I think it's the birthday is the day of June. Yes. So we're having a birthday party on this Saturday. And I think probably more than usual, partly because of that. Yeah. I hope you don't mind if I bring up a few of his teachings, even though you've heard them before. One of the things he said more than once was that the job of Zen teacher is basically to encourage everybody to practice Zazen. So how can we do that?

[01:18]

What is Zazen? Zazen is something that you can't talk about exactly. It's not an object to refer to exactly. And yet all the teachers of our school are to encourage or foster without necessarily making them out there. Still, we say things like Zazen is just to live your life fully in each moment. That's all. That's what we're saying. Sometimes he talked about it as zazen is just to be honest.

[02:31]

Or zazen is to completely expose yourself. in a moment, or moment by moment. So to be fully alive, to be honest, completely expose yourself, to be completely concerned with what you're doing. The same thing. In other words, it's not that I sit over here and try to live my life over there. That's still not completely exposing. The last few years of his life, we had Tassajara.

[03:56]

We used to drive from San Francisco to Tassajara, and Tassajara to San Francisco. So because he rode back in Portland Road, that trip became one of the main ways to teach, because that was something in his life. And while he was riding, I imagine, while he was driving from San Francisco to Tassajara, or Tassajara to San Francisco, it was a nice time for him to think. He didn't have to do the dualistic activity of driving. He got busted at one. He didn't have to drive the car. He could just be himself. So he got lots of good inspirations from riding back and forth.

[05:01]

One of the teachings he gave about that is that if you drive from Tassajara to San Francisco frequently, you don't have to decide how to go. All you have to do, basically, is not have an accident. All you have to do is make decisions. And the zazen is like that, and also carcassinid precepts is like that. It's not so much to decide about carcassinid precepts as it is to moment by moment take care of things and not have an accident. Not to have necessarily carried precepts on your shoulder or your pocket, because you might lose them.

[06:12]

But trust, be completely alive in the present as the way you not have an incident. And again, I pulled this door yesterday, but I'd like to tell that again, too, of this Zen teacher named . And as I told many times, this Zen teacher was a teacher of a whole generation of Zen teachers. Almost all the teachers that are teachers of the teachers we know, the Soto Zen, almost all of them, it's like this one teacher named . And he, when he was a little boy, his teacher sent him to the store to buy some koku for dinner.

[07:18]

And on the way, he saw an advertisement for acrobatic meals. He stopped to look at the picture. And while he was looking at the picture, he heard the bell ringing in the temple, which was a signal that was timed at dinner. So he snapped away and rushed off to the store. He took it and he went into the store and said to the store too quick. He made a tof. He made a tof.

[08:23]

He called the man to leave the tof and dashed off back to the temple. on his way to the temple, he realized that they left his hat at the store. So, dashed back to the store, and he ran to the store and said to the old man there, get it to me, get it to me. What he meant was, give me the hat. But he forgot to say hat, because he was so concerned with getting the hat. And he gave back a good time to cook dinner for food that he bought. But he forgot to say hat.

[09:25]

And the man said, You already had that axe on your back. What's the matter with you? He ran back and... This story... Actually, I talked about this story in a lecture once, and I came out from the entirety of an angle that I'd like to come out from tonight. And tonight I'm pointing out that, as the Sikiroshi said, the hat is like precepts. You always have the hat, but you think you forgot it. because you think so much.

[10:34]

It's always there. But it makes a big difference whether we realize it's there and not. Big difference for us. If I think I'm practicing the precepts, well, I wouldn't criticize anybody who thought they were practicing precepts. That's a perfectly reasonable thing to think. And also, myself, I wouldn't criticize anybody who thought they weren't practicing precepts.

[11:43]

However, the point I'm most concerned with is that we realize that to think you're practicing the precepts or to think you're not practicing the precepts is not practicing the precepts. That's just thinking that you are or they're not. How many of you think you're practicing the precepts? How many of you think you're not practicing the precepts? Some people wrote it twice. That doesn't be appropriate. Yeah, sometimes. Sometimes. [...] Yeah. I think that myself. Sometimes I think I'm practicing, and sometimes I think I'm not. I mean, sometimes I think, boy, I practiced that precept. I didn't show that ant. It was running across my desk just a while ago. And this act, this particular ant, I think, is running around there for days now.

[12:55]

And I still haven't killed it. So at least in that case, I was practicing the precept called not killing, right? Pretty good, huh? Well, again, that's fine to think that. I think it's OK to think that. And I did think that. But guess what? That's just thinking that I just say, not killing. Actually, not killing is a different situation. I'm thinking that I didn't kill the enemy or that I'm a good boy. Again, there's nothing wrong with thinking of a good boy or they don't kill ants. I just have to remember that thinking I'm not a killer is thinking I'm not killed. Or thinking I'm not killing any is thinking I'm not the other. Also, to think I do, to squash the ant, to think I am killing the ant, is also thought and action, not killing. In both cases, that's what I'm doing. And I must admit what I did, what I feel, I'm doing.

[13:59]

That's not the reality of what I'm doing. However, the different things follow from the different words I think. Following the precepts is not one of those other extremes. It's me completely involved in what I'm doing. Whether I think the hat's in my back or not is not the point. It's that I know that I think the hat's in my back, or I know that I think the hat's not in my back. And being a Buddha, or practicing Zazan, the same thing. We may think, I may think I'm not practicing Zazan, and I'm a bad Zen student, or I may think I'm an excellent Zen student, and I am practicing Zazan, but in either case, that's what I think.

[15:11]

And if I can't identify that's what I'm thinking, then I'm just not doing, I'm not being honest about what I'm doing. And if I think that I am practicing Zazen, and if I think I really am, and I think I am, I probably should be honest about that. And if I think I'm really killing ants, I probably should be honest about that. And expose myself to everybody about that point. Maybe you can't expose yourself to everybody, but at least expose yourself to at least one person, maybe somebody anyway. So I myself have been trying to expose my thinking, expose my action more.

[16:26]

Not that I say I'm exposing reality, but I'm exposing what I think I'm feeling. I see if people really think I'm really exposing myself. Is that really right? Or am I saying not so much that? I think I'm doing this, but I really am doing this. I really am being a good person. Or am I just saying, I think I'm being a good person? Which is, well, I have to say what I think. I have to say what I feel. With this kind of honesty, it's very closely related to being completely alive. Without that, I think we'll be afraid to be ourselves.

[17:32]

We'll be afraid to dissolve it. So the funny thing is, when I first talked about zazen, I never thought Zen had anything to do with confession or being like that, or repentance. But after practicing for some time, what I actually think is that actually zazen is repentance. And I think that partly because of I just happen to run into some places where it says that.

[18:37]

In other words, that to actually sit still or to actually look directly at what's happening, I mean, if you look at what's happening, but to have an argument of thought is repentance. So I have to point that down to this part that maybe needs to be unpacked, as I said. But the ultimate reality is to be one. Not even to see it as an object, because that's not alternate reality, but to practice to be absorbed in unity of all life. And so I may confess.

[19:50]

I may think I'm confessing something. But in my confession, there still may be some which another person can feel. I may feel that I'm exposing myself, but if I also say before I debate myself that what I'm really trying to do is expose myself, then another person can say what I've really done, taken all my clothes off or taken all my garments away. One simple, it's one kind of light example of this is one time I was driving in San Francisco and I was driving on the street in the night. I turned the corner, I turned into a... I was driving on the street, traffic wasn't too bad, actually.

[20:59]

And I turned the corner into a real heavy traffic jam. And I said, This is the stupidest thing I've ever done in my life. The person writing it would say, even when you insult yourself, give yourself a compliment. The one thing you say, I'm stupid, is nothing you say, this is the stupidest thing I've ever done. think, well, Gina, I'm guessing something, but who did I notice? So if I said it to myself, I probably wouldn't even have noticed it. I probably would have thought, yeah, this one's a stupid student. But since I didn't find another person, I got the feedback that not only did I do something a little bit stupid, but actually, nothing compared to the other way I did it.

[22:12]

Even in the process of compressing, I kind of hit all the other things I don't know. So is it managing or in front of a lot of different people? Again, this kind of practice, I think, for me, I was surprised to find out about this practice in Zen, because I thought, you know, I didn't realize that that would be part of it. I did. It really is part of practice to use another living being to help you see if you're really moving up something else. And also, sometimes you say to people, you know, please help me, but even that is not so easy to say in such a way that a person really can do that for us.

[23:30]

And that's tricky. So it's a subtle matter. But there's another sort of simple example that the philosopher once talked about the clarifying quality of possession. Once when he was teaching school, I think in Bavaria or someplace like that, He punished one of the kids in school.

[24:46]

And when asked that he punished the kid, he said something like he denied it or something. And 20 years later, he confessed that to another philosopher named G.E. Moore. And he said once he confessed that, it became much more clearly. That was actually interfering within all those years. And I thought, wow. I don't know if I got what he did wrong, but I thought such a tiny little thing it was, it seemed to me. Maybe I got it wrong. Maybe it wasn't that he punished a kid, but something even less than that.

[25:54]

But he wasn't honest about something. And that confessing it was years later, cleared his mind up. That was really subtle, that little thing that . So I guess what I'm trying to say is I'm just sort of warming up to say that I have to say, it's kind of like one, two, three, What Zazen is, is coming right down to the most bottom line, all the way down to the most fundamental place.

[27:13]

It's way down there. It's right at that point there. And take it thoroughly all the way down there. And not move from that thing right there. You're really willing to be in a present that you can't even quite, if you're really honest, you can't even quite get a hold of it. And you're really willing to go all the way down to where you can't be to get a hold of Christ. And to be willing to live there with people. I don't know.

[28:23]

I can even say maybe, geez, I think I'm here. I mean, I think I am. Am I here? I mean, it's not really a place. I really can't see it, but I think I'm with you. Or maybe... As I was trying to explain to you just now about this thing about coming down to the most, you know, just coming all the way down, I felt, you know, as I was struggling to explain to you, as I was kind of unable to...

[29:59]

as I felt unable to tell you what I was trying to get at at this place, you know. But I felt like I was telling you better than when I finally finished saying what I was saying. That as soon as I completed what I was trying to say, I felt like I lost it. Or, you know, that I'd missed. But as I was struggling to tell you this thing I feel about where does our end is, but I hadn't yet, and I felt how difficult it is to say where it is or to point to or to reach it, and yet I feel like it's some ultimate place. Then I felt like I was communicating. But when I finally finished saying what I was saying, and I was done, I felt like .

[31:04]

And I felt the year with me as I was reaching, but that we lost each other when I finished. And when I said what I wanted to say, I didn't want to say that exactly. That was pretty good for me, what I just said. And it was kind of hard for me to say because I was confessing that I missed. That I missed. I was trying to say something and I didn't get it to you. But I did get to you, but I did feel like I could not get to you when I confessed that I missed. Although I was preferring to get to you by saying what I wanted to say.

[32:21]

But I felt more contact in the second one. Do you understand? I wanted to tell you another funny thing about me. I really need

[33:32]

you know, to keep training myself and to study, and to expose myself. And I feel I need to have, to expose myself to more experienced teachers. And And one of the teachers that I'm fortunate to be able to try to show myself to is a Christian monk. But then I think, oh, I'm a Zen priest. So it makes it sort of different to deal with a Christian.

[34:47]

And I think, how silly that is. But still I feel that way. I don't know if you understand why I have that problem.

[36:22]

In other words, why I was teaching two different religions? What difference does it make, actually? But I have that in my mind. That's the difference. Maybe it's kind of like someone might think, well, you would be willing to expose yourself to someone who doesn't know the rules of your own house. because they're more compassionate to you.

[37:27]

Or you could fool them more easily. So you shouldn't choose somebody from a good band with tradition. Something like that might be about his own mind, but still, anyway, I think it's silly to do it. That's sort of the way my mind works. It's kind of like you've got to make sure that you're not tricking yourself, right? But actually, I don't think that will make sure I'm not tricking myself. It would be better to assume maybe I am. and then learn from what they learn from.

[38:41]

Or anyway, try to communicate, and if I'm successful, I'm not successful. I feel bad. And I feel the pain of that. So I finish by bringing up the ancient question. And that is, can you see the oneness of all life? And I won't answer your questions for you, but I'll just say,

[39:56]

But if you can't, that's OK, because it's not some object that you can see. It's more just a question. It's a question, can you see the reality? But what reality? Can you see it reaching out? And you see it reaching every experience you have. And right now, I can hear little fences popping up in the room. Yes, no, maybe, et cetera. Popping, popping. That's fine. I don't. I don't really have any judgment about the popping answers to that question.

[41:00]

I just like the question. And then I wonder, what are the effects of that question? Does that question guide us into the living of our lives. We could be ourselves. In myself, I noticed that there is a desire that a question like this will be very useful to all of us.

[43:17]

In other words, I want that question to be very useful to all of you. I want you all to use it. I mean, I want you all to be able to use it to guide life into your life. I want that. But I don't want it for a long time, and I don't want it I didn't want it to shut down. I don't want to walk up in the hall. And I think my lack of wanting it to last work really well.

[44:31]

And almost no one was saying that, see, did anybody cling to that? It would disturb the flash to make some people use it. Do you think that it is the exact same device? You see, I did it myself a while, but I did that. What are you using now? Are you using it to lift your life? Astronomy. Astronomy. Using astronomy? Oh, I think you're good. Astronomy. Are you still using it?

[45:38]

Yeah. I know that it seems like we have an innate need to complete ourselves. Like if there are things that get less electrons, then they join with some that have more electrons. And I learned also that the sound of body builds its strength, and it gives me a lot of people. But I think it's done.

[46:48]

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