I vow today is the truth of the Tathagata's words. Good morning. It's Raul for those of you who may not know me and my ordination name is Imo. Mel and Alan asked me to give the talk today because we're having a one-day sitting, and Mel is at a teacher's conference. Can you hear me? No. Now? Now, yeah? Raise the volume. Is it on? Okay. Is that better? Yes, okay.

[01:01]

So I was saying that Mel is at some kind of teacher's gathering or conference. So I thought I would talk today about refining our practice and use the Tenso Kyokun which is Dogen's text for the Tenso, Instructions to the Cook, to talk about that and so how we refine our practice and also refine our character because the Tenso is about sort of the character of the soup and the soup of character, sort of two sides of the same thing. What are the ingredients of food and what are the ingredients of the skandhas, our basic makeup, what we're made of.

[02:06]

So it's a little bit like, you know, when you give a talk like this, even though you've done it many times before, it always brings up a little bit of fear. And fear of speaking in public is one of the five fears. So we have to use this ingredient of fear to cook it and turn it into something to bring forth the bodhisattva spirit. So in the Tenzo Kyokun, or otherwise known as the Instructions for the Zen Cook, Dogen is writing about how the office of Tenzo is concerned with managing the meals for the monks in the monastery. But he also uses this practice of cooking as a way to talk about the manifestation of the Dharma

[03:18]

in everyday life and in ordinary activities. You know that ordinary mind is the way has been a staple of Zen practice, Zen monastic practice for a very, very long time. And it's also a manifestation of the Mahayana teaching and of the Bodhisattva ideal. And this teaching is particularly meaningful for us here at the Berkeley Zen Center because from its outset of foundation, Mel had the vision of, Sojin had the vision of establishing a kind of Zen practice place which would have the kind of monastic schedule but for people living an urban life in the city and with all the carrying out all their ordinary activities and responsibilities.

[04:23]

And so I think that was his vision as an aspect of the larger Zen Center. So in practice, we ground Zazen mind in ordinary activities so that the zazen or zazen mind or beginner's mind is not some kind of altered state or rare state radically different from the ordinary activities of our life. But also the other side of that is that then we make the ordinary activities of our life shine with the rarity of the urumbara flower. So those are the two sides of it, and they both have to be maintained at the same time. Also in many spiritual traditions, people have had lots of problems.

[05:35]

There have been many scandals and problems where people who were supposed to be this kind of exalted spiritual, sacred, holy person, figure, then at some point turns out to show a kind of dark character trait. And people wonder, well, how is that possible? So that also has to do with the question of character and the expression of Buddhadharma in ordinary character or ordinary activities and relationships. And then also, like, for example, Jack Kornfield wrote this book, you know, From the Ecstasy to the Laundry. I don't know if people are familiar with it, but it's also addressing this question, even though we don't talk too much about ecstasy in Zen, actually. We could, but we don't.

[06:39]

Yeah, Mel is pretty strict about that, you know. He doesn't allow himself to do that. And in that book, he talks about how some people went off to monasteries or went off to India or to do some sacred journey and encountered all these, you know, went through all these different very spiritual states and deep forms of samadhi and sublime states and various degrees of, you know, realization or revelations and so on. Excuse me, somebody said. We wondered, some of us wondered if you could be a little stronger. Okay, all right. It's the fear, right? So, okay, so that in that book he talks about how people went off to India or to, you know, find different kinds of paths and do different kinds of practices and did that for a long time and, you know, had all these spiritual experiences and various degrees of realization and revelations and visions and so on and so forth and then they came back

[08:05]

to the United States and they got married or they had a family or they got a job or something and then they encountered all these very difficult states of mind and went into grief and depression and confusion and this and that and so how can that be possible? So I think all of that deals with this question of the interface of the mundane and the supramundane. The whole teaching of Dogon and the instructions for the cook is here to look at the question of character from that point of view. So he says there that we have to use the practice of Tenso to bring forth the Bodhisattva spirit.

[09:08]

And the Bodhisattva spirit, for those of you who haven't, although it looks like everybody here knows what Bodhisattva spirit is, but it's the enlightened activity at the service of Buddhadharma. which includes doing things for both ourselves and for others at the same time. And so just like in Zazen or Zishin, we put all of our energy into the activity of Zazen, so we do the same thing in the kitchen. So we have to exhaust all our energies into pouring it into the cooking and making the soup and combining the ingredients and interacting with the people in the kitchen in a harmonious way. So zazen is the side of the stillness of activity and cooking represents the other side of the activity of stillness.

[10:12]

So stillness of activity, activity of stillness. So it's a kind of circle, right? So it's a teaching of how to integrate the mundane and the supramundane into one circle, which is also what the mudra represents and gassho represents, bringing these two sides together into one. So, this is different than the ordinary work of the tenso, is different than ordinary cooking, or a kitchen helper, or a chef, because in the activity of cooking, the subject and object are seen as one, they're not two. Whereas in ordinary cooking in a restaurant or in a home, usually, unless we practice in this way, self and other, the cook and the ingredients, the cook and the assistants, the cook and the kitchen are two rather than one.

[11:30]

And so Dogen says, you know, that we have to use all the the things that we have in the kitchen with a care as if we were dealing with our own eyes. You know, just how our eyes are so open and sensitive and anything can cause a pain or a disturbance. So in the same way, with that same kind of attitude that we have for ourselves, should we relate to all the things in the kitchen? And we also don't make distinctions between the good ingredients and the bad ingredients or food that is of high quality or food that is of low quality or people who are of high rank or people who are of low rank or who's senior and who's not so senior or who's been practicing here for so many years and who hasn't been or who's been practicing here for less years.

[12:35]

That's kind of discriminating mind. So we have to bring forth the bodhisattva spirit out of non-discriminating mind. So we don't care so much how long people have been practicing, even though that's also important on another dimension. But in the fundamental dimension, we don't make that distinction. So sometimes the tenso can be the senior student and the assistant be less senior. Sometimes the assistant will be the senior student and the tenso will be the the senior student. And the same goes for priests and lay people. In the commentary of refining our lives, his name of book, that Uchiyama Roshi put together, and we all know about it.

[13:40]

The actual text of Dogen is kind of short, about 15 pages, and then the rest is Uchiyama's commentary. And he, to talk about the difference between ordinary and ordinary, I mean, the ordinary mind is the way Yes, but at the same time, Dogen is making distinction between ordinary activities and ordinary activities within the context of practice. So he talks about, he complains about civil servants in Japan and how they treat the public as an object and they're just marking time and waiting for their paycheck and with their retirement assured, And he's kind of bitter about it, you know. And he contrasts this to the begging practice of a monk, you know, who goes around and begging for food and doesn't have any money.

[14:50]

And whatever, you know, he receives is based on the merits and virtues of his practice. So that seems to be that begging practice is a kind of ordinary activity within the context of practice, whereas being a civil servant is an example of ordinary activity not within the context of practice. So that kind of brought up an interesting cone for me, because I'm a civil servant also. I work for the Department of Public Health in San Francisco. So, it's a good question, you know, and the clients often complain, they go to the welfare office, you know, and the welfare workers are really, you know, angry and short-tempered, you know, and they treat them like dirt, and they're behind their desks, you know, kind of protected, you know.

[15:59]

And so that's kind of an example of that kind of civil servant, right? Which is really it's service, but it's not really service. So, you know, we have to do it even though we're getting paid for it. I mean, here we don't get paid for the work that we do, right? We do work period, we work in the kitchen. And in the kitchen, you know, the tensor really has to, like, there's no time for I mean, there's a lot of time and there's no time for anything. You know, it's like you have to be totally consumed and absorbed, kind of totally cooked completely into the activity. Because if you, you know, sort of black off for one second, you know, something gets burned, you know, something gets forgotten, and a key ingredient of the salad, you know, goes by the wayside. And so you have to kind of keep everything, you have to have this kind of panoramic, perspective and concentrate on one thing, but you can't just be concentrated on one thing.

[17:07]

You have to be concentrated in several things at the same time. And then not be concentrated in anything in particular, not too fixated in anything because you may have to drop whatever it is you're doing to, you know, do something else. So, you know, how to be very busy, that's kind of very busy, you know? Tenso is very busy. And then if somebody comes and interrupts you, you know, and asks you something or they need something or, you know, the tendency would be to get, you know, kind of, you know, I'm worried I'm late or whatever, don't bother me. So then you have to stay very flexible and keep the eye on the ball and in one thing and yet at the same time, not in one thing in particular, and stay rested in the midst of all that activity.

[18:09]

Lori talked in, she was, she saw, I use the koan of the one that's busy and the one that's not busy. So that's the same idea. You know, even though we're so busy, we're very busy, And nowadays, this is a koan for the modern world. Everybody's so busy, doing so many things, and you have to, you have the dharma practice, formal practice, then your work practice, then family practice, then driving from one place to another and so on. So that's like the, you have to, Bodhisattva with many, arms at the same time and at the same time remain restful and kind of lighthearted in the context of all that busyness and activity so that you're actually interruptible.

[19:24]

So in a way, you know, the other thing is that usually people at work, whether it's civil servants or in the business world, there's a big dichotomy between the week and the weekend, or work and vacation, right? Or work and reading the newspaper. People complain about civil servants. You know, you go into an office, it's 10 o'clock, people are drinking coffee, you know, reading the newspaper. They're not really attending to activities. or there's a patient coming, somebody's, you know, there who needs something and the person is trying to kind of, well, you know, trying to, that happens often at the clinic is, well, we have so many patients, one more, you know, so then people get into this mode of, you know, like, no more cases, or go somewhere else, you know, or you really don't qualify for services, you know, you should go over there, you know, and sometimes people are told to go over there, like, you know, five or six times in the same day.

[20:34]

So, you know, so you have to be able to drop everything and then give your full attention to the person that's in front of you and needs something. And the only way you can do that is if you pace yourself and stay restful. Stay not busy and open and empty. So you've got room for lots of new things and new stories and new patients and so on. And so vacation and work are one. They're not two. So you're always working and you're always on vacation. Of course, sometimes, that's non-duality. From the point of view of duality, sometimes it works. Sometimes you take vacations. But it's not like vacations are really vacations. Like we all know, sometimes people are really miserable on vacations.

[21:40]

They have all this free time and they don't know what to do. certain kind of seeds of consciousness that are kind of dormant while you're busy start bubbling up to the surface and you don't feel so good. So vacations are not always vacations. Sometimes there are a lot of work. But work can also be like a vacation, you know, so that's the importance of having daily practice, you know, that you make the effort to start your day with zazen, but then your whole day has that quality of, you know, vacation, even though you're going to work. And then you have joy, brings up joyful mind. So, The civil service itself can be a form of service of Buddha, but we don't call it Buddha service, just service.

[22:53]

And just service is Buddha service, but we don't call it Buddha service, we just call it service. If you call it Buddha service, then you have a problem. Right, because then people start discriminating, oh, you're a Buddhist, and what does it mean to be a Buddhist? Well, I'm not a Buddhist, you know, I'm a Christian, and oh, this is separation of church and state, you know, and you can't do that, you know. So better to do Buddhist service and not call it Buddha. And then if we practice like this, you know, like trying not to kind of do your activities without leaving karmic traces. Am I leaving karmic traces now?

[23:55]

Or if you do leave karmic traces, because we all do leave karmic traces, you know, which then will ripen later on and will come and get us, you know. There will be a situation, you know, where you'll feel some pain or somebody will say something to you that you don't like or you'll be in an unfortunate, disfavorable situation, right? So then, if you do leave a karmic trace, then you know how to bear your karmic pain. With some dignity, we endure the karmic results of our actions without doing more karma, because that's what happens. The karma thing, seeds ripen, and then you face an unfavorable situation, and then you react with the same kind of karma that created it in the first place, Anything goes on and on and on, right? So that's the wheel of samsara, what Freud called the repetition compulsion, you know?

[25:06]

Compulsion to repeat the same thing over and over, and it's endless. So you have to kind of get off the wheel, you know? And to get off the wheel, you know, you stop. First you have to realize, oh, this is karma. This is painful for me, and it's gonna create pain for somebody else. So you realize this is pain and you stop it by not acting on it, doing something else, responding from a different place so that you stop the wheel of samsara at that place. And if it comes back to get you, then you endure it. You have to endure the pain, go through it, And it's bitter, it doesn't taste so good. It's like eating a bitter food. It doesn't taste so good, but you eat it, chew it.

[26:08]

And don't blame anybody. Because just blaming people and because you did this to me and this and why did you say that and so on and so forth, better just to drop the whole thing. And at work, that's really important. Because people get, sometimes, you know, really the work of dealing with suffering is more dealing with coworkers in the clinic than dealing with the patients, you know, and all the office politics. And how to work with office politics to turn it into something dharmic. So that actually, if you can do that, then the work setting becomes a kind of Buddha field. And then it's like, sometimes you can watch it and see it's like a garden and just children playing in the garden and, you know, and kind of wisdom and compassion can usher out of people's own being.

[27:28]

But you can't watch too long. If you watch too long and any sense of attainment comes up, the whole enchantment comes crashing down and it turns into something else. The whole scene transmigrates to a different world. And then all of a sudden, you're practicing in a hell realm. That's like, you can't turn towards Buddha. If you look at Buddha, turn towards Buddha, then you become like those salt statues in the Bible. You look at Buddha from the side of your eye. You know, cooking also in Sen is different from gourmet cooking or refined cuisine.

[28:38]

And the quality of the food doesn't come from using food only of the highest quality. Let's say like, you know, Japanese, you know, they use the finest quality of this vegetable or, you know, that grain or this meat from somewhere and so on and so forth, and then the food tastes really good, right? But the taste of the good food in our kitchen doesn't come from the quality of the ingredients. Actually, it comes from the quality of practice. And we don't discriminate between simple food or refined food. You know, just like in Zazen, we don't want good thoughts, even though good thoughts arise, nor do we try to repress bad thoughts, even though bad thoughts arise. You know, the thoughts are just part of the environment we're in.

[29:40]

And in the same way, we don't become manic with spring, although some people become manic with spring, or we don't become depressed with fall, even though some people become depressed with fall. Just spring or fall, good thoughts, bad thoughts are just part of the scenery of big mind. Just like good ingredients and bad ingredients. So we cook with the fruits of both spring and fall, good thoughts and bad thoughts. And all these thoughts and these ingredients are cooked with the fire of our breath. A breath actually has a kind of fire. So actually in Zazen there's the legs like the logs of the fire and the breath also is a kind of fire and all our thoughts are being cooked, all the Dharma seeds in our thoughts are being cooked in

[30:45]

So the tensor is not a chef, and the head server is not a maitre, you know, a French restaurant, you know, like the maitre. I remember the beginning, and I was head server in the early 80s when we just started the, we had the zend on the other room. And so the head server and the servers were at the entrance of the kitchen, you know, and the head server would wait by the door, and the servers would go in, you know, and serve. And I remember I was the head server, and one of the servers was doing something that was really inappropriate or something, and I went. And Mel almost fell off his chair. So that wasn't good. So that was being like a maitre, you know. in a restaurant. That's not head server practice.

[31:55]

So, you know, the taste of the food comes from our own body-mind. And this is where the food tastes so good. I don't know if you've noticed, but always in sashimi, the food tastes really good for the most part, you know. Actually, I always like it. I always like all the three bowls and the food that all the different tensos cook. I always find it really good. Because it really doesn't come from the food, it comes from our own body-mind, our own practice. So it's not in the food, and it's not not in the food. So it's in the interaction of the food cooking us, eating us, and we cooking the food and eating the food. The taste comes from that interaction. How much time do we have left?

[33:08]

Five minutes? And then we have time for questions. We try to end at 11. So now it's time for questions. Could be. OK. We try to stop at around 11 now. OK. OK. Well, I was going to read you a little bit from Dogen's text, but I will leave that for some other time. And maybe your questions or your comments will talk about the rest that I wanted to talk about. So please feel free to bring Say anything, questions? Yes. Yes. I can't. I'm not supposed to. A male would have a heart attack. Where does that idea of seeing from the side come from?

[34:20]

Well, it's like, you know, if you turn towards the way, you turn away from it. You know, if you turn towards enlightenment, you turn away from enlightenment. So you just forget all about, you know, discriminating between Buddha and non-Buddha and just participate fully in enlightened activity. That's like the fish going and swimming all the way to the bottom of the ocean. Yes. You're welcome. Yeah, it's a difficult thing to do because

[35:24]

You know, our feelings and our impulses and our thinking all have this kind of pressure, you know? And there's a lot of power in that. There's a big grip, you know? It's a kind of chain, actually. So it's hard to break it. So that's why you have to do it by creating a very big context for it. That's the big magnanimous mind. And we do that by daily practice. And then through daily practice, all those negative things then becomes the very manifestations of practice. So that's the most important thing. and over a long period of time also.

[36:53]

And then it's much easier to kind of do a quick, to recuperate more quickly when you feel like you've lost your way, to get yourself back on track. But also breathing, just like in Zazen, you know, your knees are killing you. Well, don't get angry at your knees, actually. How about help your knees? Our knees are actually doing the Zazen for us. It's very nice of them. Our knees are actually enduring the pain for us. So, So don't get upset about what's happening, about the pain or the disturbance. And if you can have a sense of appreciation for that pain or disturbance, then you have some space to work with it, and then it may change into something else.

[38:07]

And then you may be able to respond differently. The other thing is, you know, to just immerse yourself, you know, in what you need to do in front of you. So if you just had a bad interaction with your coworker or with your boss or a client or something, and there are things you still need to do on your desk that need to be done, just try to do them. Even though the thoughts and the feelings are going to keep coming back at you, focus on your breathing and go back and proceed with your activities. Yes. Thanks for your talk. You're welcome. It's pretty interesting. It feels like you hit on a lot of topics that I won't remember later, except little bits of them that I'll try to figure out. I won't have a clue, but I still have this confusion about practice and what is practice and why is there a Tenzo practice and what's going on in practice?

[39:16]

So what's that got to do with life? I mean, it feels like it should you know, these shaped meats, they've got all this really great food. Well, can the person who's there cooking the food, can't they be doing Tantra practice? I mean, do they have to be a Buddhist and be here to do it? I mean, my guess is, you know, they're really, even though the food is like the top-notch food, the way they interact with it, doesn't that, I mean, isn't that the Well, I mean, I don't know the chef at Japanese. It may be that the chef at Japanese is practicing like a tenso. That may very well be, right? But not all chefs are practicing like tensos. So it all comes back to the question of the separation is that in ordinary activities without practice,

[40:22]

There's a division or a duality between subject and object. And we relate to things and to people with our small self as if they were outside of us and different from us. And then we create conflict and we become upset and create suffering for ourselves and others. So the point of the offices in the community is to practice non-duality between ourselves and things and people, characters. Characters actually means both dharmas, things, and also people with their peculiarities or particularities. Does that respond to your question or not? Sort of. So, I mean, Mel says it all the time, you know, the opportunity, the practice for the Doan is to regard the bell as your own head.

[41:26]

So the sound of the bell reflects what kind of thoughts you're having in your mind. But isn't that something we want to be doing all the time? Of course. And is the reason we have different practices is because as humans we don't have the ability to sustain that all the time and so we have these or be that way while we're... So that we can realize what our life really is. We'll talk more later. Okay. Time? Well, thank you.

[42:13]

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