Good morning, everyone. It's really wonderful to see you and have practice with you today. How many of you here It's your 1st time to
Great, welcome, especially welcome. To you. I don't know what brought you up the mountain.
And I'm really happy you're here. I wouldn't be here except for you.
Thank you. So I've just come back from Los Angeles where I go monthly to teach to.
The little valley sanga a little sister songa I haven't spent much time.
In my home there where I've lived. In Los Angeles for 40 years. Very biblical number.
And because I've moved my life here to Jakoji and I've been here for 7 months now.
So it was quite lovely. And poignant. To be back in my old home. With the ghost rattling around in that house.
In the big storms of January last year. A 300 year old Oak tree in my front yard.
And down in the middle of the night. This was another tree that was so large that 4 members of my family couldn't get arms around it.
And they're all bigger than I am. Big arms. It just came right out of the ground.
Huge, huge heritage joke. This went like.
This was a massive trade.
Of all the places in the for directions that could have fallen this tree which came out from its roots. It fell in the one direction where it would do the absolute least.
It damaged some plants and some olive trees, which have all just come back completely. But that was that.
It completely closed off the road that we live on. But someone came.
Cleaned it up.
It just laid down very gracefully, like a big sigh.
When we moved, we built that house. And when we built that house before we built that house, we had an Arbor's come out.
Tell us how do we protect these trees. And they said, well, they're 300 years old.
Oak trees do not live forever. This tree is hollow all the way up the middle. You'll get it for maybe 4 or 5 more years.
24 years who got out of this tree.
So in the middle of the night. The rains were coming down. You remember last January it was like a deluge.
It was also biblical. It's an enormous amount of rain came down. And I heard this.
In my sleep. It wasn't a thud. It was a
And I got up. I was living alone. And I went out with my cell phone. Somehow, my body.
Knew where to go. Even though I didn't know the orientation of the sound. Somebody knew how to shine a light out the front door.
And I saw the roots sticking out of the ground of this enormous in the dark. I saw.
In retrospect now, more than a year later, there are a couple of features about this event.
Which have tremendous poignancy to me. By the way, this is a tree where we had a rope swing on it.
My kids were raised in this house. All the neighborhoods kids came. Lots of adults. I would just find people swinging on this tree in the front yard.
Big people, small people, everybody swinging on this rope swing. And like children. I remember one time seeing the local chef at a restaurant who was maybe 300 pounds.
Swinging on the rope swimming like a little boy. And no one I would never go outside and disturb that happening.
It's so beautiful. So this tree meant a lot to our family.
So the poignant features about this loss. Was it turns out that that tree came down.
Exactly one year in advance of my husband's death. Exactly. A year later on that day. My husband of 40 years died.
He had been ill for many years with Alzheimer's. But it was the same day as that tree.
Almost as if the tree was saying. Let go. Giving me a little heads up. I was going to let go.
This incredibly important. Valuable relationship.
Another poignant piece about this tree and life is that in this last year again, January to January.
Several of my students from this little valley song go in from Greece and other places as well. Have stepped onto this Budapest and they decided to take the buddy sat for vows.
That means they sewed a rakisu. Has anybody got a Lakisu on here right now?
Well, you saw me. There's 1. This is a Buddhist robe and.
These people have. Decided this really is their path. They might as well admit it.
And they became layered in in January of this. A year from the date that tree fell. Not to the exact same date.
But the thing that's interesting is that one of those students, Soaky Osan, some of you know Sokio-san, Sochio said, could I have a piece of this wood that came down from the trees all chopped now?
Yeah, do you need firewood? And she said no. I'd like to get rings made out of it.
Could you show them, do you have a ring on your? No, some. Some ruckus who's mine if you were in the small center I have a ring That one was made by Ocean, the other guiding teacher here.
Ring. It's actually a non to the Chinese town. Practice.
And not to the way they wear their robes, work to work in the field. So that's what that ring is kind of.
I rememberance where we come from.
So she's taken this block and she had it cut into pieces. An ocean is making rings from this old tree.
Certainly a very deep part of my life. For all of those people who are now. Probably next year.
Not all of them. A handful are going to become priests. Not teachers, but priests.
They're gonna wear a ring on that tree.
So I told you these stories. So that you can have a little taste of Kind of the wild mystery.
Have life. And how we circle. Circle and are circled. By the great mystery, this thing.
This life. And this has had something to do with how we in these bodies experience. Time. So I told you I've lived a Jakoji now for 7 months.
Somehow all the forces of my life. Inspired, I think. To bring me here. And to have me.
Live my vows. Those vows that they take when they. Become part of the Buddha way.
I took him again as a priest. I took them again. At transmission to become a teacher.
This is my intention to serve the Buddha way, the great mystery. I chose this responsibility. And I am nevertheless completely surprised, really rather astonished to find myself here.
In the
Living in this community has changed me. I didn't really notice until I went to Los Angeles and sat with my songa.
And I've observed that. My way of movement in the world. Has changed because of the way.
We move in this world.
There is of course a relevant old coon. Sorry from the tradition and this one is a case number 19.
These are teaching stories. And the M and and that's called for some of you who know Coons it might be familiar.
Nonsense, not Nan Zen, nonsense. Ordinary mind is the way.
So these are priests. They're actually student and teacher, but they are both very, very.
Wise and experienced teachers both. One is a student and one is a teacher. Joshu asked. Nonsense.
What is the way?
Nonsense answered. Ordinary mind is the way. Joshua asked, should I direct my
Oh, it's the way. And Nansen answered. The way does not belong to knowing.
Or not knowing. Knowing is delusion. Not knowing is blank consciousness. When you have really touched the true way beyond all doubt.
You will find it as vast. And boundless as outer space.
How can it be talked about? On a level right or wrong. At these words, Joshu was suddenly enlightened.
No, you get this idea that you're going to be struck by lightning this morning. Enlightenment does not necessarily mean that These stories are often about sudden enlightenment.
But you could also just say awakening. And awakening means. You are here right now.
And you know you're here right now. You're awake. So what's here?
Right now.
So living here at I have somehow. Surrendered completely. To the rhythms of this here and now.
All the time. I find myself meeting things as they arrive, like we meet each other today, just like this.
Very ordinary, right? This is continuous. Daily practice. Continuous practice means the regular schedule of Morning and evenings as in the small zen.
The temple cleaning preparing for your visit here today. The tens of cooking lunch for us all.
It also means tours. And interactions with folks who drive up the hill, see a sign that says to Koji, and think, I think I'll go see what monks look like.
Continuous practice means meeting folks who drive up that hill. In a lot of anguish. Just in the last week.
A man whose father had suffered a stroke and was dying. A woman who had lost her child.
A couple who are expecting a baby.
History life.
Continuous practice means checking on the temple cats. We have 3 now, one belongs. The Teresa son.
And they're taking care of our temple as well. It means watering the garden, making sure the top propane tank is full.
Getting help when the will. Stops. Doing the food shopping for retreats and for you and for us.
Teaching beginnings at Asen. I did this morning. Planting for hours and herbs and the garden.
And of course the daily watering and reading practice both up there and in here.
And speaking of the garden it seems like everything we do at Jakoji. Is a kind of seed planting and nurturing.
The daily practice I have just mentioned are all little seeds. We're planting. Watering so that this temple, and remain healthy and open.
For you. And to all bings, including the scrub jays and the wild turkeys and the deer.
And the American Robins and the Tip Mouse. And soar days and the lizards and the mountain lines.
Mosquitoes.
And yes, we have gophers in our garden.
With which to contend in these plantings of Kale and Dharma.
Continuous practice means sweeping, washing, and cooking, and oiling the table and cleaning the toilet and taking a toothbrush and acetone to clean the ring around the bottom where the toilet meets the floor.
That works by the way, acetone and a toothbrush. Cleaning the altars, adding names to the altars.
Turning on the zoom from morning practice every morning you can sit with us. Checking on Wondering about that wild flower.
Meeting the gays and the scrub day. It's like to sit outside my window in my quarters and look at me.
Continuous practice is kind. Towards ourselves and all of the activity that arrives.
In my view. And it is kind and loving because We learn not to see ourselves as separate from the activity that's arising in our view.
In other words, whatever we're seeing. Kind of our creation. It's asking to see us.
And we are both addressing it and being a addressed by it.
We say yes. What's here because it's here and because we're noticing. And in a way, it's noticing us.
Saying yes means. Less suffering, saying no. Means more suffering. We recognize the fleeting nature of our lives.
Have everything. And our interconnection to it all. And we stop fighting time.
We just show up in this moment and this moment. Or what's right in front of us and we do this continuously.
So living in Chikoji has transformed my mind a little. Kind of in a background text, I didn't even know it was happening.
But it has happened so that most of the time my mind with all of its ideas about how life is should be how it would be better if it were according to my plan.
Not there. My mind just follows my body around. For what's in front of me, it needs to be.
Prepared for.
The light in the trees. My hands on the keyboard. The bed, the towels, the floor.
Toothbrush around the toilet cleaning. Ordinary mind.
So Nat Cohen, Nansen says, ordinary mind is the way. Ordinary mind is not the mind that says we're the center of the universe.
Which is how most of us operate. Like, okay, I got to do this and this has to do this for me to do that.
And check, check, check, check, check. I do this.
It is not that ordinary one. An ordinary mind. Is not the mind of concepts and delusions and ideas about what we're facing.
Seeing things as good or bad. Not that. It's just needing what's actually in your life in any given moment with an affection.
Where's it? And only and just because it's here and you're here in relationship.
It's noticed you or you've noticed it. It doesn't really matter. But you're having a relationship right now with what you see right in front of you.
Nancy says when you reach the true way Beyond doubt, and I would say. Beyond Down is another of saying when you've completely trusted your own experience.
Beyond yes and no, good and bad. You'll find that the way is vast. And boundless is space.
And this transforms everything. It is a nature. Of intimacy. Intimacy.
With once right here. And that is this practice. In a nutshell. Being intimate with what's right in front of you.
Whether it's sick. A bowl, a plate, a computer. The person.
Picking up and meeting what's right here, right now. Without any concept of. How you should be or how I should be.
Or what it looks like or what might be the rewards for me. If I meet this thing. Not gone, not there, gone.
So, Gogen, A. Hey, Dogan, is the founder of Soto Zen.
He has a fasco in his great work called The work is called Chobogenzo.
One of the festivals kind of a chapter is called Yogi Doa. Yogi, Doku, actually, Yo means Buddhist practice G, there's lots of G's like G cog, this is a different one.
This G means preservation and maintenance. So this facicle is usually called continuous practice. So.
Practice maintaining. And Dogan writes this.
On the great road of Buddhas and ancestors. That means everybody throughout space and time. Your ancestors.
On the great road of Buddhism ancestors, there is always unsurpassable practice. Continuous and sustained.
It forms circle of the way. And is never cut off. Between aspiration. Practice, Enlightenment and Nirvana.
There is not a moment's gap. Continuous practice. Is the circle of the way. So, Gioji Docan.
Yogi's continuous practice. Docan means circle of the way dough is very commonly the idiograph for the Buddha way the way.
But the idiograph con in this case is really interesting. It is both a noun. And a verb.
Originally, Kahn was a ring-shaped something, maybe a jewel, a ring shaped jewel.
But it is also a verb. Continuously revolving. Circling. So, Gyogi Docan means that the truth of our shared existence right now, right here.
Lies in the sustained. Continuous circling. Are passing in the way. Whether you know it or not.
The circle of the way. Has no beginning or end.
We are in this infinite loop. Of aspiration meaning I want to meet my life. I want to meet light.
Practice? How do I do that? Enlightenment by being here right now. That's practice.
Continuous practice. Like the Rakasu ring. I mentioned it's a nod. For the Chinese Chan monks who used that as who used kind of a way of fastening their robes when they worked.
In the fields and the kitchens. The circle of the way is. Continuous the way their work was continuous.
And it is where my practice. Merges with the intimacy. Of you right now. And in each moment here.
So that there is no eye practicing. Separately from you practicing.
There's no moment separate. From the one who's noticing it.
And it is this awareness that is changed. My living here. My experience of living here. This continuous practice.
This active, unstoppable. Pathing, circling. Has bloomed to me just like a flower in the garden.
And yes, I didn't see it coming.
This aspiration to live in community, serve this community. In the Buddha way, the practice and awaken with everyone and everything.
Has changed my own way of being.
I guess that might not surprise you, but it really surprised me. I guess you would imagine that if you turn, start living in a temple, things might change, but it never occurred to me.
I thought I was, you know, gonna just do my best to contribute in turns out. It's all serving me.
And my serving.
So I get to notice. This integrated, inclusive. Seamless expression of me. In this all the time.
I'm in this intimate friendly conversation with whatever is here, whoever's here.
It's like it's rising up to meet me and I say hi. And it's kind of like that.
And even when it's something that I think ordinarily I would not want to do, like clean that thing around the bottom of the toilet with the toothbrush and acetone.
I have generally speaking lost the opinion that that would be a bad job and I would rather be in a garden.
That this is something I really love and that's something that's kind of yucky It doesn't seem to be.
A life full of. I don't wanna do that. I wanna do that.
All I need do in each moment is meet what's here with this kind of spirit of like, oh.
Like inquiry like oh you need some attention okay Like that. And it makes it so that I can have a skillful response.
And figure out the acetone works.
I stopped fighting that my time should be spent differently than the way it actually is being asked to be spent.
And I just do it here. And I'm not alone. There's nothing special about me.
I'm no enlightened being. Everybody who practices starts having this happen to them, I believe.
Seems to be. So living here has allowed me to experience time itself differently. As in, oh, it's time to go sit 1,000.
Oh, it's time to do the dishes. Oh, it's time to get coffee.
Oh, it's time to respond to emails and phone calls and people ringing the bell. It's time to take care of the cat.
This circling of the way is kind of this uninterrupted flow. Of this and this and this and this, whatever it is.
And sometimes my response to that is
Oh, it's time to cry.
Time to take a bath. Time to laugh. It's time to sleep. Time to give a hug.
Time to ask for a hug. And to eat. Time to stop eating.
And sometimes I forget and I. The sense of affectionate meeting feels a little choppy. And it feels like there's me meeting something else as opposed to.
Merging and it's just it's as if the way the flow of the whole universe gets kind of gummed up.
It feels as if I'm gumming it up too, by the way. Like I'm standing in the middle of the flow insisting that everything go around me.
Cause I'm not okay with how it is. I'm demanding that life be kind of more on my terms.
And that is the nature of suffering if you don't already know it.
And this happens very reliably in all of our lives. When we have an idea that things should be.
Different than the way they are. Or that I shouldn't have to deal with it. Someone else should be cleaning this toilet.
Or that isn't this someone else's job?
And there are moments when I think. I really don't want to deal with this. I really don't want to look at this.
I don't want to clean out my garage unless they leave us. I really don't want to clean out my garage.
Of course, it's not the garage. I don't want to clean out. It's the lifetime of memories that I do not want to let go.
So I'd like to ask you now. Be brave. There are no right answers. You're not gonna get a gold star.
You're not gonna get a D, no matter what you say, it's okay. But can you name something in your life?
That you don't want to address.
Just throw it out there.
Anything. Kind of don't want to look at.
Yeah. I know.
The anticipation.
Or maybe you really don't know us and you'll just be whatever happens.
I hear you. Thank you.
No one else has a garage of shame. Okay, again.
Oh. From this.
Thanks.
But I don't want to. I mean, it's halfway. Hmm. Please, I can go.
Getting their way.
I know.
Yeah. I don't wanna let go of life. That's what you're talking about.
Like. I don't wanna let go. I want to, I want to keep it all. Faber.
I don't wanna let go, but I don't wanna like go up.
So.
With my dog getting over
So right now I'm actually 3 times a day I'm already going over.
Anyone else?
Well, what happens when we Don't address. We don't want to look at these. Places.
Tender places when we Turn away, we're turning away from. Reality. What's actually here?
The garage will really not take care of itself. None of the things that we have to face are going to change and transform by themselves.
It's our practice that can transform. The suffering and deliberation. It's not Han, it famously says.
Without suffering, there's no freedom.
Life is just always right in front of each of us right here, right now. Asking you to pay attention.
There's no turning away because life is still here. Trying to teach us what it has to teach us.
You're all, we are all everyone on the whole planet. Is in the midst of this whether you will look at it or not.
Turning away as a delusion. Where are you turning? It's like, I'm not really here when you're a little kid.
You can't see me.
So coming back to Jacobi after just a few days away has shown me that Jakoji time is really no different than any moment.
Anywhere. Yes, the cycle of zazen, the continuity of our collective intention to practice in the Buddha way.
Is very supportive. And the real opportunity. Is everywhere. In your lives, out in the world, in my life, on the road to Los Angeles.
All the time, the awareness that this very ordinary existence is an opening. Now. In this circle of the way.
It's nothing more, but it's nothing less either. Everything is equally sacred. Washing dishes or reading Dharma.
So Dogen, the founder of Soto-san, tells us. Be intimate with the activities.
Of the ordinary mind. The activities of the ordinary mine. Whatever is right in front of you asking for attention.
That's the functioning of the ordinary mind. Your dog. My garage. Your books, the stuff you don't want to let go of.
There was somebody else. What else was it?
You're grass! Unfinished business. Let's just zoom that out. Unfinished business.
The question is not. If it's a garage or the unfinished business or the dog. Or the books or the stuff you just don't want to like go.
It's how you respond. Dogan says, b 1. With all of those opportunities. And the circling or the pathing of continuous practice.
Is kind of unstable. Like, you cannot not do this right, folks. As long as you're willing.
And importantly, the circle of the way is not forced on you and you can't force it on other beings as well.
Everything is unfolding as it's going to unfold out of your control for the most part.
Including your ideas about it and your feelings about it. And your laughter and your and your delusion and your desire to turn away.
It's all completely connected. In this moment. It's kind of like an endless field of fabric.
And that's us. So I mentioned washing dishes as one of these. Fields of continuous practice because every Sunday at Tokugi following Sunday program, some of you are very well experienced in this practice.
I'm looking at my friend Chuck. Who is just an incredible friend to our temple and he does a lot of washing dishes.
So every Sunday I ask for volunteers after lunch. To do the dishes. We feed you lunch, we want you to have the experience of doing dishes here.
And I sometimes try to sell it like, hey, it's not like the dishes at home.
It's special here and it is special here not that the dishes are special. And not that you're special, but the experience of being in the circling of the way of those dishes.
Is an opportunity for you. It's a 3 bowl setup. You will see it. And I tell folks that walk, folks at watching this is just a cage.
Is like no other kind of dishwashing because you get to practice. We intentionally practice when we're here with the intimacy of what this is.
What is this? Oh, this plate, look at the designs on the plate after these people eat.
Look at the bubbles. Look at this water. I mean, it just goes on. It's Borderline ecstatic sometimes you sit there going, how could it be this good?
This is kind of joyful unity. With the dishes, with the other people washing, with the water, with everything in that moment.
It's undeniable if you will allow it, it's right in front of you.
And usually after I say that a lot of hands go up. But not always. So Dogan calls this the miracle of the moment.
The miracle of the moment. Washing dishes is the miracle of the moment. That's what needs being done.
It's a miracle that you're here that everything conspired to bring you here to have this opportunity to wash dishes together.
Soap, strangers.
Powell, stacking, you find yourself endlessly connected. So everything because how did this happen?
How did you end up here? Enjoying washing dishes.
It has nothing to do with the dishes or Jakoji or the towel. It has to do with no me and no you just Yes.
Water. We don't have to call it water. This, whatever this is in any moment, having a relationship with this moment, a miracle of this moment.
Unstained by any sense that it should be something else. And that you shouldn't have to do it.
And it's wonderful. There's very ordinary. And wonderful. So our practice in this temple is Chikan Taza, a form of.
Sazen which allows everything to arrive. Without grabbing or trying to get rid of it. Without an opinion.
And this is how we become intimate. With the dishes and ourselves and the grasses. And I'm We expand our awareness of what this is.
Into this wide panorama of everything that's here. In any moment without assessment like don't want that part of the fabric.
Just whatever's here. And you cannot force that awareness to arrive. It's already here. It's up to you to just.
Open your eyes. To allow it. You're not in charge of when that awareness arrives, but you can practice it.
It's like following in love. I'm not up to you.
To get anything. You just sit down and practice allowing what's already here.
And when you practice this way, you become completely yourself. In the midst of letting go of a sense of.
The miracle of the moment, Ben. We return to kind of a symbiotic relationship with everything.
What needs my attention?
Deeply recognized. And confirmed. In the midst of confirming. That which needs to be addressed.
It's ordinary stuff. And it's kind of perfect. And it's imperfections.
So this is where we meet each other. In our fullness and our wholeness. Everything, everyone, everywhere.
I think that's the movie, right? Everything everywhere all the time, something like that. Somebody tell me the right name.
Say it. There you go. Everything everywhere all at once.
And that means that even when there's loss in sorrow.
Brief. Even there there is this. Deep joy and delight. At the love.
At the beginning of whatever this is next. And this is. And this life it to Koji is just like this.
I meet the garden the same way. I meet the dishes and the sweeping. I made the bat brushing my face as I go to my quarters at night.
It's a bath every night. I don't even know it's there until after it's gone.
Have you seen that? Oh.
It's the same as when I need somebody grieving. Comes to have some refuge. If you're willing.
Living here. Living where you live. We can practice whatever it is. It's right in front of us.
With this kind of tender intimacy. Of a rising together. In this miracle of the moment. Like the ring on the rack of soup from our old oak tree that my students are going to wear.
Like the circle of continuous practice, the circle of the way. We're all in this together.
And this is where I open my heart to you.
And I see you. And I let you see me. Imperfect.
Kind of perfect.
I choose this intimacy.
Tulsa. This is how we can meet ourselves. In each other and in the trees and the birds and the bees.
And the mosquitoes.
And the
And everything.
And it's enough.
And myself.
Very life beyond.
Yeah, that's a question that. Has a lot of layers, the literal ways, you know, the Buddha refused to answer that one.
You know, is there another life beyond this? Refuse to answer because we don't know, we can't.
But if you come back to this, is there a life beyond this slide? Right this moment. This moment, this moment, in other words, your awareness of scope of each moment.
You get pretty big. It can be. Bast, in fact. So there isn't a a life that's separate.
Another life and the last life. You're with me. This expanded. Sense.
But what he says when you're in when Nanson says when you found the true path It's like infinite space.
That's in every moment. That's my experience. And I'm not believing this.
I experienced this. Sometimes. It's so vast. I don't really have to worry about it at all.
And not all the time. Your mileage may vary.
Thank you for that question.
Okay, your turn peeps. Ask me anything. Except you can ask why. Okay.
I primed you for that.
Other.
Really about. It makes me wonder if. You know, finding, more like studying.
That could be. Really?
Right. Right, and maybe even go farther and say. Sacred. Because I often maybe because I've been around some death of late that I often think that okay if this is the last day Right here, right now, this is my last day.
You never know, right? But this is my last.
Perfect. I mean, everything can be. It's all your creation, how you view it, right?
Anything, even even sadness and grief and loss. Has this, trust me on this? You're young.
You probably had some sadness and grief and lost, no doubt. But it has this depth. Wealth of love.
Right in the middle of it, right in the middle of it. You're finding yourself. We're all finding this out.
So all of it. Everything, even the stuff it's painful. It's really incredibly beautiful too.
Because it's the opportunity to be here with how it is.
There. Yeah, I'm glad you say it's a really nice approach because most people think it's neurotic.
Why are you talking about death?
Thank you. Right. Alright. Well, I mean, my approach is that coming back to this moment all the time.
Just looking at the moment without an opinion about it. Just try it. I can in any moment. Like, okay.
How is this moment? Like what is this moment? What is the full? Range of this moment because what we tend to do is say Oh, right now I have like 62 layers on and I'm hot.
And I could say, I'm hot. And I could see that as, negative, but I also say like Well, when I perspire, I get cool.
And there's that too. And I'm wearing this robe as placeholder for someone and what maybe it'll be you in 20 years who's sitting here.
I'm keeping a seat room for you. I mean, these are all things that get me out of the world as according to me, right?
I'm not hot anymore. Doesn't matter if I'm hot. It's okay if I'm hot.
It doesn't matter if I'm hot. Because I'm Completely engaged with this.
And so I guess it's the same thing with Larry's question, which is, can you expand your awareness of what this is beyond what you think it is.
Like, can you say my 1st entry into this moment is I don't like it and I don't want it.
And the next is, what else is here? What else is here? All the time. In every moment.
And that includes. Death and birth and life. It's a whole big circle anyway. So just where are you on the circle?
And when it's really tough. And you don't think you can do it. 1st of all, you know you will.
I'm telling you, is an older person. You will. At the end of your life, you'll see, of course, I dealt.
Of course, it was ultimately a big opportunity. All this hard stuff. Was a great gift. And in it is.
Hardwired so much more than I think. So look around. Look around. All the time.
Look around. When I was a little girl, I asked him, Do you believe in God? And my dad said, look around.
Socratic kind of answer. She was famous for but. Nevertheless, it was the right answer.
Look around. Call it what you will. Click around this.
So in a moment it's great suffering. And you don't feel that you can do it.
There's so much more there. And it all is sacred.
Your experience of the homeless guy on the street. Sacred. How can I serve? How can I help?
Maybe I can. Maybe I can. Maybe giving him love, maybe giving him a bottle of water or whatever.
Doesn't matter. You're meeting the moment. I'm recognizing it for what it is without separating yourself from it.
That guy is you.
That's kind of a beautiful thing. Even though. It's tough.
No.
I don't wanna practicing somewhat regularly. Like.
Okay.
And then, you know, the layer of
And I'm not here right now. And I'm not friendly. It's meta punishment.
Yeah.
Sign on this.
Oh, Sure. You're not alone. You know that, right?
That's true. You're not alone. Well, you know, I can answer this because I have a lot of experience in that world, but I'd like to hear you.
And we gotta go to lunch, so this is the last question. And I'll add at the end, but how about all of you when you find yourself spinning in meditation or not in this kind of self-assessing judgment way I'm not doing it right.
You know, and and not only I'm not doing it right, I'm not doing the not doing right.
And this includes my friends online, Randy and Ben. If you have anything to add to help our sister here.
With her self-punishing, or our self-punishing life like Doing it again.
I'm doing it again. This thing that I vowed to myself I understand and I will do again.
We have habit energy, right? It's a lot of things that have conspired to have us respond.
So teachers. Chuck, you've got something. No? Okay, thought I had.
Yes, Ross.
Nice. So that's what I'm talking about when I'm referring to broadening the view to getting a panorama.
Instead of air drilling down into your habit energy instead of saying, oh, mmm, and then another, another story.
And by the way, this gets a little self-referential, not punishing you by saying this.
Because all of us do this, but it gets a little like all about me all the time. Which we all are, so don't go there.
But still, it's kind of like. Can you do that and kinda laugh at yourself a little like, oh my gosh.
Pamela, my name. P. It's okay, you know. Kind of affectionately like
It's okay, you know, you're spinning a little, darling. I'm gonna just take a breath.
And the other thing is to ask yourself
Who is it? It's doing this right now. My own experience is that habit energy. It's never, I've heard you've heard me before, some of you have been here a lot.
It's never the person who's right here right now. Is punishing.
It's somebody from my childhood, maybe before language even. Maybe not. Who got the message that she wasn't good enough.
And she was never gonna be good enough. And so it's gonna have to keep punishing herself so she will not be good enough.
She fulfilled that habit.
Dental kind awareness. This is not a self punishing practice. This is your opportunity to Hey care of the one.
Pick her up. Take care of her. Gently, kindly, without asking for too many stories around it.
Just okay. And Ross's suggestion is beautiful. What else is here? Other than that one?
Cause there's plenty of views here. Money views to pick and choose. And, there's also the one who thinks this is funny.
And it's also the money is going, man. And it's also the only things. Okay, been here before.
It's just a multitudinous of you. And you don't have to get married to one.
So kind and gentle. Fine and gentle. If you would please do that for yourself and I will too.
And then all of you, all of us will do that for ourselves. We're doing it for the whole world.
Redo that here, the war ends.
All the wars end there.
Got to go to lunch. Thank you for your practice, everyone. We're gonna end with, oh, I didn't even say the thing I wanted to say.
In the future that we chatted, thank you, Teresa. There's a line in here.
If you don't understand the way right before you, how will you know the path as you walk on it?
Ordinary, ordinary life. If you don't understand what's here, right here, and now.
How are you ever get to sacred?
Enter here. Okay. Thank you. We're going to do the after the Dharma talk.
It's also on page 2. And you do it the same way. Just the guts.
Any put our hands in gasha.
May our intentions equally extend to every being and place with the true Merita, Buddha's way.
Things are numberless. I vow to save them. Illusions are inexhaustible. I vow to end them.
Dharma gates are boundless. 5 out to enter them. Who does ways, I
Okay, they're friends. Please move your cushions, not kicking them gently lovingly, back to where you got them.
And then stand at your cushions and wait. Google bow to each other, I will leave and then you will all leave and Rand, good to see you my friend.
Bye, Randy.