Good morning. My name is Denkei, Imo Denkei, Raul Onkayu, my birth name. And Imo Denkei is an ordination name, which you get when you have lay ordination. and it stays with you through pre-sordination. So today is Saturday and it's also the conclusion of the Fall Aspects of Practice period and so I was asked to be doshi for this sasheen so it's Saturday lecture but we're having one day sitting and therefore We won't have tea afterwards as somebody will explain to you later.

[01:03]

And so I will touch upon some themes that we studied during this aspects of practice. And contrary to what I usually do with this time, I didn't prepare anything at all. Usually I come very prepared. I pretty much write a lecture. Kind of like a paper. Do a lot of research. And this time I decided to do none of that. And just focus to be on the right state of mind. Cultivate the right state of mind. for the talk and then just let the Dharma express itself or flow. Nevertheless, that's not completely true.

[02:10]

That's a relative truth. Whenever we speak, you know, we always say half truths and half lies this language is sort of relative so half-truth half-lie and then there is the unsayable which is the absolute which actually is expressed on both sides of the relative truth the half-lie and half-truth or the white lie we could say so the white lie aspect is that we've been studying this text by Shokaku Okamura, Living by Vow, which talks a lot about the different chants. So the theme of the practice period was studying and practicing the forms of the practice.

[03:12]

And we had a class, and I want to express my sincere repentance for not attending the class this time. I did attend it last time. This time the circumstances of my life made it impossible. So that's my public repentance there. But actually during this practice period I found myself a lot more in the Zen-do than usual. And actually I stayed at Ross's place while he was in Europe for three weeks. So I actually was a resident for three weeks. So I was able to enjoy the daily schedule and usually, you know, I have to travel a lot to get here for Zazen as a non-resident. And yeah, we do that. So to help you, Peter, the topic of the talk is

[04:16]

I'm talking about vows. The topic of the book is living by vows, or how we live our vows. So what is a vow? Interesting word. Vow sounds like bow. So when we bow, we vow. Or we, with each bow we renew our vows and we lower our head. So one vow is to, I vow to sit Sazen. And so a vow has that quality of, like Sojin Roshi says, well, or Suzuki Roshi said, it doesn't matter, you know, how often you sit, this is the schedule, just choose. what fits with your life so that you can express your life and your vow both inside the gate and outside the gate so that's the most important point is to be able to express the vow both inside the gate and outside the gate and not just inside the gate because if you express the vow just inside the gate

[05:44]

Many times people say, I mean, Jack Cornfield wrote a book about how people go to monasteries and they live, this is, what is it, after the enlightenment comes the laundry. So there he documents all these cases of people who go and live in the monastery, you know, for years and years and years and years, and then they come back to the world. They don't know how to live in the world. So their life becomes a chaos and a disaster. And so where did the enlightenment go? It seems like it went out the window. Now, I'm not saying by that, there's a half truth and a half white lie in that. I'm not saying by that at all that the practice in the monastery is not an important form of practice. But the point is to be able to go back and forth between ordinary life which is the ordinary life means order right comes from order so it's an ordered ordinary life it's not the profane life right so it's ordinary life and formal monk practice or kind of scheduled practice that we have here although there's always some chaos we have chaos in here too

[07:13]

you know, quite a bit of chaos. And actually there has to be some chaos in order for there to be some flexibility in the form. You know, when we do the rites, the different rites, and the priest does the doshi thing and all that, there's always some little chaos there. You forget something, you do something a little bit different, and that's part of it. And if you get too upset about somebody not observing the form the way they're supposed to, then that's a kind of chaos, a bad chaos, because then your mind is moving. But if there's some room for flexibility, a little bit different and your mind is still still and there's no hostility invoked in you against anybody else, yourself or anybody else, then that's the good chaos.

[08:17]

So we go back and forth. So the important point is this vow to practice and to carry the practice outside the gate. And so the important point is, so Suzuki Roshi said, just choose one day. You can start just with, do that one day. Or you can do the seven days, you know, but sometimes people do the seven days, and I really gung-ho and talk about it, you know, I sit every day and so on and so forth, and other people don't, and I watch that person, you know, their practice is like this and like that, but I do it every day and so on and so forth. Often, people who talk like that, they do that for a while, and then you never see them again. And I'm not going to give any names. But I've been here long enough to see that. So the important point is to choose a point of stability

[09:28]

and that's something that works in your life and then to express the vow to practice zazen and then to carry the practice of zazen outside the gate and so some of this aspects of practice period has been focused on the different forms that we have here and how we do them and I said something about the good chaos and the bad chaos And then there's also how we carry them into everyday life. And whether we need to have like, you know, like kosher rules, you know, to carry the practice, the forms, you know, to have a little form or a little gata or a little something for every little thing that you may do in your life. I mean, that's basically the orthodox way. So no matter what you're doing, whether you're walking, you're getting in your car, you're taking the bus, you're telling something to somebody or something.

[10:32]

What? You have some little form that some prayer you recite or some gatha you recite or something. So that's one way, that's kind of the orthodox way. But Prajnaparamita really it's the name of a text, it's the name of a goddess, it's the name of a feminine, it's the name of wisdom, it's the name of a mantra, and it's the name of a state of mind. That's the markless state. So markless means it has no mark. And if it has no mark, I mean, it's the mark of no mark, really. So what is the mark of no mark? All forms are the mark of no mark. So whatever form you may be in, it is marked with emptiness.

[11:37]

That's what the sutra says. So how do we know, how do we recognize the mark of emptiness of every form? So one of the ways is to have the orthodox way in which you have something you say, the gatha or whatever you said to recite. And the other one is just to keep your mind pure. Which is what Sukhi Roshi said. That's the most difficult thing. Sitting zazen and doing sashin, you know, it's a funny joke, you know, it's really hard to sit sashin, you know, but he said, oh, that's not that hard, you know. What's so hard is to keep your mind pure from moment to moment. And pure doesn't mean not to have impure thoughts or not to have any stains or cracks. It means that it's the mind of non-attachment to whatever it may be that is there.

[12:41]

And there are many things. So we have the four vows, coming back to the question of vows. So we vow to practice, we vow to sit sasan. There's an intention to sit, just to sit. For no other reason than simply just to sit. Because we may say, oh, we sit sasan too, you know. for this reason or that reason or to make our life better and it's hard to explain you know because when people ask you go why do you do that why do you get up you know you got to get up at five in the morning or four in the morning and it's hard to explain so it's better not even try to explain too much you know this is just what I do and I do it and you can think I'm crazy that's okay you try to start explaining it then you get into the realm of doing it for some purpose or another which is the science of happiness that's how they talk about it now but actually there's no particular purpose we just do it and that's it so that's the vow to sit

[14:08]

and to practice the way of Buddha. And then we also avow, avowel. We avow the teachings of the Buddha. We avow the teachings of the Buddha. But then how do we prevent this avowal of the teachings of the Buddha from violating the vow of delusions are numberless, I vow to end them. Or the other vow is sentient beings are numberless, I vow to save them. or sentient beings are numberless, I vow to awaken with them. We changed it.

[15:13]

We've had this conversation within the Sangha, you know, why we changed it from sentient beings are numberless, I vow to save them, to sentient beings are numberless, I vow to awaken with them. So that was changed in the whole Sense Center. Because in modernity, in part of our problem with Christianity, is that we don't like the idea of a saviour. Because a saviour means there's some important person saving. Oh, I'm an important person saving somebody. So Jesus saved us by dying on the cross and erasing all of our sins in the process. So he's a very important person indeed. So that idea of savior is problematic or the knight in shining armor, you know, saving the maiden, right?

[16:26]

So there's a strong knight and a maiden that is not strong and needs to be saved. So immediately it kind of raises this duality of saver and saved. And so can we really save anybody? And then in psychiatry, you have this guy of transactional analysis, Eric Byrne, who's a local from San Francisco, who gave saving a bad name. because he created this triangle between the saver... the savior eventually becomes the persecutor or the persecuted so it's kind of linked with a certain kind of grandiosity and paranoia and it's a very common theme in delusion like most of the psychiatric delusions you see in psychiatric hospitals

[17:28]

One of the key archetypes is the saviour. So the saviour has to be persecuted, being chosen. The fact that they're chosen means that they're coming after them. And the fact that they're coming after them is because they're so important. And why are they so important? Because their function is to save the world. That's like textbook over and over and over and over the same delusion. So, if we say delusions are endless, we vow to put an end to them, we have to put an end to the delusion of the saviour. So the Diamond Sutra says, there's nobody saving and there's nobody being saved. That's the antidote to that. Nobody saving and nobody being saved. So that's why we changed it, even though sometimes people feel what I vow to say is a lot stronger, you know, as a kind of a lot stronger feeling than I vow to awaken with them.

[18:41]

And then there's the meaning of awaken. So, awaken from what? From a dream. Or from sleep. So then sometimes people think, oh Zazen is just don't sleep. Awaken means, literally, don't sleep. So just sit 24-7. And so we get this kind of zeal, this inedible zeal, where we create a duality between being awake and sleeping. Although getting up at four in the morning or five in the morning or three in the morning, you know, yeah, why not? No big deal. Sleeping your six or seven hours, which now medicine says you have to. It prevents all kinds of mental disorders and prevents all kinds of medical disorders.

[19:49]

High blood pressure. etc. etc. etc. So you need to put in at least six or seven hours, which means then you have to go to sleep early if you want to get up that early. And if you go to go to sleep early, then, you know, you got to put your kids to sleep early, or your partner, or you and your partner are going to sleep early, or you have to live by yourself and not have too many friends. Because your friends, you don't want to stay up late. So life is complicated. So we have to make some choices. But in between all those possibilities is where we find the practice in some form. And it's different for everybody. So that's the nice thing about the practice we have here is that we go back and forth. You know, this is, we're part of San Francisco Sin Center, but this is the place where people go back and forth between, or mostly the example of people go back and forth between formal practice and their daily life.

[21:00]

And for everybody that's different. So avow, so we avow the Buddhist teaching, but the Buddhist teaching is also like a dream. So Dogen says, to awake from a dream into a dream. That's the meaning of awakening. So a dream gets a bad rap, but the dream is not so bad and Buddhism is not so good. Buddhism also has problems. So it's perfection within imperfection. All sanghas have problems. You know, we like some things about the Buddha's teaching and we don't like other things. Sometimes people like the Hinayana and don't like the Mahayana.

[22:01]

Or sometimes people think, oh, the Hinayana get a bad rap, so I'm going to identify with the Hinayana. Or, oh, I don't like the Hinayana, I like the Mahayana. or I like what the Buddha says here but I don't like what it says there you know or I like this teacher and I don't like that teacher and so on and so forth so this is how in a way we relate to the Buddha's teaching so there's some avowal and some disavowal as well there's some things that are more difficult to accept but mostly we accept most of it. So, you know, there's these two ways of, you know, the second of the four vows we chant, we'll chant at the end,

[23:09]

Well, the first one I commented on. The second one is Dharma gates are boundless. No, delusions are inexhaustible. I vow to end them. So we have to also end our deluded way of relating to Buddhism. Or not delude Buddhism, keep it pure. Dharma gates are boundless, I vow to enter them. So the Dharma gates are everywhere. And here there's the big Dharma, and then there's the small Dharma gates. And the small Dharma gates are like those different practices that we have, like gathas, or intentions that we say, chants that we have at meals. And then the Dharmagate, the big Dharmagate is sort of this feeling or this sense of that everything is marked with no mark or with emptiness.

[24:21]

And so what is that? It's that we carry our daily life in stillness and compassion. So that's how we take our life outside the gate, but sometimes the surface of the ocean is choppy and we get irritated, we experience different forms of afflictions, we experience anger, we experience envy, jealousy, irritability, judgment, condemnation, reproach, I like this, I don't like that. We may use some vulgar word with ourselves or with some other people.

[25:24]

And underneath that is the stillness and the compassion. How crazy is that? Because it's non-dual. So we practice with dharma gates of almas, we practice with the big dharma, which is the stillness, and then the small and compassion, heart of wisdom, and the small dharma gates are all the wholesome and unwholesome dharmas we experience. And the unwholesome dharmas are the hindrances, states of worry, states of anxiety, Sometimes we have more anxiety, sometimes we have less anxiety. So how do we practice with anxiety? Because even though you have a mind of stillness, and yes, in the Zen though, it's a lot easier not to experience anxiety. Or the anxiety is wrapped around the Buddha mind.

[26:27]

So no problem. But outside the gate, It's not so easy to experience the anxiety wrapped around the Buddha mind. So then how do we practice with that? So there we have the mindfulness of breathing practice, which we also have in the Zen Dhamma. So whatever we're doing, always breathing, taking another breath. That always helps with anxiety. I do a group at the clinic where I work. to help people with anxiety and we do Zazen and practice mindfulness of breathing. So that's one other way of taking the practice out into the world. So I wanted to read a little bit from this book.

[27:28]

I also want to leave some room for the other practice leaders to say something. How are we doing wrong with time? Is it about 10, 15 minutes? 10, 15 minutes? OK, so maybe I would like to ask the other practice leaders and those of you who've been at the class to join in and say something about this theme since we're closing today the aspects of practice and about this theme of the forms of our practice and living a life of vow and what that means to you and maybe something that we discuss in the class that I really haven't touched upon

[28:29]

And maybe you have a question about that. Or you would like to say something about that. Yes, Leslie. So I was thinking about the four vows. And we did talk about that in one of the classes. And for me, when I hear us say, I vow to save them. It's really the subject object. There's somebody to be saved, and I'm capable, and I'm going to do that. Whereas when I hear the, I vow to awaken with all beings, to me it's about not being separate. And the with is an important word in that phrase to me, that it's awakening together, and it's not, we don't use the subject-object, we're doing this together, and so I'm vowing to be one with all beings, and if I can realize that, that's awakening, and not just for me, but with everybody.

[29:50]

Thank you. in our practice, how do we transform those? In just accepting them as they are, how do we transform them? Or how does transformation happen? To a... Not so much ending delusion, but transforming delusion.

[31:03]

Is there any way to address that? Well, first is the word transformation. How we use it. Because sometimes we kind of use it as a thing. As if we were transforming, you know, like delusion into enlightenment. Sort of like alchemy. Alchemy. Alchemy or outcoming. Outcoming, you know, so focusing on outcomes and the outcome being better than where you came from or where you're going is better than where you came from as opposed to the teaching that both are empty and that transformations are happening anyway all the time because it's the nature of change and impermanence. So I think that's more akin with the teaching of the Buddha that sometimes then the word how the word transformation is used in spiritual circles sometimes which is more like a thing but I think the transformation happens anyway in in and of itself and so we can't predict it but we can make an effort

[32:31]

and we can have some faith in the sense of I'm feeling anxious now and I have not felt anxious before do I always feel anxious? no, I don't always feel anxious do I always feel not anxious? no, I don't always feel not anxious sometimes I feel anxious Sometimes I don't feel anxious. So that's the mind of faith. And faith and impermanence. Sort of like the usual saying, this too will pass. And this is what's happening right now. Right now what's happening is I am anxious. And what am I doing with it? Well, I'm accepting it and recognizing it, and I'm breathing. I'm breathing. this breathing with the anxiety and accepting it in myself and not judging myself for feeling anxious, whether I'm bad or I'm supposed to not feel anxious after all these years of fasting, you know, but I feel anxious, you know.

[33:48]

That's the outcoming idea, trying to have these kinds of outcomes what it is, and the transformation happens in and of itself, and you will go through periods of your life, regardless of stages of practice, regardless of any idea of enlightenment, you will go through periods in your life where you may have more or less anxiety, and that's okay and that's And nevertheless, there's practice. And yes, there is attainment, even though there is no attainment. So you may think, if you hold on to an idea of attainment, then you think, well, I'm surely having attain if I still feel anxious.

[34:51]

But if we hold on to in the right way, which is we practice anyway even though we're not trying to attain anything, then it's okay to feel experienced and practice with unwholesome awareness. And then we attain. Laura, would you like to say something? I don't really have anything to add. I wasn't prepared to say anything. I'm back on a little bit on the whole Savior thing. I'm going to be chewing on that one for a while. It makes a lot of sense to question Yes, Ron.

[35:59]

You mentioned going to Zazen and this is just what I do. Would you say there's no reason for it? This is just what I do. Which is... I don't want to say it's common, but it's a common thing to hear that about Zazen. This is just what I do. And I'm not trying to get anything out of it, it's just what I do. And we actually talked about that when I'm bringing it up, partly because we talked about that in the class that Andrew and I taught. And I, you know, I have some problem with that. And that's also doing it. It's like wanting something becomes taboo.

[37:05]

So we want to avoid the taboo. And what we brought up in class was, Suzuki Roshi talked about inmost requests. He said, in the end of one of his lectures, that's why we sit, because of our inmost requests. He didn't keep on saying that too much, because I think you can infer from that a kind of gaining attitude about, I'm going to request such and such, and I'm going to really make progress. But somehow I'd like to hear both sides, that we're not trying to gain something in particular, but at the same time there's some expression of some expression of evoking something within us that seems to want to maybe be more in touch with.

[38:05]

But if you specify what that is, then it's just some idea you've got. So how can you have motivation without having a specific idea? Right. So it's like the idea of or the practice of effortless effort or an intention without a content. That's the thought of enlightenment. Is it thinking or is it not thinking? Why do we call it a thought? Isn't meditation not about thinking? So why call it a thought of enlightenment? We're not really thinking about enlightenment. But it's an intention that directs us, that guides us, but doesn't have a specific content. So maybe that's a better way to express the two sides of just sitting. But I think the side of just sitting that Sojourn Roshi and Beginner's Mind stress so much is because of the strong tendency for gaining idea.

[39:16]

and the rest of Buddhism has such a strong, I mean in many ways it's allowed even in Inayana Buddhism or the Four Noble Truths, you're trying to go from suffering to the end of suffering, from suffering to happiness, from hate to kindness, delusion to enlightenment and so on. So there's a clear idea of gaining enlightenment, of gaining kindness, of gaining compassion and so on and so forth and then you develop this idealistic view of a Buddha as a being who only has those qualities and then you're strongly disappointed when the person you thought had these practices of perfection that were supposed to be gained through the practice show these other qualities so that's the problem We're talking about the practice in those terms.

[40:21]

But yes, there is an intention. There's an intention without a specific content. There's also a desire. Nirvana is samsara, samsara is nirvana. So how does nirvana appear in samsara is as a desire, that inmost request, that desire to practice. But it's also a kind of empty desire. It's a kind of energy that drives you to fire-seeking fire, that drives you to practice, but burns everything in the process. So I like that we have this very specified form with all that we do, particularly in Zen, even more than other but, we have this very specified form, but, but, dot, dot, dot.

[41:26]

Yes. Yeah, and that's the Heart Sutra. You know, why this is one of the points that I like that Shokuhaku Okumura says at the beginning, Why would the author of the sutra negate the Buddha's teaching and still call himself a student of the Buddha? It's kind of the same koan. Sort of like his teacher saying, good for nothing, Sazen. What kind of advertising is that, you know? That's the other thing. Yeah. So it's good for the no thing. So that's the other side of it.

[42:28]

It's actually really good for the no thing. I think the question Ron's raising is so important, because if you go too much on the side of there's no reason for doing this, And I just spent years thinking, well, just sit here and go to sleep. Why not just sleep? But you need that effort. You need that intention that there is something you're doing here. And what you just said makes a lot of sense. It's good for the no thing. But you need to understand that it is good for the no thing. And just sitting here, you can be wasting years of your life. Yes, so it's good to say it both ways, right? It's good for nothing from the objective point of view of a thing, but it is good for the no-thing. Because there is right effort, right?

[43:28]

There is right effort. Right intention. But then you have the stages of Bodhisattva development, and Zen, and this is a little presumptuous from Zen, because we say we start at the 8th. at the 8th level, which is this effort beyond effort. Up to the 7th level of bodhisattva development, you're trying to gain something. And you're trying to gain all the wholesome dharmas. You're trying to get peace of mind, a sense of ease, a sense of health, mental health, physical health, a happy life, good relationships, harmony in the world, and all that. So Buddhism can be expressed in those terms as well. And in fact, it's normal when we come to practice that we have all those ideas.

[44:34]

So part of beginner's mind includes this no gaining idea, but also that when you're a beginner, You have gaining idea. That you need some kind of idea of why you're doing this in order to be able to do it. Where even if it's the teacher's gonna like you, because you're in love with your teacher, and you think your teacher's the most wonderful person, and all you want is for your teacher to say, you're cool. You know, I like you. You're a nice person. I like talking to you. That's enough for some people. And that's a kind of, you know, gaining idea for a beginner. And that's perfectly okay. But then, you know, when the teacher starts hearing questions about enlightenment and, you know, when am I going to get enlightenment or when is the pain going to end, you know, or,

[45:40]

when am I going to get some rank and some respect around here, you know? Then they start stressing the beginner's mind and the no-gaining idea. Yes, Katie? Last question, Katie. As you were speaking about stages of bodhisattva practice. I was thinking of metta practice and pramana practice and these other practices of developing calmness and compassion. I guess my experience of that is not so much being part of a curriculum that I'm involved in, but that sometimes that's an appropriate response and that my own tangled karma that there's a hole, there's some kind of medicine that I need.

[46:47]

And so that can come out of Zazen, that I need to respond by developing these qualities. I see my patterns, and it would be helpful. So I just wanted to say that I see the practices as something that can be part of the flexibility of my practice as well. Yeah, thank you. That's true. So this is the medicine. Zazen is medicine. Wisdom is medicine. The Prajnaparamita, which are the Paramitas, which all express wisdom, Paramita of kindness, and patience and forbearance. We have to experience that. I mean, we have to experience that.

[47:49]

We have to practice that giving and kindness. But we have to guide that with wisdom also. Because kindness doesn't mean, or giving doesn't mean that you always give. Kindness doesn't mean that you're always a nice person. Because sometimes the teacher is not a nice person. You know, sometimes the teacher may seem actually not a very nice person. You know, so then you get confused. Unless you have the teaching of non-duality, you get confused because you think, well, isn't this supposed to be the practice of kindness? And the teacher is not being kind. He's not being nice. and then you get confused. So that's why we need the two sides, right? We need the dual teaching and the non-dual teaching.

[48:54]

Thank you very much.

[48:55]

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