unless you come into the room and tell me that you don't want me to move in. And even then I won't move in. I just say, why did you come in here and tell me that? Do you want me to move in? Is that what you're trying to say? Or I'm not going to tell you. Well, why did you come here and tell me that? Then I get interested. It's not that I want to, it's not that exactly I want to find out your address. I mean, If you really don't want to tell me your address, just don't tell me, and I'll probably never even ask you. But if you come over to me, walk back to me, look me in the face and say, I'm not going to tell you my address, I think, you're just in your address. What is it? I'm not going to tell you, but why are you telling me? I don't get it. And I don't think necessarily you want me to know. I think you want me to ask you why you're telling me that I can't find out. And I maybe never will know your trust, except for some reason you came and told me that I couldn't have it.

[01:03]

What are you trying to do? And then you're going to feel anxiety. Because you're somebody who went out of his way to tell me that you weren't going to tell me who you are. Completely. They showed me. Completely. Totally revealed themselves. And still I'm interested. But I was interested before. I'm interested in whoever comes. I'm interested. But then when they come in with a mask over their head, I'm particularly interested in the mask. I mean, I'm interested in the person in general, but I'm particularly interested for a person who would come in and intentionally expose themselves to me while hiding. It's a funny way to hide, you know? To come in to somebody and say, okay, I'm going to hide from you now. Well, it would be easier just to sort of be some other state. Wouldn't even be wondering what's behind the mask. But you're making yourself vulnerable to come in and put the mask on, you see?

[02:06]

I'll never find out even if you take the mask off. But the funny thing is, you come in and put a mask on, I'm not going to find out who you are, even if you take the mask off, but you're going to find out. So you totally expose yourself as a person who's hiding. Like I say, it's easy for me to see somebody who's hiding when they come right in front of me and hide. But if they're hiding without where I can't see, I often, I miss quite a bit of cute people that are hiding from me. There's people who hide from me all over the world. I don't know where they are. I don't even know where they are. But these people hide from me right in my face. I know exactly where they are and I know exactly how they're hiding. And they're not hiding. But still, the fact that they're hiding makes me wonder, well, what was going on? And I really get interested. But I don't rip the mask off. I just say, whoa, whoa, whoa. And then they tell me. And then they realize who's behind the mask. Nobody.

[03:09]

And that's a big relief. Prior to that, there was a lot of anxiety. Is he going to rip the mask off? You know, what do you think when he gets the mask off in the first place? You know, would I have worn a different mask? Will he approve of this mask? Is this a true Zen mask? Is what behind the mask the true Zen face? Okay. You said that before you would... Yeah. Okay, so... in relation to all three of these there's many dimensions in which we feel affronted threatened and attacked by non-being mentioned by things that we can you know society for example is a we make an image of society that's attacking us and around action we feel society and non-being might come at us so the first one is our moral being

[04:17]

And we feel guilt. We feel attacked in terms of guilt and condemnation. That's one of the dimensions in which non-being threatens us. If you don't care about your actions, then your actions don't bring you back to yourself. I'll say it again. If you don't care about your actions, your actions will not be very self-referential. Your belief in yourself is driving your actions. As a matter of fact, you cannot do an action without believing in yourself because that's the foundation of action. I do this. I reach out. I pull back. I listen to the airplane.

[05:30]

The foundation of karma is sense of self, independent self that does that. If you're not careful of what you do, what you do is not an opportunity to reflect on who's doing it. If you're very careful of what you do, the reason why you're careful of what you do is primarily because the consequences of what you do are so powerful for you. So because you care about yourself, you're very careful about what you do. And then when you're careful about what you do, it reminds you of yourself. So it brings you back home. So when you come back home, in terms of your action, you wonder, well, did I do it right? Did I do it wrong? So the non-being out there can come at you and say, well, No matter what you do, you do it wrong. You'll never be, there's no way, you know, there's no way you've ever been, like, be able to do it right.

[06:34]

Because we got, like, stuff out here, ways of judging you that, like, you know, forget about it. There's no way you can, there's nothing you can do to, if you're capable of doing anything wrong, there's nothing you can do to, like, remove that. And isn't that right, in a sense? Aren't we capable of doing bad things? And is there anything we can do which is going to remove that capability? We try. We try, we try, and we try. And that is good. That's what's recommended. But then when you do that, then you come back to yourself more, and then you... And feeling self, you feel the big scale all around you, and the big scale says, there's nothing you can, as a person, you little pipsqueak, you can't, like, change your nature. You can't, like, pull out your fang. You have power to hurt. Human beings have power to hurt.

[07:37]

We can hurt. We can do harm. Nobody can take that away from himself or herself. There's nothing you can do. We try, working with these images and these objects, we try to, like, fix it up, but we can't do anything. Non-being reminds you of that. It brings back, relatively speaking, in many different situations, a sense of guilt. Then, on top of that, in a big way, finally, it brings back condemnation. that you're going to get it for this. The wheels will turn in that way. And there's nothing you can do about it because it's totally beyond all your action. However, your actions are just basically a reflection of your evil potential. People are both Buddha by nature and have potential to do evil.

[08:39]

We have both that. The potential to do evil means that when we're deluded, evil can manifest. Anytime that we're deluded, anytime we're not awake, evil can manifest. When we're not awake, and when we are awake, evil cannot manifest. But it isn't our nature. It's just that it can't manifest in the light of wisdom. Because the basis of evil action has been removed. The self has been forgotten. there's no afflictions anymore, there's no evil karma. But one blink of the eye, and we have the capacity to flip back into evil. When you feel that non-being all around yourself, you're reminded of your potential, and you feel that potential, which you then be very careful of. And you feel anxiety in terms of your action, but also anxiety in terms of your potential. and also you feel condemned.

[09:43]

You are already condemned. You feel that in an ungovernable way for all the things you've done in the past. Again, if you can feel that anxiety and stay present with it, you can deal with what's coming. but you do feel anxiety, we are already condemned for the bad things we've done. The condemnation has occurred, and it's coming to us. If you can stand the anxiety of that situation, when it comes, you have a chance of dealing stillfully with it. both in relative terms of guilt and in concrete terms, in ultimate terms, in terms that you've already been condemned, and you will be condemned for anything you do in the future. Facing that is the same as facing this anxiety, because you feel anxiety about that. Face the anxiety skillfully, uprightly, gently, and when the stuff comes, you can deal with it too. If you turn away from the anxiety and the stuff comes, you're going to smash back or shrink back, and it's going to be more trouble.

[10:48]

So you have to have your full integrity, and your full integrity is tested by the experience. If you can live with that anxiety, your integrity can flourish and develop and develop and develop and develop. And your integrity is that you are a compassionate, wise being, like everybody else. So that's the anxiety of guilt and condemnation. That's the moral dimension of anxiety, which we've been talking about mostly. And the other dimension of anxiety is in terms of meaning. Or you could say it's anxiety about meaninglessness.

[11:55]

And there again, as usual, when you feel anxiety, the trade-off is, the cop-out is, if you would back off and not be yourself, anxiety would subside. If you have a self, One of the rewards of having a self is being exposed to meaninglessness. Meaninglessness comes as a little gift to you on top of having a self. Let me finish this because this is real hard. Then you can have it. The meaninglessness of our life, feeling surrounded by meaninglessness and emptiness, emptiness in the sense of vacuous hollowness of our life, this is a threat to what?

[13:10]

To a meaningful thing. What's a meaningful thing? Me. I'm meaningful. Emptiness is a threat to something that's full. Me. So, by being a full, meaningful thing, person, I get threatened by meaninglessness and emptiness. Hollowness. That challenges me. So again, there's one way to respond. Back off. Surrender yourself. You're not a self. And guess what'll happen? Meaning will come back. Then you get meaning. Good girl. You pretended, you gave up yourself. You stopped thinking that you're an independent thing. And now you get a reward. Here's meaning again. Backed off being yourself was because you selfishly wanted meaning for yourself. So you didn't really give up yourself. You just collapsed in the face of recognizing and honoring the meaninglessness.

[14:14]

That's good to honor it, but don't collapse. For the people, but don't collapse. Don't submit. Meeting meaninglessness meaning emptiness. Don't collapse. Face it. Live with it. Live with the not-meaning form of meaninglessness. Become intimate with it. And by becoming, by being willing to be intimate with the anxiety of meaninglessness, another dimension of yourself will be clarified and dropped. Because in fact, Meaninglessness is a perfect match to the great self. Our independent self is actually incoherent and meaningless. It doesn't make sense. So non-being is our friend. Tip us off. Our self is actually hollow. There's nothing to it, really, other than just... There's nothing to it.

[15:18]

Whenever you reach for yourself, what do you get? You get somebody else. You cannot get a hold of yourself if yourself is hollow and meaningless. When you have a self, then hollowness and meaningless comes and knocks on the door and says, we're coming. Then they're so horrible, hollowness and meaningless are so horrible, in order to protect ourself, we shrink and submit and surrender, and we get protected custody. And then the meaning backs off, and they come in and say, okay, here's some meaning for you, and also you're not so hollow after all. And its shrunken form kind of limps off into the horizon and looks for a chance when maybe nobody's looking and it can assert itself again. But as soon as you do, non-being sends meaningless back to you. So in some sense, I kind of feel like it's like there's a being aspect,

[16:19]

In a sense, there's a spiritual, artistic aspect that we get threatened when we have a self. So I think that, you know, pretty much told you. I haven't gone into as much detail as we could over the rest of our lives, but I pretty much told you how. And anxiety has this root, you know, and fear has the same root. They have the same root. of these threats to our selfhood. Yes, what's your name? Barbara. Barbara. Yes, Barbara. goodness, my action.

[17:25]

Yes. Lots of good merit. Lots of merit. So if you were born into a human body, and would you say that if we were that evolutionarily, then how do you get born as a child? Definitely. Yeah. Yeah. and and he and some of the other people apparently i mean from what i understand they did this incredibly cruel thing incredibly cruel thing and leads to is is a misfortune on a level which you know just the misfortune that comes to his lifespan to his evolutionary stream is just uh well in his own lifetime it got pretty bad but but You know, there's no end to the trouble he's in, but that will result in a stream of events that follow from what he has done and his friends did.

[18:28]

And they were not aware. They did not believe in the law of cause and effect, so they thought they could do these things. They dared to do these cruel things and... So there was negative action in prior life, but there was also a good action that he was born with. Yeah, there's a predominance, a predominance of... We all had lots of negative action in our past, but being human means that there's a predominance of good action. But now that we've got this opportunity, all the more light unkindnesses from us can be major devastation, because we... We know better. We're, you know, to disrespect this opportunity is much more disrespectful than to disrespect the opportunity. But in future lifetimes, he will still always be born human again? No, no, no. You can be a rat. I didn't know that you can be a rat when you're born.

[19:31]

I'm just kidding. You come down and you just work it out. Yeah, I mean, you know, there are stories. I don't know the stories. I can't tell. I don't know his story, you know. But there are stories of very many, many lifetimes of being born in various forms, but not just low forms in the terms of, you know, like that banana slugs are lower than dogs or something. To be born as a mean-spirited banana slug and be irritated by everything, you know. To hate the smell of banana slime and be born as a banana slug. to be a very miserable banana slug for many lifetimes, and be in a situation where people pour salt on you, and you experience agonizing metamorphosis over and over and over and over again. I mean, these are the stories that the wise people have seen beings go through.

[20:35]

That's why they're very careful can degenerate into basically the worst of all forms of being a person who doesn't respect cause and effect. So you go down and down and down. And you experience torment after [...] torment. Leap. So say in this life I want to slap the Buddha. Yeah. And so a man always leads to bed. Yes. All right. How would it be to practice good in this life after that? You know, it would seem like you're not absorbing. As long as you, strictly speaking, as long as you don't draw blood from the Buddha when you slap him, you can still do good things after that. What if I do that? Pardon? What if I do that?

[21:37]

Well, then you immediately don't have this life anymore. Fortunately, there's no real Buddha around right now, so you're safe. But the thing is, imagine. Well, I don't think so. I mean, I haven't heard of one. Most of the candidates have said they're not. Most of the people we might try to pin it on have said, no, not me. Huh? They want to be in their nap, right? What? They want to be in their nap. You think the Buddha would kind of like... The Buddha is humble, but the Buddha wouldn't actually... You think the Buddha would say that the Buddha wasn't Buddha? The first one didn't do that. Yeah. Correct me. It may be depressing, but on the other hand, you don't have the danger of what would happen if you didn't teach the Buddha properly.

[22:38]

Right. That's one saving grace. But you do miss a chance, because, like, if you would just, if there was a Buddha like that, if you just went to the Buddha and just gave the Buddha, like, one Snickers bar or something, you know, I would fix you up. You'd be guaranteed to be a Buddha. Yeah. So there's positive and negative sides of having an actual Buddha around. Again, it's an extremely great opportunity and extremely great danger. If you miss capitalizing on the opportunity of studying with a Buddha, if there's one around, it's worse than if the Buddha wasn't there and you didn't study with somebody. So there's a great danger and there's a great opportunity. So anyway, what we've got here is a situation where nobody in their right mind is claiming to be Buddha at this time. And there's some people who are very, very good people. And that's good enough. And those people who are very, very good are also humble. But Buddha was humble. Buddha.

[23:41]

My teacher, Suzuki Rishi, when the first talk I gave, he said, I'm not enlightened. And I thought, oh, too bad. And here I came, I gave up my old life to come here to study with him, and he's not Buddha. Well, The best I've ever seen in all state. The next week he said, But then the next week he told a story about, you know, going into the closet when he meant to go in the bathroom and stuff like that. So basically it all kind of came out. He was pretty much kind of like a really wonderful, kind of like us kind of guy. He wasn't actually like Shakyamuni Buddha. And for the last 2,500 years, none of Buddha's disciples have actually claimed to be, like, equal to the Buddha. Although they're basically Buddhas and doing Buddha's work. And so can you. You're not going to be shocked, I'm any Buddha. There's not going to be one like that without us noticing. And in that case, that particular person can say, I'm Buddha, and it's okay.

[24:43]

You know, even if they say, I'm Buddha, Such people are allowed that conceit of saying, I am Buddha. But the other people, the other great sages, don't say, I am Buddha. They just say, you know, they say stuff like, well, I'm not too good, but I'm extremely happy to be able to practice. And they mean it, and they act like it. And practice means I'm extremely happy to devote my life entirely to your welfare and to the welfare of all beings. And they act like that. They're incredible. There are people like that. They're wonderful. And they're not discouraging, and it's not depressing to meet them. And they're still, if you'd be nice to them, that's also good. But also being nice to anybody is good. But being nice to really great people is slightly better than being nice to not so great people. Sorry, but, you know, it's very good to be nice to not nice people, too. But it's even better to be nice to really great people. Yes? I have a problem with a conscious studio.

[25:49]

When I hear a dog or a cat or a cow come, instead of thinking it's a nice little cat and takes bad manners, I need to think about that cat. It doesn't necessarily work quite like that. I've heard somebody say that That some people who are like, you know, really some, like, I forgot the example. Some really nice, kind, honest car salesmen are reborn as, you know, what, collies. In other words, some really nice dogs were actually pretty nice people before, okay? But the way things work is that somehow, in some other lifetime, they've made some little mistakes so that they don't get to be a human again. Being a human is an extremely exalted opportunity.

[26:50]

And some humans don't get to be human again. However, if you're a human and you're pretty good, like I say, being honest and trying to help people and not rip them off, as a result of that good, you could be born as a nice, healthy dog. And have people be really nice to you, you know? You know, have your whole life, basically your whole life, as soon as you're born, you go to a nice home and they love you their whole life. You have to eat dog food pretty much, but they get you the best food. You know, you don't get to, you don't get to, like, have a self and suffer all that anxiety and stuff and realize transcendence of self. You don't get to do that. You don't get to practice Buddhism, maybe, in that way. But you get to have a decent life as a sentient being and be, have people, maybe be pretty much everything your whole life. and maybe have a nice little family of khalis or mangra-puff khalis and other mixtures, and, you know, have a decent life. You may get lucky and be Madonna's dog.

[27:52]

Yeah, right. So it's possible to, and that's a result of good karma, to be a dog and a nice, also to be an appreciative dog and a loyal dog, you know, and love your master or mistress and love being devoted to them, and that can be pretty good. That's pretty good. You know, that's, you know, pretty good. And that's a result of goodness to have that high state of evolution. Basically good, you see. It's just that some life comes with torment. And the reason why there's torment to something which is basically good, all life, including banana slugs, is good. But some life forms feel tormented because they're tormented by what they've thought in the past. They have hated other beings. They have felt selfish. for their own welfare and not respected other life forms and as a result of that kind of process they experience now anguish and suffering and misery even though all life is precious life life continues so if i hate things i will in this lifetime i will feel terrible

[29:00]

The hateful thought that might even seem odd to you, in essence, is from the panacea. My hateful thought, what? Let's say you have a hateful thought. Yes. It arises. Yes. And you look at it and you say, me. But he arose. Yes. You're saying that's from the past. Yes. Well, more like feeling paranoid and feeling ungrateful and feeling harassed and annoyed by what's happening. I'm saying this is negative, and also, in addition to being negative, I'm not grateful for this negative experience. In other words, I'm alive in pain, but I'm not grateful to be alive and in pain. Okay?

[30:05]

Some people would be very, very happy to be in a human body that's in pain. They would be very... very happy to be in pain. The most pain that you've ever had in your lifetime, some people would be happy to jump in there and groove on that. And they'd be very grateful for the opportunity. My life, if some people were in my life, they would think it was terrible. They would think it was hell. I'm very happy. Those people would also be, some of those people would also feel very terrible to be in front of your other body. Fifth, that's the result of your past weight raising. The fact that you're unappreciative of what's happening. The things that are coming to you. That's the result of past karma.

[31:06]

Thinking an angry thought is also the result of past karma. Probably isn't the first time you did it. But it's a new karma, a new action. It's also a result, but it's an action rather than a way of feeling it, a way of preaching it. Not everything is a result of past karma, but our take on things is. The way we see the world is. The way we see the world is not all that's happening. There's a lot more going on than we think. That's not our problem either. Our problem is the way we feel about things. That's our problem. The way we feel about things, it's not always a problem because sometimes we're extremely grateful for what's happening. And then we don't have problems. Well, I was wondering how the population is growing so much at once. Are there more humans being exploited?

[32:11]

Yeah, but it still may be better. It still may be better for humans, even so. And if we can, that's why it is a way for us to, in a kind fashion, decrease human population, it may be all right. What about these people who are kind of like waiting for human opportunity? Well, if we can, in a kind fashion, All humans that are living now, and all the plants and animals that are living now, if we can kindly modify the population structure, beings that are born in other forms will also experience that kindness. That's all right. It all depends on your motivation. If we'd like to reduce human population, like, toward those who would like the opportunity, then, you know, then we won't reduce human population. That will not lead to, because that kind of selfishness means unconscious indulgence.

[33:17]

But yeah, a lot of, there's many more beings now, there's lots of beings who would like to be born humans if they could think of it. And there's some beings who have thought of it in the past, and thought they were given the opportunity, they would think of human birth. Human birth means that you're interested in human reproduction processes. But even bees that have the ability to be interested in human sex still have to kind of wait in line for the opportunity. I've lost you there. What beings are you talking about? In human form?

[34:21]

Well, if I proceed along this line, I think that it might not be conducive to you inhabiting your being right now. So I did say this, and I... I don't want to pretend like I can take back what I said, but I think that maybe right now it would get kind of ungrounded if I followed this line of thought any further about these beings that are waiting to be born. Okay, so can I just postpone that until later in your life? Rob, did you say that lack of appreciation for change in our life, or what we got as a result of past karma? Yes. The thing. Same thing. If not karma, or if? Same thing. Well, no, it's an adult. In other words, your interpretation or evaluation of things is what leads you to be appreciative.

[35:26]

Right. So. Both are the result of the way you've thought before. The fact that I would appreciate your presence is the result of me appreciating other situations and not being angry and, you know, disgusted and disrespectful of life. Respecting life in the past leads me to respect and appreciate life in the present. But the way that we've seen you all the way before, trying to understand what these things are within our control, to understand better who kept you. No, it's not that things are within my control. It's not that things are within my control. It's that I wish for, either I wish or I do not wish to do good. If I wish to do good, then I do, then I will follow to some extent that wish. Even if I wish to do good, if I also have a competition. But if I really wish to do good, and at the moment I wish to do good, do not want to do bad, and I align my behavior with that as best I can, it's not that I'm in control, it's just that leads to being able to appreciate life and appreciate other beings and be grateful for what happened.

[36:38]

That's one of the benefits of wanting to do good and trying to do good. is that you experience life in a grateful fashion, that's one of the good things that happens. Wonderful. Important. But that doesn't mean I'm in control. I'm not in control. It just lead to fortunate results. But I may have an enormous amount of bad actions in the past so that they're keeping dumping down on Before my good actions even take effect, all these bad things are coming down on me because of things I've done before. So I'm not in control. But since I don't care that I'm not in control, I just keep doing good because I believe that's the way. Even though I'm pretty sure, I'm pretty sure in this lifetime I've done a lot of bad things. So they're going to come due.

[37:39]

in this lifetime or in later. So, I'm just like, you know, kind of like trying to do as much good as I can so I get in the habit so that now I can produce good results so that when these bad things come that I might be able to hopefully be in a real grateful and appreciative mood when this stuff starts coming down on me. It is coming. I'm pretty sure. Looks like it's going to come. But I can be in really good shape for when it comes. I can be like a real good catcher, you know. So isn't misfortune just what we perceive? I mean, because if bad things happen, but you're ready to catch it, but not really misfortune. I mean, do you not define them as misfortune or... You could still define it as misfortune and receive it gratefully. I mean, you could still know. This is sickness.

[38:41]

I mean, everybody around says, oh, that's too bad. And you know it's sickness, and it is sickness, and it's painful, and it's difficult. And you know that. But you're grateful for it, not for it specifically, but you're grateful to be alive. And this is the latest version of life for you. So basically, you're grateful. You're not specifically sick today. You know, like, oh, goody, a cold. Or, oh, goody, the flu. It isn't much like that, but rather, oh, I'm grateful to be alive, and this thing comes, and I'm still grateful to be alive. Okay? But you know it's misfortune. That's why I'm saying, this stuff's coming. Some very severe ones. You know, flus like that make your, you know, you've heard about some of these flus that are kind of real bad, like they make your skin pop and stuff like that. These kind of flus are probably coming at me. So how am I going to have a practice that I can continue to be grateful and concerned for the welfare of others when my body is being ripped to shreds? Well, it's going to be hard, right?

[39:42]

So I better practice pretty sincerely now. I'm pretty sure that kind of stuff is coming to me. So I'm getting ready. Yeah. Why do you think that all this is happening? Isn't that a very negative thing? Well, I mean, I'm not going to tell you all the bad things I've done this lifetime. I'm not going to tell you, but I know I've done some bad stuff already that I know about. If I've done these bad things, first of all, here I am, born a human, and I have very good karma. I have been healthy and so on, okay? And even though I've been, even though I have been very healthy in this life and had tremendous opportunities, people have been very nice to me People have also attacked me quite a bit. But a lot of people have been really nice to me. Like today, you people have been really nice to me and I appreciate it. Thank you. Really nice. I've had a great day. You've been very kind to me. And a lot of other people have been too. I have really good karma. I believe that's the result of my good actions. Wait a second, is that negative?

[40:43]

Okay, now, I have seen myself, and nobody's punished me for it, really, too much. I've got some punishment, but I have done a lot of stuff that I haven't got punished for in this lifetime. I've seen other people do a lot of really good things. I've watched them. I've seen, I've lived with virtuous people who are more virtuous than me. I've seen that. Is that negative? No. I have done bad things, and I think that I'm going to get in trouble for these bad things. That's not negative. That's the law. Well, but can't you, by living to virtue with life and recognizing the fact that this has happened before... Can't you be exonerated? I don't understand. I am forgiven. I am forgiven, definitely. And I get forgiven for confessing the things I've done. I get forgiven and purified. But exonerated is going a little far. Okay? But I get... So in my purified state, I'm a pure, relieved, ready-to-die guy.

[41:46]

Okay? So now here comes the stuff. Here it comes. How? Okay? But what I can do is I can... But to like... What do you call it? To have it not take effect. It does not take effect. It does take effect. Okay? But here's a story which I told before. One person... I guess... This is like in the Buddhist scriptures. It's almost like too... You know what I call it? Simplistic to be... be a metaphor, but anyway, here's the metaphor. There were two people. One person in this lifetime did all good, never did any bad. The other did all bad, never did any good. Okay? As the one who did all good, and life was ending, he saw the manifestation, or you know, the appearance, he saw his next birth. And in his, you know, coming up to him, it was going to be an infernal realm of torment.

[42:48]

Hmm? So then he looked at that and he said, whoa, I didn't, gee, this is kind of surprising. I've been good my whole life and now this is happening? Well, how this works, although I was good in my whole life, I must have done something in the past to cause this. And he also said, but I do believe in the law of cause and effect. And I also, even though I'm getting in this hell now, I'm still really glad and I feel overjoyed at all the good I did. the manifestation disappeared and a heavenly birth appeared before him. But still, that manifestation was the appearance. The result was that hell manifested before him. That is a result. But that's all it was, just that. That's the extent of the manifestation. Now, that manifestation, you may say, well, that's just a kind of temporary thing. Well, yeah, they're all temporary. But when hell manifests, if you respond to it by, well, this is kind of a surprise, but it must be because of that.

[43:50]

And also, I'm still happy that I did good. I don't regret all the good I did now that I'm getting hell. Then that manifestation happens and then the good started to come in. Which also manifests. The good also manifests. That doesn't stop either. It isn't like only the bad manifests, but the good poops out. No, they both definitely manifest. Then the man who did bad all the time, when he came to the time of dying, heaven met him. And he said, I don't deserve this from what I know about myself, but, well, I guess that's the way it's happening. He wasn't even grateful. He just said, and he thought, well, I guess the law of cause and effect is a bunch of bump because I did bad things all my life, and look, here's heaven. So then heaven did manifest. He got a little preview of heaven, and it just dribbled away, and hell manifested, which was partly the result of his continued disbelief and cause and effect after doing all that bad.

[44:55]

But you don't get exonerated. The stuff does manifest, but the way you... Sometimes it lets it manifest and then go away. Other times it manifests and then you play your cards a certain way and it manifests again and again and again and it gets blown up and it gets more and more substantial and so on. So, confession is purifying. And when you confess, you know you've got trouble coming. And so you're ready for... Now, I postponed your question. I can't remember it. Sorry. Well, I don't know how relevant it is right now, but when I was talking about this, do you ignore your anxiety to this degree? Fortunately, often, yes. So that... But it depends on how you ignore it.

[45:58]

Some ways of ignoring it are so... You know, you may die before it comes back strong enough for you to notice it. But generally speaking, when an anxiety knocks, if you ignore it, it will come back a little stronger. So... Or drive you into fear. And then the fear will get stronger and you'll be terrified. There are forces in our life that are pushing us to wake up, and anxiety is one of them. What I was also wondering about is what I call pathological anxiety. Yeah, I'll talk about that later, but go ahead. Well, it seems that there are different kinds of anxiety. Yes. The anxiety that you're talking about seems to be different from... The kind of anxiety I've been talking about so far is... the human condition. And there are neurotic or pathological anxieties, too, which are different.

[46:58]

These anxieties are due to having self-existence in relationship to non-being. Other kinds of anxieties develop out of inconsistencies, conflicts in the personality, unresolved conflicting elements in the personality. So you'll talk... Yeah. Yeah. But, you know, I'd like to do now is I'd like to end this afternoon with meditation. That's okay. Too late to close endos, so could we make our meditation seats right here? I'd like to take a seat. Take your seat in such a way that you're So we're in another crisis now.

[48:18]

So there's a danger and there's an opportunity right now. There are many dangers and many opportunities, but one danger I feel is the danger of of becoming distracted. I feel the group's pretty settled now. And we do nothing but just stay together for the rest of the evening and tomorrow.

[49:24]

We don't necessarily say anything or anything. That'd be fine. A lot would develop. The danger would be to disturb the groundedness that's been achieved so far, in which I feel. right now with your ear. The opportunity is to, you know, raise more issues, become more aware of other dimensions of this, of our anxiety.

[50:31]

But in doing so, there's a possibility that you'll become, or that we'll become somewhat excited by the new frontier that's opened up. You know, lose our grounding. That's the crisis I feel at this time. Kind of a crisis in in taking care of what we're feeling. I would guess that everybody is either feeling some anxiety or is somewhat anxious about not feeling anxiety. Or is feeling afraid, or is feeling afraid that you're in denial.

[51:47]

Because everybody else is afraid for you. And I think some other people are probably anxious and also anxious about not being anxious enough and afraid, but not feel like they're really, you know, but they're really hiding what they're really afraid of.

[52:12]

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