I'd like to talk this evening about how to get your practice started. Can you hear me in the back okay? No? Anyway, I'd like to talk this evening about how we get our practice started. As you know, practice doesn't know any particular geography or situation. In fact, if we were going to make a distinction, we might say that creating a special situation for practice is not really practice. But we speak practically about our actual experience, most of us.

[01:09]

find our practice gets started, our first experience of having practice, you know, is at Tassajara, and not here in the city. And it's interesting, at Tassajara I'm always speaking about how good it is to practice in the city, and when I come here I always, it's interesting, I notice the other side when I come to the city. One, you know, Buddhism is just... When we want to say what Buddhism is, we have to say everything just as it is, and we give various suggestions on how to practice.

[02:10]

What we mean by just as it is, you know, it's not exactly what it seems when you first hear it, because it depends with how you're listening to it or what part of you is listening to it. And if only a part of you is listening to it when we say just practice, then you don't understand. So it's pretty hard in the city, you know, or in a complicated situation which continues your karma, to get a feeling for practice. So first, you know, we clear a kind of path so we can see what

[03:21]

It's happening to us. You know, if you always have a headache, you can't tell when the headache started or what was the cause of the headache. You can explore your headache as much as you want with psychology or anything you like. But still, a headache, thinking about a headache, it's pretty confusing. So it's useful to get rid of your headache. And if you don't have a headache, and you're alert enough, you can tell the instant the headache starts. And once you're that alert, you won't have headaches anymore, because you can see the minute a headache starts, oh, I see what happened when that headache started, or I see what little thing went click in my brain, and you stop it. So it's useful to have some time in which you stop your life. And since Buddhism isn't exactly what it seems, we say practice just as it is, but what we mean by that, it takes some time to get into, because it's a kind of territory that we can't think about.

[04:51]

we have to let ourselves be into it somehow. So it's quite useful, you know, to... I found it quite useful to practice at Tassajara this last... most of this last three months, because every first and third and sixth and eighth day I had to give a talk and every time they're the same faces, you know, and during sasheen especially every day. And we can begin to get into something that we can't get into, really, talking here in the city so easily, because you change and you have many things during your day which you bring to lecture, you know, which almost make it impossible to get through. I can't imagine when all of your heads are full up. All of us could suddenly see it, you know, this jungle of stuff going in this room, weaving back and forth. So what can I say in the midst of this that makes any sense?

[06:12]

Anyway, so practice at first is like clearing a path, maybe. But actually, we don't want to clear a path, you know, we want to enter exactly into things. You know, how to move in the world without hindering it. Even though Dogen says, we're hindrance itself, or hindrance hinders hindrance. Still, how to move in this world without interfering with it. To be alert enough to know when you have a headache coming, or to be alert enough to know just what you need and no more. You know, a kind of simple example, a friend of mine who's here tonight, Nanao Sakaki. Do you all know Nanao? Some of you know? Anyway, Nanao is sitting. Can you stand up, Nanao? Anyway, that's Nanao. Thank you. Anyway, Nanao is a friend of mine and he's rather started several communes, kind of communes or communities in Japan.

[07:50]

you may have heard about and Gary Snyder has written about in his book, Earth Household, about the one on Suwannisay. Anyway, yesterday Manau and I were speaking and he said that they find on Suwannisay Island many turtle eggs, and they always take, you know, from the turtle. They have to eat something because there isn't too much on the island, so they take from the turtle. just exactly the number of eggs they need and the number of eggs that the turtle needs are left behind. And that's a rather simple kind of example. But how to live in that way that we are able to take just what we need is certainly part of our practice. So, you know, it's like clearing the path is also like maybe having a glass of water that's full of some kind of... it's very cloudy, so you let the glass of water sit, you know, till all the sediment settles, you know, and you have a nice clear glass of water. Then what are you going to do with the sediment?

[09:20]

So, if you practice the tassajara, you end up with a... some of you end up with a clear glass of water, and then you don't know what to do with the sediment. You don't want to come back to the city because the sediment stirs all up, you know. So... But, you know, having a clear glass of water, it's very much like the... You know, most of you must have read the Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch. supposedly about Wei Lang or Hui Ning. As you know, I guess, it was compiled by the disciples of the Sixth Patriarch, so they made his rival look rather dumb. And he probably wasn't so dumb, but anyway, they created a kind of conflict between them by saying that the head monk his poem that he submitted for his understanding was about the mirror, which we practice by wiping the dust off and getting a clear mirror is practice. And that's like having a glass of water, but what to do with a sediment is the problem of Mahayana Buddhism or Zen.

[10:51]

Sixth Patriarch, you know, he wasn't the Sixth Patriarch at that time, he was just cutting wood in the temple. He wrote his own poem which says that there's no mirror and no stand and no place for the dust. So, we might say, you know, that from Zen's point of view Our practice is the sediment. Actually, the sediment is maybe a jewel. And if you look at the sediment carefully, you see everything. So our practice is the sediment of our life, not just clearing it. But we can't see what the sediment is, you know, until we get free of the headache. But if, you know, if we had some idea about practice, well, now I want to do something to get rid of the sediment, you know, you're going to have problems, so we have to... You know, you have problems if you start trying to put aside those things you don't like. Those things you like are our practice, and those things you don't like are our practice. So we can't start with beginner's practice, you know, some kind of beginner's practice of wiping the mirror clean or...

[12:53]

or letting the sediment settle out of the glass, exactly, because there are problems in doing that. So you have to have beginner's practice and advanced practice, if we make such a distinction, at the same time. And everything you have in your life is absolutely necessary for your practice. You know, you think that you don't want to fail, You think failure is some bad thing to do, you know. But failure is maybe the most important aspect of our life. I mean, Dogen said practice is one continuous mistake. But, I mean, he meant that very widely, that you always fail. If you know your actual life, you're always failing. I think there's some Chinese saying that

[14:19]

since you can tell a sincere person because he lets his flaws shine through. But what's interesting, the more you practice, what you find is your ability to fail continues. And in fact, you can fail over smaller and smaller things. The kind of thing you wouldn't have dreamed of tripping over ten years before, now a tiny thing can trip you. Except now you're much more alert, so you're not so likely to be tripped. And the big things you used to fail over, you pass right through. But the ability to fail remains the same. So the things of our life which we think we want to get rid of, you know, failure or anger or desire or whatever, are actually absolutely necessary for practice. But how to practice with desire and failure and etc. are not so easy because we practice to improve ourselves and we want to improve ourselves.

[15:49]

Anyway, it's rather complicated, feels rather complicated, so you have to find some way to sort of just let yourself into it with some trust. You know, every month, On the evening of the 3rd and the morning of the 4th, we offer food and sweet tea and sweet water and tea to Suzuki Roshi at the altar upstairs in the founder's memorial hall. When we offer him food, Will he come to eat it? Anyway, that's a famous question that Nansen, you've all heard of Nansen?

[17:19]

Nui Nansen was a disciple of Baso, or Matsu. And Matsu was Suzuki Roshi's favorite Zen teacher, and maybe he was the greatest Zen master of all times. And everybody, if it was anybody, studied with him. And from his disciples, all of the five schools of Zen and other schools came from him. And the founder of the Soto school, Tozan Ryokai, in the morning, you know, you chant, un-gan-don-jo dai-yo-sho, Tozan Ryokai dai-yo-sho. Anyway, Tozan Ryokai dai-yo-sho, he founded the Soto school, more or less. You know, at that time, you see, all these guys were really turned on by each other and they were going around visiting each other. And Tozan visited and studied with maybe three or four disciples of Baso and then several other disciples, second or third generation disciples of Baso.

[18:46]

And when he was pretty young, after this, I think you know the story that he went to study Buddhism with this man, this priest, and he said in the sutra, it says, no eyes, no ears, no nose, no mouth. What's that all about?" Like you said in the back. He said, I have an eyes and ears and nose and mouth. What are you trying to tell me? So this guy said, Oh, you're too good. You're very good. You should go see Nansen. So he went to see Nansen and Nansen was they were preparing to offer food to Baso, like we offer food to Dogon. So he said, tomorrow we will offer food to Baso. Do you think he will come to eat the food? And no one said anything, you know. And Tozan put his hand up from the back, I suppose. He said, he will wait for a companion

[20:16]

Do you understand? Anyway, Tozan, Nansen was saying, is there a student in the house? Will anyone come to eat with Baso? And so Tozan said, he will wait for a companion. He'll wait for someone to come forward to eat with him. So, Nansen said, ah, there's a student who's worthy of being a disciple of Buddha. Tosan said, Oh, don't say such terrible things about me. Don't try to enslave me, Buddhism, something like that. And he meant maybe, partly that's just a polite thing to say, but he meant maybe,

[21:47]

I didn't mean to be pointed out. I don't want to be noticed. I didn't say that to be a good student or a bad student. You know, we don't have some idea of past, present and future in Buddhism. You know, supposedly Buddha died 2,500 years ago, but he died, you know, maybe two seconds ago. Or maybe he didn't die at all. Actually, the experiences you're having right now are Buddha's experiences. So we can eat with Matsu, or Baso, and we can eat with Suzuki Roshi, if you know how to come forward and practice.

[23:11]

Anyway, Tosan left, you know, after a while from Nansen's monastery and a problem bothered him about inanimate objects preaching the Dharma. Famous kind of saying, inanimate objects preach the Dharma. So, these, by the way, are Anyway, stories that Suzuki Roshi liked a lot. So, he went to see a teacher named Issan. I think in Chinese it's Kueishan, Kueishan maybe, Kuei something, K-U-E-I. I can't pronounce Chinese.

[24:25]

Anyway, he went to see Isang, who's the founder of another of the schools of Zen. And if I don't speak loud enough, please say something. Usually there's a different microphone here, and the different microphone comes out those speakers, I believe. I don't think this one does. So I forget, you know, I talk, because if I talk too loud on the other ones, I get hollered at by those speakers. I forget then, I don't talk loud enough. Anyway, he went to see Isan. So he said to Isan, I have some problem about this story about inanimate objects preaching the Dharma. Can you explain it to me or help me understand it? So Isan said,

[25:27]

tell me the story, and then I'll maybe say something. So, Isan repeated the famous story that happened, I guess, maybe 75 or 100 years before. I don't know exactly. I'll try to repeat it. I may get it mixed up, but I'll try to repeat the story. The disciple says to the teacher, what is the mind of Buddha? And the teacher says, old tiles on a broken down wall. So the disciple says, but aren't tiles and a wall inanimate objects? How can inanimate objects expound the dharma? And Toza, the teacher, says, Inanimate objects expound the Dharma endlessly in every world. And so the disciple says, I don't hear it.

[26:59]

So, the teacher gives a very interesting answer, response. He says, You cannot hear it, but do not hinder that which hears it. You cannot hear it, but do not hinder that which hears it. So the disciple says, do you hear it? And the teacher says, of course not. And so the disciple says, then how do you know what you're talking about? If you don't hear it, what are you talking about? So he says, the teacher says, all the saints, all the sages hear it.

[28:04]

Anyway, I don't remember exactly what the disciple says then, but he says something again like, but do you hear it? And the teacher says, if I heard it, I couldn't preach the Dharma, you couldn't hear me. I preach the Dharma to living beings, not to sages. Then maybe there's some more dialogue, but anyway, it ends with the disciple says, well, you know, like what sutra does this come from? He's trying to catch him up, right? And the teacher says, don't you know that the Avantamsaka Sutra, the Kegon Sutra, this Avantamsaka Sutra, by the way, is the background of what Baso and Tozan and Isan and Nansen were doing, was they were trying to turn the Lotus Sutra and the Avantamsaka Sutra into practice. So it wasn't some kind of philosophy that most people couldn't make any sense of, but how could you practice it, just do it? So they were always talking about the Avantamsaka Sutra. The Blue Cliff Records, the background of that,

[29:42]

often the Avanthamsaka Sutra. Anyway, he said, don't you know that the Avanthamsaka Sutra says that inanimate objects in all worlds and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah expound the Dharma. And so he's quoting a sutra but he's actually saying, why don't you hear inanimate objects instead of asking for, you know, some sutra reference. Anyway, that's the end of the story. So Isan says, he's telling the story to Isan, remember? And so Isan says, so I have something to say about it, but rarely is there anyone who can hear it, hear what we can say about it. Tozan says, well, please teach me. And Isan holds up his whisk and says, do you understand? And I don't remember what Tozan says.

[31:11]

Maybe he says no or something like that. So, Isan says, the mouth which I received from my parents can't explain it. So then Tozan asks if there's some other teacher he might go and talk to. So, Tozan says something like, Isang says, well there's this guy and if you go there and there's this stone cave or something and there'll be such and such and you'll recognize it and you can go study there with this guy. And he says, but if you can't hear, if you can't, but you can understand his teachings if you can see which way The grass blows the wind, or something like that. Anyway, it was interesting to me to find that in my notes. By the way, that tape machine, somebody's running back there. It's all right. I have notes, you know, from Suzuki Roshi's lectures, for years, and they're so different from listening to the tapes. It's interesting that my notes are much more real than the tapes.

[32:43]

I can understand exactly what Suzuki Roshi was saying and how I was understanding it, accepting it, being it, from my notes, but from the tapes I can't understand much, you know. It's nice to hear, it's nice to hear his voice. But in my notes at that point – well, later on in my notes, in some other place, I have a little thing written which says, The grass blows by the wind, points two ways at once. Why go from master to master, from teacher to teacher? And I couldn't figure out why did I write that, you know. Then I said something like, not even, even Isan knows that, you know. That seemed rather presumptuous of me at that time, just saying even Isan knows such and such. But when I went back in my notes the other day and I found these other stories, I found why I said that, because when I first came across that story, you know, he said, Tozan was at that time saying, well, is there somebody else who understands, shall I go, who I could go study with? And then he told this story, Isan told this story, and said that if you can see which way the grass

[34:14]

blows by the wind, you can understand. I immediately saw, to me it struck me, he was saying, the grass points toward this next teacher. And I was struck by the fact that when the grass points that way it also points back toward the teacher you're leaving. And I was so stuck on Suzuki Roshi that I didn't go where the grass pointed, I went back where it pointed the other direction. So I wrote, you know, why when the grass is blown by the wind it points two directions, why go from teacher to teacher. Anyway, this kind of story is about the practice you're doing now, everyday life practice. This is what we mean by everyday life. So that's what I mean when I say Zen practice isn't what it looks like, because it doesn't sound like everyday life.

[35:30]

Or Suzuki Roshi says, quoting the Blue Cliff Records, you know, number eight, I believe, Suzuki Roshi says, the pre-voice of the ten thousand things. Do not hinder that which hears the pre-voice of the ten thousand things. So how do we hear the pre-voice, the inanimate objects? speaking the Dharma. How do we come forward to be Suzuki Roshi's companion, to practice with him? We also say, the kind of thing we say in Buddhism, you know, do one thing at a time, one thing after another, one thing at a time. So, on one side it means that's how you practice, but on another side it means to do one thing at a time means subject and object are one.

[36:54]

But how do you practice subject and object are one? You can't practice subject and object are one, even though to do one thing at a time, that's what that means. So we start out just by doing one thing at a time. We talk about... that's doing, but then we talk about non-doing. What does non-doing mean? It doesn't mean some laissez-faire, you know, leaving things alone or something. And maybe you could best say it's waiting, waiting for everything. And we say patience, you know, practice patience, but we don't just mean patience, you know, some kind of sticking it out. But the other side of it is that you're waiting, you know. Dogen says, To practice... To confirm... It's rather...

[38:25]

It's rather tricky. He says, to confirm all things, to practice and to confirm all things by conveying to them, by conveying and confirming yourself, conveying to them yourself is delusion, but to let all things advance and practice confirming the self is enlightenment. To let all things advance and practice and confirm the self is enlightenment. That means waiting. How do you let all things advance? So if we're practicing, you know, Difficulty with trying to figure out what we are, you know, or to let the sediment settle, you know, is we don't see what we really are, which is part of some great being. And a great being marked by several, you know, marked by diversity. From one point of view we're all... it's one being which exists in many parts.

[39:53]

And from another point of view, each part is the whole. And you're always changing. But how to see that subtle kind of relationship, which, when you see it, your karma is... completely different. Now, we can say by ignorance the world continues. And by enlightenment the world continues. And the world continues through your ignorance of your karma. and the world continues through your being enlightened about your karma. It's the same. So maybe it's better if you're ignorant of it. It goes on just the same.

[41:16]

but how to practice and know minutely this thing we are. You know, Buddhism calls the karma or something like a net, you know, but maybe in our own terminology we could call it a machine, a great machine that's that you're trapped in, it's a kind of prison, and it grinds you up until you know that you're the machine and how to be free of it in each moment. You see, there's no escape, you know. What's interesting in a sasheen is that lots of people during a sasheen are more alive during the break. They feel, this is me during the break, but during the zazen period they're waiting for the break. You want to get between things, but that's not where the real space is. There's no place you can go to escape. There's no escape from your karma. There's no escape from this life we're in at all. Completely, we're totally trapped in it.

[42:59]

And everything you do, in the most minute details, is intimately related to everything else. And when you're ignorant of that, it pushes you around, and when you're not ignorant of it, you work with it. Instead of your karma pushing you around, you turn your karma. It's the same, but it's Tosam, much later in his life, was offering food to his teacher, Hungan Dojo, I think that's right. And he said, and a disciple said, why don't you offer food to nonsense?

[44:34]

instead of Ungan Dojo, donjo, because Nansen was your first teacher. And Tozan said, I honor Ungan Dojo not because he was a virtuous man or a great Buddhist, but because he refused to reveal the teaching to me. So, how to get your practice going, you know, is... Maybe the best way is to go to Tassajara, but... But, actually, our practice is not at Tassajara. It's right here.

[45:43]

whatever your actual situation is. And the more you see, it's interesting, you know, when you begin to know, maybe, what I mean by the pre-voice of the ten thousand things. Your life is, it's very interesting what your karma is doing, how your life how your decisions are already made, you know? And you think about it and you say, well, I don't know, I think I'll do this or that. But if you actually can look at the big being you are, it's all very clear, you know, it's all worked out for you. I don't mean that you're not participating in it, but I mean you're not conscious of 99% of your participation. You know, that statement of his was very interesting. You know, you can't hear it, but how do you not hinder that which hears it? Now, that's our practice. How do you not hinder that which hears it? How do you not hinder that which hears it?

[47:10]

Anyway, the entrance to practice has to be the actual things of this world. You know, this stick or the bowl you eat from, you know, and how you take care of each thing you do, moment after moment. Because it's there where the real intelligence is, not up in your head thinking about this and that and what to do next, etc. That's like a flashlight, not a mug. Sort of looks around. And it's interested in all kinds of things. And something's in the dark over here. But your consciousness is much wider than that. But you think that everything that's in there that you can see is your consciousness. So you don't know anything about your life, so your life isn't practicing, you know. You try to get that flashlight shaped up, and then you want to turn it on and off, and it doesn't mean anything. I've talked too much, I'm sorry. I've been away quite a ways. Do you have anything we should talk about, some kind of question?

[48:36]

When I said all things advance, you mean? What do you mean by progress? Why is it a question for you then? I don't understand. I sometimes think progress towards something, but when I practice, sometimes I want to back, I want to progress, and then I think, well, maybe I don't want to progress at all. I don't know. Could you hear his question, what he said? He asked about progress in our practice. Do we practice to achieve something, maybe, or to gain something, or to improve ourselves?

[50:03]

I think progress is rather a tricky word because it's so connected to our Western Christian democratic idea of improving. We get better and better and the monkeys get worse and worse. That idea of progress we're not talking about at all. There is some idea in... that we have and we have some experience of becoming more stable or something. I suppose to be less scattered and less distracted is a kind of progress or a kind of improvement. But the wishing to improve is one of the biggest problems. So what I've been talking about this evening is how do you Whatever you have, including your failures, how do you... Just that, just what you are, including your failures. But if you find you also want to improve yourself, what's that? Just that. Of course, practically speaking, we have to practice with some idea, making some effort at first.

[51:30]

That effort is the effort of the flashlight. Eventually you want to... When your whole being is practising, there's no effort. There's no progress. But at first we have some sense of progress because the flashlight has such a small idea of things. You were saying that you felt like there was no escape in your karma. How do you know that when you die, maybe everything just completely ends? That seems to be the most reasonable thing to think. For you, it ends. Maybe for you, it ends. We don't have... Anyway, the more you practice, the less you have some experience of yourself as you who dies or you who lives. I don't see how you can prevent that. You die, that's true. There's no doubt about that.

[53:00]

You know, there's no idea of soul in Buddhism. But I can't explain exactly what I mean. I don't mean there's something about you that continues after you live, after you die. But... This wide being, you know, that we all participate in, doesn't die. and your karma is a part of that. But when I said that before, I was speaking specifically right now, maybe you can escape by dying, but we can also escape by being alive. If you can be awake to what your karma is and use it, that's freedom from your karma. When I say you can't escape from it, when you realize you completely can't escape from it, in the usual sense, that's when you find your actual freedom, right now, instead of looking later for the freedom. Yeah?

[54:25]

Would you speak more about the idea actually of waiting in relation to that? DB Okay, just that I'll speak about, then I should stop it. We look at a stream or a stone or some wall or something and we see it, you know? But we don't actually know what it is, you know? Our eyes sort of touch it, maybe. But how to... because our mind works in such a way and prevents us from entering this world how to give you some hint, you know? So Suzuki Yoshi often used the idea of waiting. You know, if you pick up a stone, instead of just looking at it, wait for the stone. Just try that. Wait for the stone. You know, it's interesting to be at Tassajara, because the stream is going all the time, and everybody hears the stream all the time going. But they think, that's the stream over there and this is me.

[55:53]

But, you know, there's a stone in the stream, too, and the stone causes the water to make noise and go bubbling around, right? And the stone just thinks, I'm a stone. It's not thinking, I'm part of a stream. And the water's going over the stone, and the sound of the stream is going over you. Can we say exactly, is the stone more part of the stream than you? So what is your... So in that sense, to practice, we try to limit ourself in our practice to our direct experience. You know? The sound of the stream. Not some idea stream. Just like the stone doesn't have some... Stone just knows... Maybe it knows water's going over it. If you hear an airplane, just your hearing hearing. You don't have to know that it's going to Los Angeles or something. If you want to think about it, it's all right. But your actual experience is that, just the sound in your ear. But when you can have that actual experience without thinking about it, you enter the airplane. Then you begin to enter the actual world you live in. But at first it's some effort to limit yourself to your direct experience, limit yourself to your direct experience, limit yourself to your direct experience.

[57:24]

maybe for several years you have to keep making this effort. You know, practice does require a kind of effort, and when Buddha said near, you know, I guess when he died, or the Han, you know, the Han that we hit, has said something like, uh, listen well everyone, or maybe it's a character that The character for to give up, what does it also mean? The character, kanji, for to give up, what does it also mean? To make clear. So, that's rather interesting, the Chinese-Japanese character for to give up also means to make clear. So I haven't checked, but maybe the kanji for the beginning, listen carefully everyone,

[58:26]

you know, means to make clear. But anyway, it has that meaning, listen well, everyone. Then it says something like, great is the problem of life and death, and know forever, quick, quick, awake, awake, each one, don't waste your life. But the idea of don't be idle, you know, has something intrinsic about our mind, is always trying to be idle. trying to be restless, trying to be idle, idly restless, etc. And we have to, I mean, if that is where Buddha's last words were something to that effect. So we always have to catch ourselves. And practice is to notice that, to try something, for several years even, bringing ourselves back to our direct experience. And until effortlessly, suddenly, it's not your energy but the energy of everything that's doing it. You don't need any energy anymore. Energy is everywhere, coming. Then you can be effortlessly in your direct experience, and then you can enter your karma completely. So, one kind of help is waiting. And you can sit all day watching a flower bloom,

[59:54]

And you won't understand a flower at all, and you can take a spaceship, if you want, to the moon, and you won't understand the moon at all. But waiting, maybe we can say, for us we take some shortcut called zazen. We wait in zazen, not for a bus, you know. We began talking about buses at Tassajara. And some girl had a dream, and she dreamed the Buddhist Express pulled up, and its doors opened, and only I got on the bus. Excuse me. And everybody else that was at the bus stop were saying things like, Oh, I've forgotten my watch. Or, my hair is messy. So, anyway, no one got on the bus. But then she had some image of herself as an ostrich, you know, in a two-dimensional world, thinking it was hiding with its head under the sand. And next thing she knew, she was on top of the bus looking down in. So, being the Muni bus line,

[61:22]

She came up with a mantra, Om Muni Muni Shakyamuni. Om Muni Muni Shakyamuni. So anyway, our way is to sit. But it's not just sitting, it's just sitting with some I mean, some clue is waiting. Thank you very much.

[62:03]

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