As is often said in this school, our sitting meditation practice is not just concentration. It is totally culminated supreme enlightenment. So in this school, one of the ways to speak about enlightenment is that enlightenment is helping others. And in helping others involves understanding that others are our self. Among worldly activities, one might say that concentration is the best, the most sublime among worldly activities.

[01:53]

Among worldly activities, yeah, concentration is really excellent. But the concentration in this school is not a worldly concentration. It is a concentration on the happiness and welfare of others. It involves being mindful of the welfare and happiness of all other beings. And when one is settled in that, when one is absorbed in that, then we have a concentration, a concentrated awareness of the welfare of others. But in addition to that, which makes this a spiritual concentration,

[03:04]

this spiritual concentration is united with wisdom. In this school, this concentration is a concentration which is united with wisdom, which is united with understanding that the others whose welfare and happiness we are concentrated upon, these others are our self. These others are not separate from us. We are nothing in addition to the others. whose welfare and happiness we are concentrated on. In order to do the practice of enlightenment,

[04:18]

this practice, this concentrated awareness of the welfare of others who are who we really are, in order to do that, we also have to do other practices which are included in this practice. Namely, we have to practice giving ethical discipline, patience and enthusiasm in order to be concentrated on the welfare and happiness of others. So, most of us occasionally get distracted from the meditation on the welfare and happiness of others,

[05:22]

particularly all others. We sometimes get distracted, or we just forget this meditation. And the distraction, the forms of distraction, of course, are potentially unlimited. We can actually be distracted from the practice of being devoted to the welfare of others by every single other. So, we sometimes speak of distractions as though beings are distractions, but really the beings are the concentration practice. They are what we are concentrating on. But then we sometimes get distracted from that, and when we put the distraction onto the being that we've forgotten to be devoted to, or we flinch from being devoted to.

[06:26]

And so, in some sense, there aren't really distractions, they're just things that we should be taking care of that we're not taking care of, and then we call and we feel like they're the problem why we're not concentrated. Some beings are really challenging. Inwardly, we have fear and confusion, and lack of discipline, and so on. It's challenging sometimes to be really gracious and generous towards those feelings, and be very ethical and careful and gentle with those feelings, and patient with them. But we need to be that way with all of our feelings, all of our ideas, all of our opinions, all of our judgments, all of our feelings of pain, pleasure, and neutral,

[07:34]

all of our fears and anxieties, we need to practice compassion towards them in order to have the energy and enthusiasm to focus on their welfare. And then outwardly the same. Many beings are challenging. They're suffering greatly. Their pain is so painful to see and hear and witness. And then if they are not skillful with their pain, then their unskillfulness is also challenging to be kind to, because it can take the form of them hurting themselves, and that's hard for us to be kind to that. Or them being cruel to others. It's hard for us to be kind to people who are being cruel to themselves or others. It's often hard for us. It's not always hard for us.

[08:36]

There is a state called Buddhahood, where it's actually easy to be kind to all unskillful beings, and all unskillful states. Not or. All unskillful beings, all unskillful states, there's a state where it's not any longer difficult to love them all, to be kind to them all. But now we occasionally have difficulty being kind to beings who are being cruel, to beings who are really confused, and think they're not confused. Beings who are really confused and think they're right, and that everybody else is wrong, especially perhaps us, who are insulting us, and they mean to. And in some cases they're insulting us, and they don't mean to. All kinds of varieties of challenging beings

[09:45]

are being given to us inwardly and outwardly, and the practice of this school is to be kind to them all, and also be mindful and focused on each one's welfare. The welfare of cruelty, of course, is the relief of cruelty. Liberating cruelty is well done, is done well. So I've heard from inwardly and outwardly that we're having a hard time,

[10:50]

that we're uncomfortable with our inner experience and our experience of others' suffering. So how can we practice with these things? How can we be compassionate to these phenomena? Well, simply, I suggest by, again, being gracious to them. And through this graciousness, I said be gracious to them, and also I would say receive the grace of them. See them as grace to us. See them as gifts to us, to remind us of our work,

[11:54]

and to be gracious towards them. And by entering into this gracious relationship with these beings, to settle into an intimate relationship with them. And then once we start settling into an intimate relationship with them, to be ethical, to be careful, to be vigilant of the beings. So that when they offer us their hand, we carefully receive their hand. We sense the appropriate level of firmness to embrace their hand. I don't get around in all groups of people, of course, but I remember before I came to Zen Center, and I don't know if this is still going on, but since I've been at Zen Center, it's also,

[12:57]

occasionally I meet someone, but before it used to be, frequently when I meet someone, especially a man, that when they shake your hand, they would squeeze really hard. Almost a little bit like a little bit of an athletic contest. Lately, people have not been squeezing my hand like that, maybe because I'm getting so old. They don't want to break my hand. But it used to be that men would really squeeze hard, and sometimes I would be right there for it. Because I could squeeze back too. And I wasn't necessarily trying to beat them, but I felt like, yeah, I can squeeze back. Are men still doing that, squeezing real hard? They are? Not as hard? Not as hard as lightening up? Check with the younger people, see if that's the case. Does that happen when you think that? Not so much around San Francisco. People are squeezing hard? A little more sensitive around here. Oh, so we have to go somewhere to find out if people are squeezing hard? Nebraska.

[14:00]

Yeah, we should do some research on this to find out. People are still squeezing hard, I can say that from recent experience. Say again? People are still squeezing hard, I can say from recent experience. Okay. Okay. You've recently been bruised? Yeah. So anyway, so the people are willing to embrace our hand, and the path of enlightenment is to be willing to embrace beings, to embrace their hands, to embrace their elbows, to embrace their whole body and mind. But, you know, carefully. Carefully. Sometimes careful can be firm. If somebody is falling off the second story there, I would want to embrace them firmly to protect them from getting hurt. I would like to receive their body weight firmly and carefully.

[15:05]

So sometimes a firm catch is appropriate. And as you know, like in baseball, if someone throws you a ball and you catch it, it's often good to, after it gets into your glove or into your hand, to give with it a little bit. Not to hold your hand immovably, but once the ball is in your hand or in your mitt, it helps if you give a little bit with it. Once contact is made, and then you can, like, if you move away from it with it, it takes the sting out of it for you and the ball. So we can firmly, carefully embrace things, and gently, and firmly. I think I remember a phrase from a person named Gibbon, describing Roman legions. He said they were, I don't know if he said docile and firm,

[16:10]

or firm and docile. I think it was docile and firm. And docile is kind of somewhat yielding, and docile is related to the word dossiere, I think, which means to learn. So the word docent and docile come from to learn. The docent is teaching, docile is the ability to learn. So these Roman legions, they could receive the enemy attack in a docile way, but firm. So they could learn the appropriate way to dominate the world. And hopefully for peaceful ends. But of course real peace doesn't really dominate. So, graciousness, care, and vigilance, and gentleness, and patience.

[17:22]

These patience with all this pain, being in the present, being in the present with the pain. That we have graciously welcomed, and gently related to, now we're really in the present with it. And with these practices, we can then develop the aspiration for enlightenment. The aspiration for helping others, and understanding who they really are. And understanding who they really are, is to understand that they are ourselves. And this understanding is what is really helpful in this world, because the suffering of the world comes from not understanding that others are ourself.

[18:25]

When we don't understand that others are ourself, we may slip into being concerned with our own welfare, primarily. And this is a source of suffering. If we understand, we will be concerned for the welfare of others, because they are us. But in order to be focused on that, and understand that, we must be kind to all beings, in order to be focused on enlightenment. Now, if you're focused on enlightenment,

[19:29]

if you're focused on the welfare of others, if you're focused on helping others, then we've just got to check to see if there's any sense that others are not us. If there's any sense that we're separate from other beings, who look kind of like they're out there. And if there is any sense of separation, then that's another thing to be kind to, and to attend to, and be careful of. If we can be careful of that sense that we're separate from each other, then that sense of separation can be released, and we can be released from it. Therein, there is a balm in there.

[20:51]

There is a balm in there. In where? There is a balm in being kind to the sense of separation, that heals, that makes the spirit whole. Whole. There is a balm that heals the sinsick soul. The sinsick soul is the soul that's sick from separation. Separation is related to the etymology of sin. I've heard that an etymology of sin is sunder, to sunder, to separate.

[21:59]

And our spirit is wounded by separating ourselves from others. I've often mentioned that when I early talked by Suzuki Roshi, I heard him say, when you see a flower and you say it's beautiful, that's a sin. I thought, very strict. What I thought he meant was, when you see a flower and you think it's beautiful, you're separating yourself from it. It would be probably less sinful if you see a flower and say, I'm beautiful. Or see a flower and say, I'm me, and how lovely I am. Look, how lovely I am.

[23:11]

Are these bearded irises? Yeah, the big ones. Are they from the garden outside here? One is from outside, it was broken, and the other one is from being lost. I feel sad that these bearded irises are offering themselves here sometimes, and nobody's here to see them. It's kind of sad. Bloom unwitnessed by humans. That lovely line, coming to my garden, I'd like the roses to see you. Fortunately Norbert comes out and looks at them quite frequently. Thank you Norbert. Are there any more blooming now? There are a few. Please go ahead and give them a hand. I have a gift for you.

[24:15]

It's a story about...

[24:18]

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