morning, just spotlighting the video and everything, doing the things that I need to do. I have to get the Bluetooth on and connect my speakers and get this started. So trying to start with the video, sit down and we'll start in a couple minutes. But before we start, I want to welcome you and thank you for coming here this morning. It's an honor to offer you this awesome instruction.

[11:20]

And I'm looking forward to being with you for this time. So let's just sit in silence for a minute or two. And then I'll begin. This is a sound check.

[12:26]

If you can hear me, can you just do a thumbs up? Great. And can everybody see me? Just do a thumbs up if you're okay. And if you could arrange yourself so that I can see you, that would be great. And I'll adjust my camera to do that. this point. Okay, this is also an instruction. Good morning, everybody. This gesture of putting the palms together, which in this tradition is found missing. In your traditions, it's done this way. In Zen traditions, it's done this way.

[13:28]

Parallel with our expression. And this gesture means I honor everything that is awaiting you. I honor your intention in coming to Zazen Instruction. and in considering meditation as a way to help you and everybody in this world at this time. So what do we do? This is Zazen instruction for one day soon. This is an opportunity to sit all day in ourselves, And in our situation, just as we are, just as our situation is. And this Zazen that we do goes beyond learning the forms of meditation to transformation of oneself and the world.

[14:40]

This Zazen practices practice of freedom. And so all of these instructions are offered in that context. and offered in the context of honoring the Buddha and his practice, our original teacher in this language, Bodhidharma, who brought our practice to China, Ehe Dogen Zetji, who started our religion in Japan, and Shilraku Shunya, a Suzuki Boshan, who started our language in the United States. I honor my teacher, Sergeant Mel Weitzman, and all of the practitioners in our community, both here at San Francisco Center. And any benefits that I can pass on to you are from them. And any mistakes are completely mine, and I welcome your feedback.

[15:43]

Afterwards, it's okay to email me. So today, I'm going to give Zazen instruction and be done by 910 so that you can join the 925 Zazen if you so wish. And because this is a one-day sitting at home, can you hear me? There's fire engines. This is a one-day sitting at home. I want to opt for different positions that you can use for meditation so that you can maintain a sense of comfort and safety all day long. And because of sheltering in place, the sense of maintaining safety and continuity all day long is primary. So be immersed in the rhythm of creating a meditative experience at home. That's my first and primary meditation instruction. So when you choose food, choose food that helps you do that.

[16:44]

When you choose activity that's not sitting, Help yourself in the time that you are sitting by choosing activities that are conducive to settle yourself and make yourself comfortable, peaceful, and awake. And one of the things that I do is to try to arrange my space so that it really helps me to stay. And this, so you'll see that I don't have much around me, but I have a vulture there. with an image that inspires me, some flowers and a candle. You don't have to have a candle. It can be any offering that brings you in connection with your own inner light or your own inner nourishment. So it's good to establish a quiet, clean space with everything that you need. And that includes nourishing yourself physically,

[17:45]

nourishing your senses by making it beautiful, as beautiful as it is available to you. Whether you use, you know, blankets from your bed or, you know, established props like a bolster or zafu, it doesn't matter. The point is that you arrange them in a way that is conducive to your settling. And so I also want to suggest that you can decide in advance, like now, or after this instruction, how much of this one-day sitting you want to do, whether it's just the instruction and the 925 sasen, whether you want to go to the lecture, or whether you want to do half the day till lunch, three-quarters of the day till tea time. or the whole day until six o'clock. And there's links on the page that you use to sign into this instruction for you to join, but make your commitments to yourself in advance so that you know that you are giving yourself a beginning, a middle, and a close.

[19:06]

And so today's instruction does vary. A recorded version of the usual SOSM instruction is available at sfcc.org. And so I want to tell you that these ways of taking care of yourself are not just nice things that we do at the beginning, they're essential. To have a conducive space in which you feel like you're joining with other people who are sitting, even though it's at home, really supports the ability to sit. to nourish yourself appropriately, sets up a body and mind that can do that. So the practice space may begin to nourish you in a different way from the rest of the house when you do that. And you can let that feeling permeate the old house and your old life. So an altar is a concentrated way to do that.

[20:08]

You can also just have a focus point, like a rock or photos of ancestors or anything that inspires you. So with all of that in mind, let's go to the postures of meditation. So the first one is sitting in a chair. So you can see I'm in a chair. And so you can see that from the butter bumps to the crown of the head, I try to align myself straight up and down. And this is what it looks like on the side. I try to align myself upright. But also, you can see that the angle between my hips and my knees My knees are level or slightly lower than my hips.

[21:10]

This is key because the position of the hips and legs tells the spine how much it can stretch upwards. So if you feel like your buttocks or your hips or tell your spine to go this way or that way, there are things you can do. So you can take cushions And I just have two little cushions here that I took. And you can adjust on your buttocks to create a conducive height to sit. Okay, so from the buttocks to the crown of the head, you can be without any restriction. And I suggest that when you sit, that your feet will be under your knees with the lower legs straight up and down.

[22:17]

So if you put them this way or this way, they'll influence your spine once again. So have your feet in line with your knees, the toes in line with your knees. so that you're not setting up any unconscious contradictions in your posture. So here are some other sitting poses that we can do. The next one is called Seiza. And Seiza is the Virasma, the hero's pose of yoga. And you can start with your knees together or to get close together. And then you can put a cushion between your toes and sit down for comfort. And if you have knee issues, you may need to take something like a blanket or a towel and put it behind your knees so that it protects the space.

[23:33]

between the two parts of the knee, the part that's at the thigh and the part that's at your chin. So those are the two parts of the knee chain. And you can always prop yourself up. And this is what it looks like on the side. So with the toes straight back, And I'm balancing on my shins and not on my knees. And this is key. So you see it's the same posture as in the chair. And I'm balancing on my shins and not on my knees. But suppose the front of your ankles are tight. And there's a space between your ankles and the floor. and the knees are going heavily downwards. In that case, create a stair step so that your ankles are punctual.

[24:41]

Apply a leg or two, and again, balance on your shins so that you can sit down. So that takes the pressure off the knees. The next posture that we're going to look at, and it's common for you to follow on these postures, but you can, is a simple cross-legged position. I've tried to wear simple clothes and put a simple background so that you can see. So to do a simple cross-legged pose, you sit down and you take one leg and just put that leg in front of you. Bend it and put it in front of you. And then bend the other leg so that the heels are under your knees. That's a simple cross-cutting position. But what do you do if you need more support? Well, you can put more height under your buttocks like a chair.

[25:45]

And if your knees need more support, you can take a blanket or towel and pull it in. Okay? So all you do is pull it in so that there's the ankle and the shin. And of course, if your ankles are stiff, you can roll a washcloth and put it under the ankle or under the foot in a comfortable way. Okay, so there's four sitting postures. There's the one that can call stesa, which is the sit-hasana of yoga, which is from a wide-leaning position. You take One heel, I put it in front of the center of the body. So the legs are way out. And I take the other heel, I put it in front of the first heel. And it's very stable from side to side. Or what some people will do is to tuck the foot between the thigh and the calf of the opposite leg.

[26:53]

Okay, and this is the costume of the Horsesha, which is a very stable costume. And Siddhasana, this posture, is a pose that a lot of people use. And then finally there are postures recommended by the stages, which are half or full purpose. And how you do that is that you scoop the ankle in front of one leg and put back heel up close to the, close to your belly button. So this top of the foot angle weighs down the opposite thigh. And for half lotus, just tuck that other foot on your knees and sit with this thigh weight down by the foot. And because it's 8, 10 in the morning, I'm gonna bring the other leg up on top for the lotus.

[27:57]

It's usually afternoon by the time. And you can change postures as you need to change them. So those are a few seated postures you can do. But some people can't sit in a seated posture and be stable and comfortable. So I also want to show you a lying down posture or two that you can use at your boats. So the first one is, what if you have back problems and need to meditate in a lying down position? Here's the way to develop. So you use a chair or a table, and the function of the chair or the table will be to lift the legs so that you can rest your back.

[28:58]

Then, you'll lie down and put the lower legs on the chair like this. The way you lie down, a whole outline of the back body needs to rest on the floor. If you're very Buddhist girl, you can arrange Buddhist girl overuse of methods. Then you can bring your arms up to the side. But some people with back issues will have a pinch dip, even in this posture. So you can take your hands and adjust your buttocks towards the heels and away from the center of the body. Or you can even take a blanket or two and put that against you as a fist. which will get a feeling of stability in the low back. So this posture emphasizes back support, back comfort for the low back.

[30:08]

I'll give you a couple of other lying down positions that you can use. So what if you're working on your immune system? This is a good time to do it. And what if you want to continue that work on nourishing your immune system into your meditation? Close. Will you notice a lying down with my head towards Buddha? That reminds me of waiting in this situation. And then you can put a bolster of folded blankets behind you and lie down around them which has support, your arms down, and your legs resting. Again, to protect your look back, adjust it so it's away from your waist, and so that it's brought to the sides as well. And this one emphasizes the breath.

[31:14]

If you have to emphasize awakeness, because lying veil puts you to sleep, then do support your head, but balance something between your hands. And if you fall asleep, there it goes. Anyway, so you notice that all of these postures have something in common. All of these postures are upright, from the body bumps to the crown of the head. But how about the rest of the pose? So we sit upright with the body wide as well as tall. So from the center of the body out to the tips of the shoulders, the body is wide as well as tall.

[32:25]

so that the arms can release downwards from the back of the upper arm where it meets the shoulder to the lower. And when it does that, the upper part of the body lifts and opens just like in the lower position. We use a posture of the hands called dhyana mudra. So if you look at your hands, at the middle finger, there's a couple joints. And those two joints overlap for jhana muja. And then the thumbs go gently together with the tips of the thumbs touching. Now, Dogen says, put your right hand under your left. But I switch every period to develop my shoulders evenly, just as I switch my legs every period to develop my legs and hips evenly. So what's the position of this dhyana vujo?

[33:34]

So in the body, I look someplace between my pubic bone and my belly button, someplace between here and here, there's a position in which when you circle it with your hands, it will feel more energetic. And so I find that position. and bring my little finger to my body so that the roundness of the mudra or steel, that's what this hand position is called, is circled in the energetic place. And then you can fine tune the posture. So you'll notice that if you take your hands a little bit outwards, that the, one set of muscles tenses and one set releases in your neck. And if you move your hands a little bit inwards, another set of muscles tenses and another set of muscles releases in your neck.

[34:37]

So this is kind of the Goldilocks and the Three Bears approach in which you want to make it to be just right. So this is the fine tuning of the meditation pose through the hand position, physical fine tuning. Where does it go? And for me, I like it not falling outwards, which tenses my back of the neck and puts me in kind of an adrenalinized or dull state, or not too much towards my body, which kind of tenses the front of my neck and puts me into a tense state. But just in the middle, with the little finger, firmly touching. So then the energy of the arms holds up the mudra. But there's more fine tuning that needs to be done.

[35:38]

I'm getting really close so you can see my face. So in normal life, our senses go outwards to try to find objects. We're pretty object oriented. So in normal life, we kind of do this, or we're withdrawn like that. But in Zazen, the eyes are as if they were straight or level to start, with the inner corners of the eyes releasing inwards, and the eyes wide like Buddha eyes, so that the cheekbones are relaxed, the eyes are relaxed this way. And then, Take your eyes and lower them about halfway so that the inner gaze is about at this angle. If it's too much in or too much out, you'll notice that the attention gets fine-tuned in different ways.

[36:47]

I leave it up to you to understand which way it needs to be tuned. The breath is gently through the nose. Gently through the nose, but with an awareness of where the breath is, in the neck, the oral cavernies, and in the chest. Okay? Your tongue. Dogenzenji, founder in Japan, says the tongue should gently curl upwards. with the base of the tongue resting and the tip of the tongue just behind the foot moving out. But I say, put your tongue in a relaxed place where it's not inwardly talking to you. And then the ears, which usually reach out after sounds like, oh, is that someone who talked? Is that my cat? You know, they can be quiet. So this is...

[37:48]

Roughly what it's like. So I'm just going to ask you to do this for a second, then you're going to take your hands away. But what I want you to do is just take your thumbs and put them at the tray back. You see my AirPods are in here, but the tray is these little protrusions of skin, cartilage, and just put them there so you can hear what a quiet ear sounds like. Okay, you feel that? When the ears go in, The attention goes in. Okay? And then with your upright, open, deep posture, so from the lower back of the ribs to the front of the stern, deep posture, and your gaze down, let the intelligence of the lower body just go like it's nourishing you. The intelligence of the heart and the intelligence of the head need to meet. so that the head intelligence is not dominating your sitting, but the nourishing intelligence of the lower body, the emotional intelligence of the heart region are represented.

[39:03]

Okay? So those are some features of the Zazen pose. And the Zazen practice is something else again. So now I wanna talk a little bit about Zazen practice, but first I'm gonna repeat some of the instructions. We'll have a little mini period of Zazen, and then I'll go on and teach something about the Zazen practice itself and we'll sit again. Is that okay? If I did that? These are not gonna be long and then I'll leave time for Q&A. So, Zazen, practice. So if you adjust yourself in any comfortable position that I'm taught, you can sit in a chair with an appropriate height under your buttocks.

[40:05]

You can sit Seiza, which is kneeling but resting on your shins with knee support or without knee support. You can sit in a simple cross-legged position, in a Burmese position with your shins on the floor, or with your foot tucked between the thigh and cap of the opposite leg. Or you can sit in half lotus or full lotus. And once you sit, you can understand whether you need to lie down. And if you're lying down, these instructions apply too. So once you're in this posture, just for a second, take your hands and push them down on the surface you're sitting on so that you can lighten your buttock bones. And then when you keep yourself tall, like you are right now, you can let your buttock bones rest downwards on the sitting surface.

[41:13]

And the equivalent when you're lying down is to take your hands to smooth the skin of the buttocks away from the waist and out to the side. And then your body is settled in its relation to the earth. And not whether you're sitting in any one of the postures or lying down from the hips all the way up to the armpits. Go upwards. And how you would practice this if your body doesn't understand is to just use your fingertips on your cushion and press them down so that your body has an understanding of how to lift up. Balance your head. Put your hands in the budra, or if you're lying down, put them on you in a comfortable place or out to the side. And now begin to balance the actions of the body upright, open, and deep with the actions of the senses.

[42:32]

So adjust the ears so that they're right over the shoulders and over the hips. Let your eyes rest down. the intelligence of the heart and the head meet. And let your eyes be wide from the inner corners to the outer corners, the cheekbones wide. You can feel that width on the exhalation. Let the breath come gently through the nose in whatever way it wants to. Let the tongue, the bulk of the tongue, rest open and in its own shape. If the tip gently curls upward, that's fine, but let it be still. And let your skin relax.

[43:37]

So over the shoulders and down the back, from the edges of the neck to the tips of the shoulders. from the tips of the shoulders down to the elbows, from the pubic bone to the chest and out to the sides. The lower back releasing downwards out to the sides. That skin can rest. And you may feel as if the air permeates the skin, and that's okay. And now fine-tune the muja. So with the little finger, close to the body, you need to adjust a little bit up or down so that you can feel the nourishing attention in the palm of your hand, the nourishing vital energy in the palm of your hand. With the thumb tips gently touching and adjust them a little closer to the body or further from the body until your attention matches

[44:48]

your intention. And now immerse yourself in the rhythm of the breath within the safe container of the body and mind. And let the breath be another sensible thing for you. The breath telling you how your attention and experience is. I'm going to be silent so that you can experience this. Not learning meditation, but recreating this safe container, upright, open, deep, for whatever comes up, whatever goes away. end of the Zazen period.

[46:06]

You'll hear a bell if it's a Zen Center period. You won't if it's at home unless you set one. But you can put your hands together and bow. Dedicate your Zazen. Whether it's a 30-second period or a four-hour period, it's the same thing. And so now, I want to just unmute to ask if there's any questions so far. Okay, so I'm going to unmute all. In the middle of the night, wake up. I want to hear somebody who's not mute. And then there's a... ask any questions. Okay.

[47:09]

Okay. And then if you want to ask a question, unmute yourself. Someone has their hand raised. Let's see who it is. Oh, Takedo and John. So let's start with Takedo and then John. Okay. Takedo, you want to ask? Hello, Victoria. Thank you for your instructions today. My question has to do with what you said about changing which leg is in front or behind every other period. I'm finding that one of my knees is more prone to feeling a sense of being pinched or to a pinching feeling than the other knee. Yeah. over time I tend to I do switch my legs but I don't switch every other period and I'm wondering if that's a mistake because part of it is about avoiding the pinching feeling and hopefully caring for what I see is my like slightly more susceptible to discomfort knee or whether or not perhaps I'm missing something by not training that knee

[48:28]

with more, you know, in the direction of just like a bigger capacity or something. Does that mean? Yeah, well, no, I don't want to train your knee. I want to train the rest of you to give your knee more capacity because the knee is not, okay, this is a test. How do knees bend? Do they bend this way or do they bend this way? I think knees bend this way. They only bend in one plane. And if knees go like this, they're not happy. So I think what I wanna do is give you a couple of tools for knee safety that anyone can try. Would that be okay? It's okay? Yes, yes, that would be wonderful, thank you. Okay, so I'm gonna go get a strap, but you can use a watch pot for a saw. And so this is what I suggest you do. Okay, now I didn't come prepared for this, or you may not be able to see the backs of my legs.

[49:32]

I wanted to do this if you don't just, somebody else did this yesterday. I wanted to do this today. So these are my, I have my lower legs in view, and you'll notice that when my legs bend, there's a place, you'll notice that you can put your hands into that joint and let the legs are back. That place becomes deeper. Okay, so what I'm going to ask you to do is to, and everybody can do this, is to take one leg and just hold behind the knee with your two hands. Okay? Hold behind the knee and Sorry, I saw a message there. And you'll feel that there's two tendons. And in Zaza, most tendons need to remain soft to keep the knee safe.

[50:34]

And it's the inner one that a lot of people get had trouble with. But some people have trouble with the outer one. You can protect both of them by using a saw or a strap. And here I'm using white straps. You can see it on my black pants. And I'm putting it at the place where the leg bends to support the tendon. And so when I cross my thread, that knee is protected. It's a spacer. And I thought I'm using the strap to lengthen my side. I have to come close, sorry. There's some chats. Sorry, I have no sound, can you help? I don't know how to help. If you have no sound, I think it's an adjustment for your computer. I'm sorry. Could somebody chat Joyce and give her some suggestions?

[51:41]

So you can use your hands to adjust your leg and space the inner knee. But if the knee is up, then you have to sit higher so that the hip range of motion is accommodating. So you'll notice that if I sit on the floor, and I'm simulating this because I don't actually have this problem, but I might sit on the floor and my knees might be up, but if I sit up on cushions, the range of motion of the hip is accommodating. So, I would suggest that you increase the tools in your toolbox for knee safety so that you can switch. Because if you don't switch, you're spreading the problem to your hips and your back. It might not happen now. It probably will take years. But at a certain point, if you don't switch, this part of the body will start to feel old and stiff.

[52:53]

Okay, so, but if you switch, you'll be maintaining the flexibility of the hips and the symmetry of the long back, which is really good safety measure, not just for your knees, but for the rest of you as well. Is that okay, Takano? John? Thank you. Thanks so much. John? Thank you so much, Fear. instruction and offering so far. I'm trying to, in holding the mudra, do you want, so my natural tendency is to actually have my hands and arms rest on my legs. Okay. So, because that's more supportive, but I don't know if that interferes with my attentiveness or not. It's fun, especially if you're sitting there. Mudras are seals of particular and so they're practices, okay?

[53:58]

They're practices that you can do, and particularly at home, they're practices you don't have to do. So there isn't any like mudra police coming at you to make sure your mudra is correct. It's your time with yourself, okay? You're the boss. Yeah, and I noticed also that In your shoulder posture, you have some tension where your back and shoulders beat and also in the front of the body under your collarbones. Oh, I'm not sitting down. Yeah, I know. You carry some tension there. I can see by the thickening of the muscles. I'm sorry, I'm a yoga teacher. No, that's perfect. I appreciate it. Yeah, so one of the things that you can do is tend to your door. pretend I'm in a door, is to put your hands against the door jamb and explore those arm and shoulder connections.

[55:02]

So I'm pretending to support my hands against the door jamb and coming forward, which allows me to explore the arm and shoulder connections. So that's something that you can do at home. But something you can do is awesome. You don't need to fuss with yourself. That's the whole point of You don't have to fuss with yourself to wake up. So one of the things you can do to begin to explore the buddha is literally to support the hands where the buddha would be. And then you can see if you can transfer the responsibility for the restfulness from your hands and your torso as you begin to bring your hands in. Does that make sense? Yes, it does. So you can practice kind of a passive positioning of your arms and see what the implications are for your torso, what has to lift and what has to release to have your arms even that way at all.

[56:08]

And then you can gradually begin to change the amount of support you have. When you're in half-lowness, the support might be your foot, right? And you know, in Seiza, of course, it isn't. But the Seiza is one of the easiest postures to explore this. Because if you're sitting in Seiza, you have the whole length of your body unimpeded. So you can kind of explore, okay, what would it be to do mudra for one minute? What about that fine-tuning of in and out? And often you can do a practice like that for one minute or five minutes. And it will really tell you a lot about the safety and the pitfalls of your own particular meditation posture. So I want to offer that. Is that okay? Yes. No, thank you so much.

[57:09]

I appreciate it. Thanks. I appreciate your question. These are good questions, really helpful questions. so are are we good or do you have are there more questions that need to be unmuted hi hi oh is this maria yes hello hi how are you it has been so great thank you so much i learned new postures that i will try them today I noticed for me it helps me more to sit with the cross legs. And I have been trying to do the... I don't know the names, but to bring the leg, the foot all the way up to the... to this type. What, I don't know, exercises or did you recommend to be able to do it?

[58:13]

Because now I am a little bit older. Okay. I would like little by little to be able to do the cross-legged. It really makes a difference. The other day I tried it. It lasted very, very little time. But I noticed a difference in my, I don't know, in my centeredness. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, because when the feet hold down the legs, the body spontaneously rises. And you can feel the inner body, not just the outer body. You can feel the connection between your posture and your emotional life. Yeah. And how the breath suits it. Yeah. Like if the legs, you know how I felt like when I had my baby and I cut him? Yes. He moves. Exactly. That was the image I got when I was like that, like, ah, that's why the legs needs to be like tight.

[59:14]

Okay. So for people who have not seen Maria, you know, Maria has been practicing for a long time. And so that gives some benefits and some disadvantages. So the benefits are that you have the maturity to recognize this. Your experience is matured. And you have sensitivity because you feel safe in your meditation process. You have the curiosity and creativity that come from long acceptance and meeting life as it is. Okay, the disadvantage is the more experience we have in meeting life as it is, the older we are. And things happen to us. Okay, so I'm 67 years old and I was in a bunch of bad accidents about 10 years ago. So I have to recreate my sitting pose every day. And I wanna tell you that some of the things that I've found most helpful first are anything that frees up the hips and the ankles, but particularly the inner hips.

[60:26]

So to free up the inner hips, you have to work the outer hips. So for instance, if you just stand up and you can see my hips now and try to keep facing forward and just put one leg up like this sideways, what you'll notice is that the buttocks begin to do that. So just the flexibility required to keep the body facing forward and the hips stay tight with the leg bent or straight, sorry, it's a balanced pose, bent or straight, okay, are just that much will help. If you stand in your poses or see the poses in which you take the legs through a variety of movements will help, okay?

[61:32]

Or sitting, any sitting pose or practice, which you take place to write movements, while keeping the knees aligned, because you have to keep your knees safe. So you can spread the legs, you can put the one leg in different positions that you lean, one leg and stays up, one leg with the knee out and the foot in and so on. So those girls have flexibility exercises. To work with them in such a way that the body bones continue to meet the thing you're sitting on and you continue to face forward will give flexibility to the hips. Or you have to protect the knees. Anyway, you have to work. Before that, I have a chat. coming in, you have to work for that, but not so hard that the body says no. Use your experience to work in a way the body says yes.

[62:36]

And then we become ageless. And whether you do full lotus like the Buddha, or whether you work towards full lotus, will not matter. If you do full lotus for one minute, that's one minute of zazen in full lotus. Right? So that's one moment of life in full lotus. Even if you do it for a second, that's one moment. And if you never do it, that's the moment of doing zazen in your own posture, whatever that is today. And so Guggenzeji says, the Dharma that I speak of is not learning meditation. It is simply the Dharma gate of repose and bliss, the practice realization of totally culminated enlightenment.

[63:39]

Traps and snares can never reach it. Once it's hard as grass, you're like a tiger entering the mountain, like a dragon, sporting in the water. Okay, so you have freedom wherever you are. So this is so important to have a discipline of freedom in which it doesn't matter if you can do lotus or it matters, of course it matters. But it makes no difference to zaza in itself. Do it the way you are and you'll learn compassion. Do it in full lotus and you'll learn something subtle about the wisdom of the post. Okay? So good, I'm glad the person who had difficulty in accessing the sound finally accessed the sound. And I wanted to state that COTA recorded the main part of the instruction so we can get it again.

[64:41]

Thank you so much. Thanks. Victoria, this is Victoria. Hi, Victoria. I'm looking for you on the screen. Good to see you. I do. Great. I want to take daily for 20 minutes, and always between the 15 to 20-minute mark, both legs fall completely asleep. Yeah. Do you have any suggestions? Yes. You need to know if your legs are falling asleep in a constructive or a damaging way. So that's the first thing you need to find out. Constructive way will be where the legs fall asleep and immediately wake up as soon as you rock back and forth a little bit. A damaging way is if the legs fall asleep and then it takes a long time for them to wake up when you stand. So the real damage that you need to look for and not do is when you're sciatic, when there's numbness, tingling or radiating pain.

[65:53]

So sciatic pain, It's one of the biggest nerves in the body. It comes from the lower back, there's branches, many branches, and then it goes right outside the body bones, and then it separates with part of it inside and part of it outside the leg. And what that means in Zazen is if you sit on the sciatic nerve, the back of the leg won't fall asleep. and on the whole leg I fall asleep because the sciatica drops all the way around the outside and all the way around the inside of the leg. So places where customarily the pressure points are here at the bottom, just outside the bottom, or here just outside the knee, or here at the outside of the ankle. So what I do to work with sciatica, and you can do this too if you want, is to take a cushion and put it diagonally on my software.

[67:03]

And then I put one on top of the cushion on one side of the point and one on the other. So then what happens is the sciatic nerve has these little wells or spaces where it doesn't touch. So now, I'm sitting in the sciatic mirror is not compressed at all. It's actually hanging in that space between my body bones. My thighs are not crunched against the cushion, although I can feel the touch of my thighs to the cushion. They don't crunch, so that helps. But what I would say, if your legs fall asleep in that non-constructed way that move, Okay, just accept that there's something you need to learn and allow yourself to hopefully accept the condition of the body and chalk it up to your learning.

[68:07]

And just acknowledge the mistake, like whoops. You can say whoops. You can say something specific like, I sat on the nerve. or the circulation is impeded. And then let your legs rest. You can hold your outer knee and bring it up using your hand and let the legs rest and then reset. Okay? And by doing that, you'll train yourself. Your body will gradually increase in understanding. Now, I want to say a word. hear also. And men's is important for you to hear too. It happens with men as well as with women. But I want to say women because it's very ghostly. There's different phases in a woman's life that require different ways to sit. So women of childbearing age will notice if you look hard, not hard, but firmly, firm attention in Zazen.

[69:19]

you'll notice that just before the period begins, there's a couple days when the body is very flexible. And that's because part of releasing that flow for menstruation is the body secreting the hormone called relaxin. That both makes you very susceptible to insight, but also makes the body very, you know, so the physical strength can't really be applied at that time. It also changes, the hormone imbalance changes, so there may be other things that happen too, but that's one of the main things. Whereas at different times of the month, the body is drier and more bone-oriented. During that time, it's very organ-oriented. So you have to change your zazen position to be more supportive and nourishing at that time. And the same thing at other times of a woman's life. So for pregnancy, the posture is very different.

[70:21]

You have to support a wide, open posture that has a lot of back support so that you can lift yourself up off of that weight. But again, in pregnancy, it gives things that are very unusual, hardly ever experienced in human life. So in pregnancy, you'll feel... that you're sitting right in the center of the universe and you'll feel that new life. And you'll feel non-duality directly from the body to the mind. Okay? And the baby might even remind you. Okay? Anyway, I have to say that we're getting close to the end of our time. We only have about five minutes. So I can't go into this that deeply, but... If anyone's interested, we could talk more about it. But I do also want to say that andropause happens as well as menopause. So sitting there in a nourishing way with men experiencing the gradual change of life, women experience it in a different way.

[71:30]

But the point is to meet ourselves as we are from the body to the brain, not thinking about ourselves and being bossy or kind of, you know, using the power to, like little riders of horses, with the body being the horse, go, go, we can't do that. It doesn't lead to integration, to nourishment, or to seeing who we really are. So starting by... meeting the body where it is, is direct experience of compassion and skillful needs. So we have to start by being nonviolent to the body in its actual condition, just as it is. So I hope that helps. And I want, yeah, thanks. I wanna, I wanna just dedicate the work we've done today.

[72:32]

I think the, Room for the 925 Zazen is just about to open now. So if you want to join 925 Zazen, it's the, I think that it's the same link as for morning Zazen. You go to online offerings, then it says online Zendo and you click the Zoom link. But if you're joining the sitting for the rest of the day, some of the Zendo events after lecture will be on this one. So you have to understand how to do that and do give yourself the benefit of understanding what you want to do. Oh, it looks like Kodo is saying that you can stay right here in this room for 925 Zazet with a smile. Okay. So I'm going to get off now and feel free to Write, if you have any questions, if you write to City Center or you write to me, it's okay.

[73:45]

And just say, send your questions to me if you want me to answer them and they'll send them to someone else and that's okay with me if you want them to answer. Okay? I wanna wish you the best day. in shelter in place with a whole different meaning for shelter in place. Okay. And please take care of yourself. And please take care of yourself in a way that benefits your whole life. And that will help not only you, but everyone around you for this whole time and for times to come. So thank you. I dedicate this for the benefit of all beings and I send you warm wishes and please enjoy. Thank you very much. Thanks Kodo. Thanks everyone. Okay.

[74:45]

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