During these two practice periods, one in the city and one in Green Gulch, I've been trying to lay out an outline of a course of a Buddhist study, at least part of it. Starting at the beginning and going up to the practice of . Of course, there's no beginning to practice, but I pointed to the recognition of suffering. recognition of the possibility of freedom from suffering and a way of practice to free oneself from suffering.

[01:09]

And then I talked a number of times that the first step in the practice is to confess and repent acknowledge exactly where you are and where you came from as best you can. Keep that recognition with you at all times. And then with the aid of knowing where you are and admitting who you are by confession and repentance, going beyond who you are, being released from your past. Being released from good and bad, but from bad and good. And thereby being able to take refuge in the Buddha, the Dharma, and Sangha.

[02:16]

At the beginning, refuge is a refuge probably with a little bit of a discrepancy. There is a slight or a big discrepancy when you first take refuge, when you first go back. You return to something that you feel that you've been awake from. Confession and repentance allow you to go back. After embracing the Buddha, after establishing communion with the Buddha, the thought of enlightenment, when they arrive, When the thought of enlightenment has arisen, then with the aid of the six paramitas, we can nurture it.

[03:24]

And the culmination of the six paramitas is, in a sense, the sixth reflection of wisdom. And so that is also called non-dual meditation or objectless meditation. It's not really meditation. It means that you're one with what you are. So with this preparation of the practice period and all this, I have been emphasizing the practice of reversing the mind, turning the mind around from the realm of objects, turning the mind around from the realm where there's discrepancy, where there's a separation between subject and object.

[04:30]

In other words, returning to Buddha mind without Buddha mind being an object. So we've been studying, with this preparation of this practice period, we've been studying the non-thinking. We're studying the backward step. And with the aid of the schedule and all this sitting, As far as I can tell, all of you have become tenderized. And therefore, you're able to study backward step. Or another way is the backward step. You're sensitive to the backward step. You can feel non-thinking. I hesitated emphasizing this teaching because I'm not having emphasized it until it's coming before.

[06:00]

I wondered how you would deal with it. But please, I'm very happy. your response is far greater than I expected. And from what I've heard, your success is very encouraging to me. If the docent were published, it would be a great testimonial for this practice. and for all of you. I'm laughing because there's various little cute things I wanted to say to you during the session that I just never could bring myself to say.

[07:40]

And now I remember what, and I still don't know if I can say it, but here I go. And that is, I noticed at one point that a characteristic of the meditation instruction, which Dogen's energy give, is that in one sense, he's giving you an instruction. He's giving you two-fold instruction. He's giving you an instruction that you could do voluntarily, and then he's giving you an instruction that you can do involuntarily. giving you voluntary and involuntary instruction. And this is interesting to me because it's similar to hypnosis. Hypnosis is to say, now stare at this watch. You can do that. You can look at a watch, right? Now you're becoming very sleepy. Now you're becoming very relaxed. So he says, you know, sit upright on this cushion.

[08:46]

You can do that. And then he says, think of that that doesn't think. This is not a voluntary act he's asking for. It's an involuntary act. And I thought about the word involuntary. The involuntary things we do are things we do them, but they just don't volunteer them, you know. I mean, they're done by something, by our body, by our life, but we don't do them willfully. They're not done by us in the usual way. Involuntary acts are the acts that we do. Somehow we get a lot of help to do them. And yesterday I was feeling like around this involuntary stuff, I was feeling I got this. And some other people have told me about involuntary activity going on here. Like one person told me, this person used to be a good meditator.

[09:53]

This person told me about this. She used to be able to concentrate pretty well. She thought she actually could concentrate quite well. And then gradually, over the last year or so, she's lost this ability to concentrate. Giddy kind of weak in her concentration practice. She can still do a little, but it's not so strong. And in this downtrodden state, this weary meditator state, somehow some other kind of meditation came upon her. from some other place. I mean, not another place, but by another means than her own effort. She still tries, but she can't do it anymore exactly, like she used to be. And I want you to tell me that I got this image of myself kind of like on my own little heroic journey as a meditator or as a teacher, kind of like

[10:59]

falling down on my face, just barely going along, and not exactly even knowing how to say help. But some help come. It didn't come when I was thinking of it, but I thought, and then some help come. And I thought about one of the characteristics of hero, almost all hero journeys, is that the hero tries. But then the hero always falls down, and something comes to help. So it isn't like the hero going along kind of like some wizard or something, or witch, said, and you go do this, and you do that, and you do that, and you do that, and then you do that, and then you do that, and then you'll get there. It isn't like, and then the hero says, OK, and then say, OK, well, I did it.

[12:01]

I mean, I tried. And then the help comes now. They really try. They follow the instructions as best they can. They follow the voluntary instructions as best they can. And that isn't enough. And then they get help. Like Psyche, trying to reunite with love. One of her labors is, I think, what is it? The sort of seed? Little boma seed? The goma part of the machia. Look, the sort of these goma seeds can do what with them? Yeah. Is there a time limit? Yeah, rooms and rooms. So she tries, I guess, and then she just sort of collapses in a pile of tears, right? And then the little ants come and help her, right? The little ants come. And they helped her. But she tried.

[13:03]

She didn't just sort of say, oh, I can't do this. I'll forget it. It's too much. She tried. And she failed. Dad said, oh, poor baby. And they didn't help her. And I just got a rush of these other stories. What was that girl's name? Miller's daughter? that was put in this room full of straw and supposed to make the straw into gold. What was her name? Betty? So there she is with the straw and the spinning wheel. And I don't know, she tried, she tried, she tried, she took a straw and put it in the thing and wrapped it around. And she also just collapsed in a pile of tears. And this little weird guy shows up, Rumpelstiltskin. He says, need some help, miss? Yeah, I got to do this ridiculous thing. It's impossible. I got to do it. Otherwise, I'm dead. I'm dead. But he helps her.

[14:05]

And in all these stories, the tailor who's supposed to make these fancy outfits by tomorrow morning goes to sleep after working himself to the bone and falls asleep, falls into his face. These little creatures come out in the night. These little elves come out and help them, right? So anyway, you people have pretty much done your job, I think. If you can, you fall on your face, some of you, and you've been helped. I don't know if you've been falling on your face for a long time. But you've been helped. I can see you've been helped. And all summer long, you know, I've been having kind of a hard time. And Paul, people ask me, you know, how I'm doing. But just the first thought that comes to my mind is, I'm having a hard time, I say. I don't even think I'm going to say that, but that's always what's up when they say that. It's a hard time. It's a hard time.

[15:11]

That's just what it is. I mean, I could say, well, they don't want to hear that. They'll skip over and say, oh, okay. But I've got to be saying, well, that's what it says in the thing. I say so. And people usually, oftentimes, they say, well, that's good. You should be having a hard time. And I say, yeah, I know. And during this session, I've been having a hard time, too, trying to figure out whether I should keep pushing this point, you know. Just studying the backward step. And you know, as the first lecture, I read that table of contents. You know, that very interesting table of contents. Because, you see, I sort of think, a little bit of me think, well, you know, can I get Bible actually teaching, like, basically, like, one thing for seven days? Can I do that? Will people let me? Don't they want something interesting? So they can see how interesting things can be.

[16:14]

That's just a sample of how interesting the world is. And then maybe they'll realize, I know something. I know an interesting thing, but I'm actually not going to talk about interesting things. I'm going to put them aside and talk about something that's essential rather than something interesting. And I really appreciate you let me do that. You let me put aside the interesting and talk about the essentials. So thank you very much for letting me do that. It was scary for me to give you such a boring diet. But it did work. Thank you. They're making it work. Yeah. He's welcome. Again, I would have given up. I was falling in my faith several times. But then people came in and told me that they were doing it. The elves came in and said, well, I hear I've written this little thing here.

[17:17]

You are? You're doing this, this thing? I said, Justin, wow. And some people that did it were people that just sort of really were surprised that they were doing it, too. I mean, people that just never thought they would try such a thing either. So anyway, it's very encouraging. This is the essential art of zazen. And this zazen is not the practice of dhyana. It is the dharma gate of reposing bliss, the practice verification of ultimate enlightenment. The koan is realized. Baskets and cages cannot get to it. If you grasp this point of practice, the four elements of body will become light and at ease.

[18:22]

The spirit will be fresh and sharp. Thoughts will be correct and clear. The flavor of the Dharma will sustain the spirit and you will become pure and joyful. Your daily life will be the expression of your true natural state. Once you have achieved clarification, you will be likened to a dragon gaining the water or a tiger kicking to the mountain. You should realize that when right thought is present, dullness and distraction cannot intrude. That's an earlier version of . He wrote that when he was 27. And then when he was, I think, 43, he wrote the second version, which is the one we usually read.

[19:26]

If you grasp this point, this point of thinking of the unthinking. And again, you grasp it, but you can always help you. If you grasp this point, you are like a dragon gaining the water, a tiger taking to the mouth. You should realize that when right thought is present, dullness and distraction are struck aside from the start. Another thing which I have been talking about at Green Gulch, case 32 of the Book of Etonimity, which I don't think I've talked about in the city much. And this, too, I've been trying to get to all sashim, but haven't been able to. It's another story about the same practice. I'll read it now.

[20:29]

A story about Yangshan. They called Yangshan, by the way, little shakamuni that they called him. A monk came to Yangshan, and Yangshan said, where do you come from? And the monk said, I come from you, province. And Yangshan said, do you think of that place? And he said, I always think of it. This is his confession, my comment. Then the Anjan suddenly says, the thinker is the mind. That which is thought of is the environment, or the objects. Another way to translate it is, the ability to think is the mind.

[21:34]

The ability to think is the mind. That which is thought of, or the passive aspect of thinking, is the environment. So therein, in the realm of the thought of, that which can be thought of, in the passive aspect of thinking, in the realm of passive thinking, therein are mountains, rivers, and landmass, buildings, towers, halls, chambers, people, animals, and so forth. Reverse your thought to think of the thinking mind or to think of the ability or capacity to think. And he said to the monk, are there so many things there? The monks answered the question.

[22:43]

Again, it might be several years later when he answered this question. We don't know. But he says, when I get here, when I get to this place of the mind turned around, of thinking of the ability to think, I don't see any existence at all. I don't see any existence at all. Yangshan said, this is right for the stage of faith, but not yet right for the stage of the person. Yangshan said, do you have any further particular guidance? Yangshan said, to say that I have anything particular or not would not be accurate. Based on your insight, you get only one mystery. You can take the seat and wear the robe. After this, see on your own. So this case points out that after you successfully, after you, with the aid of the ants, and also to be successfully studied the backwards step.

[24:01]

That's not the end of the story. That's what's called entrance. There is practice after this entrance. And the practice is called the stated person. And to make a long story short, I would suggest to you that what it is is that after you take the backwards step, And after you're a dragon in the water, or a tiger running in mountains, after you're running around there in the land of repose and bliss, that the stage of the person is to take the forward step again. It's to get back involved with these objects. Come back, little sheep. Into the ground.

[25:02]

that you just freed yourself of, come back into the land of discrepancy that you have just turned around from. And if you get caught again and fall from discrepancy, well, take the backward step again and learn a new way to escape from the sense of separation Again, Dougie, then, his grand-uncle wrote a priestory verse about this case. All embracing with no outside.

[26:08]

penetrated with no obstruction. This is the realm of no discrepancy, of a backward step. This is also the realm of mind. As I mentioned the other day, we were talking about the essential art of zazen. And he said, everything is the essential art of zazen. everything of turning light around.

[27:17]

If you do it, you sit or do whatever you're doing with a sense of wholeness and confidence. Like somebody told me something like, Marilka says, trust anything that happens to your whole body. But I would say, after something happens to your own whole body, go talk to your teacher. And see if your teacher sees any part of your body didn't get there before you Start a new religion. Sometimes, you know, people open up a new frontier of their body.

[28:31]

For example, their heart. Their heart opens and they think, hey, that's my whole body. I'm going to do something about this. That's pretty good, but that's not the whole body necessarily. It might be, but... But sometimes people give up that practice and they fall in love because some chakra opens up. And they think, hey, wow, this is great to have that one working. The whole body, that's pretty good. But if it's just a couple more chakras, don't necessarily change your plans right away. So in the realm of this wonderful backward step, there is this confidence that you can just sit. There's no discrepancy anymore.

[29:37]

You have taken a backward step from the slightest discrepancy. Then he says, gates and walls like cliffs, doors and locks redouble. The realm of discrepancy, the realm of object. Someone said, like an ice cliff, it's hopeless. But if you keep trying to scale the ice clip, it might encourage you to take a backward step. Gates and walls and like clips. Locks and locks and locks. This closeness is hurting me.

[30:47]

Here, you're pretty discouraged. You're not sure about your practice. Maybe you're totally screwed up about what you think about Buddhism. You're not even sure that you're doing badly. You might not even be good enough to spot that. It's really embarrassing and terrible. You've got to take a backward step from that place. Turn around. Reverse your way of thinking. You're sending yourself into a ice wall. Turn around. Sit quietly. Think of that which doesn't think. But then he said, when the wine is always sweet, it lays out the guests.

[31:58]

Though the meal is filling, it ruins the farmer. So for those of you who have been encouraged by this practice during this session, remember that you shouldn't keep hanging out there too long. But although this is a Sweet wine, it may lay out. It may ruin your daily life. You don't care. Please, run out in the mud. Dive in the water. Bursting out of the clear sky, the Garuda takes wing on the wind.

[33:07]

Bursting out of the all-pervading sky with no outside. Burst out of the great vastness. Burst out into the land of wind and rain. Fly back into the world. Treading over the blue sea, thunder follows a roaming dragon. It's a dragon sustained by the water. This is about a leading session. With a sense of, yes, I had a nice time in session.

[34:13]

And I'm a little worried about how I'm going to continue this level of energy and this level of work. But actually, And now I'm gonna really grow up and become a Garuda or a dragon and go back in a world of wind and water and fire and dirt. You got into the sashim by sitting on the ground. Chinese character for city, is this little kind of like a cross sticking on a platform. Looks like this, and like this, like this. So it's like a horizontal line with a cross on top of it. That character means the earth. And then up on the second level,

[35:24]

Second verse pours out the line of it. There's two little characters, either side. Can you see what I'm doing? It's like this. Over on this side and this side, there's two little characters which mean person. It's the same character of that stage you're talking about. And the character of a person is one line like this, and one line like this from my side. From your side, it's like this. It's a person walking. the legs, the body, kind of leaning, leaning, leaning into it. So these persons are sitting there on the earth. So we enter the vastness of the sky, just sitting on the earth. And then we go back to sit on the earth again. When you arise from sitting, move slowly and calmly.

[36:48]

Do not be pasty or rough. When you arise from Sashi, when you arise from studying the backward step, Do so slowly and calmly. Don't be rough or hasty. But not with a sense of holding on to it. Not with a sense that I got this backward step that I'm studying. I got the study of a backward step and I'm going to take it with me. Not in a clean sense. But also not in a kind of, you know, well, forget that. If I can't take it with me, well, forget it. Something between those two of rejecting it and holding on to it. More in a sense of carefully, generously, patiently, courageously, concentratedly, and non-dualistically, walk forward from it.

[37:59]

Walk forward from this session. Carefully, quietly, in a dignified manner. Leave this kindly running. Don't take it with you. Let Buddha walk forward from this session. Using the six-power note that supports you and you go into a different kind of practice. Considering the past, we have seen that transcending the profane and surpassing the holy, or if they say transcendence of enlightenment and unenlightenment, or whatever, the shedding of this body while sitting and the fleeing of this body while standing are totally subject to this power.

[39:08]

But you've probably heard that it's kind of a Zen style to die sitting in the sitting posture. You're a Zen meditator. And one of the ways to die is even if you've been lying down for months, the last minute sit up, cross your leg, And if you've never been able to cross your legs, well, cross them just for that last minute. And you think that's funny. You won't need them anymore. Yeah, one guy, there was one then master who never could cross his legs because he was bull-legged. Not for riding bulls, but because of rickets, probably. So he never could do it. But just before he died, he had his legs broken so that he could sit cross-legged.

[40:13]

And then he died with broken legs. So that depends on his power. What power? What power was that? Voodoo power. It depends on the power of the little ants. The little ants. And some people do a standing. Like one of our ancestors stood up and held a branch of a tree and then died. Zikurashi, with the aid of little ants, of course, thought of this neat way to do it. What he did is, instead of him sitting up, he was lying down up in his room and he had a hundred of us sitting up. A hundred of us sitting up, and then he died. But that depends on the strength of the little ants, right?

[41:16]

That his zazen is enough to get a hundred of us to sit there while he was dying. Pretty good, huh? Interesting little twist on the story, do you think? So those kind of tricks, which, I don't know why Zen teachers do that at the last minute, but anyway, those kind of tricks depend on his power. Surely then, to grasp the turning of the opportunity, to grasp the turning, of the opportunity. You know about turning opportunity? Do you? What? Well, you know, things happen to you, right? Great things happen to you throughout your life. People say hello to you, people say goodbye to you, your legs hurt, lunch come. Many things happen, right?

[42:17]

These are called opportunities. Can you turn these opportunities to use these opportunities as Ways to turn and wake up. Okay? Turn. Ordinary. Shonavasa, I guess. Who was it? Kanadeiro. Nagarjuna dropped a needle in some water and Kanadeiro woke up. Is that it? So he was doing zazen at the time so he could grasp the opportunity of this needle falling in the water. Amal. So these things happen. These people have grasped these opportunities and woke up on. This depends on Zaza, they say. And to present the verification of a cord with a whisk, a fist, a stab, or a shot, these are not to be understood through the discrimination

[43:24]

through discriminations of thinking, much less can they be known through the practice and verification of supernatural powers. They must present conduct beyond sound and form. How could they fail to provide a standard before knowledge and understanding? So again, there is a voluntary side of this practice, and the voluntary side we should volunteer for. And we should totally volunteer for the volunteer section, and not go back at all, and not overdo it either. We should get the mark in the realm where we could get the mark. And then, The side which is beyond seeing and hearing, which is also inside of us.

[44:32]

The involuntary side of our life will meet the voluntary side. The involuntary side will salute and say, yes, sir, or yes, ma'am, to the voluntary side. But the involuntary side somehow doesn't come forth in terms of our awareness unless we do the voluntary side. Therefore, it does not matter whether one is very smart or very stupid. Stupid people volunteer to be stupid. And a stupid person can be really stupid. And smart people have to be smart. Stupid people should just be stupid. There is no distinction between those of sharp and dull faculties in this situation.

[45:41]

Single-minded exertion is itself pursuit of the way. Practice and verification are by nature undefiled. Advancement to enlightenment is just an everyday affair. In our world and other quarters, from the Western heavens, India, to the Eastern Earth, China, All equally maintain the Buddhist zeal, while each enjoys its own style of teaching. They devote themselves only to sitting. They are obstructed by fixedness.

[46:43]

Though they speak of ten thousand distinctions and a thousand differences, they only study Zen and pursue the way. Though they speak of ten thousand distinctions and a thousand differences, they only study Zen and pursue the way. Though they may read tables of contents, Why abandon the seat in your own home and wander in Maine through dusty regions of another land? If you make one false step, you miss what is right before you. Since you have already attained the functioning essence of a human body,

[47:54]

The other translation was, since you have already attained the pivotal opportunity of a human form, human form, you know, you can turn around on a human form. We have this wonderful opportunity. You've got to. Since you have attained the functioning essence, the pivotal opportunity of a human body, do not pass your days in vain. When one takes care of the essential function of the Buddha way, when one takes care of the essential function of the Buddha way, Oh, I didn't notice this before. In this little section of the .

[49:02]

He first says, you've attained the functioning essence. And then he says, when one takes care of the essential function. Functioning essence, essential function. Those are the same words at the beginning of that poem that I read yesterday. The essential function of all the Buddha, the functioning essence of all the ancestors. Functioning essence, the central function. So you've got the functioning essence. You've got the essence that's functioning. OK? You've got the essence that's functioning. Your body is the essence functioning. Your body is the Dharmakaya, the essence in history, in a place in history.

[50:09]

These are functioning essences. These are the essences that's functioning, all these bodies. OK? So since your body and mind is the essence functioning, then you should take care of the essential function of the essential function. And if that's what you're doing, taking care of this essential function of the Buddhas and ancestors, because you have to, really, to be happy because you are the essence function. If you don't take care of the essential function, you're not being what you really are. So if you're doing that, who could Who can carelessly enjoy the spark of a flint? Well, I can. Verify form and substance are like dew on the grass. Well, I didn't say very fast.

[51:11]

Verily, form and substance are like dew on the grass. And the fortunes of life are like a lightning flash. In an instant, they are empty. In a moment, they are lost. Eminent students of the Dharma. Am I talking to anybody in this room? Again, I told you before, I'm not talking to you. Get out of the way, because I'm talking to somebody right around you, OK? I'm talking to you. And don't anybody shake their head when I say this. Eminent students of the Dharma, that's penetrating to who you are. Listen to this. Don't get in the way. Eminent students of the Dharma, long accustomed to groping for the elephant, pray, please, do not doubt the true dragon.

[52:19]

Apply yourselves to the way that points directly to reality. Honor the person who is true with learning and free from all action. Accord with the enlightenment of all the Buddhas. Succeed to the samadhi of the ancestors. If you achieve this way for a long time, you will be this way. Your treasure store will open of itself, and you will use it as you will. You may not know what Buddhism is, but you can still have confidence that it's happening here, that you're on the Buddha way already, that you are an eminent student of the Dharma.

[54:17]

And you're going to live up to that responsibility that an eminent student of the Dharma can fulfill. Somebody hears this. Somebody believes this. Somebody has confidence. And feel whole about this kind of talk. Please let this person walk out of this and help people. Thank you for what you've done. I'm really impressed with the new people who just walked in here and did this. And I'm really happy to have so many senior people sitting too. You new people don't know how senior some of the people you're sitting with are. But there's hundreds and hundreds of years of practice in this room, in this lifetime.

[55:28]

I feel, I feel really confident in the practice book here in a Green Dolch now.

[55:51]

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