Okay, try again. So this morning I'd like to talk about time. And I thought the title of the talk might be, There's No Time Like the Present. But then I thought about it more and I thought, really, there's no time but the present. And that's what I'm going to be kind of getting at in a few different ways. So I thought I'd start by saying why the topic of time rose up for me and kind of grabbed me. I think the first reason is that a few years ago, Uji, the cat who lives at Tassajara, came to my door and came to live with me. We kind of chose each other. And when I first heard her name, I thought it was a funny name for a cat.

[01:10]

I didn't realize that it was the name of Dogen's fascicle, Uji, which means being time or time being. And when I heard that, it seemed like a perfect name for a cat. And then I tried to read Uji and it didn't make any sense to me at all. So that's been a fascicle that I've wanted to understand and read again. And so this seemed like an opportunity to study Uji. And then many years ago, I heard Thich Nhat Hanh say, present moment, wonderful moment. And that phrase has stayed with me, present moment, wonderful moment. And it reminds me about coming back to the present moment.

[02:12]

It also reminds me how easy it is to slip away from being aware in the present moment. And I realize how caught up I am, as probably a lot of us are, in clock time, the time that is kind of limiting in some ways, where I often found myself saying, I don't have time to do this or that, or just feeling that time is fleeting and not very spacious. And yet, I've always loved the phrase that fairy tales start with, once upon a time, a long time ago. When you hear that phrase, or when I hear that phrase, time kind of opens up. And it's magical, things that happened a long time ago could be happening now. And that kind of boundary, the clock time, dissolves.

[03:14]

So, for all those reasons, I thought it would be interesting to explore time. And then also, in reading the Lotus Sutra, there's a way of getting into this kind of vastness of time that is offered in the Lotus Sutra. So, it seemed that this was a good practice period to be looking at time. And I found that as I've been studying time, it's actually helped my zazen practice. It's supporting me to stay in the present moment. So, I thought I'd try to weave that into the talk as well. So, I'm going to start with a poem that I wrote that Valerie requested at the end of my last talk, because I think it might help us get into Tassajara time. It's called, The Road.

[04:17]

The Monastery Needs the Road The fourteen rutted miles Rising to the crest Descending to the valley The hairpin curves Sharp rocks Steep cliffs Nothing to catch you if you fall This road dictates slow driving Sturdy vehicles Care and attention Yes, get carried away by the ancient oaks The occasional wild boar The limestone bones of the hills bared to the vast sky Get carried away, but keep your eyes on the road and take your time When you reach the monastery, you have already been on a journey through the wilderness The monastery needs the road So, slowing down a little bit, I think this talk is going to be a journey

[05:28]

through, maybe a journey that might take you to Disneyland, the ocean, and downtown Los Angeles. A trip that has different parts to it, and hopefully will take us back home at the end. So I'm going to talk a little bit about Thich Nhat Hanh's view of time in the Lotus Sutra, and read part of the Lotus Sutra, chapters 15 and 16, parts of them, and then talk about Uji, the time being, and also Ken Wilber, a short piece from a book of his called No Boundary. And we'll see how all of this relates to our Zazen practice.

[06:31]

And I want to thank a few people for helping me with this talk. Linda Ruth, who studied Uji with me one afternoon, and Shannon, who lent me her notes from a class that Norman Fisher gave about Uji, and Rarin, who found she was reading the Ken Wilber book and showed it to me, lent it to me, and then Judith, Mako, and Graham, who talked with me about time, and Leanne, who lent me her warm room to study in on a cold afternoon. So many people have helped me with this talk. So to start with Thich Nhat Hanh, he talks about the Lotus Sutra and time by showing the difference between the historical view of time

[07:43]

and the ultimate view of time in the Lotus Sutra. And the historical view of time is kind of our conventional view of time, where there's a past, present, and future, and where Shakyamuni Buddha actually lived for 80 years in his body in India and preached. He became enlightened and taught and died. The places where he lived are real places. You can go to them on pilgrimage and see where his life took place. That's the historical dimension of Shakyamuni Buddha's existence. But there's another way of looking at Shakyamuni Buddha as being present for billions of years, billions of kalpas,

[08:48]

in an incredibly vast, such a huge space of time that we can't grasp it with the rational mind. And that's what Thich Nhat Hanh refers to as the ultimate view of time. And in that view of time, the Buddha is with us now, and we are all Buddhas. So that's another very powerful way of looking at time. And there's a metaphor that Thich Nhat Hanh uses that really helped me to understand this, the metaphor of the wave and water. And so I'm going to read a little bit. When we look at a wave on the surface of the ocean, we can see the form of the wave, and we locate the wave in space and time. Looking at a wave from the perspective of the historical dimension, it seems to have a beginning and an end, a birth and a death.

[09:51]

A wave can be high or low. A wave can be long or short. Many qualities can be ascribed to the wave. The notions of birth and death, high or low, beginning and ending, coming and going, being or non-being, all of these can be applied to a wave in the historical dimension. So we've all been to the ocean and seen waves, and you have a sense of them arising and disappearing. So we too are subject to these notions. When we look from the historical dimension, we see that we are subject to being and non-being. We are born, but later on we will die. We have a beginning and an end. We have come from somewhere and we will go somewhere. That is the historical dimension. All of us belong to this dimension. Shakyamuni Buddha also has a historical dimension,

[10:53]

which I just talked about. At the same time, all beings and all things also belong to the ultimate dimension, the dimension of reality that is not subject to notions of space and time, birth and death, coming and going. A wave is a wave, but at the same time it is water. The wave does not have to die in order to become water. It is already water right in the present moment. We don't speak of water in terms of being or non-being, coming and going. Water is always water. To talk about a wave, we need these notions. The wave arrives and passes away. It comes from somewhere or has gone somewhere. The wave has a beginning and an end. It is high or low, more or less beautiful than other waves. The wave is subject to birth and death. None of these distinctions can be applied to the wave in its ultimate dimension as water.

[11:57]

In fact, you cannot separate the wave from its ultimate dimension. Even though we are used to seeing everything in terms of the historical dimension, we can touch the ultimate dimension. So our practice is to become like a wave. While living the life of a wave in the historical dimension, we realize that we are also water and live the life of water. That is the essence of practice. Thinking about water as perhaps the dharmakaya, the dharma body of the Buddha, and the wave as the nirmanakaya, they both have a reality. Although the dharmakaya we can't really grasp, we can't grasp it through our senses or grasp it at all. The place in the Lotus Sutra where the distinction

[13:10]

between the historical dimension of the Buddha and the ultimate dimension really comes forth in chapter 15 and 16. Chapter 15 is called Springing Up Out of the Earth. And it starts with... We're still in chapter 15 in that place in the sky with the great stupa. And I'm just going to read a little bit from chapter 15 and talk about it. At that time, the Bodhisattva Mahasattvas, who had come from other lands, numerous as the sands of eight Ganges, arose in the great assembly and with folded hands saluted and spoke to the Buddha, saying, World Honored One, if the Buddha will allow us, after his extinction,

[14:20]

diligently and zealously to protect and keep, read and recite, copy and worship this sutra in the Saha world, we would preach it abroad in the land. And then the Buddha said to these Bodhisattva Mahasattvas, there's no need for you to preach it because I've already taught this sutra to an infinite number of Bodhisattva Mahasattvas. And at that moment, all these Bodhisattvas sprang forth from below, each one of them leading a retinue as many as the sands of 60,000 Ganges. So this enormous number of Bodhisattvas arose from the earth, all followers of the Buddha, all having been taught the Lotus Sutra.

[15:21]

And Maitreya then asked, How could this be? Where have all these Bodhisattvas come from? And how could you possibly have preached the Dharma to so many people in your short lifespan? And the Buddha says, All these great Bodhisattvas from numberless kalpas have studied the Buddha wisdom. All of them are my converts. What I now speak is the truth. Believe me, with single minds, I, from a long distant past, have instructed all this host. And then Maitreya and the numberless Bodhisattvas and others were seized with doubt and perplexity, wondering at this rare thing, and reflected thus, How has the world-honored one, in so short a time, instructed such innumerable, countless asankhyas

[16:24]

of great Bodhisattvas and caused them to abide in perfect enlightenment? In so short a time, how hast thou done such great Buddha deeds and by Buddha power and Buddha merit taught such an innumerable host of great Bodhisattvas to attain enlightenment? So, this is the question Maitreya poses to the Buddha. And in the next chapter, chapter 16, it's called Revelation of the Eternal Life of the Tathagata, the Buddha explains how this happened. And, My good son, since I veritably became Buddha, there have passed infinite, boundless, hundreds of thousands of myriads of kotis of nayutas of kalpas. So, the Buddha says that he has been the Buddha

[17:30]

for this enormous period of time. And, since I became Buddha, in the very far distant past, my lifetime is of infinite asankhya kalpas forever existing and immortal. Good sons. Then he explains something about the understanding we have that the Buddha only lived for 80 years. The lifetime which I attained by pursuing the Bodhisattva way is not even yet accomplished, but will still be twice the previous number of kalpas. But now, in this unreal nirvana, I announce that I must enter the real nirvana. In this tactful way, the Tathagata teaches all living beings. Wherefore, if the Buddha abides long in the world, men of little virtue who do not cultivate the roots of goodness and are spiritually poor and mean,

[18:31]

greedily attached to the five desires and are caught in the net of wrong reflection and false views, if they see the Tathagata constantly present and not extinct, they will then become puffed up and lazy and unable to conceive the idea that it is hard to meet the Buddha or develop a mind of reverence for him. Therefore, the Tathagata tactfully teaches, no bhikshus, the appearance of Buddhas in the world is a rare occurrence. So, he's saying that just the whole idea of the Buddha having lived for 80 years is tactful means. It's a way of inspiring us to keep practicing because we think that life is short and that Buddhas rarely appear. And in the historical dimension, that's true. But in the ultimate dimension, the Buddha has always been here.

[19:33]

Then he talks about a parable, the parable of a good, of a doctor who has, he's a very wise doctor and he has many sons and business takes him on a trip to another country. And while he's away, his sons drink all the medicines that he's left behind, some of which are poisonous. And some of them become very ill and are rolling on the ground. And at this moment, the father comes back home and he sees what has happened to his sons. And of the sons who drank the poison, some have lost their senses, others are still sensible. But on seeing their father approaching in the distance, they are all greatly delighted

[20:34]

and kneeling salute him asking, how good it is that you are returned in safety. We in our foolishness have mistakenly dosed ourselves with poison. We beg that you will heal us and give us back our lives. The father cares about his sons and so he finds some herbs and mixes them up and offers them to his sons and says, this excellent medicine with color, scent and fine flavor, altogether perfect, you may now take and it will at once rid you of your distress so that you will have no more suffering. So some of the sons take the medicine and they are cured. But there are others who, although they're happy that their father is home and greet him and ask him to heal their illness, are unwilling to take the medicine. And you might wonder why,

[21:35]

why won't they take the medicine? But they refuse to take it. And the father reflects, alas for these sons afflicted by this poison, for their minds all unbalanced. Though they are glad to see me and implore to be healed, yet they are unwilling to take such excellent medicine as this. Now I must arrange an expedient plan so they will take this medicine. Then he says to them, you should know that I am now worn out with old age and the time of my death has now arrived. This excellent medicine I now leave here. You may take it and have no fear of not being better. And then he departs again and sends a messenger back to tell his sons that he's died. And now when the sons hear that his father is dead, their minds are greatly distressed and they reflect if our father were alive, he would have pity on us and we should be saved and preserved.

[22:38]

But now he has left us and died in a distant country. Now we feel we are orphans and have no one to rely on. Continuous grief brings them to their senses and they recognize the color, scent and excellent flavor of the medicine and thereupon take it, their poisoning being entirely relieved. The father, hearing that his sons have recovered, seeks an opportunity and returns so that they all see him. All my good sons, what is your opinion? Are there any who could say that this good physician had committed the sin of falsehood? And then the whole assembly answers, no world-honored one. And then the Buddha says, I also am like this. Since I became Buddha, infinite, boundless, hundred thousand myriad kotis of nayutas of asamkhyeya kalpas ago, for the sake of all living beings, by my tactful power, I have declared that I must enter nirvana. Yet there is none who can lawfully excuse me of the error of falsehood.

[23:42]

So he's saying that he's going to die and his limited lifespan is an incentive for everyone to study and practice, fully embrace the Dharma. And there's something about, I think for all of us, having a sense of the preciousness of time sometimes that we feel when someone close to us dies. And I know that this happened for me when my father died this year. And even before that, when my parents, I could see that they were really aging and nearing the end of their life and entered a nursing home. I felt I just really wanted to throw myself into this practice because I didn't know how much time I had myself to live.

[24:44]

And after my father died, it felt even stronger. Do the thing that's most important. Don't put it off because we never know how much time we have. So I think that's the Buddha's story of the doctor leaving and telling his sons that he had died, brought them to their senses. In a sense, it was an incentive for them to take the medicine, which is I think a metaphor for practicing. So in a way, even though we think that conventional time is what's really real, I think this parable and these chapters about the historical

[25:50]

and the ultimate lives of the Buddha may help us to turn that around and see that what we think of as our lifespan being so limited is just a conventional way of thinking about it. But really, there's this vastness that we are also part of. So I think that might be a good segue into Uji. Actually, there's one passage in Thich Nhat Hanh I think that will also help us as a bridge to Uji. In terms of the ultimate lives of the Buddha,

[26:51]

the lifespan of the Tathagata is immeasurable and infinite. Yet even though in ultimate reality the Buddha is not born and does not die, nevertheless, he pretends to be born, to exist for a while, and to enter nirvana to show living beings of the world how to take care of themselves. The Buddha gives us the spiritual medicine we need for the healing and transformation of our bodies and minds, the practice of mindfulness. Now it is up to us to take the medicine and practice diligently so that we too can get in touch with the ultimate dimension and recognize our true nature of no birth and no death. And what this points to is that actually the way we can tap into the ultimate dimension is through practice. And I think Uji, the fast school Uji, helps us to understand that.

[27:56]

So just to say a little bit about Uji. It was written by Dogen in the year 1240, and it's U and Ji, the characters. U means being, having, existence, and Ji is time. So sometimes it's translated as existence time and sometimes being time or time being. And Dogen's view of this time and existence are inseparable. That's kind of maybe a hard concept to grasp. Time and existence are inseparable. And he starts by talking about conventional time. He says, because the signs of times coming and going are obvious, people do not doubt it. We can see the seasons come and go, the hours come and go.

[29:03]

So we think that our conventional idea of time, clock time, is real. But then he says, see each thing in this entire world as a moment of time, including the self. The self is time. So time isn't just clock time. And if you begin to question that, you can begin to see that time is unlimited. And then Dogen says, each moment is all being. Each moment is the entire world. And I think this is so hard to understand because it's beyond concepts. It's like our conceptual mind has trouble grasping this, that time is the same as self and the same as consciousness and Buddha.

[30:08]

Time is not separate from you, Dogen says. You are the time being right now. So our being is beyond a linear sense of time. And then he says a pine tree is time, bamboo is time, everything is time. And Norman says about this, we encounter this multidimensional bursting with life way, like everything is imbued with time and time is everything. Then Dogen says, do not think that time merely flies away. And that's our conventional notion of time. Do not see flying away as the only function of time. If time merely flies away, you would be separated from time.

[31:13]

In essence, all things in the entire world are linked with one another as moments because all moments are the time being. They are your time being. And when he says all things in the entire world are linked with one another as moments, that brings up for me the way we're all interconnected. The idea that everything arises dependent, co-arising. Because of this, that arises. There's nothing that's separate from anything else. And all of us are time. I'm going to skip some. There's a phrase that jumped out when Linda Ruth and I studied this. Vigorously abiding in each moment is the time being. And the way we can experience that is through our practice.

[32:18]

From moment to moment, if you're present in zazen, you're vigorously abiding in each moment. And fully present. Everything is there in that moment. I don't know if I can express it. Well, I don't know if I can express it. So I'll read a little more Dogen because I think he expresses it really well. People only see times coming and going and do not thoroughly understand that the time being abides in each moment. Even if people recognize the time being in each moment, who could give expression to this recognition? So it's very hard to get at, to explain it to.

[33:23]

Yeah. And then he goes on to say the time being is entirely actualized without being caught up in nets or cages. Again, it's our conventional way to kind of try to box it in. Because then it's easier to understand clock time in a way than this other time being. But these next lines, I think, are really magnificent. The time being of all beings throughout the world in water or on land is just the actualization of your complete effort right now. I'm going to read that again. The time being of all beings throughout the world in water or on land is just the actualization of your complete effort right now.

[34:25]

All beings of all kinds in the visible and invisible realms are the time being actualized by your complete effort flowing due to your complete effort. Without your complete effort right now, nothing would be actualized. Nothing would flow. So I think that says that as we practice fully, we are holding up the world in a sense. And each being creates the world as it is so that what we do and how we practice really makes a difference. The time being of all beings throughout the world in water or on land is just the actualization of your complete effort right now. And since we're all connected with all beings everywhere,

[35:32]

if we're putting out our effort and living fully, practicing fully in every moment, this benefits all beings everywhere. So I think that's the real beauty and gift of this practice and of this fascicle, uji. And it reminded me of a phrase in this self-fulfilling, self-receiving samadhi. The last practice period we studied this with Paul. It's part of the Vendawa. So this will probably sound very familiar. This being so, the zazen of even one person at one moment imperceptibly accords with all things and fully resonates through all time. Thus in the past, future and present of the limitless universe, this zazen carries on the Buddha's teaching endlessly.

[36:37]

Each moment of zazen is equally wholeness of practice, equally wholeness of realization. And that brings us back to the present moment of practice. And I think the sense that as we're present moment by moment, breath by breath with our practice, we're benefiting all beings everywhere. So how can we do this? One thing that came up for me last session

[37:40]

was a routine that I found very helpful, actually. Linda Ruth pointed out to me in Doksan that my mudra was kind of falling down. Tilted this way and my hands were in my lap. And so I started working on, say working on or working with or anyway, being mindful of my mudra in zazen. And I placed my hands in the mudra and take a few breaths. And then I noticed that my mudra had slipped down. So for a while I practiced counting my breaths. And I'd get to three or four and start thinking and then notice that my mudra had fallen again. And it seemed every time I started thinking, my mudra fell.

[38:41]

So as I paid more and more attention to the mudra and the breath, I was able to interrupt the chain of thoughts more readily. And I found myself daydreaming much less and being much more present. It was a constant, you know, it was wonderful to have something physical to help bring me back to the present moment. So, whether it's the mudra or the breath or posture, all of these things that can help us stay present. You may have your own way of coming back to the present moment.

[39:49]

Anyway, that I found very helpful in not drifting off. I want to say a little bit more about the present moment and refer to Ken Wilber, who's someone I've never been able to read before. I found him kind of daunting. But Ken Wilber kind of explores consciousness and he draws from many thinkers and poets and spiritual disciplines in his writing. This chapter is called The No Boundary Moment. And he says, he's really talking about how we can experience the timeless moment,

[40:55]

the moment where we're totally in the present. And one way to do this is through the senses. If you think about it, you know, if you hear a sound, whether it's my voice or when we're sitting zazen, sometimes you can hear sounds in the kitchen or the creek, or not so many now, but in the summer, birds. And each sound we hear, we hear in the present. And he says, you cannot hear past sounds, nor can you hear future sounds. The only thing you ever hear is the present. And just as all sounds are only present sounds, so all tastes are only present tastes. All smells are present smells, and all sights are present sights. You cannot touch, see, or feel anything resembling a past or a future.

[41:59]

So that staying with the senses is a very helpful way of being in the present. And I think that's the same with the mudra, posture, breath. All of these are only things you can experience in the present moment. And so we can understand that in our direct experience through the senses, there's no past, only an endless present. Still, most of us are firmly convinced that we know something about the past. The past kind of seems very real. And Wilbur says that that's because of memory. We have memories of the past. We've read things about the past. But actually, memory itself is the present experience.

[43:07]

If you're sitting and you think about something that happened earlier in the day, that thought is happening in the present. And Alan Watts, Wilbur just referred to, refers to something Alan Watts says, which I'm going to read. What about memories? Surely by remembering, I can also know what is past. Very well. Remember something. Remember the incident of seeing a friend walking down the street. What are you aware of? You are not actually watching the veritable event of your friend walking down the street. You can't get up and shake hands with him, or get an answer to a question you forgot to ask him at the past time you are remembering. In other words, you are not looking at the actual past at all.

[44:13]

You are looking at a present trace of the past. From memories you infer there have been past events, but you are not aware of any past events. You know the past only in the present and as part of the present. So we think we know the past, but we only know it as we are thinking about it in the present. And it's the same with thoughts about the future. We may have plans or anxieties, worries about the future, but we are experiencing those in the present. And Wilber goes on to say that for most of us, or most of the time, we are so caught up in thoughts of the past or concerns about the future.

[45:06]

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