Well, today seems like a pretty good day to work closely with our Zazen. So this morning I would like to speak about how we work with our Zazen. First of all, it's good to begin with our fundamental understanding of what we're doing when we do Zazen, of what Zazen actually is. People talk a lot about meditation, how it helps your heart condition and calms you down and so on, which is true, I'm sure. But Zazen is not a technique to calm our mind and cool us out. Actually, we may become calm and cooled out, which would be nice as a result or as a by-product

[01:10]

of our doing Zazen, but that is not our main purpose and not our main attitude in doing Zazen. Zazen is the way we enter the center of the universe. With this ordinary and actual physical body and mental phenomena associated with it, we actually touch the silent center of the universe, the source of all peace and sanity in human life. And we do this simply by sitting down without any particular goal or purpose, just allowing

[02:12]

ourselves naturally to drop all our concerns and simply be just as we are in the present moment with nothing extra. This morning, very appropriately, we chanted Dogen's Fukan Zazengi, instructions for Zazen, in which he says this, the Zazen I speak of is not learning meditation. It is simply the dharma gate of repose and bliss, the practice realization of totally culminated enlightenment. It is the manifestation of ultimate reality. Traps and snares can never reach it. Once its heart is grasped, you are like the dragon when he gains the water, like the tiger when she enters the mountain. For you must know that right there in Zazen, the correct dharma is manifesting itself.

[03:20]

So we may have to go through some trials and tribulations for a while to find our real seat in Zazen. But once we find our real seat in Zazen, we are really, as Dogen is telling us, in our true home, and even if our mind is troubled or distracted, we feel a deep sense of spiritual security, more real and more palpable than our trouble. The tiger, when she enters the mountain, is perfectly at home in her element. The dragon, when he gains the water, is perfectly at home, it's his element.

[04:27]

And when we touch the center of the universe with our body and mind, we are in our true element, and we feel this very strongly. Maybe you don't feel this yet, but maybe you will soon. And another great founding ancestor of ours, Kezan Zenji, also wrote instructions for Zazen, and here's what he says in the beginning of his Zazen Yojinki. He says, Zazen just lets people illumine the mind and rest easy in their fundamental endowment. This is called showing the original face and revealing the scenery of the basic ground. Mind and body drop off, detached, whether sitting or lying down, therefore we do not

[05:35]

think of good or bad and can transcend the ordinary and the holy, pass beyond all conception of illusion and enlightenment, leave the bounds of sentient beings and Buddhas entirely. So, putting a stop to all concerns, casting off all attachments, not denying anything at all, the six senses inactive, who is this whose name has never been known, cannot be considered body, cannot be considered mind. When you try to think of it, thought vanishes. When you try to speak of it, words come to an end, like an idiot, like an ignoramus, high as a mountain, deep as an ocean, not showing the peak or the invisible depths, shining without thinking. The source is clear in silent explanation. So, I am aware that all of this may sound rather lofty and very far out to you, and

[06:45]

maybe you don't feel that this describes what you are modestly trying to do, sitting on this little black round cushion. Maybe you just, you know, stumbled in here by chance, and you don't feel like this describes the meditation that you are doing. But whether you feel that it describes the meditation that you are doing or not, this is really what sasan is, and I think it is important at least to hear it and to have some appreciation for the vastness of the commitment that we are all making together when we sit down in this way to do zazen. So, that's the spirit of zazen, the fundamental understanding of zazen, but also we have

[07:57]

to be practical. So, now I would like to get practical and talk a little bit about the nuts and bolts of all this. I think probably by now all of you have already noticed that zazen is very much a physical practice. It's about our body, and it's very important that we be meticulous in taking care of our posture in zazen. We are used to thinking of our body as our body, and our mind as our mind, but actually the body is the mind, and the mind is the body. So, surprisingly enough, sometimes working on tiny details of our physical posture in zazen is the way that we can work on some of the deepest things in our intellectual

[09:01]

and emotional life. It doesn't really make sense to us in our usual way of thinking, but it's really true. Sometimes, specific things about our posture can be meaningful. For example, if we sit with our head forward like this, as some of us do, this can be a kind of attitude. And the word attitude means stance, physical posture. So, sometimes if we have our head forward like this, it can be a kind of attitude of constant brooding, you know, removed from the joy of our life. So, if we watch this and we sit up straight, sometimes our attitude of brooding can change

[10:02]

dramatically. And sometimes if we sit with our shoulders very tense and rounded, this may be a manifestation of our feeling of a deep lack of respect for ourself. And if we can relax our shoulders and square our shoulders and sit back, this attitude can bring with it a change in our inner attitude toward ourselves. Sometimes we may have a pain somewhere in our body. In our shoulder, our upper back, and we think of it as a physical pain, but maybe it really isn't a physical pain. Maybe it's a physical pain, but also associated with some deep emotional pain that's a block

[11:11]

in our freedom in living. So, if we can sit with the physical pain and soften around it, some shift may happen in our whole life. So, these things are really possible. So, this is why it's very important to take care of our posture in zazen, and we really emphasize meticulous care with posture in zazen. Of course, the most important part of our posture is that our spine be straight and lengthened, so that the energy of our life can flow freely up and down. And we're not used to holding our spine in this way. Our spine usually is somehow crumpled a little bit, so we have to make an effort to lift

[12:17]

ourselves here at the sternum, and usually we have to sit a little bit leaning further back than we think, and we're used to sitting. And we actually lengthen our spine so that it feels like there's some space throughout our spine. I find that most people are unconscious in the upper part of their back, so you have to make an effort to be aware of lengthening the spine, particularly in the upper part of the back, the last third of the back up through the neck and head. Make an effort to lengthen the spine there. The back of the head should be pressed up toward the ceiling, and then the chin should

[13:28]

be pulled in, and the ears will be in line with the shoulders, and the nose will be in line with the navel. So the shoulders are really back, and there's a quality in the top part of the body here of lifting. So our posture in zazen is a kind of delicate and very alert and attentive balance between the force of gravity, which holds us on our cushion, and our own spirit, which lifts us up. So we're suspended here between heaven and earth in a very alert, energetic, and light manner. As you know, we keep our eyes half open, gazing at the wall, our tongue at the roof of our

[14:36]

mouth, and toward the front teeth, jaw engaged but not clenched. Then we hold our hands in the zazen mudra, the left palm on top of the right palm, with the knuckles, middle knuckles lined up, and the thumb tips barely touching, and we hold this mudra up against our lower abdomen. Some of us hold the mudra down lower. If you hold the mudra lower, it tends to pull your body forward. So to sit up straight in the way that I was mentioning, you need to hold the mudra close in. And it's good to put a lot of attention and energy into the mudra as you hold it.

[15:39]

If you get sleepy and your thoughts are dull, you'll find your fingers disengaging from the mudra. So sometimes the way to stop your mind from doing that is to put your fingers together, and then your mind will follow. Sometimes if we have many tense and obsessive thoughts, the fingers press together, like this. So then, if we loosen them a little bit, just have the thumb tips touching, our thought also loosens. So you hold the mudra very delicately and lightly, as if you were holding something very precious in your hands. If you hold it this way up against your abdomen, you'll have a little bit of space between

[16:47]

your armpits, your arms, and the sides of your body. So there's a little sense of opening there, rather than clutching the sides of our body with our arms. I have found it very useful, and you can use this practice if you like, to take some time in the beginning of each period of zazen to really set the physical posture, as if before beginning to sit, one is checking. And a good way to do that is to begin with putting your hands on your thighs, then arching the small of your back, and feeling what it's like to lift your sternum in the front, and your chest up, and lengthen the spine.

[17:48]

And then, to lean forward as far as possible, and then slowly come up to straight, and then go even further back than you know you should, and then rock a little bit back and forth until you find the balance point of sitting up straight. And then, just letting the weight of your head fall to one side, rocking from side to side, carefully, until you find, again, a balance point with reference to right and left, and you carefully set the position of your upper body, and then bring your mudra in.

[18:50]

It's also good, when doing this, to take some deep breaths through the nose, and then exhale through the mouth, doing this silently. And when you come to the end of the exhale, to press down and press out extra air, even when you think there's no more. This will press down on your diaphragm area, and you will have a strong sensation of awareness in the lower abdomen area when you do that, when you press extra down on your breath. And if you do this for four or five breaths in the beginning of the period, the sensation of the breath coming and going in the abdomen will become very apparent, and you will be able to more easily anchor your attention there. And then, if you do all of that, it would next be a good idea to, just as you have set

[20:23]

your physical posture and tuned your breathing, also to set and tune your intention, to be clear with yourself of what you intend to do for the next forty minutes. And I think it's a good idea to take a vow, a personal vow, during each period of zazen, of being clear with yourself and determined how you are going to conduct yourself during this period of zazen. So you can compose any vow that is a true statement in your own words of how you intend to practice for these forty minutes.

[21:24]

Something like, during this period of zazen, I vow to sit here in the present moment without distraction. Or, during this period of zazen, I vow to become awakened. Or, during this period of zazen, I vow to really try my best, or whatever it is that strikes you as your highest and best and most realistic intention. And then breathe into that vow a number of times toward the beginning of the period with real seriousness, so that you're clear you're not there for this forty minutes to just spin your mind around and carry all your laundry and stuff, but rather you have an intention. And then when the mind does spin, if it does, remember your intention and bring it back to your posture and your breathing. So this would be, I think, a wonderful practice on this special day that we've all set aside

[22:34]

to practice zazen all day long. A good practice is to count your breath when sitting, counting one at the end of the exhale, two at the end of the next exhale, and so on up to ten, beginning again with one when you reach ten or when you forget where you are because your mind wandered. This is a good way to bring the mind back to the breath. If you feel after a while that counting the breath feels like something extra or abstract, then you can let go of counting and just follow the breath, not all the way into the body

[23:43]

and out of the body, but just at this point in the lower abdomen. Be with the breath as it comes and goes at that point, being aware clearly of breathing in and breathing out. It's also okay to continue counting. Some people count for many, many years in a lifetime. There is no beginning and no advanced in zazen. If you follow the breath in the way that I'm suggesting and you find that your mind is getting dull or sleepy, then you should observe the breath more clearly so that you observe the beginning and middle and end of the inhale and the beginning and middle and end of the exhale, so that you shine more light on each inhale and each exhale and there's more alertness with each inhale and each exhale. As everyone knows, it's not that easy to sit here all day long without thoughts and so

[24:58]

on coming up. So when thoughts or feelings or images or sounds or whatever it may be arise, we simply note or become aware of it or them and we return to our breath and our posture. If thoughts are very persistent to the point where you feel you really can't concentrate very well, you may find it useful to label the thoughts before you put them down and return. It doesn't really matter what you label them. Just anything like thoughts of the future, worried thoughts, grief, whatever it may be. The first label that comes to your mind, it's a way of noticing and putting down the thought

[26:04]

and then come back to your breathing. Sometimes it isn't thoughts that engage and distract us, but it's sensations sometimes, sensations in the body. Pain, for example, is a sensation in the body or some discomfort. If these things arise, you can note, notice the sensation and give equal attention to your breathing so that you can equalize the sensation in the body and the breathing. You can actually notice both with equal attention simultaneously. In this way, if you're feeling pain, you can just sit still and the pain may not be so

[27:07]

troublesome. If you can equalize your attention with the pain in the breath, sometimes the pain will even disappear entirely. So we try as much as we can to sit still and not move around, no matter what sensations are arising in the body. But if, as you're sitting with sensations in the body, you become convinced that it's unhealthy for you to continue sitting in the face of this particular sensation that's arising, then you can move. But before you move, you should say, now I have to move. And then, instead of moving, count five more mindful breaths. Probably nothing terrible will happen in those five more mindful breaths. And in those breaths, you can explore body and mind very thoroughly.

[28:10]

So count five more breaths, and then very mindfully do a little bow and carefully move your body into rest posture and sit that way until you are ready to go back into your sitting posture. Some people find the breath difficult to stay with. You can, instead of using the breath, use some phrase. You can say as you breathe in, breathing in, I come, body and mind. Breathing out, I'm happy. Something like that.

[29:13]

So this is a verse that Thich Nhat Hanh uses and has taught us. Or you can just say, breathing in with awareness, breathing out with awareness with each breath, saying this verse may help to keep you anchored on your breath. Or you can sit with a question. If you find the breath too elusive, who am I? Just sitting, who am I, who am I? What is Buddha, what is Buddha? Breathing into it, staying with the question until it loses its flavor and just becomes a way of being present with full alertness. Or you can practice the practice of Avalokiteshvara and just listen. Sit still and calm and actually listen to the sound inside and out.

[30:22]

These are other practices that you can do instead of or with the breathing practice. I think the breath is a wonderful practice though. In the traditional list of the various 40 meditation objects, it says meditating on the breath is very good for people who have a lot of discursive thought. And I have a theory that we all have a lot of discursive thought, so it's good for all of us. Because there's so much stimulation in our world. We don't live in a quiet world. So all of us, I think, have much more discursive thought than people did in Buddhist time. So the breath is good. If you find that you can meditate on the breath very effectively

[31:30]

and be with the breath without the mind wandering or without being troubled by sensation in the body, maybe an occasional stray thought or two arises, but you're really with the breath, then you can raise up a questioning spirit associated with the breath. What is the breath? What is this breath? Or who is breathing this breath? And then you can just sit there with full intensity with this question until the words of the question disappear and the breath itself disappears and there is only mere sitting. With no one sitting and with absolutely nothing going on whatsoever.

[32:31]

And then you don't need to worry about technique or anything. Some of us get sleepy when we're doing zazen. If you get sleepy, don't indulge your sleepiness, you can, if sleepy, concentrate your breath right up here in your head, in the middle of your forehead. That's one thing you can do. The other thing you can do is notice whatever light there is in the room, there's always some degree of light, even in the early morning and in the evening, and use your eyes to emphasize that light and make it brighter. And when you make the light brighter, you'll wake up a little bit. Also, if you're sleepy, to raise up the top part of your body and press your head up toward the ceiling even more

[33:35]

will also, perhaps, wake you up a bit. If you have the opposite problem, and usually we have one or the other, to find the perfect balance between being sleepy, where we're not alert, and being so alert that our mind is racing, or at least walking along, it's not so easy. So often there is one or the other of these faults arising in zazen. So if you're too excited, and again, you find your mind is producing too many interesting thoughts, then rest firmly in your belly and in your mudra, and come back with more effort to your breath. So these are some tips, some things for you to use.

[34:39]

I don't want to confuse you by giving you a million things to use. So just if one or two things that I have said seem useful, I would encourage you to take them up today and really work with your zazen. I also know that many of you are old hands at this and have heard what I have said from me and from other people many, many times. But it's good to hear it again. And we always need to start at the beginning. It's so easy to get used to zazen and not make a fresh effort as if we're sitting for the first time. However, having said all of this, I want to make it really clear, as we can see from the words of Dogen Zenji and Keizan Zenji,

[35:42]

that there is no good zazen and bad zazen. There is no right zazen and wrong zazen. Whatever we do on our cushions today will be just zazen. And the zazen of the most experienced practitioner will be essentially the same zazen as whoever here is sitting for the first time. It's important to remember this because sometimes one thing that happens when we sit here is we have a lot of judgment and frustration about our zazen. It shouldn't be this way, it should be that way. Why does this happen? Why should that happen? I don't like it. If I were more like him or like her, it wouldn't happen, and they don't have it, and so on. This is very common that we have this sort of thing arising in our zazen. When such judgments and frustrations arise,

[36:46]

we need to be very clear that these judgments and frustrations are simply that. They're judgments and frustrations, habits of our mind. They have very little to do with the actual fact of zazen. If we find the persistence of these judgments, that's very interesting, and we should label judgment. Noticing our habit of mind, and put down the judgment and just come back to the simple fact of being in existence in this present moment. So we need to make effort in zazen, obviously. One day, session, is a time to make our best effort. But this effort must be effort without expectation. We're not looking for a result, or that we should have a particular experience or quality to our zazen.

[37:51]

We're making the effort just to make the effort without expecting anything. Effort for no reason. Effort with no purpose. Just to do it. Like Mr. Nike used to say. Just do it. So sitting, we need to sit with as much clarity as possible, as much alertness as possible, aliveness as possible, and also as much creativity as possible. You know, people don't think of zazen as being creative. But actually, one has to be very creative and resourceful to sit zazen. Because very often, our own life and our own zazen will present to us the way to practice. And we have to be creative enough, and alert enough, and aware enough to see that when it arises.

[38:54]

I've been talking exclusively now about the sitting practice. But this same attitude of alertness and clarity should also be extended to all the forms of the zendo. That's one of the interesting things, I think, about our tradition. Is that we say that there's the sitting practice, but also there's walking in the zendo, there's eating the meal, there's how we sweep the floor, how we bow, and so on. All of these things are extensions. Moving zazen. So particularly when eating the orioke meal, to pay attention to the way that we handle the utensils. Awareness is beautiful.

[40:05]

And handling the orioke bowls, and serving, and so on, is a beautiful ceremony. And we do it beautifully when we do it with full awareness and attention. So we pay as much attention to that as to the food and to the eating part. Even during the breaks, we practice mindful awareness as we move our body, as we rest, as we stretch, whatever we do. So, underlying all of this that I'm speaking of is an attitude that is completely bound up with what zazen is. An attitude of strongly wishing

[41:10]

the benefit of all beings in this universe. It is actually very difficult, if not impossible, to sit zazen without this attitude that one is joining in good will and good wish with all creatures. Whether or not we consciously have such a thought, this is in the very nature of our sitting practice. Just to sit in the present moment with this kind of clarity is to join with all beings in the world. And we know that clarifying our life and living our life in the spirit of zazen

[42:14]

is really the best thing that we can do for the benefit of all beings everywhere. This is a truly marvelous world that we live in. And there are so many things to do for the benefit of beings. And I'm sure in our lifetime we will do many, many things to benefit beings. But for today there's only one thing to do, and that is zazen. So forget about everything else and just sit today.

[43:17]

Put everything in your life without leaving a single thing out into each moment of your practice today and make your zazen as intense as it possibly can be all day long. So I wish you good luck with your practice today. I know we're already into it here and off to a marvelous start. Myself and the other leaders and senior members of the Green Gulch resident community are here joining you and really hoping the best for you. And if you have any questions or problems that arise during the day, don't hesitate to ask any of us for help. That's what we want to do, is help you to sit

[44:20]

well, most beautifully. That's all. I won't waste any more of your time. Please continue. May our intention...

[44:43]

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