I was going to talk about non-enlightening relationships today. Relationships that are more conducive to bondage and attachment and ignorance. Before we talk about relationships that are supportive of awakening and liberation. Hi, Mark. Thanks for your sweet note. Can you hear me? Can you hear me now? Can you hear me now? No, you can't hear me? Well, we're learning that the Pustits are suitable for not giving talks. So one kind of relationship that I think

[01:30]

is conducive to attachment, actually funny, is a relationship where two people feel independent of each other. That attitude, I'm independent from you, that actually is a kind of attitude that actually promotes attachment. And it's not enlightening for two people to get together, each of them thinking that they're independent of each other. That's one type. Another type would be where one person feels some dependence on the other person. So one person is feeling dependent on the other, but the other is not feeling dependent on the former.

[02:35]

Or another version would be one person is devoted to the other one. One person is devoted to somebody. Like, I'm devoted to you, but you're not devoted to me. That's a relationship I would propose promotes attachment. and maintain ignorance, create attachment, maintains attachment, supports ignorance, and what else? That kind of stuff. Yeah. Supports ignorance and attachment. Relationships that are non-reciprocal, where the parties are not appreciating the reciprocity of the relationship. Those are the kind of relationships that nicely promote attachment and ignorance.

[03:54]

Or another way to put it is non-reciprocity in terms of devotion and non-reciprocity in terms of information sharing. Now, when I say that, I think, well, what about the two people that are independent of each other? Aren't they sort of reciprocal? But two independent people can't be very reciprocal without noticing that they're not independent. Have to be awfully, awfully stupid to think that. But it's easier to think you're independent if you don't notice that there's some reciprocity in the independence. So in order to be independent, you have to really notice no reciprocity and also no exchange. even an unreciprocal exchange.

[05:07]

That's super-ignorance. So in terms of ignorance, two people that feel independent are... That's the most ignorant situation. Slightly more enlightened is where one of the people feels dependent on the other or feels the other is dependent on her, but the other one doesn't notice that. That's slightly more awake and slightly less, actually, less conducive to attachment, even though it looks like there's more. You take two people. One says to the other one, I'm independent of you. I don't care about you. I'm not devoted to you at all. I don't even dislike you. I mean, you're like nothing to me. The other one says, same here. I say, strangely enough, I would say that's more conducive to ignorance and attachment, more conducive to ignorance and attachment than in what most of our relationships are like, which is that one person is more devoted to the other, where one person feels attached to the other to a certain amount, and the other one doesn't feel as attached or devoted back.

[06:26]

that's more awake and less conducive to attachment than the independent stance, than the mutually independent stance. It's more ignorant. It's less ignorant for one of the people in the relationship to feel some dependence. It's less ignorant for one of the people in the relationship to feel some attachment. In a relationship where the two people feel no attachment and no reciprocity and feel independent, that's the maximum ignorance. Two people that are independent of each other are very attached to each other, especially two people that are at war with each other. They're extremely deluded, extremely attached, and they're not devoted to each other, but they're actually very much attached, very much promoting ignorance, very much stuck together.

[07:29]

Where one of the people notices that they're stuck together and doesn't feel independent, the level of awareness has gone up a little bit. Where one of the people cares about the other one, the level of awareness has gone up a little bit. And that devotion or caring about the other person is enlightening. The imbalance is not enlightening. And the tolerance of the imbalance without talking about it is not enlightening. So what we call codependent relationships are this middle kind. I think codependent relationships are better than relationships where people feel independent. And of course, I guess a relationship where two people feel independent is an oxymoron, right? But in fact, a lot of people, that's the kind of relationship they have, is oxymoron relationships.

[08:32]

They're in relationships that they don't recognize as relationships. So you might have understood what I just said, but then again, you might not have. Any questions about that? Yes? How is it more ignorant to feel you're independent of someone? Well, first of all, to think you're independent of someone is ignorance itself. So let's say you and I think we're independent of each other. We're just flat out ignorant. The fact that we continue to think we're independent promotes our attachment in the sense that we keep thinking, we keep ignoring the fact that we're connected. So we're actually attached to, we're in a form of attachment and bondage to that vision.

[09:34]

And that is the most powerful form of bondage is the idea of independence. So not only do I feel independent, but I found somebody else who mirrors it. So then we've got double delusion now. and doubly stuck in this narrow view of isolation, independence, and personal power. Now, if I would start becoming caring about you and feeling some dependence on you, even feeling dependence on you to the extent that I feel I need to be devoted to you, but you don't recognize me, and you don't recognize that you're dependent on me and I let you get by with that without saying, wait a minute, how could that be that I feel dependent on you and I'm devoted to you and you're not connected to me and you don't care about me? How could that possibly happen? And just not say that. That's still pretty ignorant, but it's starting to open things up because, in fact, that doesn't make sense that I would be devoted to you and you wouldn't be devoted to me.

[10:43]

And it doesn't make sense, actually, that I wouldn't want you to be devoted back to me. And it doesn't make sense to me that I wouldn't want you to acknowledge my devotion to you. I do, I would. If you don't care about somebody and don't give them anything, maybe you don't... then you're not so likely to expect them to acknowledge that you're not giving anything to them. Right? Like, there's all these people that you don't really give a lot to in the world. You know those people? that you don't think you're really generous with, you don't expect them to come up to you and say thank you. And you don't even expect them to come up to you and say, how come you're not giving anything to me? But less likely do you expect them to, you know, to thank you than do you expect them to get angry at you. Right? But if you're devoted to somebody, you kind of expect them to say thank you. You're not devoted so they will say thank you to you. You're not devoted to them so they will say thank you to you.

[11:46]

That's not why you're devoted. That's not devotion. Devotion is you're devoted to them because that seems like where it's at. That's just the way you feel. But you're not doing it to get them to say thank you, and yet you feel like something is wrong if they don't. Because you understand because you're devoted to them, you understand they need to say that to you. Eventually, that happens. And if you don't mention it, then that's the ignorance. And you're also not telling the truth, because you have something to say. So you're giving certain kind of information, but not all the information. And they're giving you basically nothing back. And you let them. And this is not. This is not. You're devoted, but not being devoted enough. You're devoted, but you're also... It's possible to be devoted to somebody quite a bit and still allow this deceit to go on. You understand that you need the person.

[12:51]

You understand you care about the person, but you're not admitting to yourself that you need them to care about you. And you need them to acknowledge that they care about you. But still, it's more enlightened because you know that there's some attachment You know that. You know there's some dependence. There is dependence between us. It's such a thorough dependence that we call it interdependence. That really we do need each other because we are each other. And some of us know that and demonstrate it by treating others as though they were ourselves. You know? We're as generous with other people as we are with ourselves, even more generous with others than we are with ourselves. Even though some people are that way, they don't require the other person reciprocate, even though they know that is really, that would be appropriate, and they would be happy if the person did.

[14:03]

So these are the two kinds of relationships that maintain ignorance. They don't make ignorance, but they maintain it and create attachment out of it. And that's one basic paradigm here. Yeah? Was there a hand there? Yeah? This would be, well, this would be, to make it simpler, I would say it is, I'm talking about adult relationships. So the relationships between parent and child maybe would be exception to this. So a relationship between lovers, spouses, friends, student-teacher. Friends, yeah. That would apply there.

[15:15]

But if the other person is not yet grown up enough to take responsibility, it may not be unhealthy to not require them to become aware of their need for you. But if I think about it, in some ways, children, it might be actually in a child-parent relationship or a child-adult relationship, there too, it might be also following this, even though they are not yet ready to be responsible. Maybe they can learn to express and understand their dependence on the other. So maybe it applies to all. But I'm tentatively excusing, perhaps excusing children from this. But now that I talk about it, I'm not so sure anymore.

[16:17]

Yes? Yes? You said, when does the object of love? Objective love. What do you mean by objective love? Me and you. I'm an object. I'm an object to you, maybe? No. Okay. Maybe. Would you want to pick somebody else's object? Maybe Rose? There is no love for everything. Non-objective love is to love everything around us.

[17:25]

Oh, non-objective love is to love everything. Yes. Okay. So non-objective love is to love everything. Yes. So objective love is to love something in particular. Yes. Okay. So I would call that, I would be careful calling that love. I would call that more something else, maybe like greed. Lust or attachment, something like that, when it's towards an object. I think what you call non-objective love, I would call love. So like, for example, if a mother maybe has this child here, and its mother has non, according to your language, the mother has non-objective love towards this child. In other words, this child, the object, the child keeps changing. One day it's this kind of child, the next minute it's that kind of child, and that keeps changing. So she loves all these children, right?

[18:28]

Not just this healthy child, not just this nice child, not just this bad child, good child. She loves all these child. That's love. To love a child when it's being well behaved means you'll hate the child when it's not being well-behaved. I mean, when you love the child because it's well-behaved, you love the object called well-behaved child, then, of course, when the child changes into not well-behaved child, you're susceptible to hating that child. Right? So, to me, I would call what you call non-objective love, love, and what you call objective love, attachment. That's the language I would suggest. And I just explained how it changes from love to hate, right? Because it's object-bound. It has that kind of attachment. Now, if you have that kind of attachment and you're aware of it, okay, you're aware of that and you're in dialogue with this being around that mutual attachment, then the relationship can evolve to understanding of interdependence of your mutual attachments and then you don't get angry at them when they change into, you know, a monster or whatever, you know, relatively speaking.

[19:41]

You don't get angry at them then then you interdependently move with them to them becoming a monster. That make sense? Pretty good, huh? English, English. You understand English. Yes? Yes. A comment about children. I'm wondering about children. I think to me that children generally are part of where But they're dependent. Yeah, and I think that's good when they are. And when they're not, then I think their relationship's not so healthy. Yeah, or a normal child who's in denial about their dependency on their parents. And sometimes, you know, someone that you've been getting along with quite well, like sometimes there's a certain phase of parent-child relationship where the child is an adult and the parent's an adult, but the parent's still, you know, able to take care of themselves.

[20:57]

And sometimes the parent moves into a phase of life where they are more dependent, where their dependency becomes more vivid to them. A lot of parents in the middle, a lot of parents are not aware that they're dependent on their child. not aware of that which is unhealthy which which is you know again conducive of attachment when the parent is not aware that they're attached to their children then that's conducive to more attachment and ignorance okay that makes sense when the when the parent is aware that they're attached to their children That awareness is moving towards awakening and moving towards liberation from attachment. But some parents grow up with their children and get old and they aren't aware that they're attached to their children and also not aware that they're dependent on their children.

[21:57]

So when they get older and their dependence becomes more vivid or literal, or the children are not changing their parents' diapers, a lot of parents can't stand to become aware of that. And then they pretend even more strongly that they're not dependent on their children. And things get really weird then. Before, they were in ignorance. They were mildly denying their dependence. And later, they get into heavier and heavier denial because it gets more and more strongly. They're knocking on the door. You're not independent of your children. You depend on your children. You knock it louder and louder if the children are around and helping. So again, the devotion on one side, of course, demonstrates the dependence. The devotion is conducive to the other side having harder and harder time denying that there's dependence.

[23:03]

The devotion to the person is conducive to liberation and awakening. But, you know, part of the devotion also is to reveal that you need the other person to note and admit that they're dependent on you. I'm dependent on you. I need you to depend on me. That's part of what devotion would offer. So full devotion is not only do I do these things to help you, but one of the things I do to help you is I say I require information coming back the other way. I require you to let me know that you understand you're dependent on me because I understand I'm dependent on you. And it's good to start that as soon as possible, this kind of thing. So I'm putting on the negative side today. rather than moving over to the positive side of how to do this. If you don't do this thing, this goes downhill and the relationship goes downhill. So that's why in some cases that people get closer to their parents in some ways when they get older and put more and more energy into them.

[24:10]

If the parents can't accept this gift, the relationship can go down. The more devoted you are and the more they resist it, the more vividly it seems to be unhealthy. But sometimes they can turn around and wake up to something they've never noticed before, namely that the parents have been dependent on the child from birth. Parents are dependent on children from birth. And some parents know that, and that's kind of like really great. If you know from birth that you're dependent on your children. Yeah. Right. Right. And some children are terrified of their parents being dependent upon them. Did you hear that? And most children, a lot of children think their parents are dependent on them, and they go to extreme lengths to, like, take care of their parents. Right? All this, and almost never mention that they think their parents are dependent on them.

[25:12]

I mean, I should say almost never, but a lot of times they're doing all this stuff for us, and we don't even know it, and they hardly are aware of it. They're taking care of it, right? And that's why a lot of children feel guilty when their parents, when their mother and father, if their mother and father are married, and their mother and father split up, children feel bad because they think they're supposed to be taking care of their parents. They don't say, I'm holding your marriage together, but they kind of think that sometimes. So it's... Well, you could be dependent on me without attaching to me. I could give you some things that you need. And again, strangely enough, sometimes the more you're aware of how you're dependent on someone,

[26:20]

then less likely you'll be attached. Now, when you're dependent on someone and you start to be aware that you're dependent on them, you might think that then your attachment might seem to increase, but I don't think so. Maybe so at the beginning, but I think actually that when you become aware that you're dependent on someone, you also might become aware that there's some attachment. So it's possible that you would be giving me something I would understand that I'm dependent on you and I wouldn't be attached to what you're giving me or detached on the kindness that you're offering me. That's possible. Especially when I understand that it really is a gift. Now, if I do become aware that I'm dependent on you and I also notice I'm attached, the more I face my dependence and my attachment, the closer I get to understanding that it's not really possible to attach to the dependents.

[27:22]

The only reason why you attach to someone you're dependent upon or something that you depend upon is because you don't understand the interdependence of the situation. You don't understand that you couldn't be dependent on the other person unless they were dependent on you. Therefore, you don't have to be afraid of the situation changing. Would you follow that? Yes? Your attachment is the desire to hold onto the conduit which you depend on. But if you pay attention to the dependent, you'll notice that there's an interdependent. When you notice there's an interdependent, you don't have to hold onto it anymore. You don't fear the loss. You're involved in a world that is held up not by the other person or you or both of you even. It's held up by the nature of relationship. And you understand that you always are dependent on everything and you never lose it.

[28:35]

And things don't lose you either. But if you see dependence, that's the beginning of where you can meditate. If you look at the dependence... and you face the dependence and you face everything you feel around that dependence, including attachment, including anxiety, you face that all, open your eyes to that, you'll see that it's not just dependence, it is interdependence. When you see interdependence, you don't grasp the things you depend on anymore because you start to see you can't grasp the things you depend upon because they're coming from too many directions. You don't have enough hands to grasp at or to give. And you don't have enough words to express your gratitude. So you shift. But for now, if you notice dependence, you can start there. If you notice dependence, if you feel you're dependent, you can start there. And if you feel someone else is dependent on you, you can start there. And some people, of course, are attached to certain other people being dependent on them.

[29:41]

Right? So some people are attached to their dependence on someone else. They're also dependent on someone dependent on them. So for example, the parent is often very much attached to the child dependent on them. This would be, if they would pay attention to their attachment to the child being dependent on them, that would open their eyes to the fact that they're dependent on the child. If you notice someone else's attachment to you, then you also note, in the relative awareness of it, exploring that will also open your eyes to the world where you're dependent on them. Interdependence is built on dependence. Dependence is the first thing. So interdependence is just dependence, the full story of dependence.

[30:43]

It's the way dependence works in all different directions simultaneously. Everything depends on another thing. Nothing exists except by depending on another thing. That's the basic thing. Next thing is nothing exists without depending on that thing. So you don't exist without dependence on everything, but also everything depends on you. But usually we have to start by understanding how we depend on everybody else. That's the first step usually. First you have to understand how everything is giving you life. Then you can understand, yes? Yes. And relationships that are conducive to attachment, that create attachment and support attachment and support ignorance, are relationships where people don't notice dependence and don't notice attachment. So So, you know, you've got some stuff to work with.

[31:50]

I mean, do you have some relationships where you don't notice dependence? I mean, aren't there quite a few people that you know that you don't feel dependent on? Well, everybody you don't feel dependent on is an example of you're going to feel a chunk of ignorance when you look at it. All these people you think, I don't need that person. I can get along without her. That's ignorance. You can't get along without anybody. So that's like All those relationships you can work on. Then the other ones, whenever you do feel some attachment or some independence, then you can work on that. Now, if you already feel attachment to the person, and you feel they're attached to you, and you've told them that you're attached to them, and they've told them they're attached to you, when that's all out in the open, then things are fairly interdependent. That's a relationship that is conducive to awakening non-attachment. Just a second.

[32:52]

Yes, Gabe. I was wondering how aversion fits into the scheme. How aversion fits into the scheme? Aversion is one of the responses you have to things when you don't understand interdependence. And attachments. or greed is another response you have to things when you don't understand, or independence. And the other response is basically confusion, just, you know, confusion. And anxiety is ongoing throughout. Anxiety is ongoing, and then in terms of, we've got anxiety, right, anxiety, and because of ignorance, because of not facing interdependence, then something's wrong. Anxiety, something's wrong. And I'm going to do something about it. I'm going to get away from something or hold on to something or just, you know, just be confused. And confusion can translate into, you know, dreaming, being dull, you know, getting excited, doubting, worrying, that kind of stuff, as a distraction from just flat-out confusion.

[34:02]

Does that make sense? So Fred, what did you want me to repeat something, Fred? You said something about when you get more interdependent. Yeah. When you become more aware of interdependence, you can't get any more interdependent. If you're right now, you're maximally interdependent right now. But when you become more aware of it? Yeah, yeah. And then a pattern. Oh, I don't remember what I said. Does anybody remember what I said? Oh, that, yeah, that thing, yeah. When, if you feel dependent on me, for example, do you? Do you feel dependent on me? You do? And when I feel dependent on you, you what? You don't know, right? I better. You won't have anybody to talk to.

[35:09]

It'll be just empty room. I depended on you, Fred. Now you know that I depend on you, and I know that you depend on me. So before that, we were just depending on each other. And we knew it. We didn't tell each other. Now we told each other. OK? Now where do we go from here? Huh? Yeah, we share. And we share partly because we're dependent on each other. We both know it. So you've got to be careful now because, you know, everything I do has an effect on me because you depend on me. And also everything you do has an effect on me, so you've got to be careful too. And I've got to tell you in case you forget. And you've got to tell me in case I forget. Right? Right. So after we get this thing down, then all kinds of other things fall, like a lot of communication. If we feel like the other one's not holding up his end of the deal, as it starts to happen, we start to become interdependent.

[36:14]

Where in a sense, both of us living alike now, we can't move without awareness of the other person. What a mess, right? But that's what it's like when you're awake. You can't move without dragging everybody with you. And you can't move without everybody helping you. That's like we're accountable. Right. We're accountable, right. And so if you're willing to be accountable to me, you need me to be accountable to you. Now, the accountability isn't necessarily the identical type of accountability. Like, the way the parent is accountable to the child is not necessarily the way the child is accountable to the parent. And also the way the parent is accountable to the co-parent is not the way the parent is accountable to the child. There's certain things you tell a peer in terms of maturity that you don't tell a child. And there's certain things a child tells a child that doesn't tell an adult.

[37:17]

But there's a level, there's a place where there is reciprocity and where there's mutual accountability. There's times when you sit down with your children and you talk to them at a level that's appropriate to them and that they can understand and where they can come back and meet you there. And that's natural for an interdependent relationship. But there's other realms that you don't share with your children or with any children. But in the realm that's appropriate between you on that realm where the dependence occurs, On that realm, it's reciprocal, and it's mutually accountable. The mother's breast and the baby's mouth, there's a mutual accountability there on that level. The mother has to take care of her thing in a way that the baby understands, and the baby has to take care of his thing in a way that the mother understands. They have to work that out, and they usually do pretty well, actually.

[38:19]

But then at certain other levels of development, things start breaking down. When we start talking, it gets harder and harder. Yeah? You went from talking about your relationship with Fred at the moment to the parent-child relationship. Could you go from your relationship at that moment to the... in a teacher relationship? Yeah. Student-teacher. Teachers need students. Or teacher needs a student. Student needs a teacher. Okay? The student needs to know that the teacher needs the student. The teacher needs to know that the student needs the teacher. Teacher does... Well, the teacher hopefully does know... that she needs the student. The teacher hopefully does know that the student needs the teacher. But the teacher does not necessarily know yet if the student knows that the student needs the teacher.

[39:25]

And the student doesn't necessarily know, even though the teacher knows, that she's dependent on the student, the student doesn't necessarily know that the teacher is dependent on the student. The student needs to know that. And the teacher needs to know that the student knows that and the student needs to know that the teacher knows that he's dependent on her. She needs to know that. She needs to know that the teacher is dependent on her, and she needs to know that the teacher knows that he's dependent on her. That's part of what's necessary for them to have an interdependent relationship. Now, what the teacher needs from the student, what the student needs from the teacher are slightly different, but the awareness of dependency should be, you know, what do you call it, the compression level should be the same in both directions in terms of understanding the relationship. It doesn't work

[40:27]

It's not going to work for the teacher, for the student, not to know as much about the relationship as he or she does. It's not going to work. The teacher needs the student to understand the relationship, understand the dependence, which means mutually understand the dependence, which means understand interdependence, which means realizing it in the relationship, even though there's a generational disparity. That's a difference. How wouldn't there be? Well, in terms of the teaching, there's a generational. The teacher-student relationship is similar to parent-child in the sense that there's a kind of spiritual reproduction, that the teacher has offspring. And Buddhism is reproductive when it's really working.

[41:33]

It's not just that two people are talking. There's actually a reproductive process in terms of generations of living beings who teach the thing. So there's a student-teacher relationship. As a result of that student-teacher relationship, a new teacher is born. But it's the next generation of teachers. So there's generational difference in terms of responsibility for the teaching. That's the difference. Students don't always outlive the teachers, but some of them should. Some teachers outlive students, and then when all their students die, they have to get a whole new crop, which is kind of a problem, because they might not be able to talk anymore. There are examples in our lineage of a teacher who had a disciple, and the disciple died before him, and he only had one disciple. So our lineage almost died out because one of our masters in our lineage had one disciple who died before him.

[42:36]

So he had to scurry around in old age to try to find another disciple, and he barely got it. And the interesting thing is the disciple he got was already a master in another tradition. So after he became a disciple in two traditions, that teacher found a disciple, and then he excerpted himself from our lineage because he wanted to carry this other lineage so he doesn't appear in our lineage. Very interesting moment in the history of Soto Zen. And Shakyamuni Buddha also had two great disciples who died before him, Shariputra and Madgalana. They both died before their master. But he had a lot of other disciples, so it was OK. And a lot of their disciples were students of those disciples. Yes? . Is there a disparity there?

[43:48]

Yeah, that seems to be a disparity. But each student, I mean, in each relationship, if the relationship's there, if the teacher doesn't depend on the student, then nothing can happen. So if a teacher's got several disciples, and then some new disciple comes, I would say that person cannot be the teacher's disciple if the teacher doesn't need that student. In other words, if it isn't a big issue for your teacher whether you get your truth together, then that wouldn't be a good teacher for you. You need a teacher who needs you to need the teaching. And that teacher needs you to need the teaching. You need a teacher who needs you. So some teachers have no students and don't need any students, so that's not a teacher for you. They're great teachers, you know, they got something to teach, but they're no good to you as a student because you can't realize interdependence with them. You've got to find somebody who needs you.

[44:50]

Not personally, but in terms of that kind of relationship. Okay? So it doesn't matter how many students there are, It just matters that your teacher needs you. You need your teacher to need you. And if they've got a bunch of students and they don't need you, then it's not going to work. But if they had no students and they didn't need you, it wouldn't work either. It's a shortcoming of the teacher. And a shortcoming of the student. Huh? Because we're reciprocal. If you don't work it out with, It's mutual. Don't you want it that way? It's not a matter of force. It's not a matter of force. It's a matter of awakening. It's a matter of awakening, not force.

[45:53]

You can wake a teacher up. If you understand... Well, I don't know what you do. But if you understand that you need a teacher to need you, if you understand that, you're kind of awake. If the teacher doesn't get it yet, enlighten him. If you don't want to enlighten him, enlighten somebody else. Then somebody else that needs you that doesn't get it yet, teach somebody else. You're not forcing them. You can't force somebody to wake up. But you can keep offering them the truth you see over and over in many different ways. They'll get it eventually. But if they don't, it's probably because you weren't patient enough. Some of these teachers, you know, they go over this material quite a few times. I mean, like they go over it again and [...] again, hundreds or thousands of times they go over it until the student gets it. The student also has to come there and go over it 100,000 times too. So it's mutually, a lot of energy has to come sometimes. Some people are not so, so it takes a long.

[46:56]

But if you find somebody and they don't get the picture and you need them to get the picture, then you have to work to help them get the picture. And it could be somebody who has some students already or it could be someone who has no students. You get to decide where you want to work. Now if you find somebody who already does need you, then you don't have to work very hard. Right? But if you find somebody you need, if you find somebody who knows they need you and you don't get it, then where do you go with that? Well, you walk away from that problem. Unless they say something like, David, David, aren't you overlooking something? Haven't you noticed that I need you? How can you leave me? And you say, what are you talking about? And so on. But some teachers don't know they need you, and you don't know them, so when you walk away, they won't say anything. Or some teachers know that you need them, you don't know you need them, you walk away, and they let you go away, but they're keeping their eye on you anyway, waiting for the right moment to let you know that they need you.

[48:04]

And maybe even to let you know that you need them. Maybe they can see that. That make sense? And that person might or might not have any other students. That's not the issue. It's between you and that person. Yes? . Yeah, right. He has a limited reservoir of interactional ability. Well, you start there. You recognize that you feel a limited reservoir of interaction. That's what you look at. Like I was saying before, you feel, maybe you feel some dependency with one person. Right? You start there. So if you have some, whatever interactional realm you're aware of now, you work there. But you can also have your eye open to the possibility that every person that you don't feel up to interacting with, and every person you don't feel devoted to, you could just listen to the words, that that's a little chunk of ignorance on your part.

[49:18]

You don't have to burden yourself with that, but just realize there's something, I'm not understanding something about the Buddha's teaching. And I'm saying the Buddha's teaching is many things, but one of the things the Buddha's teaching is about is it's about the practice of a Buddha. Part of what Buddha's teaching is about the practice of a Buddha. The practice of a Buddha is that every person that we know is a person that we practice with, that we interact with about the most important thing. And every person that we don't feel that way about is a little message to us that we don't see the Buddha's teaching in that case. The Buddha's teaching would be that every person you meet is your friend, your good friend in the Buddha's practice. It's not necessarily your good bridge partner, but it's your good friend in Buddhism. In Buddhist practice, it's a good friend.

[50:21]

So if I don't see that, I say, okay, I accept that in myself. I don't get it yet with this person. I can't quite see how I could be devoted to this person. Okay, I accept that. This is my limitation. So you work with that. You face that. Okay? Don't be hard on yourself. But wherever you do feel you can interact, then look at those relationships, and are they developing a sense of interdependence? If not, then look at the fact that they're not interdependent. If you look at a relationship that's not interdependent and you face it, you'll notice relationships that are not interdependent have certain qualities. Namely, they're unhappy. So you notice, lack of interdependence, unhappiness. Lack of interdependence, unhappiness. You keep facing that little package there. Me, you, not interdependent, miserable, anxious, attached, power, fear, aversion, confusion, drowsiness.

[51:26]

When I was first dating my wife, sometimes she would have something to say to me, something that she wanted me to hear. something really important, and she was bearing down hard on me to listen to it. And in the middle of the day sometimes, I was very drowsy. Very funny, you know? I wasn't perfectly awake until she started talking about certain topics. And then I just hardly keep my eyes open. So anyway... That's where you work. You start where you are, no place else, and you don't begrudge your current level of understanding of inner deployments. You can start with anything, but you have to have something to start with. Right? But don't most people have something? What does it have to do? It's about 4.30.

[52:34]

Anything else? Is it stuffy in here? Do you want to open the doors and get cold? Can we have a little air? I think some people seem to be fainting in the back there. Can that door be open over there? Anything else that you want to bring up today? Yeah. What? So the first thing that comes to my mind is, as a person, I need to go into the shop and look for the goods.

[53:51]

Look for the goods. But I'm devoted to this job. I need to do this. That's what I say. If I say I'm devoted to you, but you don't understand that I really am, then you need to tell me that you don't understand that I am. And then maybe you say, do you want to ask me what you could do to show me that you're devoted? And I might say, no. And you say, well, where are we going to go from here? I need to understand that you understand what I mean by devoted. And I need to understand that you really are. I don't get it yet. If they're willing to start talking to you, you can work from there. If they're not willing to talk, then you have a situation where the information thing is not balanced, right?

[55:03]

You're willing to give them information. They're not willing to give you information. So then the information you give them, if you let it go on and just let the difference be there, then it's codependent. You care, but he doesn't enough. And you've got to say, this doesn't work for me. I need this balance. I need you to give me the information I need to understand that you're committed to this on a par with me. And the hard thing is to stay there. It's painful to bring up that truth. Even just to sort of say, well, you know, you're a good person, blah, blah, blah. Maybe it'll work out. Dad drinks, but he's really a good person. We'll probably be all right. Just keep trying to stop. So I think that's what I would do for starters. I think I would tell this person what I need in terms of information in order to understand that his devotion is comparable to mine.

[56:11]

I don't think it could be more than mine, but I need to have more information, which is, if he gives it, that's another example of devotion, in order to feel comfortable. And I need the courage to tell him that if I'm not quite getting that information, I could tell them. And that's a tricky thing to do, right? Yeah. But realizing interdependence is very complex. That's why we have to train also at patience, generosity, that we train conscientiousness, be very careful, be very mindful, and be patient and enthusiastic. You can't be lazy. You've got to be concentrated. in order to develop this wisdom with other beings. It takes a lot to make these things work, to make these conversations work smoothly.

[57:15]

And sometimes you make a mistake, and then you learn about mistakes and try again. Yes? I was going to say, the concept of mentorship Yes. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Did you hear what I just said to that man? That's how you do it. You just talk to people, and if you feel like you're not devoted to somebody, you just recognize, okay, that's what I am.

[58:18]

I'm not devoted to somebody. In other words, you say the idea of independence sounds good, okay? You say that? You want to know how to make it real, right? Well, when you meet somebody and you don't care about them, all right, you're not devoted to them, what that is is an example that you don't believe that teaching. You say it sounds good, but you don't believe it. So how are you going to make a teaching that you don't believe come into reality? You can't do that because you don't believe it. Because this person right here, you don't care about him. It's not that I don't believe it. It's that I feel like it's good. That's what it means to not believe it. And you say ground into you, okay? I know it has been ground into you. But guess where they got the idea in the first place? People got this idea of interdependence, of independence. They didn't get this idea because it was ground into them.

[59:20]

It comes up out of the human psyche. If you take somebody... And you don't teach them to have, if you take a human being and you don't teach them to have an idea of self, an identity, they probably won't, they'll either be a person who needs to be institutionalized or they will fail to flourish. It is necessary for a human child to be given the kind of attention which activates our propensity to give rise to a sense of self. It's like that. You don't grind independence into a little baby. All you teach the little baby is that you're wonderful, you're my baby, I love you, and this is yours, and that's his. And that's what we get taught. Then we make up this independence thing from that. It's very much part of us. And then once it's part of us, we grind it into everybody else.

[60:20]

But don't just think it's ground into you. It's deeper than that. The problem's more profound than you're saying. So that's why when we hear a really good teaching, like Buddha's teaching, it sounds great, we can imagine, we can see how everything would work really well, and we can see that the people who understand that are wonderful people, but we have trouble adopting it because basically we don't believe it. And we believe it in our head, we believe it in our imagination, but our body doesn't believe it. So how do you actualize it? By having your body get involved in making it real. How do you do that? By being devoted to people. And noticing that you have limits in your devotion. And then notice that that's a limit in your understanding of belief in this teaching. And face that and face that. And facing it is part of believing it. And as you face it more, you start to believe it more. And gradually, you start acting more and more like you really did believe it. You start acting more and more like you do think other people matter to you.

[61:26]

And more and more people in your circle of people you care about widen. But it happens conversation by conversation. And it happens case by case where you notice that you don't care about somebody and notice that that's an example where you've been convinced to the contrary of Buddhist teaching. You look kind of spaced out. Well could you give me an example of what you're talking about? No, we're not going to write what we're talking about. Okay. You know, I think he'll be scared about being dependent on us. When Pat, like, I fear that I'll be dependent on you.

[62:32]

Yeah. Or that you'll go away, or that you'll want me to put someone up. But if Pat laughs at that happening, my fear is what the fate is going to get for me. Yeah, so where's the idealism in this scenario you just told me about? The idealism is OK. I don't want to believe things that make me feel like I want to . I want to . of awakening, of being aware. Okay. So you're considering, you say believe, but you're considering entertaining a study of awakening and independence, okay? Now, let's say we get to doing that. Okay, now what's the problem? This is good. What's the next step? I do things and behave in ways that maybe I don't necessarily 100% believe.

[63:37]

Like what? Right. Every time I pass somebody, I make them feel like I'm recognizing them and I'm aware of them and I want them to know that they're there and I'm aware of them and I care about them and I appreciate them. All right. So you do that. So I do that. And there's a problem in that? And today I wake up and I don't feel like that, but I do it anyway. Yeah. I don't know. I do that for a year or something. Yeah. So what's the problem in that? And then maybe I wake up one morning and it's like I've been living in a dream world. I don't even know people and I don't care about them. Wait a second now. I don't even know these people, I don't care about them, and they don't care about me." That dream world was there before you came, right? Right. That was before you went to the mountains, you already had that dream world. Right. So you went to the monastery and you could forget that dream world for a little while and then wake up and go back to that dream world?

[64:39]

Right. Yeah. When you're in the monastery, you didn't exactly forget that dream world, you kind of remembered it a little bit, but you started acting in another way for a while. Like, when you walked in, you said, I don't care about these people. These people don't care about me. And you start bowing to them like, I'm going to look like I care about them. And after a year, you say, hey, after a year, I still don't care about them. And they still don't care about me. So my dream really was right. Or was it just that I'd been dreaming straight through and been trying to practice in a way that would wake me up from the dream when I hadn't woke up yet? Because before I came, I kind of thought it was a dream. That's why I dared to live in a way that might wake me up from that dream. And the reason why I'm considering to call it a dream is because I've heard that enlightened people call it a dream.

[65:39]

And that when they woke up from that dream, they were really happy. And not just happy, but they were incredibly compassionate to people who were cruel to them. Not to mention people who were very nice to them. And so maybe this awakening has something to do with being totally compassionate and happy. Because all these stories say so. And the funny thing is that those people that woke up, they just happened to have the same story before they woke up that I have now. It's just that they saw that it was a dream. It's a dream that you don't care about other people. That's a dream. It's a dream that they don't care about you. That's a dream. And again, if you were really happy in that dream, and you were like totally cool in that dream, and you thought everything you did was just exactly what you wanted to do in that dream, you could say, fine, it's a dream, but I like this dream. But it's a dream in which we don't feel good. It's a dream in which we're afraid. Because since we don't care about people and think they don't care about us, when are they going to get up?

[66:42]

When are they going to get that up with us and bump us off? When are they going to burn our house down? When are they going to rob us? When are they going to hate us? Or, when are they going to love us and then leave us? Which is even worse. When are they going to hurt us? That's what we think in the world where we don't care about people. Sometimes we start caring about them even against the policy. And that's really dangerous too. That's the world of the dream. Right? So you're willing to consider, maybe I could wake up from that, like the Buddhists say. So then you start doing the practice that the Buddhists do, which is kind of like, in some sense, go through the motions of acting like you care about people. You know? Like give blood. So you are giving blood. Here I am giving blood. This is like, you know, when am I going to get awakened? How many pints do I have to give before I kind of get the picture? What the practice of giving blood or the practice of bonding with these people, it draws to your attention the dream. Usually you go around, you know, dreaming.

[67:43]

When you do these practices, the dream comes in your face all the time. I'm selfish. [...] I don't believe that I care about it. I don't care about other people. They don't care about me. You face the pain of the dream by doing these practices that are like a Buddha would do. When a person who doesn't believe in their independence acts like a Buddha, they feel uncomfortable. How come they feel uncomfortable? Because they're still holding on to themselves. And if you start noticing that self where you're holding on and you face that, maybe more than one year, maybe more than... It takes a long time to really face the consequences of the dream until you see through it. And the practice in some way is to bring the dream out in front of you. Usually the dream is back here and just pushing us all over the place. What you want to do is bring the dream out front. So the way to bring the dream out front is to do Buddhist practice, which doesn't work with the dream.

[68:49]

You know? The dreams back here, being selfish, it's got its problems, but you didn't commit yourself to practice Buddhism, so nobody's going to call you on that. They say, oh, there's another selfish person. Back up. Get out of his way. But if you say, I'm a Buddhist, and you act selfish, then they're going to say, I thought you wanted to, like, be kind to people. And then it's like, out in front of you, and they're like, I said so, but I really don't want to. You know? Then you see, I'm selfish. I actually don't want to be kind. I want to get my way. You look at that long enough, you say, well, actually, I don't want to get my way. I don't want to be selfish. That's not really what I want. I actually want to be kind and unselfish and happy. We kind of know that. Anyway, if you bring up practical examples, we can handle them one by one, but it'll take 30 years to get through them. Is that enough for today? Yep.

[69:51]

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