At the end of last week I mentioned that maybe this week we could start to look at the practice of virtue or virtues in the context of renunciation, and I still am sort of having that in mind to work towards, but I feel, again, we need to look at the this basic practice of renunciation. Not need to, but it would be good to look at a little bit more first before trying to do that. During meditation I... I said some things which actually were ways I talked about renunciation at the beginning.

[01:03]

In the first class, I suggested renunciation is to renounce or give away, let go of anything that distracts from what's happening. So what's happening is what's happening, and of course nothing can actually distract from what's happening. It's just that some beings that are there with what's happening, they somehow seem to be able to be distracted from what's happening. But of course what's happening is still what's happening, including being distracted is part of what's happening. So somehow we seem to be able to not be present even though we are.

[02:07]

So in some sense renunciation is to let go of unreality, the unreality that you can be somewhere else or that I can be distracted from what's happening. It's a remedy for... the strange thing called lack of presence. So renunciation is presence. I can say pure presence in the sense that, of course, we're always present, but sometimes we don't think we are or we don't appreciate it. So in renunciation we let go of our distraction from appreciating being present. And then I could also say that this pure presence means to meet whatever comes with no grasping or seeking.

[03:30]

This is to meet whatever comes, practicing renunciation, or practicing renunciation, meeting whatever comes. A traditional Zen way of putting this is to meet whatever comes with no mind. And saying no mind means meet whatever comes without the usual mind that we use to meet whatever comes. And the usual mind we meet things with is a mind of picking and choosing, of seeking something or holding on to something.

[04:42]

Again, if I like it, if I feel good, I grasp it. If I feel bad, I seek something else. This is the mind we usually meet things with, so it's like let go of that way of meeting things. Let go of that way of meeting things. In that sense, you let go of that kind of mind You don't seek to get rid of that mind because it's available all the time. Picking and choosing the mind of preference is always available. We don't reject it, just let go of it. We just let go of the mind of clinging and seeking. This is another way of talking about renunciation. And then, so applying that to the situation, the difficult situation of, not the difficult situation, but the normal challenging situation of something pleasant happens and we tend to be happy about that.

[06:00]

Something unpleasant happens and we tend to be unhappy about it. How can we meet an unpleasant experience and be there with presence without seeking something else? You might look to see. When something unpleasant happens and there's no seeking of something other than it, do you become unhappy then? Or is it perhaps that something unpleasant happens and you seek something else, you wish something else was happening, you want to skip over this, and then you're unhappy?

[07:09]

And when something pleasant happens, if you just stop there without grasping it, what's that like versus something pleasant happens and you grasp it, and does that make you more happy? This is something to maybe look at moment by moment in meditation. And someone kindly volunteered that listening to this description of the practice of renunciation, it sounded like something far away, to be able to meet whatever comes with this non-grasping and non-seeking. It seems far away to be able to meet an unpleasant thing and not get unhappy about that, or to meet a pleasant thing without trying to, you know, whomp it up.

[08:28]

It seemed far away to be able to hear someone speak ill of you and just hear that, as though they were talking about somebody else that you didn't know. like the great bodhisattva of compassion, would hear a person speaking ill of another, and what they would hear was a suffering person. They would hear a suffering person. They wouldn't be personally insulted. They would hear a suffering person. They would go, hmm, suffering person talking ill. Unhappy person seeing ill. over there, seeing someone that they don't like, that they don't appreciate. This is a cry of suffering, just that, speaking ill. And then, if it then comes around and it's about you, like if you're the bodhisattva of great compassion and they say, you are a lousy bodhisattva of great compassion, you're a disgrace to the great compassion bodhisattvas, could you hear that without saying,

[09:46]

This is an exception to the rule. I'm not going to practice with this. That seems far away to be able to hear someone actually say something nasty about you and actually just hear that. That seems far away, someone said. Or someone says, you're really, really, you're so compassionate. I mean, you're just fantastically, wonderfully kind. To hear that and just like hear it like, hear you, I hear you, okay? Not even what next, just okay. And then I change my mind, okay? That seems far away. So I can, you know... How can we get to that place where we didn't want to be able to hear someone say bad things about us and not be upset about it?

[11:00]

Well, one way is just During the breaks between insults, just try to meet the more neutral situations. Like during meditation, probably the only person that's insulting you is yourself. In some Buddhist temples, the teachers insult the students during meditation. But, you know, I haven't, like, said anything nasty to you while you've been sitting, have I? I haven't said anything, you know, you lazy, negligent, half-hearted. I haven't talked to you like that while you're sitting, right? So I haven't said anything to you against you while you're sitting. Maybe some of you have said, I'm not meditating very well. I'm a lousy meditator. I don't even deserve to be in this class. Maybe somebody's been talking like that. Anyway, between the insults, just then, when it's not so hard, And between the compliments, just see if you can meet what comes with complete relaxation, with no grasping of it or seeking of it, during the periods that aren't

[12:25]

really, really good or really, really bad, see if you can just practice then. And then if you can practice in the more neutral situations when the meditation is not really good, so you think, like, I've got to hold on to this, or really bad, like, this is terrible, you can develop this way of being with the less challenging situations and extend to the more difficult ones. That's one way. And an extension of that way is what I just said, you know. Just sit and sit and sit or stand and stand and stand or walk and walk and walk in the midst of this. And as you sit more and more sort of in the center of the suffering that you're aware of, that the mind of renunciation starts to come up, starts to arise.

[13:34]

So actually some people, I think, if you ask them, have you heard about compassion? And they maybe say yes. I have heard about compassion." And you say, do you want to learn how to be compassionate? They say, yes, I do. I would like to learn how to be compassionate. I would like to be really skillful and compassionate. Okay. But actually, when presenting renunciation, people are not necessarily as attracted to it as they are to compassion. Because compassion, it seems like if you learn how to get compassion, you're going to get something, right? You're going to get compassion. So a lot of people want that. But some of those people who want compassion do not necessarily want to give up a lot. Not they're told, well, you sort of, that giving up a lot will help the compassion.

[14:47]

They say, well, yeah, okay. But they're not necessarily as enthusiastic about the giving up some or a lot of things or everything. They're not as enthusiastic about that as they are about getting this great compassion that would, you know, be very helpful. But they kind of go together, those two, the giving up attachment. The non-clinging and the non-seeking go with the compassion. But some compassion can come before much renunciation comes. So you start with the compassion that you now have and you sit wherever you are, and actually everybody's kind of in the middle of the world of suffering. But some people pretend like they're off to the side a little bit, even off to the side a little bit of their own suffering.

[15:55]

In other words, they're seeking to be someplace a little bit different because they're not practicing renunciation. But the more you sit in the middle of suffering, the more this mind of willingness to be purely present arises. So they speak of all the Buddhas sit in the middle of the world of suffering. They don't sit up in heaven. However, heaven is not, they don't move away from heaven, just they sit in the middle of the world of suffering. The middle of the world of suffering is the human realm. And around the human realm, there's heavenly modes of suffering. There's suffering even in heaven, but there's no negative sensation in heaven. There's this situation where it's just positive sensation, positive sensation.

[16:56]

No negative sensation. But in heaven too, some of the people in heaven are happy about being in heaven. Now they... They never think of not being in heaven, which would be unpleasant, so they don't even think of it. In human realm, however, we think we're sometimes a little bit in heaven, we're sometimes a little bit in hell. So human realm is surrounded by hell and heaven and all kinds of varieties of other ways of being. So Buddhists sit in the center of all the suffering. not sort of over a better neighborhood or a worse neighborhood. They sit sort of in the most central position. And part of the kind of, what do you call it, anthropocentric or homocentric aspect of Buddhism is that we actually feel like the human realm is really kind of the best place to sit in terms of, like, being close to the most extreme bliss and extreme misery, but not leaning sort of either way most of the time.

[18:05]

So Buddhists sit there in the middle of the world of suffering, and as you sit there longer and longer, they sometimes think of this mind that arises or this heart that arises, which is called a supple or soft or flexible mind, arises by sitting in that suffering. And at first you sit in suffering, you may wiggle a little, but the more you can just be settled there, the more this soft mind arises. And this soft mind is the mind, that's sort of a nickname for it, it's the mind that wants to let go of anything that hinders being present. And of course, anything can hinder being present. So basically it's letting go of your body and mind. Or it's the body and mind dropping away.

[19:11]

It's willingness and actually even desire to let go of body and mind. Because even your body has, you know, your nonverbal body has, you know, tendencies of seeking and grasping. Unconsciously we have this kind of seeking and grasping. So this willingness to let go of body and mind arises in us. And somehow that mind is a mind that feels kind of like not so far away from what we're talking about. Maybe there's somebody else still there around who thinks, geez, that renunciation is far away. But simultaneously, maybe, with that attitude, there's this feeling like, okay, I'll be here. I'm in the world of suffering, and I would like to be completely here. And actually, I feel pretty completely here now, but I would also like to...

[20:14]

give up anything that would later take me away. Like right now I feel pretty present and not seeking much, but I would like to actually give up anything that would distract me later after I get up out of this meditation. So even though I still may be in a place where when somebody speaks ill of me, I cringe, it knocks me off a little bit. And when they praise me, it knocks me off a little bit. I still may be there. But as I sit there in that way of being and feel the slight or significant nauseation of getting pushed around like that, it gradually starts to build my willingness to not be pushed around like that.

[21:23]

At Green Gulch we had a tea teacher who lived there for a pretty long time. Her name was Nakamura Sensei and she lived at Green Gulch until she was 91 and then she went back to Japan. But I heard that she said one day, she said, I think she said something like, we're so weak, we get unhappy when it's overcast. And somebody might say, well, of course. Of course you get unhappy when it's overcast. But on the other hand, you know, do you really want to be that way? Do you really want to like when it's overcast? And then when it's sunny, we feel like,

[22:41]

That doesn't seem so bad. But if you think about this... And then you just keep... Do that over and over and over and over and over. It takes a toll. It tires you out. That ride doesn't... You drain yourself by going up and down like that. Or just vibrating back before. Or just going down and [...] down. or up and up and up and up. It doesn't always go back and forth real fast, but there is a cyclic quality to it. I was just reading a text on Monday with a group of people, and we're studying this part where it talks about the way things actually are and then the way they sort of appear to be.

[23:59]

And there were seven aspects of the way they actually are, the way things actually are. And one of the aspects was, its nickname is the suchness, the seven suchnesses, it's the suchness of arising. What that means is the beginninglessness and endlessness of phenomena. And the Chinese way of putting it was the mundane world. That mundane phenomena whirl around. There's no beginning to them, and there's no end to them. They just go round and round. Like I told you a couple weeks ago, the example of like, you know, like I had a cyst, you know, I had a wart. Did I tell you that story? I had a wart.

[25:01]

I guess you were out of town. I had a wart, you know, on my hand, a little wart, like one wart, not 95 warts, one wart. And I didn't want that one wart. I wanted like a, see that? Isn't that nice? No warts. Look down at your hand and it's like, cute. So I feel good, right? Because I got a nice hand with no warts. There was a wart there and, you know, I didn't like it that much, actually. I didn't feel terrible about it, but I actually did not like the wart. It was like a blemish. And, you know, warts sometimes spread too, right? And you know how warts sometimes go away fast. They'd start to deteriorate a little bit, and then suddenly he looked down. He hadn't noticed it for a day or so, and they're gone. That happened. I just looked down, and the wart was gone, and I felt happy that the wart was gone. And I didn't feel bad about myself feeling happy, actually, at that time.

[26:04]

And I looked over at my thumb. The wart was on my fourth finger. I looked over at my thumb, and there was a cyst on the joint, and I felt bad. And then I sort of got it, you know. And then I thought, well, you know, then I'll just wait for the cyst to go away. And when that goes away, then the next thing comes. So part of me is like, if I got that wart, okay, let's have the wart. Let's not be in a hurry to get rid of that one because what's going to come next? What's the next lesson that you're going to get? Work with the one you got. Don't miss this chance of accepting this ward. And see if you can just look at it with pure presence, without like, okay, when's it going to go away? Or even, I hope it's just going to be one ward.

[27:08]

Just look at the ward. And also look at your face and your foot and your age. Look at everything that way. See if you can learn to do that with everything. And again, not again, I don't know if I've said this before, but renunciation isn't the whole story. It's important, but to some extent it's just one ingredient in the whole picture. It is kind of like the key to get into the realm of wisdom and compassion working together. And if renunciation wasn't necessary, then we could just drop it off the list of practices, because really wisdom and compassion basically is enough. I mean, that's really what counts is wisdom and compassion working together. Being able to practice virtue

[28:12]

conjoined with understanding what the virtues are. And to understand what's happening, really, conjoined with practicing all kinds of compassionate virtues. That kind of way of living is really what's important. It's just that renunciation kind of is needed to get in there. So in one sense renunciation is like the key, in another sense renunciation is the context. So we have to sort of pay our renunciation dues. We have to practice pure presence in order to enter into this realm where wisdom is purifying compassion and where compassion is purifying wisdom. Our next step could be to talk a little bit more about that realm if you're ready, or if you have any questions, we can do the questions now and then move into that later.

[29:28]

What do you want to do? Any suggestions? Dorit? I want to talk about the realm. My grandson does this. Okay, so this realm of wisdom and compassion, so again, I think I need to mention this, I don't need to, but I think it would be helpful to mention another thing which we can learn, and that is to learn, learn?

[30:33]

I don't know, learn, or hear about anyway, what's called the mind of enlightenment or the spirit of enlightenment. or even the wish for enlightenment. And it is that. It is the wish to achieve enlightenment for the welfare of all beings. So it's not just compassion, although it is born of compassion. It's compassion connected with the thought that in order to to the fullest, there needs to be the realization of enlightenment. And I want to be part of the realization, I want to be in on this, I want to be devoted to it, I want to enter into this process of the realization of supreme enlightenment for the welfare of all beings.

[31:40]

And some people have thoughts like that. And it may be that you all have a thought like that, or it may be that just 10% of you have that thought, or I don't know, even less. I don't know. I haven't asked you. But this is called the thought of enlightenment, or in Sanskrit, bodhicitta. Bodhi is awakening and citta, the mind or thought. And this happens to people. This thought arises in people. For a long time they might think, gee, I'd like to be helpful. A lot of people ask, well, what do you really want to accomplish in this life? Or what do you want to have happen in this life that hasn't happened so far? I really want to be helpful. I really want to do something good before I die. And then some of those people say, some of the people who have that kind of wish to do something good, to be, a lot of people say, I want to be of service.

[32:49]

Many people say that. A lot of people say, I want to love, I want to really realize love. People say things like that. And people who talk like that, then sometimes a thought occurs to them, well, not only do I want to do something of service, I want to realize perfect enlightenment. And a lot of people say, hey, I've got to admit, I don't have that wish. That's too lofty for me. But some people do have that wish, even though it is lofty. They sometimes have that wish because somehow it happens. There's lots of stories about how it happens and what the conditions for it are, but anyway, there is this This amazing thing that can happen to somebody is they not only want to be helpful or serve service or do something good, but they want to realize the fullest possible good that there could be, whatever that is.

[33:55]

And they would like to have an understanding such that that fullest possible good would be facilitated. And we call that enlightenment, that way of understanding which would help the greatest good for the greatest for everybody. And that thought, once that thought arises, it's developed by the continuous practice of compassion. And compassion again is partly this thought, but also just simply that you want beings to be free of suffering. You want that and you're willing to work for it. And if it's great compassion, you're not only willing to work for it, but you want this happiness for absolutely all beings. you know it's pretty big like you actually want it for cockroaches and mosquitoes and ants and rats and bacteria and of course all humans

[35:25]

You actually want that, and then there's practices that go with that wish, and the practices are ways you can be conducted through life, and that is through giving, through practicing precepts through conscientious attention to all your activities of your body, speech, and mind, through patients, like patients with cockroaches and warts. Warts are from a virus, right? Patients with viruses, people, enemies, insulters, enthusiasm or courageous energy, concentration, mental and physical stability and flexibility.

[36:47]

Those practices develop the compassion, and they are compassion. And they protect and develop this wish to... Well, the wish to be a bodhisattva and finish the course. So they develop it. And wisdom, in a sense, doesn't really develop it. It more like protects it. Because wisdom means that... Wisdom is like... It's a wisdom which understands what the virtues are and what other things are too. It also understands non-virtue. It understands what they are superficially, like that's giving and that's not giving and that's patience and that's not patience.

[37:50]

It understands that kind of thing, but it also understands how patience and giving and non-giving and impatience and non-consciousness and consciousness and instability, it understands all these things are actually the same. It understands that. In other words, it is a realization of interdependence or the realization of the insubstantiality of all phenomena. With that wisdom, The thought, the practices are protected because there'll be no grasping and clinging because of that wisdom. That wisdom won't allow any grasping or clinging to any of the practices. So the wisdom will guarantee the spontaneous arising of renunciation. But before there's wisdom, renunciation is kind of like a version of wisdom.

[38:52]

Yes. I don't know quite how to put this, but I've always had this problem with compassion. And you mentioned something about the practice to be conducive to compassion. No, the practice to be conducive to making a wish, utilizing compassion in terms of . Yes. But by the way, this conceptual problem is that some people don't You don't feel the wish. I mean, is there a practice without the wish? Without which wish? Like, I think you said it was called the bogey cheetah. Yeah. You can practice compassion. Like I said, a lot of people, there's a wide variety of compassion in this world. Among all the people, there's all kinds of different forms and manifestations of compassion. So some people want to be of service. They really do. If you ask them, what's the most important thing in your life?

[40:03]

They say, I want to serve humanity or I want to serve animals. A lot of people say, actually, I want to serve animals. I don't want to serve humanity. A lot of people I know like animals. They don't like people. You know, like, I was in a parking lot someplace in this Woman came over to where I was, and where I was was in the parking lot. And next to me was this little dog I hang out with. And she came over to us, and she knelt down and started touching the dog and then started kissing the dog. And then she got up and walked away. So I thought, yeah, well, that's fine. How come she can kiss the dog and not kiss me? Why didn't you just come up and start petting me? And then just go, and then walk away. You know, non-attachment, right?

[41:04]

She didn't try to take the dog with her. And if someone were to ask her, you know, did you kiss the dog, she'd probably say, yeah. And she didn't ask the dog if she could beforehand. But there's a little thing that a lot of people know how to do is when you go up to, especially little dogs, you should go up underneath them, right? A lot of people know that. You pat them from underneath rather than up from above. They get scared from above. You go put your hand under and go up from under here. So she knew how to do that. It's kind of like, can I touch you? You go from underneath rather than from above. So it's a way of asking, can I touch you? And I think with humans, too, if you go up to somebody and lay on the ground and go like this, And say, okay, go ahead, touch me. That's my grandson. He goes, huh? Huh? And most people say, okay. You know, they say, go ahead. I'll hug you. Huh? It's a kind of request for a hug.

[42:06]

I'm getting a little out of sorts here. Would you hug me? So anyway, some people are devoted. I think that woman probably would do a lot to protect that dog. When I go across the street, you know, people don't run over me when I'm with her. They stop, they stop. They don't want to run over that little dog. Almost no one wants to run over that dog. So a lot of people, they have compassion for dogs or cats or horses, and they're devoted to them. Like some people, a lot of kids grow up, they want to be a veterinarian. They don't like people, though. But there still is compassion. They want to, like, help these animals be healthy. So there's that kind of compassion. Then there's compassion which, let's say, Let's say it's even bigger, like, I want to help all animals and all humans, and I really do, and I want to work for them. But you don't think, well, I want to be a Buddha, too. You don't think that. It doesn't arise in you. Even if you hear intellectually, well, don't you think it would be helpful to be a Buddha if you're going to help people?

[43:14]

Like, you know, to be able to, like, know just the right thing to do because you're so wise. Wouldn't that be helpful, you think? Yeah. But you still might say, well, I don't really want to be one, though. Well, fine. But sometime it arises in you that you think. I actually... I think what I think is that for me to be the most helpful to people would mean to me to be as wise as I could possibly be. And maybe human beings can be Buddhas. So if human beings can be Buddhas, and that would be the most helpful way to be with people, I really want to be that. Not so much that I want to be a Buddha just to be a Buddha, but I want to be a Buddha so I can really... And I can see now that that's necessary to be that, so I want to be that. And I'm talking to you about this, and so one of the conditions for the arising of this thought is talking to somebody about it like this, and reading about it, and hearing about it. So it's not hearing about Buddhas and seeing what they can do with their understanding, with their wisdoms, is part of what makes people think.

[44:22]

Like me, you know, I didn't exactly hear about Buddhas. I heard about Zen priests behaving certain ways. And I read those stories and I said, I want to be like that. That's the way I want to be. I didn't think it was being a Buddha. Now I do think it is. That's what I wanted to be. But there's other things Buddhists can do which I wasn't so interested in. Like they can, you know, do miracles if it's helpful. I wasn't interested in that. That's a tough one. Want to learn how to do miracles? I don't know. So anyway, so what sometimes people say is, well, you may not want to be a Buddha, but would you like to learn how to want to be a Buddha? The person might say, well, yeah, I guess I'd be willing to learn how to want to be a Buddha. And just the practice of compassion at whatever level you're practicing it, generally speaking, is conducive to your compassion developing deeper and wider. And the compassion which is perfectly united with the realization of the final truth, the most universal truth, that is the most perfect compassion.

[45:48]

And that's basically Buddha, is when you have this perfect wisdom and perfect compassion. And renunciation is sort of the way we get in there. So it means that we practice giving or we practice various kinds of precepts or patience, but we practice those virtues the same way we practice renunciation with everything else. So we practice giving. We just meet it. with pure presence. Which means we don't grasp the giving or seek the giving. We don't prefer the giving to the non-giving.

[46:53]

Because preferring, if you're practicing giving, preferring giving distracts you from the giving. It makes the giving more unstable. So to be able to be with the practice of giving in this kind of, in some ways, unexciting way is a way that gets you into the giving which will gradually be joined to wisdom. So at first we practice giving and we kind of like get excited about it. Maybe like I was successful at giving and giving is a lot better than not giving. Giving is great. Being stingy is lousy and I was giving so I'm happy. Again, that's perfectly understandable. That's very similar to something nice happens and you get happy. But how can you give? Period. That's it.

[47:55]

No big deal. Give, period. Rather than give, feel good, happy that I feel good, and also what's going to happen next. Does anybody notice? So one of the basic things about like a summary, one of the summaries of the traps of practicing virtue is big name. So a lot of people who practice virtue, they're practicing virtue and they're They're pretty good at it, and somewhere they know that they could become famous for this practice. And a little bit, they kind of are into that, and they are doing pretty well, but to do Practice giving and precepts and patience and enthusiasm and constant to do these practices and to do them with the hope of becoming more and more skillful at them for the benefit of others.

[49:01]

Okay? Wouldn't that be, I mean, excellent, right? Let's just say it is excellent, shall we? Let's say that you're really good at all these practices I just mentioned. Or somebody is. That can happen. I've seen people that are good at this stuff. I've seen really generous people. I've seen it. Haven't you? There's such people. And some people are really, really careful about everything they do. They're really careful. They really think about whether they're stealing or not. They really think about whether they're lying. And they're good at telling the truth. They're good. They're excellent. And so on. And some people are good at a whole bunch of stuff like that, right across the board. And then, if you just have this little thought up there, I'm, you know, I am and will continue to be famous for this.

[50:03]

And people are, you know, I can sense, and you can check and find out, people who aren't even near me right now, who are in other areas of the city, people around the Bay Area are talking right now about how virtuous I am. I'm sitting in a cave in the Berkeley Hills, but people down in the lower parts, they're talking about me. They're having little tea parties, and they're saying, you know, I am famous for my virtue. And that's... basically makes those practices pretty much shots, shoots them down. It doesn't make them as bad as some other things, but basically pretty much equalizes them to like simply like trying to get stuff for yourself, being impatient and stuff like that. The nice thing about those things is you're not doing those to be famous. You're just doing it just because you're selfish and you're trying to get stuff for yourself and being impatient with people that irritate you.

[51:07]

So renunciation helps us enter into these practices in a way that they start to really work, really develop compassion. And also, we start to treat them like we would treat them if there was wisdom. Because if there's wisdom, when you understand this practice, you cannot get into this big-name thing. You cannot get into, like, You don't get it. You're practicing virtues. You're practicing virtues, but you do not fall into that virtues are better than non-virtues. You don't get into that. So, of course, you can practice virtues better because you don't get demoralized and enervated from non-virtue.

[52:15]

And you don't get shot up and pumped up from virtue. And you do not look down on people who don't practice virtue. you actually but you do look up to everybody because the practice of virtue makes you appreciate people when it's done without any grasping to just go around and say well virtues not really different from non-virtue, you know, as a policy statement or something you heard that sounds cute. Of course, that's non-virtue to talk like that, to go around and say that virtue is the same as non-virtue without actually understanding that, because you understand what virtue is and what non-virtue is.

[53:22]

But you have to practice virtue in order to understand that. You can't say, okay, virtue and non-virtue are the same, so I'm not going to practice virtue because I don't prefer virtue. I'm beyond that. No, remember I said before, you have to practice all those virtues without any expectation of reward, also without an expectation of punishment, but people don't usually... I guess people, when they're practicing virtues, they might expect punishment if they stop practicing them. So they are practiced without expectation of punishment or reward. And finally, they're practiced understanding that they're not different from non-virtue. But you're practicing virtues with the understanding that virtue is not different from non-virtue. You're not practicing non-virtue with the understanding that non-virtue is not different from virtue.

[54:25]

Unfortunately, no. Yeah, unfortunately, unfortunately, you can practice non-virtue with the understanding that non-virtue is not different from virtue. You can do that. And some people do. So what's recommended is practice virtue until you understand that virtue and non-virtue are not different. Which is similar to practice virtue with the understanding that of the rewards you get for practicing virtue are not different from the punishments you get from not practicing virtue. Which means that you understand that the punishment you're getting is the same as the reward you're getting. If you can understand that being punished, how being punished is the same as being rewarded, then you can understand if that's the way you are.

[55:39]

Then you can understand how virtue and non-virtue are the same, but you have to be practicing virtue at the same time with that. So you practice virtue with renunciation. of the mind which discriminates, or I should say, renunciation of the mind which discriminates between good and bad, but also renunciation of the distinction between good and bad, kind of the same thing. But you practice a virtue with the renunciation of that distinction. And that's approaching wisdom joined to compassion. Practice virtue with renunciation.

[56:47]

You can practice renunciation and practice virtue. If you practice renunciation with non-virtue, what that turns into is not practicing non-virtue. But you can continue to practice renunciation with virtue, or virtue with renunciation. But non-virtue doesn't go with renunciation. They don't go together. As soon as there's renunciation, the non-virtue is not functioning. And if there's practice of virtue and you lose the renunciation, then the virtue deteriorates into non-virtue. That's why renunciation is the key, to keep virtue being virtue and purify it. and to drop non-virtue. Because non-virtue is basically anything that distracts you from what's happening.

[58:00]

Or whatever distracts you from what's happening is non-virtue. Anything that distracts you from being present with someone suffering is non-virtue. Anything that distracts you from being present with someone's happiness is non-virtue. Anything that distracts you from being present with your suffering and your happiness is non-virtue. And renunciation is to give up being distracted. And if you haven't got renunciation yet or the wish to practice renunciation, then trying to be present as much as you can with what's happening makes you want to do that more, which means you're wanting to be a renunciate. Because if you like being present sometimes, then maybe you'd like to be present more.

[59:06]

And wanting to be present is actually wanting to practice renunciation. Does it make sense? Any questions about it? We have some more time. Yes. Do you have to give up playing football then? I mean, you don't get to score and touch. Well, I don't know. I don't know. It depends on who you're playing with. If you're playing with Bodhisattvas, you probably would be the star. Because they'd be out there to, you know, help you be a star. But if you go play with the 49ers, you know, I don't know how that will work out. Yeah. So I think it might be hard to play with the 49ers. It would be very difficult to do. So I think some things you might actually stop doing.

[60:08]

if you practice renunciation. But some things you might be able to continue to do, but by doing them in a way that you weren't distracted from them, they might suddenly become virtues. Like, I think playing touch... Well, like, forget about touch football. I remember one time I was... I was at Esalen Institute, and it was during the last year of, actually during the last few months of Gregory Bateson's life. Do you know Gregory Bateson? Gregory Bateson was, well, he was a biologist and anthropologist. He went to Bali with Margaret Mead. He was her husband. He co-authored some of those studies and so on. And he was the author of the Double-Bind Theory of Schizophrenia and things like that. Anyway, and his father was kind of like a, you know, he wasn't Darwin, but he was kind of like Darwin's, almost Darwin's equal.

[61:21]

Anyway, he was a great biologist. And anyway, Gregor Bateson was at Ethlin, and And for some reason or other, he offered to play chess with me. And he was, at that time, he was 76. And really a wonderful guy. But he was 76, too, you know. And you may or may not know that chess players are not usually 76. They die young, actually. They don't live very long. Among the various professions, they have the lowest longevity. It's a very tense, nerve-wracking sport. Anyway, they're usually good up to about 40, like mathematicians or something. Anyway, I was a young man and he was an old man, and I'm not saying I'm a good chess player, but anyway, I decided to play the most beautiful game I could play with him. I decided to make moves that I thought he would find interesting, which are not necessarily stupid moves, like, you know, here, take my bishop or something, but moves that I tried to, like, do interesting things that weren't, like,

[62:36]

But I wasn't trying to beat him. I was trying to give him nice opportunities to think. And he really liked me playing that way. And I did sometimes win the games. But I wasn't trying to. And since that time, I've never played chess again. Because I just feel like... It's the only way I want to play now is just to play for the other person, not to beat the other person. So I think it is possible to get out there and play football for the other people and do something generous. Playing football that way might be in accord with renunciation and you might find that you can be more present than you were perhaps when you played to win. That sometimes when you play to win, you close your eyes to what you're doing in terms of whether it would hurt the other person's feelings if you scored a touchdown against them or something.

[63:51]

You kind of close your eyes to that and say, I'm not going to look at if this hurts your feelings. I'm just going to go ahead and score this thing. So it might be interesting to go and have, you know, like a Zen football game. Get everybody together and see if everybody really could be devoted to all the other people and try to promote, you know, compassion through this activity. I think it might be an interesting exercise. But maybe ridiculous, I don't know. Patty? Yes. Well, it's easy to grasp anything because we're excellent graspers. And it's part of our normal development is to learn how to grasp.

[64:54]

And so we know how to grasp any kind of instruction. Even we know how to grasp the instruction on non-grasping. Huh? Yeah, it's kind of hard to learn how to do it. But, you know, sometimes you get a feeling for it, like, because today I got a, what do you call it, I got a hepatitis A shot. And, you know, sometimes when somebody sticks a needle into you, you can just relax or you can tense up. It's possible to relax. Or if someone is, I don't know what, some other thing I'd say, you know, like a massage. Sometimes people are massaging you and sometimes they're pressing and it hurts a little bit. And if you relax, you know, then there can be some give there, you know.

[66:02]

But you can also tense up. And if they push too hard, the pain gets too strong, then you start tensing up, and it's antithetical to the process. So some massage therapists would, you know, they would ask you to tell them when you get to the point where you're going to tense up, and then they won't go any farther than that. So I think we have some experience of, like, when something is challenging us that we sometimes tense up or sometimes we relax. And also you can do various physical movements, and the movement can be accomplished using a certain set of muscles. And you can also use a bunch of other muscles on top of that. So this muscle has to contract in order for this movement to occur maybe, but it's possible to use several other muscles in the same area on top of that. to just sort of grip and tense around the basic activity.

[67:05]

But it's also possible to learn how to let those go and let the basic movement muscles operate. And that can be pointed out and you can go, and somehow you hear it and the muscles relaxes. When I first learned how to cross my legs, I used to cross my legs and I used to notice, well, at first it was like, no, they don't cross. And a lot of people say, when they see the legs cross, they sit down and they try to do it and they say, well, it's just not going to happen. The leg won't go there. And partly it's because there's a whole bunch of muscles that are like saying no. And when I first started trying to cross my legs, I used to, like, sort of, like, trick myself and sort of, like, you know, pull the leg up there when those muscles weren't noticing, you know? And it actually worked, you know, that I, when they were relaxed and I would kind of, like, sneak the leg up there and they just sort of, like, stayed asleep, you know? They didn't need to be, you know, these muscles don't have to be working when you're sitting here, right?

[68:11]

But somehow they go to work sometimes because I don't know why they do it. It's sort of like, should we be involved here too? But if they do, then the leg really doesn't go up. So I would actually like kind of look the other way and go. And the other thing I tried was crossing my legs in a warm bath. So the legs get real relaxed and then you circle. And you're in your posture. And then sometimes the leg would say, okay, now we're going to tense up. Say, no, no, back off, okay? So this is part of being present, you know? Get in there with those tensions and talk to them. Could you consider taking a break just for a little while? So sometimes in meditation, a 30-minute period or a 40-minute period Maybe that's too much to take a break from picking and choosing.

[69:21]

Maybe it's too long to take a break from grasping and seeking. But maybe you could do it for like two minutes during 30 minutes. Just like the middle of the 30 minutes, just okay now. Would it be all right for two minutes here just to, like, just relax completely? Would that be all right? Would the world allow me to do that? Just try it. Some say, no, that's... How about a minute? How about 30 seconds? Well, that might be okay. You just... Let go of anything that takes you away from this, just for 30 seconds. Or maybe that's too much. How about for one moment, just for one moment, just... Was that all right?

[70:24]

Did anybody get hurt? And try it for two. you know, a minute, a whole minute. Just pass up on all the things that are taking you away from just being here. And that's enough. A minute. A one minute where you actually just were here and all the opportunities to get distracted, you just let them go. That's renunciation. And you don't even have to tell yourself that you were successful. Just And sometimes if people sit for a whole week, you know, maybe in the middle of the week, for a half an hour, for that whole half hour, they're just there. That's great.

[71:27]

But it may take a week, like 150 periods of meditation or something, to have one where you just were completely there the whole time But then, if you keep practicing over the years, there'll be more. And again, seeking that there'll be more is not the point. Just keep practicing and don't worry about whether there's going to be more, and there will be. Don't worry about improving, and you will. because it's just because we're worrying that we have these problems, you know. And we're worried because we're seeking and grasping. So again, I would like to continue to discuss in gradually more detail how to practice virtues like giving, enthusiasm, patience, precepts in the context of meeting the practice without giving up that mind which is judging and

[72:52]

distracting us from the practice in terms of like getting something out of it or afraid that we won't be able to do it or whatever. Okay? Thank you very much.

[73:08]

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