Not Knowing –

I would like to start today’s Dharma talk with one of the most famous of the Zen Koans –

Attention! Master ​Dizang asks ​Fayan,
“Where have you come from?”
​Fayan replies, “I pilgrimage aimlessly,”
“What is the purpose of your pilgrimage?” asks ​Dizang.
“I don’t know,” replies ​Fayan.
“Not knowing is the most intimate,” remarked ​Dizang.
At that, ​Fayan experiences great enlightenment.

Not knowing is the most intimate. This line is the heart of Zen teaching, and as Norman Fisher, the former Abbot of the San Francisco Zen Center, has said, it is also the central point of many teachers’ practices. So what does this mean?

So traditionally, Koans are riddles that allow you to discover and answer beyond simple rational and logical thinking. What we are going to share today is not that I am not sharing some special awakened insight, but my “studentship” and my trying to see how I can apply this to my life. How I can make sense of not knowing is the most intimate part of my everyday life. First, I want to look at what it means to be intimate with someone or something.

Q So, what does it mean to be intimate?

The word “intimate” originates from the Latin term “intimus,” meaning “inmost, innermost, deepest.” It also comes from “intimatus,” which translates to “closely acquainted” or “very familiar,” as well as “inmost” or “intrinsic.”

Intimacy refers to that which is closest to us—specifically, the deepest, innermost part of ourselves and our experiences. To be intimate means that we are very familiar with something and closely acquainted with it. Intimacy carries with it an implication of vulnerability; it requires a willingness to open ourselves up.

As I have mentioned before, many of us, due to disappointment, suffering, and emotional exhaustion, live our lives in self-imposed solitary confinement. We may appear to walk around in the world, but inside, we remain locked in our solitary cells. To emerge and be intimate with life means embracing vulnerability once again and taking the risk of being hurt—and that can be terrifying. However, as the writer Richard Bach has noted, “The opposite of loneliness is not togetherness; it’s intimacy.”

Q: So what are some of the things that get in the way of intimacy?
According to Dizang, knowing – gets in the way of intimacy

Q: How does “knowing” get in the way of intimacy?
This kind of knowing is can also be called the trap of knowing

Q – what do you think is meant by the trap of knowing?

As human beings navigating a constantly shifting and vibrant world, we find ourselves in an endless and often fruitless quest for certainty. We yearn for security—a deep-seated need to anchor ourselves in a reality that feels stable and unchanging. Yet, we search for this sense of assurance in a world that inherently defies permanence.

Consequently, we often place a premium on certainty above all else. If you take a moment to observe your thoughts during interactions with friends, family, and loved ones, you’ll notice how readily we assume we can decipher their motives, thoughts, and feelings with unwavering confidence.

It strikes me as amusing how eager we are to proclaim this supposed understanding to anyone who will lend an ear. In doing so, we reveal our deep-seated desire to grasp the intricacies of human connection, even when the truth may be far more elusive than we imagine.

Candace behaves that way because she has always believed X, or my dad acts that way because he feels guilty about Y. This tendency is especially evident in our polarized times. If I assume (which really means I believe) that all Republicans are, at their core, fascists, or that all Democrats are, at their core, socialists, then my beliefs are obstructing my understanding.

This may sound overly simplistic, but if we think this a little, it keeps us from spending time, interacting, or getting to know the “other.”

I appreciate this quote from Mika Korhonen . where she writes that knowing is one of the most pernicious of mental trapes

“In the state of ‘knowing’ we feel satisfied. It is like complete puzzle with no pieces missing. We go around and ask questions until all the gaps are filled. If there are no pieces missing anymore then there is no reason to go searching!”

I know therefore I am done thinking, I am done asking questions, I am done learning. The knowing we are talking about here is the kind of knowing that gets in the way of intimacy with others, with ourselves, with our lives and our practice.

The path to intimacy isn’t knowledge but the invitation that comes from asking a question to understand another.

The only way we can get know someone, or to get to know our lives is to start with I don’t know – for years I told the story of my father – in all its unflattering details – but I realized that I had no idea who my father was and is and still don’t because true knowledge comes from being willing to see the other beyond our stories of who they are – and to ask.

And this also applies to our practice. When we even think we Know with a capital K what mediation is, what Buddhism is, what awakening is, what enlightenment is – who we are, we are cutting ourselves off from what it really is when we let it manifest in our lives naturally, unhindered by our silly meddling.

I don’t know – but maybe that is what Dizang mean when he said to Fayan

“Not knowing is the most intimate,”

As Socrates taught

“To know, is to know that you know nothing. That is the meaning of true knowledge.” –Socrates

And I love this quote from Daniel J Boorstin,

“The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance—it is the illusion of knowledge.”

This “not knowing” I am referring to is not confusion or paralyzing doubt. When I say, “I don’t know,” I am talking in the spirit of openness and curiosity as in, “I don’t know! Let’s find out!” or “Let’s keep going and see what happens,” it is the ‘not knowing” of faith. It’s the “not knowing” that comes after being defeated time and time again as Josh Bartok from Boundless Way Zen writes

“Defeated by our lives, defeated by our minds, defeated by our spiritual practice. This then unfolds into a really profound – and profoundly uncomfortable – not knowing. This not-knowing then gives way to a kind of receiving, a receiving of just this, of this moment as it is, a receiving … a receiving of Amida Buddha’s compassion. And a receiving of ourselves.”

The Buddha experienced this when he tried for six years assorted practices to find awakening – when he realized he did not know the way to wake up and to just sit under the Bodhi tree until he awoke. It was his unknowing that allowed awakening to find him.

What we are aspiring to is the the not knowing of Suzuki Roshi’s Beginner’s Mind, in Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind,

“With beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert mind there are few.” Beginner’s mind is the essence of not knowing”

It’s embracing the joy of unlearning what we thought we knew about ourselves and others as Gareth Young from Red Clay Sangha has written,

I am finding that I am unlearning more every day and am more aware of each person I meet as a beautiful, radiant manifestation of the same reality that manifests me, not different and not the same.

Ahh and here is intimacy manifest – contemplation, mediation and mindfulness are doors to intimacy not just with ourselves but with the world around us. I love this from A Hillman,

“The more we tune to our core, the more our boundaries widen and melt. We begin to see ourselves in others and others in ourselves. We let go of our hold on what we think we know and tremble as the energy of the unknown rises within us. We stumble on the lair of a wild creature in our bowels. Our kinship with the grasses and hills grows, and beasts of the forest and soaring birds of prey acknowledge their counterpart in us. The whole world enters as if through our pores, shining threads of light spun across chasms of separateness.

Love coheres. It is an energy that unites. Love joins us to the mysterious dimension of the One. This intimate communion leaves us wide open and exquisitely sensitive to Presence—inside, outside.”

As Dogen taught, “Enlightenment is intimacy with all things,” and not knowing is how we open ourselves up to intimacy,

So how can we cultivate the non-dual spirit of “I don’t know”? The first thing is to simply be willing not to know, to let go of the knowing. I have found the world is lighter when I am free of having to know, I am more patient, less stressed, open.

Here are two concrete things we can do to cultivate the not knowing.

First, there is a good practice suggested by Buddhist teacher, Gil Fronsdal, is to attach “I don’t know” to as many thoughts as possible.

“For example, when thoughts arise like, this is good, or this is bad, or I can’t handle this; these become, I don’t know if this is good or I don’t know if this is bad or I don’t know if I can’t handle this. “

As he says, “the phrase “I don’t know” questions the authority of everything we think.” It allows us to be free of fixed ideas; it can create curiosity and allows openness to creativity.” He goes on to say that this simple phrase can help us challenge tightly held beliefs and can “pull the rug out from under our most cherished beliefs.” Not knowing opens the world to us, it makes way for us to be compassionate, patient, kind, honest and help cultivate equanimity.

The last thing that we can do to cultivate the essence of “I don’t know” is bowing. James Ishmael Ford has written about not knowing and how it relates to the act of bowing.

“Not knowing is, in essence, the ancient spiritual practice of bowing. I believe that this act can open our hearts and lead us to places we never imagined. It takes us to a tangible, transformative, and boundless world of possibility known as not knowing. I want to emphasize that this state of not knowing is filled with endless creative potential. To use another metaphor, one or two are simply not enough to describe this experience. When we surrender to not knowing and bow to life, we uncover a well that seems bottomless, filled with rejuvenating waters.”

I raise my hands in gassho and bow to each of you. May we be like Fayan and in our not knowing experience great enlightenment.

In closing, these two simple yet profound practices—attaching “I don’t know” to our thoughts and bowing in humility—offer us a way to step out of the confines of certainty and into a more spacious, compassionate way of being. “I don’t know” is not a failure of understanding but a gateway to wisdom, inviting us to loosen our grip on rigid beliefs and open to what is unfolding. Bowing, likewise, is a physical expression of surrender and reverence, grounding us in the present and connecting us to something greater than ourselves. In the spirit of Fayan, may our not knowing not be a void, but a vastness—alive with possibility, presence, and the quiet unfolding of awakening.