..續本文上一頁 to walk at all and you won”t be able to join the walking periods. As to the upper part of your body, I have noticed that some of you wrap up your heads. That”s not appropriate when sitting in meditation. You absolutely should not wrap up your heads. Your heads must be exposed. You can”t even take it when your head gets a little cold

　　 You shouldn”t wrap the upper part of your body at all--only your legs. You can wear more clothes on the upper part of your body to keep from being cold. If you wrap the upper part of your body so that you”re cozy and warm, you will fall asleep and you won”t be able to apply effort at your meditation. It doesn”t matter if the upper part of your body is a little cooler; in fact it”s better.

　　As to sitting, I have noticed Guo Yu”s way of sitting and I am always correcting him. Sometimes I see him sitting like that and I wonder what he is doing. That”s not sitting in meditation. You can”t pull your knees up like that. If someone does that in the Chan hall, he should be beaten with the incense board. That certainly merits a beating. Nor can you stretch out your legs down in front of the bench. That”s the behavior of a lazy worm! Incomparably lazy! Anyone who acts like that is domnright shiftless. Anyone like that is not worth much. You cannot be so casual. You can”t put your head down just because you feel like it or do anything else just because you feel like it. At all times you must be solid and strong. Just at that point you must be like vajra. no one else has the strength that you have. Don”t moan and groan and say, "Ultimately what”s the meaning in all this

　　" You really make a fool of yourself.

　　Some people sit like this [demonstration] Ah! These strange styles are too weird. Coming to America I see the way you meditate and I think, "Really! That”s just too much! A bunch of freaks! Too weird!" But I”ve never said it aloud before. I never mentioned it while we were at Tianhua Temple on Waverly Place and I never said anything when we came here. Nobody--absolutely no one--ever wraps a blanket around himself during the walking periods. That”s really too strange. It”s really a sign of having come to the wilderness where no human beings can be found! And so today I”m mentioning it to you: no one ever wraps a blanket around himself during the walking periods in China. And so when I came here I asked myself: "What is this

　　" I”d never seen such a weird style. No one ever wraps a blanket around his torso. Never! In the Chan halls that would never happen. Everyone is the same. Each person wears a padded robe and tucks it in around his legs. No one does anything to bother anyone else. You can”t come up with some weird style. If you are afraid of the cold, you can wear more clothes. Especially Guo Fa, who basically isn”t afraid of the cold and yet insists on wrapping himself up in a blanket. To tell you the truth, I am very fond of Guo Fa. And so when he used this strange style, I didn”t say anything to him. But today I”m mentioning it. There are others who do it too.

　　If you feel cold you can put on more clothes. I too am afraid of cold and afraid of heat. And yet in all the years I”ve sat in Chan halls, I”ve never wrapped myself up in a blanket--even when I slept in the Chan halls. At Zhengjiao (Proper Enlightenment) Monastery in Hubei, I was assigned to be door-keeper. At night it was very cold where I sat. But I never pulled my blanket up to wrap around the upper part of my body. I only wrapped my legs. When you sit in the cold, you don”t fall asleep. That”s what”s great about it! If you are too warm, you will sleep; and if you fall asleep, you can”t work at your skill.

　　Every year when I was in Hubei at that monastery, a very rare fragrance would fill my nostrils. That rare fragrance was quite…

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