We will now begin today's Dharma talk, offered by Christine Winner. We will now chant the opening verse, which should appear on your screen now. An unsurpassed, penetrating and perfect Dharma. is rarely met with, even in a hundred thousand million kalpas, having it to see and listen to, to remember and accept, I vow to taste the truth of the Tathagata's words. Just want to let everyone know this program will be using closed captioning.

[16:45]

This feature is automatic and is not perfect, but we hope it will be of benefit. To enable closed captioning, click on the CC icon at the bottom of your Zoom window. If the subtitles are distracting, click on the CC icon to disable them. Can you hear me well? I see that right now there are 95 people in this space together. And that does not fit on one of my windows on my screen and probably also not on yours. So I would like for myself and for you to invite you to make yourself visible.

[17:50]

Turn on your video for a while, just the way you are. Reb Anderson in last week's talk said, part of our practice is the endeavor to express oneself completely, just the way we are. So whether you are in a pyjama or lying in bed, If you feel up for it, make yourself visible for a while. And so we have, I have the time to see who is here and you have the time to look around on your screen and give yourself the time and space to actually become aware of what sensations or feelings arise when you see a friend, you maybe haven't seen for a long time that leaves far away.

[18:51]

When you see a person you might have a conflict with at the moment, to just really see what happens when you give yourself the time to actually see who all is sharing this space in time right now. And I will do the same. Sorry, we can't all have the unmuted to be able to say hi to each other, because I feel like wanting to say hi to Suki, to Cynthia, to David, to Marsha, to many, many people, and also hi to all the people I do not know, I've never seen before, which I'm happy to meet in this way.

[19:54]

Allow yourself to feel how it feels, you know, to see someone. Oh, here is. I'm still scrolling through the pages here. been already more people joining us okay if you want to anytime during the talk you can go on click out the video

[21:10]

or you can stay, whatever feels right to you at this moment. My name is Kiku Kristina Lehnhe. I have started Zen practice in 1976. And I have lived at Zen Center as a Zen practitioner and student for 18 plus years as a resident at City Center, a little time at Tassajara and a long time at Green Gulch Farm where I started out. I had many functions while I was there. And now I live in Marin County with my spouse, Marcia Angus, who is also a lay entrusted Zen teacher and having her in my life with the background of our shared practice is what sustains me every day.

[22:24]

So do also my teachers that I've met in the course of my life to which I would like to express my profound, bottomless gratitude. And that is Charlotte Selver, sensory awareness teacher, who brought me actually to come to Green Gulch, to Zen Center. To Norman Soketsu Fisher, who was my first teacher and gave me the lay precepts. Tenshin Reb Anderson, who is my ordination teacher and Dharma transmission teacher, to my family, my friends, and to each one of the Zen students who have been meeting with me in the course of many, many years.

[23:25]

Because your life and your practice and giving me the honor to witness it. keeps encouraging, supporting, and teaching me. You are all my teachers. As is really, truly everything else that is occurring every day. If I don't forget about it, which of course I often do, forget that this is teaching for me because I'm getting caught up in some kind of reaction or habituated pattern. So, in these times, we are all fundamentally challenged by the global and simultaneously immeasurable diverse impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.

[24:35]

we are deeply challenged to honestly and gently investigate our views, our place in systems that govern our views and actions. System is defined as a group of interacting or interrelated elements that act according to a set of rules to form a unified world. A system is surrounded and influenced by its environment, is described by its boundaries, structure and purpose, and expressed in its functioning. So we hear so much about systemic racism, systemic injustice, systemic inequality, inequity.

[25:49]

And so I looked up what actually the definition of system is. And I would like to also preface this talk as an invitation to you to my struggles and my investigation and my finding my way in today's world on how to respond appropriately, how to wake up to what I'm blind to, to how to open... The systems I'm subject to because all of us. So I'm not giving you the truth or a unified view, which I think is actually the short.

[26:50]

Most of the anyway, I go there later. It's really my where I'm today. And while I was preparing for this talk, it kept changing and it will change while I'm talking and it will continue to change after I'm not talking to you any longer. So, it's just my contribution to today, right now. All of us are subject to many systems, personal systems, individual individual systems of habits and survival patterns of family systems of a family system we grew up in of generational system of a cultural system or maybe of different cultural systems if we lived in different cultures caste system

[27:56]

governmental system, spiritual system. Systems can be open or systems can be closed. Closed systems are where they are taboos, where you can't talk about feelings or sex or conflicts or anything. that is a agreed upon taboo that is an enforced taboo that this is not to be expressed or talked about or even felt. Closed system are exclusive and have inherently a rigidity. Open systems are open to curiosity, to questions, to change, to innovation.

[29:10]

Nancy Petring in her, the City Center Tonto, in her talk on the 10th of April, talked about the practice of erasure. And she said, and I think she quoted, but I couldn't find out who this quote was from, even though she mentioned it didn't come through clearly enough. Erasure, the practice of collective indifference that renders certain people and groups invisible. dismiss inconvenience, inconvenient facts and people plotting them out. So any closed system will have elements of erasure of making invisible or rendering us indifferent to certain aspects.

[30:25]

So we are usually don't know unless we are interested and curious and investigate where some of our fundamental habits of survival come from and how they actually govern our life. They govern our views. They govern how we react. They govern actually keep us in place and keep the world around us in place, our views. So they create the unified world, the world of patterns and habits. They're like blinders that we put on horses so they don't see everything, so they don't get freaked out. We walk. often through our life or to parts of our life with specific blinders on in specific areas which do not allow us to see, which hinder us to see.

[31:37]

So. Knowing that what. supports us in discovering the excluded, the line spots, the not seen, the not felt in ourselves and outside of ourselves, around us, in others. It always goes both ways. We have blind spot about our own being, things we have started to not feel, not see, not express, not accept, not include, that we are excluded by different ways by making them judgmentally, saying they're bad, they're not me, I don't want them,

[32:50]

I don't know what to do with them, so I shove them away, whatever. There are many, many ways we can eliminate or exclude. And some of it is available to our awareness and some of it actually we have to really want to find, to want to discover, to want to make the effort to see beyond what we habitually and usually see and feel. I'm sorry, my phone is calling in. I'm going to turn it off. Marsha, could you come over and turn it off so I don't have to move so much? Maybe she comes, we'll see. You're all participating in my life. And here comes Marsha.

[33:52]

Thank you very much. Bye-bye. Okay. Thank you, Marsha. So unless we have the curiosity and the willingness And on some level, you could say the fearlessness of really wanting to investigate beyond what's just habitually apparent to us. And I want to read you a poem by Ryan Maria Rilke. That's called This Press of Time. We set the pace. But this press of time, take it as a little thing.

[34:53]

All this hurrying soon will be over. Only when we tarry or tarry do we touch the holy. Only when we tarry do we touch the holy. Young ones, don't waste your courage racing so fast, flying so high. See how all things are at rest. Darkness and morning light. Blossom and book. I had to look up tari and it means to stay, sojourn, stay in a place. So only when we stay, when we sojourn, when we remain still in a place, do we touch the holy and can see how all things are at rest, darkness and morning light.

[36:20]

blossom and book. So I find personally this the effects of the pandemic to me making more tangible and more visible things I had known but I didn't really see or feel to the extent I do now is quite overwhelming. And when I think of the global aspect of it, it paralyzes me. So what helps me is to kind of come back to the teaching of practicing one practice is practicing completely.

[37:32]

To the understanding that the only place I can influence everything is actually in my everyday life, moment by moment. I cannot take one breath for another being. Many of us, all of us maybe would have loved to give some breath to George Floyd. We couldn't. We can't. We'd have loved to give breath to the people who died from lack of breath from COVID-19. We couldn't, we can't. So what can we do? We can cultivate what we want to see in the world, what we feel in our heart would help the world in our everyday moment by moment life.

[38:39]

How we respond to whatever is in front of us, be it a person, be it a thing, be it an object, be it the weather, it's how do we bring ourselves to the experience we're having that presents itself. And it is in cultivating that capacity, and for that we need, I think we do need a daily practice, something we intentionally do for a certain amount of time every day, so that it's a cultivation. It's not just, oh, today I feel like it, oh, today I don't feel like it. It takes that effort, that commitment,

[39:41]

and that dedication to daily practice. And the only way we can do that, in my experience, is if we actually take some time to find out what it is that we can daily do that is small enough so that it's actually sustainable through the ups and downs and demands of daily life. Not, oh, I want to do so much and today I can do so much, but tomorrow I can't because the kids are having a hard day or one is sick or my workload has suddenly increased or I have a deadline, then I can't do it. So what is the smallest amount I can always do? It can be five minutes in the morning and five minutes in the evening. If you do that consistently, it changes your whole life.

[40:46]

And it changes the whole world. Dogen says, your practice affects the entire sky and the whole earth. Not noticed by you, it is so. Intention transcends boundaries. Transcends. Because we are so completely inextricably interconnected, what we think, do, say, sends energy waves through the whole universe that are not stopped anyway. And we are supported by how people practice and how people live according to their intentions.

[41:52]

So, cultivating what Rilke says, tarrying, cultivating Being with, staying with, being still. Fundamentally still is how we can kind of the blinders start dropping away. We can see them, we can begin to see them because as long as we keep moving, we keep using them. If we stand still, we start noticing them and we start having a choice of seeing beyond them. We can turn our head or they fall away. We can suddenly notice, oh, there's always a wall on the right. Is there really a wall or is there something else I don't want to see or I have been taught not to see?

[43:01]

So the erasure Nancy Petring mentioned is not... It's a cultivation that is systematic, it's in the system, so it trains us not to see. It's not even we decided necessarily, I'm not going to see that. Survival patterns weren't the decision, oh, I have all these choices, I do this. Survival patterns was At that point, at that age, that was the only possibility and many of them start before there's even a thought of I or I have choices or I'm deciding on this or that. And then there are others where we have more we have decided or we keep deciding. When we're overwhelmed, we turn our head away. When we see all the homeless people, what do I do? Do I say good morning with a smile or good afternoon or good evening?

[44:01]

Or do I behave like they're not seen? Do I blot them out? Because I'm so uncomfortable. I feel so guilty. I can't handle it. So I blot them out. That is something I know when I'm doing it. So we have all that and there are all these grades in between where that's to a degree where we know what we're erasing or we don't know what we're erasing, but we are erasing or it's not visible to us. So our practice, the Soto Zen practice, is meditation. It's a practice of stillness. which can have many, many ways. So it's not the only way to sit still. You can sit still in your room.

[45:03]

You can be still out in nature. You can be still while you're swimming. There's a student in Cape Cod that swims in the winter in the cold water, and her experiences of how to learn to be in the water And become one with the water is just an absolutely inspiring story to witness. And liberating and heartwarming in the freezing water. And so anything can be a gate, a Dharma gate to stillness. But you have to find yours. Nobody can find it for you. But when you find it, can you commit to it? Five minutes, twice a day. I recommend early morning and late evening because that frames your day and it frames your night. There's something about two times a short period of something.

[46:07]

It can be clean up a corner in your kitchen and leave it with no trace there or on your desk. Not the whole desk, maybe. Just what is really so small. that you know you can do it even in the most troubled and most chaotic day? Usually we brush our teeth even when we had a terrible day. So is it something like that? Can we make a habit of doing something that doesn't take extra effort, but takes effort to maintain, to keep doing, but not effort of overextending yourself, because that is not sustainable and it will falter. So I have this wonderful, wonderful little book, which are thoughts, stories and prayers.

[47:11]

by Mother Teresa, and it's called In the Heart of the World. And in it, she has this wonderful practice, which I think we, you know, she mentions God in there because we could replace this with Buddha nature or awakeness. But she puts Silence. So her order is an order of contemplation, of stillness and of activity in the world. In the world of the poor, the disenfranchised, the invisible, the erased. So it's deep contemplation, deep silence, stillness and activity in the world of suffering. It's not either or. So she says to make possible true inner silence, practice.

[48:17]

Silence of the eyes. By seeking always the beauty and goodness of God everywhere or Buddha nature everywhere. Tenshin Reb Anderson in his lecture last week at Green Gulch. last Sunday, mentioned we are all on the path of becoming Buddhas. Can we see each other on this path, regardless of what they look like, where they are, in what circumstances? Every being is on the path to waking up. So she says... By seeking always the beauty and goodness of God everywhere. You can leave God out and just see goodness everywhere. By seeking what is good. And closing them to the faults of others and to all that is sinful and disturbing to the soul.

[49:26]

So that's like when we say in our precepts, do not... I can't even say. Terrible. Not to talk about faults of the others. Not to engage in unkind speech. Praise yourself at the expense of others, etc. Then, so what I also like by her practices is they include actually our senses. So silence of the eyes by seeking always the beauty and goodness everywhere and closing them to the faults of others and to all that is sinful and disturbing to the soul that agitates us. Then silence of the ears by listening always to the cry of the poor and the needy and closing them to all other voices that come from fallen human nature such as gossip, tale bearing and uncharitable work.

[50:41]

Silence of the tongue. By speaking life giving words. that are true, that enlighten and inspire, bring peace, hope and joy. And by refraining from self-defense and every word that causes darkness, turmoil, pain and death. You know, we say, All my ancient twisted karma born through body, speech and mind. So this comes from a deeply contemplative Christian tradition, and it meets completely the teachings of the Buddha as I see it.

[51:47]

Silence of the tongue. By speaking. The truth, what enlightens and inspires, brings peace, hope and joy. And by refraining from self-defense and every word that causes darkness, turmoil, pain and death. Silence of the mind. By opening it to the truth. in prayer and contemplation. And by closing it to all untruth, distractions, destructive thoughts, rash judgment, false suspicions of others, vengeful thoughts and desires. Silence of the heart.

[52:56]

By loving one another as God loves and avoiding all selfishness, hatred, envy, jealousy and greed. Then she says, I shall keep the silence of my heart with greater care so that in the silence of my heart. She says, I hear his words of comfort and from the fullness of my heart, I comfort Jesus in the distressing disguise of the poor. For in the silence and purity of the heart, God speaks. We can really replace here God with Buddha nature. Our intrinsic capacity to be fully awake, fully human. And there's a third one, which I can't remember right now.

[54:09]

And it's like in New York, there is, I think it's the same church, John's church, where there is on the bench outside is a sculpture. And it's... A person wrapped in a blanket. You don't see anything but one foot, I think, is sticking out. And that foot is pierced. It's a homeless person. It's Jesus in the disguise of a homeless person. So how do we each find what supports stillness?

[55:13]

Because in the silence and stillness, in the quiet, in the not moving, we discover, we discover own inner universe, our own inner system. And Pema Churkin has a beautiful quote. She says, the most fundamental aggression to ourselves, the most fundamental harm we can do to ourselves is to remain ignorant by not having the courage and the respect to look at ourselves honestly and gently. Only in an open, non-judgmental space can we acknowledge what we are feeling.

[56:23]

Only in an open space where we are not all caught up in our own version of reality can we see and hear and feel who others really are, which allows us to be with them and communicate with them properly. So whichever way works for you to actually be that supports you to be with your experience as it is arising in that moment. And be with it, cultivating a non-judgmental space. That means when judgment rises up, oh, I don't like this or I don't like to feel like this or this is bad. We look at that in a non-judgmental way.

[57:27]

Oh, here is judgment arising. These are the movements it is promoting. And what happens if I just let it be? Remain still, hurry. Don't go away. Don't push away. Don't turn away. Don't grab it. And then she says something really interesting that resonates with, well, Reb mentioned, Tenshin Reb Anderson mentioned in his talk last Sunday at Green Gulch, that he is promoting, his endeavor is to be in harmony within conflicting or opposing views and beliefs, not harmony that eliminates

[58:30]

different views. And that's in the text we read often, you know, in our service, harmony of difference and unity or equality, that there is a harmony that is not based on only hearing one sound or all of us hearing the same sound. It's actually Also, if you look at the music piece and people that are musicians can say that much more, you know, differentiated than me, but there's no real music if there's no disharmony somewhere in the piece of music that actually encourage it to move to a next place. That it's a play between what may sound like harmonious and not harmonious. And then if we listen to music from different culture, some of us to our ears, because we're so accustomed and kind of systematically trained to think of harmony or hear harmony a particular way, sounds not very harmonious to us.

[59:46]

Do we take the time to actually Let it influence us so that we can hear it for what it is rather than looking from our place at it, defining it from our viewpoint. So then Pema Chodron in When Things Fall Apart, Hard Advice for Difficult Times, she also says, As human beings, not only do we seek resolution, but we also feel that we deserve resolution. However, not only do we not deserve resolution, we suffer from resolution. We don't deserve resolution. We deserve something better than that. We deserve our birthright, which is the middle way.

[60:51]

An open state of mind that can relax with paradox and ambiguity. And I think that is exactly what we need in these times where the paradoxes and the ambiguities are so... tangible and visible through this medium, for example, we're on right now. That we can not only hear, but we can see things we could never see before, unless we were there in person. And that tendency that we bring to so many things that we don't have answers to, to look for a resolution, for a solution, And by doing that, we have to find a solution, we have to eliminate, again, things.

[61:54]

So can we relax and see what is the appropriate response now within a paradox or an ambiguity inside ourselves or so-called outside of ourselves with somebody else or with a situation? And for that, is stillness, silence, quiet is the place where we, our view starts and our heart starts to open up and become more tolerant of seeing things as they are and not judgment, but let them be. Let them be as they present themselves.

[62:56]

And then we might get to the place where we can see that all things are at rest. That darkness and light are not fighting with each other. They're at rest. It's the yin yang. sign that he says, darkness and morning light blossom and book. So we as humans, we do need to get out of being just the subject of being subjected to systems, internal and external systems, we need to practice, we need to create a space in time for ourselves that we regularly visit and cultivate.

[64:14]

And that will... tell us in our individual lives how to respond appropriately to what is arising. And our bodies will tell us if it's an appropriate response or not. If they tighten up, if we can't breathe, if we can't swallow, then we're not... We're not relaxed. If it's an appropriate response, there is a relaxation. There's an ease in the middle of that. And that will help us and not to judge it, but to go, oh, no, that's. We can feel it's on the way there, but we haven't gotten there or we're not there. And that is teaching us. If we do not have the idea that we sit down and we. Figure it out once and for all with a solution that addresses everything.

[65:20]

So I want to thank you for your presence, which has moved this talk through the notes I made. made its own path through those notes. Thank you for living your lives where you live them, far away, close by. And I want to read the poem by Rilke one more time and close morning talk with this. called this press of time. We set the pace, but this press of time take it as a little thing next to what endures.

[66:32]

We set the pace, but this press of time take it as a little thing next to what endures. All this hurrying soon will be over. Only when we hurry do we touch the holy. Young ones, don't waste your courage racing so fast, flying so high. See how all things are at rest. Darkness and morning light, blossom and book. May you all be safe. May you all be well. May you all feel support together with all beings. Thank you. May our intention equally extend to every being and place with the true merit of Buddha's way.

[67:58]

Beings are numberless. I vow to save them. Delusions are inexhaustible. I vow to end them. Dharma gates are boundless. I vow to enter them. Buddha's way is unsurpassable. I vow to become it. I want to thank everyone for joining us today. And wanted to let you know that we are having our spring fundraising campaign known as the Zenathon. I'll be posting a link in the chat to the Zenathon website. And I encourage you to visit the website to read stories from your friends, teachers, and fellow practitioners about the heartbeat of their practice and to contribute to the Zenathon on that page.

[69:01]

You can also make your own page and become a fundraiser. Your generous support allows San Francisco Zone Center to keep on providing opportunities to practice together and share transformational teachings with thousands of people worldwide through online programming and residential training. We will also be taking a five-minute break before coming back for Q&A. If anybody needs to leave right now and would like to say goodbye, you may unmute yourselves. Thank you. Goodbye. Thank you. Thank you. Goodbye. Thank you. [...] Goodbye.

[70:09]

Thank you. We will return at 11.15. you something?

[77:18]

Were you sitting there? No. So I think the question and answer period is open. Yes. If you'd like to raise your virtual hand, you may do so by clicking on the reactions button at the bottom of your Zoom application. There's a smiley face button with a plus sign. And if you click on that, there's a raise hand button. You may also send me a direct chat if you would like me to pose a question for you. And I'll also be looking through the video feeds if anybody wants to wave their actual hand as well. And it looks like we have an offering from Lisa. You are muted. I've unmuted twice.

[78:20]

Does it work now? Yes. Thank you. This is a very helpful talk. I really have so much that I'm going to have to go back and listen to over and over again, I think, to begin to see its reach and depth. I had a very, a lot of questions about how one sorts out an intention to practice from all the distractions. So that's the core, I think, is of the talk for me. It's meeting me where I'm at right now. To deeply feel that I can be silent and take care of what the appropriate needs are that are calling in every direction at every time.

[79:31]

It's this moment of great turmoil where I sometimes feel like up is down and down is up and I have a great deal of trouble being upright, maintaining the sense of being upright. that I've disappointed something, I've let something down, I made an intention, I didn't get it done. I'm trying to meet the moment in this very limited being and have to just let that sink back into the ground like rain or something. Any offerings you can offer for helping to sit with that Well, maybe you can use the... Well, thank you for your question. Maybe you can use the instruction of silence by Mother Teresa to look at the situations in front of you with eyes of silence, with ears of silence, with a heart of silence, with a body of silence, and just see what if you look for...

[80:40]

positive, the goodness, the beauty, it might actually, out of that might come that maybe you need to do something, there needs to be an action, and what would that be? And maybe there doesn't need to be an action. You could play around with that and experiment. Open question. Because it would eliminate judgment from the inner pressure and the outer pressure. Eliminate judgment. way of looking at it that is silent. Thank you. Welcome. Next offering is from Homa. Homa, you can start your video. Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate your talk in the sense of one more time allows me to look into the system.

[82:03]

And as I was looking into the system from the conversation I heard, the system of I and me got a little bit bigger, and it turned into the system of we. And to me, it still is the system. So the I turning, the I or me turning to a we, still the system I see the crookedness of the system. That there's this crooked system, which you said it so beautifully, that is paralyzing. Being the system is paralyzing.

[83:08]

And the inability... To be paralyzed, totally paralyzed, is what makes me run to other systems. And when I looked into that, I realized the ability to The ability of not being still, but the ability of observing stillness, which is pure observation in the paralyzed, in the system, may give a possibility of being liberated from the system

[84:13]

which is, when I look at it, it appears it is impossible. It's impossible. There's this impossibility of being free from system because it's a system within a system within a system within a system. So the system itself fools itself from thinking I am free of it. So there's this foolish fullness. And one who can be totally, totally, totally attentive to this whole fullness, I would say it's goodness or good luck. Only through goodness, goodness can see this wholeness.

[85:15]

Less than goodness, it sees aspects and it's still part of the system. So I'd like you to express your thoughts too. I think you said thank you for sharing that. I think when I'm listening to you, it engages my mind. And it traps my mind in system by system, fueling new systems. If you look at nature, you could say nature in its by itself. You could say is a system is a system that is. I think there are, maybe you could say there are intrinsic systems and there are man-made systems.

[86:25]

But what I would like you to engage is feeling in your body when you get to feeling paralyzed by a view you have, by a sight you have when you see a system and see its crookedness and it has a paralyzing effect. You say, then you run. So can you try out and experiment what happens when you just go into your body with your awareness and feel what your mind calls paralyzed or paralyzing. And just be with the sensation of it in your body with its location. And see if you can just surrender to it. Just let it be. Just stay with the felt sense of it in your body.

[87:31]

Not go into any thoughts. Each time your mind jumps in and wants to say something about it, you say, thank you very much. But I'll stay with the sensation, with the... the sensory experience of it in this moment in my body and see what happens then. That's what I can offer you today. May I respond? Because I like to receive your offering, but I'm still not quite receiving the offering. Yes, so you have to play with it. Yes, so therefore, when you ask me to try. Yeah, to see if you're curious enough to experiment with when you feel trapped and paralyzed to actually enter the experience rather than think about it or try to change it.

[88:40]

Okay, now I can receive, I can see myself. that I can receive to the curiosity of trapment. Being curious with the trapment, that I can see. There's a possibility for that. But the rest of the guided parts... Leave it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So thank, yeah. Ask what resonates with you. Yeah. And the rest just forget about. Yes, yes, that exactly. That's why, thank you. I'm glad I stayed with you because, yes, thank you, thank you. You too, very much. Our next offering is from Mary Ann and Phil. Hello, Christina, can you hear us?

[89:45]

Yes, I can hear you. Phil and I are watching you from Venice Beach in Southern California. And my comment, I'll try and articulate it, but I wanted to say thank you because it made us think about how in our neighborhood, when we encounter homeless people, we need to be ready to Approach them and offer them some easy help. Like, can we go to this little restaurant and get you some water and a burrito? See what they want. And if they respond to us, do what we can to provide them something. And you have to be prepared to do that because You're also prepared in case you encounter a threatening situation.

[90:49]

You have to be able to deal with that. They're mentally ill. You don't know what's going to happen. So you want to help somebody and you need to balance being prepared to deal with somebody who may be suffering mentally and may respond that way. or find out what they want and get it for them. So you have to be in the middle here, but you have to prepare yourself because when you go out, it's constantly there, that moment. So if you think about it ahead of time, you won't be overwhelmed by being scared and you won't be overwhelmed by trying to focus on helping them, but you'll be ready. to do what has to happen. Sometimes we don't do anything. So we're remembering, thank you, to do something.

[91:55]

Well, thank you very much. I would even step one step back. I'm not promoting to do things. I'm more promoting to receive. So what I'm promoting is how about you start with just acknowledging their presence by smiling at them and saying hello and no more. Just to whoever you encounter, you say good morning and smiling at them. If you do that, then it will become maybe over time clear who needs something and then you can maybe ask I'm going by the restaurant, can I bring you something? Because we don't know what they need at any given moment. We think we know, but we don't. And if we go and say, oh, you need this or bring it, then we already have made them an object of our interpretation.

[93:02]

And then you don't have to already kind of Imagine this situation and that situation, and it's an imagination, and then find your middle. It's a middle within imagination. But if you have the intention and manifest that intention to acknowledge their existence just as it is with respect, by saying, for example, good morning, or smiling at them and really looking at them, that will create a A space in which things maybe at some point come into some action. Thank you. Thank you very much for pondering that question with us and that challenge, because it is a big challenge. Our next offering is from Yashar.

[94:09]

Sure. My question has to do with the practice of Zazen. And if we are able to practice stillness in anything we're doing, and that ultimately is the goal, to not really see this line between Zazen and the rest, why is it that we even do Zazen? If there's no difference between, if ultimately there's no difference between the zazen and jumping into a frozen lake in the river and swimming or helping at an orphanage that's nearby why do we then elect in the conventional world that we see why do we elect to practice stillness through zazen as opposed to um i'll use the example i said before helping in an orphanage working with children That's my question.

[95:18]

Can I use your example of jumping in the frozen river? Please. So if I go and jump into a frozen river, I probably will die very quickly. The woman I know who is now swimming in the cold, cold, cold lake practiced for months and months and months. training her body, training her mind, training her understanding on how to swim in very cold water. So stillness runs through everything. But for us to actually have cultivated that connection and cultivated our capacity to align with the stillness that runs through everything. needs cultivation. It's like, I can't just go to an orphanage and just help them.

[96:22]

I mean, I can and they can say, give me money. And that's often how we think we help. We have somebody else who is knowledgeable helping. But are we getting into the capacity to resonate fully and align fully with stillness that runs through everything. So that when we are in a situation we're moving from or with that stillness and not with the distractions of our habituated Harumi. So it's not one or the other. That's why I find Mother Teresa's practice so inspiring because it's a deeply, deeply contemplative practice. And they cultivate that. All the people in her order cultivate contemplation, which is another word for meditation.

[97:25]

I mean, it's the same intention to connect with silence, profound silence in which we can hear the cries of the world, in which we can hear the beauty, see the beauty of the world. and the suffering and not be divided by it or think we have to take sides, but can see the whole picture. And they are fully engaged in help collecting people off the street that are dying and giving them a home. So it's in the world and it's in silence. And that's why we practice SASE. It's not an either or, it's really, cultivating our capacity to be profoundly, profoundly still, which does not hinder our activities, but then will kind of inform our activities.

[98:30]

Thank you for your question. Our next offering is from Sally. Hi. This has been really helpful, really interesting. Thank you so much. My question is about something that I think you said about intention that feels like it applies to everything everyone's been talking about. Did you say, and could you clarify, intention transcends boundaries? How I understood that was, I don't know if that was your word, boundaries, but sort of the limits of systems. When we're caught in a system, if we have the intention and practice the intention in the ways that you've been talking about, that in and of itself can get us past the boundary of a limit. Or is that what you meant?

[99:38]

I mean, it depends on the intention. Systemic intention is, unless it's an open system, is generally to maintain itself. So we can practice that, then our boundaries get stronger. If our intention is to be open, to cultivate an open heart, for example, or kindness, just for respect, cultivating respect in all throughout our day, then when we actually engage that intention, our capacity to be radically respectful will grow and grow and grow. And that will make us see things differently because we approach them respectfully. So we are get a bigger receptor to the information that comes from what we've just met respectfully.

[100:48]

So if we meet homeless people on the street to go back to Marianne and Phil's question, if our respect, practice of respect by, for example, acknowledging everybody's existence, just their being there, just the way they are with a smile and looking at them, whether they look back or not, that will allow us to actually receive information they're sending. And we haven't, we have only expressed our respect, our intention of respect. And so over time, we'll know people will say, or we see who we actually is open to be, ask if we can bring them lunch or a sandwich or something warm when it's cold. So the intention, you have to really be careful what the intention is.

[101:50]

Well, I like what you said about not making anyone the object of your own interpretation. I mean, that's being receptive. before you're being helpful or, but thank you. I'm just scanning the video feeds now to see if anybody has their hand raised. And the offering from Kate. Christina, thank you so very much. I'm very new to this.

[102:54]

I only started practice last December of 2020. So I'm very, very new. And oftentimes when I come to the talks or when I come to tune in by Zoom to the various things that I sign up for through Zen Center, oftentimes I feel like they just go whiz right past my ears and right over my head. And, you know, if I can get out of a talk, maybe one small sentence or one small little idea, that hits my heart or where my being responds to, then that's really wonderful thing. It's intimidating. Oftentimes I hear people say, oh, I've been practicing for 40 years.

[103:58]

Oh, I've been at Zen Center since 1976. Oh, I've been, you know, on and on and on. It's a little bit intimidating for a beginner. But today, I could cry. I feel like the words that you gave us and gave me, they feel so big, but not big in a way that's overwhelming, but big in a way that is just like delicious water. to a thirsty person. Just, the words just feel so, so nourishing and so delicious. And I don't feel like, I don't feel like things have gone past me or over me or beyond me, but that things have gone in me.

[104:59]

And I really just wanted to express this to you. And just offer such deep gratitude for your being here this morning and for offering words that came into my being on such a deep and profound level. I'm so very grateful. Thank you. And I want to offer you because You showed up and we're here to receive it. So don't forget that. Thank you. And I also want to say. You know, when you said how it is that sometimes one sentence. For whole talk kind of resonates. That's fabulous.

[106:00]

That's already makes a good Dharma talk. And I think we. Particularly when we're new, we have to learn. And it's an ongoing challenge to just show up and maybe not necessarily try in your head to follow what the person is saying. Just let your body wash the words of the person wash over your body because it will pick up what resonates for you. And it reminds me, you know, Tenshin Reb Anderson has senior seminars and I used to go there. Now I can't because of my scheduling and I don't even know if currently they're happening through the pandemic. But I would go and I will sit there and feel like I'm in a group of people that speak Chinese. I don't understand a word of what they're talking about.

[107:01]

They were kind of... You know, in the circus tent, they were doing their trapeze voltages in the mind. And I can't follow. I can't follow. It doesn't. But then usually one sentence of the text or what somebody said resonated with my life, my experience, and illuminated something. In my experience, it was something very big, but also very simple. So I learn and I encourage you to just see if anything resonates, but you showing up already is manifesting an intention and is changing, affecting your life and is moving your life forward. Just showing up and trusting that What resonates is what's important to you.

[108:05]

Sometimes something resonates two years later, say, oh, that person said that your body stored that sentence somewhere, even unbeknownst to you. And if you are in this receptive mode, you are a little bit stepping aside from making comparison. I'm a beginner. This person must be advanced because they did it 40 years. Not necessarily, actually. This practice is about beginner's mind. So all those comparisons may drop away and you just follow your impulse to show up and see what happens. So thank you for showing up today and being here to resonate. You're welcome. I don't think I see any other hands up right now.

[109:10]

You might be complete. Yes, that's perfect timing. Thank you all very, very, very much. And take good care of yourself. And find your little, little piece of cultivating stillness, if you can, in your daily life. Feel free to unmute yourselves if you'd like to say goodbye. Thank you. Thanks, Christina. Thank you, Christina and everyone. Thank you so much. Hugs to Kate. Thank you, Christina. Thank you. Bye-bye. Thank you. Thank you, Christina. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. You're so welcome. Thank you for your great presence. You're welcome. Thank you, Christine.

[110:20]

Thank you, Sally. Hi. Thank you, Christine, for seeing you again after all these decades. Yes. I was on your Doe on Rio, and you were the Eno. Oh. Yata Sahara? Yata Sahara. I was on the Dome on Rio with you, and you were the Eno then. Wow, that's a long time ago. So good to see you again. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. I'm going to go away now. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Thank you. Good luck in Venice. My old stomping grounds. Bye-bye. Bye everyone.

[111:08]

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