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Resting in Is-ness - Hogen, Roshi · Zen Community of Oregon Dharma Talks

• 0:00
  Jomon: Hello and welcome. This is the Zen Community of Oregon, making the teachings of the Buddhadharma accessible to support your practice. New episodes air every week.
• 0:24
  Hogen: Tei Show is a time of meditation, And the talk is hopefully pointing you, us, to direct experience. So this is a time for actually increased attention. This is an important day, filled with unknown possibilities. So right now you look at your own experience, you don't know what's going to happen next. The future cannot be known.
• 1:04
  There's probabilities perhaps, but your body right now is filled with unknown possibilities. This is from little excerpt from Three Pillars of Zen and it's an experience by a 47 year old hospital executive, a businessman, and this is back from 1953, so almost three quarters of a century ago. And this person became Zen teacher Kon Yamada. Here's a little snippet of his story. At midnight I abruptly awakened.
• 2:01
  At first my mind was foggy, but then suddenly a quotation flashed into my consciousness. The quotation is, I came to realize clearly that the mind is no other than mountains, rivers, and the great wide earth, and the sun, the moon, and the stars. I repeated it. I came to realize that mind is no other than mountains, rivers, and the great wide earth, the sun, the moon, and the stars. This is an experience.
• 2:35
  Right now, the world outside and you are not two things. Mind is no other than this body breathing and the light shining and the rain dripping and the hardness at the floor and the sound of the room. He continues, I thought I had come to enlightenment. I realized that Shakyamuni Buddha and the ancestors haven't deceived me. They haven't deceived me.
• 3:13
  We hear so many things about dharma. We have to verify for ourselves. We have to know for ourselves the truth that the dharma is speaking to. Until we know that ourselves there's always the possibility that we've been deceived, there's always the possibility that, Oh, yeah, maybe it's just a bunch of people writing books. We have to know for ourselves.
• 3:44
  He continues, A day or so later, After several hours have elapsed I still feel the aftermath of that earthquake. My entire body is shaking. I spend all of it laughing and weeping to myself. I'm writing to report my experience in the hopes that it will be of value to to your monks. Please remember me to that American, that was Philip Capolo, who was at a retreat, telling him that even I who am unworthy and lacking in spirit can grasp such a wonderful experience when the time matures.
• 4:17
  When the time matures. So, we are here doing sashin ripening. All our lives we are ripening. Each moment ripens into the next moment, ripens into the next moment. When our intention, when the vow of our heart, when our direction ripens, then things open up in our own unique way.
• 4:45
  He says, That American, Kepler, was asking whether it would be possible for him to attain enlightenment in one week of Sashin. Tell him this for me: Don't say days, weeks, years, or even lifetimes. Don't say Millions or billions of kalpas. Tell them the vow to attain enlightenment could take infinite, though it could take the infinite, boundless, incalculable future. It is the most important thing.
• 5:31
  When we are paying attention, right now, feeling the body breathing, being breathed, we're not doing the breathing, we're being breathed, we're feeling the body alive right now, and we're looking directly, we begin to see through the beliefs and the fixed ideas that we've been bound by. When we see through the fixed ideas and beliefs that we've been bound by, there is a different world of vow, of compassion, of respect, appreciation, of willingness to support others opens up. One sign that this is happening and many people have experienced it is an innate feeling of gratitude. When we're at the mercy of our habit mind we often feel trapped, afraid, alone. And as we do zazen, come into alignment, come into harmony with our essential being, as our awareness opens up, gratitude for this life and all that supports it is a natural outcome.
• 6:44
  And as we begin to feel and sit with gratitude, appreciation, not judgment, our experience opens up even more. It's interesting how it goes. With appreciation of the moment, with gratitude for the experience, then that is the foundation for opening up. Judgment, criticism, grasping won't do it. And when our experience opens up, when we are breathing right now, feeling your body being breathed, noticing that you don't have to make any effort to hear the sounds.
• 7:34
  You may have to make some effort to keep the mind from wandering off someplace else, but in terms of the direct experience there's no effort. You just have to pay attention. And when we are paying attention intimately with this life right here, we can actually see directly there is no other. It's all intimate. There is no other.
• 8:03
  The only evidence that there is another is our mind thinking. Other, other, other. Our direct experience is everything is intimate. Everything that we see and hear and feel is intimate, it's right there. As Yomata Roshi said, You know, I came to realize the mind is no other than mountains, rivers, the great wide earth, the sun, the moon, and the stars, and this assembly, and this building, and the troubles of the world, right here.
• 8:37
  Only place it can be experienced. When we have a direct experience of no other, we lose the fear of others, at least in some measure, and we're no longer afraid of our own experience. Many people come to Cishin and they're afraid of their own experience. Might have this pain, might have that pain, might feel this, might feel that, might feel darkness, might feel lost, might feel, might feel, might feel, might feel, feel Yes! Yes, you might!
• 9:15
  So what? So what? You have the courage to actually feel our lives, right here, right now. The courage to actually accept, Oh, that's what's happening right now, without the story. The stories, you know, the imaginations, the conclusions, all that, and it serves a purpose at some time, but it does not serve a purpose to recognize what is really fundamental, what is liberating.
• 9:52
  So as we practice, as even right now we're feeling the body being breathed, even right now as we're feeling the sounds in the room, even right now as we're feeling all that, right there is a versatility, a responsiveness to life. And when we're not bound by the future and past, then we're not bound by the ideas and the stories and the conclusions, and we're now responsive to what is real, to what is right in front of us. Our only experiences of now, but even now is a dream, it's already over. One of my favorite sages is a woman named Dai Hyung Sun Em, a famous Korean Zen teacher. She was born in 1927, she died in 2012, and she was practicing, she was probably 25 or so, when the Korean War was going on.
• 11:07
  So, a big civil war in Korea, and Russia and China were on one side, and The US and NATO were on the other side. From our perspective it's sort of a vague memory, but from the perspective of being in the middle of it, the whole country was in uproar, every single aspect of the country, and as you know, Korea is still at war in some way. So here's what Dhyun Hogen Roshanam says in her first chapter, Who am I? Above all else, you have to truly know yourself. Who and what am I?
• 11:55
  Are the most important questions there are. You may think, I'm me, what else could I be? But it's not that simple. How did you come into existence? If you say your parents gave birth to you, it implies that you are merely the biological combination of your parents, sperm and ovum.
• 12:12
  Is that all you are? No, there is that which is your foundation, your root, your true nature. Would you reject the root of your being just because you can't see it? Experience the root for yourself. To experience the root for yourself is the work of a human being.
• 12:39
  Everything in your life happened after you were born. Everything in your life and everything as far as you know happened after you were born, experientially. The world came into being. Your family came into being. Every single thing you encounter came into existence.
• 13:00
  The entire universe came into existence when you were born. The entire universe came into existence when we were born. We have lots of stories imagining about other Big Bangs and other kinds of things. Wonderful. I love science, But the direct experiences, world comes into being when we, our awareness, is present.
• 13:32
  What is it that hears and sees and sits and stands and speaks and responds to any situation at any time and place? You must clearly know your true nature, your true root and seed. You must truly know it. It is this true knowing through our direct experience, this true knowing through our own breath, this true knowing through awareness, our own awareness, the only awareness that there is. We can't even say that my awareness belongs to me, we have no idea.
• 14:26
  That awareness may be the exact same awareness, the content may be different of everybody. Awareness is awareness is awareness. The content may look different, but the fundamental awareness why do we think it belongs to us? This particular teacher, Dai Hogen Roshanam, practiced in the middle of the civil war, practiced in a really difficult time. And yet, during that very difficult time when her whole society and culture fell apart, was able to see something that was fundamental, that was life affirming, that brought clarity and equanimity and peace to her, and then through her to thousands of others.
• 15:25
  All lives have difficult times. All lives have difficult times. We, as you all know, in our condition right now, if we imagined that we were in a war zone, we were cold, wet, unhoused, ill, in danger, the desire that somebody in that situation would have would be exactly our situation. They would exactly wish, Oh, to be in a warm community, to have food, to have shelter, to have peace, to not It is exactly, this is exactly the aspiration of people who are in deep distress. They aspire to have the experience that we are having right now.
• 16:28
  We are in a heavenly realm. We have everything that people who are in difficult, troubled states would love. This is a blessing. This blessing is alive and dynamic. It's not something that's given.
• 16:48
  The blessing we have to is we have to rest in the is ness of this experience. Now when we are resting, looking, attentive to the is ness of our experience, we find that we're made of stuff. All kinds of stuff. All kinds of labels. The stuff on the surface has labels like chest, back, belly, head, but those things, those labels are made up of smaller labels.
• 17:34
  The chest has lungs and alveoli, the chest has a sternum, the chest has heart, the chest has the back has spinous processes and vertebrae and nerve endings. Everything is made up of something else. Everything is made up of something smaller, smaller stuff. Everything is made up of smaller and smaller stuff. So we're sitting right here with this awareness, our body being breathed, it's made up of stuff.
• 18:07
  Our awareness is particulate. Our awareness, if we're able to feel the whole body and the whole room, find that it's nothing but little tingling stuffness. If we feel our body, that body is made up of lungs and hearts and all the tissues and aches and pains and things of the body. Everything is made up of smaller things. That includes the visual, auditory, and kinesthetic fields.
• 18:36
  So, as we pay attention right now, what is the tiniest, temporarily shortest, temporally shortest thing we can experience? What is the smallest particle, smallest quela of percept? Focus the mind. As we do that, we can see, recognize, feel, that at the root of our direct experience we can touch the formless. All the quivering tingles that make up who we think we are, if we go inside those tingles, if we go inside that experience before labels, before we have bisected and trisected and dissected it into bits, before labels, we can feel the tingling aliveness of this body mind.
• 19:55
  It has no form. Form is after the fact. It has no story. Stories are after the fact, conclusions are after the fact. You can even ask, Is it alive or dead?
• 20:21
  Again, experience, right now, experience, touch into your experience without the label. Hearing, feeling. There are two truths that we can recognize. One truth is that, well, we're whole and complete, which is this container which contains my body and my head and my thoughts and my feelings and it's just the way it is. It's whole and complete.
• 20:53
  The story of inadequacy is for the past and future. It's a moment. It's whole and complete. But it's not neutral. When we touch the presence and we say everything is okay, it's not neutral Because simultaneously everything is emerging.
• 21:17
  Simultaneously life is coming into being. Simultaneously there is life. So everything is okay is not a static statement. It's not a statement of, Well, it's frozen like this, therefore it's okay. But rather it is okay because there is a dynamic life.
• 21:44
  Each breath, each breath you're feeling is a different breath, is a different time, comes out of the great mystery. Experience it. If we get too sidetracked on, Now, now, now, you know, Just this moment, just this moment, just this moment, it's like looking at a dead monitor. It's dead, it's there, it's just this moment, it's blank, it's a monitor, it's there. Yes, yes, yes, there.
• 22:20
  But when the monitor is turned on, it's exactly the same monitor, exactly, it hasn't moved an inch, hasn't changed, and yet there is dynamic life. It's full of life. Same thing is true with us. We learn to rest in the is ness of this body, but then as that is ness is dynamic, our life is dynamic, we each of us have karmic movement. So, on one hand, we have to work really hard just to see the fundamental truth that we are whole and complete, that this life in this moment is pristine, valuable, important.
• 23:21
  And in that moment we have our particular karma. Karma in this case means our particular shape, the way our particular mind works, the way that we process information. Each person's information operating system is, because we're human, it's basically the same, but each person has tweaks, has their own. So, this unique karma, this information operating system that we have, this experience that we have of our individual lives has movement to it, has movement, has a direction, has proclivities, has skills. When we are meeting this moment and watching the dynamic unfolding, it is always responsive.
• 24:13
  Always responsive, always alive. And when we begin to actually touch anatta, you know, the three signs, the four signs of a Buddhist teaching are anatta and dukkha, or sukkha, nirvana. Flow, everything is flow, you can't step outside of flow, you cannot find a person. We're a composite. We're made up.
• 24:46
  And at the root you can't find anything that it's made up of. And then, of course, if you have a human life that's got challenges, and liberation is possible. Those are the four foundations of a Buddhist teaching. When we encounter difficulty and we have some insight, some sense that we are not our personality is not the center of the universe. Our being maybe, but our particular personality and our particular circumstances is just stuff, then our mind is more inclusive and is responsive to the challenges, the aches and pains, the despair of the world.
• 25:46
  Just like if we have a cut, we treat that wound because it hurts and it needs to be attended to. But when our mind is not collapsed into this small minded thing, the story, the history, and we are instead beginning to see that we are made up of the same stuff that everything is made up of, it has formlessness, there is boundlessness to it, it is inclusive, then we are called, just like we would take care of a wound, we are called to respond to the joys and sorrows of the world without being thrown off our center. We're here doing zazen to find that center, to find that place that is stable, alive, dynamic, responsive, does not belong to us. And we find that, we rest in that, we begin to know that so that in our lives we can respond to the joys and sorrows of the world. Right now there's a war going on in The Middle East, as you know, and the concern is that it's growing.
• 27:14
  World War One began by one assassination in an obscure place, and then little by little the ripples of it includes the whole world. World War II began when Germany invaded Poland under false pretenses, and then ripples and ripples included the whole world. We have a war going on which has the potential. Hard times will come one way or another. So, part of our practice here is to find the stability, the confidence, the loving kindness, the firmness that even if there is a disaster, we still can practice.
• 28:02
  We still have a root. Even if suddenly oil is not possible and gasoline goes down and our power matrix collapses, we still, regardless of circumstances, still have the root of goodness, still have the root of aliveness, still have the pristine okayness of the universe right there, close to home. So we're practicing stabilize the mind, bring the mind into alignment with reality right now. Stabilize the mind, bring the mind into reality right now, see what is fundamentally true, see that we are not separate from the universe, see that we are inclusive, our mind is inclusive of all things, and then we function, we function according to our circumstances with compassion, with generosity. It is entirely possible for us to realize all the teachings of the great sages, at least the fundamental teachings of the great sages, and then we'll express them as they did in our unique way.
• 29:30
  So having that confidence, I have that confidence in everybody here. Jog and Noosha, have that confidence in everybody here that everybody, including us, has that capacity to know directly the pristine, inclusive, bright, luminous nature of reality and then from that foundation to be of service. To be of service. So please have confidence. Have confidence.
• 30:16
  Have confidence that what is being shown to you right now, not necessarily with these words, but with your direct experience, what is being shown to you right now is a pristine jewel. A pristine jewel, the jewel of the Dharma. May that jewel enliven and support you and countless beings.
• 30:55
  Jomon: Thank you for listening to the Zen Community of Oregon podcast and thank you for your practice. New episodes air every week. Please consider making a donation at zendest.org. Your support supports us.