In the last lecture, we began exploring what it means to engage in continuous practice. how it impacts us, how we live with and through such conceptions of practice. And I shared the impact of a statement Suzuki Roshi made in a lecture on me.

[01:05]

It was in June of 1969. And I had returned to San Francisco after being with my family for six months after the death of my father. Yeah. Seven months. Because it was about five weeks before Suzuki Roshi died. No, excuse me. It was... Suzuki Roshi had not died yet.

[02:16]

But I had returned from the East Coast. And wanting to find entry, a way to begin practice. That was June of 69, that's about three and a half years before Suzuki Roshi died. And in this lecture he said, You must continue this practice forever. And my heart stopped. How can I do that? And he said, you do this by being completely involved in what you're doing now.

[03:44]

We may say that the world as we know it is not continuous. As much as it's continually appearing and disappearing. How is it that we can fully engage in each moment? Wie geht das? Wie können wir uns vollständig auf jeden Moment einlassen oder uns in jedem Moment ganz involvieren? What and who is it? Was und wer ist das?

[04:47]

The information that we've been continually feeding ourselves Telling ourselves about what this world is. About constancy and accountability and knowability. doesn't hold up. And recognizing this and turning our lives toward practice. Sometimes it's called a kind of enlightenment experience. Beginning to see into the nature of things as change. As insubstantial.

[06:00]

Momentary. Bodhidharma supposedly as we understand it, asked his disciple, Taiso Eka. Bodhidharma had, at least we are told, asked his disciple, Taiso Eka. What is it, who is it, that practices constantly? And he responded, because I know myself very well, I can't say.

[07:01]

And as we understand it, Bodhidharma responded, that's right, that's why you're my disciple. The information that we have about ourselves, continually trying to know ourselves within this narrative that we've developed, doesn't often take into account the fact that we mostly know the world as continually appearing and disappearing. A number of years ago, when the airport security was quite strict, it's gotten a little bit better recently.

[08:24]

I was in the Frankfurt airport waiting to take a plane to San Francisco. And at that time you had to go through two duplicate levels of same thing, but two duplicate levels of security. And once you passed the second, they kept you almost like in a pen for animals, no Coca-Cola, no Laugen, no coffee, just in this holding pen. Is it like a cage, a pen? Like where Kohlbrenner keeps his cattle, but without the electric fence.

[09:29]

So like a fenced-in, closed-in area. Almost a cage without a top. Yeah, okay. And I felt that a woman was staring at me. She was completely covered. Except for her eyes. Uncovered. And I said, this woman is staring at me. After 20 minutes, I knew she was staring at me.

[10:31]

There was no question. And as such things happen, of course, when we get on the plane, I'm sitting in an aisle seat and she's sitting in the middle seat next to me. And she turned to me and she said, you're Egyptian, aren't you? And I said, maybe some place, I didn't get into my history, but my ancestors were slaves to your Pharaoh and we built your pyramids. But I said, maybe some point in my life, You know, I was Egyptian. Yeah, it's possible. And she was traveling from Kuwait to visit her daughter who lived in the suburbs of San Francisco. And she'd never traveled like this before.

[11:40]

And she had lots of really good food that she made. So she fed me throughout the entire flight, all these things that she had made. And a couple of weeks later, we had dinner with some friends, one of whom is from Kuwait, the other is from, he says Iran, Persia, but from Iran. And I told them this story and I said, this woman said I looked Egyptian. And they both looked at each other and they looked at me and they said, you do look Egyptian.

[12:44]

The information that we have about ourselves is not exactly who we are. The information we have about ourselves is not really who we are. Who we think we are. How we know this world. Continually gathering in and rolling out. Knowing something but not exactly knowing something.

[13:49]

Establishing ourselves in this continuity of time and place. A daily schedule that we can see is posted on the wall where there are specific times. And yet as we enter Fully, completely, wholeheartedly each moment. The verticality, not just the horizontality of each moment. There's an out-of-time, bottomless, without-bound quality.

[14:53]

Each moment outside of how we conditionally know ourselves and one another in this world. And so continuous practice, the term that Dogen uses for it is called Gyoji. And it includes two elements. It includes the element of doing or making or we could say being practice. And it includes the element of keeping at practice. So there's this horizontality and also verticality contained in what Dogen is addressing when he speaks of ceaseless practice, practice without end.

[16:44]

And in this lecture in June of 1969, Suzuki Rishi made a suggestion about how to practice this. Because we can't think our way into such a paradox. Something is complete as it is, but also we need to keep continuing to develop and notice it. And he brought up a story of the four horses from the Samyuddha Gama Sutra.

[17:46]

and it said that the first horse just at the shadow of the whip runs perfectly the second horse when the whip just touches the hairs of the hide it runs The third runs when it feels the pain of the whip. And the fourth runs only after it feels the pain penetrating its bones. And we may, there are a number of ways to work with such an image.

[19:09]

And we may consider the whip to be impermanence or change. Some of us might know right away. Some of us might need a small taste of change to know it's truth in our life. Some of us may need to suffer. And some of us may have to suffer bitterly to the marrow of our bone. And it's not so much accepting a teaching as confirming it in our experience and then living it.

[20:53]

Allowing it to be what informs and unfolds our life. It seems like such a simple teaching. Everything changes. Some of you know our great good Dharma friend David Chadwick. And I received... maybe a week or 10 days ago, a picture of David with Peter. Evelina took the picture in Bali.

[21:55]

And for those of you that know Peter and Evelina, they're in Bali almost half of each year, but they practice with us even when they're in Bali. Aber diejenigen von euch, die Peter und Evelyn kennen, ihr wisst, dass die beiden fast ein halbes Jahr lang auf Bali leben, aber sie praktizieren in all dieser Zeit auch immer mit uns. Die hören sich jeden Vortrag an. Und sie schicken Kommentare und Fragen zu den Vorträgen. They're honored guests for our practice period too. Anyway, David's from Texas. And has a very straightforward, simple manner. Very likable, easygoing kind of guy. And it masks his... ...forbiddable intelligence and skill in the world.

[23:23]

Four masks? It hides. You don't exactly see how smart and how skillful he is. After a lecture one evening at Tassajara, David said to Suzuki Roshi, You know, you say all these things and I feel it makes sense but I really don't understand it. Can you say it just as simply as you can for me? And Sukershi said, everything changes. Then Suzuki Roshi said, everything changes. And Baker Roshi has been exploring this teaching.

[24:34]

Developing this teaching is a kind of foundational condition for our practice. And we in our varying degrees of Buddhist teaching familiarity may say, oh yeah, everything changes. I agree with that. Except most of us want to continue to be an observer of change that doesn't change. We may to varying degrees be willing for everything to come and go, but kind of secretly we're not so willing for us to come and go. establishing our continuity in the story that we are continually patching and weaving.

[25:51]

which may include some idea that we completely understand the teaching that everything changes. So allowing each thing to come forward and be part of our life moment by moment. It means a kitten coming into the lecture as part of the lecture. A truck rumbling by is part of the lecture. And throughout practice period I've been talking about the practice of a pause. To pause is to wait inside the moment.

[27:20]

The practice of a pause is the practice of the confirmation of of each moment and are practicing each moment. It's an unknowingness which includes what we know but also is outside of what we know. Each moment is unique and stands alone in its own uprightness. Because we know ourselves so well, we can't exactly say who we are.

[28:37]

Apart from each particular, unique, mysterious arising, So continuity is not just establishing ourselves in some idea of a continuity of our practice. But it's allowing a continuous practice that we share to inform us in each moment. So each moment is complete in itself and also an opportunity to further that completion. So every moment is completely out of itself and at the same time an opportunity to develop this completeness further.

[29:57]

To continue this practice forever. To be completely involved in what we're doing now. Everything we need is here and possibly available for us. Thank you very much.

[31:27]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_72.52