Sit immovably in original stillness. This conveys much. Sit steady as a mountain in the pristine silence you can find on high mountain peaks, not affected by the bustling life beneath. Thinking does not need to follow the arising of thought and does not need to lead into narration. Thought arises – no need to get involved. We can take note: this thought, this feeling. When we notice we get lost in thinking, we can return to just being present in this body sitting here and now. This is not repression; it is a gentle and aware repositioning. And it may be good to take the subject of your thinking after meditation to a suitable place to think.

Dogen also says implicitly: think the fundamental ‘thought’ which is not intentionally ‘not thinking’. We sit, neither getting involved with thought, nor with no thought, so we do not resist thought. The same counts for feeling: feeling and thought are not such separate phenomena as you might think; they are entangled. They naturally arise because we are alive. One translator of Zen master Dogen’s work, Gudo Nishijima, translates the depth beyond thought where the mind rests, as a ‘concrete state’. I prefer: a concrete transparency. The above concise instruction is the very basis of zazen.
This zazen is not learning concentrated meditation. It is simply the Dharma-gate of peace and joy, the realization in practice of enlightened wisdom.

Concentration seems to still have an object, a purpose, an aim. We are not learning concentration, we are not learning to focus on something, we are not learning first this and then that, we are not after specific results. When we sit this way, we emulate and join the enlightened wisdom, which is already there. We realize what is already happening through the practice of not doing anything else.
The universal is revealed through the particular without means.

The particular is you as you are, things, as they are. This particular thing or you right here right now. Each moment of particularity, the universal is revealed without means. No need to try, to grasp for methods and means. Let go. This sentence is a crucial one; it is an explanation of the word koan. The particular problem of now ( = koan) reveals universal truth. When we look with care, we see that this seemingly limited, particular instance opens as a window into universal being. Without means. It simply happens. This simply is so. Dogen uses the words nets and baskets for means. Nets and baskets are used to catch beings. Being cannot be caught. We do not need any nets, hooks or baskets to catch the universal. It is already freely present each instance of being, precisely as it is.

Once you grasp this, you are like a dragon disporting in water or like a tiger reposing on a mountain. You naturally know that the true Dharma manifests of itself and that darkness and confusion have already been cut down.
We can rest, knowing our true element is all around us. This is a great joy. We can entrust ourselves to life, whatever it’s koan brings. We naturally know – this knowing is inherent in our being – we already know the Truth and that it manifests of itself. So we realize there never was any darkness or confusion to begin with.

When you arise from meditation, move slowly and get up calmly; don’t move abruptly. It is clear that the ability to transcend the profane as well as the sacred, or to cast off body and mind while sitting or standing, is entirely due to the efficacy of zazen.
Both the profane and the sacred can be transcended in zazen. We can let go fully of any identification with mind or body while we sit or stand. We have heard even of some ancestors who left this life sitting in zazen or standing up.

Also, the discriminating mind cannot understand how a shift in perspective can come with a gesture or an occurrence; or how an unexpected sight or sound can catalyze realization. With accomplished supernatural powers one cannot grasp this either.
This paragraph I have shortened into its essential message. Dogen enumerates some eight examples in shorthand, which refer to the stories of the awakening of various masters. One ancestor had a change of perspective on existence when this (…) happened. Another practitioner realized his original state when that (…) happened. What the details are does not matter. Sometimes a master helped a disciple turn her mind around. Sometimes this happened due to an occurrence in nature. These occurrences are potentially present all the time, but they can only bring about a change in our perspective when we are ready.

Our discriminating mind can neither understand zazen nor the change of perspective it brings about. It cannot explain it. We cannot even perceive it with the ordinary mind. Even with supernatural powers it escapes us. Because:
Such noble presence is not bound to form or colour, how could its pathway possibly not precede perception and conception.
Dogen expresses himself strongly with a double negation, i.e. it is preceding perception and conception – It is freely already present, before we even see or think or feel or conceptualize. This noble presence cannot be defined. It is not describable or conceivable and it is vibrantly present.

It therefore does not matter whether you are intelligent or not; it does not work differently for the sharp- or for the dull-witted.
This is good news for all, both for persons who rely on their faculties and for those who are not inclined or capable of conceptualization. The Buddha Nature is present in all, whatever their abilities. Let this encourage those who are always trying to work things out, who hold on to the cerebral, to put that down. Let this encourage those of us, who are not into reading, to trust ourselves – we have what we need already!
Making a wholehearted effort is in itself practising the Way. Practice has naturally the purity of enlightenment and enlightenment will increasingly penetrate your everyday life.

The Way lacks nothing. It simply needs wholehearted expression, which comes in practice. In practice the enlightened mind, which is the foundation of our being, is naturally present. The more we practice, the less the Way is obscured, and the more it shows.
The fundamental Buddha mind universally pervades both this and other worlds, India and China, East and West. Everywhere the way of practice of this school is equally available to everyone, as it is simply sitting immovably in original stillness with one’s whole being. Although there are many different ways to approach the Truth, to verify it you cannot dispense with the earnest inquiry of zazen.

Any world, geographical or spiritual world, the world of beings, the world of objects, is pervaded by the Buddha mind. In all parts of the globe, spirituality has sprung from and has mixed with some form of sitting still. Human beings and also animals intuitively know that. The Sufi’s, Christian contemplatives, Vedanta- and Advaita-practitioners, American Indians – all practice some form of meditation on their path to Truth. Whatever time or culture we are in, we cannot dispense with the earnest exploration of zazen. Zazen naturally unifies form and formlessness, appearance and timelessness. It brings insight in and acceptance of life and death. Formless and loving it flows with any form.

Why roam through dusty realms of other lands, forsaking your own sitting place?
Other countries may look interesting, smell different, feel nice and we may think that the grass is greener there. But all we need is ‘here’. Lost in characteristics, in this or that, in distraction, we roam in the land of ‘other’, ignoring the home of the true self, our home where self and other are one life.

One wrong step and you are immediately off track.
Breaking the Precepts because of ‘want’ or ‘don’t want’, or simply wandering after pleasures, I loose track of my direction. As Dogen says in the beginning: the Buddha mind then slips out of sight through confusion.
You already have the crucial opportunity a human body brings. Do not use your time in vain but guard the essence of the Buddha way. Who could be satisfied with fleeting pleasures? This human form is as short-lived as dew on the grass. Like a flash of lightning this life comes and goes in a moment, gone as if it had never been.
Some participants of this retreat are keenly aware of the preciousness of this life. What is it good to do with my life? Do I marry? Do I become a doctor? What about monastic life? How can I best live according to my true wish? How can I keep up the commitment to my practice?

Dedicated practitioners, do not get so used to partial reality and to seeming appearances, that reality ends up scaring you.
It is easy to get trapped into thinking that we know what something is, that we know what the case at hand is about. Dogen plays here with a reference to an old story from the Buddha’s time about some blind people who were grouped around an elephant and, touching just a part of it, asked to describe what it might be. They all came out with something different: a tree (foot), a rope (tail), a snake (trunk), – all partial reality. It takes some letting go to see the whole picture, to not take what seems to be for what is. If we are stuck with our way of looking at the world, reality (literally: the dragon of reality – i.e. great awesome being) scares us.
Devote yourself to the upright, direct way.
Upright of body, upright of mind. It is direct, im-mediate.

Respect those who have severed the ties of knowledge and live free of goals and intent.
Dogen was very knowledgeable. He studied Chinese and Japanese classics from a young age. His explanation of the Dharma is not simple and easy. But he knew not to depend on this erudition, he severed the ties to it. Also, we can live free of doing ‘in order to’, to live in the present and trust what you are, trusting the fundamental being of things. Trusting this, I can, like Kanzeon, be anything: even what I am – which I often do not want to be – myself.

Harmonize with the Buddha’s enlightened wisdom; receive the ancestors’ transmission of samadhi. When you practise this continually, you are surely becoming this; the store of treasure will then open naturally and you will be able to receive and use it, according with and fulfilling the true wish.
We saw that we harmonize naturally with bodhi in zazen. Samadhi means: being absorbed in ‘not two’, aware and one as this. You receive this from the always present, the ‘ancestors’, and from those who realized this before.
Practicing this continually, the store of treasure of compassion, love and wisdom will be ours to use so that all beings will find this also. Our being may help others; we cannot hold on to a way to help others. We cannot hold on to an ideology, however beautiful. Compassion, love and wisdom flow free of fixed forms.