NOTES FROM LOST COIN CLASS 8-1-2011 Doen wants to use a model from 4th way- nice model. Similar one in Zen, but this one is nice. Everything we talk about today will be about how to get things out of your way. Why?? 1. See your true nature. 2. Do stuff- to "manifest" There's who you are and what you do. Human Being is Horse and Carriage: Carriage is your body. It's good to keep in shape and take care of it. One of the things you train in martial arts is to not make big deal of pain- suffering is worrying about pain. Your body, though, will suffer some. If vain, suffering greater :-) It's a fragile entity. The horses are your emotions. Horses are a good analogy- they run off. Horses are prey not predators. They just run off and drag us in all directions. We don't believe it but they hijack us all of the time. Doen has tried to teach people to trade the stock market. He's had extremely smart people who just cannot do it because of their emotions. this happens in our relationships, in our work, when we are trying to do stuff. The driver is the mind. The mind thinks thoughts and tells the horses and carriage how to do and where to go. All in all- the mind is a better master than carriage and horses but THE MIND IS NOT THE MASTER. The master has left town. We have broken-down carriage and out of control horses and a drunk driver and the mind thinks everything is okay. If the mind sees that the master is not it and realizes that it thinks thoughts it doesn't even know it has, doesn't want, it's driven by emotions and thoughts. The self-aware mind looks around and realizes there is something beyond Mind. Consciousness is the master. Get mind and emotions out of the way so the master can come home. Keeps the body in shape so that it can manifest. Master is different. Handles things differently. Has different relationship with other people . Has different perspective. Sees emotional thought for what it is. Consciousness is empty and free. This is emptiness. This is consciousness. Time, space, consciousness are one. Our practice is to see this emptiness. 1 to 3 years to begin to touch this at all. Another 7 years to be able to see it. 30 years practice. That kind of practice comes from the gut. No thoughts. The understanding is from the gut. Not mind. Not emotional. It's a deep being. In Tibetan Buddhism it's described as a magical nectar that cures. Our mind doesn't like this because it likes to be involved in everything and the mind is not in this. This is one thing. Mind is this one thing. 1 divided by 0. Infinite. Student Q: You do need the horses? You need the emotions? Doen: Yes, you need it all it's just that the horses aren't running the show. They will resist the master coming back in. They are valuable but without the consciousness, they use very crazy things. They do things mechanically without consciousness coming in. For example, married people all have arguments but you never wake up and say I will have a really big argument with my spouse today. You can then come to the conclusion, Mind says, "I will become conscious then!" nope. that's not it. That is the mind masquerading as consciousness. That is not it. Mind must agree but only that it GETS OUT OF THE WAY. Not figure it out. Not decide to do this or that. Just get out of the mix. Force is out of harmony with the Way. The tao. In the Way, you lose something everyday. Not gain. Lose your mind. Lose your emotional charge. Emotions will come up and say what about LOVE- look at the last four times you were in a relationship and ask yourself, wasn't there something there I could look at and do better? Student Q: Does the master ever not come back? Doen: Yes, all the time. In Tibetan you'd be reborn over and over until you run into the master. At one point Don Juan says to Carlos Castenda, who is being dramatic and a victim etc,. Don Juan says, "you just believe that because the black magicians have a hold of you!" Who are the black magicians? Your fellow man. You are culturalized so early that you separate your master very very young and do so more as you grow older until you wake up, if you wake up. So let's say the master comes home to some degree and it's growing and you're becoming more conscious. And you see all these people who have no chance- they will never wake up! What comes up- compassion. Harder to have compassion for people you demonize. They are people they are suffering. We see them as powerful but they are horses (asses) that lost their way. Important part of the practice is to see other humans as suffering beings who cannot or will not wake up in this life. If you force compassion. If you're idealistic. If you're consciously doing it. THat's not compassion. Compassion comes from spontaneously arising of love for another person for no reason in your mind. Virtue is who compassion because of who you are! The more you realize who you are, the more naturally you'll manifest virtuously. The precepts describe how you would act if the master is at home. Student Q: Emptiness cures everything? Including negative things? Doen: Analogy. Husband abuses you. Got fired. Have insomnia. All is really really bad. This is the wave of life and all the other waves (people) are crashing into you. Then you start to practice sitting. Then one day you see that all of these waves are part of Ocean. One Ocean. They were always the Ocean and SO AM I. I am Ocean. Ocean is emptiness. Ocean is oneness. Student Q: Does emptiness dissolve joy and happiness? Doen: NO, opposite. Emptiness reduces suffering to mere pain. Just another thing in life without all of the turmoil mentally. As you practice longer, they are more even. They have more equanimity. They still get upset and have arguments with spouse, but generally more even. Koan is Part Two: From the Blue Cliff Record, Case There are koan collections after this one but they are not more advanced. There are no more advanced koans. It's like martial arts. Young martial artists are different than old ones. Same with koans. You may get through the collection but you have to live with them for a number of years. For years after you don't even know what they were for. Exercise of forgetting the self over and over. Doing the exercises of a ballerina for years doesn't make you a ballerina until they are mastered in a different level. Carryingn his ring staff when to Chao Ching. Ring staff is a staff an adept would have so it makes a sound when you move. This is an announcement of understanding- Dharma Combat. Chao Ching said Correct. Wrong. Same guy goes to Nansen. Same presentation. Nansen, incorrect. Correct WRONG Incorrect WRONG So now this monk says, wait a minute. The other guy said CORRECT? Nansen says, yeah that other teacher was correct. It's YOU who are wrong!!!! This breaks down. WHAT BREAKS DOWN? The monk is blown around by the words and approval and thoughts and emotions and THIS IS what turns to dust. This is not important or real. Monk is a wave being blown around. The teachers are all talking about the ocean. Monk operating at the wave level. Read the poem. The waves, the ocean, the medicine. DON'T TAKE all of this and figure it out. Take this song and put it in your body. Develop thoughts or feelings about it- not consciousness any more. Student Q: Dropping judgment in sitting with Mu. Doen: Daido said. Two fish swimming in the water. First fish is always talking about this stuff called water. Second fish says what is the water you keep talking about?!!! So fish one grabs fish who, pushes him up and out of the water and show him the ocean. THAT IS WATER. Sitting will push you up and out and show you the water.