It's just not alive enough. So here's the poem. Some of you might know it. Some of you might have heard me already talk about it. It's from Hafiz. And it came up when I was invited at Tassavara, where I was for Sangha week two weeks ago, three weeks ago, for two consecutive weeks, where Sangha's from all over the United States are invited to spend five days with the residents at Tassahara working and then being guests and having their own program in the afternoon. A wonderful time. Wonderful groups always are there. So I was invited to give a talk and I went to the library and got out the book by Hafiz, The Gift. I was just lost in it. Kind of taking... Some kind of soul bath for hours, you know, laughing, feeling moved, not understanding, wondering what does he mean, everything.

[01:12]

And this is the one that just since then stays with me. Now is the time. Now is the time to know that all that you do is sacred. Now. Why not consider a lasting truth with yourself and God? Now is the time to understand that all your ideas of right and wrong were just a child's training wheels to be laid aside when you finally live with veracity and love. Hafiz is a divine envoy whom the beloved has written a holy message upon. My dear, please tell me, why do you still throw sticks at your heart and God?

[02:17]

What is it in that sweet voice inside that incites you to fear? Now is the time to for the world to know that every thought and action is sacred. This is the time for you to deeply compute the impossibility that there is anything but grace. Now is the season to know that everything you do is sacred. Now is the time to know that all that you do is sacred. Those two lines I'm taking with me or they stick to me.

[03:21]

I don't know which way it's actually going. And they pop up here and there in my head, you know. And there was kind of... sometimes almost jolt me into the present moment. They bring me to exactly what's going on right now. Very often we question how, you know, how is this sacred? I don't get it, you know. What does it mean? But if I give it the benefit of the doubt, well, maybe. Even if I don't understand it's sacred, it makes me immediately pay more attention. I'm more careful with what I'm doing. And somehow my heart starts to sing beyond what I understand.

[04:27]

So I looked up sacred in the... American Heritage Dictionary. And one of the things under captioned for is worthy of respect, of reverence. Respect in its root has something to do, comes from Latin respectare, which means you look back, you give it a second look, you don't just pass it by. You're not satisfied with your immediate, maybe habitual interpretation. You actually pause and take time to look more fully what is actually going on. So, now is the time to know that all that you do is worthy of

[05:30]

being looked at respectfully, being investigated, being respected, which also, of course, means all that everybody else does is worth of, what I like to say, radical respect. It's not about do I agree with it or not agree with it, but do I treat it When I do that, I have a chance to actually see more fully what it is and what would be an appropriate response. Secret is also connected in its root to sacrifice. So I looked up sacrifice. And there it says, it's a full feature of something highly valued. as an idea, object, or object for the sake of someone or something considered to have a greater value or claim.

[06:43]

So if we kind of entertain the possibility that everything we do is sacred or is worthy of respect. Then we have to forfeit ideas. We hold. And that's what he says. Now is the time to understand that all your ideas of right and wrong were just a child's training wheels to be laid aside when you finally live with veracity and love. While I was kind of carrying in my mind that today was coming along and I was supposed to show up here at 10 o'clock with all of you to be here, with all of you who also showed up here, I had two long conversations with a friend in Switzerland.

[07:56]

I know her since 1979. We worked in the same place in a psychiatric hospital. We were on the same team. And she has always been ill. And she has been ill in the most horrendous way. Her illness has progressed in the most horrendous way one can imagine. She's 63. She looks like she's She weighs about 90 pounds. She has an illness that only about 3% of the world population suffers from. So there's no research. There's no understanding really what it is because there's no money in it. You know, if you create the medication and only 3% need it, so forget it. You know, these are the endangered species that we think we can dispense of. She's now losing her eyesight.

[09:05]

It is completely a mystery to me how she's still alive. When I came back here in 2003, I was sure she was going to die within the year. She is an incredibly lonely person because of her conditioning. She felt like she had to do everything herself. She couldn't trust anybody else because when she was young, she was raped, and her mother's answer was, what did you do? What did you do? You know, like you brought this on by yourself. There's no understanding, no support, and that wasn't the beginning. That was kind of like... She is a fighter. She is a lonely fighter. She is so committed to her life that I, on the other side of the phone, just speechless.

[10:12]

All her doctors have abandoned her in the deepest sense. They only look at the specialty they are trained in. And so since a few years, she has to do dialysis, not because her primary problem is her kidneys, but because her kidneys are a symptom of what else she has. So each time she tells them how the dialysis affects her, they say, oh, then we have to do more or less, or we try this or that. But nobody sits down with her and says that really this is... A situation that's far beyond us. We don't know what can help you. But we're your partner and find out what gives you the most relief. So she's never partnered. She's always kind of treated as an object and of course because they don't know what to do.

[11:16]

We usually don't like to feel helpless. We can't stand it. So everybody... leave Cheryl because it's almost unbearable the suffering she's going through. So here I am on the phone and she talks to me. And I am so grateful to this practice because this practice is about learning how to stand what anything in you goes This is too much. This is too much. This can't be like that. Why doesn't she do this? Why didn't she do earlier this and that and this wouldn't be happening? Just because it's almost unbearable and there's nothing you can do to change her life. Besides being there and dropping all your ideas about right and wrong.

[12:22]

Because they get in the way. They immediately get in the way. And they actually get in the way of veracity and love, which is unconditional. So she speaks to me and says on the phone, you know, I start having these ideas. But she told me many years ago, she started to, when she still could see and still could move and still could drive a car, she learned to shoot with a pistol. So she told me then, you know, when I can't go on anymore, I will end my life. And I said, Gabriele, I would love it if you ever think of that, that you would let me know so I can at least... think of you. So she says, I'm having now these ideas.

[13:27]

And I said, what kind of ideas? She said, well, I know this medication. And she's worried that it's not going to really work. You know, you never know for sure. And she says, I don't want to hurt myself too much. I can open my shant, which she has for the dialysis, but that will create such a mess for the people that are coming afterwards. And I say to her, you know, there are organizations that actually help you die when it's time to die. And maybe you want to check out if there is something that feels more appropriate and you feel accompanied more.

[14:33]

The next morning she calls again and leaves me a message and said she called this these people, they are going to send her the papers. And she said, I am so relieved. I felt like When I do this by myself, they will call the police. They will dissect my body to determine the cause of death. There was something not quite right.

[15:42]

Also, she remembered what we've talked before. She could just stop. dialysis and go to hospice. She talked to somebody who occasionally helps her and that person said, I'll be with you when those papers come and I read them to you because she can't read anymore. She's losing her eyesight. She's losing her eyesight and the doctor says, come back in three months. And it's really hard to stand it when you hear, because there is such incredible, incredible loneliness and suffering that it's hard to breathe. So everybody... Now is the time to understand that all your ideas of right and wrong were just a child's training wheels to be laid aside when you finally live with veracity and love.

[17:07]

When life's ultimate challenges enter your life, you can feel how true this is. It's not about ideas whether Deciding when it's time to end your life is wrong or right. It's about being so available and so present that whatever is the most appropriate response to that person actually has space to arise. It's not about judging. It's not about judging. It's about being available beyond what you think you can be available and beyond your ideas of right and wrong. You know, I worked in a nursing home while I was back from Zen Center for a little while.

[18:17]

And There were people with Parkinson's that couldn't speak, couldn't move, and would have been living for a long time and would go on living for a long time more because nothing was wrong with their organs. So first when I was there, each evening, I was so utterly exhausted and depressed. that I felt like somebody needs to carry me home and take me, put me to bed. I couldn't imagine how I would get home and put myself to bed. Because it was so depressing. But every day I was there and I fed these people and I changed their diapers.

[19:18]

And I dressed them and I put them in the chair and I undressed them and put them back to bed. And one day I had already cleaned three people and walk into the third room and there's this horrendous smell, right? And first comes up in me, wide knee. I already did three. This is enough and the others are having a coffee. This is unfair. And then, just by grace, I saw the person. I saw who was in front of me. It wasn't number four. It was... This single one person.

[20:20]

And it didn't smell differently. It wasn't a different mess. But it affected me in a completely different way. It wasn't about why me. It wasn't about how many did the others do and why do I have to do this. It was just this one person that needed to be cleaned. And there was no... one before and no one after. It wasn't number four. It was number unique now. And that was a gift that I feel I was just given to understand something about being completely present and of understanding that Now is the time to understand that all our ideas of right and wrong are just a child's training wheels to be laid aside when we finally live with veracity and love.

[21:28]

Then we are present for the other person's situation without judgment, which doesn't mean without judgment. It's not the same judgment and discernment, what we often think it is. I have no way of judging Gabriele's life and her decision. I can try and we can try to be present with people that we don't know. we can help them. It's not about knowing how. It's about standing to not know what to do. That there's nothing else to do than just stay with them, be with them, maybe weep with them, maybe laugh with them.

[22:32]

And not abandon them. Because when we recoil, we abandon them. And because we're all absolutely intricately interconnected, we abandon ourselves. No one in this world gets happy by themselves. It's just not possible. We have to build walls around ourselves to be able to believe that. We can't save the world. But we can save the world by being, by serving ourselves and what's around us by being willing to be fully present and continue to be present beyond what we think we can.

[23:40]

And that saves the world. There's a person in one of the sitting groups I'm reading, and her husband is full of cancer. And he, for whatever reason, is not able to see that he is most probably dying. So we don't want to think about what needs to be put in order. So the doctor tells his wife, you have to tell him that he's dying. And I said to the wife, you do not have to tell him that he's dying.

[24:50]

You have to be his partner where he is going. You do not have to kill him ahead of time by telling him, it's good for you to know that you're dying, which he's obviously not ready for. So she is losing her husband. She is losing a partner in the understanding what's going on. Can we be a partner beyond the other person's possibility to partner us back and allow him the time to come to that understanding when he is ready and when it doesn't kill him ahead of time? We so often abandon people in... Under the umbrella of truth, I'm going to tell you the truth.

[25:59]

It's good for you. You know, I'll open your eyes. It's because we can't stand it. We can't help. When someone you love is dying, you are not dying, but you're dying with them. You can't die one urge for them. You can't take it away from them. And on that level, helplessness, we often can't bear. So we turn away. We don't want to be around. We reprimand them. Why didn't you do something 10 years ago? Then it wouldn't be like that. We... Now is the time to understand that earlier ideas of right and wrong were just a child's training wheel.

[27:02]

They train us. They're important. But when it's about life and death, right and wrong is, in that way, when it's ideas, they won't help. When we're fully present and accepting, What is in front of us, we know what is an appropriate or not appropriate response. So, is it more appropriate to say, you know, taking your life is a very bad thing, you know, that creates very bad karma, so I leave you alone there. It doesn't work, really. We are so interconnected that this abandonment is an abandonment of all life. Not just that particular one. Now is the time to understand that earlier ideas of right and wrong were just a child's training wheels to be laid aside when you finally live with veracity and love.

[28:11]

So the next phone call from Gabriele was that she... called and said, I called. And I had a wonderful conversation with the person of that organization that helps people die when they think it's time for them to go. And she talked to somebody else who said, I'll come and I'll read to you what you can't see anymore. So suddenly someone was there who would be there with her. And it opened up a space for her to actually look at her life with space. Because she said it was so, the ideas I had before were undignified. I didn't want to leave with a huge mess.

[29:21]

leaving behind a mess for others to clean up. It opened up that she can think, oh, maybe I go to hospice and just stop the dialysis. And she could finally start to have space to look at her life more fully because she didn't have she had partners in investigating what would feel the most appropriate for her to do. So it's completely open what's going to happen. But I also think there's no way anybody outside of a life has the possibility to judge somebody else's life.

[30:28]

We can't. But do we abandon them because they do something that we think is not right? We are so interconnected. Our lungs have a surface of 1,500 square feet. That's the size of a tennis court. Can you imagine you have the size of a tennis court inside this little chest? where people run like crazy after bears and sweat and, you know, huge. You know, that's what our lungs, our lungs, that's the surface of our lungs.

[31:31]

And we all breathe the same air. The dust from China is here. What we breathe out gets breathed in by trees, but it goes into the whole atmosphere. This is how interconnected we are. So, now is the time to know that all that you do is sacred. Worthy of respect. Worthy to be looked at. Worthy to be re-looked at. To be examined. Now, why not consider a lasting truth with yourself and God?

[32:39]

Which you could translate into Buddha nature. the mystery of life that permeates the whole universe, that we cannot grasp, that there's no concept that actually holds that. So Buddhism talks about emptiness, because it's beyond conception. And often we think, well, if I'm enlightened, then I can conceive of it. Ha ha. You know, it's really, we can conceive of it, but we can... Realize it, which is a different thing. Now is the time to know that all that you do is sacred. Now, why not consider a lasting truth with yourself and God? Now is the time to understand that all your ideas of right and wrong were just a child's training wheels to be laid aside when you finally live with veracity and love.

[33:57]

Hafiz is a divine envoy whom the beloved has written a holy message upon. My dear, Please tell me, why do you still throw sticks at your heart and God? What is it in that sweet voice inside that incites you to fear? Now is the time for the world to know that every thought and action is sacred. Meaning it affects The whole universe, the butterflies flapping its wings somewhere, makes a storm way, way, way far away with not consciously knowing it's causing a storm there. Now is the time for the world to know that every thought and action is sacred.

[35:11]

This is the time for you to deeply compute the impossibility that there is anything but grace. I looked up grace in the Webster Dictionary. It says, amongst other things, favor, esteem, kindness. I made a little arrow. In Buddhism, we would say dependent, co-arising, complete, interconnectedness of everything. It also says, with appropriate dignity, grant something freely. So free, unmerited, not bound to merit, beyond what we think is right and wrong or good and bad. The gift of being alive is something.

[36:18]

We are just alive, and it's a gift. And then there's another explanation for grace, and that is to dignify, to honor. And I thought that is such a lovely meaning. If we get to really look at everything that happens as giving you dignity and honor, we can start to see what it is beyond our ideas of right and wrong. There's a Rumi poem that goes beyond ideas of of right-doing and wrong-doing. There is a field. I will meet you there.

[37:19]

When the soul is too full of ideas. Now I can't remember it. where there's too full to talk about or speak about. When you lie down in that grass, all ideas and something else don't make any sense. All ideas, self and other. Yes. There is a place where there is That is beyond ideas of right doing and wrong doing. Which is not the same as saying everything goes.

[38:22]

Everything is okay. So grace has also to do, the word grace, with to dignify, to honor. And that is something where it kind of relates to Buddhism, where it's... Our teachings say, see things as they are, not how you think they should be or how you don't want them to be, but actually how they are. And to be able to see things how they are, you have to be present. You can't go and say, oh, this is this. have to sit there and say, tell me what you are. You have to be in a receptive mode and wide open for things to present themselves.

[39:24]

Instead of you going and saying, you are this and you are bad. And then there was a word in there that I can't remember how it was, Connected with grace, but it is, and it says, clemency. And clemency is very Buddhist. It says, kindness, compassion, forbearing, tender. Isn't that lovely? Now is the time to know that all that you do is sacred. Now why not consider a lasting truth with yourself and God?

[40:26]

And Buddhism would say with Buddha nature, that's expressed in everything. Now is the time to understand that all Your ideas of right and wrong were just a child's training wheels to be laid aside when you finally live with veracity and love. Hafiz is a divine envoy whom the Beloved has written a holy message upon. My dear, please tell me, why do you still throw sticks at your heart and God? What is it in that sweet voice inside that incites you to fear? Now is the time for the world to know that every thought and action is sacred. This is the time for you to deeply compute the impossibility that there is anything but grace.

[41:37]

Now is the season to know that everything we do is secret. Everything we do affects everything around us. Everything we think affects not only this body, everything I think does not only affect this body, but actually everything around me. And Bergen says somewhere, the power of continuous practice confirms you as well as others. It means your practice affects the entire earth and the entire sky in the 10 direction. We are so interconnected. Although not noticed by others or yourself, It is so.

[42:41]

So we may not be able to see how our thoughts, our actions affect the entire universe, but we can pay attention how they affect us and how they affect the people around us. And the same rules govern the whole universe. Out of a great need we are holding hands and climbing. Not loving is a letting go. Listen, the terrain around here is far too dangerous for that. It's another poem by Hafiz. Out of a great need we are holding hands and climbing. The terrain around here is far too dangerous. Not loving is letting go. Listen, the terrain around here is far too dangerous for that.

[43:50]

So in Buddhism we talk a lot about letting go. But it's not the same letting go that Hafiz is talking about. That he says, that way we shouldn't let go. We shouldn't. ever stop loving beyond what we understand because we should always give it the benefit of the doubt that we don't understand it completely and not loving giving up on loving is abandonment and it's not only abandonment of maybe a person we think we are abandoning, but of ourselves because we are so intricately connected. Buddhism talks, nobody gets saved by themselves. It's not possible. And you know that.

[44:54]

You know that when your family members or friends are suffering, you are suffering with them. And then we try to fix them. Not necessarily because they need fixing, but because we don't want to feel the suffering. What time is it? I have no idea. Oh, wow. Okay, I should stop. I mean, I think our lungs are a wonderful picture of how interconnected we all are on this planet.

[46:14]

You know, it's mind-boggling. The dust that's kicked up somewhere in the desert we breathe in is, you know, here. where we carry that reality in our bodies, in our lungs, that we all breathe the same air, that the dust that's kicked up in the Sahara might, you know, throw it around here. So it's a physical expression of how we are very unique and singular expression from One life without which we all wouldn't be here. So we are both.

[47:14]

We are unique and we are utterly and completely interconnected, interdependent. And what happens to one of us happens to everyone, whether we know it or not. Now is the time to know that all that you do is sacred. Now why not consider a lasting truth with yourself and God? Now is the time to understand that all your ideas of right and wrong were just a child's training wheels to be laid aside when you finally live with veracity and love. Hafiz is a divine envoy whom the beloved has written a holy message upon. My dear, please tell me, why do you still throw sticks at your heart and God?

[48:17]

What is it in that sweet verse inside that incites you to fear? Now is the time for the world to know that every thought and action is sacred. This is the time for you to deeply compute the impossibility that there is anything but grace. Now is the season to know that everything you do is secret. This is another poem that keeps accompanying me. It's very short and it goes, the title is, and love says, and love says, I will, I will take care of you to everything that is near.

[49:33]

That is a very helpful point for me. Because it's how love works. It takes care of what's in front. And it doesn't overwhelm me with thinking I have to take care of the whole world at the same time. You know, all at once, which I feel overwhelmed by. But if it's just what's here, because it's so interconnected, it is taking... care of the whole world through the particular that's just in front of you. And now is the time. And the wonderful news is it's always now. And if I miss now, now, there's the next now and the next now. have a chance every now.

[50:42]

And if you missed the last now, the next one is right here. Thank you all very much.

[50:59]

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