Seven million kalpas having it to see and to remember and accept to taste the truth of the Tathagata's words. Good morning. Wasn't it nice to hear a little thunder? We live in the wrong part of the world or something. I've been here now well a while. Anyway what I wanted to talk about today is a

[01:12]

subject that seems to come up a lot for people and it's basically the kind of question of what shall I do and there's various versions of it you know. One is like well what shall I do with anger or what shall I do with sorrow or grief you know and how do I know when I should keep my mouth shut and when I should open it and how do I know what to say if I open it and so I wanted to talk a little bit about this kind of question because it seems to me like some point we have to acknowledge there's not really any answer to these questions. So I'll talk to you a little bit about what I sort of hear in the questions sometimes and I ask myself these questions too you know you have to understand that. So one of the things I hear is like well what shall I do with anger without having to really relate to it and how can I get rid of it without having to really acknowledge it. You know isn't there some sleight of

[02:16]

hand that you Zen people know about and you know so I don't really have to get angry or be depressed or have grief or sorrow. Don't you know that kind of trick would you tell me please and then there's another it also sort of sounds like you know what shall I do so that I win or that I get my way so that I can go on being me the person that I know and like and get the world but still get the world to treat me better. Like how can I do that would you tell me right like you know I don't really want to change I want to go on being me but I would like the world to kind of you know acknowledge me better in some way or kind of you know be nicer to me and even don't bring me tea and things and you know be nice. It's not very often you know I get somebody brings tea you know this is but this is a different kind of space which I'm going to talk to you about today. Ritual space when we come into this hall here we move into ritual

[03:23]

space when you come into Green Gulch even we move into ritual space and then it's sometimes hard for the people who live here who are in ritual space all the time and then other people just are sort of coming into their ritual space without seeming to acknowledge that it's ritual space and people kind of who live here regularly wonder like what are these people doing here they don't seem to understand the kind of space they're in so different we're going to talk more about that but let me talk a little bit more about you know the question what shall I do and then there's the kind of version of the question well how can what do I what shall I do so that I can get through life intact or unscathed or blameless you know can you tell me the Buddhist way to behave so that at least even if I get the shit beat out of me that you know I'll be right anyway you know I'll have done the Buddhist thing and I can somehow take some you know you know some assurance or something in the least in the fact that

[04:24]

I was right and or that I'm blameless you know that I'm clean you know the world did all that stuff to me but you know I least did the right thing and then sometimes we want to know well wait a minute now how can I do it so that you know I don't just cave in like that and be right but you know I still don't want to kind of you know bloody too many other people and but I still like to do a little bit better than just sort of eating whatever comes my way so you can see how this kind of question gets you know as we go on it can get a little more clarified but it starts out at this sort of funny level I sometimes have I've told you sometimes the I think sometimes the American dream is about happiness is happiness is never having to relate to anything you know that somehow you could sort of move through the world unscathed and not really have to deal with anything troublesome or bothersome you know like it's sort of like the way TV's

[05:29]

presented the war in the Middle East right it's pretty not much blood and stuff you know so we can kind of move through it without really kind of touching any of that mess you know it's very polite in a certain way but it's also not you know not really touching anything or relating to anything and we can kind of move along and things and we'll get the world to just kind of it's just kind of easygoing kind of California New Age spirituality or something you know you can have whatever you want and you don't have to be have these kind of troubles that ordinary people have and so on I think it's pretty funny but I mean I don't think that's possible is what I mean but I have this kind of question all the way from like walking into the grocery store and there's aisles and aisles and sometimes like I've told you this but I

[06:32]

you know a whole row with all kinds of soap now washing detergent which one shall I buy and I get pretty confused you know I can stand there and it's this whole ocean of colors and you know price tags and I find it being in the market like that it's kind of I don't start to not know where I am you know what to do how to act I start feeling very kind of alone and abandoned you know in this and I was reading a thing a while back where it was about Macy's in New York City and they have oceans of bras and seas of you know dresses and then they have fake log cabins and English writing clubs and so that you can and there's different music in different places and then and now it's like you can't go to the women's department you know you have to go to the cellar or the boutique or the you don't know where anything is anymore because they have all these

[07:35]

funny names for the places and I was reading this thing and he said in there you know everything in Macy's is kind of whispering just for you just for you this is our new age you know idea but then he said there's an insidious code that goes along with it which is are you sure you belong here so that's the one that I you know I'm getting both those message but especially the second one I'm getting in the store though like no I'm not I don't know that I belong here but it also comes up in I mean that's a sort of you know silly example but you know what to do in relationships or when something's bothering you or do you talk to somebody or not talk to somebody or you know etc and or work you know somebody's bugging you at work or you know various things all these things are

[08:36]

going on what do we do you know how do we act so but I want to be careful when we talk about this I mean you know what do we do we have to look at what is the end of that you know do you have some little agenda that you're not saying when you ask well what shall I do like what shall I do so I can make it through intact and unscathed or what what can I do so that I don't really have to relate to anything and I can just get rid of this thing that's troublesome you know what are we asking ourselves when we ask what shall I do so first of all you know from of course from a partly from a Buddhist point of view you know there's good and bad and there's fortune and good fortune and bad fortune it's like the Chinese story which I heard a while back I forget where I saw it but you know there's a there's a farmer and he's got one horse he's very poor but he does

[09:40]

have one horse and it's like this is the family fortune the horse because other than that it's the crops and you never know when it's going to rain or not rain or flood and and one day though the horse disappears and his neighbors come by and lament to him oh that's too bad about your horse we heard your horse went away that's terrible and he said well we'll see so a few days or a week or so later the horse comes back and it's leaving the whole herd of wild horses back with it and so then the farmer now has this whole herd of horses and his neighbors say geez that's such great fortune you know good for you boy that's you're really lucky and he says well we'll see so a while later his son is out his son is breaking in the horses right so his son is out there riding on one of the horses one day and it throws him off and he breaks his ankle and he

[10:41]

doesn't get it fixed up very well so he's from then on you know he's in terrible pain and he's not getting it fixed and people say oh what a horrible accident you know and now he's you know has to limp all the time and he's you know boy that's never gonna heal you know and the farmer says well we'll see so of course a few months later the army comes through conscripting young men they don't want him because he's limping they don't want you know these cripples in the army so people say gee your son is so fortunate boy he doesn't have to go into the army and farmer says oh well we'll see and the story goes on like this I think for several more pages but that's as far as you get the idea we never quite know I mean and if we just left it up to each of us to say you know how can I get my way in the world and what shall I do to get my way I mean that's not the way the world works right so this is like the first noble truth

[11:44]

in Buddhism things don't happen like that and that's not the point to try to get our way and get the things that we want and not get the things that we see as misfortune and so on and a lot of it has to do with where you're positioned right I mean this morning this morning I stopped at a stoplight in San Francisco and it turned red right as I was coming up to it and I I darn you know I'm trying to get to Gringotts for a lecture I tell the universe right to no one in particular right don't you understand light that I have a mission you know I have something to accomplish here and of course the light doesn't pay any attention but that's pretty funny because I mean we're sitting here now dozens of lights out there hundreds and thousands of lights out in the world are changing from green to red now and who cares but it's only like you know our

[12:45]

particular is just a position to something you know and then we go oh why are you doing this to me world yeah it's pretty funny anyway so that's one side of this sort of answer to what do I do in a certain sense you know we ought to relax a little bit more and not worry quite so much about how things come out and whether it's good fortune or bad fortune or whether we get to Gringotts in time or don't and so on that's easy enough to say right but okay but I'll say it anyway but then there's this other kind of side to things which is one kind of way we attempt to deal with this is to move into a kind of ritual space and things are different in ritual space and we have a here at Gringotts we have a this hall on Sundays it's a hall and we have the meditation hall and when you move in you behave in a certain way you have to cross the threshold and at the threshold you bow and now you're in ritual space and it's a different things work differently in this kind of space

[13:49]

you know for one thing we slow down we're not rushing anymore in order to sit still we can stop you know we've arrived we don't have to you know we're there and we slow down and in this kind of space it doesn't matter anymore we've moved into that space where it doesn't matter whether we're getting what we want and we have something to do a way to behave there's particular forms you walk in a certain way with your hands a certain way and you walk quietly and you take and your steps are not too short and not too long and so on and then when you get to your cushion you bow facing your cushion and you turn clockwise and bow away from your cushion and there's a posture for sitting and and then we're all in the middle of this form and this way to do something what do you want to know what to do here's what to do and then good fortune bad fortune it comes and you can say well we'll see you know today it's a

[14:52]

pretty good period of meditation tomorrow it's not well we'll see we don't know what's good fortune in that kind of space you know and it's just and so we're not anymore aiming to necessarily get through unscathed in fact when you get into that kind of space you may find it's a you know you don't in fact you kind of tend to come apart it's very hard to sit still you know you get you can get antsy and agitated and you can have pain and and you can and things will start to come up and all this stuff you know all of our baggage so to speak will start to kind of tumble out and it will feel to us as though everybody can see all of our baggage all of our dirty laundry and it's spilling out and I'm sure they're all getting pretty you know disturbed by it only they've got all their dirty luggage you know their laundry and their baggage and it's spilling out by them too and you can look around you can see what people are doing on one hand everybody's falling apart but on the

[15:53]

other hand everybody's keeping it together this is ritual space where we can fall apart with some structure in a kind of container and in that kind of space we can have a kind of transformation can take place but so that's in some ways that's so that's one way of approaching things but we get to a new problem then start using ritual space it's pretty good but then there's there's the possibility we can over rely on ritual space pretty soon we want to just be in ritual space all the time right when you walk out of this endo then somebody talks to you and then you just keep your eyes down and walk along and you know and we pretty soon we forget that now we're not in ritual space and the extreme is like a friend of mine who was married for many years to a more or less a kind of Buddhist priest kind of person and and when she wanted to

[16:58]

talk to him about something he just do his beads excuse me but I I think I'd rather do my beads now than talk to you this is like a kind of at some point the use of ritual space becomes it becomes it's just a ritual and it's not doing its function and it's becomes a way to hide and escape rather than you know something that has its place and its time and then we can we move out of it and in the world we have to act and we respond to things whether it's a person there or what's good the stuff that's going on in our life how do we how am I going to get to work today how am I going to support myself and we have to actually do something about these questions we can't just sit there anymore you know so we have to find some way to move from this ritual space into the everyday sort of space and the problem then we have sometimes you know there are those of us then you get overly involved in everyday kind of space right and where everything is really important and you've got to try

[18:04]

to make it come out the way you want and you've got to get your way you know and as you know some of you I mean to the extent that we've we all you know may spend some time in this kind of space you know where you know that's what happened to me this morning it happens to me when I drive you know I want people to get out of my way you know I'm sorry I apologize and so then I've completely lost this kind of ritual space where it doesn't particularly matter whether you're here or there you know and I've completely gotten caught up in this other side of things getting my way getting to where I want to go you know arriving at my destination not getting through unscathed and intact being right and blameless it's not my fault I'm late all those other people were in my way you know and so this there's various stories about this but the one I like is

[19:06]

that fellow who went to Nepal and he was off someplace and he was actually kind of met it he was meditating and he was in seclusion and he had his bag of brown rice and a few vegetables or something and then he's he's doing this and after a while he starts hearing there's a little Creek going by and in this in the sound of the Creek he starts hearing marching music dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun maybe he played in the band in high school anyway he can't get it out of his mind once he starts hearing it all he can hear is marching music and he can't stand marching music and he wants to get this to stop so he meditates on it nothing works he tries to become one with the sound he tries being you know kind to the sound forgiving the sound nothing works you know so finally one day he goes out and starts moving the rocks apparently this is a true story so this is what we try to do you know I mean in

[20:11]

our lives sometimes we want to move the rocks in some stream and it's you know it's not much you can do I mean and then it's not like you know after you move the rocks in the streams you stop hearing marching music and now you get rock and roll or you know who knows what right so it doesn't work to go out and move all those rocks in the stream but that's what we try to do and we get so involved in our everyday life and we forget you know there's no balance to it there's no container at all for it and we can get pretty hot and irate and you know worked up and then when things don't go right we can get unhappy and discouraged and you know upset sorrowful hurt so it doesn't quite so it doesn't quite work to try to just stay in that world

[21:28]

or to move just entirely into ritual space sort of not really relate to anything in the kind of thinking it's spiritual or to just be involved in the world like that and we should have Buddhism is always suggesting some middle way right the 80s were kind of like the in some sense are now we can see are some extreme of the just being in the world type of thing and and pushing things to the maximum and I was reading in the Wall Street Journal the other day that there's a whole school of of business people and and you know what I forget what the article is about but one one investment person in Wall Street was quoted as saying net worth is self-worth and and so then it's important when you and so people are actually believing that we're all sort of at some level you

[22:30]

know we get hooked into that that we're as good as our last you know if I cook right I cook well then I'm you know I'm as good as my last meal you're in some other kind of work you're as good as you know whatever you can however you grade yourself you know your last accomplishment you know that's how that's how good you are right so that again is being involved in the in the world in this funny way that is completely unbalanced and you can see in that kind of scenario that it's endless right if net worth is self-worth then how much do you need to have some self-worth hey the sky's the limit you can go endlessly there's no end you never and so do you ever get self-worth out of the deal you get a kind of fictitious self-worth out of the deal and then even that isn't

[23:31]

worth much right and you have trouble believing it so you have to get more and you never get the self-worth and you know we're always and so we're always pushing this is known as the in Buddhism this is the samsara world because of this endless quality never arriving and having ourselves hooked into this kind of scenario but the other side is we get hooked into well I'm going to do the right thing then I'm going to behave properly I'm going to just value what there is you know I'm going to find my real self-worth and I'm going to be hit you know and I'm going to do the right thing so we can go to this other extreme right and then pretty soon we can't say anything to anybody you know we'll sit doing our beads being holy and afraid to say something that would be the wrong

[24:35]

thing to say or that would be hurtful or that would be shameful or that would show that I have problems I mean I wouldn't want to let the world know that I'm needy or that you know I have you know that I can get upset right so those of us in spiritual practice we tend to have more this other kind of you know we can say the self-worth is net worth that well that we know where that's not where it's at then we start taking a spiritual practice and then pretty soon we can tell we have this idea that this is this is much better you know but pretty soon we kind of isolated ourself in a kind of cocoon of being a righteous person or a holy person and we can't let the world know really how messed up we might be if we opened our mouths you know or said something or you know had to talk to somebody or whatever it is so there's some limit to that too

[25:37]

so in the in the in the world when we are when we move out of ritual space I mean at some point we can we should you know work towards or understand that in the long run we can develop some space that is both the ritual space and an everyday kind of space but if we stick to one way or the other like this and get caught in one way or the other then we get pretty lost or we get stuck so in the everyday world you know people want to know what shall I do and basically you know you have to wing it and but you better do something and not just sit there doing your beads unless you're a really good holy person that doesn't quite work you know I've heard of the Saints who can get away with that but not very many and basically in the world and so Sisychus used to say it's

[26:48]

like being in the dark we don't know what to do you have to feel your way along and then you know and you don't want to try to go too fast you might bump into something and then you can hurt yourself and you feel your way along and if you're doing things with that kind of feeling your way along with that kind of in a sense carefulness you feel out what to do but at some point you know it just kind of bubbles up and it bubbles out and it comes out and then it you may not look good you know and you may get criticized and then you have to take that into account and and go on from there this is how we learn about the world we don't and then in the long run this is what Buddhism calls wisdom what to do and what to do how to make these distinctions what is the difference between repressing things and expressing things and emoting you know acting out where does one stop and the next begin you know we

[27:50]

don't quite know what's what what's just dumping on other people and what's expressing yourself and what's you know keeping too much to yourself so to find out we have to make mistakes we have to do something and see how what comes back from the world and then figure out and then feel out the next thing to do wait for it to bubble up something comes up we do it it's very interesting you know I had a discussion with Karagiri Roshi many years ago about this kind of thing I mean I was down in Tassajara in the summertime and in Tassajara in the summertime as many of you know it's very hot it's not like it's raining here and so if you're down at the pool certainly there's I'm a young man or was when I was you know at Tassajara there's many women with rather skimpy amounts of

[28:53]

clothing on you know bikinis and there's many attractive women and there's many attractive women who are students at Tassajara and in hot weather like that people tend to not wear very much and so it's a it's kind of interesting for me and meanwhile I have a girlfriend in San Francisco you know but San Francisco is San Francisco and Tassajara is Tassajara and here is all of this flesh appearing before my eyes in ritual space you know you just you just let it come and go right stuff comes stuff goes who cares and you know so that's fine right so out in the world what are we in now ritual space or the real world so I asked Karagiri Roshi I said well now how is one to practice you know you say practice as

[29:58]

the ancients practiced right and he said yes practice as the ancients practiced so I asked him did the ancients have a place like Tassajara was this their practice with all of these women walking around with skimpy amounts of clothing on no they didn't have a Tassajara what should I do then well still you should keep in mind the example of the ancients okay and then I said but you know also I have a girlfriend in San Francisco oh he said oh in that case well then that's just greed it's very definite about it I have trouble drawing those lines he had no trouble oh in that case it's greed so I mean if you start saying

[31:02]

that that's greed well then pretty soon like is it always greed is there never a time that you can go and talk to a woman then oh yeah then you're gonna end up being a monk and you'll just be in ritual space do you want to spend all of your life in ritual space or you're gonna be in the world sometime what are you gonna do so finally he said look just do whatever you want but remember you're the one who did it and you should take responsibility for it some people might call it right other people might call it wrong you know some people call it good some people call it bad you know sometimes you know we might say it's hurtful it's not hurtful you know we don't know exactly what it is but you're gonna hear all about it you know once you've done it but there's not any alternative you know there's not some way to just do this thing or make a

[32:07]

decision or do something and then nobody now or in the future ever can criticize you you know right how can I do the thing that nobody can ever attack me for doing how can I get through my life unscathed intact getting my way having what I want to understand you can't do that we can't we can't do that way somehow we're going to do things that undo us whether it's in the world like that or whether it's in meditation we're going to become undone and we're going to get at times torn apart and in the context of meditation we say you know welcome home at that time Nyogin Senzaki that this 20th century Zen teacher I've talked with you about sometimes he said meditation is not very complicated not

[33:09]

very difficult it's just a way to your long-lost home what did you think home was you know so in one sense we can think well home is this place where we're all protected and cozy and you know it's a little nest but home is also where we don't have to worry about being perfect we don't have to worry anymore about being right we don't have to worry anymore about not letting the world know that I'm really not that great a person we don't have to worry about you know pretense and good show exactly right this is home where everything can hang out right well that works pretty well in ritual space where it's got a container little more complicated in the world wouldn't you say how do you let everything hang out and yet not you know hurt the people that you're with and not

[34:14]

hurt yourself harm yourself in Robert Bly's new book he tells us a story about his local Lutheran minister his new book Iron John and the local Lutheran minister in Minnesota is a very careful kind of person and fairly stern fairly you know together right and he had a firm hand in his congregation in spite of various things going on and then he was this way with his son too and he and for one reason or another he didn't want his son to use the car the family car so finally the son stole the car and then he called the police the father called the police and the police caught up with him and the son pulled a gun out of the back and shot the policeman so we never quite know what will happen there's not

[35:23]

always some there's not going to be some way that you know if we're careful enough if we're good enough if we're right enough where we'll make it through intact with all of our who wants to do that anyway with all of the baggage we've got you know so the aim and Zen finally is some kind of idea I like this kind of expression I use sometimes take off the blinders unpack the saddlebags right the blinders are when you're out there in the world net worth is self-worth full speed ahead right you've got to go to your goal and you can't you know pay attention anything that's around you or really relate to anything except this distant goal of arriving at net worth is self-worth which you can never get to but you better keep going and you better keep the blinders on and you better keep you know at it right and then maybe you'll get there only you don't and then what about all that baggage you carry in them all the pain and the hurt and the

[36:28]

sorrow and the imperfections and all that stuff you don't want the world to know about it's gets to be pretty heavy you know and the way you've been going about life isn't addressing it that we keep carrying all that baggage it's such a weight then you know but sometimes you know there's the other the flip side of that kind of weight is hey let's just drop all that weight in the the easy way to drop all that weight is to adopt the kind of viewpoint of one way my way the right way if I want your opinion I'll tell you what it is and then you can go full speed ahead and it doesn't matter you know and then you can you've dropped all that weight of am I doing the right thing and you know what do people think of me if they don't think well of me well that's their problem you know right so a lot of people who a lot of people who have a lot of us when we adopt that kind of energy or take up that kind of energy or have that kind of way of life that's we have those kind of blinders on and we don't care what the

[37:30]

rest of the world thinks or you know because we know who we are where we're going and I'm you know and I'm doing I'm doing it right so anyway when we're whether we're in ritual space in ritual space we have a kind of opportunity to take off the blinders pretty soon you know you've noticed that in meditation like you say to yourself you start to you start to meditate right and what five minutes ten minutes a week goes by two weeks and then you say you know I'm not getting anywhere oh well maybe you should just take off the blinders and be where you are right and make yourself at home there find out how to be at home or where you are instead of thinking there's someplace to get to and keeping those blinders on and trying to get

[38:32]

ahead and unpacking the saddlebags doesn't all this stuff when you meditate it starts to come out right but it'll do that you know your sorrow and your pain and your anger and rage and lots of things will come out in meditation and it's so much more relaxing now that you can be like a real person you know to be a person a human being and animals apparently Walt Whitman said something like animals don't stay awake at night worrying about their sins but you know if you don't have a ritual space this is going to happen to you in your regular life too or even if you have a ritual space our daily life will bring us the same kind of undoings and if we're lucky you know we'll we'll find

[39:33]

yourself forced to be you know with no alternative but to be where we are sometimes it's only when we get sick or when we have you know irreconcilable differences we can't solve something we can't work out something in ritual space you don't have to work out everything you don't have to solve everything you don't have to be a beautiful person and it's the same in the in the in the everyday world so another Zen saying very similar the winning of the pack horse completely unloaded how refreshing is there some way to let go of the baggage

[40:33]

so we may have to you know at times in our life will emphasize one way or another we'll get involved in the fast track and you know net worth is self worth you're only as good as your last meal and other times will get involved in trying to be right blameless the good one and there you know we have various kind of besides a you know a more articulated ritual space like the Zendo here we have our own rituals and our society has its rituals like alcohol and drugs and things that can be your ritual and will help you not have to relate to anything and will help you not get too involved in striving ahead net worth is self-worth so somehow we have to find our middle way we're all

[42:15]

each trying to find our middle way in that sense how to how to and even if it's not how to get through unscathed it's how to proceed Suzuki Roshi said just to feel your way along like you're in the dark there's a short little poem by Antonio Machado that Robert Bly uses it says Walker there are no roads at sea there's only the steps that you take each of us is we each have to find our own path and create our own path in this sense to know a Zen teacher once said 56 years I've walked this path by

[43:21]

myself no one else on the road spring rain so finally no Zen or Buddhism will give us little pieces of advice what is this middle way where we don't get stuck so Dogen Zenji and the instructions for the cook he says handle each ingredient with sincerity and wholeheartedness don't be disdainful when the ingredients are poor don't get overjoyed when you've got extra special ingredients each thing that comes along I'll relate to each that comes along respond to things and also we can then say something like to

[44:23]

treasure or to acknowledge your true intention or your deep wish which is not exactly the same as getting through unscathed right that's a lot of baggage but it's something more like to become whole or to grow or to live in harmony but living in harmony does not going to mean you know sticking to the ritual way the right way to do things to feel okay about being who you are to about your being that you have a real place in the world and even if you don't feel that way to leave some warm place in your heart for the possibility that you can feel that way you

[45:30]

ready to listen to the rain how about you at that be alright if we listen to the rain for a few minutes and then stop being here today I appreciate your I don't know when I'm here and and sitting quietly with you in the rain it's like a big ocean very deep feeling and I wish you well in your path finding your way making your way away that isn't you know already there that you make by walking walking your own path in the wisdom of which way to go or what to do is not something that we get overnight

[47:04]

or some simple simple simple thing to get hold of but something by proceeding with some care and sensitivity we can find and know

[47:14]

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