Let me know if I don't talk loud enough for you to hear me, unless you don't want to hear me and then you don't have to mention it if I'm not talking loud enough. Sometimes it's nice just to listen to your own thoughts rather than having to listen to somebody else's. The other option, of course, is you could walk out. But anyway, here I am, and I assume, I have to assume, that what's come to me to talk about is what you wanted me to talk about, so we'll see, won't we? So, I wanted to talk about a Zen saying, more or less. There's one that is, if you reach a barrier, change. That's pretty simple. And it goes along with the, don't stick to the zero point of the scale.

[01:14]

And also, every one of you has reached the top of a hundred foot pole. What now? Like it up there? What will you do? And you know, the simple answer is leap. Or you know, you could say, if you reach a barrier, change. Anyway, often in our life, we don't know what to do. We feel stuck. If you didn't know where the answer is, you don't, you know, if you think you don't know where the answer is, it must mean you know exactly where the answer is, and you've spent

[02:20]

a lot of time being very careful not to look there, and to look everywhere else but there, otherwise you'd have stumbled upon it by now. But because you know what the answer is, you know where not to look. So what this means is, you know, we'd all like to be maybe different, but on the other hand, wouldn't want to be different. We'd all like to change, but wouldn't want to be somebody else. Aren't you kind of used to being you at the top of that pole? So, it's also similar of course to the, you know, the old blues song, everybody wants to get to heaven, nobody wants to die. It's kind of like that. Of course, as soon as, you know, I mentioned leaping off the hundred foot pole, then, you know, there will be people who ask, how do I do that?

[03:20]

And of course, that will stick you right back on the pole, because you've probably spent your life asking people, how do I do that? That's what you've done, to stay on the pole. You know, to keep the world, being the world that you're familiar with, that keeps you with the same problems you've always had, you know, how will you do that? It's actually, it takes a lot of work to go on having the same problems you've always had. Being the same person you've always been, it's a big effort, because at the same time, you're making all that effort to be the person you've always been, some part of you wants to change, and you have to keep defeating that part. And you have to keep finding new ways, maybe, or reinforcing the old ways to stick that person back on top of the pole, every time a little finger starts to come loose, you know.

[04:27]

So, who do you, you know, who do you think you are? Who do you think I am? What do you think the world is like? Those beliefs, you know, is what keeps us on top of the hundred-foot pole. And those beliefs are what keep our life being the way it's been, just exactly as separate from others as we've always been, just as close or separate as, you know, we've decided to be a long time ago. You know, it's easy to think something like, the example I've been using lately is, nobody likes me. Once you start believing that, how will you ever get any evidence to the contrary? All the people who don't like you, you say, see, I was right.

[05:40]

And then, if it starts to look like somebody likes you, you'll think of some reason to overlook or ignore the evidence. They're just pretending. They like everybody, so it's not really a test whether they like me. They're just not very discriminating. They just go around liking everybody, so they're just not looking that carefully. They don't know me that well. They don't know me well enough. If they knew me better, they would see how awful it is. So nobody likes me. How much does the world support you? How much do other people support you? You know, do your feet support you? Do you get a lot of support? What kind of world is it that you live in? Are you at home there? And then, how is it that it's like that? And you'll have to keep, you know, behaving in just the right way so that everybody treats

[06:50]

you with the exact right amount of support or lack of support that you're comfortable and familiar with. Or you'll find some new way to behave to get them to confirm what you've always thought. They don't support me. Or they do. So beliefs, these beliefs are very powerful. You know, because then we'll find ways to behave that make it true. And it's very difficult then. How will you ever be free? You know, get off of the pole, leap free of your beliefs. This is big, you know, this is our big question, our big challenge, to leap free of our beliefs. So, you know, to have some experience outside of the framework of what you've always thought, how can you do that? How will you do that? And will you have enough, you know, can you have, will you decide to have, you know, enough

[07:56]

confidence to go ahead and experience what you've never before experienced and admit, you know, you were wrong. It's really hard to admit I was wrong. I was wrong all those years that I made such a commitment to the fact that men are not trustworthy, or women are deceitful, or those Zen people are, you know, whatever they are, boring or, you know, something. They're not very friendly. And what kind of person are you? And can you do, is there, is it possible to say something that is outside of who you've always been, or do something, or just be, you know, different than you've always believed? So this is a big challenge.

[09:00]

It's a leap. Maybe the pole for you is not just a hundred feet, maybe it's a thousand. Maybe you want people to put mattresses around the bottom. Maybe you could ask them to build a pool down there to dive into. So first of all, there's beliefs that keep us on the pole. This is the big one. And then there's, you know, certain of those beliefs are even more powerful than others. So one of them is blaming others. It's also, blaming others is very similar to always tending to be, you know, the tendency to be the victim of your experience. You made me mad. You know, you disappointed me.

[10:05]

Why, why don't you help me more? You're the Zen teacher. You know, why don't you enlighten me? Why haven't you done it already? Why are you withholding from me? Don't talk to me like that. If you didn't speak to me like that, I wouldn't be upset. So you need to control the way that you behave so that I'm not upset. If you all just behave better, I wouldn't get angry. I would have a nice peaceful life if you all just were like really nice. So you can blame others for everything that happens. That's a good way to stay on the pole. That's a perfect example. So one way to leap, you know, the big leap really is to take responsibility for your life. To take responsibility for, when you said that, I got angry.

[11:10]

When I saw that, I was jealous. I was jealous. I decided I became jealous. I got angry. I did that. When I asked you, you know, to help me and you said no, I felt unsupported. I felt unsupported is different than you don't support me. And this is especially true, of course, you know, for, you know, your parents. But then you get to Zen Center and there's lots of parental figures around, you know, so you can ask them to do the same. Take their place. Anyway, you know, this is also to say, so this is a big, you know, this is the main thing you can do is take responsibility in your life for who you are and for what happens. It's not somebody else's fault.

[12:13]

There's no one to blame. You did it. You decided. You know what kind of world it is. You created that world and now you're living in it. And you haven't wanted to jump off the pole. So here you are. This is also the same, you know, as saying there's actually no events. There's only experience. I talk and, you know, we can say, we can think, well, the event is Ed is doing a Dharma talk, but actually everybody here is something different. Everybody has their own experience. There's no event here. There's, you know, all of your experiences. And no event. It also means, you know, when my mother died, she wasn't abandoning me. I may have felt abandoned. I may have the experience of being abandoned, but that's not something she did to me.

[13:18]

There's no events. Nobody's doing anything to you. There's your experience. And all the time with our experience, we decide certain things. And mostly, you know, we decide the same thing we've always decided. It always, it goes to show people don't like me. It goes to show men abandon me. It goes to show men aren't trustworthy. It goes to show that people don't care. It's more evidence. But it's really possible. It's a very, it's quite possible for any of us to leap. To leap free of everything we've always thought. And the nice thing is, you know, a couple minutes later, you can get all your beliefs back. But then, you don't have to worry about it.

[14:25]

You know, they won't be quite as, they won't have you quite around the neck the way they used to once you've leaped. And so this is what we're studying. You know, things that can help. So at the risk of, you know, keeping you on the pole, I will offer you some suggestions. But, you know, you're quite welcome to pay no attention to my suggestions and find your own way to leap. And just decide, you know, I will leap. I will do that. So when you sit down, you know, to do Zazen, when you sit down to meditate, what are you deciding to do? You're going to calm your mind? You're going to quiet your mind? You're going to get enlightened? What do you tell your mind, you know, how do you tell your mind and body to behave?

[15:30]

To give you the experience that you're asking for. And then when you're not getting it, what do you do? You know, how will you talk to yourself? Can't you do better than that? I told you to follow your breath. If you would just follow your breath and do what I told you, we could have a really nice experience. How can I practice with all this fear? Well, that makes it sound like, boy, practice doesn't include fear, does it? Your idea of practice doesn't include fear. How can I practice with all this grief? Oh, is practice something different than grief? Well, whose idea was that? Back on the pole. So why not, you know, if you leap, you can have grief, fear, whatever your experience is, you've leaped.

[16:36]

You're not trying to stay on the pole anymore. Why not leap into, you know, in Zen we also say, dive in. Jump in, you know, leap into your experience. Without regard for whether it's the one that you thought you should be having, that would indicate you're a really good Zen student, people ought to respect you more, you know, people ought to appreciate you more. They ought to be congratulating you, because, you know, you look like a good Zen student now. How would you get them to believe that? And if you were a good Zen student, then people could, you know, wouldn't they like you then? Couldn't you like yourself then? Why not just go ahead and like yourself in the first place? Or did you need some reason to like yourself? See, all of that will keep you on the pole. So it's a leap just to give yourself permission to experience whatever happens in your life, and, you know, we say over and over again,

[17:36]

without regard to good or bad. I'm experiencing anger, I'm experiencing fear, I'm experiencing grief. I'm experiencing gratitude. I'm happy. If you watch carefully, you know, you'll have all kinds of experience. Did you know that Jimmy Dale Gilmore song, my mind has a mind of its own? Takes me out walking when I'd rather be home. Takes me to parties when I'd rather be alone. Anyway. Why don't you let your mind have a mind of its own? Well. And then, you know, we'll wonder, like, well, how do I do that? What's the right way to do that? What's a really good way to do that? I'd like to do that really well. This is a problem, you know, for us.

[18:40]

But you can just have your experience. You know, and mostly, I mean, it's very, you can take something like your breath. You can study your breath. Does your breath support you? Does your breath refresh you? What, you know, what kind of breath is it? What kind of world is it that you live in? You know, the breath is there for you to breathe. How do you feel, you know, towards your breath? Do you, you know, can you trust your breath? Do you trust your breath when you breathe, when you sit? Do you trust it? Or do you feel like, oh, my breath, I'd better, I'd better tell it how to do it

[19:42]

because it may not know so well. So maybe I'd better make it a little deeper because, you know, those short breaths, you know, they're not really the way to do it. Or you could make your breath calmer. Or longer. Or do you just, will you just trust your breath? So you can practice just trusting your breath, however long or short it is. You can practice believing in your breath. You know, is your breath your friend or your enemy? Is your breath, you know, another one of those three-year-olds that needs to be taught how to behave? How to be a Zen person? And actually, you know, each part of your body you can study. You can ask your sacrum where it likes to sit.

[20:49]

You know, if you tilt your sacrum forward, you sit up a little straighter. If you slump your sacrum back, you know, you start to slump a little bit. And usually you'll have one idea. You sit down. Oh, this is where my sacrum goes because if my sacrum goes here, I'll be able to go on being me. I'll be able to go on thinking the things I've always thought. But if you ask your sacrum, you know, your sacrum may say, actually, you know, a little bit forward here, it's a really nice spot. There's actually, I feel some energy here and vitality. You know, a little forward, a little back, you can study. You can ask your sacrum, you know, where does your sacrum like to be? Where does your sacrum feel supported and like it can support you? Where does it feel like it has energy or it doesn't have energy? Where does it, you know, where does it feel like it says no?

[21:56]

Where does it say yes? And this is true, you know, with your hands. And your neck. You know, your neck and your head is a lot to do with your beliefs. The neck is where you keep control. And you have to hold your head a certain way, you know. So that, you know, you listen more on this side and you don't listen on this side. And you know, by changing, you know, how your head is, you'll change your whole life. You know, because if you go around, you know, like this, you know, you'll have an attitude, won't you? There's, you know, we all have a way, we have our heads.

[22:58]

If you're not careful, you know, you might lose that. But, you know, mostly you'll know just how to keep it no matter what happens. But that's a leap to let your head and your neck have its own mind. You know, be itself. If you want to, you know, liberate yourself, you can liberate your neck and your head. From your idea of the world. From, you know, your idea of how people support you or don't support you. Or they appreciate you or don't appreciate you. They like you, they don't like you. They're helping, they're not helping. I can trust them, I can't trust them. I can trust myself, I can't trust myself. How did you decide all those things? A long time ago without really thinking about it, I'll tell you. But you have a chance now, you know, we have a chance now to, you know, start over.

[24:06]

See if we can experience the world outside of how we've always thought things to be. And let that change our thinking and our beliefs. You know, at the beginning of the satsang, if you go to instruction, you hear, Why don't you lean side to side? And I look around this endo and, you know, I see almost nobody does this. Wouldn't be useful, right? You know where to sit. You know how to have your head. Why would you want to sort of just feel like what it feels like over here? And here, and here, and here. You know, and here, and here. Why not feel like what it actually feels like? And check out and see like today, right now.

[25:11]

Where is it that feels? You know, rather centered, and stable, and clear. And you're not, you're not holding your head. The way you usually do. And you let your head relax, you know, and your neck. And let your head and neck find itself. If you liberate your head and your neck, you liberate yourself. You can study this. You can do it. I watch people walk sometimes. Do you know when you walk, It's amazing how many times, you know, I do teach people walking meditation. And mostly when I watch people walk, you know, what do you think walking meditation is about?

[26:16]

It's about walking. But mostly when people do walking meditation, it doesn't feel or look to me like any awareness is actually in the feet. I mean, you know, the feet are what support your body and how your feet come down on the ground is how much support you get or don't get from the ground, from the earth, from the floor. And how your feet, how your foot comes down, that's how much support from the earth, and that's how well or not so well your foot supports you. And if you've decided like, Oh, nobody supports me, the world doesn't support me. They ought to do a better job of it. You know, that's the way you'll walk. Your awareness won't be in your feet. And when you walk, you're like, Oh, I'm not sure I could step there. I don't know if it's going to hold me up.

[27:19]

I better not put my weight into that foot. You know, there'll be lots of things going on, and you won't even notice. But you'll be able to walk so that exactly how you've always thought is exactly the way it is. You can behave in a way that confirms your belief, or you can study how to walk, how to move, so that it's a whole new world. Absolutely a new world. Top to bottom, through and through, and you're not even you anymore. And you know what? It's scary. As soon as you do that, you feel like, you feel vulnerable, you feel exposed. It's frightening. Now what? Because you've let go of that pull. It's scary. You know, even if it's a shift for the better, it's a whole new world, it's completely different, you don't know how to behave anymore, you don't know what to do, you don't know what to say,

[28:22]

and you're not familiar with anything. So also this means, you know, are you willing to go through a period like that? Not no. Stumble around, be lost, it's a whole new world, but you'll have to find out how to live in it. You know, even if you have, if you wear shoes that are too small all your life, 30 years, 40 years, 50 years, and you suddenly have shoes that are the right size, do you think your feet aren't going to, like, be feeling around, well, where are they? Where are my shoes? And then you won't, and then you'll feel like it's scary, you know, because the shoes aren't impinging on me anymore. They're not, you know, gripping my foot anymore. Where are my shoes? And it's the same with your beliefs. You know, you may have, you could move or sit or breathe

[29:23]

in a way that you enter a whole new world, and then to live there, you know, and to keep living in a new world, you know, after a while you'll get used to it, you know, you might feel like, who am I to be living in this world? That's what happened to the Buddha, right? Mara stood up to him and said, who are you, who do you think you are? You're getting free of the world. What gave you the right to do that? Don't you think you should go on believing what you've always thought? And he touched the ground. Hmm. And he said, you know, the ground is my witness. The earth mother, the earth goddess.

[30:24]

But what, you know, most of us, most of the time, we try to make sure we stay in the world that we're familiar with, even if we don't like it. Because at least we're used to it. And we go on being me, even if we don't like it, because at least I'm familiar with me. Problems I have. I wouldn't want to just end up with somebody else's by mistake. Do you know that story? If we each throw our problems and difficulties into the middle of the room, I mean, you wouldn't want to take somebody else's back when it comes time. But, you know, why not? Anyway, to leap off the pole is actually, you know, to have a whole new life. And then you have a whole new challenge. And, you know, it's scary. And you'll be exposed and vulnerable and fragile and awkward. And thank goodness.

[31:39]

And see if you can make it last as long as possible. You know, and then you reintegrate. You know, and you reorganize who you are. Actually, I say you, but it's not exactly you because it's more like your body. Your body will incorporate whatever experience you let it have. Another way to understand, you know, this is also, by the way, of course, you know, this is to take responsibility. This is to be responsible. Nobody's to blame. You step. Each time you step, you can step in a new world. And usually in Zen we call this feeling your way along in the dark. You know, you find your step,

[32:40]

each step. You don't already know how to walk. And then, you know, it's scary because if you don't know how to walk, then how do you do it? So, actually, after a while you can trust, you know, that you actually can feel your way along in the dark. And you just feel your way. And you don't know what will happen. And you haven't decided what will happen. And you don't know, you know, whether the world will support you and you just try it out. And you haven't decided ahead of time. I deserve or I don't deserve. And, of course, you know,

[33:56]

what I'm talking about doesn't necessarily mean, you know, for any of you to change what your basic practice is or what your wish and practice is. I'm just talking about how you, practically speaking, how will you go about it. If you want, you know, stillness, you'll find a lot more stillness in just feeling your way along than if you clamp some stillness on yourself. If you already know how stillness is and you try to create the stillness that is, you know, your conception of stillness, then you will have a lot of resistance because your neck and your body and your breath may not want to be still according to your conception of what stillness would look like. But when you stop telling yourself how to be still, then that's called stillness. Right?

[34:57]

Because all the noise and the lack of stillness was you're telling yourself how to be still. It's the Zen master who said, for 30 years I tried to sweep away the dust, then one day I realized my sweeping was creating more dust. Right? Every morning, you know, this morning, I look up, the sun is coming in the window completely new. Anyway, I don't mind whatever you do. So, if my talk is of some use, fine. If not, you know, you can wing it on your own. I've been fascinated lately. I was reading a little bit about John Cage, who is, you know, a musician and a composer but also a Zen student. And he decided he would create music

[36:00]

outside of likes and dislikes. You know, usually when you create music, you create music that you like. Sounds better to go la-la than instead of la-la you decide, usually music by what you like and what you don't like. So he decided to create music by flipping coins and tossing yarrow sticks and all kinds of things. He decided to do it by chance, you know, to let the universe create the music. And he got really interested, actually, in the sound that's already arising. Like, why would you think that music is something special, different than what you already hear? Why do you even have that idea, is what he thought. And so he started listening to just the sounds quite differently, as though they were music. And finally, you know,

[37:05]

one of his pieces was called Four Minutes Thirty-Three Seconds in Three Movements. It lasted four minutes and thirty-three seconds. And at the beginning they lifted up the top of the grand piano and after a little while they put it down and then lifted it up again for the second movement. And then they put it down again for the end of the second movement and then lifted it up for the third movement. Apparently when it was first performed a lot of people walked out. The concert. He said, if they had been listening carefully they would have heard in the first movement the wind coming up outside. And during the second movement they would have heard people starting to shuffle and the rain starting to fall on the roof. And during the third movement they would have heard a lot of people walking out. Laughter

[38:06]

But you see they had stopped listening because that's not music. That's not what I wanted to hear. This isn't interesting. I don't care about this. This is stupid. You know, a lot of people walked out. Laughter So, I find that really fascinating. And then he said, he would listen to the sounds and he said the hardest sound to hear for him to get used to and appreciate was the sound of heavy equipment that sort of drones and hums like huge air conditioning machines or giant heaters or ventilation systems. He got used to pretty quickly the sound of traffic and appreciating the music of traffic. Probably put it into the middle of some of his compositions. How do you decide, you know,

[39:12]

which is music and which isn't? This was his question, you know, and he decided everything is music rather than this is music, that's not. I can tell. I don't want to hear that. And finally he said he got to where even that heavy equipment, those blowers, he could go, his awareness could go into the sound and then it went on and on. You know, these big spaces opened up. This is exactly this kind of shift, you know, from your decision, you know, any of our decisions, like how we stay on top of the pole and how we leap is to go into our experience until you can penetrate it. And then the world is not the same. You live in a new world. Of course it's useful if you can come back. Every so often somebody goes off someplace and we never see them again.

[40:13]

That's one of our worst fears. This is why Zen says, we put these little, you know, stumbling blocks at the front door, you know, usually we put a little rim at the front door. Now we have to take them all down so wheelchair access, you know. But traditionally you have little things to trip on when you get to the door. So, you know, you'll wake up and you'll be here even if you've wandered off someplace. And then, well, anyway, I'm not going to go into all that. Startup. Excuse me, I'm not going to get started. I need to stop my talk. That's another talk I almost started, so excuse me. I can keep you up really late if I get started on that one. So I think that's about it for tonight. I hope you enjoy either the view from your pole or that new world once you leave.

[41:20]

Where nothing is the way you thought it was, you know, a moment ago. You know, just one last thing, but this is, you know, often in very small and subtle movements. This is not any big deal. This is not something major, you know. Sometimes, you know, you try to do something and you just need to move your head

[42:22]

maybe, you know, a sixteenth of an inch. There's not just one, you know, way to have your head. Or your, you know, the area by your heart, the sides of your body. If you're sitting sometimes, I'll give you one other suggestion right now, but if you're sitting sometimes, you can try fattening the base of your tongue. See what that does. Your world will be different when you make the base of the root of your tongue fat. Check it out. Thank you.

[43:11]

@Text_v004
@Score_JJ