I think this is the third class in the series, training selfless archery. Four? Uh-oh. How many are left? I haven't counted this one. Three after this? Hm? I think we'll be okay. I think we're alright. This is number four? Okay. So, we were talking about training a selfless heart, or you could also say, training in selfless compassion. And we talked about this bodhisattva mind.

[01:06]

The bodhisattva mind is a mind that's full of compassion, developing compassion and selflessness together. And we talked about giving, and trying to be mindful of practicing giving, of learning to make every action throughout the day an act of giving. And then some week later, I don't know how many weeks after that, we started to talk about being careful and vigilant about our actions.

[02:14]

So, to be mindful to offer our action, to make our action gifts, or giving, and then be careful about this giving. And be vigilant about what's going on in our mind, even while we're giving. So, the most important thing to be vigilant about is whether what we're thinking about doing, what we're thinking about saying, and what we're thinking about thinking, is it for the welfare of all beings. I don't know if I mentioned in this class, but

[03:18]

at Green Gulch, we're kind of towards the end of about a two-month practice period. And towards the beginning of the practice period, there was kind of a request from the participants to consider the issue, the reality of intimacy. So, the first part of the practice period, we were kind of looking at intimacy. Also, someone asked me, towards the beginning of the practice period, did you hear about intimacy? The first part of the practice period? People request that I talk about intimacy. And also, someone asked me if there was a text for the practice period towards the beginning. And I said, I don't really have a text, I was kind of waiting to see what people...

[04:22]

what seemed appropriate for the group of people in the practice period. Can you hear me? Barely? Barely? So, I thought of a text about intimacy. And the text that came to mind was a story about one of the ancestors of our lineage, a Chinese ancestor, his name is Liangshan Yuanguan. And his teacher's name is Tungan. So, Yuanguan was Tungan's attendant. And we have an expression for attendant in Zen that we often use.

[05:31]

In Japanese, it's pronounced jisha. It's the word for attendant. And ji means holding or carrying, and sha means person. So, the attendant is the person who carries stuff for the teacher. Just in case the teacher is too old to carry anything, the attendant carries stuff. So, this student named Yuanguan was carrying the teacher's robes. And they were going to the teaching hall. And when the time came for the teacher to put on the robe to teach, the attendant handed in the robe and the teacher said, What is it? What's the business under this robe? The robe is called a patch robe, because the two Buddhist robes are made of patches.

[06:31]

What is the business under the patch robe, the teacher asked the student. To make a long story short, the student didn't say anything. Just stood there. And then the teacher said, To wear this robe and not reach this realm, the realm of this business under the robe, is the most painful thing. And I think the student says, What is the business under the patch robe? No. That's not right.

[07:32]

The teacher said, Now you ask me. And the student asked the teacher the same question. What is the business under the patch robe? And the teacher said, Intimacy. And then the story often says, And the student had a great awakening. But I think it's more like there was a great awakening rather than the student had it. That the intimacy of the student and the teacher was realized when the teacher said, when the student said the same question, What is the business under the robe? And the teacher said, Intimacy. That relationship was great awakening, I would say, rather than the student was greatly awakened. But of course, it doesn't make any sense that the student would be greatly awakened and the teacher not.

[08:33]

That wouldn't be a very great awakening for the student to leave the teacher out, right? Can you hear that? So anyway, tears came to the student and he bowed to the teacher. And the teacher says, Well, now that you understand or now that there's understanding, can you express it? And the student said, Yeah, ask me the question again. The teacher asked him again. And he said, Intimacy. And the teacher said, Intimacy, intimacy. So, this training in selflessness, this training of selfless compassion is also training in intimacy.

[09:34]

And in intimacy, there is giving and receiving. There's no taking. There's just giving and receiving. And there's carefulness in intimacy. And there's vigilance. When we're intimate, we watch to see what's going on with us and what our intentions are. In other words, I'm saying we are intimate, but in order to realize intimacy, we have to be kind of careful with each other. When I was a teenager, I was with a young girl one time who was also a teenager, and we were on a date, and I asked her if I could kiss her. And she said, No one ever asked me before.

[10:35]

I forgot what she said, but she did say, No one ever asked me before. She might have said, No one ever asked me before. No, you cannot. No way. But thanks for asking. That was good. I'm not in the mood, but I'm glad you asked. Now, the next part of intimacy, or the next part of the training in selflessness, is that the next practice, or the next dimension of the practice of selfless compassion is called patience. And patience, in some sense, the object of patience is usually, well, there are two main objects of patience. One is suffering or pain,

[11:51]

and the other one is kind of like a kind of a kind of a the fact that nothing's happening. That's kind of a big thing to be patient with. But before you get to that problem, you have another problem, which is to be patient with pain. In order to be, in order to realize a selfless heart, a selfless compassion, we must have patience. In order to be a Buddha, you need patience. And in order to have patience, you need some suffering. You can't be a Buddha without some suffering. You don't have to have like super terrible intense suffering, but you've got to have some

[12:54]

in order to develop patience. And in order to fully develop it, I guess occasionally you have to have really intense, just a test to make sure that your patience is fully developed. The human realm is, you know, is called this planet Earth, and the usual kind of planet Earth, you know, with cities like Berkeley and San Francisco, Chicago, Baghdad. That Earth is the Earth of humans. Fish do not really know about San Francisco. They swim around the bay, but they don't know it's the San Francisco Bay. They think it's the San Jose Bay. No, they don't know such things as San Jose, Berkeley. Water is a different thing for them than it is for us.

[13:57]

The human world is the world where there's San Francisco and Baghdad. And in that world, that world is called the Saha world in Buddha Dharma. The Saha world means you can practice patience there. Some divine beings and some fish, actually fish can practice patience too, but some divine beings don't have any pain. There are such beings. They really, it's hard for them to practice patience. In order to be a Buddha, you have to come into the world where there's discomfort, because you need patience. In order to be a Buddha. So you know about that world, right? The world that has some pain in it. That's where we practice patience. That's where we practice the compassionate virtue of patience. I was just, a thought came to my mind

[15:05]

that I was in a yoga room class maybe 20 years ago, maybe more. And the teacher in the class was Judith Lassiter. And I think I was in what's called the corpse pose and I was pretty comfortable. I was awake and she was talking and she said, if you stay in any posture, in yoga pose long enough, and I thought she was going to say, you will attain supreme bliss. Something like that. But she didn't. She said, you will notice that you're uncomfortable. And I thought, good. Good yoga teacher. If you stay in any yoga posture short enough,

[16:12]

you might not notice that you're uncomfortable. If you move in your posture enough, you might possibly miss out on discomfort. If you run around fast enough, you might be able to distract yourself from discomfort. Sorrow. Lamentation. Etc. But if you sit still, or stand still, or lie still, or triangle pose still, or headstand still, if you stay long enough, you will notice in your stillness there's some discomfort. And then you can practice training the selfless heart in the form of patience. Pain isn't exactly fun, necessarily. Some people may be okay, but... It's not necessarily fun, but it has good qualities.

[17:18]

It's useful for developing Buddhas and bodhisattvas. Compassion. It's useful for reducing arrogance. It's useful for manifesting compassion in the world of suffering. It tends to inspire the practice. It can inspire the practice of virtue. And in particular, most immediately, maybe, patience. But also, it can inspire the practice of giving. Of welcoming. Pain. And you'll notice how wonderful it is if you welcome pain. Not, I like pain. I welcome pain. Tonight I'd like to mention two basic ways of practicing patience with... Yeah, two basic ways of practicing patience with discomfort.

[18:25]

And... So the first way is that when you have discomfort or suffering due to heat or cold or you know, being bit by insects or being put into bondage or being beaten or things like that. When you have discomfort around those kinds of things or sitting still in meditation. The first point is not to fret about the discomfort. Because if we fret about the discomfort it increases.

[19:27]

Matter of fact, even a minor fairly minor discomfort if you fret about it enough it can be unbearable. But if we don't fret about even very intense pain we can bear it. And fret means... One way to fret, one of the main ways to fret about pain is to think about how long it's been going on. That's kind of fretting. Rather than, it hurts right now. You say, it hurts right now and it's been hurting for quite a while. Or, you're being mean to me and you're always mean to me. Rather than, you're just mean to me. You're being [...] mean to me. Rather than, you're always mean to me.

[20:30]

You do that to me all the time. You've been doing that for so... You know, you can get really worked up about this if you think about how long the person and how often and how they're totally always that way. This is like, it makes me much worse. Or if you think, I'm in pain and this might last a long time. This might go on for hours. A minor pain multiplied by... A minor pain in a moment multiplied by millions of moments in the next five minutes, in the next two hours. That thought can just blow your... You know, blow you out. If the pain's really bad in the moment and your body really can't stand it, it'll just pass out. You know, we have a limit. But somehow we don't have a limit

[21:32]

of the pain when we fret, when we worry about it, when we fight it. So the first aspect of patience is to be grounded in the pain. To experience it in the present moment in the present. And experience it right where it's happening. And give up anything else but feeling it. Just be totally grounded in it. Moment after moment after moment. The pain's changing all the time. It doesn't... It pulsates. Sometimes it gets strong. Sometimes the pain... You could say sometimes the pain gets stronger but really it's the pain that rises and ceases and sometimes it's followed by another pain that's more intense than the past one and that ceases and then followed by another one which is more intense. The pain doesn't really last.

[22:34]

But you can have many moments in a row with some pain. But usually most moments in a row do have pain. Usually there's some discomfort. And it's a matter of when you're still, you notice it. So the best place to deal with it is now. The best place is here and the best time to deal with it is now. And the past and future are not a good time to deal with pain. Give up the past pain. It's over. You've got the present pain to deal with. Give up the future pain. Don't get into it. Deal with the present one. It's enough. We have enough problems. We don't need the present pain. We don't need to blow them into huge proportions by magnifying them into past and future. We don't need to. We do it, but we don't need to. It's not necessary. In other words, in order to be a Buddha

[23:37]

you don't have to magnify the pain of God. You just need to deal with the pain you do have. That's enough. And you will be rewarded with bigger pains. And then if you don't fret with those, you'll be rewarded with bigger pains. And if you don't fret with those, you'll be rewarded with bigger pains. But you'll be fine. If you don't fret. You'll be grounded. You'll be like a Buddha. And your patience will get... Your compassion in the form of patience will get more and more useful. It will make you more and more able to tolerate suffering. And the more you can tolerate suffering, the less likely it will be

[24:39]

that you will slip into hatred and violence and cruelty. The other way of dealing with pain, especially pain that comes from other living beings, animate beings, for us, especially humans, is when humans try to hurt us, insult us, physically abuse us, the same thing applies when you try to experience it in the present, try to feel the pain in the present, but then also try to reason, not reason with the pains in it, but reason with yourself about the pain.

[25:42]

And the following kind of reasoning Well, basically, the basic kind of reasoning I'm talking about is reasoning about the selflessness or the independent, the selflessness of the agent, the selflessness of the source. So, for example, most people do not hate a disease when it comes to pain. Most people understand that a disease did not plan to cause us pain. Nowadays people talk about fighting cancer and things like that. Still, most people don't hate a disease. They don't think the disease is intentionally

[26:49]

trying to hurt them, but they think that people who are angry at them and hate them, they sort of think the person is doing it intentionally. But I propose to you that people do not, generally speaking, think, I now want to become angry at this person. And the anger also doesn't think, I want to arise. It's not like an agent, the person's not like an agent that's going around planning to get angry at people. They think that they're living and that people are doing things to them that are painful, and then, because these things happen to them, anger arises in them. But some people, well, like a bull, you know, a bull

[27:50]

sees, like, sees some electromagnetic radiation of a certain wavelength and they have an eye organ that's sensitive to the electromagnetic radiation and they see green. And that green, that experience of green, is because of their sensitive tissue called their eye and the light bouncing off, the light of a certain wavelength bouncing off grass, for example, going to their eye, stimulating their eye, and they have a previous moment of consciousness when those come together, you have, the bull sees green. And the bull maybe goes, oh, nice green, I think I'll have some. And then a different wavelength of light bounces off something else and comes back to the bull and they see red. And an anger arises in the bull

[28:55]

and charges towards the red. I guess red probably, maybe, is the color of blood. And the bull sees that red color, they charge at it, almost like they're angry, almost like they hate it. But the anger in the bull doesn't, it didn't think, okay, now I'm going to, now I'm going to produce myself, I'm going to rise up and attack something. The bull doesn't think, I'm going to get angry. Causes and conditions come together and the bull is enraged and attacks. The bull can't control itself. Usually. You put the red in front of the bull and wave it, the bull just gets all over the car, hot and bothered. It's all worked up, starts fretting, feels uncomfortable and starts fretting and becomes enraged. And most bulls cannot avoid that.

[29:55]

The cows don't do that. I guess if you wave the red to the cows, they just don't have the same reaction because different conditions, different hormones. They can't get like a bull. They can't get like a bull, even if they wanted to. They have to have a hormone treatment in order to be that, get that enraged. And the bulls, a normal bull cannot help that. So they're governed, and they're not governed by the matadors or the picadors or whatever. Everybody's governed by causes and conditions. Nobody's in control of himself. So when people insult us and they're cruel to us, it's not like they're in control of being the way they are. They're responsible for what they do, but they're not in control of what they do.

[30:56]

And I've talked to you about this before. A lot of people think, well, if you're not in control of what you do, you're not responsible. I disagree. I think we are responsible for the things we do which we're not in control of. And we're responsible for other things that happen to us that we're not in control of. We're not in control of the rain we've been having, the wonderful weather we've been having. We're not in control of it. It's been so beautiful this week. This alternation of rain and sunshine. I just feel so grateful to live in this weather. I'm not in control of it, but I'm responsible for it. And the way I'm responding to it is to say thank you very much. I'm just so grateful to have this weather. I am responsible. I have the ability to respond to weather. So do you. And you have been responding. We've all been responding. None of us are in control of it. People do cruel things to us.

[32:00]

They're responsible, but they're not in control. They're not deciding to be the way they are. They cannot. You cannot. I cannot. We cannot decide how to be an MPM. Wherever we can aspire to be somewhere, we become that way. And not by controlling ourselves into it, but by receiving it. But tonight I'm talking not about aspiration, but patience. Part of patience is to get grounded in the pain, grounded in the discomfort of heat and cold, grounded in the discomfort of being abused by illness or by humans, treated disrespectfully by humans, or disease.

[33:02]

And be grounded in it, but also reason with it so that you don't blame it. And also you don't blame yourself. Don't blame, like the I Ching said, no blame. Blame means don't put it over there and say that that thing over there is in control. Conditions are in control, but none of the conditions that are controlling us, none of them are individually in control. None of the conditions for our pain think, I want her to have pain. The color that the bull sees doesn't, the electromagnetic radiation doesn't think, I want to make the bull mad. The thing that it bounces off of doesn't think, I want to make the bull mad. The bull's eye doesn't think, I want to make the bull mad. The bull doesn't think, I want to be mad. You might say, well what about the matador?

[34:05]

It's putting the red thing on, doesn't that want to make the bull mad? But the matador can't control himself into being that way. Causes and conditions make her try to control the bull and be deluded that way. So patience not only grounds us in the world, not only grounds us, and by being grounded the patience develops, but also patience develops in reasoning, and this reasoning is the beginning, is one of the exercises to develop wisdom. So to just sit around and meditate on how people are produced by causes and conditions, that's a good meditation. But this is a meditation where you're meditating on somebody who you're about to hate, if you don't do this meditation.

[35:07]

So this is meditation on cause and effect, which is one of the main ingredients of Buddha's wisdom, but it has two other aspects to it. Number one, if you do this meditation, you might, instead of hating this person who's doing something that you find painful, and actually even happy that they're causing you pain, rather than hating that person, you can have compassion for them. So by practicing patience you can have compassion for someone rather than hating them, plus you can start to develop wisdom. Along with this compassion, the development of wisdom will help you be compassionate towards the person, rather than trying to punish them back. But again, this type of analysis, which is part of patience, is being done in the middle of pain.

[36:11]

It's not done in an ivory tower way. Oh yeah, people who hurt people, they're not in control of their hurtful activities. It's like when you're hurt, do it then. Then you can really see how necessary it is, and when you see how necessary it is, you won't just do it in your spare time to be wise, you'll do it as a life and death matter, which means you'll do it more deeply and more well. See us for a second. Patience In some ways the test of wisdom, patience is one of the tests of wisdom. Do you understand cause and effect well enough so that you can be patient?

[37:11]

Is your analysis of cause and effect, in the case of someone being your enemy, sufficient that you actually have compassion for them? Rather than theoretically, I know you're not under control, but I want to eliminate you. I just can't be compassionate to you, well then I would say your wisdom isn't strong enough. But also your wisdom won't be strong enough unless your patience is strong. So wisdom and patience support us to be compassionate, even under very painful situations. And in painful situations, if we practice patience this way, we develop selfless wisdom, and when you're in pain, if you bring this wisdom analysis into the relationship with the pain source, then the wisdom grows. So the wisdom can help the patience grow, and the patience can help the wisdom grow.

[38:15]

Pain can make the wisdom real. And I guess sometimes you might think, well I'd actually rather have the theoretical if I have to have pain to get the real stuff. Yeah. But then when the pain comes you might say, well since the pain's here anyway, I might as well practice patience. And then I'll have real wisdom, Buddha's wisdom. Buddha's wisdom lives with patience. Patience lives with pain. And as I will push forward next week, we'll see how patience is necessary for us to do some of the difficult work that occurs in the next aspect

[39:21]

of the intimate and light mind, which is heroic effort. But for now, maybe that's enough for some responses to this. Loud talking because I was asked to talk loud. Is it too loud for you people in the front? No? One time I was at Tassajara, and I was giving some talks, and it was the middle of the winter, and the streams were roaring, and it was raining and windy, so I had to yell for people to hear me. And after the talk was over, someone said to me, are you angry with us? Because I was really shouting. But I'm not angry at you, John. I love you, John.

[40:21]

Comments are welcome here. Loud talking. Loud talking.

[41:30]

So this man, I heard that this man has written or is writing a book about this experience, about his illness. And I also heard that he said that if he loses his ability to speak, he might not want to continue to live. And just now when you're talking like that, if you can express yourself in this place, and share yourself, and see that probably your presence with yourself becomes other people, then I probably would encourage you to continue. I have to let it slide. Yes.

[43:00]

I'm trying to train myself in a certain direction. Yes. It doesn't matter if you're a woman or a man. It's all the same. For example, I resist people who I resist many times in my life. Even when I'm speaking, I don't want to listen to myself all the time. In what? In what sense do you do violence to yourself by giving? I suffer by giving. I don't like it. I don't like it. That's the greed. I may not accept it. Yes. I know that

[44:17]

I know that about hanging on to things, but giving, usually what I mean by giving is that actually I let go of the thing. Not that I hold on to it, but I actually let go of it. And so, when I actually let go, I don't... I mean, when I really let go, I don't feel pain. But if I give someone something, if I pass something to someone, then I don't really want to let go of it. And that's, in some ways, more painful than holding on to it. But that's not giving. That's like, in a sense, that's like losing something or being robbed. You sort of see that I'm robbed. We can even feel like people want me to pass this thing to this other person,

[45:18]

so I'm going to do it, but I really don't want to, so they're kind of like coercing me into giving. So that's painful. I don't know if that's... And that might even be more painful than just keeping it. But that's not about saying something else. About control. Exactly. Yeah. I think that, again, if we aspire to practice patience, and we try to be present with our pain, you could say, isn't that some kind of control? I guess you could say that. But again, I'm not in control of trying. I'm not in control of wanting to practice patience. The wish to practice it, I don't control myself into having that wish. But it's true, if I do have the wish to practice patience, that's usually one of the conditions. I didn't make the condition, but when that condition is in me,

[46:18]

I wish to practice patience. That usually is one of the conditions for practicing. Like when I think, oh, I have pain, and then the thought rises in my mind, I would like to be in the present moment of it, because I remember from past experience that the present moment is the best place to be with it. And I've learned from experience that. But I don't make myself into the person who learned from experience. My experience makes me that person. everything that I do influences what happens. I'm not in control of everything I do. But what I do, in some sense, does influence or contribute or govern what happens. But not all by itself. There are two perspectives. You can, like my daughter says to my grandson quite often, make good choices. I think part of our life situation

[47:22]

is that we're pretty much choosing all the time. However, I don't think we can choose what we choose. We can't control what we choose. Like you can say, I chose to love this person. But how did you choose to love? And sometimes people say, I didn't choose to love this person. I love this person, but I never chose. But they might say, I did choose to say this. But some people do not notice that they choose to say it. So, I think choice is something that we should be aware of. The thing we call choice does occur. But, like all things, if you look at it carefully, it's pretty hard to find choice, actually. But I'm not saying it doesn't exist. I just say it's pretty hard to find here. Like if I say,

[48:24]

I choose to leave this room now. Maybe not a good example. Let's say I choose to stay here. I'm going to choose to stay in this room for another few minutes. And so now I'm here, so I guess I followed through on my choice. So I really did choose. But also, a few minutes ago, I didn't really think I was choosing to stay here, but you could say, well, you did choose to stay here, because you did stay here. And sometimes we choose to do things, and then we don't do them. So do we really choose? So people can, we can project on ourselves and others that they're choosing, like I said, you people are choosing to stay in this room. You're choosing to stay in this room for another minute, for another few seconds. For this moment, you're choosing to stay. You may not agree with me. Or you may agree with me,

[49:26]

but did you really choose to agree with me or not agree with me? Like suddenly some of you are like, I don't agree with you. Did you choose to not agree with me? Well, you can say, well, yeah, you did. It would be awkward to say it? Yes. Yeah, and yet you were able to. Laughter. Awkwardness, actually, is another aspect, I would say, of enlightenment. Huh? That awkwardness, I think, is a quality of enlightenment. Awkwardness is a... Huh? Awkwardness is a quality of freshness. When things are really fresh, you're kind of awkward.

[50:27]

Kind of like you're not an expert at the new person you are. It's kind of awkward being a fresh person, even if you're an old, fresh person. It's kind of awkward. Enlightenment isn't like, you know, what it used to be. Like yesterday I was enlightened, and today I'm enlightened the same way. No, there's a new enlightenment, and I'm kind of like, I really don't know how to do it. I'm kind of awkward with the fresh enlightenment. Just a second. Just one second. She had her hand up. Wait just a moment. Angelica? There's a moment of no agenda. I'm sorry. You could say that, or you even said, there's a moment with no agenda, and then you said,

[52:03]

and then something happens. Now, according to some analysis of Buddhist psychic workings, when you say something happened, someone would say, well, you chose to see that rather than something else. In a sense, everything you see happening is your preference. You prefer to see this rather than that. Somebody sees something happening, and somebody else sees something else happening. So in some sense, they make two different decisions because they're paying attention to two different things. So again, people could say, when you see something happening, you make a choice. But, you know, it's not a what? It is a mind choice. Your mind chooses to pay attention to one thing rather than another, but you're not in control of what your mind chooses to pay attention to, your past experience. Like some women, they pay attention to, well, some women pay attention to men.

[53:10]

And they choose to, but they're not in control of choosing to. They just can't help themselves but pay attention to men. Some men, they just pay attention to women, and they don't pay attention to men. Some men pay attention to men and not to women. So they do kind of choose to pay attention to this person rather than that person. But they're not in control of what they choose. So did they really choose? They're not in control of what they choose to pay attention to? Well, yes and no. Again, if we study this process, you will find out that there's nobody in addition to the process who's making these decisions. The ego thing is like something in addition, that's kind of something independent of the process, this process of illusion. There really isn't. However, there is the imagination, and you could say there is the choice to think that there is something,

[54:14]

in addition to this process of decision-making. But the more vigilant you are to these workings of your mind, the more you realize that the conditions are conspiring to create things, and none of the conditions are planning to create what is created. And yet, they create this, and they create a sense of self, but the self doesn't make the self, the conditions make the self. But once the self is made, then the self is the imagination that the self can make things, rather than the self is something that's the result of the conspiring of conditions, which then becomes a condition for other things to happen. So when it comes to having a problem with somebody, and they're being mean to you, this is a good time to do this analysis of cause and effect. You can't actually see how the cause and effect work,

[55:16]

but you can reason, because you know that things come together to make certain things happen, even though you don't quite see how. And you notice that when you're having problems with somebody, that if you do not do this analysis, you probably will blame them, because you will project on them that there's an independent agent who's doing this thing to you. So if you don't do this analysis, you'll probably try to hurt the person back who hurt you. You will be cruel rather than compassionate. You need wisdom when people are being mean to you. You need it to not be mean back. And sometimes people aren't really even being mean to you. And sometimes the person's actually really being kind to you. Like, you know, again, you know, now my grandson's getting older,

[56:17]

but when he was younger, you know, at a certain time, if you didn't get him fed and his pajamas on and his teeth brushed by a certain hour, and then after that point you tried to get him to bed, it was like... he thought these people who were trying to help him go to sleep were monsters trying to actually destroy him. Because he got into this state where like his whole world was falling apart and everybody was like, you know, ripping him to shreds. He was like completely, we say, that he's losing it. He's losing his sense of reality. He should have been asleep ten minutes ago, but he's awake in this nightmare of his mother and grandparents trying to help him go to sleep, lashing out violently against them until finally he just collapses. But without getting his pajamas on and his teeth brushed. Because we waited too long. We didn't have him under control. So...

[57:23]

giving, welcoming, be careful and vigilant, and now try to be present with the pain. And again, the pain, it would be more obvious, you'd be able to find something if you just don't move too much. And then, when the pain is in the form of, even when you move, sometimes you can feel it. People run after you and attack you. So even moving doesn't get away from attacks from enemies. So then, finally, we're back in the corner and we have to practice patience. And we have to analyze and practice wisdom in order to be patient, in order to not be violent back. Here. Yes.

[58:34]

People who are doing good things are also not in control. And when people are doing good things, well, usually then we don't practice patience, we have other practices there. Like rejoicing in the good they did. But also, in that case, it doesn't seem so necessary to reason with the situation so that you don't think that this person was in control of the good they did to you. Because if you don't do it, if you don't do the analysis when the person is being good to you, you won't be so likely to lash out at them. However, when something else is kind of bad, but not as bad, you might attach to them. But attachment is closer to compassion than hatred. Attachment is more difficult to give up because it's very closely related to compassion.

[59:38]

Hatred is not like compassion. But we should do the same thing when people do good things. We should rejoice in the good they do. We should also not imagine that the person did it by independent action. Sometimes people wisely say to me, they say to me, I feel grateful. And they sometimes say, I don't know to who or for what, but I feel grateful. So I miss out on being the one who gets the gratitude. But I think this is quite wise, that you're feeling grateful, but it's not to me who did the thing by myself. The person is grateful to what happened when we were together. It's also contributing to what they're grateful for. Yes, Bill.

[60:41]

What is hatred? I don't know, but it's a kind of energy. And it's a kind of energy, which when it comes, we should be very careful of. And when hatred comes, we should practice compassion towards it. However, we also try to live in such a way that we do not become possessed by it. And we're not in control of when hatred arises in us. But in this training, we're trying to train ourselves so that hatred does not arise in us. However, if it does, then we should go back and start over and practice generosity towards the hatred that arises in us, and practice generosity towards hatred, the energy of hatred when it arises in others. That's what I'm saying, right?

[61:45]

You've heard this before, right? So I'm actually trying to practice in such a way that I do not become possessed by hatred, that it does not arise in me, and I'm not trying to get rid of it. But I'm kind of trying to not have it arise. And one of the main ways I try to have it not arise is by welcoming it, trying to welcome everything, and also watching my own mind, and also being patient with pain. When people do something painful towards me or in my neighborhood, I try to be patient with it. So these practices help me not be possessed by hatred. I'm not. You know, it's happening. And I'm not in control of myself, but I'm fortunately not possessed by hatred much, at all. Which is, you know,

[62:47]

I'm really grateful for that. I don't know how it happened. I think it has something to do with practices, but I'm not in control of it. And I'm not in control of the practice, but the practice seems to be making less hatred in my heart. A lot less. Almost none, ever. So I'm very happy about that. But when I see hatred, I kind of say, this is a job for generosity. This is a job for studying myself. This is a job for patience. This is a great opportunity. I've been waiting for this. Thank you for coming. I don't like hatred. I don't like it. But I am happy, very happy to have a practice which is just waiting

[63:48]

to be kind to it. Thank you. Yes? So is empathy part of this practice of patience? Or does that shift awareness to the wrong place? In some sense, empathy is like... One of the ways it would come up here is that when you see an angry person or a person full of hate, you kind of can understand how they would get to be that way. You can kind of see the causes. You can kind of understand. You might have to ask them some questions, but even without asking questions, you might be able to kind of feel how they came to feel this hatred. Like with my grandson. I can kind of see in those situations how I can kind of empathize with if my body and mind were totally disorganized and falling apart, and all my different body rhythms

[64:51]

were disorganized, I think I might be really scared. Even though I'm with my parents and grandparents, and it's just a normal Thursday night, and it's bedtime, I don't know what's going on, and I'm terrified. So I can kind of understand that if that would happen to me, or when I was young and it happened to me, I would be really terrified, and not be able to see the people around me who were trying to help me. So I can kind of understand that he's not in control of being that way. Just like when our blood sugar level gets low, some people like, you know, you've got to watch them. If their blood sugar level gets low, they can't even decide, they can't even figure out what to eat. You can say, oh, it's going down,

[65:51]

you're starting to lose it, what do you want to eat? I don't know. I don't want anything to eat. No, not that, not that. You've got to feed them before it gets too low, because then they can't figure out what to eat, and once it gets too low, they don't want to eat anything, and they want to eat everything. It's good to empathize with that, and even if you don't have the same level of fragility, it's good to learn to remember that they have this, and to that extent, be empathic. Yes? When you were talking about hatred before, I was remembering the teaching last week about being like a block of wood. Yeah. You've talked a lot about,

[66:53]

sort of perceived external threats, but my sense also is that this practice, especially this moral discipline we talked about last week, of having my caper to rise, and having my caper to rise, and practicing watching your mind with it, and being like a block of wood, is a source of pain itself. Yeah. The source of pain is the hatred you notice in yourself? Well, there's that hatred, but also not acting on the hatred. That might be painful too. That's very painful. There's a self-expression that wants to come out, and by being like a block of wood, it's painful. Okay. So, there too, you know, that might be painful, and also, when that pain comes, or even before the pain comes, being like a block of wood makes an opportunity

[67:56]

in that situation, where you're not distracting yourself from the situation of having this hatred, to bring compassion to it. So, we need to be vigilant to notice some things that need some kindness. So, we're practicing welcoming, and then, but still some hatred can come up. It doesn't mean if you're practicing welcoming that the next moment hatred can't come up. But then when it comes up, we need to be vigilant about it, and not act upon it without careful consideration, without being careful and aware. But then we can begin giving to it, and patience to it. It seems hard in that moment, there's so much heat behind that, that it's hard to cultivate a sense that these are causes and conditions

[68:58]

in myself that are raising this, in myself and the interaction I'm having. Yeah, it's hard, that's why I said be like a block of wood. That may be simpler. And then once you've got yourself still, then you might be aware of the pain, which you maybe skipped over, and flew into hatred. You weren't practicing patience enough, so you slipped into the hatred. So in this case, the patience wasn't presented before the vigilance. The vigilance was presented first, because... I don't know why, but anyway... The vigilance comes after the giving, and then the patience comes next. So the patience, together with the vigilance and the giving, could be brought to the pain. But probably, again,

[69:58]

part of the reason why we feel hatred is that we didn't give the pain enough patience. Either the pain of our physical condition, or the way people are relating to us. We weren't able to practice patience with that, so we need to be vigilant of this condition that has arisen. Now bring giving and patience to that hatred, and then hopefully, now that the patience has awakened, it can be applied to the pain. To that pain and future pain. So each of these are virtues. The giving, the carefulness and the vigilance, and the... In some sense, you could say the control, almost. Like not acting. It's almost like control, but not really. Just like, don't act on it. You might go ahead and act on it, but... You're still aware that you're acting on it.

[71:00]

And you see how that goes. And other times you don't act on it, which you're not in control of, and you see how that goes. And usually, I think usually, people would feel like, well, when I didn't act on the hatred, I'm glad I didn't. And when I did act on the hatred, I'm not glad I did. As a matter of fact, that was like the worst thing I ever did in my life. I'm really sorry about it. We sometimes say, one moment of hatred, thirty-five years of sorrow. And just years and years of that one moment. And we're not under control, but the vigilance of that one moment of thirty-five years of sorrow, that vigilance, maybe means that after that, there wasn't so much hatred anymore. For thirty-five years, we repented how devastating that hatred was, when we totally destroyed that person

[72:01]

with words or actions. Yes, Marilyn? I like the situation in work where someone felt that I had gotten into their game or they felt threatened by the ways in some way. They came at me very viciously. And I was completely unaware of this behavior on my part that made them feel this way. So she wanted to speak with me, and so we had a conversation, and she became very threatening and attacking. And at the time, I was just watching. I could actually just step back inside myself and just watch the way this was unfolding. And the only thing I could think of was, what can I say that will be a skillful way of letting her know that I really care about

[73:03]

her feelings and let's discuss this in a way that she kept coming at me very viciously. And I kept saying the same thing over again. You know, I'm not trying to hurt you. I really want to hear what you have to say. Let's talk about it. And I had to say it about five or six times. And then all of a sudden, she started to calm down. And then she was able to express to me what was her anger. And I could see that she was almost fighting for survival. That's how intense it was. And I kept reassuring her that it's okay. By the end of the conversation, she allowed me to tell her what had happened from my perspective. And she then actually was able, I could just see her whole face change. And then she came over to me, and she gave me a big hug. And she had a big grin on her face. And from that point on, she had just been really going out of her way to be really kind and polite. And I was very shaken by the whole thing, even though I felt that I was really handling it in a skillful way. And I remember the feeling afterwards.

[74:06]

And in the evening, that evening, I mean, I was really shaken. And I want to know why, if I felt that the outcome of it was, you know, the best it could have been under the circumstances, why was I so shaken? And what do you do with that energy? I will amplify on this kind of issue next week, but tonight I would just say, number one, sometimes when you interact with someone, your adrenaline gets up when they attack you. Sometimes your adrenaline comes up, and you handle a situation really well with your adrenaline up. And then after a couple of weeks, after the thing is over, you have, what do you call it, lactic shock or something?

[75:07]

Post-traumatic stress. Yeah. Anyway, if you almost get in a fight, if someone attacks you, and your adrenaline comes up, and you don't get in a fight, the adrenaline stays in your system, and you feel shaken for hours afterwards, even if you handle the situation without hurting them. And take care of it very well, and make friendship. The hormones in your body are still disturbing you, and then when they pass through you, sometimes you're really tired. That's one of the things that happens when adrenaline is released into your system and not used by lots of activity. Another aspect of this is that in the process of helping people, sometimes you get hurt. Also, sometimes in the process of not helping people,

[76:12]

sometimes you get hurt. We've all been hurt many times in the past. But now, if you get hurt in the process of helping people, you're developing compassion. Whereas if you're getting hurt, but you're not getting hurt with the thought of how can I help this person like you were, it's kind of just a painful situation. So this, I think, was painful and cost you something to perform the service for this person, but I think you did perform a service but it cost you something. And now, or not about now, but now or then, it would be good if you would actually be willing to give, to pay the price of that that cost you something and disturbed you somewhat to perform this service, which sounds like you did really well.

[77:13]

And part of what was necessary, I think, was that your body reacted the way it did, of actually feeling an adrenaline response to this aggressiveness. And a lot of times we feel that, but we don't manage to keep thinking what can I do to help this person. So those situations are kind of missed opportunities, and we have a long history of those missed opportunities. So then all those disturbances kind of like, they didn't really do much good. But now, these things still happen to us, they're still happening to you, people still will continue to attack you, but now when they attack you, if you can practice with them,

[78:19]

it still disturbs you, it's still painful, it's still disorienting. But you may be able now to bring these practices to these situations. But it doesn't mean that there's no pain or no disturbance. It just means something good is developing in situations that used to be kind of just trouble. Well, thank you very much. Sorry to keep you late.

[78:53]

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