This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfcc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. So we just chanted that we are bowing to hear the Tatharata's words. That it's hard to hear the Dharma. But don't be fooled. Not everything that comes out of my mouth is the Dharma. The instruction of Buddha was to listen and then to examine what you've heard in your own life. Take it into your own life and study it and find out if it's valid for you, if it's valid for your experience. So he said, don't delete anything.

[01:01]

That's not what this is about. All the spiritual teachings are guides for us to wake up. They're not telling us the truth. There is not just the truth that we can put in words. But there is true life and reality. But to really get to that, you have to examine it. What you hear or what you read, and you may nod inside or you may go with me, but see if it sticks with you in some way or resonates with you in some way, then it's up to you to really practice it, to find out for yourself. Only what you have found out for yourself is really through your body of wisdom. We can have so much stuff in our brains.

[02:04]

But how do we live our everyday lives? Actually, it comes down to that because we will die. We don't know when. At some point, maybe suddenly, maybe slowly, maybe painfully, maybe easy. Nobody can tell us. Nobody can. But what we have when we die is what we have. So either we have practiced just going along and doing out the habits and trying to be comfortable all the time and manipulating us and managing our life so that we feel kind of safe. But we haven't really woken up with being triggered by habits of mind, habits of body, habits of conditioning, habits of culture. So waking up actually takes courage.

[03:08]

It takes the courage to investigate, to find out, to try, to keep going, to keep trying. If you know for yourself that that is true for you, Oh, I don't want to say my own. We are in one-day state. So my name is Christine now. I have a variety of spirits in the center since February, and the honeymoon is over. Excuse me, on that note. Let me just say, for the sake of the recording, also for the sake of the people in the dining room, that the box to which your microphone should project is missing.

[04:12]

And that is the problem. So, I just wanted to let you... Oh, hey, no, that is... And my apologies, you know, in the dining room, we have no receiver for the microphone. Where did it go? I don't know. Where did it go? Is there... What? Is there... What? Is there... What? There you go, and I'll see you later. So, we are in a practice period And the theme of the practice period, which is a time, like 10 weeks, where people move in or people participate from outside.

[05:20]

But the theme of the practice period is living in harmony with all beings, taking refuge in the Samba, which is another way of saying it, taking refuge in the community of people that make the effort to examine. their experience, their life, in order to live it more fully and more deliberately and more freely just who they are, to discover who we are beyond the ideas we have about ourselves and that other people have about ourselves. So in this end of a dining room, we have a work meeting, and the work leader says, who is new to the cycle And I always feel like we should each say, I'm you. Today, I'm you. Please look at me fresh. Forget what you thought or how you figured me out and how you now managing me in terms of how you figured me out, what you tell me and what you don't tell me and how you behave.

[06:32]

You do that to each other. But I would always like to say we each knew and can't be just Try that on, just drop all our preconceptions, the stories we've made. So last year in the fall, when I was still screaming, One of the things that suddenly dawned on me after the honeymoon was over, I'm not free anymore, in the same way I was before. And how can I say the honeymoon is over? It has something to do that inevitably, first of all, if you step into position

[07:34]

into a place, it doesn't matter what position. You might, and other people might think you have a lot of power now to do in that position what you think would be good and what you'd like to do, what you're enthusiastic about. And then slowly you notice, even though you do it, but you notice what you are inherited. what has been happening all along before and has had its impact and still has its impact. So that takes up a lot of what you're able to do. And I think we have an example with Obama. Now it sounds like Romney feels like he can do all these things. If he gets to be the president, he will inherit what's here now, and as Obama has been there, a lot of things that have been coming, and a long way coming.

[08:39]

And are we willing, in some ways similar, are we willing to deal with the reality rather than how we would like it to be? Which doesn't mean we shouldn't have wishes or ideas how we'd like to benefit. We can relate to what is here now with our vision made in our mind. But how can we get there with what is here now, rather than how do we agree with what's here now so we can get there? That doesn't really work. It's very tempting to think that. And I catch myself all the time, you know. What if and if they and if I had back there done something else, then I would have to be with this now.

[09:42]

I have to spend a lot of time doing that. It doesn't help me. But sometimes I'm at the receiving end. of being in the way of somebody's vision. Or you are in the way of somebody else's vision. How do we do that? It requires a lot of honesty, a lot of looking at yourself, a lot of courage, a lot of patience. tolerance, generosity, and spaciousness. So last year when I was free in a different way, I traveled to become my partner.

[10:46]

We signed up for a group tour because we would not have been able to afford anything else. Six weeks before we left, we got an email from the organization that organized the tour for us saying, apologizing to us that unfortunately nobody else had signed up for the tour because we didn't have a private tour. I love you. I love you. But I didn't sign up. I didn't want to go at the same date. There were no more flights into the Because two weeks after our tour was finished, the king of Bhutan, 31-year-old, I think, got married. And so everybody was flying into Bhutan. And there's only a limited amount of flights allowed to go in. Bhutan is a small little country, high up in Himalayas. And he's the only country that still lives

[11:53]

Their everyday life is completely intertwined with what is practice. And it's very small, I think. Very small. High percent, I think. Maybe 70,000 people. 50,000 people on mouths. So they may... I mean, the taste is immediately totally different. Except one, the cows, the dogs, the duckies walk on the street, lie on the street, and the cars kind of drive behind them. I mean, they decide to move to the side, to lie down, and then they all try to get around. So everything is

[12:54]

way, way more, in some ways, human race. Human and animal race. And the king of Bhutan went to a monastery for six months before he got married, and a while before he got married. And what he declared to his people is, can you hear me? Yes. Throughout my wedding, I will never rule you as a king. I will protect you as a parent, care for you as a daughter, and serve you as a son. I shall give you everything and keep nothing. He has a very small little house. Their own house is prepared to be a very unassuming house. I shall live such a life as a good human being that you may find it worthy to serve as an example for your children.

[14:02]

I have no personal goals other than to fulfill your hopes and aspirations. I shall always serve you day and night in the spirit of kindness justice and equality. So everything in Buddha's life reminds you of interconnection. There are prayer wheels everywhere. Huge ones that are as tall as this room and you know, You can't put your arms around it. You have to really work with it and go away. Small ones that people have in their hands, turning them. All sizes. And they're everywhere. They're alongside the walls of the monasteries.

[15:09]

There are always a hundred feet. There's always somebody there turning them, walking, turning them. When they're turned, they send out the blessings. all beings, for well-being, for safety, into the universe. The ones that were the most touching for me were the ones that were built by creeps and had the water, diverted some of the water that brought them underneath to a water wheel and the prairie wheel was off and it just kept turning day and night. It wasn't dependent of somebody having the time or the energy to spin it. So while we're sitting here, while we're sleeping, while we're working in that little country, continuous blessings throughout the universe are just saying out, coming our way. When I remember that, it just changes how I feel regardless of what's happening right here.

[16:15]

prayer flags everywhere, temples everywhere, monks everywhere. And when they have big ceremonies, the people come in, our guide took us to a ceremony, because before she got married, a lot of people, I mean, all the monasteries, the blessing ceremonies, long-life ceremonies for the king and his wife. And so we went. He said, sit down on the wall. He said that longhorns were just right in front of our knees, and the monks were sitting there, and then a few little monks, very few, there were maybe 12, and the little ones had to play, and then when the head monk would look at them, they would play. And then longhorns sat there tied to make their silence and then they have a pause and then suddenly our guide starts talking to one of the mothers and introduces us and it's his uncle but the others were continuing to pray it wasn't the ceremony was over then it was time for the long-term space seriously so life ritual life and daily life kind of flow into each other there's not such a script

[17:39]

So I think why I'm bringing that forward is in our culture, it is very difficult to find the space or create the space to actually have time to examine your mind. You can't examine it. why you're running from one activity field. It just doesn't work. And Thomas Morton already said that sometime in 1950. He died in 1968. But he was 53 years old. Thank you. So way back, he already said something about is helpful for us.

[18:46]

There is a basic form of contemporary violence and that is activism and forward work. The rush and pressure of modern life of modern life are a form, perhaps the most common form of its innate violence. To allow oneself to be carried away by a multitude of conflicting concerns, to surrender to too many demands, to commit oneself to too many projects, to want to help everyone if everything is to succumb to balance. The fancy of our activism mutualizes our work for peace. It destroys our own incapacity for peace.

[20:01]

It destroys the fruitfulness of our own work because it kills the root of our inner wisdom, which makes work . So slowing down, making space, is one of the first steps to actually have a chance at contemplating your experiences What happens around you? What happens, what's going on with your kids? What's going on with your partners? What's going on in your neighborhood? So he, I don't, I wanted to look it up, I don't remember, but he at some point decided to become a practice club, which is a very contemplative and it's always very quiet order.

[21:04]

So we don't have both practice monks or Zen monks or, you know. We can do this in your very own way. There are many ways you can come here and maybe what we offer helps you. Maybe it doesn't. That doesn't mean that you haven't practiced. There are innumerable ways to practice. But they all share making space. Being still in that space. Not making space for another activity. Making space for doing nothing but being. Being is a word. It's interesting that human beings, being and being is a word of the land. So to allow the feeling that's happening all the time, as long as your body is breathing, and your heart is beating, and your blood's running through, and you get nourishment, and you're not there to breathe, you're being.

[22:26]

And it's just happening. You don't have to do anything. It happens from the moment you don't perceive to the moment you die. in this world. So making space for that, making space to be available to your experience, you start seeing, you begin to see the construct you created about who you are. What's good about you, what's bad about you, what you can show, what you can't show, what you better, you know, What do you like? What do you hide from yourself? You know, the funny thing is most of the things that you try to hide are very obvious to everybody else. Some of you like what we say, you know, when I, years ago I once said to, in a circle of my friends, I said, I just realized I'm such a perfectionist.

[23:29]

Are you serious? I mean, they just couldn't believe that that was a realization, that was news to me. They said, please decide that it's all the latest of our friendship. But then it wasn't a mystery at all. It wasn't news. And that's true for many things. So we just take a lot of energy just from ourselves, from our own idea or we should be, who we should become, and with this, being appreciative of the life we have, the air we bring, the clothes we have to make, that we're capable of seeing power, that we are capable of seeing slack, that we are capable of talking to of communicating with children, that they are capable of seeing these children.

[24:41]

So in practice theory, we started out with the practice of appreciation. And because not everybody here is sitting in the Zendo, or can come here, or can sit down in that domain, I'm not dining. and you can take some home, take care of the practice of appreciation. And you can practice that every day for a while. For example, take it on for a month. Do it every day. And then after a month, see, pay attention. You can modify it for your kids. You can do it with your kids. You can do it with your partner. You can do it by yourself. It's one of the most transformative practices. Because when the honeymoon is open or when nothing works, you know, when just nothing works, you have to edit it twice or three times, because it just doesn't go.

[25:52]

You know, it confits your garage door and then they say it was broken again. So you have to go through the whole potion. So you know these things. So what do you do when nothing works? If we don't pay attention, we blame, we complain, we get depressed, we get angry, we get upset, we get frustrated, irritated. That's meant to go faster. doesn't need to go better. So that's how most of us automatically go. So also encourages us to not take ourselves too serious. We have experiences,

[26:57]

How do we open? Can we open with some lightness, you know, with some humor, with some appreciation that we are actually able to experience and we're able to have some choices? We have some choices how we respond to a given situation. We may have an initial reaction which just comes so fast that we don't have a choice. But if we then, after that, we cannot stop and pause later with bigger status and look, we can really actually ask ourselves, what is the most ease of holding for myself and roundly response to this? Oh, but this person is just, you know, they've had it in for me. Well, that's Because I'm sure that it's a fixed idea which sits on the spot.

[28:02]

So what happens is to open up that perception? Or somebody tells you, well, if you do this, maybe that will help. And the other person goes, no, that won't help, because the person is such and such. They won't appreciate it. We all carry these things around with us. And are we willing to stop and back, step a little bit back, and try another approach? Well, maybe, but I can still offer it. So for example, giving generosity is one of the first practices of perfection. And one part of generosity is We give without expectation of particular return or return to us. So if I'm only kind, if I'm sure you will then be exactly how I would like you, happy, or more compliant, or have kind of this motivation, that's not generosity.

[29:17]

That's not really giving. But if I give, because you're a human being. I have no idea what's going on with you. You may have a really hard time, then be out of it, irritated, or in pain, and some of it comes my way. I can still be totally respectful. Not take it personally. If I took it personally, the next time I meet you, Start over like it didn't happen. Be respectful. Just be respectful. Not over like that from your best friend. You might not want to be my best friend. So that's not it. It's can we give with no one return. Can I give a gift and not think that gift that has to hang on the wall when I come and visit you?

[30:19]

Otherwise you won't. You know, you won't be my friend. And I received it, a lot of people now I hold it. There are many families who go and when the relatives come, put out things in their apartment, so they see that they put it back in your closet. These are not gifts. This is not general. So can we explain? Explore that. Where am I generous and where am I in love? Not when that's bad and that's good. It's more discover. It's no objection. It's just this freedom to find out. That means you don't give up. You don't give up on yourself. You don't give up on your attention. You don't give up on your commitment. And you don't give up on anybody else. Even for a while ago, I'm out here.

[31:20]

I'm not going to talk to you anymore. That's it. After a while, it's a bad joke. And it's not like it's really deep and honest. People say, I can't talk to you because I can't talk to you kindly. But because you did this to me, because I accept. I accept I have been triggered in what I've heard or perceived, but nobody can make you feel any way. Nobody has the power to make you feel in a particular way. The way you feel is what arises in you and has going to be a long history in any Many components that come into it, but it's your feeling. It's your experience.

[32:24]

It's the experience that arises in you, and for that, we are responsible. And we are responsible for how we treat other people. How we are. So, the practice of appreciation. I will put the sheets outside when I leave, and people that are all here, residents, and in the practice period, please don't pick one up, because you can get a lot of copies from me if you want, but people who you are maybe leaving, and that's it for today, and one more piece, pick one up. You can modify it. to your capacity.

[33:28]

But my suggestion would be, if it speaks to you, try it for a month. Not having anything is important. Just try it. And then, go. Just see how you want to continue, how to affect your life by now. We will not have because we're sitting in the meditation hall over there. And there won't be a question about your period. So if you do have questions or comments now, please, we have a little bit of time here. Yeah. So while I'm in the park, I made a comment, and you answered the question that I didn't know I was asking.

[34:32]

And I'd like to make this stupid to like now, but what I know is some of my practices with my father. And you're speaking this, but I think I think that there are certain things that are liable that I get hooked by that my father will study or do. And that practice that Peyton left off, and that the notion So I really appreciated that practice. And I really appreciated the circumstances of time that I do with my father a lot in these months. And in fact, just yesterday when I was meeting him, once again, something showed up. Upset in this thing for me that's very important of not stepping over what's up. And what I haven't mastered is that it is difficult.

[35:43]

I'm still in the practice of, oh, this is how I have it. And there may be other . but not to step over or practice in life and not that I'm applying now, not to step over that, oh, this is how I have it. So it may not be. But the untangling of this is how I come in without getting what changed by that and the expression of that without putting an eye for velvet. Listen to the back as well. Does that make sense? What I understand is the difference between being aware of your perception and not making your perception feel true.

[36:46]

You will guess. And then there's a step beyond that. of not stepping over that I have. Yes. Your perception will affect you in a particular way. So you don't acknowledge and go for yourself and make space for your effects it has on you. So first, you know what you perceive. Then you know how that affects you. You don't necessarily have to share that, but you know that for yourself. And then that gives you an invitation to what we do best to do next. Maybe I don't say anything because I'm so upset that everything I'm going to say is going to create the next. Or, oh, I actually can just change the subject. Say I'm going for a walk at the back in an hour or two.

[37:49]

you can bring, then, your intention to how you respond to working perceived assembly. So I guess the question is, is when there is something that's growing that the media permits out is possible, maybe not harmful, but not, I don't know what the word is, but not, And to step over it is like, you know, it's pretending like it doesn't, that's the place where I get high. You can, you know, there's a way, there is a place to stay. If you speak to them in social life or with such whatever the words are, I am going to leave.

[38:55]

I'm just going to leave. I don't come back. But when you do that, I will leave. I mean, they take the other person quite a while to get it that you leave, and you will not believe. Sometimes we have to train each other to do it. I mean, it's not like, you know, condone abuse or condone everything. That's not what this is about. So you have to decide what you need to do, to not condone it, or not stay over, not to blame the other, not to make them a villain, but you can say, when that happens, I will leave. And what I'm also hearing is making sure that Yes, because if you say I read, I mean, you know, a whole range, you know, somebody has, somebody eats a lot of time, at some point it's not good to say, and I read that.

[40:05]

Predictions, yes. But in a relationship where we want, that's not the main thing that's happening. But it's happening occasionally or a lot of times, and it's not good for me. What? Really? Then find the solution that is really an action. But you don't have to stay there and have it happen in your life. It's not perfect. Yeah, I wanted to. I wanted to. I was thinking about the people who bring out the items when the company comes, that's given to them by the company. And I was wondering if the generosity can be at the level of money so that please the person you like to do that

[41:17]

or your motive might be fearing the person in some way. It could be a little more complex. I can't follow any of these, quite single and quite complex at the same time. When you practice generosity, you have to, you can practice anything and use it to wake up. You can start noticing, I'm doing this out of fear, and fear I really ask to get something. That's what we need to have lost. So then you have to start . So if we have space and have time to look what happens, what is the motivation? What happens afterwards are there and in you? We do the work, and it will help us understand them. We might discover things to be wrong.

[42:19]

Like, what exactly? And then you don't, if you discover something like that, you find all the ways. Then you're generous with your fear and with yourself. And find out great space for yourself. Find out what's going on with yourself. What are the ways to? be with that, so it doesn't make things unintentional in some ways. In terms of they don't scream more. They tie me more. Or they tie the other person more. So if you speak to us, I can love this awareness of the field. Do I feel weird? Do I feel all tired? Yeah. Our bodies are wonderful instruments to death. They tell us exactly when they're free and when we hide.

[43:25]

But we have to make space to feel that and notice that. And if you're running around, you won't have a chance. It's time to go. And I want to just add something to that and say that when I say that people's expectations, my expectations that at the beginning were completely in some ways, you know, just floating around and start taking the work, start being impacted by what's happening. And It's on starting to have, if I don't pay attention, fixed views. Kind of, oh, this is possible, this is not possible, this, this, this, and this is that. And that's, in some ways, it's helpful, but on many levels, it's actually very unhealthy.

[44:28]

Because it's only creates a somewhat static world around you, and they feel static, and life is nothing. Everything else is. For more information, visit sfcc.org and click Giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[45:05]

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