I like six-day obsession. How about you? By way of summary of what's gone before and also introduction to right livelihood, I would say that being present in the midst of our experience, which means being present, not even being present, but presence of our immediate experience. If I say being present in the midst of something, being present in the midst of, but the presence of our immediate experience is what I call being upright.

[01:17]

Presence of our immediate experience. The presence of this moment. is nirvana. The essence of this moment is right livelihood, and no matter what happens, no matter how experienced From now on, even beyond this life, the presence of whatever happens will be the eightfold. The presence of our experience

[02:31]

is the non duality of our experience. The presence of experience is the same as the presence of the cosmos. In the midst of our experience means in the midst of the five aggregates. presence of the five aggregates is the five aggregates being the five aggregates. No more, no less. When the five aggregates appear, that's all there is. There's nothing more or less than that. However, our experience can manifest in the form of thinking that there's something more than our experience.

[03:33]

So. Our experience, we can experience, for example, we can have there can be the experience, the arising of the experience of a question, for example, what is it that is aware of? What is it that is aware of? It. that is aware of the aware thing of something. That's the fifth skanda, being aware of other skandas, which is a concoction of the five skandas. Still, we feel like, what is it that's aware of? The experience can manifest itself in the form of feeling like it's a duality. The fact that we experience duality being nothing more than that is non-duality. Still, we get tricked by the question, what is that?

[04:43]

What is it that is aware of x? So for example, you can put various x's in there. What is it that is aware of the five aggregates? Five aggregates. The five aggregates are what is aware of the five aggregates. What is it that is aware of presence? What's the answer? What? What? No. Five aggregates. Also, Awareness of presence. What is the presence? It's the five aggregates. It's part of the five aggregates. There's awareness of a thing in the five aggregates called presence.

[05:48]

The idea of presence. The presence that you're aware of is not presence. It's an aspect of the five aggregates. And the awareness... is just five aggregates. However, five aggregates just being five aggregates is presence. And the fact that your experience is always your experience means that presence can never be taken from you. You can only be confused about it. That object of awareness is the presence. But your presence is always your experience is your experience. What is it that is aware of self? What's the answer? Five aggregates. What is it of something separate from the five aggregates? Five aggregates. What is it that's aware of the feeling that something is separate from the five aggregates?

[06:55]

Five aggregates. Hmm? Only one person want to answer that one? Getting tired out? Five aggregates. However, the nirvana that the five aggregates is aware of as itself or as separate from itself is not nirvana. It is just an idea of nirvana. However, the five aggregates just being the five aggregates is nirvana. The five aggregates seen as separate from samsara will be grasped. That is samsara. That is suffering. Not just suffering, but endless suffering. But when the five aggregates are not any longer set aside from anything else and not grasped, therefore, that's nirvana.

[07:57]

Believing in the reality of these various processes of what is it that's aware of, believing that there's some reality to the duality here, is suffering. Believing that the self is separate from the five aggregates, or the five aggregates are separate from anything, or that anything's separated from anything, believing in any of these dualities is suffering. is samsaric suffering, not just thinking that the pain in the knees is separate from anything is samsaric suffering. For the pain in the knees to be just the pain in the knees is nirvana. It is the presence of the pain in the knees. Meditating on the process of how it is to take as real the five aggregates of something, or something being separate from the five aggregates, meditating on that is meditating on the first and second noble truths.

[09:29]

It is meditating on suffering and the conditions for suffering. Endless suffering is this separation of self and other, of self and five aggregates, of five aggregates and five aggregates. Being aware of this is meditating on the first two truths. Meditating on the first two truths is the Eightfold Path. And in particular, meditating on the first two truths is right livelihood. Believing in any of these dualities is the ground for wrong livelihood.

[10:32]

Believing in the reality is something separate from I have a feeling that there's something separate from or something more than this. I feel like there's something more than this. Feeling like there's something more than this sounds innocent enough. Like, well, I just don't think that this is all that's going on. Or I feel like there's something more than me. That sounds humble. Wouldn't it be arrogant to say, all there is is me? Wouldn't that be solipsism? It sounds innocent, but really it's guilty of saying that there's a universe plus me. It's actually very arrogant. There's me on top of the world. Or rather, the world is the place where there's me in addition to what's happening, or what's happening is in addition more than me.

[11:39]

And then believing that rather than remembering that me is nothing but five skandhas. Me is nothing more than anything. I'm not an addition to the world or a subtraction. There's just the world. There's no me in addition to the world. But I feel there is a feeling that there's something more than this or that this is something more than that. Believing in that is the basis of wrong livelihood. If you believe in that, and most people do, If you believe in it even a little bit, you've got to believe in what you do, because you are deluded if you believe that. This belief is the ground out of which wrong livelihood grows. If you have that kind of belief, then you have to restrain and refrain from some of the impulses which arise from this belief. Not all, but some. You need to check out the list of things that you shouldn't do, that you should restrain, the list of things that arise up out of this kind of belief.

[12:54]

The list of things which arise out of this kind of belief are those kinds of livelihood which do harm to that poor thing which you said was other than yourself, to that world that was more than you. On the other hand, if you stand on the ground of nirvana, if you stand on the ground of not believing these dualities, not believing in any of these dualities is the ground of right livelihood. If you don't believe in these realities, right livelihood arises spontaneously. And you do not have to restrain yourself. Because you don't see yourself to restrain. Your life is just five skandhas spontaneously expressing five skandhas, never more, never less.

[14:06]

Your life is the world expressing the world. But if you don't see it that way, Then we've got to have some restraint here. So right livelihood is to abstain from livelihood that brings harm to those others that you think are other. To restrain this dangerous person who thinks that he's separate from others and don't do anything that will harm, such as trading in arms, trading in living beings, trading in intoxicating drinks, trading in poison. How many billions or trillions of dollars of our economy would drop away if people practice drop those arms?

[15:16]

Intoxicating drinks and drugs and poisons. And do we support, even if we don't sell arms sell various kinds of living beings, sell drugs or sell poisons. Do we hire these people? Do we support these people who are willing to directly do these things? Also, no slaughtering, no fishing, no soldiering, no deceit, no trickery, No soothsaying, no usury. Do we work in a bank? Do we have money in a bank? Livelihood is our means of support of life.

[16:30]

Livelihood means the course of life. Logically. This kind of practice. Giving up our belief in duality prior to that. We're going to have a little bit of pain in general and pain in particular about putting this into practice. There's going to be some difficulties here for us, probably. One story that I found particularly touching both times I heard it was a story I heard from Ravi's teacher, Rinso Insan, Suzuki Roshi's son.

[17:45]

I can't remember which, I think somebody asked him one time, what was some of your favorite things as a child? What were some of the happy things you used to do when you were a child? And then someone asked him in our time, what was some of the main teachings, important teachings that your father gave you? Two different times asking that question. He gave the same story twice, answering those two questions. The first time I heard the story was asking, what were some of your favorite childhood pastimes or happy times? He said, well, one of the things I used to like to do best, happiest times I had, was when I used to go fishing. Not mountainous area, but kind of like mountains, coastal mountains. Maybe they're about the height of the mountains around Marin, maybe 2,000, 3,000 feet tall, would you say?

[18:54]

So he and his brother used to go up in those mountains, and then on the other side of the mountains were rivers, and they used to go fishing. One time he and his little brother, Otohiro, went fishing and caught some fish. And they love to go, well, they love to go walking in the woods, and they also love to fish and catch the fish. And they caught some fish, and they brought him home. This is his story about... I don't know how many times he went fishing, but more than once. On one particular occasion, he and his brother came home, and after they got home, They cooked the fish. They knew how to cook fish. And he described the skillful way that they cooked it and the delicious fish dish that they concocted. And just as they were about to sit down and eat the fish, which they so joyfully fished out of the beautiful mountainside, their dad came home.

[19:56]

And he said to them, what is it? He took the frying pan and said, what is this? And they said, it's fish. And he took the frying pan and the fish and threw them into the forest at the back door into the woods. And he said, you are children of this temple. You cannot fish. Thus is the end of one of the happiest things he used to do when he was a kid. And I felt sorry for him and sad his father was with him. And then another time, somebody asked him, what was in the important teachings your father gave you? And he told the same story. It was just as sad the second time as the first time. Isn't that sad, sweet little boys? It's hard for little people like us to understand Buddha's mind, which does not go fishing, which does not kill fish and eat them for fun.

[21:19]

I have a koan class at Green Gulch, and I believe case 18 is about Zhaozhou's Mu. It says in there in the verse celebrating the case that Zhaozhou goes fishing with a straight hook. He fishes for the fish that turns away from life with a straight hook. The greedy fish, you catch that fish with a hook, with a bent hook. But the fish who turns away from life, you catch that fish with a straight hook. I think one time I was going to visit Minnesota around the time we were studying that case, and I told people that I was going back to my home where I used to go fishing when I was a kid, but I was going to go fishing again with a straight hook. I went down to the lake.

[22:29]

somebody's fishing equipment. I went down to the lake and I straightened the hook. And then I did something which I guess wasn't so nice, but then I tied an earthworm to the straight hook. ...with the worm down in the water to go fishing. And the fish came, but they didn't go for it. And I sat for a pretty long time, but I finally got bored and went home. But I did fish with a straight hook and didn't catch any fish. ...of the fish that are turning away from life. Or did I? The Buddhist monks in old times were not supposed to even farm because in farming they might hurt animals.

[23:45]

And at Green Gulch, we do farm. And in the process of our farming, we seem to harm those animals. We dig up the ground. We disturb various animals that live under the ground. Birds get caught in our netting. Some animals get electrocuted in our pump boxes. And sometimes people also even poison, I think, poison some animals. So traditionally, Buddhist monks would not farm because even farming would possibly harm beings. In Zen monasteries in China, they started farming again. At Green Gulch, for a while, we had horses because we didn't want to use tractors.

[24:54]

We wanted to be natural and avoid using petrochemicals and things like that and pounding down the earth by the tractor tires. So he tried horses, but we gave up trying working with horses because for various reasons. But one of the reasons is that in order to work with those horses, our people had to be cruel to the horses. Now, maybe somebody is so skillful and it's possible that someone is so skillful in working with horses that they can get the horses to work and be kind to the horses. But we didn't have the skill. And I saw one time. I saw our Zen students trying to get our young mayor workhorse onto a truck to go to stud. And they were really being mean.

[25:58]

They were bidding to get her to go on the truck. We started with two really old percherons. I think they were like 15 and 18 years old. They were very docile, had been well trained. But then we got ourselves a huge colt, and she was not docile. Extremely powerful, and if she didn't want to do something, you had to be pretty skillful to get her to do it. And we weren't skillful enough, so they used brute force But then we thought we didn't want to do that anymore. So we stopped having horses. We also had chickens. We stopped having chickens. We tried chickens. I never had such delicious eggs as those Green Gulch $35 eggs. I never saw any such thing as those eggs. I mean, they were like a totally different thing.

[27:04]

Usually the yolk is yellow, right? These yolks were not yellow. No, they were like almost red. They were orange. It was like, you know, but they cost many, many dollars a piece because these chickens had an incredibly fancy lifestyle. There were several Zen students to each chicken. Anyway, it was very expensive, but it was worth it. But the problem is that we didn't have the skill. We had the skill to make very happy chickens, luxury chickens and luxury eggs, but we didn't have the skill to keep them from getting massacred. Somehow, the Zen students couldn't close the door to the chicken coop. So basically, over and over again, the raccoons would just come in and slaughter them. So since we couldn't take care of them, we didn't have chickens anymore.

[28:10]

We had cows, too. We couldn't take care of them. Anyway, we tried various things. We had a good time. But now we don't raise any animals anymore. We still have a problem with the farming. What's a Buddhist to do? Do it ourselves or have somebody else do it for us? It's tough. As much as possible, until you're enlightened, the instruction is refrain, abstain from doing anything harmful. That's the point. After enlightened, it's not that you then can do harmful things, but that then you see the path of beneficence.

[29:12]

That's the prospect. But the road between wherever we are now understanding of this precept of right livelihood is to restrain and refrain as much as possible. And if we do not restrain and refrain, then to catch ourselves at that, confess it, repent it, and try to stop Again, Buddhist monks in the old days and still today in Tassajara more than some other places do not do these harmful activities to support themselves. What they would often do is they would let other people do it for them. But there's even more hypocrisy than that.

[30:19]

Even after the people If you do depend on other people for them to give you food to support your practice, then there's various things you can do. How are you going to get them to give it to you? So the Buddha allowed his monks, his students, his monks beg to get support for their bodies so that they could practice, the idea being that the that the benefit of Dharma practice, number one, it justifies being supported. Number two, that you allow yourself to eat because of your attempt to live in a way that would benefit those who are feeding you. The idea is that you develop a practice that will benefit those who are feeding you.

[31:21]

Both people who give you food, but also even the food that you eventually want to live a life that will benefit the food you're eating. That would be your ultimate rationale for allowing yourself to eat anything. In fact, we eat, we live on things that live. Is our practice worthy of eating the life we eat? Do we benefit that which we eat? This is our question. Does our virtue and practice deserve it? And the Buddha said, so you can ask for the food, even if you aren't yet completely realized in benefiting those who give to you. Well, and even that which is given to you. And ask.

[32:22]

However, this process of begging and receiving gifts, in that process, there came up six precepts about how to beg. Six precepts about how to purify basically the way... Now this is somewhat irrelevant to people who don't beg. And maybe it's only just interesting, but I'll tell you a little bit about it. So there were precepts. For example, one precept was about scheming. So what some monks have done, what some religious people have done, is that when people have given them donations, They have refused them. They have rejected the gift, rejected the donation.

[33:27]

Then when the people see the person rejecting the donation out of, you know, not wanting to take from them because this kind of thing, then they think, oh my God, we've got a real holy one here. So then they bring donations by the cartload. So one of the basic schemes of getting more donations is to risk, of course, but is to get a donation and become famous and get much more later. This is called scheming by refusing donations. Another way to get more by working on your deportment. For example, Buddhist monks are supposed to be mindful of their posture, right? So if you're mindful of your posture, you're doing Buddhist practice, right?

[34:32]

And if you're really good at it, people will notice and give you more donations. So to do your good posture straight and to sit up straight to impress your teacher and also to impress donors is called scheming. It's called not right livelihood It's impure. Even like not only standing up straight and sitting straight, but being very careful, you know, of how you use your orgy and how you pick up teacups. It's a very posed and poised way of conducting yourself with the feeling of, are they watching? Do they see how well I'm doing this? It's a very careful placement. It's a very reverent way, which you've seen demonstrated by various Zen masters. And just show it at the right time, especially in a situation where there are some supporters around. Another kind of deportment thing is to grimace.

[35:39]

I thought only Zen monks did this, but I guess they did it back in Southeast Asia, too. You look at the picture of certain Zen masters, you know, when they're meditating, they look like this. It's a sign of intense concentration. It's not a friendly look, but people look at it and they say, my God, this must be a holy person. Look at that concentration. Look at that intensity. They're beyond, you know, trying to flatter us and make us think they're sweet. This is real practice. Let's give them a lot. I look just like... You notice I'm getting these marks along the side of my face from zazen? These deep grooves along the side of the mouth. It's a sign of many years of meditation. Another one is hinting, another impure form of life for monks.

[36:49]

Another thing is called hinting. So you see some people coming back from the sugar cane fields. So the monk says, we're coming from the sugar field. Oh, really? What do you got there? We have sugar cane. Oh. Well, how does it taste? Well, the only way you can For a man, it's by tasting. Well, you know, it's not proper for monks to say, please give me some. Oh, I see. Oh, well, here, have some, sir. And then there's belittling. You go, you know, walk down the street and you hold your bowl up to somebody and then you don't get too much or maybe you get none.

[37:53]

And you say, oh, prince of donors. Or you may go on and say, mighty prince of donors. Another one is called tail bearing. So you go up to people's houses and you say, hi, how are you? You know, I just want to tell you about some people down the road there, how stingy they are. I'll tell you. They are the rottenest people. And the person thinks, oh my god, I don't want to be saying this to anybody about me. So would you like something, anything I can do for you? Another one is indirect speech, indirect talk. So there's this one monk who was supported by a particular family. He went there one day. And the woman of the house said, sorry, no rice today.

[38:58]

And he said, well, may I sit down for a little while? And she said, fine. She left the room for some reason. And while she was gone, he looked around the house a little bit. And he noticed that right nearby, in the corner of the storage room by the door, there was some sugar cane. So in there was a bowl with a chunk of sugar in it. And then also he saw a string of salt fish in a basket. And then he saw a jar of rice. And he also saw a pot of ghee. When the woman came back, he said, why did this thing happen? So I understand why you don't have any donations for me today. I saw a snake. that looked just like sugar cane. So I wanted to throw something at it. So I picked up a stone that looked like a piece of sugar and threw it.

[39:58]

And the snake got very aggressive and spread its hood. And it looked just like a string of fish in a basket. And its teeth stuck out, just like little particles of rice. And in its fury, it started to salivate, just like . And the woman said, well, I can see there's no possibility of tricking this shaveling. So she made him quite a little dish of sugar cane and rice with sugar and ghee on it. Then there's ingratiating chatter, like endearing, charming chatter. So charming. So charming. Without concern for whether this charming chatter is in accord with the truth or dharma.

[41:07]

Then there's flattery, speaking very humbly and taking an inferior position. So these are various means that some Buddhist monks used to get more donations. These practices are of course to be renounced. Now, if one practices right view and right thinking, and right speech and right action, then one will naturally cut off this kind of scheming, persuading, hinting, so on kind of stuff. Someone

[42:17]

It's a coral ring. I mean, it's a ring that has coral in it. And so I put it on. It fits this baby finger. I've been meditating on jewelry. That's kind of nice, doesn't it? One of my students was wearing an earring recently. He's a priest. I said, what's the earring for? Don't you think I'd look nice with a shaved head and a big gold earring? I'm just sort of an experiment for a little while. I thought, you know, one of the problems of being a monk is people don't know what to give you besides food. If you wear jewels, though, they could say, oh, I could give jewels. He likes jewels. Hint, hint. One of our members here had a little talk with Dalai Lama not too long ago, and she told the Dalai Lama that she was thinking of becoming a priest.

[43:38]

I think he had met her before or something, and he said... Anyway, I forgot what it was, but... Oh, no, she told him, I think, that she had been there before, been in that area before, and he said, is that where you got the earrings? And she said, I don't know, something, actually, I used to have a lot of jewelry, but I gave most of it away. And he said, I think maybe, excuse me if I'm telling the story wrong, but I'm just going to tell it this way anyway. He said, she said, he said, then you'll take those off too? Or those will be the last to go, those earrings she had on at the time she was talking to him? She'd given away all her other jewelry except for these earrings and said, those will be the last to go now that you're going to be a priest. And she said, no, no, I have something else that I wear for medicinal purposes. That will be the last to go. Anyway, I had no jewelry until last year.

[44:42]

I started wearing a wedding ring on my 21st wedding anniversary as an act of devotion to my wife. And the reason why I didn't wear jewelry was because Suzuki Roshi told me not to. He said, we don't jewelry. We're Zen priests. Not just in the Zendo, but outside the Zendo, too, we don't. Anyway, I didn't. I didn't. Now I'm wearing this just to sort of meditate on this for a little while, this coral ring. In a conversation with the Dalai Lama, he said to this woman, when he was talking about getting rid of the jewelry, he said, but I'm really attached to my watch. He has a watch. I don't know what kind of watch he has, but he said, I'm really attached to it. I really like my watch. He said, it's bad, but I like it. And then she said, all the Tibetan monks are wearing watches. And he said, yeah, it's terrible, isn't it?

[45:43]

Somebody said to the Karmapa when he was coming to visit America, he was wearing a big gold watch. And somebody said to him, you know, if you wear that watch to America, people won't like you wearing a big gold watch. And he said, oh, really? Well, then I'll wear gold shoes, too. They have these These fake Rolexes. They look just like Rolexes. They cost about $30. And a lot of people who have Rolexes wear them. They have a real Rolex that they keep in a safety deposit box. And they wear these $30 ones. And my father-in-law was going to get me one of these $30 ones. And my mother-in-law said, don't get it for him. He's a Buddhist monk. He shouldn't wear it. He even looked like he's wearing a Rolex. And also, I told you a story before.

[47:07]

One time I was driving on Tata Heart at the end of a practice period, just like this one. And as I was driving up the road, I listened to turn the radio on, and I got a gospel station. And the gospel station was singing a song, something like, da-da-da-da-da-da. Jesus on his TV evangelist show. Would he wear a Rolex? Would Jesus, if he was alive today, drive a Mercedes-Benz or a BMW? I think, I forgot what he said, but anyway, the upshot of the song was, he wouldn't. He wouldn't. I think that was the point. So, you know, these TV evangelists, who are driving these big cars and stuff, they aren't really like Jesus. I think that was part of the message, right? But after a long time driving out of Tassajara, I felt like there's only one way to know what Jesus would wear on his watch, what kind of watch he would wear, whether it would be a Timex or a Rolex, and that this could be Jesus.

[48:12]

The Dalai Lama is embarrassed to wear a watch at all, but he wears one. He wears a gold watch, and he'll wear gold shoes if you push him. What's the point of all this? What is the point? How do you know whether you can eat or not? How do you know what is the right means of supporting your life? How are you going to know? Well, my bet is... My bet is... No, you cannot decide for yourself. You cannot. No, you cannot. That's what people do. They decide by themselves. You cannot decide by yourself.

[49:15]

That's selfish. And nobody else can decide for you either. That's selfishness too. You have to give up your deciding mind. The mind which says, I decide this or that. You have to give it up. You have to stop believing in your own power to figure out what's right. Until then, please, if you think something's bad, don't do it. Don't. If you go ahead and do it, confess it. Repent it. And try to stop. But we have to give up something more fundamental than that. We have to give up this faith in our own dualistic thinking. And the way to give it up is to notice that that dualistic thinking is samsara. That believing is misery.

[50:21]

Misery. And in order to see that it's misery and be convinced that it's misery, we have to meditate on that. We have to see that that is causing suffering immediately, and action that comes from that causes suffering more. We have to meditate on the first and second truths. And in order to meditate on them, we have to be upright and present. We have to trust presence. Presence will show us the selfishness. We have to liberate ourselves . We have to liberate ourselves from our arrogance that we can decide what's right. Dogen says that right livelihood is . We have gruel in the morning.

[51:23]

and boiled rice at noon, that we train ourselves single-mindedly in the monastery and listen to the teaching. Practicing this way, we Zen monks can see that the mountains and the rivers of the immediate present are the manifestation of the Eightfold Path. of the old-time Buddhas. Abiding in their dharma position, they culminate the qualities of completeness. Because they are the self, before there's a sign of self, because they're the self, they are the livelihood. of the present.

[52:27]

For us, the Dharma position is no more, no less. The Dharma position of what's happening with no duality, that's our Dharma position. That's our livelihood. Our mind is built to cause us to separate, dualize what's happening. We have to give that up. And we give it up by watching how we separate and break ourselves into two parts. So when we let our experience be our experience, beyond subject and object, with no duality, and we do not believe and fall for the separation anymore, right livelihood is realized.

[53:39]

That is right livelihood. Anything else is not right livelihood. Learning right livelihood is to be aware of how the slightest duality is pain. Learning right livelihood is to be aware of how that slightest duality is the source of wrong livelihood. Realizing right livelihood is to drop and heal that separation. Then we become servants of the entire world. then we become the dharma position for the expression of the harmony of the cosmos.

[54:54]

But to take our position entails accepting the pain of whatever duality still exists in our life. get there and feel what the duality is like. To restrain the livelihood which arises from the duality and to confess the rises from the duality which we couldn't restrain. to be grateful when this deluded person is restrained from stopping on the highway and going into a restaurant and getting a steak just for me secretly with my by a baseball cap.

[56:22]

And if I don't restrain this dualistic believer, this believer in dualism, from such wrong livelihood, then I'm ashamed of myself. I'm ashamed that I'm wasting this life, wasting this life where I could be an opportunity For my life could be an opportunity to realize the extremely beneficial life of the Buddha Dharma, which is to give up my selfish trips and to really eat only what's necessary and beneficial. and to wear clothes that are only for the purpose of supporting and protecting the Dharma, and to live in a house, and to take medicine that only support the Dharma, that only help other people by helping me.

[57:49]

To skip over such concerns in the process of supporting this life is a waste of a precious opportunity. To carefully, humbly, without showing off, consider these things It's a great encouragement. And I would say that many of you do this. Many of you quietly consider these things without flaunting your virtue. I'm overcome with seeing what a funny person I am. At the same time that I think I'm kind of a funny person, I think it's funny that I'm so much like I am.

[59:10]

I think it's funny that I happen to be like this. And then I think of saying things like I'm about to say to you. So I think it's about to say to you. Here it is. Ready? And I want to scream this, but I'm not going to scream it as loud as I want to. I'm just going to say it kind of loud, but I really want to scream this. This is not an order, okay, exactly. It's not from me exactly. It's from you to yourself. Here it is. Don't run away. Do not run away from what's happening. Never run away. I know you're having a hard time. Never run away. Do not run away. Otherwise, you will definitely fall into wrong livelihood.

[60:14]

If you don't run away, eventually you will realize right livelihood. Please do not run away from the present circumstances of your life. I'm happy to hear that you want to run away. Please tell me. That may help you not run away. Tell me. Tell me you want to run away. I'll listen to you. And I'll remind you, you do not want to run away. Do not run away from this life. It's going to be gone soon enough. And you will really regret it if you didn't enjoy it. So please don't run away. And I think it's really funny that I talk like that. And you know, I think it's also funny that I feel like I should apologize, but I don't really mean it.

[61:22]

I can't not be this way. And you can't not be the way you are either. There's only one more day of session. But there's three more practices. This is a problem for somebody. Right effort and right concentration. I don't know what I'm going to be able to say about these three, but I just want to briefly mention. Right effort. You know what right effort is? I just told you. Did you see it? Did you hear me talk about right effort? Yeah.

[62:23]

Did you hear me talk about right mindfulness? Was that there? Could you see it? You have to practice right effort and right concentration and right mindfulness in order to do what I just talked about today. There's much, much more that can be said about all those practices, but they've already been discussed. They've already been implied by what I said so far. They are necessary in order to practice right speech, right action, and right livelihood. You can't practice these things if you're not mindful of what you're doing. You cannot do these things if you're not concentrated on this project. And you cannot be concentrated or mindful if you don't make right effort. OK? So that's the Eightfold Path. Do you have the Eightfold Path now? Do you have it? I mean, does anybody not have it now?

[63:30]

Does that mean that nobody's answering, that you all really feel like the Eightfold Path is sort of under your belt, so to speak? Is that right? What? Just don't know. So also as the session comes to its conclusion, and the practice period comes to its conclusion, the person who plays the role of the teacher thinks of asking questions, like, how did you learn this session? What did you learn this practice period? What is your stand on the Four Noble Truths? What is your stand on the Eightfold Path? Do you know enough about the Eightfold Path?

[64:40]

Yes, I will. I will commit my life to the Eightfold Path of the Buddha Dharma. I will. I give my whole life to that. Can you say that? Do you want to say that? How are you? I ask this question. You don't have to tell me, but I ask that question. Any of your lifeblood from the practice of the Eightfold Path, do you have any doubt about it? And if you have any doubt, do you have any doubt about not running away from your doubts? So excuse me for saying one more time. You don't have to tell me the answer to my questions, but I hope you ask yourself, how do I stand on the Four Noble Truths? Do I accept them? Will I study them? Yes or no? Are the Four Noble Truths in my heart?

[65:43]

Do I trust them to take me into death and beyond? Do I trust that they'll help me Do my job as a living being. Do I accept the teaching of the Eightfold Path and commit myself to it? Yes or no? Please ask yourself those questions. And listen for your answer.

[66:06]

@Transcribed_v005
@Text_v005
@Score_88.58