I'm thinking of talking a little bit sometime this afternoon before we stop, we're scheduled to stop at 5. It's getting close to 4.30, do you think I should talk first and then sit or sit first and then talk? Talk first and then go ahead and then you can wash your mind in the sound of the silence, clear out anything I might have said. I don't know if I want to talk first, I don't know if I want to sit, I don't know if I want to sit. Well, since it's towards the end here of our weekend, I'd like to suggest some conclusion

[01:11]

type of things. And partly, I'm reminding myself that the subject for the weekend was the wisdom of letting go, which kind of goes back to, you know, Alan Watts, he wrote a whole book about this, you know, the security of insecurity and, you know, various things he was... Dear Man never made it to Tassajara, I don't think. The story is he was headed down there one day and then got so drunk along the way he decided he was too ashamed to, you know, show up there. So, given that there's just a few minutes to talk about this, I'm kind of, you know,

[02:39]

sitting here like, where do I start, where do I go, how can I finish, where do I say this in just a few minutes, and waiting to see if anything comes. I'm trying to help you up. Yeah. Thanks, yeah. There was a period in my life, as I recall, it was in my late thirties. I had the idea, first of all, you know, going back just a little bit before that, I had had the, when Suzuki Roshi died, I had the idea, oh, that's okay, you can have my life.

[03:43]

You know, about Suzuki Roshi, my teacher dying, I thought, oh, that's okay, you can have my life. And I suppose there's something kind of sweet about this, but, you know, it wasn't very practical. And I didn't know how to let Suzuki Roshi have my life. And I certainly didn't know, and it's not very accurate to think, I could let Suzuki Roshi go on living through my life. I mean, don't I have my life to live? And this is related to something he used to say, when you are you, Zen is Zen. And largely we start from the place of how do I get to be, you know, how do I get myself to accord with my mental picture of what a valuable, good, loving person is like?

[04:53]

How do I get to accord, how do I get myself in accord with my picture of what that would look like? And then if your picture of how you should look is Suzuki Roshi, it's like, oh, my God. Not measuring up yet. So you can feel pretty bad or pretty worthless that you're still not good enough. So is that something to let go of or not? I eventually decided this is something to let go of. Aiming to be another Suzuki Roshi, why don't I aim to be me? And this is, of course, an interesting question. You know, what is it to be me? What is it for you to be you? After, now jumping ahead of all of that, you know, five or six years ago I was reading

[06:04]

some Zen book. I don't read very many Zen books anymore. And there was a Zen master named Deshan who was saying, the Twelvefold Buddhist Canon is nothing but tissue paper to wipe infected skin boils. Buddhism is just a post to tether your donkey. Why bother with that excursion? And, you know, things like this. And then in the middle of all this berating of Buddhism and how you can tie yourself in knots by taking on Buddhism and trying to make yourself that kind of a person, he says, realizing the mystery is nothing but breaking through to grasp an ordinary person's life. That would be you. An ordinary person as opposed to becoming an extraordinary person, you know, that you

[07:08]

were setting out to be. And again, you know, when you're a child this is important to have grandiose ideas. You know, when you're two or three years old you should have the grandiose idea that your behavior could change the world. And it can, but, you know, probably not in any way. It's important to think that. And it's important to understand something about that in our present condition, but maybe not quite in the way we think. So, having an ordinary life. At some point then in my late 30s I decided, I've got it. I'll just see if I can spot every mistake I make and then improve and fix myself so I don't ever make that mistake again. So, this was about a five-year project in successive failures.

[08:18]

I couldn't get through all the problems and I didn't have much success with the problems I had identified. And then it turned out, at one point I did some therapy and the therapist said, you know, the therapist kept saying, why do you think that's a problem? Why do you think that's a mistake? And I kept being annoyed with him. Isn't it obvious what a problem that is? Isn't it obvious what a mistake that is? And when I tried to explain it to him he never seemed to understand and see it my way. You know, what a problem I was for the world. And so I did various kinds of work on this. And I finally, you know, let go of that one too. Trying to fix all the mistakes so that I never made them again. And then pretty soon, you know, you're so like, how do you get to do anything if you're so concerned about it being possibly a mistake? How can you say anything, do anything, you know, because it could be a mistake.

[09:24]

So pretty soon you're kind of in a little kind of semi-petrification, if not rigidity and petrified. You know, you're semi there anyway. Later on, you know, again jumping forward, I was working with a teacher for a while who does hands-on healing, an extraordinary man. All of his students agree, his personal life isn't so extraordinary. But I asked him, I said, you know, my wrists are very stiff and, you know, when I sit sometimes my consciousness just goes down to my wrists and I don't feel my hands. Since then I've kind of done more work to discover my hands. And he said, oh, you spiritual people are all the same. In your past lives you've made so many mistakes, you want to be sure not to make any of those mistakes in this life. So just to be on the safe side, don't have hands. Then you can't do anything, you know, that's a mistake.

[10:29]

Then your mistake becomes not doing anything. But in your thinking that doesn't seem like such a mistake as the things that you could actually do. You know, you don't, and it takes a while to realize that not doing and petrifying yourself is another mistake. So I eventually learned to let go of that project. Are you getting the drift here? How many projects we can have? And then I spent a lot of years thinking that, not that it was a mistake exactly, but that I could, and not that it was exactly being Suzuki Roshi, but, you know, these things have a way of creeping back in, even though you let go of them.

[11:33]

So I thought, anyway, I could be. I could be a sound body and mind, and I could be full of love and light, whatever. I don't know. I can't quite tell you what it is, except that, you know, if I was to be sad or depressed, that was a problem. And if I was to be anxious or scared, that was a problem. And if I was to be angry and frustrated, that was a problem. And so basically to have any intense emotion was a no-no. By the way, do you know what that's called? Depression. If you want to know how to be depressed, try it sometime. Don't have any intense emotion, and you too can be depressed.

[12:40]

And then, but then, you know, I wasn't supposed to be depressed either. So at some point, you know, this is a, what do you call that? You know, like Catch-22 or the, one of these dilemma things. So I had to, I decided finally to let go of that project. So one of the letting goes, so overall, you know, the letting go that I'm talking about, in Buddhism it's described as the perfection of wisdom. And it's said that those who are, the bodhisattvas who are unskilled in the perfection of wisdom will notice what's happening and decide how that makes them wrong.

[13:52]

I'm abbreviating this. That's not the technical language. Technical language is more like you will settle down in sights, sounds, feelings, emotions, thoughts, and whether you like them or don't like them, and then what does it mean about me? What is it a sign of? What does it indicate about who I am? And how does it make me feel? And shouldn't I be, you know, able to do this differently and better such that this wasn't appearing in my life? And what does it all mean? And those who, and then when you let go of all of that, that's called the perfection of wisdom. You let go of keeping track, this is better, this is worse, I like this, I don't like that, it's, I still have this problem, I don't have that problem, you know, and look at them and look at me and what does this say about me? And so, one who is skilled in wisdom lets go of all of that. What does this mean about me and how I'm doing and, you know, etc.

[15:06]

So in a way then, you know, we get to something like, and it's taken me years to appreciate some of my Zen teachers, you know, like Kadagirishi is saying, let the flower of your life force bloom. Because you think, if I let the flower of my life force bloom, shouldn't that solve everything and fix everything? Oh, letting my life force bloom will fix everything. And it doesn't fix everything, but did you want to, because everything isn't fixed, did you want to sabotage your life force and restrain yourself so that the problems don't happen, which are happening anyway, even when you let the life force bloom, did you want to stop your life force? So that wouldn't be wise. I don't know if I'm quite making any sense here, but, you know, I'm trying. So in a simple way, this is also to say, you know, go ahead and make your best effort. Share your heart with people.

[16:11]

Sometimes it will work to your satisfaction and sometimes it won't. Sometimes people will appreciate it, sometimes people won't. But did you want to hold yourself back and restrain yourself and stop yourself from offering and sharing what you have to offer and the goodness of your heart in the way that you have to share it, because other people may not appreciate it, other people may be upset with you? You just, you go ahead. And then sometimes people don't know what to make of it, or they receive it the wrong way, or they don't get it, and you say, oh, so you found what I said hurtful. Okay, you know what I was trying to say was, and you can try again to say what you had to say without being, you know, what the other person found hurtful. If you are going to live in a world where you want to argue with somebody

[17:15]

about what's hurtful and what's not hurtful, and they say, when you said that, you know, I found that hurtful, and you say, that's not hurtful. I don't get it that you find, you think that's hurtful? You're wrong. That's just, that is not hurtful what I said. You know, then you get into fights and, you know, about reality. So this is not, you know, so there's a certain letting go of reality here. What's real? It's like, oh, you found that hurtful. I wasn't intending to be hurtful. I wanted to share with you about such and such, and I'm wondering if maybe you can help me say that in a way that's not hurtful for you, or whatever. So you work, you keep trying to express yourself and allow other people to have the reactions they have in life to unfold, and you're not in control of it all. You know, so you can let go of thinking you're responsible for all of it, and you're in control of what goes on, which again is, you know, nothing wrong with that when you're two years old. You need to think that. It's healthy to think that when you're two years old,

[18:18]

that you're in control of everything, and that you're changing your behavior will change everyone and everything. Mom and Dad will lighten up, they will appreciate you, they will love you, and you can manifest yourself differently and take care of all of that. So, two years old, it's healthy. You know, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, we're trying to figure out or studying how to be a grown-up, and to offer and share what we have to offer and share, and the goodness of our heart, and work with how people receive that, and understand that we're not in control of anybody else's reality or experience, and they're going to see things the way they do. So, I want to share with you one other little story about that.

[19:29]

You know, Friday night I mentioned if you want to try using this little... It doesn't necessarily going to work, but if you want to try saying, I'm angry and frustrated, nevertheless, I will be joyful and happy, you know, mindful, and I will be joyful and happy is a form of letting go of my capacity to control reality. Whether I can control reality or not, I will be joyful and happy. Because I can't control reality, I will be joyful and happy. I'm sad, nevertheless, I will be joyful and happy. Even though I'm angry, even though I'm disappointed, I will be joyful and happy. Mindfulness, letting go. So that's a little mantra form of this. And sometimes it is like magic, and what was so distressing to you just pops and disappears, and you can go ahead and be joyful and happy. It's amazing.

[20:33]

But it doesn't always work like that. So sometimes you will just have to chew and swallow. And over time your body or being will digest what's arising, and you'll be finished with it. So, I want to suggest this other little piece, which is interesting to me, and there are different ways to work on this, or do this, or have this come up in your life. Um... There are many ways to work with things, so part of what you're studying in your life is how to study, how to work with things,

[21:38]

what works for you, what doesn't work for you, when it works for you, when it doesn't work for you, and you're studying all of that in an ongoing way, and we have our whole life to work on any of these things. So... And my goodness, it's already 10 to 5, and I've been talking for 25 minutes or something. My God, I thought it was about 10. You see? Anyway, short story. A friend of mine

[22:41]

told me this story. She was in the middle of her third divorce. She and her husband were doing marathon therapy sessions with somebody they both liked to work with, and sometimes they worked together and sometimes they worked separately. And at one point in this, the therapist said to my friend, Do you have any idea how scared your husband is of your anger? Huh? And the therapist gave her the following suggestion. Go home, sit down, and talk to your 7-year-old, would you? You know, maybe it's a 7-year-old, maybe it's a 5-year-old, maybe it's a 3-year-old, and there's ways that you can find out how old the part of you is that appears

[23:48]

uncalled for. Go home, sit down, and you say to your 7-year-old, Thank you for being so tough, for being so angry, for being so intense. You stood up for us, and you got us through a very difficult and painful time in her life. And if you hadn't been like that, when we were 7 years old, we wouldn't be here today. But you got us through. There was a lot of painful things that were happening, a lot of very challenging behaviors that we were around. And bless your heart, you know, you were angry enough, and strong enough, and intense enough,

[24:52]

and outrageous enough that we survived. Thank you. I'm an adult now. I'm grown up, and I have a lot of resources that we didn't have when we were 7. I have a lot of resources that you may not be familiar with. So I really appreciate the way you stood up for me, for us, but you don't need to do that anymore. I'm happy to come and visit you, but I don't want you showing up unannounced anymore. I'm happy to come and visit you. I don't want you just showing up as though I need your help. I don't. To talk like that to yourself, of course you have to have these things

[26:07]

actually coming up. Anyway, there's various ways to work on this, whether it's in therapy or it's in the context of meditation. You learn to relate with yourself, be friends with yourself, letting go of trying to be perfect, and beyond reproach, beyond criticism, as though there was some objective reality, and as though you were in charge of that reality, as some people blame you for being. So, I'm going to give you a few minutes to think about this.

[27:27]

You know, there's a therapy called Internal Family System, so that, for instance, is a way similar to what I was describing. You find places in your body and begin to talk with them. But that's also a kind of meditation. That you're finding, as I was suggesting earlier, finding places in your body and asking them, what do they have to say? And the most powerful tool that any of us have is our attention. To give something your attention, or to pay attention to something, to give your attention to something, is so powerful. And so many things and people in our life just want our attention. I want to be received

[28:39]

and listened to. And in some ways, you know, see, this is our real wealth, our real capacity, our real well-being, is that we can give our attention to things and be present with things with our good heart and listen and receive. And our doing this doesn't fix everything. But we feel so much better when we're in this kind of connection, rather than when we're separating ourselves and giving out directives and instructions and advice about how to do it, so that we finally measure it up. And as I was mentioning earlier, that's all useful to let go of. Hopefully sometime before you drop dead. Because

[29:43]

some of this takes a long time, I can assure you, to let go of these things. Okay. Well, we've got about five minutes now to sit quietly and breathe. I appreciate the sacredness and the blessedness of our life with all of its idiosyncrasies. And I'd like to suggest that in this appreciating or sensing at the subtle level, the sacredness or preciousness of life, when your awareness is just exactly with things, not arguing,

[30:46]

not looking somewhere else for something better, that's called stillness. Stillness is to be exactly with your experience. It's not something different than your experience, but your awareness being exactly with your experience. In a way, this requires renunciation. You renounce other possibilities, and renounce the idea that there could be other places somehow better than this. So being exactly with this will settle into stillness. ...

[32:06]

... [...] So we'll chant HO to share our prayers and blessings with the world. ... [...]

[33:11]

... [...] Thank you. Thank you for your presence, your good hearted practice. I'd like to offer at the end here just a few words about

[34:18]

going back into your everyday life. We talked a little bit about this earlier, but it won't be so obvious how to bring your experience from meditation into your everyday world. So this again is a study, and various things will be happening. On one hand, it's likely that there's an experience of not being with the energy of the group anymore. So sometimes people will feel sad or lost because that energy isn't there and you don't realize how much of what you experience here in the room is

[35:19]

the energy of the room. So that may not be there. So there's a certain... ... [...]

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