You serve as a profound and wondrous Dharma. It is rarely met with, even in a hundred-thousand-million-kalpas. Good morning, everyone, and welcome. This morning I'm going to talk about the inner dynamic of Zazen and Zen practice. And I will talk about that in terms of teachings of Ehei Dogen, the 13th century founder of Japanese Zen, who I talk about somewhat often.

[01:12]

And his teachings are sort of the foundation of our practice. I did one of our five classes yesterday on Dogen's basic teachings. What I want to do today is just mention a few basic teachings about Zen and Zen practice. And then we'll look at one of his essays and use some of the material on that. So maybe foremost teaching principle of Zen practice for Dogen is, in Japanese, shisho no ito, the oneness of practice realization. This is kind of fundamental to our practice, that practice is not, unlike almost everything else in our life, in our activity, practice, zazen, and the expressions of it, you know, beyond our formal sitting, is not something we do

[02:21]

in order to get some result later on. We don't practice as a technique or a method or a means to achieve some enlightenment in the future. Realization or enlightenment is kind of foundational to our practice. So whatever brought you to consider spiritual practice is in some sense, this realization. Of course, it can develop and grow and blossom in our lives, but we don't practice as a method or technique for something in the future. We practice right now. So the practice is our expression of Buddha here, now, this morning. And similarly, realization or enlightenment is not some abstract event, it's not some understanding or experience that will happen later on.

[03:23]

Realization or enlightenment is not truly realization unless we put it into practice. So our practice is an expression of this oneness, this mutuality of practice realization. And this is actually kind of subtle and radical. Most of what we do in our life, we do, well, okay, I won't assume that for everyone, but a lot of what we do and what we're trained to do in our culture is to do something so that we get some result later on. We study to get a good grade, or we do our work so that we get a paycheck and salary and can pay the rent and so forth. But one of the basic principles of this practice is to learn to just be wholeheartedly expressing the activity and the reality we are in right now.

[04:28]

So it's not a practice for something later, and realization itself is not, or enlightenment, is not a matter of some particular understanding or fancy experience. It's actually only enlightenment if we actually put it into practice, if we express it, if we live it in our lives. So that's the first basic principle. A couple of other teachings that I'll mention. You can make a list of six or seven basic teachings of Dogen, but I'm just going to talk about three today. One that he talks about a lot is going beyond Buddha. So a lot of spiritual practice is about reaching some ultimate experience or ultimate understanding, attaining Buddhahood. But the way we practice here is not about reaching some special attainment. Buddha is only Buddha when Buddha is going beyond Buddha.

[05:33]

So he uses this phrase a lot, to go beyond. So it's possible to have some dramatic experience of awakening. Buddha just means the awakened one. It's possible to have some really deep experience of that. It's also possible to have some understanding of what Buddha is or how Buddha is in our own lives. But the point is that Buddha is an ongoing dynamic activity. So all Buddhas are going beyond Buddha. Whatever Buddha you are right now and whatever Buddha you understand or have experienced, that's great. And this is an ongoing practice. So the historical Buddha Shakyamuni, 2500 years ago more or less in what's now northeastern India, became the Buddha for our cycle of history when he had his Amitāra Samyak Sambodhi in Sanskrit, his unsurpassed, complete, perfect enlightenment.

[06:38]

But that doesn't mean that he was finished. In fact, in some ways, that was just the beginning of his practice. He continued to meditate every day the rest of his life. And we could say he continued to awaken every day the rest of his life. Buddha meets the new situation of each day and each interaction and each event in the context of awakening. So awakening is not a thing that we can get. You can't go down to the corner store and buy a six-pack of enlightenment. It's a process that is happening. And that requires our... Dogen talks about the Buddha work. It requires... We have a responsibility. We have an ability to respond to the world and to the precepts and the teaching. And we also have, you know, Buddha is only Buddha when we do the Buddha work. So this going beyond, this ongoing awakening is very important.

[07:40]

In some sense, it's the definition of Buddha for Dogon, for our practice. So that's the second one, the oneness of practice, realization, going beyond Buddha. And the third I'll talk about today is a phrase he uses a lot, dropping body and mind. And for Dogen, for us, this means zazen itself, and it also means awakening. So dropping body and mind is what happens when enlightenment is here, when awakening is here. And dropping body and mind doesn't mean like, you know, physical mutilation or lobotomy or something. It's letting go of our attachment to and our versions of and our stories about this body, this mind. So in some sense, our practice is about creating the body of Buddha. We sit in upright posture, whether it's cross-legged, like the Buddha did, or kneeling, or in a chair.

[08:45]

Upright, relaxed, and creating Buddha's body on your cushion or chair. And that's an ongoing process. It's not something that happens once and then we're finished. So dropping body and mind is letting go of our attachment to our idea about who we are. So, you know, Zazen is challenging in both ways. You know, we feel some pain in our knees or our back or our shoulders maybe. And so there's an actual craft to breathing into our body and allowing ourselves to relax completely, let go of the... So all of the mental tensions we have are also reflected in long-held tension in our muscles in various ways.

[09:47]

So to drop body and mind is to let go of that physical holding. And also we see when we sit that our mind is, thoughts keep arising. Sometimes there's a space between the thoughts and that's fine, but the idea is not, the point is not to get rid of thinking, but to be present in the middle of this body, this mind. and to let go of our attachments to it, to allow the experience of what is here to be this experience. So these are three basic principles that Dogen talks about. I want to talk about these more this morning in terms of particular writing of Dogen's, which I've talked about here before, but not in a while. And it occurred to me, just to talk about a few pieces of this is a good way to get into what how these inter-dynamics work. So this writing is from his Dogen Shobo Ganko collection, a big collection of essays.

[10:52]

It's called, in Japanese, Gyōbutsu Igi, and Kazutani Hashino translated that as the awesome presence of active Buddhas. So gyobutsu means active or living or practicing. Actual Buddhas, not just the Buddha that we put up on a platform in the altar. So the wooden Buddha that we bow to is just an expression of the Buddha in all of us. So that's really what we bow to when we bow to a Buddha image. But active Buddhas are actually practicing. Iggy, or we've translated it as awesome presence, also could just be read as dignified manner. So that translation of awesome presence was a little melodramatic, but I still feel good about it. But Iggy also just refers to a kind of manner of and form and decorum, where we express physically and then find within ourselves this dignified manner, this dignity.

[11:57]

So part of Zazen is that we, over time, over this ongoing awakening, find this inner sense of uprightness. So, you know, all of the forms we do in the Zendo and the way we walk in the Zendo and bow into our cushion in a way, and all of those things are not, there's nothing sacred about them in and of themselves, and don't worry about getting it right or doing it perfectly. But to actually take on the manner, the dignity of uprightness, of the awakened ones, is to express that in our body. And we learn something. So, just like the mudra of bowing. So when we bow, the way we bow is with our palms together, fingertips about nose height, and then we incline like this, about a hand's width away from our face. So there's particular forms for these physical practices.

[13:02]

And by doing this, or by doing prostrations as I did, and as we do in our services during our all-day sittings on Monday evening, We express something in our body, this great respect and gratitude, and that becomes part of us. So we do these physical practices as a way of actually sealing some inner awareness. So this awesome presence. I'm just going to look at a few very short sections of this long essay. But it's about finding our own way of being fully present and upright and awesome. You can take it in all kinds of ways, but this practice is awesome. So one of the things that Dogen says early on in this, which is one of my favorite passages from all of Dogen's writings.

[14:06]

He says that, know that Buddhas in the Buddha way do not wait for awakening. So that's, again, this idea of the oneness of practice realization. We're not sitting there waiting for some enlightenment. If we come here often enough on Sunday morning, that some Sunday morning there's going to be this dramatic, wonderful experience. That's not the point. We don't wait for awakening. Awakening is here now. That doesn't mean that you aren't also, you know, you might have a Sunday morning Zazen that's very foggy and sleepy or that's very busy with thinking about stuff or that's filled with sadness for things that have happened in the past week or the past month or throughout our lifetime. This isn't about you know, some idea of Buddha. Dogen elsewhere says that deluded people have delusions about enlightenment. Enlightened beings are enlightened about their delusions.

[15:09]

So we don't wait for awakening sometime in the future. We are expressing the awakening that's here right now. And of course, there's this Buddha going beyond Buddha, this ongoing awakening. Anyway, he says after that, active Buddhas alone fully experience the vital process on the path of going beyond Buddha. This is maybe my favorite sentence in Togon. Active Buddhas just fully experience the vital process on the path of going beyond Buddha. I wrote that on the back of Roxas one year. I don't know if it's on the back of Roxas. Anyway, some people have that on the Roxas. just to fully experience the vital process on the path of going beyond Buddha. So this is a vital process, this is a path. It's not that it's a path to some magical enlightenment in the future. Suzuki Roshi said the world is its own magic, right here, right now.

[16:11]

How do we see this vital process? So this is a Our chemical practice and organic practice, we don't always, you know, we may feel like, oh, that was a wonderful period of zazen, or that was probably a period of zazen, I was sleeping, or my mind was busy, you know, but that's not it. We don't always know what's going on in our zazen, and that's fine. But fully experience, please, this a vital, lively, organic process on the path of going beyond Buddha. So, just to be present with the next inhale and the next exhale, upright, relaxed, expressing Buddha in the body and mind on your Kushner chair. just fully experienced the vital process on the path of going beyond Buddha.

[17:18]

This is something, he continues, that self-manifested Buddhas and the like have never dreamed of. So he talks about various ways that Buddha has been described, but this is part of this tradition and this lineage, this practice that we have inherited. for 2,500 years in every generation, people have kept it alive. And so there's this vital process. He says, because active Buddhas manifest awesome presence in every situation, they bring forth awesome presence with their body, thus their transformative function flows out in their speech, reaching throughout time, space, Buddhas, and activities. So this is something that, you know, as active Buddhas, that Buddhas who are actually practicing Buddha, which, you know, on some level are these great Buddhas, but another level is all of you here are doing this Buddha practice.

[18:29]

So even the first time you come and sit saza, this is what's going on in some way that we don't necessarily, not that we don't necessarily recognize, but that part of the point is that we don't recognize it. in the usual way we recognize things. He talks about that later, and I'm going to mention that. But this sense of bringing forth awesome presence or dignified manner with our bodies, this body, not some other body. It's not about trying to get a better body or whatever. Right here. Thus, their transformative function flows out in speech, reaching throughout time, space, buddhas, and activities. So Suki Roshi, the founder of San Francisco Zen Center, a tradition I'm trained in and connected with, and my teacher's teacher, talks a lot about non-gaining attitude. And this is about not trying, as I was talking about before, not trying to get some particular experience or state of mind, not trying to get whatever we think we want to get from our practice and from our activity.

[19:40]

So again, most worldly activity, the stuff that we do in the world, is about doing something to get some particular result. But this is different. This is, again, it's not waiting for awakening. But also, even though we're not trying to gain something particular, there is a transformative function. So this practice is, you know, something happens, and that transformative function, which happens in the vital process on the path of going beyond Buddha, again, it's not something we necessarily even notice. Sometimes we do. So people who practice here, who've been practicing here for a while, in many cases it's really quite noticeable that something has happened, some transformative function. But it's not necessarily what we think it is, or even what we think we want.

[20:42]

So this non-gaining attitude, it doesn't mean that there's no purpose or function. And this transformative function happens in this body and mind, as we're sitting here. The point that Dogen makes is that this flows out in our speech and body and activities, reaching throughout time and space through Buddhas and activities. So doing this practice regularly, and I regularly encourage people to do this at home in your spare time, in between times of coming to Ancient Dragons' End Gate every day if you can, or several days a week at least, and even if it's not 30 minutes or 40 minutes, even 15 or 20, whatever, just to have a regular practice of stopping whatever you're doing.

[21:45]

Putting it aside, it's not that you're going to get rid of it, but just, you know, it'll be there. It'll be there on your cushion too. But with it, just finding a space, a space of black wall in your house and, you know, with a chair or some blankets and pillows, finding a way to sit and be present. So this practice is not limited to zazen, formal zazen. So a lot of what we talk about and emphasize is how this transformative function flows out. So when we're doing this practice, when we're settling into this dignified manner, this presence, through our zazen practice, it expresses itself in our everyday activity. And we emphasize this a lot. So we just did walking meditation. It's a slightly more active mode of sitting meditation. It's Zazen. It's a continuing of Zazen. And after this talk, we'll do temple cleaning.

[22:47]

So another way of expressing, again, a slightly more active mode, but mindfully, activity in meditation. in our life. So all of these are ways of just fully experiencing the vital process. So there is a transformative function. Part of it is that we settle and find some inner calm to some extent. Part of it is just that we actually are able to be present in the middle of all of the difficulties and strangeness of the world in our lives. And even when things feel like they're chaotic or when we're going through changes or in the middle of loss or in confusion, how can we be present and manifest this dignified presence? So I want to have some time for discussion. I just want to mention a couple of other sections in this.

[23:48]

There's so much in this essay that is very rich, but he says, although everyday activities of active Buddhas invariably allow Buddhas to practice, active Buddhas allow everyday activities to practice. This is to abandon your body for Dharma, to abandon Dharma for your body. This is to give up holding back your life. to hold on fully to your life. This awesome presence does not only let go of dharma for the sake of the dharma, the teaching of reality, but also lets go of the dharma for the sake of mind. Do not forget that this letting go is immeasurable or unlimited. So this letting go is also about dropping body and mind, just letting go of the ways in which we hold on to our idea about that. There's so much that's so useful in here. One other place, he talks about mistakes and making mistakes.

[25:03]

So this is not being, manifesting awesome presence is not about being perfect or correct. We can misunderstand it in that way. But he said, he's talking about, Well, I'll just read this section. Who would regard this apparition of blossoms in the sky as taking up a mistake and settling in with the mistake? Stepping forward misses it. Stepping backward misses it. Taking one step misses. Taking two steps misses. And so there are mistakes upon mistakes. So he famously, I haven't been able to find this exact quote, but people gloss that his whole life was one continuous mistake. So it's not about being right or perfect, it's how do we learn from the situations that we engage in with this dignified, awesome presence. So each, we will chant the four bodhisattva vows later, which say, Dharma gates are boundless, I've got to enter them.

[26:09]

Every situation, every mistake you make, you may have things you regret, but each situation is a way of entering into reality, entering into awakening. So he says, elsewhere, totally encompassed by Buddhas, active Buddhas, practicing Buddhas are free from obstruction as they penetrate the vital path of being splattered by mud and soaked in water. Which is to say, being right here in the midst of all of the muddiness of the world. So it's not, again, it's not about being perfect or getting everything right. It's about how can you be present and attentive and responsive in the middle of the situation we're in. It's not about changing your body and mind into some idea you have of a perfect Buddha or how you would be a perfect Buddha.

[27:11]

It's actually taking on the situation coming up in the next inhale, and the next exhale, and being present in the middle of it, and being settled in the middle of it, and being, and through this transformative function of ongoing practice and ongoing awakening, we start to be more settled and more responsive and more flexible. We get unstuck from our ideas about how things are and start to be able to be more flexible and see more options for how to respond. We get to know our own patterns of response and our own patterns of greed and anger and confusion more fully, and when we are intimate with ourselves, with these patterns, we see them arising and we don't need to act on them. We don't need to react. We don't need to act in ways that are part of our, you know, family dynamics and psychological patterning and all of that, to put it in Western terms.

[28:13]

We can we have some flexibility. And we also have some steadiness and sturdiness. And I've been talking about this in terms of the situation of things in the world, and as climate damage and all the other unravelings in the world and our society proceed, how to be steady and sturdy and flexible to respond helpfully in the situation in front of us. So one last section I'll just read from and then maybe we can talk about a little and then have some discussion. He says, the teaching of birth and death, body and mind, is the circle of the way and is actualized at once. So also he talks about the very first time he sits us and what happens. Thoroughly practicing, thoroughly clarifying, it is not forced. So actually, you know, we can try and force ourselves to sit in some particular way, you know, force ourselves to try and sit full lotus if we're only doing half lotus or half lotus if we're doing Burmese or whatever.

[29:24]

And that's fine if you can do that, but it's not about forcing some particular practice form. And also, the way Zazen works in us in this vital process on the path, this alchemical way, is not forced either. He says, it is just like recognizing the shadow of deluded thought and turning the light to shine within. So this is actually what happens. We sit, we're not trying to think of anything, we're not trying, you know, but we're not pushing away thoughts either, we just let them go. But we see the shadows in our life, in our body, in the tension in our shoulders or wherever, of deluded thoughts, of patterns, of thinking of things as separate from us. I'm thinking of trying to force things.

[30:25]

So he says, it is just like recognizing the shadow of deluded thought and turning the light to shine within. So this is a basic meditation instruction. The point of our practice is not just to work on ourselves, because of course we are connected, as he said, with all of space and time and many beings. We're not isolated from them as we sit. Our practice is to stop and turn and face the wall, and in some ways turn the light to shine within, to see what's going on here, in this body and mind. So we, in some sense, are turning the light to shine within. Then we get up and do walking meditation or temple cleaning, or go out into our life and express that naturally. But there's this side of Zen practice that we learn, which is to pay attention to how I am, how it is to be this body and mind. So he says, it's like recognizing the shadow of deluded thought and turning the light to shine within.

[31:33]

The clarity of clarity beyond clarity prevails in the activity of Buddhists. This is totally surrendering to practice. So this phrase, the clarity of clarity beyond clarity, you know, sometimes, so this word that is translated here as clarity also means understanding or brightness. And sometimes then students, you know, work at trying to be clear and clarify, you know, things about their life and so forth, and clarify their understanding of the Dharma and so forth. And that's okay, although the great, great Chinese investor, Zhao Zhou, or Zhou Shu, once said, I don't take refuge in clarity. And that's kind of what Dogen's saying here. He's talking about the clarity, of clarity beyond clarity prevails. So this gets to the question of how we know anything.

[32:35]

How are we clear about anything? So, of course, this is not about getting rid of your Western, rational, linear, intellectual mind, which is a wonderful tool, but what is it to be really clear? There's a clarity beyond clarity, Dogen says, which is, I would say maybe something like trust. not faith in the Western sense, but just to see that part of what we realize as we follow this process of Zazen and Zen practice is that we realize we know something not in our ordinary way of knowing or thinking. that we become sensitive to the tension in our shoulders, the confusion in our repetitive thinking and so forth.

[33:36]

And we start to allow the clarity, beyond clarity, to prevail. The awareness that is not just intellectual, but is physical. We know things In our knees and in our shoulders, we know things in various ways beyond our usual sense of clarifying things. This is totally surrendering to practice. One or two more paragraphs. He says, to understand the principle of total surrendering, you should thoroughly investigate mind, which means to pay attention to thoughts and feelings as they come up. It doesn't mean to figure it out and calculate, but yogically to investigate mind. In the steadfastness of thorough investigation, all phenomena are the unadorned clarity of mind. So we start to realize that everything that is happening and will happen and has happened, all phenomena, not just in this skin bag, but throughout everything, is the unadorned clarity of mind.

[34:45]

Although your knowing and understanding are part of all phenomena, you actualize the home village of the self. Wonderful phrase. Although your knowing and understanding are part of all phenomena, you actualize the home village of the self. This is no other than your everyday activity. This being so, the continuous effort to grasp the point in phrases and to seek eloquence beyond words is to take hold beyond taking hold and to let go beyond letting go. So just like he talks about the clarity beyond clarity, there's this subtle art of letting go, which is dropping body and mind beyond our idea of letting go. How do we just really let it be? Let it be. [...] So just to end with this home village of the self, you actualize the home village of the self. So what is home? What is your home village?

[35:49]

You might sit with that question. What is your deepest home village? You might think of the place where you grew up, but you might think about what is most deeply I don't know, true or fulfilling or enjoyable or generous in the home village of the Self, on your cushion or chair. How do we actualize this home village of the Self? How do we come home to our deepest love, our fullest kindness to ourselves and others, because there's no separation really. We're connected with others. Although your knowing and understanding are part of all phenomena, connected to all phenomena, you actualize the home village of the self.

[37:02]

This is not this isolated separate ego self, but how do you really express this home village of the self? So maybe that's enough for me to say this morning. Maybe that's too much to say. But comments, questions, responses, please feel free. Yes, what? A little bit louder, right? That's the where you're thinking this way, and then they say this.

[38:26]

Yeah, Dogen is especially good at that. And if you don't know that, you have to write this out, because you start thinking, I don't understand, I don't understand, I don't understand. But it's important to just stick with it and see what it says. One day, if you come along with it, you will understand these things. And they're not actually riddles. They're speaking the truth. Well, yeah, good, thank you for that. Yeah, so this is, a lot of what he says is subtle, but this thing about understanding, in some ways, the point of this is not to have some understanding, and a lot of the Zen koans and a lot of Dogen, so when you try and read Dogen, worry about understanding. It's like listening to a symphony or bathing in a nice hot tub or something. The point of these teachings is not for you to understand them or figure them out.

[39:28]

But we have a very, very strong, all of our schooling is geared towards trying to understand in that way, to figure out what does this mean? And partly we just have to allow practice to go beyond practice. So the clarity beyond clarity is not about There's a deeper understanding that you can't figure out. And it's not that these sayings and teachings are nonsense riddles for you. They're actually about how the practice body manifests. So some part of you may hear a phrase and it resonates in some ways, and then it's good to just stick with that phrase. Again, it's not about figuring something out. But yeah, that question about understanding. Elsewhere, Dogen says, don't judge different styles or teachings or schools by the profundity of their philosophy or something like that.

[40:42]

See how it's practiced. See how you put it into practice. So it's about the practice. He's not trying to present some philosophy. He's talking to practitioners, like all of you, and trying to encourage them in their practice. And you just have to feel what rings true, what resonates for you. But you need to take something on, to take it on and try it for a while and see, because it doesn't necessarily, you know, it's not about one particular experience. Just settling in is important. Other questions or comments? Yes, Joan. My mind keeps coming back to the phrase about dropping body and mind. Because it always seems to me when I'm sitting that I'm much more in body and mind.

[41:47]

It's like I'm much more aware of both body and mind when I'm sitting. Yeah, so this is about a kind of presence, dignified presence. This is about fully experiencing this process. So this is, you know, maybe a paradoxical one, but somehow when we're fully experiencing body and mind, that's what he means by dropping body and mind. We're not trying to create some other body and mind. We're actually just present with what is. So to fully experience that, yeah, a big part of Zazen is just to be present. And what he's talking about is just to be present. and fully experience the next inhale and the next exhale. And enjoy it. And allow yourself to be present there, beyond your idea of accomplishing something or figuring something out. So thank you, yeah.

[42:49]

Yes, Debra? When you talk about the home village of the self, what occurs to me is it feels to me as if it's the present moment. It's the one village that I come back to over and over again and constantly leave. But my desire, my intention is to come back to it. Yeah, returning is an important part of this practice. So just on the level of when we're sitting, our mind wanders, or we drift off, or we're sleepy or something, and returning to awareness of inhale and exhale. returning to uprightness, returning to this dignified manner. Yeah, it's this, and we could say that this is like returning to, returning home. Returning home also has to do with taking refuge, so we have this formal practice. But in some sense, all of us, what we're doing here this morning is taking refuge, returning to the home of Buddha and Dharma and Sangha.

[43:51]

Yeah, the home village of the self. It's about being in the present, but it's also, it's not... We recognize that this present is deeply connected to everything in the past and everything in the future. We are creating the future right now. So to occupy the space we're in, This is an occupied movement. We're occupying this body, mind, fully, and letting it go again and again and again. Any last comments or comments? Responses or questions? Libby? Yeah, I guess just adding it up. I like the, well, village was evoking this interesting poem. Village was evoking sort of the complexity, diversity, you know, like in a village, like there's so many different kinds of people and situations.

[45:02]

So, that in this present moment, you know, whatever. Yeah. And our own bodies and minds are kind of a village. But also we're connected to the village of everybody we interact with in the past week, or in the past year, or in this lifetime. It takes a village, somebody said. Anyway, we... to create this Buddha body, this awesome presence, this act of Buddha, is a kind of home village practice. So, thank you all very much.

[45:59]

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