I vow to taste the truth of the Tathagata's words. Do you want me to wear that? This morning during meditation, this dear person fainted. And then later he seemed to feel better.

[01:01]

Maybe he's resting now in his room. Do you know? I think he's resting in his room. he's been feeling sick lately, and he was looking forward to this retreat, so he said he felt it was a pity that on the first day he became sick. ... I also feel sorry for him to feel sick today, but this is the retreat, even so, that he's having with me and with you. Also, you said Jana?

[02:03]

Jana? Jana. Jana, who is sitting over there in the corner, gave me a note. And the note said, I'm feeling unwell, a cold, and she's staying in bed, resting today. Hopefully tomorrow she will be able to. Feeling better. I think she gave me this note partly because I ask people to let me know if they're not visible to me during a retreat. If you feel a need to miss a period of meditation, you're not feeling well, or some other reason you have where you don't come to practice here in the room, I request that you give me a note or

[03:12]

or tell Lisa Lott to tell me or tell Bengt, you know, send me a message somehow to let me know where you are. It's partly so that I know where you are and otherwise I wonder where you are because I feel Particularly now that I can see you, I feel responsible to know that you're okay. But it's also an example of a practice that we can do to embody reality. Sometimes when I say this to people, they say, oh, I didn't know you cared if I was there, or I didn't want to bother you.

[04:27]

If you don't want to bother me, then you should go to another universe. On a piece of paper here before me, I wrote some words. And in a way, these words are kind of big words, words about big things. And I wrote these words in a circle around the piece of paper.

[05:29]

And then the middle was empty before. Before this morning, the middle was empty, and I wondered, what do I put in the middle? What goes in the middle? The things around the outside are big things like... Words about the one vehicle. The one vehicle. The one practice of all beings. That's one of the words. One vehicle. Another word is Lotus Sutra of the True Dharma. Another one is becoming Buddha. Another one is learning the Buddha way. Another one is learning yourself.

[06:40]

Another one is forgetting yourself. Another one is dropping off body and mind. Another one is self-receiving and enacting awareness. Another one is truth. Another one is justice. Another one is the sphere of action of an enlightening being, of a bodhisattva. So these are big topics. What do they surround? And this morning I thought to write in the middle, Making Straw Sandals. It occurred to me, Making Straw Sandals. And I wrote that because...

[07:48]

One of the very important ancestors in the Zen tradition is named Dongshan, Chinese Zen master, Chinese disciple of Buddha, who is considered the ancestor of what we call Soto Zen. And he had a teacher, and his teacher was named Yuen Yen. And when I was reading the stories about the student, Tung Shan, and his teacher, Yuen Yen, many of the stories start out by saying, Yun Yan was making straw sandals.

[08:54]

The Zen master was making straw sandals. Straw sandals are usually what the Zen monks were wearing on their feet when they were walking around on the earth. maybe sometimes they wore leather sandals, but anyway, it says that the Zen master was making straw sandals. And when I read that, I thought, oh, maybe they make straw sandals for themselves, but also maybe he makes straw sandals and sells them to make a living. But just recently I thought, he's making straw sandals just as a ceremony to embody the Buddha way.

[10:15]

You could say another story is the Zen teacher lived in a big monastery with thousands of monks and went into the main hall of the monastery where the monks were assembled and gave a talk to the monks. And they had some interaction, maybe. And you say, this is a ceremony that the teacher does with the monks to embody reality on this planet. This is a ceremony that the teacher does to save all living beings. But you could also say, forget the word ceremony and say, this is what the teacher does to teach the truth.

[11:33]

But again, I'm emphasizing that this is like making straw sandals. It's a little thing a human being does And not only is it little, but even the little things, even the little things are empty. Even the little things can't be found. And you might say, oh yeah, the little things are hard to find, the big things are easy to find. Either way, the big things, the little things. The teacher does the big things, the teacher does the little things to show people that all things are empty.

[12:45]

To show people that all things cannot be found. And if people can see that, then they will become free. I vow to save all beings. I vow to save all beings. I vow to save all beings from thinking that there's some being that they can find.

[14:08]

How do I practice to save all beings? I sit with you. I offer incense. I eat breakfast. I brush my teeth. I brush your teeth. How do I save all beings? I learn myself. How do I save all beings? I be me. I be myself. How do you save all beings?

[15:24]

You be yourself. How do you be yourself? You do a ceremony of being yourself. You are yourself right now, of course. I told you that a million times. But you cannot realize that you are yourself unless you do the ceremony of being yourself. One ceremony of being yourself is to sit on a seat on the ground and don't move. Do the ceremony of not moving. Do the ceremony of not moving.

[16:26]

And by doing the ceremony of not moving, you will be able to realize that you're not moving. You're not moving. I'm not moving. You're who you are right now, and you're not moving. And now you've changed. And you're a new person, a new person, a new self, and that person's not moving either. And now that person's gone, and you're a new person. But if you don't do the ceremony of being you, you will not realize this. Where are you going? You didn't do the ceremony of telling me what you're doing. I tried to. Well, you gave me a note. Thank you. It says, I'm doing the ceremony of looking for Samir. Do you know the English word radical?

[18:02]

The etymology of the English word radical is root, like the root of a tree. It means very basic. That's one meaning of it. Etymologically, it means root. The root meaning is root. The root meaning of not all words is root. But the word radical has the root meaning root. And I hope you can stand that you find yourself in a situation where I'm being radical with you. I'm talking about radical practice, root practice, the practice of you being you. And I'm proposing to you that this is who you really are. It's not just that you're who you are but that you practice being who you are and that you understand that if you don't practice who you are, you're still who you are but you will miss it.

[19:05]

And if you miss it, you will miss that you're saving all sentient beings. You are saving all sentient beings already. If you weren't, it would not be possible to save all sentient beings. You're already doing it by being you. You already liberate all beings right now. But you must do this radical thing. I must do this radical thing of being myself every moment, or one moment at a time.

[20:06]

And this is not doing anything. But this is the place where the activity of helping all beings comes from. Me being me is not constructive. I am constructive, but me being me is not constructive. And the ceremony of me being me is constructive. And that's the practice. And again, when you practice the ceremony of being yourself, you will forget yourself.

[21:38]

And when you forget yourself, because you are really practicing being yourself, Everything will realize you. Everything will enlighten you. Everything will understand you. Everything will be a gift to you. And you will be a gift to everything. And you will save all beings in that practice. But I admit to you that when I read the story about the great Zen master's teacher who makes straw sandals, I thought, I was surprised that the teacher of the great Zen master did such humble work of making straw sandals. Please come in.

[22:54]

Thank you, Timo. Does anybody know the room number, some of you? Yeah. I think... It's like a walk-in. Okay. Go in. No, next time. I had some idea that the Great Zen Master's teacher would do something... more Buddha-like than be making straw sandals. Like I think of the Buddha, I think, did the Buddha spend her time making straw sandals? I don't have the story that the Buddha makes straw sandals. I think the Buddha does something more glorious, what do you call it, higher level of, higher skill level than making straw sandals, because ordinary people can make straw sandals, right?

[24:08]

Shouldn't Zen masters do something a little bit more, I don't know what, something more grand, something more amazing? I had that feeling. I still have that feeling lurking somewhere in my mind. That the great teacher of the Buddha Dharma does something more than be herself. But today I'm proposing a radical idea that the great teachers are highly trained at being themselves. That's what they've actually learned to do. And because they are really wholeheartedly practicing being themselves, they are also wholeheartedly forgetting themselves and wholeheartedly saving all beings.

[25:16]

Did I tell you the story about the teacher called Suzuki Shinryu Roshi? Did I tell you the story about him teaching Rev Anderson to count people in Japanese? Did I teach you that story? No. I taught this lady. What do you mean again? I taught Malika the story. Did I teach you the story? Right. So this is a story about I don't want to say my teacher because he's not my teacher. He's your teacher too. His name is Suzuki Shunryu. He came to San Francisco because he wanted to give a gift to America. a good gift. He noticed after the end of the Second World War that Japan was sending lots of junk to America.

[26:29]

Their industry was kind of suffering because of the war. So they didn't have the ability to send really good quality goods. manufactured products to the United States, so they sent junk, and the United States bought it. But Suzuki Roshi wanted to bring something really good to America. Any news? He's breathing. Sleeping about two. Sleeping? Yeah. Okay. So he wanted to bring, he thought he could bring Zen to America. That would be a good gift. So then the Zen Center starts and one day he asked me to be his attendant on a trip.

[27:38]

from San Francisco, California, to Portland, Oregon, where he's going to give a retreat. And when we get in the plane, before the plane takes off, he tells me he wants to teach me how to count people in Japanese. And he actually was teaching me Japanese already. He wanted me to learn Japanese because he wanted me to go to Japan at some point. So in one sense I'm thinking, in one sense I feel this nice Japanese Zen priest is going to spend his time teaching me Japanese. But also I'm thinking, what is a Zen master doing, spending his time teaching Japanese?

[28:48]

Shouldn't they be teaching Zen? Any Japanese person can teach Japanese. Why is a Zen master teaching Japanese? Many Chinese people can make star sandals. Why is a Zen master making star sandals? Maybe I thought, well, maybe I'm not advanced enough to get real Zen teaching, so he's going to teach me Japanese. But there's some thought in my mind that he could teach something, something, I don't know what, more advanced than counting people in Japanese.

[29:58]

Do you have some idea like that about some great teacher? who knows great subtleties of the truth. He can teach these celestial realities to the people. So if you get into some detail about this, this is Suzuki Roshi's teaching making straw sandals. He's doing a little ceremony now of Buddha teaching student. He came to America to show people Buddha, Zen Buddha,

[31:04]

teaching American people, American men and women. That's what he came for. Now he's doing that. But it doesn't look like, you know, it's in an airplane. It's not in a Zen center. It's an airplane. It's sitting in those little chairs. And now he's going to give the secret teaching of how to count people in Japanese. Is this Buddha teaching people? Is this Buddha liberating people? The young man doesn't think so, thinks maybe not. Maybe this isn't like the essence, the essence of Zen. Like I'm looking at this lady who studied Tibetan Buddhism, you know.

[32:10]

He's teaching how to count people in Tibetan. Is that the essence of Tibetan Buddhism? So anyway, he's teaching me. And so they, you know, like in Japanese they have like one, two, three, four, five, six, and so on. But then they also have special words for counting different kinds of physical things. So just regular old one, two, three is ichi, ni, san. That's one, two, three. But if you're counting bottles, cylindrically shaped objects, then you say ippon, nihon, sambon. That's how you count one, two, three for bottles.

[33:12]

And if it's black things, you say ichimai, nimai, sanmai. Instead of ichi, ni, san. And if it's people, you go shitori, futari, sannin. So it's a special word for counting people. and special words for counting bottles, flat things, books, and so on, bodies, houses. So he was now teaching me how to count people. So anyway, I was okay counting people. If my dear teacher wants me to count people, I'll learn to count people. There's something in my mind thinking maybe there's something more important in this life than counting people.

[34:16]

Of course, there is something more important than counting people. Saving all people from suffering. Bringing peace and harmony in this world is more important than counting people in Japanese or Swedish or Chinese or English. That's what's really important, right? Is to have peace and harmony here. Right? Because people are counting people in Japanese and going to war. Counting people in Japanese doesn't bring peace. What brings peace? What do I say brings peace? What do I say brings peace? I already told you. What do I say? What brings peace? For example, You said truth and justice.

[35:19]

You said truth and justice. What brings truth and justice? Counting people. What? Counting people. Right. Counting people in Japanese, not in Swedish. Because your teacher's not Swedish, your teacher's Japanese. And he's sitting next to you on the airplane, and he's not teaching you to count people in Swedish. Now, teaching people, counting people in Swedish, that would be very advanced practice. But when your teacher is teaching you to count in Japanese, then what saves all beings is for you to learn to count people in Japanese at that time. In other words, to be yourself, because you're on the airplane with your teacher who's doing this with you. Now, you can also say, I don't want to... You can also say to the teacher, I do not want to learn to count people in Japanese, dear master. I refuse to learn to count... I don't want him to learn Japanese.

[36:21]

Maybe some of you are like that. I'm not that way, usually. or at least, you know, with the kind of things he gave me, I was usually kind of like, okay. He wants to teach me how to carry the stick, you know, the Zen stick and the Zen dog. I said, okay, teach me. He wants to teach me how to do various things. Usually I would say, okay. He was easy on me. He died pretty quickly. So he didn't teach me any things I didn't want to learn. Except, you know, look carefully at the story. So he teaches me how to count, and I'm counting. He teaches me, and then he says, now you do it. So I did it. And then I made a mistake, and he told me again. So finally I could do it right. You know, I could count to ten.

[37:23]

Count people to ten in Japanese. I could do it right. And then he said, continue. Continue. And so I continued. And then he went to sleep. And then I stopped. And then he woke up and said, started, in other words, start again. And so I started again and continued, and he went to sleep. And when he went to sleep, I stopped. And when I stopped, he woke up. I said, Stuart. And then I continued, and he went to sleep. But then I got the idea that if I stopped again, he would wake up again. So I just continued all the way to Portland. And he didn't wake up. the young monk thinks there's something more important to do than count people in Japanese.

[38:37]

In other words, the young monk thinks there's something more important to do than be himself. And most non-Buddhas, most people who aren't enlightened, all people who aren't enlightened, think there's something more important than being themselves. Very simple. Very simple. What I just said is very simple. Most unenlightened people think there's something more important to do than be themselves. It's not simple to be yourself. That's the most difficult thing to do. And the reason why it's difficult is because we think there's something more important. But there's nothing more important, because there's nothing more important than justice and peace and harmony and saving beings.

[39:46]

And that's the same as me being me and you being you. It's the same thing. We think peace and harmony and justice are important. Yeah, we think that's important. And it is important. We think saving people who are suffering is important. That's right, it is. That's the most important thing. But what we don't understand is it's exactly the same as being ourselves. Exactly. But who we are is not who we think we are. So we have to do the ceremony of being ourself. And that's hard to do, too, because we think there's something more important than this ceremony of being ourselves. So maybe you're convinced, okay, I agree, being myself is important.

[40:50]

Well, now, I just want to mention that in order to be yourself, you have to do this little tiny ceremony of being yourself, this puny little ceremony of being yourself. You have to be yourself counting people in Japanese. You have to be yourself sitting in a seat. That's not really who you are. But if you don't accept sitting at your seat, you're not going to realize who you are. If you don't do this ceremony of being yourself, you're not going to realize... reality of yourself. Because who you are is an ocean, a vast ocean. And you are that vast ocean. So you have to do a little circle of water in relationship to what you are. I do too. And it's hard to be a little circle of water. We want the circle of water to be a big ocean, which it is. So I'm happy to give you this radical, simple practice of doing the ceremony of being yourself.

[42:28]

At the same time, I'm almost afraid that you'll have some difficulty with it. Almost afraid. That you want something more interesting to do than be yourself. And not even do the ceremony of being yourself. And I know I have troubles, too. I think maybe you might have some trouble, too. But that's basically... I have some confidence in this wonderful practice of you being you. the practice of you being you, the ceremony of you being you, to realize you being you, and to realize saving all beings. The ceremony.

[43:30]

I hope Samir is doing the ceremony of being Samir, feeling sick. I hope Jana is enjoying doing the ceremony of being sick. And I hope you are really enjoying the ceremony of being you right now. And in order to really do the ceremony, in order to give your life to the ceremony, I recommend that you be very gentle about it. Gentle about doing the ceremony of being you. Gentle, soft, tender, and very calm, and patient

[44:38]

if it's difficult. Patient if you notice you resist it. Patient if you notice you resist doing the ceremony of being you. Be patient. It's very difficult for human beings to do the ceremony of being themselves. Very difficult. So if you have a hard time All the great ancestors had a hard time, too. So it's perfectly normal to have a hard time doing the practice, the ceremony of being here. So be patient. Be gentle. Be cool. And also, don't do anything. Don't do anything. You can make straw sandals. as something to do while you don't do anything. You can sit in this sashin and follow the schedule.

[45:40]

That's making straw sandals. That's making straw sandals here in this room. We don't have any straw. We just have our bodies. You have them. Weep them. Take care of them. And that is doing nothing. And from there, I propose to you, peace and justice and truth will be realized in our practice. Not later, not at the end of the week, not at the end of the week, not next week, not someday, but now. Only now. Only now. Only now. And if we stop the practice, we lose it again.

[46:47]

If we stop doing the practice of being ourselves, we lose touch with what's important. And I welcome your feedback on anything, including this radical teaching. And I give you two places to sit if you'd like to come and give me some feedback or give me any other gifts. One place is here and another place you can use some of your seat. He's not using it now. You can use his seat. But be careful, you might faint. I had no expectation that you'll come up here.

[48:36]

I don't expect that you will. You don't have to come and sit here. It's all right with me if you don't. Ah, a young man comes. What is your age? Twenty-two. Twenty-two? Ah, that's young. I guess I'm sitting here because I ... Could you speak up, please? Yes. I guess I'm sitting here because I don't know what I'm doing. Is that what you think? From time to time.

[49:40]

You think you don't know what you're doing? Yeah. Can you do the ceremony of being a young man who doesn't know what he's doing? Can you do that? Can you wholeheartedly be that person? I might. Yeah, you might. It's possible that you could be this young man. There's a ceremony of being this young man who says he doesn't know what he's doing. It's possible in this life. Could you speak up? Yes. Just by the frustrating It's the endless possibility.

[50:43]

You find the endless possibility frustrating. Because it starts getting too ridiculous. It gets too ridiculous. Well, once it gets ridiculous, the possibilities have shrunk. So one way to fight against endless possibilities is to call it ridiculous, and then you can get a hold of it. You got it in a ridiculous box. It's normal for us to try to put the endless ocean into a box called ridiculous or called wonderful or whatever. We do that. And when we do that, we're being a human being. And then we can like totally give ourselves to that. And that's the practice.

[51:45]

Because I know sometimes I find myself really enjoying the endless possibilities. Last night I couldn't get enough of the ridiculous sensation. Yeah, you looked like you were enjoying something. Last night. And another question. Could you say it louder now? When sitting. Can you hear me now? Can you hear me? When sitting. When sitting. Yes. Is that just sitting? I haven't done so much of Zen meditation before.

[52:50]

Yes. So when we're sitting, we're just sitting. We're just sitting. And you can make sandals in various ways if you want to. Some people like to follow their breath. They like to weave their breath with their mind, weave their breathing body, make straw sandals of a breathing body. Make straw sandals of a posture and a breathing posture. That's one thing you can do. But when you're doing it, it does what you're doing. Realize that that's just what you're doing now with no expectation of becoming enlightened or healthier or whatever. You're just doing this thing to enact who you are.

[53:53]

Just doing this thing to save all beings. And if people say, Rasmus, this is not helpful. Go do something else. you could say, okay. I guess I could say okay. Yeah, you could say okay. If you give yourself completely, you could say okay. If you're trying to get something, then if people say, you're wasting your time, or you should do something different, then it's harder for you to say it's okay, because... you don't understand how helpful you are being you. And if you understand how helpful you are being you, you have no problem giving yourself away and being somebody else who, again, will be very helpful. The whole universe depends on you. It's very helpful.

[55:01]

But it's a hard job to be yourself. because you think you could be something else. So when you sit, whatever you are, completely give yourself to what you are. Be close to yourself and don't do anything to yourself. Whatever you are. That's your job. That's what the universe is asking you to do. But it's very difficult for us to say yes to that. But it's a wonderful thing to give one's life to. Give your life to being this person. And this person. I believe it is so. Good. And then you continue. Thank you. You're welcome.

[56:04]

Thank you. What we're doing here is Judaism. What? I said, what we're doing here is Judaism. You don't know what that is? Let me say it this way. What we're doing here is Christianity. Okay? This is Christianity. What we're doing here is Islam.

[57:21]

What we're doing here is Tibetan Buddhism. What we're doing here is the whole universe. There's no way to get away from it. You can only resist. but you're still right here, realizing the whole universe as your life. It's a big responsibility, but you're perfectly built for it. So, you know, I might have said, what we're doing here is Zen. And then you would have said, yeah, yeah, right. So I think, no, what we're doing here is Judaism.

[58:25]

Then you go, really? This isn't my idea of Judaism. I didn't know this was Judaism. I mean real Judaism. That's what I mean. real Judaism that doesn't look like Judaism. Real Zen does not look like Zen. Now, sometimes Zen looks like Zen. That's okay. That's fine. And you can do Zen that looks like Zen. It's okay. And if you do... Zen that looks like Zen. That's not Zen. That's Zen that looks like Zen. If you do that wholeheartedly, you will realize Zen, which does not look like Zen. In other words, that's Judaism. That's Islam.

[59:26]

You won't be afraid of terrorists anymore. This is a great attainment. When they come, you say, Brothers! And they will be disarmed by your love. Any other feedback you want to offer now? I'm laughing because I thought of it. of a cigarette commercial. On American television now, I don't think they have cigarette commercials anymore. Do you know? You know American TV better than me. I was traveling.

[60:27]

I went to Turkey right after 9-11 on a tour group. What am I doing now, by the way? What do we call what I'm doing? What am I doing? Islam. What? Why? And what do they do in Islam? They make straw sandals, right? Don't they make straw sandals in Islam? With the straw that's growing in the desert? Don't they make these straw sandals and go on pilgrimage to various Zen monasteries in Islam? Isn't that what they do? So that's what I'm doing. I'm practicing Islam now. This is Islam. In Islam, I tell you stories about going to Turkey. Right? Why do I tell you that? Because I want to talk about American television. And who knows most about American television? Well, Americans. But I'm an American.

[61:29]

I don't know anything about American television because I don't watch it. So I'm going to Turkey right after 9-11, but my tour group gets canceled because none of the Americans want to go to Turkey. But I still want to go. So they say, well, you can go with a Dutch tour, because the Dutch people are not afraid to go to Turkey. So I go with the Dutch people. I'm hiding behind the Dutch people. They're very tall. They protect the little American from the terrorists. So the Dutch people, they know all about American TV, much more than I do. They taught me about American TV. It was wonderful. So anyway, I'm thinking about American TV. When I was a little boy, I did watch American TV. And they had lots of ads for cigarettes on TV. Really good TV, really good commercials for cigarettes back in the 40s and 50s of the last century.

[62:36]

So one of the ads for cigarettes was they would have a cigarette auction, not a cigarette auction, a tobacco auction. It was for, you know, there used to be a cigarette called Lucky Strikes. Do they still make those? No. Lucky Strike. And Lucky Strike makes fine tobacco. Lucky Strike is owned by the American Tobacco Company. So they have this commercial for cigarettes, and then we have an auction where people are bidding to buy tobacco. And this man, this auctioneer is saying, "'Going once!' Going twice. Going three times. Sold American. So I say to you, is there anything else you want to talk about? Any more gifts? And then I say, going once. Oops.

[63:45]

There comes a buyer. Sold Mikael. Sold Mikael. You know, I was sitting with thoughts about being and doing. Yeah. Because you asked, wouldn't you really like to be yourself? I can feel myself saying, oh, yes. But I have also other voices. Yeah. Thoughts about doing. Yeah. Something in my mind that being would be like just to be like that. And those voices say, well, you're a human being. We are here in the world. We do things. We create things. We live inside things. And I can, of course, say, yes, I built a dilemma around this, but it's good. It's like when I'm inside my practice, if I am settled in, then there are no problems of that nature.

[64:51]

But then I'm outside, and I might feel that it's restlessness. Yeah. And it's a distraction. So far you feel it's a distraction. Yeah. Sometimes. It's a distraction, but you can turn it into a ceremony. The kind of being you are includes the illusion of activity, of personal activity. That's sometimes the way you are. So the way you are is actually beyond any stories you have about yourself. The way you actually are being is more than just your stories about what you're doing. But since you have stories about what you're doing, you need to make those stories into a ceremony of being a person who has stories.

[66:02]

Then, if you can accept that, not just your story, but accept that your story or your activity, is just a very small version of who you are. And make that little thing you are an offering, a ceremony of offering your story, your activity. Then you open to the way you actually are being, the way you actually are. But if you get caught by your story and don't realize how limited that is, then you don't open. to who you really are. And maybe sometimes when you're sitting, you do actually let what you're doing be that way, and you start to open. But the challenge is to make your storytelling, to make your constructions, connect them with something that isn't constructed.

[67:06]

By admitting that all your constructions our ceremonial actions, inactions, embodiments. I think I understand. Yeah, so now just practice it. It's difficult. It is difficult. You know, we throw a flat stone across the water and it skips. Sometimes I feel like that stone, skipping and skipping and skipping, afraid to sink. You are like the stone skipping. You are like that. But you're also different from the stone because the stone... cannot imagine that it's something other than the whole universe. But you can. So you have a job the stone doesn't have. As you're skipping across the water, you have to make that a ceremony. The stone doesn't have to. Because the stone doesn't think that it's just a stone.

[68:09]

The stone doesn't think it's not the ocean that it's skipping on. The stone just is what it is, and what the stone is depends on the ocean. The skipping stone does not skip by itself. It skips because it's supported by the ocean. It's supported by each place it touches, but each place it touches is supported by the rest of the Baltic Sea, and by all the islands, and by all the Swedish people. That's the way the stone is. You're just like that. You're just like the stone. But the stone doesn't think, I'm only supported by some of the spots on the water. Or the stone doesn't think, I'm flying across the water by my own magical power. The stone does not think that, but people do. People think that they skip across the water by their own power, and people think or overlook that the ocean is supporting them. They overlook that. that the universe is making possible everything they do.

[69:13]

Because of that, we must make our skipping across the water, every bounce, we must make a ceremony of saying, now I'm doing a ceremony of skipping, so I won't be caught by the illusion that I'm doing this by myself, not together with everyone. If you don't do that, you miss it. You miss who you are. The stone does not have to do the ceremony of being itself. Because it's not distracted from itself. But if you don't do the ceremony of being yourself, then you're going to find being yourself, as you said, distracting. The kind of people we are is we can feel distracted from ourself. And being distracted from ourself is being distracted from our relationship with others. It's being distracted from how we're helping each other. So we need to come back to being ourselves.

[70:16]

Why do we have to? We just have to. Why do I have to do a ceremony, a ritual of being me? Well, you don't have to unless you want to realize who you are. People who don't want to realize who they are don't have to do a ceremony. But those who wish to be themselves, whole, completely, have to return to themselves, to be themselves. You have to ritually, ceremonially come back to yourself in the moment. And then if you want to do it again, you have to do it in another moment. Otherwise, being yourself is going to be a distraction from justice and peace. which you very nicely told us, that you feel distracted from the life you really want to live. Sometimes, yeah. So then you have to counteract the distraction by being the person, including being the person who feels distracted. Thanks for your offering.

[71:17]

Okay. Going once, going twice, going three times, gone beyond. May our intention easily extend to every being and place with the true merit of Buddha's way. Walking meditation.

[72:01]

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