I made an appointment to have a massage on August 9th, August 9th, yeah. And then I wrote it down on the calendar and I thought, oh, August 9th, that reminds me of something. What do you think it reminded me of? This is kind of esoteric, I know, but it reminded me that that would be the 43rd anniversary of when I became ordained as a Zen priest. And I was born in 1943. And the person who ordained me, who we sometimes call Suzuki

[01:33]

Roshi, he said one time, I don't know if he said it in public or to me privately, but he said, in some context he said, the job of a Zen priest is to encourage people to practice Zazen. And it just popped in my head that one time when I was the Ino, the director of the formal practice in the Zendo at the city center, after a Sesshin, he said to me, good job. He used the word job. And I was happy when he said that. And now I'm

[02:39]

thinking, was he saying good job at encouraging people to practice Zazen? I didn't ask him good job at what. I thought he meant good job as Ino. But if the Ino is a priest, is it good job when the Ino encourages people to practice Zazen? Nowadays, and it's been the case for quite a while now, that the word Zazen is used by me as a word which refers to another word, and the other word it refers to is enlightenment. So the Zazen that I'm talking about is enlightenment. It's a practice of enlightenment and a realization of enlightenment.

[03:43]

It's not just a realization, it's also a practice of enlightenment. So then I asked myself, do I aspire to inspire people to aspire to practice enlightenment? I feel a little bit, yeah, it seems a little bit, it's almost intrusive that I would aspire to inspire people. But Shakyamuni said that the job of Zen priest is to inspire or encourage people to practice enlightenment. And to practice enlightenment would seem to practice Zazen. That would seem

[04:48]

to follow from aspiring to Zazen, aspiring to practice enlightenment. So maybe I should be more polite and say, if you want somebody to inspire you to aspire to enlightenment, you came to the right place. I aspire to inspire those who would like to be inspired to become Buddha, someday, when the time is right. And I don't know exactly the context where this comes up, but I hear Suzuki Roshi saying,

[06:10]

visible world, maybe we're too attached to visible world. Visible world is not so big, but big enough to be a problem for us. We live in an invisible world, in a big invisible world, which I would say we live in an infinite, immeasurable, imperceptible world. That's a proposal to you from me and from Suzuki Roshi, that we live in an immense, imperceptible world. And we also kind of live in a not such immense, pretty big, but not as big, perceptible

[07:18]

world or visible world. And we tend to be attached to the visible world. The imperceptible, one of the things nice about the imperceptible, invisible world is that it's pretty difficult to get attached to it. But we live there. So I was thinking, I don't know when I was thinking it, but I seemed to be washing my face or something when I was thinking it. What's the relationship between we live in an invisible world, where we tend to be a little bit attached to the visible things, but we also live simultaneously in this really limitless, imperceptible world. How do they relate? And I got the image of a cloud chamber. The visible world is like a cloud chamber. And I thought, oh yeah, in order to have this visible world, we have

[08:22]

to have this cloudiness. We have to have this dust. And then, when we have this cloudiness, we get some sense of the invisible world. The things we can't see, when they pass through the visible world, they make little tracks. Like we can't see gamma rays, but they're going through us all the time, right? I've heard. I think x-rays are going through us too. Is that right? Not unless there's some around. But when they're around, they can go through us. I'm not saying we should. I'm just saying, but when x-rays are going through you, you don't necessarily notice them right away. Gamma rays are going through you. Radio waves, do they go through us? They partially go through us and partially bounce

[09:23]

off. Anyway, lots of stuff is happening that we don't know is happening. We live in it. We also are having a lot of effect on each other right now, like we're exchanging. I'm inhaling your carbon dioxide, I guess, that you gave me. I'm inhaling it along with some oxygen, which you didn't give me, but the plants gave me. So we're breathing with each other. We're breathing with the plants. We're giving them carbon dioxide and each other carbon dioxide. We're receiving, mostly receiving, oxygen. So we're in this relationship, and we're helping each other. We're assisting each other. We're giving each other life. We're guiding each other to enlightenment, but that's not necessarily perceptible. So again, I hear Suzuki Rishi saying, Zazen is to sit in the big invisible world. Zazen

[10:43]

is to sit in the big invisible world. The big, and this is me talking, the big, the immeasurable, imperceptible world. Zazen is to sit there. But also, it doesn't mean that the visible world becomes invisible. We can still see a visible world, and we sit there too. So actually, Zazen is to sit in the visible world, in the invisible world. So we sit in this temple here, which is visible to us, which has other human beings in it, which are visible. We sit in this visible world, with this visible posture. We sit with our visible attempt to be upright, and this visible world that we're sitting in is simultaneously

[11:45]

in an invisible world, and in the invisible world, the Buddhas are teaching us, we're learning, we're practicing enlightenment, we're helping each other do that, but this is not perceptible. We're assisting each other in an imperceptible process of creating the life of enlightenment of the Buddhas. But we are already in that world, but we will not be able to realize that we're in that world unless we take care of the visible world. So we take care of the visible posture and the visible people in the visible temple, as a way to realize that we're sitting in this imperceptible world of unimpeded reality being realized.

[12:49]

So this path of zazen, this path of enlightenment, this path of practice enlightenment, is also called the bodhisattva path. And this, this path of unimpeded reality, this path of practice of the visible body at this visible place, in this visible assembly of beings, is the temple, the visible temple. It's called the bodhimanda, which means the place of enlightenment. Enlightenment doesn't have a place, actually, doesn't have a place, or the enlightenment is actually, you know, it's beyond place or not place. But we must find a place to realize

[14:03]

it, because we live in places. So this place, we must use this place, we must use this place to realize the Buddha way. And we must use this time, this moment. This way of talking is quite familiar in the Zen school, to use this body, in this place, in this time, in this temple, in this community. And I'm just saying, we use this to realize the realm we're actually living. So zazen is to sit in this place, and zazen is to sit in an imperceptible place at the same time. And by taking care of this place with diligence, we will realize the place of the Buddhas.

[15:06]

You're welcome to do so. We have the great practice of window opening now. The visible practice of opening windows. Also I hear Suzuki Roshi saying, before you enter this invisible world, you must realize you might be afraid to enter, because you don't know exactly what it is, or what it will be. Before you enter the big invisible world, you might be afraid. People are often

[16:52]

afraid. It's like being afraid of death. We might be afraid of death because we don't know exactly what it is. However, once we enter, once we have entered, when we re-emerge into the visible world, we will no longer be afraid. We will no longer be afraid.

[17:58]

So, I might say, someone might say, and I might be one of the people that was saying that, that here we are in this place, and the place is called Noh Abode. Here we are in this abode, right? Which is called Noh Abode. So this place is named in honor of the invisibility of where this is. So here we are in this Noh Abode, and we're going to practice enlightenment in this place, which is in Noh place. And we're going to practice at this time, which is in Noh time. So how do we practice with this visible body, and visible place, and visible people? Well,

[19:30]

in order to enter and realize the place where enlightenment is practiced, we have to practice I should say, realize the practice of enlightenment, which occurs in this big world. We practice enlightenment, we practice the six perfections, we practice Zazen with the visible world. Practicing these six virtues with the visible world, we realize the practice in the imperceptible world. We realize the reality of where we already are, and how we already are. So, how do we practice? We train to practice generosity with the

[20:58]

body, as every action of body, speech and mind. We train so that when we're involved in the action of talking, it's a practice of giving. We train to remember that, to remember that every word, every action of verbal karma is a gift. It seems to me, now I'm giving, I want to give you a gift now by saying, it seems to me, that it's hard to remember that every word is offered as a gift. However, it also seems to me that I can sometimes remember

[22:07]

that what I'm saying is offered as a gift, that I wish my words to be gifts. But I seem to notice that I sometimes forget that what I'm saying is a gift, is meant as a gift. I want it to be a gift. And also, when I'm listening, that is also karma. It's the karma of listening. I wish my listening to be a gift. So if I'm listening to you, or listening to the wind, I want my listening, I wish my listening to be the practice of giving. I wish my speech to be compassionate, to be compassion, which means I wish it to be generous.

[23:09]

I wish my seeing to be generous. I wish my tasting to be generous. I want to train so that all my actions of all my senses are gifts, and are the practice of giving, which means they're also receiving gifts. Like I see the colors of the Buddhist flag coming through the crack in the screens behind David. And now the colors of the flag are gone, and I see the colors of a tree. I think I need to train myself so that when I'm seeing colors and hearing sounds, I can remember to practice generosity. I think so, because I notice I sometimes forget. Do you ever forget the practice of giving?

[24:15]

Maybe you do. Do you ever forget that what someone is saying to you is a gift? Maybe you do. I do. But I really do wish, I see no problem in remembering that every moment. I think it's going to be fine if that ever happens. I think it will be just fine. And sometimes there's been quite a while where it has gone on for a while, like moment after moment for five minutes, ten minutes, I haven't noticed it's a problem, and I haven't heard that it is a problem for anybody else. And then we move on to ethics. I would like all my speech to be ethical, to be careful, careful speech. I would like all my speech to be true and gentle, and not disparaging others and putting myself up, and not putting

[25:23]

anybody down, and not saying anything about anybody that would make people care for them less, and so on. I wish to be careful of my speech, of my physical postures and my thoughts. I wish to practice that way. And then I wish to be patient with any hardship I have. Sometimes I have a little hardship. Sometimes I have a little more. I wish to be patient with it. Sometimes, people seem to be insulting me. I wish to be patient with that. Sometimes people seem to want to hurt me. I wish to be patient with that. And sometimes I hear teachings which are just really shocking, like for example, that things aren't happening, that things fail to happen. I wish to be patient with that. And I wish to practice concentration.

[26:31]

I wish to, as a matter of fact, I wish to be enthusiastic about practicing concentration, of developing a mind that is focused, undistracted, open, calm, flexible. I wish to be patient with that. I wish to develop such a mind for the sake of enlightenment. I wish to develop such a mind to deal with the visible world, of visible beings, in visible places. I wish to develop that kind of state of mind. And I wish to develop true understanding of the nature of the visible world, which is the same nature as the nature of the invisible world, which will be realized if I apply these practices to the visible world. So the visible world is a constant opportunity to be practiced with in such a way as to realize

[27:39]

the place of enlightenment, where we must already be. And if we don't respect the place we are, the time that is, the way we are in this place, if we don't respect that with these training practices, we will not realize enlightenment, even though that's where we already are. So, when Suzuki Roshi says, Zazen is to sit in this big invisible world, I agree with him. That really is what Zazen is. But on other occasions, though, he might have said, in order to sit in this big invisible world, we have to sit in this little, troublesome,

[28:46]

invisible world that we tend to be attached to. The price of sitting Zazen in the big invisible world is to sit Zazen in the sometimes very cramped, tight, uncomfortable visible world. And not just to sit there, but to sit there with great joy at this wonderful opportunity of being so little, so constricted. But these are the opportunities of compassion. The big invisible world doesn't really call for compassion, it is the world of compassion. The little world is calling for compassion. So, if you want, I'm happy to inspire, and I aspire to help you aspire to practice compassion in the visible world.

[29:51]

And this is on the verge of me talking to you about something. I wanted to talk to you about practicing concentration in the limited world of the invisible world. Living beings in places and times. I'd like to talk to you about the three times three aspects of concentration. I'd also like to talk to you about the practice of wisdom. Now, the practice of wisdom turns out to be not just practiced in the visible world. So that discussion will also be discussing the practice in the invisible world. But before I launch into this potentially distracting discussion, I invite any feedback

[31:00]

or questions you have. And here they come. Yes? Stenior Charlie? So, I've heard that the job of a Zen priest is to encourage the practice of enlightenment. And it seems to me that's also the job of musicians. So he feels that the job of musicians is to encourage the practice of enlightenment. Okay, I'm glad to hear this. So, does that follow then that the job of a musician is to encourage people to practice generosity towards mechanical waves called sound?

[32:01]

I think so. Yeah. Does that mean that the job of a musician is to encourage people to practice compassion towards tactile sensations? I've heard lyrics about that. Musicians don't usually talk about smells so much, do they? It's mostly tactile and auditory, right? Invisible? Oh, they do a little dance. They show people their body as it's doing that. They show people moving their hands on the keys or on the strings or throwing their hands up in the air and dropping their guitar on the floor. They show people so it's visual, mostly emphasizing those three. So the people who are working on visible, auditory and tactile areas that are involved in music, they're doing that in order to encourage people to practice enlightenment.

[33:06]

That's how you feel, huh? And when they're practicing that, you feel inspired by some of them to practice enlightenment, right? So some people feel inspired to practice enlightenment when they hear Mozart or Bach or Beethoven or Lead Belly, R.E.M., U2, Traffic. Yeah, okay. Anything else? Any other feedback? Yes? For me, talking about practicing in the visible world, I can see where that's good for the visible world. It's a leap of faith for me to say that that will help me to understand the non-visible. And what I find is that I long for just enough of a result to prove

[34:11]

that it's like the right path, so that's the place I get stuck. You said something like you're stuck on something? Wanting enough results to prove... Oh, enough results to prove that practicing with, doing these practices with the visible world will show you the world of reality, allow you to enter it. And you'd like some results to encourage you? Yeah, so again, that's what Siddhartha Girishi said is the job of a Zen priest, and Charlie is saying that's the job of a musician, to show some results to encourage people. So Suzuki Roshi was appearing in the little

[35:12]

world, there he was in the little visible world, there he was, showing some results. He was demonstrating results. He wasn't just saying Zazen is to be a good person in the visible world. Zazen is to... enlightenment is to be a good person in the visible world. He was also saying we need to access a realm beyond the visible in order to fully demonstrate enlightenment in the visible. Because before you enter the invisible, you're still trying to practice maybe kindness, and you may get some results, but he's saying in order to fully encourage people to practice enlightenment, you sort of need to let go of the visible world and enter the invisible. And then, because before you enter, you might be afraid a little bit. And if you're afraid,

[36:20]

you're not showing the results of living in the invisible world. The results of living in the invisible world is you can show people fearlessness, which is a result of having entered even though you're somewhat afraid of giving up what you know. So he was somewhat showing the results of his practice. So you become a Zazen priest or you become a musician to train so that you can show people results of entering the world, the invisible world, so that you can inspire them to do the practices so they can enter the imperceptible realm of all beings helping each other on the path of enlightenment. So you may be stuck because sometimes you don't see some results. So sometimes you say,

[37:29]

I don't see any results. But one of the results you can see, actually that I think you do see, is some of the results are these teachings. These teachings like the teachings of the Buddhas that are somehow appearing in the world. The teachings of the Buddhas are results of the practice of enlightenment. And these teachings, when they touch human beings, human beings think they hear something. And they sometimes write down what they heard. So these teachings are also results of the realization of the imperceptible world of reality. And sometimes you look at these teachings and it looks like this is like results. Like I sometimes, I had a picture of a Sangha up in the altar but it got moved because of other altar activities and now it's in the changing room. But a Sangha, he either wrote down teachings

[38:35]

which he heard from Maitreya, Bodhisattva, or he thought of them from his own meditation, or both. And the stuff he wrote down, I feel like that's results. To be able to write that stuff down, where does that come from? That's a result. To be able to write these teachings is a result. And I look at those results and I feel encouraged by those results. There's also results from not practicing, right? There's results from living in the visible world and treating it with cruelty. Those results we can see too, but they don't encourage us to practice. Well, maybe they do. Actually, maybe they say, well, since that's what happens when you behave like that, so those results also maybe teach us, let's not go that way. We're not going to go that way, but what way are we going to go? It would be nice if somebody showed us that way. So we had this teacher who showed us some results and he told us how to practice in the visible world and he also said, but also, Zazen isn't just practicing

[39:41]

in the world you see, it's also practicing in a world that's all around the world you see. It's practicing in both. And we sort of need to enter the world that we can't see and sit there in order to be really not afraid anymore of the world we can see. So that horrors can appear in our face and they are horrible, but we can say, welcome. You know, I heard that when Gandhi was shot, he continued his blessing practice. He was doing a blessing practice and then somebody came up to him and shot him and he just kept doing the practice before he died. So you're practicing, I bless you, I bless you, may all beings be happy, I'm here to serve you, I want to give my life to you. And then somebody

[40:41]

slaps you in the face or puts a bullet in your body and you say, I still want to. Thank you very much for one more opportunity to practice generosity, to be careful, to not say you're a bad boy. I'll say you're a bad boy, but it's really just a kind of affection. Or that was a good shot. Which reminds me of this Chinese story, this is not a Zen story in a way, but really it is. It's a Chinese story about this guy who was going to be beheaded and he said, if you will make sure that the people who are going to be killed are not the executioner who has a really sharp blade, I will tell you an extremely valuable piece of information. And so the official, the boss, who was having him executed, said, okay,

[41:49]

if you tell me this great thing, I'll... Oh no, I think he was talking to the executioner. He says to the executioner, if you will use a really sharp blade on me, I'll tell you a really valuable secret. And the executioner said, well, what is it? He said, he gave him a recipe for peanut sauce. And the executioner got really angry and chopped his head off really fast. And his head fell off and rolled down the street and then out of his mouth came a piece of paper. The piece of paper said, the blade was sharp. Thank you. That kind of welcoming has to do with enlightenment, that you're not afraid when this blade is hanging over you. You say, whoa, I've been waiting for you, sweetheart, here I am. And

[42:55]

he was a really smart guy, a Roman statesman and writer and poet, really smart. But like all of us, he had some shortcomings, and one of his shortcomings was he was really afraid of any physical discomfort. We all have physical discomfort, horrible physical discomfort sometimes, but the Bodhisattva, this path is to aspire to not be afraid of it anymore. It's coming. How about welcoming it? If you can welcome physical discomfort, then you can be careful with it. And if you can be careful with it, then you can be patient with it. If you can be patient with it, then you can be diligent with it. And if you can be diligent with it, you can be concentrated and relaxed with it. And then you can realize the reality of physical discomfort and become a Buddha. Anyway, he was afraid of physical discomfort. He couldn't welcome it. That's the kind of guy he was. But at the end, they say, when a Mark Antony's

[44:07]

centurion came to visit him to cut his head off, he offered his head. And he said, I don't know. He gave his neck to be dealt with. Any sticking points left? Oh, no. I'm just kidding. Oh, yes. Ah, yes. Somebody was stuck. What is it? More work. Well, that's what Charlie said. He said it's the job of a priest and musician. You feel like it's all of us. I

[45:09]

think what he's saying is that my idea of a Zen priest, did I say priest or Zen priest? Sorry if I neglected the word Zen. The job of a Zen priest is to encourage people to practice Zen, to practice Zazen. I think a Zen priest, in Suzuki Rishi's mind, is a Bodhisattva. So if you are a Bodhisattva, if you aspire to be a Bodhisattva, then your job is to encourage people to practice enlightenment, dash Zazen, dash the Buddha way. So he's saying Zen priests are supposed to be Bodhisattvas. I'm saying he's saying that Zen priests aren't just people who sit in nice temples with beautiful gardens and enjoy serenity. They do that to encourage

[46:12]

other people to sit in beautiful places and enjoy serenity. And sometimes Zen priest temples are falling down on their heads because of lack of maintenance. And their job is to sit there and be calm and relaxed and generous. But not just to be that way, but to encourage others to be that way in their situation where things are falling down on them. So this is a job of a Zen priest, but it's also a job of a Bodhisattva, whether they're a priest or not. A Buddhist priest named Saigyo, who lived in the 12th century, he might have made

[47:13]

it into the 13th, I'm not sure. Anyway, he said, this leaky tumble-down grass hut is a Buddhist temple. Are you living in a leaky tumble-down grass hut? Yes. Me too. Leaky tumble-down grass hut. Some teenagers don't notice that. My little granddaughter, I think, quite frequently notices that she's living in a leaky tumble-down grass hut. And she's just totally horrified by the situation. It just seems like, I have to move this podium here. She sometimes feels like this. She feels totally, what is it, besides herself? She's

[48:15]

like beside herself, feeling sorry for herself. She's like, this is like, there could not be a worse situation in this world. She's able to do that. This leaky tumble-down grass hut left opening for the moon, or leaves an opening for the moon. Now I gaze at it. All the while, it was reflected in the teardrops fallen on my sleeves. And she's like, this is a very special moon. Ah, special moon. Great. Yes. So, early on you were talking about how Zazen is being in the invisible world. Not just being in the invisible world,

[49:20]

sitting there, sitting upright there. It isn't just like, you're sitting there. You're sitting upright and awake in the huge invisible world. Yes. So when I'm sitting Zazen, I feel like I'm in varying proportions from moment to moment doing that, or being in this tiny visible world. It seems like there's a blend of both for me. Well, I would say the blend, that both sides of the both, they're both in the visible world. The big world is not perceptible. The two worlds you told me about are perceptible worlds. But if you're kind to those two worlds, the perceptible little world and the perceptible big world, if you're kind to both of them, you will realize the really big one. Like I remember, this is just my memory,

[50:30]

this is not, this is just a memory, okay? It's a memory of, what's his name, St. Thomas Aquinas? Of course, he didn't speak English, right? So what I'm telling you is not what he said. But he said something like this. He was called a doctor of the church. He wrote quite a bit. He's like perhaps the major scholar of the Catholic Church. He wrote all these huge treatises on theology. And then, when he was quite old, he wrote a book. I don't know what happened, but he woke up in this big world. And he said, everything I've done up till now is like a piece of straw cast into an infinite space. And he didn't write anymore. But he still came to breakfast. And he said,

[51:36]

okay. And with the monks, then he was like a walking proof of the practice, which he finally realized. He had to become this scholar saint before he could wake up. And then all that stuff is like... But still, he could have kept writing, he just didn't. And some people don't write and then they start writing then. But he kept coming to meals. And he was so fat that they carved out the table in the refractory so he could get somewhere near the table with the other monks. Otherwise, he'd be in another room. But by carving out the table, he could be in the same hall with the other monks. So you know, I appreciate St. Thomas Aquinas for his great work and his great realization

[52:51]

that all of our stories are... But we have to take care of the straw in order to realize where it is and how wonderful where it really is. We have to really take care of the straw. And of course we have plenty of straw, right? Which reminds me of that other story called Rumpelstiltskin. Do you know the story of Rumpelstiltskin? Yeah, because you grew up in Germany. Rumpelstiltskin lived in Germany, I think. Or Poland or something. Or maybe he lived in Czechoslovakia. Anyway, he lived in the central part of Europe. And you know that story, right? So there's a miller who says, you know, I think I'll go to town. So he goes to town and there's this big announcement and the king says, I'm going to tell you a

[53:59]

story. If anybody has a suitable daughter, you know, an above average daughter, and suitable to be my wife, well then I'll marry her. And then guess what? She'll be the queen. And then guess what? Her father will be rich. So this miller, who had a daughter, he thought, maybe I could convince the king to marry my daughter. And then I'll be rich. And so the king says, anybody have any daughters they wish to recommend? This guy raises his hand and says, yeah, I got a daughter and she's quite special. She can spin straw into gold. The king says, that sounds good to me, bring her. And by the way, if you're not telling

[55:00]

the truth, this won't be good for you. Something bad will happen to you. I won't get into the details right now because this is a Buddhist temple. So the guy says, oh my God, now I'm in trouble. He's going to test her. And if she can't do it, I'm in big trouble. So he goes home and tells his daughter and she says, oh daddy, daddy, that wasn't good. He says, well, you're going to kill me if you don't go and give it a try. She says, okay daddy. So she goes and the king says, welcome. Let me show you to the straw area. So he brings her to a large room full of straw. Because I guess he wants a lot of gold, so he gives her a lot of straw. Well, we got a lot of straw, right? So we can have a lot of gold if we know how to deal with straw properly. So anyway, she's sitting there and she doesn't

[56:04]

know how to do it. And she starts crying and this person comes to her. And this person comes to her and he says, what's the matter dear? And she says, well, she explains the situation. He says, oh, well, I can spin straw into gold. I'll do it for you. And she says, you will? And he says, yeah, he does. He spins the straw into gold. And the king comes the next morning and he says, my God, the room is full of gold. So that's our practice, right? Is to spin straw into gold to save our daddy. We've got the straw. We've got the ability to write great theological treatises. We've got the ability to cook. We've got the ability

[57:07]

to make music. We've got the ability to have a body that has all kinds of troubles and a mind. So we can practice, we can convert all this stuff into gold, into enlightenment. But the reason I brought this story up is twofold. One is because of the straw. All this stuff is just straw. Everything in the visible world is just straw. It's just a smoky straw version of the gold of our life, right? So that's why I brought this story up, because of St. Thomas Aquinas. But if you're not kind to the straw, it's not going to turn into gold. It's just going to get mildewed. And you know what happens, that mold is not good

[58:08]

for you. But if you're kind to the straw, it will become gold. And then it's the job of a Zen priest to spin straw into gold. And it's the job of a Bodhisattva to spin straw into gold by treating the straw in a certain way, which is called training in these virtues of how to take care of straw. But the next part of the story is usually the reason why I bring it up, is because after her assistant spins the straw into gold, the king says, that was great, but actually I got another room that has much more straw on it, and I want you to spin that room of straw into gold. And so now she's in the same difficult situation, but even more so, and that's the characteristic of the Bodhisattva path. When you're able to be kind to your straw and convert it into gold, your reward

[59:15]

is to get more straw. Or as a friend of mine said, no good deed will go unpunished. This person that says that, she really astounds me, this person, how many good deeds she does. She's amazing. And she does get punished for her good deeds on a regular basis. I'm just like, wow, you're doing that for that person? Amazing. And then she comes and tells me the punishment. And I think, I wouldn't have done it in the first place, so I wouldn't have that punishment. It would never occur to me to do that. Wow, it's just amazing. It's amazing the good deeds people think of, and then it's amazing the punishment they get. So she does this good deed with her assistant, she and her assistant do this good deed, and then their reward is twice as much to do. So she cries again, and he comes again, and

[60:21]

that room gets turned into gold too, but then as you know, the second time he says, well, I'll do it again, but this time you've got to give me something. That part of the story I've not been able to integrate into the Bodhisattva path. The main thing is, if you practice, your reward will be that bigger challenges will come to your presence, your generosity, your ethics, your patience, your concentration, and your wisdom. That's how you grow. So you'll be rewarded with greater challenges if you practice, and that's how you grow. It isn't like the results won't be that there's no more things to work on. Rather, the results will be more difficult things to work on. Not always. Sometimes the results are less

[61:22]

difficult, just to sort of set you up with a little trick for when you think, oh yeah, the result is that it gets easier. Easier is not the same as joyful. Easier is not as wonderful. Easier is not the same as wonderful. It could be. Easier could be wonderful, but it's not exactly the same. Sometimes harder is wonderful. Yeah, the practices we're using to deal with the straw, to realize that it's gold, those

[62:29]

practices are coming from those who have learned how to treat the straw in such a way that they've realized it's gold and now they've transmitted these practices to us, and we do a straw version of these practices, but still it does show us the truth eventually. So these teachings are coming from the realm of liberation. The teachings are coming from the realm of reality, but we convert them into straw. But still, the straw teachings are telling us how to deal with the straw. Anything else at this time? Any other feedback? Yes? I thought I heard you say that it's important to remember to practice generosity and etcetera. Is that what you said?

[63:33]

Yeah, I think it's important to remember. Otherwise, I don't know. I find it's important to remember because when I don't remember, I sometimes forget. Some people practice generosity and hardly even notice that they remember. It's become instinct that they have a generous response and hardly even notice that they remember. I wouldn't say it's better, it's just that I think that way, when it's become an instinct, it becomes more continuous. The theory is that after you enter the realm of reality, then the same practices you remembered, you now do spontaneously. You don't have to have any additional effort over the effort of doing them. But before you're continuous in these

[64:39]

practices, remembering does seem to be helpful or necessary. And would you also recommend noticing that you remembered? I don't think it's necessary. If I remember practicing generosity, I don't think it's necessary to notice that I remembered. But I think it would be okay to say, oh, I remembered. It's like somebody slaps me in the face and I remember. That reminds me of Jesus, right? Slap you in the face, give the other cheek, right? Somebody slaps me in the face, I say thank you, and they hit my other cheek and I say thank you. But I could also get slapped in the face and say, there's something I'm trying to remember. I'd like to remember something. I remember what it is now. Thank you. Oh yeah? Thank you.

[65:45]

But if something horrible comes and I say thank you, I have remembered. But sometimes I might not be able to remember. I might be on the verge of doing something ungrateful for this horrible thing. And then I might say, there's something I'm trying to remember now. Oh yeah? So like I often tell this story, Zweigarn used to wake up in the morning and he would say, Master. I don't know what point he would say that right out of getting up awake or when he was washing his face, but anyway he would say, Master. And then he would say, yes. Or maybe, yes sir. Are you awake? Yes. Now if somebody says you're awake, you might have to say, let me check. But you don't have to check necessarily. You can say, yes. But

[66:53]

you can also check just a second. Yes. And then he said, all day long, don't let anything distract you. I won't. All day long, don't let anything distract you from generosity, from ethics, patience, so on. I won't. So that's what he did. That's what he said he did in the morning and maybe that got him through the day. But maybe he did it at noon too. Who knows? There's that story about, I heard a story about Moses. No, no, it wasn't Moses. It was Mohammed. He had this little horse. He rode this horse up to the sky and had a meeting with God. Or maybe it was with a man. I don't know. Maybe it was with a man

[67:54]

or maybe it was with God. Let's just say he had a meeting with God. And he asked God, what do we need to do in order to be in accord with you? And he said, what should I tell the people? He said, tell them to pray a million times a day or whatever. Tell them to remember reality or God a million times a day. Oh yeah, and then I think he went down and had a conversation with Moses. And Moses said, what did you find out? He said, well he told me that people should practice prayer or whatever a million times a day. Moses said, no way. They're not going to do that. It's too much. So he went back and had a talk to God again and God reduced

[68:58]

it somewhat. I forgot what it went out to. Anyway, he went back down on his way back down to the people. He saw Moses again. He said, well he said a hundred thousand. And Moses said, no, that's too many. They won't do it. So he went back to God. This negotiation went on for quite a while and finally he got God down to five, I think. And then he's coming back down and he said, well I got him down to five. And Moses says, let's go with that. So now they do it five times a day. But in Zen we just do it once. When do we do it? We do it now. We only do it once. [...] There's only one time to practice enlightenment and we only do it once and we only do it once. We don't do it five. We don't do it a million. We

[70:03]

do it once. But when we do it once, we also welcome doing it infinite times in this once. So we don't ignore infinite time, infinite space. We just do it once, once, once. And we totally welcome people who are doing it five and a hundred thousand. They're all welcome right now. But five is nice because you remember that you do it once. Five times a day you remember you do it once. And you can put a bunch of other people who are doing it five times a day, you do it at the same time, right? So you get together. Time! So you're reminded. So here we have Nobod sitting. So it's time! Here we are, remembering. What are we remembering? What was it again? Oh yeah, it was enlightenment. Practice realization of enlightenment. Yeah,

[71:09]

that's what we're doing, moment by moment, in the midst of all this straw in our face. Any other feedback now before we move on to the next event? One question. In terms of the relationship of the two worlds, can it be said that every event in the small world originates in the big world? Originates? Yeah, you could say, or is occurring in the big. So the story of me and the world is occurring in a world where, for example, there's other stories of me. In fact, that's where I do live, but I don't keep track of all the other stories of me. It's inconceivable, all the stories of me that I have of myself and that you have of me. So we live in an

[72:10]

inconceivable world. All of our small stories are just like little, the perception is just to make a little package in the midst of this thing so we can get a hold of it. So isn't that a way to be patient? If someone says something mean-spirited to us, we realize that it's not personal. If saying to yourself that it's not personal will help you say thank you, and feel grateful to them, and be careful of them, and not put yourself above them or below them, and be patient with that, if that statement would help you, it's good. Well, maybe this afternoon I'll talk about the nine aspects of concentration and the

[73:15]

nine aspects of wisdom, and relate them to the three aspects of Bodhisattva ethics, if you want me to. Anyway, thank you very much for your wonderful presence. I bow to save them. Delusions are inexhaustible. I bow to end them. Dharma gates are boundless. I bow to enter them. Buddha's way is unsurpassable. I bow to become it.

[74:23]

Thank you.

[74:27]