Question: Could you please explain what you mean by "mind," Professor?
Answer: The mind is just a name. It's merely a name, and the only way to know it is through your own direct experience. You can never know it through explanation. No matter how you try to explain it, you can never truly know it through explanation; you can only know it through direct experience. Scriptures and the sayings of monks are all explanations of the mind, but they are all different, and none of them are perfectly accurate. This is because they were used as the necessary medicine for the specific person, for the listener. Therefore, the mind is absolutely not something that can be explained through words and grasped conceptually. That's why, if you want to grasp the mind, it's about correcting the posture of the person who truly wants to know the mind—what we call mind study is precisely that: correcting your posture.
Initially, people generally try to understand it through knowledge or concepts. However, what we teach here under the name of mind study is about correcting that attitude, because you cannot know the mind with such a posture. When there's a genuine desire to know the mind, a desperate yearning like a child who can't sleep at night wanting a toy, that's when you can confirm the mind within yourself. It's like that; there's actually nothing you can say about what the mind is. So, this mind study is absolutely not something you can learn by reading many books or listening to many people's stories. It depends solely on your own attitude.
Question: Is there no other method besides this earnest desire to know?
Answer: That's right. Nothing else is required. Even if you live with a certain degree of worldly values like money, family, and honor, it's more about a question regarding your own existence than an interest in those things. It's a vague desire, perhaps, that the value of your life isn't in these external things, but perhaps within your own inner self. So, for a person who normally questions whether there might be some internal value, finding worldly values like making money, honor, or family matters not particularly important, they can do this. Otherwise, it just remains as knowledge. In other words, you only get to scratch the surface.
Question: In my case, especially after adolescence, I kept asking "Who is the true me?" but at that time, I couldn't find an answer and just muddled through, then went through college and worked in society, and the conditions weren't suitable for thinking about it, so I feel like I was swept away by various currents. Before achieving something, I would pursue it busily, but after achieving it, I would feel empty. This continued in the same pattern—an incomplete state where I had to keep pursuing something. In conclusion, I think I've lived with the thought that "there is no truth." But now you say, "This is it!" so definitively, which makes me both believe and doubt. I wonder if such a thing truly exists... I'm not completely without that thirst, but I still don't have faith in it.
Answer: That's how our worldly affairs are. We jump into work with a vague hope that if only this task is finished, we'll be happy and satisfied. We pour all our energy into it, but after it's done, the joy of completion lasts only for a moment, and then soon it's just the same as before. Nothing has changed. Then you think, "I have to do something else again," and as you just said, you end up giving up on life, thinking, "Whatever I do, it's all the same; there's nothing special about living."
Question: Even when I give up, I feel a bit anxious.
Answer: It's true that you give up but remain dissatisfied. It's not that you stopped because you were satisfied. You're dissatisfied, but because you can't satisfy it, you give up.
Ultimately, the solution to all these problems of life does not come from outside. For example, no matter how high you pursue honor and reach the top, you're not fully satisfied there. No matter how much money you earn, you're not satisfied there either. This satisfaction can only be found within your own inner self.
Question: I think I always had the thought, 'I can't find it outside.'
Answer: Even when we speak of the inner self, we usually tend to be interested in things like art, philosophy, and literature. We mistakenly think that these are the inner self. We delve into philosophical inquiries to acquire grand theories, or we examine various aspects of human psychology and life through literature and art, and mistakenly believe that we have understood all of life.
Question: But after I write something, I don't look at it. I don't want to see it. It feels like it's not it...
Answer: That's right. When you're doing it, you're immersed in the desire for inquiry, but afterward, you feel empty. That's because you know it's not "it," so you don't look at it.
Question: So I first think that I'm lacking (in expressive ability) and haven't fulfilled it enough. That I don't have the skill...
Answer: In art or philosophy, there's no such thing as completion in terms of the work's quality or theoretical depth. There isn't, but we expect completion.
Question: That's right! I always have that thirst...
Answer: It's like always striving with the thought that there's some kind of completion, but I lack the ability to reach it.
Question: With the thought that something real will come out someday...
Answer: That's right. "It'll happen someday..." But why can't there be completion? Because it's something created and manipulated by humans. It's the Tower of Babel. Because it's created, no matter how high you stack it, if you build 100 stories, the 101st floor is waiting next, so there's no end.
Question: Really? Is that true?
Answer: That's true for things that are created. Think about it. The principle is simple. If a human has created something for, say, 30 years, then someone who has created for 31 years has created more than the person who created for 30 years. If humans lived for 80, 100, or 200 years, the quantity and depth of what they create would naturally be different. Ultimately, it ends when life ends, not because they couldn't create it all or lacked the ability to create, but because there's no time. There's no completion there. It's impossible. Even if you lived for a thousand years, it would be the same. What humans create is endless. You might think you've completed something in your own way, but a few years later, looking back, there's no such thing as completion.
Question: Why do humans live that way?
Answer: The reason we are compelled to pursue endlessly is because the first button was fastened incorrectly.
Question: But most people...
Answer: Not most, but 100% are like that. So, in Christian terms, humanity was cursed by God. It began the moment they ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. In Buddhist terms, that's the starting point of sentient beings.
Question: So, being born human means that's just how it has to be...
Answer: That's right. That's a fundamental characteristic of humans. Humans are born with a physical body, so they are fundamentally inclined to look outward. They cannot see their own existence. They look outward. All physical organs are designed to look outward. Consequently, consciousness is also always directed outward. Based on what it acquires through the senses, it constantly tries to draw something. That's the basic mechanism of our consciousness.
Question: You mean it constantly creates things using sensory input as raw material?
Answer: That's right. Endless... That's the mechanism of consciousness. A being born with a physical body like a human being first maintains life based on physical sensations, and as they live, their consciousness itself follows that direction. They follow, seeing, hearing, smelling, and touching, and based on that, they think and make various comprehensive judgments as they live. So, they combine and assemble these differentiated objects that they see, hear, and smell, to create a picture. Our so-called worldview is entirely based on that, isn't it? Within that, to draw a more harmonious, more desirable, more plausible picture is what we call philosophy, and human cultural activities like art.
However, if we look at reality as it is, human society, based on what we know and what we've learned about values, isn't it absurd? We don't know what that absurd reality is, but it's dissatisfying. So we want to make it a satisfying state, but how can we make it a satisfying state? We fundamentally think that we can make that dissatisfying object satisfying by continuously controlling, regulating, and changing it.
But is that really possible? You might be able to decorate and change your own room as you please. But even with just our family, it doesn't work. First of all, because they are other people... So, saying you want to change the world is nonsense.
Then we think, since it's impossible to change the external world, shouldn't we change our own thoughts? Since it's impossible to satisfy ourselves by controlling external objects, and no matter how much we think about it, no answer comes, the final answer we arrive at is to change our own thoughts. In other words, since the external environment doesn't change, we adapt to that environment.
However, adapting means giving up on yourself, and it brings various sufferings. Dissatisfaction still remains. In fact, that's not a solution either. The problems of our lives cannot be solved in any way by methods we can consciously think of.
The solutions presented by religion are not of that kind. They teach that we must abandon the way we try to solve things, whether externally or internally. We must give up what we ourselves desire. But it's not telling us to adapt to an irrational situation. It's telling us to give up, but not to abandon the earnest hope that there will be some escape route. I can't do anything about it, but I want to solve this. If you feel that way, you'll experience heartache, and when you're in such a situation and it ripens to a certain extent, a solution will emerge on its own.
That's what I mean by "earnestness." That solution doesn't come from our conscious mind. The solution emerges in a way that is utterly unimaginable and completely unexpected. Suddenly, all the burdens that were weighing you down, all the burdens you were carrying, are resolved all at once, as if they've disappeared.
Question: Is it possible with just that earnest desire for such a solution?
Answer: There's nothing else. That's the only method.
Question: So, even in daily life, all I need is that earnest desire, asking "What is that solution?"
Answer: If you have earnestness, you'll unconsciously search in various ways. You'll feel frustrated if you just sit still, even with earnestness... So you come to a Zen center, read books, and if there's a great teacher somewhere, you seek them out and ask questions.
Question: But you don't give specific explanations, do you? You say it can't be put into words...
Answer: Actually, I can't give it to you. It's absolutely impossible. You already possess it. No one else can give it to you. That solution, so to speak, is an experience of your own existence. Who possesses your existence if not yourself? The reason we wander around externally is because we don't know our own existence. No one can give you the recognition of your own existence. There's no other way than to confirm it yourself. Since you've only been chasing outwardly until now, my role is to guide you to turn your direction inward.
Question: Besides Buddhist scriptures, for example, the Bible, can we say that all scriptures tell the same story?
Answer: Yes, they're the same. It's exactly the content I just explained. In conclusion, they are all talking about this.
However, if you only look at the words written there, it's like in Buddhism, where the Buddha's words are often said to be a finger pointing to the moon, but foolish sentient beings see only the finger and not the moon. Generally, people only look at the words written there, only at the finger, and fail to see what the words are pointing to. That's a problem. So, if you just read books and say, "Christianity is like this," or "Islam is like this," you're merely talking about the finger.
Question: I want to see the moon, but that's really...
Answer: If you want to see the moon, it doesn't happen overnight. As the saying goes, "Great minds mature late." You have to think of it as investing your whole life's energy over a long period. So, don't be hasty. Take it slow, but with earnestness, and you must have faith. "It will happen someday. Why shouldn't it happen to me?" That kind of faith. It's like climbing a high mountain: you have to look straight ahead and take one step at a time. There's no need to look at how far others have climbed; that will only drain your strength. If you keep going, looking only ahead, you'll only see the path, and then suddenly, at some moment, the view will open up. That moment will come. You have to keep going until then.
Question: Some people say they achieved enlightenment just by hearing a single line from a text someone else read...
Answer: That person has already come a long way in that manner over a long period. It doesn't happen by chance. A person who has maintained the basic posture for a long time, in other words, a prepared person, only needs one poke. There's also the saying, "Hatching simultaneously" (referring to the chick and the mother hen tapping the shell at the same time). An egg doesn't hatch suddenly, does it? It hatches when time passes and the conditions are right.
Question: I initially misunderstood. I thought that some people get it quickly, and others, no matter how hard they try, never will...
Answer: (laughs) There's a reason why it doesn't happen. For example, if you put an egg in the refrigerator, it won't hatch no matter how much time passes, will it? There's a reason why it doesn't happen.
Question: Can you recommend any books that might be stimulating?
Answer: There aren't that many books worth reading. You shouldn't just read any book. There are actually very few good books. What I mean is, ordinary books come from people's thoughts, right? By way of thought... That ultimately leads you to thought. As we read books, we get accustomed to the author, don't we? Books written with thoughts only train your thoughts, so ultimately, you don't reach this spot and keep going down the wrong path. You need to read books written from this spot, not books written from thought. Not only are there not many people who have experienced this spot, but also, not many of those who have experienced it have spoken about it properly without interjecting their thoughts. People who don't know read many books, but that's just practicing thought and has no relation to the actual spot.
Question: So, does reading books related to this topic in daily life help with this study?
Answer: It doesn't matter as long as you yourself know that what you've understood as knowledge from reading books is not (the study). Then you'll read books, but you won't pursue knowledge, will you? If you read with an earnest heart, thinking, "There's something, but I don't quite know it," then it helps. It's the act of raising that earnest heart that helps; knowledge is no help at all.
The most appropriate example is to think about waking up from a dream. "I'm having a nightmare right now, and I want to wake up. This life is a nightmare. It's a dissatisfying dream, so I want to wake up." So, in the dream, you try various things to wake up, like pinching your leg or screaming. Do you wake up from the dream? No, you don't. That itself is the dream. No method will wake you up. But when the frustration in that nightmare reaches its peak, at some point, you'll suddenly jump up without even realizing it, not through a method. Your eyes will just snap open.
Question: But I think that to have such earnestness, you need to have a firm belief that such a solution definitely exists. If you think, 'Could such a thing exist?', your mind won't solidify, will it? If you truly have faith that it definitely exists, you'll try to find it...
Answer: (laughs) 100% certain faith only comes from confirming it yourself. Many people have said so for thousands of years, and it's written in various scriptures, but no person or scripture can make you believe 100%. If you say, "I'll only do this study if I believe 100%, if someone confirms that such a thing truly exists, then I'll study..." then there's no possibility. Because there's no way to do that for you.
Question: So, it's a matter of destiny...
Answer: That's right. When your own heart is stirred...
Question: People say that mind, Buddha-nature, or God exist in all things, even animals. Does it permeate all things?
Answer: It permeates everything, but it's not something that can be confirmed as an object through individual things. Once you've confirmed it, there's nothing it isn't. But before confirmation, it doesn't emerge from scientific inquiry like observation and experimentation, or by deeply contemplating.
Question: So, it's not something that can be solved by looking outward. It's by looking at myself, within myself...
Answer: "Looking within myself" isn't actually the most accurate expression either. "Looking at myself" already objectifies myself. You shouldn't look at it as an object. Simply put, (picking up the teacup in front) you might inquire, "What is the true nature of this cup? They say the Way is in this cup..." But the act of "What is the true nature of this cup? They say the Way is in this cup..." is happening right now, this act of me doing this, it's not happening because of the cup, is it? If you just know where this act is happening and what this act is, then that's it. That's it. The confirmation of your own existence does not happen through an object. The confirmation of your own existence is simply confirmed in the fact that you always exist. After all, because I exist, this cup also exists.
Question: As I've lived, both physically and mentally, everything changes, but when I think about what doesn't change, it's this vividness, this consciousness, this being alive... Even when you get older, they say you feel love as intensely as when you were young, and that this sense of being alive persists. I completely understand that, and I wonder if it's only this "being alive" that doesn't change.
Answer: If you say, "Yes, only this being alive doesn't change, and everything else changes...," then you've grasped it conceptually. Then, what is "being alive" truly? You need to directly confirm what being alive is, not just conceptually.
Question: So, if I confirm that, all my problems will be solved, right?
Answer: That's right. They'll be solved all at once. The problems themselves never truly existed in the first place.
Question: Then it's useless to ask for solutions to the difficulties I'm currently experiencing in life, right?
Answer: Those are all symptomatic treatments, not fundamental cures. It's like I'm constantly creating waves in my mind and asking someone else to teach me how to calm those waves. The other person might be able to block external winds that cause waves, but the waves you create yourself...
However, if you misunderstand "calming yourself," you might mistakenly think it means sitting quietly in meditation, but that's absolutely not it. Consciousness can never stay still. Consciousness is like water. Water inevitably moves in response to external stimuli. Fluidity is the nature of water. As long as we are alive, we cannot remain still without external stimuli. We are bound to live encountering various circumstances like flowing water, and then we are bound to be shaken.
So, sitting quietly and hoping for your mind to settle down is a symptomatic treatment. It's like putting water in a container and closing the lid. The nature of water is to flow. People are the same. It would be fine if we could just stay cooped up in a room doing nothing, but we can't live like that. Unlike water, even if a person stays still, (delusions) arise. Since their arising is their very nature, trying to stop them from arising by holding onto them is impossible.
Question: Then even those who have experienced it, won't delusions still arise for them?
Answer: Yes, they all arise. They're human, after all...
Question: Then what's the difference? Especially in situations of pain or awkwardness, rather than pleasure...
Answer: But that difference cannot be explained in words. In any case, (for both those who have experienced it and those who haven't) they all arise, but it's as if they didn't arise. They arise, but it's as if they didn't.
Question: Does that mean it's not painful? Does it mean they don't feel those things?
Answer: The various phenomena that arise from it don't affect me much. The water might be violently shaking, but you don't feel dizzy.
Question: So the feeling is always a state of calmness, I suppose?
Answer: That's right.
Question: Always...
Answer: It's always stable and calm. Even when speaking furiously, it's always calm.
Question: Will death be like that too? Even in the face of death? Or the death of others...
Answer: That's right. It's always calm and composed. Its effects cannot be expressed in words or imagined. No matter how much you talk about it before tasting it, describing what it's like afterward...
Question: Isn't it that if it tastes good, you'll want to delve into it? So you should tell me it's good... (laughs)... because it's hard now...
Answer: The difficulties you had when you didn't know this will lighten. All those difficulties will lighten.
Question: More than anything else, I feel weakest in front of people. Perhaps because I've always been conscious of others and lived focused on them...
Answer: That's right. People always torment us more than inanimate objects. We are very easily swayed by people. The sway caused by people is so deeply rooted that it doesn't disappear immediately even after this experience; it disappears slowly, but it does lighten. You become much freer from the influence of people around you. It doesn't feel burdensome anymore.
Question: I long for freedom.
Answer: Because we don't know the true taste of freedom, we try to cling on more spectacularly... (laughs)
Question: That's right. I did that (creative work) thinking it would be a way to solve my curiosities, and while I'm doing it, I can forget, but when I finish, the same problems are waiting for me.
Answer: They say to immerse yourself in work when you have worries, don't they? Because while you're immersed in work, you forget them... But that's forgetting, not solving. That's symptomatic treatment. When children get injections, they sometimes get a pat on the bottom because the injection hurts, right? If you distract them, they don't feel the pain of the injection... Most things are like that. That's not a fundamental solution.
Question: (Sighs) So, there's only one thing, then. This stifling feeling...
Answer: So, if you carry that stifling, earnest feeling and listen to dharma talks, and reflect on your own worries in daily life, you will slowly and unconsciously transform yourself. It's like a chick hatching from an egg, a gradual transformation. Then, at some point, it just happens... The moment of becoming a chick is instantaneous, but there was a long, gradual change before that.
Question: Earlier, when you were giving a dharma talk, you used an analogy and kept repeating "That's it," "That's it" for about five minutes. At that moment, I felt a jolt. I also felt something physically different from what I had thought before, so I wondered if my body was feeling that too. Could that also be a kind of good sign...?
Answer: Anyway, study isn't done externally. Even if others don't know whether you're studying or not, it should always be a concern for you. While maintaining a harmonious social life and not outwardly revealing much, this should be your concern. You have to do it that way; otherwise, you won't be able to live your social life properly under the pretext of studying.
Question: I need to pay attention, but when I'm living my social life, I forget. Even if I try to hold onto that question, I get swept away and forget it in an instant.
Answer: Rather than holding onto it, if it truly becomes a concern for you, it won't be forgotten. You need to reach that state. Consciously holding onto something is hardly study...
Question: You always talk about the same thing, just one thing. Does that also affect people?
Answer: That's right. It's not that they understand the words by listening. It's a kind of subtle hint. Then, they gradually change themselves. Understanding the words can be done by listening a few times. It's not easy for a person to change at all. They don't change easily. They understand the words quickly, but the person themselves doesn't change according to the words.
Question: There's that point. At first, when I didn't know, I was swept along, but then I heard that this reality, which seems vivid to me, is like a dream, that it's not real, and in a way, living became more comfortable. There's a difference between before and after hearing that everything is created by human consciousness...
Answer: That comfort you feel is actually a trick of consciousness...
Question: That's right. It's consciousness suppressing consciousness... but it still feels more comfortable.
Answer: That's right. Even doing just that makes it a little more comfortable. But that's not enough. Usually, what people call mind study satisfies people at that level, and that's it. That's not how it should be.
Question: So, if I study hoping for something good, it won't work?
Answer: You shouldn't expect anything. You just need to be thirsty for this, without any conditions.
Question: At first, I wanted to ask how to resolve the issues of constantly bothering myself and finding it hard to meet people, but I'm too embarrassed to ask now. I know that's not what it's about...
Answer: It's not symptomatic treatment. Those symptomatic treatments can be answered through general counseling programs.
Question: So, it's just about "What is the truth?" and that's it?
Answer: You just have to be thirsty for it without any conditions. If you attach any conditions, you will inevitably go in the wrong direction.
Question: "What is the truth?" Is this really the only thing?
Answer: (laughs) If you know this one thing, everything is resolved. My existence is singular; it's not complex.
Question: But perhaps because I live in such a complex world, I'm suspicious of simple things?
Answer: (laughs) That's our sickness. The Tao Te Ching also says that study is "損之又損" (loss upon loss), constantly subtracting until it's empty, until there's nothing, becoming the simplest... The reason it talks about that is because it is originally a simple unity. There is only one.
So, if you approach study with interest and keep doing it, you might unknowingly fall deeply into it. However, you can't force it, and if you approach it with an intention, you will eventually go towards that intention. That's why study doesn't happen. There's nothing else but thinking, without any conditions, "This is my life's task."
Question: Could you please explain what you mean by "mind," Professor?
Answer: The mind is just a name. It's merely a name, and the only way to know it is through your own direct experience. You can never know it through explanation. No matter how you try to explain it, you can never truly know it through explanation; you can only know it through direct experience. Scriptures and the sayings of monks are all explanations of the mind, but they are all different, and none of them are perfectly accurate. This is because they were used as the necessary medicine for the specific person, for the listener. Therefore, the mind is absolutely not something that can be explained through words and grasped conceptually. That's why, if you want to grasp the mind, it's about correcting the posture of the person who truly wants to know the mind—what we call mind study is precisely that: correcting your posture.
Initially, people generally try to understand it through knowledge or concepts. However, what we teach here under the name of mind study is about correcting that attitude, because you cannot know the mind with such a posture. When there's a genuine desire to know the mind, a desperate yearning like a child who can't sleep at night wanting a toy, that's when you can confirm the mind within yourself. It's like that; there's actually nothing you can say about what the mind is. So, this mind study is absolutely not something you can learn by reading many books or listening to many people's stories. It depends solely on your own attitude.
Question: Is there no other method besides this earnest desire to know?
Answer: That's right. Nothing else is required. Even if you live with a certain degree of worldly values like money, family, and honor, it's more about a question regarding your own existence than an interest in those things. It's a vague desire, perhaps, that the value of your life isn't in these external things, but perhaps within your own inner self. So, for a person who normally questions whether there might be some internal value, finding worldly values like making money, honor, or family matters not particularly important, they can do this. Otherwise, it just remains as knowledge. In other words, you only get to scratch the surface.
Question: In my case, especially after adolescence, I kept asking "Who is the true me?" but at that time, I couldn't find an answer and just muddled through, then went through college and worked in society, and the conditions weren't suitable for thinking about it, so I feel like I was swept away by various currents. Before achieving something, I would pursue it busily, but after achieving it, I would feel empty. This continued in the same pattern—an incomplete state where I had to keep pursuing something. In conclusion, I think I've lived with the thought that "there is no truth." But now you say, "This is it!" so definitively, which makes me both believe and doubt. I wonder if such a thing truly exists... I'm not completely without that thirst, but I still don't have faith in it.
Answer: That's how our worldly affairs are. We jump into work with a vague hope that if only this task is finished, we'll be happy and satisfied. We pour all our energy into it, but after it's done, the joy of completion lasts only for a moment, and then soon it's just the same as before. Nothing has changed. Then you think, "I have to do something else again," and as you just said, you end up giving up on life, thinking, "Whatever I do, it's all the same; there's nothing special about living."
Question: Even when I give up, I feel a bit anxious.
Answer: It's true that you give up but remain dissatisfied. It's not that you stopped because you were satisfied. You're dissatisfied, but because you can't satisfy it, you give up.
Ultimately, the solution to all these problems of life does not come from outside. For example, no matter how high you pursue honor and reach the top, you're not fully satisfied there. No matter how much money you earn, you're not satisfied there either. This satisfaction can only be found within your own inner self.
Question: I think I always had the thought, 'I can't find it outside.'
Answer: Even when we speak of the inner self, we usually tend to be interested in things like art, philosophy, and literature. We mistakenly think that these are the inner self. We delve into philosophical inquiries to acquire grand theories, or we examine various aspects of human psychology and life through literature and art, and mistakenly believe that we have understood all of life.
Question: But after I write something, I don't look at it. I don't want to see it. It feels like it's not it...
Answer: That's right. When you're doing it, you're immersed in the desire for inquiry, but afterward, you feel empty. That's because you know it's not "it," so you don't look at it.
Question: So I first think that I'm lacking (in expressive ability) and haven't fulfilled it enough. That I don't have the skill...
Answer: In art or philosophy, there's no such thing as completion in terms of the work's quality or theoretical depth. There isn't, but we expect completion.
Question: That's right! I always have that thirst...
Answer: It's like always striving with the thought that there's some kind of completion, but I lack the ability to reach it.
Question: With the thought that something real will come out someday...
Answer: That's right. "It'll happen someday..." But why can't there be completion? Because it's something created and manipulated by humans. It's the Tower of Babel. Because it's created, no matter how high you stack it, if you build 100 stories, the 101st floor is waiting next, so there's no end.
Question: Really? Is that true?
Answer: That's true for things that are created. Think about it. The principle is simple. If a human has created something for, say, 30 years, then someone who has created for 31 years has created more than the person who created for 30 years. If humans lived for 80, 100, or 200 years, the quantity and depth of what they create would naturally be different. Ultimately, it ends when life ends, not because they couldn't create it all or lacked the ability to create, but because there's no time. There's no completion there. It's impossible. Even if you lived for a thousand years, it would be the same. What humans create is endless. You might think you've completed something in your own way, but a few years later, looking back, there's no such thing as completion.
Question: Why do humans live that way?
Answer: The reason we are compelled to pursue endlessly is because the first button was fastened incorrectly.
Question: But most people...
Answer: Not most, but 100% are like that. So, in Christian terms, humanity was cursed by God. It began the moment they ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. In Buddhist terms, that's the starting point of sentient beings.
Question: So, being born human means that's just how it has to be...
Answer: That's right. That's a fundamental characteristic of humans. Humans are born with a physical body, so they are fundamentally inclined to look outward. They cannot see their own existence. They look outward. All physical organs are designed to look outward. Consequently, consciousness is also always directed outward. Based on what it acquires through the senses, it constantly tries to draw something. That's the basic mechanism of our consciousness.
Question: You mean it constantly creates things using sensory input as raw material?
Answer: That's right. Endless... That's the mechanism of consciousness. A being born with a physical body like a human being first maintains life based on physical sensations, and as they live, their consciousness itself follows that direction. They follow, seeing, hearing, smelling, and touching, and based on that, they think and make various comprehensive judgments as they live. So, they combine and assemble these differentiated objects that they see, hear, and smell, to create a picture. Our so-called worldview is entirely based on that, isn't it? Within that, to draw a more harmonious, more desirable, more plausible picture is what we call philosophy, and human cultural activities like art.
However, if we look at reality as it is, human society, based on what we know and what we've learned about values, isn't it absurd? We don't know what that absurd reality is, but it's dissatisfying. So we want to make it a satisfying state, but how can we make it a satisfying state? We fundamentally think that we can make that dissatisfying object satisfying by continuously controlling, regulating, and changing it.
But is that really possible? You might be able to decorate and change your own room as you please. But even with just our family, it doesn't work. First of all, because they are other people... So, saying you want to change the world is nonsense.
Then we think, since it's impossible to change the external world, shouldn't we change our own thoughts? Since it's impossible to satisfy ourselves by controlling external objects, and no matter how much we think about it, no answer comes, the final answer we arrive at is to change our own thoughts. In other words, since the external environment doesn't change, we adapt to that environment.
However, adapting means giving up on yourself, and it brings various sufferings. Dissatisfaction still remains. In fact, that's not a solution either. The problems of our lives cannot be solved in any way by methods we can consciously think of.
The solutions presented by religion are not of that kind. They teach that we must abandon the way we try to solve things, whether externally or internally. We must give up what we ourselves desire. But it's not telling us to adapt to an irrational situation. It's telling us to give up, but not to abandon the earnest hope that there will be some escape route. I can't do anything about it, but I want to solve this. If you feel that way, you'll experience heartache, and when you're in such a situation and it ripens to a certain extent, a solution will emerge on its own.
That's what I mean by "earnestness." That solution doesn't come from our conscious mind. The solution emerges in a way that is utterly unimaginable and completely unexpected. Suddenly, all the burdens that were weighing you down, all the burdens you were carrying, are resolved all at once, as if they've disappeared.
Question: Is it possible with just that earnest desire for such a solution?
Answer: There's nothing else. That's the only method.
Question: So, even in daily life, all I need is that earnest desire, asking "What is that solution?"
Answer: If you have earnestness, you'll unconsciously search in various ways. You'll feel frustrated if you just sit still, even with earnestness... So you come to a Zen center, read books, and if there's a great teacher somewhere, you seek them out and ask questions.
Question: But you don't give specific explanations, do you? You say it can't be put into words...
Answer: Actually, I can't give it to you. It's absolutely impossible. You already possess it. No one else can give it to you. That solution, so to speak, is an experience of your own existence. Who possesses your existence if not yourself? The reason we wander around externally is because we don't know our own existence. No one can give you the recognition of your own existence. There's no other way than to confirm it yourself. Since you've only been chasing outwardly until now, my role is to guide you to turn your direction inward.
Question: Besides Buddhist scriptures, for example, the Bible, can we say that all scriptures tell the same story?
Answer: Yes, they're the same. It's exactly the content I just explained. In conclusion, they are all talking about this.
However, if you only look at the words written there, it's like in Buddhism, where the Buddha's words are often said to be a finger pointing to the moon, but foolish sentient beings see only the finger and not the moon. Generally, people only look at the words written there, only at the finger, and fail to see what the words are pointing to. That's a problem. So, if you just read books and say, "Christianity is like this," or "Islam is like this," you're merely talking about the finger.
Question: I want to see the moon, but that's really...
Answer: If you want to see the moon, it doesn't happen overnight. As the saying goes, "Great minds mature late." You have to think of it as investing your whole life's energy over a long period. So, don't be hasty. Take it slow, but with earnestness, and you must have faith. "It will happen someday. Why shouldn't it happen to me?" That kind of faith. It's like climbing a high mountain: you have to look straight ahead and take one step at a time. There's no need to look at how far others have climbed; that will only drain your strength. If you keep going, looking only ahead, you'll only see the path, and then suddenly, at some moment, the view will open up. That moment will come. You have to keep going until then.
Question: Some people say they achieved enlightenment just by hearing a single line from a text someone else read...
Answer: That person has already come a long way in that manner over a long period. It doesn't happen by chance. A person who has maintained the basic posture for a long time, in other words, a prepared person, only needs one poke. There's also the saying, "Hatching simultaneously" (referring to the chick and the mother hen tapping the shell at the same time). An egg doesn't hatch suddenly, does it? It hatches when time passes and the conditions are right.
Question: I initially misunderstood. I thought that some people get it quickly, and others, no matter how hard they try, never will...
Answer: (laughs) There's a reason why it doesn't happen. For example, if you put an egg in the refrigerator, it won't hatch no matter how much time passes, will it? There's a reason why it doesn't happen.
Question: Can you recommend any books that might be stimulating?
Answer: There aren't that many books worth reading. You shouldn't just read any book. There are actually very few good books. What I mean is, ordinary books come from people's thoughts, right? By way of thought... That ultimately leads you to thought. As we read books, we get accustomed to the author, don't we? Books written with thoughts only train your thoughts, so ultimately, you don't reach this spot and keep going down the wrong path. You need to read books written from this spot, not books written from thought. Not only are there not many people who have experienced this spot, but also, not many of those who have experienced it have spoken about it properly without interjecting their thoughts. People who don't know read many books, but that's just practicing thought and has no relation to the actual spot.
Question: So, does reading books related to this topic in daily life help with this study?
Answer: It doesn't matter as long as you yourself know that what you've understood as knowledge from reading books is not (the study). Then you'll read books, but you won't pursue knowledge, will you? If you read with an earnest heart, thinking, "There's something, but I don't quite know it," then it helps. It's the act of raising that earnest heart that helps; knowledge is no help at all.
The most appropriate example is to think about waking up from a dream. "I'm having a nightmare right now, and I want to wake up. This life is a nightmare. It's a dissatisfying dream, so I want to wake up." So, in the dream, you try various things to wake up, like pinching your leg or screaming. Do you wake up from the dream? No, you don't. That itself is the dream. No method will wake you up. But when the frustration in that nightmare reaches its peak, at some point, you'll suddenly jump up without even realizing it, not through a method. Your eyes will just snap open.
Question: But I think that to have such earnestness, you need to have a firm belief that such a solution definitely exists. If you think, 'Could such a thing exist?', your mind won't solidify, will it? If you truly have faith that it definitely exists, you'll try to find it...
Answer: (laughs) 100% certain faith only comes from confirming it yourself. Many people have said so for thousands of years, and it's written in various scriptures, but no person or scripture can make you believe 100%. If you say, "I'll only do this study if I believe 100%, if someone confirms that such a thing truly exists, then I'll study..." then there's no possibility. Because there's no way to do that for you.
Question: So, it's a matter of destiny...
Answer: That's right. When your own heart is stirred...
Question: People say that mind, Buddha-nature, or God exist in all things, even animals. Does it permeate all things?
Answer: It permeates everything, but it's not something that can be confirmed as an object through individual things. Once you've confirmed it, there's nothing it isn't. But before confirmation, it doesn't emerge from scientific inquiry like observation and experimentation, or by deeply contemplating.
Question: So, it's not something that can be solved by looking outward. It's by looking at myself, within myself...
Answer: "Looking within myself" isn't actually the most accurate expression either. "Looking at myself" already objectifies myself. You shouldn't look at it as an object. Simply put, (picking up the teacup in front) you might inquire, "What is the true nature of this cup? They say the Way is in this cup..." But the act of "What is the true nature of this cup? They say the Way is in this cup..." is happening right now, this act of me doing this, it's not happening because of the cup, is it? If you just know where this act is happening and what this act is, then that's it. That's it. The confirmation of your own existence does not happen through an object. The confirmation of your own existence is simply confirmed in the fact that you always exist. After all, because I exist, this cup also exists.
Question: As I've lived, both physically and mentally, everything changes, but when I think about what doesn't change, it's this vividness, this consciousness, this being alive... Even when you get older, they say you feel love as intensely as when you were young, and that this sense of being alive persists. I completely understand that, and I wonder if it's only this "being alive" that doesn't change.
Answer: If you say, "Yes, only this being alive doesn't change, and everything else changes...," then you've grasped it conceptually. Then, what is "being alive" truly? You need to directly confirm what being alive is, not just conceptually.
Question: So, if I confirm that, all my problems will be solved, right?
Answer: That's right. They'll be solved all at once. The problems themselves never truly existed in the first place.
Question: Then it's useless to ask for solutions to the difficulties I'm currently experiencing in life, right?
Answer: Those are all symptomatic treatments, not fundamental cures. It's like I'm constantly creating waves in my mind and asking someone else to teach me how to calm those waves. The other person might be able to block external winds that cause waves, but the waves you create yourself...
However, if you misunderstand "calming yourself," you might mistakenly think it means sitting quietly in meditation, but that's absolutely not it. Consciousness can never stay still. Consciousness is like water. Water inevitably moves in response to external stimuli. Fluidity is the nature of water. As long as we are alive, we cannot remain still without external stimuli. We are bound to live encountering various circumstances like flowing water, and then we are bound to be shaken.
So, sitting quietly and hoping for your mind to settle down is a symptomatic treatment. It's like putting water in a container and closing the lid. The nature of water is to flow. People are the same. It would be fine if we could just stay cooped up in a room doing nothing, but we can't live like that. Unlike water, even if a person stays still, (delusions) arise. Since their arising is their very nature, trying to stop them from arising by holding onto them is impossible.
Question: Then even those who have experienced it, won't delusions still arise for them?
Answer: Yes, they all arise. They're human, after all...
Question: Then what's the difference? Especially in situations of pain or awkwardness, rather than pleasure...
Answer: But that difference cannot be explained in words. In any case, (for both those who have experienced it and those who haven't) they all arise, but it's as if they didn't arise. They arise, but it's as if they didn't.
Question: Does that mean it's not painful? Does it mean they don't feel those things?
Answer: The various phenomena that arise from it don't affect me much. The water might be violently shaking, but you don't feel dizzy.
Question: So the feeling is always a state of calmness, I suppose?
Answer: That's right.
Question: Always...
Answer: It's always stable and calm. Even when speaking furiously, it's always calm.
Question: Will death be like that too? Even in the face of death? Or the death of others...
Answer: That's right. It's always calm and composed. Its effects cannot be expressed in words or imagined. No matter how much you talk about it before tasting it, describing what it's like afterward...
Question: Isn't it that if it tastes good, you'll want to delve into it? So you should tell me it's good... (laughs)... because it's hard now...
Answer: The difficulties you had when you didn't know this will lighten. All those difficulties will lighten.
Question: More than anything else, I feel weakest in front of people. Perhaps because I've always been conscious of others and lived focused on them...
Answer: That's right. People always torment us more than inanimate objects. We are very easily swayed by people. The sway caused by people is so deeply rooted that it doesn't disappear immediately even after this experience; it disappears slowly, but it does lighten. You become much freer from the influence of people around you. It doesn't feel burdensome anymore.
Question: I long for freedom.
Answer: Because we don't know the true taste of freedom, we try to cling on more spectacularly... (laughs)
Question: That's right. I did that (creative work) thinking it would be a way to solve my curiosities, and while I'm doing it, I can forget, but when I finish, the same problems are waiting for me.
Answer: They say to immerse yourself in work when you have worries, don't they? Because while you're immersed in work, you forget them... But that's forgetting, not solving. That's symptomatic treatment. When children get injections, they sometimes get a pat on the bottom because the injection hurts, right? If you distract them, they don't feel the pain of the injection... Most things are like that. That's not a fundamental solution.
Question: (Sighs) So, there's only one thing, then. This stifling feeling...
Answer: So, if you carry that stifling, earnest feeling and listen to dharma talks, and reflect on your own worries in daily life, you will slowly and unconsciously transform yourself. It's like a chick hatching from an egg, a gradual transformation. Then, at some point, it just happens... The moment of becoming a chick is instantaneous, but there was a long, gradual change before that.
Question: Earlier, when you were giving a dharma talk, you used an analogy and kept repeating "That's it," "That's it" for about five minutes. At that moment, I felt a jolt. I also felt something physically different from what I had thought before, so I wondered if my body was feeling that too. Could that also be a kind of good sign...?
Answer: Anyway, study isn't done externally. Even if others don't know whether you're studying or not, it should always be a concern for you. While maintaining a harmonious social life and not outwardly revealing much, this should be your concern. You have to do it that way; otherwise, you won't be able to live your social life properly under the pretext of studying.
Question: I need to pay attention, but when I'm living my social life, I forget. Even if I try to hold onto that question, I get swept away and forget it in an instant.
Answer: Rather than holding onto it, if it truly becomes a concern for you, it won't be forgotten. You need to reach that state. Consciously holding onto something is hardly study...
Question: You always talk about the same thing, just one thing. Does that also affect people?
Answer: That's right. It's not that they understand the words by listening. It's a kind of subtle hint. Then, they gradually change themselves. Understanding the words can be done by listening a few times. It's not easy for a person to change at all. They don't change easily. They understand the words quickly, but the person themselves doesn't change according to the words.
Question: There's that point. At first, when I didn't know, I was swept along, but then I heard that this reality, which seems vivid to me, is like a dream, that it's not real, and in a way, living became more comfortable. There's a difference between before and after hearing that everything is created by human consciousness...
Answer: That comfort you feel is actually a trick of consciousness...
Question: That's right. It's consciousness suppressing consciousness... but it still feels more comfortable.
Answer: That's right. Even doing just that makes it a little more comfortable. But that's not enough. Usually, what people call mind study satisfies people at that level, and that's it. That's not how it should be.
Question: So, if I study hoping for something good, it won't work?
Answer: You shouldn't expect anything. You just need to be thirsty for this, without any conditions.
Question: At first, I wanted to ask how to resolve the issues of constantly bothering myself and finding it hard to meet people, but I'm too embarrassed to ask now. I know that's not what it's about...
Answer: It's not symptomatic treatment. Those symptomatic treatments can be answered through general counseling programs.
Question: So, it's just about "What is the truth?" and that's it?
Answer: You just have to be thirsty for it without any conditions. If you attach any conditions, you will inevitably go in the wrong direction.
Question: "What is the truth?" Is this really the only thing?
Answer: (laughs) If you know this one thing, everything is resolved. My existence is singular; it's not complex.
Question: But perhaps because I live in such a complex world, I'm suspicious of simple things?
Answer: (laughs) That's our sickness. The Tao Te Ching also says that study is "損之又損" (loss upon loss), constantly subtracting until it's empty, until there's nothing, becoming the simplest... The reason it talks about that is because it is originally a simple unity. There is only one.
So, if you approach study with interest and keep doing it, you might unknowingly fall deeply into it. However, you can't force it, and if you approach it with an intention, you will eventually go towards that intention. That's why study doesn't happen. There's nothing else but thinking, without any conditions, "This is my life's task."