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New podcasts every Tues, Thurs and Sat. Here you can find talks from various teachers involved with the Zen Community of Oregon. We share talks from our retreats, as well as our different weekly offerings between Great Vow Zen Monastery and Heart of Wisdom Zen Temple.
Zen Community of Oregon's purpose is to express and make accessible the wisdom and compassion of the Buddha’s teachings, as transmitted through an authentic, historical lineage. To support and maintain Zen Buddhist practice in order to realize and actualize our Buddha nature in everyday life.
For more information, please visit zendust.org.
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.
Speaker 2:I take refuge in the Buddha, in the Dharma, in the Sangha, the transcendental values of oneness, discrimination, and connection. People online, I'm sorry. My computer apparently is dead, so I can't turn turn it on. But I can see people from a distance. We're going through the Mangala Sutta, one that we chanted earlier this evening, and, the highest blessings.
Speaker 2:So anything on anyone's mind before I begin? Anything worth talking about? Is that machine not working? I'll try another one. Well, see another one.
Speaker 2:So it's spring. I hope you're all really enjoying spring. I hope you're enjoying the wonderful wonderful weather. You know, part of the the pleasure of this moment is part of practice. It still means that tyrants are still being tyrants and it still means the first noble truth is still the first noble truth, and we happen to have a blessed moment at this time.
Speaker 2:I'll turn this on. Yes.
Speaker 1:So
Speaker 2:I'm very happy that everybody is coming and practicing. The fact that we feeling good and we have a nice a nice time is not a sign, oh yes, I don't need to investigate. I don't need to to keep practicing. It's just the the way things are. We have good times, we have bad times.
Speaker 2:They go up and they go down. And the continuity of inquiry, the continuity of what is is true has sometimes more impetus when we're suffering and unhappy. But really the same questions are there whether it's a good time or a bad time. And the questions are really about what is the nature of life? What is the the root?
Speaker 2:What is the the root that is stable in the midst of the good times and the bad times? And one of the things that this Sutta is about, the Mangala Sutta, the highest blessings, is about blessings. And all of us know that even if we have blessings, there are easy times and hard times with the best of blessings. And so we find the the the common denominator of stability, clarity, open heartedness, regardless of whether things are going well or not going well in the world. Then we have the ability to respond instead of react.
Speaker 2:And so I think that learning to respond instead of react is one of the themes that we were talking about with people this evening. Reaction is all those old habitual patterns that we learned when we were children about how to defend how to protect and defend ourselves and how to, you know, put up the walls, all those old habitual reactions, unless we have done some really mature work and and begin to see them, they just happen before we know it. You know? But when we're able to respond, responding means we have a calm, clear mind and we can meet each circumstance. Without anger, we can meet it effectively.
Speaker 2:Without fear, we can meet it with confidence. So to meet any circumstance with confidence is, I feel, an essential part of practice. So I'm so happy people here are are endeavoring to really find that route, whether it's beautiful out there or whether it's stormy out there. You know, good start. Good place.
Speaker 2:I think this Sutta Sutta Sutta is Pali, Sutra is Sanskrit. And I think that we are down to accomplishing learning and craftsman skills with disciplined, highly trained, and speech that is true and pleasant to hear. These are the highest blessings. It's on page 90 if you're interested in it. That's true.
Speaker 2:Each of us is so different. We are so unique. You look around the room, you do not we do not mistake one person for another. Each person, even those of us who are wearing kind of somber black, we wear it differently. It looks differently, it different cuts, it's different shapes.
Speaker 2:Everybody is different. This particular line is about about really that difference is so important to the world. That difference that we are so unique is vital to the functioning of the world. It's vital to the functioning of our lives. So we talk about being a craftsman, a craftsperson, a craftswoman.
Speaker 2:We talk about being a craft It means, do we have skill in this life, in this unique constellation that is us? Nobody else can cultivate that skill, but we can cultivate the skill. Now it may be that we have that the way this particular karmic constellation, this particular karmic bundle has a skill in music. You know, we don't all have that. Some people have a skill in philosophy.
Speaker 2:Some people have a skill in painting. Some people have a skill in carpentry and construction. Some people have a skill in psychology. There's lots of different kinds of skills. They're not separate.
Speaker 2:They're not something that's tagged on from who we are. Unless, you know, you grew up in a family and everybody said, you know, you've got to become a doctor even though you hate blood, and you sort of try to live out that role. When we know ourselves, when we begin to recognize, oh, this is my nature. This is the way my mind works. This is the way my my fingers work.
Speaker 2:These are the things that really attract me. These are the things that that I love and engage with. And we cultivate that. We refine that. We grow in that.
Speaker 2:We take the talents that we have and we all have many many many talents and we put them to to put them to use. The craftsman skills are the the skill of our life and knowing who we are, what we can do. There are some people who don't know which end of a wrench you use. You know? And there are some people who don't know which end of a paintbrush you use.
Speaker 2:And there are some people like me who wouldn't recognize middle c if you hit me with it. You know? We all have particular unique capabilities. So that is really to be honored. It's really to be honored.
Speaker 2:And we honor it first off by trying to to see through the reactive habitual mind that we all grew up with, and to look and think, okay, what can I put myself into? What can I vow? Where can I What offering can I make? What kind of of place in the world will this constellation of qualities. We find ourselves in very different places.
Speaker 2:You know, we're all I don't know much about many people, but we all work at different places. We have different families. We have different situations. The craftsman skill is can we skillfully with intention, with clarity meet our life? Meet our life and grow and grow in that?
Speaker 2:Can we grow in music? I keep thinking music because Shajaku is over here. We all have our version. So how do we do that? We again find our center, become present, open our heart, and then see can I wholeheartedly, unreservedly learn and develop whatever I feel is appropriate for my life?
Speaker 2:And that is a blessing. That is a blessing. And of course, you know, we we tend as When we're at a certain age, we think of productivity and what am I going to do with my life, what kind of what kind of job am I going to have, what kind of activity. When you get to be an old an old person, the still thing the same thing is still relevant. You can still be a crafts person of of aging, of dealing with all the challenges and the sestitudes that come up.
Speaker 2:You can still practice integrity. To have integrity and refine that sense of integrity and then to cultivate a skill that can be offered is a wonderful blessing. You know, we often talk about the function of spiritual practice is generosity. Loving kindness, generosity, the four immeasurables. But in order to be generous, it's nice to have things you can be generous with.
Speaker 2:So to have generosity with our wisdom, have generosity with We have somebody at the monastery right now who comes in who is a mega construction guy. You know, he he can he can We we had a big problem a few weeks ago as you heard. We we pulled a big excavator, a giant excavator, was able to use it and able to, you know, kind of work with all of our plumbing. We're able to change these big pipes out. Such a gift.
Speaker 2:Oh, such a gift. Such a gift. And we have people who know how to do the the ritual parts of our our community. In order to have a spiritual practice, not just an ordinary practice, you have to have you have to have people who understand the ritual and the transcendental parts of the container. If people don't understand the ritual transcendental parts of the container, it just becomes another let's let's do good society.
Speaker 2:So whatever our particular life is, wherever we found ourselves, we have one guy at the monastery right now who comes on Sundays, who's a dishwasher and a janitor. And he says, I wanna do my best to do the best job I can. I wanna have integrity with this particular job. What a what a gift. What a blessing to have that state of mind.
Speaker 2:So all of us are interested in spiritual practice, are interested in meditation, are interested in the nature and deeper nature of mind. So if you're truly interested in that, then we we read about it, we think about it, We begin to say, okay, how can I apply it here? How can I apply it there? We'd be gradually We refine our spiritual practice so that it's not just an internal state where we find a certain calmness, but we can actually express it. How do we express it?
Speaker 2:We express it in our life. We express it where we work. We express it with the people we meet. We express it. One of the things Dogen Roshi says, which I can't remember what something something else.
Speaker 2:One thing is is the case that if we have a deep insight into the nature of ourselves or mind, and by deep we all have insights, but unless it's expressed and tested, it doesn't doesn't carry any weight. We can see something. We can have a little experience of the oneness of things. We can have an experience of the nature of loving kindness. But until it gets challenged, until we have to express it, until we have to give it life, it doesn't really settle.
Speaker 2:So it's that expressing and giving life is the craftsperson skills that is essential. You know, if we just if our practice, our spiritual practice is just sitting on a cushion once a week, good luck. You know? But when we begin to say, oh, I have to cultivate this state of mind and I will then express it, I will offer it, I will share it, I will encourage other people to see their own potential, Then it becomes live. Then we have real confidence.
Speaker 2:Without without offering something, we don't really own it. The very fact we can offer something, we can offer love, we can offer kindness, we can offer Then we have really lived with it. Compassion learning craftsman skills. To become a craftsperson of anything, we have to learn. And I know is the best way to stop learning.
Speaker 2:You know, I'm often at the monastery, we'll be teaching teaching something and people say, yeah, I know that. I know that. Soon as we say I know, we've we've closed the door. To learn, we have to not know. Not knowing is there's a mystery here.
Speaker 2:Not knowing is I'm accomplished at what I do and yet there's so much more to know. Einstein used to say that the more the you understand, the less you less you know. That kind of of spacious not knowing is at the root, I think, of becoming a craftsperson. And if we look at what we really actually know, it's so such a piddling little thing. There's trillion cells in our body and we don't have a clue what the mitochondria are doing or the You know, we might have the 21 functions of the liver.
Speaker 2:We might have that list, but what's the liver really do? Or the spleen? Or We don't know. Not knowing is most intimate. Because not knowing means we're open to learning.
Speaker 2:We're open to refining. We're open to growing. We're open to to, to having greater sense of integrity. Disciplined, highly trained, And of course, anybody who has been done anything, you you go to graduate school, you you become a clerk at a counter. It takes a year.
Speaker 2:I think it takes a year. Even if you're trained, it takes a year for you to learn the job. At the monastery, we'll have people who are bookkeepers or who are the cooks and who are in charge of grounds and, you know, all the different all of our realms. For somebody to step into a job and really pick it up takes a year. A year of learning.
Speaker 2:A year of investigating. A year of trial and error. A year of getting feedback. A year of learning. And then after that year, then you begin to actually know something.
Speaker 2:In meditation, often they would say in in the monasteries in Japan, it takes two or three years for people to really find their seat. Really find their their their center of gravity to really be settled in the practice. I think when we're practicing not full time like we do in a residential center, practicing it takes a little longer. It takes longer to actually just keep embodying and keep embodying and keep embodying until some point you say, oh yeah, okay, I can't be shaken. Oh, there is a core here of of I can trust.
Speaker 2:When we can trust our own core of loving kindness, we can trust our own core of stability, we can go all kinds of places with courage. If we can't trust ourselves, then we can be shaken all kinds of ways. And so that trust is a matter of both insight, practice, disciplined, highly trained, testing, testing, testing, and speech that is true and pleasant to hear. Now I'm not quite sure how they put craftsmen together with speech, although a lot of a lot of us do have our skill in life isn't being able to talk. It's not mine.
Speaker 2:Although I can do these these short talks gracefully sometimes, but some people are just so so refined in language and can use it so so well. It doesn't come easy. It doesn't come easy. Nothing comes easy. The first noble truth of dharma is everything is difficult.
Speaker 2:You know? That's the first noble truth. Everything is difficult. And if we meet that difficulty, it becomes easy. And then there's a next level which becomes a challenge.
Speaker 2:Learning curve is always a learning curve. These are the highest blessings. Speech that is true and pleasant to hear. Now there's something, when we are fixated in our beliefs, when we have when the algorithms have have tuned in to our fundamental beliefs, then what is pleasant to hear is what matches our beliefs. I believe the world is a dystopic place and therefore I'm going to be getting all this this feed about the dystopic, particular dystopic perspective I have.
Speaker 2:That is not what he's talking about here. We like to hear we like to hear things that are affirming, that are in accord with our beliefs. If we're practicing, our beliefs get seen through. We begin to to They begin to have holes in them. They begin to realize, oh, what I thought was so true actually is only partially true.
Speaker 2:What I thought was so true is actually not always this way or all that way. What I thought was so true actually is one perspective of many different perspectives. And when we have softened our our belief system We always have beliefs. We've softened it and enlarged our belief system to realize, oh, everything has a place. Everything in the universe has a place.
Speaker 2:Then what what he's this speech that is true and pleasant to hear are things that are not polarizing. Not I am right against the world, which is wrong. I am right against you, which is wrong. But rather it's about speech that is that brings us together. It's about speech that touches the the humanity at the root of all things.
Speaker 2:It's about speech that that does not kill but cherishes all life. So pleasant to hear speech, you know, the algorithm is for or the media has has got that down. Feed people what they want to hear. Feed people what they want to hear. That's not what this is talking about.
Speaker 2:This is about feed people things that really are inclusive about the nature of mind, about that which is bright, which is present. The nature of the world is inherently creative. Inherently creative. So to to to hear things that affirm that is
Speaker 1: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 zendesk.org. Your support supports us.
Speaker 2:Part of the highest blessings you're talking about here.