Sesshin Lecture

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SF-02751
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Appreciation for the world happens. Don't go looking for heavenly sights. We get sticky around the beautiful. Master Heretung (?) letter - being in the world without misery (?) 1 - what has long been neglected, changing karmic blend(?) cannot be neutered (?) immediately. 2 - ills accumulated for long time can't be cleared away immediately. 3 - one can't enjoy oneself forever. 4 - human emotions can't be just right. 5 - calamity can't be avoided by running away from it. Story of her daughter - can we sit on our ... (?) and breathe? Two versions of Buddha's enlightenment, one is a quest (post canonical) other is earlier - sangha Betavasthu (?)

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attention
come morning
really
julia

one of the members of this machine was some called away due to
her father being critically ill for julia somewhere who is sitting on the floor the proceed here up
happily
so maybe we can do our well being for money

so this morning i ah
was late to breakfast
here the han ending
so gee
because i was deep in a conversation about karma
ah
which it was just it ah
an everyday event
that happened in
my family and
just looking at what the response would be to this event
and was there any leaning towards greed was what was the appropriate response so with deep in this discussion
ah
and then i actually haven't heard the han and then when i got down here the clappers had clapton
so i decided not to come in late but i missed having breakfast with all of you how his breakfast
k
yesterday at town t
right before t that period right before t
the our room the vendor was bathed in golden light coming into the the western windows and are falling on the altar and shakyamuni buddha was glowing and all if you were
glowing
it it looked like a golden palace filled with ah
beautiful beings sitting quietly
and then there is a lovely rhythmic noise and and we all turned and then kind people came and brought us hot beverages in delicious treats to eat did you notice this yesterday afternoon him
and die out
i had a kind of up welling of appreciation watching the servers bow to you and you bowing back and taking your food and drink
all ah
very harmonious
so this is the third day session and you may have noticed a kind of settling you may have noticed that your eyes are
clear
you may have noticed that there's little green plants papaya all over and notes that are wobbly around you have to watch out for the news
and quail
and
a pale sky washed with clouds and a waxing moon
have you noticed
hi
did you see them you killed there was a kind of yip over here in l for

coyotes and wolves and our off
so we may be feeling alive
more alive
huh
this is not the purpose of our city
two wow
appreciate
the world
we're not sitting in order to appreciate the world but this happens
in fact this is there sitting
he but if we're looking for some special effects
some heavenly
feeling some heavenly sites ah
this is sam
extra
whoa let's not go looking for the heavenly sites but allow whatever arises to rise
and without sticking to things without grasping after things
just being clearly aware
think this was a point out well worth
repeating which is not to use ourselves in for things not to use our practice to create alternate steaks or heavenly realms or
or to lose weight or something you know to use
ah the user session practice for some purpose some
something we want
i remember being at tessa her when i was a know and somebody you know saying that they were they plan to lose about ten pounds during its machine they had their meal can have set up so this is mount an elaborate
diet
south beach west coast green dragon diet
but we get where are mine gets we begin to stick to things ah
so let him go even after we're happy to let go of what uncomfortable and death
painful but we stick get a little sticky around the beautiful the so-called beautiful and marvelous
huh
so
the first day i read that recipe for unhappiness and today i wanted to read isn't really a recipe but it's
master
why tongs letter to master young
and it's kind of a recipe for being in the world without misery
and there's five points the first is these are things to remember
in order to be in the world of our misery are you interested in being the of that mystery
the first is a what has long been neglected cannot be restored immediately
what has long been neglected cannot be restored immediately
in the second one which is similar is ills that have been accumulating for a long time cannot be cleared away immediately
the third point is one cannot enjoy oneself forever
one cannot enjoy oneself forever
and the for these human emotions can never be just right
human emotions can never be just right
and the last is calamity cannot be avoided by trying to run away from it
and then the bottom of this letter this is a letter mastered to master he says to him anyone working as a teacher who has realized these five things can be in the world without misery but i don't think it's
necessarily for anyone working as a teacher i think i think these five things are for all of us and we're all in the world is teacher in some capacity or not
so it's a shame
you know we have a strong determination and resolution to sit and to practice hard
to fall the schedule to
harmonize with the zendo to accord with conditions and still remembering ah this isn't necessarily cutting ourselves some slack but just remembering that what has been long neglected cannot be restored immediately so changing
our habit mind changing and transforming our karmic life
ah give to give ourselves some space around it
what it's long been neglected cannot be restored immediately
and in our posture you know ah areas where we're ah
stiff or not so flexible
maybe through injury or just not just for not flexible in that way through years of ah not
i don't know years of what just for not
so there's no need to criticize to be angry at ourselves to
just working with this working with this up loving spacious way
ils that had been accumulating for a long time cannot be cleared away immediately and i think these ills are ah all kinds of ills including ill will i think ah
we just work on it over and over and over and over
not putting it off for procrastinating ah
being willing to go over and over
thanks
when i think also this ils is can be ills between people you know misunderstandings sanga relations that are not harmonious that had been accumulating for
long time
ah it takes work takes work i received a call yesterday and i think was a mistake to pick up the phone
and it was some zen center business some difficulty some
and it has all sorts of tendrils in areas to look at and take care of and follow up on all through him
and it can't be restored immediately
can't be cleared away immediately
one cannot enjoy oneself forever
this is the suffering within pleasure where the suffering ah
the pervasive suffering
you knowing that things will end we all can have suffering right in the middle of enjoying
but just to no one cannot enjoy oneself river i is a kind of enjoyment
and human emotions cannot be just right
we bake effort you know over and over and over
to on
get to know another be
get to know ourselves
and we sometimes we think oh finally all as well but but then there's the next moment and human emotion
guns and relationships need tending named ah
attending or they tend to unravel fall apart and if we haven't been tending carefully
there may be lots of work to do
calamity cannot be avoided by trying to walk or run away from it
think that's a kind of dream we have you know okay i'm just gonna pick up and get on a train i'm in head for canada in our or wherever some mythical place
were there won't be any trouble
where there will be no hot or cold
where i'll be able to avoid hot or cold hot and cold
like dorothy know somewhere over the rainbow
but calamity cannot be avoided by trying to run away from it
huh
so we sit
not trying to run away from anything
just being willing
to allow our life
to unfold
i yeah i can tell us i'm talking that i'm preoccupied with something ah
calamity cannot be avoided by trying to run away from him so maybe i should bring when i'm preoccupied with into the room me that well ah
help
huh
why don't know if it will help

huh
so i'll just save your words yesterday i got a long email from my daughter who's in ah colombia south america in a young
a piece community a community that's in the conflict zone and die
she wrote a piece that hopefully will be published in turning wheel the buddhist peace fellowship
newsletter but anyway that she was telling about it a situation where there were a big these communities have experienced human rights abuses in ah
many of their members have been disappeared and guy
ah killed
so she was in a situation where are the paramilitary had been in the village while the peace accompaniment people were
at a meeting in another village
and there was a decision that
two of the three members of the team would stay in one village and she would go back to the other village as to to do her job as accompaniment
and a night was falling and they had to ride
mule up the mountain about an hour and a half in the dark to the village and she was describing
what was going on for her which was her she was filled with ah fear
night was falling the the the path that will goes to the mountains is large some vegetation that could hide
beings on neither side ah
and her mind was going towards kidnap and torture the worst and
and also chastising herself for not being you know
for being afraid
so ash was riding up the mountain on her mule with the other village villagers were with her trying to get back
she young
ah she
i think she took refuge actually what she did she she began practicing something that she learned at a tick nhat hahn family practice day many many years ago when she was about seven i think which was a practice of i'm breathing and saying on each breath
and there's a song to it he say in
out
deep
slow
smile
no com ease smile release
present moment wonderful moment
so that's that was her practice
and then ah which i helped i guess
and then she began to chant the end major coup can on go for protecting life which she surprised herself by knowing all the words other
so she's riding her base via which is the generic term for mule and horace and whatever goes up and down the mountain her beast
in the dark
chanting ah you know
peng j o now more but you know
so another thing she said in the article was that she young
has picked up these buddhist practices through us moses you know just by living in this community but never been formally
made to go to the zen over ah
anyway i am
they made it safely back
and dow
i feel very happy that she has this resource of her own body and breath in the middle of fear and ah real
life-threatening kinds of situations that she can draw on
returning returning to this very mind is booted this very body
the fruit of many lifetimes
as a means
as the way
may she continue to
practice in this way
and each one of us as we sit on our cushion and are based year
a little mere home
riding along
with danger on either side of it's not not your neighbors
but danger arising you know fears and under distress of all kinds
you know can we return can we find our way
to draw on our resources that we have you know that is our birthright
i've been saying you know we have a right to sit here we have a right to breathe
and this is in a buddha touching the earth we have this wonderful practice figure of shakyamuni buddha touching the earth
ah the anja nancy was telling me this morning that
ah i think this is another practice maybe it's a ticket and ham practice of for children when are having difficulties in anger like on the playground to go and touch the earth you know
call on the earth for help
so this is what is are touching the earth practice
hey so i would like us to find are seeking isn't that what they say about riding a horse
people have their their seek i'm not a horsewoman but with find your see take your seat
and ride your
based year ride your animal find you're sitting you're sitting bones
you know when we when we rock your body right and left but once contacting the cushion or the chair we have be sitting bones there and i think to notice are they what's happening with those sitting bones are they even is there even pressure if were tipped a little too
forward the sitting bones will feel pointy
pointy on the cushion you could try that and then when you tip back they kind of flatten out
and it you might notice one as pointy and one is flattened you know or
so to actually find your seat
and god check out your same bones
are they where's the pressure
if they're pressure the front the back the sides right centered is where the city modes
can best support
and also our head you know which is a thierry henry
item
i've told this joke before ah
one or lose ten pounds of ugly fat
cut off your head
but i think your head may be twenty pounds actually it's pretty him so if we're too far forward we can feel the front of our face kind of
the heavy heavier and if we're too far back we feel heaviness behind either way if our head is got balanced or around it's a strain you know and we are neck and muscles have to hold it you know we do sometimes a very ill
lab thing of being too forward on the bottom and in compensating back and forth so to have her head even we situated not hanging back not
and one images this head like a ping-pong ball on top of our fountain water you know just
babbling along there on the top
even
so the bottom part of ourselves is rooted on the earth and then
raise pulling up on the spine and the side bodies i love that term the side bodies are lifted and you know the front and back inside bodies are lifted
from the sitting bones up you know if your picture the sitting bones kind of centered in the middle of her ah bodies and then even with the sidebar is coming from up the city bones pulling up on the side and front and back
and in the hands are very light
dear down
and touching the belly but good likeness in the hands
no resting
in the shoulders are not holding the hands of and are light
thumbs
light
huh
huh so the buddha how did the buddha find his way to this some body seat
you know there's there's two stories of the buddha's are probably more than that of the buddha's enlightenment and and the one that we know very very well was picked up by western scholars and it's a kind of quest story it's very particular are leaving home
leaving wife leaving son and i'm going off to
accomplish one's spiritual quest and at severely think that story is archetypal and but there's other stories
one that's from an older strata of the pali canon
that the story that we know as post canonical there's other stories where the buddha leaves his parents crying as he goes off which is another type of thing i think to leave her appearance
ah but there's another story
then i'll just mention that jam

has the buddha ah
leaving his wife but not creeping away in the nighttime while she and the baby are asleep but actually a talking about it with her in the night and they don't have a baby yet
so this story comes from
ah
i'll find it anyway it's from me
an earlier description
of the buddha setting off
so in this story his wife yes hodara has she wakes up and she has this dream and they talked together the husband and wife talked together a kind of well a family situation how that might happen we have a bad dream and you wake however
the width and say had this terrible dream and death
he listened to it and and tries to interpret her dream
and mrs from the sangam paid or vaastu
sangha bit of last two
so in the dream she has dreams of our
that things are gonna happen to her like her necklace breaks and different things and she asks him to take if he goes to take her with him
and he says some he will take her with him but then he leaves without her but the the ideas perhaps said in his heart she's with them on his quest for enlightenment but
that night or when she wakes up and they talk about their dreams them they make love and she gets pregnant she conceives that night and he goes off
so during his quest he does ascetic practices and he all the story that we know and she mean well she sends a am
messenger to see what her husband's up to and how he's doing and the messenger keeps coming back and telling her things and he tells her he's doing these ascetic practices is only eighty one sesame seed a day or something and she starts doing that but it's not good because she's pregnant by just taking the baby so they decide
i'd not to tell her what he's up to because it's going to interfere with her you know pregnancy
ah
so this idea of conception you know this new life new birth new will not the brief yep at new life growing and for him it's the spiritual quest of new life and for her it's a a a new being
and her pregnancy last as long as his quest so she's pregnant for six years
yeah so this is some little problematic for the family i think
at the end when he some
about to have his enlightenment
ah
at that point
this some extended pregnancy is very unique in the buddhist tradition
and at the end when he has his great enlightenment experience she gives birth
two out
to the baby
and then there's other things about him recognizing the child and was at his own trial because he was gone for six years it's an interesting folkloric motifs thereof paternity and so forth
and relevant does our
recognize his father
at in this story at the end mara in america will tell the story of the boot of it mara you know sands things to make the buddha get off his based yeah and the buddha is it moved by that and mara as a kind of last mask
venus sends word to yasuda that he's guide and she has a she fades and everything so she ah
falls to the ground in a faint and is like wasting away
and because of her grief she's in danger of losing the child
and then other celestial beings come in contradict what mara said and she revives
and in fact they say not only is he not dead but he's accomplished the great enlightenment
and in this story they don't name the baby rahul lot which means fedor they made the baby a nanda which means joy
because she gave birth at the time that the buddha you know had his great enlightenment so the baby was named joy which is interesting in the story of psyche and arrows
ah
it's interesting psyche in that story is also pregnant and she does her tasks and her quest to read ah join her husband arrows or relationship
and she has a number of tasks gathering the golden fleece and getting something from the underworld and water a flask of water and separating seeds these are all part of her quest
and at the end with she's joined with arrows and she has her baby to and that baby's name is joy
so interesting now or paypal patterns here
so i i think it's good to keep in mind
a variety of stories of
individuation or full ah
fully realizing
ourselves
huh
so does anyone have anything they'd like to say or
ah ask about her
huh
those five
five items to live in a world without misery
kate we can push those or put him out
he's see a hand
suzuki roshi is wet cough yes
no

yes i agree yes

thank you i i think i said but i'll say it game are clearly that i wasn't imputing nervous cause i'm any of the
i'm symptoms of people's flus and colds and things that have been going around here thank you
i think sometimes
it's interesting to notice even with our car from sickness when it arises and when it doesn't and is there any pattern to it at all you know that's something to just watch not that it's about nervous but
i'm
it's just something to watch out
yes

that word stoic is some
i think of stoicism is a kind of rigidity view is that when you think of stoicism stewart news
so i'm a kind of clamp down rigid grid the teeth
dig the nails into the skin
white knuckled thing something like that
and dumb i don't think that works very well actually him
so but there is a way to
and i was trying to talk about it yesterday this relaxing into whatever is going on like lying on a beach or embracing someone you love or breathing into it allowing yourself to breathe and just
what is it you know just be open to whatever is coming up that kind of feeling and you might you might see do i have to move or not you know that i think that the stoicism clenching thing or which can also be
endurance test or some kind of bomb
a comparative mind and there might be shame you know if i move and feeling ashamed and whole bunch of other stuff
anyway
i think i'm asking for us to experiment and the first signs of paid do we quick get away from it
calamity cannot be avoided by running away from it so as they're running away feeling or is it is my practice now moving and i think those are two think so it's not about stoicism or competition or endurance tests it's
ah
being willing to
experience what we experience and if we feel like it's time to move its terminable you know but that very moving isn't really moving on cross your legs at that point
where you're completely with moving
you stay completely with the moving
in an unmoving way
i think gum
the more we sit the more we play with that edge and actually we can find night
we often him pain or discomfort with stop get rid of it done goal and to
to see the difference between
working with pain and not changing it that they don't have to be laminated together
there's another way is some space in there

yes if he happy to
yeah
we can have the menu of the game and recipe for unhappiness happened
yes
the in our deep slow
we can even seeing that how many know that song
it's really pretty
that

the
what would be the most encouraging thing to you
the
a
the true
i have pain i experienced pain
and and by
in my salad days you know when i was younger hen certain kind of payment as i've gotten older the pain is changed and i think everyone can attest to this the it's not always the same now it's it's it's it's very different it's not me so much anymore
it's it's other things

yeah having

author
i think that's how we end up i don't know exactly in greece how what their practice was but i think that's how we use the word now yes
no you don't use it that way
really
the

so it sounds like the real meaning of stoicism is equanimity and come and not being perturbed
thank you thank you daniel i don't want to
ah cast disparagement on any greeks have any
any time
not during session don't find out i'll find out i get to look things up
yeah
yeah the stoics well there may then it may be a misnomer how we used to work
and
yeah
so shannon stoicism yeah

calamity cannot be avoided by trying to run away from it
the i don't mean to ah
say that there are times when we there are times when we remove ourselves from situations of danger right that that doesn't mean we go after and try to you know get over our head into dangerous situations so i don't mean that
but to have the idea that
we can avoid anything or run away from our life i think that's what i'm pointing to how it our
ah
relates to serious situation
i don't know and i know i think gum
in what skillful in a situation and running away from things maybe a skillful thing at times but that's not real running away that's just skilling means that means you go here rather than here that's not running away you know to me but it does mean you move and go to and
other place
different from than running away i think trying to avoid or life and running away
i'm doesn't work but it doesn't mean that we don't
ah
accord with conditions
okay
know if

whether you
oh
i think i was talking about her practice of
the you know finding some way to be there in the moment fully
and how that supported her and for me
i think my practice is not indulging in
fantasy that is and future you know calamitous things in the mind you know
when i think that that kind of indulging his running away even though it looks
you know thinking about the worst possible scenario is a kind of off balance thing it's it's what's going on right now in fact that's what she said i'm okay now everything's all right i'm all right you know that's what she and she's riding on
wonderful moment present moment
so indulging in certain kinds of thinking
is it kind of running away
and kind according calamity i guess
not that real calamity will come but our own calamity of mind
he said
the i'm with those of you know what say you wanna hit it were near the kakutani i've done
yeah
do you slow com a's smile read these pray
in no men wonderful no man and
he like dirty
keep the eye
yeah when the parking lot
some of the
if children thing for a man
what is a practice
recognize it
he also not a little
have you could have
and then that
preface as a way to teach meditation
kelly fall now and should be dead
ah
what would anyone like to try it can we tried again i would like to hear if we just to join him you can i just do it once the way shirt because it always drag that
ah he was calm
mile i'll keep that that quickly some of somerset will really movement and then when you're reading and all
okay sure tramp
also for service we should be going briskly to i've known as and the morning we're we're beginning to drag so lets everybody keep up the pace specially the danish and are running which gets very dirge like to so this will be good practice for our service okay hit it
the in oh gee slow so me a smile relieves pressure more men wonder if oh no
man

thank you very much
may i