Welcome everyone to our second call and the Manifesting the Wisdom of the Body online retreat. I see we have a bunch of people who have called in and I'd just like to welcome you to tonight's call. And, you know, we thought to start us off, this is Robert Thomas and I'm here with Samantha. And we thought to start us off, maybe Samantha could do a very simple conversation grounding exercise with us. So maybe you could all get comfortable and Samantha will lead us through a little exercise just to get us all, so to speak, in our bodies and connected to each other. So Samantha? Thank you, Robert. Thanks so much. Hello, everyone. Welcome. So glad to see so many people on the call tonight. So let's take a moment just to come into our body and come into the space where we're at.

[01:08]

Take a moment just to feel your body. Feel where you're touching the ground underneath you. Whatever is underneath you, just feel your body in contact with whatever is underneath you. And then relax. Let yourself relax your body. We'll take two breaths and just feel the length of the inhalation as the breath moves into your body and then feel the length of the exhalation. And then we'll do that one more time, very simply, just being aware of the breath for the whole length of the inhalation and the length of the exhalation. Just feel the breath in your body, feel where it moves. Feel what the breath feels like. And as you exhale that second breath, just let your body relax a little more.

[02:11]

Feel yourself arriving just right where you are. Okay. Thank you, everyone. Thank you for being here. And Rob, I'll turn it back over to you. Okay. Thanks, Samantha. I wish that every time I got on the phone and had a conversation that your voice could be there telling me to do that. Now I feel so different right now. Oh well, I don't think that's gonna happen, but maybe we could develop some kind of app for that. Yeah, sure. But as Samantha said, welcome everyone. I hope you've been able to watch and listen to at least one of the videos for week number one and have started to practice together with us and with others here in our four-week online retreat. In this call, our focus is going to be on understanding how to support you in your intention to practice and to develop a personal practice and also help you get the most out of our four weeks of practice together to really start engaging with you and helping you

[03:27]

establish your practice, helping you work with the materials that we're sending you. And most important here at the end of week one is to check in with all of you and see how your practice is going. And are you able to practice? And if not, where are the obstacles? And how can we support you to work skillfully with those? So before we move on, I'd like to introduce Barry, who's also here on the call with us, and he's our technical support person, and he's going to be coming in at various times, and I'd just like to introduce Barry. Welcome, Barry. Yeah, thank you, Robert and Samantha, and welcome, everyone. Thank you, Barry, for being on the call with us. Robert, should I start now? Yeah, sure. Do you have more to say? Okay, great. Nope. So, welcome everyone.

[04:30]

I want to talk a little bit about what we did last week. I hope that you've been able to watch the yoga and zazan practice video where you got to start with a relaxation practice, a little bit of breathing into the low abdomen and connecting with the lower part of the body and the relationship to the earth. If you haven't watched... and practice with those videos very much. I hope you'll do those videos at least twice. If you've just joined the retreat, and I know that there are a lot of people who've just signed up and just joined the retreat in the last few days, before you start with the week two practices, please take a few days to really deepen into the week one videos. Really take that time. because it works with our relationship with the earth and the relationship with the lower part of the body. That's a really important part of meditation practice, is connecting to the earth and really feeling connected to the place where you are with gravity.

[05:38]

And I also want to suggest that as we move into other practices this week, that you will continue in your daily life consciously remember the experiences that you've had of connecting with the feeling of being in your legs, the feeling of having your breath reside in the low abdomen because these really connect us to our center and to the ground. And just by consciously remembering what those practices feel like, this will recreate the experience in your mind and body. It will cement these neurological connections in your nervous system, and you'll start to be making more permanent changes in your nervous system, in your body and mind, so that you'll be experiencing your body and mind in a new way. So just by consciously remembering and tuning in to what that practice feels like, you're continuing to transform in

[06:48]

in ways that are beneficial for you. So I just wanted to give you that suggestion. And I also want to say that the practices from week one are really great for people with low back issues. I know this is a really common issue. So if that is an issue for you, you can continue to use the week one yoga practice video. Keep going back to it during the rest of the retreat. and continue to benefit your lower back that way. Okay, so that's all I wanted to say for now. I'll turn it back over to you, Robert. Thanks, Samantha. So to start us off in our more of an interactive way, we'd like you to participate in a very simple and fun poll here. So the question is, question we're asking you right now to start is how many times were you able to practice meditation or yoga last week either one how many times were you able to practice meditation or yoga and don't worry you're not going to be you're not graded or judged this is all anonymous we don't know who you are and how you're voting we just want to get a sense of how it's going for people how it's going for you and

[08:14]

and this is just one of many ways, and we thought it might be kind of fun. So we've asked Barry to set up this poll, and I believe you can press one to five on your phone keypad, and one for I was able to practice one time this last week. And if it was zero, that's okay. It was week one. I know we're just all starting off together. But if it's week one, don't press anything. If it was one time, press one and all the way up to five. And if you practiced more than five times, then just press five. Okay? Will that work, Barry? Yeah, perfect. So, again, press between nothing and five, nothing if you didn't do any, and one, two, three, four, five. That corresponds to a number of times, and we're due to the poll. Okay, great. And again... The results are coming in. Do you want to share the results just to kind of know what's going on in the space?

[09:18]

Yeah, boy, we have a lot of people at five, yeah. So interesting. It's election night here in the U.S., and it's election night here just as far as polls. So it's just information. Do you want to read it or do you want me to read it? What's your comfort level on that? Go ahead and read it off. Yeah, so I'm going to read the percentages. So 9%. were able to do it once, 12% were able to do it twice, 6% were able to do it three times, 12% were able to do it four times, and 40% did it five times or more. That is fantastic. Congratulations, everybody, for your practice. Are we still getting votes in, or is that pretty much it? No, they're solid. Yeah, okay. Well, 40% of you were able to practice at least five times this last week. That is really great. I'm astounded, actually. And, of course, you know, you sign up for the retreat to be able to practice, but still, sometimes it's not so easy.

[10:25]

And thank you to all the people, the 9%. who were able to practice once this last week, at least you did it once, so congratulations, that's fantastic. And everybody at two, three, four, and five, wonderful, thanks a lot. You know, as Samantha said, so much of this is just about creating new patterns in our life, new patterns in our body, new patterns in our mind. You know, we've... I don't know how old anybody is out there, but for most of us, you know, we've had a pretty long life and we've been doing things the way we know how to do them and in ways that make us happy. And sometimes we start to develop these patterns. You know, we set these kind of...

[11:27]

set ourselves in motion to keep going in the same direction, you know, repeating ourselves. And so practice is actually a way to work with that skillfully, a way to in some ways question our patterns, our habits, this habit energy that kind of propels us forward in the same way over and over and over again. So returning to the experience of the present moment and setting up that pattern of doing that over and over again, just returning. Well, how is it now? Like Samantha said at the very beginning, noticing as our breath went in and out of our body. Well, how does that feel, actually? So even just noticing that, that changes everything. And so our practice becomes... becomes a process of stringing together these very small moments, relatively small moments of noticing. You know, we string them together.

[12:30]

In some ways, our practice isn't one huge event or isn't one huge, like, big sudden change in our life, but actually it's more like, you know, small moments of noticing strung together one after the other. creating that connection, reconnecting, remembering, recognizing what that feels like, like Samantha said, over and over again. This is difficult, but as we start to do it, we start to create new habits, reinforce new patterns, create new habit issues, energies. And I just want to reinforce right now how important it is to do a longer period of practice. You know, it's important that we notice through the day, oh, you know, I'm a little bit anxious right now, and just come back to our breath, come back to the experience of being in our body.

[13:36]

But if we can really like take like 20, 30, 40 minutes in our day and find that time and really just get a little bit deeper than usual and give that gift to ourselves, take care of ourselves in that way. We'll find that throughout the day, it's even easier to reconnect with that feeling, use that practice that we engaged in, that we went deep in over those 20, 30, 40 minutes earlier in the day. We can use that as a touchstone, a reference point. for remembering, oh, yes, okay, I can just reconnect with my breath right now. I can just do that. And bit by bit, step by step, moment by moment, day after day, this makes everything different, just like everything was different after we took those couple of breaths at the beginning of this call.

[14:39]

And that's our practice. And in many ways, that's all we have to do. that's where we find our enlightenment, our waking up is in just those moments of reconnecting, oh, this is my breath, you know, right here. Thanks, Samantha. Should I go? Hello, yes. Okay, great. So I just wanted to say a little bit about that to follow up with Robert. You know, our lives are very busy and we live so much of the time if we really tune into what's going on in our mind in a state of mental chaos. You know, our minds are going very, very fast. So if we can take some time to practice every day, really give ourselves, you know, 20 minutes, 30 minutes, 40 minutes to take the time to

[15:43]

drop our awareness into our body, doing our yoga practice and doing our bazaar practice, that this, you know, as I said in the beginning, it imprints on our nervous system. We start to make new patterns. And we give ourselves a chance by bringing ourselves into our body to let the mental static and the mental chatter calm down and slow down. then our minds will be more clear and then there's a whole world of experience and knowledge that begins to open itself up to us. It's the world of the wisdom of the body that starts to open up. But it takes that commitment to a regular practice in order for that world to open up to us. So again, the practice that we're asking you to do in both the yoga and the meditation, it's the same practice for the yoga, for the meditation, and for our daily life.

[16:49]

It's very simple, very straightforward practice. We are just becoming aware of what is going on. What is going on with the body? What are the sensations we're experiencing? How is the breath right now? So anytime you do that, anytime you stop and notice that, that's also practicing. That's practicing meditation, that's practicing yoga. So as Robert said, it's easier to build this habit of mind of paying attention to your experience moment to moment if you set aside a time every day just to do your practice. And so back to you, Robert. So I'm going to ask all of us on the call right now to take just a moment and think about a vision for your life as if you had established this regular practice.

[17:59]

And maybe a lot of you have established a regular practice, and that's fantastic. So even think about that vision for your life, this vision of our life with a regular meditation and yoga practice, a regular practice that does just what we were talking about, brings us into our body, reconnects us with the experience of our body. So take just a minute right now to think about having this intention for What would that look like? What would that feel like in your life? What would that be like? So I'm going to give us just a minute to picture that, create this picture, create this image in your mind of what would it be like if I was successful in manifesting this vision of a daily practice, a mindfulness practice, a practice that brought me into the experience of myself.

[19:00]

body and mind. So holding that vision. Now, think about the obstacles in your life that you are currently facing, the obstacles that are actually presenting themselves and preventing you from realizing this vision. So we think that we have this some kind of sense that that people who have joined this retreat have the intention to focus on their practice and develop their practice, deepen their practice together. For some people, it's actually just establishing a practice. But what are the obstacles in your life that are currently presenting themselves and preventing you from realizing this vision of your life? that you have this picture of your life. So right now I'd like to, holding that vision and the obstacles that are preventing you from realizing, from manifesting that vision in your life, I'd like us all to break up into groups of three or four.

[20:20]

And what I'd like you to do in these groups is, And we're going to be in these groups for about six minutes, six, seven minutes, depending on how many people we have in the group. So some groups are going to be three and some groups are going to be four. So for six or seven minutes, we'll be together. You'll just be in your group. You'll just be able to talk to the two or three other people in your group. and I'm going to ask each one of you to speak for about two minutes, and we're going to give you some help with that. We're going to ring a bell after two minutes, and then once you hear the bell, just go ahead and finish up your thoughts and switch to the next person. So we'll ring a bell at two minutes, and we may go a little bit longer if we have a lot of groups of four, but that'll be pretty much the form. And during those two minutes,

[21:22]

I'd like you to share your main obstacle to practice. And then think of and share at least one idea or one change of habit that will allow you to overcome that obstacle. So again, just to repeat, just to make it perfectly clear, you can first introduce yourselves, say, I'm Sally, and my main obstacle to practice is this. And I've been thinking that if I just did this or whatever idea you have that would help you transform that obstacle into not an obstacle anymore, but actually a path to practice. So one idea that will change and allow you to overcome your obstacle. So I hope that's clear. I think we can break out into the groups right now.

[22:22]

I think you'll find Barry, would you like to tell us? Oh, and then we'll come back to the larger group and we'll have a discussion about all of that. But Barry, would you like to tell us what to do now? Yeah, just you're gonna go into your breakouts, you're gonna hear the bell and it will say breakout begin. If you have any technical problems, you fall off the line, you come back, you're not in your group, you can't hear anything like that, just press five in your keypad. Most of you have groups of three, a few of you have groups of four. And here we go. We'll see you in about six minutes. Okay, enjoy. You are now in a breakout. Please begin. Please bring your conversation to a close. This breakout session is now ending. Welcome back, everybody.

[23:25]

We're back here as one big group again. I hope you enjoyed that. I hope you had enough time to share your obstacles and an idea or two about how you think you might meet them. I'm wondering if anybody would like to share anything that they came up with, any insights, any obstacles, any ideas they have for for changing a habit or overcoming their obstacles. And if you'd like to share something with a larger group or talk about resolving or getting some help with your obstacle, please go ahead and raise your hand and we'll call on you and we'll pull you into the room and you'll be live with everybody and we'll all be able to hear. So please, I encourage you, if anybody out there would like to share your thoughts please raise your hand now. Perfect. So as people are pressing one on their keypads to raise their hand, we're gonna bring the mic, and I hope I get your name pronounced correct.

[24:30]

I wanna say Lou. Welcome. Hi, yes, I'm Lou, and just doing this exercise made me realize that my obstacle to practice, I think, is not sitting or finding the time to sit. It's having my mind tell me my habit of having my mind tell me that there's always something more important I should be doing, when actually probably just being present is the most important thing I could do. So, you know, I want to take a look at that. Yeah, right, how to make that the most important thing, because I think you're probably not the only person who has a mind that tells us, oh, there must be something more important. Yeah, yeah. So what... So did you have an idea, Lou, about how to work with that? I think I need to look at it and sort of look at it as a delusion that that other thing I'm not doing now that I'm mentally preparing to do, sort of like a racehorse straining at the gate, I need to look at that and laugh at it and let it go.

[25:41]

You're right. Laugh at it. At least give yourself a few minutes or a few moments to be with it and wonder, is that really true? Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's a really good practice, so good luck with that, Lou. Okay. Thank you, Lou. Next, we'll go to Andrew. You have the mic, Andrew. Welcome. Hi, everyone. I was in a breakout group with... Sally, and Carol, and all of us had a similar type of obstacles, namely distractions in the form of either obligations of one kind or another, or something that we thought perhaps was more pleasurable than sitting. So in both cases, those were obstacles that were common to all of us. um Sally had um in terms of overcoming the obstacles Sally had an idea that of setting an intention that by 10 o'clock in the morning say that she would commit to sitting at least for a few minutes every day um and then Carol I thought had a great idea too in the sense of um trying a daily meditation

[27:10]

just something that she already did every day, such as brushing your teeth. And then immediately associated with that, sitting, even just for a couple of minutes. So I thought that was really useful. And for me, even though I didn't think of this at the time, I'm thinking of it now that what I've found is helpful is if I've made a commitment to someone else, either in a group setting, like such as this retreat, or to just one other individual, I find that I'm more likely to follow through on my commitment because I've kind of made a promise, if you will, to someone else or to a group of people. So I appreciate the fact that everyone has supported me. in a group setting.

[28:11]

So hopefully that can be useful for me and perhaps others. Thank you. That's very useful. And feel free to make a promise to us to sit every day. We would love to feel that promise. And you can do that either silently on your own or you could go to the... practice site that we've set up, and you can do that publicly as well. You can start a little discussion and just say, you know, this is my intention, this is my commitment, this is my promise to you all folks, if you want, if that feels like something. But I have found in my life that that's extremely powerful to have commitments to other people and to bring that into my practice. So thank you. Andrew, I also want to say thank you that I thought that the ideas that the people in your group had of even practicing just for a few minutes is a really great way to start.

[29:20]

Even if you just go roll out your yoga mat and tell yourself you're going to do one yoga pose or you're going to sit for three minutes, often that's going to feel so good. that you're going to want to do more. So sometimes I do that myself. I'll fool myself if I think, oh, I don't want to. I'm tired. Well, I have these other things that are more important for me right now to do. I really have to get started on these things. I'll say to myself, okay, I'll just do one pose. I'll just sit for a couple of minutes. Or even if I don't go to my mat, okay, wherever I am, even just sitting in this chair, I'm just going to sit for a couple of minutes right here. So I think starting small and really giving yourself credit for practicing however you do practice, even if it's just in the middle of your activity being present to whatever is going on. Really give yourself credit for what you do. Really encourage yourself.

[30:23]

Be an encouraging and kind presence to yourself rather than judging yourself for not practicing. Try to really... praise yourself and encourage yourself for what you are doing. So thank you, Andrew. That was really great to hear from your group. I think there's a couple of other hands up. Yeah, so we're going to bring in the mic to Robert and just want to remind people if you want to raise your hand, simply press 1 in your keypad and we'll cue you up to have the mic. So Robert, you're live. Welcome. Hi, thank you. Our group came up with the idea that the only real situation or obstacle is, quote, unquote, me. Just cutting to the zen of it all, that's all the problem is, you know. And each of us came up with a way to resolve that situation with me. It's just a matter of changing behavior. That's what we did.

[31:26]

Would you like to share any of those ideas? like some of us have the opportunity to turn on the television when we get home and zone out the other opportunity would be to turn on music and not turn on the tube and then allow the evening to gently segue into perhaps a quiet yoga session or even zazen and another one would be to realize that You know, any obstacle that really is coming up, I'm making it up. As one of the other participants said, you know, it's just a delusion in the moment. And it really isn't real. And, you know, this is what we're doing. It's just a matter of acknowledging, accepting it, and saying, okay, now what do I really want to do? And going with that. Period. There's a period there somewhere. Thank you. That's fantastic. That's really great. Good luck with that.

[32:28]

Good luck with yourself. Amen. Okay, thank you, Robert. We're going to go to Carrie next. You have the mic, Carrie. Welcome. Hi. I guess for me, in my group, I was telling them that mine's a bit more basic. I mean, I do have the time issue, and myself, I'm an issue. But... It's a bit more basic in that I've struggled setting up a dedicated space. I had in mind a dedicated space and kind of set it up a little bit, not perfectly like I wanted. But I went ahead and practiced there and I had the issue where my dog kind of ate my mat and another dog went to the restroom on my mat and I quickly realized I needed my space to be where the dogs couldn't be. And then I don't really have that space or that space is very cluttered.

[33:32]

It's my office. And I remember last time you guys were like suggesting not to have it in an office. It's my office craft area. And so I've gotten really stumped because and it's been really holding me back because I don't have a cool little pretty nice And I did hear the Dharma talk, and it came loud and clear when you said it doesn't need to be perfect. Just roll out a mat and try to do some stuff. So I've been doing that, but I have struggled with where to set up my space and to feel at all at peace and not be surrounded by things that are fun, different diversions that I can go and do. I don't really have any ideas of how to fix that other than just to roll out my mat somewhere and just do the stuff rather than focus on this one small thing of it not being perfect.

[34:38]

Yeah, well, I think, thanks, Carrie. I think that's, actually, you touch on a really great point there. You know, we say practice can happen anywhere and does happen anywhere. in the context of our lives wherever we're at. And at the same time, what you say is very true. It can be extremely supportive to have an environment that you feel like practicing in, you know, that really supports your practice. And so I'm wondering, maybe you could just hold that question, you know, and maybe it's a process that... over time you continue to work with. And maybe you try even going outside to practice, going to a local park. I don't know, it's turning, you know, the weather's, the days are getting shorter, the weather's colder, and I don't know what part of the country you're in.

[35:39]

I'm in Texas, so I can do it all year. Oh, yeah, okay, good. So maybe there's a, you know, practicing outside is a wonderful thing. Maybe there's a local park. or a place outside where you can feel safe and calm and collected and also just refreshed and expansive and open. So maybe you might just want to keep that in your mind and as you go through the day, just keep, well, I'm searching for this for this space, and in the meantime, do the best you can, but I think you have a good point there, that the space can actually be a very, it's a very important thing, and it may not happen just immediately. It may be something you need to figure out over a period of time.

[36:41]

I guess that's all I'm saying. I don't know if that's helpful advice to you or not, Keep on it and keep working at it. You'll find the space eventually. Okay. Thank you, Carrie. Thank you so much. Yeah, I think we have time for just one more question, and that is Linda. Welcome, Linda. You have the mic. Thank you. Our group, it seems like the issues are time, space, and intention, and all of it is, of course, me as well. Our group, it was the time that was a challenge for all of us. And we all seem to be coming to the conclusion of early morning is the time. And I know I've had constant struggles for years of getting to bed on time so that I could get up in time to get through my day without starting completely rushed and then adding something else in the morning seems difficult.

[37:42]

And I was... I was really tickled when I realized the time changed this weekend, and I thought, I bet they did that on purpose. Anyhow, whether you did it or not, it was wonderful timing that this morning was the first time ever after really years of having this thought of doing it that I got up early. I got up early yesterday, but other things happened. And so this morning I did it, and I was so proud of myself and so happy. Okay, I think... This is an opportunity to fit this into my day. Great. Wow. Great. Wonderful. Wonderful. And I just want to say, I think it's wonderful that you noticed how happy you were that you got to your practice. And I think for all of us, that's something for us to remember. Because we really allow ourselves to enjoy how we feel when we practice. This will encourage us to do it again the next day. You know?

[38:42]

Really take the time to notice, oh, God, this feels so great. And notice how you feel after you practice. Notice how it changes your day. Even if it just changes it a little bit, you know, take the time to notice that, and that will encourage you to practice again the next day. It's really all about noticing. So thank you, Linda, for bringing that up. Okay. Shall we move on? Robert? I think, Samantha, you want to give us some thoughts about practice going forward into week number two? Okay, great, great. So for week two, we have two yoga practice videos for you this week. One is a basic yoga practice and one is what we're calling an extended practice for when you have more time for your practice.

[39:44]

but you could also use them alternating. You could do one and then do another. One is a little more active and one is a little bit more of a restorative practice. And both of them are about breathing and bringing awareness into the torso, bringing awareness into the sensation of the breath. So we're moving up the body from being grounded from the last week with a grounding practice into more of an expansive practice. use this week's practice videos, I want to suggest a couple of specific ways for you to bring the practice into your daily life. I really suggest that you try to do this practice in the morning so that you can carry it into your day because then you'll be able to experience the benefits of the transformation that the practice brings into your life. If you feel that you don't have time to do the whole 30-minute yoga video, just do the very first practice in the video, which is the breathing practice, which is about five minutes.

[40:52]

And then you can fast-forward to the end, which is a 10-minute Zazan period. And we do a couple of stretches that will also help with your breathing before we start the sitting. So that will give you a 15-minute practice. If you're going to do a longer practice with both videos at once, what we've done is we've suggested that you start with the first basic video, you do the first 20 minutes, and then we give you a stopping point so that before we cut to the zazen, you'll start the second video. You could give yourself a 50 minute practice if you have time this weekend to do a longer practice. So now I want to say a little bit about our breath. Oh, and I do want to say that the videos that are up right now for this coming week is just the Dharma talk is up right now. It's available right now. This week's yoga video will be available tomorrow in the middle of the day.

[41:53]

And we'll send an email out reminding people about the videos for this week and letting you know when it's available. So when you get a chance to do the I want to say a little bit about the breath. Practicing with the breath really opens us up to being in the body. Many of us have very restricted breathing patterns. This is due to stress and tension and a lifetime of habit. So these yoga practices will help us to free the breath and help to bring our awareness into the sensation of the breath and the torso. And this really gives us a direct connection to our awareness in our body. So for this week, this is how I want you to bring your practice into your daily life. Imagine that you don't have a head. Every time that you can do this, imagine that you're just a headless body.

[42:54]

Drop your awareness down from your head into your body. Imagine you're just your legs and your arms and your torso. And just sense with your awareness what's happening with your body. rather than being with your thinking mind. As you work with your breath and your awareness of the torso and this feeling of just being a headless body, you're going to see how this practice shows you how connected you really are to the world around you. This practice teaches us about our interconnectedness with the world around us because you'll see how the body is naturally very sensitive, it's very open, and it's always responding to the world around you. So you might notice that you can perceive through the response of your body, and I'm talking about the level of sensation, that through the response of your body to the person that you're talking to or the situation that you're in or the environment that you're in, that your body is gathering information, that your mind

[44:01]

your thinking mind doesn't perceive. So our bodies really have a lot of intelligence and a lot of wisdom that we can learn from, that we can remember to drop down out of our incessant thinking, out of the chaos and activity of the mind, and really stay with the body. There's so much that we can get from them. So thank you for your practice, everyone. Thank you for your effort. And now I'll turn it over to Robert. You know, I was thinking, Samantha, as you were talking, that actually, you know, this notion of us being without a head and just a headless body can actually help us just with some of the obstacles that we were talking about before. You know, this People were talking about, well, it's me who's my obstacle to a certain extent, but even more detailed that is kind of me and my thinking mind.

[45:08]

So oftentimes I've been able to just go and practice as thinking about my body. I'm a body that moves over here to this side of the room, and I'm a body that just starts practicing. So much of it is just about just starting, you know, and if we start as the body, the body doesn't really, you know, this headless body is going to want to practice. It doesn't have any resistance to practice. It's probably just fine going over there and we'll feel, as you talked with people before in there when we were talking about our obstacles, the body will actually feel really good when we start to practice. So this body, as we bring our attention down into our body, it just wants to practice, and that may help in our obstacles as well.

[46:10]

So thank you for sharing all of that upcoming week's practice with us. We'll also be posting this on our website, and we're going to continue to send out inspirational emails and kind of practice advice to you every day. I wanted to very quickly kind of highlight a quote that I use in this week's Dharma Talk, which, as Samantha said, is already up on the website. You know, a few years ago, I was looking through the archives, the Zen Center, And I like to study Suzuki Roshi, who was the founder of Zen Center. And so I have the archives, the full set of archives on my computer, and I'm constantly looking through the archives. And one day I was reading a rather obscure talk he gave in the 1960s. And as I was reading along, all of a sudden it said, to be ready to accept everything as it comes.

[47:19]

one moment after the next is the Buddha's activity. And then I kept reading and I kept reading and I thought, oh, Suzuki Roshi just said something is the Buddha's activity. So I went back and then I read this, to be ready to accept everything as it comes, one moment after the next is the Buddha's activity. And I copied that off and I put that into a document and And that was about three years ago. And that has continued to be an inspiration to me, to inform my practice, to help me to practice. And even if, you know, I was thinking about this as this headless body, to be ready to accept everything is similar to being in this body. you know, this body that just receives our experience.

[48:23]

One moment after the next is the Buddha's activity. So that's a little tidbit from the Dharma talk that if you listen to it, I'll talk about, I'll explain that a little bit more and share my thoughts, a few more thoughts with you in the Dharma talk. But I encourage you to have that spirit inside in your practice as you take up practice this week, you know, with this body that brings its awareness down into the torso and just accept everything as it comes, you know, this experience of being in the body, in the torso, in the limbs, on the ground, you know, not with the thinking mind that decides, you know, tries to decide, well, this is good and that's not good, I'm a good practitioner. I'm not a good practitioner. I want to practice now. I don't want to practice now. But instead, just accept our experience as it comes one moment after the next.

[49:26]

This is our activity as Buddha. So that's all we have for you tonight. And we want to thank you so much for joining this call and for participating in the poll and in the group. And, of course, thank you so much for your practice, your commitment to practice. We hope this feels like support for your practice. And, Samantha, would you like to say anything as we sign off on tonight's call? I just want to echo what you just said. Thank you so much for your practice, everyone. Everyone in your life around you will benefit from your practice. So please don't think that it's a selfish or an introverted activity. Actually, it benefits everyone around you because you'll be more patient with your family. You'll be more present with yourself and with the people that you love.

[50:27]

And so, you know, let that be an encouragement for you that, you know, the people that you work with will benefit also. from your practice. So thank you so much. Thank you and have a great week of practice. And if you'd like to send us any questions or any follow-up questions to tonight's call, please go to the site and you can start a discussion with the group or with us all together. So please feel free to use that and start discussions and ask us questions if you need some additional support in your practice. So happy practice, everybody, and have a great week, and we'll talk to you next week. Thank you.

[51:21]

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