Something happens that was little and it triggers an intense reaction. It is spontaneously arising pure karma that started as a combination of thirty-eight hundred and fifty-two thousand things. Stories about it protect ourselves. Acting out means avoiding the situation. If you blame something you are ignoring everything else. Meditation uncovers the confusion. You are looking at the things you have been shutting down on your whole life.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqm3mT8emLo

Dokusan is a Japanese work that refers to the private interview between teacher and student, usually in the hojo (the abbot’s quarters where interviews are conducted). Here it is taking place in the zendo to teach about this practice form.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1fvhqUdTPfE

We have all kinds of forms. We have forms in the zendo and in the monastery, you have forms at home, you have the form of brushing your teeth…you probably do it the same way every time and you are probably not observing that form, you’re probably observing your daydream. We are caught by the forms that we’re not actually practicing. We are caught by the form of the mind when it’s trying to protect itself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1-5DJUWqnA

"Don’t look away" is a way of talking about and working with the poison of ignorance, one of the three poisons that cause suffering.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Py5AC_sbww8

Something is receiving and what is being received tends to dissolve that which is receiving. Open your windows and take the doors off and let the ten thousand things come to you. No more walls of the mind.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3dBZYeswZ0

Look at the way you look around. It is seductive when we think whatever we see means something else. If you’re searching for something else that means you’re ignoring the very thing that you’re leaving. Firewood doesn’t become ash. Firewood is firewood, ash is ash.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxotskLR3HA&t=2s

If you do something to offend someone or let someone down, apologize once. Any apology after that, the apology flips. The second apology is more about you wanting to get off the hook. Don’t look for forgiveness, it is a twisted form of self-centeredness. Be responsible for what you’ve done.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5PqEBgQZf8

A student asks “Is observation a skill that grows in strength?”

Sokuzan responds “No. There’s no muscle there. The thing that grows in strength is getting to the cushion. As soon as you come to your cushion, you take your seat as an observer. This is called discipline: come in, sit down, hold still, observe. You are saying to the Universe “I’m ready to see this!””

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGb6W-1uCWM

With meditation practice, personality could become even more intense, or maybe not. It might slow down and be less articulated or less prominent. You don’t get rid of dependent origination just because you’re awakened or you’re moving in that direction.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJrboXyHf-Q

Prior to thoughts. Before anyone has a problem with anything, there is a space that is not a person or lack of a person. Don’t crank up thoughts to help you stitch together protection against the unknown. Dogen refers to this as dropping off body and mind.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1eDdX7RymG0