Good morning, everyone. I'd like to welcome everyone into this one-room Zoom schoolhouse. Sojiro, she likes to consider our temple practice as a one-room schoolhouse where we have people that are here for the first time as well as people who've been sitting more than 50 years all together. I'd like to take a moment and go to gallery view and make eye contact with each and every one of you before I begin my talk. I do this before I give a talk in the Zendo, so it's nice to take a moment and see you all.

[01:15]

Looks about right. Can you hear me, Blake? So I came across this article in the Times I'd like to share with people. I don't know if this bookcase makes me look smart. I hope not. But more importantly than the bookcase is Sogyal Roshi's mudra over there to my left, your right. That's for me the touchstone for practice. I study a lot and I have books behind me, of course, that are used to illuminate some things that I've experienced over the years, and things that I hope to experience at another time, perhaps.

[03:33]

But most importantly, Zazen is a foundation of our practice, and I'm really grateful for Sojiroshi and Hozan, who took the picture of putting that together last year, and as a visual reminder for me, for my practice. So monks of old in China used to stand during lectures. That was centuries and centuries ago. And at some point, the monks and nuns were sitting in zendos on cushions, perhaps a little bit more comfortably, while they listen to lectures. And now, we're sitting in our homes. And this is the first time I've given a talk on Zoom.

[04:35]

It feels a little different and also is familiar to what I've done over the years since becoming Shuso, giving a talk in Zendo. The first time I gave a talk, I asked Ron Nestor, one of our 50 plus meditators here, could you give me some feedback on my talk? And he said, it felt like a fireside chat. I didn't quite know what to make of that, but it felt congruent with my attitude and feeling about presenting myself to you all formally in this way in a talk, as well as just informally when we meet each other on the Temple grounds. Fireside chats were conducted by FDR during the Depression and World War II as radio broadcasts to assure the population of America that things would be okay and that we would get through this.

[05:42]

I'm not here today to assure you that we're going to get through this, but I have faith that in practice we will get through. Today also feels like, this time also feels a little bit like pajama dharma. I got out of my pajamas today for the first time in a long time. But you know, sitting at home it feels homey. And the feeling of hanging out comfortably is a little different than standing listening to lecture. So I hope you're comfortable in your own homes. And I was thinking about Timothy Leary's adage, tune in, turn on, but don't drop out, stay present. That's my update. A few weeks ago I was filling up my soap dispenser here in my apartment and it's a sort of a thick

[06:48]

kind of gelatinous liquid that was pouring slowly out of a large bottle into a little pump dispenser on my sink. And I just wanted to get it done. And then I stopped. And I slowed down and paid attention to what I was doing in a deeper, less gating idea just to get it done and just to be present with what was happening in front of me, which is what we continually remind ourselves to do. So I was grateful to have taken that moment to just be with the task at hand. And I had a kind of an awakening experience, not a thunderclap awakening, but just an ordinary awakening. to the extraordinary nature of just taking care of what was in front of me.

[07:54]

And this is what we're always doing, whether we're aware of it or not. So with the intention of taking care of that task of filling my soap bottle, soap dispenser. I wasn't behind time and I wasn't ahead of time, but I was just in time. And the COVID-19 virus reminds us to slow down and be in time. So the other day while watering the garden, I noticed the leaves dropping as the water was hitting them and it sprang from the hose. I have to hand water the east, north, and west sides of the building here.

[09:01]

So as the leaves were, or the grasses and leaves were dropping, I recall Sojin Roshi's teaching from a few weeks ago where he said, a good Zen student adjust to circumstances. And I thought, that's true. We're always adjusting to circumstances. The thing that gets frustrating for us sometimes is that we feel there's a timeline when we're going to adjust. I want to be mature. I want to be able to sit still. I don't want my mind to be so busy. all of these things, and we get frustrated if it doesn't change fast enough. So just like with the soap dispenser, am I too slow at calming my mind and adjusting to circumstance? Or am I too fast and not really meaning what's going on?

[10:06]

So again, it's just being in time and hanging out with a water hose. ordinary thing of just taking care of the grounds here, one can have a realization that just what's at hand right in front of us is all we need. We don't have to go off to dusty lands, as Dogen said. You don't necessarily have to be reading scriptures to understand this. All that should be supporting us to the matter at hand, what's in front of us. Blake, thank you for your introduction and noticing the visuals of my food preparation. I was a photographer for many years and have a great deal of appreciation for the visual aesthetic in life. And so while we eat the food, the food eats us, there's something in the process of eating that we can actually appreciate through visuals.

[11:12]

that actually sets a tone of appreciation before the food reaches our lips. So we need to compare ourselves with others when we try to find our balance or when we fall out of balance. A.K. Roshi said, when you let go of your own perceptions, you give people a chance to change. when you do not let go, you are participating in the continuation of their faults. So that's a good teaching for us to have patience and space and compassion for others. Something that Ekin Roshi, I think, implied, but wasn't explicit, which I have been thinking about lately,

[12:13]

is to add, when you let go of your own perceptions, you give people and yourself a chance to change. When you do not let go, you are participating in the continuation of their faults and your own stuckness. Ellen Webb's husband, Sandy Walker, had an art exhibit scheduled in April here in Berkeley. And it was canceled, of course, because of the virus. And so he sent images of his paintings to his mailing list, one each day, to cover each piece of the exhibit. And with a little bit of a commentary. And I was looking at this one called Sean Reeves Dancing.

[13:17]

Sean Reeves Dancing. And if you can picture, so to speak, no pun intended, no pun intended, a picture frame and a collection of what looks like repeating images. There are lines of a figure slightly altered across the frame. from one side to the other. Some of you may recall Marcel Duchamp's nude descending a staircase, where he depicted a nude descending a staircase with images slightly different from the down side of the steps to the upside of the steps. So what I inferred from Sandy's and Marcel's depictions is that we are this body still, and there's movement within this stillness.

[14:25]

After looking at Sandy's painting, I went outside for a walk in my pajamas. In Berkeley, thankfully, nobody bats an eye at such a thing. And as I was walking, I was down by the library there, and I had a sense of this image that Sandy had depicted, where I was in my body, and I'm walking slowly down Russell Street, carefully, quietly. And, you know, words are hard to, words don't really get it, but the sense of myself passing through space. It was just an ordinary thing, but as when we sit zazen and we're really still and really tending to our body and our breath, you can feel the movement within the stillness of zazen. So there I was walking down here on Russell Street, moving and experiencing stillness and movement.

[15:39]

It's not one side or the other. One side's in light and the other side's in dark, one after another. You know, occasionally the Zoom thing will chop out because of the internet connections. We all have had those experiences and it gets kind of frustrating when that happens. For me, besides the frustration, it reminded me of the space is in our life, that we think everything is continually moving, but actually like a movie screen, there's single little images that are being run across a projector, moving quickly, giving the impression that things are moving, but in fact, they're still. So how does that help us? Well, for me, it helps to remind me that there's space in between each and every moment of our expression.

[16:50]

It's like when we sit in Zazen, we breathe in, we take in the universe, there's a little space, and we exhale, and we let go of the universe. But in between taking in and letting go is that gap or that space. And in that space, there's an opportunity for us to respond to the circumstances, maybe not in the same knee jerk reactive way that we often find ourselves when we are either grasping towards something or pushing something away. So we're not rigid and stuck. We need to be flexible, like that blade of grass, breathing in, breathing out.

[17:54]

Speaking of books, not only so by our teacher's teacher, Suzuki Roshi, He gives us a tip on how to read Buddhist scripture, which sometimes can be a little bit daunting. In the chapter Letters from Emptiness, he says, Besides the world which we can describe, there is another kind of world. All descriptions of reality are limited expressions of the world of emptiness. Yet, we attach to the descriptions and think they are reality. That is a mistake because what is described is not the actual reality. And when you think it is reality, your own idea is involved. That is an idea of self. But what many Buddhists have made this mistake, this is why they were attached to written scriptures or Buddha's words.

[19:11]

They thought that his words were the most valuable thing, and that the way to preserve the teaching was to remember what Buddha said. But what Buddha said was just a letter from the world of emptiness, just a suggestion of some help from him. If someone else reads it, it may not make sense. That is the nature of Buddha's words. To understand Buddha's words, we cannot rely on our usual thinking mind. If you want to read a letter from the Buddhist world, it is necessary to understand Buddhist world. This book is the Book of Serenity, which is a collection of koans from about a thousand years ago in China. Thank you, Lisa Verzoni, wherever you are in the universe, for this gift of a bookmark.

[20:18]

Case four. The World Honored One points to the ground. The case. As the World Honored One was walking with the congregation, he pointed to the ground with his finger and said, this spot is a good place, I'm sorry, this spot is good to build a sanctuary. Indra, emperor of the gods, took a blade of grass, stuck it in the ground, and said, the sanctuary is built. The world honored one smile. Tian Tong offers a verse to comment on the case. The bell is spraying on the hundred plants, picking up what comes to hand She uses it knowingly. The 16 foot tall golden body, a collection of virtuous qualities, casually leads him by the hand into the red dust.

[21:24]

Able to be master in the dust, from outside creation a guest shows up. Everywhere life is sufficient in its way, no matter if one is not or is clever as others. So when I read that, I thought, well, what is this grass and sticking it in the ground and building a sanctuary? It didn't make any sense to me. And then I realized it's a story and a teaching. It has to be looked at differently than our usual way of thinking. And for me, it means to use what's at hand, what's right in front of us. A few weeks ago for Zazen on Friday afternoon, well, Monday afternoon, maybe, Kika was Doan.

[22:32]

And Zazen, for those who are not in the Zazen platform here at Zoom at BZC, just to give you a sense of what it is, we sit Zazen in front of a computer, and a timekeeper rings a bell, sells a bell, and keeps the time. Anyway, Kika's computer died. just before Zazen was scheduled to happen. So she texted me letting me know when it happened. I said, well, just come on down and we'll set up here in my apartment. So she came downstairs and we set the computer up pretty quickly before 5.40. And then, thankfully, a little while earlier, my friend Henry, who turned me on to Zen and jazz, two of the most important things in my life, gave me this bell, presented this bell to me in the mail. And I had this cane from Amsterdam from a trip that Kika and I went on with Jerry and Paul. And from Kika's seat, she sounded the bell.

[23:37]

Sorry, bell, this isn't so good. With the cane. So she had to adjust using a large cane, large bamboo stick, sounding a little bell, typically the strikers on the bells are pretty small. So again, this is this world of adjustment that Sojinroshi was talking about that we need to do as good Zen students in order to be one with and not separate from the things in front of us and around us in this world. So how do we build a sanctuary, a place of refuge? Well, the Zendo is a really beautiful space to do that. It's a designated space. But for the past few months, we've been sitting at home. So how do we make our home a sanctuary? This reminded me of the Diaspora of the Jews undertook in 70 of the Common Era, where the Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed, and that the practice went from the Temple into the home.

[24:50]

And all the ceremonies and rituals that were typically done by the high priests and such in the temple were now done by ordinary people in their homes, which is what we do. We create by building altars and sitting zazen here in our dedicated space. So how does our body feel? It's like a little blade of grass. versus a rigid edifice. So are we building a sanctuary of flowing grass or are we building something stiff that doesn't move? There's an appropriate time for stiffness and uprightness, but if someone comes by and taps you on your shoulder, you should be able to flex and flow with that movement and then come back upright. I was gifted this card by a friend some years ago that says, F-ing love this.

[26:14]

And I have it on my altar. I didn't know what my friend meant by sticking the card in between my door, the door jamb, when I came home and found it. I put it on my altar, and for however many years it's been now, when I offer incense, I see this card, fucking love this. Well, for me, it's come to mean effing accept this. And I find myself in some world of disconnect and separation and suffering, is typically due to my not accepting some circumstance, some idea, some situation. And so by making the effort to just accept what is in front of me, it allows me to be myself, to be myself with my pain and difficulty and suffering, to be with myself

[27:30]

when I'm happy and joyous and free. You know, wherever I happen to be at, it's all about accepting and adjusting to circumstance. I've also thought of this card as a get out of jail card for those of you who are familiar with the game Monopoly. Now we place ourselves in jail by our greed, ill will and confusion. So how do we get out of jail? You know, we live with conditioned relationships and we divide and separate. How do we cultivate and live in a sanctuary and live the unconditioned life? Well, there's a role of the unconditioned, which we sit with.

[28:32]

We tap into a zazen, the world of oneness, and then the bell rings, so to speak, and then we're in the world of conditions of duality. How do we work with those two sides, not one, not two? You know, when I graduated from college, just about five years before I started sitting, I came out to California and lived here just for 10 months. And I got a copy of a Tassajar cookie, Tassajar bread book. I didn't know anything about Tassajar or Ed Brown or Zen or anything. I just heard that these were good books. And I got them and I baked a little bread from Ed's book.

[29:33]

I preferred the bread that I bought at the store. I didn't do such a great job at it, but nevertheless, I made the effort to do that. And some years later, I stumbled into Bernie's Place. It was 36 years ago now that I found my way into that temple. And then I discovered Ed Brown and cooking and such. And this is asparagus season now. And so I've been getting asparagus at the Berkeley Bowl up the street and making my little pasta dish with asparagus. And with the cooking that Blake alluded to earlier that I do here, along with a bunch of other people, of course, a lot of TenZones that we're grateful to have here feeding us, I thought, well, how am I going to cut this asparagus spear? You know, one way is straight across, chop, [...] chop

[31:01]

Don't go like this, but you just slice it down using the whole motion. After you sliced it, you roll it a little bit with your other hand and then slice it again. Roll it again, slice, roll it. So this roll cut is going to create pieces of asparagus that have different angles on either side of them. Now, I don't know if it affects the taste or not. There's a little bit more surface area exposed to the oil or however you're cooking your asparagus, but there's a visual treat to it that I liked. But more importantly, from a practice place, not from a chef and an efficacy place, there's the opportunity to be at one with the asparagus because you're going slow, you have a particular technique that you're following and it's chop, chop, chop.

[32:06]

And as the story goes, we often say cutting the carrot. So today it's cutting the asparagus that you're cutting the carrot, but at a certain point, the carrot, the carrot or the asparagus is cutting you. And so how can that be? You know, I'm here and the asparagus is there and I'm going to cut you up and put you in the saute pan. Well, with that kind of attitude, you will always be cutting the carrot. But if you let go and you're present with the practice, the carrot is actually cutting you. You and the carrot are one. And if you're not careful, as I was not careful, your mind will drift and the asparagus will cut you, and I have a little scar on my finger to prove it. So please pay attention when you're cutting the asparagus. I'd like to close by noting that I feel that we're missing our body practice during this time of sheltering in place.

[33:27]

You know, we practice together in the one room or one room Zoom schoolhouse. We rub up against each other, literally or metaphorically. We have different experiences and we are connected by our presence and relationship. And so being isolated, so to speak, or separated, we're missing that body connection. And there's a tendency, I believe, to go into our mind and become a little bit more psychological, trying to figure things out. So I look forward to returning to the Zen Do and being with you in body and mind. And a question to keep in mind is how to be with ourselves and return to this body practice. We have an opportunity moment by moment as Sandy and Marcel Duchamp showed us in those images.

[34:32]

When we're sitting and breathing, when we're standing and breathing, inhale, exhale. What goes on in between those moments? Where are we? Thank you very much for your attention. And I'd like to, open up the question, well, Blake maybe will give a brief description of the questioning. I'd like to ask Sojin Roshi for a comment before opening it up to the group. Thank you all. Yes, so we know, go ahead and type a question, good Sangha, or raise your hand. on the virtual hand. Participants, press the little blue hand, raise it, and then I'll call on you or type a question. First, Sojin Roshi, do you have a comment or a question for Ross? Sojin, you need to unmute yourself.

[35:44]

Good. You're good to go, Sajan. Go ahead. Can you hear me? Yes. I can hear you. I like the images of the painting, Sandy's painting and the nude descending the staircase. Duchamp. Marcel Duchamp, yeah. Yeah, Duchamp. the stillness within the movement and the movement within the stillness. I thought that was a very, very nice image. I hadn't thought of it that way. I mean, you see it that way, but I didn't necessarily think it that way. So it kind of jarred my perceptions. Well, that's what great artists do, is they jar our perceptions. Yeah, yeah. I wasn't jarred. Thank you for that, Sojin. I wasn't jarred when I saw Sandy's painting.

[37:00]

It wasn't until the experience in my body, walking down the street, that it came together for me. And that's where this body practice, I was reminded of how important this body practice is. It's not just an intellectual exercise. Thank you for that. Thank you. Next up, we have Riff Riff. I think it's Sean. Could you go ahead and lower your blue hand and ask a question? Okay. Hi. Yes, it is Sean, and I'll have to update that at some point. Ross, thank you for speaking. you were talking about the space between movements, and my mind instantly went, well, no, there's no space between movements. It's all analogous, and it flows completely. But I still kind of listened and trusted, and it reminded me of, I was recording a cellist here at my house, and he had a very long tone,

[38:14]

I needed a long tone from him. And at some point, he had to return the bow back in the other direction. And I said, well, no, there's a space there, you know, once you get to the end of the bow. And he said, yes, there So I did run into a couple of classical musicians down at Stanford, just kind of grabbed them. They had violas and violins, and I kind of asked them, too. And they said, there is a space there. So I just wanted to share that, really. There's something fascinating about it. That's really great, Sean. It's what I was trying to say is, in everyday life, we experience the Buddhadharma. We don't have to go to a monastery necessarily to see that. It's right in front of us if we can see that, just like that blade of grass. As far as the one and the many, the space of stillness and activity, it's important to not get attached to one side or the other.

[39:27]

We think things are moving, But when there's a glitch or there's a depiction by an artist, we can actually see there's a little space there. And as our practice settles and quiets, we can perceive that and actually taste that. Just like if you take a forkful of food, you can actually feel the subtle differences in flavors versus just, I'm just eating just to eat. So thanks again. Next, thank you for the questions. Katie or Katty Guimond, is she her? Could you? Thank you. Can you hear me? Yes. It's actually from Ken. Thank you, Ross. Yes. I was very taken by the quote from Akin Roshi and that

[40:29]

if we do not accept people, we participate in our stuckness and in their, I forget the word. Yeah, we don't allow them to change and we persist in our own stuckness. And I believe that's true. That's my experience. But I wondered if you could maybe share why that's the case. Why are ideas or how our ideas limit other people's growth in our interactions. I'm curious to understand that with a little bit more nuance and texture. That's a good question. I'm reminded of when Sojiroshi says when he meets people in Dōkasan, there's a perception or an awareness of someone in front of him, but there's no story.

[41:39]

They're meeting the person fresh. And so when we're in dialogue, like right now we're in dialogue, I see you and Katie, that lovely cat there, so I already have an idea or perception of what that must feel like, what it must be like, and I'm not even meeting with you. I already have a story going on in my head, and that limits our relationship. It limits the depth of our relationship. As to why, well, that's an interesting story because it's about me. It's my story, so I'm gonna go on and run that little story out, whereas to be in neutral, not ahead or behind, but to be in neutral, And to receive your story in voice, visually, and all the rest of the skandhas that are playing out here, it enables us to have an actual relationship versus just, I'm just, you're just my audience, or I'm just your audience.

[42:43]

How does that play out? And even in a conversation, we can go from one to the other. So it's important to kind of stay grounded and received completely. Does that touch to it? Yeah. Thank you very much. That answered it directly. Yeah, good. Yeah. Well, thank you, Ken. Thank you, Katie. Thank you. And thank you, sweet cat. I think a final question. Dan Harden, I invite you to lower your blue hand and unmute yourself. Thank you so much. Yes. Thank you, Ross. Hey, try to think of exactly how to phrase this. I was thinking about the you cutting the carrot and the carrot cutting you. And I was going back between you and the carrot. And then I was thinking, where's the knife in all of this?

[43:43]

And, you know, I was thinking. Maybe I'm focusing too much on the knife, and the point is to just. Be cut. if that makes any sense. And I don't quite know what my question is, but I was just looking for the knife, I guess. Yeah. Well, there's enough information there for me to give a response, offer a response. Thank you. One of the first experiences I had of kind of no separation, so to speak, was I was sitting in the Zendo, and I had a bowl in my hand. I'll use what's in hand, which is Henry's little bell here. And I was eating. And I saw the bowl, and my hand, and my chopsticks, and all of that. And at a certain point, the bowl wasn't there. My hand wasn't there. It was just all one piece, which is always that way.

[44:45]

But we tend to chop things up, so to speak, or divide things up. And it just happened. So I'm certainly conscious of the knife. I was conscious of the knife when I was cutting the asparagus. So that's the many side, but at the same time, there's also the oneness of it. And when we are swimming, we practice our swim strokes, but if we're just focused so much on the strokes, we'll sink. We have to let go of the form of the strokes of swimming and just go down the river. That's the best way I can explain it. So it's always there. And once in a while, the curtain gets pulled back and we get a little glimpse into something that is a different view, a more holistic view, if you will. Thanks for that question.

[45:42]

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