Usually at Noah Abode, we begin with a ritual where each person says their name and then everyone says their name. But I don't think that will work with this present situation. So I can see your names and your faces and yeah, I see people from England and Germany and the United States and Italy and Greece and Sweden and Denmark Yeah.

[01:01]

All over the United States. And I haven't seen any of you for quite a while. And I haven't seen some of you for years. So yeah, this is a great, a great moment. So I'm not at no abode monastery or not a not a no boat hermitage. I'm at Green Gulch Zen center. Last, let's see, on the May 2nd, I gave a talk to a very small group of you.

[02:23]

And yesterday I was asked to give a title for the talk. And the title I suggested was, Caring for everything. As awakening. That's what I talked about the last time. For example, take care of a garden. as awakening or as taking care of awakening. Take care of a sick friend as taking care of awakening. One time, the Buddha was moving around

[03:38]

on the surface of the earth with his attendant, Ananda. And as they walked, they came upon one of the Buddhist students, a monk, I believe, was lying near the road and he was very sick and uncared for, dirty and Yeah, with various kinds of signs of illness on his skin. And I found this story because I was looking for examples of where Buddha touched somebody. And here's an example where Buddha actually, together with Ananda, picked up this human body with their hands. put it on a clean surface and washed it and cared for it.

[04:49]

There's not usually much notice in the scriptures about Buddha touching people. But occasionally, the Buddha does touch people when it's appropriate. And later, the Buddha met with a large group of students and told them about finding this monk. And he said, he had never told them before. So they weren't, they didn't take care of the monk. He told them when one of you is sick, I, it would be appropriate for you to take care of that, that member of the Sangha. And I'm bringing this up because, and he said, when you take care of that person, it's like taking care of me. And so what I mentioned last time is, if we're taking care of the Buddha, if we're taking care of unsurpassed, complete, authentic awakening, we probably wouldn't be thinking about improving it.

[06:08]

we would be perhaps thrilled to have the opportunity to take care of the Buddha. To take care of the Buddha, to give the Buddha a seat, to give the Buddha some water, to give the Buddha a question. We'd probably be very happy to do that. But we probably wouldn't think, oh, let's go and prove the Buddha. Some students might actually think, oh, I'm going to go improve the Buddha. But some of us might not think that. Just like, let's go meet the Buddha, and look at the Buddha, and serve the Buddha, and care for the Buddha, right? And what I'm suggesting now is to take care of everything like that, to take care of all your feelings like that,

[07:12]

to take care of the cups in your sink like that, to take care of yourself, and to take care of all living beings with no exception, like you take care of the Buddha, joyfully, diligently. And again, if you've got a chance to meet the Buddha or a Buddha, or somebody who is more or less a Buddha, you probably also would not try to control them. Like if they're going to sit in that chair, you might actually just help them sit in a chair rather than tell them to sit in some other chair. Or you might say, you might give them a question like, excuse me, world honored one, do you really want to sit in that seat? Because maybe you know that seat is kind of an old chair, and it might not support the Buddha's weight.

[08:20]

And so you might want the Buddha to sit in another seat, but you probably wouldn't be thinking that you're controlling the Buddha. You're serving the Buddha. And so you might say, excuse me, I think that chair might not be strong enough to support the entire universe. would you please sit over here? And the Buddha might say, oh, thank you for the suggestion. I think I'll sit in this chair. And then the Buddha might sit in it and fall through the chair. But that would be a wonderful teaching for you, for us. So that's what I was talking about last time. And also, I emphasized that in the practice of taking care of everything and also in particular in the practice of taking care of Buddha and taking care of unsurpassed awakening, it's essential, unavoidable, indispensable to take care of the Bodhisattva precepts.

[09:26]

But there too, in taking care of the Bodhisattva precepts, We treat them like we're taking care of Buddha. So we don't try to control the Bodhisattva precepts. We don't try to improve the Bodhisattva precepts. Of course, we don't ignore them. But also, we don't depend on them. We take care of them like we take care of the Buddha. We take care of the Buddha, but we don't depend on the Buddha. We take care of the Buddha, but we don't abide in the Buddha. Taking care of the Buddha means not abiding in anything, including Buddha. And not abiding in anything, including Buddha, is Buddha. Not abiding in the Bodhisattva precepts is

[10:33]

the way the Buddha takes care of the Bodhisattva precepts. So the Buddha gives us the Bodhisattva precepts. One of the ways the Buddhas take care of the Bodhisattva precepts is by giving them to us. But they don't own the precepts. They don't cling to the precepts. They take care of them. And if we take care of them like Buddha takes care of them, then we wholeheartedly practice them without abiding in them, depending on them, trying to control them or improving them. That's the way to be wholehearted in the practice of the precepts. And that's an aspect of taking care of everything. You could also say taking care of the precepts is taking care of everything. And you could also say, taking care of everything is taking care of the Bodhisattva precepts.

[11:44]

I was talking to one of you who are here today a couple of days ago, and they mentioned that I think that they had been practicing something they thought I were thought I was teaching, which is the practice. I think the way they put it was the practice of taking our seat. Sometimes also called the practice of taking our Dharma position. taking our true position. And I think I have talked about that. And many of you probably heard me talk about that, the practice of taking our seat.

[12:53]

But today, I would like to, instead of say taking, or in addition to saying taking our seat, I would say the practice of receiving our seat. of accepting our seat. Again, it is suggested in some scriptures, when someone comes to visit you, give them a seat. Give them water. Give them your attention. Rather than when they come to see you, let them take a seat. or take the water. So again, idiomatically take a seat doesn't necessarily mean you take something that's not given. But today I'd like to emphasize the practice of receiving the seat that's given to us. Accepting the seat that's given to us.

[13:54]

And today, and maybe tomorrow, but certainly today, each of us has been given a seat. And the seats we've been given, you could say, are all over the world. But I didn't take this seat. I'm given this seat to be here on this place in the world. And each of us has our seat which has been given to us. And each of our seats, this seat I'm sitting in and the seat you're sitting in, each of our seats, are at the center of all living beings. Each of us is surrounded by all living beings. All beings who have realized the way are all around us and with us. All beings who have not yet completely realized the way, they are also all around us and they are suffering.

[15:02]

And our particular position in the midst of all suffering beings, we did not take, it was given to us. And we have the opportunity to receive it and accept it. So I'd like to talk to you a little bit about receiving our seat. and sitting on our seat, or sitting at our seat. And I was reading Suzuki Roshi a day or so ago, and he said, moment after moment. And actually, I think it's more like moment by moment. Receiving our seat. accepting our seat moment by moment and sitting at our seat or standing at our place without abiding in anything.

[16:26]

caring for everything at our seat without abiding in anything or depending on anything. We call this sometimes just sitting. Just sitting in our true place right here, each moment, without any elaboration, without trying to improve anything, without trying to control anything, without abiding or clinging to anything. This is to sit in our position right here as a Buddha sits. And this is to care for Buddhas.

[17:33]

by sitting like Buddhas and standing like Buddhas. Now, the person who brought up this practice to me, after telling me that they were trying to do this practice, they said, But it's so hard. It's so hard. What's so hard? It's hard to be at the place and be surrounded by all this suffering. It's hard to keep accepting that position. Because part of what's surrounding us is beings taking the form of, it's so hard. It's so hard as a living being.

[18:37]

It's hard to care for. It may be hard. And it being hard is another living being. And thinking that it's hard is another living being. These are living beings to take care of. So we don't try to improve this living being called, this is so hard, or it's so hard, I just feel like giving up, I can't go on. That's another living being. We listen to and take care of all these beings. And yeah. and taking care of them without abiding in or depending on anything, we practice and realize the Buddha way.

[19:52]

Taking care of everything at our place right now, We practice unsurpassed awakening. And again, the way of taking care of it is the way unsurpassed awakening takes care of everything. It gives wholehearted attention to everything without abiding in anything, without trying to control anything. And I think of a question asked in chapter 7 of an Sanskrit, originally Sanskrit, Buddhist text called the Samdhinirmochana Sutra.

[21:00]

And the question at the beginning of chapter 7 is asked by the Bodhisattva of Loving Kindness. Manjushri, Maitreya. Asked the Buddha, World Honored One, depending on what and abiding in what do bodhisattvas practice? And the Buddha says something like, depending on and abiding in the teachings and an unshakable vow to realize unsurpassed awakening. So today I'm bringing up another aspect of this is that

[22:10]

we actually need we actually depend on and abide in something in order to practice like a buddha we depend on and abide in something in order to practice non-depending and non-abiding If we try to practice abiding and depending, we won't have a hard time. It's easy for us to depend on things and abide in them and cling to them and try to control them and try to approve them. That's not difficult. It's suffering, but we know how to do it. All of us are good enough at that. All of us are good enough at trying to control people. Nobody needs to be better at that, that I know of. Some people think that some other people should be better at it, and they try to control those people.

[23:14]

Like, control your children, control your dog, control yourself. So some people can't control themselves from trying to, can't control themselves and get themselves to stop trying to control others. Because they're so good at it, they like to use their, their muscles, their controlling muscles, their improving muscles. But I think everybody's good enough at it, or almost everybody. If any of you know somebody who's not good at trying to control things, let me know. I'd like to meet that person. Well, I just thought somebody might think, well, Suzuki Roshi wasn't very good at it. He wasn't very good at controlling his students. That's my view of him. And I didn't feel like Roshi, you should you should you should get your students bet more under control. I'd never felt that about him. I noticed that he that his students were not under his control.

[24:18]

I noticed that. And one of them was me. I wasn't under his control. And he didn't really try to get me under his control. And I noticed that some of his other students were not under his control. And he was not trying to get them under his control. But he was devoted to them. And he appreciated them being around in his life. Now, he might have had some impulses to try to control us. But I think he was very good at not falling into those impulses. And I might sometimes have some impulses to try to control some of you. But I'm trying to be upright and not lean into any impulse to control you or improve you.

[25:23]

That probably is good news to you, right? Or do some of you want me to try to control you? Raise your hands if you want me to try to control you. Nobody raised their hand. Okay, I won't. I won't try. In the early days of Zen Center, we had a lot of enthusiastic, almost fanatical Zen students. And I remember one time they said to Suzuki Roshi, give us some way to be more strict. Be more strict with us. And one of the things he said was, when they asked that, he said, well, when you put the brooms away, you could put them with the head of the broom up. That's about as strict as he could get with us. And even now, we're still working at that at Zen Center. I sometimes find brooms with the head down, and then I usually pick them up and put the head up.

[26:27]

I'm not trying to control the people or the brooms. I'm just putting the broom head up. And obviously, I do not have control of the broom broom workers. He also said when we asked him to be more strict, in other words, get us under control. He also said, if I was strict with you, you'd all leave. Maybe not immediately, but That's what he said. And so he was, maybe some people think he was, one of my Dharma brothers said to me, maybe Roshi's too kind to us. Or do you think Roshi's too kind to us? So some people might've thought that about him. Does anybody think you're being too kind? Does anybody think you should get your friends and neighbors and spouses more under control?

[27:33]

Anyway, abiding in what? And depending on what can we give up abiding and depending? Abiding in what and depending on what can we give up trying to control living beings and instead take care of them? wholeheartedly, without abiding in them or trying to control them. Abiding in what? We abide in vows. The bodhisattvas and the great vehicle abide in vows, in aspirations. And by living with and abiding in these vows, they had the energy and courage to do this really hard thing, which is not the really hard thing of trying to control people.

[28:41]

That's pretty hard. It's easy to try, but it's almost impossible to succeed. But that's not what we're talking about. We're talking about something that in a way is even harder. Giving up, trying to improve people and control them. We need a lot of energy to give up trying to control, to care for without trying to improve. A lot of people do take care of people and they want to improve them and they try and the people don't improve and they try and the people don't improve. And then eventually some of those people, they just give up helping the people. They try to help people over and over, and the people do not improve and do not come under control. And because they're holding on to improvement, they quit. It's so hard on them. So in order to do this practice of sitting at our seat with no elaboration, without depending on anything, we need to depend

[29:56]

on vows, that's where you get the energy and the courage to do this hard work. It is hard, but it's, again, it's like climbing a mountain. And in order to climb the mountain, some people need to have the vow to climb the mountain. At the beginning of this talk, I recited a vow written by a 13th century bodhisattva named A.H. Dogen. That was the vow he wrote. I don't know how often he recited that vow, but that was his vow. And when I recite his vow, it encourages me. It inspires me. And I thought of some other people's vows.

[31:05]

Like Suzuki Roshi's vow, the one that came to mind was he vowed to come to the United States and give American people something good from Japan. He came to the United States shortly after or even still during a time when Japan was recovering from the war and they had industry, but their industry had been crushed by the war. So most, all they could do is make kind of like little tinker toys. They weren't sending over their national treasures to the United States. They were sending over cheap, not very well-made, not very skillfully made junk. However, they gradually have recovered and Suzuki Roshi wanted to bring something really good.

[32:08]

He wanted to bring the practice of the Bodhisattva and give it to the American people. He wanted to bring the practice of sitting at your seat, right where you are, moment by moment. He wanted to bring the practice of sheltering in place and caring for all beings without trying to improve or control them, but rather show them great compassionate care so that they can also practice great compassionate care. He vowed to do that and he came and he tried for 12 years. And then he died.

[33:12]

But here it is, his vow, to give American people something really good. I'm sorry, speaking to the Europeans and Asians, he didn't say that he was gonna go to America to give people in Europe a gift. But his disciples wanted to go to Europe and Asia to give a really good gift. The gift of sitting at our place and encouraging other people to sit at their place. And another vow. is the one we'll do at the end of this session called the Four Great Vows or the Universal Vows. Living beings are numberless.

[34:22]

I vow to save them. Living beings are numberless. I vow to care for them without trying to control them. and thereby save them. Show them that I'll care for them, not until they're under my control, but until they're free from their own impulse to try to control, and then they're saved. Afflictions. Delusions, greed, hate, and delusion are inexhaustible. I vow to cut through it. The Dharma gates are boundless. Everything's an opportunity for care. Everything's an opportunity to take care as taking care of Buddha.

[35:24]

I vow to enter the door of all those opportunities. And the Buddha way is unsurpassable. I vow to become it. This is another vow. Sustained by that vow, we can do this difficult practice. The Bodhisattva Kshitigarbha, which means earth womb, In Japanese, in Chinese, that kishiti garba is translated into ditsang, which again means earth womb, or jizo, which means earth womb. This bodhisattva's vow is, from the time of Shakyamuni Buddha, I will teach the Dharma.

[36:28]

until all beings are freed. And the last few talks I've given this year, I emphasized the vows of Samantabhadra, the 10 vows of Samantabhadra, which again, relying on those vows, we will receive great energy and inspiration to do the difficult practice. Without abiding in these vows and relying on these vows, we will not have enough energy and enthusiasm and inspiration to really respect everybody and take care of them without in a sense disparaging them by trying to control them, including ourselves.

[37:36]

And then the Buddha Amitabha, Amida Buddha, was born by a monk practicing 48 vows. The ancestors of the great vehicle, the Buddhas and Bodhisattva ancestors, they all got their courage and energy and inspiration to do this very challenging practice by relying on, by going back to, by refreshing and recreating and renewing their vows. That's where our energy and courage comes from. And it's a circle.

[38:42]

Practice is the realization, and the realization gives rise to the vows, and the vows fuel the practice, which is the realization, which gives rise to more vows, which gives rise to more heroic practice and more realization. So round and round we go. You can start any place on the wheel. Vow, practice, realization, vow, practice, realization. But yeah, a lot of people, they kind of remember the practice, or they remember the realization, but they forget the vow. And so their practice can get weak. So yeah, so I don't know how often, but every moment's a good time. to remember your vows.

[39:47]

Or if you don't, if you can't remember them, just ask yourself, what vows do you want? What's most important in life? And then are you ready to commit to that? And if not, ask yourself again. And again, until you get clear enough so that you're ready to commit. And that's where the energy to do this practice comes from. Even under ordinary, excuse me, even under what we might consider to be ordinary circumstances, even then we may feel uninspired. And when things get really tough, then too, of course, we might feel, oh, it's just so hard.

[40:56]

I just, I just can't practice. Well, that feeling is, again, a sentient being who's calling for compassion. And do you want to give the person who says, I can't do this practice, I don't feel any inspiration, do you want to give that person thorough, compassionate care? And if you do, keep looking at that wish until you feel the energy to commit to it. If you want to, I'm not telling you to do that. I don't mean to tell you to do it and I'm not trying to control you into doing that.

[41:59]

If all of you disagree with everything I said today, my vow is to keep caring for you without trying to get you to agree with me. If none of you want to sign up for this arduous path of sitting in the middle of all beings and caring for them all, if none of you want to commit to it, I still aspire to care for you anyway. And no less if you don't want to do this practice. And no more if you do want to do this practice. That's my vow. And that vow is enlivening and encouraging. Please excuse this follow up what the following looking out on the morning rain.

[43:12]

I used to feel so uninspired. Looking out on the morning rain, I used to feel so uninspired. And when I thought I had to face another day, oh, it made me feel so tired. Before I met you, life was so unkind.

[44:21]

You were the key to my peace of mind. Cause you make me feel, you make me feel, you let me feel like a natural human. You let me see how to sit at my seat. I don't know who that you is, but. Well, I'm amazed how long I've been talking and maybe you are too. But yeah, we need to take care of our vows.

[45:27]

We need to find them, we need to find them, and we need to take care of them. If we want to sit at our seat and turn the wheel of the Dharma for the welfare of this world, if you want to do that for the welfare of the world, if you want to free all beings, you need to keep in touch with your vows. And in order to keep touch with them, you have to ask what they are and listen to the answer. And when you find it, then you have something to take care of. Not something to control, not something to improve, something to take care of. And if you take care of your vows, you will have the energy, you will be inspired. to take care of the morning rain. Looking out upon the morning rain.

[46:30]

Now I feel so inspired by my vows. No matter where I am. to sit at my place, my seat with all beings. And turn the wheel of the Dharma. Okay, if, let's see. Yeah, let's, if anybody wants to bring anything up, we could do that for a while. And some of you are gonna go away now, if you don't wanna come to the question and answer session. I just wanna say, I recognize you and I'm very happy to see your faces.

[47:34]

And I pray for your health. And whether you want it or not, I pray that you take care of all sentient beings and that you serve all Buddhas. I pray that you do that and I'm not trying to control you to do that. By the way, I'll just ask you, do you believe I'm not trying to control you? All right, did someone wanna say something? So if anybody wants to participate, go to participants and at the bottom, you should see, raise your hand. So if you, I don't know if you heard me the first time, if you want to participate, go to participants and then at the bottom, it should say, raise your hand.

[48:39]

Okay. We got Tracy. Okay. We got, we got Tracy, huh? You got Tracy. Oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead. Doesn't sound like Tracy to me. Gracie, go ahead. Don't touch anything. Okay, good. Yeah, I was confused there. I was actually typing out a text chat, but I'm so glad to be able to say it. Reb, you said just a little while ago, you said, I feel like you can't practice. No inspiration. That is a suffering sentient being that needs to be taken care of. Amen. And it's what you said next that got just a little sketchy in my mind of something along the lines of, and then try to remember what your vow is.

[49:54]

Would that be something like what you said? Well, even if it wasn't, it sounds good to me. Whatever it is, it's a sentient being or a Buddha calling for your compassion. It's either a sentient being calling for your compassion or a Buddha calling that you practice it. Or demonstrate, it's a Buddha demonstrating it. And then you need some energy to respond to that. So remember your vow. Like if somebody insults you, if a sentient being insults you, that insulting sentient being is calling for compassion. It might be good for you to go back to your vow before you respond to them. And not just go back to remember that you want to respond to this insult with compassion, but that you get the energy to do so and the courage to do so.

[50:59]

I want to respond to that lack of inspiration. Yes, lack of inspiration. So a lack of inspiration, respond to that by remembering what your vow is. Yes. Now sometimes, again, when I think I have to face another day, that makes me feel so tired. So now I feel tired. I don't have energy. Okay, that's a sentient being. What's my vow again? I don't have the energy to face another day. Where's the energy gonna come from? There's a vow in me. Where is that? That's my life. Find the vow, and in the vow, you find the well of courage, to face another day with energy and enthusiasm. But you may have to hang around in that well for a while.

[52:05]

You may have to go over it quite a few times. But if you hang out there, your energy, its energy, not yours, its energy will come and make you its servant. So again, I feel uninspired. My lack of inspiration is calling for my compassion, but I don't feel inspired even to take care of my lack of inspiration. So what's my vowel again? Oh yeah, right. I do remember my vowel, but still I feel tired. Yeah. Go back to the vowel again. Yeah, that is my vowel, but I still feel tired. Go back again. Yeah, that is my vowel, but actually I feel a little less tired now, but still not enough to go to work. We'll go back to it again. Now I feel enough energy to actually, I'm ready to go back, I'm ready to go.

[53:06]

I feel enough energy to go to work. That's one of the advantages of getting up and sitting in the morning is that if you sit, you may not feel really that inspired when you first get up, but if you sit, you may be able to discover and be fed by your vow. Before you try to go to work, fuel up on your vow. Nobody can do this practice without the energy of our vow. And sometimes you have enough left over from the day before, but on a regular basis, like every morning, the people of Islam do it six times a day or five times a day, they refuel. It's a good, and in many Mahayana texts and other Buddhist texts, they talk about six times a day refuel.

[54:14]

Go back to your vow and look at it and receive, oh, I see a little rabbit outside. Does that make sense to you now? That makes perfect sense. And I can add that in just the recollection or the recollection of the desire to remember the vow, there's a little energy there. Yep, that's right. There's a little energy there. Thank you so much. You're welcome. Anything else? Anybody else? We got Laurie. Okay. Laurie Jobu. Good morning, Rev. So I have difficulty, well, with many of the precepts, but one in particular, which I'd rather not say. And I look at it from different angles. I try to work with it. And then I end up, there's a part of me that really doesn't want to do it.

[55:20]

Like, I don't like this precept. I don't want to do it, but I know I should do it. Well, um, let's see now. What, what, just referring to the last person I was talking with, uh, so you have this sentient being and the sentient being is, I don't want to do it. That's a sentient being. Does that make sense to you? Yes. So that sentient being is, I'm not telling you to be compassionate to that sentient being. The expression marching orders comes to mind. These are marching instructions, but they're not marching orders. Do you want to take care of the person who says, I don't want to take care of this priesthood? Yes. There it is. There's a there's a wish.

[56:21]

Do you wish to take care of the person who does not want to practice? Yes. Yeah. And do you feel ready to commit to take care of the person who doesn't want to practice? It needs work. Yeah, that what's a big that's a big next step to go from wishing to do something committing to do something is a big step. Of course, I run into, I'm not run into, I walk into and it runs into me a lot of time, people saying, I wanna practice the Bodhisattva precepts, but they're not yet ready to commit. So the step from wanting to do something to committing to do it is a big step. Or I should say, The step from wanting to do something to, what's the word?

[57:28]

To think that you're ready to commit is a step. To go from wanting to do to feel I'm ready to commit is a step. And then there's another step which is I'm ready to commit and now I am committing. So that process is the process we go through to commit to the practice. First of all, do you want to? Next, do you want to commit? That may take a while to say yes to. If the answer is yes, or now that you said you want to commit, are you ready to commit? And if you want to commit, you still might say, I want to commit, but I'm not ready. OK, let's take care of that person. And maybe even though you're not ready to commit, you feel like you could take care of the person who's not ready to commit. Again, I have this opportunity all the time, people who wanna do something, but they're not ready to commit to it.

[58:29]

And I take care of the person who wants to, the person who's ready to, and the person who does. And after they do, I take care of the person who does not follow through on their commitment. So what we have to start from the beginning over and over. So if you have committed to take care of everything, like you take care of the Buddhas, If you've made that commitment, that doesn't mean you don't have to go back again and ask yourself, what do I wanna do? It's like the flower at the end of the plant is like, okay, I'm committed to take care of everything as awakening. That's great, but you have to go back to the roots of that plant, otherwise that flower won't come to fruit.

[59:31]

So even though you have committed, you have to say, I do commit. Now, and you have said that, Lord. You have to go back to what do I want? What do I want? And do I want to commit? And am I ready to commit? And am I committed? And now that I've committed, again, start a new moment. What do I want to do? You have to go round and round. Find your wish. Find your commitment. Make your commitment. Practice it. And then again, don't just keep practicing and practicing and practicing without going back to the basic root wish. To keep going back to it. Otherwise, the practice, we lose our inspiration. Under ordinary circumstances, that will happen. Not to mention specially challenging situations. Thank you.

[60:37]

How does that work for you, Lori? It gives me a lot to work with. Yes, thank you. You're welcome. Hello, Bert. Hi. I just wanted to say the lyrics that follow Those lines that you sang are, before the day I met you, life seemed so unkind. Your love was the key to my peace of mind. Yeah. Because you made me feel. You made me feel. You made me feel like a natural human. And there's another line, which is, before I met you, I think my soul was in the lost and found, and you came along to claim it. Yeah. Exactly. So every morning, in a way, our soul is in the lost and found.

[61:43]

Our bodhisattva soul, every morning we wake up, wake up in the morning, the sun's not shining, Our soul's in the lost and found. Well, go to the lost and found and claim it. It's in the lost and found. You still gotta go get it. It's in there. And then you claim it and say, oh my God, I wanna practice. I wanna practice caring for everything. Okay. And do you have the energy? No, I wanna go back to bed. Okay. Get up again. Go get your soul, go get your vow. But again, before your vow is a wish. The vow and the wish are not the same thing. You can wish for something, but not be ready to commit. You have to find something that's so important that you'll commit to it. That's where the energy to keep going on this practice is coming from.

[62:48]

And also that wish is coming from the practice. So the practice leads to the realization, leads to the wish, leads to the vow, leads to the energy, leads to the practice, round and round, every morning. Now, if you wake up and your soul's not in the lost and found, that's okay. If it's right in your face, good, go to work. But you might have to look for a little while to find it. That's good work, looking around the lost and found. Is that enough, Bert, for now? Oh, yes, that's fine, thank you. How's Joe today? He's good. Great. He's at home splitting wood. Splitting wood, okay. Yes? We have some more people.

[63:52]

Here's Homa. Homa. Hello, Rab. Homa. Homa, Homa. Thank you for offering us again and again, the teachings. You're welcome. Thank you for listening again and again. I love it. My question is, I was picturing the vow, and then the realization, and then the practice. Don't skip the practice. Yes, so the vow, practice, realization, or is it the vow, realization, practice? So I see like in the whole spectrum. Well, you can switch them if you want to, but usually we say practice, realization, but you could say realization, practice too. bow practice realization bow practice realization but you could also do bow realization practice because realization and practice are really one thing so you can say thank you and i need help here because

[65:02]

I, when I, I, I experienced realization, the realization actually gives me energy to renew my vow. And then the practice without the realization, I become, I become like, like a machine, you know, kind of doing, doing, doing, but with the realization, actually it makes it the whole, whole circle wholeness of it. Yep. That's right. Okay. Then you also mentioned about... So if your realization isn't functioning fully enough to be pumping out lots of vows, then you probably should go back to the vow again and practice more so your realization will produce more vows. So they're actually, it's a cycle, right? They're all really happening at the same time. Yes, so thank you because your respond was a respond to my next, a question that I couldn't understand, so I'm clear now.

[66:06]

Thank you. You're welcome. Next, we have Josh. Hi, Beth. Hi, Josh. Long time no see. Sorry? Long time no see. Yeah, long time, good couple of years. So part of what you said right at the beginning has struck me and I'm just trying to reformulate my question because I was listening to the other people in between. You were talking about caring for everything like we would care for Buddha and yeah it's about, so I can see the practice although I find it difficult of caring for whatever I'm doing, you mentioned the garden, I can see out my window right now a bed that needs weeding, so caring for that weeding as awakening, I can see that. And then often as I'm in my everyday life caring for my everyday life, there's also something that's in me that needs caring for that wants a different everyday life.

[67:10]

And so my question is about caring for my everyday life and caring for the part of me that wants something different and how I care for both of those. Yeah, because they seem often in conflict. And yet I can see they both need caring for. Yeah Okay, so we got a garden and you're caring for the garden. Yeah, then we have this special plant called I want I want my life to be different. Yeah That's another garden. Yeah, and then we have another garden or another flower which says Taking care of the garden and taking care of my wish to have things be different. Those are That's another sentient being. And I would want to take care of my garden, my wish, or thinking that things need to be different, and also thinking that those two are in conflict.

[68:14]

I want to take care of each one of those, both as have the taking care be, take care of them as awakening, and take care of them as I would take care of awakening. So of course I would be very kind to awakening, right? So I'll treat my garden that way. Now we have this thought, I want things to be different. I'll treat that like I would treat awakening. I would be a servant to that thought. I would be devoted to the thought, I want things to be different. Here's another one. I don't want things to be the way they are. That's another one. I would want to serve that thought the way I would serve my beloved teacher, the Buddha. Again, I don't try to improve the Buddha. Then I don't try to improve my garden. And I don't try to improve the thought.

[69:18]

I want things to be different. I don't try to improve that. I try to take care of And by taking care of that thought, I want things to be different. I realize that that thought, I want things to be different, is not the slightest bit different from awakening. It's not separate from awakening, and it's not conjoined to awakening. It's totally not different, not separate. But if I don't take care of my thoughts, like I don't want to practice, I don't want to do this practice, I want a better practice, I want a different practice. If I don't take care of them, then I'm just missing an opportunity. It's not the end of the story, it's just a missed opportunity. And also if you don't take care of your garden, it's a missed opportunity. If you don't take care of other people's nastiness or your own, it's a missed opportunity.

[70:23]

To do what? To take care of that illness. And just like he would take care of Buddha. Like Buddha said, when Josh is sick, taking care of Josh is like taking care of me. When Josh is uninspired, when Josh is resistant, when Josh is not accepting what's going on, taking care of Josh is taking care of Buddha. That's what Buddha said. And if Josh says, I don't believe that, taking care of that Josh is taking care of Buddha. Take care of everybody the way you would take care of Buddha. Unless, by any chance, you wouldn't take care of Buddha compassionately, then don't take care of people that way. What's coming up for me as I'm hearing all that is, I can only do that, when you said moment by moment, I can only do that moment by moment, because otherwise the idea I've got about my life as it is, and the idea I've got about how I want it to be different,

[71:28]

be with all that in one moment but otherwise the ideas are taking me they're trying to pull in different directions or something yeah so yeah yeah so part of what i said also was to sit at your seat right now yeah without any elaboration an elaboration in terms of elaborating now into past and future yeah But again, that's a hard practice. So you need inspiration and energy to do the hard practice of being in this moment and taking care of what you already have been given. You need inspiration, that takes energy. Thank you. You're welcome. So next we have Linda H. Hi. Can you hear me? Yeah. Okay. Uh, yeah. Oh, hi Rev.

[72:31]

Um, the moment in your talk that was the most moving to me, um, made my lower lip start trembling and it was, so it's, it felt so deep that I kind of can't remember it. So I'm going to ask you if you would say it again. And it was about the, Maitreya asked, first you kept saying the Buddha doesn't abide in anything. You were saying that, right? Okay, then the Maitreya asks, what does the Buddha abide in, right? What does the Bodhisattva in the great vehicle abide in and depend upon in order to practice meditation of the Buddha? And then the Buddha answers, abiding in the teaching and the vow.

[73:39]

And then you said something. You said something like an impossible thing. That's what made me start to tremble. And that's how the Buddha abides. or doesn't abide in anything by abiding in the vow. Is that what you said? Yeah, so we abide in the vow to practice like Buddha, which is to practice not abiding. The Buddha, the Bodhisattva and the Buddhas, they have a mind which doesn't cling to anything, doesn't abide to anything. It cares for everything without abiding in anything. That's the Buddha's mind. In order to practice that mind of the Buddhas, we need to abide in the vows. Thank you. And there's two translations of that little conversation. Not two translations, two basic versions. One's from, we don't have the Sanskrit anymore.

[74:41]

So we have Tibetan and Chinese. So the Tibetan says, that the Bodhisattva abides in and depends upon the vow to teach the Dharma and realize authentic awakening. So in the Tibetan, the vow applies to both the realization of authentic awakening and the teaching of the Dharma. with that awakening. The Chinese does it slightly differently. It says, abiding in and depending upon the teaching and the vow. So one way to look at it is, in order to have this mind of Buddha, this difficult to attain mind of Buddha, which doesn't abide in anything, which takes care of all beings free of discrimination,

[75:48]

In order to do that, we need teachings and we need a vow to apply those teachings to this Buddha mind. The other way is we need a vow to attain awakening and then also the vow to teach once we have awakening. So both ways are true. But the key thing is that we need this great, this unshakable vow this really strong vow, which you have to take care of and keep it in really good shape in order to do this very difficult thing, which is called the Buddha mind. And yet the Buddha says, you guys can learn this. I, like we said, before Buddhas were Buddhas, they were just like us. Before they learned how to do this, they had a hard time. not abiding anything. So we need a lot of energy and inspiration and courage to, like, take care of things really wholeheartedly without leaning into improving them or controlling them or, you know, having opinions about them or whatever.

[77:16]

But again, if we do any of that leaning, those are other sentient beings to take care of. And again, how do you take care of them? Wholehearted devotion without abiding in them. Thanks. So Rev, there are four more questions. The next one is Priya. Oh, thank you so much. Oh, I'm not alone anymore. So I will do my best. I'm sorry. Um, so it's a question that came to me a few weeks ago about compassion. I work with people and sometimes they share things from their childhood, all kinds of challenging things they've gone through in the war and very extreme. And I don't feel any sadness. It means I hear them. I hold. the emotions, but I don't feel any, you know, sadness.

[78:24]

I see something bigger. I see the way out. I heard, you know, another Zen talk talking about the loss, the grief, and I don't feel it. So I wonder, and the question came to me, do I miss something? Okay, so this is an example. So the example here in this case is Miss Glickman. Yes, thank you. So now we have somebody who's not sad. All right. All right. So the practice is to take care of the not sad person. Take care of the not sad person and don't try to improve her into a sad person. Don't try to make her a sad person. Take care of the unsad person. Now we have somebody who doesn't feel anything. Now the practice is to take wholeheartedly care for the person who doesn't feel anything.

[79:26]

Without trying to improve her into a feeler. But that's hard. That's why we need energy to take care of even an unfeeling person. even an unsad person, and of course, to take care of sad people, and depressed people, and to take care of happy people, and to take people who are clinging to their happiness, and to take care of people who are pushing away their happiness. Take care of all sentient beings that you meet who seem to be somebody other, yes, and take care of your own sadness and your own lack of sadness. Grieving has its own life. It doesn't, again, some people try to control their sadness and control their grieving. Grieving is a wonderful thing to take care of, but don't try to control it.

[80:30]

Don't try to make it. A lot of people feel like they're supposed to grieve now. So if somebody dies and people feel like now's the time to cry. I noticed when Suzuki Roshi died, people, His students were taught well enough so they didn't feel like they all had to cry at the same time. Some did, when he died, some cried right away, but some didn't cry right away. Like me, I cried before he died. And I was looking in a mirror while I was crying and I said, what are you crying about? I was crying about him dying and he hadn't died yet. I didn't think I would be crying then, but I was. The sadness comes according to a living process. And if it's not coming, take care of that person and let her be the way she is. When my father died,

[81:34]

Uh, he was in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and I was in San Francisco in the back. And the phone was brought to me. My brother told me if my father had died. And I had been with my father before that, uh, quite a bit. And I felt like every breath he took, I thought was going to be his last breath and I was ready for it, but he didn't die. And then I went back to San Francisco. And again, the phone was brought to me and my brother said, dad died. And I said, okay, I'm coming. I didn't cry. I didn't feel sad. I was ready for it. And now my dad, my sweet dad was dead. And I didn't cry. I didn't feel sad. I didn't really feel much of anything. I didn't feel, I didn't feel like, oh darn, I have to go to Minneapolis. I just thought, okay, here we go. And I went, and he was in a mortuary, a funeral home, as they say.

[82:40]

I went in and just walked into this big room and his casket was up there and I walked up and looked in the casket and I saw my dear, sweet father. And he looked so sweet and so handsome, although he had makeup on. Still, it was my dad. And I burst into amazing, amazing crying. Just sobbing and sobbing and sobbing and sobbing. Totally surprised me. But before I was crying, I felt okay not crying. And when I was crying, I felt so good too. This unexpected eruption of tears, and I was so joyful. And what a wonderful father I had. And then my uncle came over and tried to control me. Everybody was kind of getting upset, I guess, scared how much I was crying.

[83:41]

So I stopped this joyful crying. I stopped this joyful sobbing. I stopped this great sadness and great joy for the sake of my uncle. But before that, I wasn't sad. That's who I was. Cause you make me feel, you make me feel, you make me feel like a natural human. We're natural humans, but we need help to let ourselves be who we are and let others be who they are, which is not different from Buddha. You're welcome. Anybody else? Yes, uh, Carolina. Carolina. Carolina. Hello, Rev. Can you hear me? I can hear you. It's so nice to see you, Rev, and to hear your teachings and to be reminded of vows.

[84:50]

I've got, I've got two questions. If I could have one about because I was a little bit late and I didn't hear the first vow. Oh, the one I read at the beginning? Yes. Could I ask you to... I don't know if it's a very long one, but... It's pretty long. Can people flash that vow up on the screen for her to read? Is that possible? And then everybody can read it again, too. Or should I read it? What's best? This vow is written by Ehei Dogen, the Zen master who founded Soto Zen in Japan. Oh, right. He wrote it. It's his own personal vow. And I've said this before, let me say again, you all can write your own vow.

[85:53]

So there's the vow. You can read it. You can all read it. Yes, I've got it, Rep. I have a copy of that. Thank you. So that's the vow I read at the beginning. Thank you very much. I will find it. And another question that I have, an inquiry, is I lost my dog in January. And I sit with the vow, I sustain all life. And my dog was ill and ended up with vet. And vet insisted that she needs to be put down. And I wanted to look after her at home and wanted to attend to her like a Buddha and look after her in the end of her life. But I doubt,

[86:53]

something happened and I couldn't follow that through as I responded to vet's wish to euthanize my dog as is common practice. But I feel weight in my heart that I did something wrong and that I didn't follow that vow of sustaining or life. And I think this is what... What do I do with that? And I... I hear your teaching to invite me to sit and to attend to the weight of my heart and... to look after it. But it's hard to know what is right, what is the right action.

[88:06]

As I often say, and I've heard this from many ancient Buddhist practitioners, this is what I've heard and what I often say, you've said quite a bit there. And so, you have thoughts in your mind and feelings in your heart right now, is that right? Yes. Okay. So, and one of the thoughts you have is, did I do right? Is that right? Yeah. Or maybe you have, did I do wrong? Is that right? Yeah. Yeah. So such thoughts do occur in our minds, right? Yeah. And you have feelings of pain, right? Yeah. Yeah.

[89:14]

Another song is maybe I'm right and maybe I'm wrong and maybe I'm weak and maybe I'm strong. I only know I'm in love with you. So I'm not saying maybe you are right or maybe you are wrong, but you might think maybe I was right. Maybe I was wrong. Is that right? The important thing is that you love this person who thinks, maybe I was right. You love this person who thinks, maybe I was wrong. You take care of, maybe I'm right, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm weak, maybe I'm strong. Maybe I'm good, maybe I'm bad. All this stuff, we're living in the middle of all this stuff, right? The thing is to love it all, not like it, love it all.

[90:26]

And it's hard. You also said it's hard. It's hard to love. Maybe I'm wrong. But love doesn't mean like, love means you don't abide in it. You take good care of it. You don't cling to it. You take good care of it. So you have, maybe I'm right, maybe I'm wrong. Did I do right? Did I do wrong? What should I do? I'm in pain. All these things, these are more examples. And these examples will never end. We'll keep getting more and more examples. Our own thoughts about others, like we might think, did she do right? Did she do wrong? Did the vet do right? Did the vet do wrong? Did my dog do right? Did my dog do wrong? Was my dog good? Was my dog bad? Such thoughts can occur in this world, right?

[91:32]

And they're all calling for compassion. But it's hard to be compassionate to all these thoughts. That's what I hear over and over. It's hard. And again, when you wake up in the morning, you look out on all that hardness, you feel so uninspired. You have to go back to what inspires you, which is to practice like a Buddha with dogs dying and dogs being born and Buddhas dying and Buddhas being born. thoughts dying and thoughts being born, all this stuff. We need to be kind to it. Then with that kindness and with that inspiration to practice kindness and non-abiding, we'll be able to practice that way. And that will be free of good and bad. It will just be peace and freedom for all beings.

[92:40]

But we didn't say it's easy, okay? Now, if it's easy, okay, we can deal with that too. We can have, sometimes a thought might arise in your mind, hey, practice is easy today, wow. But often it's hard. Often. And now it's really hard, right? It's really hard for so many of us. And a lot of people, they have the pain of not being sick. They feel bad that they get to be healthy and go to Dharma talks and other people are so sick. So that's the pain that they have. They have food, other people don't. So that's their pain. The people who don't have food, that's their pain. The people who do have food, we're all challenged. The Buddhas are challenged.

[93:44]

The Bodhisattvas are challenged. That's how they proceed on the path, is by being challenged in this practice. Also, one of the people whose face I see right now, I won't embarrass her by saying her name, but I was looking at a piece of paper yesterday that had her name on it. And on that piece of paper, she wrote her vows. Part of me wants to go find the piece of paper and read her vows to you, but she wrote out. That might be a good exercise for us all to do. Just sit down and write down your vow or your vows, just write it down. And if you wanna send me a copy, I'd be happy to see it. So I want you to know those of you who've given me your vows in the past, I still sometimes read them and I'm inspired to read your vows and Dogen's vows and Amita's vows and Samantabhadra's vows.

[95:02]

When I read these vows, I just feel so uplifted and inspired. And I really wish everybody could read these vows and be inspired by them. So I'd share them. I don't inspire myself, the vows inspire me. They do. Anything else? Any other questions today? We have one more person, Karen. Yes. Karen, go ahead. Good morning. Well, first, I want to say thank you to you and everyone for creating this opportunity to come together this morning. You're welcome. I'm sure they all say you're welcome. And also, I want to say I'm grateful to you that you don't try to control us, that you don't try to control me.

[96:07]

And- I'm grateful for that too. Yeah. That's kind of an unusual situation. So I'm wondering if you might have a story about how you came to realize that that wasn't the way to go. You know, that controlling people wasn't the way to go. Well, I have quite a few, but one of the most accessible ones, many of you have already heard, So I'm sorry if this bothers you to retell it again. But this is one of the stories which really helped me. I mean, one of the things that really helped me. I had a dog. A dog was given to me. I don't know if somebody says, you want this dog? And I said, yes. This dog was a terrier golden Labrador mix. So it was a small own Labrador looking dog with a terrier energy.

[97:16]

And she lived with me and her name was Lara. I received her around the time that the movie Dr. Zhivago was being shown and Julie Christie, name in that movie was Lara. So here's my dog, Lara, and we lived together in an apartment, and I had a really nice apartment, and I kept it nice and clean, and I kept her clean, and everything was going really well. And then, uh, and she had never had puppies as far as I know. But then I, with my limited veterinarian's training, I saw that she was apparently coming into heat. Somehow I got them, I figured that out. And one of the reasons I figured, one of the ways I figured it out is because outside of our house, there were lots of dogs and they were all males.

[98:29]

And they were very agitated and excited. And she also wanted to go outside to hang out with these male dogs. But I didn't want her to go outside. Do you know this story, Karen? Yes. So that's the story. Should I go on, or you had enough? I think it's fun. It's a good story, if you'd like to tell the rest of it. OK. So, or you could tell it and I could give you assistance. So anyway, she wanted to go out and the male dogs outside wanted her to come out and that was the situation. But guess what? I didn't want her to go out. I wanted to control her and my life. I did not want her to have puppies. I did not want to take care of the puppies. And I tried to control my dog into being celibate.

[99:34]

Even though her heart wasn't into it. Anyway, one day it happened that somehow she got out the door and those guys were waiting for her. And still I didn't give up. I called her back in the house, trying to control her. And she was obedient to me. And she started to come back in the house. But on her way back into the house, one of the dogs managed to enter her. And without getting into too graphic details, Once dogs enters, it's hard for them to disconnect. They have various equipment that makes it so that once they connect, until they're done, it's very hard to pull them apart.

[100:41]

So I called her into the house, and she was obedient to me, and she was dragging this other dog up the stairs behind her. And I saw how ugly it was that I was trying to control her. And I said, OK, go ahead. I gave up trying to control her. I realized I got a little dose of seeing how ugly it is to try to control a living being. And so that event concluded and I didn't know, but I gradually found out that not only did she have intercourse with this other dog, but she became pregnant. So now, and I wasn't gonna like take her to a vet and have her have an abortion. So anyway, she proceeded in her pregnancy and as time went on, she came to a place in the pregnancy where she was getting ready to deliver and her rear end started to ooze and secrete lots of what looked like to be blood.

[101:55]

but thicker than blood. And it was dripping all over the house, not all over the house, all over her bed. And then so I kept her in the kitchen so that this blood wouldn't get all over my bed where she liked to go. I did not want her blood on my bed. So I tried to control her and keep her in the kitchen. And she stayed in the kitchen and used her own bed. And when she got blood on the floor, I cleaned it up. But although I had seen something of the ugliness of trying to control living beings, I slipped back into trying to control her again. It's hard not to try to control people sometimes. Even when you get lessons how silly it is. So one day I came home and came into the apartment and she wasn't in her bed.

[102:59]

And I went into my room and she was on my bed. And she was up on my bed, and she was on top of my pillows. My pillows were white, and she was on top of them. And again, I tried to control her. And I said, get in the kitchen. And she was obedient. I tried to control her. I didn't control her in the first case. I didn't control her in the second case. And this final case, I also still tried to control her. And I didn't control her, but she did go in the kitchen. And then I went over to my pillows to clean up, getting ready to clean up the blood. And I saw these four puppies. And again, I saw how foolish I was. to put my clean pillows above this obedient, beautiful creature.

[104:02]

When I said, you know, go into the kitchen, she didn't smile at me and say, you can't do that to me, I've got my babies. She went into the kitchen, and then I let her, I said, okay, you can come back here. So she taught me, and over and over she taught me that what I should do with her, is take care of her and respect her, not try to control her. And every time I tried to control her, not every time, but when I tried to control her, she repeatedly showed me that she would be compassionate to me so I could see how foolish I was. And any Zen students I tried to control over the years, they also showed me how ugly that was. I've never been successful at controlling a Zen student. And whenever I try, they show me how foolish I am. And then with lots of lessons of seeing how foolish I am, I've pretty much given up trying to control Zen students.

[105:11]

But I haven't given up trying to take care of them. I haven't given up trying to be devoted to them. but I'm not trying to control them or improve them. High cause. So is that it for the questions? Oh, one more. We have the road. Yes. Okay. Reb? Yes, Yaron. You're on, Yaron. Thank you. Well said. So the content of what you say is, you know, I clearly understand it as pretty inclusive, whereas the description is, you know, oftentimes refers to sentient beings or living beings.

[106:19]

whether it's taking care or helping or wishing well for. The phrase oftentimes limits, instead of all beings, saying all living beings or all sentient beings. Can you elaborate on that phrase? Because you also said, take care of the cup in the sink, which is neither living nor sentient. Sometimes we say take care of living beings, and I think living beings are good to take care of. Yes. But I said at the beginning, take care of everything. Okay? Everything. Living beings, Buddhas. So that's why everything works better for me because I think the way some people can imagine taking care of Buddha, they can imagine, okay, with Buddhas, I don't have to control the Buddha. But with my kids, I got to control them. So I would like to take care of everything the way I take care of Buddha. So my own doubts and pains, my children's behavior, my dog, my garden, my friends, all beings, treat them all like I would treat Buddha.

[107:34]

Cups, saucers, pencils, pens, rocks, everything, take care of it the way you would take care of a Buddha. If you're a rock worker and all day long you work with rocks and you don't take care of them the way you would take care of Buddha, then you get in the habit of trying to control where they go. Then you switch back to people and you're out of shape. You're out of, you're not in the flow of it. So take care of everything the way you would take care of Buddha so that when rocks and people show up, you're already taking care of things that way. So you take care with no exceptions. Yeah, that's the message I get from you and I both hear it and resonate with it. However, when I read, you know, Sutras oftentimes will say work for the liberation of all living beings. Oftentimes, it'll be limited like this. And I was wondering why in scriptures, it'll be limited like that.

[108:40]

Well, you know, Buddhism is evolving. It's evolving. You know, there's some wonderful sutras where they talk about women in ways that don't seem to work these days. Or they talk about animals in ways that don't seem to work these days. The world's evolving and Buddhism is evolving with it. The Buddha Dharma is evolving with it. And I'm not saying that I'm correcting the old ways. I'm not improving them. I'm taking care of the old ways. and taking care of the old ways, I offer new ways. Thank you. Yeah. And one more story is that I was working at Tatsuharu with Suzuki Roshi, moving rocks with him. Me and another young man were moving these large rocks. He, uh, I think at certain points in his life, he actually moved the big rocks himself and his broken finger, you know, have you ever seen his broken finger?

[109:47]

One of his fingers never straightened out. He broke that by moving rocks and a rock fell on his hand and broke his finger and it never got straightened. So when he was young, he actually moved the rocks. But in the last year or two of his life, he got his young students to move the rocks. So we're moving these big rocks. He would say, move the rock over here. So we'd move the rock over there. And then he'd say, now move it over there, and we'd move it over there. And he'd say, now move it over there, and we'd move it over there. And they'd say, now move it over there, and we'd move it over there. Now move it over there, and we'd move it over there. And one day, we moved this big rock like that, and we wound up right back where we started. So he was not into controlling his students or his rocks, but we did go through this process together, right? And it was hard work, but it was a great joy. So he liked to work with rocks and show us how to treat rocks like Buddhas. Okay, thank you all so much for a wonderful meeting face to face.

[111:00]

May our intention equally extend.

[111:09]

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