I think at the end of our last meeting I said something about the difficulty of understanding or realizing the middle way. And the middle way in one sense is our actual nature, it's the way we actually are. and it's also teachings about how we are. So in the first teaching that the Buddha gave, the Buddha gave teachings about the middle way. He gave teachings about something he found. So the thing he found is not exactly the same as the teachings he gave about how to find it or in one sense what it isn't.

[01:11]

So he talked about some extremes that are to be avoided and in avoiding those extremes one finds the middle. By avoiding extreme interpretations or views of our nature, we may be able to find or discover our actual nature. Most people are not familiar with their own nature. most of us are not actually familiar with the way we actually are. And it may be the case that most of us therefore need some kind of training so that we can overcome anything that's interfering with our recognition of the way we are.

[02:17]

I I think that some Zen students maybe had a view of the process of training that it would involve something like sitting down and becoming quiet and calm, and then the truth would be revealed to them. And I think that there's something to that. But again, sitting down and being quiet and still and the truth being revealed may...it may require for some of us, maybe for most of us, maybe for all of us, that in order for it to be revealed, we have to receive some training

[03:29]

to let go of what's blocking it or what's obscuring it, which is our habitual way of seeing things, is obscuring the revelation. So we may have to, there may be a step, a big step of training between sitting down and having revelation of our nature. In the Lotus Scripture, The Buddha says that the Buddhas appear in the world because of one great condition, and that is because of the wish to open living beings' eyes to Buddha's wisdom and knowledge. and to demonstrate the wisdom and to help them awaken to the wisdom and to help them enter the wisdom.

[04:38]

So the opening the eyes or the revelation of the wisdom is part of it, but there also needs to be some demonstration and some awakening and some entering. So there seems to be a process of training. And sometimes this process of training which is sometimes called the path is described in such a way that it looks like if one is able to diligently perform certain practices, then things will move along quite smoothly and enlightenment will be achieved for sure.

[05:41]

And I'm not saying that that's not true, but just that The actual process may not feel like that when you're in it, and some of the descriptions don't tell us about a lot of the harrowing experiences that can happen as one proceeds along the path, the path of learning the path, and then even when learning the path, staying on it when all kinds of challenging emotions arise. And again, this is the path that I'm speaking of, the path to Buddhist wisdom, which again is called the middle way to bring us to realize the middle way, the middle way to help us realize

[06:49]

the middle way that we really are and always have been. And so part of the harrowing emotional experiences that are happening perhaps in the process of this class is that we live in a world where our government and our military services are being used to create what we are now calling a war. So we live now with this world. And it's challenging to meditate on the nature of phenomena or on our nature in the middle of a war.

[07:50]

Or maybe for most people it might be hard. Maybe some of you aren't having such a hard time, but maybe tomorrow you will. And so we have to be compassionate to ourselves and the people we meet in order to be able to do this study. And I heard an etymology once of the word Karuna. which is translated as compassion. Another word, that's a Sanskrit word, another word is maitri or metta.

[08:55]

Maitri is a Sanskrit word which means loving-kindness, love or loving-kindness. But Karuna is not usually translated as loving-kindness. It's more often translated as compassion. It's not so much friendliness, but more like being concerned for people suffering and hoping that they would be free of it, or your own or other people's. The etymology of the word that I heard, which I don't know if it's true, but I like it, is dented happiness. Compassion is actually a happy state, but it has a dent in it. You're happy to feel compassion for beings, but when they're suffering, it kind of dents your happiness. It cramps your happiness. And that's the way compassion is.

[09:57]

It's not unaffected. It's a happiness. It's a happiness that is affected by the suffering of beings. So if you feel happy and your happiness is dented now, that may be compassion. But another thing about compassion is that... it has kind of like two close, there's lots of pitfalls around the practice of compassion, but two that I've mentioned tonight. One is that you can become involved in sensual, what do you call it, devotion to sensual pleasure you can slip into or attachment to beings if you care about them. You can start lusting after them even sort of slipping off from concern and wanting their welfare, you can sometimes get attached and lustful towards them.

[11:04]

But the other side, which I think is even more likely the closer danger in the practice of compassion, is depression. And actually some people think, I think, have a feeling like, If somebody's suffering, you should be depressed about that. And if you feel compassion towards someone, you might feel that depression makes sense. And it makes sense in the sense that it's a likely place to slip into. But actually, compassion is a happiness. So even though we're in a terrible situation now, And we have been in other terrible situations. Compassion has to do with being glad that you're here and glad that you care, happy that you want the welfare of beings, happy that you want people not to suffer too much, and hurt, your happiness somewhat hurt or dented by seeing that all this pain is arising now.

[12:18]

Another thing which I think a lot of people feel now is one way or another is helplessness or powerlessness as though their efforts are not having much effect and one can see things that way and even if one doesn't see things that way still we have limits. Like if we can get together here and in other places and be kind to each other and peaceful. That's not much in a way, or Russians say it's not much anyway, but it seems to have a limit. It seems to be limited to when we're together in this situation, maybe walk out the door and that's the end of it. Or maybe we get... down the stairs and out the door and that's the end of it. Maybe we get all the way home and then it's the end of it. There seems to be some limit to our skills and there seems to be some limit to our participation in peaceful activities.

[13:29]

And like we see they don't reach everywhere. So that's just the way things look often. And that's part of the dented thing about the happiness too, that you know there's some place where your happiness doesn't reach, it bothers you, if you feel compassion. But on the other side, without denying that limit, if we can be patient with our limits and accepting of our limits, then that way of meeting our limits is an opportunity for the growth of compassion. If we fight our limits, if we try to get rid of them, the limits tighten around us. If we try something that's beyond our limits because we feel ashamed that we can't do more, we become more hemmed in by our limits.

[14:42]

But if we accept that, well, only in this area can I really like wholeheartedly participate, then that wholehearted participation and acceptance of that limitation can be the basis for it to grow. So I say that to you and I say it to myself at this time. People look in my face and I feel like they're kind of saying, they're looking at my face these days and they're kind of saying, I don't know, they seem to be saying, well, is there anything else that we can do? Am I doing enough? You know, would you do more? Would you help me? And in a way, I'm dented by all that. But I don't try to fix it. I don't try to say, okay, it's enough. Well, maybe not enough.

[15:47]

Sometimes it's okay to say, but really I can't say we're doing enough. I mean, I can say it, but I don't want to. And just face that... at this moment, but all I can do is look in your face most of the time. Of course, I could look away, but that doesn't seem to be necessarily expanding my capacities greatly. So I just say that as ongoing work, ongoing context for studying the nature of phenomena, to take care of ourselves so that we feel good about caring, that we feel happy about caring

[17:02]

And then also, as I mentioned before, there's two types of meditation, basically, that we talk about. One is the kind of meditation which is more like calming down meditation, where we give up discursive thought. And the other kind is the meditation on the middle way, for example, wisdom meditation. If we become too agitated and too tense, then the calming meditation is more appropriate. Or even if we become, even if we're doing wisdom meditation and we start getting too agitated and tense, it's good to go back to the calming type. Just put aside all the teachings, let go of them for a while. and let go of every other kinds of thoughts that appear in your mind. Just relax with them and let them go. And then when you feel calmer and more energetic, then you can turn that calm energy back to the meditations on wisdom.

[18:13]

Last week we were also talking about the way of seeing things in terms of avoiding the extremes of things lasting or things being annihilated. And Jenny said something like, Buddhism has lasted. And I said, no, Buddhism hasn't lasted. And then I think she said something like, well, Buddhism has been passed down. And in a way, that's kind of another way to put it. Buddhism does seem to have been passed down. But when we have Buddhism and then we pass it down, The thing that gets passed is not the thing that was passed.

[19:44]

But there seems to be a continuity in this discontinuity. It's supposed to be changing all the time, so it makes sense that... that this teaching now would be a teaching which is different from the teaching before. So this teaching wasn't actually passed down. This teaching is arising right now. But it's related to previous teachings, but it's not them. So they didn't last over until now. And yet, I wouldn't be able to be involved with this teaching with you if it weren't for you and the previous teachings. So there's a lineage of things not being passed down. There's a lot, there's a succession that way of, you know, a transmission of not transmitting anything from one to the next because things don't last.

[20:55]

But also the previous teachings have not been annihilated. because they are the basis of what we're doing tonight. Even last week is the basis of what we're doing tonight. So Jenny's not the Jenny of last week, and her comments aren't the comments she's making tonight, but they're a condition for tonight's discussion. And the middle way we are is that we are beings, our nature is that we don't last and yet we're not annihilated because what we are right now is based on what we have been. What we are right now is based on what we aren't anymore. We're not based on ourself getting moved over from the past to the present. But that's easy for us to think that way.

[21:57]

Like this is the new version of me. This is a new version. But it's not the new version of what I used to be. What I used to be has ceased. But it's not annihilated because it's the basis of this one. This one depends on the last one. that the last one isn't this one. That last one didn't get carried over and then fixed up a little bit into this one. But it's easy for us to think those two extremes, that the old one's gone entirely and this one's got nothing to do with it, or that this is really just a little bit of a change of the last one. Just the last one's slightly older. That's easy for us to think, but the middle way is hard for us to think, even though that's the way we are.

[22:59]

Now one of the ways to get at, one of the ways to talk about how come it's hard for us to see it is that when something appears to us, like you know, the body, our body, or our memory of our history, or a person's face, whatever that is appears actually does appear, does arise in the moment, and it appears to a consciousness. And it appears to a non-conceptual consciousness. And that thing that appears at this moment, like your own self, your own personhood, your own body, that thing that appears is conceived by a conceptual consciousness to be inherently existing.

[24:32]

In other words, we agree with the appearance that we and the things we see exist on their own. That's the way they look, actually, even to sense consciousness. But then our conceptual consciousness agrees with that. And that just goes on. That's just sort of part of our life. And in a sense it's part of our nature that we have these two kinds of consciousness working together. The problem is that, not the problem, but an additional problem is that we confuse the

[25:57]

It is possible, however, to discriminate between them and to see that they're not the same. It's kind of like...I like the example of...it's kind of like if you look out at a hillside and if it looks blurry and some people...if they put glasses on Then this hillside looks clearer, the trees and so on look clearer, sharper. You can tell the difference between the trees and the background hills or something. But after you have the glasses on, you can't separate the vision through the glasses from the vision of the way things look without the glasses, even though the way they appear without the glasses is the basis upon which, that's the reason why you put the glasses on.

[27:10]

And you're looking at the same thing, but now it's clearer in a way. And you can't really see the way they look without the glasses on, even though they still look like that without the glasses on to you. But you can see it. I had this sense that that was difficult for you to understand.

[28:12]

I somehow don't feel like another example would be helpful at this point. More I feel like it might be more helpful to speak abstractly in the sense that...but I can give an example in speaking abstractly, like, you're looking at me or I'm looking at you, and the way the way I actually am, if you're looking at me, or the way the sound of my voice actually is, if you're hearing me, the way I am is something you can see, and the way I am or my voice that you can hear is Let me say, the way I'm happening right now for you is a mystery.

[30:59]

And I recently looked up the word mystery in theology. I suppose this means Christian theology or Western theology. A mystery is something that cannot be known clearly or comprehended. It's beyond understanding and it can't be known except through divine revelation. And that's sort of what I was talking about earlier, that some people see, maybe see Zen meditations, sit down calmly, and maybe even some people say sit down calmly and then pray to Buddha. You know, your sitting calmly is kind of like a symbol of a prayer that you're making to Buddha, and Buddha will reveal to you, Buddha will reveal to you what the mystery is. is, what the mystery of your life is, what the mystery of your self is, what the mystery of your body and mind is.

[32:17]

So actually what you're seeing actually is a mystery, or yeah, it's actually a mystery, but we tend to overlay the mystery with a kind of fantasy about it. So it's not a mystery anymore. It's clearer. It's sharper. It's graspable. So if you imagine me out here separate from you, then I'm not such a mystery. Then I'm disguised sitting over here on my own, separate from you. But if you don't see me over here separate from you, then, well, then you've got a mystery on your face, in your face.

[33:27]

Because, you know, where do I stop and start if I'm not over here on my own? What do you have to do with... It's not that I'm not here, It's just that the way I appear when I don't look like a mystery, that's not here. The unmysterious me is not really here. It's just an imagined thing that doesn't exist. You said that it was a mystery and not... and that part of the definition is that it's unknowable? I said that's what it says under the theology section, under the definition. I think the regular definition, just a general definition, I think also means that it's beyond knowledge, incomprehensible.

[34:32]

That's the regular definition. No, I think the faith part would be not just a regular definition of the word in the dictionary. I'm saying in theology they say that it's pretty much the same except that they also say further, which it isn't, it's not in the, the regular definition in the dictionary, English dictionary, doesn't say mystery is only revealed through divine revelation. It says mystery refers to things you can't actually comprehend that are behind your comprehension. But under religion, the religion section says, the theology says, you cannot do divine revelation. But I'm saying that the way we know, the way we know how we're happening, or the way we know how other things are happening, the way we know events, is that we put this

[35:40]

thing over them this appearance that they're out there on their own and when they appear out there on their own they're not a mystery anymore and we can understand that thing out there on their own on its own and we can agree that it really and we can we can agree to that appearance that it's the way we imagine it out there on its own and agreeing to it is the source of our problems. And agreeing to it is what puts it over into it lasts or it's annihilated. Because if something really existed, it would last. If it was out there on its own, it would last because it wouldn't be dependent on other things. So when they changed, it wouldn't change. So I'm just saying, and I'm just saying again, that what you're looking at has this mysterious quality which we usually don't see because we wrap it up out there in its own fantasy so we can get a hold of it.

[36:55]

The middle way has something to do with starting to admit that we're doing that. see how that's the source of our extreme views and see how it's the source of suffering and train the mind to stop agreeing to stop believing that things are this way that they appear and find out which way that they appear you should you should not believe in and which way you can believe in so it's not that there's nothing there There is, like, something there. It does appear to be a certain way, and things do appear to be out there on their own. But the belief that they're that way, that should be given up. And we have to learn how to do that because, as I said, those two are usually mixed together. We have to learn to discriminate them and give up one and let the other one go. Is putting on and taking off the glasses that discrimination?

[38:00]

No. You always have the glasses on. You have them on all the time, basically. So actually, practicing tranquility meditation, to some extent, is taking the glasses off for a while. And wisdom practices is consciousness? No, wisdom practices is having them on and learning to see... what it's like with them on and what it's like with them off at the same time and letting one be because it's the way the mind works and stop believing the other one and also stop believing that they're the same. There's a basis for this fantasy and the basis for this fantasy is the mysterious dependent co-arising of every experience. That's the basis of the fantasy but the fantasy of these things being out there on their own and, you know, them being permanent and so on, that fantasy is about something that doesn't exist at all.

[39:04]

However, it's quite useful, that fantasy, because it's so sharp and graspable. And that fantasy is the basis for taking what we call words and putting them on things. So conventional designation, our language, is based on wrapping up these little mysteries in little packages of being out there on their own-ness. I was going to say, so the, it's sort of, there's something very, very useful for us as human beings to be able to encase things and wrap them up and, I mean, to start it. It's very useful. Yeah. Just like people have trouble taking their glasses off when push comes to shove, you know.

[40:07]

If you're sitting on the porch, you know, with a glass of lemonade or even some lemonade with something in it, looking out at your garden, you can take your glasses off. And so what if the roses are a little blurry? You remember there were roses. Can't see them anymore. But if you ever want to, you can put the glasses back on. But when it comes to finding a telephone number of the doctor, you really want your glasses on. And you're not so like, oh, I'll just take them off now. So what if I can't read it? Yeah, it's very useful. And some uses of conceptual thought, which makes things sharp, are not a problem at all. Some conceptual thought is quite helpful. Makes music and things like that. Makes all kinds of teachings and practices. All those things are based on conceptual thought, which is the basis for language so we can talk to each other and have some culture. This particular one, this particular misconception is an idea about the way things are which is not the way they are.

[41:16]

They do appear that way. They do. You're not making up the appearance and you're not even making up the belief. But the belief is optional. The appearance is not. So we are born such that things do look like they're out there separate from us even though they're not. But we don't have to perpetually believe in that. As long as we do believe in it, we can't see the middle way. If we could not believe in it, we see the middle way things are. Including, we still see the process of believing. You know, we see how that works too, but we don't believe anymore. We see the believing and the appearance as separate. We're not hooked on either one. Carmen?

[42:20]

Huh? I kind of went away. Went away? I wanted to ask about what you said before about knowing our human nature or our nature and... I was wondering, I know they're not separate, but I was wondering if you meant human nature in general or our own human nature? Well, I guess when I was using our nature, I meant like the way we actually are, you know, our middle way nature. There's also like human nature in the sense of human beings have certain tendencies. They have tendencies to make discriminations and to believe them. That's also part of our nature. And we have to learn that too. We don't necessarily know that. But that's easier to recognize than the way we are beyond... What do you call beyond?

[43:27]

Well, first of all, beyond our imaginations about ourselves. And the way we are beyond our imaginations of ourselves... is that we are not here on our own. Not at all. We are here under the influence of things other than ourselves. That's how we're here. And you can hear that teaching, and we can meditate on that teaching, and then you can meditate on how that teaching implies that there's no essence to us, that we don't make ourselves happen. And you can meditate on that teaching too. And it's good to meditate on those teachings and listen to those teachings and think about those teachings. And those teachings will help us get ready to hear more teachings, for example, about how we project a...

[44:31]

an imaginary thing in ourselves, which is that we do make ourselves, that we are on our own. And then we can see that that's not really true. In other words, it's not really true. that this essence that we project on ourselves is actually in ourselves. It's not that we're not here, and this is the balancing thing. It's not that we're not here at all. It's not that we don't know anything. We do know things. Every moment we know something, we really do. But we also... And the way we know things every moment, the way we know things every moment, the way we know things every moment is that we know them in a way that they appear to us.

[45:43]

That's the way we know them. And the way they appear to us is not really true. They don't appear to us as happening under the influence of things other than themselves. That's not the way things appear to us. They do appear to us as though they were making themselves happen. As though they had a little essence inside and then that sort of popped out into the event. Or that there's something about them that goes with this packaging we're putting on them. So they do appear a certain way, and then we package them in a belief in the way they appear, and then we've got problems. But if you can learn that process, then you can understand the way things are, which is beyond their appearance, or behind their appearance in a sense.

[46:48]

But the first step, or a first step, is to get used to... I guess just get used to... I don't know if this is really right to say, but get used to remembering that everything you see has a mysterious quality that you can't see. Everything you experience has a quality which is beyond your thinking. And don't forget that. Or, put it positively, be mindful of that. Learn to be mindful that whatever you're experiencing has this mysterious quality, or is a mystery. But it's not exactly that it's a mystery, just a mystery. It's not just that it's beyond all your conceptions of it.

[48:01]

because it is also your conceptions of it. It is also your imaginations about it. That's part of what it is to have something happen for us. But it's also the fact that those two, your imagination about things and the way they are beyond your imagination, that those two are not confused. That's also the way they are. So all those together are what our nature is. But we need to learn to see without taking the glasses off. We need to learn to see that what we see in the glasses is not actually in things. Yes. There's a Hindu saying that says that nothing is quite beautifully revealed by everything. Nothing is quite beautifully revealed by everything.

[49:05]

Yes. But again, that process of revelation is what we're into now. So, can you just sit and look at everything and have the nothing that's in everything be revealed? or you have to do a little investigation. And then how are you going to investigate? And so, because the nothing doesn't mean that everything is nothing, it's just that there's a nothing about everything. Everything has a particular kind of nothing about it. And the nothing that everything has is that everything has nothing of what we imagine It is in it. It's not that things are nothing. It's just that everything lacks all of our imaginations about the thing. Even though our imagination is very helpful for us to, you know, get somebody to come across the room by saying, hey, Donald, would you come over here?

[50:13]

So it's not that there's no Donald. It's just that my imaginations about Donald are not in him. He's a mystery, actually, that doesn't have any of my ideas in him. And yet my ideas are useful for me to talk to him and talk to you about him. But I have to learn to see that there's nothing about what I think he is in him. In particular, there's nothing about... There is, you know, there's nothing in him to which Donald refers. Yes? Is it possible to experience the mystery without going into naming or knowing it?

[51:14]

I think not. Because that's the way our tendencies are as human beings, and so... You can say that's the way our tendencies are, but another way to say it is that the way we know these mysteries, the way we know them, is by taking them as what we imagine them to be. That's the way we know them. Otherwise, they're not really known to our knowing equipment. So we can't suppress that part and really experience mysteries? No, but you can suppress... You can suppress that part, though, and feel good. In some sense, calming meditation is to kind of suppress that part for a little while, to reduce the conceptual activity for a while as a calming technique, to get more settled and relaxed and like, you know, more into the pores of everything. But the way of developing insight is not to try to suppress that. But to hear a teaching that tells you that the way the mystery really is, is that in the way all phenomena are, everything that exists has this quality that they don't make themselves happen.

[52:36]

They have a lack of being, a lack of essence in terms of making themselves happen. Everything's like that. Now you hear that teaching, But everything you would apply it to, the only way you know how to apply that teaching to something is to something you know about. And everything you know about, or every way to know what the teaching is talking about is to approach it through your imagination. However, even though you have to pay that price of admission to apply the teaching to something, the price of admission is to take it for what it isn't. in order to apply the teaching to it of what it is. So if you're looking at somebody in order to apply the teaching that they're a mystery and that they depend on things other than themselves, the only way for you to find them, to get a hold of them and to know them is by taking them for what you think they are.

[53:39]

See, that's the way it goes. That's the only way we know them. However, once you apply this teaching, you start to change. Once you apply the teaching that things are dependent on things other than themselves, you start to change in the way you relate to things, like I mentioned in the first night. As you apply this teaching to everything you meet, not just reminding that everybody you meet is a mystery, but it's a mystery in the particular way that number one, it's not how it appears to you, and number two, whatever it is doesn't make itself and depends on other things. And therefore is radically impermanent. Not just getting old, but constantly changing. And that you can't depend on things. You know, you can't depend, for example, on people. But we like to depend on people, right? This is a dependable person. I'm a dependable person. When you meditate on this teaching, you start to realize that people are not worthy of confidence.

[54:45]

and I often use the example of my grandson, you know, you can love somebody who you realize is not worthy of confidence. He's unstable, impermanent, and not worthy of confidence, but you can love whatever this mystery is. But in also particular, he's not worthy of confidence based on the way he appears. He's not that way. You can't trust that. But you can have a good relationship with somebody if you remember the teaching that the thing is not made by itself. You can have a very good relationship. As a matter of fact, you'd start to have this relationship, which I spoke of in the first class. You have the appropriate level of care for the thing, for the person of the thing, or yourself or your teeth. Whatever it is, when you remember this teaching, you develop more and more skillful and virtuous attitude towards things.

[55:51]

You care, but not too much or too little. This teaching helps you become that way with things. When you become that way with things, you become more and more ready. You're grounded in the mystery, even though you can't see it. You're getting closer to it. You're meditating on it even though you can't see it. Because again, the only way you can see it is by taking it for what you think it is. And you have no way to find it otherwise. It's there. But to locate it and grasp it, we have to take it for something that we can locate and grasp. So that's still going on. It still looks that way. And you're probably still believing it to be that way. But by listening to this teaching you start to relate differently and that becomes a basis now to start looking at your fantasies about things and examining them and seeing how you believe them and then gradually educating yourself, training yourself to give up that belief.

[57:03]

Or, you know, not just training yourself but working with the teachings and the teacher to give up that belief. When you give up the belief, and you give up that belief, when you see what the belief is, and then you learn how to look at what's happening and not be able to find what you believe is there. And it's not that nothing's there, it's just that the essence isn't there. And you know what that essence would look like because you see your imagination of it. And so in this way, by studying all these things, you find the nothing part of each one. Then you understand the mystery. Then you found the middle way. But you still can't know the mystery. You still can't see how everything is under the influence of other things.

[58:05]

You can't see that... Because, you know, you're part of it. Pardon? Yeah, that's part of the logic of why you never really can know the mystery because you're part of it. just like I was saying to Roy, he can't, you know, as long as I'm over here separate from him, then he can know me. But when he doesn't have this thing that, when he doesn't find a way for me to be over here on my own, then he starts to open to the mystery, but then he doesn't get to know me. So, eliminating the conceptual overlay and the belief in it

[59:08]

You can't know things the way you usually do. You can't know. However, you can know your fantasies. But the fantasies are actually not things that exist. Fantasies actually don't exist. But they do have reference. and so they can be the basis for talking about things. Another thing I... What's your name again? Olivia. Olivia. One of the things that happens in this process sometimes is that if you began to be able to look at things and

[60:29]

not be able to find anything in them, which was the essence, you might... well, you might become frightened because, again, you might think that there's nothing, was that there's nothing at all. That's one of the first problems. Another problem, another way to put... I'll just stop there. Disappointment? Disappointment? No, I don't think so. It's more like that things appear a certain way and When you don't agree with that appearance, it may temporarily seem as though you can't see the appearance at all, and then you might think there's nothing there.

[61:49]

But the mystery isn't nothing there. The mystery is actually the way things happen is the mystery. The way things are actually happening is the mystery. It's not nothing there. But as you see what isn't there, sometimes you, when you first start doing that, you see it looks like nothing's there. Because what you're used to thinking is something's there is what's there covered by what you're not believing in anymore. So you take away what you usually believe was there and it's like there's nothing there. So that can be quite destabilizing. So when people, again, when people talk about the way they are and then you bring up or they hear teachings that they're not that way, they flip from being, from exaggerating to underestimating.

[62:58]

They switch from I'm really here to I'm not here at all or I really last to I'm annihilated. Disappointment might apply more to when you think things are permanent or reliable, and you start to see that they're not, then I think disappointment will more apply at that level of the teaching. I was first thinking of it in context through your grandson. Mm-hmm. So I... I do meditate, I do that meditation with him, I actually do, and it works fairly well to just remember he's... It works fairly well to remember he's not worthy of confidence and that he's not making himself happen.

[64:02]

He's not by his own power making his activities, and he's not creating himself. And what he is is not creating itself. Those teachings work quite well. And if I thought, you know, I don't know what, that my grandson was what I imagined him to be, that that's what he was, and that that was reliable, and that was something that could make itself continue, then I think I might be disappointed or discouraged about him. And of course, I'm not saying I would never slip into that, but when I'm discouraged about him, it's coming from previously expecting that he would be some, you know, some, what do you call it, self-powered event. So if I looked at him that, and probably I do look at him in that way a little bit, so then I will be discouraged about him.

[65:10]

I will be disenchanted. I will be disaffected, you know. Well, then I don't like him anymore. He's going to be that way. When we let that go then we are less disappointed and probably more present. Well, let's see, when you accept your disappointment and you like feel the disappointment and feel the discouragement and then say, yeah, that's the way to feel about these things, in terms of the way they appear to me. I'm discouraged that they're going to be the way I expect, the way I imagine them to be. I'm discouraged about that. I'm disaffected in them being the way I imagine them to be. I'm disenchanted with the way I imagine them to be. It's not so much then I become encouraged about them being the way that I imagined them to be, or I'm not discouraged anymore about them imagining.

[66:20]

I continue to be discouraged and disenchanted about my imagination about them. But somehow this thing starts to develop called a good relationship. and good behavior. Skillful behavior starts to emerge in the face of still you got these glasses on that are projecting things on the person that aren't that way. And so still, vis-a-vis that confusion of him being what I imagined him to be, There continues to be a constant process, actually, a continual process of disaffection, of disenchantment, and disattachment. And the relationship thrives under that auspices, which doesn't sound very nice. But that seems to be what's necessary. disenchantment is not necessarily by itself.

[67:23]

That part of it is not pleasant. The pleasant part is the behavior that emerges from the disenchantment. Yes? You just described the process of forgiveness. Isn't that exactly what we would truly forgive? I suppose. Tell me about it. Well, it seems to be a pretty clear description because The disenchantment is still there. The hurt is still there. All of that is still there. But she moved to a new behavior that is one based on love or something that seems to... There may have been love there at the beginning, you know, but it was confused or it was... undermined by the belief that the person was what you imagined them to be. And then, of course, the mysterious nature of them keeps like, you know, not going along with your imagination.

[68:31]

And then you can have imagination about how they're not going along with that and so on. But anyway, the teaching will, you know, help you Develop the just the right amount of involvement with this person Now they they want you to tape actually and they actually do want you They even though they're just as deluded as you are. They still do want you to Have to behave in an appropriate way towards them. They actually do want that and do like that mostly They do appreciate it when you don't care too much or too little. On some level they do. On some other level they may want you to misbehave, to care too much. And sometimes they want you to care too little.

[69:34]

Yeah, right. That sounds familiar. Sometimes they want you to care too little because then they can do certain things. And they want you to care too much other times so that you can do certain things. And so we can actually learn how to manipulate other people who are caring too much and too little about us once we see that, which is kind of, you know... But we really don't want that. We want people to relate to us appropriately when we hear this teaching, and we also want to. So this is the ground, this is the basic meditation to get into the middle way. It's a teaching about the mysterious quality of every event. Yes, Diego.

[70:39]

Experientially, I have difficulty making the connection between, although we've been talking about letting to tell the difference between the fantasy aspect of the nature of things and, well, the The fantasy that we overlay on the way things really are. The difference between the fantasy and what? And the mystery in the way they... You can't really... I don't think you can really tell the difference between the two for the time being. Or not fall for the fantasy. The difference is between things appearing this way and believing them. Those are two different things, and you can see those two. But you can't actually see the way things are because there is this projection of fantasy on things. If you take away the projection, you don't see anything.

[71:44]

But it's not that there's nothing there. It's just that the only way you can see them is by overlaying them with something so you can get a hold of them. And that's why we don't like to take the layer off because that's like seeing nothing, in a way. It's not really seeing nothing, you're actually seeing the way things are actually happening, but it looks like either nothing or almost blinding radiance. So essentially I kind of got sidetracked with what I was saying, but I had difficulty making the connection between that, understanding that and the end of suffering or freedom from suffering, how those two relate. And I'm thinking now that maybe the part about the end of suffering kind of takes care of itself as you become more grounded in this practice of just studying

[72:53]

how you project your fantasy on things and that in seeing how that's not really an attribute of things? It is an attribute of things in the sense the way things are for you, a character of them is that they have this imaginary quality, okay? But another character they have is that this quality is not actually found in them. It's more overlaid. But they do have this overlay. That's part of the deal. So you learn that, and you learn about what's being overlaid, but you can't see it because the only way you can see it or know it is through taking it for what's overlaid. You learn that too. But you do eventually find that actually this overlay is not in what's happening.

[74:01]

And as you start to see that, that is what, you know, frees the mind of affliction, of suffering. Suffering itself is an overlay. Suffering itself is an overlay. Suffering has a... Has its own nothingness, or not nothingness... Suffering has a mysterious quality, a fantasy quality, and a nothing quality. Has none of that fantasy in it quality. And so you can meditate on suffering, actually, itself. and see the lack of the imagination in the suffering while you're looking at the suffering and become free of suffering, while you're looking at suffering. And actually, in traditional Buddhist meditation, that is often the topic that's being looked at at the time of the first insight into the lack of, you know, of the essence of things.

[75:06]

Because you're looking right at the thing which is caused by a lack of realization of that. And then you expand it out from there. right so maybe you want to like next time get more into the end of suffering business but in the meantime the basic practice is practice you do all the time is a meditation on the mystery that's the practice you do all the time because the overlays on the mystery and the nothing pertains to the mystery There's nothing about our imagination in the mystery. That's just an overlay. So the mystery is the central meditation, the way things depend on things other than themselves and therefore are impermanent, the way that they're impermanent, the way they don't, you know, the way they don't, you know, that they can't rely on them. even though it looks like you can, that meditation is the basic one of the other two teachings, one of which is the confusion of one of them with this is the cause of suffering, and realizing that there's no confusion is the object of freeing us from suffering.

[76:22]

Yes? I just want to make sure. I'm a little confused at this point. It seems that You're saying that the possibility to know things the way they are, to see things the way they are, that's not a possibility. So I'm wondering, does the possibility exist to know things? Well, you can actually know them the way that, in a sense, you can know them the way that they are such that you will be liberated from suffering. That things, everything has the way, one of the ways things, the way things ultimately are, you can know. You can know that. And when you see how this... You can see the way they ultimately are. So, the way things are happening, everything that happens, everything that happens happens in dependence on things other than itself. That's the way things happen. Everything that exists exists in dependence on things other than themselves. That's the way everything that exists exists.

[77:26]

Okay? You can't see that. That's a mystery. But that's not the way things ultimately are. The way things ultimately are is that there's nothing about what we imagine that they are in the way that they are. The way things are ultimately happening is that there's nothing of our imagination about them in them. That's the ultimate way they are. And when you see that ultimate way, you're no longer fooled by this imaginary way. So the ultimate way is the way that they ultimately are beyond our imagination, but also they are. Something's happening, so the way that they're happening is that our imagination doesn't touch them. I was just confused. But you still can't... You're confused about... No, I was confused about you saying I couldn't see things the way they really are, but you're saying now you can see... You can't see the way things exist.

[78:34]

You can't see the way they're happening except by confusing them with some idea about them. But you can see the way they ultimately are because the way they ultimately are means the way that they are such that you will become free. This ultimate is ultimate in terms of... But the point of this meditation is to set us free from suffering. And that way they are is the absence of our imagination in them. And they're always that way. We just have to learn to find that, which is the middle way. The middle way is they're not not there. But they're totally not there the way we imagine they are. But the way we imagine they are is always part of the deal because the way they ultimately are is the absence of the way they imagine they are. So you can't find the ultimate truth aside from your imagination. I just, maybe I told you this, this is getting late, but I read this thing about this literary critic, Harold Bloom, and he or somebody pointed out that the early, I don't know if they're early, but some of the romantic poets like Wordsworth, they thought that if you could become one with nature,

[80:05]

that that would be salvation from suffering. But then other of the poets, like Shelley and Blake, they thought that salvation came by liberating the imagination from nature. So they weren't concerned with nature. They just wanted to somehow get the imagination free of nature. And then they thought that would be freedom. And I thought, that's very close to Buddhism, except in Buddhism we aren't trying to get the imagination free of nature, we're trying to find nature free of the imagination. We're trying to find out what's happening, our nature, in which imagination is like, imagination is free, like bye-bye, imagination is not there. So it's the other side of the coin, that when you find how your imagination never really reaches what's happening, Now, here's your imagination, and you know your imagination, and your imagination is not in there. When you see that, that's salvation.

[81:07]

But you have to have the imagination there, and you have to have something happening to find the nothing of the imagination in what's happening. And you can't actually see what's happening. That's always a mystery. And it's the basis for everything that happens in our life, but most things that happen in our life will continually be mixed with what's happening in imagination, which is fine as long as you also know that they really aren't mixed. So I often tell the story, the Woody Allen story, you know? The guy goes to see a psychiatrist, you know that one? How many people know that story? You know it. How many times you heard that story? Three times. Three? That's not bad. But I don't remember it. You don't remember it? Hey, that's my salvation. My salvation is people don't remember these things. It's not, I'm not frustrated.

[82:11]

I'm not impatient. So he goes to his psychiatrist and he says, doctor, my brother thinks he's a chicken. The psychiatrist says, well, why don't you tell him he's not? He said, I need the eggs. Thank you.

[82:27]

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