the aroused capabilities of this young man, Dongshan, that by his engagement in these questions was able to bring himself to the critical point, the critical point where you discover the fullness of your own power, Your own potential. And you realize it's not enough. And fully realizing that, the power of everything comes in and makes you understand, hopefully. That's what's meant by this critical point practice. And you should understand that some of these people who created this lineage weren't so smart.

[01:09]

And were often pretty obstinately deluded. But what they all shared but was able to existentially engage themselves in a question and accept no excuses and accept no half-understandings. You have to be a little crazy or awfully courageous Because it's much easier to choose comfortable half-truths. All these folks, smart or dumb, would not settle for half-truths.

[02:14]

So they, for some reason, I don't know why, commit themselves to just practice whether it was successful or not. I mean, occasionally you had to trick people into thinking it might be successful, you know. But in general, whether it's successful or not wasn't the point. It was putting yourself in this engagement. But in general, it wasn't about whether it was successful or not. It was about participating fully. So Guishan said to Dungsan, you should go see Yunyan.

[03:20]

And he said something like, if you're able to tell which way the wind is blowing from the grass, You will be able to understand Jungian's teaching. And I don't know when I first encountered this story, why this so deeply touched me. About the grass. Because, I mean, it's a cliche in English, which way the wind is blowing. Mm-hmm. But for some reason, that this turned on a blade of grass really struck me deeply and was part of my engagement with Suzuki Roshi.

[04:43]

It struck me the same way, similar way to in the Tao Te Ching where it says, finely polished like jade, scattered like gravel. And that touched me as deeply as a place from the Tao Te Ching, where it is called... Finally polished like jade and scattered like gravel. So he went to Yunyan. And Yunyan, as you know, is the dumb brother of Dao. Who was sweeping, you know. And... Yunyang had almost the exact same conversation with Dongshan that Guishan had.

[06:08]

Raising his whisk and so forth. But this time Dung Shan had some understanding. And some say he didn't really fully understand until after Yun Yan's death. But this is after Yun Yan's death too, so... So, There's consciousness and its partner, awareness.

[07:10]

And what interests me is the weaving of these together. And let's assume this is experientially true. Let's say it's perhaps experientially true or even scientifically true. That we have these possibilities, capacities of awareness and consciousness. And we can say that Buddhism is a teaching of wisdom and compassion, of the wisdom and compassion necessary to weave awareness and consciousness together. The Buddhist conventional self and self-worth and awareness.

[08:18]

Now what I ask myself, is it possible that we could have a meta-psychology or a psychology and mindology that weaves, in a new way, awareness and consciousness together. Or perhaps Christianity could weave awareness and consciousness together. And taking into consideration, of course, the way the Western self has established itself in consciousness. field that we can practice or explore together.

[09:40]

But Buddhism is that teaching which weaves these together, and allows us to function through a kind of non-knowing to allow the whole of being and the immediate presence of being in each situation, to function through us as long as we don't hinder it. Okay, that's enough. Thank you.

[11:10]

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