Good morning. ... ... ... A few days ago I started thinking about what to talk about today. And at some point I realized that this week is Thanksgiving. So, it seems like a random topic. So I'd like to talk about Thanksgiving and gratitude in the context of Buddhist practice or Buddhist understanding. ... ... ...

[01:01]

... I'm a little bit like I think generally I'm kind of like the kind of person that somebody else will say good morning and I'll ... [...] There's a lot. There's innumerable things to be thankful or grateful for and on the other hand things could be better. ... And maybe we ought to hold out for a little more. And, you know, withhold our gratitude or our thanksgiving until we get, you know, a little more out of the deal. And then we can say thank you. ...

[02:08]

... ... ... So, of course, one of the basic elements of Buddhist practice or understanding is to practice or to be grateful for small, smaller and smaller things. I want to tell you a story a number of years ago at Tassajara. A student, we were having a, we had a talk Suzuki Rishi had given a talk and then we had a question and answer period and one of the students said to him, a little belligerently, why haven't you enlightened me yet? ... ... And, you know, this is not a very kind of, in a sense, respectful kind of question to ask your teacher. But on the

[03:12]

other hand, you know, it's a little bit like sometimes parents do with their kids or, you know, we do for one, you know, what have you done for me lately or couldn't you, you know, like, why can't you get it together? We often sort of accuse one another of various things in this way. Last summer I was at Tassajara and Suzuki Rishi's son was there and he's now taken over Suzuki Rishi's temple in Japan, which is the, it's not as though it's a really large temple, but still it's the head temple for 16 sub-temples. So, Suzuki Rishi's son, Hawitsu, came to Tassajara with the 16 abbots from the sub-temples. So, even though some of them are 20 years older than he is, they practice respecting him because he's the head of the big temple. So, we were a little surprised, but nobody would sit next to him in the meditation hall.

[04:16]

You have to leave a little space there, you know, this is the way to honor him. And at dinner, nobody would sit next to him either, which we thought was a little strange because who does he get to talk to then and doesn't he, isn't it kind of lonely after a while? But this is the way they do it, to practice honoring this person. And, of course, we didn't understand that when Suzuki Rishi was alive, so we sat right next to him and we, in the meditation hall, we sat right next to him at dinner and we even said to him things like, why haven't you enlightened me yet? He was rather polite and kind in his response. He said, I'm making my best effort. And he didn't say, and how about you? Are you sure you are?

[05:22]

Or, you know, maybe you need to try harder or, you know, I'm doing everything I can and, you know, maybe you're not. He was very careful about his answer, I think, and he said, I'm making my best effort. And I don't think, I think on the whole, you know, we don't acknowledge and notice how much each person is making their best effort. And whether it's the teacher or the student. Sometimes, you know, the student is trying pretty hard and the teacher doesn't appreciate it. And sometimes the teacher is trying pretty hard and the student doesn't appreciate it, or the parent and the child, whoever. And this is where, you know, we don't have any gratitude just for someone's

[06:26]

being there and the way they're there. Suzuki Roshi sometimes also would say if I said something to him, he would say, if I said, you know, I got confused when you said that, or I was upset, or and he would say, thank you for telling me. When there's a feeling of this kind of gratitude, this kind of feeling of appreciation or gratitude, and you can see someone making their best effort, and when someone says, thank you for telling me, you understand then how there's a little more intimacy, a little more connectedness.

[07:27]

If we put this kind of dialogue, you know, in you yourself and in me, myself, you know, sometimes I will say to my thoughts or my feelings or my body, if my body's hurting, I tell it to shut up. I don't say, thank you for telling me you're tired. Oh, you're scared. I don't think I want to hear about that. You have nothing to be scared about. You know, on the other hand, when I get angry or I'm upset or confused, and my body and mind, my thoughts, my feelings, if I hear them, if I can hear, if I'm listening carefully, I can hear, I'm making my best effort. I'm making my best effort. And we say, you've got to

[08:35]

do something better. It's not good enough, you know. Why haven't you enlightened me yet? Why don't you give me some more powerful, stunning kind of experience that would make me feel really good? What's wrong with you? In this way, you know, we tend to demean ourselves because we don't hear our own body and mind. We don't notice, I'm making my best effort. I'm making my best effort. I wanted to let you know that I'm tired. I wanted to let you know I feel scared. And then we can say sometimes, thank you for telling me. Thank you for telling me. Thank you for letting me know. You know, this is very different.

[09:37]

I also had a teacher at one point and I said to him one time, I have a difficult time talking with you. I get kind of afraid when I talk with you and I feel intimidated. And he didn't say, thank you for telling me. Or, I'm making my best effort. Or, I'm making my best effort. You know, we'd have to say, if we look at it, if I look at it now, I'd have to say, well, he was making, I was making my best effort, he was making his best effort. But what he said to me was, well, Ed, you're the only one at Zen Center who has that, nobody else has that problem. You're the only one, so it must be your problem and not mine. And I thought, oh.

[10:39]

I have a problem. And it took me four years, four years later, I finally got up the nerve to say to him, you know, I've noticed other people at Zen Center have this problem too. And he said, well, I meant you're the only one of the senior people at Zen Center who has this problem. This sets up a different kind of relationship, and we're all in a certain kind of relationship or dynamic with each other, with our own body and mind, with the world. What are we telling? What are we saying? What are we saying? What have you done for me lately? You could do better. I don't like it when you get angry. You know, we say to her, it makes me mad, or when you're afraid. How come you're so confused all the time? What's wrong with you anyway? There's also an expression in Zen, if you want to attain intimacy,

[11:42]

don't ask for the question. And this is true, you know, we have to be a little bit careful about this kind of statement, because, but there's a difference between how's it going, the kind of question, and why are you like that? What's wrong with you? So, sometimes, we have to listen then to what is it we're saying to ourself? How do we receive the world, and how do we appear in the world? And when we have thankfulness, thank you for telling me, and we have a gratitude on making, and we can hear and see and appreciate the way that other people and things

[12:45]

are making their best efforts, then we have some resonance with the world. And not only resonance, interestingly enough, but this becomes the basis for imperturbability, because we can see and appreciate what's happening as part of big mind. And we know that there's no way to control big mind. We can have some gratitude and thankfulness. Receiving the experience of this moment. One time, a monk asked

[14:15]

the Zen master, Zhao Zhou, to whom does Buddha give passion? Passion, in this sense, is a word to cover afflictive emotions. Greed, hate, lust, intense emotions that afflict perhaps us and then other people as well at times. To whom does Buddha give passion? And Zhao Zhou said, Buddha gives passion to everyone. And the monk said, how do we get rid of it? And Zhao Zhou said, why should we get rid of it? In this way, when we start to try to control our own mind and body or someone else, we say, you know, you have to do something about that. You have to get rid of that.

[15:19]

I don't want that around here. It doesn't mean we have to, but, you know, when we can appreciate them a little bit or have some gratitude or we're not immediately trying to get rid of something, this already sets up a tension in the situation. Suzuki Roshi used to call this kind of passion mind waves. There are many waves or mind weeds. There are many waves and there are many weeds. And when you don't understand how to use them, how to make use of them, how to turn the weeds into compost, how the weeds will nourish your garden in the long run, if you can find out how to use it that way, you know, then pretty soon we're destroying our whole garden. Everything

[16:20]

starts to look like a weed. There's no beauty left. You know, so the third patriarch said to the fourth patriarch, how do I attain liberation? Oh, the other way around, you know. The young person asked the senior person, how do I attain liberation? And the senior person said, who is it who's binding you? All the time thoughts of thoughts and feelings and sensations and experiences are coming up and then there's somebody who's going like, excuse me, but get it together. That's not good enough. I don't like that. You have to get rid of that. Don't tell me about that. Get out of here. And in this way, then our body and our being, we feel alienated and estranged from ourself because we've pushed ourself away. And we've put ourself in a bind. I'd like to tell you

[17:23]

what's going on, but I feel like when I do, you get mad at me. I want to let you know how I'm tired and how I ache, but all you tell me is, like, I need to have more energy. You know, so this way we put ourselves in binds. And then we wonder, how do I get liberated? And really we want to know, how do I have, you know, like limitless energy and how can I have a body and mind that doesn't experience anger or fear because I don't want those around? So then we ask the wrong question. You know, how do I get rid of this? Rather than, and you know, really the question could be, how can I appreciate this experience I'm having or how could I be grateful or thankful? And there's no answer to that. You know, how? The answer is, just be grateful, just be thankful, just appreciate. And

[18:27]

in this sense, you know, this is why we say practice, practice appreciating, practice being grateful, practice being thankful. One of the ways, you know, of course in particular that we practice gratitude is by bowing. Bowing in some ways it looks or seems from the outside kind of strange perhaps but there's something about bringing your hands together and tilting your body that elicits gratitude. It's very mysterious. And then you can say, well what is there to be grateful for? But already it's there. So Suzuki Roshi would say that bowing is

[19:30]

to receive and respect each thing as it is. ... ... Then Buddha bows to Buddha and you bow to yourself. Each of us has experiences, you know, and then we wonder sometimes other people say, well that's not worthwhile enough. And sometimes we say about our own experience, it's not worth much. And so if we say it's not worth much, we're not bowing to our experience when we say it's not worth much. You know, so even the heartache and the grief and the sorrow is something to bow to. And when we bow to it this is how we heal. And how we become intimate with ourself and how we become

[20:32]

imperturbable. Even though at the same time it may seem we're quite upset. In this sense, you know, we don't have to be upset about being upset. Right? ... [...]

[21:34]

... So in some ways, you know, so in some ways gratitude is a kind of doorway, entryway into our experience, into the depths of our life, into our inner being. It's also a kind of doorway into connectedness with others, connectedness with the world. We stop holding out for more and holding out for better. Our heart and our being soften so we can receive, appear and receive, give and receive. And we're connected then. All the time, of course, we're connected but when we don't have gratitude or thankfulness we feel disconnected often times. ...

[22:35]

... [...]

[23:35]

... [...] There's implicitly, you know, a kind of gratitude in that, I would say, a kind of thankfulness which is the connective kind of tissue for all of this. ... Sometimes, probably, there's some element of forgiveness involved in order to have gratitude, to connect with something, to receive something, the trees and grasses, the wall and fence, the fear or anger,

[24:35]

the thoughts, the feelings, sensations. Sometimes, there's an element of forgiveness that's necessary. Traditionally, one might say, ... [...] Unintentionally, may I be forgiven. As much as anything, you know, mostly, it's to forgive ourself. Many times, we couldn't.

[25:39]

You know, we were small, or we were stupid. You know, we were making our best effort. It wasn't good enough in some ways. Even though we were making a sincere, careful, a sincere effort, something went wrong. We were hurt, or we hurt someone. ... ... To forgive is to allow ourselves to feel some gratitude and thankfulness for having made our best effort, that others are making their best effort, ... to be able to hear and receive again, ... and to be able to give again. ...

[26:43]

... ... ... So, Buddhism teaches that, right now, already, we live in the midst of realization, where there is this connectedness. The grasses and trees, the land, are emitting a bright and shining light. Each of us is emitting a bright and shining light. And, often times, it's kind of obscured, wouldn't you say? ... But, when we touch things carefully with our awareness, we can receive and know the bright and shining light. I was at, for a while, yesterday, I went to a workshop on, the Zen Center Hospice had a workshop given by Marian Rosen, who does this

[27:49]

Rosen work, this kind of, so-called, body work. ... It was a benefit for the Zen Center Hospice, and it's very simple. They described their work as being low-tech. So, we did a little exercise in the morning, where we were in partners. We had to find a partner. And then, one person would sit down, and the other person would either stand or sit behind them, and then we'd put our hands on the other person's shoulder. And you don't, exactly, you're not supposed to do anything. You practice receiving with your hands. You don't practice, like, here, let me straighten this out for you. Let me make this better. Let me fix this. You know, let me get rid of this ache for you.

[28:49]

Just have your hands there, receiving. And interestingly enough, people, you know, most of the time, notice, they get, they start to relax and feel warm and ease, and it's because somebody sees you. Somebody receives you. And when you're seen and received and met, then you feel, oh, thank God. What a relief. And then your body relaxes, and then people's shoulders go down, you know, one, two inches. And then, pretty soon, the hands are not at the surface anymore, but the hands somehow are connecting, and sometimes feeling, then, the bright and shining light. And so, you notice that when you can be with something and receive something that carefully, not trying to fix it, not trying to make it better.

[29:52]

And if you feel fear, just feel fear. You can feel someone's guardedness or someone's tightness, someone's edginess. You can feel that, and then, when you feel it and receive it, then somebody else relaxes, the other person relaxes. Because why one is guarded is because someone's going to say, oh, God, you're afraid. Then, of course, you're afraid. All the more so. But that's the way we are with ourself, too. In meditation, we're trying to learn how to receive ourself, touch ourself, so we don't put ourself off. I had my hands on a woman, and then, at one point, we were invited to say something, either the person sitting or the person with their hands on the other person. And she said,

[30:56]

I'm really surprised because I feel so comfortable and so relaxed and peaceful being touched by a stranger. And not only that, a man. And I said, I only look like a man. Because when you feel somebody's shoulders like that, you don't feel a man or a woman. You feel living, breathing sensations. You don't feel that. When somebody's hands are on your shoulders, that's the point. She felt

[31:59]

so comfortable because it wasn't a man touching her. She had to think and remember, oh, it's a man touching me, but I feel this other way. That's because she doesn't feel as though a man is touching her. She feels some warmth, something receiving her, something being grateful to be with her. Someone's awareness giving her attention. So we can do this for ourselves and we can do this for one another, to touch something, receive something, and appreciate and be grateful for our experience and for other people in our life. For the grasses and the trees. The wall and the fences. ... ...

[33:04]

Suzuki Roshi said, and this is, you know, not just Suzuki Roshi, but Buddhism, there's no nirvana outside of our practice. He said our practice, but we could also say there's no nirvana outside of the experience, the everyday experience we're having. And nirvana is in this touching something and receiving something, connecting with something, with the gratitude or thankfulness, with some warmheartedness. Hearing, receiving this sense of I'm making my best effort. Thank you for telling me. ... One has to set aside, you know, the standards, the high standards one has for oneself and for someone else. And be able to receive in the moment

[34:09]

the experience of the moment. To bow to the experience of the moment. ... ... I'd like to close with a brief meditation. ... I'm sorry. ... [...] I want to close with a brief meditation, which to me has a little bit of this quality of gratitude or thankfulness in it. It's based on a meditation taught by Thich Nhat Hanh, a Vietnamese Zen teacher who was visiting here recently. Sometimes at the retreats I've been to with him,

[35:17]

sometime in the afternoon we will do a meditation like this. ... [...] Inhaling, I'm aware of my eyes. Exhaling, I smile at my eyes. ... ... ... My eyes see pleasant and unpleasant things. I smile at my capacity to see.

[36:22]

... [...] Inhaling, I'm aware of my eyes. Exhaling, I soften and relax my eyes. Inhaling, I'm aware of my nose. Exhaling, I smile at my nose. ... My nose smells pleasant and unpleasant smells. ... I smile at my capacity to smell. ...

[37:31]

... Inhaling, I'm aware of my ears. Exhaling, I smile at my ears. ... ... My ears bring me good news and bad. I smile at my capacity to hear. ... [...] Inhaling, I'm aware of my mouth. Exhaling, I smile at my mouth. ...

[38:34]

... ... My mouth lets me taste good things. Pleasant and unpleasant. I smile at my ability to taste. ... ... ... Inhaling, I'm aware of my sense of touch. Exhaling, I smile at my sense of touch. ... All of my senses, my body, are making their best effort. I smile at my mind, at my body, making its best effort.

[39:36]

... ... Inhaling, I'm aware of my thinking. Exhaling, I smile at my thinking. ... ... I think positive things, negative things. There are thoughts of praise, thoughts of blame. I smile at my thinking. ... ... My capacity to think. ... Inhaling, I may be aware of a feeling. Anger, boredom, sorrow, sadness, fear. Exhaling, I smile at my feeling.

[40:48]

... ... My feeling smiles back at me. ... Appreciating that I can know it, receive it, allow it to be. ... ... Inhaling, I'm aware of my heart. Exhaling, I smile at my heart. My heart, which carries the whole world. ... All the joys and sorrows. I smile at my heart,

[41:51]

doing its best, making its best effort. ... [...] Inhaling, I'm aware of my heart. Exhaling, I'm grateful for my heart. ... [...]

[42:52]

... ... Inhaling, I'm aware of my stomach. Exhaling, I smile at my stomach. ... My stomach digests things, good things and bad things. Receiving the world. Digesting the world. Providing nourishment. I smile at my stomach. It works so hard for my well-being. ... ...

[44:02]

Inhaling, I'm aware of my liver. Exhaling, I smile at my liver. ... Purifying the blood. Supporting me. Carrying me. ... Sustaining me. I feel grateful for my liver. ... ... Inhaling, I'm aware of my body. Exhaling, I smile at my body. ... My body which can ache and hurt. ...

[45:04]

... Feel joys and sorrows, pains and pleasures. I'm grateful and appreciative for my body. ... Making its best effort. ... [...] I'd like to wish you all ... ... ...

[46:01]

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