Do you remember the line in one of the Beatles' songs, " He's a real nowhere man, sitting in his nowhere land..."? I see this line as being a "sign of the times". There are various signs of various times which may not be evident to everyone, but when you are open to them and get a smell of them a little bit ahead of time, before they make themselves obvious; it can be pretty scary. You don't know what's going on, you don't know what you're reading, you don't know that what you see is indeed what you see, and that what you see is, in fact, a new trend in the world, a new state of being. An interesting aspect of being a Zen priest for so many years is that it has given me the opportunity, for better or worse, to panic at various signs, not realizing that they are simply stages ... passing stages.
 
We think in decades. We love decades, don't we? -- the '30's, the '40's, the '50's, the '60's, the '70's, the '80's -- right? What is weird is that "decades" seem to work. We can compartmentalize occurrences with them; we'll stuff this one in the '50's box and that one in the '40's box. I remember being a Zen priest in the '60's box and in the '70's box. I was ready to close the Temple. This was when the Temple was on Halsted Street in Chicago. I don't know how many of you are familiar with Halsted Street. Its Yuppieville now, but back then people were walking down the street with no shoes on. This is a rather nasty practice when you consider all the dogs that walk those same streets and the heat of the sun which dries up a lot of things beside rain.

During this time people were coming to the Temple with headbands, tie-dyed shirts, and stinking, dirty feet. It got so bad that we bought socks to distribute for those who didn't have them. We began making announcements, asking people, please, if they chose not to wear shoes or even if they wore sandals, to bring a pair of socks to wear in the Temple. I am not exaggerating. I did not invent this. I experienced it.
 
These people, who came to the Temple reeking of marijuana, were leftovers from the '50's and the Jack Kerouac days, the Beat Generation. They were coming to get freedom. They didn't realize that the price of freedom is dear, that it requires sitting for two forty-minute periods on the cushion. They were able to perceive the freedom that is evident in Zen Buddhism as a philosophy, as a way of life, but they circumvented in their own minds, conveniently of course, the work involved which is sitting on the cushion.
 
So I look around me and see things changing. It makes me realize how prophetic the Beatles were. Although they were speaking of their times, I don't think they realized how they were speaking for the future, this period, the Nineties. These changes concern me, because this is my Temple and I am the head priest. My disciples change with the times, too. It's a constant treadmill except that I do always have disciples. I look among them for one vein that is golden, for something to keep the Soto line going after I'm under ground.
 
I had one ex-disciple say, "I can't see what I'm getting out of it." Of course, he was talking about zazen. As he spoke, I listened in amazement. It struck me like a fist in the face that this person, who had heard so many of my talks about not attempting to get anything out of zazen, would say this thing. As soon as you make that initial grab, as soon as that little paw goes out, it's all over -- you've contradicted the raison d'etre, the whole reason for the existence, the purpose of zazen. "I can't see what I'm getting out of it, so I'm splitting." You don't see what you're getting out of it, because it's too close to your nose. What you are getting out of it will become evident as your zazen matures. You plant a seed and you watch it grow. I mean, what's new in life? Why should development in zazen and Zen Buddhism be any different? The planting of the seed is the sitting on the cushion. That first sitting is the planting; the follow-through is the nurturing; the result is what you gather from careful, continuous cultivation. The scary thing is that statement: "I don't see what I'm getting out of it."
 
Zazen has always been a clarifier, a purifier, a process of distillation which a human being goes through, physically and mentally. It's a continuous process, true, but it is a process that starts bringing results quite soon after you begin practicing zazen. I can tell you very clearly, very surely that your zazen, assuming you realize it to be lifelong commitment, will grow boundlessly richer and deeper. This will happen in ways impossible to foresee because of the element of time. By time, I mean retrospection. Twenty years ago I could not even perceive the bottomless well of profundity. Indeed zazen is the quintessence of the universe which reinvents itself in its own time. You are tapping into the very core, the source, of all things. If there is a God, in zazen you are knocking on that door. However, zazen
does not seem to be filling the void as it should be. I hope I'm wrong, that indeed if this is an indication of things to come, a sign pointing to more; I pray to whatever 'powers that be' that I am wrong. There is another frightening sign of the times that is beginning to escalate: we must have the answers. As you probably know, Professor Huo is the former director of the Chinese Cultural Academy. He left here with an increasing discouragement with his students. The revolving-door syndrome got to him. This is the only country where he experienced the student teaching the teacher. It doesn't take much ego assertion for a student to become a teacher, which is frighteningly perverse.
 
I have spent my life in discipleship. I've been blessed with an innate understanding of discipleship as assuming a position of absolute receptivity and trust to another. It's a hellish process. It's agonizing, yet unimaginably rewarding in the level of revelatory insight it affords. The teacher may ask your opinion, or advice on various matters, but you must never delude yourself into thinking that now, you teach the teacher. This would never have been acceptable to the people with whom I studied. These people came from hundreds of years of tradition. It isn't the idea of tradition itself as being almighty, as being cast in stone; but an understanding that there is a smelting process at work. This is the beauty of tradition. What doesn't work has been discarded and what does work has been adopted and assimilated. This is a continuous process of evolution. When it comes to you, when it drops in your lap or you drop in its lap, inadvertently you have inherited this whole process. I can safely say that this does not qualify you to revamp it completely.
 
Of all the ages this one is the most dangerous due to our obsession with having all the answers when we don't even know the questions. I was telling someone that I had made a taped lecture about "yeah, buts", the people who must have an answer. You say something and the response is "yeah, but..." followed by the oh, so desperate words of wisdom, the answer avalanche. So, 1 could not find the tape of the lecture and I told this person that now I would have to make another tape. This person said, "Oh yeah, but it won't be as good as the first." You see what I mean about dangerous? Ives this is blindness, what is the color black?
 
Also (and this goes hand in hand) I've never experienced such isolation between teacher and disciples and amongst disciples themselves as I do now. I can tell you this is true, because I've lived through discipleship then and now. I can say, "Yes, I've seen it happen. I've been there." Contact was always maintained; relationships were always maintained. Discipleship did not automatically infer a love affair, but disciples were always courteous and kind to each other. Remember kind? It's become an archaic word. Kindness. Disciples were always kind to each other. They may have gone their separate ways, but they always maintained contact with each other, certainly with me. Now we have this isolation box, this kind of mini-refrigerator that extends through all relationships. I'm not just talking about disciples, I'm talking about everyone.
 
In the past, I've never experienced any pettiness or snideness or hate or jealousies or any expressions of such meanness, such smallness. You see, the world of discipleship, the Buddhist Sangha, is a world in microcosm. What you see, what you experience and live in here, within the Sangha, you can be sure is a concentrated form of the external world. Everything is heightened; everything is blown up, exaggerated, not out of proportion though, sadly enough, just big enough for you to see it. The trouble is I haven't seen anyone smart enough yet to warrant assuming any negative stance. Ives you come to the temple, zazen should form the bedrock of your life. Whether disciple or laymen, zazen is designed to mirror your life clearly, to bring you back to earth so you can clearly see: "Oh, I'd better take a vacation, I'm losing It."; but if you don't see this -- that's the point. Do you get it? To see it is wonderful, that's healthy ... then you make amends, back up, tighten up the game and go forward. Life is forward march. Yes, ultimately into the grave, but there's something to be enjoyed along the way. The more life deepens and ripens through the practice of zazen then it's worthwhile.
 
There's a new age a-comin', folks. Babies are now old wise people. No one wishes to be a student; no one wishes to be a learner, just a learner.  It's sad that everyone wishes so desperately to be recognized as being "knowing". Why? Is there that much lacking in one's selves that it has to be counteracted so vehemently?
 
Let's think. Let's think very carefully, so that we do not become nowhere men in a nowhere land, where we have no deep sense of selves-worth or of the value of life. So many of us are running so fast we don't realize that the guy up ahead of us who we are trying to pass is ourselves. Let's all review our own lives and ask, "What the hell is going on? Is he right?" At least ask yourselves that. Think hard and respond. I am just planting a seed. Now you must do the cultivating.