Good morning, everyone, here and there. First of all, I want to thank the abbot, David, and the head of practice, Mary, for inviting Leo and I to be with you this morning. And of course, I want to thank my friend, Leo Babauta, for joining me in this attempt to meet what is happening right now. Leo and I have known each other for a long time, maybe. A decade. A decade, yes. And he has a very, very helpful and wise and compassionate blog called Zen Habits, so you can imagine why we met. So... Anyway, thank you all for being here in these changing times.

[01:01]

Some people have told me that they are afraid. I myself have a knot in my stomach, so it's highly possible that a lot of you are feeling this too. And rightly so. This is a frightening time. Our job now, everyone's job, is to be awake and aware and to bear what we're feeling and take beneficial and kind action to help protect ourselves and our communities. One of my Dharma sisters, Shokuchi Deirdre Kerrigan, who's the head of practice for the Brooklyn Zen Center, put something up on Facebook the other day that I appreciated.

[02:10]

So this is what she said. She said, listen to and feel the fear. It teaches us how to take charge of ourselves, our family and community in the midst of it. of sudden change. Then let it go and fully live this altered life. Panic, anxiety, dread are not fear. They are what happens to fear when it's not attended to and released. It is helpful to know the difference. And this knowledge takes time and practice. Listen to the fear. In Buddhism, there are five basic fears that are outlined. Loss of life, loss of body parts or mind parts, loss of livelihood, loss of reputation, loss of confidence in front of large groups.

[03:27]

At this time, we're likely to be feeling the loss of livelihood and the loss of life. We are in a time of vast groundlessness, which combined with fear exacerbates the feeling of freefall. Romides such as everything is going to be all right are only temporary vacations from fear. When the thought is too much to bear, it might be better to tell ourselves no story at all rather than one of hope or one of total disaster. Not knowing has its benefits in that the next moment includes all possibility. So I propose to you that there is some freedom in helplessness.

[04:37]

There is possibility in the dynamics of change. To settle into realizing we've never been in control in the first place. The delusion of control has been very... very nicely erased for us right now and there is some freedom in that please consider that so leo would you like to share what you're noticing now in your life and and in your family in these conditions of change yeah so on my way up here from san diego i went through the airport through an airplane and another airport, and just really felt in my body the rising upswelling of fear and anxiety in everybody.

[05:41]

And I noticed it in myself as well. I noticed it in family members texting me. It's just a moment of really, really strong, intense fear that I think we're all feeling, and it's just coming from all sides. And so it's hard hard to avoid and so i notice also that that's that's um it's shutting out our usual responses to fear normally our responses are things like avoiding you can't avoid it right now it's everywhere coming from all directions another one is control as you said which has been wiped out we can't control this it's completely uncontrollable we usually like to try and get things under control and do things about it. And that's another one is taking action. But there's not much you can do when it's in the air all around you and you have to breathe. So I've noticed that all of those responses are completely shut down and that leaves the only thing that we can do besides just trying to panic and run out into the streets and

[06:59]

pull out our hair. I've done that already. But it's just to notice, as you said, to feel that. And so I invite you to feel the fear and anxiety that's rising up in you, if it is. And for me, that's often from the stomach to the heart area. And it feels like a tightness of breath. It feels like an electricity and faster heartbeat. So just notice the bodily sensations of that. I've also noticed that it's actually very close to the feeling of falling in love. And so, yeah, that's what I've been noticing. Thank you. Life as we know it is ending for a while. And if we look carefully, we can see that this has always been true.

[08:06]

Everything changes. We're just not used to so much of everything changing at once. But big or small change, the practice is the same. We ask the question, what has not What is basic to us as humans when there is little or nothing to rely on? This massive set of changes is an opportunity to realize what lies beneath our everyday habits. This is a time for us to be exquisitely aware of our feelings and our actions. This is the time, this is the practice challenge we've been preparing for.

[09:10]

When normal routines are swept away, what basic human resources are revealed? What's revealed? And which of them can we count on? When reliable routines disappear, what new ones take their place? Will the awareness of our connectivity, so obvious in both the spread of the virus and the community efforts to band together while staying six feet apart, will this lead to a deeper understanding of what it is to live in harmony? How do we collaborate? How do we cooperate? I'm sitting in a room right now where the love is so clear because the leadership has made this big effort to figure out a way for us to be together and have six feet between us.

[10:24]

I don't know, you probably can't see it on the camera, but it's actually, this is a manifestation of love right now. I'm so appreciative. I'm so appreciative. Thank you all for... figuring out how we can stay together and protect each other. It's quite beautiful. Another thing that I picked up when I was on Facebook the other day is a beautiful poem that I want to share with you. It's from the Reverend Lynn Ungar, who's a Unitarian Universalist Poet Laureate. It's called Pandemic What if you thought of it as the Jews consider the Sabbath the most sacred of times? Cease from travel. Cease from buying and selling. Give up just for now on trying to make the world different than it is.

[11:29]

Sing. Pray. Touch only those to whom you commit your life. Center down. And when your body has become still, reach out with your heart. Know that we are connected in ways that are terrifying and beautiful. You could hardly deny it now. Know that our lives are in one another's hands. Surely that has come. Do not reach out your hands, reach out your heart, reach out your words, reach out all the tendrils of compassion that move invisibly where we cannot touch. Promise this world your love for better or for worse in sickness and in health so long as we all shall live.

[12:33]

I'm just going to read the first part again. What if you thought of it as the Jews consider the Sabbath the most sacred of times? Cease from travel, cease from buying and selling. Give up just for now, trying to make the world different than it is. Sing, pray, touch only those to whom you commit your life. Center down. When Leo and I prepared this talk a few weeks ago, we intended to talk about fear and how it affects our work life since we're in the middle of an intensive about Zen and work. And Leo has a lot of experience in coaching people in those situations. And work fears can often be about the fear of loss of reputation.

[13:40]

which can feel like our very existence is being threatened. And in that talk, I was going to share the example of the first comedy that I ever acted in. It was in a small community theater, and it was Thousand Clowns. And I played the social worker. And the social worker steps onto the stage pretty much at the beginning of the first act. And by the end of the first act, she has to be hysterical. So when you put your foot through the door onto the stage, if you're not in exactly the right place, you don't get there. You don't get to that place that you've practiced. And it's a comedy. And when you don't get to that place, it feels like, you know how comedians say, I'm dying out there? It feels like I'm dying out there.

[14:43]

So that was a support to know that if you don't make it to that place, you're going to die. So it helps you to really be ready to walk through that door. But now, we're in a situation where physical dying is possible. not just this reputational loss. How well did we practice with those other fears before this moment? Leo, what are some of the practices you've developed to transform fear into fearlessness? Fearlessness. Yeah, that's... Fearlessness is a... powerful word that i've been practicing with for my with for myself for a while and i don't see it actually i think i learned this from you i don't see it as a an absence of fear but just the willingness to be with the fear and even become intimate with it so that's been my practice is to as i said notice first of all dropping out of the thoughts that are spinning around in your head that are

[16:05]

bringing up those feelings of fear, and then to drop into the body. Notice the sensations, as I described before, that are going on often in the torso, heart area, sometimes the stomach, the throat. And just be with those sensations to start with. Acknowledge their presence. Become curious about them. And even look at them closely, openly, staying with them. That's a start and just letting go of judgment and letting go of needing for it to be gone or to be any different than it is. It's just a sensation in the body. And as you practice with this, what I found, and it's not always true, sometimes people have really strong trauma where they can't be with the physical sensations of their fear. But most people are actually completely capable of being with those sensations. You don't actually die, even though we don't want to feel them. So you're just staying with them, and then there are ways that you can shift that relationship and become intimate.

[17:14]

And one of them is curiosity. Another one is friendliness. So bringing a sense of warmth, like I might welcome a friend into my house. Can you bring that sense of warmth to this feeling, which we don't normally want, so we usually have a very antagonistic feeling relationship with our fear and so having that friendliness really brings something different to that relationship and you start to relate to it differently and with practice actually doesn't need to be anything different it doesn't need to be anything you turn away from and so you start practicing with friendliness and warmth even compassion so I'll imagine it as like a little hurt child inside of me who just needs to be comforted who needs some love and Gratitude, which is often a challenging thing for a lot of people, can we be grateful for the sensations of fear in our body? And for me, often I can bring gratitude that I'm alive.

[18:19]

I have sensations that I am practicing. Gratitude that I am putting myself into a place of groundlessness. In this case, in our moment right now, we don't have the choice. We didn't voluntarily step into it, but in my meaningful work, I'm voluntarily stepping into it. And we can voluntarily step into the groundlessness of this moment as well. So being grateful that you are actually exploring unknown territory, the territory of not knowing that you mentioned. And so gratitude often can shift that for me. And it's not needing it to shift the feeling in any way, but just shifting how I relate to it. So practicing with that often will loosen it up. I'll become more open to it. And then it doesn't go away, but I can walk with it. I can act with it. I can come from a place of love.

[19:20]

So compassion for others, starting to feel my connectedness to others. And that's possible once I've worked with the fear itself, the sensation of it in my body. And the interesting thing is when you do this bodily sensation... It's like a pattern interrupter for the thoughts that are spinning around in your head, which we don't have control over. They just appear whether we want them or not, and we can get stuck in those. But if you can drop into the body, all of a sudden you're not in the thoughts anymore. So that's actually an amazing way to get out of your head and to step into a much more compassionate place. Thank you. This part that you mentioned just at the end there about feeling connected to others, right now, what we are feeling is very similar to what almost every other person in the world is feeling.

[20:24]

There's no status difference, no gender difference, no income bracket separateness that keeps us from being affected or threatened. by the same thing. No one is immune. What an opportunity to find connectivity in this. Meeting someone in the street, meeting someone just walking down the hall, and honoring the connection. We may be all responding somewhat differently, but there's a commonality in this that we could um take solace from so maybe one of the main antidotes for this fear this extensive fear is we're all in this together no one's excluded so maybe turn that and think what does that mean to me we're all in this together we're living in the middle of

[21:36]

And that poem had a wonderful stanza that really stood out for me, which is when she says, know that we are connected in ways that are terrifying and beautiful. We thought that what was meant by interconnection was that good feeling we get when we're aware of the humanness of the person across from us. we maybe forgot that it also means we are still seeing them as the person across the room. And they are a threat to our sense of a separate self. Is it even possible at a time like this to return to the ultimate teachings that tell us that we do not exist separately? For in order for us to be afraid, we have to believe that there is someone in here who can be annihilated by someone out there who can annihilate.

[22:44]

Fear shows us that we don't yet fully believe the teachings. It's too difficult of a truth. Is it too difficult of a truth to hold right now? When we are caught between the wisdom of real interconnection and the reality of bodily danger, how do we practice? The tension can be extreme. So I've been looking at this. This came up for me very strongly yesterday, this dynamic of knowing we're connected, understanding what that means, and feeling the need to protect myself from others. And what I'm looking at and practicing with is I think there's a place in the eye of that storm. The yearning to be connected and the urge for self-protection.

[23:49]

There's a place to settle in the eye of that storm. For if we don't find a way to settle, our strength will be sapped by the buffeting winds of this paradox. affecting our ability to hear important truths, to respond with appropriate actions, to take precautionary measures, to leaven the strictness with kindness. What we want is to feel connected. How can we do so in this situation of six feet away? So, Leo, what are your thoughts on... vulnerability and the benefits of being connected? Vulnerability is a scary word sometimes. It's something that actually I was afraid of for a long time and thought I didn't need to be vulnerable to make connections.

[24:55]

And yeah, I like to be in control. And so... not being vulnerable was a way for me to control how people saw me, which is a complete illusion, but that was just how I was. And so putting up the walls and showing them certain parts of me, the parts that I thought they would like, that's kind of how I operated. But there were a number of pivotal moments, but one of them that really comes to mind is a moment I was on an airplane flying back from a conference with a friend of mine named Scott about a decade ago. And we were talking and sharing all the things we were interested in, things we had been doing. And he paused and shared a story with me about a guy he had seen give a talk on stage. And the guy had presented two different people. First one was successful, wealthy, had an amazing life, did everything right and always successful.

[25:59]

Second one had gone through... incredible struggle. His parents had died. He had to overcome poverty and disability and trauma and loss and grief and rejection. And it made it through a better person, but had gone through so much of that and still had lots of doubts and fears. And the guy on stage asked the audience, which one of those two do you connect better with? The audience answered the second one And the guy said, well, they're both me. But we can always present the good side, the successful side, or we can be vulnerable and share our fears and struggles, flaws, what we perceive as flaws, and allow for connection. And so this was Scott's way of inviting me to be vulnerable and connect with him. The rest of the plane ride, a few hours, we had together.

[27:03]

We shared all of our fears and struggles and all the ways we were falling short and beating ourselves up. And it deepened our friendship. And it kept doing that for the next five years. I'm so glad he invited me into that and that I stepped through it because in 2015 he died at a young age of 33 while climbing Mount Kilimanjaro in a freak accident. Boulder hit him. It was a tragedy. He had so much life in him, so much generosity and love. And so that's a painful memory for me, but it's also a memory of incredible gratitude that I accepted his invitation and connected with him more deeply and kept doing that over the next four or five years. And I kept doing it with others too. I did it with my wife, my kids... other loved ones, friends.

[28:04]

As a writer, I became more vulnerable and connected with people more deeply that way. And so this was me stepping into that invitation to let down those walls, let go of the control of how I was trying to present myself. And as I've deepened into that, I've noticed those walls are stopping... me from realizing that interconnectedness that you talk about. That's a much deeper level of connectedness. And it's all because of fear of loss of control. And so letting that down allows that possibility. And right now when we have so much fear of loss of control and loss of life, I think we have that opportunity to let down those walls and realize our interconnectedness and actually make that connection with others. And we don't know how much time is left.

[29:08]

So I say we take that invitation and step into it. Thank you, Leo. My sense of safety now is reliant on a barrier I place between us. And this... process solidifies my sense of a separate self. We solidify the idea of a self over here that needs to be protected from the idea of a self over there. But seeing the connections that we have, that our actual lives are, is what heals. Being overly afraid in this situation is being out of balance. leaning into the abyss that we've created of self and other. So there's a kind of a piece of the fear that's appropriate and helpful.

[30:11]

And then there's the increasing of it that is not helpful. It's harder to practice right now. Because the need to self-protect is arising side by side with the fear. So how can we hold both the need to self-protect and the need to feel connected? This is what I'm turning right now. Maybe recognize the fear is not a necessary part of protecting ourselves. We can take actions and not do it in a place of fear. The fear is extra. Can we honor the relative world's needs while resting in the teachings of kindness and connection? Let's honor the fear, but not feed it.

[31:14]

Widen around the fear to include the beauty of everything that is moving in this dynamic, changing situation. And maybe soften the heart to include all others who are suffering beside us. And find simple joys. Nature is safe. Walk in the park. Walk by the beach. Stay in the present. Don't make up disaster stories. I know you've had some experience with disaster stories. Do you want to say a little bit about that? Sure. Yeah, disaster stories. I love that term. It's something we're very good at making up, and I'm including myself in that.

[32:20]

Yeah, I've had plenty of disaster stories about what people will think of me, about what will happen if I put my work out into the world, and what will happen if I'm vulnerable in a relationship, or if this person leaves me, or right now. I think all of us have some disaster stories of what might happen. And one thing I've learned is that, first of all, we can't stop them from coming up. Our minds are just manufacturers of these kinds of stories. And second, it's another form of control, this narrative that we kind of lay over the current situation, but also how things might play out in the future. It's like, okay, it might not be very pleasant to think of it this way, but maybe I can map this out because it's complete groundlessness right now.

[33:21]

We don't know how things will turn out. And not knowing is not something we enjoy, so we lay out a narrative. It gives us a sense of knowing, even if it's really unpleasant. So it's control, but it's a complete illusion, of course, because we don't know that that'll happen. And so another thing that I've noticed is it really precludes us from... It makes us miss out on what's happening right now, being present with what's going on in us. The disaster stories... get in the way of what's going on in the moment, of connection to others in this moment. And so noticing that, that can help us to wake up. Like, what am I missing out on right now as I spin around in these stories? And the other thing is that the disaster stories are actually what feeds the fear.

[34:22]

The fear is like a little spark that happens right away because of... like a feeling of the rug being pulled out from under you and being groundless. But then the response is the disaster story, so our minds just react that way, wanting to control. Like, okay, I need to get something, some kind of ground, and coming up with a narrative. And then that feeds the fear, the fuel of that fear, or fuels the fear of the fire, flames up and starts to roar because of the disaster stories if we drop out of the story into the body again it's a pattern interrupter we're not feeding it anymore we're just being with it and so that's that's my practices as i mentioned before just drop out of that but it's um it's an unusual thing for for a lot of us maybe not the people in this this room but a lot of us to be in a situation without any story, without a narrative of how things are, how they will be, and just be in that not knowing completely without a story.

[35:30]

And I encourage everyone to practice with that because it's actually a much more beautiful, open, spacious place to be is letting that fear and even the disaster story wake you up and then Yeah, stepping into that. I actually found that to be the most beautiful place that I've ever been. It's just not having it. And so, yeah, that's been an amazing awakening for me. So feeling the difference between how it feels with the disaster story running and how it feels when that is gone. Yeah. It's letting it go for a moment. It can always... Pick it back up. And the other part of it is not to judge the stories, because we all do it, right? And it's not a bad part of you. It's not a bad experience to have a disaster story, but it's not true.

[36:32]

It's getting in the way. It's an illusion of control, and it's fueling the fear. Yeah. Thank you, Leo. So... I found this quote from Trungpa, a Tibetan teacher about fear and fearlessness. He said, as we sit, study how fear arises and how it manifests. Don't try to cast it out, but regard it as the kindling to build a big fire of fearlessness. Fear is the starting point of fearlessness. Let the experience in. It contributes to gentleness and forgiveness and increases the mind's imaginative capacity.

[37:33]

So as I said at the very beginning, I think our job now, everyone's job, is to be awake. and to bear what we're feeling and then take beneficial and kind action to help protect ourselves and our communities. Thank you.

[38:05]

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