmother
and row is parental so here he talks about parental mind roshan is the spirit this the second the second one of these three minds it's a spirit of fathers and mothers
it is for example like a father and mother who dote on their child
once thought of the three jewels i liked your concentration on that child
even though they are poor or desperate they strongly the love and nurture that child
people who are outsiders cannot understand what their state of mind is like they can only still understand it
when they themselves become fathers or mothers
this is what are the things that that i remember when now
lori and i became parents actually when lori became pregnant which is not when i became pregnant
how was that all the sudden we were ah
we had been inducted into this big open secret club
but i don't think it's confined to appearance
i think it also applies to aunts uncles
people who love people
ah all of them can understand
this parental mind
without regard for whether themselves whether they themselves are cold or hot they shaved their child or cover the child
we might we may regard this as affectionate thinking at its most intense
a person who arouses this spirit is fully conscious of it a person who cultivates the spirit is one who truly awakens with
and dogan speaks to this
in the context of of being the cook and there's a lot of people in hero have done a lot of cooking for sessions and for saturday breakfasts ah this attitude is how all of our tasks should be approached and how all things should be handled her used
when you have a water rice or anything else you should have the affectionate and caring concern of a parent raising a child
the supplies to people
perhaps it applies more easily two things because things tend not to talk back so when were you know when we're handling our zappos we don't just plopped them down on the ground when are handing our is often job times we don't move it with our foot to change it's a
google we actually reached down because it is a part of us
it is our mind her child
and so we handle it carefully
so how much more carefully
should we act in relation to each other

after dog and death
ah don't first disciple was cohen angel
ah whom who had been with him for many many years and he became the second and of a ag monastery and geek guy was there geek i had a lot of responsibilities have
you know he
he had been in that community for for many years and ah
he when angel went away ah and dogan was still live dogan appointed
guide to be
sort of the the temporary director of the temple in dobyns first practice period when he moved to this distant remote area he appointed be as the as the tensile in kind of a really fierce winter with
many many feet of snow
so a geek i wandered so what's the deal here why
what is he saying to me what is it that i need to learn
k geek i finally he came to realize
ah
the principle that we have which is that enlightenment is actualized only within her activity
so sometimes were confused about and sometimes and some things that we read about buddhism and then suggest that enlightenment is inexperience it's some state of mind it's some big
it's a great event whether with the fireworks go off and all the lights are blinking on and off all the time and it's like wow i've got it so this is this is actually
something i remember from a dialogue that took place between the surgeon roshi and one of my teachers robert a commotion a condo she had been asked that a had an event what's your most satisfying experience as a teacher
when my student comes in to the focus on room to the interview room and i see in her eyes she's got it
yeah
she's pretty good
hand in the neck the next day we were having a dialogue between the a commotion sodium roshi and i asked him the same question
and sojourn row she said
my most satisfying experiences when my student changes her life
the site
that was the response that he raced all questions in my mind about who my teacher was
my student changes his life her life that is enlightenment
within activity
when we change what we do
so that we act in accord with dharma so that we act in a way that is kind
that is thoughtful
that is helpful and encouraging to all beings
when we take the position
a being grandmother
to all beings

the more i've thought about this over the last
over the last month or two because i've been thinking about a lot the more i feel like
the more i said that as a as a vow and an intention from myself
the more i want that
one man is that manifest that myself
and the more i want to encourage you
to do that
and simultaneously
the more i recognize where i fall short

there are places where
where i do turn away
or where i feel tired or
frustrated or just maybe lazy
here you know i and just
don't i cannot remember ever seen my grandmother be lazy
i just can't
i just felt like
in a very straightforward step by step way she just did one thing after the next
without any
sense of self aggrandizement without calling for any recognition
so i've got this model in my life
you know sometimes i can do it and sometimes i can't
sometimes you can do it and sometimes you can't
but the hold
the spirit of grandma's really mind
to hold it up in front of our eyes
i think that the
that's really something to
the aim for not has a that's so much as a goal but just as a way to live

so that mind comes from deep within our training
i'm the one hand but really it's the natural mode
that as we as we
peel back the layers
of our ego and our personality it's what naturally arises
that's at least the vision of
the dharma that we've been given
and we have this story you know it's been
pass down to us for
seven hundred and sixty three years this encounter between dogan and and geek i haven't several and sixty three years ago and it still alive in this room right i'm telling you this story many of you know it but it's alive because it has
as real meaning and give direction to us and it gives direction to in a had a time when
it sort of seems in short supply
had also i want to see gives direction to the spirit
oh i've been taught that
all of our all the talks that come from the seat or that seen for her should be encouraging you to sit zazen
so i have to bring it back to that for what is your attitude towards yourself
can you be you can you be your own grandmother
as you are sitting
can you
include and encompass
your shortcomings
and meet them with a
i directed love and a wish
to do better to to be more open
to be kinder first to yourself this is what we're doing in zazen in in danger in in phuket tanzania by dogan tangy ah
he says that doesn't i speak of is not learning meditation it is simply the dharma gate of repose and bliss
some of you may be waiting you you ready for the repose in bliss you know like okay bring it on
it's there
when we get out of our own way when we settle into our posture and our breath
we find that ease
henry we can take care of ourselves with that spirit if we can take care of or we we cannot really take care of anyone else until we can take care of ourselves with that spirit
hum
and we cannot take care of ourselves with that spirit if there is a this juncture
between our attitudes towards ourselves and how we act in relation to all of those around us so it works from the inside out and the outside in because there is no inside and outside
that is also one of the things that we encounter
in zazen
and little by little our understanding comes to
see this manifests in our whole lives
and we act in a way that manifests enlightened activity
that is enlightenment lightman is not a thing it's not an experience
it's actually how we act in the world
you don't get any medals
badges
but everyone sees it
you may not see it but other people see it
you may not see that your
your the grandmother but other people see it
so i encourage you to ah
consider hold up reflect on this grand bottomley mind
each of us needs it and we need this for
it's the spirit
that should really infused the practice that we do here
his individuals and has a community
and spread from there
in of
you know outward ripples into the world itself
so i'm going to stop there and ah
live we have little time for question and answer and thoughts and so maybe you have something to share perry
the
to kick i yeah

she said the guy you understand all of buddhism to get good guy was very accomplishes rugged good scholar but you cannot go beyond your abilities and your intelligence
you must have grandmotherly mind the mind of great compassion and selfless concern this compassion must help all of humanity you should not think only of yourself
very easy for me too
picture myself in geek place
you know it's like we we're all intimate with ours with our self regarding views
but it doesn't really help for us to beat ourselves up about it that's not what dope was staying
you know so it's wonderful message
thank you somewhere else
so yeah thank you for some very

hi
right accessible
so and will work with each other
beyond chicken soup like
come to each other and say
me
i feel
encouraged to speak up

didn't sit with them
we work with
i'm i'm not quite sure what your question is how do we work with which encouragement encouraging and allowing other people who encourages oh feeling courage oh asking other people what we can you do encourage them
well i think you can encourage you to you as a grandmother which you are right
you can encourage other people
ah do it privately you known to it personally
and the other side which is really tricky for some of us is
ah when someone offers one offers you encouragement
you should accepted and don't deflect it
did you know me
it's like if i offer you some
some appreciation
let it in don't push it away
ah hi
had and still have a reflex to do that and i realize it it's really that's not helpful because it it just it pushing the other person away they are trying to offer you something nine years because of your psychological
ah makeup you're not able to accept it learn to accept it live in and also correction can be very
yes correction this this is this is a is a big issue you know we have we have a practice that is too
to some degree formal and their ways of doing things that we have in our tradition ah
the spirit of correction
happy it's you know it takes two to tango right ah first of all if i offer you a correction you know this this was
something i really had to work with you know the motivation can be i'm correcting you because it makes me uncomfortable that
you don't know how to do something the right way
that's not grandmotherly might
that's just flat out
anxiety and authority and that's not motivation that we want to encourage ah
if i can do it cleanly not publicly you know step aside and suggest something to you
for your sake
ah because i really would like you to understand that that's that's the spirit and that's one side the other side is you may not like kidding corrected you know you may take no matter what my intention is
you may have a response to be corrected and that's from from our side is like how do you just take the correction you know to somebody offers you something whether irrespective of what their motivation is if there's something for you to learn there
yeah
just say thank you
you know and if you have an inner response work with it work with it yourself instead of perhaps having a reaction to the person who suffering that is very this is complicated stuff you know and it's it's the stuff of
your personal relationships to stuff of marriages is the stuff of communities so ah
who was to our best
when unfortunately you do have the designer to
correct somebody because what they're doing is faithful to you
how do you get over yourself how you you said take them
private and do something and suggest something for their
out of compassion without rather than concerned with when i saw
you get over your those reactions to be more compassionate i don't know if any categorical way it may be that you actually have to own your own in a response
you know and check it out with them
you know
to say ah
that you knew you made acknowledge some question about your own motivation
it it's really tricky it depends on the nature of the relationship that you have if you have a relationship ship of of religion of trust and intimacy then there's a space for that there's a space for the ambiguity of relationship if you don't you know then ah
probably it's best to quiet
sometimes it's best to be quiet
peter on your teaching flooring
a slight variation of known as the golden do
unto others as you would do on yourself
what's the golden rule into her brothers as you would have them do unto you write that's the that's the standard right
as you would even use out of news extended grandmother if you receive regular remind so to be doing
that's true
but the reason i'm talking about grandson mostly mind is that the because i recognize the gaps in my own grandmotherly mind and so
it's it helps me to talk about stuff because then it's like first what than you hold me accountable psych well you said you know but also i hear myself say it and it it reaches someplace deeper year
judy
said

take it out of
game

not popular
sometimes in ways that mine on
the hundred and about
the capacity to decipher the find mine
the same now since start
there was something
i actually don't think he's talking about that here
the what's that what's the distinction what's this distinction i think our

all of buddhism is medicine
hand
in other words it's it's any teaching that
one gives to another is basically to that person has a way of rebalancing
distortions or over that might be him in
in their case i saw i think that ah
ah i'm sure that geek i had plenty of fierceness that was not the medicine that dogan was giving him you know so i'm not i'm not speaking against what you're suggesting it just seems to me that he was giving other medicine in this
a particular case and in other cases he you know ah he might give that give that medicine so i don't i don't deny that yeah i think he knew obviously he is dealing in ah stereotypes are archetypes and
okay dealing with that i don't think this is the i don't think this is the conclusive
categorization of how we should be in relationship to each other in our
in the bodhisattvas for embracing dharmas and other physical of jovian where he talks about ah kind speech
he actually there he distinguishes he says he adds mostly kind but sometimes you have to speak strongly so that's another teaching in another place so that that's what i would say it just like every and also you have to realize every teaching is incomplete
yeah
it may be an attempt to bring us back into balance to us on the center point but we don't stay on center point we don't stay anywhere
you know it may bring us back there and then we we're over we move a little over to the right and we need another minute we even need another teaching that brings us back to center and we move over to the left so constantly is it's basically we're lives like a an automatic pilot that was a that was a metaphor that
that a conversion used to second were averaging or our direction so that it comes out along the middle way
megan
my grandmother was a wonderful grandmother and what i remember is she thought i was the cat's meow
she was she was were hate
well all of us grandmother's one thing we feel about our grandchildren as that they are wonderful ah and so that when when when when will you kill someone to have to
that you know that correction that needs to be given if it's done with the attitude you are a valuable first right i want you to know this
it is better than i am a fan
well i had one of those grandmother's to
i'm not talking about her and i loved her and she loved me you know and the perhaps she was a bit narcissistic but
but
this is the attitude not just a grandparent but of apparent you know it's like
whatever you do and it may be a strong action it may be immediate and forceful like your kid is gonna run out in the street the ground of that is unconditional love
which is quite different from i'm going to stop you megan because i really don't like what you're doing and you don't get it
that's not unconditional love that's about me
fortunately i haven't had to do that what one one request question
guy i talked to you about writing everything vaccines his eyes and
being a grandmother by recognizing was similar between grandmothers from a major said as as it is that we recognize
in children that part of v like my way it is as and we have the opportunity to remove the separation so he can see that everyone in august is vague
that occurs we have a grandmotherly i would say arrived
yeah i think that's true
the other aspect of it that it would raise which is that
whether to mother or grandmother they want the child to be him or herself which is not which is maybe part of me but it's not me you know it's we want we want that child to thrive and be who they are
ah
which often may have some resemblance in some some disassembler emblems to to oneself so you want both you feel connected but your wish and this is our wish this is actually or bodhisattva wish this is suzuki which which you when you are you
zen is then
so it's like
i don't want you to be like me mill you know if you look at mills surgeons disciples you know there are really
quite varied group of people and personalities there's something that perhaps we have in common there's something we all in this room have in common from practicing together in this way and each one of us is unique so it's it's the celebration of our connectedness and our uniqueness
it's not one that too
thank you very much