Travel is, as they say, educational. I got a taste of it on my trip back east to New Rochelle. And it showed me sort of how much in denial I am about my age. was necessary to make a reservation to be picked up, taken to the airport. And the person who was making the reservation for me gave a description of me so that the person would know to get the right person. And it was very apt. but it was quite a shock to me when I was described as an elderly man.

[01:11]

Another sort of shock was the May page on the calendar. That sort of describes my current medical history. And it says falling apart, falling apart, everything all at once falling apart. Nothing to do. Tonight I'm going to take practice and the practice period as my topic and sort of describe my personal struggles with practice.

[02:25]

I'll start with my definition of practice, a time to consciously cultivate body, mind, and speech in ways to strengthen desired preferences. I think it's apt to say that it's a conscious intention to cultivate sort of skillful means. And this is sort of in opposition to the established patterns that are well established.

[03:40]

It's sort of an uphill battle to consciously try to intervene and change long-term habits. And I said that And the practice period is about desired or preferences to strengthen desired behavior. My teacher, Darlene, has a practice which is somewhat different from that. method of taking sort of random actions.

[04:59]

For example, in choosing a dessert, one of our examples is not choosing what she prefers, but just picking something at random to break this habit of always choosing your preference. She found this very useful in training, breaking the... habit of always choosing what your preferences. So that goes for also for clothing to wear whatever to reach in and grab an article of clothing and wear that without making a choice based on your preferences.

[06:12]

She would say that always choose what you prefer does not allow growth and flexibility. I just learned in practicing. This is sort of the position that I'm presently coming from, that my present behavior is a result of learned reactions to past events and conditions. These learned preferences can be unlearned or changed or new preferences learned. I believe I can change that we can change, but we must accept that this is a long, slow and hard growth process.

[07:27]

This is my understanding of the word karma, that karma refers to this conditioning. But. We visit Parma. can be changed. Karma is, in a sense, a learned behavior. In my own practice, I find that I think I'll start getting here that it takes trust which I also would say includes courage to express my own views especially angry negative ones and I'm often surprised that I

[08:44]

find support for these years. Also, but I have to sort of drop the idea that everyone has to agree that when I first came to City Center and started practicing, one of my worst Parts of practice period were the T's and the small groups. And they were very difficult for me until I started, I say, taking the risk and the trust.

[09:46]

to voice my opinions, which sometimes didn't agree with sort of what I believed the sort of house view was. But as I say, I began to enjoy tea in small groups when I, in desperation, I guess, started voicing my views. And I wouldn't sort of recommend that to anyone here. Tea in small groups only became enjoyable when I took the plunge and voiced my views without fearing rejection or needing acceptance by the whole group.

[11:05]

I became confident that others have done it and I can do it also. Taking the precepts, studying precepts and taking the lady or initiation, I think they call it now, was quite... I didn't understand how, why somebody should take a vow if they were... to break it. Vows are impossible to keep. And I had some sort of fear of failure or even punishment that if people broke their vows, well, they were punished.

[12:12]

That was my experience and belief. So to set yourself up for failure, Again, just didn't compute for me. Slowly that view has changed. I did take the vows, and I have broken them. And I wasn't struck dead, I guess. I think some of my early religious training and background was still lurking somewhere down there that, you know, if you made promises and didn't keep them, well, you would be punished. I think you have to be...

[13:19]

very careful about making vows if you have any of that attitude. If you get down on yourself and sort of lose self-respect or confidence because you've written a vow, That's sort of counterproductive. It all goes back to failure and making mistakes and how I have sort of been taught. It's better to play it careful and take care of yourself.

[14:33]

Don't take any risks. So you have to ask yourself, does defeat her proves that I'm a bad person or worthless. You have to watch out. And you need lots of support and examples of others doing it, especially a teacher. I relied on books a lot, but books. The problem with books is that they can't answer your questions or they don't answer your questions when you when you need it. And. The book cannot.

[15:46]

Know. person or teacher or a Sangha or your fellow Sangha members can interact and give you feedback and tell you things that you do not see and the book certainly doesn't see. And the book can't cover all the circumstances that come up. Is there another side to that? Yes.

[16:47]

But I read it. So we have our opinions. I have lots of opinions. And lots of things we reject. What we dislike needs to be challenged. A book usually doesn't do that. Your friends will. My catchphrase for that, which I would recommend, it's an old commercial, actually. Try it. You don't like it. Maybe not like it, but at least you're

[17:50]

attitude will change. It's amazing how many things around here that I avoided originally and had very strong fixed ideas about when I actually did them. So it wasn't what I expected. And it was a long list, starting the service and going on to almost every activity, bowing, chanting, the well-being ceremony. For example, I came here. First in about 97, 98.

[18:51]

I'd been sitting alone. And I was good at sitting. And so I was safe there. And I sort of made my peace with sitting before I got here. Not that I didn't have trouble with sitting, too. But by the time I got here, my sitting was fine. So I sat. And for probably the first year, I did not ever get up to the Buddha Hall. Any excuse will do if you don't want to come. My excuse was a good one, was that I commuted and parked in a tow-away zone that towed cars away at seven. So I'm not. Wasn't able to stay for the city for the service.

[19:52]

But I didn't get up here. But then. So the same process started again about bowing. I was in bad physical shape too. For the first several months of bowing. That was a major physical effort for me. And I was a lot younger then than I am now. Chanting. I had all the same troubles. The thing is that when I actually tried them, all my expectations and beliefs as to what they would do to me never materialized.

[21:05]

All my fears and fancies and preconceptions. Proved to be false or empty. Empty, that brings up another thing. Travel is broadening in another way. In that empty hands, endo, has different forms. And they have the heart suture, but just enough difference so that you cannot chant it. You know, with half a mind. And it doesn't appeal to you. You have actually become accustomed to it. Actually, you don't even have to travel to do that.

[22:11]

There's enough change that goes on here that people are constantly. Fussing about change. I can recall the big fuss when they changed the ending from all beings to all honored ones. And people were going to go to higher authority, wherever that is, to challenge that change. And... Now you don't hear much about it. So just shows us how arbitrary the forms are and yet how attached we get to them, especially the older students. And as soon as we get used to one, well, somehow something gets changed and we start all over again.

[23:21]

feeling that it's strange and then becoming attached to it also. I guess the last thing I want to talk about is the well-being ceremony which ceremonies which have sort of a unknown, mysterious magic about them, or I would have said superstition, or hard to get used to. I think that's just it. symbols and things cannot be sort of established by the intellect.

[24:32]

You have to you have to sort of grow like chants that you have done for years can bring tears to your eyes. And yet a new chant, an unfamiliar chant, can leave me cold. Emotionally, anyway. And on these chants, I really still cannot say whether they're effective for others, but I found that doing them has made a change in me. And it allows a sort of heart connection to take place in me and other people who have been

[25:48]

For example, Chad, far before, have faith in the comfort that it has given them. And that's enough for me. There's something about the pursuit of happiness. I was talking loud enough. I want to say something about the pursuit of happiness, which is, of course, I believe guaranteed in our Declaration of Independence or somewhere or other.

[27:00]

And I think. approach is a mistake. One way to say it is I think happiness is a byproduct of living, for example, keeping the precepts and the Dharma law, and to seek happiness directly. And I have found that when I sought happiness directly, it has not come forth.

[28:03]

The direct pursuit of happiness has not been successful for me. I think it is a mistake. And then I have an example here from the tale of Faust, the legend of Faust selling his soul to the devil. He would give his soul to the devil if the devil could provide one moment of complete satisfaction or bliss. And while Faust never found bliss by that root anyway, and he caused himself and others much more,

[29:22]

according to the legend, or at least the version that I read, was that he did finally get his moment of complete joy. And that was when he got involved in a project to reclaim this was in the Netherlands, to reclaim land from the sea for the farmers. And that gave him the moment that he had been seeking. practicing seriously for about 10 years now. My conclusion is that two can several conclusions.

[30:31]

One is that I must be doing something right because I have never been. It's hard to say happier, but it's sort of hard for most people to imagine me being happy. I'd say contented. I have never been as contented in my long years. I'm pushing 80. Despite the physical and other problems in the past 10 years and in just the past year, I am sure that I've never been more contented than I am now.

[31:36]

So I want to. Before we get to questions, I do appreciate your questions since I have. sort of provided a one-sided view, maybe, of practice. Wanted to go into some detail into a particular incident that was of some importance because it was brought up this year again in New Rochelle. It happened last year, so it's still being talked about, and Darlene talked about it. and got a big round of laughter from the crowd and a red face from me. I'll use it as an example of how practice can work and not work and

[32:48]

Maybe do both at the same time. And my explanation of the time was repeated. And it's sort of when practice, I said earlier that practice is an uphill battle, that it's my conscious intention against the sort of invisible voices of the body. And the phrase that I use to explain it is that you can only hold your breath for so long. If you use other words for breath, it may be more sort of country. But it's the same. Shanti Diva talks about holding and being like a log or being like a block of wood to resist these sort of breakdown in your good intentions.

[34:14]

This happened, I think, next to the last... Not this year, but last year, at this same time, I accompanied Darlene, my teacher, to empty Han Zendo as her Jiko. And we did a... I think a five days machine. Not there, but at a retreat facility up to Hudson. There used to be a monastery, a Catholic monastery, I think. The name of it has escaped me right now. It's well known. But anyway. I was acting as Darlene's G. Cole and had a bunch served cafeteria style and Darlene went back to her room to remove her grove before we went to lunch so that we were usually at the end of the line

[35:45]

the buffet line to get our lunch. And since Darlene needs some help with holding her plate and other utensils, part of my job was to help Darlene. Sometimes I had to come back later to get my own food. And sometimes that happened before or sort of with the other people so that there wasn't any problem. One day we were a little later than usual. The other people were a little quicker. But anyway, when I got Darlene back to our table with her plate, everybody else was seated.

[36:56]

And Darlene asked me, of course, a different stories about this is her story and my story. Her story prevails. She asked me to sit down, and I did not sit down. I went to get my food, which was walking all the way across a large dining room there, helping myself to food, walking all the way back. with everybody staring at me. Noreen later said that everybody was shocked. And that's possible. Actually, I was a little in denial about that, too.

[38:01]

But practice. I'm trying to make a point, is that we have to expect, I think, these things in practice. Darling had told me earlier that I had three duties. One was to take care of the sangha, the second was to take care of her, and the third was to take care of me. pretty good on all of them for the first several days. But as machines wear on, people, including me, get tired and not enough sleep and maybe not enough food and sudden

[39:14]

Sometimes the body just says enough or revokes. And in this case, it wasn't pretty, so I'm told. But we can still laugh about it. They can laugh about it. I turn red in the face.

[39:45]

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