When I get up in the morning, sometimes, occasionally, I might forget where I am. Take a little time to figure out where I am. That's one of the first things I actually try to figure out when I get up. And then I usually figure it out in a little while. And then, maybe even before I figure that out, I'm not sure exactly when, I remember, I think I remember somewhere along the way that I'm there. I remember myself. I'm not sure I do, but I don't grope for it anyway. My experience is that I don't have so much trouble remembering about myself.

[01:11]

And although it's not true of everyone, most people I meet are able to remember themselves and be concerned about themselves. But we sometimes forget, it seems to me we sometimes forget what the point of life is What was the reason that we came here for? So I wanted to start again today by asking you, what is your motivation in coming to Zen Center? It's hard for each one of you to answer individually, of course, in this group, but I ask that question and I ask you to look for a moment to see what your motivation in coming is or was as you approached this valley, as you thought of leaving wherever you were earlier to come here.

[02:29]

What was your motivation? And also maybe what was your motivation the first time you came to this Zen Center or any Zen Center? What was your motivation? What was your reason? How did it happen? And I'd like anybody who wants to, when you meet me, I'd like to hear what your motivation was in coming today, what your motivation is in general to come to a Zen center. I'd like to hear. This is, in some sense, the basis of our meeting, to clarify what we're doing, what is our reason for coming together here.

[03:36]

It is traditional or in many stories, Zen stories and other Buddhist stories, often the teacher asks the coming monk or the coming student, what was your motivation in coming? Or, where do you come from? This is very important. Where do you come from? What do you come for? We start there. And every day it's good to look inside and ask again, what do I wish to accomplish in this day? What do I hope to accomplish in this life? What's my reason for going to work? What's my reason for going to the Zen Center? When the monk says his reason for coming or her reason for coming, then the teacher often asks or sometimes asks, okay, well, what is it that came?

[05:07]

What is it that thus comes? It's the next level down. what is it that you brought here today what is it that came here I'd like to hear the answer to that too from each person you know we have to have that conversation Now, I can imagine some of the reasons why you might come here. I've heard before some reasons. They might still hold. Perhaps you want some encouragement to go on with this life.

[06:11]

Some instruction about how to be dignified in this process that we're going through. How to carry ourselves with some presence and dignity and wisdom and kindness in the midst of what's happening to us. So I guess that people who come here know that human beings have a hard time. I guess that most of you know that, but I don't know. So I just thought I might pay homage to the fact that being human is difficult. I think right now some of us are having a really hard time with our children. are really worried, sick about our children, or just having a hard time.

[07:24]

Some of us are having a hard time with our spouse, with our husband, or our wife, or our girlfriend, or our boyfriend. We're having a hard time, some of us. I know that's a fact. I've heard. Some of us are having a hard time with our parents, our parents getting old, getting decrepit, in some sense losing their minds and bodies. It's hard for us to relate to them. Some of us are having trouble with our neighbors. I know some people who are actually fighting with their neighbors, like arguing, going to court, hating their neighbor, feeling hated by their neighbor. We're also having a hard time with the world at large, with the whole country and the whole world.

[08:27]

All the suffering we're aware of is hard on us. And some of us are having a hard time with ourselves, with our body, with our health, with our aging, with our losing some of our abilities, with our teeth falling out and our memory going in our ears going, in our eyes going. Some of us are having a hard time with that. Some of us are scared of death. Some of us feel difficulty just all by ourselves. Some of us feel like we're having a real hard time. This is normal. Not everybody notices it, however. It's not necessarily normal to notice that they're having a hard time.

[09:28]

People do have hard times, but a lot of people are what you call in denial. And they have various ways of saying, I have no problems. No problem. And maybe some of you are like that, too. Have no problem with your children, parents, neighbors, spouse, self, or anybody. Well, okay. I'm not going to talk you into this. Anyway, my history is that I have not had such a hard life, in a way. There's been times when I thought it was hard, but, you know, it wasn't exceptionally hard, just regular hard. I just had regular kind of frustrations and failures. There was a poignant setting to them, but I'm not bragging about suffering more than most people.

[10:35]

Anyway, somewhere along the way, when I was a teenager... and just about 20, I read some stories about Zen monks. This is my history of how I came here, what my motivation was. I read some stories about Zen monks. I read about how they behaved themselves in the midst of their difficulty. They had difficulties, too, with their neighbors, their neighbors robbing them, their neighbors, you know, Insulting them wrongfully, accusing them of crimes. The stories of Zen monks having a hard time. But the way they responded, I was impressed. So impressed that the little thought came across my brain, I want to be like that.

[11:48]

I want to be thus. I want to be like those people were, like those men and women were, those Zen men and Zen women. I want to be like that. That's what I thought came across my young man's brain. And I could even say it out loud to my friends. Even show them the story. Isn't this neat what they did? Faced with difficulty how they could respond in such a creative, loving, free, an unexpected way, wouldn't it be great to be like that? And I still want to be like that, like they were. But after I read the stories, I thought, but how? How can you be like that? What's the difference between me, the way I am under those circumstances, and the way they are? I want to be like them. Less like me, more like them. Somewhere along the line, after not too many years, fortunately, I heard how to be like them, how to be the way I wanted to be.

[13:05]

And the irony or the surprise is that the way to be like them was to be more like me. that all these monks did the same practice, which they called sitting zen, which means sitting on yourself, which means be the person you are right now, which means have the difficulties you have right now. which means don't lag behind your difficulties or get ahead of your difficulties. Just be yourself moment by moment without expecting anything. They all did that practice. And by doing that practice, they could respond in this way that I wanted to respond.

[14:16]

They trusted... Not... They didn't trust, you know, their human nature. They trusted that not running away from their human nature would set them free from their human nature. I don't want to... I don't want to like insult human nature, but human nature is, as they say, to err. It is human to err. Huh? Well, E-R-R. Err or err? How many people think it's err? A minority. How many think it's err? Well, you're winning. You're winning. I think it's er. E-R-R. It is human to er. And you know what er means? Er means... You know what it means?

[15:24]

You know what the root of the word er is? It's to wander. It's human to wander. It's human to wander away from being human. It's human to not want to be human. It's human to want to get away from this. And then you've heard the next part of it. It's divine... to forgive. And divine, the root of the word divine is to shine. So the practice of these monks who could behave in this way where they transcended their human error where they transcended their wandering ways and just responded appropriately to the suffering of the world, was that they forgave their humanness. They recognized it. They admitted it.

[16:27]

They accepted it. They forgave it. They were just human beings. And for a human being just to be a human being It's rare and wonderful. So I learned about this way, this practice, you know, a formal practice and an informal practice, a formal and informal ways to just be this person, that I just be this person. I learned these ways and I tried to practice them and I found them difficult. So then I gradually got the idea maybe it would be easy to practice this working on being present with myself and admitting and forgiving myself with others who are doing the same practice. So I came to Zen Center. And also I thought it might help to have a teacher who could help me with what came up when I practiced being myself.

[17:37]

So I came across the country here 30 years ago. And I've continued to try to practice being myself ever since. I won't say that I'm like those guys and gals that I wanted to be like. I won't say I'm like them, but I will say I still want to be I haven't changed my mind about what I want. And I haven't changed my confidence in the practice that leads to the realization of it. I trust presence. I trust being upright. So my trust is that Intimacy with human failings, human error, human affliction, is the mode and road to liberation from human error and human affliction.

[19:07]

and that being upright is the way to realize intimacy with what's happening. The great sage can calmly and confidently announce that the ongoing quality of the human mind is turbulence and conflict. And by calmly observing this turbulence and conflict conflict between many things, like between self-interest and the welfare of others, your own interest and the interest of your neighbor, what you think is good for your children and what they're doing, what you think is good for you and what your husband's doing, what you think is good for you and what your wife's doing, and so on.

[20:29]

This conflict and turbulence is the normal state of affairs. If your mind isn't like that, you have an abnormal mind. Abnormal. Not bad. If you have a calm mind, fine. If there's no conflicts and no turbulence and it's just a serene ocean, what can I say? It's unusual. Turbulence is the normal situation. To be upright in the middle of the turbulence, you will become intimate with the turbulence. Becoming intimate with the turbulence, you will become free of the turbulence. Becoming intimate with the source of the turbulence, the source of the turbulence is self-concern, self and other being separated. That's the source of the turbulence. Believing in a limited self, which is self-delusion, because there is no limited, isolated self.

[21:33]

But to believe in that illusion, which we... most of us have, causes turbulence and conflict. So to be first of all intimate with the turbulence and conflict, you'll become free of the turbulence and conflict. When you're free of the turbulence and conflict, you'll settle down to the root of the turbulence and conflict. If you can then be present in this terrifying place of self and other creating each other and threatening to destroy each other, you will transcend that duality. Not you will, but there will be transcendence. When I was a new monk at Zen Center, Suzuki Roshi used to give long talks, and I tried to sit in formal posture during the talks.

[22:54]

Sometimes they were an hour and 45 minutes. And I was uncomfortable after a while. And one time in the midst of my discomfort during the question and answer session, in those days we didn't have talk and then tea and then question and answer just right together, which is part of what made it so long, I raised my hand and I said, Aroshi, is the suffering of a Zen master the same or different from the suffering of a Zen student. And he said, same. I felt good. Now maybe he was just saying that to make me feel good. So I don't know actually still if I feel like the suffering is the same, but I think the difference between the new student and the old student is that if the old student has been practicing sincerely for a long time, they're more settled in their suffering.

[24:15]

They're more settled. They have more confidence that freedom from suffering comes from intimacy with it. They have more confidence and maybe they even have realized intimacy with suffering and freedom from it. Some people in the process of practicing Zen start to notice in how selfish they are. They start to notice how selfish they are. Like I said, with our parents, sometimes we start noticing how selfish we are. Or we start noticing signs of selfishness. Like one person I know has this father who's sick and has been cruel to her for many years. So he wants her to come and be a very loving daughter now. Which is a reasonable thing to expect, right?

[25:23]

I've been kind to you all these years, so now you come and be kind to me. But she feels like he's been abusing her all these years. So she has some problem of going to now be very loving and supportive of him without at least commenting on a few points. But when you have a sick old parent, you know, they don't necessarily want to hear about the problems you've had all these years. But you feel maybe some problem there because you'd like to bring this stuff up a little bit and say, well, at least I can mention a few points while in the process of being a kind, supportive child. It's difficult. And we might feel like, oh, just put aside your self-concern, your agenda, and just be supportive. Well, what's the proper way there? I don't know. It's difficult. And in the process of the conversation, this person said something about, well, she doesn't want to betray herself.

[26:32]

Like, you know, go and say, oh, hi. Hi, Daddy. I love you. You're wonderful. That's what he wants to hear. Please tell me how wonderful I am. Make me comfortable. Why not? Well, that's fine, actually. Like I say, call your dad up today and say, Dad, you're the greatest. Call your mom up and say, Hi, Mom, I love you. No problem. Unless that's a betrayal of yourself. Then it's a problem. Betrayal means to, you know, give over. So I said to this person, Don't betray yourself. [...] Don't betray your petty, selfish self. Don't betray. Don't betray. Don't betray. I'm not saying be proud of yourself.

[27:39]

I'm saying don't betray yourself. The world needs you to be what you are. And the world needs you to become free of what you are. Both. And you can't do the second one without the first one. If you're unwilling to be yourself and you betray yourself, you will always be stuck in yourself and you'll be a problem to everybody. To everybody. Some people are more tolerant of you than others. But basically, Your job is to be you and not betray yourself. And that will be the source for you to become the kind of person that I want to be. You may have also heard the famous Zen saying that the path, you know, of enlightenment, the path of wisdom and compassion is not difficult except for picking and choosing.

[28:57]

If you give up picking and choosing, the path of freedom is not difficult. If you, however, are still involved with picking and choosing, then the path to freedom and all other paths are difficult. So some Zen student says to me, well, what am I going to do? I'm always picking and choosing. Well, then it's going to always be difficult. It'll be hell. Picking and choosing is hell. Hell is where all is happening, is picking and choosing. You don't have a life. You're just picking and choosing. pick and choose, [...] picking and choosing, picking and choosing. That's what this person's life is like. That's what many people's lives are like. That's hell, according to her.

[30:02]

Well, what do you do in a situation like that? A situation where it's just like that all the time, basically. This is the turbulence. This is the conflict. What do you do? Well, I already said. You recognize it. You recognize this constant wandering into picking and choosing. You recognize being a human. You accept it. You acknowledge it. And you forgive yourself for it. And by recognizing, accepting, or acknowledging, you go deeper into it until finally there's not the slightest bit of picking and choosing. When you pick, you exactly pick. When you choose, you precisely choose.

[31:05]

You're not the slightest bit ahead or behind your picking and choosing. And that is freedom from picking and choosing. When picking and choosing is just picking and choosing, there's no picking and choosing. And the path is easy. But it's hard to be precisely there as you pick and choose. When someone says, well, what's your preference? And to say and admit what your preference is and be just exactly as embarrassed as you are that this is your preference. Precisely be yourself with your preferences. That is transcendence of preference. The only way for preference not to happen is just to eliminate your nervous system. But freedom from preference...

[32:11]

can come to a person, a human, who's picking and choosing all day long. Freedom from preference can come by being yourself moment by moment without expecting anything but a life of picking and choosing. But you have to give up alternatives to this. And then you'll be free of this So I haven't been talking an hour and 45 minutes yet, but I could stop anyway. I think I made my point, don't you? Do I need to grind it in any further? I am 100% sincere about this point.

[33:16]

I'm not saying I can practice it all the time, but I completely, sincere about it, completely trust not our nature, but that our nature is our nature. I trust that. I trust that we are the way we are. And I trust that accepting that and forgiving it will set us free. And I also recognize that it's very difficult, very difficult, very difficult when the kids, the spouse, the parents, and the neighbors are doing what they do. And when our body is doing what it does, it's very difficult to stay present and not try to run away from that. And that's our usual way, is to try to run away. Very difficult. So I guess that's enough. See if there's any other little things in here, fun things here.

[34:22]

So again, I'm a little embarrassed. That's where, that's how I am, that I always say the same thing. But, you know, I see very little effect of all the things I said before, so... It looks like you always forget what I say, so... I guess I can just keep saying it over and over until nobody comes. But at least then I would have realized that you... Oh, he says the same thing over and over. What is it again that he says? Oh, he says that we forget. We forget to be present. We run away from being present. We don't trust being present enough. But the people who I want to be like, those old great kind beings, they practiced this.

[35:39]

They said so over and over. This was their practice. So, there it is. There's infinite other ways to put what their practice was to express it, but this is the way I'm choosing. This ancient way that's been going on for at least 2,500 years. So, maybe if it worked for them, it's good enough for us. Maybe. Give it a try. I am which is not too much recommendation I'm not saying I'm any better or easier to live with than I used to be but I'm more intimate with people than I used to be and I'm more intimate with myself and I'm freer and I'm a little bit more ready to adjust to the next moment so it reminds me of a song

[36:49]

which I don't know very well, but it's a simple one. It goes like this. Give me that old time religion. Give me that old time religion. Give me that old time religion. It's good enough for me. It was good enough for our mothers. No, no. It was good for our mothers. It was good for our mothers. It was good for our mothers. It's good enough for me. Is there anything you'd like to talk about? Can you hear me in the back? Hi, yes. Difficulties? Yes, I'm personally having difficulties.

[37:54]

Yes. What? What? Has it improved how I handle them? Yes. I... Let's see. Anyway... what I used to take days or weeks to get over I now get over sometimes in a few minutes the more present you are the more your activity matures more rapidly so if you do a small stupid thing

[38:57]

and you're very present with it, the result comes back to you very quickly. If you do a small stupid thing, a cruel thing or, you know, disrespectful thing, if you act disrespectfully or condescending to people or whatever, and you don't stay present with it and you don't recognize it and be present with it, it tends to just basically get bigger and bigger and bigger, and then when it finally matures it like major a major a small thing that isn't attended to can become a big problem so during the course is lasting for a long time because you're not present with it and then when it finally manifests it can be a big big problem so I tend to be more present with my mistakes and and results seem to manifest sooner and I'm more aware of my anxiety than I used to be on a moment-by-moment basis.

[40:06]

I have a more ongoing sense of turbulence, conflict, and anxiety than I used to. I feel ashamed more often about smaller things than I used to. Used to be like, I would only notice major blood. Now I notice minor, more minor things. So that's one of the main differences. I can't see your face, but I see a finger pointing up in the air. Yes. You. What's your name? What's your name? Duncan, yes. What does volunteerism mean?

[41:09]

Selfless service? What is it? What role does it play? It's the goal of my path. Well, if I was saying that it was, then I would say I was selfless already, right? How poor? Huh? What? That's, well, almost everybody is richer than me. So can I help rich people or just poor people? I just help whoever, I help whoever comes in my face and people are coming in my face pretty non-stop. What? My whole life is service. That's all it is. But some of the people I'm helping have quite a bit more money than me.

[42:12]

And I don't turn them away because they're rich. Real richer than me anyway. I like rich people as much as poor people. I don't hold it against them. So, please, rich people, come. I don't go into the slums and spend my days in the slums. That's what you mean. I don't. But when I'm in the slums, then I meet people in the slums, and I relate the same way to them that I would. Yeah. yeah I personally you know some of the people I work with some of the people who come to me for help are people who are out in the streets I I help the people who are more out in there I don't go myself so much so I'm specializing in meditation and there's some people who don't want to do meditation so I help the people who help the people who don't want to do meditation that's my role

[43:21]

and for example someone brought their child here today because she was thinking that it would be helpful for her child to have some exposure to Zen but the child wasn't interested so I told the child don't come here unless you want to, don't come here because of your parents but I'm happy to help his parents deal with him who isn't interested in meditation and I felt close to the kid but he didn't want to see my face again. He isn't interested in Zen and hanging out with Zen priests, but his parents are, so I'll help his parents help him in whatever ways he's up for. So I came here 30 years ago and part of the reason I came here 30 years ago was to help me sort of go out in the street or whatever, right? But I stayed, never left. So maybe the last minute of my life I'll go in the street and do something good. I think Pat's next, if you still want to have a question. .

[44:27]

Did you say cleaning too much? Is that what you said? Like cleaning house too much? I have that same problem. So what I try to do, I particularly have a problem with the vacuum cleaner. I tend to lean into the vacuum cleaner. In other words, I don't keep good posture. I sort of get into cleaning rather than being present. Into cleaning rather than being present. So I try, when I'm vacuuming, to really be present with my posture and not get too much into getting the job done. And it's hard, though.

[45:57]

It's hard to, because actually they have the vacuum cleaner built in such a way that it's hard to actually stand up straight, especially if, like, you're tall. Like, Craig, you need an extension, you know, a couple extensions. Huh? Yeah, there's an extension. So I think the very important part is that when you're doing cleaning, that you stay in touch with your posture. And like you're cleaning windows, you know, it's very easy to get into weird positions because you're trying to clean the windows, right? But try to stay present and have a good posture while you clean the window. Or if you do lean, to really be present with that. So to try to fight your obsessions is another obsession. But to be present with your tendency to clean too much. Working too hard is laziness. Overwork is laziness. Because it's just going with your inertia, you know, rather than being present and saying, hey, I'm working, you know, like, particularly if I'm doing something like painting or something, you know, you can paint yourself, you know, into a corner, so to speak, but you can paint too long and you get to a point where you start making mistakes and you get fatigued and, you know,

[47:17]

So once you get moving, it's easy to keep going. Once you're not moving, it's easy to stay not moving. But to be present and keep checking with, is it appropriate to continue here? That's the best way to deal with these working too much, cleaning too much, and so on. To try to get rid of the too much is another too much. But if you're present, you can spot the too much and say, well, you know, I'm actually going too far. I think I'm going to stop now. I'm actually going to, like, stop and enjoy the fact that here I am in this filthy house. Yeah. Well, now, giving yourself permission, that's one way to put it. Now, I personally feel a responsibility. Like, if you people came up to my house and saw me cleaning in a very mindless way, you know, it would really discourage you, wouldn't it?

[48:21]

Or would it encourage you? You'd say, oh, he's mindless, too. Look at him. But anyway, I feel a responsibility. I feel a responsibility to work in a way that's dignified and encouraging people. So it's not so much permission, it's more like I actually feel I don't give myself permission to meditate, I feel like it's my responsibility to meditate. That people need me to. That I'm a less good person if I don't. I'm a more dangerous creature if I don't take care of myself and be present with what I'm doing. If you think that you're practicing And if you have permission to practice, to do this selfish thing for yourself, you'll never feel comfortable. Because they can always take back the permission. But if you're practicing for the welfare of others, it's not a matter of permission. It's a matter that they're asking you to do it.

[49:23]

Okay? You look... I don't know where you're at. Right. Right. And sometimes the only time you realize that you're crazy is when you're being crazy. Gotta really be crazy in order to catch yourself sometimes. So that's the one good thing about being crazy is that you can realize it. In other words, to be wholeheartedly crazy. To be crazy all the way so that you can realize it. If you're half-heartedly crazy, you can be crazy indefinitely and say, I'm not really crazy. Well, it's true, you're not actually, you're not getting into it enough. But if you do it all the way, you maybe can realize it and then you're not crazy anymore because you're right. So the presence is the main thing that will wake you up to your situation.

[50:33]

But it's hard to be present when you're busy and crazy, right? But it's also hard to be present when you're not crazy and not busy. It's hard to be present because we're human. Human beings tend to wander. Wander, wander, wander, wander. Always erring, erring, erring, erring. it was a tie there between you and you Mm-hmm. Oh, yeah. I know there's a connection, but I'll be darned if I forget it afterwards.

[51:59]

So how could it be good for some monks to live in the mountains and never come out? How could that be helpful for humanity in general? Well, one way it could be helpful is that many people I've heard are very encouraged to know that there are some monks up in the mountains. It encourages them to live their life in the city, to know that some people are sitting up quietly in the mountains. That's one thing that some people have told me. They said, it really encourages me to know that you people are sitting there witnessing silence. It makes me feel like the world, the universe is silent. is operating properly, that some people are devoting their life to that.

[53:20]

That's one thing. The other thing is to live in the mountains could also be a waste of time. So if you are sitting in the mountains and never come out it's a tricky situation and most monks have to leave occasionally just to test their practice. Because you might do fine, some people do fine out in the lovely mountain scene, you know. They get along really well with pine trees and gurgling brooks and chipmunks. But as soon as they come into the city and visit their mother, they freak out. You know? And that kind of practice up there, if they were to stay there and never come into the city and never find out that they weren't yet able to talk to their mother, they wouldn't realize that they hadn't really got the point yet. The point of meditation retreats is that you should be able to come back into the city and meet people and not be a creep.

[54:26]

There's one story in one scripture where a monk, a very strong meditator, went out in the woods, he came back from retreat, and he was very rude to the other monks. kind of contemptuous and condescending to the other monks. But he was a powerful meditator in a way. And the monks said to the Buddha, they said, Lord Buddha, is this appropriate that the person goes on retreats and they come back and they're rude to us? He said, no. If the retreat works, you should come back and be kind to the other monks when you come back from the woods. And be kind to the people. Or somebody else said... If the meditation's working, it should be the case that when you come back from the meditation retreat, your kids say, Mommy, Daddy's nicer now that he came back from the retreat. It should make you more kind, more patient, and more loving. So, in fact, almost nobody is enlightened enough to stay in the monastery forever.

[55:29]

Almost everybody needs to come down occasionally from the monastery to test, to see, if they can handle ordinary life. And a lot of times what they find out is, no. So what do they do? They go back to the monastery. They don't then stay in the city and cause trouble. They go back and train mores. And you could stay in the city, but there's many stories of Zen monks who trained for a long time, they thought they got enlightened, they went into the city, and they found out they still were totally hung up. Not totally hung up, but anyway. They couldn't handle really challenging situations. and they went back to study some more five ten years more then they came back down again and then after like many years of study they could be in the city and be patient and kind and wise and beneficial in the city so I think some people can stay there forever but almost nobody can stay there forever like I mean some people can stay basically living in the mountains but almost everybody has to come into the city to test

[56:34]

Occasionally. So monks need to go on pilgrimage too. So when mountain-dwelling monks go on pilgrimage, they go into the city. And when the city dwellers go on pilgrimage, they go into the mountains, into the monastery. So everybody needs to cycle. So some people think, I'm doing okay. You go to the monastery, you sit in the mountains, and you totally realize you're crazy, you know? In the quiet, you know, you're sitting on the pine trees and you're, you know, you start hating the pine trees and you hate the mountains, you know? So you need to change, almost everybody needs to change a perspective in order to get in track of that. But anyway, some people do develop a very beneficial state of being by spending most of their life in a monastery. But the greatest sage, of course, is one who, generally speaking, lives in the city with all the people. But most great sages have spent quite a bit of time up in the mountains facing themselves in a situation where they could really see that their own delusion was the problem.

[57:42]

But if you've got people attacking you all the time and telling you that you should do this and do that, it's hard sometimes to see, well, that's just me. It's hard to see that. So if you go in the mountains and you feel attacked by the pine trees and the brooks in the mountains, you say, ah, ah. And so people do. They go up in a beautiful place. They say, this is a gorgeous place, and I'm totally in hell. They know it's not really the environment. They try to make it the environment, but they know they have a weak case. So gradually they start to see how they're making the world, how they're polluting the world with their lack of understanding. And then when they become free of that, then they come back in the city and they're more beneficent, more helpful. But some do spend most of their time in the monastery. The predominant are predominants. But those are usually, hopefully, the ones who most could do well in the city. So they train the other people to go into the city.

[58:45]

And we can go on, but anyway, that's part of it. That's a little bit about it. Yes? Yeah. Yeah, right. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Right. Yeah, so let me see if I got what you said. Are you saying that you notice that when you do things you add more to what needs to be done, you use more energy to do something than you need to?

[59:51]

I think a lot of people notice this, that they do something but they use a whole bunch of extra muscles to do it than they really need to do, use, you know. So it's very tiring because you use like major muscles to do things that minor muscles can do. and you use minor muscles which aren't necessary sometimes when you're doing things that major muscles should do. So basically your whole system's working all the time so you get really tired. Stress. Yeah. So there's this forward leaning, busy kind of rushing kind of feeling. Yeah. So again, you know, the usual way is I've got so much to do I have to rush. The other way to put it is, since there isn't much time left and I can't finish anyway, therefore I'm not going to rush. For what little time I have left, I'm not going to rush. We have to learn the difference between urgency and rushing.

[60:54]

We don't have much time left, none of us. Some of us just have a few years left. Some of us have a few decades left. But anyway, none of us have very much time left. It's an urgent matter that we don't rush. Don't rush. Don't miss this life. It's going to be over and you're going to regret it if you rush. Not only that, but anybody who loves you will regret your rushing too. Because it's so short, because it's so urgent, don't rush. It doesn't help. And also, Don't lag behind. Come abreast of yourself. Bring your breast right up to your breast. Can movement occur without what? Well, in some ways, to be strict, movement...

[62:04]

for most of us involves something extra. And the extra thing is me. The extra thing we're carrying around all the time is me. Day in, day out, minute in, minute out, we're carrying the self around. So every action we do is like me doing it, or doing it for me. That me is extra. But that's the human situation, basically, is we're carrying a self around and doing things. This is the world of karma. And this is the world of misery. Okay? So that's the case for many people is this kind of situation of this extra thing all the time. What I'm recommending is that if you can be present with the situation of where there's the caring of the self in all action, you can be present with that and you can realize the self can drop off. And then there's just the the movement, but it's not you moving.

[63:07]

And that's not tiring. You never move in the slightest bit more than you have energy for. And your energy just spontaneously, your action spontaneously arises out of its natural unfoldment, as a natural unfoldment of your life, without this burden of self. But as long as there is a burden of self, we have to be present with that in order to see through the illusion of it. And a wonderful thing happens is the world will shift from being a world where things are happening with a self on top of it to things are happening and then there's a self. It shifts from the self doing things to things doing the self. Things doing the self is not tiring. The self doing things is draining and burnout. But it's the same self, you know.

[64:12]

It's just a question of whether the self's added or whether the self is created. Whether the self's added to things or created by things. If you're present with it, it can switch from one to the other. The world of freedom is the self without grasping it. The world of suffering is the world grasping the self. But the self's there in both cases. The self is a place where we get deluded, where we enter into suffering, and the self's a place where we get released from suffering. Release from suffering has no meaning if the self isn't released. And also bondage has no meaning if the self isn't in bondage. The self is what gets put in bondage and the self is what gets released. The practice is to be present with the self in bondage and then witness the self being released.

[65:16]

It's hard to be present with the self in bondage. The suffering, trapped, stuck self. Now you say, can you be present with that without moving very slowly? And the answer is, yes. You can be present with it when you're moving slowly, you can be present with it when you're moving rapidly. Some people have an easy time catching on to being present when they're moving more slowly, but then sometimes they turn moving slowly into another attachment. So, Zen tends to be more in the sort of fast, get with the fast program, rather than do slow and then speed up. The one school is, you know, slow down and tune in and then speed up. The other is, just see, just jump right into the speedy world and try to find your feet there. And if you can't, okay, okay, okay, slow down. Okay?

[66:20]

Good luck. Right. I try to sit with them and I just get deeper and deeper into the pain of it. So you have a case where you're stuck and you say it's hard not to get on the telephone and have someone else break the trance of your being stuck? Okay. So it's okay to call somebody and get some perspective. It's okay to break the trance of your being stuck. That's not a problem. That's good. But if you're not present with your being stuck and they break the trance, it doesn't do you any good.

[67:26]

So your job is to be stuck Then it's okay to call your friend and say, okay, I'm stuck. I'm stuck just like this. Now what do you have to say? And then they go, boop, and something changes. But it won't do you any good if you're not present with your stuckness. You have to bring your stuckness and say, okay, this is my stuckness. And they say, oh, this is your stuckness, and you see it. But if you're not present with yourself and you say, would you fix it? They say, here, I fixed it. And you say, yeah, but fix it again, fix it again, fix it again. They can never fix it if you're not present. And if you're present, they can fix it. If you're present with your stuckness, all you've got to do is touch you and everything changes. So it's okay to bring yourself, and it's good to bring yourself to meet another to get perspective. But first of all, you have to bring somebody who's present to meet somebody who's present. If you're not present and you go meet somebody, it's a waste of time. You're wasting their time. You're wasting your own time. It's a waste of time not to be present

[68:29]

But that doesn't mean that you can do it all by yourself. Because once you're present, you still have to bring yourself to meet somebody else to see how that being present works with another person. Because a lot of times people are present, but they're just barely present. They've just sort of tentatively settled in themselves, and the slightest bit of interaction, they'll fall off and run away. So if you can be present with yourself and bring that and then interact with somebody and stay present in the interaction, your presence gets deeper. So there's interpersonal, I mean there's intra-psychic settling and then you bring the settled, your settlements with yourself to meet another and then in that interaction it gets deeper. It takes two Buddhas to really settle the truth. It takes two beings that are settled to settle it. You can't settle it by yourself, but nobody else can do your job for you. So you can't do it by yourself and nobody else can do it for you.

[69:33]

So if you're stuck, you have to be stuck, then go meet and be settled in your stuckness, then find somebody else who's settled in her stuckness. Get two people that are completely settled in their stuckness and they can release each other. Okay? So it is good to go for help, ask for help. That's good. But don't skip over your homework. Yes? I'm not even sure if I've talked about this. It's working for me, but it has to do with, I think I have ideas about helping, but I can't have it. I didn't experience it. I'm trying to declare myself to help and sort of a duty, but there's something about it either it's presumptuous of me that just simply mean my fault, or I'm doing it for approval, or I resent doing it for... There's something about finding where health is, and about being constantly trying to say that my health is... I don't quite see it, but... I recognize that I have some idea about health that isn't...

[70:55]

Uh-huh. You have some idea about helpful, about what helpful is, and you feel there's something disturbing about your idea. You feel some disrespect around in the area and some condescension in the area? Uh-huh. If you say, I'm here to help you, there's some condescension potentially or disrespect. Uh-huh. Well, maybe just don't say that anymore then. Don't say, I'm here to help you. How about saying, instead of I'm here to help you, how about saying, is there something I can do to help? You don't know that there is. The person may say, no. Say, okay. That's one thing. Try anything else? That solved all your problems? I think it just goes into... Oh, it's possible to meet some people who won't ask you for help, and then at the same time... Ah, so now that we hear that there's a possibility there's some people who don't ask her for help, but blame her for not helping.

[72:19]

That's a situation, isn't it? They won't ask you, but if you don't guess or read their minds, they blame you for not being able to read their mind. Okay? Okay. Life and death plan, okay. So what do you do in a case like that? How about saying the same thing I just said? Is there anything I can do to help? And they say no. Okay, then does that mean you let yourself off? And so you say, and a little while later you say, anything I can do to help? And they say no. But I would, and then also they say, you say, anything I can do to help? And they say no. And then they say, you know, you never helped me. you're a bad daughter. Say, oh. Then you might say, was that helpful? It's not the way I wanted to be helpful, but maybe it was helpful that you could tell me that I'm a bad daughter. Was that helpful to you? It's pretty helpful, I think, to ask and then also to be there for them to tell you that you're a bad daughter.

[73:30]

I think if you're there and you're able to be that way, you are, I would say you're being pretty helpful because you're there. You're there with them, suffering with them, offering to help, but they can't say, they can't, a lot of older people, our parents, for example, they can't accept help because if they accept help, it really bothers them because they're very insecure about being old and so they don't want to admit that they need help. So I've known some old people, you know, They kind of give me a little hint that they want something, you know. Then I go give it to them, and then I give it to them, and then they act like a fool to give it to them, you know, like make fun of me for giving it to them because they don't want to admit that they asked me to get it for them, right? There's no way that that doesn't hurt a little bit because you just went out of your way to do this thing for the person, and then they tease you for getting it as though, you know, I didn't really need this. What did you get it for me for? But if you understand that it's coming from their insecurity, it might help a little.

[74:37]

It still hurts, though. But the most important thing, I think, more important than whatever you give to somebody, is that you're willing to be there with them with no gaining idea. Because you're showing them what they need to do. They may not see it, but you're showing it. And they may criticize you for it. It doesn't mean they're going to say, thank you, And if they do criticize you again, you're there feeling what that's like without trying to get away. But you also might get away, but not by running away, but just saying, I'm going away now for a while. But not because you're running away. You could stay there, but it's not good to stay there, so you leave. And maybe the reason why you leave is because you think you'd be more able to settle with the pain of what they just said in the other room. You say, now I'm really in pain now.

[75:40]

I'm going to go sit in the other room for a little while with what just happened to me. But I'll come back. I vow to come back. I'll never abandon you. But it's right now, I've just got to go take care of myself because it's so painful for you to call me a bad daughter. And I'm not saying I'm not a bad daughter, or I am a good daughter. I'm not saying anything that I'm just saying it hurts to be called an unhelpful daughter. So I have to go live with that. Now you've got to me. Congratulations. And they feel good about that, that they still are in touch with your buttons. That's comforting. Yes? I wanted to talk earlier today about the importance of respect for your family. I mean, you've been a chef for years. distinguish between being attached? Yeah. The difference is that the intimacy is more like, well, like you've got suffering, right? And the intimacy is like at the most kind of central position. Okay?

[76:41]

Like you're in the middle of it rather than like it's over there and you're holding it. If you feel like I'm here and the suffering's over there, that's not as intimate as like suffering. There's just suffering. and there's a sense of being present in it, but it's not like my suffering. That would tend to be more like less attached to it. Another sign of it is when it changes, like when it gets less or more, you notice you don't get thrown off. If it becomes less, you feel like, well, that's okay. Rather than, oh. That's kind of like, it's going down now. Oops, coming back up, coming back up. So if the change is in it, don't make such a difference, and you ride them, that's a sign that you're balanced in the middle of the suffering. If you notice yourself basically secretly wishing it would go away, and you don't think of that until it does go away, you say, ah, it shows you maybe you really did want it to go away.

[77:43]

Wanting suffering to go away, of course, is another form of suffering. Right? So, it's not that we don't want, as animals, we want our suffering to go away. That's natural. But you can be sitting in the middle and intimate with that wanting our suffering to go away. You can. It is possible to be present in the middle of whatever is happening because we are. It's not some great feat. We've got reality working for us. We are present. We can't not be. And yet, the strange thing about humans is we have to practice and make an effort at being what's already happening. Because we can imagine being not what's happening. We have to balance that with the effort to be present. And another thing is that if you feel like you have become present with your patience and with your pain, and you're not attached to it, you're just present and intimate with it, then you're a Buddha.

[78:48]

So then you should find another Buddha, or at least kind of a pretend Buddha, and go meet the Buddha and tell the Buddha that you're completely intimate with your suffering and see what the Buddha says. And then in that interaction you may find out that it was a fake presence. The Buddha says, oh, you're free of suffering? Well, here, I have something for you then. And you go, whoa! I didn't come here for that. That's too much. I mean, you're causing trouble here. You're abusing, you know, you're taking advantage of my Buddhahood. You know, this is like, that's just not appropriate for what you're doing here now. Do you understand what I said? So, if you think you're Buddha, in other words, if you think you're intimate with your suffering, intimate with suffering is Buddha. Intimate suffering means not attached to suffering. Not attached to suffering means not attached to self. It means Buddha. Buddha is not being attached.

[79:50]

So if you're a Buddha, then find another Buddha. Go and meet the Buddha and see if your Buddhahood stands up. Now, if you don't feel like you're intimate with your suffering, you're right. If you don't think you're intimate with your suffering, you're right. If you have any thoughts or doubts about, you know, that you're intimate with your suffering, you're right. But when you are intimate, you don't necessarily even know it. You're just free. If you're suffering and you want to get rid of suffering, that's because you're attached to your suffering. Right. Well, you're attached to the suffering going away. That's attachment to suffering. If you're not attached to suffering, coming and going makes no difference to you. And you'd be the same way with pleasure. Coming and going, pleasure coming. High pleasure, by pleasure. High suffering, by suffering.

[80:51]

High monstie, by monstie. High mom, by mom. High daughter, by daughter. High son, by son. High sickness, by sickness. This is called not being attached. So everybody's got the stuff, right? Daughters, sons, mothers, fathers, suffering, sickness, all that coming and going all the time, right? That's the situation. Everybody got that? So just being completely at ease with the coming and going, that's a possibility. And then, not only is it at ease with the coming and going, but it actually is unassailable bliss also, and freedom, and happiness, and also you can share with everybody else. That's a really good deal. That's the proposal. But you cannot realize this if you have the slightest wish for what's happening to go away. I mean, at some level you have to find a place where you have not the slightest wish for a change. You're willing to accept the way it is and therefore you're willing to accept the change and the change of the change.

[81:55]

This is a possibility for us. This is the possibility of human life. Okay? Okay? Is it easy to attain? Is it commonly attained? It's very rare. So we're talking about what we aspire to. We're not talking about something which we attain full scale frequently among our population, but which we aspire to. And even aspiring to it is pretty nice. I think it's nice if you can have an aspiration. That's what we're talking about here. The goal of the openness?

[84:39]

Yes. Yes. And there has to be acceptance. Yes? Once you've got what you just said, you've got the acceptance, the openness, what else do you have? The intimacy, okay, with suffering. When you have all three of those, or even one of them, if you have intimacy with suffering, you're done. You're free. Intimacy with suffering means you can't be intimate with something and attached to it at the same time. Okay? If there's attachment, if you're reaching over to get it, you're still not intimate. When you're intimate with something, you're too close to be attached.

[85:40]

You're just there with Not even with, you're just there. But there's somebody else there too. But they're not other. When there's intimacy, there's non-attachment. So anyway, non-attachment, intimacy are synonyms. When you've got both of them, you don't need faith anymore. Your faith has been realized. Your faith has been culminated. What you need faith for in the meantime is to trust, I guess, that being present will bring you to intimacy and freedom. So my faith is that intimacy... will release me and all beings. Because my intimacy with you will release you. My intimacy with you doesn't mean that I get to be released and you don't. When I'm intimate with all beings, all beings are released. That's my goal. My faith is that that intimacy will liberate all beings. And also my additional faith is that the way to establish intimacy is by being present. not by like going to intimacy or running away from intimacy or going towards you or away from you, but just being with you as you manifest, as I manifest.

[86:45]

That the presence is the road and the mode to intimacy, and intimacy is the whole point. It's release. But isn't it hard to be intimate with everything that happens? Of course. So we understand that. So we practice, we have the faith that getting intimate and continuing to learn how to be intimate with things will be a good road, will be a good practice. But once you are, then faith is realized. Your faith is proved. You've verified your faith, which you practiced for however many zillions of moments it was. Okay? Yes? Yes? This is a good time for me to be familiar with my fear of watching the future.

[87:54]

I don't understand it very well, but I want to avoid it. Well, again, what's your motivation? You say you want to see it, so what's your motivation in seeing it? Well, I think I'm avoiding suffering. Other people suffering. I live a pretty easy life, but I don't want to avoid other people suffering, maybe. You think it would be good for you to watch the show? Well, I mean, I know you don't know, but is your motivation that you think it would be good? Well, if you think it would be good, then I would suggest that you watch it, if you think it would be good, and then see what happens. And if you become afraid, then what do you think would be good if you became afraid? Yeah, I think that would be good. And if you hang out with your fear, you'll learn something about it.

[89:02]

It'll probably drop away, and then you'll just feel anxious. How do you do that? How do you stay in there with your fear? Pardon? How do you stay in there with that fear? How do you do that? I hear you say that. How do you do that? Well, why don't you come up here for a minute? Come here. so what's happening now can you sit down here yeah so is there fear now well I think I'm pretending there now isn't because I haven't really I haven't acknowledged it are you here are you here Mm-hmm. That's how to work with fear. Just be here like this. Just be like we are right now. Just be here like this. That's how to work with it. It always feels like it goes away and I don't know what to do.

[90:07]

It feels like it... Wait a second. Are you here? Yeah. That's how you do it. Are you here? This is how to work with fear, like this. Now, are you worried about something going away? Are you worried about something going away right now? No, I'm just trying to remember what it felt like when I was trying to look at the situation when I'm so fearful. Are you here? Yes. Are you here? If you're here, you're going to have trouble, you know, being afraid. That's one of the problems of being here. Oh. It sounds so easy when you're sitting here telling me, you know. It is easy if you're sitting... When you're sitting next to me and I'm telling you it is easy. That's true. It is easy. This is easy. It's okay to have easy sometimes. This is to give you a feeling for when it's easy. Okay? I'm telling you this. Now, when I'm not telling you this, you need to tell yourself. Same thing I'm telling you.

[91:10]

You need to say, are you here? Pat, are you here? Yes, I am. Pat, are you here? Yes, I'm here. Are you awake, Pat? How do you know you're here? Pat, are you here? Well, I'm saying I'm here. What does that mean? Pat? Pat, are you here? I'm here. Okay. See the difference between Pat, are you here? Yes, I am. And what does it mean to be here? Pat, are you here? See? How do I know I'm not kidding myself? Are you here, Pat? How do I... I might be kidding myself. I am kidding myself. Are you here, hearing those words? Are you laughing at me right now? Yeah. No, I'm just telling everybody that. See the difference? All this stuff's buzzing around your head. You're a fake, you know. You're going to get it for this. You know, this is not real presence, you know. How do you know you're present? All this stuff's buzzing around your head. But there's somebody else that's saying, are you here? People are coming and going back and forth all around you all the time. Stuff's happening all the time, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Are you here?

[92:10]

Yes, I am. Blah, blah, blah, blah. Are you awake? Yes, I am. So that's one famous Zen master who did that, right? He got up in the morning, looked in the mirror, and he said to himself, Pat? He said, yes. Are you here? Yes. Are you awake? Yes, I am. All day long, don't let people fool you. I won't. So one person to fool you includes yourself. It's tough to say yourself, right? Oh, how do I know this is real? What's going to happen next? Blah, blah, blah. This is people fooling you. No matter what the story is, oh, you're bad, you're good, you're great, Pat, you're doing swell. Are you here, Pat? Yes, I am. Are you awake? Yes, I am. Pat, you're deluded. Are you awake? Yes, I am. How do you know you're awake? I'm here. It's not, I know I'm awake because of this, this, and this.

[93:03]

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