Today, I'd like to talk about practicing calm mind. These are difficult times for most people. I don't think there's anyone here who's not feeling it. We're worried about the wildfires, climate change, the pandemic, the November election, and not just the outcome of the election, but whether the election will be fair, whether the post office will able to fully do its job during the election. So there's a lot on my mind. I've never experienced this country so divided.

[01:04]

It's hard not to feel overwhelmed by the anxiety and passion. In our practice, we talk about suffering and the cause of suffering. In the Dharma, the teaching is that the mind is the cause of suffering. Suffering begins with craving. This craving isn't just wanting things, it's also not wanting things. So it's both greed and aversion. But it can be little things. With practice we understand we begin to understand delusion in the sense that we believe in a false sense of self, a false self.

[02:13]

A self that's separate from other people. And that falsity manifests in our mind, in our thoughts. the mind that shatters, the mind that has a whole narrative about me, who I am, what my problems are, what I want, am I gonna get what I want, fear of catastrophe, and what will happen to me, good and bad, right and wrong, opinions, viewpoints. But we have our practice of zazen, And in Zazen, that is where we practice letting go of this grasping, of this craving. I'm gonna read a little story from Thich Nhat Hanh.

[03:18]

There are a couple little stories I'm gonna read from this book called The Heart of the Buddha's Teaching. There's a story in Zen circles about a man and a horse. The horse is galloping quickly and it appears that the man on the horse is going somewhere important. Another man standing alongside the road shouts, where are you going? And the man replies, I don't know, ask the horse. This is also our story. We're riding a horse, we don't know where we are going and we can't stop. The horse is our habit energy pulling us along and we are powerless. We're running and it becomes a habit. We struggle all the time even in our sleep.

[04:20]

We are at war within ourselves and we can easily start a war with others. We have to learn the art of stopping, stopping our thinking, our habit energies, our forgetfulness, the strong emotions that rule us. In the 13th century, Zen master Dogen in Japan wrote a fascicle called Universal Recommendations for Zazen. It's basically Zazen instruction. And he says, think of non-thinking. So this is what we're told to do in Zazen. Think of not thinking. Not thinking, what kind of thinking is that?

[05:24]

Non-thinking. This is the essential art of Zazen. I was aware from a very young age about the destructive potential of spot. I came to the Berkeley Zen Center in 1976 So I was 21 and I really didn't understand what Zazen was about, but I came because I wanted to stop my thoughts. And needless to say, that was impossible. And the instructions were to keep the mind on the breath. It took me a year just to find my breath.

[06:27]

That was how busy my mind was. Thoughts were like a flood and it was very claustrophobic. I don't know how I persevered. I made a decision that I wasn't even gonna try to follow the breath because that was impossible and I would just sit down all I would do is sit in the posture. And after about a year, the mind began to settle and I could find my breath. Last week Sojin made a remark about thinking and trying to find it actually. But basically he said, stop, don't think so much.

[07:39]

We're caught up in our heads. We're caught up in our, he said thinking is imagination. That we need to focus on body and breath. Not to get completely lost in our passions. He's been telling me this for years. I felt like I was one of those people he was speaking to. I'm sure he was speaking to all of us. Zazen frees us from these mental habits one breath at a time. Sometimes I give Zazen instruction and somebody will complain that they can only focus on two or three breaths before the mind completely runs off like a wild horse

[08:56]

and then come back. It doesn't matter how many times the mind runs off like a galloping horse. What really matters is coming back. Fortunately, our practice is not just, it isn't just sitting on a cushion and practicing Tsao Zen. Fortunately, the Buddha gave us a broader teaching, and that's the teaching of the Eightfold Path, how we live our life. I'm gonna read another story that Thich Nhat Hanh tells. When the Buddha was 80 years old and about to pass away, a young man named Subbada came to see him. Ananda, the Buddha's attendant, thought it would be too exhausting for the master to see anyone.

[10:06]

But the Buddha overheard Subbata's request and said, Ananda, please invite him in. Even as he was dying, the Buddha wanted to give an interview. Subbata asked, World Honored One, are the other religious teachers in Magadha and Kaushala, fully enlightened. The Buddha knew he only had a short time to live and that answering such a question would be a waste of precious moments. When you have the opportunity to ask a teacher about the Dharma, ask a question that can change your life. So the Buddha replied, Subhata, it is not important whether they are fully enlightened. The question is whether you want to liberate yourself.

[11:09]

If you do, practice the noble eightfold path. I just love this particular phrase, the question, is whether you want to liberate yourself. If you do, practice the Noble Eightfold Path. Wherever the Noble Eightfold Path is practiced, joy, peace, and insight are there. So this was the Buddha's very first teaching. He taught the Four Noble Truths of Suffering and the Fourth Truth, as we know, is the Eightfold Path, the path to resolving suffering, coming to terms, liberation. I'm not gonna go into much detail about the Eightfold Path because that would be a whole year's study in and of itself.

[12:22]

Obviously, there are eight aspects And I'm only going to say a sentence or two about two of them. One of them is right view. Right view is understanding what we see, our experiences, in terms of the Dharma. So we understand the causes of suffering. When we see suffering, we understand the causes of suffering. We understand the cycle. As part of this, of course we understand this delusion we have about having a separate self. And right view

[13:25]

Sometimes I start to think when I hear the word right view, I think viewpoint. But it's not viewpoint. If anything, it's dropping one's view. And then another part of the, Eightfold path is right speech. Right speech is speaking in a way that does not harm others. It doesn't mean not to be honest and forthright, but we need to look at what we say in terms of how it creates harmony. or how much it does to help another person awaken and freeing them from suffering.

[14:36]

One very important aspect of right speech is it's completely intertwined with mindful listening. being able to listen to another person with empathy. I want to go back to what Sojin said, a week or two ago. He said, trust in the calmness of the mind. We hesitate because we depend on our heads.

[15:44]

Everything we think is our imagination. So we should stop thinking. When we create images, we can't see clearly. So, back in the third or fourth century, there was a Indian Buddhist teacher, scholar, practitioner named Vasubandhu. And he was a avid dharma specialist or thinker. And he, they were very concerned about the nature of mind and the nature of consciousness. And way before psychology became popular in the Western world, which is fairly recent, Indian Buddhists were examining how our minds work.

[16:54]

Now, Hozon taught a class, a four-week class on this very recently. on the Yogachara School, and Vasubhandu wrote many verses on the nature of consciousness. But I would like to read two verses. And this is about perception. When Sojin says that our thinking is imagination, It's about perception. That's what he's talking about. So these are two stanzas that they were initially written by Vasubandhu, but they've been translated and elaborated upon by Thich Nhat Hanh. Manifestations from store consciousness can be perceived directly in the mode of things in themselves,

[18:01]

as representations or as mere images. All are included in our elements of being. How do we understand our experience? What do we see? We can perceive directly without asserting ourself into it. Sometimes that's easiest in nature with a flower or a mountain, the rain yesterday, the view from my window. When we practice zazen, we are practicing not asserting ourselves into it. I think that's what Dogen's referring to when he says, Not thinking.

[19:03]

He doesn't mean that thinking is bad. He's talking about the fact that in most of our thinking, which is based on perception, that we insert ourselves into it. I just read a book. Actually, a few months ago, I read this. And being a librarian, I have to share a book. I'm gonna tell you just a few things about it. It was written by two women, one of which was one of the women who founded Black Lives Matter, Patrice Kahn Colors. And it's a memoir. about her life, her young life, because she was very young when she coined this phrase with two other very young women.

[20:12]

They had no idea how far this was going to go and people's reactions to it. So the memoir, a lot of it is about her brother who had a type of mental illness and he was arrested because of this mental illness, even though he was not a violent guy. And so it's just a memoir about what happened to her and her life. But she called the memoir, When They Call You a Terrorist, Because here it is, a few young women talking about their experiences growing up as black women, and then they're labeled terrorists.

[21:24]

That's obviously about perception. And it's not just about perception. When we practice Sazen, we're practicing not inserting ourselves into what we hear. But very often somebody hears somebody's story And they color it with a lot of personal ideas that don't really reflect what the person is saying. For example, I've lived in the Bay Area for a long time and I've actually had a few careers.

[22:32]

I worked in non-profits. I became a baker. I worked at Nabalum Bakery for five years in the 80s before I became a librarian. And then I became a librarian and I worked for a couple of library systems. I worked for Berkeley Public Library, Oakland Public Library. I worked, but my main career was San Francisco Public Library. And since the 1980s, I've participated in a number of trainings about race. And most of the trainings that I went to, including, by the way, there was also a training at Berkeley Design Center. I forgot to mention that back in the 90s. But most of the trainings that involved my employment were quite mixed in terms of the people who were participating.

[23:49]

There were people of all different colors and backgrounds. One time, I was working in a non-profit. This was in the 80s, where, not surprisingly, a lot of the so-called professionals were Caucasian, and a lot of the paraprofessionals were African American. We had a training. It was actually kind of a mediation because there was a lot of struggle in the organization. It was a health-related community organization. And I remember saying something that blamed the people working at the front desk for a lot of the problems in the organization.

[25:07]

And those people happened to be African-American. And there was a lot of anger towards me for that. And at first I felt assaulted, hurt, like I was misunderstood and why are people so mean to me? That kind of thing. But truthfully, I wasn't listening. I wasn't hearing the pain that they felt. And since then, I think that was my first training. But every single training I've been through, there's been some kind of a blow up because this is a subject that a lot of people don't want to talk about. I have to say that from my perspective, and I'm just speaking for myself, I think it's mostly white people who don't want to talk about it.

[26:25]

Obviously, it's all over the news. So there are people talking about it. So in the many different trainings that I've been in, I hear people say things like, I don't want to feel guilty. It's not my fault. I didn't bring slaves over here from Africa. But I think this is, for me, a very pressing example of ways that we cling to ourselves and our story.

[27:30]

I'm also speaking a lot for people Closer to my age, I'm very heartened by younger people in this country who seem to be brought up a bit differently and are more open-minded. I'm just checking the time. I'll stop in a couple minutes. There's a story in the, I think it's from the Polly Cannon or it's an early talk of the Buddha's from a Theravadan text. Buddha told Subhuti, one of his disciples, where there is perception, there is deception. We practice wisdom when we practice Sazen.

[28:56]

I love the first line of the Heart Sutra, Avalokiteshvara, when practicing deeply Prajnaparamita, practicing wisdom. It's not something we acquire, it's something we practice. As we practice wisdom, thoughts drop away, that protection of self that me and mine passes away, drops away, let me say, drops away.

[30:02]

And compassion is there because we can hear. One incident that really affected me was a diversity training at Berkeley Public Library I think I mentioned this in a talk a few years ago. There was a group of us, we were in small groups. I think there were seven of us in our group and it was a mixed group, different backgrounds. And the instruction was each person say something about your, whoever your people you came from, something that makes you proud and something that you want everyone else in this room to know. What do you want them to hear? And I had an African-American coworker who actually I didn't know her very well, even though I saw her every day, I didn't really know her.

[31:14]

And she said, I want everyone to know how many young African-American men there are out there trying so hard to succeed. I never forgot that. I never forgot how I felt in that moment when she said that. I suppose I'll stop and see if there are any responses, questions. Thank you for listening. Good sangha. We have time for one or two questions.

[32:18]

Please raise your virtual hand. at the bottom of the participants screen on the right hand side, and I'll call on you, or you can type a question. Please, but, oh, it's not hard to see anymore, because you can only type me, the SAG director, but you can type a question as well. Please, step forward. You're just getting started. Yeah, that's true. Can you please continue? Well, there's always a lot to say about our minds and perceptions. What's nice is hearing about your feelings and your experience. I've been fortunate in that I've had the opportunity to participate. Maybe it comes from being a public employee too.

[33:23]

Someday, I want you to talk about your experiences at the Castro Library. You're not tired of me talking about that yet? I never get tired of hearing you talk about that. That's my favorite thing. Yeah, well. Say a little bit about that. It's been a while. I know. Don't lose it. I won't lose it. I wrote a lot about it in my journals. I look forward to your book about it. Thank you. Maybe you could say just something about it a little bit. About my experiences at the Castro Library? Yeah. Well, you know, it was my first time really being a boss.

[34:27]

I had never supervised anything and I'd never run a branch. I'd never even worked in a branch library. All of a sudden I was in charge of it and in charge of a bunch of employees and all the books and everything. And I remember coming to you and because I was surprised, I thought, most employees easily did what they were expected to do. And I'm surprised at how hard it was. I came to you many times for advice and you said to me, make sure they know who's boss and carry a big stick. But I had to become very assertive. We were in a neighborhood where there was a lot of drug use, and there were people shooting up in the library often in front of children.

[35:35]

And when I started the job in 1999, I prided myself in being kind of a very polite person. which unfortunately meant somewhat conflict avoidant, but I had to become very assertive. And so, I really thank you for helping me do that. You've always been very quiet about being the boss. You don't have to yell and scream, you just carry that. Do you remember when I was stalked?

[36:40]

Well, you were stalked by a lot of people. Yeah. I had to go to court many times. You'd think a librarian's life would be simple and sort of quiet. Yep. Your job was to control the chaos. Yes. Everybody thinks the library is a very nice place to be quiet and contemplative. I don't think it is anymore. No. It's a haven for the homeless. Yeah. But it was, I really missed my job because it was the perfect practice place for me.

[37:49]

I was confronted every minute because I was out in public. I had people demanding things, people violating rules. Some of them, they couldn't help it too. The place was constantly in physical disarray. I had people calling me a Nazi. And I had people calling me a Nazi if I told them not to do something. And then I had a persistent customer, a patron, who was angry we didn't subscribe to a Nazi paper. So... Yeah. It was the ultimate practice place. It was, and I miss that. because it was a moment every minute was clearly practiced. Yeah.

[38:49]

It was your monastery. It was. Okay. Maybe somebody else has a question. Speaking of the working in a library, you were referring to when people were going around and asked, what are you proud of? I think, or what was your history? And Ed Herzog asks, what was your answer to the question about what you were proud of, Karen? If I go back and remember correctly, I said that I came, I grew up in a Jewish community in Philadelphia. And I was proud about Jewish people standing up for justice. There was, Sean asks, how do you prepare for things without thinking?

[39:57]

That's a great question. You know, there's a kind of thinking that's necessary For example, when I thought about what I was going to say today, I created an outline. I wanted my talk to have some flow. I didn't want to spontaneously just go all over the place. So I thought, I thought about what I wanted to say, and I thought about some examples. So that's thinking. But then there's this kind of other kind of thinking that's another layer that actually is not helpful. And I think truly it's probably the majority of thinking, which is worrying about scenarios. What if I forget what I'm gonna say? What if my mind goes blank? What if what I'm saying isn't important to other people?

[41:03]

Just all kinds of things. worrying about an earthquake happening in the middle. All that kind of thinking is just, it's like the galloping horse that's not really going anywhere. That's why we come back to our body and our breath over and over. We're perfectly capable of thinking when we need to. Mostly what we're doing is paying attention. That's the important thing. When I'm cutting carrots for a salad, my attention is on cutting the carrots. Sean, does that answer your question?

[42:04]

Uh, yes, it does. And, um, to some degree I was thinking about, you know, I think hostile situations came up initially, but I also thought about, you know, um, how would you prepare for a meeting without thinking? So it did to some degree. And, uh, you know, I think that that, what you said could be applied to harsh, uh, hostile situations. Like someone, you know, let's say you're, you had the opportunity to meet with Donald Trump and you know, you know, you have a perception of this guy and you know, the way you have, you have some preconceptions, you know, and, um, I like, how would you, you know, prepare for that? Even like with an open mind, I guess, I don't know. Um, you know, I do, I think your answer did kind of, reach the fuller spectrum of preparation and it defined the different types of, there's thinking and then there's all of these preconceived ideas.

[43:14]

I guess there's propaganda sometimes that influences perception. Definitely. I mean, that's a major point. In the very first two lines I read of the verses by Vasubandhu, it says, well, the first line is manifestations from store consciousness. Store consciousness is everything we've seen, heard, experienced, including propaganda. Propaganda's in our store consciousness, as well as all the good, wholesome things that we've learned, all that generous potential, compassion, open-mindedness, but then there are all sorts of negative things, too. So we have to be very careful, which brings us back once again to the practice of zazen, where we actually water the seeds that are beneficial.

[44:18]

And also, speaking of training and diversity, this is where we learn a lot about our false perceptions. Thank you. Exceptions are based on things we've learned often. Thank you, Sean. Rondi Saslow, I invite you to unmute yourself and lower your blue hand and ask a question. Good people will run it through to 1115. So we have time for two or three more questions. Yes. Karen, I wondered if you could say how you tell people on what basis you got your job at the library as it related to your Buddhist practice, what you were told. Rondi, I know what you're asking, but it's important.

[45:26]

The Castro branch was one of the most popular jobs in the entire library system. And there were 22 people who applied for the job, and I was an outsider. So I didn't expect to get the job, but I managed to get an interview, and they interviewed 22 people. And I got the job, and I didn't know why, but I didn't care. And... Shortly after I was hired, one of the people on the hiring panel came up to me and said, you know what the best thing you said was in that interview? And I said, what? My eyes wide open. He said, you said that you led a meditation group for homeless people. That was one. I can't tell you how. I'm sorry?

[46:28]

He said that before I got hired. Right. What I was thinking of is that you also were a session director. And I thought that was another reason that was given to you. And also, I guess having that position sort of denotes to me that you already had a certain kind of authority. You maybe, you didn't have to use it the way you did at the Castro Library, but you already had a certain amount of authority in that role and it was translatable. Thank you. Being Sashane Director at the Berkley Zen Center probably was my very first experience with that kind of, I guess you'd call it supervision. When I became Sashim director, I had been warned by several previous Sashim directors that you'll be surprised at how much it's harder than you think.

[47:40]

And I didn't know what that meant, but I started and I said, all I'm going to do is model practice. That's all I could think of doing. And fortunately, I got a lot of help from Sojin and Hozon and other people. But I don't know if I would have been so eager to be a branch manager if I hadn't had the experience of directing Sashi. Thank you.

[48:17]

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