There is a hidden love center in human beings that you will discover and savor and be nourished with. That will be your food. There is a hidden love center in human beings that you will discover and savor and be nourished with. That will be your food. It's hard to know, of course, whether, you know, our effort will help us with that discovery or our letting go of effort, or allowing ourselves, you know, something to discover us, or if

[01:17]

our seeking is that savoring. So we'll sit and see, you know, what we discover, what we savor, if there's something in the sitting that nourishes us. So, um, I guess we're going to do a little bit of movement now. I'd like to do a little

[03:01]

qigong with you, I guess, so. Good evening. So can you hear me all right? Do I need to speak louder, or it's okay? I mean, it might be just as enlightening

[04:07]

not to hear what I have to say anyway, you know. You just watch somebody's mouth move. That's another, you know, in this poem I read, you know, I gave you a line earlier, and another one of my favorite lines in this poem is, when we mature and sweeten, we'll feel ashamed of having clung so clingingly. To hold fast is a sure sign of unripeness. We hold tight to the limbs because we know we're not ready to be taken into the palace. More needs to be said on this, but the Holy Spirit will tell you when I'm not here. So won't that

[05:08]

be a relief? Um, when I'm not here, the Holy Spirit will tell it to you when I'm not here. You'll tell it to yourself. Not I or some other I, you or me. You'll tell it to yourself as when you fall asleep and go from the presence of yourself to the presence of yourself. You hear the one, and you think, someone must have communicated telepathically in my sleep. You are not a single you, good friend. You are sky and ocean, a tremendous you, a 900 times huge drowning place for all the hundreds of yous. So once I'm quiet, you'll tell it to yourself. So anyway, I'm going to talk anyway, though, because it's what we do at these things.

[06:15]

Somebody talks and people listen and something happens and we go home and other things happen. I seem to be on this thing about poems tonight. I had another talk planned for you, so we'll get to that talk. A couple of weeks ago, two or three weeks ago, I was feeling kind of moody. I often do in March. Then somebody emailed me a poem. It's a poem by Hafez, the Sufi poet. It's called The Ten Thousand Idiots. Do you know that poem? I heard this poem and I was so relieved. The poem goes like this. It's a grave danger to the aspirant on the

[07:21]

spiritual path when one begins to believe and act as if the 10,000 idiots who lived and ruled for so long inside have finally packed their bags and left or died. I thought, I guess I'm not in that grave danger. It is a grave danger to the aspirant on the spiritual path to begin to believe and act as though the 10,000 idiots who lived and ruled for so long inside have finally packed their bags and left or died. First I thought, thank goodness I'm not in that grave danger. Then somebody sent me another Hafez poem. Not only was I not in a

[08:24]

grave danger, I seemed to be doing really good spiritual work, it turned out, to be feeling what I was feeling and going through what I was going through. The second poem goes like this. Don't surrender your loneliness so easily. Let it cut more deep. So of course it's not just your loneliness but your sadness, your discouragement, your disappointment. I mean somehow we're supposed to have the secret, all of us, and attract what we want. But this seems to be a little counter to what Hafez has to say. Don't surrender your loneliness so easily. Let it cut more deep. Something missing in my heart tonight makes my eyes so soft,

[09:35]

my voice so tender, my need for the divine so great, or my need to touch and know that love center makes it so clear. So you know oftentimes things come up in meditation or in our lives and we worry. Why can't I do better? Why can't I handle this? Why am I so this? Why do I feel so that? Can't I just be this or shouldn't I just be that? It's a relief when somebody says you could go ahead and feel your feelings. You could think your thoughts. You

[10:40]

could be you and you could discover the hidden love center in human beings that helps you with this. That doesn't come or go and is always on your side. What in Zen we call big mind. But it's your own inner being. It's your inner life. We all have the resources that we're not often using in our life that help us meet and be with the circumstances of our life. So tonight I wanted to talk a little bit about hands. Hands is part of your body. I was mentioning

[11:47]

during the qigong the head and neck. I've decided your body is a little bit like what they say to parents. Do you know where your children are? What they're doing? Who they're with? Do you know where they are and do you know where your body is? Because if you don't know where your body is, after a while you know it's going to have some complaint. Some friends of mine, they say if the children are the younger children, not the teenagers that you need to know where they are, but the younger ones you know where they are but they're playing someplace in the house there and if it's quiet for too long, I say they get worried. So they go and check. I think on the whole physical

[12:53]

relationship with our bodies, there's a lot we can work on or develop and shift in terms of our relationship with our bodies which is also with consciousness. And meditation is not just some kind of mind business, mind practice, but about how to be an incarnate human being. How to have the lovely vitality of a human being, what Rumi calls. And this has taken me many years to have some sense about this that I'm going to talk with you tonight and I'll tell you a number

[14:00]

of stories and then you can see if something I say is of some use to you and if it is, you can use it, and if not, you can get on with your life. Sometimes I think this meditation business is, you know one of my favorite artists is the painter named Hundertwasser. Hundertwasser is German for hundred waters. He grew up in Austria and when the Nazis came, one of his parents was Jewish, I think it was his mother. When the Nazis came, he dressed up in his uncle's German military uniform and they let him go. And he became, you know, he was quite a creative painter. He did a lot of spirals in his paintings and he also made a lot of his own paints. So he was the kind of

[15:06]

person who would say, how can you make something creative with manufactured ready-made paints? So some artists, I mean, you know, I don't have these kind of strong feelings about it. He has very strong feelings about it, but you know, he was like, he never liked Karl Appel, for instance, who uses like wads of paint and has stacks and stacks of cans. He would have stacks of cans and cans, you know, stacked up with paints, you know. So Hundertwasser used to grind up fine bricks and grind them up, you know, and mix them with tempera or whatever, you know, if you have a paint. And then the particles are different, the particles are different sizes. And then to get layered, instead of, you know, putting on wads of paint, he would paint over and over and over so it would build up and have a kind of patina. And then there's a kind of depth to it that you don't get

[16:13]

from just putting it on thick. It's a different kind of depth. And, you know, he also designed a series of buildings, and there's now one that's opening up in the Napa Valley. He designed a winery in the Napa Valley, which is, I think it's called Quixote. And there was an article in the New York Times, it's just started opening to the public about a month ago. And his buildings are really whimsical. You know, they look like something out of Hansel and Gretel, or it's like bizarre. But when you look at it, it's hard to keep from smiling, you know, because it's like these different colors. And then he used to go to architectural conventions and accuse them of being fascists. He didn't get invited to a lot of them. You're forcing people to live in straight

[17:18]

lines. And, you know, his idea was, you know, like the Asian idea that evil goes in straight lines. When you need to go, you know, which is also a little bit like the idea that, you know, your consciousness, we think we'd like to be able to go and not be obstructed. But when your consciousness goes and isn't obstructed, then it just thinks it knows what it's doing and where it's going. And then it gets like knocking things out of its way, because I have an agenda. So, you know, Wendell Berry and many people say, you know, the impeded stream is the one that sings. Think about it, you know, the culverts, the concrete culverts where the water goes along, it doesn't sing the way that the streams with the rocks, you know, sing. And we're like that, you know, we and our

[18:21]

consciousness is like that, where when we're impeded and we bump into things, you know, our consciousness starts to sing. So we're learning in meditation to appreciate, you know, to hear our song and appreciate this song, you know, of our consciousness bumping into things. This seems, you know, a little strange, but don't worry. So, Hundertwasser designed buildings and he also said, you know, your foot, when you always walk on level surfaces, your foot's going to go dead. You know, feet like to, your body actually likes uneven surfaces, and then your foot has some intelligence that comes alive, because it has to feel where it is and what it's doing on this uneven surface. If you're always

[19:25]

walking on a level surface, oh, that's so great, you can get someplace. So, but your consciousness actually comes alive when you're walking on the uneven surface. So like if you, like I've noticed this, like the difference between hiking in like Marin County and hiking up in the Sierras or, you know, especially like New Hampshire or Maine, and then the trail, there's not really a trail sometimes, it's just like, you know, about 20 feet up there, and this is true in the Alps in places too, you know, there's a mark, a little piece, a little paint or a little mark on a tree, and you know to head in that direction. But it's not like they made a path, and you're climbing over things. So your body and your being, you know, comes alive to be doing this rather

[20:25]

than just getting somewhere. And, you know, when it's all flat, then your head sort of gets, you know, in a way excited, like we're getting someplace, we're, you know, we're going to get somewhere. But, you know, on the other hand, your body can be alive, you know, because you need to find your, your body needs to find its way and how to get over that rock or climb. Sometimes there's a walk and you kind of, you have to climb it, and some of these trails. So this is actually more like the way our life is, you know, many poets say that, you know, there's no fixed trails. On the ocean. And then, you know, that Robert Bly used to like to quote that poem by, I think it's Juan Ramon Jimenez, or it might be Antonio Machado, you know, there, there are four things useless at sea, anchor, rudder, oars, and the fear of

[21:27]

going down. And in the same poem in Rumi, he says, your life could be like a journey of the stars. And then he says, Oh, forget that journey, a journey without even any sky, even. I can imagine that. Anyway, so Hundertwasser, I'm sorry, I gave you this long introduction for Hundertwasser, but one time, and you'll see in the story, not for very long, and you'll see why, but he was hired as a visiting professor of art at this university in southern Germany. So the first day of class, he came in, and, you know, I sometimes think that this is true of meditation, too, you know, but he came into the first day of class, and

[22:28]

he said, some of you have some talent. There's nothing I can teach you. Why don't you just make your art? And then he said, some of you have no talent. Why don't you go home and get on with your life? There's nothing I can teach you either. Go home and get on with your life. So is that the way it is with meditators, too? You know, can anybody actually tell you how to meditate or, you know, what to do, what not to do, and you're going to get better at it? You know, some of us, I mean, I just like it. You know, I meditate, and I don't know whether I'm any good at it or not, you know, but there seems to be something to do. And it seems useful to, you know, lately I've started meditating daily again, and it seems like a really nice thing to be doing, you know. So anyway, then Hundertwasser said, but anyway, why don't we do

[23:40]

something together? And he got out some paints, and he started drawing a line around the baseboard of this room, and the room is like 30 by 40 feet or something, and he started drawing a line around the baseboard, and he went all the way around the room, and after about an hour or so, he gave the paints to somebody else, and you could use whatever paint or crayon or anything you wanted to continue the line. And the line continued, in other words, making a spiral around the room. And then when there was a radiator, it went over the radiator and continued, and when it came to the door, it went along the back of the door, and if it came to the windows, it went across the window. And he just continued this, you know, like around the clock. It didn't stop, like at the end of, you know, a class time or something, so people got, the students got very excited, you know, and after a day or so, and then, you know, they would take turns. So some people would go out for pizza or, you know, food, and they'd bring back food and drinks, and then people were napping and sleeping, and this became this huge event. So of course, the school

[24:47]

administrators heard about it pretty soon, and they came, and one of them came to the door, and they just happened to be painting the back of the door at that time, and they wouldn't let him in, and he pounded on the door, and he said, let me in, and Hundertwasser yelled out, no, the rule of the line is at the door. So anyway, they got about seven or eight feet up this, you know, ten foot room, and they closed him down, and they fired him, and they painted it over. And he said, didn't they get it? This is the only room in Germany that would have been like this. They would have had something they could charge admission for. This could have earned money for the school. This would be the only room in the world like it. Anyway, I'm sorry I've gotten distracted again, or maybe not.

[25:54]

Maybe we're being led someplace. But anyway, I want to come back to hands and bodies, and helping your body find its way. In some ways, this is so simple, and yet, it's so challenging, because our mind is so fixed on the idea that we are in charge. I am in charge here. Do you understand that? And you will do what I tell you to. And if I want you to move, you'll move. And if I want you to sit still, you'll sit still. And don't complain. Just do what I tell you, and don't complain. This is the kind of attitude, largely, we have towards our bodies. And then, do you think that doesn't carry over to other things, like your thoughts and your feelings? I'll tell you what to feel. I'll tell you what to think. And then other stuff happens.

[27:00]

This is only another way of talking about, of course, the First Noble Truth in Buddhism. Things aren't going to do what you tell them on a consistent basis, on anywhere near enough of a consistent basis to think that that would be the way to do things, to just tell them what to do. But we would like to think that at least with my body, I could tell it what to do. And then, if it doesn't, then we feel like, I'm so betrayed. And so forth, you know. So, for instance, this started for me many years ago. One of the places it started for me, I was practicing Zen. And you know, in Zen, we sit up straight. So I was doing it right. Because I was going to be the best Zen student ever in the history of the world.

[28:08]

I don't know if any of you have ambition like this. I guess I've kind of outgrown it. But I was just sitting there, minding my own business, doing it right. And all of a sudden, I was sitting there like this. And said, excuse me, but this is Zen. I just sit like this. I don't care. But this is spiritual. So what? Well, it's a thing to be doing. I don't care. But this is right. No. Yes. No. So pretty soon, I'm trying to get myself to sit up straight. And something in me is just going like, uh-uh. Not today. So what do you do? You know, after a while, I finally said, well, OK, have it your way. And then after a while, if you're sitting like this long enough, you know, something inside goes, excuse me, but could we sit up a little bit? Because this isn't really that comfortable.

[29:13]

I'm only here in this position because you were so insistent on being in that other position that was uncomfortable for me. And you weren't paying any attention to me. And you didn't notice that it was uncomfortable for me. But could we sit up a little bit? So then, you know, the way bodies are is they're not very articulate. Bodies are a lot like two-year-olds or three-year-olds. And you have to check with them. Why don't we try this? How about here? A little bit back? Is that better? Would you like a little bit forward? A little bit back? So this is where you have to find your hips. So now I tell people, like being in meditation, I often say to people, find your hips. Bring them forward. You know, bring them back. And help them find where is it that they really feel stable and balanced and at ease and comfortable and willing to.

[30:17]

And when your hips are in a good position, then an energy just comes up inside you that wants to grow tall. When your hips aren't in a good position, you don't get that energy. When you just tell your body what to do, what it should be doing and what it shouldn't be doing, you don't get the lovely vitality and energy of your body. Stability is not just something like your mind is stable. Stability is also something you do with your body. You help your body find its place of stability, whether you're sitting or walking. In Buddhism, you know, it's four postures, sitting, walking, standing and lying down. There's four postures. And you can find in each of those postures, you help your body find its well-being, its joy, its happiness, its stability, its ease. And then you feel stability, ease, joy, well-being, because you helped your body find it. You didn't just tell your body, do this. And then your body is kind of like, who is this person?

[31:31]

And then, you know, this isn't really that great, but okay. And then your body's in a kind of like, okay, but you're getting stiff. You're getting rigid. Rather than, how's this for you? How's this? Would you like to sit up a little bit more? Would you like to sit up a little bit? Would you like to lean back, forward? And what about your head? Why don't we see how it is and where it would like to be? So, we don't do very many things that emphasize this point. And it's very challenging. I mention this to people and I tell people too. The old Taoist saying, if you want your head to be in the right place, you need to have your heart in the right place. If you want your heart to be in the right place, you need to have your hips in the right place. This is ancient wisdom. But oftentimes, if I tell people to bring to meditation, locate your hips, move them around, help them find their stability and ease. One or two people in the room, move. Because everybody knows where their hips are, they think.

[32:45]

But really, to know where anything is, you have to move it a little bit and see where is it. And what is it actually feeling? What is it actually sensing in that part of your body? What are the actual sensations there? Not just giving directives. The more you give directives, what to do, what not to do, the less you'll be able to sense, the less you'll be able to perceive. You can't be giving out directives and perceiving at the same time. This is just basic stuff. Okay. I've studied how to use my hands to do a number of things, cutting vegetables and cooking and changing my handwriting and doing touch practice, sensing.

[33:54]

When you do touch or healing touch or mindfulness touch, when you touch someone, you're not telling them how to be. It's mindfulness. It's like, I'm not going to tell you how to be. I'm not going to tell you to relax or straighten up. Calm down, straighten up, relax, go over there, come over here. No, it's just like, I'm going to touch you and whatever's going on with you, I'm willing to touch it. And you can feel whatever you're feeling. Okay, that's healing touch. That's mindfulness touch. So you're not directing, you're sensing, and I agree and I'm agreeing when I touch you to touch you, to touch consciousness, not just stuff. And I'm agreeing to touch the hidden love center. Okay. That's just an agreement I have, you know, with myself, I'm making this agreement with myself and with you, if I'm going to touch you, rather than do this, don't do that. Calm down, straighten up, feel good. Don't feel that, feel this.

[35:06]

So we're so easy, you know, to be directive rather than to be receptive. How will you discover the hidden love center? So this has taken me years to come to this kind of understanding, you know, I did Zen practice for 20 years, you know, every day, day in and day out, pretty much all of 20 years. You know, meditation at four in the morning or five. And, you know, a little while after I stopped living in Zen center, I went to an Aikido class. And there's a, I was working with a partner, it's, you know, and I'm 40. And, you know, the partner's 22 or something. And, you know, you're supposed to hold out your hand. So I put out my hand. And he says, could you put some energy into your hand? And I thought, I thought I was. Well, little by little, I found out that, you know, I didn't have hands. I noticed in meditation, like consciousness just comes down to the wrist, there aren't any hands there. Do you have hands in meditation?

[36:23]

And usually in order to have hands or have any part of your body, you need to be doing something with them. Otherwise, they disappear. Or, you know, you have a practice like you move your consciousness through your body and check in with different places. Or one way to get consciousness of your body is you do something specific with your body. So in Zen, we actually have this posture for the hands, you know, where you have your left hand and your right and your thumb tips touch. And you can't do this without having consciousness in your hands. So I had spent 20 years at the Zen Center not having consciousness in my hands and then, you know, beginning meditations like this. But then, after a while, the hands are just sort of sitting there. And we sit with our face in the wall. So then, for the most part, you know, people can't see.

[37:26]

Excuse me, but, you know, do you have any consciousness in your hands? And I talked about a friend of mine with this and he said, Ed, you spiritual people are all alike. I said, oh, really? He said, yeah. And he said, yeah, you know, you spiritual people, you're old souls. This is kind of like Marinspeak. This person is actually up in Sonoma, but it's kind of like Marinspeak. You know, you spiritual people are all old souls. And so, you know, you've had all these past lives where you've made all these mistakes, you know, one after another. And you've made so many mistakes. You don't, in this life, you don't want to make any mistakes again. So the mistake you're going to make, so just don't have hands. And if you don't have hands, you won't do anything wrong with them. So this is one way to be spiritual, you see, is to abandon your body and not be there.

[38:26]

So it's very challenging, actually, to, you know, actually take your consciousness and find your body. And then I was working with someone, and this had actually started, you know, a number of years before that, but I went to see a therapist. And we were doing two-hour sessions, and after a few minutes, I'd start crying. And I'd mostly just cry for two hours. I had a lot of grief. But anyway, after, and then one of those sessions, I said to her one day, you know, and these aren't even my hands. And I don't remember what she said, you know, I don't recognize my hands. I don't remember what she said, but after six sessions of that, she said, you need to get your thyroid checked. And I said, I don't need to anything. I believe in choice. If you'd like to tell me what you think would be good for me to do, or what you would suggest or encourage me to do, okay, but I don't have to do anything.

[39:34]

And she said, you have to get your thyroid checked. And she told me, and this is, you know, sort of typical of these things, you know, like, that she had had her thyroid taken out, and the way I was behaving reminded her of how she behaved when she had her thyroid taken out before they started giving her thyroid supplements. So obviously, I had hypothyroid function, and I need to get my thyroid checked and get some thyroid supplements and get, you know, normal. And I said, well, I don't want to do that. And she said, but you have to. Anyway, and then she said, I'll give you, I said, well, she said, she said, well, why aren't you going to do this? And I said, well, I don't believe in Western medicine. And besides, I don't want to pay somebody a bunch of money just to order some tests. And she said, I'll give you half back half of your fee if you'll promise to go get your thyroid checked.

[40:34]

I said, I gave you the money for the session. You can do whatever you want with that money, and I will do what I choose to. I'm not promising that. So she did give me back half the money. And then I went home and got some Chinese herbs, and I felt a lot better. I went down the street to the herbalist in San Francisco. You know, he's next door to the Green Apple on Clement there. Vin Kahn. Sweet man, Tony. And, you know, kidney. It's kidney stuff, you know, because kidney herbs, you know, help you be, because it settles you. It grounds you. You're grounded. You're stable. You know, from the kidney, better kidney energy. And then a few months later, I said, you know, I was telling this story to some friends of mine. And he said, but Ed, I'm a doctor. I can order the test for you. So I got the test. It was $45. And everything was just like right in the middle of, you know, thyroid function.

[41:37]

Recently, I saw a psychic, and he said, you need to get your thyroid checked. I said, no, that's my, I said, no, that's my daughter. She's got hyperthyroid. And he said, no, it's you. You need to get your, no, it was my daughter. But anyway. I don't know why I'm telling you all these things, but. Okay. This is, this is to, you know, to tell you. So then I was working with this other woman, another woman. And we were doing, you know, various kinds of energetic and hands-on healing and, you know, various things. It's fascinating work. I just find it really fascinating. And one day I said to her, and these aren't, these aren't even my hands. And she said, whose are they? Wow. What a good question. And I said, some big persons. So how big do you, are you, if you say there's some big persons.

[42:48]

And then she said, and where are yours? Oh man, that is just such a brilliant question. That's like when, you know, when your mother or father or an old person is dying and they start telling you that, you know, they're not even in their own house. And you, instead of saying, well, yes, you are. Of course, this is your own house. You want to say, where are you? Like, can you engage with reality of the person you're meeting rather than telling them what is the way to think and feel and be? So she said, where are yours? And I said, I felt around and they're in the elbows. So then I started working on, as she suggested, could you see if you could extend the little hands out into your big hands or shrink your big hands down to little hands so your hands could be in the same place.

[43:53]

So we, I think now, you know, we all have, you know, bodies, you know, where our consciousness is stopped, you know, and we didn't quite decide to, you know, be, you know, for the consciousness to come fully out into the periphery, into the hands, into the feet. You know, we've, our consciousness is, isn't completely present throughout. It has little places it likes to hang out, that it knows. And we have a vision, you know, an image, a picture of the body that's mine, that I want to keep, that I want to have and keep. And I'm going to keep on having this body. So then when we're in meditation, you know, and your body starts to hurt, well, no, I want that body, that other body back again. The body, the one that I remember, that's mine.

[45:01]

Where is it? So we become very attached to, you know, a certain body, picture, body, image, body. And that's not our real body, that's just a, that's a picture, that's a picture body. That's a, that's a habit body. And often, you know, one's habit body, as mine was, is, you know, can be different ages. But mine was, you know, three years old. This is about how long your arms are, you know, for three years old. But your body can stop at six or seven or, you know, and especially if something happens in your life. A lot of things happen, you know, in our lives. So part of what we're doing is studying, like, well, you know, and if you want to liberate, liberate your body, you know.

[46:04]

That's like, you know, some people call it, Thich Nhat Hanh calls it, you know, you re-inhabit yourself. You move back in. You re-inhabit. And Suzuki Roshi called it owning your own body and mind. And you own it by moving in, you know. And moving in is also like, you know, from your center, from the love center, the hidden love center, you extend that out. You know, into your hands, into your feet. And they don't just, when I went to that Aikido class, you know, that's when I had these little hands. And so, and it's amazing, you know. Twenty years of Zen practice and somebody's been doing Aikido for a year. You know, well, can you get some energy in your hand? People can see these things, see these things.

[47:06]

It's the same if you go to improv class, you know. I've been to different improv classes. I remember Ruth Sapporo, you know, watching the students and then she'd say to a student, you were in your body there and then you moved over to there and you were in your body again. What were you doing there? Where were you? She could tell right away, you know, you were present there. You know, you just, and then you went over there. And you weren't present. And you just kind of wandered over there. And then when you got there, you came alive again and you were in your body again. So people who see these things, see these things. And if you're interested in this kind of, you know, like coming alive, you know, in your life, then you can study, you know, meditation or you can study dance or improv or you can study like how to cook, how to use your hands in cooking, how to use your hands to cut.

[48:12]

And you, but you ask your body. You don't just tell your body. And then she said, when you can walk, when you walk, you know, you can walk the way you walked, but you know, you're, but you're conscious of how you're walking. You're conscious of just wandering over there. Anyway. So now I've been to a number of classes with this yoga teacher, Eric Shipman. He's in Santa Monica, so I don't get to very many of his classes. But we were doing workshops together for a little while. And Eric Shipman, if you have a chance to do yoga with him, it's an amazing, I think an amazing experience because Eric's one of those, he's Eric's like another, like, you know,

[49:15]

sort of like in my mind, in my world, you know, it's like, you know, it's just like one of a kind. And it's like, it's like awesome one of a kind. And first of all, of course, he's like well over six foot awesome and huge. And then he does, you know, all these amazing yoga poses, which, you know, for little thin 115 pound women, okay. But, you know, 200 pound over six foot, you know. Wow. Stunning. But Eric has never done anything in his life as an adult but teach yoga. He's never had any other job. That already is pretty unusual. And what happened was that he went to high school like in Santa Monica or someplace. And then after high school, and he'd been a little interested in yoga and he had these books on yoga

[50:16]

and he had a closet that he set up to, you know, have his do meditation in and he had pictures of different gurus up. And then in summer after high school, he was thinking about going to, you know, San Francisco Art Institute or something. And then he came across this flyer or something describing a high school in England that was run by Krishnamurti or founded by Krishnamurti. And he thought, I want to go there. So he wrote them a letter and said, I've graduated from high school, but I really want to come to your school. Would you please accept me? So he said he wrote a very sincere letter and they accepted him. So he got to do an extra year of high school without having to worry about grades. And they had yoga classes. So he started doing yoga. And at the end of that year, he said to Krishnamurti, well, if you were me, what would you do? And Krishnamurti said, why don't you go to India and study yoga with...

[51:17]

Not Iyengar, no. At that point, he was studying with Desikacharya, the other one. What's his father's name? Krishnamacharya. He said, why don't you go to India and study yoga with Krishnamacharya? So Eric went to India to study yoga with Krishnamacharya. And Krishnamacharya was the teacher of Iyengar, the teacher of Pattabhi Joyce, the teacher of Desikacharya. He's the teacher of all the teachers who brought yoga to the West. And so Eric lived there and studied for months with Krishnamacharya. And he would go to class and Krishnamacharya would say, how are you? And how is the traffic? And how's the weather? And this is happening with my family. And Eric's like, well, but he never talks about yoga. And one day he asked Krishnamacharya a question about yoga and Krishnamacharya answered him. Well, it wasn't long before he came to class with hundreds of questions. So then when he got back to England, the yoga teacher at that high school quit and they offered him the job.

[52:25]

And after a number of years of doing that, he met somebody who told him about Iyengar. So then he went back to India to study yoga with Mr. Iyengar. And he said that was really amazing because, and he says to this day he's extremely grateful to Mr. Iyengar because when you do Iyengar yoga, you know, as many of you know, if you put your hand out, you don't just put your hand out, you extend from the middle of your chest out your arm. It's not just putting your arm out. It's like this is consciousness embodying and the consciousness locating itself in the body. And this is one way to, you know, have consciousness, activate your consciousness in your body. It's like you have something very particular to do. You extend from the middle of your chest out and out through your fingers and your fingers are at a certain angle and the whole deal.

[53:29]

So he did that for a while. And then at some point he, and then, you know, he developed, you know, and then the whole thing of like raise your kneecaps, you know, and if after a while if you don't raise your kneecaps, then Mr. Iyengar will hit you. You don't have ears? Raise your kneecaps. And then, and then Eric began to like, why would I do it the same way every time? Now that I have consciousness in my body, why wouldn't I just send it out through my hands? And now his hands make every time he does this pose, his hands are a different shape. So ironically, and he calls his yoga now freedom yoga. And he, but he got to freedom yoga by doing forms, practices. You know, you, you know, in meditation is if nothing else, you know, show up.

[54:38]

Right here, right now, what's happening. Whether it's your body, whether it's your mind, whether it's your thoughts, whether you're feeling show up here, now, what's happening and be present with it. And this is a, you know, this is a huge gift. You can give yourself. It's the gift of that any, it's the biggest gift that any of us give to one another, which is our attention. How are you? What's happening? How are you today? And real attention, you know, and you can give that attention to yourself in meditation. So I've talked about a lot of things. And again, you know, for me, it's been very interesting to shift, you know, from directing my body, what to do,

[55:46]

telling it how to be to how is this for you? And how about this? You want to sit up a little straighter. You want to sit a little more relaxed. Where is it that you like to be that you and then start to sense your body. So you can tell what's happening. Where am I? How is this? And, you know, that you could actually discover your find your hands and extend your consciousness out into your hands. So that you actually have hands rather than, you know, only having hands to do what you tell them to. Because hands, the amazing thing, you know, that hands love to be hands. Hips love to be hips. So, you know, hands love to touch things and feel things and do things. So, you know, we say like, oh, I don't feel like doing that today. Let's do that tomorrow.

[56:50]

That's not your hands talking because hands were just as soon touch something and work with something. And this is a whole long talk, you know, but. But, you know, we've lost a lot of this and we've lost a lot of the. You know, understanding of the value and importance of having hands and doing stuff with their hands and how how energizing it is. And, you know, now we sort of think it's too much work. So we don't cook so much, we don't garden so much, you know, we don't sew so much, you know. Watch some television, you know, listen to your iPod, you know, get on the Internet. Why would you want to do anything with your hands, with your body? You know, and then we wonder, like, well, where's my life? Where's my energy? Where's my vitality? And it's all here. There's a secret, you know, a hidden love center.

[57:51]

Inside human beings. That you'll discover and savor and be nourished with. Okay. Thank you. Well, it's just about eight o'clock and, you know, I've gone on.

[58:13]

@Text_v004
@Score_JJ