I think that what I would like to do is take, I don't know if I said this last time, but these small sections that appear on your pages, the page that has all the comparative translations, use that. Just take one section at a time and discuss that, okay? And I would like us to be careful not to get too far away from the subject. Sometimes a thought will appear in your mind, and you'll think, well, oh, what about this, or what about that? And it's somewhat related, but it's not directly related. So be careful about that kind of question, and I might turn you off if you, politely, if you insist on that. So, let's do a little chanting. We have, I'm pretty sure we all have this one, which is, I don't want to call it a sutra.

[01:08]

You know, sutras came from India, but I mean, they're supposed to have come from India, As the sutra started coming into China, as you may know already, the Chinese got kind of curious because they said, well, this sutra doesn't match that sutra, and what is over here doesn't correspond to what he says over there. It's all supposed to come from the Buddha's mouth, and the Buddha seemed to be contradicting himself all the time. But still, people believed for a long time that the sutras all came from the Buddha's mouth in India, but of course, you know, the sutras are not written down until 400 years, about 400 years after Shakyamuni's demise, so it's all oral transmission. And the oral transmission was very good, but not that good. learned to memorize in the old days, they've memorized the whole thing. And the Platform Sutra of the Sixth Ancestor on the high seat of the law, which we call the Platform Sutra, which most people who have studied it or read it, Platform Sutra was supposed to, in China it was called the First Chinese Sutra.

[02:29]

In other words, the sutra, the indigenous sutra that came from, sprang up from Chinese soil through the sixth ancestor. So, this is not exactly a sutra, but it's sutra-like. It's not exactly a poem. It's not exactly a gatha. It's the Shinshin Ming. Last time we chanted up to the first two paragraphs, I believe, or three. So, let's chant from Do Not Abide, which is the fourth paragraph in the middle of the page one. You see that? Using this copy. Why don't they have it tonight? What makes this night different? Do you have it or not? Yeah.

[03:31]

I gave mine away. Bad boy. You can use this. Don't give them away. Sir Axel first. I have another one. It may be on the back as well. Okay, are we ready? Do not abide in dualistic views. Carefully avoid seeking them. If there is even a trace of this and that, the mind essence will be lost in confusion. When one is undisturbed in the way, the 10,000 dharmas offer no offense. When a thing can no longer offend, it ceases to exist. Stop. Andrea, Andrea, you're way off. There's a delay.

[04:33]

She forgot to put the mute back. Time lag. Put the mute back or whatever they're saying because what's happening is you're confusing us, me. She had it on mute and unmuted it to say hello and then forgot. Okay, okay, okay. Do not abide in dualistic views. Carefully avoid seeking them. If there is even a trace of this and that, the mind essence will be lost in confusion. The two exist because of the one, but do not hold even to this one. When the one mind is undisturbed in the way, The ten thousand dharmas offer no offense. When a thing can no longer offend, it ceases to exist in the usual way.

[05:34]

When discriminating thoughts do not arise, the usual mind ceases to exist. When thought objects vanish, the thinking subject vanishes. When the mind vanishes, objects vanish. Object is object because of the subject. Subject is subject because of the object. Know that the two are originally one emptiness. In this emptiness, the two are indistinguishable and each contains in itself the whole world. When no discrimination is made between coarse and fine, how can a one-sided imprint of this view arise? Okay, so, of course we didn't get that far, but it's good to keep going down and seeing what comes. So, in most pieces like this, the first paragraph

[06:40]

tells the story about what this is about, and then the rest is commentary. When you read a fascicle of Dogen, you can be pretty sure that the first, the opening statement, the first paragraph is the subject, and the rest of it is commentary. So here, the subject is, we talked about this last time, I'll just bring us up to speed. The great way is not difficult for those who have no preferences. When freed from love and hate, it reveals itself clearly and undisguised. A hair's breadth difference and heaven and earth are set apart. If you want it to appear, have no opinions for or against it. The duality of like and dislike is the dis-ease of the mind. When a deep meaning is not understood, the mind's essential peace is disturbed. Okay, so what we did last time We talked about the great way is not difficult for those who have no preferences.

[07:43]

And we talked about when freed from love and hate, it reveals itself clearly and undisguised. I don't think we talked about the Herod-Dreth difference. No, we didn't. So that's where we'll go tonight. So I'm going to use this, or you can use any one you want, but it's easier because when we use this comparative chart, we can look at what other people say about it, the way they understand it and express it in a translation. Let's look at what the meaning of all these words are. Here's breadth's difference, and heaven and earth are set apart. I call that a gap, or duality, or heaven in this case means something like nirvana, and earth, samsara, is the dualistic world that we live in.

[08:55]

As we know. So, here's Breth's difference. That's not much of a difference. Where does heaven and earth meet? That's a good question. Where does the past and future meet? We talk about the past. But now, where is now? Okay, what about where they don't meet? Well, to say they meet is to bring up a hair's breadth difference. Yes, yes. So where they meet and don't meet is actually the same. Right, in order, well, the same, but if you say the same, that leaves out the difference.

[10:04]

So what's the difference? Thinking. Well, yeah, you can say thinking, but that's not so. But that's not the meaning I'm looking for, because what comes to my mind is the place where, when they're not two, then there's no meaning. So, that's kind of the stuff we're talking about, but I agree with you, thinking divides. So, thinking, when our conscious mind thinks, it almost always thinks in discriminative patterns, and discrimination means to divide. So, and then this division is called partiality.

[11:10]

It's really hard to see when you're sitting behind that pillar. If you could sit here. Yes, it's like when I go to my Mexican friends to get a cup of coffee, I say, a little bit, leave a little bit at the top for cream. He said, well, what about if I left it at the bottom? I said, well, what about the middle? Anyway, yes? I was noticing before I said the paragraph before, the line before, having no preferences, and you say it's not, it's where the meeting point or not meeting point is. Yeah, preference is the dividing point. And then I took the next line to go, if you make any division, it might as well be as far as heaven is from earth, as if they were apart from each other, like it might as well be miles.

[12:13]

Well, yes, yes. Herb Brett's difference is like miles. Yeah, it could be miles. It doesn't matter what the difference is. Just the slightest difference and it's off. Yes, but it could be 500 million miles. Or miles. Or miles. Or miles. I have a breath. Yeah. So heaven and earth being the states of mind where heaven being nirvana and samsara. So it's working that way rather than distance. Yes, of course. This is just a metaphor. In Zen, everything is a metaphor.

[13:15]

So, heaven and earth, basically, oneness and duality. This stands for oneness and duality, because the earth stands for differentiation, and heaven stands for oneness. And differentiation is the expression of oneness. Oneness expresses itself through differentiation, and differentiation expresses itself through oneness, as oneness. But because we live in differentiation and must negotiate our way through the differences it's hard for us to see the oneness. Jerry? I think I experience this if I'm sitting in Samadhi and I'm totally tranquil and in good mind, and then I notice, oh gee, isn't this great?

[14:31]

Or I know some thought arises and I catch on to it. And from one second to the next, I go from kind of abiding in mind of samadhi into the mind of everyday duality? Well, yes and no, because everyday duality is also samadhi. There's the samadhi of stillness and the samadhi of activity. which is actually the basis of what's being spoken about here, because if we only see the difference between samadhi, oneness, and ordinary activity as two different things, that's the hair's breadth gap.

[15:32]

So samadhi is not just stillness. Stillness is within the activity, and the activity is within the stillness. So it's the stillness of activity in the activity within the stillness, and I'm using stillness to mean oneness. Darshan is called the great dynamic activity. It's not called anything else. It's called activity. Darshan is activity. It's great dynamic activity. That's stillness. Because stillness is the greatest dynamic activity. And within our movement activity, the stillness is not lost, but permeates the activity, so that you're always calm within the activity, and active within the calmness.

[16:47]

That's no gap. So it's really hard, because it's easy to fall into the gap, and think, well, this is it, and this is not. I can only be calm within zazen. I only find calmness in zazen, but we should find calmness or express calmness in all of our ... whatever happens. Including when we're upset, is kind of what you're saying? Best time is when we're upset. That's the test, actually, is when we're upset. Where is the calm mind when we're upset? That's why I used to like to sit in San Francisco. Because back in those days, 70s, 80s, there was always the activity outside, Zazendo was, people, you know, all kinds of, what should I call it?

[17:53]

yelling and screaming and carrying on and cars racing by and trucks going up the hill, great. So where do you find the calmness in that situation? So it's called either the top of the mountain or in the marketplace. The marketplace is the best place to practice. I sort of feel like, you know, really, you know, I have, you know, we all have, I have preferences and I have attachments, so, you know, practicing calmness and, you know, in that kind of activity seems, I mean, it's not, I mean, we talked about this last time, but it's not like I have no preferences. No, that's right. It's also not like I'm not attached to them. I am. Yes, that's life.

[18:56]

But then where's the calmness in that? That's what you have to ask yourself all the time. I can't tell you that. That's your practice. But is it sort of knowingness? Yes. It's knowingness. Absolutely, it's knowingness. So, you have to ask yourself all the time. What do I do in this situation? What do I do in this situation? Because we have to see every situation as an opportunity for practice. If you don't see every situation as an opportunity to practice, that's the gap. You just fall into blah, blah, blah, the old way of thinking, instead of saying, well, how do I practice in this situation? What do I do now? given, you know, the character for patience is a person on one knee like this with a sword on his head, not going through, but touching his head.

[20:11]

That's a good question. That's the question that we all should be dealing with. So when we get angry, when we lose it, where do we go? So here's Brett's difference, and heaven and earth are set apart. If you want it to appear, it, so what is it? It is the great way. If you want it, the great way to appear, have no opinions for or against it. I use the word samadhi here. Samadhi is the place of unity between heaven and earth, the balance point, the unwobbling pivot. So wobbling, our life is wobbling. Samsara is the realm of wobbling because we have two poles.

[21:18]

When there's only one pole, there's no wobble. The wobbling has to have more than one pole, and that's called eccentricity. So this is actually a Confucian idea, but it's not just a Confucian idea, but the unwobbling pivot. So the unwavering pivot just stands up straight and is balanced on all points and does not move. This is actually Zazen, epitomized by Zazen, the unwavering pivot, and when the pivot begins to move, then activity starts, what we call activity starts, and then we go from one side to another, or around in a circle, but he's saying one side or the other.

[22:22]

We lean toward this pole, and then to balance ourself, we lean toward the other pole. Good, bad, right, wrong, this, that, like, dislike. We're always wobbling between, and this is called preference. the pivot or our self pivoting on a base is not wobbling, then there's no gap. It's like a top. You know, the top is triangular, and the old tops were made out of wood, and they had a nice little base, a little knob on the bottom. You wound them up with a string, and you go, and the top lands on the floor and goes, it's going, you know. really fast, but you can't, it just looks like it's standing still, right?

[23:27]

Top looks like it's standing still, no wobbling, and then it starts to wobble because it loses speed and then goes spinning across the floor. But when it's dynamically active, balanced, it's the unwobbling pivot, and it doesn't look like it's moving at all, but it has all that stored energy. And if you touch it, it goes across the floor. Have you had that experience? Yes. Peter? So I'm grappling with the difficulty I'm having with this teaching, because on the one hand, we have difference and oneness, and we ask ourselves, well, where do these meet? Maybe we find some stable place by asking that question. But then there's another way in which the concept of oneness and unity is used again, which is the unity of those two. And I guess I'm trying to understand how to relate to this other level of leaping beyond into even greater unity, or that's what you want to call it, without falling back

[24:40]

Within goodness, there's bad. Within bad, there's good. Within right, there's wrong. What you're talking about is the reconciliation of opposites. That's what it's about. It's about the reconciliation of opposites. So dualism, duality means opposites, that's all. So there's nothing wrong with duality. It's just that when we get caught by of dualistic thinking, it causes an imbalance. I don't want to use the word suffering, but yes, it's a, it causes, the Chinese use the word afflictions. So you can use the word afflictions or suffering or unsatisfactoriness or Vexations.

[25:46]

Vexations, yeah, vexations. Why don't you wanna use the word suffering? Well, because it's not necessarily, suffering, it's okay to use the word suffering, and that's the popular word, but it's not necessarily so severe. In our daily life, we have anxieties, and we have various, low-level discomforts, right? But we don't necessarily call it suffering. Some people do, but that's okay. Call it whatever you want. It's what? Yes, hopefully we learned something from it. So, if you say suffering is bad, right? But sometimes suffering is good, you know, if it becomes our teacher, and because our suffering can be a catalyst for enlightenment.

[26:59]

Yes, suffering is, I don't like it, so it's bad, but it was a catalyst for enlightenment, so I really appreciate it. That's really good. So here's a good example of good and bad, and right and wrong, and making distinctions. So this is a hard teaching, because it's hard for us to see always the good side of what's bad and the bad side of what's good. So, you know. Yes, you have to see. Yes, you're upset that you're upset, and that's the bad side of it. That's even worse than the bad. Yes, but bad is bad and good is good. This is the heart sutra. Form is emptiness, emptiness is form. But form is form and emptiness is emptiness.

[28:03]

So while the bad is bad, it is bad. And while the good is good, it is good. But nothing is always so. But to be able to find your composure, which means to not get caught by anything. to not get hooked by anything. And we get hooked all the time. And it's the getting hooked that creates the biggest problem. My teacher always said all the time, don't get caught by anything. He didn't say, don't be attached. He just said, don't get caught by anything. What's the difference? Well, there's no difference. It's just that it's more down to earth. It's not as intellectual.

[29:04]

More immediate, yes, it's more like, oh yeah, don't get caught. Don't attach. Attach has a lot of different connotations, right? So you don't want to get attached to the connotations of attachment. Or you don't want to get attached to the connotations of suffering. Because then we think, there is a Buddhist Like the Theravada often say, everything is suffering, even your enjoyment is suffering because it doesn't last. But something doesn't have to last just because, I mean, you can enjoy it even though it doesn't last, right? It's like catch the joy as it flies. Bye. That's okay, I think that's okay. Oh, I'm not going to enjoy that because it's not going to last. I don't think that's a good outlook. Enjoy what you enjoy thoroughly, and suffer what you're gonna suffer thoroughly.

[30:08]

This is our attitude, actually, is enjoy your enjoyment thoroughly. Suffer your suffering thoroughly, totally and completely. If you don't enjoy your enjoyment completely and there's some, hesitancy, that's the gap. Then it turns into suffering. And if you don't suffer your suffering completely and try to get out of it knowing that it's there, then you suffer more. That's the gap. So instead of trying to escape from whatever, we enter it. We're like those little worms that enter the apple and eat it from the inside out. And this is how we sit satsang.

[31:08]

I don't like to bring that up all the time but it is, you know, instead of trying to escape from your difficulty you go into it, and so that as long as there's not an opposite you're okay. But when you create an opposite, that's when you suffer. That's creating a duality. But if there's no opposite, there's nothing, no problem. Even though there's some problem, it's not a big problem. It's not the major problem. What might be an opposite to the real screaming pain in my legs? Yes. What might be an opposite? Well, I don't like it. Just that, I don't like this, I don't want this, when is the bell going to ring? And more and more and more. And then because you try to escape from it, you can't escape, it gets bigger and bigger. The demon gets bigger and bigger the more you try to run away from it. So it's like demons.

[32:12]

If you're haunted by demons, running away just makes the demons bigger. So when you have a demon, you turn around and face the demon, hold the light to the demon. What are you? And then it disappears. Isn't just identifying it as pain? Yes. Well, identifying it as pain is our usual identification, our usual reaction. Oh, pain, bad. Oh, pain, bad. Those three sequences. Oh, pain, bad. Let me out of here. So, we don't only practice alone. I don't know what you mean by alone. Sometimes you walk through the Zen, though, and you see something you adjust it.

[33:14]

You mean like somebody's posture? You're talking about me specifically. I watch Zendo and I do something. Okay. There's a moment where there's a recognition, there's a moment of understanding of maybe the source of suffering. There's something that Dogen calls identity action, where, and this is just called suffering the suffering of others, that's called compassion. Calm, passion, passion means suffering, and calm means suffering with, so it's compassion. You recognize, it's not necessarily you take on somebody's suffering, you can do that, You have to recognize the suffering in the world.

[34:18]

How do we hold the suffering in the world that you can't do anything about? You ask a lot of questions, it's okay. Candidates say, I'm going to step out and fix what's wrong. I'm going to make an adjustment to what is wrong. And so it's like when we adjust things in Zendo, wandering around adjusting my posture, for example, and so on. This is stepping out. But the question is, you're just thinking, what state of mind are you in to do it? Well, that's true, yes. Adjusting someone's posture is giving them some help. It's not trying to make everything perfect.

[35:21]

We don't sit up straight in order to be perfect. We sit up straight in order to be comfortable. So adjusting posture and so forth, that's just to make people comfortable because we don't always know that when we're leaning over, it puts a strain on our body, right? But when we're sitting up straight and balancing, there's no strain, no pain. So it's just helping people to be comfortable. I call it correction, but it's like help, you know. And I say, you know, do this and do that. It's not to be perfect, it's to be comfortable. We should take two minutes. Yes, oh, they're already, okay. And then when we come back. I mean, we're not going anywhere. But when you stretch for 60 seconds and then sit down again, we'll go on to the next page.

[36:25]

Okay. Okay, there are two questions. You have one. So you asked the question, what does one do with the suffering that... That you can't do anything about. The suffering of the world that Is it right to think that you do whatever you can from a compassionate place? Yes, well, you do what you can from a compassionate place, whatever you can. But then there's, when you allow yourself to see, you know, really take a big view, You see this world of suffering beings from birth to death, you know, and there's this suffering that goes on in between birth and death, but then there's the suffering of birth itself and the suffering of death itself.

[37:30]

Death is not suffering, of course, but up to that point, and the closer you get, the And the sickness, the illness, and what's going to happen, and I'm going to leave, and not knowing, right? It's a totally realm of not knowing. And so, what do you do about all that? Where is your composure given that that's happening all over? And it's always been happening, it happens to everybody. Where is your composure? That's important. It's like, what do you do? Well, you can do a lot of things, you know, in your area, you know. Take care of what's in front of you, take care of, you know, and even across the ocean or whatever, right? But you can't take care of everything. And so how do you hold it? That's a good question.

[38:33]

And Ross? I was thinking of that question, The way to hold it is to sit upright, because it maybe applies to Rick's question that if someone's posture is off, it may very well be that they are out of balance and maybe ruminating about something. And it doesn't mean that sitting upright is not doing anything. It's actually doing or holding everything, in a sense. Well, sitting upright in Zazen is the way you hold the universe. That's the way, that's how we hold the universe. When we do zazen, we hold the universe. So it's sitting alone. There's no such thing. It looks like we're all sitting separately, but actually, when we actually let go of the divisions, of the discrimination, of our discriminating mind, there's only the one mind. And when there's only the one mind, that's our connection to the universe.

[39:37]

without bias. There's no bias. There's no discrimination. Discrimination means to take apart, compartmentalize. That's the meaning of discrimination. So that's why when we talk about no talking or no thinking, what it really means is not compartmentalizing. And compartmentalizing is duality. We do compartmentalize, and we need to do that, but we should practice oneness within duality, not trying to get rid of duality. We appreciate everything, right? So this brings up, a good way to explain this is through the four wisdoms, but I don't want to go there yet. It'll come up again. So the next paragraph, the next four lines is page six.

[40:39]

It's just the next page from where we were. The duality of like and dislike, longing and loathing, is the dis-ease of the mind. When the deep meaning of the way is not understood, the mind's essential peace is disturbed, that is, out of harmony. So out of harmony is another way of talking about suffering. Out of harmony means out of sync. Synchronicity, things working together to create a comfortable situation. Which, when things are in exact harmony, there are no opposites. Opposites are reconciled in harmony. Even in music, there's dissonance is great harmony in music.

[41:43]

And the greater the music, the more intricate are the dissonances. because the dissonances are so expressive. So to be able to harmonize or work with dissonant situations, the more we can do that and actually create a harmony of dissonances without changing them, but working with them, the more vitality we have. That's why if a teacher only has nice students, it's kind of boring. It's not as dynamic as when there are a lot of discord. Ross, do you have your hand up or do you just want to scratch your head? Scratching your head. So we should be very careful, you know, not to get too angry at each other. How can we really approach each other and work with each other when there seems to be a lot of discord.

[42:49]

Otherwise, the world just goes into taking your place and fighting, right? Seems like we have to decide there's nothing to defend. Well, yes, we have to decide there's nothing to defend. Self-defense is a big problem. It's kind of like Aikido, which is a fairly recent practice, but it's the practice of two opponents actually creating a kind of dance where you allow your opponent's energy to defeat them. You're not doing it, you're just for their energy to defeat them. And this is what Nargajuna did. Nargajuna was this great Buddhist philosopher of the Mahayana. And most of his arguments with people, and he had debates with all kinds of people, and he just helped them to see where their problem was instead of opposing them.

[43:59]

That's very skillful. Judy? is the thing around unconscious harmful action for instance sociopaths and so on where I guess when I hear the word hold I also think about containment that's not violent and yet has to meet the harmony that we could call safety or I don't know what to say. So for instance, like in chaplaincy, I might be caring for someone who turns out to be a violent offender, as they're called. And I can stay within the reality this person is experiencing, which is violent and so on. But at some point, there's also, and I've run into it, a security issue of my own physical safety, where there has to be containment.

[45:06]

to be able to care for or with. And so I'm wondering how that meets this, maybe harmonizing this sentence. I can't tell you, but, you know, when we deal with somebody, who are we dealing with? Like, there are layers. And there's the face, and then there's behind the face, and then there's behind the face, and so forth, until we get to their Buddha nature. So if we address the person just as they are, I mean as they appear, that appearance, there's so much behind that face and that appearance that actually is what needs to be addressed. And when we react just to the face that we see, it doesn't, that's when we feel scared or vulnerable. But if we address their buddha nature and go all the way through without getting stopped by the various layers, then you have a chance of dealing with somebody.

[46:19]

Sounds like what? That's the classic example that I think of as a Buddhist parable. And yet, you know, it would be great to be able to have such a moment with somebody coming at me with a knife, but you know, that's not always the case. That's not always the skillful response. Well, you know, these are unusual circumstances. And unusual, you know, it's like the gun advocate who says, well, what if a guy, you know, I'm a Christian. And I have a gun, right, so why would I have a gun if I'm a Christian? And then he said, supposing somebody is taking a baby into their car, you know, and stealing, and what am I going to do without my gun? But these are unusual circumstances, right? They're not the circumstances that we face every day. There are ways of dealing with his, you know, you don't need a gun in order to do that.

[47:27]

Can't help but think of the tragedy that we experienced here. There's, you know, there are things that you can do, and there are things that you can't do, and there are things that somebody can do better than you, and there are some things that you can do better than somebody else, right? So to make a, to try and make a A set thing of what do you do, it's hard to do because it depends on the circumstances. But first thing is what we can do is find your composure. And then everything will come out of your composure. That's the bottom line. And when you find your composure, then you can find the other person's Buddha nature. So even though you get angry, you don't give way to anger. Because as soon as you do that, the anger controls you and you lose your composure. This is what's taught to you as a soldier.

[48:30]

The first thing that a soldier learns is don't lose your composure. As soon as you do that, the enemy gets you. How do you do that? That's up to you. That's your practice. I'm not gonna tell you how to do it. And so the duality of like and dislike. is the dis-ease of the mind. Dis-ease means you can't find your ease or your composure when you give way to duality of like and dislike. But there are things that we like and things that we dislike, right? So if this wasn't addressing that difficult problem, it wouldn't be worthwhile. teaching, address the most difficult thing and find your way through it. That's what it is. So, like and dislike is with us all the time.

[49:30]

We live in a realm of like and dislike all the time, moment by moment. So how do you deal with that so that you don't get caught by it? It's just the dookie beans. Yes, and dookie beans are not good or bad. It's just my attitude. That was a great lesson for me. It's just my attitude. Bad attitude. I mean, it wasn't a bad attitude. If they think it's a bad attitude, there's good and bad again, right? So, you know, the real teaching is kind of silent. We get it. But when you try to explain it, it loses something. Yeah, the dis-ease of the mind.

[50:34]

And that's like disease, right? This disease is out of balance. And Chinese medicine is all about balance and out of balance. Our Western medicine is good, but we're much too dependent on medicine, whereas the older therapies were more dependent on balance because they didn't have all the medicines, and so it was more like natural balance. And what are the medicines? The medicines are to make artificial balances in your body. You have this problem, so take this pill and it helps to balance artificially instead of balancing naturally. It's all the same, except that we're lazy. We're really lazy with our bodies. We're very lazy with our bodies. If we really took care of our bodies well and balanced them, ate food that was balanced with our activity and actually walked a lot and worked more physically and took care of understanding how the body works, we wouldn't have so many problems.

[51:56]

But instead, we say, oh, the pill, take the pill. And the pill makers say, take the pills, you know, because it makes us wealthy. And then the doctors say, well, giving you makes us wealthy. Yeah, so, you know, we're working against ourselves. But actually, if we really took care of ourselves, keep the weight down, you know, our bodies work a lot better. Anyway, but disease, right? And there are many mental, emotional factors that go into how our bodies work. Our bodies work emotionally. Emotions, thoughts and emotions. in our physical dispositions, big part, because the chemicals, the emotions create the chemicals. Emotions and thoughts create the chemicals. People say, well, it's just a chemical imbalance. Well, yeah, but what creates the chemicals? Our thoughts and emotions.

[52:57]

Anyway, so like and dislike creates an imbalance in our mind because it's dualistic. And then we have dis-ease. So when the deep meaning of the way is not understood, so what's the deep meaning of the way? You two guys, you can find out. Chocolate. Yes, chocolate helps. Is it referring to the true nature Yeah, well, the deep meaning of the way, let's not define it. Let's just ... I have written something. Okay. It says here, embrace the way to embrace.

[53:59]

You're, without exception, undisturbed by your being, your ongoing being experience. They say embrace the embrace of the way for that mind. What do you say? You can say it. I won't say anything. Thank you. I won't say who's right and who's wrong. So when a deep meaning is not understood, the mind's deepest essential peace is disturbed or out of harmony. So you could say various things. to be in harmony with the universe. Why not? So if you turn the page, it says page eight. You don't know it's page seven, but it's page eight. So the way, oh here he talks about the way, what the way is. Not what it is, but what it's like. He says the way is perfect, like vast space.

[55:04]

And I wrote totally inclusive. And if you look at some of these other translations, the one at the top says, perfect like unto vast space, and then perfect like space, great space, perfect like vast space. So pretty much everybody agrees. perfect like the great void, it lacks nothing and has nothing in excess. So the way is perfect like vast space where nothing is lacking and nothing is in excess. So Dogen has a saying, beyond excess and lack, Ginger Cohen. And he also says, everything is provided for you, which is true, actually. And everyone has their allotment. It's not a funny way of speaking. Everyone has their allotment in this world, but if everybody supported everybody else, then everyone would have their allotment.

[56:11]

But because everybody doesn't support everyone else, some people take other people's allotments away from them and cause them to starve, right, or whatever. ideal harmony would be that everybody would be supporting everybody else. I used to wonder about that when I was a kid. I thought when somebody gets to be president or head of a country, how come they let all these poor people stay poor? I could never understand it. How come they're the head of the country when they're not paying attention to that? I could never understand it. I still don't understand it. I don't want to talk about politics. The way is perfect like vast space where nothing is lacking and nothing is in excess. I don't know how that equates with vast space. Yes? That's right, that's exactly right.

[57:19]

Yes, there's no need for preferences when there's nothing lacking and nothing in excess. Everything is the way it's supposed to be. That's right. Because of grasping and rejecting attachments, you will miss its suchness. So that's an interesting word, suchness, true nature, things just as they are. Peter? Well, I think grasping should be the word. I think so, yeah. Although, if you think about it, without accepting, there's no giving. Yes, so we say, oh, it's better to give than receive, which is altruistic and nice, but it's just as important to receive as to give and to know how to receive.

[58:24]

Yes, so how to receive the gift and how to give the gift. You know, when the monk, in Japan, the monks would go around doing takahatsu, begging, they wear the hat. And the hat comes down to here. So the people don't see their eyes, there's no eye contact. They simply chant and they put out the bowl. And then somebody puts something in the bowl and they chant for that person or for that event or whatever. There's a short chant, but there's no thank you. And so the giver is just giving and forgetting, and the receiver is just allowing that to happen. And so everything goes round and round, and the satisfaction is there with both of them, because there's no self in it at all. Yeah, and so the person chants.

[59:32]

It can be almost any chant, but there is a certain chant, certain chants that are short, you know, that are for the benefit of the giver and whatever, yeah. So satanas means just as it is, right? So just as it is is, before grasping and rejecting, just as it is is, without splitting, discrimination. So, a thing, a dharma, a thing is just as it is, but we discriminate it. A tree is just a tree, but when you say it's a tree, you've already discriminated it from something else. So, you don't have to say tree, you can hug the tree, or have a relationship with the tree without saying anything. How do we know the tree, right? So we know it through our mind, or we know it through our body, or we know it through our being.

[60:34]

And when we, the less we discriminate, the more we, the less we separate. So discrimination is separation. So that's why we say stop discriminating. It's not like you're attached to something so much as you're separating yourself. As soon as you discriminate, even though you think you're identifying, and we do, that's a tree and I identify, you know, but it's a mental identification. There are other kinds of identification, but when we walk through the forest and forget ourself, this is what John Muir was doing all the time. He was walking through the forest and the mountains and forgetting all about himself, and he just was in ecstasy all the time because there was no separation for him between the forest and the mountains and himself. He was just one with everything, pretty amazing person. He couldn't handle that.

[61:40]

So let's turn to page, page 10. Pursue not the outer entanglements, conditioned existence. Dwell not in the inner void, emptiness. In oneness and equality, greater great equality, wisdom, confusion vanishes of itself. In parentheses are mine, but I just want to go over that again. Pursue not the outer entanglement. So that means the world, right? Don't run after things in the world. Don't run after things in the world. We all live in the world, and we live in the world of duality, and we use the world. using the world. Suzuki used to complain about us all the time, using the world. We just think that everything is there for our use, and so it doesn't matter if we cut down forests or whatever we do.

[62:41]

everything is free for us to use. And this is, I think, a Middle Easterner, old Jewish concept, you know. We have dominion over the world, but actually we're the caretakers of the world. There are some Jews who say it's stewardship. Stewardship, yes. Well, stewardship, yes. You mean dominion meant stewardship? Is that what you're saying? My understanding of a steward is taking care of it. Yeah, but where does that come from? Why are you saying that? It's a different translation. Oh, it's a different translation. Oh, okay. Yes. Yeah, I don't see it at all. But pursuant, in other words, appreciate everything, appreciate, to have a deep appreciation for everything instead of simply seeing things as just objects for our use. We don't think about that so much, people don't, and we just objectify the outer world.

[63:45]

So when he said don't pursue, you know, many peoples have had, the American Indians certainly, many of them had this understanding of how to be, harmonize with our surroundings so that we'll use everything. Even if you kill the buffalo, you appreciate the buffalo. If you kill the deer, you have deep appreciation for the deer. It's not like, my kill, you know, your trophy. It's like, because we need this to survive, we apologize for having to do this. So that's to not pursue, but to take care of. Yeah. but also not to dwell in the inner void. So this is like, you can't sit in zazen all the time. You have to get up and do something. You don't pursue the outer entanglements and you don't get stuck in the void.

[64:50]

You don't get stuck in oneness. You don't get stuck in duality and you don't get stuck in oneness. We appreciate and respect duality and we appreciate and respect duality. respect oneness. We don't prefer one over the other. This is where we get really caught. This is heaven and earth. We don't get stuck in heaven and we don't get stuck on earth. Everything falls in between because there is no substantial oneness and there's no substantial differentiation. It's just one piece, but we talk about it in two ways because that satisfies our dualistic mind. So dwell not in the inner void. Don't get stuck in oneness and don't get stuck in entanglements in the world. In oneness and equality, confusion vanishes of itself. It's time to quit.

[65:55]

Sorry. Next time, we'll start with this next time, and I want to talk about the four wisdoms, which includes the wisdom of equality and the wisdom of differentiation. This is the book, Trust in Mind, by Musang, and is subtitled The Rebellion of Chinese Zen Against the Establishment of Buddhism in China. Well, this book is a commentary, and it also has many translations, a number of translations. Some of them are the ones we use.

[66:39]

@Text_v004
@Score_JJ