I bow to the Three Supremes of God, the Tathagata Spirits. Good evening. My overriding concern of this evening is to... And that's all that came up in my mind. It stopped right there. And just before that, what happened was, I was enjoying... This is almost my favorite part of talking. This microphone. I'm a hearing person. I love sound. And... The sound that I'm making is being magnified, right? So I can breathe. I'm aware now that my voice is probably a little bit deeper than I usually speak. Isn't that great?

[01:01]

So... But what I wanted to talk with you, not to you tonight, but actually with you, tonight, is something that sounds like form. But I realize that we've been talking about that for at least a week, if not years. So I didn't want to call it form exactly. But that is what I'm going to be speaking about. But more fundamentally, as I was walking down the stairs, the question came up to me, what really are we doing here? And somehow or another, those two things were connected for me. If we really think, or believe, or anyway have an inkling

[02:10]

that it might be a good thing to kind of believe in that everything comes out of emptiness, which is a little bit funny way to put it, but I will for now. If we really do feel that way, then how in the world do we manifest that understanding? My thinking is that what we are about here is to free the heart. And if that isn't what it's about, then somebody tell me. And my experience is that it's not easy.

[03:17]

It's difficult. So what gets in the way? Jogo Bhek has a wonderful way of expressing the four vows that we take. She says, caught in a self-centered dream, exactly suffering. Holding to self-centered thought, exactly the dream. So, what gets in the way? Me. Me. Me, me, me, me, me.

[04:19]

Yay, me. I'm going to be happy. I'm not going to be unhappy. Or sometimes we go, Blue me. Lousy me. I'm going to stay unhappy and I'm liking it here because I'm familiar with it. But. So, how is this talking about forms? It's talking about it in two ways.

[05:23]

The first way is, it's talking about it in two ways. I love the forms, first of all. So let me get that said. I really love them. We make them up. Right? It could be anything. But the first way is, is that when someone asks you, for example, to walk quietly in the Zen do, and you're used to walking kind of at a normal, usual place in the Zen do, and someone taps you on the shoulder and says, Excuse me, our form, whatever that is, that we just made up, is to walk quietly and slowly in the Zen do, and then you go, Fuck this. Guess who's there? Me. Right? And that's not so bad.

[06:29]

That's fine. So the forms mirror, are a wonderful mirror for us. And we can love that person who has that kind of response. That's a person with a lot of energy, full of life. Has real opinions. Knows what's right and wrong. Probably knows what the best thing is for everybody. And can tell you why. But you know, another... I'm not going to tell you the other reason yet for a minute, but another thing about walking slowly in the Zen do, and we really mean slowly. I told somebody that one time, and I said, Please walk slowly in the Zen do.

[07:32]

You know, I'm sitting face out, which is a real problem, for two reasons. One is, the candle is right in front of me. So I'm sitting there, you know, and it's going... That's one thing. And then the other thing is, especially in the beginning of Satsang, you know, it's really busy in the morning, and lately I've been allowing myself to sit in the morning, which is a gift. So... But people go by, you know, I'm sitting there, I'm trying to sit, and they go... First they all go this way. But then, everything quiets down a little bit, and then the gender happens, right? And then, all of a sudden, everybody goes that way. I think we had a practice discussion and Doug said that. So, it's like about ten minutes before. And then, people come, they walk close to me, so they're in my eye of sight. So sometimes I say, Please walk slowly.

[08:39]

And then they say yes, and then they try to walk slowly. I can see they're really trying to walk slowly. But they have some place to go. I understand, totally. They're hurrying to their seat, to sit down. And they don't want to disturb anybody. Suzuki Roshi said one time, If you think you're cleaning the room, to clean the room, you don't understand why you're cleaning the room. And I thought, Oh, a Zen koan. I didn't understand it. Everything I don't understand, I assume is a Zen koan. I give them to Paul.

[09:41]

He can explain it. But now I understand. If we have a goal, like getting to the seat, or cleaning the room, or getting enlightened, or whatever, we're not really present for the life that we're living. And this is where it comes back to form. Form actually gives us a chance to manifest our life. It's a wonderful thing. And we do it all the time. It could mean offering a stick of incense. It could mean

[10:41]

washing the dishes. It could mean holding your hand in mudra. It could mean any of the forms. It is. It is, in fact, the way we manifest, everything manifests, emptiness. We are what emptiness looks like. Okay. So even if you do the so-called forms in a very peculiar way, you're still manifesting emptiness, but you don't get to enjoy it when the me is there. But when you do the forms completely,

[11:44]

completely, no trace, like riding a bicycle or playing basketball when there's a game, or even when you practice, maybe. Maybe so. When we offer the incense, completely offer the incense, completely paint, completely wash the dish, right there without any thought that in ten minutes you have to be somewhere and you have to be really fast with these dishes. And it doesn't mean that you're not fast. It only means you're completely there for chopping the onions, completely there for your life. And personally, I think

[12:54]

I'm [...] And personally, my experience is is that the only regret, really, that we can have in life is having missed it. It's also, regret sometimes comes up if you hurt somebody. But mostly, I think,

[13:54]

if we miss our own life, what else have we? So the forms are great. The forms are a tremendous opportunity to try again and again and again, total repetition, over and over and over again, to pick your little self up and say, Thank you very much. I realize that you are tired of chanting the same stupid thing over and over and over again. But I can set you aside this morning. You haven't been a real great advisor to me most of the time anyway, frankly. You can set it aside and really be there for service. Really chant. Full on chanting. A lot of energy.

[14:57]

A lot of vitality. Why? Because of form. It was just offered to you. Like today, we were talking about are you used by or do you use the twenty-four hours? The twenty-four hours, it comes to us and creates who we are. Seven o'clock in the morning, oh yeah, I'm a chanter. No. That's not right. I'm not a chanter at seven o'clock in the morning. I'm a worker. I do Soji. I do Soji. I don't do Soji a lot. But I've been going to the flop room lately. Does anybody know about those books in the flop room? Are they like classics of science fiction or murder? Are they the classics of murder mysteries there? They're junk? Junk. Sorry. I don't really trust myself to go through.

[15:58]

It's not a genre that anyone is familiar with. But maybe somebody can come with me one morning during Soji and we can look through the books and see. Although, I don't know, maybe sometime junk... Am I disparaging something? Anyway, is good for something. I don't know. No, I don't think so. Really good science fiction is what we... No? Well, anyway. You understand. I've been looking at those quite a lot lately because I've been doing it, Soji, when I do it down there in the flop room. And I'm looking and sometimes I do take one off the shelf. I put it in the... put it in the to-be-recycled bin. But I'm getting a little nervous now because I'm not sure if I'm going toward the core section. I don't want to... I don't want to recycle something

[16:59]

that someone really is in love with. What was I talking about? I forgot. Do you get the picture? So, forms. So, just to review. If you have any that you know about that I'm not going to mention, you could raise your hand and we could see. So, when you get up in the morning, you brush your teeth. There's a form. Okay? Really brush your teeth. Enjoy it. Be there for that. Zazen. Walk slowly in your room. Don't run to your seat. Okay? Because there's nowhere to go. Ever. It's only here. Sit. Sit. Up. Straight. I'm just...

[18:01]

You can do whatever you want. I'm just running down a list. Okay? Sit up straight. In Zen and sometimes in Buddhism, the posture is important. Very important. Sit up straight. It makes you look very good from the back when you're sitting up straight. In terms of vanity. Sit up straight. Somebody's watching you. Do you know that we care about you? Do you know that? Do you know that the practice committee really cares about you? Do you all know that? We really do. We really, really do. We try our best to take care of you in the best way we know how. All right. Sit up straight. Chant with vigor during service. What else? Did I miss a bunch? Kinyin. Yes. What's a good thing?

[19:04]

A reminder for Kinyin. What's a good Kinyin reminder? Coordinate your foot with your breath. Stand up straight. Gassho. What's a form that we like? Bowing is a great one. Bowing is a wonderful one. Bow until everything disappears. No Buddha. No you. Just bowing. Did I tell you my bowing story of Suzuki Roshi? I didn't tell you that? I must have. 1970, I was at... I think I'll stop after this story. 1970, I was in Tassara for the summer. 1970, Suzuki Roshi came down and he was giving these great talks on the Sanda Gaya which is going to be a book in a minute. It's coming out like in November. And I saw it.

[20:05]

Michael has one already. It's a beautiful... Michael, you guys did a great, great, great job. Words in the coming... Let me tell you, it was not easy. Especially those last lectures. How you did that, I am impressed. Really impressed. Great, great. Thank you very much for that work. It's coming out soon. Anyway, he gave those talks the summer that I was at Tassara and Okasan was also there and she was teaching tea, the tea ceremony. And I was taking tea. And... Oh, that's not the story I'm trying to... Oh yeah, no. The connection is that in the same room that I made tea for him, which is now cabin 4, the shiso room, for the shiso stays, he also had Okasan in that room. So I was having Okasan with him and I asked him what is a bowing, what is bowing about. It was a new thing for me. I'm Jewish.

[21:05]

We don't bow in Jewish. So it was a new thing for me. I had no idea. And so I asked him. He was sitting right across from me and I asked him what about bowing? And he got up right then and he came over to my left and he started bowing like this, right here. And I looked at him like... I hadn't talked to him before. And during Okasan he had never done anything like this. And he didn't stop. To me it felt like years. Bow, over and over and over again, bowing. And then he sat down right in front of me again and then he started talking like nothing had happened. And I kept talking to him. I have no idea what we said at all. The only thing I remember was his bowing over here. And it wasn't even like he answered my question.

[22:06]

Certainly not in words. But I saw him bow and that for the rest of the time, for years, even now, sometimes it comes up for me. What is bowing? And then bow. Bow. Bow. Just throw yourself in. Bow. There are lots of other forms and I'm not going to mention them because I'm going to say goodnight soon. But please what we're doing here is helping each other train in this nobulous kind of Soto Zen training. And one of the real core things that we do are the forms. They're a real help to our own practice

[23:08]

and to everybody else. And they are a manifestation, an embodiment of your understanding. And like Rib is fond of saying all the time that Suzuki Roshi told him, when you are you, Zen is Zen. When you completely can be yourself, no matter what it looks like, totally there, the world comes alive then. And that's a gift to everybody. That's the gift you give to the people you're practicing with when you're really who you are. So... Thank you very much.

[24:20]

Thank you very much.

[24:27]

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