Turning the Light Inward

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BZ-02461
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i'm warning
oh
excuse
this morning figures or not there was a longtime practitioner residents here at b being c
why is so many roles that so many things inside simon
possible to recap
simply say
diagnosis year we walk up his works thank you asked her

so today i wanted to talk about a mundane topic eye contact
i originally had another topic in mind for this talk by
can hear me okay
i was i have had this thing on my mind about the eye contact i was going to start to bring it up and it can kiss to say a few sentences about it and maybe kind of start a song a conversation perhaps but then as i was thinking about my talk and mulling it over the eye contact part just kept growing and growing and growing and
you know kind of like what happened when the sun came out in our town month ago
so than the other talk just gracefully stepped aside
we have a custom in relation to our intensive sitting practice or are sitting practice
of i think we have a customer of not making eye contact it's actually i don't think it's i'm not sure when it's told i'm not sure when it's imparted to people i don't think it's in the session guidelines but anyway we have used to be we all seem to know that we when we're doing are sitting practice we are
are not making eye contact and it's sort of based on are coming from a japanese zen monastery style
and when you're in the monastery you're not making eye contact but when you meet each other on the path or in a situation where you normally would be making eye contact you don't make eye contact but you both stop and you bow to each other in unison and that's if they actually a very connecting and warm experience
it's when you do that
and we don't exactly have anything like that so we just don't make the eye contact but you know whatever discomfort that might have for people we don't have anything in that spot
so i wanted to talk about maybe what will explore what why we might have that custom
ah our usual way
of experiencing the world is to posit a fixed self over here and from that from the point of view of that fixed self we observe we experienced the world right this is our hard wiring this is normal this is how do we how our minds work and we observe the world
in relation to this posited fix self over on the side you know so we divide the or the world and you know important to me not important to me right and then we put the not important to the side and we take the important to me and we divided into good for me and bad for
me
right so
and that's very that's how we survive that's normal that's how you know from that whatever is it a one celled amoeba or whatever the first thing that moved
it moved towards nourishment and away from threat and that's how it how life was you know born so this is a normal thing
but fortunately as humans we have other things our minds can do our brains have evolved to do we have a lot of soft wiring we haven't we are we have a lot of parts of our brain that are not hardwired we can do other things with our minds and one of the things since the great i think the great discovery of the buddha you could
describe it this way i think we can turn around and look at ourselves and in the words of our
great japanese and master dogan zingy learn the backward step that turns your light inwardly to aluminate the south
and when we do that when we turn around and look at ourselves were dumbfounded to find out that the thing we thought was over here is not over here
and you know what's over here are sensations and feelings emotions thoughts trains of thought
unconscious beliefs conscious beliefs many many things right
but the were more like like a kaleidoscope or like you know sand dunes in the wind or like a symphony that never ends you know there isn't any one thing that you point to that's the reference for this activity of sorting your experience
and so that means there isn't a person who is either a winner or loser who's either a success or failure who is either good or bad who was either right or wrong who's loved or unloved
in a hussein or not seen
there's nothing that we know boiled down to which is an expression that alan first
i heard first from allen one time when i have come upstairs from ducks on i had dogs on and mel had said something critical which is his job you know the zen master gives you feedback that's the nor that's the correct thing
i don't i don't remember what the content was maybe too loose
a was one of 'em i can't remember if this is that was the particular when what
the
the
so i went upstairs and was fuming and defending myself and talking to you know complaining to allen about it and and he said you know he's not saying that's what you boil down to
yes right
it was just such a great thing to realize
oh
so you know we could have a conscious intention not to tell a lie and then we all do have an unconscious intention to survive and those two could be in conflict with each other and they could actually be in contact with each other or they could just we could just be imagining that they're in contact with each other and depending on
on circumstances one or the other will influence will you know sort of influence what we end up doing
and so we don't have i we don't have to understand or what i'm telling you i'm telling you this all in concepts but but i really want to say is we don't have to understand this conceptually we we just have to turn around and look and turn around and look and turn
around and look because our minds will begin to cognize there are brain is for taking in information right and it takes in the information of whatever we're paying attention to so if we turn around and look at the looker you know listened to the hearer try
to find the one on the other side of this activity
our brains will take in that in some information about that that i can't even put into words and it will adjust your your life choices it it will change things there's a tibetan expression it's something like even a suspicion that objects are empty rex the seeds of sick
assistance so i mean that sort of a big mouthful but to paraphrase you know even an inkling that what's on the other side is not what you think is on the other side can free you from suffering
and and that's the funny thing that somewhat counterintuitive to me is that when you do this activity it's it's common for most people it's a calming activity to do kind of seems like it wouldn't be but the thing is we are you
it's like way
it's like this activity of pot imagining this fix self over here and and experiencing the world
it's like we we always know that that's not true hope it's like somewhere inside of us there's cognitive dissonance there's like and so we're always trying to establish ourself and that's what so anxiety producing is that we can't establish ourselves we can't control and it's it's true that it's very
troll what's going on out there
but for some reason when you turn around and see that you can't control what's going on over here that's can be very calming not for everybody
but a lot of the time it can be in fact i wonder if really that's the only way to deal with the only real way to deal with anxiety because as long as i'm thinking there's a thing over here i'm always gonna be relating to you in relation to that and it's always gonna
be uneasy for me
so when when you
i'm i'm i'm i'm knowing that the
flaw or the what's the problem with what i'm presenting this morning is this sort of like the gaining idea like if you do this than later you will have this so i apologize for that it's really hard to give a talk without introducing a gaining idea i think i've said that before i've said before and not so
it again and i won't and i haven't succeeded yet or i haven't i don't have succeeded but i haven't even i haven't even figured out a strategy to try to do that
but
so let's just say that you could you can do this right now not some other time turn around and look and when we do that we join we join the river that we're always in any way that you were always part of but we think we're not and we think we're standing in the river get
being buffeted about by everything that's happening but that's just the way we're thinking about it so when we join the river
we're just part of what's happening already
so i mean and that's not tomorrow like we could just do that right now
i'm going to try i don't know if i can do it won't see the thing is i'm making eye contact right and this is very distract it a
a
and but i wanted to share with you another tibetan i like these tibetan phrases they kind of the kind of rattle around in there in a nice way and there's another one that says again with the gaining idea
when your mind when we grok this the truth of this it's like water being poured into clear water
i like that
i'm so let's see
right so
so again it's not that there's not a person here and nothing over here but it's really that the thing you think is here is not here there's a thing that you think you are or maybe a bunch of things you think you are but still
it's and that's why we each have to do this for ourself because i we only we are the ones who constructed this out of a combination of our hard wiring and our experiences of childhood we've made up who we are who we think we are the subject of our experience and
way you have to do it yourself you have to look at that yourself and i have to look at myself and and it's not like a thing you do once you just keep looking and looking and and
it's really when you think you have it that's a great opportunity to look right so you know when yourself is activated that's the time that you turn around you leverage on your reactivity and turn around at that moment and look
i'm
there's a reading some some buddhist her book somewhere long time ago i have these things that i read they're just floating around to have no idea where they were a i can't look up the reference and tell you anything but anyway
there's two times when you feel your false self then you can there's two times you can most easily feel your false self when you're falling and when you're falsely accused
and i don't know about you but for me anytime i'm criticised i basically feel like i'm being falsely accused
right and my racket
so that's the time whenever it is or whatever is happening you you use that
the energy of that to turn around and see what you're referring to when you say your false what what am i referring to what is being falsely accused what is that you know and again there's no answer to that your and it's very it's not something will understand conceptually but the id
dia is you know to just keep turning around and looking turning around and looking whenever we remember to whenever we have a chance
oh and again with the gaining idea here
either today right now or some other time we we can start seeing or we do see or we always see what's you know
who we really are peeking out from behind who we think we are
k so who we really are is peeking out from behind who we think we are and if i if i can see that when i can see that right now or today are some time then i can turn back around and look at you and i can see who you are
really are peeking out from behind who i think you are
i think it's hard to do that first i might be wrong it might be wrong but i think that we this is the thing we need to do this is the thing we really need to do is turn around and look shine the light inwardly it sounds like a self centered thing to do but it's that's the paradox that the self centered thing
to do is to always experienced the world from this imaginary fixed point
so by the way i'm trying this new gloss on form an emptiness form is what we think is happening and emptiness is what's actually happening so
trying that out
so now i come i want to really what i really want to talk about was i contact at bcc you know in our life here together so i'm not saying that every time someone doesn't make eye contact with you there doing this practice and i'm also not saying that
it's impossible to do this practice of turning the light inwardly and make eye contact you know i think so i think what i really wanted to bring up all of that that i said was that you know in its intention this practice this custom of not making eye contact in its intention it
is profoundly not rude
but of course that this is not the only thing influencing our
ability or habit or custom of making eye contact you know we have individual differences about that so some of us feel safer when we're making eye contact with people that's one of the ways we make ourselves feel safe and you might end so you some people might not feel so safe here
ear when we're doing this practice and some of us feel safer when we're not making eye contact i'm i'm a little like that i'm a little i shy so for me it's very safe to be somewhere that that's what that's what we're doing you know and then we have cultural differences some cultures
favor or teach you to make eye contact and that that's the polite thing to do and some cultures
have that as the ruins is ruined to make eye contact
so all this is kind of like all these different influences are playing out you know
and in a certain way it comes to a head every saturday morning this is what this is what i've been trying to get through this all time
i recently was working i've had this temporary job at the san francisco zen center and i had a key so i would go my job was in a different building not the main building there but i had a key to go in to have lunch
and one time i came in is my key came into the you know that nice front hall for people have been there and there was a couple guys there and they didn't make eye contact with me and it felt so weird i thought that's weird and then i thought oh i think i've done that to a lot of people
and the feeling was kind of like who's the host of this party
you know i mean i'm coming in you know and so i've been thinking that you know so we have these moments i think it really comes kind of comes down to this issue of host and guest really we have these and we have these various junctures on saturday morning where this comes
james ah piano
so like we just had breakfast and breakfast is the super xenos soto zen ritual that most you know ritualized thing that we do and and it's a very complete experience so we you know and we're not making eye contact and where you know opening up our balls
and then the servers com and they and we have a partner and we bow to the servers and we're not making eye contact but we're doing this bow that feels very connecting and then they serve as the food and the steam as coming up from the cereal and
and the since very quiet and you just hear gentle sounds of people's
managing their utensils and things and and you know then you put the to moscow on the cereal and the smell of the commercials comes up van you know and
then you eat your food and you when you when they bring them hot water and again with the steam and everything is very you if you know you can really experience it i'm not saying that every single minute all of us are really doing that but it is available it's being made available to
us to do that
at its and it's and it's you know
turning the light inwardly what is this you know what is what is this
oh and then so then we finish the meal at you know we're having let's say let's just say we are having a kind of soto zen moment together
and then we are we make it excused and we're leaving and the director is just told us to you know maintain silence until after lecture so wariness in a certain zone you know and then we go out there and who is out there are most guests guests the absolute new people
who are coming to instruction right i mean they may not have come yet but they could have come they might be getting here a little early and so it's like it's there's a little bit of a clash there i think
there's a person who you know is designated to greet those people and hopefully maybe they're the first person they see but you know we're coming ever holding the bowls it just seems very formal you know i don't have a solution to this i i'm just bringing this up that you know
there are several junctures on saturday morning were the guests arrive right some guests so those their sneeze guess that the most guests guests if you don't mind my expression coming at eight forty five per instruction but then there's people who arrive at nine thirty two for zazen which is right as
after we've had our work period and we're trying really hard during work period to not talk not engage it's really really hard it's the hardest time did not do that so we're making a big effort you know and then the people come up the walk
and so what how do we respond
who is who is the host their who is the host when those when people are walking up
i don't have an answer for this i think we can all agree that when we're going to go outside now and have tea and cookies we are making eye contact unless we really don't want to that's completely okay and it's really appropriate so one extreme is you know zazen or says shane the other extreme is saturday t
but then these in these intervening moment there's these other moments you know i think that what because then there's another moment when people who were just coming for lecture arrive and we're doing kin hidden and were walking and looking down and
again we're doing this wonderful practice weren't doing something that's an offering to everybody between a good thing you know
but i don't know how it's experienced
i'm
lost my train of thought to
oh right so i think the ideal is not that we should be talking about ideals but anyway here we go again making a million mistakes
is to have a lot of flexibility and actually i think that the ideas we gain the flexibility by doing this turning inward practice because the non flexibility is all about the self i am the host i am the guest or i am this i make eye contact i don't make you know like that's
the
the non flexibility so we gain flexibility by keeping turning and then we look back and then we look back and we look back that's how we the flexibility and i saw i think ideally it would be like
if there's a guess there there's a host here if there's a host there there's a guest here
and so the we are mind is flexible and our mind and body our whole being is flexibly responding to the circumstances
and i don't know you know how we're doing with that but i thought it would be an interesting conversation to have together so i hope there's enough time for for conversation peter
the last season
because it's times like
to
so
yeah
so let's go
who's house
oh
oh about your messages on practice
no it also it's also
well and there's the variations like further as the eye contact with the smile and the eye contact without the smile that is weird and i've been noticing since i've been thinking about that like there's a lot of other situations where people aren't always making eye contact like when i go to the women's fitness center at the why there's really two kinds of people some people are
a really warm and friendly and then it's really hard if you make eye contact and smile at a certain point it's weird if you don't say anything that's what you know that's and then so here we're really trying not to talk so so like sept about the i think that's probably we assume we're making icons
act when we're talking about our work thing right
it's the grey areas yeah
yeah like the look away and that's certainly to
to make eye contact with big they make i kind of them they look away that's really that's a uncomfortable then there's the smiling without the eye contact that's are like i think i'd try to do that like to halfway halfway be friendly so they see my smile but they don't mean we don't make eye contact is ken
i have two questions or a baby coming together
what is it seems like
i'm in meeting the should shouldn't be a way to engage with someone that preserves know so for yourself and others from
trying a hundred cultivator earned his or a wonder efforts if there's something there are another thing that i wonder about our practice of booking away is it can create a
he
oh
the tower or a strict or a self controlled or a closed
form that is then hard to a get out of the
and not appealing like that's really important we don't we want people to be inspired to do this practice road not like whoa i went there but they were weird so i never went back
a to cultivate in in our practice to cultivate lightness of spirit to cultivate or
joyce self to cultivate are conducting so
home
in a way that doesn't trigger other people which is harmful and have some trigger ourselves is it seems to me is yeah this
i get or how solutions but ah i know there's some people here who always make eye contact and for me with them
i wasn't thinking to you but yeah you
so oh sure is to ocher here she's so warm she all but but with those people to make eye contact smile and not say anything is kind of that's kind of the practice to then maybe that would be a place we could stop in i'll stop it there because it's really kind of hard
once you've made eye contact and smiled at somebody that could be like are the equivalent of our bow and not say hello it's that's hard to so john and gary than sue of i was raised to the stay alone had a big fan on it
it's an interesting thing that are you see people on the street making eye contact they seem to have a gaining idea are you going to look and be the our
okay now this is definitely won't we don't want to practice here i hear you saying and i kind of we really want i want to look at you and call you out and see right but when i look at you and there's no host and no guest and i make eye contact and i android or blissful moment but go about ourselves in being together that's what i call
the idea i don't want you to or need you to
say i ici
that's sounded nice though
there might be good you are and when i found when i look at surgeon at the end of by the one taking my cue at the end of says she i look at surgeon and i realize how much of me as left or how much of me is gone and so in my practice vegan you i'm when i look at you have open
see no one
i'm be no one see know when it'll be no one gary than soothe and i apologize because i i like to s surgeon but manila you guys go first because i call voters i keep thinking i don't know if it's premises of erosion or the surgeon that's a you know could claim your pathetic clean up the
data you pull over to potatoes in the pockets and shake of around and that cleans off all the dirt and me it sounds nice but you're talking about is this kind of ordeal and i'm trimming the hedges on ourselves so that was nothing there eventually
or that so that the nothing there that's already there is is is it is understood or something and just before haha yeah so how does that fit in with weather
our make eye contact or well i think i think we need forms and then then then the edges get more down because if we know
you don't have one kind of way we're aiming
ah and that's the no eye contact at the form because if we agree that we were going to do the eye contact and not talk that could also be that would also be a form right
i don't know i don't know it's it's the other people's eyes i mean that is there's this wallace stegner line and new all estate worker he says there's two things in the world faces and everything else you know another person's eyes
that is really a different kind of a thing than anything else you know so that's a factor here too so
what i was gonna say that the of eyes but in for the praise by contacting the way that it's not just the are out in the world and the hustle and bustle of communicating with other people to help its eye contact is so intense and intimate and hard wired in
games and influence look for the i
a an urban his eyes are the windows to the soul novice and jerker vets practice for scientists to do sometimes she we have these ideas and sessions access to the rings are looking into the i have just the same effective but you are talking about pretty you realize there's nobody here who are that that you and
this other person inhabit the same consciousness credit and it it is equally effective in this dance or break it down haha various but i'm not suggesting that we do that but i'm just pointing out like autistic children have trouble making eye contact is it's such an important thing
it seems like having a team or
time where we got speed which is also an important thing and then we don't have i come back as great that's wonderful that's protected space but then they would be obvious an avid that when where
outside
but even you know like i experienced that's awkward when we're leaving after lecture a little bit because it takes so long it takes them like get it takes so long to for everybody to leave so you've got people next to you are you still not making eye contact and if you do make eye contact it's really hard not to say anything because i
i am really trying not to say anything that i'm committed to of although i don't always do it but it takes so long it takes if you're if you're one of the back people it takes ten minutes it's awkward not to look in anybody's eyes at that because we've kind of broken the formality i don't know
in the now eye contact and go along with the not speaking and as densely populated the same as long as the other people feel okay about and i'm okay yeah i'm okay with him i'm going to say so i'm sojourn roshi than etonian and judy an hour
no remit
in xander
you don't usually make eye contact in order to attract an individual other than ourselves but so will the
usually we talk about no eye contact to recession because we don't lose their concentration by introducing another government
so but a winter and weren't period
and people who come here
if you said
he responded situation you let go of your
so-called concentration and you concentrate on the else which is the person working down the path so you open your eyes know if the person and you're like like that you would be and defend includes saying how our not saying hello soon you because one time i brought up in practice committee
yeah that could we have that time that ten minutes have as not a silent period your the hosts and then everybody totally didn't want to
if you didn't know fifth person who in the person can learn a repair your the hostess yeah
a instruction
you can you hear martha have exactly so you don't stick to your idea and work i concur let's just a device and don't see them
we say we don't talk during recovery but they're good goods
in belgium actually so she doesn't really matter you should do with appropriate that's the main that was really appropriate in this situation so i contact is seductive
visibly
it's not necessarily seductive but that's the that's the seductive
your soul comes through your eyes and these the of the boy you want
question what do you want so
two how would you just act naturally
so zendo we don't want anything remember so they don't let the people though
you know unless it's appropriate some to look into presents it's appropriate to
and into ballet when you mean we don't do that so much more would only hurt them can lead to bermuda you have to make eye contact me again
this is that were with me when you do that meet
let's remember that some digging to some idea of what you should be doing
this week that's what we get caught my you know that better yeah i think so i hope so
tony and judy than allen oh solitary
oh
go ahead i worked with kids with autism and yeah i started in a long time that they were doing that and we were writing goals for these kids to make eye contact ninety percent of the time
and then studies were done about what to ordinary people do you know how often to ordinary people make eye contact that we realized with the study is that an ordinary situations you make eye contact somewhere between forty and sixty percent of the types that we were like really happening is hi my name
because a lot of things we found you know try and teach them they thought contact as they would come up to people or go
a smart they know they have an iraqi people the make guy
a
the
so we've really had to start looking at you know what sergeant was talking about what appropriate nice wage and then you know just really
teaching the kids how to make inappropriate contact and and i were so what's say around with back my own my own like what's appropriate what's funny and what's appropriate and feeling our way kind of feeling our way along with whatever's happening in the moment so i guess that's what we were trying to teach these
if
thank you is kind of a poetic response to a fascinating gonna talk
you will be spoke beautifully ever liver that you know flowing in the river rather than might be an obstacle and cyber so i had this image of like making our eyes like rivers i'm thinking if at all possible hey
so unlike the buddha like the say this example the mythological a real buddha turn turn out dogan s turn the light back a word on itself the dakota like i i can imagine like the eyes being like rivers that flow your right kill you mean
the time that they were turning the light they could look like so much that and both in inside the get some of this form around here i'm outside the games like if that would be at all possible it's like an ideal poetic way serve a pool at during her talking if we could make our eyes like rivers
like without object from caught you know without that sort of a seeking are some yeah that the fixed self transplant the eyes that's you know coming out now counting on
it's an ideal state but wanted to share can make me
thanks to judy
it's actually flows from that which is you know we have the we have such beautiful imagery
zen and the one that was coming to me as you use this exquisite phrase that had never heard before soft wiring in your hard wire and your software
i'm somehow placed a top or you know a soft wiring
that if it brought to mind you know that image of of canon as soon as the scotus of compassionate this feminine quality which i haven't been here for praised as receptive but actually my experience of that is that it is flow that there's a receptivity that flows into that natural response
since and so that image of the thousand ours and a hands that are my hang out the and the i can high is you know to permeate the edge of that is is you know that when the when i'm making eye contact with you and i'm feel attention it's huge
italy something around in psychological terms the distinction between transparency and full disclosure for a lot of reasons during to she is just work period you know or anything it's like you know i'm aware that we have five minutes to go and you know die and you're talking and i realized like i gotta get something done
so i don't want to blow you off but i also have to get this done we can pay them and that's just one context there are a lot more challenging reasons or that i don't want to tell you this thing about me because it has repercussions for a lot of other people are you don't want to tell me or you know and i don't actually know a lot of time
what's really going on i just feel attention in you not wanting to fully disclosed on me when i wanna be able to be transparent and and so you know an austin there is also sometimes an opportunity to say all that we say that in our body gestures and so i was wondering
how did you my author
what is that soft water and in such a moment that that we could practice with that as a natural response meditation
i'm who can we let's talk about that outside and can i have two more people that i bet him so many have allen and peter
well thank you i simply said a lot of announcement to say
you know i think the i've been thinking about the seek the i he did but i still facing out and facing the door i see everyone who comes to door and but i'm not looking at everyone door can see witness whereof we six
zazen our our senses of we're we're seeing without without looking but sometimes but this see i have to book sometimes someone comes through the door who needs to be greeted by a host friend and so the real essence of it
this is where i keep to complete agreement with and is one every one of us this is not a japanese monastery which is completely hierarchical and everybody has
fixed knows where it is a hierarchy it's like each of us this is with great americans each of us moment by moment as defined our ground
and asked to determine for ourself what's an appropriate response time you know so sometimes i sit here and do nothing and sometimes they may have to get up and killed somebody and it's also bush he it to the is based in the physical position that i in said
being and facing out whereas other people are facing the wall that's not a responsibility that but as we meet in the path or and people come in
you know it's is parallel to me to zaza that every moment in zazen we have to
again and again find out ground and find our intention and determine what we're going to do at that hope even though we have a lot of attention in this right and i don't think karzai the socials we have to figure that out the social contract wins the main process right and i and so i don't think the appropriateness is a
fixed thing either like this conversation will influence how we feel about what's appropriate and i'm not just me but i mean any so it's all it's in it's full i do you know appropriate is not an appropriate is not an absolute so and what we agree on if we agreed to do something than that would make that thing more appropriate to do
maybe not completely and universally but now peter and then remember going to be done but want to thank you i will when you said richard we're gonna talk about wow that's a real lorries
a page i really got something out of
two things one
as always curious how to use good as to restate serve yeah some people look at you some people don't i look at some people that it all and now i'm so i'm going to change their
at the server
contrast that with with with done so said about the seductiveness of i cocked hat and i was wondering who's gonna i didn't know who to speak with was couldn't eat today
and you walk through the door and my sense was we had some eye contact and i feel so good
and that feeling that if that could feel a
it didn't take me away from
the emptiness
it is a bad i can't although i can commit to okay or whatever contact with the that excellence is that giving around with feeling i don't know
there's a lot of moments where it's not clear what the practice is yeah no that's fine too just triumph to i think the thing the point would be try it and then see turn around and see what that blush turn the light around and see how that feels
ah can we talk you can go and he is urgent words zero oversight about warm hearted practice ah ha wear whatever you should be worn yeah right and that's so that's kind of more if there is an absolute it's more like something like that although there isn't an absolute
okay thank you