This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at sfzc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good morning, everyone. Great to have you here on a beautiful and cloudy Green Gulch Day. Thank you to... Abhijiru for inviting me, and for the head of practice here, Eli Brown-Stevenson, Lutanto, and Arino for keeping me so well taken care of, Cam, and Majesha Everett. Thank you all for coming here. My name is Michael McCord. I do reside. I'm usually at City Center in San Francisco, which is one of our three temples. that make up San Francisco Zen Center and I work in administration there.

[01:00]

So usually this time of year we talk about our Zen-a-thon. That is what's going on. Outside you'll see some promos for Zen-a-thon. The a-thon usually means that there's some activities that happen around it. There's an activity here on the 31st I believe and some other things happening. And usually we talk about one of the paramitas, which is the perfections, the perfections of dana or generosity, something that aligns with that. And this morning I'm not going to talk about that. But there is something that I found really interesting over the last several years of turning the precepts over with students. If any of you ever want to study the precepts or just know the basics of what's going on in the Soto Zen Buddhist practice, you can talk to any of the teachers. It's not a commitment that you have to necessarily take the vows publicly. I've gone through them with several students that didn't, but some that did.

[02:04]

But they're really good things to live by, if you will. And when you start getting into them, you realize that they're all kind of the same thing. How do I... suffer less and thrive more, so that I can help other people suffer less and thrive more. And then they all kind of intertwine once you get down into the roots of them. But there's one that really corresponds with and intersects with well this paramita of dana or generosity that doesn't so much look like it on the surface because it's kind of the opposite. And it is the vow of to not take what is not given I vow not to take what is not given and so I think for most folks if you grow up in a place that there is at least your basic necessities taken care of and in this world there are plenty of places where that's not the case but in a lot of places in the US a lot of folks have at least the basics taken care of and if you're in that fortunate place then it's

[03:13]

You look at that precept and you say, well, I'm really not inclined to steal. Maybe I fudge some things here or there, but I could work on that. But I'm not going to leave here and see if anyone's guarding a nice statue on the altar or whether or not someone's going to take the donation box when they leave. These are not the normal temptations, let's say, of the folks that are usually here. at Green Gulch, but not taking what is not given implies something. That people might, as humans, want something that they don't have. I mean, why would that be a precept if everyone always felt like they had whatever they needed? So this implies that maybe we might not have what we need, or it might not feel like we have what we need. So where does this sense of scarcity come from?

[04:24]

This sense that I need to add something to myself that I'm not getting. And the physical objects we just talked about, but what I want to turn over this morning has to do with what's usually coming up when we do precept study around I vow not to take what is not given, is that with the gifts that people are giving me, how they show up, Their awarenesses, their habits, how they treat me, how they treat you, what they pay attention to, the gifts that they are giving are not adequate. Have you ever felt that way? That you wish that your mom was a different mom in some ways. You wish that your friend was a different friend. You wish your supervisor was a different supervisor. Even that friend that you really like, they've got these three things, how they show up. You just wish that they were giving a different gift. You feel like, I need something different from this person. Has anybody in this room ever not felt that way?

[05:28]

I need something different from this person. We had somebody in the back that had never felt that way, and that's great. I'm going to have to find exactly what they're doing. That's pretty equanimous. So... In the area that this is the real practice for me, maybe for you and for the students I've been talking to, it really has to do with, in many cases, a sense of lack of what the people around me are providing in regard to their treatment of me, of others, their awarenesses, their skills, their habits, how they basically show up, the gifts that they give the world. Have you ever heard the phrase that your entire purpose in life in a spiritual path is just to figure out how to give your gift? You know, how to give your gift, what it is that you bring to the world, how to give your gift. But then you see other people giving their gift, and I don't know if you've ever been around Buddhist sanghas long enough, but you'll find somebody in the sangha that you're just not exactly sure that they're even trying to give their gift.

[06:38]

You ever felt that way? Like, what's going on here? the way that they're impacting me and the other people. And then when I look at like inside, why do I care? Well, I want that. There's some lack in here. I want a different gift. So how do we show up and start turning over and working with, I vow not to take what is not given? Well, just like in many spiritual practices or in even recovery practices, whether it be NA or AA or any of those sorts of things, Al-Anon, like in AA, they have this, you know, we deal with a lot of, there's even recovery meetings in our different temples, and they have 12 steps for recovery of alcoholism. And 11 and a half of them have nothing to do with alcohol. They have to do with the spiritual condition, what you do.

[07:43]

So if we have a don't, don't drink alcohol, or we have a don't take what is not given, then what's the do? What are the things that I do? Well, I accept what is given. Oh, I accept what is given. And where do I start with this? Where do I start with accepting what is given? Because we know what it's like when I'm not getting from my supervisor or my colleagues or somebody in my neighborhood what I want them to be giving me. We know what that feeling is like. And that can be a very interesting study to even the next time that that happens, just notice what's the somatic experience like. Where do I hold that like, yeah, I'm not getting what I want to be given by the bus driver, by my colleagues. the customer service person and they have to understand that i already paid for these four pairs of socks but one of them is just not exactly the way that they should be and they're just not listening all the little ways in which we want people to show up and they're not showing up what is the somatic experience where do i hold that do any mental formations come up consistently

[09:03]

when people show up in a way that I don't want them to be showing up, or when they're not giving what I think they should. Years ago, I was living in the Middle East, and I've noticed the older I get, the more I start stories with years ago. How about just at one time? At one time that's not now in the past, I was living in the Middle East, in Amman, Jordan. And I was living there as a volunteer for a non-profit. And the person that was the head of the center, he and I were co-workers. We both worked for a foundation. And his name was Nazi Hijazi, literally spelled Nazi, N-A-Z-I. And Nazi... I guess you'd say he was an angry person.

[10:07]

He was not terribly happy with a lot of things. And he liked to chain smoke. And this was 19, well, it was the early 90s. And so I'm not sure how it is in Amman, Jordan now, but back then, everybody smoked everywhere and no one even thought of it. There was even an ashtray next to the bench press in my local gym. And... He got in the truck every day. He would stop by and pick me up. And we would drive 30 miles out into the desert and through these little windy roads, about a 40-minute trip. And this was going to be my day. And the very first day I got in, and Nazee got in the vehicle. Or I got in the vehicle. He was already there. Windows were up, and he's smoking. And he says hello. And then starts to drive and instantly starts telling me all the things that are wrong with his coworkers, his wife. the government, his neighbors, and just kind of ranting the whole way there and like chain smoking and shifting. And I thought, this is going to be a long year.

[11:08]

This is going to be a long year. And Nazi was giving me a gift that I did not want. He was showing up in a way that I did not care for. I did not want what he had. And how am I going to tolerate this? all year long. And something dawned on me, and I'm not exactly sure why or how, but maybe it was just out of sheer survival. But I thought, how am I going to make the best of this situation? Is there something here that I can focus on besides my disdain for Nazi's basic manifestation of everything? And I realized that You know, I could ask him questions and maybe we could just, you know, start talking about different things or find something in common. So it was my goal in the first 90 seconds when I got into the truck to find something that we could focus on, find something we could share.

[12:13]

And after a period of time, we actually started to have some conversations that I enjoyed. And every day I would get in the truck and I didn't smoke, but he'd offer me a cigarette and I would say no. And then we'd have our routine. And then I would roll down the window a little bit. And then we'd drive. And then he'd start telling me a story about what was wrong with his kid's school administrator. And then we would get off on some subject. But I'd always try to find some sort of way to find something I agreed with, empathize with, and turn it into something and quit thinking about the thing that I'm not being given. Now, this was a very extreme circumstance. And maybe I did it out of just... pure survival and being concerned about myself. I'm not sure how much it was initially just about Nazi, so I'm not trying to paint it that way. But at the end of the year, we kind of got used to it after I was there for a year, and every day we had these conversations, and they kind of got to be pretty fun. They got to be mildly tolerable, I would say. And even on the last day, I even smoked a cigarette with him. And then he dropped me off on the last day, and he said,

[13:20]

Michael, I have enjoyed this year. In fact, you might be my best friend. And I was just like floored. I was like, you know, and I realized that probably with Nazi's temper and manner, no one had ever really taken the time to just be with him. Now, I was largely doing that out of self-preservation, but that impact stayed with me. And years later, when I was studying the precepts of I vow, not to take what is not given, I started to think about the vow of I accept what is given. I accept what is given. Now this is kind of like a default stance. It's not to say I approve of what's given. That's a totally different thing. And if what's being given is something that's abusive or what have you, I'm not talking about bad boundaries. But I will postulate this to you. The more that someone is working from I accept what is given, the more clarity someone will have in setting appropriate boundaries at the appropriate time.

[14:29]

Because I'm not going to be a reactionary. I'm going to actually be using discernment in the moment to be working with the thing as it's unfolding and not on autopilot that I'm just in aversion and I don't like the thing that the person is manifesting right now. Now, when I first started sewing my Rokasu after... doing precept study with my teacher you might have seen the rakasus they're kind of the little they look like bibs and there's five panels and they are arranged in the same order that you would have the rice fields in china and you pour water in one end and because of their levels the water or the dharma would flow all the way throughout the other side it's a wonderful practice you take refuge in buddha dharma and sangha with each stitch as you sew it And there's no sewing machines. You learn how to thread needles, and you learn how to go through the whole process of old-world craftspersionship. And my mom was a seamstress and a really wonderful tailor.

[15:30]

She sewed my sister's whole wedding. She sewed my dad's suits for work. She sewed my blue jeans growing up. She was great at sewing. In the back of my head somewhere, I just assumed, I'm going to be great at sewing. And I didn't even realize that I had this assumption. But, you know, I'm going to show up in some sort of way, you know. And I'm going to have some sort of ability to show up in some sort of way. And so I was at Tassajara, and it was time for me to be sewing my rakasu. And I noticed that after sewing for three or four sessions, I put it down and didn't go back to the sewing class. And I didn't go back for probably about six months. And then Steph Wendersky lives here. She came there for the practice period. She's a sewing teacher here now. She actually encouraged me to get back to sewing. And it made me think of, why don't I want to sew? I mean, I always thought that I looked forward to this. And so the next time I was in class, I noticed that actually what was going on was anger.

[16:34]

I thought, now that's weird. I'm here sewing Buddha's robe, and... Everyone's quiet and calm. You'd think this would be a great place to be really rejuvenating yourself or whatever. Many people sow for recreation. And it's winding me up. I'm feeling angry. And I realized I have an expectation that I'm going to be good at this. And quite frankly, I might be stunningly average at best. In fact, I might be less than average in regard to like... the ability to just be sewing by hand. I didn't accept myself in regard to how I manifested in the universe. And this is usually the clue or the starting place, let's say, of where people start to work on this, is with themselves, how I show up and give my gifts.

[17:34]

How is it that I am with the people around me? Do I feel that I need to show up and perform at a certain level in order to be accepted, respected, and honored as a human being? Some performance level. How I dress, how I speak, my awareness. And are there pieces of me that I don't really think are that beautiful, strong, and brave that I try to hide? Because I feel like I wouldn't be accepted if they were known. It's almost like we need a heralder when you come into a room. You know, like the king or the queen or the prince or the princess, you know, before they come into a room, you know, they have the heralder that says, you know, this person, you know, lord of this or lady of that and conqueror of this and whatever, you know, all their different titles and accomplishments, you know, then you come into the room. So, you know, in our modern world, we have, you know, our statuses.

[18:40]

and our educations, and our money, and our jobs, and our looks, and our clothes, and our personalities, and our emotional intelligence, and all the other things that we have, that we have as far as our wonderful qualities, that we try to show the world. What if we had no heralder, and we just step into a room? Do I accept just me showing up as being enough? Do I deserve enough? be accepted it's usually a clue to how much i accept myself and again not approval approval is a separate thing that's why later on we're going to get to the statement by suzuki roshi that is all about this you are perfect just as you are and each of you could use a little improvement the first part of that is where it starts that i am accepted i am a human and

[19:40]

I don't need a heralder to enter a room. I don't need to tell people about why they need to love me. Can I live with that default stance? When we walk past each other in a monastery, especially during formal times, you'll see people doing a gosho bow to each other. And that's not saying, I approve of everything about you. I think that every way that you show up is everything that I like. The way that you give your gift is exactly how I want you to give it. No. We do it regardless of the person, regardless of their status. 45 degree bow down, two hands together, thumbs in, fist distance relational from the tips of the fingers to the nose. A formal gesture of respect and honor for your humanity. a practice for letting other people show up without a heralder, a reminder that other people don't have to give the gift that I need them to give for me to hold them with respect and honor.

[20:51]

It doesn't mean I approve of every way that they show up, but can I start from that place? Or with some people in the sangha, is that like chewing glass? With some people in my life, is that too hard? these are clues to the mystery when i am with someone and i feel that way inside why do i not accept their gift again not approve but just accept this is where they're at what is the feeling of lack why do i need something else why am i focused on that where is my feeling of scarcity coming from And so looking at the gifts that I do not accept, what is it to not accept my own gifts? Have you ever done a personal inventory where you just write down everything about yourself on one page that you like, you have an affinity toward?

[22:00]

These are the things about me that I like. Then on the other page, all the other things that I don't like so much. And then when you're done writing it, you kind of look at it as a collage of at least my impressions of me. How much of it do I hold on to as fixed truth? How much of it am I afraid of other people seeing? Can I just show up in the next conversation unencumbered and meet the moment and let it unfold without having to accomplish anything? Because here's one of the really interesting things that's happening right now. It's been happening ever since there were humans on Earth.

[23:01]

It got sped up at the Industrial Revolution, and it's been sped up even more in the last two years with artificial intelligence. But that's the awareness. that if my worth is being defined by my production, then I'm already obsolete. There is something else that is human that has to do with my gift, that has to do with how I show up, that has to do with the beating heart of now that I am attached to, that is actually my unique gift that I'm giving the world. And like a prism that's sitting there, you know, it's like crystal prisms, you put them there on the ground, and then the sun shines on one side, and on the other side it refracts light. Every prism has a unique refraction. Same light, different refraction. We have our own gift, our own refraction to give to the world, our own unique heart.

[24:02]

And it's not something that is... bound up by defining its production it just shows up without a heralder and it's accepted not necessarily approved of i might need a little improvement but accepted i am perfect just as i am we talk about the giver the receiver and the gift I know that all of these are practices. And in this vow, if I vow not to take what is not given, it's all bound up right there in giver, receiver, and gift. Every person playing every part. And realizing how it is that I accept and I feel and I absorb in regard to my gift and how I'm giving it. And how it appears to be my gift.

[25:05]

as though there's some sort of ownership. And other people, how they are giving and how I'm receiving. Am I receiving a gift? You know, when we do Oreoke, if any of you have ever had the pleasure of doing Oreoke, when I first did it, it just frustrated the heck out of me. And then I came to love it. Now it's one of my very favorite things to teach and do and what have you. It's eating as a meditation with three nested bowls wrapped up in cloths with chopsticks and some spoon and a little scraping utensil. And in the Orioki ceremony, you have essentially 47 minutes of ceremony, six and a half minutes of eating. And food tastes different in Orioki, it just does. And in Japan, they have the Takahatsu rounds where they go out with their begging bowls and they literally just hold their bowl out and what people give them It's what they have for the day, you know.

[26:08]

So in Orioki, we are practicing giver, receiver, and gift. We are turning this over. We're getting used to receiving the gift that is being given. And we're not sitting there in a stance of trying to take what is not given. And the people come and they're servers and we're supposed to sit as though we're in meditation. We're in a meditative pose, eyes degree down, 45 degree angle, not looking left or right. teeth and lips shut, tongue against the front roof of our mouth, breathing through our nose in a meditative posture. And then when the people come from the left or the right, we just notice them in our peripheral vision. We don't make eye contact and we bow to them, giving them respect and honor because they're going to give us a gift, an offering, if you will. And then whatever it is that they put in my bowl, many times we even talk with students about, you know, other than, you know, if you have a lot of allergens, If you don't, maybe just don't even look at the menu. Just see what shows up.

[27:10]

And if you can't have something because of an allergen, take a little tiny bit. If you can't take a little tiny bit, then still hold out your bowl and give gratitude. But to be in a physical stance of eating, one of the primal things of life, and to be doing it from the sense of, I'm going to accept your gift. I'm going to accept this offering. As a reminder for the rest of the day, as I go through and intersect with the rest of the rock tumbler of the Sangha as we soften each other's edges, that I'm going to try to receive your gift. I'm going to be like a person in a Takahatsu round with my begging bowl out, accepting what it is that you give me. My teacher, Ryushin Paul Haller, would tell me about the times that he was in the forest monk tradition in Thailand, and they would do these begging rounds, and they would go around, and it was integrated into the culture, so people knew that at a certain time, the monks would be walking around with their bowls, and people would come out, and they would put different things in the bowl, you know.

[28:29]

But Ryushin said that he knew that there was this one place, and every time he passed it about every other day, they would come out and they'd put these wonderful banana chips in his bowl. And he just hoped that they would give him banana chips. But you're not supposed to ask for banana chips. But then this person opened up a shop right near the banana chips person, and he was a fish person. And then he would be putting like the raw fish and other things in the bowl. And people don't arrange the bowl. You just stack it up, you know. And then he's just like, I don't want those banana chips with that fish all over it, you know. But it's just like, okay, banana chips and fish. All right. That's going to be the thing today. And just like, you know, thank you very much. And just walking. And then they would go back to the meditation hall, and they only ate once a day. They'd go back to the meditation hall, they'd have their bowl full of food, and they'd be sitting there, but you couldn't eat yet.

[29:36]

Just like an oreoche. You know, it's like, now I want to consume my gift. I'm a receiver. I have just received. No, no, you've got to do a whole bunch of other ritual and chanting before you can eat. And when he was there, he said that was the beginning of lecture. He said that they would give a Dharma talk first. So just imagine that all of you now are sitting with your begging bowl, and you've got your banana chips, and you've got that fish sitting on top of them. But they haven't just been sitting on top of them for the last five minutes. Like, this is getting near the end of the Dharma talk, and they're just absorbing all that fish juice, you know. And you're sitting there, and you're thinking, would Michael just please finish the Dharma talk? Not only am I hungry, but my banana chips are getting soggy, and this just isn't really what I want. This isn't how I want to be a receiver of this gift. And he said sometimes the teacher would just go on and on and on. So how is it that we receive our gifts from the people around us? I think one of the most beautiful capacities that a person can acquire and work on is the capacity to accept how others show up.

[30:45]

Again, not approve of how other people show up, but accept how they show up. Because remember, we don't meet people as fixed entities. We meet them at intersections. They've been on a trajectory for a long period of time, and they might be way more tolerable and fun than they used to be. Who knows? In fact, I remember asking one of the teachers when I was like a year into practice, and I really liked how they kind of were in the universe. And I said, can you tell me a story about about how you used to be a real jerk. Because I don't want to know that this practice doesn't work. I would love to know that you used to not really treat people well now. And of course, they were very humble and said, well, there's a lot of ways I don't treat people well now. But yes, there has been a migration. And all of us are on a trajectory. But we meet people at intersections along their trajectory. And it's easy to feel like somebody else is a fixed property. And they might be giving a much more digestible gift than they were 10 years ago.

[31:51]

They might be way more aware. They might have way more emotional intelligence than they used to. This might be a success story that I am encountering. And if I don't let that manifest, if I have a fixed view that I know what other people's gifts are... Because it's one thing to have an aversion to Nazi and his gift... But the next person that rode with him the next year, Nazi might have been a lot more tolerable. And he still might have been really hard to be with. But if that person was open to an evolution, let's say, of the manifestation of Nazi, they might have grown to have some bit of appreciation for what they were intersecting with. And that gift was something that was way more digestible. In fact, there's even molecules of appreciation now crawling into the relationship. Learning to have acceptance for what is is the beginning, the first step in Alcoholics Anonymous.

[32:58]

It's the first step in almost any program for physical fitness. Whatever it is, it's like I was hearing a story the other day about a guy who... really wanted to work out. But he just, in his head, he was so beating himself up over the fact that he couldn't work out. He couldn't find a way to work out. And then he kept doing this thing that was hilarious. He kept buying more and more expensive gym memberships, thinking that it would compel him to show up. And he eventually got a gym membership that he could barely afford. But he thought, now I'll really go and I'll really show up. But the thing was is that he was telling the story about working with his therapist and how much he just regularly would just beat himself up and that the weight got more and more and more. He was not accepting of the fact that I am really, truly handicapped in this area and I need to start incredibly small. And deciding that I'm going to go do a workout program for me, regardless of whatever it is for other people in the universe, for me, is a big, big hurdle.

[34:07]

And so he created this program where he was going to get in his car, the gym was five minutes away, and every day he would drive to the gym and touch the front door and go home. And that was where he started. And sometimes that's where we have to start. Just be humble. Okay, this is bigger than me. The way that the person shows up at work, it overwhelms me, and all I do is just think hateful thoughts. Okay. Well, at least let's start with that's where I'm at. You know? And then how does it feel in my body? And is this really a fixed property? Or can I think, well, maybe they haven't, maybe they're getting better. Maybe they're having a hard time. Maybe this is just a traumatic response from them. Now, again, it's not approval. It's not approval. But the more that I am in acceptance, the easier I will be able to set healthy boundaries.

[35:16]

The easier that I will not be in reactive mode. And the easier that I'll have clarity in the situation. Because if someone else is manifesting a certain way and giving their gift in a way that I don't accept, I'm essentially saying, I have already defined your gift. I know what your gift is. rather than holding it loosely and saying, this is how it appears to me right now. And having some bit of flexibility in the awareness of what I am seeing other people give. And from that standpoint, it allows other people to unfold and to manifest over time, and I don't just revert back to autopilot of, oh yeah, this is how that person is, and this is how they act, and this is why, and their mother was probably whatever, and you know... That whole thing. That divorces me from the curiosity and the possibility of allowing someone else to give a dynamic gift that is actually unfolding.

[36:20]

And maybe one day, you know, you'll find out that unbeknownst to you, that person looks at you and says, I think you are my best friend. And they'll shock you. Like, oh, wow. Something was actually going on here. because I decided not to define what it was that I was seeing. I'll divorce myself from my own perceptions. Yes, I realize that I have an aversion. I think that I'm correct about thus and such. But how we are with each other is oftentimes a lot like a funhouse mirror. You ever see those at the carnival, the funhouse mirrors? I mean, they're based on real things. They're based on real objects. They're just distorted. They're not clear. And usually, I mean, when someone meets you for the first time, you just met somebody for the first time. Now, you've got all this life history behind you. How would you feel if they summed you up in 10 seconds?

[37:23]

Oh, yeah, I know so-and-so. You're like, well, wait a second. Hold on. I mean, you're probably working off of some real data points. But hold on. It's distorted. But we do that to each other all the time. It's based upon real objects. It's not that we're trying not to say that we're not seeing anything, or we are seeing something. But keeping in mind that there could be some level of distortion. So as we enter the last few weeks of Zenathon and we look at our giving and receiving of gifts, I invite all of us to notice what it feels like when I have a sense of scarcity and lack.

[38:32]

And that is what these temples are for, is for us to come in here and to be able to have things calm down a little bit, get some forms so that we can settle. The monastery has these three kind of like progressions of like you settle, a whole bunch of things to help you settle and kind of calm down. And then once things settle and calm down, you can kind of get a little bit of clarity. And then once things get a little bit of clarity, then you, oh, maybe I should be doing X. And then there's, you know, do I have the felicity of mind and will to do what it is that I now see? That first part about settling. If I'm in a default stance of not accepting what the world is giving me, I will not be settled. And if I'm not in touch with my sense of lack of what I want other people to be giving me, then... I will not be able to actually let them unfold. And so this is our work.

[39:40]

This is what we're doing here. We're here trying to learn how to receive gifts, how to give gifts, how to accept our own gifts that we have to give, how to be humble about the fact that there's a lot of things that I give that I wish I didn't, and there's a lot of things that I wish I gave that I don't. And yet, I don't have to worry about coming into the next room and having a heralder. I can just come in there and be me and I will be accepted and loved. And from that standpoint, I can then start to hold other people. So in this time of giving, we do invite you to literally give. We have outside some little QR codes. We have some flyers. Or if you just go to our front page at sfzc.org, you can easily see how to donate. But a big portion of how we keep the lights on in these very expensive counties three of the most expensive counties in the world is because of generosity from folks like you.

[40:41]

And if you can just give us, you know, $1, $5, that's plenty. And if you can't give anything right now, please don't. Just being here, being with us is supportive and helps other people with their practice. And so please look for those QR codes and how to donate outside. There's a donation box. And we will do our best to keep the doors open for the next year, 10 years, 50 years. And hopefully inviting all of you to come in and realize that this is your temple as much as anybody else's. Green Gulch is just the people that are here practicing today. That's all it's ever been. And we're here trying to receive each other's gift. and tried to give our own unencumbered. And I invite you to explore it with all the rest of the Sangha today and off into the future. So I think now we do questions and answers and comments.

[41:51]

So if you all have a question and answer or a comment, Cam will come around with a mic and We'll see what happens next. Thank you for your talk. At one time in your past, did you work with folks with disabilities? I did. I worked with folks that had Down syndrome and cerebral palsy in vocational training. I would love to hear stories about your work, in particular... One person that may have made a profound impact on you during your work with people? Yeah. Well, I mean, one of them was a young man named Jamil. And the thing that's interesting is that the folks especially that have Down syndrome, there's an inhibition or a lack of firing in the frontal lobe around different executive functions.

[42:54]

but there's an immense capacity for all of the different emotional life that someone has, as well as for learning. And Jamil grew up in a wealthy family in Amman, Jordan, who could not accept that he had any sort of impairment whatsoever, some very accomplished parents. So they sent him to boarding school in London, and they thought that he just needed more education. And at the time when I was there about well, 35 years ago in Amman, the patron of the mentally handicapped or the mentally challenged was Princess Sarvit. And she was really trying to bring the country into the modern world in that way. But most folks kind of hid away any family member who had those sorts of challenges. And only some of them people even knew about. It was like a shame or some sort of karmic retribution. And so they were trying to get Jameel educated.

[43:57]

And they sent him to boarding school after boarding school in England. And he probably had a 65 or 70 level IQ. And after about age 13, 14, they said, look, we're not gonna keep taking your money. He really cannot do the work. In the process though, Jameel became bilingual. and became a translator. And he became unencumbered by social conventions. And he was the most wonderful translator because he just translated it exactly like the person said. And he didn't sugarcoat it. And he was great. He would say, Michael, I was talking to Anil, and Anil says that you are a horse's ass. Thank you, Jamil. And the capacity for forgiveness and for accepting each other was profound in that group.

[45:09]

Even if there was a disagreement the previous day or whatever, the amount of which they would support each other and be with each other was just beautiful. And we used to have to... Oh, it was an industrial woodworking shop, and I was... creating safe processes for them to build products. And I used to have to build safeties into the situation because there was such a capacity for meeting each thing anew that they would get really bad repetitive stress injuries where like if you were working on an assembly line, let's say for eight hours, and you were just screwing in the same bolt over and over again with a ratchet. After a few hours, you'd kind of get bored. You'd start to wander in your head and whatever, you know, and you might find a different way to do it or you might ask if you could, you know. But because the individuals with those conditions just were set, you know, saw each bolt as a new bolt,

[46:15]

They seemingly were happy and engaged with each bolt, and after seven hours of screwing in bolts, I could give them another bolt, and they'd be like, thank you very much, and put the bolt in there. So you have to really be sure you changed up the thing, because their capacity for just accepting what's happening right now and just really meeting it was just profound. And so there were so many lessons I could share with you, but thanks for asking. And you don't have to come up with a great comment or question. You can just say anything. We'll see what happens. Looks like there's a hand over here somewhere. Thank you for your talk. I don't have a question.

[47:17]

I want to... My experience with Qigong... is going to the nature and so with the wild geese what they do is giving and receiving so they are giving they are receiving they are giving by cleansing the meridians like this yes coming because this is a lawn and this is a colon and coming and cleansing first the cleansing the mind whatever you have Just give with the giving. And then receiving is with the heart. Just to receive by heart. So it's amazing how the birds are living with the giving and receiving. If you do practice every day, that is special with the kids in school.

[48:20]

With the gratitude and also the youngsters, that's when you mentioned about the Jordan, that we are doing those in Middle East, how the kids, you know, to learn to be gratitude and then also with the giving and receiving. So it's so wonderful practice to focus on giving and practicing. It makes you happy. Yeah. Happiness is a big gift right now for what's happening in the universe. Thank you for bringing Qigong into the awareness. So much of that is the giving and receiving is the core of that. Thank you. I may have it to Paul Heller possibly in Tassahara to work for giving this system. Thank you.

[49:21]

Thank you. I don't know if I said hello to everybody online yet. I think I just see you there with the camera. But hello, everybody online and out there. in the world, you're here with us, and really grateful that we are able to have this technology so those of you who couldn't be here in person, we can, yeah, be with you. I just had a quick question. It's my first time here, and I thought it was a really awesome talk, so I appreciate it a lot. I guess the question I had was about something you hinted at, which is the relationship between accepting gifts and boundaries. I guess that's something I've been thinking about a lot is like when people are overstepping boundaries, like to what extent is that a gift or how do you kind of see it as a gift and then how does that translate to action?

[50:33]

Yeah. Well, I mean, I think that the thing that in every setting that underpins action and interaction with other human beings is the humility that i can't surf every wave you know that there are some settings that i just need to get out of there's some relationships that i really can't handle you know um and yet the if the default stance is acceptance there is a certain clarity of mind that becomes possible that even helps you set a clearer boundary even earlier because you're not on autopilot. And there is a certain discernment that is being, you know, spotlighted and energized and given oxygen because I'm not in a default stance.

[51:36]

I'm actually watching things as they unfold. And sometimes you don't know what the best way to meet the moment is. You just know that the way that the person is manifesting isn't working and might even be abusive. So maybe what you have to do is get space. Get away. But if somebody has a practice of acceptance, a practice of settling, a practice of being grounded, the time that it takes and the awareness that is found is usually much greater. And the time takes less. It takes less time. I would call it the half-life of bother, you know, of being able to actually settle the amount, the rate at which bother dissipates. And then, you know, you can actually have a little bit more clarity. You're in like, if you're ever in like a really fraught conversation, you know, you're both bothered. Neither one has great clarity in that time. You can test people five seconds later in regard to their ability to memorize things, and it's greatly diminished.

[52:38]

You don't have all of your capacities because you're not settled. You're not grounded. You're churned up. But living with a default stance of acceptance is an ever-growing kind of walking in the mist, if you will, where the baseline gets stronger, the defaults being settled gets stronger, if you will. And still, I mean, I know people that have said to me, you know, Michael, I've been a Zen priest for 40 years, and I can go home now, and I can be with my family for up to an hour before I want to strangle somebody. You know? And for years, I just didn't go home, you know? So being humble, yeah, you might not be able to surf every wave, and just because... You know, like I'm stirred up in the moment and I don't know what to do. It doesn't mean that I'm not practicing. Maybe the fact that I'm aware of that is the fact, the sign that I'm practicing. And maybe I just know, oh, I think I need to get away from this moment.

[53:39]

Just one follow up on that, which is the acceptance point makes a lot of sense, but I'm also curious about the gift perspective. Like, are you viewing everything as a gift or how does that factor in? Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, gift, like when we think of gift, like something that's like nicely wrapped and You know, it's like this bow on it and like we want it, you know. Have you ever known anybody who was a bad gift giver? I mean, it's really like, it's like some of my best friends in the past, I don't know, they'd give me a gift and I'd just be like, what? And it was really funny. Like one time I was in a relationship, a romantic relationship for a long period of time. It was years ago. And this woman's family, I really... didn't get along with that much, but they were awesome at giving gifts. And I can remember thinking, and it wasn't that they were really expensive gifts. They just kind of paid attention. And the gift that people give is also relative.

[54:41]

It has to do with how I'm viewing it. And I still have my collection of Pablo Neruda's works that her dad gave me and other things that... that people just honed in and they noticed. So sometimes the gifts that people are giving us are just out of sheer lack of ability, lack of awareness. They could be a wonderful person, and yet the gift that they're giving is just like, no, I don't really want this. So when I'm using the term gift, it isn't synonymous for a really fun thing that I want to unwrap. It's synonymous for everything that somebody is manifesting. And everything that I'm manifesting. Because that's what we're putting out into the universe. That is action. That is karma, if you will. And so how do I be with the manifestation of someone else and hold that begging bowl up and say, thank you for putting those pieces of fish on my banana chips. I have a hand over here.

[55:47]

This is from the online sangha, Eloisa. They ask, Hi, Michael. Thank you for your talk. I'd love to explore your thoughts on how we might approach the current government as a kind of gift. Rather than defaulting to a reactive stance, how do you navigate that? Yeah, no, thank you very much. I think that's like the, you know, they call that advanced practice. And... I can remember when I was first starting to study Buddhism, and I was watching this interview with the Dalai Lama, and they were talking about some monks that had just been released that were imprisoned just for being Buddhists. And they were in the prison for 15 years. And the interviewer said, do those people fear for their lives? And the Dalai Lama said, well, for a period of time, one of the monks feared that he might lose compassion for his captors. And I thought, okay, that is not me.

[56:58]

Sometimes I get a little snarky with the barista. And, yeah, so there's advanced practice. You know, Viktor Frankl wrote Man's Search for Meaning, who founded a whole branch of psychology in the middle of a Nazi concentration camp. when he realized that the last power that I have on earth is how I'm going to respond to this moment. And that's a power that as long as I have a mind, that people can't take away from me. And he formed logotherapy from that. There are horrible situations that people can find themselves in. And even though there might be really difficult things that folks might find in the current political climate, it's not to say that there isn't action that needs to be taken. It isn't to say that You know, there aren't things to be done. But if I am so stirred up and not finding a way to ground myself every day, I know how much news I can actually digest. I know how much I need, you know, do I just randomly let stuff pop up on my phone and on my iPad and in my car, just like the news just all day long?

[58:08]

Well, maybe that's like that person that we were talking about earlier that I just, I can't surf that wave. Like, hold on a second. If I'm going to actually be engaged in something that is stirring me up, then I think I need to have more grounding practices. I need to be able to, you know, digest. And, you know, for me personally, I look at the news four times a week for 20 minutes. And then I choose a couple different pieces of longer, I guess you'd say text to read that I find to be fairly, you know, objective, even though nothing's objective. um and um yeah because there was a period of time where i would just get up in the morning and i would listen to democracy now every single morning for like an hour and a half and i was like wait a second this is like more than i can actually digest and so if i'm going to get engaged and i'm going to be settled and i want to have a clear mind and i want to be able to respond and if i'm going to try to live life where it's not us and them and those people that are out there that are evil and me and my friends that are good and right and just

[59:16]

If I'm going to keep away from that stance, then I'm going to have to be very careful with what waves I can surf. And so I just invite us all to do an exploration and to know what it is we can do because the world does need us to take action. It always has. But we need to be in a place where we can do that and not be a reactionary that is othering a good section of the planet. Thank you for listening to this podcast. offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our programs are made possible by the donations we receive. Please help us to continue to realize and actualize the practice of giving by offering your financial support. For more information, visit sfzc.org and click Giving. May we fully enjoy the Dharma.

[60:13]

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