I begin to see and listen to, to remember and accept. I vow to taste the truth of Ajatashatva's words. I have the feeling like each day I'm getting here a minute or two later. It's a good thing this session isn't going on much longer. You might have to sit a whole period before I show up. Okay. When it came time for lunch yesterday I was a little embarrassed having said anything about the meal practice.

[01:04]

It made me feel so self-conscious. It seemed rather cumbersome and awkward to try to have lunch with all those beings scrambling around all over the place. Normally things like the bowl and chopsticks, they kind of stay in their place. But in this case they're sort of moving around so that it's sort of hard to get a hold of them the way you normally can just get a hold of them. And they're sort of lively after all. It's a rather curious phenomenon. I was reminded of... Well, it's so interesting to make a ceremony, as it were, out of something ordinary like eating

[02:12]

which one can usually do quite unconsciously, thank you very much. I was reminded of when I was trying to quit smoking one time and somebody said, well, why don't you make a ceremony of it? What do you mean make a ceremony of it? Well, you wrap your cigarettes up in like a suture cloth and have a little tie with it. And then you have your matches in there. Or a separate little cloth. You can design it so you have the ashtray and the cigarettes and the matches and the lighter in some nice container maybe and in a cloth and then with a nice ribbon. And then when you want to have a cigarette, you...

[03:17]

Now I'm about to smoke a cigarette with all beans. And I hope they enjoy it as much as I do. And I know some of them don't like smoking, I'll try not to bother them too much. Then you start opening it up. And you have to do it, you know, you can't just... It's not like, you know, the kids at Christmas time ripping open their presents or something. You have to do it slowly and carefully. Unfold the cloth and spread it out neatly. And set out the ashtray and the cigarettes and the matches. And you know, all you want is a cigarette. You don't want to have to go through all this fuss and bother.

[04:22]

You just want to have a cigarette. So you do all this stuff. Agitated. It's all kind of annoying. And then you finally... It's even more elaborate if you're rolling your own, of course, rather than just pulling a ready-made cigarette out of the package. You have to get out the paper and then the tobacco and then you roll it and then the pieces of tobacco fall out the end. And then you have to put them away and so on. And you can make it even more elaborate, you know, you offer incense to the poor. Do nine bows, chant the Heart Sutra. Make the cigarette part of the echo.

[05:31]

While I'm smoking this cigarette, I don't want to forget that form is emptiness and emptiness is form. So at last... Anyway, however complicated you've made this ceremony for yourself, at last you get the cigarette and you light it and then... By this time you're so self-conscious and you can't enjoy it anymore. You've got this thing and you wonder, what in the heck am I doing with this cigarette in my hand? And you go to, you know... And sort of nothing happens. Wait a minute, I thought this was supposed to be fun, something I enjoy. And it seems like somehow it's... difficult to have the same kind of conscious enjoyment

[06:50]

as the pleasure or relief of being of some unconscious activity for a little while. So then you just toss the whole thing aside and say, well, thank you very much, but I just like to have a cigarette and have some nice unconscious pleasure. And I can't possibly go through this whole number every time I want to have a cigarette. So anyway, that was my experience with that. The cigarette ceremony didn't last very long. I couldn't keep it up. ... As someone mentioned to me yesterday,

[08:03]

I very carefully did not look around to see if anybody was holding their bowl, as I suggested. I very carefully, you know... Someone said, well, gosh, did you look around and see if everybody was holding their bowls? I said, well, it's a good thing you didn't suggest holding your bowls over there. ... But I think this kind of practice, you know, I find this kind of practice rather interesting,

[09:08]

because one has the chance to find out... I have to think of how to say this. ... Well, on one hand, one has a chance to find out how unconscious one was, or one is, when there's some rule or ritual or form that's pointed out, which we, of course, make up, it's not exactly, of course, the point just to follow the rule or the form,

[10:20]

but that the rule or form or ritual brings this kind of consciousness to our unconscious activity, unconscious... to how our mind and mental process is normally working away, and we're not really conscious of how it is, how our mind functions. ... And then we also notice, not just unconscious, something about unconscious mind,

[11:26]

but we also then notice how our conscious mind works, and we notice this kind of separation between conscious mind and unconscious mind, which is to say, like, you know, why is it that when we are conscious of it, we can't enjoy the cigarette anymore, whereas if we're unconscious of it, we can. And whether it's a cigarette or just our breath is not so important. Maybe it's not so good to be enjoying a cigarette anyway, although there are those people who, you know, who... It's in microbiology, so I said, you know, smoking cigarettes will help you live longer. It's a nice yang activity. Most of us are over yin anyway, so there's no problem about it. And some people who are into acupuncture, you know, sort of say the same thing,

[12:29]

well, I just hit the right points, you know, it doesn't matter. Anyway, so even if it's just your breath, or eating, or walking, or working, somehow when we're conscious, we may not be able to enjoy ourselves, and we need to be unconscious to enjoy ourselves. So, in this way we find out something about the tendency of our conscious mind to want things to be a certain way, and it's almost like our conscious mind says, now be careful not to have too much fun. You might get into trouble, or you might make a nuisance of yourself, or you're going to end up, it's going to end up no good.

[13:30]

Or something, you know, it's hard to know exactly what conscious mind is saying, but somehow conscious mind, once conscious mind is there, there's some element of control, or manipulation, or it should be a certain way. And it's no wonder then that sometimes we find unconscious mind saying, but you know, I just want to enjoy a cigarette, and I get lost, and leave me alone. And pretty soon we're not so conscious of what we're doing, because we can't enjoy ourselves if we're very conscious. We can't relax if we're very conscious of what we're doing. We feel, if we're conscious of what we're doing, we feel,

[14:35]

you know, we start judging ourselves, and criticizing ourselves, and so on. It's no wonder we need some unconscious time, in order to relax and enjoy ourselves, and just feel good, and not feel criticized, not feel judged, and so on. So of course, from this point of view, our practice has something to do with how we practice being conscious, and without the same element of control, or manipulation, or judgment, or criticism, or evaluation, or measurement of ourself, and of what's going on. And we try to practice doing that. And so we take some forms, and rituals, and rules, and so on,

[15:47]

which will bring up consciousness. And then we have this kind of opportunity to see, well, what happens, and is there some way to be conscious, and also to relax and enjoy yourself, to have that kind of, you know, to practice and cultivate that kind of freedom. The freedom of this kind of harmony of conscious and unconscious activity, or not so much of a separation. And some things can happen if I'm conscious. And the more things happen consciously, you know, the less we have to be paradoxically, or ironically,

[16:55]

the more things happen, we can allow things to happen consciously, the less we have to, the less we need to have unconscious time, and the less we need to be critical or worried about what we're going to do, or what will happen, because what we need to worry about is when we're unconscious and we act out something unconsciously. That's more of a worry than if we acted out consciously. And maybe it's not so paradoxical or ironic. Today I also wanted to talk about the next part of the Gensho Kon. Which is the part about bird and fish.

[17:58]

So anyway, in that kind of practice we try to allow what normally, what we notice as we become aware of what happens, what we're doing unconsciously, we try to see if we can allow it to happen consciously. It won't be in quite the same way, but it is what, as I said, gives us some freedom. And it's freedom from our own letting go of our own judging ourself, measuring ourself, being critical of ourself, disapproving ourself, rejecting ourself, and so on. And our mind doesn't need to seek some refuge from that in unconscious activity. The bird and fish, that passage, I'll try to say it for you.

[19:50]

A fish swims in the ocean, or in a little goldfish pond near the library. And no matter how far it swims, there is no end to the water. A bird flies in the air, and no matter how far it flies, there is no end to the air. No matter how far it flies, of course, means whether it flies a short distance or a long distance, there's no end. Even a bird in a cage, there's no end to the air. However, a bird and a fish never leave their elements.

[20:56]

When their activity is large, their field is large. When their activity is small, their field is small. And thus, each experiences, each totally covers, each totally covers its full range, totally covers its full range. Each totally experiences its realm. If a fish leaves the water, it will die at once, or pretty quickly.

[22:07]

And if a bird leaves the air, it will die at once. So we can know that the air is life, and water is life. The bird is life, the fish is life. It must be that life is the bird, life is the fish. It's possible to make further analogies, practice enlightenment, and people are like this. And now, if a bird or a fish tries to reach the end of its realm, or go beyond the end of its realm, rather than moving in it, that bird or fish will not find its way or its place.

[23:22]

When you find a place right where you are, it's just where you are, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point. This fundamental point is, or actualizing, actualizing the fundamental point is translation of Gensokyo poem, that cause has come to now over the years. When you find the place is right where you are, when you find your place where you are, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point. When you find your way right this moment, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point.

[24:38]

The way of the place is neither large nor small, neither yours nor others. It does not carry over from the past and is not merely arising now. So in the practice enlightenment, our school has this kind of hyphenated beast, practice-enlightenment. I wonder sometimes, like form and emptiness, if form is emptiness, why do we call it form, rather than emptiness? If emptiness is form, why do we call it emptiness and not just call it form? Why don't we just have one word? And skip this roundaboutness. Thus in the practice enlightenment of the Buddha way, meeting one thing is mastering one thing, and doing one practice is practicing completely.

[25:55]

There is something that is attributed to Buddha, saying... I can't remember it right now. I'll maybe come back to it. So I think about this bird and fish in the water and so on. I think about it as an analogy for each of us and our experience. No matter how far we go, there is no end to our experience.

[27:17]

There is no end to there being objects or fields of experience. The sensory field, like the twelve ayatanas, there are the six senses, five sense organs, five senses and mind organ, and they play or like to go about in their field. Each organ has its field or realm of activity, that it plays in, so to speak, or acts in. And so no matter how far we go, there is no end to the realm of experience, to the fields.

[28:31]

And small activity, big activity, it's hard to say which is which. If you look at a pin, it takes up the same amount of space as looking at a mountain. It takes up your whole body and mind. But if we look at something small, we say it's small. If we look at something big, we say it's big. But each event totally pervades our mind and body. And the bird or fish totally covers its full range and totally experiences its realm.

[30:08]

And each moment we can have that total experience of that realm, of that activity, and there's not really any difference in size. It's not exactly as though it's big or small. But if the bird or fish leaves its realm, it will die at once. So if we were to live off having experience in various objects, fields, realms, then we would die.

[31:23]

But while we're alive, we have experience. And it's particular. There's always some particular experience, and if we want, we can make distinctions between large and small, better and worse, and so on. Either from habit or as we find useful, we will make distinctions about the particulars of our experience. So Dogen says, the water is life and the air is life. Our experience, that is life. We shouldn't think, it would be a mistake then to think we could somehow get rid of our experience or get rid of, what would we get rid of?

[32:33]

Colour, sound, we would get rid of thinking or feelings. All of these, the whole range of experience is life, and there's no getting around it. The air is life, the water is life, all the objects of the senses and the objects of mind are life. The bird is life and the fish is life. It must be that life is the bird, life is the fish. There's not some abstract life. There's not some life apart from the bird or apart from the fish. Life is the bird, life is the fish, life is me and life is you.

[33:44]

So if the bird or fish tries to reach the end of its realm, go beyond its realm, its element, it will die. Rather than moving in it, it won't find its way or its place. If somehow we want to or we try to get rid of, somehow I reach the end of all this stuff that keeps happening to me, and I keep having these various thoughts and feelings, well I just want to get rid of it, get beyond it. So once the bird or fish tries to get beyond it, rather than moving in it, it can't find its way or its place.

[35:52]

It's completely within the particulars of our experience that we find the way and that we find our place. It's like, I sort of have this image of a busy intersection and you're trying to cross the street and sort of think, isn't there some other way to cross the street? I don't know if I can get across here, all this stuff looks pretty dangerous, how am I ever going to get across? And we may go blocks out of our way to get across. Or just not decide, well we don't nearly need to go across after all.

[37:14]

And we don't even notice that there's a pedestrian crosswalk or something. It may not be that simple, but we don't make the effort sometimes to observe carefully how things work at that intersection. And to find out how to negotiate our way across. And just every time we come to it, it's so busy and frantic or worrisome or fearful, we just decide not to go across or to do something else instead. Or to try to go around some other way. It reminds me of George Lynn's story of his grandmother dying.

[38:46]

And he couldn't eat cantaloupe for 20 years. Just the smell of cantaloupe made him sick and then he didn't want to walk by the cemetery or the mortuary because it would remind him his grandmother died. And then he'd think of elaborate ways to go around some other way. And then even going around some other way reminded him of the cemetery and the mortuary because he was going out of his way. And so on. Anyway, I think you get the idea. So Dogen says, when you find your place, right where you are, right, these very particulars of your life, this is practice. Practice occurs. And this is actualizing the fundamental point. Which then pokes you. Spears you.

[40:01]

I knew we'd get back to Christianity someday. And then you say, that's not the point. So it's funny, whatever words you come to in a translation. The point is kind of nice because what's the point and the point is. But then it also, maybe it's nice that it's also the tip. And you don't want to get, you want to, I don't know, it depends. Do you turn the point away from you or towards you? We hear both being the way to practice. Anyway, find your place. You find your place right where you are at home with your experience.

[41:16]

You find out how to move in that experience rather than trying to get rid of it or trying to go beyond it. You find your way right at that moment. Practice occurs. This is actualizing the fundamental point. This is like when I talked about the place, what about the place where you live? What about residing right there even though from some point of view it's not very pretty or wonderful. But you make your home there and you find your place there and you find out how to move within the particulars of your experience rather than trying to go within or with the particulars of your experience rather than trying to go beyond or reach the end of that.

[42:36]

If you do that, you can't find your way or your place. And there's no end, still there's no end to that element. And as we said, this is not a matter of large or small. If you are happy with yourself or unhappy with yourself, it's the same mind that's happy and the same mind that's unhappy. It takes up the same space or no space. It doesn't have to do with big or small. What is the basis of it?

[43:43]

So we say that meeting one thing, you meet one thing and you master it. Meeting one thing is mastering it. Meeting one thing is how we practice in this moment. And doing one practice is practicing completely. And in all of this we should know, I think, remind ourselves that these particulars, these particulars are not the same when you're trying to go beyond.

[44:57]

When you're trying to get rid of them or reach the end of them or go beyond them. And they're not the same as when you settle down with them, investigate them, look into them, approach them, meet them. The particulars are quite different then. What looked like a problem is a teaching. What looked like something difficult is something new. Why are you bothering me and looking at them and saying, is there something I can do for you?

[46:02]

Or is there something you were trying to say to me? So when you avoid it, you may have, for instance, anger. And when you turn towards it, at some point you may find it's just your intensity, your energy. And when you meet that energy and use that energy and intensity, you don't get angry. But there's some great energy or intensity which is our life.

[47:15]

And if you don't use it, sometimes it will explode. So anyway, we have this kind of a teaching from Dogen that we can't find our way or place if we try to reach the end of our, to end our experience or to go beyond it. And maybe when we find ourselves right where we are, we're at a loss of what to do. Or we don't know what to do. Or that may be so.

[48:17]

But that's all right. We must be willing to not know what to do. And in that way we find our way. And we will find out. And not ahead of time. But within those very particulars. Thank you. Thank you.

[49:07]

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