I said yesterday that I find it precious and extraordinary that we can be here together and do this. And also, but also, you know, if I feel that way, as I do, and it's very clear my own practice is practicing with you, so you both hold my practice back. you both hold my practice back and you lead it forward it's somehow very similar a kind of spiral so if that's the case why do I feel before every tesho I feel a little shy are quite shy and maybe even a little frightened because for me my intention is to engage you to engage you where you live

[01:28]

And to engage you where you might live. And to engage you, engage us together where we might live together. So I feel a little shy because, I mean, in a way you're giving me permission to do this, but on the other hand I want to be very careful with your permission. So I want to engage but not invade our intimate practice together. The Sandokai says all objects interact and yet do not interact.

[02:55]

All objects interact and yet do not interact. Now to read sutras, to read Shido's Sandokai and so forth, you really have to develop the skill of close reading where you really feel each word and feel the context of each word and let the context of each word proceed to the next word So all objects interact and yet do not interact. Is that your experience? describe anything like your experience?

[04:11]

And then it says, light and dark are opposed as the front foot is by the following foot. In other words, light and dark are interrelated, like the front foot and the back foot. So it means we're always living in a territory which is both light and dark. Okay, now what light and dark is Shido talking about? Yeah, that's a big question. Don't expect me to answer. I'm just here to chat with you.

[05:13]

And then he says myriad things function according to myriad things function I forget exactly. Interact according to function and place. Know the way in front of you. Okay, now it says myriad things. Now, myriad things here doesn't mean toothbrushes, you know, kitchen pots, bamboos and so forth.

[06:39]

It doesn't mean the stuff of entities. It refers back to the front foot and the back foot. In other words, the hand that's picking up the pot in the kitchen is a myriad thing. If you think the pot is a myriad thing, this is delusion. It's a conventional truth, but not a fundamental truth. So the front foot in walking is a myriad thing. And the back foot in walking is a myriad thing.

[07:39]

And the foot lifted but not touching the ground is another myriad thing. Can you shift into that way of thinking? Because the only thing that exists are interactions. If you took all the interactions away, all the entities would just disappear. They'd collapse. They couldn't exist. That's a simple fact. But You can live in the delusional world as we all do. But we are here to engage wisdom. To use wisdom to transform how we are in the world. So to get us to really feel That's a myriad thing.

[09:04]

And that's a myriad thing. And they're not the same thing. The open hand is not the closed hand. And one finger or two fingers, each is different. The right hand touching the left hand is not the right hand, it's the right hand touching the left hand. You have to get this through your thick skulls. Excuse me, I didn't mean to say that way. My thick skull, too. Okay. Yeah. Now... Abiding...

[10:08]

How's it go? Abiding. Not abiding. Not abiding. Anywhere. Anywhere. Yeah. Not abiding anywhere. Give rise to mind. Not abiding anywhere. Give rise to mind. Now, giving rise to mind creates a location. So you're not abiding anywhere except that you create a location which is mind itself. And this is not simply a location. Because you're not abiding anywhere, but in that abiding you give rise to mind. And in that not abiding anywhere, the mind is also continuity. In the background of what I've been speaking about for the seven days or six days now is the concept and practice of continuity.

[11:30]

And in the background of the background is Samantabhadra. Which is, we can think of it as the one who does not move generates wholeness. Okay. Now, let's go back to the cafe. I need a cappuccino. Even an imaginary one. That's good. You can have imaginary ones very quickly. Okay. So we're constructing the cafe. And I gave you five ways you're constructing the cafe. Okay, but you're also deconstructing the cafe. So... So the cafe is in parts.

[12:51]

You've taken the cafe apart. Walls, espresso machine, waitress, chairs, the back of the chairs, the legs of the chairs, the floorboards. You've taken it The walking of the waitress. The smile. The angle of her shoulders. These are all the parts of the cafe. And you can't really have a cafe without coffee. the angle of the shoulders of the waitress. Otherwise no one would make you your caffè latte. So you've taken all these parts apart. So as I said earlier, I said, arising in the already arisen.

[14:10]

And I think that's potentially a useful phrase if you can feel it. Because there's the already arisen all of you, the lights, the room and yet for the practitioner of wisdom all this is simultaneously arising in the practitioner's mind and body continuum. Okay. So you've taken all the parts apart. And even though they still look like a cafe, and pretty much like the cafe you entered when you first got there, simultaneously, they're not yet reassembled.

[15:20]

Okay. So you have this experience of the two truths. You've constructed the cafe. And it's assembled. And that's in a way a conventional truth that knows about the fundamental truth. And the fundamental truth is, yeah, but they're not yet assembled. If they're to be glued together, they're glued together. or reassembled by your activity. Yes, so when you walk, say, to the restroom, You're reassembling the cafe as you walk.

[16:27]

You're at least reassembling the parts where you walk. Now, you may think this is crazy. And you may want to send me somewhere later. But this is enlightened vision and accessible to all of us, not yet assembled. And in your walking to the toilet, And when you decide to leave the cafe, you're assembling the path to the door. And in some way the rest of the cafe is rather loosely held together. You're waiting for the guy over in the far corner you noticed later on while you were there for him to reassemble.

[17:49]

And it's sort of loosely assembled because the waitress is assembling it. And I said the other day, the open field cultivates itself. So you're walking down the street now. And you've left the not yet assembled cafe behind. And it's more and more fully gone. There's no karmic calling going on. And now you're discovering the sidewalk and the rest of what's around you assembling itself as you walk.

[18:59]

Now, probably you know that one of the sayings of the Native Americans that goes back and is not just white people mythologizing Indians, is that you lay down the path as you walk. And everybody owns the path as you walk on it, so you take care of the path as you walk on it. So now walking down the sidewalk. And the world assembling it, the not yet assembled world assembling itself through your walking. And in some sense, being unassembled as it passes past you.

[20:10]

This is letting the open field cultivate itself. The not yet assembled world is a field of brightness. And the not yet assembled world is the practice of inter-independence. Okay. You got that? Crystal clear. It shines like a crystal. All right. Now, let me go just back to a yogic practice I've given you often. And illustrate it by myself. As I'm sitting here, I'm not thinking. And my practice is to feel the field of you.

[21:38]

And then also simultaneously notice the particulars. So the all-at-onceness and the particular flow together. There's the wisdom phrase I've given you, to pause for the particular. So you get a feel for this by pausing for the particular and then going to the field. and after a while if you get used to this as I said the other day the field the field of the mind in which everything appears is somehow in front of you but located anchored in your back And you get to know the physical experience of this.

[22:50]

So for the yogi, this is mentation. So So the field of mind is a mental posture. And going to the particular is a mental posture. So here you're developing the skill which doesn't come naturally to us because we don't function that way. Now, you know, one of the things that Asian teachers, Tibetan, I'm not so sure about Tibetan, but Japanese and Korean teachers have spoken to me, and Vietnamese.

[24:01]

When they first come to the West, or at least to America, probably not to Germany, but at least to America, They can't believe the flora and fauna that Westerners bring to them. the psychological flora and fauna. This hurt me and I was scared of this and I didn't like that. I don't know what kind of person I am. Where did you guys get all this stuff? And I've had the same experience when I've had doksan with Japanese or Chinese people.

[25:02]

They come to doksan and they speak to me about how strong their willpower was. Or how something shined when they thought about it. There's no psychological stuff of I don't like this, I'm this kind of person. It just doesn't happen. But that's where our culture is put us. We're always thinking about what kind of person we are and who the hell cares? You imagine someone's out there caring. I'll let you know how bad I am because you're out there caring. So one way to function here is establish mental postures as a a process of continuity.

[26:18]

Establish mental postures as a form or a process of continuity. Okay. Okay. So what are some kinds of continuity? And you ought to experiment with continuity. And that's one thing we can do in Sashin more than, as I've said, than usual seminars. You can experiment with physical continuity. Yeah, right now I'm feeling the contact of the cushion and so forth, and my posture of my spine, etc. And my hands on this teaching staff. It's called a nyoyi. And nioi is also the word for wish-fulfilling gem.

[27:37]

So the wish-fulfilling gem is also what's in Koan 92 and 93. And how words don't stick to entities in Japanese and Chinese, but... are about interactions. So this allows me to engage with you in teaching. It's a wish-fulfilling gem. Okay, so you can just try in the next couple of days. We have two left. I'm sorry, unless you vote to extend the session. And just see the physical contact with the world as continuity.

[28:44]

Because you're not going to fly. I don't think you're going to fly through the room. You're going to walk through the room, probably. And if you fly, that would be great too. So you pay attention to the physical continuity. And really establishing that, you have to do that to survive. Walk through the door instead of the wall. But really sense it as continuity. As attentional continuity. So your attentional continuity... karmic calling, thinking and all that stuff is pretty much diffused and dispersed.

[29:52]

And you just feel attentional, physical continuity. And you can also experiment with sensorial continuity. You're in a flow of a visual field, an aural field. Yeah, like that. And you can also feel phenomena as stuff. We already do this already, but I'm just emphasizing it as continuity. You're always in the midst of stuff. You just have a feeling of the continuity of the stuff of the world.

[30:53]

These are rather practical forms of continuity. And if you've taken the precepts or you've practiced the precepts, I would say that's sort of also kind of practical continuity. But related also to mental postures. So here you have the precept of, say, don't kill. and you're always in the flow of not killing her am I killing her not killing and that's a continuity or you're in the flow of not taking what is not given and innumerable times you'll see was I given that or

[32:01]

Am I taking what's not given? Etc. Or you can be in the flow of right speech. Speech that doesn't abuse others and so forth. So that you can now develop the five and ten precepts as flows of continuity. Or you can take a phrase like, not abiding anywhere, give rise to mind. And there's a whole process considered called something closely held teachings, closely held attention. where you closely held hold in the flow of activity not abiding anywhere but you are abiding or you're not abiding

[33:17]

You're in that kind of flow. Or maybe you can feel wisdom like it's a little baby. And you're holding this little baby of wisdom in your heart. And the baby of wisdom likes being next to your heartbeat. and it likes feeling your breath and your warmth and you don't want to drop it and it likes your attention so you feel this kind of heart, mind, baby, wisdom being held and you don't drop it. Yeah. Yeah. And you discover how to spend the whole day without dropping it.

[34:43]

Or forgetting about it. A kind of background mind that pays attention. And when you forget about it, the baby says, hey, I can't breathe. It's like that. Yeah. Or you find the continuity of the not yet assembled. The bright field cultivating itself. This is also continuity. Okay. To be continued. Thank you.

[35:25]

@Transcribed_UNK
@Text_v005
@Score_72.0