I thought I would summarize a little bit the basic gesture of calming or stabilizing the mind and entering into concentration. is to train ourselves inwardly, attend inwardly to the way we respond to objects. we're not really focusing on objects although as you may know sometimes when people teach concentration practice they start by getting people to concentrate on external objects.

[01:11]

I have not been emphasizing that but I think you know that some people do. But even those who start with concentrating on external objects later turn to an internal object, a non-external object. And the inner object that I'm talking about is this way of relating to objects. You still may see objects. They still are objects of awareness, feelings, pain and pleasure, various emotions, colors, sounds, ideas about colors and sounds, and so on but the tranquilizing gesture is to not move among the objects so you meet each object attending to the way you meet the object so objects appearing and disappearing whatever they are you meet them basically in the same way

[02:27]

with relaxation without holding them, keeping them, or casting them aside. Training the mind in this way to basically not get involved with any objects, even though in some sense you do see the objects and see even the difference among them, you don't treat them differently. and that way you don't move among them. You don't elaborate on them. You treat them all the same. You don't give one more attention than the other. This kind of training in the way the mind meets things in the same way the mind becomes calm and stabilized by this relaxed meeting of each thing. It's not just relaxation is relaxed is a relaxed encounter with the object and this calming also is a flexible calming it's light it's buoyant and it's alert it could become drowsy and so on

[03:59]

we're not really meeting the things. If we're getting too excited, agitated, we're getting, we're not, we're grasping or getting, not getting tense around the objects. So without tensing or disregarding, we find this balanced way of meeting things. Then this opens up into the field of actual activity of the samadhi and this samadhi or this playfulness has lots of vitality and its vitality comes from the precariousness of the balance between not grasping and not rejecting, comes from the precariousness between keeping in touch with your inner sense of things and keeping in touch with your access to shared reality.

[05:29]

precariousness of keeping in touch with both in a balanced way. Tapping, feeling that precariousness, we feel the precariousness of the reality of things. We feel the impermanence of things. Tapping into that is both calming and energizing. from the buddhas. The buddhas emerge from samadhi and they teach wisdom. They also teach samadhi, but they teach wisdom.

[06:35]

And one of the ways they teach wisdom is by mentioning that the The inner and outer, the subjective and objective, the player and the play, the sufferer and the suffering may be distinguished but can never be separated. They are not two. And as I mentioned last week, generally speaking, the sufferer, the subject of suffering, is not compassionate enough with himself or with others to be ready for realization

[07:51]

of this non-duality, of his subjective sense of suffering and the objective reality of suffering. The same could be said of player in play, that generally speaking the player is not compassionate enough to be ready for the realization of the non-duality of player and play or player and playfulness. And again, compassion means not, not enough compassion means not giving enough, not devoted enough to the precepts, not patient enough, not diligent enough, not devoted enough and not concentrated enough.

[08:55]

But when we are concentrated enough are diligent enough and so on we are in a state of play. We are in playfulness. We are able to live with this dynamism between inner and outer and the precariousness of it. and then we are ready. We become comfortable or we become maybe comfortable is too much but we have some trust even in the discomfort of the immense energy and vitality of reality of dependent core rising. the vitality of non-duality.

[10:03]

Duality has some energy, but less than non-duality. Less in the sense that because of clinging to one side or the other, we don't participate in it. Now the way to put this is that we're not ready to realize, I should say to be realized, we're not ready as a person to be realized by or in the coming of all events. If we're not playing, if we're not in samadhi, we're pretty much already here and then we go to meet things so since we're already here we cannot be realized by the coming of things as we relax and enter into the playfulness of concentration as we relax calm down

[11:30]

and enter into playfulness we forget the self for a moment and then we're ready for the revelation of the self that's born in the advent of things but the self that's born in the advent of things is very energetic so again we have to be flexible and soft and calm in order to face the energy of the advent of all things wherein we see ourselves born, where we actually experience the autonomous person who is autonomous because the whole world makes her. Being present in the advent of all things, being open to the coming of events in the vitality of all that, if we can face that, we can witness how in the coming of things

[13:09]

We are born, we appear, and we appear as an autonomous person, an interdependent autonomous person. Yeah. Sometimes autonomous is associated with independent. Autonomous doesn't mean it means self operating. But you realize the self that's born of all things, and that's true autonomy. The self which is independent is getting pushed around by things. We don't have autonomy when we're independent, when we feel independent. We think we should be autonomous and we want to be autonomous. People who think they're independent can certainly want to be autonomous, but they keep getting frustrated.

[14:11]

because they exist before the world arises. So when the world arises, it's more or less frustrating and challenging. And again, our inner sense of the self, the self that's there before events, this is our own fantasy of who we are. Or you could have the self that's there before events arise, and that could be like the person in your driver's license or something, or who you're supposed to be. That could be the person you are before things happen. Like you're this kind of a good person that's been, you know, you've lined yourself up with that, and everybody agrees you that way, and that's the person that's there before you go in the room. And you want that person to be autonomous, but they can't be.

[15:16]

Or you can have your inner sense of who you are before things happen. Both these cases, you're standing outside of this precarious interplay, this intimate interplay between those two realms. And that precarious interplay is where dependent core arising where the principle of creation is being revealed as you. You're constantly an example of that. It seems like in psychology, in psychological framing of things, that sometimes it's framed that the closer your subjective reality is to objective reality, the more psychologically healthy you are. She said that sometimes people say the closer you're subjective to the objective is, the more healthy you are. Yes, uh-huh. But that's not what we're talking about.

[16:19]

You're talking about having a balance between... Having your subjective reality be close to the objective reality. Or not to be an either, really. Pardon? Not to be an either is really what you're saying. I'm saying to find a place between them, yes. But that doesn't mean that you don't have some fairly good rapport between your subjective sense of yourself and objective reality. But you just said to have the subjective sense be close to, pretty much close to the objective sense, that that's psychological health. If it gets really close, it's not healthy. If you walked around with a sense of who you are, which we all sort of signed up for and, you know, certified or notarized, and you were walking around with that, you'd be kind of like a pretty unhealthy person because you'd be walking around this certificate of who you are and checking with that about everything.

[17:22]

So you'd be out of touch with the constant magic of intimacy with your own fantasies, which we cannot keep up with here. The rest of us cannot keep up with. So you either have to totally suppress those or deny them or betray them or something in order to be really like, okay, this is who I am and it just happens to be identical to what all these people think I am. That would be kind of unhealthy. that's not a psychotic, that's not a psychopath, unless I guess it was that people thought you were a psychopath and then you'd be totally in accord with that. No, it's not too good to have the subjective be really close to the objective. And it's not so good to have the objective be really close to the subjective.

[18:26]

Because it's not so. The objective world is not... We're not all going along with your moment-by-moment creative response to the world. We're not lined up with that. That would be wrong. And for you to say that we were and ask us to agree to that would be either a joke or you'd be the example of the man who thought he was Jesus in the in the state hospital. I guess what I'm thinking of is like an anorexic who thinks that they're overweight, but they're really not. I mean, the objective reality of being this 5'8", 130-pound person was, I mean, that was an objective, good, healthy weight. But the anorexic's view is that they're fat. They have to die.

[19:35]

The closer you could get that person's subjective reality to objective reality, the better, the healthier they would be. So you're saying that if they could get their subjective sense to be closer to the objective sense, they'd be healthier. They would realize that they're not fat. They could eat. They could realize that they're not fat and that it would be okay for them to eat. Well, that's one way to put it. Another way to put it would be that they could be aware that they still feel like they're fat.

[20:38]

That's still their view of themselves. But that's just their inner sense of themselves. It's not really true. So if you try to modify their inner vision of themselves to be that you are normal weight right now and it's okay if you eat. That's kind of tampering with the person's inner, inner spirit or inner world. It's different from saying, you know, would you please recognize Could you recognize that most people would say that this person who weighs this much and is shaped like this, that we feel this person's not fat? And could you look at that person over there and say that they're not fat? The person might actually say, no, I think they're fat too.

[21:41]

They might. But could you recognize that we're saying that the person isn't fat? They say, yes, I recognize you're saying that, but I don't agree. I don't share that reality with you. What reality do you share? Well, I share the reality that you think this is so, and I don't agree. That's my reality. And you could share that reality with the person that you're saying this is so, and they're saying that's so. That seems to be the shared reality. That's the objective reality. I don't think it's an objective reality that... We could be objective reality. We all agree that Christian is not fat. Maybe all of us agree, and he can agree too. But if he can't, then it's not an objective reality because he doesn't agree. In fact, some people, I don't know, maybe somebody does think he's fat. Probably not very many people, but some people might.

[22:44]

This objective thing is shared. It's not ultimate truth. It's a convention. But our inner visions are not conventional realities, although they have some relationship. So our inner visions are related to the external shared reality. They're related, but they're not the same. And to try to get the inner one to be the same as the external one might do as much damage, although it's hard to imagine, you might think if someone's on the verge of starving themselves, what could be worse? There's worse things than starving. Like that story of the person who goes to the psychiatrist with a tick and he And he hypnotizes him and says, when you wake up, your tick will be gone. And the person wakes up and the doctor says, how do you feel?

[23:54]

I said, fine, my tick's gone. That's great. And then the doctor says, what's that? He said, oops, uh-oh, I just shit in my pants. The doctor hypnotized him and said, you're not going to shit in your pants anymore. He wakes up and he's continent again and no tick. And to make a long story short, the doctor says, how do you feel? He says, I feel great. And his arms come up like this and they form like this and he starts walking towards the doctor and places his hands on the doctor's neck and starts squeezing. The doctor puts him into a trance and says, you have a tick. So, you know, we don't want to, like, make people's inner world like the outer.

[24:56]

We want to leave it alone and get them in touch with them, help them find out what it is. And if some people walking around thinking that they're skinny, I mean fat, we should let them think they're fat and not try to, like, get them to say, don't think you're fat anymore. Think that you're normal. I don't agree with that. However, please, would you please listen to me? I respect you for going around thinking that you're fat. Matter of fact, you are fat, you know? I told you the name of that story. The guy had an inner vision that he was fat, right? He was a fat Jesus. That was his inner vision. All the other doctors tried to get him to, like, give up his inner vision and line up with you that you're just a regular mental patient. But he wouldn't relate to them. So Milton Erickson comes to them and says, yeah, you are a fat Jesus. In a way, you know, he kind of like recognized it.

[25:58]

So then the guy can like, he doesn't have to defend his inner world anymore. We do not want to lose our inner world. And the good thing about him was he wasn't going to cop out on his inner world. He went too far, but there was something good about that. We shouldn't try to get... People who think they're fat, who we don't think fat, to think that they're fat. Not to think that they're not fat. We shouldn't overwhelm their inner world. We should let it be. We should actually recognize it and say, you know, like I maybe told you the story of this woman who came to see me. It was quite a few years ago. She came to see me and she told me how bad she was, you know, and I just didn't get it. And I kept saying, well, you're not so bad. We went around and around. She kept trying to convince me she was bad. And finally I realized what she wanted me to do, say, oh, yeah, you are bad. Did I tell you that story? Yeah. She wanted me to, like, admit to her inner world that she was a bad woman, bad young girl, a bad redhead. And once I admitted that, then we can talk about something else.

[26:58]

you think you're what? You think you're fat. And yeah, you are kind of fat. But would you please now recognize that although you are fat, a lot of people would think you're not. And then most people that are your weight and your shape are not considered to be fat. Can you recognize that? Even though you have a sense that these people and you being like that would be fat, can you recognize this? If they can, they're not considered to be fat. They're not considered to be fat. Objective reality should not overwhelm the inner, but they're related. In this example, we're relating this person's vision of their fatness to the high statistical correlation that people would say that they're normal. They could recognize that and still disagree inwardly. And they just had that sense, you know, and it may stay there. for the rest of their life, that they just walk around feeling fat.

[28:06]

But that's the point. The point is, like, once you get these recognized, then can you, like, keep in touch with them so that when you're aware of this one, you don't forget this one, and when you're aware of this one, you don't forget that one. So then you get those. Then can you relax in this field? And it's hard to enter the field until you have the two sides. because part of you is the external world is saying, what are you doing meditating? And the internal world is saying, if you don't recognize the external world, people say, you know, you're supposed to be doing something else, you know, take care of your kids or, you know, you're late for work or, you know, blah, blah, blah. You have to sort of take care of that side and your inner side will bug you in some way. Hopefully it'll bug you in a way that you're aware of to get you to be aware of it. When you take care of both sides, then your life says, okay, now you can Now you can be in the middle. So same with yoga postures. You take the posture of sitting meditation, you have to be aware of the external reality of the body, the actual physical object of the body and your inner sense of it.

[29:17]

You have to be aware of both of those to enter the playful space between them. That's where the person will become healthy. without destroying their view of themselves as being fat. You don't have to change that for the person to be healthy. What makes a person healthy is to see the relationship between these two, the intimate relationship between these two and the separation between these, I mean the apparent separation between these two, the difference in their relationship and how they create each other. When they see that, then they're healthy. Then the whole system, it's a whole system then. Then they're healed. They're whole. So how can we, we need to like develop a trust and part of the way to develop trust to get somebody to move away from one side or the other, the trust in the inner is to trust that they can continue to have their version of it. The trust of the outer is to get them to cooperate with it or sometimes actually let go of it a little bit.

[30:20]

Like, if the general opinion is this person's a jerk and this person even agrees with it, they've got to let go of that a little bit in order to see the relationship between a very quiet inner sense of who they are, which is much more creative than that, and this established external object that they've been defined by society as a jerk or something. You need to trust to face this and to face that and then trust to relax with this setup and move to the middle. And there the energy starts coming up where you can face that it's a lot harder, not harder, it's a lot more challenging to face what you actually are than anybody's version of you or your version of yourself or both. But to face who you really are means to face both of those and to let go of both of those. That's what you actually are.

[31:23]

You're somebody who has an inner sense, who has a sense of shared reality, and you're somebody who's actually not either one. That's who you actually are. And that's very dynamic, ungraspable, and beautiful. Everybody's beautiful, and nobody's really their version of themselves or what they agree with other people about who they are. Nobody's either one of those, but everybody's made up of those and a lot more. So this is what I'm talking about is psychology, but I think it's a different school. So a lot of the people who were in that mental institution where Jesus was living were psychiatrists or psychologists of the school of get that guy to, you know, don't recognize that guy's reality. So they weren't very motherly. So somebody has to mother this person out of that.

[32:24]

And some psychologists don't. So I think what they're doing is not always wrong. It's maybe some other time that they should play that game. What I'd like to do is I'd like to hear your situation and talk about what would help you relax. You heard me out. As you know, my grandson and my son are abroad. They're in Cuba. Two days ago, I learned that my grandson has an ear infection, which has to be provided after health.

[33:29]

They're supposed to come back in 25 days. And later, my grandson told me that his ear is kind of clear. Some years ago, my near doctor did not allow me to travel for a whole week under the same circumstances. But I'm almost ready. I'll consult with some other doctor, but I'm almost ready to tell my son. not to come back until this year. That's clear. That's a big, big thing. So I find that my fear for my grandsons, I don't know what will happen to them. They're great, but they're tense about my role with them and about what will happen to them. If he takes off from that airplane, his hair grows very sore.

[34:37]

So I feel very unwise at this moment because I'm just printed with tension and ungratefulness about it. Well, at least I heard you right. Did you relax? I just gave you some feedback. So what else do you need to relax besides having that I heard you describe the situation? What else do you need to relax? Theoretically, if I could just be in a moment and not think about what could happen tomorrow to Eric. In other words, just not think of any of the possibilities that are to think.

[35:51]

And I know I think he will say, can you relax? Yeah, so I don't... Are you saying that if you didn't think about his situation, you'd think that under those conditions, if you're not thinking about it, that you'd be able to relax? If I didn't think about harming something to him. If you didn't? As a matter of fact, there's no harm to him right now. He only does near infection. Now, at this moment. You only... This harm would happen if... So, so is it, would you think it would be alright if you, if in the next few minutes anyway, you didn't think about any harm coming to him? Would that, think that would be okay? I was wise. Hmm? If I was a wise person, this is another thing that's just about myself. Are you requiring that, are you requiring that, are you requiring that you be wise as a condition for you to relax?

[36:55]

Huh? Huh? Yeah, it's the other way around. Yes, so what conditions do you need to relax? And you proposed that if you didn't think about him being harmed, you'd be able to relax. So can you, for example, in the next five minutes, do you think you'd be able to just like perhaps not think about him being harmed? Would that be all right with you? Yes. Okay, is there anything else you need to relax right now? Okay. Are you relaxed? Are you telling me, are you relaxed? I'm asking you if you're relaxed. No. No. Is there something else you need to relax? Is there anything else you need to relax, anything else you can think of that would help you relax right now? Maybe you could think about that.

[38:04]

Think about what might promote you being relaxed right now. Not necessarily, you know, not necessarily next Tuesday, which I understand there's going to be a class here. But just in the next few minutes, you know, maybe you could get an experience of relaxing just in the next few minutes. Maybe you would Can any of you, can all of you, just allow yourselves to be relaxed now? And if you can't, is there anything you need that would help you relax? Do you feel, any of you feel like if you relaxed you would be like being irresponsible? And if so, how can we deal with that sense of responsibility to find, you know, some way for you to feel permitted to basically let go? of whatever's hindering you from relaxing in the midst of what's going on.

[39:10]

I can think of some things that do hinder relaxation, and that's part of what I was just talking about before. If you are out of touch inwardly or outwardly, that out-of-touchness will tell you not to relax. Is there any way you can put it, any way you can express it, any sense that you have that you're not allowed to relax right now, that you feel hindered in relaxing in the midst of what's happening? Do you have any way to? Yes, Roger? Sometimes you need to come up with what seems like a plan to know that you've done the responsible thing. For instance, if you're worried about your grandchild coming back with an air infection in the first year term, that could be a serious thing. So if you come up with a plan, Like right now, there's nothing that could be done. There's no sense in not relaxing. But it would be good to take the matter seriously and formulate some sort of action steps and to know that.

[40:12]

So that might be a requirement for relaxation. If you had a contingency plan, and just in case certain things happen, and you had taken care of that, then you could just set that down and use that if you needed it. Right. And then you could say, relax first without doing it later. Yeah. And you could sometimes make a contingency plan. Right. Yeah. All right. Michael? This past week, my son had a diagnosed retinoblastoma. And I had a real hard time trying to deal with, what was cancer going to be? What is the future? And I guess, for me, the one thing that's helped me the most is to research it, to find out as much information as I can. Because I think my fear is that he was going to grow up to be a guy with a big patch on his eye and look like Captain Hook.

[41:18]

Somewhere in the back of my mind, that was one of the things I think I had to just, it was kind of propelling me to really feel sad. This was the worst thing that could have happened to him. Fortunately, it looks like it's testing his right eye. It hasn't gone to his other eye. I'm afraid I think so. But sometimes I would try to, you know, think of the positive side of it. But I guess the most important thing for me, I guess, I guess, to really kind of research it. Yeah. To try to sort of have an understanding of it, but at the same time, there is this ambiguity that you're never 100% certain what it is. Try to live with that a little. Right. And even if, even if, yeah. no matter how much you research, you still have your inner, your inner world which is constantly being creative with whatever you find out. Yeah, and you can't stop that, you know.

[42:21]

But there's another side which also needs work. So you did that side. You did external research, objective research. But at the same time, also need to take care of how you feel as a father and how your father's mind is being creative with everything you find out. And your research also involves looking at your son. It's also part of the research. So that's part of the work. And then what else do you need to be able to relax with all that information? You need to be able to inner and outer, intra-psychic and interpersonal stuff? And what else do you need to be able to relax into the middle space? Yes? I think that it's okay, whatever it comes, it's okay.

[43:25]

Whomever I am, it's okay. You know, it may not be what I really want it to be. You know, when I observe myself, sometimes I'm much less than I thought I am. And then if I don't like myself in that moment, that's really the worst. And it's very painful just to reject who I am. And I remember I just said, okay, I have a little bit of compassion for myself, but it's okay. And I believed it. I was like that two days ago. I was disliking myself so much. Actually, because of last week here, I was just judging myself and having myself down and with the thought back and forth, you know. And then I was watching on YouTube this person that we know, this guy, voice came and goes right to my heart. And then the tears came out.

[44:27]

And then I just, I don't know, as soon as I just cry for whatever. Yeah. So one of the conditions for relaxation is sometimes to listen to Placido Domingo. Listening to him is maybe receiving Buddhist compassion. You listen to him, Maybe he reminds you of compassion, so that maybe helps you relax. Just like some women, when they see a baby, they wet their shirt with milk. They let down, right? If you have a letdown response and the milk flows, they relax when they see the baby. So that's sometimes, for some women, that seeing a baby's face is a condition for relaxing. And so I think it's basically we need to have a set up, make arrangements.

[45:32]

This is like making arrangements for samadhi, like making arrangements to enter into mental one-pointedness. And just be, I don't know what, honest about what we need to feel allowed to do that. And making those arrangements is also the work itself. Dorit, would you have your hand up? Sometimes when I'm in this relaxing mode or something, I'm not quite sure what to do. It's harder to control yourself. It's harder to control yourself when you're relaxed? All these people come up, and they're mean, but they're not exactly appropriate for whatever situation they're in, necessarily.

[46:40]

I mean, all these different Doritos. Yeah. I remember my old place. My boss would walk by and go, . That's an easy one to deal with. Yeah, it's confusing. I mean, sometimes it's a sexual person, not meaning to be, but maybe interpreted that way, or sometimes... You mean one of the Dorites that comes up is a sexual Dorite? Is that what you mean? Well, it's just who I am, but I think it's just me being awake and smiling at people. Oh, I see. And it's being interpreted in an odd way, or sometimes it's a very... Yeah. Is that an extremely lovely place to be? And I don't necessarily like relaxing. Even I would be glad to. Well, that in itself wouldn't necessarily be relaxing. But as you said, when you're relaxed, that might happen.

[47:41]

So part of what relaxation makes possible is to be alone with other people. Usually, It's rather challenging to be alone with someone else. That's rather difficult. Right, you don't get it. So usually we feel like, well, when nobody's around, I'm alone, and when somebody else is there, I'm not alone. Right? That's the way a lot of people would feel, right? But part of what you need to learn to do is to be alone when you're with someone. But that is a more advanced stage than just being able to play, for example, by yourself. So if you're just sitting there in the office or wherever and relaxed, you start playing and then you're like going, you're smiling or you're dancing on your chair or something. You're doing something maybe in harmony with a kind of playful spirit which arose from you relaxing.

[48:48]

You go into work. You know, and you get into the office and nobody's around, and you relax, and when you're relaxation, you know, your muscles in your face start changing. Right? It can happen, right? Yeah, when you're relaxed, almost anything can happen, right? As usual. But when we're tense, we feel like, well, that can't happen, and that can't happen, and that can't happen. When we're relaxed, it's more like, well, maybe we're open to the possibilities. So, in fact, if you're alone and you're relaxed, this stuff comes out, all these different persons. Okay? If somebody else walks in, then some of these people, you may feel like they're not permitted because you're not alone anymore. So to continue to act like you are when you're alone with somebody else is an advancement in this practice.

[49:52]

No, that's the point. Well, actually, they're still there, but when you feel alone, they aren't. So that's, again, part of what we need to learn how to do is how to be alone And relax with that, and then be alone with somebody else in the presence of someone else. And be alone in the presence of somebody else means they're kind of like not there for a little bit. And again, as I mentioned last week, that's similar to being alone with somebody and respecting them. Because usually when we're with somebody, say, okay, now I'm here, now somebody else shows up, and we deal with the person that shows up as the person, who the person is. rather than when the person shows up we realize we're in someone else's presence and we go back to being alone namely realizing what's going on with us and forgetting about them for a minute and then looking at them again after we remember ourselves but if we look at them without including ourselves we don't see them very clearly because we're projecting something on them which we're not taking credit for namely our fantasies about them so in fact

[51:12]

Being alone with somebody else is hard because we feel like we're not allowed to be alone when we're with someone else. We have to constantly attend to the shared reality and what do they need. I should say we always feel that way, but there's some pressure we may feel to, like, do that. Plus, we're attending often to what their interpretation of us is. I think that's part of what you're raising as a problem. How does what I'm talking about go with that? I'm talking about how to find the place where you can witness this person, whoever it is, Dorit or Elena, where you can witness Dorit born in the advent of all things. When you witness that person who is born in the coming of all things, then when you act from that, you act appropriately.

[52:18]

That's the proposal, because you're acting from the witnessing of the creation of yourself. But it's a fuller and deeper realization of the creation of yourself when you can witness yourself being born in the presence of another human being. because we're very attuned to tense up around other human beings when they make certain facial expressions and so on. And when they start interpreting our facial expressions, So we may be able to be relaxed when we're alone. Somebody else shows up and we tense up. So part of Zen practice is people go and sit in the meditation hall and they learn to relax. In their relaxation, they open to creation, to creativity. They see how they're made. They understand who they are.

[53:21]

Then the next step is you go see the teacher and see if when you're now in the presence of the teacher, you can relax again. And oftentimes they can't. What? Pardon? What about it? Yeah, if you go and see the teacher and then you tense up, then maybe if you hear inside, you know, then maybe you relax again in the presence of the other, which means you forget about the teacher, the big teacher, all like, you know, and you hear this inner thing, you know, and you relax with the teacher there. So you're alone again. The teacher's not there to sort of make you tense up. Then you relax. Then you open your eyes again, and when you see the teacher's face from that relaxation, then the teacher's face gives you birth. You see yourself born by the arrival of the teacher's face.

[54:23]

But when you first walk in, if you tense up, then the teacher's face is there. When you tense up, you're there, and then there's the teacher's face, and then you tense up more. Or maybe you don't tense up when you first come in, but you see the teacher's face and then you feel like me and him or me and her. So then you're tensing up, you're cutting yourself out, you don't see it again. Does that make any sense to read? Wow. Yeah, definitely. Definitely. Well, okay, I think okay is not really accepting. Okay, okay is more like patting yourself on the back. Accepting is more like actually whether okay or not okay is not really the issue.

[55:28]

Even if it's not okay, I still accept it. So making, again, I said a few weeks ago, making mistakes is not that the mistakes are okay. It's that you're going to learn from them. It's not that tense is okay. That's just the backside of not okay. Don't get into the okay and not okay. Just get into, I'm tense. Now, if you do judge it, then accept that you judged. But the judgment okay is not the same as accepting that you're just tensed. It's just another trip, another comment, which also should be accepted if you're going to relax. So again, confessing that you're tense can be done, you can learn to confess that you're tense in such a way that you just state the facts, just recognizing this tension which is blocking you from relaxing, which is based on that you don't trust the situation as really what you're going to work with.

[56:33]

You're a little bit resisting, trying to get control of it still. So you confess that, and you confess that, and you confess that. And by learning to confess, and repeatedly confessing the power of the confession, and we also say repentance, which means, repentance means to reiterate that you would like to relax. and also reiterate that you think it would be good to relax, that this would be a good thing, but you didn't do it. By this confession and repentance, you melt away the root of the tensing reflex. That's part of the process. Does that make sense? Rochelle? Who are you confessing to? To yourself? You start with yourself, I think. And again, after you confess to yourself, then deepening the practice goes to confess to another. So if you can confess to yourself, in other words, note to yourself, I'm tensing, I'm judging, and you feel like you're doing that pretty smoothly, I mean, you know, in a pretty relaxed, matter-of-fact way, like, yeah, you know, and you're not really worried about making mistakes, you're just noting the mistakes, noting the mistakes.

[57:45]

You even tell yourself, bodhisattvas do this, bodhisattvas... Acknowledge their mistakes. That's part of their job is to acknowledge their mistakes. It's not like this is a spiritual practice So no problem Okay, then go do it with somebody else just like before when you felt like you could see Whenever you can do a practice like that go do it with somebody else to see if you can continue because it's more dynamic with somebody else part of the way you have to do it is go be with somebody else and Basically be alone with them for a while And then... Because when you first go, you do think there's somebody else. That's how you get there. And then you arrive and you forget it, that they're there. And then you reemerge to see them. And then, when you see them, then they really add to the... Or you hear them, then they really add to your process. So in a kind of practical way, if you can go and tell somebody something...

[58:47]

almost as though they aren't there. In other words, be as relaxed, even when you first tell yourself the bad things about yourself, even when I tell some myself and I admit my own mistakes, it takes me a while to relax with it, to kind of just say, okay, some things are pretty bad that I've done, you know. It takes a while to like just say, okay, I did that, okay, you know. But now I've adjusted. I've accepted this big mistake or this big unskillfulness I did. That's good. Now it's like I've really recognized and I'm not trying to avoid it anymore. It's part of my life. This is part of my past. Now, can I go and bring it up again and... and be relaxed and listen to the response. And then sometimes you get more information about it. Usually you get more information about when the other person's included in the process.

[59:55]

But then again, can you relax with that and integrate that? So you sort of do start with yourself, though, usually, otherwise you don't have anything to report. and then go do it before a Buddha or representative of a Buddha. Does that make sense? Gloria? I know about ten things that are so terrible What I was thinking about is, I know I'm at my absolute best, I doubt about it, but I'm relaxed, more relaxed. That's just the way it is, the better things. Well, I'm not trying to build around it, but then at the same time I realize that somehow I've learned or mislearned to not trust relaxation. It's supposed to be something... That's some weird objective, or misapprehension about objective reality, is that relaxation is linked to laziness.

[61:02]

You know, so there's this thing that goes on about relaxing. Right, thinking that trust and relaxation, or relaxing are kind of the same thing, but they're so closely related. Trust and relaxation are very close, yeah. So, before I go down to darkness, which came first critical about trusting and relaxing, like trusting in a child. But then that is relaxing. Yeah, they're very close. We don't have to separate them. That's why I ask, you know, what do you need to trust the situation or trust that the situation is allowing you to relax? And part of it is that there's a little voice, a little devil in the ear which says, you know, relaxation is lazy or relaxation is not diligent.

[62:11]

And... Again, relaxation, if you're, I don't know what, if you're doing, I remember that in order to learn, the best learning happens when you're relaxed, but again, relaxed doesn't mean that there's no muscle tone. You can be standing up on your two feet and be relaxed, but there is some muscle tone there. You can be jumping through the air and there is muscular activity, and there can be relaxation. So relaxation doesn't mean that there isn't a lot of energy there. You watch some athletes, you know, they're making a tremendous expression of energy and activity, and they're simultaneously relaxed. Dancers, singers, Placido Domingo, right? Tremendous energy and relaxation. being expressed there of the breath moving through the body and the body relaxed and becoming this wonderful resonant, resonatory surface for this breath.

[63:23]

Because he's trained all these muscles to relax while the diaphragm and everything, the lungs are working to produce this air moving through this relaxed space. So a lot of what voice training is about is to get us to relax in here, right? If any of you have taken voice lessons, a lot of exercise is to relax here, to let the breath move through. So it isn't just relaxation. It's relaxation in the context of having this living organism. So we do need to sort of convince ourselves that relaxation does help us be very active, fully active and calm in the activity. The organism doesn't end at the end of your nose?

[64:30]

Yeah, the organism doesn't end at your nose and doesn't start at your nose, but it does need your nose. It depends on your nose, but your nose isn't the beginning and the end of the organism. So we need your nose, your eyes, your ears and so on, all that to make you, but we also need everything else to make you too. The question is how to enter into the vision of your creation, moment by moment. That's the challenge. But it naturally unfolds. This is revealed to us in this space between these two realms, which again, in order to make sure you're between them, you sort of have to be in touch with both.

[65:49]

So there's the dynamism, there's the relationship, and there's a space which isn't either one of them, and that's the dependent core rising space. And that can be revealed to us if we just relax between these two sides. Well, the person who's playing the role of the teacher is hopefully doing the same thing with the person coming to visit the teacher, namely you know, forgetting the appearance of the person for a moment, relaxing with the appearance of the person, respecting the person who's visiting too, like, this is a good student, okay, well, it's nice to see, but forget it.

[66:58]

Now, who is this? This is an attractive person, this is a challenging person, okay? Well, relax with that. And then what happens? Well, it's my vow. I'm not saying I'm always there, but if I'm not there, if I see you or I see someone and I just see them and that's the end of the story, then I confess that I'm dead in the water. you know, that I'm just stuck with, like, I'm dealing with the appearance of this person, you know, and it's like there was me and now there's them. So I'm in the realm of delusion, of here I was and now I see you, and now I'm going to talk to you. So if I see that, then I should confess that I'm in the static realm of me and you, rather than the realm of me, you, and forget that.

[68:08]

relax with that, let go of that. And then what happens? And then there's me. Because there's you. So my vow is to enter that space, but if I don't, if I'm not in that space, if I'm not, if I'm one side or the other, then I should confess that I'm sort of out of it. And then I'm playing, you know, I'm afraid to enter the real creative space of the relationship. So I just confess it over and over, and that helps me be more confident in it, and it helps me relax. My confession helps me relax. I'm not afraid to be a lousy meditator. I'm not afraid to be stuck in my old ways. I'm not afraid to tense up. So then I don't have to hide that from myself if that happens. Then I can learn from the mistake of being kind of lazy and inattentive and just stuck in my basic human habits.

[69:18]

That's the power of the confession. And most of us have plenty of opportunities. So we need to feel good about it so we don't miss all these opportunities to confess And then in the process of confess, relax, and then we've just addressed the problem of tensing. Any people who haven't spoken who would like to speak? Yes? Yes? I did this not very carefully. Playing basketball, or trying to play basketball, and a fellow who normally runs the roster .

[70:27]

And I only had 34 points, which dropped to 25, which dropped to 720. went right out the window. I was kind of frantic, because maybe I could get nothing from what was in there. And it didn't do any good to be frantic at all. I did open it one weekend. And so, yes. And now, I need to talk to a couple of people who I got a little upset with because we couldn't get the game going. So, now I need to confess to them that I was really, you know, I, I, it was a compliment.

[71:27]

I was not going to just let it go. You didn't feel permission to relax with the situation? You didn't see this as a great opportunity for meditation? That's right. And that's where I came from. By the way, may I make a comment on what you said? When you confess, it's good not to, like, preface it with evaluating the confession as light or heavy. You know, like, I have a very small thing to confess here. This is not a big deal. So if you notice that, notice that you're probably, like, a little bit still hedging your bets, so to speak.

[72:30]

I'm not saying that what you did was heavy or whatever. But just that you start out by saying... Well, you see what I'm saying? You're saying it's not earth-shattering, right? So that's your closing off the earth-shatteringness. This confession could have been earth-shattering. It could have shattered, you know, your... Huh? Well, you may hope not, but... It's okay to hope not, right? But it's also okay... What's important is that... For me, what's important is that even when the earth's shattered, you can be enlightened, that you can be happy even when the earth gets shattered. I'm not here to prevent the earth getting shattered. It will be shattered, as far as I know. But I'm hoping that we can learn to meet a earth-shattering experience and be happy. But if we go around saying, you know, trying to arrange for things not to be earth-shattering, then we're not going to relax. So a confession could be earth-shattering, but facing that earth-shattering quality of the situation could show you that you can find happiness in a small town in Colorado.

[73:47]

A small mining town in Colorado. That's a radio show from the 50s. Can a girl from a small mining town in Colorado find happiness with her English lord? But that's really what it's about. That's what this practice is about is to be able to be happy meeting whatever comes. You know, for example, having your basketball game just blown out of existence. So I didn't get to play basketball, but I did learn a lot about meditation that day. And actually, you did learn something that day, actually. You learned something because what you reported shows that you were aware. Whereas if you had gotten to play the basketball game, maybe something else good would have happened, but you might not have learned anything about meditation. But I think you did learn something about meditation.

[74:56]

by that, from that basketball, from that lack of basketball, or from that diminished basketball. John plays basketball, too. Used to. Yeah, it's a very painful thing for me right now. It's so bad. Today, it's such a difficult thing. It's part of my identity. Right. You know, it's... When you were talking about purpose, about not a big deal, it's like, you know, I beat myself up with the idea, you know, because I feel like, well, if I don't play basketball, it's not a big deal. It shouldn't be a big deal. People are like, oh, you know, but it's very hard to be honest. You know, it's the whole thing. What's going on? What's going on? But it's so easy to just, like, get out of balance just by getting frustrated with my response.

[76:02]

You know, I don't have the expectation that things are going to be easy. I prefer for my world to be shattered, but I get mad when I get frustrated because I'm kind of relaxed with my world shattered. So that's where I'm from. So I'm kind of relaxed with that frustration of... I think I was very relaxed here. I mean, I felt like I came out of a week of not being relaxed, just being like this. And, you know, it's the idea of being relaxed here. It's really easy to be relaxed here. But I was worried about us not getting in the car. Wow, you need a chauffeur. Well, you know, we have here lots of opportunities for confession. I have a question about confession. My confession, I feel personally, I had this habit of just confessing too quickly and easily.

[77:33]

It's a problem, a hard time. I refused hard as you could. It's easy to deflect, and so I almost feel like I should deny myself. Like, I don't know. That's great, thank you. Well, I think you need a confessor. Not just somebody who's going to, like, you know, let you confess too easily and just sort of say, you know, nothing.

[78:42]

But somebody who, after you confess to them, you say, well, how was that? You know? And they might say, you know, it was too quick. That was too quick, John. It's okay, yeah, right? Yeah, yeah, the people... Yeah, this is a lot of... Do we have to go along with it? Do you have to go along with it? Yeah, probably, it would be a good idea. Okay. Okay. But, you know, one of the ways of confessing is to do it really quickly so that people will say, oh, no, it's okay. But if you do it too quickly, some people, they say, you know, do you want some feedback on that? Not on what you said so much, but the way you said it.

[79:44]

So I gave Roy feedback that he started out his confession by saying, this is not, this is, he told me what kind of a confession it was before he gave it to me. This is a light confession. This is a brown confession. This is a big one. So people, they rank the confession. And sometimes they say, and also, I want you to know beforehand that I know this, this, this, and this about it. So I say, okay, you know, listen to that. And then after they're done, I say, what, do you want some feedback on the confession? No. No. I'm done. Okay? Fine." So I think that's part of the reason why I... Because a lot of people are not up for it. They want to get away from the whole situation of you apologizing, because they know it's a dangerous situation. If they agree with you, they might get in trouble. You might ask them to confess something.

[80:50]

So you kind of need to give it space for somebody to really be able to listen to you and then say, you know, I don't understand what you're talking about or whatever. And then you have to tell them more or whatever. And then it's, you know, you get better at it. And they get better at listening to you. And you develop this of musical relationship but it's it's a big deal to have a friendship like that and not some people are just not for the intensity of it right i mean it's like Yeah, right. Right. And even when it comes to something little like, sorry I'm late. To just say that, you know, like, I'm sorry I'm late.

[81:55]

Yeah. Well, I'll tell you, I'll tell you that I'm glad you came. And, but I'm just saying that people oftentimes say, sorry, I'm a little late or kind of late. Or sometimes they say, sorry, I'm very late. But there's something in the modification of the confession that disperses the, you know, the simple presence with it and makes it kind of like you know what should you respond to the fact that they're hedging it or what they said or you know do they want to hear about this whereas the person just comes on and plunks it down you know that's not that easy to do just just simply state really what you mean to say indicate precisely what you mean to say just say that it takes practice to get that just like that

[83:08]

And the other people can help us get it right on. And it really, it's very grounding and very relaxing. And, yeah. Anyway, this isn't the last class, so I'll see you next week. And I'll be coming to you from Sashin. So I'll bring you the... I'll bring with you the early session in mind. And I appreciate the good attendance as well. Thank you very much.

[83:50]

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