What I'm talking about every day or every time I talk is Buddha's teaching, and it's not something possessed by me or possessed by Buddha. but something that belongs to all of us. Maybe in Buddhism, faith, initially faith is in dharma, is in the teaching, not in a god or in even Buddha. Can you hear in the back okay?

[01:06]

It's amazing, this room. So yesterday, as you know, some of you know anyway, I talked about a blank screen and about the precepts and faith. Actually, we have faith in Buddhism. Sometimes we say three things, but actually four things, and the three of course are Buddha, Dharma and Sangha, and the fourth are the precepts. Practicing virtue or morality, and in Buddha, Dharma and Sangha.

[02:19]

This is quite a contrast to… was historically quite a contrast to Hindu religions of that time, which the gods were very involved in, were very passionate themselves, and so if you had some difficulty in the midst of that difficulty, you didn't call on a god that had difficulty, you could call on something like dharma, some faith in the... almost like a law of the universe, And faith has several meanings. Behind the idea of faith is always the idea of wisdom. Actually, faith is another way of saying wisdom. And faith arises when you understand, accept the law of causation, everything changes, and the four holy truths.

[03:50]

We can say, sometimes wisdom, faith is defined as wisdom plus purity of action and mind. Someone asked me yesterday about positive aspects of morality, because I went through the precepts which say, don't do this, you're okay as you are, don't do that, don't add this. But they're all from a negative point of view, don't do that.

[05:05]

Behind that, of course, is the idea of an empty screen or a blank screen. And nirvana is sometimes, we can say, a blank screen. Selfhood or, maybe better, something irreducible – svabhava, I guess is, I think, the word – doesn't exist in Buddhism. Because everything changes, a correlate of that is that there's nothing that is irreducible. There's not some soul, there's not something you can reduce the universe down to, say, this is the essence. So if you don't have something, some substance, svabhava, then you have a blank screen. So yesterday I talked mostly about letting your screen clear up or letting the movie go off your screen.

[06:39]

But we can also speak about it from the point of view of when things come onto your screen. And actually, just as the sun came in the window here and changed the room rather gently, emotions or anger or various things arise on your screen in the same way. But usually we think they arise all of a sudden. But if you have the feeling, oh, if you, through your zazen, become sensitive enough to your self, you'll see, now anger is coming. And it comes, like the sun coming up. And you can watch, now I'm quite angry.

[07:47]

If you can do this, that's not the same as anger. I remember Suzuki Yoshi said about crying, and now I think I'm going to cry, I want to cry. Now I, pretty soon I'll be crying, now I'm crying. That kind of crying. Sometimes you can have a good cry like that without even crying, because you can feel it coming and you can just let yourself into the feeling and then your face never gets involved. It's wonderful, you have a great feeling having a good cry, you know, and no tears have come, but tears are okay. And the same in your zazen, the same attitude toward images. as they come onto your screen, you know. Oh, here they come, and here they come. But very important, in order to have a blank screen, or a screen with one thing at a time on it, is you have to live with some decision.

[09:18]

As I said a couple of weeks ago, the decision to give up the impure likeness of yourself, accepting the rise of bodhicitta, is, we say, seizing the jewel or being a conqueror That's maybe the primary decision, but every moment you have to live with some decision. And this kind of decision is the same as having an empty screen. If you make a decision, you return to zero, to a blank screen. Because on one side of making a decision is, I'll do such and such, or I won't do such and such. But the other side of making a decision is you do one thing and not all those other things. If you make a decision, you feel some great relief. Oh, I don't have to do all those things.

[10:42]

So, it's difficult to make a decision because you have many conflicting things. And the more movies you have simultaneously showing on your screen, you know, the more difficult it is to make a decision. But it's actually, you know, pretty hard for us to give up the idea of wanting a little extra on our screen. Maybe pretty soon it's a Vista vision, a wraparound vision. You want to keep extending your screen and getting several more projectors. But when you decide to do something, you have some relief, and that relief is shutting off all those other projectors. And that relief is the enjoyment of our practice, the actual decision to set the alarm to do zazen. The decision to do zazen, to start practice, is much more important than we realize. The ability to do it has some deep meaning.

[12:14]

If you can do that, just once, already you're practicing, and maybe that's 90% of practice, but the last 10% is very difficult. But still, there is a real difference between somebody who's never made such a decision, even once. So if you can live with decision each moment, just this, that's what we mean by right effort, just this, then your screen has one thing at a time. Of course, the result is you can do much more than you could before, because one thing after another, without many movies on your screen, you can accomplish a great deal.

[13:27]

So that's some other danger, is to use our practice to accomplish things. As you know, there are two sides to practice, of course. One is, emphasizes jhana or potentiality out of which everything arises. And the other emphasizes wisdom or each moment, each action, complete and inclusive. So the enjoyment of our practice is the relief, the profound relief we find

[14:29]

when we exist as a blank screen on which images arise. But the fruit of our practice is giving and participating and activity. So it's easy to get caught, actually, on the negative side of practice, limiting yourself. Because when you really have that experience of returning to zero, such a profound feeling of relief, some joy comes up that fills everything. You can just sit there, it's wonderful, it's like an oven, you know, cooking away. Some warmth. But the fruit of... that's the enjoyment of your practice. And the enjoyment comes from being able to return to zero.

[15:47]

You watch things arise on your screen slowly. Once you can actually watch them arise so slowly on your screen, you can also just stop them, if you want. But the fruit of our practice is some giving up of that enjoyment, some participation, not minding anything. So the maybe two main wholesome states, we say, or things to be encouraged are first is giving, dana. You can't hear in the back? Oh, the airplane, sorry.

[17:04]

He doesn't know what effect he's having on us. Anyway, first is giving, and even giving is rather close to negation because you're giving away, but you're also giving to. And this is, of course, related to the second precept, do not take what is not given. what is the true value of things, can you actually possess things. So the first practice is to give quite freely, because it's a way to realize the interdependency, the actual realm in which everything exists.

[18:32]

And our practice, you know, actually is too attainment-oriented. We create some pretty secure community for ourselves and we try to make it possible to practice here rather undisturbed. And we often have the idea of we want to go to. We want to practice here or go to Tassajara. Actually giving as little as possible. I hope I can find some way to go to Tassajara without working at this job so much longer. Anyway, we all have that kind of feeling. But before you can receive, before a monk can beg, he should give. Giving comes first and receiving second. So many students also want to go begging, but first they should go giving. And actually, when you go to a store and buy something or have a cup of coffee, you should pay for it with the...

[20:03]

spirit of giving. Oh, I'm giving you this money I have for this cup of coffee, and I'm giving my presence. Not my presence, but whatever I am, I'm here, and you're here. If you can have that kind of feeling in all your activity, Just making yourself available, your money available, and your person available, in every situation, moment after moment, that's practicing dana. So, actually, Buddhist culture and tradition and history and this present society make it possible, give you the opportunity to practice zazen, give you the opportunity to go to Tassajara or come to Green Gulch or live in the building in the city nearby.

[21:28]

But maybe the way our practice is, you have to give to many people first, and they will then give, and that way they'll give you enough money or some opportunity, some support – you can think of it as encouragement – to then take some retreat from ordinary activity. Or you contribute in the same way in maybe working with everybody in Zen Center. It's the same as working outside. So everybody here makes it possible for you to go to Tassajara or live in the building or live here. Anyway, that kind of giving is the first wholesome state we encourage. And the second one, which is quite similar, meta, is to treat everything and every person the same as you treat yourself, to consider another person possessing something the same as you're possessing it.

[23:03]

very close to giving. I mean, an aspect of this kind of practice is, again, it has a giving-up quality. Tsukiyoshi talked about his great joy of practice when he went shopping, because before his wife came he had to go shopping, and he would pick the rotten bananas and the oldest cabbages. He had some great joy in using those things. which would be wasted otherwise, and letting other people, taking some joy in, well, someone will enjoy this good cabbage that I'm not buying. Someone else will have this good cabbage. It doesn't mean asceticism, it just means taking joy in all of us together, giving up your idea of privilege or opportunity, or something special. Giving is more...

[24:40]

maybe mechanical idea, and meta has more feeling of love, or that realm I spoke about yesterday, We can say the real present, not the present you see, which is already past, but the present which is fluid, flowing, unconditioned. In that realm you can't possess anything. As you know, the four truths, the main basis of Buddhism,

[26:18]

The first is that everything's suffering, everything's changing, impermanent. And that also means that everything is rather... that you perceive things in some crude form, some complex form, some gross form, or that you have ignorance Ignorance means unknowing, but it means some stupid view of things, you know, that you only see a little bit, and you see it too simple. You see objects, you know, but you don't see the relationships. You're ignorant or stupid about relationships. So we practice zazen in the beginning, almost having nothing to do with Buddhism, it just is a contrast.

[27:48]

to that crude, unsubtle state of mind, which we can call suffering. Anyway, that's one part of our practice, of course. The second truth is that this suffering had a cause. At this level, suffering has a cause. By the time things are... you see them as past, not the real present I meant, the past, what we normally call the present, in that realm there's cause and effect. And suffering is in that realm, and there's some cause.

[29:01]

And cause is giving, basically it means rebirth, it means giving reality to this present that is past already and being involved in it, trying to arrange it or adjust it for our benefit, making platforms or clinging something in it. And the third is that if there's a cause, then there's an end. Suffering can end. So we have faith in this teaching which ends suffering in Dharma, in Buddha Dharma and Sangha.

[30:06]

So the path actually is the second and third, the recognition of causality and the end of causality or suffering. So the fourth is the path, how we can end suffering for get out of being caught by this present for ourselves and everyone. Anyway, Buddha's teaching is like this. Something, nothing special, any of us can possess it. Actually, it's just a description of the way things are. But then, what to do about it?

[32:08]

requires some decision to recognize this as the truth, to have faith in this as the truth. And if you can make that decision, you can practice. And if you can make that decision moment after moment, you can start from zero each moment. feeling enormous relief. I like that statement from the Lankavatara Sutra.

[33:11]

I mentioned yesterday, because you can take the whole of this Buddhist teaching and describe it in such a statement as the consciousness arises in every organ, even in the molecules and the pores of the skin by degrees and suddenly. And the sense field apprehends objects like a mirror or like the ocean stirred by the wind. And the mind notion is stirred constantly by the wind of appearance and deeds and cause, which condition each other endlessly. If so, you know, if we start out just seeing that everything changes,

[34:40]

and the need to stop being caught by our movie, returning to a blank screen, how to participate in this with this wind that stirs the mind ocean constantly. Zen especially says no religious act or ritual will free you, no magic or belief will free you, but actually a practice

[35:50]

real participation in this realm will free you. And the easiest way is through zazen, realizing that everything you do is linked up. And when you do one thing, you fiddle with all the links, and you're linked together when you live that way, like a puppet, you know. rather stiffly, and I think someone else pulls the strings. So first you have to stop yourself enough to see the links, and then you can break the links. So you take some care with your activity, knowing how it conditions everything you do, and you create some opportunity when you can make a very pure effort to realize this state in which the mind ocean is constantly stirred by the wind.

[37:24]

And you know that if you make that effort, it links up to everything. So if you know that, with real confidence, you can make a real effort in your zazen. If you don't have that confidence, well, this zazen is some relief from what I was doing, but it doesn't have any connection with anything. In that way, you can't practice with real strength. But if you don't have that feeling and you know this moment is every moment. And when you see how often you get caught by things in your activity, which then condition everything, It's such a rare opportunity to have a time like zazen, and you won't have it very long. As you get older, it'll be less and less possible and easy to do zazen. And your life will take some more and more fixed course very rapidly, and your opportunity to have time to have pure practice will be very slight. So each time you

[38:54]

have an opportunity to sit in this zendo, or any zendo, or in your own room, someplace where you've put aside for zazen. There you can give up to the empty screen. Completely just give up to it and practice the Eightfold Path. Right concentration. right effort. Knowing how subtle you are. But first the decision seems like some, you know, big effort, you know, to live with decision. But that's because you don't know the screen yet. Once you know the screen, it's just like the waterfall Suzuki Roshi described in Yosemite. Each drop comes down from one stream and then separates.

[40:25]

And if you look at each drop, it falls so independent and slowly and comes together. But our existence, if you know the one stream, participate in the one stream, then from then on your individual existence is just falling through space. in the realm of metta. But you don't make, even though you're separate, you remember the stream, you know actually you're not separate. The thousand arms of Avalokiteshvara, who I think belongs in this valley sometimes,

[41:30]

doesn't practice a way of attainment but giving. Anyway, please in your zazen take each opportunity, each opportunity, each breath opportunity. To know your big empty screen. To know everything is a big empty screen. Forgetting everything. So as an infant, like that, it's like being in your mother's womb. You don't know anything, and everything that happens then is some surprise.

[42:42]

You can have surprise deep down in you. Without it, there's no enlightenment. There's only controlled existence, afraid of some unusual experience. I don't know what that is, I don't want it. How careful we must be with everything, giving up to everything. Do you have anything we might talk about?

[44:18]

Yeah, you're finished for eternity. I'm sorry. No, of course not. That's an interesting idea though, washed up for eternity. You could hear what she said? No.

[45:42]

Well, when I talk about things, there's some... When you talk about Buddhism, if I say the conditions for practice or to practice it's necessary to do such and such, you can interpret it to mean, well, I don't know, I don't have those conditions so I can't practice, something like that. I'm not really practicing. I think you all have to accept that you are actually practising and then try to understand from there. Well, what she said was, if you've broken the precepts or don't have the conditions, you know, I've mentioned for practice, are you – to exaggerate what she said – are you condemned, you know, forever? Can you not practice?

[47:35]

Of course, that's not true. And some of Buddhism says, if you've committed some pretty bad thing, bad, I don't know, let's say, killing somebody is pretty bad. Say you've killed somebody through carelessness, in a car accident or through anger. Then your practice is, this way of looking at Buddhism, says, will be much slower and your practice is more difficult. But another school says, true practice maybe is for those people who've been the worst. because you have some wisdom then, and you have some determination, real determination. It takes some supreme determination to actually practice Buddhism fully, and so if you've been a total mess, you have more opportunity.

[48:58]

In the beginning of Zen Center we attracted messes and in some cases the fact of having a previous life which was a mess helped, but now we have a more opportunity to practice and you don't have to be such a mess to practice Buddhism because it's not necessary. We have some It's only necessary, really. The key point is decision. No matter how much your life is in some confusion, if you can keep making a decision to practice, that decision is the difference. And sometimes we say one instant of zazen, one instant of Buddha. And I admit that doesn't make so much sense, particularly when you're first practicing, because you don't find your instant of zazen much. But later you see what profound causes had to go together to make even one instant of zazen possible.

[50:34]

and that the process of letting go of all the projectors has already started, and when they're gone, that's Buddha. So the important thing is We don't... anyway, the idea of some time and space in which you can be condemned doesn't exist, you know, in Buddhism, at least not in the way Zen practices. Right now, the meaning of sudden enlightenment is right now everything can be wiped away. The images on your screen, your defilement is not real. Whether it's good images or bad images is not important. But if you continue, you know, letting your life be confused,

[52:17]

you'll continue letting your life be confused, and actually it's not very important, because if you create karma, karma is very swift and retaliates instantly, almost. Maybe it waits a day or two sometimes, but usually you don't notice how quickly karma retaliates, because you're not alert enough, you know, to notice. You know? You can say, oh, because my life is like this I had to break this precept. But because you break this precept your life is like that, you know, actually. So, from one point of view, karma takes care of karma. But if you want to get free from karma, not just practice in the realm of getting free from karma, but to be free from karma, that's the real path of Buddhism. And that path, actually, you need some decision.

[53:57]

Yes, Margaret? I feel some confusion about living with the decision that when Living, decision seems to be, sometimes seems to be close to being caught. Living, you know, I want to do this, this is what I'm doing. I feel that more and more in my life. So that in some way I feel, I feel more and more that everything I do

[55:20]

this practice, so that it's hard to make some effort to practice in some sense of the day. It just sort of feels like, oh, I'm doing this, and I want to do it. But also, that feels right to me, but I'm not quite sure that I'm going to do this practice. There's a lot of personality. Seems like to do things, to act, to really be, you also have to be involved with me, personality. And somehow being me It makes it possible to act selflessly, to say, I feel this, and I think this, and then I do something else, instead of not making a decision. You need a decision. So I don't know what pure activity

[56:53]

Could you hear in the back? It's quite long, what she said. So I can't, I don't know, maybe I'll partly repeat what she said and partly I'll respond and the combination maybe will be completely different. She said that in her life, you know, because everything she does seems like practice, she doesn't feel the need for any specific practice, and maybe she partly implied that Can you be completely confident that that isn't a way of fooling yourself? That, oh yes, really I'm just doing what I want and I call it practice and it's a substitute for some specific practice. And she does things.

[58:17]

I think she's speaking, you know, for all of us, not describing her own activity just, but how we feel about our activity. That she's doing this thing, I want to do it or I should do it, and she does it with some decision. So what does some purity of practice mean, decision? I can't disagree with that.

[59:19]

I mean, it's rather what I just, if I describe what she said accurately, can be true practice and it can be a way of fooling ourselves, depending on the person. But decision, you know, even a decision to do something you're doing, that's a mistake completely, I mean, is what we mean by decision. Decision, I mean, is some idea of time and space or some experience of our situation which doesn't have qualification. So what you're doing now you do, without distraction.

[60:40]

Then you take, in addition, you take responsibility for it. If it's some cold way of doing things, it's maybe not quite right. If it's some warm, as Suzuki Roshi would say, warm, kind-hearted way, it's maybe more accurately practiced. But when you practice this way, which is a pretty good way of practicing, we start practicing seeing some contrast between ordinary state of mind and zazen, and we clear some path, and life is maybe easier for us, practically speaking. And you start, whatever you do, instead of refraining from, you try some. So why then again set out some path clearing or zazen? After you've practiced some years, it's not so difficult. But then you can get caught very easily and subtly. Maybe for one year or two years, you can practice this way, even without doing zazen. But then you find something sticky has happened.

[62:10]

and you may find it useful to do zazen again. But it also sometimes is based on a limited idea of making things work smoothly and there isn't much difficulty, and it has some narrow vision of the real possibility of practice. The wider your vision of practice is, the more you can find the opportunity to do zazen. But something else happens, which is, although we can do without practice in the specific sense, just moving with everything, Usually, if you practice, you find the most complete expression of us is not in activity but is in zazen. Like a painter might find, his most complete expression of himself is a particular painting, a particular time of painting. We find, practicing zen, that the most complete realization of ourselves is

[63:32]

Zazen practice, and it helps us and helps other people. But it's only an expedient device, you know, so it's not necessary. Anyway, all of you will practice the way she's described – now, some, and at other times more. Very interesting to see what happens. It's very definitely part of our practice, to practice in this way.

[64:28]

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