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The subject is the Dharma, the deepest matters, our own true face. And one way to look at that is through the Blue Cliff Record. It is a good way to look at that—all these occasions for revealing who you are.

It’s kind of remarkable that the Picking & Choosing koan appears four times in the Blue Cliff Record, which contains only one hundred cases. So, what to do with it? When everybody tries to make sense of it, things happen: They get captured and taken off by pirates or drug lords. You’ve got to be careful in Zen.

A guided meditation from John Tarrant: You’re walking along, and you’re kind of in the middle of your life—which you always are, no matter how old you are, you are in the middle of it—and you’re sort of just thinking and noticing, and then you have this idea: Why don’t I treat my whole life as a pilgrimage? That’s it. That’s what I’ll do.

The Daoist idea that came into Chan and Zen is that we harmonize with things. We don’t try and subdue them, although that’s a very strong human impulse. The great koan masters pointed out that the heart has a place of ease, and that there’s an inner freedom and a path we can walk no matter what we’ve suffered or are afraid of or are afraid might happen.

The tip of each hair on the golden-haired lion is itself a whole world, an image of all the galaxies, all piled together. This lion is warm-hearted, delighted with everything, having a generally good time no matter what kind of time we’re having.

Deep in Summer Sesshin, we are in the middle of the Blue Cliff Record. We, ourselves, are under the Blue Cliff, with Yunmen and Yunmen’s friends. We are all those people. The Blue Cliff is still being written, and we’re helping out with that project.

The immense vulnerability of being alive comes to the mother dropping off her children in Texas and everyone else, including you and me, particularly when we do something tender. In the Zen path our job is to be at peace, to offer refuge and sanctuary. That peace is infectious, other people will feel it and it will sustain them and those they meet.

When I regard the true nature of all things and all living creatures, I find them to be the sacred forms of the Tathagatha’s never-failing essence. Each particle of matter, each moment, is no other than the Tathagatha’s inexpressible radiance.

Sacha Kawaichi’s artworks on canvas and iPad.

Here is a curation of four dharma talks on a single page, for easy finding and listening, from Hakuin’s Praise Song for Meditation 4-Part Special Sunday Series with PZI Teachers Allison, Tess, Michelle, & Jesse. As recorded in the PZI Digital Temple on January 9, 16, 23, & 30, 2022.

John Tarrant Roshi in a short interview with host David Chadwick, author of Shunryu Suzuki Roshi’s biography, Crooked Cucumber. Recorded for the Cuke Podcast, December 2021.