Gil and I have been associated with each other for many, many years. Especially when I was at the Lakeland Center in the 80s and 90s is when we associated with each other. I always had quite a fondness for Gil. I always thought That was just something that I always felt. And it actually didn't come to fruition until... I don't know. You know what I'm talking about. So, I actually was able to do that. And John has created quite a wonderful organization for his teaching. And what kind of things I can't remember at all, I can't repeat it.

[01:17]

I've got it out there in the net. I think the founder of the insight And also the Insight Meditation Center in New York City, which is now a residential. And he's been teaching since around 1990. And he practices Zen and compassion meditation. So he's the author of several books, one called The Issue at Hand, and Monastery Within, and a book called Unhindered, and a translation is on the bottom.

[02:42]

Thank you, Mel, very much. And I first met Mel in 1976 when he came up to Davis in his little Volkswagen Bug to lead a half-day sitting. And during the half-day sitting, there was a chance for practice discussion. And I was so nervous that I couldn't speak. And he had to tell me, he said, Gil, breathe deeply. That was his first instruction to me. So here we are, many years later. Thank you for having me. Is the volume adequate for everyone? A little bit louder? Because I have a... The system unfortunately doesn't have a vital control if you bring the mic closer to you. See, is this better now? Good? Is that better?

[03:54]

Can you hear? So, okay. So let me know if my voice gets quiet. Wave your hands or something because I'm quite happy to try to figure out a way to adjust. I guess if I talk like this, if I look at the floor, is that better like that? No, that's too much. Okay, so let's see. Is that going to be okay for people? Backwards a little bit lower? How's that? Up or up? Up. Let's see. Okay, let's see. So let's see. Keep talking. So let's see. It marvels to me that the Buddha spoke without a mic to 2,500 people. And one of my favorite Dharma talk stories that I aspire to is, Gary Snyder tells a story of practicing in Japan in the 60s, and there was a famous old Zen master that people would come from all over Japan to listen to his Dharma talks, to his teishos.

[05:09]

And the thing was that he spoke so softly, no one ever could hear what he had to say. And it didn't matter. So that's what I'm hoping to, I'm waiting for that day. So what I had in mind to talk about is, or talk around, is the idea of intention, resolve, vows. my involvement with Zen Buddhism has a lot to do with the four bodhisattva vows. In some ways they represent the central organizing principle for how I live my life. And there are teachings from the ancient Buddhist suttas that I refer to often that are comparable, something called the four resolves. And so I thought it might be interesting to talk about the four resolves and maybe see the connection or the similarities to the four vows.

[06:16]

And intention is quite important. So I've done both vipassana and Zen practice. And after I practiced in Thailand and Burma for a while, I came back to a Zen center in San Francisco. And I'd been ordained as a priest by then. And I was at a priest meeting. And we were having some kind of conversation. And I asked a question. I said, why is it? that in the Zen Center, when we have practice discussion and talk about practice, we seem to never talk about what happens during meditation. But in Vipassana, that's all they talk about, kind of. And one of the teachers there said something that had a big impact on me, a very nice statement, I thought. And he said, oh, the reason for that, Zen, we focus on intention, and Zen practice is the purification of intention. And this idea of purifying intention kind of that stayed with me and made a lot of sense to me and something that I've kind of explored and worked with probably as a way of thinking about Zen practice.

[07:18]

And it's certainly a nice contrast to the idea of using meditation to attain something, to get something. To purify something is in some ways is to allow the essence of something to come out because there's no gunk that's kind of clouding it over or hiding it or something. So they're purifying your intention. And so as I kind of engaged in Zen and found my way to the bodhisattva vows, it's probably helpful to go back to the very beginning of my practice, that time when I was in Davis. I was there being a student at UC Davis. That's when I started having a regular meditation practice. I meditated twice a day, every day except for Sunday. And the reason I didn't do Sunday was that I'd been a guest student at San Francisco Zen Center and they didn't meditate on Sunday, didn't do Zazen.

[08:21]

So I thought that's how it was done. And I thought maybe it was reasonable to take a day off. And I started doing Zazen like that because I was suffering. And I thought that somehow the Zazen would help. And after some months of doing it, in fact, in a way, I don't know exactly how it helped, but after a while, the particular motivation, the particular suffering I had that got me interested in practicing like that kind of fell away, or I was no longer interested in it, or something like that. And I found it very strange that I continued to meditate, because I didn't have a reason anymore And I'm kind of rational. And so I thought that, you know, you should do things because you have a reason. But I didn't have a reason anymore, but I kept doing it. And so I thought that was really weird. And so I kept doing it, but I kept looking, why am I doing this? Why do I keep, why do I keep doing this?

[09:22]

And at some point, this was the best answer I could come up with for myself, that I was sitting Sazen in order to express myself or to express something. in the way that maybe an artist would express herself on canvas or in sculpture or something. And it was something that was inside, that was just coming out, maybe a little bit like creativity, I don't know what. It was coming out, and that was the purpose. I wasn't trying to attain anything or get anything, and I was no longer trying to get away from anything, but rather, it just felt really right. There was a rightness to having this expressivity come out of me, just sitting there, kind of just being. But to say just being doesn't quite say enough, because it was more dynamic. It was kind of a dynamic sense of... And if I had another word to put on it, what was going on for me, the word I used, or the concept I used was integrity. That I was sitting there with integrity, or I touched into a kind of sense of integrity.

[10:25]

I probably didn't know what that word meant, really, when I was, you know, I was pretty young and naive, But that was the word that I came up with. And I think what I had in mind was a sense of whole. And luckily, I knew very little about meditation. If you learn too much about meditation, if you listen to vipassana teachers too much, it's not so good for some people, especially for Zen students, because you get all these ideas of what's supposed to happen. So I didn't have any, very little ideas, and I didn't have the idea that I was not supposed to be thinking. And that was kind of pretty good for me because thinking was then, I didn't see it as a problem, but I didn't think I should be thinking either. So it wasn't like I was getting involved in my thoughts, but I also wasn't trying to stop them. I just was trying to show up and be here and be with my breath. And in doing that, something started to shift and the sense of what I called back then integrity began to arise.

[11:28]

The sense of just allowing something to be expressed arose. And as I continued my Zen practice, there was a variety of, you know, it unfolded in a variety of ways. And in some ways I was not so conscious or aware of how I was being changed by Zen practice. I think maybe I was too busy thinking I knew what it was about to notice what was really happening. And one of the important things that happened over the first few years is that I became compassionate. That sense of compassion began to well up and arise for me in a way that I wasn't looking for it, I wasn't expecting it, I didn't put any particular value on it, oddly enough. And so, but that became one of the most important things that happened in my first years of Zen practice was this welling up of a sense of compassion. And in terms of this expressivity or this purification of intention, it wasn't something that I was trying to do or trying to be, but it was a welling up from within.

[12:40]

And I got the sense again that the Zen practice could be just kind of just being a form of expression, a form of just allowing, like the practice was doing me rather than I was doing the practice. And it's a very different kind of way of looking at practice than what is often people associate meditation with, because meditation too often has the idea of trying to attain something, doing a technique, X, Y, and Z, and if you have this issue, then do this, and these are the different stages you can experience, and people measure themselves by it. And so there was very little of that in my mind. but rather this idea that just making space. And I wasn't trying to make space for things to happen. What I was trying to do was just be fully, not even fully present, but I was trying to have a certain kind of radical acceptance or thorough acceptance of whatever was happening in the moment.

[13:43]

And with that, I got to look at a lot of how I was not accepting the present moment, how I was judging it, or trying to change it, or fix it, or all kinds of things. But for me, coming back to just being, accepting of this moment as it is, and a lot of that for me was being with my suffering. But in doing that, something began to bubble up, or flow out, or something started to be for me, and this idea of expressivity. And compassion is part of that expression. And I remember once running into Sojan Roshi at Tassajara, and we passed each other in the paths. I think we were kind of walking at right angles to each other. And so I leaned over to him and said, spontaneously, it wasn't planned or anything, I said to him, it may be an unfortunate use of words for this purpose, but I said to him, I feel like I'm becoming a response machine. And the machine part is maybe unfortunate.

[14:46]

We're not supposed to become machines, right? But what I meant by that, by machine, was that there was a spontaneity or a naturalness of responding to the circumstance I was in, responding to what was happening. And that was kind of becoming more integral to who I was, or if I identified something as me, it was not the usual things you identify, but rather was this expression of responding, this capacity to be connected and respond to the circumstance I'm in, that was kind of where I, I wouldn't say me was there, but not what I identified with, but if there was some organizing principle for who I am or was or acting in the world, it was this responsivity that would seem to be spontaneously coming up, just being there. And I don't remember what Mel said or what he understood, but I think he probably just bowed and we walked on.

[15:48]

It was just a moment there passing each other in the path. And so as I practiced, there was this sense of compassion welled up and became more and more important. It was part of this organizing principle for how I wanted to dedicate my life, how I wanted to live my life, was to respond to the suffering of the world. And as I started feeling this, coming from the inside, the Bodhisattva vows became a way of acknowledging that. So rather than the Bodhisattva vows being something I was going to take on, like an outside thing that I was going to take on, now I'm committed to them, For me, it was much more of an acknowledgement, a recognition of something that was already happening inside, that I recognized in the Bodhisattva vows, that somehow were the mirror of it. And the Bodhisattva vows was my way of saying, this is the basis where I want to stand. This is how I want to be in the world, is responding, coming out of this place of compassion and responding to the world and the suffering.

[16:53]

And that's what's important for me as I go forward in this life. The only thing that feels funny, saying it this way, for me, is how often I use the word I. It feels a little bit, you know, but in English we kind of have to do that, I think, in order to make some sense. But it was just, it was kind of this thing that was happening, and I wanted to, I again, you know, wanted to kind of come from there. And that was a big part of why I chose to be a Zen priest, and also to get Dharma transmission was because of this, to make this come out, support that. And so what happened then was that in taking the Bodhisattva vows, it became a relationship that we had with each other. And it expressed something that I felt was integral to who I was, welling up from the inside, But I don't always live by them. I'm always in touch with them. But the bodhisattvas' vows were kind of like hovering around in the neighborhood.

[17:58]

And so they would remind me of Gil, you know. You remember those vows? And I said, well, yes. And then we'd have a little debate or a little discussion about it. So there was a mutuality. between the bodhisattva vows and this inner desire to live compassionately. And I think what was important for that was the sense that it wasn't just only me or only what was welling up from inside. It was kind of in a conversation or in relationship to something. I can't quite say it's external, but kind of the vows as statements or something. And so there was this kind of feedback loop or this relationship that that was in between something other and something not other in a kind of way. And so there was a kind of mutuality or bigger picture going on in exploration. And so the four Bodhisattva vows, which we'll chant at the end of this talk.

[19:02]

In the early traditions of Buddhism, there's something called the Four Resolves. And the Four Resolves, the word is Aditana, The Sanskrit word for vows is pranidhana. So it's different words. But adhitana kind of means determination. Etymology of the words means something like taking a high stand, taking a stand, a special stand. Here's where I stand. Here's where I base my life on, on these things. Kind of like the bodhisattva vows are kind of like this is where I base my life, on these vows and what they mean. So to base my life on these four resolves that the Buddha taught. So these four resolves are the resolve for wisdom, the resolve for truth, the resolve for relinquishment, and the resolve for peace.

[20:11]

And, you know, maybe it's a teeny bit of a stretch, but they kind of could be, you can make the case that they kind of map the four vows. The first one would be resolved for wisdom. The way that a wise person is, one of the ways, my favorite way that the wise person is defined in these ancient teachings of the Buddha is a wise person is someone who intends for the welfare of oneself, the welfare of other, and the welfare of both self and other. And the fact that it's inclusive in this whole way I think is very nice. That certainly not only oneself, certainly not only the other, but sometimes self, sometimes other, and then sometimes this third category, which is, the word is self and other. And self and other I understand to mean we. There's me, there's you, and there's we. And they're all kind of have their own kind of, they're all like their own entities, their own kind of patterns, their own integrity, their own important thing.

[21:23]

And some people are good at paying attention to one or two of those, but not all three. But to learn how to attend to all three is very important. Some cultures focus a lot on the we. I think that certain currents of American culture don't focus much on the we. But how to kind of do all three is very nice. And this idea of being concerned for the welfare of self, other, and both is an expression of compassion, of concern for the welfare of others. And I think that it seems to me completely natural that this should be part of the early tradition, because how could it not be? If the first settled and open and present without any attachments, without resistance, or fears, or judgments. We're just here in a very full way. I think the heart's capacity to feel, and the heart's capacity for empathy, the heart's capacity for concern, to be responsive, would naturally go equally in all directions.

[22:26]

Would naturally go and care for yourself, would naturally go and care for others, and hopefully naturally care for the we, for the world as a whole. So the idea that we'd be resolved on wisdom seems to work well with the first Bodhisattva precept, first Bodhisattva vow. Beings are numberless, I vow to save them. That's a clear expression of compassion. And the wealth, you know, when he talks about the concern for the welfare of self, other and both self and other, this early tradition clearly makes the point that the highest benefit, the highest welfare is to be saved, is to be liberated, is to be freed, The second resolve is the resolve for truth. And at Zen Center, we used to talk about the second bodhisattva vow as being delusions are boundless. Is that right? So delusions are boundless. And so truth and delusion, they complement each other somehow very well.

[23:32]

And so rather than being committed or standing or basing our life on delusion, we want to base our life on truth. And that takes many forms. There's a form of honesty. And honesty is a very important quality in our society and for individuals, for our relationship with everyone. And it's a wonderful thing to explore and learn about and be challenged by, to really be honest in our communication. But it seems often when I talk about being honest in communication, people will raise exceptions. You know, there should be times when you maybe shouldn't be truthful and maybe say something which is not quite true. The bride in her wedding dress, And it's awful, dress. And she asks, what do you think on my wedding day, my dress? Hmm. You know, you tell her what you think or what's the, you know.

[24:37]

So then people come up with these, you know, there must be exceptions to being truthful sometimes in society. But I think one of the places where there's never an exception for being truthful is to yourself. Because if we're not truthful to ourselves, then there's no path, there's no opening up, there's no awakening, we're not really allowing for what's here to be acknowledged to live within us. But there are other ways of truth as well, to discover the truth of our experience, what's really true here. In this early tradition, the primary way that they want to point to how we see the truth of reality is to really have a close connection to impermanence, to how things arise and pass and how things change, and the constancy of inconstancy, the regularity and the ongoing nature of how things come and go, arise and pass. I think it's something that Dogen called, equated with bodhicitta, the thought of awakening, is to have this deep experience of how things are impermanent.

[25:45]

And to base our lives not on our ideas of permanence and clinging to having things need to be a certain way or resisting how things change, but to be connected to the truth of how things change. The impermanence is another place to stand, standing on the quicksand of impermanence. And then the third aspect of truth, which the Buddha was quite explicit about in talking about these four resolves, was vimutti, which means liberation or freedom, which he equated to nibbana or nirvana. And this is true. And he said the one thing that's non-deceptive, the thing that's most non-delusional is liberation is release, is freedom. And so how is it that release is true? How is it this experience of liberation is like the most true thing? And so I'll try to offer an idea.

[26:49]

It's, you know, the whole idea of something being really true, you know, I feel it's a little bit tender, you know, to, you know, it seems a little bit maybe dogmatic to make a claim about something But the way this early tradition talks about Nibbana, Nibbana is not a thing, but an action. And it's the action of release, of letting go. And when I hold my hand in a fist for a long time, And maybe for years, I can't do a lot of things with a closed fist. And it's interesting what people do when I go around like this. But after a while, it gets kind of sore, and I get kind of tired of it. And someone comes to me and says, you don't have to hold your hand in a closed fist anymore. In fact, it's OK to open it. You can relax. Really, I say. Yeah, try it. So I try it, and sure enough, my hand actually wants to open up and relax.

[27:53]

Oh, that's nice. But because I've been holding it really tight for years, it's such a relief. And because it was so many years I held it clenched, the absence of being clenched and the open space, the sensitivity, the openness that's there, the absence of clenching feels like such an important reference point And I'll probably never forget how important this absence is. So the absence is not a thing, but it's also kind of not nothing. So maybe a better analogy, if someone spends 30 years in prison and then gets released, if they're walking down the street here in Berkeley, wearing regular clothes, I see them, I probably won't notice that they just came out of prison. I've seen people come out of prison after 30 years. I've seen them a few days after they're coming out.

[28:54]

And I don't notice that there are any, it doesn't stand out that they just got out of prison, they're just like there. But for them, after 30 years in the prison, not being in prison is probably gonna be significant for the rest of their life. It's like a big deal. The absence of prison that comes with the release from prison is a big deal for them. It's such an important reference point. So you can't say that that absence of prison is nothing for them. It's a huge thing for them. But it's not a thing. What is it? you know, is it something impermanent? It is if they go back to prison, but if they never go back to prison, is it impermanent? It kind of doesn't make quite sense to talk about it in terms of permanence and impermanence. It's not a thing that comes and goes exactly. It's an absence, but it's a powerful absence. So that one of the truths that the Buddha was, you know, when he talked about, you know, base your life on the truth, stand on truth,

[30:00]

was also to stand or have a reference point for your life, something which is nothing. It's not something you can hold on to, but it's also something which you can't say is nothing. I'm not quite sure how to talk about it, but it's this absence. And if you like that absence so much, It's so great to have an open hand. Finally, the hand is released. It's so good. I really want to have more of this. This is so important. I'm going to hold on to it. And I clench my fist. I've lost it, right? So as soon as there was any movement to have that absence or make it mine or do something, there's no longer absence. So I find it quite intriguing and quite enlivening and quite freeing to stay in relationship and be in dialogue with a sense of this release, this absence, because of the times in my life I'm not quite there or kind of holding on to something or trying to make it be something.

[31:05]

So rather just let it be. And in that being, let things flow. Let things be. The third resolve is the resolve for, usually in English it's translated as relinquishment. And relinquishment, it's a fascinating word in Pali, because the ancient language, the word is chaga, and it also means generosity. And to have relinquishment, which is for some people is bad news, connected to generosity, which is good news, is quite lovely. Also that generosity is something that you can't, it can't be an obligation to be generous. Then it's not really generosity. It can be giving, but it's not really generous if it's not, if it's an obligation. And to be able to be generous comes from a kind of welling up, a movement of the heart to, you know, goodness of the heart, to be supportive, helpful, to offer to others more than is expected.

[32:09]

And to have this idea of letting go, deep letting go, come from the same place. That there also, there's no obligation to let go, no obligation to let go and to relinquish. But I think it's also, again, if you're here, I think it's kind of natural to be here, present, just being with nothing special, not trying to be anybody or trying to make anything of anything, but just be here in a responsive way and care for this world. You know, we can feel, you know, when we start wanting to be something or prove ourselves to someone or get something, we can feel how that doesn't quite feel in harmony with the truth, in harmony with how things are, in harmony with its integrity, or in harmony with the practice moving through us. being us, kind of. And so, you know, it makes sense to let go of it, or not pick it up, or let it be.

[33:13]

And so the state of relinquishment, and what I found is that over time, that sense of relinquishment became sometimes quite important. One of the important junctures in my life where this became important was when I was living at Green Gulch, been living at Zen Center for some time, And I became acutely aware of how many social gymnastics I was performing, social maneuvering, mostly trying to get everyone to like me. And it's pretty exhausting to get people to, especially if it has to be everyone. And I went to Tassajara, and remember Tassajara, I don't know if you know what the fukuten is. In Tassajara, the fukuten is a person who kind of runs the kitchen. And basically, you're trying to direct a group of people who are somehow highly allergic and sensitive to be told anything whatsoever.

[34:18]

That's something in the nature, that was at least back that year in the kitchen. And so, you know, it proved kind of impossible to get everyone to like me. So after a while, I was just like, this is, I'm getting exhausted. So that was, I started to see this, you know, how this sense of self, the social gymnastics, and I was basing my life on self-identity issues. So at some point I could see this is not something how I want to live, this doesn't make any sense, it's not true, it's not valuable, and what do I do? So I felt, well, the natural thing to do is to let go of it, to stop doing it. And I felt, when I realized that, I felt like I was standing at the edge of a cliff, and I was being asked to take a step into the abyss, because, you know, I felt like that's where somehow, somehow, safety, security came from, having an identity and having people see me a certain way. And so I held back, I stepped back from that cliff for quite a while, until something inside of me, again, it wasn't, you know, something that's practiced that was practicing me,

[35:31]

kind of helped me to finally take that step. And at some point, I felt like that powerful kind of way of being involved with self-identity lessened and didn't become the same issue it had been. The fourth resolve is the resolve for peace. And I think when we let go, when we're no longer trying to fight reality, when we're in harmony with the truth, we're no longer resisting reality, that then it's, you know, we're more peaceful, we're not in conflict with how things are. And one of the ways of understanding practice is to come to a place where we're no longer in conflict. The world can be in conflict with us, but we're not in conflict with the world. It might be we still say no, it might be still we stand up for injustice, but we can do it without a sense of conflict. It's just what we do, it's part of the responsivity, and to come with me. But this idea of to have a mind, a heart, where we're no longer in conflict with ourselves, no longer in conflict with others, and no longer in conflict with reality, is a definition of peace, to be peace.

[36:44]

The fourth, bodhisattva vow, to become the Buddha way. I like to believe that those are synonymous. So in that particular place where the Buddha talks about these four resolves, he said for someone who stands or bases their lives or enters their lives with these four resolves, that they are no longer swept away by the tides of conceiving, by the currents, by the floods of conceiving. And the word conceiving in English is a very powerful word because it means both, you can conceive something means to think something, but it's also to bring something to life, to bring something to birth, to conceive a child. And so the word that's being translated as conceiving in Pali also means to imagine. So a person, when we get caught up in our imaginations of things,

[37:51]

our fantasies of things, our kind of these creative ways in which we think about ourself, the world around us. We plan ahead, we project. It's easy to get swept away. It's easy to get caught up in the stories we tell ourselves. But for someone who's established on these four resolves, they are no longer swept away by the floods of conceiving. And the conceiving that the Buddha was most identified as being the most serious ones was all having to do with I. They no longer have conceived I am something, I will be something, I was something. They no longer conceive I am not. I will be. So I take this to be all kinds of ways in which we kind of add to the idea of I some kind of definition. Because probably to a fair, it's pretty obvious that to a big degree that human beings, when they add some kind of ideas, concepts on top of I, I am this,

[39:02]

It's usually a little piece of imagination, creative actions, or even if it's not so creative, we relate to it in all kinds of creative ways. So this idea of not being swept away by self-preoccupation, self-concept, self-identification, If a person no longer conceives, no longer lives in their imaginary ideas and abstractions of their mind, but is based on wisdom, on truth, on relinquishment, and on peace, then that person is called a sage at peace. And then the Buddha goes on to say something which I think you'll hear resonates with something that you guys here at Zen Center, I think, say almost every day. A sage at peace, for a sage at peace, there is no birth, no aging, and no death.

[40:04]

But, you know, it's a little bit strange to say that because, you know, certainly a sage is not exempt from getting older and then dying. So how could they say that? A sage at peace. has no birth, no aging, no death. How I understand it, it relates back to this idea of conceiving, the imaginary stories and ideas that we can so easily cut up and in our minds. And it's kind of like, it's not so much that there isn't aging or death, but we don't have to live in our conceptions of those things our concepts of those things, our ideas of those things. Because for most of us who are sitting here today, I don't think any of you are in the active process of dying right now. It's like, you know, it's like, you know, hopefully at least a few minutes away.

[41:14]

But you know, you were here. And so any concept of yourself actively dying is a thought, an idea. You might think ahead that you're going to die, but it's still a little bit of imagination. You are, but to be involved in those thoughts and ideas, it has some truth to it. But how much reality do you give to those thoughts? How much do you hold onto those thoughts or get preoccupied by those thoughts? And a lot of our conceivings, a lot of these thoughts and ideas that we come up with, It's a little bit like taking a brush and watercolors and then trying to paint on running water. I don't know how successful you can be. It can be abstract painting, I guess. It might be beautiful, but in terms of painting an object, a thing, it's not going to work very well. The concepts and ideas, in terms of making something real, it's kind of like that.

[42:21]

Or it's even more dramatic. It's taking the brush and the watercolors and going to an open door and trying to paint in the space of the open door. You know, space is not going to take the paint. It's not going to receive the brush. It's not going to work. It doesn't touch. There's nothing there. Perhaps there's something about the concepts we live in, the stories we tell ourselves, the memories we tell ourselves of the past, that in a certain kind of powerful way don't really work. It's like, you know, there is this release, this absence, this freedom that's available to us here, now. And it's not found through our concepts, but it's not found, you know, getting rid of our concepts, but it's just we don't base our life on those concepts.

[43:29]

we can base our lives on something else. We can base our lives on the four bodhisattva vows. Or for this Theravada tradition, we can base our lives on these four resolves. And what I hope is that both of these are not something that ideas and concepts we take from the outside, as good ideas or as something that we're supposed to do exactly, but rather we've discovered that they are who we are. This is what the system here wants to do if the conceivings don't interfere with the picture, the stories we tell don't interfere with the way that the practice is an expression. It's not an attainment. It's the Buddha nature that we have, that we are, that sits zazen. It's the Buddha nature that we have, that we are, that is how we live our life.

[44:36]

And that to sit in zazen is to find a way to let that which maybe has been shy or overlooked for a lifetime, to be in touch with that and allow that to surface and be. And just let that be in the moment. That's practice realization. That's practice being practiced. That's just nothing to attain, nothing to get, nothing to be. Who I am and what I want is a conceiving. It's trying to paint with watercolors on an open, empty space. And if we appreciate the absence and that emptiness, that there's nothing that we stand on except to these vows, that I think we can live a wise life, a beneficial life, a life that supports others and makes a difference to the world we live in. We have a world that needs us, needs all of us to be concerned with the welfare and benefit of our society.

[45:40]

And I think that, for me, the bodhisattva vows are a wonderful expression of the connection between the depth of our hearts and the needs of our society that we live around. And for them to come into harmony and work together, I think, is one of the great things of a human life. So thank you very much.

[46:04]

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