last weekend we had a retreat at mount madonna and the topic of the retreat was two ways of entering buddha's wisdom
one way is
within within the psyche interests psychic
and the other way is
interpersonal
soda the interest psychic way is i would say
practicing stillness
and interpersonal way issue you go and made a teacher and listened to the teaching or ask about the teacher but i would also apropos of today say
you go to the you go to the teacher and
you express yourself and ask questions and
get feedback
but you can also go and be quiet and received the teachings to both of those are going on so this could be applied to
these two dimensions can be applied to the
we're talking about this morning as at you in into psychically you
receive something you receive it in your mind you receive
the teachings
in your mind your receives the bodhisattva precepts
and in your mind you might
think oh they're really good i really want to practice practices and then you aspire to them
and then you watch
the receiving in the aspiring and the practicing within your mind
then you also go and talk to teacher and you tell me they tell the teacher how it's going
or asked the teacher for more information about the precepts which you have received in which you're trying to practice
and we need both of these we need to work on
ah the teachings in our own mind and we need to work and read to dialogue with
others about how we're doing the practice
so the
the interest psychic has been described as
practice and enlightenment or unifying the practice was enlightenment within your own body and mind
going to see the teacher helps us let our mind move freely with the teaching
so that the dialogue with the teacher on the teaching can help us
interact with such a way that our mind works freely with the teaching
and so there are no so many examples of the dialogue
and showing points of sticking and point of release

so into psychically you know i could have a dream
i have a wish in my mind and body for the way i wanna live
and then i go and tell someone my dream i tell someone my wish

and then you up
you get some feedback on your wish and your understanding of your wish
and you any other person
work is such a way that you get a bigger perspective on your wish than you can get just in your own mind
and then you go back to work you with your mind
and then also you learn when you're dialoguing
when your interpersonal relating you learn how to work within your mind at the same time
so for example you could be receiving the precept of stillness
and aspiring to practice stillness and practicing stillness
within your own mind
and then you go see the teacher you start talking about this receiving an aspiring to stillness and why you're talking
he had the opportunity to continue to receive
and practice of stillness why you're talking about the practice
and some people they are feel that they're doing quite well in their own mind receiving an aspiring and practicing stillness but when they start talking to someone
the kids you know what were disoriented
in the car in the words because words can
can turn us

and
or you could you could go you could be contemplating within your own psyche within your own body mind the practice of stillness and you go to meet someone and you know that if you start talking to them or if they start talking you know that the conversation
one might be disorienting so you tense up and try to hold on to your contemplation of stillness you become rigid because you don't want to get disoriented from your practice while you're talking even to a teacher about the practice
and then the conversation might go on such that maybe is it the teacher or the the relationship is such that they holding to this wonderful practice is revealed and you can notice that
got this practice and it is wonderful but you're holding onto it
and maybe the teachers like
touching that holding point and say can you take care of this teaching that you've received in that year aspiring to can you take care of it without holding onto it
can you uphold it
and let go of it
so one way is people either go to meet the teacher and tight tense up so that the conversation will not disorient them or they go and the conversation does disorient because partner they're flexible
and lot of people don't go to the teacher at all because if they kind of know that they might get disoriented
and sometimes people come to talk about teaching and the teacher feels that ah
they can't really discuss it anymore until the person goes and contemplated themselves like someone might come and say i'd like to receive the teaching about stillness and the teacher might say why don't you go
and sit quietly and said still with your wish to receive the transmission of the teaching of stillness want to do that before you come and talk to me about it
that make sense in other words you're not you need to you need to work within yourself with this wish to receive the teaching of stillness once you feel like you have received it within your mind then come to me and we can see if we can discuss it
and to see if you're open to being disoriented
so are two stories come to mind
one is that one of suzuki rate oh em anyway somebody was sitting in meditation
and it was raining
and he heard the ring
and then at the same time you heard the rain he also heard the sound of a waterfall in the distance so heard the waterfall and the rain at the same time and then somebody hit
the wooden board
and till he went to the teacher and he said
what is the place where the sound of the wooden board and the sound of the waterfall and the sound of the rain meet

and then from the song of the jewel mere samadi you could say what the placed a meters in that samadhi
but are you know
you can say that and then the precious mirror somebody sit says
true eternity still flows
they meet and you could say they all meet in eternity
anyway the teachers and said true eternity still floors where do they meet true eternity still flows and then the students said is there anything beyond that the teacher said yes break the mirror and bring it to me
and we can meet
so in this case
didn't see much sticking to teachers giving to instructions about not sticking
this place that you'd asked me about where this sounds meet there is a place like that but it's not something you can get a hold of this wonderful place is flowing and student accepted this instruction that he says any more than that he might not have been trying to get hold of it again and he might not
been trying to get a hold of in the beginning but just it he was sort of asked where is it
and the teacher said
wherever it is it flows you can't get hold of it and then he could is against it is there anything beyond that without trying to get it again but just wondering teacher says break the mirror
and bring it to me and we can meet
so the teachers instructing
giving instructions about how to work with stillness without getting stuck in working with stillness
another story is the one about
the director of the monastery
and the teacher the teacher's name is dharma i and the teacher dharma i said to the director of the temple why don't you ever come and talk to me why don't you ever do interpersonal practice with me
why don't you come and listen to the teaching why don't you come and tell me about your practice and dialogue with me so i can see if you have any sticking points
but he didn't say all that he just says why don't you come and see me
so the monk was practicing the the director the monastery monk was practicing and to psychically some way or another
though
we don't know how how do we know how because he comes to meet us and talked to us about it
so everybody's working and to psychically but how are they working
did they know maybe do i know no
if they come and tell me that i know then then i'm sorry to find out how they're working and to psychically
how they're working interest psychically so they don't come and meet me
and maybe the work with way they're working into psychically as they think i'm already enlightened i don't need to go interact interpersonal anymore i don't need a teacher to help me like not be stuck in my understanding because i'm i have a perfect understanding and i'm not stuck in it so therefore i don't have to go see the teacher
so i don't go see the teacher but then the teacher says to me why don't you come see me sometime
and then i tell the teacher and is the to the director tells the teacher or didn't you know
that i had entry into enlightenment was set with this other teacher
so in fact he was hurt working interest psychically
like we all do and guess what was going on there
he thought he had completely enlightened understanding of the teaching so what need to talk him so and his understanding which he thought was complete he wasn't it was didn't necessitate going to dialogue anymore
this is a mistake
the teacher the enlightened teacher he needs to dialogue why doesn't the enlightened student
the teacher needs of students to come and talk that's the kind of enlightenment they have it's not like i'm enlightened slider to see the teacher plus i don't need to talk to students
i'm fine
some
teachers don't think they need students to come and talk about the dharma with them
some students think they're enlightened and one hundred off to teacher this is example here the director thought he had enlightened with another teacher therefore i didn't have to go talk to this one
but this one was wondering why didn't come because this one doesn't think that anybody doesn't need to come everybody needs to come the enlightened ones need to come and to see if there are attached to their enlightenment the unenlightened ones need to come and get education in their enlightenment
but the director thought not necessary
because i already had enlightenment enough so the teacher says oh yeah well tell me about it so he told him about it

he said i asked
the teacher what is the self of the student and the teacher said the fire god comes
bearing fire
and i understood
and then teach teacher fi dharma i said well how did you understand
and he explained
and
the teacher said ah what i thought you didn't understand

but the director actually was kind of holding on to that he did understand so in a teacher said he didn't he had some trouble with that
he got severely disoriented and got angry and didn't
attack the teacher but just left the monastery
so he hadn't understanding he was holding onto it he may not have known he was holding onto it but when he went to the teach but because he was holding onto it he didn't go through the teacher
so all the people who are holding onto their enlightenment not all of them a lot of em don't go see the teacher they don't think they need it plus de on some level may feel like what the teacher disagrees with me i don't want to hear about that
but some do com
anyway
this one didn't really come he got invited without him ask him to come to teacher gave him an interview that he didn't want
and then the teacher seem to find out that he was stuck in his enlightenment and didn't want any back talk
but then a teacher gave him back talk and again he didn't walk back talk and he left
and after you left
as he was walking away thought one
he is a well-known teacher and he does have
ah fifteen hundred students so maybe he has something to offer maybe i'll give him another chance so he went back
and also after he left the teacher said to the attendant if that monk comes back he can be liberated if he doesn't come back he will not be able to be liberated
so if we are holding onto our understanding or holding onto our mind
and the teacher pushes on it and we run away
it's not too late if we come back
but if we don't come back
we can't be helped
and if we're not holding on then we naturally would offer our understanding to be interacted with
so he didn't come back and ah
and any any several please i'm open to some instruction so the teacher said
asked me the same question you asked the other teacher so he did he said what is the self with a student and the teacher said fire god brings comes
bearing fire and he he can say he woke up again or you could say he woke up for the first time and this time when you woke up
he was not attached her as understanding
don't
so when we aspire to these precepts
and try to and try to practice them sometimes we feel like we're not i'm not doing well with these precepts so we go talk to the teacher and the teacher and we confess and repent and then the teacher in or accessed with us in such a way that although we did have the story of our failure
and we're sorry about that
our mind doesn't need to be stuck in that story the story that we failed the story that we
he transgressed but an order to not dwell in the story that we transgressed we have to go tell the story that we transgressed to see if we can tell it
without getting stuck in it
so interest we tell the story into personally to see if we can enter psychically not be stuck in telling a story
so are you can tell the story of i try i transgressed into being stuck i confess i got stuck i sorry i got stuck and now i'm telling you i got stuck and now that i'm telling you i got stuck i'm not stuck
teachers and name doesn't have to even say anything you can say i'm stuck
and then you could say i'm not stuck and they teach you can say you're stuck and you can say i hear you and you don't know to talking about and a teacher can say you're right i don't know what i'm talking about

that's going is think i confess i transgressed k
but we're not supposed to dwell on that
i could also go and sake guess what happened i am not transgressing anymore
and now is that but i'm not dwelling in that story i just told you i'm not transgressing but that is my story i'm so happy i'm not transgressing but i'm even more happy that i don't dwell on that story i don't abide in the story of no more transgressions
and the teacher says great i have a medal of honor for you may i pinned it on
and student runs out of the room no no don't get me that metal teacher setting very good see you later

so once again there is the possibility of receiving the gift of all kinds of teachings and practices aspiring to practice them and
then trying and having stories that we are successful
that moment hey i think i wasn't happy stories of how we're doing with these practices
that's how we work and then we bring our work to an interpersonal interaction to get help to make sure we're on
missing
something or that were not skinny stuck in our work yes
how did you break it i didn't hear about that part
the teacher just said break the mirror and and come to me didn't it didn't say about and breaking the mere the story ends then
but but we can say how do you break the mirror jackie
yeah
your question is how to high break the mirror right
how do i break to me yeah i think how do i break the mere that that could be an extension of the story which i didn't hear about
so i didn't i didn't hear he broke the mirror but you can ask after hearing that story i'm wondering how i can break the mirror
how'd you make the teacher i i would break the mirror by practicing stillness with the mirror
anybody got a mere on him
pass me a mere and i vow to practice stillness with it and if i practice stillness with the mirror
didn't get broken
not because i break it
but because i'm not attached to the precious mirror samadi
like the precious mere somebody says about itself
if you if you touch if you touch me i'll break if you turn away from me i'll break so by being still
it'll break to
there was three at the same time okay one
i would break the mirror by singing the old song in any anyway
two
where
three
me off guard
for i'm curious about the role of
the about the relationship with a teacher but what about the song that appears same you erect you really inner personally with the sanga around your practice
but the song is not in a rare interview room so you actually go meet the teacher but if you go to other people i like you're going to meet the teacher even though they're not called efficiently teacher that's that's good
if you go to other people respecting them and asking them questions about the dharma and listening to their teaching of the dharma and then intended you're going to the teacher
if you go to interact with people and you're not talking about the dharma
and you're not listening to the dharma then that's not we're talking about
that's the way you talk to people that's what we're talking about and if you of course if you go to the teacher not a iran this course is almost of course that if you go to the teacher what you're gonna be talking about is the dharma
the teacher it you know is kind of a special a straight so you're not going to talk to teach her about not the dharma
that really wouldn't be appropriate as the teacher doesn't know anything about that
so you gotta talk teacher about the dharma
he listened to it you ask questions about it if you relate to other people that way then that's what we're talking about

thank you very much for another lovely day i hope this was a new song
may i