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Illuminating Silence #4 | Otter.ai

Illuminating Silence #4

John Pulleyn42min

John Pulleyn

00:03

Hua. Today is day four of this November, 2025, seven day sesshin. We'll continue with the book illuminating silence, insights on the path of Chinese Zen by Master Sheng yen and Dr John H crook,

John Pulleyn

00:35

we're going to pick up with a short early morning talk from Sheng yen, and he says, I have two themes for the day. Every thought a present moment, every moment a rebirth.

John Pulleyn

01:01

As time passes, you witness the passage of thoughts as thought succeeds. Thought, you experience the passage of time. In your practice, it is important to make every thought the present moment. If you make yourself one with the moment you stop the thought, there is simply experience without time, because without thought, time becomes a continuous Present. Many of you have experienced this. Lots of words for it flow,

John Pulleyn

01:50

really letting go, moving along unencumbered. You.

John Pulleyn

02:08

Says you have to discover for yourself what being one with the moment actually is.

John Pulleyn

02:31

The kanze Yun chan say, this moment arises from mind. This moment itself is mind. When we're not carrying the past into the present that everything rises up fresh, as Sheng Yen will make clear. Further on, when you make every thought a present moment, there is no continuity of time, no carryover from moment to moment. Everything is continuously fresh, like the water of a spring endlessly bubbling up into the open air. In such practice, every moment is a rebirth. Here we have no thought succeeding thought rather, there is endless recreation, an endless continuity without discrete moments. As one Ancient Master has said, One thought for 1000 years, yen. In those 1000 years, there are no thoughts. There is simply a continuous, unbroken newness. This is why it is so important for a beginner to cultivate going beyond thought today. Therefore, focus directly upon the present moment. There is no need to think about it. Just enter the present moment like a diver who has left the springboard, plunge into it without judgment or consideration. When the diver dives, he lets go. There is only the long fall into the water, which takes no time. Each time you sit down on your cushion, dive into the present moment, becoming thoughtlessly, one with it, and you will find that every moment is indeed a rebirth.

John Pulleyn

04:36

It's not so hard to do just to wake up into the present, What's hard is to sustain it. Inevitably thoughts come up, and all of a sudden we've become tangled up in our usual drama, but this moment is constantly being presented to us again and again. It, no matter how much we ignore it, if we turn to it, there it is, right there. So turn to it. If you're struggling in your practice, come back to this moment you wonder why you're struggling. Take a look. What are you holding on to? What are you picturing? What are you trying to get? What are you trying to live down? What kind of drama is cycling through your mind, thoughts of good and bad and progress and lack of progress, success and failure. You

John Pulleyn

06:06

in the next section is breakfast table remarks. And he says, In the USA, there is a particular question which my Western students find especially important, and which I would like to put to you. Here in the Eastern tradition, there is a major emphasis on no self. It is no self that has to be discovered. Yet in the perspective of Western psychology, the most important thing is to develop one's personal self to a maximum degree, emphasizing one's individuality, uniqueness and admirable qualities one cannot get on in the world. It seems, without developing this assertive self, there seems to be a contradiction between East and West here. How can this be resolved? And then he says, Actually, both the East and the West are talking about the same thing, but they're emphasizing different levels. When we're young, we have to develop our sense of personal identity in order to take on the world. If we did not know that John, Mary, Esmerelda or Harry was the name for this thing we call i, this no thing we call I, it would not be possible to relate conventionally with others, to pass examinations or to get a job. And since personal welfare depends on income and we need a livelihood, we have to function within that livelihood as individual persons, which means we need to know how to manage ourselves in our relations with others, the Western psychologist is making a realistic point in stressing the importance of becoming an individual. And in fact, the more integrated someone is, the more solid they are. Often the better they do. In Zen practice. We have to have a solid, conventional basis. Roshi Kapleau used to say that neurotics couldn't practice Zen Well, I don't think that's true. Otherwise, what are we doing here? But, but it does help to be have it together in the conventional ways not to be poo pooed. It is kind of bittersweet when you see it happening with a child. Just the other day, pulled my camera out and I was taking pictures of a couple of my grandchildren, Sophia and koanna. And Sophia is about two years older. And looking at the pictures, I could see Sophia knowing that she was having her picture taken, sort of bit of self consciousness there, composing her face, and koan is just out there, crazy. It's wonderful when kids are young and you they have that lack of self consciousness, that freedom, but they need to Grow up. We all do. It's

John Pulleyn

09:38

kind of bittersweet. You.

John Pulleyn

09:46

My oldest grandchild, Alex, when she was little, was at the table in Brooklyn. We were visiting them when they lived there, and all of a sudden, she pointed. And said, Mommy. And then she pointed and said, Daddy. And then she pointed to herself and said, Izzy. Just her name at the time. I just thought, Oh, shit.

John Pulleyn

10:22

You and Sheng yen says, in fact, without having a grasp of your personal identity, of who you are in the usual everyday sense, it would not be possible to train in Buddhism, the practice of Dharma starts with an individuality that has the will to train and practice the methods. That's why it is so important to be well integrated, because this is a difficult practice swimming upstream, going against the tendencies of the mind. So we say in workshops, it's like you've been floating along when you first come to practice in an inner tube on a stream, and you decide, okay, I'm going to stand on the bed of the stream and see what's here. And when you do, you realize the incredible force of that stream, which is, of course, stream of our consciousness, our habit energies. You

John Pulleyn

11:24

he says, to go beyond self, there must first be a firm sense of self, someone who is all over the place, who changes mood or intentions with every shift in circumstances, who has not been able to distinguish him or him or herself from others who are potent influences is not equipped for the practice of chan need to have a little bit together to get started. Yet wisdom comes from going beyond the elementary constructions of identity, from investigating who this is that walks, talks, argues in quarrels. When we go beyond we develop a larger sense of self, still talking about self here and not no self. A major step in this progression is the discovery of the undivided mind, one in which the splits produced by discrimination are healed. This is what I meant the other day when I spoke of the internal and external being united, or the body and mind becoming one.

John Pulleyn

12:38

This is the undivided mind, no small thing, he says, yet the unified mind remains of the same structure as the divided one. It is not yet gone beyond. It is not the no self. So this is a continuum. This is the nature of practice. Says, What then is no self? Look at the words. It's a state of being in which the self is absent. There is no self center, no habit of self reference. Everything else in experience is the same as before, but the quality of being has become radically different. Actually, even before people really do experience no self, there's a softening of self that happens with sincere practice. It begins happening right from the very beginning. You just stop taking yourself quite so seriously. Sense of self relaxes its grip a little bit. It's not yet been the complete dropping away, which, parenthetically, is usually only for a moment or two haven't yet seen, had some taste of who we really are, but we were better able to go along with the flow of life. Take disappointment, take success, just not be so bothered by so many things, not to care what other people think so much, really, how much pain is caused by our concern with the opinions of others. It's another bittersweet memory of my grandchildren point when Alex was so excited about getting lots of likes on Facebook. So my god, I.

John Pulleyn

15:03

He says it is usually the case that the appearance of no mind depends on the prior integration of the mind, that is the unification. As long as self and its object are separate the one regarding the other, there is duality. The split mind of discrimination cannot transcend its own habits. You cannot experience release into no mind from a divided mind. You can only do it from a unified one. And where there is no self, we may say there is no mind. For in this perspective, the ordinary mind is the activity of self in

John Pulleyn

15:50

where there is no self, completely different quality of mind. It's mind stripped to its essentials and

John Pulleyn

16:05

the practice therefore focuses on methods that unify the mind. We discover ourselves as whole beings through practice gradually, as we master the mental processes and bring about calming and integration so we master ourselves, we gain control over the monkey mind. I would say here, to some degree, this wholeness is always a novel experience. Its discovery is a source of freedom, relaxation and clarity. It is the completion of the self as self, to reach this condition is already a major step. Most of us remain scattered in mind and body, discriminating and arguing within ourselves and with others, and we get a nice dose of this as sesshin gets underway,

John Pulleyn

17:09

he says, Let us attempt to integrate mind and body. This is the first step. Allow yourself to become one, attain the state where body and mind are not separate in experience, and then the external and the internal will also be united. Dive into your method wholeheartedly, without doubt or reservations, and when you do, dive into your method, into your practice, this can happen when you leave your thoughts Behind, just doing, just being, just looking

John Pulleyn

18:01

here, right now. He goes on, for an untrained practitioner, it is impossible to be continuously in the present. It is therefore impossible for him to know that there is no time yet, so long as you are entangled by thoughts of past and future. The present is the best place in which to be. I think he's distinguishing here between complete and continuous absorption in this present moment and dipping in, as we can all begin to do from time to time, coming back, coming back, not coming back to an idea or a picture, an image that would carry of what practice is, but coming back to what's actually here, just opening our eyes and looking. It's the goal that gets in the way,

John Pulleyn

19:13

that feeling that I have to accomplish something. Oh my god, it's day four. When am I going to get going? Those thoughts are not your friend.

John Pulleyn

19:32

He says for us, who are beginners, there is time, there is past and future, and between past and future, there is this present moment that we constantly try to capture, and because of this attempt, every present moment is a new beginning, even though we're not completely successful, keep being renewed as we come back, notice and return. It since our minds are moving, we are constantly starting afresh. Yet when every present moment is a new beginning, there cannot be failure, displeasure or disappointment. For these imply a carrying over of time.

John Pulleyn

20:20

This means we stop chastising ourselves. We stop standing outside and evaluating it's going well. It's not going well. Instead, we turn to this moment you

John Pulleyn

20:45

see what's there. We don't know what's there until we turn I

John Pulleyn

21:05

it, we have to realize that we're really not in any kind of control. We're not really driving the ship by devoting ourselves to practice by living the right way. Things get better, but we don't make it happen. We make room for it to happen. People get really discouraged. Sometimes keep running into the same thoughts, same regrets, same frustration. The only way is to leave it behind, and the only way to do that is to keep coming back to this moment. Start again from zero. Don't bring something with you. Let it be fresh. Let it be new. Joh kobek said, It's of no use to look back and say I should have been different at any given moment, we are the way we are and we see what we're able to see. For that reason, guilt is always inappropriate.

John Pulleyn

22:36

Anthony de Mello says, I'm an ass. You're an ass. You

John Pulleyn

22:47

Sheng yen says there is nothing intrinsically good or bad about each new beginning. One thing is simply following another. When you're working in the kitchen and cut yourself by mishap, there's a new wound. Your appearance is new. When you buy fresh clothes, when you brush your teeth, even if the mouth is old, the teeth are newly brushed. Every day I find a new white hair. This is something new. A new gray head is appearing. If we always know that every present moment is also a new beginning, a new birth, then there's nothing to be happy or sad about. It's simply that the new collections of experience are appearing. When I was a young boy, China and Japan were at war. The whole country and my own village were very poor in the old days, it was the custom every New Year's Day to wear new clothes and shoes. But in that year, there could be neither neither new clothes nor new shoes. So I said to my mother this year, everything is old. My mother said, not so everything is new. The clothes are freshly washed. Trousers have new patches. Shoes are freshly repaired and cleaned. That made me happy, wherever you practice, whenever you practice, be in the present moment. Each one is a new birth. You

John Pulleyn

24:23

Hmm. Now we're going to go back to Wang Ming and the poem calming the mind. Sheng yen says we have this next stanza, literature and art are but busy gnats in the air. Technique and ability a solitary lamp in the sun, and he says, Whatever our skill or learning, we should not consider ourselves to be extraordinary or our abilities special. Yeah, puffing ourselves up is at least as. Add maybe worse than tearing ourselves down. Ching yen says there is a Chinese philosopher who said that whereas one's life is limited, knowledge is unlimited. How then can one be proud of attainments intelligent people who are learned and proficient in complex disciplines or who practice skills in the arts often think of their activities as the most important in the world. They take pride in their accomplishments and look down on those less skilled. They have the habit of comparing the grandeur of their abilities with the mediocrity of ordinary folk. Doubtless, such people are exceptionally talented, but they would have great problems in the practice of chan.

John Pulleyn

25:51

Really, we have to ask, what is true accomplishment. It's impressive many of the things that people do, but when you look at their lives, not so impressive. It's true in activities of the mind, research science, it's true also in sports, athletics, people tremendously accomplished in that way

John Pulleyn

26:32

with athletics. Of course, at a certain point you're too old, you can no longer be on top of your sport. And then there's often a kind of inglorious fall, a lot of sad stories of really tremendous athletes who don't know how to live. And

John Pulleyn

26:57

there are some who live very well, just like every everybody.

John Pulleyn

27:10

Sheng yen says the accomplished academic, polished in his field and skilled in his discipline, tends to see everything through the perspective of learning. A scientist may see everything from the point of view of an exciting paradigm. A philosopher usually praises a certain school. The artist practicing one style, admires it more than others. All such tendencies are actually attachments to self rather than to knowledge. To have to have developed a skill becomes a mark of what one is, and we defend it by superior attitudes with pride. Such techniques and abilities are like lamps standing in the light of the sun. Being constrained by pride prevents one from becoming one with the sunlight extending one's mind to infinity. There is a fabulous bird with wings that extend from one horizon to another. Think it's called the Garuda. In comparison, gnats are insufficient, insignificant. Once, when I was in Japan, I attended a Zen retreat in the evening, the master gave a talk. He spent two whole hours in scolding me all because I had a doctorate in literature. What is the use of all this reading and scholarship? He said, it only it's only an obstruction to practice such study only leads to arrogance, a belly full of straw. Afterwards, I thought about it, and went to see the master. I said, How come you spent so much time scolding me? He replied, If my words had not got to you, you would not have come to see me, I had to acknowledge that this was indeed the case too much learning may indeed be an obstruction at the beginning of this retreat, John, that's John crook. Remarked to me that most of the participants were well educated and intelligent, and that this in itself, could constitute a problem, is that so

John Pulleyn

29:34

going on with the poem, those able and talented ones are really stupid fellows, discarding the pure and the simple, they drown in too much beauty. And Sheng yen says those who consider themselves able and intelligent are actually foolish. You possess the seeds of wisdom if you think of yourself as a fool, you.

John Pulleyn

30:04

It, yeah, when you take a good look, it's not hard to think of oneself as a fool, but it is. It is the beginning of wisdom and being willing to look at that, being willing to take it in, that's the problem so many people struggle with is just the pain of seeing their flawed nature, the pain of having other people see it. I remember when I was in recovery, first in recovery from drinking and working with a sponsor in AA, I did something which many people do, making a list of the harms I'd done to other people and my resentments, especially looking at my resentments of other people. And I was easy to make a list. My dad was on that. Of course, Roshi Kapleau, there were. There were a lot of people on that list, and when I looked at it, I realized every one of those people that I resented had seen me not at my best had seen me in a bad light. That's where the resentment came from.

John Pulleyn

31:30

You've seen I'm not all that I want to think that I am. I hate you. You you.

John Pulleyn

31:49

Again, you possess the seeds of wisdom, if you think of yourself as a fool, a practitioner, a practitioner who experiences problems is doing well, right? One who thinks he has no problems really has difficulties. But for those of us who have barely started to practice, it is important to recognize our problems, otherwise we're likely to have a troublesome time. Often, I find myself counseling practitioners who have lots of problems with vexations of body and mind, I tell them that if you recognize your obstructions, you are certainly practicing well and with sincerity, find out what you can do about your vexations. If you're stuck, then come and see me. Eventually the difficulty will be solved. If the vexation is the belief that you have no problems, then that is sometimes a very difficult case. It's difficult for such a person to find the right motivation, and of course, it's difficult for a teacher to reach such a person. It's difficult for anyone to help that person. Wang Ming tells us that we can, if we can let go of our attainments and return to a pure and simple state, then we can make progress. If not, there's Trouble in Store. Practitioners of chan should learn all kinds of skills and attain excellence in many disciplines. These are things that are the light of the mind and show us the breadth of our mental scope. They may also be the means by which we can help others, yet never mistake them for the unlimited wisdom in these skills and attainments, there is nothing reliable. If you're attached to them, then your intelligence has made you stupid.

John Pulleyn

34:00

Next stanza reads, consciousness is an untamed horse. The mind is an unruly monkey. If the Spirit is overactive, the body will sicken and die. And Sheng yen says, If you recognize the unruly monkey, then perhaps you can set about finding out what sort of wandering thoughts possess you. If you examine them, you will find that, rather than being of unending variety and interest, they are, in fact, few limited in scope, repetitious and boring. I've always said somebody could give us a transcript of our thoughts for 24 hours. It would make tedious reading. Maybe you don't know how many wandering thoughts you have or what their nature is. They're like the sheep around here. Of course, being good practitioners in the middle of a retreat, you have not seen them. That is not seen the sheep, but you probably saw them before this retreat started. I. To find out how many sheep you have, how many black ones, and how many white you need to be like the Welsh Shepherd, who rounds up his sheep with skilled dogs and corrals them in a pen. Then, when they're all collected, he can count and examine them, give them names, even whether you are like an untamed horse, an unruly monkey or a bleeding sheep, the same principle applies. Be like the shepherd who rounds them all up, then you can see what the problem is. It's good to know what our tendencies are. You

John Pulleyn

35:43

It's a saying that Buddhists are not afraid of consequences. They're afraid of causes. What causes our problems,

John Pulleyn

35:58

our tendencies, are natural. They're the natural, inevitable outcome of how our life has unfolded. They're what we need to work with right now. It's like this. It's a big difference between seeing your weak spots and bemoaning them and beating yourself up. It it is important to see them. It's not like you shut your mind to it, saying in AA, we will not regret the past, nor wish to shut the door on it.

John Pulleyn

36:48

So again, be like the shepherd who rounds them all up. Then you can see what the problem is. The problem is how to tame the monkeys. The first method of practice is to pen them up. You can do this by holding them in one place. You can catch the thoughts as they come up and prevent them from wandering on device for doing this is the method of counting the breath. There are many variations of this method, depending on the unruliness of the monkeys. If the mind is quite concentrated, then all you need to do is be aware of the breathing. You don't need to count at all with a less concentrated mind, counting can be useful, since watching the breath is proving insufficient to prevent wandering thoughts. Doesn't mean that if you have wandering thoughts, you should immediately return to counting the breath. But if they won't subside, won't lessen, then you might think about doing that for a while. Anyway, I've heard of teachers, Zen teachers, Japanese Zen teachers, who, if their mind was roiled, would go back to counting the breath. It's an excellent practice.

John Pulleyn

38:08

Sheng yen says counting is like tying a monkey to a tree after you've caught him. The method of the koan is a similar principle. It enables us to reach a point where we do not even have to concentrate. It's a pretty advanced state to begin with. Using the koan is just like mechanically counting the breath. One repeats the koan over and over like a mantra. As the mind becomes more focused, you can use the koan in a more precise way in Chinese, this is called San, spelled T, apostrophe, s, a, n, San. It means investigation, looking into the mind to perceive its nature. When the mind is focused, you get a certain flavor from using the koan and derive power from it. It's like eating ice cream on a summer day. It gets more and more attractive, and as you immerse yourself more and more into it, wandering thoughts lessen. They may even disappear completely. However, this does not mean you are enlightened. Simply means that thinking in a random way has come to an end. The koan ties the monkey to the tree. You go deeper and deeper into it until you reach the point of enlightenment. What is that? No explanation will help you. You must experience that insight yourself. You

John Pulleyn

39:46

although the koan method resembles counting the breath at the beginning, it will take you all the way. This is unlikely through counting the breath alone, even so through counting the breath, one can enter Samadhi, which is a valuable aspect. Of training. Wang Ming says that if the Spirit is overactive, the body will sicken and die. He means that if you struggle too hard with too much discursive thinking, you'll get very exhausted. Wild monkeys in a cage rush about destructively. You must consider the methods of training to catch the feather you need to practice with a peaceful frame of mind, a gentle approach you

John Pulleyn

40:45

Yeah, we need to get out of the way,

John Pulleyn

40:55

Entering again and again into this moment, letting this moment be new, be fresh, letting the mind Fall still, and looking San, investigating, investigating without thought and silently looking, letting the process unfold, not jerking the fan trying to grab something, not tensing up When thoughts come into the mind, flowing on relaxed, patient and thorough. This is our job here in sesshin, and our time is up, we'll stop and recite the four vows you.

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