I guess I have to say something. Yesterday I talked about how for Buddhism, material and spiritual are one, by bringing mind and body and breath together. in our practice that is based on the idea or the experience that mind and body are one, material and spiritual are one. And why then has it almost always been ignored by people, and most or many

[01:31]

religions don't say so. And for a Buddhist it means that the problem is that we don't, we are, the way we look at material, the way we see the material world is ineffective and defective So how to see things as they actually are with the eye of wisdom or eye of the Dharma. And I'd like to try to give you some some feeling for that because it has a great deal to do with many of the common phrases you hear in Buddhism, like, Zen is just daily activity or carrying water, chopping wood.

[03:04]

So I think I should talk about the seventh bhumi, the far-reaching, because this is the level at which our practice actually exists. And if we're talking about one whole being, or a big mind, the far-reaching is how, or the one who reaches far, is how we act on that level. But it means that you have had to seeing through our usual perceptions.

[04:29]

Actually, it means that your mental activity is quite transformed. It's almost impossible to describe it. For instance, the seventh bhumi is characterized by you no longer have ideas, you no longer form ideas. And for most of us, I think, that seems impossible or quite unlikely. that there's no comparison, no way. You're not forming mental images and comparing them to reality. That you no longer have opinions or conflicting emotions. That you see reality as

[05:47]

experience this which we are as ungraspable. And when we say everything changes in Buddhism, we mean maybe one way you intimately can sense the meaning of that is that it's ungraspable, that you cannot actually form ideas about that it's unsatisfying and that it's empty or incomparable. And this is all an extension of the second Paramita conduct and I think

[07:04]

Some people add... have ten param... there's some systems of ten paramitas rather than six, and I think in that system the seventh paramita is... I think the seventh is skillful means. So, skillful means and conduct are two forms of the same thing. Conduct being our way of behavior. of being ethical, of finding our place in a static view of the world. And skillful means means you're finding your way to exist in what I call a non-repeatable universe. So each moment you have to have some expedient way of acting. So, and as long as you're creating systems by which you do things, you can't do one thing, just one thing, you have to have an idea you should do it, or that you should do it, that you should always do it, or this is a good thing to do, that kind of

[08:46]

A system is gone in the seventh bhumi. Ideally it should be gone right now in your practice. So when you sit, you know, when you come up against a formation, I think the world is like this, or I think my legs hurt, or I think... whatever you notice as a way you perceive it, you should see that as an opinion or idea or some kind of construction which is unreal.

[10:00]

And you should give up your attachment to it. It sounds difficult to do, but actually it's not. It's only because we don't want to do it that it's difficult. You actually have to give up your life to do it. Which maybe sounds difficult, but it shouldn't. This life has no value, you know, no particular value. So, again, going back to Layman Pang's poem. Layman Pang, you know, was one of the disciples of Matsu. as was Nanak, Nansen, and Nanaku was Matsu's, Baso's, teacher. Of course, Nanaku and Baso had the discussion about making a tile, a mirror. And these people, Layman Pang and Matsu and Nanaku and Nansen, all emphasized ordinary daily activity, just wearing your clothes, washing your face,

[11:32]

So there's various ways to translate, understand, Layman Pang's poem. You know, we could say it means, doing whatever comes into my hands, doing whatever's next, doing whatever happens to be before me, without taking or rejecting. There is harmony within and no contradiction anywhere. not needing any sign or emblem, robes or special activity. The mountains and hills, it means you, the mountain, has not even a speck of dust. And supernatural activity and wondrous function is carrying water and chopping wood. But this means that you see things and act on things without any idea of self.

[13:13]

So there's no whatever you do next, there's no how many of us can just do whatever is next, whatever happens to be in our hands. So life is very simple if you live it this way. But if I try to talk about what it means, material and spiritual are one. Material means mind. It sounds so complicated, but it just means no self. So your eye is opened and you can see things as they are, acting in things without restraint. So all I can suggest to you is that you Sit as best you can and try to give up anything that comes. Try to find yourself without possessions. The Buddhist idea of karma means that

[14:42]

You're the product of your own activity. It means that all suffering is the product of our activity, not some god or the stars or something like that. So no god can help you. I mean, there may be one hundred gods, one thousand gods, or one great big god. I don't know. It doesn't make any difference for a Buddhist because god can't help you. Your suffering is your own creation and only you can be free from it. And you can be free from it just because it's your own creation. So whatever kind of muddle you feel you're in, whatever kind of contradictions you feel your life is, are your own creation. But how to get out of that when we can't see things as they are is the problem. So you may feel frustrated and bored often with Buddhism and Zen and Zazen and Sashin. And you should be, actually.

[16:22]

What's more boring than to sit here for seven days with nothing to do? Bowing nine times, chanting the same thing every morning. It's pretty boring, actually. And if it wasn't boring, you know, it wouldn't be Buddhism. We should put that on the window. It isn't boring, it isn't good. That'll keep people away. But why should anything be boring right now, at any particular moment? Practically speaking, it's very useful to extend more and more into what you find boring. When you first start practicing, maybe quite a bit seems boring, and the longer you practice, less and less seems boring. And it's very useful. Sometimes I have to go be with people, you know, or in a meeting. After one hour, they're bored.

[17:52]

or getting restless. I don't even notice anything. One day passes, I don't notice anything, because it's somehow quite interesting. But actually, practically, we find ourselves in situations like that all the time, and if you're boring and restless, this threshold is low, you can't see what's going on. That's some practical advantage. But when it's boring, it means we're no longer waiting, no longer ready. And it's but perhaps it will always be, should include. Buddhism should include boring things and things that seem a nuisance. I have found what seems to me a nuisance

[19:19]

in 1963 with some great thing in 1967. I can't explain why, but over and over again that has happened to me. Because we keep making space for that which we can't perceive. We say in Buddhism, hold up one and know three. It has the idea of like a holograph that you can, I think holography means you can transfer onto a two-dimensional from two dimensions into three dimensions, and you can put on a plate something which then you can recreate what it is three-dimensionally. But in Buddhism we should be able to take one dimension or two dimension and create all the dimensions. As Dogen says, we shouldn't

[20:46]

See water just from the point of view of our human use of water. To a dragon, you know, water is a palace and doesn't flow. So how to have a sense for and act in the world beyond the dimensions which we can experience, consciously grasp. That which we can see, actually when you look, what you can grasp is always the same, the basic constituents are in essence the same. But what is happening is always different.

[21:56]

So it means giving up your mind, giving up your attitudes, giving up your opinions, giving up any plan for yourself. Maybe for a while, just to be a puppet, letting whatever happens, wherever you find yourself, pull your strings. This experience you should also have, instead of always trying to control things, not knowing who's controlling what. Maybe you should just be a puppet in this sashimi. Just, absolutely, just following the schedule without any idea of anything. Giving up. Even trusting. Just doing.

[23:02]

trusting or not trusting. If you can do that you may find out how you are actually created. How we exist on each moment so the purpose of sasheen is to give you a chance to

[24:07]

Sit still as if you possessed nothing. Not even life, maybe. No need to move your legs, no need to change your situation no matter how restless or bored you get. Maybe just dead, like a withered log. deader than these trees which already have lost their leaves, just sticks, just a stone, sitting like a stone, no idea of comfort or discomfort. Something will come to life. Unexpectedly, if you can do that. But how many of you can do that? Because you think you'll lose something precious. Some essence that's yours. Something of value. But you don't know what is of true value.

[25:37]

So you don't want to give up some small trinket. don't want to give up your history." Rinzai said, a true man of no rank, of no title, no name, no existence even, no value. No one knows who he is, who she is. Coming and going in the world, invisible, sometimes here and sometimes not. Such a person we can call a man or a woman of Zen.

[26:56]

I think you can do it, but you have to give up all forms of attachment to self. Sometimes Buddhism lists twenty-seven and other numerations, but anyway, there are many. If you do so, you will find you know the selves of others and then give up those too. So just to sit in this session. Knowing your true home. No need to move or go anywhere or do anything. Just some calm, calm, deeply relaxed, easy,

[29:26]

comfortable place. No need to think anything, plan anything, resolve anything. No need to form any ideas about anything. This kind of absorption is not limited to zazen. Again, the seventh bhumi means every moment you have this state of being. But for us, you know, we must find out now, without an idea of it being nihilism or enlightenment or anything. The willingness to have nothing at all. If you are angry, it means you want something.

[30:52]

If you're sad, it means you want something. If you're unsure, it means you want something. But you can't practice Buddhism as long as you want something. Just now, let that all drop away. Then you'll be a man of no rank. Someone who just embodies the way. We can be true friends. There's no intimacy or alienation.

[31:57]

no degrees of knowing. This was a problem Layman Pang faced. Should he be a priest or not? How do you know someone He asked Matsubasa, what is a, who is a person who has no companion among the ten thousand things? And Vasa said, when you've swallowed the West River and all the waters of the West River in one gulp

[33:05]

I'll tell you. Can you swallow all the waters of the West River in one gulp? As I talk often, you know, to be a companion means just to come forward, to do whatever is next. To be Matsu's, Basu's companion is nansen.

[34:14]

as Tozan said when Nansen performed the memorial service for Basel. Just ordinary activity then means no ideas, no comparing, thinking which is at one with the material world, not an idea about events or phenomena. This is the meaning of dharma. So how we practice, how we know each other in this way is the point of Zen practice.

[35:40]

Keizan Zenji. Keizan is the last name we chant in the lineage. Ehe Dogen. Two more names, Tetsu and Gikai. Keizan Joki. Keizan said that to be a I can't remember exactly how he puts it, but basically, the true spirit of the priest is to remain a layman with long hair, involved in worldly cares, but as pure as a lotus or a jewel, without attachments. Only in this way can a priest

[37:23]

or anyone know what it means to really practice Buddhism. No distinctions, no title, no rank was what Layman Panning was concerned with. So I said at the end of the Shuso ceremony, The jade is sown, S-O-W-N, in the leaves and sapphire in the sky. I could have just said the green is in the leaves and blue in the sky. But how to convey what we mean by ordinary activity. The sky is blue, the blue is in the sky,

[38:37]

And as I said, we should be deaf and dumb till we can hear everything with some maybe marvelous ear-eye. This practice which transcends your life history, contains all the possibilities of your life in any moment, can only be found if you can give up your self, your ideas and opinions, ways of thinking.

[40:24]

I think you can do it if you can become convinced enough, if you can see thoroughly enough the worthlessness of our usual way of evaluating things, of structuring out our life. Anything you'd like to talk about? Okay.

[42:00]

How can it have any value? Because it doesn't exist. What? Yeah, I can't hear you. It sounds like you're only telling us half of the story. What's the other half? You're telling us, it seems like you're telling us that one of them can decide, you know, that we should just be completely, you know, eminent, we should just do whatever, you know. But sometimes, I mean, we try that, you know, to be so far as possible.

[43:32]

What do you mean by a limitation? And we can't really read, um... completely empty all the time, completely dead and down there all the time. It seems like we have to get it, you know, we go to that point and in return, in some form, we return with that. Maybe, I think, not the same for a long time, and it's important to know that, but nonetheless, it seems like we're still getting something back, you know? And that has

[44:59]

You're putting value back in? If that's so, why worry about it? I just listen to that, and one thing I know is that I'm really, I sit there and I'm just putting myself through all kinds of things, and I'm in a good comfortable being. I just have to, I'm not, I have to bring it out and make myself remember.

[46:11]

Sitting there putting yourself through some kind of trip isn't necessary. Just sit there. And if you're a stone and everything comes to life again, you don't have to figure out that it's going to come to life again. If it doesn't, it doesn't. If it does, it does. If we don't know what will appear next, that's best. And what we'll do. We'll do something. You know, we're not to have emptiness and then it turns into form and form into emptiness or something like that. What I'm talking about is not emptiness or form, it's emptiness-form. Sometimes we call it emptiness, sometimes we call it form, but you can't act... there's no separation. Form is exactly emptiness, there's no gap.

[47:37]

Why don't you tell me a little poem? I don't have a little poem. I only have a few words. I was referring to what I've said several times. The Sixth Patriarch said, the mind is a field of blessings which does not stray and from which wisdom always naturally arises. That's what I'm talking about. Yeah, that's what I was talking about. I realize I didn't say it yesterday. Sit up straight and breathe deeply and fully. What's important is to sit up straight. The breathing deeply and fully

[49:28]

We make an effort to sit up straight. We shouldn't make an effort to breathe deeply and fully. Your breathing should be more unconscious. You have to make a conscious effort at first, maybe as we get older and older, always, to sit up. But our breathing should... You shouldn't have some idea of breathing deeply and fully. You can start out your breathing at the beginning of the period of zazen, with some deep breath or some strong exhale, but then you should just let your breathing go as it goes, noticing how it goes. as breathing? Making an effort over and over again to sit up straight is the same thing as what? Breathing? Yeah, maybe so. Some of you

[50:55]

Yeah, if you're sitting as, of course, if you sit up straight and it affects your breathing, that's okay. But consciously to try to breathe is like consciously trying to make our mind do something. There are certain practices we can use in breathing. And when it's appropriate, I'll teach each of you individually. When you eat, by the way, you should also be sitting pretty straight Same as in zazen and you should hold your bowl up. Some of you sit in zazen like this a lot of times. Thinking about things, you know. But especially during meal time you do, you lapse into something sort of.

[52:30]

Sitting up, you sit up through yourself. When you sit up straight you leave yourself behind. And some energy is needed. always, some energy is needed, are self. Laziness and self, ego, are one thing, maybe. Ego. When you have an idea of ego or self, it means you're lazy. It means you want laurels. So, part of the way to get rid of the many forms of attachment is to have energy, to make an effort. So one of the sure signs of someone who's going to find what is meant by a man of no rank is someone who has that energy, who keeps that energy. Energy and courage maybe are two most clear signs of someone

[53:58]

Who will resolve this big question? And that energy, after, you know, you finally resolve the question, that energy is no longer effort or energy even. It's just actually the way we are. On each moment we are doing something. But we are lazy, you know. Ego and lazy are the same thing. Yeah. Thank you for asking.

[54:50]

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