Do you want me to read it to you so you can see how it sounds? No, this is not really exactly what I wrote. Okay. Okay, so the first point that occurs to me about the home altar is that the altar for a Zen student is right here. It is a place from which the way comes forth and returns to. This is the altar of non-dual meditation. This is the non-dual altar, the altar which is not an object of thought. It is an altar which is thinking Buddha and is the place or location of awakening, the bodhimanda, which in Japanese is called dojo, which is often dojo. It literally means place of awakening,

[01:01]

but in common parlance it means place to practice Zen or Judo or whatever. Home altar is a good expression because it is an altar in our home and it is also an altar which is our home. If I think about Chinese Zen, at least when I first started studying Zen, I might even be surprised that a Zen Buddhist would have an altar because we have stories about Zen teachers burning Buddha statues to heat themselves in the cold winter and things like that. The longer I practice Zen, the more I realize how deeply devotional it is. And I recently heard a story about a Zen student who went to Japan

[02:06]

to study Zen with a Japanese teacher and he was really surprised to see this teacher being so unabashedly religious in terms of bowing, offering incense, making offerings. In Japan? This guy was in Japan? Come in. Are we going to do lunch? Speaking of clichés... We're going to work through lunch. You're just going to work through lunch? We can eat here. We'll have our own separate lunch. You'll have equal but separate lunch. Eleanor seems to have a preference for this table. Is that right? Yes. And then the table that you're working on too? This is all being recorded so I'm not going to say anything about this.

[03:08]

Anyway, he was really surprised to see this Zen teacher bowing and scraping to a Buddha. So he asked the Zen teacher, why don't you spit on it instead? And the guy said, if you want to spit, you can spit. I prefer to bow. Suzuki Roshi's teacher, Gyokujo Son, had a callus on his forehead from bowing. Since hearing about that, I've heard that a number of other highly respected Soto Zen teachers are also proud of their calluses on their foreheads. They're proud of their trophies. In one sense, having no object of thought is thinking Buddha,

[04:20]

and our bowing expresses gratitude for the profound and magnificent practice of Zazen, of objectless meditation. And profound gratitude for the profound and magnificent practice of non-dual meditation. Okay. So an altar is a place, it seems like an altar is also a place or a location at which we can alter our lives at the moment. Or an altar is a place where you can alter your life for a moment. Etymologically, altars rely, I found more than one etymology. One etymology is from the Latin, altare, which means the materials for burning sacrificial offerings, hence altar.

[05:24]

Another etymology is the Latin, altus, which means high, a high place. Another extraneous piece of material is that when Dogen Zenji's teacher, Ru Jing, was being installed as abbot of a large monastery, and he was supposed to go in and offer incense in the Buddha hall, he walked to the door and looked at the Buddha and said, a poison dart in my eye, and walked on. So Zen is iconoclastic in the sense of we rebel against any icons that are outside ourselves. And our altar is a place to express our non-dual relationship with our true nature. It's not a place to make offerings to some Buddha which is other than ourselves,

[06:27]

or some awakening which is someplace else. So the Zen altar then is a kind of radical space, where we have a chance to drop all duality, and express our gratitude for the teaching which teaches how to do that, and for the teachers who have maintained the tradition of non-dual meditation. Why have something then? If you've got it on the altar, it seems like it's a temptation to make it outside yourself. Well, to keep testing yourself to see if you can continue. If you fall for it, that means that you've been bewitched by dualism. So the altar gives you a chance both to be tempted by dualism, and to fall for it, to be bewitched by dualism, and then also to, again, free yourself of it,

[07:28]

and reiterate in some formal way, or some actual physical way, non-duality. Because bowing is not to bow to something, bowing is actually to cut through duality. Bowing is Buddhism. When there's bowing, there's Buddhism, and when there's Buddhism, there's bowing. Well, I mean, why bowing? Instead of spitting, you mean? Or instead of, I mean, is there something special about doing that with your body that makes it work? Yeah, you go down to the earth, you touch the earth with your head. The fine upstanding person goes down to the ground, goes down, goes down to where they come from, returns to the ground which they're standing on.

[08:32]

So bowing is not the only thing you can do, but it's... We don't just bow, we also stand up after we bow. We stand up and we bow down. We stand up and we bow down. Okay. Anyway, maybe I should say some practical things about the altar too. Yeah, we've got three hours of tape, so you can just say everything. So, if you want to set up an altar in your house, it's probably good to start looking for a place that feels good to you, a place that... sort of a home within your home kind of place. And a place that won't disturb other people.

[09:43]

Don't put it in a place that people will impose upon other members of your families or visitors too much. What do you mean by impose? You mean they have to deal with it? They have to deal with it more than they want to or something. You know, start... I would suggest starting with an altar for yourself rather than an altar as a political statement. You know, just something, a place that you can feel at home, feel refreshed by. Rather than something that you're getting other people to be refreshed by or getting other people in your family to start become Zen Buddhists, to be Zen Buddhists or something. So like maybe in your room, your bedroom or something? In your bedroom. Your bedroom would be fine. Or it could be in a closet. Closets are nice because like it could be...

[10:49]

maybe you can close the door and nobody has to deal with it except those who want to open the closet. And it could be like up above all the clothes or something. And you could open the door of the closet and, you know, sit in front of it or make offerings in front of it and it would be, you know, it would be up high and out of the way. It would be kind of special that way. You could also, of course, go into the closet, close the door and meditate in the closet which a number of saints have done. With or without the clothes and they're still. Actually, setting up the altar, it's often good to have some kind of a center, central figure or central form. It can be a statue of a Buddha, namely a living person who is personifying enlightenment. Or it could be a statue of...

[11:52]

an enlightening being. Like... I don't know if I should say Avalokiteshvara, Guanyin or Kuanyin or what... or Kanan or... Anyway, Avalokiteshvara, the Bodhisattva of infinite compassion, the one who hears the cries of all suffering beings, that's a nice one to have in a home altar. And it's a good one to bow to. And... Again, one way to look at it is that Avalokiteshvara's compassion is coming into you as you're bowing. Another way is that your bowing cuts through the duality between what you're doing and Avalokiteshvara's compassion. The bowing is to make your life infinite compassion. You make everything in your life compassion rather than... Your life's one thing and you're going to get the compassion from Avalokiteshvara. What would you do? Just get a picture of Avalokiteshvara?

[12:59]

What if you don't know anything about him? What if you don't know him? What if you don't have any access to a central figure? A picture out of a book or something? Yeah, come in. A framed picture would be nice. Nice alternative. To a statue you mean? Yeah, to a statue is maybe harder to find than just a picture from an art book or something. For example, at Zen Center we have catalogs from Japanese Buddhist equipment stores that have many pictures of Buddhas that you can buy and just cut the picture of the Buddha out instead of buying it and frame it. So you can get pictures from art books. You could even draw a picture. You can draw a picture of a Buddha that you would like. It could be very simple. You can also just write the name of the Buddha or the name of the Bodhisattva. You could write, Regarder of the Cries of the World or Avalokiteshvara on a piece of paper. Could you make a little...

[14:00]

It just goes in there, doesn't it? No. Kitchen. The kitchen has five for ninju. But you know what? It's Eric's, the cozy mat. Just for now. Do not fail. It's dirty. You want a dirty one? But I want to tell you something. Please take the cozy mats back to the kitchen after you're done. Where are they? Where you all incur many years of hell. I'm not sure where they keep them anymore. They used to keep them on the right-hand side of the stoves in the shelf. I'm sure there's like five of them here. Yeah, you could probably find them. Excuse me. So, could you make a little statue too? You could carve one, yeah. Or make one out of clay. Sometimes museums have postcards too with pictures of Buddhas on them. Or a museum postcard from some Oriental collection. And so you put the Buddha or the Bodhisattva

[15:02]

or whatever in the middle. And then usually to its left you'd put a candle. And to its right you put a flower. Left is considered higher. The Buddha's left is considered... The Buddha's left or your left? You're right. The Buddha's left. And flower is traditional. I mean light is usually considered to be the highest of the physical offerings. And smell is considered next. So the smell of the flowers and the light of the candle. And then in the middle, right in front of the figure you can put an incense bowl. And, you know, any bowl would be suitable.

[16:04]

Wood's not so good, but ceramic or metal is fine. And you can put sand in it if you have stick incense. Or you can take ash from the fireplace and put it in ash. It works best. And as you use it for a while gradually the incense dust will build up. You can have that. So that's basically it. And at the altar you can make offerings of light. Or in addition to offering light and flowers and incense you can offer teachings chanted by you personally. Or your personal rendition of certain teachings. So you can chant scriptures or something that you feel is really Dharma. Really awakened teaching. You can offer that before the statue to bring it,

[17:06]

to bring the joy of teaching to it and to yourself. Which is the same thing. So the altar is a place for you to return home a place where you celebrate the non-duality of all living beings and the awakened ones. It's a place where you express generosity. It's a place where you express gratefulness. It's a place where you express respect and reverence. And it's a place where you experience peace. And it's a place where you get some spiritual exercise. I wish there was some other way to say the non-duality of ourselves and the awakened ones. The oneness? The oneness of ourselves? Well, but that's...

[18:10]

The unitary... The identity? I don't even know. Those words are so conceptual compared to what you're trying to say. You know what I mean? I mean, you have to go through your mind process before you can... Yeah, something more body. The one body of living beings and Buddhas? The one suchness of all living creatures and awakened ones? The one body or the one substance? It's like you're right next to them. But that's not what you mean, is it? It means you're totally interpenetrated or something. Totally interpenetrated. Well, you're not the same and yet you never have one without the other. There's no Buddhas where there's no sentient beings.

[19:10]

There's no Buddhas appearing in the world where there's not sentient beings. And there's no actual oneness. I guess a lot of people would maybe be willing to go along with that. But the other way around is really hard for people. Namely, there's no sentient beings where there aren't Buddhas. That people have a harder time with. That's what... It's still a little bit like saying... You know, let's be sentient beings so there can be Buddhas. I don't know how to explain it, but... Let's be sentient beings so there can be Buddhas. That sounds good to me. Really? Yeah, that sounds good. Let's be sentient beings so there can be Buddhas. That's nice. Let's live our lives

[20:11]

so that there can be Buddhas. So that there can be a universe. Yeah, that sounds nice. I don't know if you understand it the way I do. Were you saying that that sounds like cop-out to you or something? No, it just sounds like it's still making you different from Buddhas. Which is maybe that's okay, but... You know, when you first say the non-duality of... Well, there's non-duality and there's also difference. There's... yeah. And there's a... And there's a non-duality between difference and... Non-duality is not the same as oneness necessarily even. Non-duality is also that there's difference and sameness. Right.

[21:11]

So when you're bowing to... when you have a Buddha on your altar, your bowing expresses both that you're different from... that there's sentient beings and Buddhas and that there... and that you already are Buddha or... you know? Well, your bowing expresses that there's sentient beings and Buddhas and your bowing also expresses that there aren't sentient beings and aren't Buddhas. Bowing expresses both of those things. And even if you don't bow, just when you put the Buddha on the altar, you put the Buddha on the altar because there aren't any Buddhas. That's why you put it on the altar. I don't understand. You put the Buddha on the altar because you're deluded.

[22:18]

And if you don't put the Buddha on the altar, it's also because you're deluded. But if you were deluded and you didn't admit it... I think if you're deluded and you're honest, you might want to put a Buddha on the altar as a... kind of... great gratitude for being honest about being deluded. And if you weren't honest about being deluded, you might still want to put the Buddha on the altar sort of as a kind of congratulation to yourself for being enlightened. Anyway, putting Buddhas on altars and also taking Buddhas off altars seems like

[23:20]

encountering some important issue. You wouldn't be able to encounter it if you didn't do something. You need some way to encounter it. And I don't think putting Buddhas on altars is necessarily better than taking them down. And you can't take them down unless they're already put up. So the whole process of putting them up and taking them down depends on... on Buddha. So I would just think it's really an auspicious opportunity to put a Buddha on the altar in your house so you can deal with the issue of your Buddhahood somehow. Deal with the fact that your... that your life is... deal with your life.

[24:25]

Help you deal with your life. Help you live. Feel the tender... feel those tender feelings of being Buddha's child. And also feel those tender feelings of being Buddha and having many children. And look at Buddha's face. Find a Buddha that has a beautiful face. A calm face, a happy face. Or maybe find a Buddha that has a fierce face. So rather than me saying

[25:29]

that you should find a Buddha that has a calm face or a happy face or a beautiful face, I might say you might want such a Buddha. You might want a Buddha like that to look out. You might want a Buddha like that to look out. And then see if you can see that Buddha not as an object. See if you can see that beauty that... see if you can see that beauty and that peace and that happiness and yet not see it as something... That would be really great. Someone might see the fierce Buddha as beautiful. I mean, that might... Yeah, our fierce Buddha might be beautiful, yeah. Do you think you can trust your own... what you want... what kind of Buddha you want to have on your altar?

[26:30]

Just trust that, you think? What kind of face you want to have? For starters, I'm sure I can. Maybe that's enough on the altar. Okay. That's, I mean, that's quite a bit. Do you know how many pages or how much you want it or... It doesn't matter how much he wants. I think we just sort of make what we think is good and if it's too long, it's too long. It certainly wouldn't be too short. Okay. Just a paragraph or two probably would be enough. So if what we have there edits down to something nice, that's what's important. I'm sure. And it might be too long, but then we can fight for it. Okay. More pages? More pages. Oh, for about where to put it, another place that sometimes is good is like up on top and...

[27:31]

I'll take it back. But something maybe up on top of a... Up in maybe a dining room is another nice place for it perhaps. You might want to thank all the enlightened teachers and be happy for their teaching at the time you express happiness for their teaching at the time of eating. And go out, for instance, before you eat or something like that. That might be another possible thing that might not be too intrusive on people. Right. Okay, then the next one is the Zazen instruction. I think that, I think... I think that one I would... I'd just write. Okay. And you can do that? Make yourself do that? I think I can do that because I'm just going to do something pretty... Let's see. Oh, maybe this is home...

[28:35]

This is a home altar and then this Zazen instruction for practicing at home. Okay. Sounds good. I'll have to go with that. And... I will talk about the specific aspects of posture and breathing awareness. But in addition to that some general comments about practicing at home. The first thing that comes to mind is that if you're practicing at home, in particular if you don't have regular contact with a teacher, I think it's very good to have a regular schedule. And that means not necessarily that you practice every day but that you have some fairly clear idea about when you practice.

[29:38]

Maybe you practice three times a week. Maybe you practice Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 7 o'clock in the morning for 20 minutes. Or four times a week at 5.30 in the afternoon for 30 minutes, something like that. But you don't have an indefinite commitment. Or you don't do it based on whether you feel like it or not? You can do it on that basis too but you make a commitment before you do that anyway. And then if you do it on the basis of feeling like it, then you have that commitment to reflect on. Again, if you're not relating to a teacher so often, when you do, if you can tell that teacher, that meditation teacher, I practice Zazen three times a week for 20 minutes at these times, that helps them a lot understand what you're doing. If you say,

[30:39]

I practice irregularly or not so much or some weeks I practice once and some weeks I practice four and sometimes I take off two months and you're not really sure about what you're doing or what you're practicing, particularly if you're writing a letter or something like that. But if you're practicing in a rather consistent way and you convey that information even in a letter, the person can get a fairly good understanding of what you're doing if you tell them the time, the day, the time of days and the amount of time and all that's regular. The teacher can get but you're not clear about what you're doing. It's harder to convey your situation to someone that you meet not so often. If you have close contact with a teacher then they can handle a lot of

[31:40]

very complex, they're in touch with the complexity of your meditation practice so that's okay, they can understand it. And also, once you make, even if you can relate to it or reflect on it, even if you don't follow the commitment, it's still useful to have made it. So for example, if you decide to practice meditation at a certain time, even when you're not meditating at that time, you think about meditation. If I'm downtown shopping or something sometimes during the time when Zazen is usually held maybe a meditator thinks oh, meditation is being held now or I'm not at meditation. It's a kind of meditation. It makes wherever you are into the meditation hall to some extent or makes it basically the same.

[32:41]

Anyway, the fact that you remember the meditation because you have regularly done it at a certain time, even that's useful. But if you don't meditate at a regular time you might not remember meditation. Now it's okay to not meditate at a regular time if you always remember meditation. So since there's no regular time for meditation, any time is okay for meditation. That's also a fine practice. But still it's useful to have some definite commitment, some specific commitment. Even if it's not too extensive it's quite useful. Away from a group or a teacher it's even more important to do something like that. So when you set up the place to sit

[33:43]

again it should be a place that's like it should be in a similar place that I just mentioned for the home altar. In fact it probably would be if you had a home altar it probably would be that's probably where you would sit but not necessarily. And so it should be a place you feel at home and a quiet place if possible and a place that's not too bright but also not too dark. So the place you sit it's good to spread out a thick mat with a cushion on top of it

[34:48]

and sit in some cross-legged position. The most traditional ones are the full lotus and half lotus posture. The full lotus posture means when you sit you first put your right foot on your left thigh and then your left foot on your right thigh. However, it's also good to reverse this sometimes and start by putting your right foot on your left thigh. If you continue to always sit in that one direction or for some period of years you can develop some imbalances in your bodies as a result of that always crossing in one way or another. So it's not just with lotus no matter what cross-legged position you're in

[35:50]

you should switch the way you've crossed your legs? Yes. So this reversing the way you cross it would also apply to the half lotus posture where you just put your left foot on your right thigh or you just put your right foot on your left thigh. There's also what we call the Burmese posture or a perfect posture where you just bend your legs I don't know how to describe that maybe we should look that up in Iyengar's book I have it right here see what his description of it is. In line on yoga? Yeah. In that one? Yeah. It's not exactly like you cross your legs I guess. You don't really cross your legs. You put one foot in front of the other. Yeah, but that would also describe walking. Burmese? We can find his description. He wouldn't have Burmese he would probably have perfect posture. I don't know if he had a perfect

[36:53]

probably listed under. I think he had an ananda. Yeah. Anyway. Perfect ananda. I can look it up later Tom. You can also you can also sit in what Japanese call Seiza which is basically kneeling and I think some pictures would be good. Drawings. Probably should get some drawings in there of these different postures. I'm starting to see it come together. I'm starting to see it come together now. Maybe at the beginning I think he has some of the same positions although they're in kind of a funny order.

[37:55]

Stick your tongue out and bulge your eyes out. And go. I don't think what's that's not it. Oh that's his that's his lotus. I don't know if he are you sure he has it in here? No. I'm not. I'm not sure either but there it is. That's it right? That's one. That's Burmese. Isn't it? His one foot's in front of the other one. 1984 Ragi Yoga Samadhi It's called Siddhasana 1 Siddhasana?

[39:01]

That's the posture of the Siddhas. A semi-divine being supposed to be a great purity and wholeness. Technique Sit on the floor both legs stretched straight in front bend left knee There it is. What page? Page 119? Okay. I don't think we should I don't think very many people can sit full lotus to tell you the truth. I don't think you need to go into details about how to sit full lotus because I think it just intimidates people. Not that you ask my opinion but anyway. I mean I think wouldn't it be better to say if you, you know if you practice Hatha Yoga you can gradually

[40:02]

make your pelvis do full lotus or something because it just seems Parikunasana Pre Padma Asana Four Plate 104 Padma means lotus this lotus this is the lotus posture one of the most important and useful asanas is the posture for meditation and Buddha often is often depicted in it. Okay.

[41:05]

This is where you're supposed to sit before you sit in full lotus. Sit on the floor with your legs straight page 77 we don't want to recommend this actually at home it's be alright. Bend the right leg at the knee hold the left foot with the hands in place now bend the left leg holding the left foot hands placed over my foot Effects after initial knee pain has been overcome full lotus is one of the most relaxing postures the body being sitting posture it is at rest without being sloppy the position of crossed legs and the erect back keeps the mind attentive and alert hence it is one of the asanas recommended for practicing

[42:06]

breath control On a purely physical level the pose is good for curing stiffness in the knees and ankles since the blood is made to circulate in the lumbar region and abdomen the spine and abdominal organs are toned sit in the padma asana full lotus plate 104 keep spine erect and head level well I don't know if we should put in the instructions on the sitting or not you mean those instructions or any instructions the instructions on the sitting on the full lotus it wants to be short anyway so yeah okay so sit in the full lotus half lotus do those things

[43:08]

loosen the clothes loosen the belt wear loose fitting clothes and don't have something don't have a belt or something tight around your waist they should be loosely arranged or you know loosely fitting but also arranged in order then put your right hand on your left foot and your left hand on your right palm with both thumbs touching their faces supporting each other it's interesting the faces of the thumbs supporting each other I've never heard that the faces of the thumbs it says both thumbs touching their faces supporting each other then sit straight without leaning left or right forward or backwards ears should be in line with your shoulders

[44:09]

and your nose in line with your navel the tongue rests on the roof of the mouth with mouth closed and teeth together the eyes should always be open and the breath should pass subtly through the nose did I say the eyes should always be open did you know I think so we could just quote from there though, right? from here? if we want, right? you could say I couldn't say I can't really say it better than no, I'm not I'm just saying this but it's not going to be a quote this is a translation anyway right once your body is adjusted I'm not reading this exactly anyway once the body is adjusted inhale and exhale once completely rock body right and left rock the body

[45:14]

left to right back and forth then steady settle into a steady he says then settle down and sit still that's not nice hm? so this is the basic instructions for sitting now Suzuki Ueshi usually recommend that you first of all just work on your posture for a while and not worry just work on your posture for a while and then after you're fairly well able to continue to maintain mindfulness of your posture then you can also be mindful of your breathing so when you say work on your posture you mean be aware of it be aware of it, yeah so there's a big question

[46:22]

about whether we should recommend counting the breath or not in the Satipatthana Sutra do they say to count it here? or is it no they say just long you know it long breath is a long breath and a short breath is a short breath an agitated breath is an agitated breath right well since there's since there's another book that says count maybe you don't need to say count hmm well anyway the point I just made was first work with your posture and as Suzuki Resshu says the most important point is to own your own physical body okay

[47:32]

okay so that's the most important point and that's enough on that for now okay see what that turns into I have to by the way I have to go to looks like I have to go to the doctor again when? Friday Friday? I mean I think I can work on if I can get this the doctor in Monterey? well yeah my chiropractor wants me to see a neurologist what's happening? well something it's just really subtle I have a little loss of muscle control in my leg and foot but it's really subtle in fact it's gotten it's gotten pretty much better I think but she was really adamant but I don't want to I'm not I'm going to go I'm going to go to a regular doctor in Carmel Valley and see if they can tell me something that's really expensive to go to a neurologist so

[48:32]

I'm hoping to work on this Eleanor thought maybe this she thought the story about the session and seating was really good she thought she'd be at the beginning because the way she usually writes is to write something that sort of draws people in first but on the other hand that's not what happened also I was thinking of changing those quotes perhaps yeah I was going to say the mountains and rivers of the immediate present are the the mountains and rivers of the immediate present are the manifestation of the path of the ancient Buddhists and then and then maybe have this thing in here about maybe a little bit about maybe that quote jump to that because I really don't I really don't talk in this lecture about Dharma position do I? but you do talk about because they are the self before the emergence of signs yeah I thought maybe have that sentence too because they are the self the mountains and rivers of the immediate present are the manifestation

[49:33]

of the path of the ancient Buddhists dot dot dot or something and then skip to because they are because they are the self before the emergence of subtle signs before the emergence of signs they are penetrating they are penetrating liberation manifestation of immediate actuality Master Dao Kai said to the congregation Green Mountains Master Dao Kai said Green Mountains are forever walking stone and we can even do that up and then maybe if one knows if one knew one's own walking one would know the walking of Green Mountains mhm that sounds good could you say if one knows one's own walking one knows

[50:33]

the walking of is it ok to editorialize on the quote a little one should not doubt the walking of Green Mountains who knows the measure of the walking Green Mountains as well as the walking of oneself should be clearly examined there should be examination of both stepping back and stepping forward now that stuff could be perhaps that and that mhm I don't know how you do that you do line and dot dot dot and line dot dot dot I don't know how people feel about that well we could just say we could just put it like a quote as if it were written that way and then we could say

[51:34]

this is excerpts from blah blah blah this quote is excerpts from such and such the mountains and rivers sutra so that's the question we have to do there and here I thought to say there are about 80 people in this session and we are all packed into this one room mhm so unfortunately some of the seats are not so good mhm you wanna just yeah that sound yeah you can just scratch it if you want some of the seats

[52:38]

are some of the seat assignments some of the seats are not so good you wanna just say seats some of these people who get these seats some of the some of the people got these I think I mean I feel ok about bad but I remember you were saying you didn't like bad I thought maybe poor might be better well but I don't know poor sounds almost like worse I mean the problem with this part is that this is really funny but I don't know if everybody is gonna see

[53:39]

it's a joke but I don't I think we should just try it and see what happens I mean anybody who's ever sat a session is gonna see it's a joke I think are there any bleeding hearts before this bleeding heart hearts are meant to bleed yeah there's something there's a heart that's meant to bleed but you don't have to yeah it's before that oh maybe it's not no it's after this where are they maybe it's not no it must be before yeah it must be before oh it's right before oh I see and you may think I'm explaining something to you but I'm just expressing myself I'm trying to I'm trying to express myself you wanna leave that out no

[54:39]

I don't think it needs to be in there this is not necessary no hearts are meant to bleed that's why that's what they're built for what it's sort of out of nowhere isn't it the whole paragraph no the hearts are meant to bleed yeah yeah but let me just look in here there was a lot of ass that I left out up here at the top I said oh up here I'm just trying to here I'm expressing an aching heart it's trapped in a circle of water trying maybe I should say I'm trapped in a circle of water does this sound funny for the heart to be trapped in a circle of water actually I think you said it it's in a trapped circle of water and I changed it to it's a trapped circle of water I think you said it's in a trapped

[55:40]

circle of water trying to return to the ocean maybe you should say I'm in a I don't know it's really hard to mess with it if I can simply accept this that's enough okay you told the story about the littlest angel but it wasn't completely in here so I didn't didn't include it okay I think trapped is unnecessary too right it's in a circle of water trying to return to the ocean

[56:40]

trapped isn't unnecessary okay okay so there are about 80 people in this session and we are all packed into this one room so unfortunately some of the seats are not so good some of the people got these bad some of these people who got these bad seats got moved to other bad seats they are currently in some new bad seats due to the compassion of the practice leaders are bleeding hearts sensed your sensed your bad seat? how about sensed your your pain your your difficulty with your bad seat or your your difficulty your difficulty

[57:41]

your difficulty you could just say difficulty and forget the seat again here are bleeding hearts sensed your difficulty? we wanted to make you more comfortable we want to make you more comfortable so we move you or we wanted to make you yeah it's hard because you keep changing the tense here but then that's how you said it you know I mean if we make it all the same tense we might just totally lose it right we want to make you more comfortable so we move you all over the place while we keep our good seats where we can see how bad your seats now see that's really bad bad English where we can see how bad your seats are yeah that's not a sentence how about going like this that's an example how about a comma comma we want to make you more comfortable so we move you all over the place while we keep our good seats where we can see how bad your seats are yeah but you know when you say it it's different when there's a pause

[58:48]

you know I can you just pause I'm sure you just pause there and you said so we move you all over the place while we keep our good seats and then let that sink in and then you say where we can see how bad your seats are which is okay I mean we can change it but that's the thing it makes it hard to to do we could just put maybe we could put a dash that makes I guess that makes it even more connected though oh I think let's try it with a comma I'll read it again yo this is another bag in your life we're trying to figure out where are you going to start are you going to start from here yeah do they come here uh-huh okay we announced that the denture would start at 1.15 uh-huh how realistic is that do you want us to check with you at 1 o'clock I'll give you a uh A minus on real on realisticness yeah have you looked at the ceremony and decided have I no

[59:49]

but so we'll check with you I'm pretty comfortable with with what you're going to do I'm pretty comfortable with that ceremony so I I don't have to know beforehand what it is alright all I have to do is remember the causal nexus so they they'll just come in here and in the third round you and Paul and they will just come do they need to be so that's in an hour what do they need to be instructed as to what to do from here who follows who you tell them um uh I think I'm taking over Eno's role that's the thing where is Eno by the way she's there she's been on codeine all night are you are you she's been on codeine she had root canal done yesterday oh I see does she have any more codeine laughs [...] I'm not a big of champagne laughs it's ok I take a little laughs Carol left me some ginseng laughs it's not the same thing laughs um

[60:51]

I told them if they have any questions to come at 1 and if they don't have any questions to come 1 15 and 1 110 or 115 So, I think in that time we can handle any instruction that they need. Do you anticipate walking to the kaishandra during the third round?

[61:12]

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