Ōshin Jennings is the founder of No Barriers Zen, a Zen Buddhist community in Washington, DC and online. Ōshin is the first known Deaf Buddhist priest and he received Dharma transmission from Shoho Michael Newhall in 2022. His mission is to use his experiences as a Deaf and disabled practitioner to help make meditation practices and the Dharma accessible to all people, especially those with historically limited access. Ōshin is also a psychotherapist and artist, and he is working on translating the sutras into ASL with his community.

Full Transcript

Well, it's really, really lovely to be back, to be back with Santa Barbara and Los Olivos folks. And just thank you so much for the warm welcome. As my bio said, and Monica explained, I'm deaf. And so, if at any point during my talk, you don't understand something I'm saying, or you can't hear me or something, that's fine. Just, if you're on Zoom, raise your hand or send me a little message in the chat. And same for those of you who are in person practicing. Give me a little high five and I'll repeat myself. As I like to say, I know I'm deaf. You're not going to offend me by letting me know you didn't understand something I said.

We're joining you from our little apartment just outside DC. And it was making me think about how our Sangha, our Maha Sangha, our greater Sangha here, is spread out and how amazing that is. It feels just like it's been just a few minutes since I was in Los Olivos and was able to practice with many of you in person. And now I'm back here in DC. And actually, we just got back from Minnesota as well. And I'll tell you that story. But yeah, our Sangha is all kind of spread out. And those of you who might be exploring taking the precepts with Pamela Sensei, you'll be joining our Sangha as well at Jikoji, our Mother Temple, if you will. And that assuredly makes us Sister Sanghas. So what a beautiful feeling. And so please, yeah, please join us as well. No barriers then. You can join us online or if you're on the East Coast. Please come join us. Come sit with us.

This beautiful idea of how we're all kind of spread out like this. At first, you know, in the beginning of quarantine and everybody jumping on Zoom and figuring this all out, it wasn't always comfortable. It wasn't always easy or smooth. But I had so many beautiful moments and I was reflecting about that because we just had a large in-person event. It was reflecting on this wonderful spread out web, this Indra's Net, if you will. All of us spread out and interconnected in a really different way.

I was sitting the other morning with our Sangha. We have Sangha members in California as well and across the United States and in other places around the world that sometimes join us as well. And sitting there on Zoom watching the light change on my wall, watching the light change move across our altar and also watching the light change in the rooms where you are. You know, or with a lot of our California people who join us really early in the morning, watching the light arise on their screens in their rooms. We even have one or two people who join us occasionally from Alaska. So really watching the light appear. Think about that. I mean, they're getting up like four hours before. In theory, they're getting up four hours before the Zazen and Balk before that early morning bell.

And yeah, so maybe we have some feelings about that. Feelings about getting up early. Feelings even about Zoom. You know, some of us are still kind of over it. Why is that? What is that? You know, maybe it's a quality of, this isn't what I thought it would be. This isn't what I asked for. Maybe we don't need to know how it's going to be. Is that okay? Can you still meet it? Can you still meet it exactly how it is? Can you just be this moment?

When I was in undergrad, there was a Zen group not far from campus. And I used to join them for sitting. They had a wonderful teacher who had become a practice friend over the years. When I was really young and sitting with them, at the end, the teacher would ask me, how was your sit? And I would say, good, good, it was good. And then we would clean up and stack the cushions. And then the next week, how was your sit? It was good, Sensei, good, good. And stack the cushions. And this went on for a few weeks. And I thought, hmm, wait a minute. How can you have a good sit? How can you have a bad sit? That's not good Zen. That's not right. So I said, I know. Next week, when he asks me, I'll see. So the next week, how was your sit, Oshin? And I said, bad, bad. And his response was, good, good. Now help me stack the cushions.

Good, bad. What was he teaching me? What was he showing me over many weeks, over all that time? How was your sit? How was your sit, Santa Barbara? How was it? Maybe it's not what you thought it was. Maybe you can still meet it directly.

So yes, no barriers, Zen, our little Sangha. We just finished a summer sesshin. We had about a dozen Sangha members come join us in Minnesota, where we have a small group of students, Sangha members. And so that's kind of where our Sangha is right now with Zoom and how we've changed and how we're returning to this normal and figuring that out still. We were kind of online with having different one-off events or sesshin in different places around the country. So we decided we were gonna do this recent one in Minnesota. And so we had a dozen or so people and only four of us had ever even sat sesshin before. And actually the majority of people who joined us had never sat more than one or two periods in a row. Just jumped in. And everyone sat every period. It was really, really fantastic, really interesting sesshin.

How was your sit-in busy? How was your sesshin? So we decided, okay, we're gonna just rent an Airbnb and we're just gonna have the sesshin. So we found this place on the shores of the Mississippi River. I know, I always think Mississippi River, not being from the Midwest, I think about the bottom. I think about the Delta. But it's actually this massive river flowing all the way through our country. And when, kind of this bisecting thing, I'm thinking about driving all the way out there, meeting everybody in the middle like that.

Well, anyway, so it's in this area where we were set up along the river. It's in this area where the Mississippi is like a big Northern kind of Delta. All of these shallow rivers and grasslands flowing together. And that whole area was missed by the glacial flow of the last ice age. So all of a sudden, I've never been here before. I have no idea where I'm going. Google Sensei is telling me to go straight and make a left and what. Google Maps Sensei tells me to go straight on. But here we are driving along following this river and all of a sudden, these rock formations, these buttes, these mountains appeared. But the rest of the Midwest has been leveled flat for thousands of years. Here all of a sudden, this untouched area. Maybe I don't know how it is. Maybe I don't know how it's supposed to be.

So we went in an Airbnb on the water. We all just showed up. We just did it. We just had a sesshin. And of course we all confront our stories of how it should be. And what are those stories really telling us? Those stories that we have, those resistances, those things that show up like that, they're just showing us our relationship with the moment. Maybe that's a way we can look at it.

So I just turned 40 as well. I turned 40 on sesshin, which is a very normal thing for me. Actually, my birthday was while we were driving, a two-day drive to get from the East Coast to get to the Mississippi Delta of Minnesota. But really, every birthday for over a decade, I've either been in residence doing summer retreats or sesshins or practice periods, summer ango, something like that. I've always kind of been in residence or in noble silence kind of for every birthday, pretty much from college on until now. And what's that like? What's that about? Driving across the country, stopping only for cheese curds, with our car filled to the brim with zafus and zabutons and an altar and a kettle. Just driving across the country to sit with some friends.

So it was making me think about a specific birthday I had while on sesshin. Well, one summer I was doing a practice period and I was one of the tenzo, one of the cooks. And so for the summer, show up at this not so well-equipped, not so well-maintained retreat center kitchen. We'd cook, cook, cook. And when it's been in the 80s and 90s, that meant in the kitchen itself, it would easily be 100 degrees or more. And we had this big, massive industrial oven that only kind of half worked. It's got massive cold spots and they're constantly spinning trays and moving things up and down. It was difficult. A lot of work to cook three meals a day and be on your feet like that, chopping away and rushing around. And like monks of old, trying to find time to get in for dokusan with our teacher and maybe get to sit a few periods between things and get up at four. Chop, chop, chop, chop and cook your head off. 9:30 or so, collapse. Get up, do it again. Again, again, again. Cooking for 40 or so, 40 plus people.

And the other tenzo I was working with, he had done this a lot more than I had. And he was saying the entire run-up to this summer practice period, he was saying, this is my last one, this is it. I'm not doing this anymore. I'm done, I'm done, man, I'm done. And to constantly kind of walk him back into the fold, please don't, please don't leave. But he said, okay, this is it, but this will be my last one. And so we talked to the guiding teacher about this and we got actually special permission to use eggs and dairy that summer. And I thought, oh, this is really great. Instead of being so vegan and so strict, we can kind of live it up a little bit. And my tenzo brother said, okay, well, this is my last year. I'm gonna pull all the stops. I'm gonna leave it all on the field. We're gonna have this kind of summer.

So, I mean, even like one morning we decided we made individual baked eggs for everybody. You have to picture, you know, 40, 50 people and you have these muffin tins, these industrial muffin trays. And we would put tomato sauce in the bottom and crack an egg or two, and then cover it with cheese and herbs. And we put these big trays in and we'd bake them up and they'd, you know, kind of pop out. And did the lovely baked eggs on these, on these cool mornings that we would sometimes have.

Well, this would be my life for the summer sometimes and other parts of the year. And really enjoyed it. And it was really tough also. And you would just get into the rhythm of getting up and working your head off and kind of not even thinking, just taking care of what needed to be taken care of. And you would go through this day after day and you might even forget it's your birthday.

So that's what happened. We were cooking along and I had this moment where I'm chopping away and I look across the kitchen and I see my brother tenzo, my brother cook. And beyond him, I see that that rickety oven is actually, it's on. We were always wrestling with this thing, turning it on and off and preheating it in weird ways and put a spoon in the door, just all of these things that we had to do to make it work. And I said to him, hey, is the oven on? I need, no, not even looking, no, it's not on. And we, okay, just back to work. Dogen said, think not thinking, okay, just doing my job, man. I just work here.

And then the next meal service we're prepping and I looked over and I said, oh, hey, is it on and on? Are we preheating for something? He said, no, no. I said, what's going on? He did, he's acting a little strange. And I had this moment where I realized, oh, tomorrow is my birthday. Oh, okay, wink, nod, the oven's not on. Okay, I can see that it's on. He's trying to pull something. Okay, okay.

So it goes on like this. And then here comes the dinner service. And then I see the oven is still on. And I say, well, I've baked a few chocolate cakes in my time, but I don't know any cake that bakes for 13 hours. What's going on? So I said to Dogen, hey, I think we've left the oven on. And he comes into the kitchen and he looks, oh my gosh, the oven is on. When did, and we're trying to figure out what are we doing? We kind of lost the plot. So he turns it off and leaves. And so I peeked into the oven and I see this wondrous sight of these dozen chocolate cupcakes baking away. I said, oh, wonderful, wonderful. How did they know, you know, one of these? Wow.

And then after cleaning up, I realized there's no way. I don't know what's going on. And the tenzo, my brother tenzo comes back in and I say, how long has the oven been on? You got those cakes in there and he says, cakes? And we're looking at each other and we realized something's messed up. And he flings open the oven and he hauls out this tray. And we realized we had forgotten a tray of those individually baked egg cups, covered in cheese. And they had baked for like 13 hours in the far back of this industrial oven. And they had, these are the cups that ballooned up with cheese and egg and everything, sauce and everything. And it ballooned up and then blackened over. It was a beautiful, glorious shine. And the only assumption anyone could ever have is that they were chocolate cupcakes for your birthday.

Well, dear readers, dear listeners, they were not chocolate cupcakes. And instead I spent the majority of the next day of my birthday on any little break that I should have had chipping out a muffin tin. It's my birthday. This isn't what was supposed to happen. Well, two, three hours ago, I had completely forgotten it even was my birthday.

Why are we like this? Why do we do this? Why are humans like this? And sometimes that's what you need to be focusing on in your practice. Just need to focus on seeing ourselves clearly, seeing our minds clearly, seeing our tendencies, our habits, seeing it clearly and learning to focus our attention and develop those qualities of attention. And we can't do that if we're hiding. And we can't do that if we're constantly telling ourselves stories. We can't do that if we're constantly putting barriers, barriers in our way, barriers in our practice.

Imagine all of these barriers we put up, all these resistances we have, all of these stories we have. All of that energy that we sink into propping those up and perpetuating those stories and keeping that habit energy alive or holding the door closed. All of that energy that we could be using to instead live our lives, to instead to meet the moment, to meet it how it is. Energy that can become freed up to help us live in more connected, more alive feeling, more purpose driven life.

So what do you wanna let go of? What's in the way? For me right now, I was thinking about that. And for me it's a lot of really subtle qualities of mind that I'm working with right now. I'm noticing comparing and judging coming up in my life and my practice. And so I'm able to, in my practice, to connect with that and look at what it is. Why am I doing that? What is it? What is it?

That classic Zen koan of koans, that appears in the Japanese as well as the Chinese and Korean traditions. What is it? What is it? So for me, that's stopping and listening, shining that light inward as Dogen would say, or as Kobun Chino Roshi would say, to really shine that light, to shine that light inward. And that light of my practice can help me see that fear, to help me see where I got hurt, to help me see the patterns of a culture that no longer serve the culture or serve me, what can be released? What am I ready to let go of?

And just sitting on the cushion here, you can just allow that, just allow your breath to kind of just sweep, to sweep those away. It's almost like letting silence kind of pull it, kind of sweep it away, just like the Mississippi, just like Monterey Bay, maybe. Just letting the tide coming in, pulling it out, just letting that silence of our practice.

So, this is a teaching that I thought I would also share with the sangha as we embarked on our sesshin together recently. Just let the silence, just let this practice sweep it away in a very gentle way, all of these first time sitters and first time sesshin participants, like, just let it allow, allow. Whatever's happening, just allow it to happen. And we just kept talking about this every day on sesshin. And the gorgeous qualities of light bouncing off the water and shimmering through our zendo. Oh, it's so easy to just say, allow, allow. When you're off of some other place and not in your life, then literal light, just allow, allow.

And then all of a sudden, all of our phones exploded at the same time. And it said, seek shelter, seek shelter, seek shelter. 80 mile per hour winds. And we're like, what? No, no. We're on sesshin. Look at the light. There's not a cloud in the sky. But this is what is happening actually. This is what's happening now. And it was. Very randomly, out of nowhere, a burst came through. And we had 80 mile an hour winds. So we all had to leap up off the cushion and run outside and pick up anything that wasn't nailed down and bring it into the zendo. What else could we do? And these winds whipped through.

So at a certain point, we all just went kind of down into the basement. Somebody grabs a bag of Oreos too. So all of a sudden we just all huddled in the basement with a bunch of candles, just eating Oreos, still kind of in silence, looking at each other. And then the winds died down and we went upstairs and sat some more. And then the next day, the last day, we just collected all the sticks and we had a nice big bonfire with all the down branches. We all wrote, I think I'm ready to let go of this. We put it on the fire. That was what happened. That was what was happening.

But it's an odd sensation to say allow, allow, allow. And to be confronted with, well, how much are you ready for? But we've all had those moments in our life where we feel like we're on our being. We feel like we found the rhythm. And then seek shelter, seek shelter. The klaxon, the siren, the air raid siren, the tornado alarm. Whatever it is goes off. The loved one gets sick. Something happens. And you say, okay, I'm ready to let go. I'm ready to do this practice. And then it's 80 miles per hour. And then you say, oh, I'll let go. But not that fast. I'm ready to let go. But not on those terms, on my terms.

I could feel myself saying, okay, okay, okay, but not like this. All of these people who I barely know, some of them I barely know. We're all crammed together in this house. I don't know where anything is. And I'm responsible for all of this. And we're having our Wizard of Oz moment. We're going to be lifted up into technicolor. We're going to be flown around. I don't know where I'm going to land.

And as we say in Zen, we say all beings preaching dharmas. It's almost like a storm could come and could give you one really good dharma talk. That shows you, hey, you've put some conditions on how you want this to go. You have even put conditions on how you're willing to let go or not. You're putting conditions on how you want it to be after you've let go. Okay, I'm going to let go, but only if it looks like this. Or I'm letting go because I know when I let go, I'm going to get this. We all do it. Why put that barrier? Why put that in the way?

That's the, you know, the gateless gate, the barrier of no barriers. That's why we call it there's no barriers in. We're both very interested in removing barriers to the practice so that people with limited access to the practice, people with disabilities and differences and all of it, we want them to practice. We want us to be able to practice. But also at its core, it's a play on words of this barrier that we have, these barriers that we put up. What's the open way in front of you? Without all of your added conditions. How can you step forward? Without becoming caught up in the beliefs you have about how things should be or the beliefs you have about yourself.

And then turning that light and then shining that light. How do we become not caught on those barriers I've placed? How can I see beyond this? Maybe I'm going to say beyond this small person to see that greater, wider view. This isn't how it's supposed to go. I mean, here we are in an Airbnb. It's, maybe it barely feels like a temple to me. Maybe being on Zoom isn't what I wanted. Maybe this weird deaf monk from the D.C. area to tell you how you should live your life isn't what I wanted.

I'll tell you another little story. This is a koan from the Book of Serenity. This is case number four. And it goes something like this. Once upon a time, the world-honored one was walking with the gods, the devas, and the humans. When he paused, he pointed to the ground and he said, this is a suitable site to build a temple. The god Indra then plucked a blade of grass from nearby and stuck it in the ground at that spot where the Buddha had pointed. And Indra declared, the temple is built. The world-honored one smiled.

So what is this? What is this koan? What does it mean to us? I'm building a little community. We're going on sesshin. I can just click and open Zoom and the temple is built. Or click, purchase Airbnb from date X to date X. Oh yeah, credit card, last four digits. Yep, the temple is built. Is it real? Is it enough?

While sitting with this koan, some things arose for me. There's this feeling sometimes that is this the correct way to do this? Is this enough? Or how? How do I do this? How do I walk forward? What's the next right move in my life, even? Can I be satisfied with the connections I have in my life? And the physical connections or lack of physical connections I have in my life? Right now. The lack of a physical meeting place for our sangha.

But then there's also this bigger theme when I drop down through that. This bigger theme for me is how do I feel about what's being said? Here we go. Just like that. There's not a lot of resistances I can have. If the god Indra's come down and plucked it up and put it right in the center of my life. The whole world is the temple. The temple is your intention. The temple is just my intention. And in my effort, yeah, it's like the temple is everywhere. I practice everywhere. I meditate everywhere I am. The temple is everywhere we meet.

With our sangha, it's great to see people joining us on Zoom from work. From their cars. From a park. All of a sudden. Los Olivos, Alaska. Wabasha, Minnesota. The whole world, the whole world is activated. What is it then? What is it? Maybe the temple is our intimacy. Indra comes down and plants a blade of grass. And Buddha smiles. Buddha smiled to show his approval maybe. But the temple is also Buddha's smile. It's us. It's our connection. It's us practicing together.

Now yes, this koan is on one hand about what it is to build a temple. And what it is to practice. And what it is to be sangha. And it's also for me about building places of refuge. For ourselves. Because it's what's needed. And for me that's why I practice right now. That's what I'm doing. And also on the other hand, how many hands is that? I keep contradicting myself. I'm going to end up like Avalokiteshvara on the other hand. On the other hand it's about how we view the world. It's about practicing in a way maybe where we can become a place of refuge. How our homes, our communities, our towns, our sangha, and ourselves can become a place of refuge.

And how do we do that? Sometimes maybe it's just about turning the whole world into our temple. You know, what's here? What's here? What can I use? And that's all Indra did. That's all. He used exactly what he had to illuminate. To shine his light, to shine the light. And to help others shine theirs. Just boop. It's built. It's built. You don't have to worry about that. It's done. You can now show up fully without judging or comparing yourself or your practice. Without judging or comparing this moment to another moment. This sangha with another sangha. This job with another job. This partner with another partner.

And why grass? Why did he pluck up a blade of grass? This is, if you've studied the Zen canon, the Zen literature for a while, you'll understand. You'll start to pick up on various in-speak and themes that we have. One of them, grass. You'll hear a lot about grass tips. Grass. Or blades of grass. Or the 10,000 grass tips. Or something like that. Anytime you hear a large number, like 10,000 usually, you can just cross out that line and underneath it just write everything. So anytime somebody is saying the 10,000 grass tips, they're saying all phenomena. The multitudes.

So on the one hand, some of you have been studying with me or Pamela Sensei or another teacher or sangha. And we understand that. It's relative. You've got Bushi. You've got Tess interpreting. You've got Susan joining on Zoom. You've got Monica. You've got all these people. Oshin has Oshin's bills he has to take care of. Susan has to prepare Susan's lunch. We understand we live in a relative world and it has to function like that. Oshin understands he is one with all things. He has to take care of his things too. So understanding that oneness is understanding the opposite. It's so we can see all the grass tips. My plucking one up. Is it one? Is it many?

So I won't give away the whole game, but this koan goes deeper than that. It goes deeper still. How? How do you actualize the Dharma right where you are? Indra did it to Buddha's approval. He brought forth all the relative and all the absolute with one move. One gesture. With what? With what was there? That is how we make sanctuary. That's how we make the refuge. By bringing together all the parts. By bringing together what's there. By stepping out of our fixed views. By meeting that moment. That's actualizing the Dharma. With what's there.

How? How do I do it? In front of Buddha, in front of the early sangha, in front of all the gods and devas. All come down in that moment. For this powerful moment. How? How do you do it? Just be the moment. Meeting the moment. That's it. It's collapsing those distances. And embracing a greater intimacy with all things. Maybe it's visiting a friend who's sick. Maybe it's opening the church doors or the hospice doors. And setting up the cushions. Maybe it's cleaning the bathroom. Again. And again. And again. Maybe it's learning to be a little more tender with yourself. When you're getting frustrated. That your art isn't looking like how it looked in your head.

When we let go of criteria. When we let go of judging and comparing. What my art should look like. What my sesshin experience should look like. What a temple should look like. What Buddha's shining temple should look like. Instead. You build it. You're always building it. With Mississippi mud. With Monterey Bay. Seals. The little birds that flit around in Los Olivos. With picking up trash. Do you know? Do you think if Indra was walking with Buddha. Through San Francisco. Maybe instead of a blade of grass, it would be. A hypodermic needle. But I don't want that. It's not what I. Well you said shine the light. Use what's there. Harmonize what's there. Bring it forward. Pick up that trash. Stick it in the garbage can. The temple is built. Eat Oreos in the basement. Huddle together with your sangha. This is one of the weirder birthdays I've had.

So I'd like to end with the poem. So each koan from these koan collections, each case, we call that the koan actually a case, the main body of it. And then you have the associated commentaries. There's an intro section and monks over the years have added little things and the headings and footers. We study these things. But the original poem from this collection, I'd like to read it to you.

The boundless spring on the hundred plants.

Picking up what comes to hand, he uses it knowingly.

The 16 foot tall golden body.

A collection of virtuous qualities.

Casually leads him by the hand into the red dust.

Able to master in the dusts.

From outside creation, a guest shows up.

Everywhere life is sufficient in its way.

No matter if one is clever as others.

So friends, thank you for your practice. I encourage you to drop it. Drop it. Drop your practice. Drop all the criteria. Just practice. Just build the temple. Go out there. Build the refuge you need. Build the refuge the world needs. Just be this moment. Meeting this moment.