How is everybody? Great. How am I? I'm pretty good, too. Welcome to Green Gulch Farm. I hear that today is a children's program. So I thought I'd tell all of you a story about something that happened to me, a real story, last week when I was working in the kitchen. I'm just kind of wondering how many of you get a chance to work in the kitchen at home? Anybody? Yeah, a little bit sometime? Yeah, everybody. Great. What kinds of things do you do? Cut onions? Anybody get to use the microwave? Yeah? Yeah, that's pretty good. Well, I get to work in the kitchen twice a week here at Green Gulch. And it really makes me happy. I love to be in the kitchen. And one of the things that's fun about the kitchen is I never know what I'm going to be doing.

[01:05]

So sometimes I wash the lettuce or cut onions, sliced tomatoes or oranges. And then last week, the head of the kitchen asked me to make 12 cups of corn. So I thought, okay, that's pretty easy. I went into the walk-in. which is our refrigerator at Green Gulch. It's a great big room. You can actually walk into our refrigerator. And inside, there are rows of boxes of vegetables and cartons of eggs and all kinds of food. So I found the big box that said corn, organic corn, which means that corn is safe for anybody or anything to eat. So... I took the box out and I opened it up and this was what was inside. Do you know what this is? Corn. What's wrong with it?

[02:07]

Something funny? It's corn. But there's something funny with this corn, isn't there? That's one thing that's funny. There's no thing sticking up on the top. What's this? Do you know the name? husk I asked my daughter to stop by the store to get this corn I said get corn in a husk and she said what's a husk so this is the husk this part so I got my space in the kitchen all set up I had a wooden board and a knife and a big box of corn and a little bowl for compost and I started to do this with the first gear of corn And inside, look what I found. Isn't that nice? Corn. Real corn. But also all these little things.

[03:12]

You know what the name of those are? Anybody know that? These little strings? Is that a big person? No? Okay, fine. You can answer too. It's all right. So this is the silk. So what I did was I took the husk and the silk, and I'm sorry for the mess, and I put it into the compost bin, and then I took my knife and I started cutting the corn off of the cob and into a measuring bowl so I'd know when I got to 12 cups. Okay, that all makes sense, right? Sort. So anyway, everything was really good, and I was really happy. doing this job, and I was in the kitchen with my friends, and we were all making lunch together. And so this happy tune came into my mind that I'm going to ask all of you here to sing with me. It's from a musical that you probably never heard of called Oklahoma.

[04:17]

Right? OK, you guys ready? I really need your help. I'm not a singer. OK. There's a bright golden haze on the meadow A bright golden haze on the meadow The corn is as high as an elephant's eye And it looks like it's reaching right up to the sky Oh, what a beautiful morning What a beautiful day I have a beautiful feeling Everything's going my way Isn't that nice? And it was. It was all going my way until I hit the fourth ear of corn.

[05:21]

So I opened the corn and there at the top, was a giant green worm. And my stomach kind of got squishy. And my face changed. I went like that. And I thought, yuck. Yuck. And my song went away. So I took the worm and I put it in the compost. Thought it would be happy in there. And I picked up the next year of corn, hoping that was the end of it. But guess what was inside the next year of corn? Giant green worm's brother. And the next one was his sister. And the next one was his cousin. And pretty soon I had the whole family of giant green worms in my compost bowl. So then I thought, this isn't making me happy.

[06:25]

So I took the knife and I started cutting the corn way up here and putting the top in the compost. Pretty smart. I didn't have to look at the worms anymore, right? But then a terrible thing happened. Guess what? I cut one of the worms. I cut his tail off. So I gave a blessing and I prayed that his tail would grow back soon. And And at that point, I knew what I had to do. So what I did was I took the next year of corn, opened it up, and put it right next to my face. And I looked at the giant green worm. And the giant green worm had these little spots and these stumpy little legs. And his mouth was going... Just like us. You know? And somehow I stopped being afraid.

[07:27]

I stopped thinking yuck. And I felt very kindly toward the worm and his family. Isn't that funny? So that's the end of my story, except to tell you that you all are going down to the garden to learn all about organic apples. Potatoes. Potatoes. And... which are the apples of the earth. I think they're called that in German, actually. Isn't that right? Yeah. So I hope you're lucky enough to find some worms in your potatoes. And if you do, please be friendly to them and let them know about their cousins up in the corn so that next time one of them sees a giant person like you, they won't have a squishy feeling in their stomachs. Okay?

[08:27]

Okay? Bye-bye. Thank you. You're welcome. Would you like to have that? To take home? Would you? Okay. Thank you for thanking me. Bye. See ya. My daughter says I'm like monk. You know, I can't stand to leave anything kind of laying around.

[09:28]

Obsessive cleaner. I'll be there in a minute. Here in my paper, it says part two, the rest of the lecture. So I think all of us know this experience of finding a worm in the corn. It's not so unusual. Everything's fine and then all of a sudden it isn't. And these sudden and inevitable changes that take place in our lives are what the Buddha was trying to help us to understand and to meet. So much of his teaching is about how to meet these Inevitable changes.

[10:29]

Now, sometimes changes are very small and exciting, like the worms and the corn. But sometimes they are heartbreaking. And we come away sad or injured. We come away discouraged, full of fear, or even furious. And when big changes like that happen to us, I think some of us find our way to places like Green Gulch to take comfort in each other's company or in the beauty of this land or in the wisdom and compassion of these precious teachings. And one of the most basic teachings of them all is this teaching of impermanence. That whatever you see, whatever you hear, Whatever you think and whatever you feel, whatever you taste or touch, whatever you have, arises, abides, and ceases to be.

[11:40]

Impermanence. So now you see it, now you have it, now you know it, and now you don't. And everything is like this. So in other words, you and me and everything else around us is continuously arising and ceasing, moment by moment. So the past is gone, the present is not yet here, and where is it that we are right now? hard one to answer and wherever it is how will we get a hold of it with what will we take hold of it you know even though we continuously try arise abide and cease to be this is the law the inviolable law of the universe

[12:51]

So his deep observation into the impermanent nature of reality gave rise to one half of the Buddha's enlightened vision. There are no permanent objects, there is no permanent self, and any objection to either of those truths is the cause of our suffering. So these are the wisdom teachings. Certainly no show tunes there, are there? So unfortunately, these teachings by themselves, the wisdom teachings, such as the teachings of impermanence, may lead human beings toward a kind of despair. I remember when I was young, probably fifth grade or so, and they showed us a movie called Our Mr. Son. Any of you old enough to have seen Our Mr. Son? Yes. Just you.

[13:56]

Oops. Don't remember? Uh-oh. Really old. Our Mr. Sun was, I think, done by GE, as I recall. And what they helped us to know in this film was that the sun is a star and that there's something called a red shift and that scientists are pretty sure that all of the stars, including our sun, are going to run out of fuel someday and die. You knew that, didn't you? Yeah. So to me, this is kind of hard to believe. But at the same time, this very thing happened to our Prius the other day. You know, my daughter, Sabrina, who's just turned, well, she's turned 16, she's going on 17, is learning to drive, and she, after many lessons, I let her take the car with an older friend to go up to Novato to visit Target, which she claims she's never been to.

[15:12]

It's probably true. So anyway, I got a call a few minutes after she left, and to my great relief, she was fine, and But she said, Mom, I had to pull over because the car lost power and all of the lights on the dashboard started flashing at the same time. And I thought, oh, my God. So I said, honey, don't touch anything. Don't do anything. Just sit there. And oh, yes, don't worry. It's not your fault, even though that's not what I thought. And I'll be there in a minute. So I jumped in the other car and drove down to... where she was at the Arco station, ironically. And, you know, I tried to start the car, and it would just jump for a second, and then all the lights would flash, and I thought, oh, my God, something terrible, terrible wrong with this car. So the next day I had it towed to the Toyota Service Department, and this not-so-nice man called me and said, ma'am, you're out of gas.

[16:16]

And, you know, I was kind of embarrassed, and I said, well, excuse me, but, you know, I used to have a Volkswagen Beetle, and that car could read empty for a long time, and it never ran out of gas. So I really didn't know that it was possible. You know, I thought Toyota had caught on to what Volkswagen knew about us, really. And... But anyway, it is true. The sun, the Prius, the giant green worms in all of us are going to run out of fuel and we're going to die. Which is something I didn't want to say in front of the kids. Because reality by itself is not particularly comforting. So because of that, the Buddha gave a warm and tender touch to these teachings. as did a number of his descendants.

[17:23]

And he did it for the sake of our feelings, how we feel about things, how we feel about the sun and the earth and ourselves and each other and all of our stuff. So in the spirit of giving comfort to us all, I want to share with you a portion of the... self-study I've been doing to address the sudden changes that have taken place in my own personal life, which is clearly impermanent and proven so by events of these past years. So first of all, I want to say that I find myself in circumstances that are dramatically unfamiliar and at the same time you know, utterly commonplace. So in the last four or five months, unlike the last 40 to 50 years, I have spent most of my days in or around my home.

[18:35]

And the reason for that is really fairly simple. You know, I think a lot of you know that over a year ago now, my friend and partner, co-parent, Grace was in an automobile accident on the Golden Gate Bridge from which she emerged fairly injured, significantly injured. However, she survived, and four months ago, she came home. Now, even though Grace sustained some severe injuries, internal injuries, brain bleeds, multiple fractures, You know, all kinds of amazing. The list was long and stunning. She has recovered her intellect, her humor, and her chi. So last week I was awed by her persistence in sitting at the computer, you know, with her two fingers, and taking a re-examination for her certificate as a family physician.

[19:43]

And she passed the exam. So she's getting herself all primed to return to work, maybe in a year or so. And all of that is very exciting, and I'm just deeply happy for her and for everybody, everybody who's happy for her. On the other hand, she is still severely limited in what she can do for herself, in what are called the activities of daily living, or the ADLs, as they say in the rehab trade. You know, she can't get herself to the toilet or feed herself or get out of bed or transfer to a car or to a chair. She needs a lot of support. And as her primary caregiver, that support most days comes from me, which is why I'm home. So it's been pretty easy to see the impermanence in these dramatic changes that have happened to Grace.

[20:46]

She went from being a physician to being a patient, from a healthy, strong, vibrant living being to very nearly dead, all in the matter of moments. But for me, on the other hand, the transformation has been much harder to characterize, even though it was just as sudden. You know, in the morning of May 21st, 2008, I was the director of Ringelch Farm. I was on the board of the Marin Interfaith Council. I was a student of the tea ceremony. I was a number of other things I can't even remember that I thought of as my identity, how I described myself to myself. And, of course, I was the mother of a 15-year-old adolescent daughter, along with Grace. We partnered in that, and it's tremendous support in having someone to share a child with.

[21:49]

So by the afternoon of May 21st, 2008, the only thing left on my business card was mother of an adolescent child. So the rest of my time very quickly became filled with travel between here in the hospital, here in school, to the bank, to the attorneys, to the probate court, to the pharmacy, and so on and so on, and thankfully to my therapist. And then in the evening I'd come back home and there was dinner to make and the animals to feed and laundry to fold and so on and so on. By the end of the day, I was pretty beat. It was easy to sleep, I must say. So finally, after a while, maybe six months of this, I said to my therapist, you know, I'm getting kind of discouraged to find myself at the sink every night washing dishes.

[22:59]

And he said... but that's what everybody does. I know you're laughing because for me, this came as a revelation. That's what everybody does? Really? So I actually didn't really know that because I hadn't really considered before what everybody does. I had been thinking about myself. about impermanence and about the sucky nature of my narrowed view of the world and reality. So it was really a sweet thing to hear that all of you do the dishes every night, don't you? Yeah, you're naughty. You do. And you go to work every day and you take care of your loved ones.

[24:04]

And you pay your taxes and you vote and you go to the store and you cook meals. And so do I. And it was an incredibly sweet feeling that came into my heart. I felt like I had joined this huge club that I didn't even know I belonged to. That you and I have so much in common. And I'm not alone at night with the dishes. There you are. We can share stories about dish soap, whatever. So we all share, moment by moment, the arising and vanishing of all things, including each other. But together. We do it together. And we're good at it. We don't even notice. You know, I wouldn't be here, I couldn't be here without each and every one of you.

[25:08]

And none of us could leave if we didn't let that happen. We are co-creating this universe. It's a wonderful, wonderful and magical show. So this is the teaching of no separation, no separate self. And it's the other half of the Buddha's enlightened vision. By exchanging our limited view of ourself for the view of others, of all others, we enter into a vast field of compassion. You know, wherein the knowledge of impermanence will lead us to wisdom, the knowledge of non-separation will lead us to love. Big love. So this simple practice of exchanging oneself for others is what helped me with my revulsion at the sight of those worms.

[26:14]

I thought they were in my corn. It wasn't my corn. It's our corn. Them too. So the relief that I felt was triggered by my... identifying with the pain that I was causing to those creatures. I had to see that. I had to see that my actions were causing them injury. And once I knew that, I know pain, I know fear, and I don't wish that on anyone else, not even worms. With the arising of that compassion, the veils of disgust and revulsion just simply melted away. Where my mind had been frozen, it was suddenly free, soft, tender, melted.

[27:22]

So one of the things I wanted to mention about this practice of exchanging ourself for others is that it's not literal. You know, I didn't become a mom. But I did change my attitude and I changed my feeling about our relationship. And when we do that, we basically conjoin and forge these two teachings, the teaching of Wisdom with the teaching of compassion, making a very tight and essential bond. These two wings is how the bird can fly, compassion and wisdom. Now again, I want to say that we don't do these practices by ourselves, that we need all of the causes and conditions to bring the realization of non-separation together. into being.

[28:27]

So I needed to be in the kitchen working with the crew. I needed to be humming that tune from Oklahoma. And I needed to be open to the work and to what happened inside of myself as I encountered the wormy corn. All of that together, those are all the causes and conditions for me to have an experience of non-separation. to awaken from a dream of an isolated self. Dharma gates are boundless. I vow to enter them, each and every one, each and every time. So I think wherever we go, if we're open and we listen, there are constantly lessons being offered to us in all kinds of places and people. who want to give us something that they know, something for us to learn, something new.

[29:30]

And I think that we experience a tremendous joy at each of these discoveries. There is joy in learning, learning from each other. It was once a conference held in Europe a long time ago, probably over 50 years now, but I heard this story and I was struck by it at the time. D.T. Suzuki, who was one of the early pioneers bringing Buddhism into the West, I think the conference might even have been in Germany, I'm not sure, but... All of the professors were introducing themselves as, you know, hair professors so-and-so, the head of such-and-such at Leipzig University, and the author of that, yada, and so on. So there were these long credentials were being given about each of these professors. And then D.T. Suzuki, who was the guest speaker, stood up and he said, I am a student of Zen. I'm a student of Zen.

[30:40]

I'm a student of life. That's who I am. I'm here to learn. This is revolutionary. So a few weeks ago, Grace and I attended back-to-school night at my daughter's school, and the assistant principal... told us about some studies that the faculty were doing to improve their knowledge in helping our kids. So there were a couple of books they mentioned, and one in particular I was drawn toward, and I went out and bought it. It's by a Stanford psychology professor named Carolyn Dweck, and it's called Mindset. And what Carolyn Dweck has discovered, rediscovered, actually, is that human beings basically come in two distinct flavors.

[31:42]

And this can be found at any age group. And it can be tested by certain kinds of questions. So the one kind of mindset is called fixed mindset. And this mindset... comes from a belief that each person has about themselves. And that belief, in one case, the fixed mindset, is that I am smart, or I am artistic, and I was born that way, and I'm going to do everything I can to protect my intelligence and my talent from, you know... from being eroded in some way or judged by doing the hardest work I can to maintain that impression of my intelligence. I'm going to prove myself.

[32:44]

So people with a fixed mindset tend not to take up challenges. Now, the children of that mindset, if they're given puzzles to do, they'll stop doing the puzzles as soon as they start getting too hard because they don't want to fail. So I say, that's enough. I don't want to do any more. But then what Carol direct noticed is that there were some children, and she couldn't figure out where they came from, who would say, oh, give me a harder one. I just can't wait to see if I can figure it out. And she was surprised by these kids. So these kids are what are called people of growth mindset. They basically don't have the belief that intelligence is fixed. They think they can become smarter if they study, if they make an effort, if they try really hard. They think they can become better athletes. They think they can become better musicians if they practice.

[33:48]

And guess what? They do. They become very accomplished and satisfied. with themselves and how they do. Because criticism is also something that they think they can learn from. Foo, that was a terrible lecture. And here's why. And I go, oh, tell me more. What could I have done to make it better? So I can recognize this fixed mindset. There's a lot of fear around it. People will judge me. They won't like me. And I really appreciate the work that this woman has done because she also says, because it's a belief we have about ourselves, it can be changed. It's not true. In fact, just by knowing that it's not true begins the process of opening to growth, to learning, to adventure.

[34:50]

So I'm not going to say too much more about the book. I haven't quite finished it, but I find it really encouraging. And I would recommend it to all of you. Again, it's called Mindset by Carol Dweck. But I would like to share with you, to end, a teaching by the Buddha concerning this very thing, fixed views, holding views. And this story takes place between the Buddha and the teacher of the skeptics, whose name is Dikanaka. And Diganaka approaches the Buddha to present him with his understanding. Thus have I heard, while the Blessed One was living in Rajagaha in the Sukkurata cave, the wanderer Diganaka went to him and exchanged greetings. Then he said, My theory and my view is this, Master Gautama. I have no liking for theories or views.

[35:57]

The Buddha replied, this view of yours, I have no liking for theories or views. Have you no liking for that too? You get it? Should I say it again? So the skeptic says, my theory and my view is this, Master Gautama, I have no liking for theories or views. And the Buddha says, this view of yours, I have no liking for theories or views. Have you no liking for that too? Gotcha. And then the Buddha went on to explain, if I am obstinate and claim that only this is true and everything else is wrong, then I will clash with others who hold a different view. When there is a clash, there are disputes. When there are disputes, there are quarrels. And when there are quarrels, there is harm. When one foresees that, he or she abandons each view without clinging to some other.

[37:06]

So I hope all of you have a growth-filled week. And I hope that you all find the boundless joy that comes from walking through birth and death, holding hands with each other. Thank you very much.

[37:28]

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