Zen Mind, Beginners Mind: Study Yourself

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good morning
it feels like fall has arrived as a christmas in the air which is really nice and and gathered there's gonna be some rain this week is that people have heard maybe it would be good
i'm also noticing this is a digression before even before i even started that ah
ah my thighs really hurt i'm sure this is of great interest to you
but he just goes to show i wasn't doing enough bowing in india you know just the bowing in the last couple of days ago it's really use it or lose it ah so ah to do have to do about about it
i'm so today we're after this we're going to will have a ceremony that opens aspects of practice with this our sixteenth aspects of practice which is quite amazingly years really go by ah and will have a ceremony with the scene
new students who are teaching opening that ah and for this for these four weeks we're going to be
delving into send my beginner's mind hitch each class and each talk will
people will take up a particular chapter or chapters and so i'd just like to invite you you feel free to bring your book with you
so that are you can be actually looking at the text taxpayer this is not the way you're supposed to do it and send your so it's just listen just do one thing but if you you can follow the text so i i think that it'll help it come more alive for you so please feel free to do that
the chapter that i'm going to talk about today is chapter called study yourself and i'd thought i would just give a little little background first whom you may have found their sins in mind beginner's mind in the introductory material
sir you may know this purchased it to acknowledge that a
the origin of this book were recordings that were made in los altos a design design group in los altos that says if you have you visited weekly for a number of years and ah
originally ah
there was no thought of recording either by students are by suzuki roshi of recording his dogs but ah marion derby who was one of the students in los altos
realize that these are these are really good beginner's talks really good tops drawing new people into the practice and so with his permission she began to tape and nineteen sixty five and a little later and tender vieja tape is dogs as well so we have this great
very wide archive of of his original expression
ah so she she gathered these tapes into a manuscript and gave it to richard baker ah and richard baker invited trudy dixon who was had been a student of suzuki roshi since nineteen sixty two ah
and of
she she really formed it into a manuscript she took these these are
transcriptions and she edited them into chapters and ah and structured the book in in the way that we have an added the epigraph that the beginning of each
of each section
and have
she added on page sixty nine cheap as she added a drawing of a fly
by her husband mike dixon
ah
peter did you know him you know mike
mike dixon is also he's the painter who painted that a portrait of suzuki roshi is that we have in the community room
hum
and
she completed the manuscript he didn't she died of cancer and she had been dying while she was assembling this and ah and she was young woman she was thirty when she passed away with children
richard baker took the manuscript to japan and he found a an excellent publisher whether hill and book came out in nineteen seventy
so my question in approaching this chapter and approaching the book is
how do we approach it
and i think that the
perhaps the response is implicit
in that question
how do we read this book how do we understand it
ah this is how
is an essential in question is something that surgeon is emphasized over and over again for for years how
not why
but how
and you know how do we read this book i think david chadwick of
a crooked cucumber the biography of suzuki roshi
says
i think even suzuki roshi had some challenge or difficulty in reading this book he would read the book and he would say
did i say that
and we've had already several discussions are several just informal discussions that have come up with senior students in the last in the last few days about their chapters and i have the same questions as like
the tone of the book
is so inviting and so open
and then you get all these sentences of these these statements and suzuki roshi says and second
what did he say what does this mean and it really you know if you are desirous of
having some fixed doctrine you know of getting the the word you're in trouble
ah
you know talking with jake and sojourn and i were talking about question with jake had the other day and sojourn was not going to give the answer you know it's it gets thrown back on you which is why the wonderful qualities of this book it's not that one should take it as
the gospel but to let it work on oneself and i think that that's implicit in
get the year the epigraph the famous epigraph to read the beginning of the book where he says as we all know in the beginner's mind there are many possibilities in the experts mind in the experts they are few so in the beginner's mind there are many questions
ah i don't know i don't really understand what he meant here ah how how do i understand is how do i in contrast this with my mind and with my practice
so this not knowing
is really a central aspect of our practice
so i want to encourage you ah
as we go through this practice period to a question yourselves about all that you read and all that you hear what you read in the book when you hear from from the senior students ah
question it does it work do you understand you know does this lead you
towards a kind of freedom
and i'd also like to invite you are
do feel free and respectfully i hope
to question your teachers
if something that i say or they say is not clear
so this is also this is studying ourselves
so one side of our practice is
continuous inquiry
and another side of the other side or and other side of our practice is settling completely
into the moment

settling into your body and mind in such a way that have questions just fall away
and this is
the other side of the statement that suzuki roshi makes an ed dogan makes to study the self study the buddhist way to study the buddha way is to study the self and to study the self is to forget the self
and so to settle completely in that moment
ah is the aspect of
forgetting yourself
and when you forget yourself
the next in line with what i was talking about yesterday that is lined with accepting yourself and standing on your two feet
so forgetting yourself
and questioning these are we have to include
both of these
has aspect of our practice we have to include both sides in fact all sides
and not fall into one sidedness yes
i don't like that term forget yourself i think it's not accurate i think it's misleading i don't think literally it means to life
forget baldrige way because who
what it means you study yourself and you see you see through your ideas about herself and then you kind of don't take it seriously anymore you set it aside you
setting aside these notions of yourself that you know are so you know delusive i am forgetting yeah basically i agree and i think that that moved and explore this as we go into the chapter ah but i think that that's a primer that a prime
example of the question of that question like what did he say you know what because when we take things literally ah
will take to the english words trends you know translated from the japanese words and so on
the questions that should arise so i think that's a question that should arise
but anyway just to say we have to include all these sides rather than fall into a one side in this the words to say forget yourself that's really what we should be doing you know to sit to fall into that one sidedness of course carries the shadow
of the other ah and then we're in the realm of touristic thinking to stick action game i may have i may have made a mistake here by my invitation go ahead
sandra south or story
yeah and let's go on
you could also be saying one could also postulate that
the self drops the self
that the story drops away but let let's explore what would suit us she says so

there are several sections to this to this chapter which is it's about study yourself but actually at the heart of this is also a very ah
a kind of exposition of
what one's relationship with a relationship is between student oneself and teacher ah and he uses his chapter two to explore that
so the epigraph is to have some deep feeling about buddhism is not the point we just do what we should do like eating supper and going to bed this is buddhism
ah
so
it's interesting or the second word of this chapter gives me a problem
he says the purpose of studying buddhism is not to study buddhism but to study ourselves ha
i'm not sure about that word purpose it swore to me like the way
we study the way we practice read then or something necessarily purposeful but anyway that's my feeling then he says it's impossible to study ourselves without some teaching
if you want to know what water is you need science and the scientists needs a laboratory so on and so forth he said but it's impossible to know what water is
itself to no water in itself and our i think that one of the things they find is reading reading seven mind beginner's mind is that there is always a subtext
of dogan
you know like a an underground stream that's running through the book dogan talks a lot about corner ah so in the same in the game show god ah you know he talks about is when you sell in a boat out in a boat in the middle of alone
ocean when no lads in sight the ocean looks circular does not look any other way but the ocean is neither round or square it's features are infinite variety it's like a palace it's like a jewel
it only looks circular as far as you can see at that time
in the mountains and waters sutra
gets even more graphic you know so this sentence but it's impossible to know water in itself of
because
our view of water is conditioned by
the actual
reality or the conditions of this world that we that we live in so
in mountain waters he says all beings do not see mountains and waters in the same way some seawater as a jeweled ornament
some being seawater as wondrous blossoms
hungry ghosts seawater as raging fire or pulse and blood yeah dragon seawater as a palace or pavilion
some being sea water as a forest or a wall
some see it as the door money to a pure liberation the true human body or it's a form of the body and essence of mind
human being seawater water as water
water is seen as dead or alive depending on causes and conditions so this is quite apart from
the kind of elemental analysis that say a scientist would do
see says it's the same with us
we need some teaching in other words we need science we need various
very critical investigative tools for looking at ourselves but just by studying the teaching alone it's impossible to know what i in myself am
through the teaching we may understand our human nature but the teaching is not we ourselves it's an explanation of ourselves
so if you've had so me stop there so i think this is
what we see when we read the sutras
when we'd be dogan
every teaching that we come across ah first of all it's been offered within a particular set of circumstances ah if you read the but the poly suitors
almost every one is the buddha's response to put to a question
and that question is the question of the person who brings it and the reason that we have these teachings is because there was a general applicability
ah but there was also something very specific and because it was specific sometimes the sutras seem to contradict each other
and it's also true that the teachings i've been thinking we talked about this in the class we had on ah the hindrances and the factors of enlightenment harm
the various dharmic systems that we have ah the eightfold path the power meters ah the factors of enlightenment in the or
foundations of mindfulness and so forth hob
they
comprise the teachings
and they are really conserve has lenses through which we look at ourselves
but they're not ourself
they're just ways they're just tools by which we can see ourselves and that this whole book
ah is just a multifaceted lens through which we can see ourselves if we read the book and really study it we keep seeing ourselves from different angles which is which is how we study ourselves just as when we sit zazen ah every
breath every thought is different and it allows us ah to see the workings of our mine and to see our conditions and to glimpse the unconditioned which is really been able to access
sept
ah our conditioning without getting stuck on it so perhaps that's closer to what it means to i think that's in line with somewhat with what paul was saying to see it and see through it ah and let it go
rather than two
forget it and when we forget them and i you know
yesterday i forgot my saga of stairs since the like that saga wasn't gone it was you know what i got here i remembered it was up there but that's not come out forgetting the self i think yeah i'm starting with the idea of not forgetting yourself
realize that put myself from an angle but realized myself it's a company with you or everyone present or the fact that i just fell on the ground or whatever is the realization of self that is new because i forgot elsa and as have used the word projects really move
do not know who i will be when i have you in his post yes it's not getting stuck on that idea of self and recognizing that the self is relational
that it's in relation to all those who surround us all the causes and conditions and that there is a you know cause i took a big self which is bigger than this being in this envelope of skin and the strain of bone
so then he turns their knees are soon as a teaching we may understand our human nature but the kitchen is not we ourselves in some explanation of ourselves so if he were attached and teaching or to the teacher that's a big mistake
he says the moment you meet a teacher you should leave the teacher and you should be independent
ah
you need feature so that you can become independent
if you are not attached to him or her the teacher will show you the way to yourself you have a teacher for yourself and not for the teacher
i think that that last point is something that he wanted to emphasize because he probably
you know experience from his teacher from his students in a great amount of projection everybody wanted to serve him and everybody wanted to help him but that was not his point you know his point was to help the
them
of course this is a natural this is a natural dynamic ah i was so the conversation with a teacher in india who was pointing out a
a suture from a policy to where the buddha just after his enlightenment he he when he says in effect is oh i have no one to rainier anymore
i've got nobody to look up to that's painful really interesting it's interesting point know pointing to hours that are human proclivity to want to revere or look up to somebody and he said well no i'm i'm done i've got nobody who's
gone as far as i haven't this is this is it so what are we do now because he was alluding to perhaps there was a little point of pain there i can find you the citation is really interesting ah he says oh
what i can revere
is the dharma
and by that he did not mean the dharma of meeting his teachings he was talking about
his insight into the nature of reality
as dharma
and that the workings of the universe of it's the impermanence of it's constant rising and falling away
is ah
what he can revere
so if we revere that than we let that help us
ah
now stuck at the buddha now going back to suzuki roshi the woods sutra from
the buddha on his enlightenment yeah
yes keeping with your point about
our are with relational i like to think that as a parent has the way or if one is no accomplished and understanding and teaching be a teacher that there's a way in which this person the buddhist the grocery ourselves he comes is a
relationship with each other and the teachers didn't think so you think about how the to prepare the teacher i think of any ways to teacher preparing their students
we can have is that we think it's only going one way yeah it it's and this is
it's a get a two way street ah but
you know as he says the next section he goes on to talk about our teacher teaches me talks up from rinzai said this yet for ways sometimes ruins a sometimes a teacher talks about talked about the disciple him or herself and other words said here's what i see
sometimes the teacher talks about the teaching itself here's the dharma has has presented by our ah those who've come before us ah
sometimes
he gave an interpretation of the of the disciple or the teaching and other it's coming from his own view from his groundedness and intuition ah and understanding in himself and the fourth way is finally he did not give any instruction to his disciples you know this is when the
when this when the teacher just sits there and lets you work with whatever you have to work with and
experiment pieces that when you do not hear anything from the teacher but just sit this is called teaching without teaching he said but sometimes this is not sufficient so we listened to lectures and have discussions
this is the three their there three traditional aspects of sin teaching
first is just zazen itself
the second is meeting with a teacher in doak saunders signs in and the third is listening to the kitchen listening to lectures are listening ah
listen to an exposition of the text knees or this is you see this in in many of the old of the old teachers ah
then suzuki pitcher where she said so but we should remember that the purpose of practice in a particular place is to study ourselves
ha we need a teacher because it is impossible to study ourselves by ourselves but you should not make a mistake you should not take what you have learned with the teacher for you yourself
ah i think what he means there is that
ha
what you hear from your teacher
you have to digest in this work of studying yourself but i think what would i got from this we need to teacher because it's impossible to study ourself by ourselves that had come back to this kind of process that i've evolved way
with with lori
ah and somebody was asking me a similar question in ah in in discussion of a few days ago ah kind of
what do you do basically what do you do when an afflicted emotion arises so you're studying yourself you're seeing this has arisen this is very hurtful you know i'm i'm hurting this is are vibrating
so what i find and i don't really understand this mechanism but i think it it's also kind of at the core of our in certain ways at the core of a psychotherapeutic
methodology
is if something is troubling me
i have to say it
and i don't know why that works but if i don't say it
it thinks it's
oaks into me and really holds on tight if i do say it say to laurie who's often the unfortunate victim of our of these so perceptions ah
if i but what we worked out his i'm not saying this because i want you to do something you know i'm not saying that even because i want feedback you know if i if you have to that fine if there's something helpful i want to hear that but i just need to hear myself say this so i can just clear it out
out
sometimes you can write it and sometimes maybe you don't need the and sometimes maybe it works read it think it and recognize that you can see through it but this is what a teacher does like well i think we need a teacher cause it's impossible to study ourselves by ourselves yeah
have you
is a teacher
i'm
you know ultimately everyone is our teacher
ha
i think we look around we observe people
ah we meet with them we talked with them and in time
not by virtue virtual position in time by discovery you see is there a relationship they are reserve early the potentiality for relationship ah that we can grow into duet and you also to do i trust this person
you know do i have a sense that this person that they want something from me
this is one of the themes when somebody asked sojourn and of reviews go what's the most important thing for teacher and he said never to want anything from your student
ah and i think that that was very isn't for me not always easy but ah
ha
not want something from your student not want something for yourself so when you you know you have to discern by the on the basis of building relationship is that person trustworthy the same as any other relationship
ha and
also
do i have a sense that
this person
has some understanding
that i might like to have a glimpse of not so i'd get their understanding with that in that they are that they've been to places in themselves that ah that i might like to go
i feel like you know ever since i came here
ah in the early eighties
aside from sojourn because my primary teacher ah i have learned from so many people who've practiced here and they were people that i felt
there if you will ahead of me in some in some area and ah yet they're just you but they have their shortcomings in their in their strains
so all of them i see is my teachers ah
and you choose which is a you know which is a deepening relationship

so he talks about want to just be aware of the time and ah and probably won't get through all of this but yes you read something that you
sense to
which we awoke at what wasn't
this
your view they are attached to the teacher and teaching that's a big mistake
and even more confusing as the more the moment you meet a teacher you should leave the teacher and you should become independent and you need a teacher so that you can become
and if you are not attached to them the teacher will show you the way to yourself all of that as not a doesn't make sense to me
i'm sorry
here is i can try i mean i think
his is suggesting don't merge with your teacher and don't also object don't put your teacher on a pedestal it's your life that you need to be independent so he also said when you are you that is it not when you are male
well zen is in cause that's not going to happen
i never thought that i was no no but but people
what people do
is too
there's a hazard of giving up yourself
of our of thinking this person is wise and i give up my autonomy because he knows better or she knows better i think this is what cisco is it suzuki roshi is warning us against and at the stand he saying but
teacher if is a teacher actually can be helpful to you think can be helpful by pointing you back had yourself okay you
sentiment i want to be just like you yeah and that could be good though
yeah did not just like you know it's used to be right but there's a distinction to be made listed by mind ah it's like there are people that i've seen in my life the people i've seen in this room
who i aspire to be more like them
they have qualities that i want to cultivate it myself and in that sense they are my teachers but i don't want to be them
ah say how do i and this is just the way i learned to play music you know i've i played traditional music so there's a form are very there's a lot of form and i listened to everything that i played with the older musicians and when you after a while you realize you have to make it your own
for to be authentic otherwise it's just an irritation
i'm seeing on the world can be the teacher
so obviously sort of been for
yeah i mean it's just it's suzuki roshi language it's it's it's great language it's really provocative you know
and why do you need a teacher to become independent i don't see why you need a teacher to to be any teacher tomorrow
that i sometimes find helpful
let's say you're studying mathematics and internet six times for your teacher tells me six nights worrying for twenty four take the forums and you put 'em of six time yeah that was a
has given you some satanists after all you're not going to need to go back to your teacher six times for you understand and so finally went away have them all by six time for so i think that's what this is if alex is about our understanding of the dharma is our own
i know that else
yeah that when you learn something you make it around somebody else has also
it's it's been somebody else's it's an it's something that applies more generally but but once you learn it you can't forget it and you don't have to keep going back to write such transport one el nino and six times know what it right that's what i think it's when received a tree teaching
yeah
because you don't need to come back
right now to keep going back over and over and over again to be told six times for my four or eight times eight is
yeah but part of the that's true it were dead
it works with math and i'm not so sure how well it works with then because it's hard for us to really it's hard sometimes somebody the teachings when something else is so deeply pattern in i said so we end up going back to the we do end up going back from teacher
ask him asking him or her the same thing over and over again until someday something goes
and we get it and were free but that's that's another damage
judy
what i have have to add that
where i was a i took a class on introduction to mathematical analysis of spent the entire semester
one is no one
i learned that arms and faces face to face three sometimes it doesn't matter
and so i mean that's just
ah don't like cosmology and objective reality einstein it's not always so now that science
i'm just wondering
no exception yeah
independent state
i guess that's a your words is for independence and also that or a relational
how would you
define
independence
i think the point that he's making here is in line with what i was talking about yesterday it's one side one side is you have to stand on your two feet
the other side perhaps is we're all in it together
so don't fall down on one side don't get caught by one side as the truth because he says independent here that's what he's saying here in that moment and someplace else in this book is going to say something very different but it doesn't contradict
this is you know i think this is the great thing about xin really great thing bad sand which quite different than early buddhism is ah
it's non dualistic it doesn't
in admit to a world a reality that has many possibilities rather than just a binary one
yes no you know nobody ever wins an argument
with the buddha
he's very kind he's very respectful and you can read the suitors he always wins you know ah and you could say what
where are you a bunch of bunch of guys you know
ah
anyway you have to allow for this all sightedness so here is making the point about he's he wants us to be independent and i think that he's giving this because he's in the position of being a teacher he respects himself in that position he was
you to understand that he's available for you but he wants you to be you
it's getting towards the end here is is let me just let me just read a little worn running over i'm sorry ah
there's a there's a lot here it's a beautiful section about it practicing and adhd bit a mokena not gonna go into it all
towards the end he said
dorgan said to study buddhism is the study yourself to study herself as to forget ourselves let me read you the whole passage of from dogan because it doesn't stop there
and it's it's important where it goes is ah to study the buddha way is to study the self to study the self is to forget the self than it is to forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things when actualized a myriad things your body and mind as well as the bar
audi's and minds of others drop away no trace of realization remains and is no trace continues endlessly so there's a lot there but
suzuki roshi ah
in the end but he says is the purpose of studying buddhism is to study ourselves and forget ourselves when we forget ourselves this is the same as this are we are actualized we were really thinks he says when we forget ourselves we are actually the true activity of big existence or reality
itself i think it's a wonderful way of saying it's like when we set aside ourselves when we enter an activity completely were part of everything
we don't we're not always there you're not go this is the problem that we have when we hear that we think that's the way i should live nobody lives like that
but all of us have moments like that
we all have moments of freedom we all have moment even
even when when you drove here you in a big moment of that because it's like
is such a you in order to drive you have to be aware of the entire universe around you it's amazing we don't just completely smash into each other every second ha
that's been mind functioning and yet it's also purpose for directive
so when we forget ourselves we actually are the true activity of big businesses are reality itself when we realize this fact there is no problem whatsoever in this world and we can enjoy our life without feeling any difficulties
the purpose of this practice of our practices to be aware of this fact so this is this is tough for me when we realize this fact there is no problem whatsoever in the world and we can enjoy our life without feeling any difficulties
it's just one of those places where you you have these this kind of
statement description of reality by suzuki roshi that
you know i at least stop the is that true
but there are moments i do see from from reading him from senior teachers from looking at ways of there are moments when it's like that even
when they are among moments of difficulty so a couple more questions new we have to him john economy it seems like that said if you work through the provision of no preference
and then you have this
right it says he worked but again this is
him presenting
he's presenting an aspect of existence that in our business we can lose track of
it's an important it's really important to recognize this
this unconditioned reality that is the part it's always there
and that it's something that we can connect with and be it you know be at ease with ah you know justice
i was hearing somebody talked about someone dying the other day just they were just oh it was i know what it was it was actually reading david chadwick talking about our truly dixon's dying
of her being just really at ease with her dying even though
the loss must have been at thirty years old with kids just unimaginable and yet
she was able to be at ease with an inset other people that east
so yeah i would say that's an aspiration
the something that that i feel ah ha moments difficult moments i can i can feel this way you know him even
sitting in an awkward place just say okay here i am i better just sit here
you know and i was sitting on a stage for three hours in india ah had you know and there were several thousands of people in the audience said is like
i had to go to bathroom i want to get out there you know it's like and i just felt i really for the pool like i wanted to check my phone you know
you know anything to get away and i just said
i'm here just sit just
d the situation and just two thousand and that was and it was fine so
anyway ah study yourself that's what that's do doing for the rest of the day and that's what we're doing for the rest of our lives so thank you very much