I often contemplate an image which I first heard in ancient Zen texts. And the image is of the Buddhas sitting in the midst of fierce flames. Turning the Wheel of Dharma Another image is Buddha's sitting at the center of the infinite ocean of suffering beings.

[01:10]

And I often also extend that metaphor to apply to, well, of course, Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva sits at the center of an ocean of beings and observes them with eyes of compassion. I wouldn't be surprised if that didn't surprise you, that you might not be surprised to hear that this great bodhisattva sits at the center of all suffering beings and observes them with eyes of compassion and listens to them with ears of compassion.

[02:27]

But then, extending the metaphor further, some people might be surprised when I have suggested that each of us is also sitting at the center of all suffering beings. The center where each of us sit is different from the center where others sit. The center you're at, the center you're at, the center you're at, is a different center. But you're at the center. The difference is that you're at the center of your universe, but you're not at the center of mine. You're around me, and I'm around you.

[03:45]

So each is a unique center, and everybody is a unique center. And that's where we practice the way of Buddha. I suggest to you. And I remember that myself. This morning, during morning service, as often occurs to me when we're chanting the Heart Sutra, it often occurs to me, oh, as far as I know, this is the only scripture, the only sutra of perfect wisdom where the person who's teaching is Avalokiteshvara.

[04:58]

And some scholars who search more than I have, as far as I know, they have not found any other ones. Do you understand that? There's one Prajnaparamita Sutra where Avalokiteshvara is the teacher, speaking the teaching. This is the Heart Sutra. Great compassion is taught by the bodhisattva, great wisdom is taught by the bodhisattva of great compassion in the Heart Sutra. The Buddha is there and Avalokiteshvara is speaking for the Buddha at the center. Great compassion. teaches great wisdom. In other sutras, Subhuti, the great Subhuti, teaches, or Shaliputra, or the Buddha, correctly.

[06:11]

But this one, this sutra we chant, is taught by the Bodhisattva of great compassion. So this morning it seemed quite appropriate that Mary Carol changed the dedication and said, we have now chanted the heart of great compassion. Did you notice she said that? Thank you. Thank you for making that point. This sutra is the heart of great compassion and wisdom. Does that make sense? Someone recently said... I'm not sure what they said, but something like... Like you say, I'm sitting in the center of all my personal suffering.

[07:41]

You're also sitting at the center of your personal suffering. We've all got our personal suffering. But you're not just sitting at the center of personal suffering. You're sitting in the center of everybody's suffering. Anyway, this person said, I'm sitting at the center of personal suffering and it's like a cocoon. And I thought, oh yeah. Yeah. a cocoon. That's where the larvae, or little larvies, or larvae I guess, or little larvae, or big larvae, different sized larvae, different sized larvies and levi's. sitting in the cocoon. And in the cocoon, the larvae and the larvae, they melt.

[08:44]

They, yeah, they melt. They not exactly disintegrate, but they melt. And then they, and then they reconstitute. So it's another nice metaphor for our practice that if we take our seat and sit there properly, we will melt and be reconstituted. A larvae usually don't have axial skeletons. Any biologists know? Do they have axial skeletons? I don't think so. They're often very soft, like maggots. But then they, after the transformation, they often come out with axial skeletons and wings.

[09:48]

Right? Do ants go through it? Have metamorphosis? The queen ant comes out of metamorphosis, right? The queen ant was once a larvae. And by being cared for in a certain way, you get a queen ant and you care for the larvae. So they have these larvae nurseries, right? In the colony. And then they take care of the different larvae in different ways. Take care of the larvae, feed the larvae this kind of stuff, they come out as worker. Feed them other stuff, they come out as guardians. Feed them other stuff, they come out as queens. That's what I've heard, but I'm not a really highly educated zoologist.

[10:50]

Anyway, we are being reconstituted here in the cocoon. And we can do some good work in the cocoon. And also we have some temple cleaning to do in the cocoon. You don't have to be totally metamorphosed before you start practicing. The practicing melts and reconstitutes. And the melting is sometimes accompanied by various emotions, like, yikes, what's going on here?

[11:55]

Or, I'm afraid what's going to happen to me? Or us, or whatever. A lot's going on. Lots of full range of stuff is in the process. Yeah, so you could imagine this going different ways. One way to imagine it is that the bodhisattvas stay in the cocoon until they emerge as Buddhas. But you could also imagine, well, they stay in the cocoon long enough to be great bodhisattvas, and then they emerge.

[13:02]

Right now I kind of feel a little more close to they stay in the cocoon and do their work in the dark until they emerge as Buddha. And sometimes they have a hard time. Earlier in 2021, I often laugh, and you don't know why I just laughed, right?

[14:30]

Does anybody know why I just laughed? I often laugh before I tell you what I'm laughing about. In fact, I don't actually have time necessarily to tell you all the stuff I'm laughing about. But in this case, I'm going to tell you what I laughed about. And when I examine my state, my cocoon, where the laughter emerged, I often find that what I'm laughing at is something ironic. I'm gradually developing a sense of humor about irony, which I feel good about. And so the irony is that I just had this thought, and I said, 2021, in the summer of 2021. Did you hear me say that? And then I had the thought, 2022. And I had the thought, that's a nice number. And then I thought, I thought 2020 was a nice number.

[15:35]

I thought, this is a nice number for a year. And then after a while, 2020 turned into not a bad number, but a really, really hard year. It was like cocoon hell for a lot of us. Anyway, 2022 is another nice number, but wait a minute. Wait a minute. So anyway, we'll see. But in the summer of 2021, in the midst of all that, we still could study the Dharma. And we studied, we had a class, an online class. And some of the people in this room attended the online class. And the topic of the class was, no surprise, compassion. And we studied an ancient Indian text, an Indian text written probably in the fourth century by the great Asanga.

[16:56]

Actually, he was maybe the amanuensis for Maitreya Buddha. You know, he wrote it. And it's called... Adornment of the Mahayana Sutras. And it's a pretty big book. Not huge, but anyway, pretty big. And in chapter 17, there's this marvelous section on compassion. So we studied that section, which is about 34 verses. It wasn't even the whole chapter. The chapter has 64 verses and we started on verse 29. And when we were studying it, one of the people in class was particularly interested in... Can you guess which verse?

[18:02]

Verse 32. She has some questions about verse 32 of this wonderful teaching by the great Bodhisattva Sangha. In the Chinese Buddhist canon, where they have this scripture, they say for the author, the bodhisattva, asanga. A lot of people oftentimes say asanga and vasubandhu. They were brothers, supposedly. But in the canon it says bodhisattva, asanga, and bodhisattva, Vasubandhu. So, number 32 is something like a verse, a verse on not dwelling in either samsara or nirvana.

[19:13]

So, as I said earlier, compassion is the main cause of Buddhahood. And Buddhahood bears on the protection of all living beings who are suffering in the prison of samsara, the prison of birth and death. Remember that? I said that yesterday. I said it again today, and then maybe tomorrow I'll say it again. And then maybe on Sunday you'll have memorized it. Have you memorized it? Why don't you go ahead. Let's recite it. Compassion is the main cause of death, which bears on the protection of all living beings who are in the prison of birth and death, or suffering in the prison of birth and death.

[20:27]

Yeah. So this verse is called a verse on not dwelling in samsara or nirvana. Bodhisattvas don't dwell in samsara, but they live there. It's not the same as like in Monopoly where you go to jail and you're just a visitor. They're working in jail. They're prison workers. And they're prisoners. They're in the prison, but they don't abide there. Because they're working to protect beings in prison. When you're working to protect beings in prison, you don't dwell there. You're too busy protecting beings to dwell. Now, if you take a break from protecting beings, you may notice that you're in prison and start dwelling there.

[21:36]

And that's not good. No, no, no. But they also... If you don't dwell in samsara, then you can work in nirvana. In other words, you can be happy in prison. with these suffering beings because you're protecting them and serving them. So you can be happy there in all this suffering. And this happiness is called peace. It's called nirvana. But they don't dwell in nirvana either because they're working in samsara. Is that like real clear? Maybe you don't believe it, but is it clear? But this is the proposal. This verse is about these bodhisattvas, these compassionate beings like Avalokiteshvara, who don't dwell in the prison of suffering, and they don't dwell in freedom from suffering.

[22:41]

But they are free of suffering, and they are in the prison. They're liberated beings in prison, teaching other beings, helping other beings in prison. And just a brief comment before I read the verse. So the Bodhisattva is in prison, or you could say we're in prison, and we have, you know, we have mates there, and we also have supervisors and, you know, guards, wardens, etc. I guess there's also like cooks who work in prison, stuff like that. They aren't really guards, but they make the food for us, and probably janitors who clean.

[23:42]

I don't know, there's a lot of people in prison with us. And we have the opportunity to see that everybody in the prison is a precious human being, and we have the opportunity to cherish all the other beings in prison with us. Now, if Bodhisattva sort of came, appeared in the prison, of course we have the opportunity to really cherish the Bodhisattva too. Anyway, that's another picture of our life as Bodhisattvas. So we're in prison, and there's a lot of different people there with us. And some of them give us a really hard time. And some of them are really kind to us. And they're all opportunities to practice compassion and we need to really value their living radiance in order to do the work properly.

[24:52]

So here's the verse on not dwelling, or it also says, not being located. So I'm in prison, but I'm not located there. I'm in Nirvana, but I'm not located there. The verse says, the compassionate genius understands that everything included in brackets, the prison of the life cycle of samsara, is naturally both suffering and selfless. So bodhisattvas, of course, are practicing compassion, but they also are practicing wisdom. And they come to understand that everything in samsara, everything in this prison that we live in here, everything in this prison of the caste system of this country is a prison and we live there and everything in this terrible caste system is suffering and selfless.

[26:23]

We need to understand those two things apparently. So the bodhisattva, the compassionate one, who understands that everything is both selfless and suffering, they neither become disgusted nor damaged by any faults of the prison system. It says, the translation is disgusted. And disgust, you know, means disgust. It means like to spit out. Disgustatory.

[27:24]

They don't spit out the suffering. And also they're not tormented by it. When we understand that suffering is selfless, it doesn't hurt us, so we can work with it. If we think it has a self, an independent existence, this suffering, that suffering, this suffering, that... If we think they have an independent existence, it hurts us. And if it hurts us, then we just want to faint, or just get out of prison and leave those other people there. I don't care. I've got to get out of here. But you said you would stay here and work with us. I've got to get out of here. This is hurting me too much. The Bodhisattvas understand that all this suffering and all the suffering beings have no substantial existence.

[28:29]

You can't get a hold of them. You can't locate yourself in them. You can't get away from them. You can't get under them. You can't get over them. They're unavoidable. They understand that. So they're with the suffering, intimately with the suffering. It doesn't harm them because of their understanding. But also, because of their compassion, they're not disgusted. But another translation would be, even though They know these beings are insubstantial. They don't get bored or disinterested. They're still interested in beings who you can't get a hold of. They're interested in insubstantial beings. They're devoted to them, even though they don't know who they are. I don't know who you are, but I'm devoted to you.

[29:32]

I'm your girl. I'm your guy. I'm for you. And I don't know who you are. But I'm not going to abandon you. So it says, not disgusted. No. Yeah. So I understand emptiness and I'm not disgusted or disinterested in beings. This is something which one can think about a lot. I remember when Edward Konza was alive, the great translator, he said, this is the Mahayana miracle. is that bodhisattvas understand, our bodhisattvas are devoted to liberate all beings, and yet there's no beings that they can find to liberate. And the miracle is, they just keep trying to liberate beings even though they can't find any. It's a miracle that they keep working without getting anything out of it.

[30:36]

They're working for beings and they can't grasp any beings. But somehow they don't get, like, feeling like, well, what's the point? Why put all this effort into seeing beings who don't really exist in a substantial form? But they do. We sort of, like, have to work that one out. Now, most of us haven't got there yet. We still think beings do exist. The problem with that is burnout. So this is verse 32, to be devoted to beings who you can't grasp and to not be hurt by the hard work. And the hardness of the work is also self. That can't hurt you either. But if the hardness becomes substantial, then it can wipe you out and you can retire, or not even retire, just quit.

[31:50]

So there's this baseball player in San Francisco. who's from Georgia. His name's Buster Posey. And he just announced his retirement. Basically, yeah. He said, well, it's still sometimes a joy when we have a great game, but mostly it's just too painful for me now. All these, I have to put so much work in. So he's he's retiring. And I'm not criticizing him, but he's kind of burned out on baseball. He had so many big injuries. He's just in so much pain. He's a catcher. He walks catchers. It's a very painful job to be squatting there. How they squat. Anyway,

[32:56]

Bodhisattvas, because of their understanding, they can keep catching. They can be catchers in the rye. Forever. Because of their understanding. We need that understanding. So we chant the Heart Sutra. Even without you reminding me, I remembered that I have some examples of housecleaning to do in the cocoon. I have a number of examples. One is... You're in the cocoon. You're in the dark. I mean, you may not know you are, but you actually are in the dark. you may be thinking, oh, they have really nice lighting in here.

[33:59]

But you don't know where you are because you're in the process of dissolving. But you're there and somehow you can remember your vows still. Because you're doing your vows so much, you can remember them even when you dissolve. That's a proposal. The bodhisattvas are changing and yet because of their vow practice, they keep remembering their vow. Like, what am I here for again? Oh yeah, right. What's my vow? Oh yeah. Maybe it doesn't come that fast all the time. Like when you're in the middle of being disrespectful to someone, you might not remember to say, what's the point again? But they might ask you, what's the point again? Oh yeah, right, sorry, I remember now. So, one of the house temple cleaning opportunities is the thought that arises in some people who are in the cocoon, which is worrying about the future.

[35:14]

And we have a future here, right? We have a future of the planet, of the human species, of the species of many other plants and animals that we see are disappearing. And so in the face of that, a being arises and comes to meet us, and that being is called worrying about the future. Worrying about the future of our loved ones, of future generations. Worry comes. So the housecleaning is to clear away the forgetfulness that this worry is what you're here for. You're not here to get rid of the worry. You're here.

[36:18]

The worry is your job in the cocoon. It's to take care of it. Not to say, there's nothing to worry about. But to be kind to your worrying about the future. And then again, here comes another one. What about the future? The housecleaning is that you don't get distracted from compassion by what arises in the cocoon. whatever arises there. The house cleaning is, oh yeah, that's my job. Or even, let's get out of the cocoon. That's another thing to be compassionate to. I can't stand this any longer. Another thing to be compassionate to. Being compassionate to all these things which temporarily, for the moment, you don't understand that they're beings calling for your compassion. Another one is, you know, what's next?

[37:23]

Another one is, is this enough? The housecleaning is, don't get distracted by them, from your practice. Practice with them. So in that sense I'm suggesting that there's no distractions. All distractions are calls for compassion. And you could say, well, if I don't remember that, then they're distractions. Say, okay, if you missed the chance, then you have temporarily missed the chance. So you are distracted. But really, they in themselves are not distractions. Your response to them is to be fooled and miss the chance. And so we need to be... It's very similar to not miss the preciousness of any being.

[38:28]

Worrying is a precious being that's calling for compassion. And I wish this worry to be happy. I wish this worry to be at ease and to be buoyant and relaxed. I have loving kindness for this worry. But if you don't practice, remember that this is a precious worry. You might try to get rid of it by doing something. And if you do, well, then that's the next precious thing that you're trying to eliminate the worry by, if I did that, then there wouldn't be any worry. That's fine. Let's take care of that one then. Everything is asking for your compassion. So housecleaning is to clean away... In a sense, to clean away falling for beings as anything other than something precious.

[39:36]

So I have more examples of housecleaning, but I'll wait for later to bring them up. I think, yeah, I think, what time is it? Well, anyway, that's, obviously that was plenty, right? in my perspective I barely said anything but I know that that's an illusion which I'm compassionate towards is there anything you'd like to bring up bring forth offer yes sir One second, please. Could I ask you a little bit about how your family is doing?

[41:03]

Ask me about how my family is doing? Yeah, my mother-in-law died at 103 during the intensive. She died the day before Mel Weitzman, Hershey. She died the day of the Capitol riot. And I think my family was pretty much at peace with that. And we had a very lovely ceremony for her about maybe after the intensive was over. And then we just, a few days ago, interred her ashes along with her with the ashes of my wife's father, both of them, put in the ground just a few days ago.

[42:12]

And then one might think, what's next? But we can work with that for the time being. Duties to parents are completed and there's peace in the West. Thank you for your question. My wife was such a devoted daughter. Amazing. That's what I mean by, what next? Where's her devotion going to go next? Yes, Zach? I just wanted to thank you for pointing out that the heart sutra is taught by Apolkita that was very helpful on construction and reminder about maybe the purpose of intent in construction.

[43:29]

Yeah, thank you. Yeah, the scripture doesn't say. And then Abelokiteshvara, for the welfare of the world, said... All five skandhas are empty doesn't sound very compassionate necessarily. They might say, well, that's compassionate. But the teaching is to help people be free. The teaching all five skandhas are empty is to help us not dwell in suffering or freedom from suffering. So, you know, it's like the word compassion, I don't see that much. I don't see it at all. in the Heart Sutra, except in the name of the teacher. And if you look in the marvelous Mahayana Perfect Wisdom scriptures, so many... The word compassion is not... I don't see it that often. It's wonderful, but it's being delivered from compassion.

[44:36]

So it's understood, but we need to remember that. Thank you. And then you can ask, what's compassionate about this teacher? Yes, Jill. I had this... it seemed to me that... confusing, but I mean, it's true it's confusing, but I mean, it's the right kind of compassion. I wanted to say that there have been so many instances, I'm sort of going to lose it here, of you, and there's lots of other instances, but one is that I noticed that you take care of me, and in the sense of waiting on late to get the door down here for you to offer me assistance.

[45:40]

but many others. I just happened to be with some people from San Francisco recently. And the care that they're employing to build this retirement facility, including a celebration to break ground, but being supportive. Well, anyway, I'll piece this up in a bit. Caring about things, in that sense, in practical terms, is compassion. It's not a thought. It is not a conditioning for me to let myself be related all the time. I'm just, okay, it should work. You know, I think, oh, I could do a few more things. So I don't think, is that true? I mean, is care and taking care of things like doing what you're supposed to do a passion?

[46:45]

As well as things that I already know is a passion. Like, you know, helping somebody who's obviously suffering I think you could say it is, and you could also say that people who are compassionate care about everything. That there's nothing they don't care about, because there's nothing which isn't deserving of care, and there's nothing which isn't deserving of respect. I should say when their compassionate practice is mature, they manage to be kind and careful with everything they do, every step, every word. So I think that compassion and wisdom make that possible.

[47:50]

Some people do care, But they care in a way that's not based on compassion, that's based on, for example, greed, or even hatred. They do things based on hatred. They care that this army beats that army, and not the reverse, rather than care that everybody in battle would be safe and free of suffering. So I think compassion makes it possible, as it matures, to care for everything. And maybe in the way that's beneficial, rather than caring too much or too little. But some care isn't really in accord with compassion.

[48:53]

Like, if you're kind to Zach, and I cared about it in a way that I cared because I didn't want you to be kind to him, that kind of care, that's not compassion. But if you're kind to him, and I feel like, yeah, thanks for doing that for me, And I want you to be kind to everybody the way you're kind to him. That's more in accord with mature compassion. Thanks for being kind to each other, supporting each other. And some people prefer the word kind or kindness. They think they like, they feel better about that than compassion. I'm okay with that.

[49:57]

The thing about compassion is that it notices, it acknowledges suffering. So loving kindness is part of our practice, wishing people to be happy. It's very important, but bodhisattva is a little bit more concentrated on helping suffering beings, not just having people be happy, but having them be free. Because you can be happy even though you're not free. So the Bodhisattva wants people to be happy, yes, really happy, yes, They do not disparage worldly happiness, no. They're happy for people to have worldly happiness. They want them to have compassion so that they can help other people. Because some people are happy but they're not able to embrace suffering.

[51:04]

The bodhisattva's happiness is suffering. because they love people. And that suffering doesn't come or go. But worldly happiness is wonderful, like when we were studying this text, I did something, what happened? I worked with somebody, oh, we had this little electric tea kettle that heats water, right? and it stopped functioning. Pressing the button, the click, it didn't go on. And so that was that. But I thought, maybe I'll try to fix it sometime. And in the meantime, before I fixed it, or got to start trying to fix it, my dear wife wanted to have a

[52:14]

So I said, I have one over at Noah Bowden Hermitage. I'll bring it over. So I brought it over. And it works very nice to heat water, but the problem is when you tilted it over, the top fell off. So she tolerated that for a while. She said, can I get a new pot? And I said, okay. She got a beautiful new pot. And she said, can I throw out the old one now? I said, I'll take the one I brought back over to the temple, and also I still would like to try to fix this thing. So the day came, while we were studying this text, while we were studying bodhisattva happiness and worldly happiness, and I started trying to fix it. And the first thing I tried to do was to take it apart. But the screws in it The shape of the screws was not a straight screw. What do you call those?

[53:18]

Standard? It wasn't just a slit, and it wasn't a Phillips screw. It was a triangular screw. It also wasn't a, what is the other one called? Allen wrench. It wasn't an Allen wrench screw. We tried Allen wrenches, but they didn't work. And then we found this kind of like a screw that has kind of like a round, soft head, and somehow managed to get it open. And that was really, that was quite a feat to get it apart. So I got it apart and looked inside and I couldn't see any problems, but I kind of cleaned it up a little bit. There was... there was and somehow dirt and some kind of crud got in there. I just cleaned it up and I didn't really see any difference and put it back together and clicked it and it worked. worldly happiness.

[54:18]

It was delightful to fix this thing. You know, good old primate hand-eye coordination. And it's nice stuff, you know. You make the teapot, you break it, you fix it. It's fun. It's a worldly happiness. I really felt worldly happiness. And I said, this is worldly happiness. And then if it stops working again, that goes away. Or even before it stops working, it fades. But the happiness of suffering because you love people, it never goes away. And it makes it possible, like we said before, to not run away from suffering. It makes it possible for you to care about the most obnoxious situation, the most obnoxious people, the most painful situation.

[55:26]

You can go in there if you love people, but you need to feel happy in the middle. You need to be happy so you dare to go into the prison. If you're not happy, you're going to run away. But there is this bodhisattva happiness which is the greatest happiness, which doesn't come or go and enables you to go into a situation where there's no worldly happiness, where there's just worldly suffering. That's all there is. and you love those beings, and it hurts you that they're suffering, and you're hurting, but you're hurt because you love. And that joy sustains you in this very difficult work, which I know the Houston Zen Center has lots of suffering, but putting this place together, it's very difficult to arrive,

[56:29]

being able to take care of this wonderful place, which we don't know if it's a retreat center or a temple. But you suffered, this community suffered to take care of this place and the other place too. There's lots of difficulties that you went through. But I think you had some joy to sustain you in this hard work. And same in Sashin. We have a hard time in Sashin. Sometimes really hard, sometimes just a little bit hard. But there's always suffering. There's always suffering in its birth and death. It's omnipresent. And we need to be able to accept that, but we can't accept it if we don't have joy in the work of accepting it. And this joy is held up in this text, this text on compassion as the greatest happiness which sustains us in working with suffering beings.

[57:44]

and makes it possible for us to care about everything and also not too much or too little. Or it sustains us to keep working when we care too much and also to keep working when we care too little. Caring too much and too little is more suffering. But we... Yeah, okay, I care too much. You're right. I care too little. Yeah, you're right. And we need to invite others to call us into question. Hey, do you care too much about this? I think you're right. Do you care too little about that person? You know, I think you're right. Thank you. Did you think that wasn't important? Like I, I think, I wonder, I'm just going to do a little test here. Something came into my mind of an example.

[58:47]

And I wondered how many of you have heard this story? Probably you have. So one of my first work assignments when I went to Tassajara Zen Monastery, during the initiatory period called Tangadio, where we were sitting all the time for several days, after we got out from that sitting that difficult city, we got work assignments. And, you know, whatever work assignment we were given, we were happy to have it. Oh, work? Oh, okay. So, one of my first, not my first, my first work assignment was to drive a truck. And I got in the truck and the truck was next to the sendo and it was facing downhill. And I got in the truck and started it up and started driving and it didn't have any brakes. And it was heading towards the dorm. That was my first job.

[59:52]

But being a young person, I acted quickly and reached down and pulled the emergency brake and it stopped before it ran into the dormitory. It was a big truck. That was my first job. My next job after that, because I couldn't drive a truck, was... was to go and fill in a ditch, which occurred during the rainstorms, and the creek above the Zendo overflowed its boundary, and instead of running down the creek, it ran down the road. It dug a huge gully in our road, so the next job was to fill in the hole. And then a little bit later, in the next work period, my job was to repair the water line that got washed out because the water line was above ground and the roaring stream had broken the water line. So we went up. We and another man, and I remember his name.

[61:01]

Fifty-three years ago, his name was Jim McGuire. And we went up to repair that water line. And it was plastic, and we put it back together and then put these wires around it, wire clip, I guess it's like sheet metal clips that you can tighten to hold them together. So we clipped it together, and then we moved up to do the next one. And while we were working on the next one, I said to him, let's go back and fix the last one And he knew what I meant. We didn't care enough. We were thinking... Did you hear the story before? We were thinking, it's broken in several places, we've got to go to the next one now. But we didn't do the first one very well. Both of us knew that, but neither one of us said, let's do this properly. Kind of rushed.

[62:04]

It held together, but we kind of were haunted by the incomplete job in the previous one while we were working on the next one. So I said, let's go back and do it. And he didn't say, what do you mean? We did it. He said, okay. And we went back and we did it properly, which took more time. We cared too little in this case. We didn't care too much, we cared too little, and we noticed it, and we acknowledged it, and we went back and made amends. We fixed it. And then we went to the next one. So of course that took more time. It would have been better to do it thoroughly the first time, but we learned a lot from that. So we're going to make mistakes. We're going to care too little about some people and some suffering. Some of our jobs we're going to do incompletely and then we say, sorry, let's go back, okay.

[63:07]

And some places we're going to care too much. And that's also harmful. And we're going to learn by trial and error. This is what we're doing, right? Let's see, there was somebody else. Who was it? Was it Gail? No, nobody over there. Somebody over here. So there's Matt, Matthew. Which do you like? I like them both. OK. Matt and Dan. Matt. I had a very fruitful session in Zazen this morning, and I'd like to kind of share

[64:08]

If I may, some reflections about... Share the fruits? Share the fruits. Yeah, please. Especially as some kind of reflections of it happening as I've been listening to you talk. I've been sitting, I've been sitting as often as possible for what feels to me like a bunch of years now. And I always am reminded that I still don't really know what I'm doing, putting air quotes around that. I don't really I don't really understand what our practice is, what does it start to do. I don't think that I know why I do it, but I know that I do it with a lot of .

[65:19]

You know, as I was saying to you, I'm reflecting that something else that I don't really understand are other beings. You know, I have kind of, as you said in the previous talk, I have my ideas about them. I have ideas about all of the . I have ideas about . But I'm convinced that my ideas are compared to what all of you actually are. I do know that. I know that my ideas are what they're accurate . And so, yeah, I was reflecting on one way that our sitting practice can be a bodhisattva.

[66:33]

It is a bodhisattva practice, but one way that it can be a bodhisattva training is just this simple devotion to this kind of unknowable, that we want to take very loving care of, you know, moment by moment, take very, you know, appropriate care of this practice that we're engaging in, and how that sort of has definitely, for me, it has trained me to take the appropriate, not perfectly, but more often than not, So take the appropriate kind of care for beings that suddenly seem to . And that's all I wanted to say. I was just at a reflection about that. Thank you.

[67:33]

Thank you. You can be devoted to a practice which is inconceivable. You can be devoted to an inconceivable dharma practice. And one of the ways you can express your devotion to an inconceivable Dharma practice is by expressing your devotion to conceivable Dharma practice. So, for example, putting your body in a sitting position, you can practice with what you think that body is. You can be generous to that body. You can be careful of that body. You can learn to not care too much or too little for that body. You can be patient with that body. You can be diligent with that body.

[68:35]

You can practice compassion with your conceivable body. And you can make that practice for itself, and you can also make that practice as an offering to the reality of what the practice is, which is beyond human conception, in which you have told us you have some sense you don't really understand the inconceivable practice. Nobody can understand the inconceivable practice. Not even the Buddha. Buddha by herself does not understand the inconceivable Dharma. Only Buddha together with Buddha understands our practice. And it isn't that this Buddha understands it and this Buddha understands it.

[69:37]

It's the Buddha together that understands it. It's their conversation that understands. Our conversation understands the inconceivable Dharma. But our conversation is not me or you. It's our relationship. Our intimacy, which is also ungraspable, understands the ungraspable. In the meantime, you do your conceivable things in conversation with your friends. They're doing their conceivable thing, you're doing your conceivable thing, you're devoted to it, and then you're in conversation with each other about it. Like, let's do that again, shall we? Or, hey Matt, how's your practice going? They ask you a question about it, and you say yes. You have a conversation. But also you're sitting in silence next to Mary Carol.

[70:38]

You're in conversation with her. And that conversation understands the Dharma. Not you, not Mary Carol. So it's good to get used to, I don't understand the Dharma, but my relationship with you understands the Dharma. So I take care of myself, my conceivable self, and I also take care of our conversation. And our conversation, our intimacy, understands inconceivable Dharma, which we're devoted to. And we express our devotion by having conversation with each other, which we're doing right now. This is how we understand the Dharma. Dan. I was just glad to be here with this story. Difficult to use now. So I really appreciate that.

[71:42]

I think the only time I ever see kanji sai is, of course, the kanji, or is it the passion? Yeah, I think that's the only place that... So, yeah, it's kind of interesting. Yeah, so why is that? My understanding is, I think, the timely si sai is kind of like to be free or to be... Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, so... I think that's the usual understanding of that is that khanjitsa is to contemplate. You can either say it's the contemplation of the one who is free, it could be the contemplation of this being who is free, or it could also be contemplation of this freedom, of this Ishvara. So Ishvara is translated as self-existence. And Ishvara, I think, means also in Sanskrit, to be free.

[72:48]

Avalokiteshvara. Avalokita. Avi looking down from above. Lokita, world. Ishvara, the liberated one who contemplates the world. So that, I think that's what most normal scholarly analysis of this unusual name is. But I also, sort of as a, as a non-native speaker, to say the least, of Chinese, when I look at it, it looks like he's contemplating the way the self exists, which is not the usual understanding. But this wise contemplation of the way the self exists actually is freedom from self-clinging. contemplation of the way the self exists is that the self is empty of its own being. But that's not the usual understanding. The usual understanding is either the contemplation of freedom or the contemplation of the free one.

[73:52]

And it's only in the Heart Sutra that we see that. So Avalokiteshvara is only teaching the Heart Sutra, Perfect Wisdom, and also that name for Avalokiteshvara is only in the Heart Sutra. So it's a very unique scripture, which not just Zen people are devoted to. Thank you for that point. Had enough this morning, if it's still morning. I know it's not enough for this afternoon.

[74:32]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_86.84