Good morning, friends.
And welcome to Jacoji
Wonderful to be here together.
Appreciate your practice this morning.
Before we begin the Dharma talk, I like to pause and remember
The heritage of this land
Which was cared for by the Ohlone people. That was the name of the native people
We have lived in the Bay Area for over 10,000 years. So we are very recent immigrants to this thing
This land was never seeded. That means it wasn't willingly given away.
And it's important for us to
recognize that truth. It remains present
Whether we speak of it or not. It is the truth
It can be very easy for these land acknowledgements to become
kind of check. I've done it
Or worse yet, a kind of virtue signaling.
So I'd like us to receive this acknowledgement of
Where this land, who took care of this land
To allow it to bring something else forth in us other than guilt.
We're shame
About the harm that has been caused.
I'd like us to allow in an awareness that we have a shared history.
And we who practice here at Chicoji are not separate from that history.
Not separate
from their loss
And so we could maybe understand our responsibility in this moment to each other
The ground beneath the sundo has been locked down.
by people or us being cared for
tended to
So we thank them.
We express our gratitude and responsibility to be good stewards of this ourselves.
Some humility, I hope
So when I speak of the Ohlone people.
And when I welcome you every week, I'm looking always for this web
of relationships
Because that's what's basically all I can see.
I only see relationships and this week is kind of special today.
This afternoon, we're going to welcome back
some extended family in our lineage, the Phoenix heart
and we're starting a kind of a
As a sheen that you've never done before welcoming back our family. My Dharma brother, Ian
is going to be here teaching
And it's really
Kind of a welcoming home.
Family.
But some of these people have had a lot of experience in our lineage for a long time. and I'm very happy to have them back.
In our little temple.
And so I'm thinking about their return a lot, and Jero and I are getting ready to go to Switzerland to be with our temple in El Centor in Switzerland
So it's a lot of family right now. And for me, this is about relationship, of course
And in particular about unity
Kind of not as an abstract thought
But as a lived experience
letting it rise in your body
Because actually we exist in relationship to the Ohlone. To each other right now. We exist in relationship.
We are
Shaped
So people often like to say everything is one.
It's become ubiquitous
It's everywhere. I think it's on coffee mug.
And t-shirts
China has become spiritual wallpaper.
I don't even notice it, it's so common
And while everything is one
Just talking about it
Isn't what we're talking about.
It actually points to something very real, which is
An experience that is beyond words
And while everything is one can sound great. It also sometimes feels strangely far away.
When you're frustrated.
Or when your partner's upset
Oh, and someone you love is ill
And then we can feel separate.
Where's the oneness
The insight about everything is one has to come to the body.
Not to an intellectual understanding of, oh yeah, everything's right, right. But I want my latte with extra foam.
Most of the time we have ideas that we are not one.
It's an epidemic of not one.
Others.
And sometimes just even the language of unity can increase our awareness
Of separation.
We might
kind of have an idea that there is no separation in the midst of feeling lonely
And separate.
And when people tell you, oh, all is one, you may feel like, well, I'm not good at this either, being one
increasing the sense
Separation
So
Thankfully, our practice is not rooted in coffee cups slogans
It's rooted in sitting down.
And we are not asked to adopt oneness like putting on a hat.
And today I feel one with everything. Not like that
We're asked to look
Exactly at life as it is
That's what we're asked to do
Sit down with me
So there's a koan from the Mumulkan, the gateless Gate. These are collections. All the koans are collections of teaching stories between
students and teachers and students and students and teachers and teachers
And they are often the Chinese tradition from which Zen comes
And I particularly like this poem.
It has different kinds of translations
Kind of mixing them up, forgive me, translators. The title that I'm going to give you, this is case 10 from the Mumankhan, because Kowan's going to ask me later what case number was that, and it's 10.
And it is called Seize Alone and Poor.
This is how the story goes.
A monk named Seize to the great teacher sows on
is utterly destitute
Will you give them some support?
Now, at level one, this is very relatable, right?
What would you support? You need my support. Sometimes we have a very deep sense of not being enough
There's not enough love and not enough time and not enough caring.
not enough of me to go around, and not enough of you coming at me
We have those ideas.
But I want to say that in Zen koans
Poor or destitute can have another layer of meaning.
And the commentaries are that seize
had a little insight, a little awakening, a little awareness of non-separation, awareness of vast relationship, and he's testing the teacher
And he's saying
Here I am. I'm poor.
And I want to find out whether or not you can give me more
Guess how the teacher was
He looks at him and says
Day
And Seize says, yes, master.
That's the whole poem as far as I'm concerned. But there's another line that I like.
The next line, this teacher says.
You've already drunk 3 cups of the finest wine in China, and still you say your lips are parched
So Phase A is not offering
So done is not offering a philosophy.
He's not saying, you know, think about this. He's saying.
And Sandy says, Yes, master the rep right now, right here, nothing else. He's telling him
Whether or not you imagine yourself as poor, if you fabricate this idea of poverty, or you fabricate this idea of great insight, doesn't matter, it's over. Get on with it. Let's go right now.
In the immediate
unmitigated response feature
That's nonsense
Direct
not creating a story about who I am and what a great insight I've had, or even, if you want to use the other approach
imagining
I don't have that much. Could you give me more?
So his teacher says
There is no distance.
Between
Life
And your participation in life right there, right?
instantly spontaneous the response
Just
Relationship
And this, I think, is the lived experience
immunity
Not with an idea about what we're bringing to it.
Just immediate response.
What's happening
You may have experienced that this morning
Immediate
Well, I'm here
This is all I am. It's right here in this body. Who is it that's here in this body right here? What's happening
So Unity is not necessarily merging with the cosmic light
Although I'm not knocking that, and if it happens, okay.
It's the understanding that we're already in
Everything.
Right now
each other
This great teacher, Sozanne, is saying.
If you're hearing, you're already one with the hearing.
You're breathing, you're already one
You're seeing you're already one
The whole mess
Transcending this idea of rich and for insight non insight.
One.
And that is actually freedom
Transcending these dualities. Recognizing them
So as I'm saying
In this moment
moment after moment after moment, just this ordinary moment right now.
Everything.
How are you going to be
Yes, Mass.
This is this immediacy of reality that we practice when we're sitting down
And close.
What's right here? Not what happened yesterday. Not what we're imagining for tomorrow. What's right here?
Shikantaza, this is our practice
sitting
find as just sitting
I think it's the embodiment, physical embodiment
trying to meet reality as it is
And a few weeks ago, I received something really a teaching
An early student of Kobun's, our founder of our temple
Someone named Nick. Thank you, Nick.
I attended a ways seeking mind talk that he gave at Berkeley Zen Center
Coban was his first teacher. He was 17 years old when he encountered Hoban
And I was just very touched by his entire talk.
And I have to tell you, I cried through a little thing. He was just so tender and vulnerable and open-hearted
And, you know, to be around that
Wonderful. So a few days later, he sent me this and I'm going to show you. This is his handwriting copying from a board that Colin had written on these are the characters. And for those of you who
This version
Current.
Ideograph
Ordinarily, we talk about Shikantaza as
She meaning only or just
is
Open, clear.
PA is often said to hit, like to hit the target.
And Zah is sitting as in Zazem
But Copeland did this thing, she can'taza
He said
and empty
through
Clear and open. Ha.
Zah, the
By the way, CA is con when we usually translate it, sometimes translated as
kind of to mind. So just minding
Target city
is how we would, you know typically translate that into just sitting. You're just sitting. You're not trying to gain anything. You're not going anywhere, you're not doing anything, you're just sitting
But what Hoban said, free, empty, through clear open
And I think this has something to do with our colon. To me, it does.
Sitting without a buffer
Experiencing reality without a buffer.
something that creates a separation
between reality and the experiencer of reality.
Know me over here trying to create a virtual experience.
Yes
this
Just this immediacy all the way through.
This seems very much like the quality of mind that Sozan was asking.
DJ
I dismissed.
Just
Nothing more, nothing will happen.
What's right here, right now
So a few days ago, I had a kind of a lived experience with what's right here, right now. I had an echocardiograph
When you get older, you have a lot of these tests, they're just checking you out to see if you've got an expiration date. It's really weird
They did an echo of my heart.
And I was lying in this dark air conditioned room.
And this lovely, kind, young technician named Angelo is moving this wand across my chest
Mapping my heart
And I have to tell you that almost immediately, my mind got pretty busy.
What happens
If my mitral valve is not in good shape
What happens if I'm going to need that surgery where they replace your mitral valve, and my neighbor had that? She's dead now, by the way.
Didn't die.
But your mind just starts, whoa, it's going off on this train into the you know
Paranoid fantasies of everything that can go wrong
I was in this imaginary future, which was scary
Valve surgery and long hospital corridors and feeling not alive and vibrant and hiking the mountains, but weakened.
not pulling myself
Wherever she is
I thought about the worry I would cause the people I love.
And it would be hard to tell them. Sorry.
Happening
I was really imagining becoming one of those kind of self-defined invalids who would talk at dinner parties about for my procedure
This is like a whole whole story. This only took about 30 seconds, by the way. This one boom like like a reality had just dropped into my lap
And I was feeling it
Oh my gosh. What if
Meanwhile
what was actually happening is
Very straightforward and simple. And actually loving
There is Angelo.
Mapping my heart and I could hear it
Because I had my full valve prolapse, I heard a little bit of other sounds too
There it was
I said, could I see the screen?
Turns the screen towards me
So my mitral valve. I saw my tricuspid valve. I saw the four chambers
I mean, gives me goosebumps right now. It's amazing. There's my life force beating away.
Since the moment those cells
Specialized that's over six decades ago, kids.
That heart
There it is. I'm so grateful. I'm nothing but gratitude for this heart and what it's given me so far.
And then I flash
My kids
two sons, they're grownups but I remember hearing their heartbeats the first time
That was my heartbeat in their heartbeat
On your father's head
All of your heartbeat and I thought about all this gown I'm wearing, it's been worn by a lot of people over the years
And it's going to be borne by more people
Over the years.
There was this one vast heartbeat
It wasn't just one
It was our heart
I wasn't worried about anything
There was a cool dark room and sweet Angelo taking care of me and all those ancestors, all of your ancestors, all of the ancestors going back to the beginning of time taking care of me right then in that moment
And me taking care of them and forward and onward
Don't worry
evaporated
I just had a great time.
It was a beautiful experience, actually
There was still uncertainty. I'm not looking away and pretending that
Sure. I don't know what's coming next. By the way, nor do you.
But this uncertainty is not a problem.
Because it's just the truth.
I don't know what's coming next.
It's not a problem. It's okay.
I didn't create this heart.
And create my life
You could argue that not even my parents created my life. The beginning of time, the great force, they call it the force in Star Wars.
Whatever you want to call it, it's unnameable
I'm the lucky beneficiary of all of that and so are you.
So we're just so lucky
Have a heartbeat.
And a liver
The brain and the body
mostly worked
And I guess what this points to again is relationship
Fundamental truth of non separation.
And yes.
When we recognize the vastness of our interconnection of relationship
We might feel vulnerable.
Not vulnerable as in weak.
vulnerable like a superpower.
Because you're not doing this alone.
You're vastly supported.
On and on and on and on and on
I hope you will be the support too.
On and on and on and on
When we remember, we turn to this interconnection
Endless sense of support.
It doesn't become about us at all.
It comes about us
And we allow everything to touch us.
Everything touches it
That means watching the news touches us.
That means
Listening to your sniffles touches us
Everything.
As we experience this
I am you and you are me experience not thinking about it, not carrying the mug and the hat that says, yeah, we're all one, babe.
Experience
The edges. We just do and it feels good. Yes, you're going to feel things. You're going to feel. We're not numbing you here. Quite the opposite.
We're opening, like Coburn said, free, empty through clear
Open, allowing everything
Not
Picking and choosing.
chanted this morning in the
There isn't this I, it is a self that is separate from that whole thing that has predictable outcomes. Sorry.
So if we're
And we make up these narratives about ourselves. We are making up separation.
We are not allowing
the whole experience in
This discrimination is actually the source of it.
Reality will continue to refuse.
To be separate. It's constantly pointing at connection and relationship. Reality is relationship.
To the extent that we fight reality and relationship, we suffer
It looks like reality is a bunch of isolated objects and countries.
the conversation.
So, you already know this
Every breath you take, not your breath.
It is your breath, of course.
And keep breathing
But where did that breath come from?
And I can tell you the trees, but that's just
One level
It's true of our words too. Words are very culturally specific. I'm getting ready to go to Felsantor where they speak Swiss German. And part of the time I'm going to have to have
a translator.
I'm thinking so much about words. It's culturally specific
And they're not ours either. Everywhere you go, it's relationship.
With words
Even the food we eat it was food and now it's being converted in relationship with this body into something that is fuel
And emotionally too.
I know everyone here has experienced that feeling of walking into a room and someone is very
You know, uncomfortable in their own skin.
The whole room gets a little whiff of that, and everybody kind of gets a little uncomfortable in skin.
Pension that comes with you. Sometimes
And everybody's responding
Perfectly unconsciously.
You can observe that.
And you can also observe walking in the room and notice somebody's head back laughing hysterically, and you kind of relax
They're willing to just let go
And so everyone in the room kind of
be okay in here if they're willing to do that
Expose them
My experience is that
In every single moment of the life, we're all calling each
CZ
Yes, Master.
All day long
Not just humans
the mosquitoes and the trees and the leaves and the ground
birds, if you're a Tikoji
And the bells
It's call and respond. Call and response endlessly.
Relationship
For any philosophy about we are all one
Any idea narrative that I don't have enough. I'm not good at this.
for any of that
Just…
Like life is calling to itself.
Now, I'm not going to say that separation is not
something that we experience is real, because if you step on my foot, I am not going to say, wonderful, everything is one
That didn't hurt at all.
I will experience some pain if you step on
And yet, underneath our experience of separateness. There's relationship. You'll say, oops, sorry, Nelson. I'm fine
Relationship again
Please make sure you put your feet
In life
And so that's why when I hear Sozan screaming, Daise
I do not hear it as
An admonition or a criticism at all. I actually hear compassion.
Usually when you hear about his own teacher screaming, it feels like you're getting whacked
I don't hear it that way
I hear him saying
Look at all these incredible supports you've already had. This, in this moment is everything that's ever experienced by everyone. Your cup is really full.
Where are you that you think you're
Now
That forgetting that are
our cup of the best Chinese wine has been thrilled, filled 3 times, and we've had this delicious wine.
The fact that we forget is really human. Please do not
About that it's okay. We forget, and then we can
That's what we're doing, sitting down. We return
And when we return again and again and again in our practice
All the little pointy spots
Make us feel separate. They really soften.
It's delightful.
Even in the midst of all the suffering
Okay
And the reason it's okay is not because we have achieved any
We have not achieved perfect oneness.
It's just because life continues to show us over and over and over again
This relationship that we're all in together
We're in a conversation all the time.
It's just no pretending otherwise. I didn't try. It doesn't work.
Find out for yourself
So one of the myriad ways to read
Coban's definition
that I like is
Open
Direct city
I like this open
like to think Coban and say open means right in the middle of our messy lives
Right in the middle of our shared, messy lives.
Right in the middle of what's happening in the whole world
So as our extended family, the Phoenix heart
turns to Jacoji this week
As all of us gather together, old friends, new friends
Your faces
Birdsong
I hope
We can return and
Remember that
Unity is not something that we manufacture by ourselves or going. Yeah
It's something we are already inside of.
Hope we can all practice letting go of any ideas of separation.
That we can each be of some benefit.
to the immense suffering of the world
Separation
At least long enough
Thank you for listening.
Okay, your turn.
I'd like to start with the people online so they can feel more in the room.
So anybody online
Please just
Yes, sure.
Thank you, Sensei, for your talk. It was so helpful for me to hear you. Can you hear me?
I'm just turning my volume up. Go ahead.
I really learned from your talk about that sense of
unity that we can
Realize even in suffering, even in grief, even in our mortality
Yesterday, I was sitting on a park bench in front of Mount Shasta and grieving like the potential future of my former teacher, Angie Bosevine, who had been director at Jacoji for so long
And with me for so long and now
And
Suddenly I thought, what does she offer me? What was all this teaching about? Why am I crying? And I looked at the mountain and
I got to see it.
And I think that's what she taught me is to be intimate with this, this gift. And you said it in this unity, we can be free
Does it mean it doesn't hurt.
It does
Yet
I'm feeling my heart pumping. I'm feeling that connection with her heart that's pumping still
So
You know, we sit with that and it's a practice that she started me on and
Can't be more grateful.
Angie's name is on our altar
all of our alters right now. She's a beloved teacher
And she's not going anywhere even she's gone.
I think I saw
Sorry, I had to unmute. Uh, Sei Chaoson, thank you for bringing Angie into the room.
My tea ceremony teacher, Peg.
was a very close friend of Angie in the very early days of Conan Do and Jikoji, and uh…
I know exactly how you're feeling right now.
When Peg was dying, but again, you know, there's that one story of…
Zen Master is dying, and…
Everybody's crying, and he says…
Why are you all crying? And they're, well, because you're leaving us. And he's like,
Where do you think I'm going?
And that, I finally was really able to take it in with Peg, and…
And later with other people who had died, because I realized…
She's right here. Angie is…
right here. She's never going to leave you.
But thank you for bringing her into the room.
Return, friends. Yes
The question is about the quality of relationship.
Not acknowledging that there's
There are relationships that have caused suffering and will cause suffering and do cause suffering
and create
You know, vulnerability not only in this person, but globally, right? Think of all of the levels of relationships
for our dear little planet
It caused some problems.
Continue some problems.
Question is, how do we deal with
The both and the end of this.
Relative and the absolute
Technology making us continuing to maybe make us feel a little bit more
Separate.
That's a view. That is a view.
In your hands, maybe not
Really, whose hands can you control
It's up to you
And not be separate
Can't do that for you. No one can do that for you, and technology can't change your response.
You have to find your way to the relative and the absolute
Potential damage
And returning and returning and returning
to what can I do?
When you experience interconnection, when you can no longer not experience connection
You take care of what's right in front of you.
That's it. That's what you're responsible for. What's right in front of you
You pick up a stick off the road so someone doesn't trip on it. You take really good care of a teacup.
It's just what's right in front of you. That's what you can do. And if everybody care what's right in front of them with an understanding that
That happens
serving me and I am
Bowing to its existence.
There's that kind of interpenetration that is both
Two items, not 2 items.
One
Not to
at the same time
So I don't have an answer that is like a global answer because there's no magic wand.
That's
Our childhood dream, me too, sister. I live in a world of idealism, and I really have to
come back to reality all the time. What's right here
And that idea of harm, it could happen if I lose track of this moment.
I lose track of this moment.
That's at my hands, that's my responsibility.
So what I'm trying to point to is it's
Moment by moment by moment by moment by moment by moment on you
And what you do makes a difference. Huge.
Right now.
And all the time
If you enter the room with an awareness of open-heartedness, vulnerability, willing to
see everything
as well as you can through this mind and body.
Haste the wine.
cups of wine, which would absolutely have me on the floor, by the way.
If you're willing, if you're willing
You're like broadcasting that for the whole world
I don't know what else you can do except meet yourself.
open
Suzuki Roshi is very famous. I mentioned this in the beginning instruction today. He had this question that he answered a million different ways, but I'm very fond of one of the answers. I'll probably get a list of them together sometime
He said, the most important thing people would ask, what's the most important thing, the most important thing
To stand on your own two feet.
That was one of his answers
That does not mean to be separate
Independence
Responsibility
You're standing on your own two feet, but it does not mean separation
So you have to walk in that little middle space.
That's what we all have to do.
And in doing that, I think we're actually stopping evil and doing good for the benefit of all beings like our first pure priestess
Just by being willing to be free
Open
I don't know what else maybe you teach me
That's all I've got
Hmm
I see the company
Tell me your name again. I'm sorry
Tell me
Chenmin is a regular here and he asked this question about how do we deal with competition
And I have to tell you that I want to say
Because
That's an idea that you have about scarcity, just like Seize.
Their idea is that there's not enough or that you have to do better, or that you're not enough
And that there's competition for
And I mean, I'm not sure I agree with you about that.
At any given moment, of course, there is. I mean, if there's a bowl of ice cream and everyone's gotten to it before I get there, I'll feel like there's some scarcity.
But in the big picture
My happiness cannot depend upon there being enough ice cream for me
That kind of
A mind of poverty is what we call it in our practice. A mind of poverty means there's not enough. And it actually points to something very fundamental and I share it with you and everyone shares it on the planet.
Which is, I'm not sure I'm
That's the fundamental teaching that somehow we got a message pretty early on probably
We're not quite enough, and that we have to do better and better and better. Again, Suzuki Roshi's famous statement is
You're all perfect, just the way you are. And you could use a little improvement
You're already perfect.
You're already fine. There is enough. It just is a mind habit
I think there's not enough and that we have to compete
I'm not saying there's not competition. It exists as well. And you may have to sometimes compete in this way
You can choose to compete in this way that is entirely wholesome.
That means not causing harm to yourself. Not causing harm to anyone else. There is that.
Because you're not trying to get something. You're trying to be
in the moment holy awake
One of Coben's teachings is
Don't compare.
Now, Angie
One time said, must be the very last thing to go before you die.
comparison.
I thought that was right on.
Because we just have a habit of
constantly comparing. And that can be, you know, benign in some ways, like, I like chocolate ice cream better than vanilla ice cream. That kind of comparing doesn't really seem to hurt anybody
Unless you're… happiness depends on chocolate ice cream, and there's only vanilla
I don't know why I'm talking about ice cream. Sorry.
The point is
Comparison is
going to arise. We've had an incredible amount of conditioning, especially
in Western culture
This individuation that we talked about
It's up to you practice with this inside. You're not going to change anybody out there.
I promise you, you will not change a person. They're all going to keep doing what they're going to do. My teacher, Vanya says, you know, Pabla, people are going to do what people are going to do
That's a very bad Swiss-German accent. Sorry, Vanya.
But it's a great teaching. People are going to do what people are going to do
So you decide what you're going to do.
You decide if you want to suffer like that. Feeling like there's not enough, I'm not enough. I got to keep trying to get someplace else. If you can go towards something that calls you from this beautiful place of
Everybody's in this with me. Yeah, I'm with you.
Some people will come along.
And you'll go along with them. Some people will not, and they'll be like comparing. Look what he got. Look what I didn't get
It's not a happy place.
So I recommend you turn that light this direction
Instead of that direction
And see how you can work with it
Like a fool on fire.
inside. Okay
Thank you.
I don't know if you could hear any of that, but there's someone here who has experienced an echocardiogram.
And he was saying, I've been there, done that.
And he saw
I think he experienced
We had a merging of experience, which is not just my heart
Not just my body
One big, vast heart beating
And also this one
That's how it is.
And he said very poignantly, I guess that's just what it's like being human
Anybody else?
It's 11:40 AM.
We should have that every week, man. That's even better than Kaishan giving me the look
Anybody else? Yes. Last question, and then we can talk about.
Thank you for this question. It's very real and honest. The question is
When we feel connection, this vast inter
Interconnection, inter
Inter being as Thich Nhat Hanh would say. And so we want to help somebody who's suffering.
But there's a piece in us that recognizes that helping this person is going to be a little bit
Violation of our boundaries
Maybe not
Really
Wholesome is the word I want to use.
And how do we deal with that? Well, the first thing that comes to mind is Coban's
expression, I'm a helper, I'm a recovering fixer
I really like to help. I mean, it might be obvious, and I was a lawyer, and a mother, and I'm gonna have all these helping careers.
But Coburn very famously said, no helping
How do I help people? Oh, helping.
That helping idea is already a separation. There's a me and a you
No helping.
And
You will naturally, through this body and mind, be of service.
Someone will take up your offering of your existence
Without you having an intention to fix or help.
You with me?
So this is kind of an important thing, because
I can do that
you know, just
I'm not so concerned about me.
a lot of the time. So I can just let the boundaries go, and then later go, -oh.
Now I've set up this
Kind of form that boundaries are actually important.
And has to take care of oneself in order to take care of other people. But it's not helping. You understand there's this kind of taking care of everything, the stick the paper, the water not wasting
taking really responsibility
Might end up helping.
That's not the energy. I'm going to fix you. I got something to offer. It's not like that. It's basically all a mutual mutuality.
Right now. Happening is us together.
It's nothing other than that. Nothing other than relationship
I cannot see anything other than relationship. And yeah, my job is to actually meet face to face with students all the time. And they're telling me the difficulties in their practice and in their lives. I can't do anything for them.
Except meet them where they are.
And
Hold hands as we walk through this
That's not helping. That's not fixing.
That's just, yeah.
All right
This is what it's like to be a human
This is what it's like to be a human. We're gonna feel things
And you can help by just
Being healthy here
Good, healthy care of this one.
And you will then automatically be in offering
The problem with
Kind of
Intellectually dismantling boundaries, it is not the same as non-separation.
Intellectually saying it's the whole oneness thing again. It's not the slogan on the coffee cup.
It's actually meeting what's right in front of you and caring.
and that will, if it's done through that openheartedness, it is never separating. It is never invading your boundaries
You can't
operate from separation and call it
selflessness.
And yet, there's this person and this person and these people, and we have to take care.
So it's that whole relative and absolute thing. Make yourself an offering the best that you can, but start here.
And it's actually the hardest thing. It's
Very easy to give yourself away, but not with these little I'm holding something back because I'm not actually
Merged
Take care.
This is not a selfish taken care of
It's how can I be wholesome?
I use that word a lot because maybe someone here could give me a better word. I feel like I'm beating it to death
But wholesome is, again
Not harming this
Not harming this.
not harming
Whole beautiful mess.
And we will. I mean, right now there's microbes doing stuff to harm the food that I went in to break it down to make it fuel.
But
Having this intention
Be more kind
Self-involved
be less confused
Will help us to be a benefit
Automatic.