Well, I was talking with Ron, and he said to me, you know, you never talk much about the value of boredom. And I said, well, I think you're right. I don't. So I said, well, I usually talk about about practice not being so interesting, not so exciting or interesting, not an interesting thing, you know, it's not something that excites the mind, thinking mind. But if you think about it, during Zazen, We spend a lot of time.

[01:04]

If you're not, if your mind is not active, then there's nothing to think about. And so it's easy to feel bored. So when we sit in Zazen, we pay attention to posture, and following breath. And when we focus in this way, our focus becomes very narrow and we don't have an object of thought other than the posture and the breathing. And any other object or thought is, well, you might say a visitor.

[02:12]

You could say an intruder. I didn't want to say intruder, but visitor. Traveling salesman. What? Traveling salesman. Trying to sell us something. And up and we have our money out, you know. When he got there... So, you know... This thought process during Zazen is sometimes called scenery, called the scenery of our life, is this thought process.

[03:25]

Thoughts and emotions and feelings come up and then we realize them. Realize means to make real. But it's also often described as secretions. The thought process is called secretions of the mind, like the gastric juices in our stomach. Thanks, Ron. Eat up the food, you know. Digest the food and break it down. It's just secretions.

[04:31]

And the thoughts that are present in our mind are like gas bubbles. Maybe it's some kind of mental flagellation. And it just keeps coming up, you know. And then sometimes we realize it, or we try to make these things real. To make, you know, to do something about it. So... Which menu?

[05:39]

Yeah, who puts his menu together? That's right. Who is the one that puts his menu together? So, it's called the scenery of our life. And it's like riding in a train, you know, and just watching it go by. And every once in a while we want to stop, you know, and get out and walk around in it. Oh, this is a beautiful spot. But when we do, we have to remember to get back on the train. I remember there used to be a place on the way to Tassajara called the Buzz Inn, and they was down by Gilroy, when the road used to go through.

[06:43]

The road used to go through all those little towns, but now it's straight. And Suzuki Roshi used to stop there. When people were driving in Tatsuhara, we'd always stop at the Buzz Inn and have some coffee, and the truck drivers would look at him, you know. And he'd strike up some conversation with the bus drivers, with the truck drivers, Anyway, he'd say, it's okay to stop at the bazin, but you have to get back in the car and continue to Tassajara. Don't get lost at the bazin. So when we sit in Zazen, our effort is to realize the clarity of mind. I don't say to clear our mind, but clear mind, clarity of mind is sometimes called a sheet of white paper or the blue sky.

[08:00]

That's the analogy. Original mind. non-dual mic. Our thought process is... What can I say? So, discriminating mind is always dividing our original mind. And Sazen is to resume to our original mind, original non-discriminating mind.

[09:05]

So, if we sit and don't pay too much attention to our thinking mind, then But life is not so interesting because we're used to active mind, which is always attaching to something and creating something. And so the clear mind is like a movie screen. And an active mind is like the other side of the screen, or like the projection on the screen. When we go into the movie house, out before the picture, you see the screen.

[10:13]

It's just a white screen. And it's not so interesting. They usually have some music playing to keep your interest up, to keep you from being bored looking at the white screen. And then the movie goes on the screen and the white screen disappears. And all you see is the movie and you say, oh, it's come to life. The screen has come to life and we forget all about the screen and just watch the movie and we get into the movie. If it's a good movie, we become totally absorbed in the movie. And we live our life within the movie. It's just a movie. And then, if you go to a movie in the daytime, and then the movie's over, and you walk outside,

[11:16]

all about it. So we get bored with the white screen. I mean, you know, interest comes with attaching to something. So in Zazen, there is a place for the mind to go, and it's in the posture and the breathing. But, you know, we get bored also adjusting our posture. Is this all? We get bored just following the breath.

[12:24]

So it takes a very subtle, concentrated effort to maintain attention and to keep the consciousness concentrated on posture and breathing. And the mind, the thinking mind, works independently. It's not that you try to bring something up. Sometimes you do. But it bubbles up. Thoughts just bubble up by themselves. And they become something for the mind to attach to. So it's not so easy to bring the attention back from something that's very interesting to something that's not so interesting.

[13:26]

Sometimes, there's a state of Zazen where you have good posture, are aware of breathing, and there's no thought at all. And there's complete awareness. And your eyes are open, and eyes are seeing, and one is right on the edge. various feelings, painful feelings, pleasant feelings, but there's no attachment. It's a very wonderful kind of state that you probably all experience at times in zazen. This is in a very clear kind of awareness, a very dynamic feeling, even though there's no movement.

[14:34]

It's the dynamics of stillness. And if something moves, you notice it, or it's noticed, but it doesn't disturb anything. And even if a thought passes by, the thought doesn't disturb it. I don't like to say this is good Zazen, because if I say this is good Zazen, then we think all the rest of the Zazen is not so good, or not as good as this. So we have to be very careful here. There's dynamics of stillness and being fully awake within stillness without attaching to thought processes is wonderful.

[15:54]

The other side of that is the stillness of sleeping or the stillness of dreaming. we try very hard to stay awake. That's our effort. And if you can establish yourself in this stillness of wakeful, dynamic wakefulness and stillness without attaching to anything, then the thoughts can pass by and it's not a problem. Thoughts can bubble up, feelings can bubble up, emotions can bubble up, but it's not a problem because you're established in dynamic stillness and wakefulness. And there's nothing special to do, but there's no boredom.

[17:06]

Boredom is like separation. When there's separation, then one feels disconnected. And when you feel disconnected, you can't really connect with anything. And so nothing seems interesting to you. But when there's no gap and no thought, then it's not boredom, even though there's nothing to do but exist for its own sake. So zazen is like pure existence for the sake of existence, not for the sake of something else. just experiencing pure existence, which is enlightenment.

[18:15]

So enlightenment is the state of Zazen, or the state of Zazen is enlightenment, because there's nothing hindering the light of existence. the world is not divided and you're not separate from the universe. Suzuki Roshi also talked about cultivating the ground. He said people often are interested in cultivating various things, interesting things. But for a Zen student, the most important thing is to cultivate the ground. Not so much to worry about what we put in the ground or what the result is, but just to take care of the soil itself.

[19:26]

If you take care of the ground itself, then whatever you put in the ground will work. You'll have a good result. But you don't have to worry about the result. All you have to worry about is the ground, which means you don't have to worry about whether or not you will be enlightened. Just take care of the practice. Just take care of your practice. For the sake of the practice, if you know how to do this, enlightenment is there. But if you go around looking for enlightenment, you'll never find it. It's like, reminds me of the Aesop's Fable, which I told you the story before, of the farmer who had three sons.

[20:34]

And the farmer, he knew he was about ready to die. And he wanted his three sons to take care of the farm after he had died. He didn't want them to go to the city and sell out to agribusiness or developers. So he said, boys, on this farm, there's a buried treasure. And when I die, you should look for it. So after the old man died, the three sons got out their shovels and they dug up the whole place and they didn't find anything.

[21:44]

And just looked at each other and said, well, let's try once more. Let's do it one more time." So they got in and they dug up another treasure. Well, by that time it was spring, so they did their spring planting. When the crops came up, you know, they were far greater than they ever had been before, you know, lush, wonderful bounty. And then they looked at each other and they said, You suppose this was what the old man was talking about? So, this story, you know,

[23:01]

a good analogy of practice. And the treasure that everyone is looking for doesn't look like what you had in mind. So just taking care of the ground, you know, may actually be kind of boring practice. It may not be so exciting, but the more mature we become, the more mature our understanding is, the less we need for excitement. can find something very simple to be very interesting, or find something very plain to be very tasty.

[24:22]

I remember an old saying, The food of the gods tastes like nothing at all to ordinary mortals. So in the area of satisfaction, one who is mature needs very little. is usually satisfied with something very basic and fundamental. And when we haven't touched that something basic and fundamental, then we keep looking in various other places for satisfaction. So boredom may not be boredom.

[25:40]

But if you have boredom, what do you do with it? Actually, the most important thing for practice is patience. Shanti. Patience sometimes means the ability to wait for something. If I'm patient enough, this will pass. Or if I'm patient enough, I'll get something. That's one kind of patience. But shanti more means being able to settle. on each moment in any situation. You're not waiting for something, but you're actually settled in yourself.

[26:46]

Sometimes patience means when people are being rough with you, or insulting you or pushing you around that you're very patient with that, that also means that. But to actually be able to stay on your place without being anxious to move, even though it may not be the most pleasant thing. So zazen is a practice of patience. And sasheen is practice of big patience. Big patience to just be with nothing or with whatever is passing by, to remain undisturbed.

[28:00]

not to let anything upset, and stay grounded in fundamental mind. So there are also different types of people who seem to approach, practice because of their personalities in different ways. And there are people who fundamentally have faith and there are people who fundamentally are riddled with doubt. So there are the faith types and the doubt types. And the doubt types see the world in a somewhat pessimistic way.

[29:16]

And faith types see it in a somewhat optimistic way, regardless of what's going on. And in order to have spiritual awakening, doubt types seem to need to strive more, whereas faith types are more like cultivators. A doubt type, you know, is searching and striving and goes from the depths to the heights and has spiritual agony and so forth. Whereas faith type doesn't seem to need to do that so much. Although, you know, they intermingle, but for purposes of discussion, faith type is more

[30:30]

it's easier for a faith type to always have faith. And when a faith type discovers a way to go, then they appreciate that and will follow it, and more easily start cultivating the way. And sometimes Rinzai style and Soto style are equated with doubt types and faith types. So Rinzai style may in some way be equated with doubt types who need to have things like koans to work on, something to grapple with, something to awaken their mind. Whereas faith types The mind is already awake. They don't need to awaken the mind.

[31:41]

All they need to do is verify their practice and cultivate practice. So Soto Zen is more like that. People say, why don't you use koans? Koans are fine, but mostly for doubt types. People who need something to struggle with need to prove something to themselves. So Rinzai Zen style is more like going from delusion to enlightenment, striving from a point of delusion until you burst into enlightenment. Whereas Soto practice is starting from basic realization and gradual practice. sudden enlightenment and gradual practice. Sitting in zazen, in dynamic stillness, is enlightenment, enlightened practice.

[32:55]

So Hakuin and Dogen are like different ends of the spectrum. Hakuin was a kind of doubt type. And he didn't have the patience for his lazin. And he took hold of the koans and really struggled with the koans. And that was his way. And he established, re-established koan study in Japan. And Dogen, being more of a faith type, although he studied koans, and if you read Shogun Genzo, it's all about koans, but he established in his practice on faith in Buddha-nature and that sitting in zazen is enlightenment itself.

[34:01]

There's no need to struggle. So we have these two ways, and both ways are good. So sometimes people have some problem with zazen, but zazen is also a big koan. Even though Zazen itself is realization. It's the realization koan. Ginjo koan. So it's not that there's no koan. Zazen itself is a koan, and daily life is a koan. So Rinzai, they also sit Zazen, but they put a lot of emphasis on koan study.

[35:03]

Soto Zen put big emphasis on Zazen and Koan as Genjo Koan, the Koan that arises in your daily life moment by moment. So both schools have both things, but the emphasis is different and the approach is different. But at the core, it's not different. If you study Rinzai Zen, then you should study Rinzai Zen that way, the way they study it. If you study Soto Zen, you should study it the way Soto Zen studies it. And if you don't want to study Soto Zen, you should go and study Rinzai Zen. And if you don't want to study Rinzai Zen, you should go and study Soto Zen.

[36:07]

But we shouldn't have a problem. So if you're bored, just be bored. My son Daniel used to go to bed and say, about a half hour after being in bed, This little voice would come out and say, I'm bored. I said, that's fine. No problem. Just be bored. It's OK. We think that if we're bored, that we should do something about it. That it's not a good state to be in. There's something wrong with being bored. But it's OK. Being bored is just okay to be bored. And in Zazen, if you feel bored, you make a... bored.

[37:24]

It's okay. Just be bored. No problem. How do you deal with that? How do you deal with just... with nothing happening? No interest? a good koan. Sometimes, you know, when people are talking, they'll be talking very excitedly, let's say in a group, and then suddenly nobody has anything to say, and there's this silence, you know, this embarrassing silence. It's only embarrassing because people lose their continuity and they feel, God, there's this hole. There's this big hole and we're all falling into it because nobody knows what to say.

[38:26]

But if people would just let themselves be silent and enjoy it, it would be wonderful. That's actually probably the most valuable thing about their conversation. But we don't allow ourselves to do that because our life is buoyed up by the momentum of our thinking and speaking. That's what keeps us going, the momentum of speaking and thinking. And when it stops, where are we? But actually, we're found, but we think we're lost in the silence. It's just the other way around. And then sometimes, you know, I remember when I was a kid, I would fall into a kind of reverie, you know, kind of the... not thinking at all, you know, just suspension.

[39:33]

And, you know, we've all done that, right? And then somebody goes, ah! You know? Don't do that. It's not good for you. And I used to say, God, don't tell me it's not good for me. It's the most wonderful thing in my life. See, I was always a faith type. It's the most wonderful thing in my life. Why are you telling me that it's wrong or bad to fall into this reverie for no reason at all? So somehow it's bad. We should keep moving. Of course, if we get too spaced out all the time, it's not good either. So Zazen, actually, is not being spaced out, although we do get spaced out, I must say, in Sashin. One of the characteristics is being spaced out, but it's not the goal.

[40:37]

It's just to enjoy our everyday mind, ordinary mind. So when we need to do something, we should do it, and not get stuck. in spades. So that's why we have a schedule, and we get up from zazen, and we do hin-hin, and we, you know, we don't just stay all day, except for tangaryo, which is something else. Nobody wants to do that anyway. But I'm wondering a little bit. Do you have a question? I was very grateful for your talk, actually, because it cleared something up for me. I've never been bored for a minute in Zazen. And my husband, who I think is a fairly objective evaluator, told me he'd never known anyone who was more fascinated with shitting or all of the byproducts associated with it.

[41:53]

So now you've explained why. As things bubble up, I'm completely fascinated with this process. But you also remind me of a question that came up when I read Refining Your Life, Chiama's book, where he said, you cannot exchange even the smallest single fart with another person. And I really thought that we did. I really don't understand that. Well, he's saying, what's yours is yours. Your karma is your karma. doesn't belong to somebody else. What you do, the result of what you do, is all yours. You can't exchange. In one way, what we present, how we meet the world, is completely ours. On another, it seems like it has an effect on other people.

[42:56]

That's true, but Still, what's yours is yours, and the effect that you have on someone else is theirs. So you can't exchange your karma for someone else's. You know, say, I have a little bit of this and you have a little bit of that. Hey, it can be exchanged, you know, we both can do that. It is. That's what we should be doing. Why can't we do that? Well, you will. If you continue to practice diligently, you know, we say hard practice, you know, practice hard means to really practice sincerely, wholeheartedly.

[44:18]

When you do that, then zazen becomes zazen. And not, you know, not practice to get something, But just, you know, when we talk about something like devotion, people say, well, I like a devotional practice. And what they mean by a devotional practice is emotional practice or emotional response to a deity that's where people generally think about devotional practice, you know, singing and chanting and so forth. But Zen practice is completely devotional practice. It's devotion to the practice. Complete devotion to practice. When you have that, then you're giving yourself completely. And then this begins to work in your daily life.

[45:22]

because you're carrying the practice with you wherever you go. You're completely devoted to it. So when you're completely devoted to what you're doing, then it appears in your daily life. But if it's just an idea, it doesn't appear. It can't be just an idea. It has to be, you know, the dynamics of your life. So when you sit sasheen devotedly for its own sake, then the stillness that you experience and the patience that you experience and the non-duality that you experience appears in your daily activities. From the very, very slight taste that I have gotten of this in any life,

[46:40]

Yes, of course, time is experience. We think of time as having a certain kind of duration, and that there's a standard for that. But actually, one moment in one situation can seem like eternity, and in another situation it just goes by so fast you don't notice it. your experience becomes wider. Your ability to be where you are becomes much wider. And then you abide in this much broader, wider space. Just like Zazen. In Zazen, you abide in this wide, even though you're focused, very sharply, your existence is boundless, wide space.

[48:01]

And then when you walk around and do things, it's the same way. So, little by little, you develop. But that comes by itself. It will come by itself. The relationship of the artist in making art. I'm so spaced out that I can't make linear sentences. I'm always having doubts now about the product. whether it's a worthy product in light of this light process. Is it all right to do it?

[49:05]

Is it just a product that's of the mind bubbles and not totally a waste? And yet just when you were talking, I was thinking that if you go into this narrow thing and get the space, then the product that comes out of that, It might be a worthy product, but I'm not sure. Well, the product is an expression of the expression. So, if the expression is coming from a shallow place, then you'll have a shallow product. If the expression is coming from a deep place, you're more likely to have a more profound product. I also have a question about whether the process is worth it. I mean, even though it feels like it arises, I mean, sitting here, poems come up or ideas come up that seem fine, but how do I know I'm not really down the road in some, you know, Afghanistan hollow, which is, you know, I've been infatuated with at that moment.

[50:19]

I mean, I don't know how to check it out. in light of what you're saying exactly. Well, write it down and then check it out. Write it down and then two years later look at it. Is that pretty helpful? I could sit on it. Yeah, sit on it. Well, you were talking about devotion, and I spent May in Jerusalem among Orthodox Jews, and the thing they would ask me about my practice is Well, you know, in a circumstance like that, even though in Buddhism God is not the model,

[51:48]

You can use the terms, so that people will understand you. As a matter of fact, in Zen, there is no model. So you can just use anything. You can say he is a god, or no god, or whatever. Right? So, you appropriate. Yeah, well, God is, or is God not? So, you don't have to say, well, in Buddhism we don't think about God, you know. And that just puts everybody off. Or it might be okay. It's okay to say, well, in Buddhism, God is not the model. Or you can say, well, God is, you know, everywhere, depending on the situation. So, as long as you don't get attached.

[53:02]

So if you say, well, in Buddhism there's no God, then you start, it feels like you're criticizing and you're making people feel defensive, you know, or they have to defend their feeling for God, or you have to defend your feeling that there is one, you know, and then you can't meet. So better just go in and use their terms and come out. in thinking that we learned through Zazen that we may lead ourselves, to lead ourselves through life? Well, yes. To be independent, Zazen gives us the realization

[54:19]

that it all depends on us, and that I am completely independent and completely dependent at the same time. I'm completely independent of everything, and at the same time, I'm completely dependent on everything.

[54:39]

@Text_v004
@Score_JJ