Good morning, everyone. Good morning. For new people, I'm Tygan Leighton, the guiding teacher at Ancient Dragon Zen Gate. I want to speak today about one of our primary texts, the Song of the Grass Hut. Last couple of weeks, we spoke about the harmony of difference and the sameness, both are by Chito or Sekito, who lived in China 700 to 790 and is one of the major ancestors in our lineage called Soto, Japan and America. And this text, Song of the Grass Hut, many of you know very well, but for new people, I'd like to start by just challenging it. So it's on page nine of our chat book. And oh, if you can put the people online. So we're just going to chat, this is we will be chatting this later as part of our service with offerings and bows.

[01:10]

I actually want to chant it now for information. So I'll announce it and yeah, we'll just chant it. Song of the Grass Hut. Grounds where ugly people love, Chito doesn't love. Though the hut is small, it includes the entire world. In ten feet square, an old man of limitless forms and their nature, a Mahayana would have sought the trust without doubt. The middle-ager, though they can't help wondering, will this hut perish or not? Perishable or not, the original master is present,

[02:14]

not dwelling south or north, east or west. Firmly based on steadiness, it can't be surpassed. A shining window below the green pines, giant palaces over a million towers can't compare with it. Just sitting with head covered, all things are at rest. Thus, this mountain monk doesn't understand at all. Living here, he no longer works to get free. Who would proudly arrange sheets trying to entice guests? Turn around the light to shine within, then adjust your turn. The vastly conceivable source can't be faced or turned away from. Meet the ancestral teachers, be familiar with their instructions. Bind grasses to build the hut and don't give up. Let go of the hundreds of years and relax completely. Open your hands and walk in a sense. Thousands of worries, myriad interpretations

[03:15]

are only to free you from obstructions. If you want to know the undying person in the hut, don't separate from this skin bag here and now. So thank you all. And I meant to say this before we started chanting. But our forum for, and this is for people here, for any presenter, but also the people online. Our forum for using our chant books is to hold it like this, with three fingers, three on the outside and two inside. Please don't bend it back. And also, please don't just lay it on the ground. So anyway, this is the forum in which we hold the chanting. So I just wanted to mention that. So all of our forums are just to help us organize this together in a solemn manner. So again, the Harmony of Difference and Sameness or Shantoukai, we talked about the last couple of weeks. And both that and this Song of the Grasshopper

[04:21]

we just chanted are by Shito Kisetsu, a Japanese. Shito, sorry, Sekito Kisetsu, a Japanese. Shito Shishang, a Chinese. A very important, one of our important ancestors. A few generations before the formal founder of the Shouzhou or Xiaodong ancestor lineage in China, Dongshan. So I wanna talk about just a few parts of this chant. So actually the idea of a grass hut on the Japanese is part of the Zen tradition for people who were hermits. But also often the abbot has a hermitage. It's called an odd hermitage, a grass hut,

[05:22]

even though sometimes they're very elaborate. Shito himself had a large monastery where he instructed many people, but he also builds, it's hard to see in this picture, but somebody from San Francisco Zen Center went to where his, I'll hold it up for the online people that mess it around. This is actually the big rock where his hut was away from his main monastery, kind of a tree space. So that's not much to see now, it's overgrown. As he says, now it's been covered by leaves. Well, it's not been over for a long time, but the rock is still there. His name, let me translate it, is On the Rock. So he was a major of this time. So again, I just wanna focus on a few lines in this chant. I'll just start at the beginning.

[06:26]

I've built a grass hut where there's nothing of value after eating and relaxing to enact. So there's a feeling of regular, everyday, casual almost practice. Of course, Shito was a strict Zen teacher and also an admitted disciple. And so he built this hut and practiced there, and there's a tradition of many great central ancestors, Ryokan in the 19th century, well, Dr. Hanshan in China, who lived in hermitages, grass huts, and practiced on their own, so to speak, or had connections with a nearby monastery, but lived as some of the recluse. And as I said, sometimes in Japan, there are these Hanshan or hermitages which are quite elaborate and large.

[07:29]

Anyway, he says, when it was completed, fresh reeds appeared, now it's been lived in, covered by weeds. So again, this informal feeling of this actual, you can see in China and Japan, not silk, buildings with thatched grass, roofs, it's hard to do that now because it's too expensive to build it, but they're not kept up so well. But anyway, he says, the person in the hut lives in a cobble, not stuck to inside, outside of the city. And the place is well with people who live here. So part of this, part of the energy of this chant is this, and it comes in later, to turn within, to turn away from the values of the world, to take the backward step that turns the light inward into the remote self, as one way is described.

[08:30]

This is a meditation hut. He says, though the hut is small, it includes the entire world, 10 feet square in all manner of forms and in nature. So this song, this poem, is about the space of practice, whether it's a formal zendo like this, or a large temple, or a space where you do sit and practice in your home, just a place where you could put a cushion, a chair, and face the wall. This is an instruction to really tell the space of pleasant, the space of love meditation, the space of practice. It's not stuck to the inside, outside, or in between. It's not part of one of those categories. And it's not about worldly values.

[09:31]

No one's worldly people around. She doesn't love. But this is important. The hut is small, it includes the entire world. So here's Avatar, you know, small, or a chair. And yet, as we sit upright in formal class, and the whole world is here. Each of us, as we are sitting, are the product of many causes and conditions. Everybody we have ever met is part of what is sitting on the sheet. We don't remember them all. People we may have met casually, or who we didn't even meet, are part of how we are, who we is. So, yeah. The entire world is here. And that's an important part of our practice. We sit upright, we emphasize posture.

[10:34]

We sit in this stance, and everything is here. So our practice body is inclusive. All of our experiences are part of how we are. Yeah. So he says, Mahayana Bodhisattva trusts without doubt, and we're all doing this Bodhisattva practice, practicing to know, awaken all beings. He says, the middle and our lowly can't help wondering whether such are perishable or not, the original master is present. So I want to talk about that line. That line does not seem that important to me when I talked about this text many times, but I want to emphasize that line, perishable or not, the original master is present. We can't actually get a hold of our identity,

[11:45]

as if there was more identity, there are products of everything, and perishable or not. So we take care of our software and our symbols and try and keep it, maintain it. But whether we can, another important text of ours says, turning away and touching are both wrong. We can't get a hold of it, and we can't avoid it. So this original master is present, is in some ways the heart of our practice. So the original master might refer to Shakyamuni Buddha, who started this practice 500 years ago, and it's now known as Jain India. But the original master may refer to Shakyamuni Buddha

[12:46]

but it's something deeper. When we set up a place to practice, Buddha is there. And not just Shakyamuni, but Buddhas before Buddha, and Jankaya Vairochana, the Buddha that is the awakened aspect of everything in the world. Everybody we know, even the people who we don't like or who feel his difficulties, and not just the people, the trees, the lake, the grasses, the concrete, cushions and chairs. The original master is present when we set up a practice place, whether it's a formal Zen zone like this or just a space that you use in your house to do this practice. Maybe every day or at least several times a week,

[13:51]

the original master is present. This original master, there are aspects of the word master in English that maybe we won't question, but fundamental feature, fundamental teaching. The awakening of everything is present in our practice and in our practice place. This is what a practice place example is about. So we have particular ways. One of the things that priests do is to know how to set up a practice place in a particular form. The altar is arranged, cushions are arranged. There's a particular structure and it has to adapt to the various spaces we're in. So this room, which is our Zen zone,

[14:53]

has a little recess back there, so we won't use that space. But the main point, the original teacher, the original teacher, the fundamental reality, the truth is present. Whether things are, everything is perishable. We lost our temple space at the beginning of COVID. So we're still in recovery in some ways from the pandemic. Perishable or not, everything is in some ways perishable and in some ways not. Something remains. Barnes Capital is here, talking about seeds. And all of our practice is about planted seeds. So we're not just practicing, this is not a self-help.

[15:56]

Of course, it does benefit us to do this practice, but it's not about us. It's about how do we maintain this basic practice? How do we maintain the fundamental teaching? The original master is a perfect translation. So it's a perfect translation, I think. So anyway, it is here. When we sit upright, enjoy our breath, feel our inhaling and exhaling. Allow thoughts and feelings to pass by. We don't have to try and grab a hold of them. We don't have to push them away. So I'll talk more about that in another teaching from Chateau's after talking about this song. But it's great that we still have the lyrics. The melody has been lost, but I've said this before about the Grasshopper song

[17:03]

with Joe Morrison, presenting musicians here. If you want to put the music to this song, please let us know. The fundamental teaching, the original master, is present in any practice place. That's what it means here, in any practice place. And every place we go, not just in the center, but as we leave and walk around and take care of our lives and our families and friends that are working, all of that. Here in Chicago or Michigan and Mexico and various places. When we are breathing and being informed by our experience of this practice, the original teaching, the original teaching, the fundamental teaching is present in this place

[18:06]

where it's formed by the air. It goes on to say, firmly based on study, music can't be surpassed. Shining window below the green pines, Jake Ellison's The Longing Towers can't compare with it. That's a kind of classical Chinese reference to a study about somebody living in a hut. Shining window below the green pines. The next line is also one of the very important lines. Just sitting with head covered, all things are at rest. Thus this mountain monk doesn't understand it at all. So this just sitting with head covered, actually, literally that image is of Forty D'Argo. The Indian master who came to China and is considered the founder of Chomsak. He had a conversation with the emperor and then went up to this cage in northern China

[19:11]

where it was pretty cold. And images of him often as his quilt covering his head. So there's this literal reference. And actually when I was practicing when I was there in Japan, they had a quilt and he was sitting. But the point is, just sitting, head covered. You're not, the practice is not about, no, what are you thinking? Head covered metaphorically is letting go of your idea or your thoughts. Doesn't mean you try and get rid of thoughts, but that's not what's important. Just sitting head covered, all things are at rest. So one aspect of this practice, of course, is just calm, steadiness, letting all things be at rest, letting all things be as they are. That's one side.

[20:12]

The other side is that we try and respond when we help or have a sense of the spaciousness of everything. But first, we take the backward step, we turn away. That's coming up in a few lines. But thus this Nalchulam should so refer to himself. Doesn't understand at all. It's not about, this practice and these teachings are not about getting some particular understanding. Or some particular special state of mind. Actually, it's okay if you have some good understanding of the teaching. And what happens is that people have experiences of kind of altered states of mind or beyond our usual conventional way of being and thinking. So that happens. But the point isn't to get the hold of some understanding. The point is just to keep, just to continue this practice regularly over time,

[21:17]

day after day, more than several days a week. And to just sit, head covered. And allow all things to be at rest. So a couple of lines later, this is another key line. Turn around the light to shine the light, and just return. In some ways, this is the entire, this single line encompasses all of that. Turn around the light to shine the light. That's a traditional meditation instruction. One of this, I say so again, it says take the backward step, turn the slide inwardly to illuminate yourself. Shinto's version here is, is definitely much later in the 12th century in Japan. But Shinto just says it very concisely here. Turn around the light to shine the light. But then just return. So the point of our practice is not to reach

[22:18]

some special state of mind or experience. Even though that happens, then just return. We come back to our ordinary conventional practice in the world. Our relationship with partners, with family, with children, with parents, with our work situation, with neighbors, with Chicago or wherever you're living, and just return. So our whole practice is about this turning around the light to shine within. And then returning, lock-serving pictures of murals, for example, we come back to our everyday life in the world. So this dynamic of turning within, facing ourselves, seeing all our intertwisted karma,

[23:20]

seeing something deeper, its original magnitude, its original fundamental teaching, that is always present, getting glimpses of it, and we can't get a hold of it. We can't define it beyond our powers of conceptualization of this code. But then just return. We live in this world, and we respect this world, and we take care of this world. So, very important line. One of the wonderful lines in all of the texts. Turn around the light to shine, and just return. But, I would go back and add, perishable or not, the fundamental teaching is present. Buddha is here. Once we come into this realm, they can see the world, they see each other as we are now. Buddha's here. Oh, and then after, then just return,

[24:25]

and it says, explicitly, Chitra says, the vast, inconceivable source can't be faced or turned away from. We can't get a hold of it, and we can't avoid it. Can't be faced or turned away from. And this vast, inconceivable source, this is, Chitra uses this metaphor of the source, and a lot of the texts talk about the source, and it doesn't mean like the source of creation back, the Garden of Eden, or something like that, or one of the seven, or what, the Big Bang, or, you know, it's right now. The source is always right now. As we turn within, and face ourselves, and face our impermanence, and enjoy this world here, paying attention, we're not trying to figure anything out. We can't, it's always right here,

[25:27]

this vast, inconceivable source. So the source is not something historical. The source is, you know, it happens, so this is one kind of meditation instruction. You know, sometimes you can follow a stream of thought back to the source. Oh, wait, where did I start thinking about that? You can, you know, spend time during long meditation retreats doing that, but the source is always here, and the fundamental teaching, which you won't reach it, is always here. This is our understanding. So Chautauqua goes on to say, meet the ancestral teachers, be familiar with their instructions, find grasses to build a hut, and don't give up. So find grasses to build a hut, and make a space to practice. So we've done that here, but what that's for, this is our grass hut. And don't give up. And sometimes it's boring, and sometimes we have pain in our knees, or our back, or our shoulders, or something.

[26:29]

Sometimes there's something in our heart, some problem in our life, or some problem this week that haunts us, that is difficult. But don't give up. Once we build this space of practice, once you take on this practice of being upright, and present, enjoying your inhale and exhale, fundamental teaching, the original master, the original teaching is present. So just don't give up, and just let go. Let go of hundreds of years and relax completely. You've been talking about that something. Let go of hundreds of years and relax completely is a reference to, which we will chant during our regular service, all our ancient truistic karma, from the beginning once we ate delusion, or through body, speech, and mind, are now over now. The part of our practice is just to acknowledge

[27:31]

and witness to all of the stuff, all of our habits, all of our particular wishiness, as our own particular hatter, grasping, or anger, or confusion. And when we sit, it comes up sometimes, and it's not about getting rid of it. It's about witnessing it and becoming intimate with ourselves, studying ourselves, finding the space where the original teaching is present. So meet the ancestry teachers, be familiar with their instructions, find grasses to grow the hut, don't give up, let go of hundreds of years, relax completely. So, you know, when people walk into a Zen meditation hall, it's a lot of people sitting up, they walk like they're stiff, you gotta sit up, up right, straight, especially during a long retreat.

[28:32]

People don't realize that what this practice is about is to relax. How do we relax our minds? How do we relax all of the difficulties in our life and in our troubled world, and in our collapse of civilization, and all of that? How do we just meet this experience? And then we return and respond, when we can see some way to respond. And there are many people there are doing work, responding to the difficulties of the world, but we do it from this place of settling, of turning the light to shine the room. Not giving up. So it's just like he says, let go of hundreds of years and relax completely. Oh, let go, oh, and let open your hands and walk innocent.

[29:37]

What's the name of Mishiyama Roshi's book, Opening the Hand of Thought? Yeah, so it was not that we're getting rid of thinking and thoughts, that's part of Mishiyama Roshi, great Japanese teacher in the last century, said, as we're sitting, our stomach continues to secrete digestive juices, as we're sitting, our brain continues to secrete thoughts. So it's not about having a blank mind, it's not the point. But how do we sit calmly in the midst of the whirlpool of sometimes monkey mind and loss of thoughts, sometimes it's just dying, inhale and exhale. Open your hands and walk, relax completely. Open your hands and walk innocent. And then Shito concludes, thousands of words, myriad interpretations, are only to free you from obstructions. So as I've said many times,

[30:40]

all of these wonderful Dharma teachings, all of these great sutras and great dialogues and stories and great practice texts like this one, it's not about studying them so you have some great understanding, it's about freeing you from obstructions, encouraging practice. So each of these texts that we study, and there are many Dharma texts, truth texts, teaching texts that we can't study and they can be helpful, but the point of them is to just let go and relax completely, to encourage our practice. The end is, if you want to know

[31:46]

the undying person in the hut, the person on your seat, the person in the center, the person that is supposedly you, the person with whom the original teacher, the fundamental teaching teacher is present, whether it's perishable or not, undying person. He says, just stop, separate from this skin bag here and now. The skin bag, it's a funny expression. I remember one of our great early practitioners here at Ancient Dragons Medicate got very upset when she heard this, I'm not a skin bag. She really had a problem with this word. We ended up talking about it a lot in talks. Anyway, it's just a slang slogan

[32:49]

to present for this part of the month. So separate from it, here and now. In presence with our experience, with our life, with our world, and its struggles, and the pains in our knees or our shoulders or wherever of our heart, just step away from yourself. Great Zen artist and translator just had his 90th birthday, called Tenkaz Tanahashi. He was at a urban park, then to one's possession. What, can you sum up that in one word? That's a perfect question. And he just said, non-separation. So that's pretty good. And separate, don't run away from yourself. When I left Sasakawa after my Dharma transition,

[33:54]

through the ceremony there, my teacher said, as I was in there, he quickly invited me to get back over the road and said, don't run away from yourself. Don't separate from the skin bag, here and now. So there's a, I think it's a good question. So this is companion piece to the Harmony of Difference of Zen, which we've been speaking of some, last couple of weeks, Sanzo Kai, Sano Japanese, which we also chant a lot, which is more like the dialectical philosophy of our tradition of Soto Zen. But this is about, whoops, this is basic practice. On your seat, in your room, in our Zendo. How do we make this space? How do we not separate from the skin bag, here and now? Fundamental teaching, the fundamental teacher is present.

[35:00]

Whether a particular Zendo characters are not, it's changed in what conventional world. No longer, as I said, there's a lot of people, the fundamental teaching is present. So that's a little bit of the Song of the Grass Hut. I wanted to add something, another, another, just a short dialogue by Kito Kishin, Kito Kishin, who wrote the Song of the Grass Hut, in the 8th century. So, you know, one of the things about Zen is that we have this wide angle of time, and it's really helpful. Want to be stuck in thinking about court-opened profit monitoring, just to the next election cycle. But to see a wide range of time and spaces. So we have teachers that we quote from the 8th century, and from the 9th century, and from the 13th century,

[36:03]

even back in the 20th century. Anyway, Ships out once was asked by one of the students, what is the essential meaning of Buddha Dharma? Great question. Usually it's not asked so boldly. Sometimes they ask things like, why did Bodhidharma come from the West? Which I, there's lots of ways of asking this question. Anyway, somebody asked Shih Tzu, what is the essential meaning of Buddha Dharma? And Shih Tzu said, not to attain, not to know. That's really deep. Not to get a whole, not to get something, not to acquire something. It's difficult for us in a, you know, commodity society, where we're taught from an early age to try and get all the things on the TV or whatever.

[37:05]

Not to attain, not to acquire, and not to know. And we're also trained to, you know, get through each grade and into college, you know, to know stuff. And it's okay if something comes around and you look at, you know, it's okay that we have, you know, nice Buddhas and stuff. But, and it's okay if you have knowledge. But the point is, how do you use the knowledge? We're all being. And you show. We're all waking. So that's just the first line of the story. Shih Tzu said, not to attain, not to know. The students, Chau was pretty persistent, said, oh, beyond that, is there any other pivotal point or not? Very impertinent. King Shih Tzu said, I love this. The wide sky does not obstruct the white cloud's drift. The wide sky does not obstruct the white cloud's drift.

[38:11]

Did you say wide? The wide sky? No, I didn't say wide sky. I said wide sky. Oh, the wide sky. Sorry, little way to get that now. It's not the wide sky, it's the wide sky does not obstruct the white cloud's drifting. This is a meditation instruction. This fundamental teaching, original master. It's not, doesn't obstruct the clouds of thoughts and feelings and sensations that are drifting wide. And they don't obstruct the wide sky either. The sky doesn't bother by our thoughts. Wide sky does not obstruct the white cloud's shifting. Maybe, you know, if you think of Buddha as a wise guy, he doesn't obstruct the white cloud's shifting either. Okay, so that's the story.

[39:13]

That's the whole story. And, you know, there's this not to attain, not to know, and the wide sky does not obstruct the white cloud's drifting by. And then this is quoted in Dogen's extensive record later this coming month, Saturday, I forget the date. It's in our, it's on our schedule. I'm going to be doing an afternoon seminar on Dogen's extensive record. Dogen was the wise guy who brought from China to Japan all of this tradition of wisdom and practice. In the 13th century, one of his huge, the next is Dogen's extensive record, which I translated to show up more. I'll be doing a seminar on that in October. This is just one little piece from it. A lot, it's got lots of little, little things. Anyway, Dogen says about this dialogue, not to attain, not to know is Buddha's essential meaning. The wind blows into the depths and more winds blow.

[40:17]

So when there's an energy of teaching, coaching, we have to start awakening. And further winds blow. So this is about Buddha got, you know, Buddha, which is something that talks about how to apply. It's not enough to just become Buddha. You have to keep practicing, keep reawakening. Buddha just means awakened one. So we awaken, we continue to awaken. So Dogen said, the wind blows into the depths and further winds blow. The white sky does not obstruct the white clouds drifting. Dogen says, at this time, why are you taking the trouble to ask Shinto? While this is going on, why bother asking about this? So we're asking the teacher. So I want to stop and have time for discussion or questions, but I, you know,

[41:21]

my first teacher instructed me to ask this question when I did this, and I got a couple of interesting answers, but I'm going to stop for now. So comments, questions, responses, people here in the room or people online, go, you can help that. And please keep your response or question or statement somewhat brief. Please give time for other people to ask questions. So thank you. Comments, questions. Bell had a question. I can't say it. Yes, Jen. It seems to me that this Diamond Talk came up this week.

[42:26]

Well, something happened to me 82 years ago that I've never forgotten. And it has come up to my mind periodically. I was in nursery school and there was a little girl in the nursery school with me and we were having art and she started painting circles on her piece of paper. As far as I know, I didn't have any ideas. I didn't have any idea what to do with the piece of paper and paint, you know, except mess around with my fingers. But she, and I looked at that and I thought, that looks terrible. And I said, do you think that's beautiful? And she said, yes, I do. And this has puzzled me. All this time. And so the other day I didn't take my car

[43:33]

because I didn't want to lose my parking place. So I took the bus to Marin and I was standing waiting for the bus. And there was a light rain and a gutter puddle where I was standing and I was looking at that gutter puddle and the raindrops were falling in it. And each of them formed a circle and then another one would fall and it would be a littler circle because the other one had expanded and disappeared. And as I was looking at this, with the raindrops falling in the puddle and the circle getting bigger and then little circles and then circles disappearing, I thought that must have been what she saw. And I just, I feel so good about having finally resolved this problem.

[44:35]

This is pro on practice. This is exactly what Zen talks about. Something happens, maybe somebody says something, maybe you see a circle and you don't recognize that it's full moon or whether it's whatever. And 22 years, you said you've been struggling with this kind of thing? Yeah, I mean, yes. Great, thank you, thank you, Jen, for sharing that with us. And yeah, sometimes it takes a while to realize something. But congratulations. Thank you. Anybody else have any? Ayshan has her hand up. Oh, good, Ayshan. Thank you for the talk, Tegan. I had a similar phenomenon happen just now as you were talking, which was I have heard that instruction about tracing your thoughts back to the source and it always seemed so esoteric to me

[45:36]

and like something that I just couldn't do. That was because I had a concept about what that was, like I thought I was gonna get to some vast source of emptiness, but my concept was really faulty because what I realized when you were talking is that I often do, in Zazen, sort of trace a thought back to the source. And what I realized is the thought actually is triggered by something, maybe inside me, but maybe outside me. It's like, you know how much I love to get songs stuck in my head and then trace them back and I realize that, yeah, an acorn fell off a tree and it made me think of some song. And I think maybe that's it. It's that it's the interconnection that I'm actually tracing the thoughts

[46:37]

back to the interconnection and it just made me kind of realize that all this stuff is just, it's just swirling around through the universe and it kind of passes through and then it's gone. And actually even something inspired the person who wrote the song to write it. So yeah, I really appreciated the opportunity to kind of see that today. Yeah, like the nursery school circle or when you started talking about that, about the acorn, suddenly I heard raindrops keep falling on my head. So now that song could be stuck in me. Thank you, yeah. Other comments, responses, questions, anybody? Amy. Amy.

[47:38]

I mean, I'm just following. Well, I might remind me your name again. Vicky. Vicky. Yeah. Oh, hi. Hi, nice to be here, everyone. Welcome. So I'm just following the thread and it takes me back to, first of all, I was looking at this first line that keeps striking me. I've built a grass hut where there's nothing of value. It's so interesting that that's where we're starting. And then the thread that came through here is in my early 20s, being at a lake with friends and kind of having a celebratory weekend and seeing some adult out in their donut-shaped energy. And I had what I called at that time an epiphany, but it was just like when the scene just struck me so strongly that I didn't really have any, that really I knew nothing. Like I really had no idea what's going on.

[48:40]

And even just adults floating in the lake in the donut-shaped inner tubes was somehow everything. That's the only way I can express it. But this line that keeps standing out, I built a grass hut where there's nothing of value. Somehow in that moment, this scene, which I would have maybe at the moment in some ways said was nothing of value, suddenly, absurdly became, it held everything. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So yes, as you say, the entire world is presently in this. Yeah, those experiences like that can point us towards this whether it's raindrops in the gutter

[49:41]

or something dropped in the surfboard. When I was, I'd say you were 20? Yeah. I was four years old sitting by a lake in New Hampshire, as it happens, and had what I now recognize was a big smutty experience. Just sitting there, it was awful, it was disgusting. And I had just little pine needles on the ground in front of me. I touched the light again. It was just all luminous. And I remembered it many years later when I was in class that day. I think those things happen. Other people have those experiences. Yeah. Yeah. So thank you for sharing that. Other people, other questions, experiences, comments, responses to discuss.

[50:46]

Oh, and just thinking that line you focused on where there's nothing of value, of course. This is, the word value is interesting because there's the usual worldly value of things based on dollars, cents, or whatever. And then there's what's really of value, which is seeing people, heritage, and knowledge. I mentioned this question that Rishita was asked. I've told the story before, but what is the essential meaning of human dharma? My first teacher was a Japanese, a Christian lawyer.

[51:48]

I was going to move out of state, ready to move to San Francisco. But one of the reasons that I moved out to San Francisco, San Francisco, was that my mother was not. So even though she was gone, the way she used to look at you. And the junior sensei said to me, when you get there, ask the teacher, what is the essential meaning of human dharma? So I got there. I didn't get to see Benko Roshi for a while. All right. But I started practicing with Tenshin Rikandesan, who is my teacher. So I asked him first. His answer was, don't you already know? We already know. The original master is present. Fundamental teaching is everywhere all the time.

[52:50]

Everywhere all the time, all at once. So, later on, I got to ask Benko Roshi, what is the fundamental teaching of Buddhism? Fundamental teaching of Buddhism is, which both Buddhist, she's not a good answer. Maybe, does anybody have any other answers? Or questions? I am. Yes. How would you answer that now? After all these years of practice? I don't know. I'll ask you. There's a space that there's room for everything. Yes, there is the space, but there's room for everything. Thank you. I'd say Aishan has her hand up.

[54:02]

Okay, Aishan. This is a little bit of an aside, but if I have a moment to share. At the last Camping Sashin, when we talked about the Song of the Grass Hut, Jerry alerted me to the fact that there is an episode of Star Trek where the Enterprise encounters some more advanced life form out there in the universe. Pardon? There are many of them. Yeah, well, and they're trying to communicate with us and what they say to the crew is, hello, big, ugly sacks of mostly water. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, [...] no. The skin bag, right now, yeah. So, yeah, so when you think about not wanting to be a skin bag, you could try to look for the Star Trek episode.

[55:03]

But, thank you. Can I? Yeah, Aishan, go ahead. Maybe people read Viktor Frankl when he was running away from the Nazis and he was in a forest running away by himself and he sat down and there was a beam of light that illuminated a little plant that was by him and he had this kind of an experience. And then another one that I read was, you know, your basic dick in a Russian prison. He went out to take a pee and all of a sudden the world was just illuminated for him and he was actually not getting enough to eat and was enslaved in a camp and yet this appreciation or this love of life suddenly flared over. Yeah, it's always here and now.

[56:07]

And sometimes you get the most peace. So, yeah, I'm gonna wrestle up. I mean, I like that last line, the last two lines. So, yeah, so that don't separate from the skin bag here and now. So, that's about appreciating and valuing life and being sexual. That, yeah, appreciation. But sometimes even if we're not appreciating it still, don't separate from it. Don't want to be in some difficulties. And the ugly insult, the ugly sexual or accent insult. Yeah, having me say. Good.

[57:08]

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