Innermost Request

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Serial: 
BZ-02660
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#starts-short

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so that phrases are in most request
and i thought he probably use these words more than once
for me to remember that are other people use them
and so i went to that great resource of all things suzuki roshi known as cute dot com and i were you can find pretty much anything that he ever said in public
i listened may not be there might be an exaggeration but they're not really clear about the status of the collection but it's pretty comprehensive and how does able to search her we have a search engine that gives you are the lectures in which such and such phrase shows up
when i found one faded from july nineteen sixty five which is so close to fifty years ago
the lecture was entitled great prize and apparently to sutra so he was giving a talk on the heart sutra which we chant every day
and the
ah there were a number of lectures i've looked to me like there was a series of lectures about that time given in los altos on this topic but i couldn't quite make out what was what was the connective tissue between the talks starts he that i'm going to talk
at such and such so there were the a year i'm still curious about and and we can see if i can find out how
was a sequence of related topics or whether he sort of landed here and we still talking about this so i mean talk about it's another part of the sutra and so on this particular sutra this particular talk seasoning
he talks about the concept of attainment and heart it says there is no attainment or then it says well although is attain such and such it said
it's a difficult topic
and on
the
oh another thing i want to mentioned
suzuki roshi talks about
ah in this in this talk he refers to our true nature
and on
yesterday i was thinking
he's not referring to my true nature is not saying my true nature or or
your true nature you seen our true nature i don't know whether that i don't i'm sort of curious about that why he is using that pronoun and it may be that he wants us to not think about this too personally or to individually or maybe it's something one of the things that you fine
when he look at the early talks that is registrar transcriptions of what he actually said in the talk is it he's experimenting with how to use english and how to express the dharma in our native tongue
and so sometimes when you read these talks are you have to of step back step back step back just to try and figure out where where the flow is
which is probably true of many of our talks in english with
haven't read the transgressions yes
so i'm just going to read a little bit of the beginning of this talk
and i'm gonna read it just as it's transcribed so ah he asked me if you need any clarification that be tough
he says this morning i want to talk about the attainment the attainment here it means to resume our true nature is actual attainments
to attain nirvana means to resume our true nature
i'm true nature is beyond reason beyond our reasoning beyond our sensory world if when we when we are beyond our reasoning or sensory world there is no problem there is no fear
okay yes
okay so f when we okay southern to read it the way i think it is meant to be read is when we are beyond our reasoning or sensory world there is no problem there is no fear
there is just our true nature itself
when resume when we resume our true nature we say we attained enlightenment so actually there is nothing to attain to resume our true nature is our attainment
so
ah resuming a true nature sounds like something really easy to do
i didn't but you know it's probably not like you're finding a dear old sweater that you haven't seen in years in your closet just started putting a lot of feeling ah
maybe it feels that way
the something more challenging about this

so it's you know he suggesting that are true nature is something inherited us and yet we have to do something about it sooner too
connect
also
he is a
because he's talking about the heart sutra the the diet of form an emptiness is always in the background and it appears in this talk a little bit when he says

this nirvana for menzies referring to above training
is from l a negative view point it is calmness stillness
but from a positive view point it is the origin of all of our activities
all of our activities are supported by the state of mind even though you were taking and even though you are taking activity strong activity there must be calm this of your mind or you will be lost in your activity
so i think this is kind of earth
a really engaging way to start talking about that ah problem of language that it comes up for aside when we kind of about form of and his vhs strong associations with those words that our minds use them in ways in which ah
i think need to be refreshed from time to time
emptiness is something that we admit can't be grasp and it's a
you know we have this word referring to something which is incomprehensible and that's the sort of basic problem of languages that
we keep thinking of it is comprehensible other than we keep using the word that refers to something we can't really understand in a normal way that we understand language
and
like for instance you know for me is the the word ncse folks
i think a big space but there's no it doesn't contain anything
it's that there's no boundaries to the to the lawn containment
and likewise form when we say form we often think about you know something we can identify
something we can distinguish
and yet form is something which is sort of
where the so-called were the farm is something which everything is interrelated in such a way and is constantly in motion and it's like a torrent basically of changing like a great and mudslide over of experience and we can't a torrent of me immutability
we're not really you know we say sometimes we live in the world of form but we don't live in we are just you know coextensive with it and it's always changing so there are these problems and so i appreciate if you russia's attempt to talk about this in a different way talk about the
our true nature is something inherent in us and as a year same time
ah
something which is life itself
so i'm going to read a little bit more of this this talk where he talks about this phrase in most request
so he's been talking about you know
ha

he's talking about calmness bad the
absolutely nirvana of the amzing his side and now he says
now my mind is very calm but i want something more
because you have inner strong some desire you don't know how to appease it it is just as you take food when you are hungry
even though you take food that is not enough
in america you have in california you have various fruits which is very delicious and beautiful so we japanese think if i go to california i will take as much fruit as i can best fruits
but we find out and even though we eat the best fruits in california that is not enough and we are rather disappointed with myself or with fruits i don't know which
this fruit is not good enough to appease my hunger not hungry maybe i don't know what it is but we are but we have some inmost request
something says actually something which appeases your inmost request is not something you eat which you see which you feel
either or is not something which is called your desire or instinct
we don't know what it is but we have some deep request and this request is very very deep and everyone has this kind of request
in most nature nature will take which will take various forms which is the origin of all activity mental and physical
the only way is to give up the only way is to give up all appeasement all the medicine all the ways which are supposed to be effective and to give up our desires even when we give up everything we will have direct insight of the hunger direct insight of era
of our instinct when we know what is our inmost request and all the things you eat all the things you do or see will serve as an appeasement to appease your inmost request
that is why we sit
that struck me
ah
so
he's talking about our nature which we cannot really grasp is something which from which emerges
our desires and activities

but it's not something we can examine with the objectivity but which we can into it if we make space by not attaching to the various expressions of our inmost request
that is everything we can identify
pointing it sorted points to a sort of life force within this which is life itself and is not the thing we identify as what we want it is only the manifestation of that in most request
so this phrase resonates a lot for me because it points to
something that
it points to a certain intimacy with our own nature
data it's sort of planes suggesting that this is something that i alone can know that may be true for everyone but there is something deep inside us
it's for it maybe it's wrong to say inside
ha
but something that ah
we ourselves alone can know
and
it also points to
for me

they did something that wants to be known
it's that services one side of looking at this which is this is something alive and as that wants to be known and can we receive it can do what do we do in order to to serve so-called few that request
and
it also implies that we have some choice we can say no i don't want hear it or i'd rather be doing something else or are
ah but the same time something might be knocking
softly at first
ah
and then perhaps
come again
so sometimes we know
don't really wanted to hear that are open up to it even though it almost deserted emerging on its own
ha
so sometimes we distract ourselves we think of for things to do other things to do we think we're too busy or too tired nora
ah
and then that inevitably comes back
knocking
the are a couple of weeks ago in the morning thousand
ah and i want to shift perspectives here a little bit because the other side of this thing is this is something we can look into we can ask ourselves a purpose
and so it gets to the question of
what's the relationship between awakening to this nature and our practice well yeah what are we doing intentionally that and when what's that aspect of our activity
the other morning
during season
seven sojourner she spoken he said tom
even though it's early in the morning
try to sit up straight
i don't know if us with the exact words
try to sit up straight even though it's early morning
and then he spoke some more
about the various points of zazen and posture
and on
and you know sometimes he that he speak this way and
ah
and we listened and take this instruction but i realized this morning
that
when he said is he was giving himself instruction as he often says he does when he sits down he was just doing this out loud
so
how do we
how do we ask ourselves about
something
like our inmost requests whatever that is that thing we really cannot quite identify cannot quite put our hands on
am i was remembering years ago
well in san francisco zen center we were studying the frozen apparently two suitors and i think the text at the time that was being used was the the accountant various sizes the the other the heart sutra is a very condensed form of the president for me to see truth
and then there's the various other ones that are different in size and is the one that we were setting at the time was known as the large cedric ten thousand lines or something like that
and i remember
and i haven't been able to find it here because to very long text that
i remember reading it and
realizing that
it was giving a it was is it was laying out of meditation instruction
that was almost forbade him from old a caravan sources the early buddhist sources that on was not the
part that were not ah the same as the what lori was referring to in her talk sometime ago a few weeks ago as the second tourney the wheel ever mahayana
perspective
and so i was reading this and then at the end of this this this text
it said and the bodhisattva does not apprehend this
now other words does not get hold of it has not grasp it
so we do practices we we act with intention but we
do not
try to own it grasp it
attached to it
and
so there this this this this word apprehend shows up in the suture over four hundred times and ah there is a point being made here about how to relate to intentional activity in practice

so
how do you ask a question about this how do you ask yourself a question about this if you if you are inquiring into and trying to discern and where with the with the territory is where the inmost request lives
have you ask that question you know simply saying what is my inmost request can be very evocative
but it's also something to be done with care
to somehow asked the question and then let the question girl
let's just go out in wherever he goes
and then perhaps return to it
something something he will appear

so again this is a question about what's the relationship between the effort in practice and awakening
when we sit down
we give ourselves thousand instruction we we sit up straight in mine fleece attend to pasture and breath
and this assertive enough to sort of an approximation of effortless upright sitting
but as we can return attention again and again to the central points of pasture we disengage we can disengage with distracting an habitual thoughts and then true upright sitting emerges
so there's some connection between these things
but again it's not something we can get a hold of
we can't say what causes the other
we can't say there's no connection
for we have to live with a mystery

so keeps coming back to the question of how not to stick
two aspects of our true nature
even though
the body and mind we engage with are not separate from it

so
we probably got a lot of time left
fifteen minutes well that's plenty of time to get into serious trouble
i'm gonna i'm gonna open it up here to others to speak as questions
yes
my sphere
story
when you said that white city
as i requested it arises
emerges
it's such a nice word for with seems be creeping out everywhere in your talk it's like this i didn't we haven't in most requests as a and we all share and the idea of be allowed to heard like a right city by letting self drive away
so my he must request is only heard with myself is not presidents like my ever to sit upright doesn't really bring it by emerges
when my will is there an answering the fact that i can effortlessly sit right
it is indeed hard to talk about
but i would have complained the point you may seem to really hit it was that emerges is not inside his several pie
separate five but will we melt down to the ocean of
does that's definitely one aspect and we can encounter or fall into a drowning man was this is to be was about
yes ron
years ago as the same thing
internet connections
no and when i remember is that he synthetic a number of talks
request and then he stopped ah
and stop is never used it yet
yes it is thinking when you talk is it the reason i would think that just hear that phrase without your talk
i'm gonna guess
trey
ah
could the people can this to that phrase and
showing me smile
ah interesting starting point
yeah yeah points
jesse
phrase itself
that's interesting and i think it's probably true some other words he used to but
they don't come to mind the moment
yes judy

vincent
south
cause
class
yeah sure

ah
susan
plugs

last

well in any given moment
we're all present here
and
if we offer whatever is emerging
in with openness and lucy a an invitation to respond
then then
some kind of shared space will open up

popcorn happening here at that you're experiencing are you imagine popcorn nick that's could be coming here but does not been heard

bring the popcorn and please
no
laura

hi
here
yes yes
keep asking yourself the question first of all
ah
you know i mean on one level
ha
katahdin a desire
you always have to ask yourself with this create harm
until they on one level that's true on another level it's our inmost request
how did i think i think you can trust this that that's what gets us out of there in the morning
ah there's another pardons talk for he actually talks about that
ah me see if i can quickly find it

oh here it is
no i don't know it but there's actually says we'll find out even a month
some people say my mind is not calm enough to sit this morning so i'd rather stay in bed
this is opposite i'm just really what it says here so even though you stay
if you are desire is not so strong it may be better to stay in bed but if you find out what is our inmost request you cannot stay in bed you have to do something
though you do something it will not work
if you hit your head or smash your hand and feet you will not work
in this case the best way is to sit
this is the best way so we've heard that before that that strategy of upright sitting
is the
least harmful of our practices
yeah
yes

wow
ha
ha
ah
wow
no
ha i think on that one
thank you it's a wonderful story
mary

hmm

you know it's interesting
yeah yes
even
not yeah not hanging enough yeah basically not grasping apprehend is is in take hold of

ah

yes it implies you to play certainly implies the other yeah here
ross
it seems like there's two kinds of requests
request bridges
this is enormous
no he's pointing to something the second yeah but i also play with it in terms of the first
question i wanna wake up with the
or didn't know that
like that in bed
tomorrow or intention for this was
yeah yeah it's what he's getting and i think i mean there are also ways in which we mistake
v in most request there's something like
ah you know i'm going to buy that shiny car or ah
i'm going to you
turn away from something on the street i'm uncomfortable with you know it said of so the question is
ah
there's a category of requested to sort of limited in scope yeah
i get to that in a minute
yes
go ahead gary

easy
all i see so another other words yeah it is an intentional action to ask yourself that is that what you're saying now okay

so what's the quality of walking away what is the quality of walking down the street
then points to then

hmm
yes
stash
me

six degrees

fail
chaos

isn't answering
neither which have neither of which work by themselves and don't even exist separate from each other
even more personal
hmm
there there's somebody over here you go ahead

france
why
yeah
yes

hi
eating
you know see acknowledgement of some lifeforce the juice find its presence in you
around you yeah yeah there's lots of people some people say i can't think of anything better to do
i haven't yet sure
it's you know
this is difficult to talk about
yes

hmm
hmm yeah
yeah
now that's interesting
because i think it's also we sometimes get distracted by thinking it's this over here which is really bothering me
when it's actually something else that we really care about and when we see what that is this said the problem goes away now
no
oh interesting yeah k
so i'm getting a signal that i have to answer roses questions of
so i'm gonna put it to you this way
knock knock
my inmost request
you know your part come on

the