Good morning. So here in the land of city center, we are in the midst of what we call our summer intensive. We're a group of people come together and intensely look at what's going on for them. in an effort to wake up in the journey of their life. What's going on? Who am I? What's happening? What's all this about? And then I'm the coach for that process, which is both a privilege And a wonderful learning experience.

[01:03]

Each person's life, each person's journey is amazing. In a way, that's what I'd like to talk about this morning. How amazing it is to be on the journey. And how that can be a deep support for us. And it's so easy for us to be caught up in the impact of the details, to hold it in a bigger frame of reference. How do we do that? So I've been thinking about Norman Fisher's book on the Odyssey, the story of Odysseus. I don't know if you've read it. I find it charming. You might hate it, but on the other hand, you might find it charming too.

[02:10]

Here's what I find charming about the book. Odysseus goes through all these misadventures, and all these human characteristics get exposed with disastrous consequence. Stupidity, greed, laziness, hypocrisy. You know, thirst for power. And then when we go through each one, you know, Norman describes, he sets the scene, and then he talks a little about it. And you think, you know, hypocrisy. Well, surely he's going to say, that's a terrible thing. You shouldn't be hypocritical. You should be authentic. Well, time after time, Norman says, this isn't so bad. Laughter We're all hypocrites. Thirst of power, that's not so bad.

[03:11]

We all do that in one way or another. Lining, yes. We all deceive ourselves. Green, yeah. Somehow, he just takes one human trait after another and forgives it. And not only does he forgive it, he finds within it something noble about the human character. I mean, from this place of ennobling the human character, then decide, but be careful. There's something noble a part of this. But how it's related to has real consequences.

[04:15]

Your life is not an abstract event. It's a very particular event that's influenced by how it's engaged. And how do we wake up so that we can enable human character, the human dispositions, and engage them skillfully. And this is very much one of the overarching flavors and challenges of Zen practice. This very mind is Buddha, our original nature. In Zen, that's talking about this noble quality of our being. Several months ago, I was at a discussion between Paul Ekman, a psychologist, and Pico Iyer, a writer, a journalist.

[05:20]

And they were talking about their experiences of meeting the Dalai Lama. And neither of them considered themselves Buddhists in that card-carrying, robe-wearing version of it. Although I think he has enchanted them in such a way that whether they prefer to call themselves Buddhists or not, I think they're quite taken by the proposition he makes. And Paul Ekman, who by this point had several substantial exchanges with the Dalai Lama. Paul Ekman is a specialist in emotions, fascinating work. And he's had substantial discussions with the Dalai Lama in a setting of scientists and psychologists and the like. And on this occasion they were coming together, Paul Ackman had brought his daughter, who I think was 16 or 17, I can't remember, to the event.

[06:31]

There was a kind of gathering before they set off into their profound descriptions. And the Dalai Lama came over to talk to the two of them, Paul Ekman and his daughter. And mostly he addressed his daughter. He'd never met her before and he seemed interested in her. But while he was talking to his daughter, he took Paul Ekman by the hand and he was holding his hand. And Paul described it as... This extraordinary, nothing special experience of casual friendship. Here's someone who's just being my friend. Like we were two kids at kindergarten holding hands just because it's nice to do.

[07:33]

It's kind of reassuring when you're four or five and all these big people are all around you. have someone hold her hand. And he said, so as he stood there, you know, the Dalai Lama's talking to his daughter and asking her questions about who she is in her life. Feeling through the physicality of touch and just this kind of unspoken intimacy. It's unspoken acceptance, connection, casual friendliness. He said, in its own simple way, it was quite a profound experience. It made him more sensitive to his own reactiveness, his own emotions.

[08:39]

way of holy luck, casual friendship, his own way of holding on to that kind of sourness or bitterness we can hold in our life, resentment, suspicion. And he said he marveled at it. that this profundity, this deeply moving experience was initiated by something very simple. To my mind, it tells us something about practice. Maybe in our more thoughtful and studious and complex way of being, we search for some

[09:43]

intricate, well-defined truth to unlock the complexities of our being. But sometimes it's helpful to look almost in the opposite direction. Something simple. Something we've known all our lives. since we were four and held our best friend's hand. Something that loomers through our lives searching for expression. So I think of Norman's book Yes, there are this array of human characteristics.

[10:52]

And when they come out a certain way, they are indeed unsavory. The whole drama of Odysseus' journey is an adventure story. He keeps getting into impossibly difficult situations. is traveling by a narrow gorge in their boat. And if they go this way, they'll be devoured by this monster. And if they go this way, they'll be devoured by this enormous whirlpool. Which way are you going to go? How impossibly complex life can be. Engaged in a certain way. the goal of life is framed in a certain way.

[11:57]

So let me offer you a certain way of framing our life. So when we go to sleep, which we do, regularly and we appreciate when we sleep silently and wake up refreshed it heals our body quite literally and often it softens our emotional difficulties not always but when we sleep silently it refreshes our mind There's something innate in our being that knows how to reorganize, how to heal itself, how to rediscover its basic harmony.

[13:06]

It's not something we learned in the book. We came with this capacity. And then there's another human capacity. We eat, we breathe to nourish our life, to give us energy, vitality. So there's something about engagement that's life-affirming, life-supporting, creates within us an optimism, an enthusiasm, a zest for life. to these two very basic qualities that we have. And then to put the harshest terms on them, when we refuse them, you could say, we're worth holding still, this drawing in to recreate peacefulness, settledness, inner harmony,

[14:24]

in service of healing and restoration. It's a kind of pushing the world away. It's a kind of aversion. At its harshest, we could say it's hatred. Let's start a world with them because they are disrupting our inner harmony. We get angry to ward off that which is potentially dangerous. So this innate quality can take on harsh, destructive characteristics. And when our quality of engagement, that's a necessary part of our vitality, can become desire, can become greed, compulsive grasping and addiction.

[15:28]

So part of our challenge is how not to forget the nobility of our core disposition. And how to learn how to be skillful with it. How to see that it's a powerful force. asking us to learn how to handle it. And then as it comes forth, of course it references the circumstances and conditions we live in. And in a way of practice, the practice of mindfulness, the practice of awareness, It's about looking up, seeing what's going on and just being taught by that and discovering through that education what is appropriate response.

[16:39]

How do we do that? I was thinking of doing guided meditation. Well, let's do it. So if you could... The reason I was hesitating was because... It's not so easy to have your mind do what you tell it. Anybody who's meditated knows this. Usually it's not totally out of our control either. So just to find yourself in a settled, upright, spacious place. Grounded, touching that place of restoration, but also upright, opening to that enlivening engagement.

[17:48]

And just to contemplate, everyone in this room, every human on this planet has come from the womb. They've been a newborn baby. They've crawled. They've learned how to walk. They've learned how to talk. They've been a toddler, a four-year-old. They've gone through the developmental phases of being a child, going through puberty, being a teenager. This is our common heritage. We have all gone through this.

[18:57]

And it's been a challenging journey. As challenging as the journey Odysseus took. Fraught with difficulties. But just for a moment, offer yourself and everyone else in this room, and everyone else you could offer it to, a wish for their well-being, a wish for your own well-being. May I thrive on this human journey. May I remember the ability and not be overcome by inappropriate response.

[20:05]

May I be well. May you be well. contemplate on this journey, none of us are perfect. We're not omnipotent. We're not omniscient. We have made mistakes. We will make mistakes. And we've suffered as a consequence. And we've caused suffering as a consequence. Offer compassion to yourself, to others.

[21:32]

May they have the fortitude to hold their suffering. May they feel supported. May they not be overcome by it. Offer this to others and to offer it to yourself. And now to contemplate that indeed we do have a noble spirit in the times that has shone through.

[22:44]

There have been times of success, times of accomplishment, reasons for celebration, acknowledgement, congratulations. So to offer your good wishes, your congratulations for the successes and joys that others have experienced. And to acknowledge your own successes, your own joys and appreciations. Offer yourself that acknowledgement, that appreciation, that respect.

[23:44]

contemplate that every human life holds these sadnesses and joys, these failures and successes, these sufferings and delights. This is the nature of the human journey from birth to death. So be it. So it is. Yes, indeed, you will be pushed and pulled by desire and aversion. To hold them both as the winds and waves

[25:35]

come upon us in our journey. A willingness, an acceptance, a settledness, an equanimity So I hope you got out of that maybe too brief process and some of the flavor. As we engage in the practice of waking up, indeed we will touch our suffering.

[26:47]

We will touch the residue. Of our difficult experiences. And how they have formulated. Into a definition of who you are. And what the world is. And how to engage the world. How they become ingrained as habits. Become part of our psychology as defense mechanism. but also to hold something to acknowledge. We're here today because in living the life we're living, we have witnessed experiences of wisdom. We've seen behaviors that taught us something, whether we realized it or not.

[27:53]

that the path of seeking, the path of waking up, that the path of engaging this life in an intentional way is a worthy one. We've had that lift living to us. And something within us heard it. Something within us said, so it is. This is worthy. of putting my energy in. This is worthy of committing my time to on this Saturday morning. And something about when we pause and hold life in a bigger picture. We know we're all in this together. We know that each of us goes from birth to death. We know that none of us are perfect.

[28:56]

We know that forgiveness plays a role in our human lives. We know that an honest acceptance of who we are rather than trying to deny it, ignore it, is an appropriate response. We know It's something about casual friendliness. Something about a steady constancy, like our breath. And I would say we know that kind of benevolence, casual friendliness is also a deep support.

[30:01]

It's so close to this equanimity that doesn't lose this lost in a state of distress. Of course we're going to be pushed and pulled. We're going to lose our balance. But something about An equanimity that has a resilience to it. You know? If you fall down on your face, you get back up. You're living too much into desire, accomplishment, performance, control, meaning. Back off a little bit. You're not doing what you want. Okay. Yes, that hurts. Yes, it does. You're leaning into security, safety.

[31:07]

I'm not going to do that. It's too challenging. It's too difficult. It's too uncertain. I'll just stay within what I know. In a web of concern, maybe even fear or resentment. To look at that and from this place of deeper knowing, not be fooled by it. Not a statement that says, this is how to live life. From this place of fear and resentment. From the balance. Not caught up in desire. Not caught up in aversion. A certain candidness about the human condition.

[32:13]

While we're always wobbling. We're always... looming into it, putting out of it. As Norman Fisher would say, that's not such a bad thing. I can't remember quite what the rationale for hypocrisy was, but he managed. If nothing else, The book is a marvel of Norman's ingenuity. In my journey, I have found an appreciation of poetry, because I find in poetry a kind of equanimity, a kind of big picture. You know what, Jeremy, is just plain old amazing, you know?

[33:21]

I would challenge that almost every one of us, if you had told us a decade ago what we were going to be doing today, we would be more or less incredulous. I don't think so. I kind of would have imagined that would be the outcome. And here we are. And maybe there's another decade ahead. kind of larger appreciation. This poem, it's a very long poem, so I'm just going to quote to the end. It's called, Things I Didn't Know I Loved. And as he goes through the poem, it's by Nazim Hikmat. As he goes through the poem, he quotes something, usually something quite simple. And then he gives an associated thought. Sometimes it has a charm and a sweetness, but sometimes it has a poignancy.

[34:26]

You know, like at one point he says, I didn't know I loved the blue sky. And then he was in prison for quite a while. And he says, and I remember being in prison in the yard, looking out by the blue sky. And that was the same yard where they be this kind of sweetness and sourness mixed together. Anyway, I wanted to give you a flavor for the poem. I didn't know I liked the rain, whether it falls like a fine net or splatters against the glass. My heart leaves me tangled up in a net or trapped inside a drop and takes off for uncharted countries Didn't know I loved rain. But why did I suddenly discover all these passions sitting by the window of the Prague Berlin train?

[35:26]

Is it because I ripped my sick cigarette? One alone would kill me. Is it because I'm half dead from thinking about someone back in Moscow? Her hair, straw blonde, eyelashes blue. The train plunges on through the pitch black night. I never knew I liked the pitch black night. Sparks fly from the engine. I never knew I loved sparks. I didn't know I loved so many things, and I had to wait until 60 to find it out, sitting by the window on the Prague-Berlin train, watching the world disappear as if on a journey of no return. So in the heritage of Soto Zen, the prime mover, the catalyst, the primary agent for practicing, experiencing, realizing this kind of deep appreciation, this deep connection to the vulnerability of the human spirit and condition.

[36:51]

This reawakening of a capacity for insight and skillfulness with the human life. The prime agent for this is just soothing and savoring each arising. Even when we're in the process of being pushed and pulled, even when we're under the influence of what attracts us and pulls it into us. Even when we're under the influence of what our response is to push away, to tighten our body, to tighten our mind, to try to control our experience. To let something... some engagement in our fundamental being, be like a gyroscope.

[37:54]

And as we move off balance, we come back to balance. And the very process of moving off balance becomes a teacher. The very process of moving off balance and coming back to balance teaches us about things we didn't know we loved. very life that we're living, that in one frame of mind can seem just a web of restrictions, limitations, and entanglements, can be reframed, can be engaged from a different disposition, that in some strange and beautiful way, appropriate to appreciate, to write called three movies I didn't know I loved. And now, for good measure, I want to read another one of this movies.

[39:02]

This one's a lot shorter. Ebert means too much towards something. Maybe. It's this way. I stand in the advancing light My eyes can't get enough of the trees. They're so hopeful, so green. The sunny road runs through the mulberries. I'm at the window of the prison infirmary. I can't smell the medicines. Carnations must be blooming nearby. It's this way. Being in prison is beside the point. The point is not to surrender. Thank you.

[39:57]

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