And that we're hanging in an empty space. This window isn't connected to anything. This thing is in empty space. Like us, right? We're on this planet. Floating in empty space, affected by all kinds of things. And... This image is given by Dogen Zenji's teacher, Ru Jing. It's an image of what we call bodhisattva, somebody who is training to be a Buddha for the sake of all beings. So kind of at the seed. center of the window is the vow to devote one's life to helping all beings realize freedom and peace and happiness under the circumstances of this world.

[01:23]

And in order to help this seed develop, there's two practices or two types of two, not two practices, but two domains that need to be developed or two causes which help this seed develop. One cause is what's sometimes called merit. The other cause is non-dual meditation. The combination of these three things, aspiration, altruistic aspiration of enlightenment, merit, and non-dua meditation brings this seed to fruition, brings this seed to maturity.

[02:48]

So these two areas can be subsumed, can be presented by what we call the six paramitas. OK, six paramitas are number one is giving, number two is ethics, number three Patience. Number four is enthusiasm. Number five is concentration. Okay? Those five practices equal merit. So the first five, first five of these are the merit side. These also are sometimes spoken of as developing compassion, these first five.

[03:50]

And then coupled with these first five is the sixth, which is what we call perfect wisdom, or wisdom which is beyond wisdom, wisdom after wisdom, which is non-dual meditation. You couple that kind of wisdom with giving, ethics, patience, enthusiasm, and concentration. Together, they bring this seed to maturity completely. awakening. Okay? And the image of the wind bell is the image of non-dual meditation. So in the koan class, the emphasis is on non-dual meditation, not so much emphasis on giving ethics. They're there, but they aren't sort of obvious what's what's the primary thing in these stories is non is a non dual a non dual meditation non dual awareness non dual life okay so we talked the practice period has now talked a little bit about giving and we can go into more detail later hopefully but

[05:18]

And we talked a little bit about ethics. And tonight I'd like to talk about patience and maybe a little bit about enthusiasm. Okay? And I have here... What? Pardon? Pardon? philosophy of presentation of this. Also, some of the teachers mentioned our renunciation as like a third part, you know, that is absolutely necessary. It was renunciation, the development of what we checked out, and then correct the correct view of emptiness. Right. So, like, our renunciation is, though, we could practice it up to this fellow. I was thinking about what happens in the sense of the world as Well, that'll come up tonight in relationship to patients.

[06:22]

Renunciation is essential in this process, but it's not an additional practice to these practices. For example, in the practice of giving, Giving immediately addresses the issue of renunciation because it's immediately to try to overcome your stinginess and to be ready and willing to give away everything. So renunciation is strung through all this. But you're right. But I'll specifically, I hope to mention it today in relationship to show how renunciation is part of the practice of patience. And I have here a reading list, which you can pick up after class on the six paramitas. Some reading on that. So first is patience and the Sanskrit.

[07:26]

Oh, and also I wanted to say that all these practices can be done, again, on two levels, just like in Koan. They can be done on a dualistic level and on a non-dual level. Or on a dualistic level and on a level which goes beyond dualism. So these practices all finally, for example, when you first start practicing giving, you might kind of feel like, well, I'm over here and I have some stuff and I want to give it away and I'm real happy to give it away and I'm going to give it away and I'm going to give it to you. But as you practice it more and more, finally you realize that the joy you get from giving is certainly also that you're getting something from giving And it's really not that you're giving something away any more than you're receiving something. And who is the giver and who is the receiver and what's the gift start to get kind of like, it's pretty hard to say who is the giver, who is the receiver and what the gift is.

[08:29]

And the more you meditate on that, after a while you can't really separate them. You can't really, like, make a real clear distinction that these are independent entities. And pretty soon the whole thing kind of mushes together into one happy little ball called the practice of giving. But at the beginning you can practice it in its dualistic way. The same with ethics. When you first start practicing ethics, you can practice them with some idea about what they mean. Like you can think, oh, not killing means this, and not stealing means this. Well, that's good. Try. As you practice it more and more, finally at the end of the practice of ethics, you really can't hold on to some fixed idea of virtue as something which you attain. At the end, you can't say, this is ethics, I'm ethical, I'm an ethical person and these are the people I'm helping by my ethics. You can't think that way anymore at the end.

[09:31]

So it's not the perfection of ethics to think this is ethics and I'm ethical. But the beginning of practicing ethics, you can think this is ethics, I'm ethical, or you're ethical. You can also think I'm ethical. You can do all that kind of stuff. But finally it goes beyond that. That's what perfection means, to go beyond these practices. But starting with patience, now the Sanskrit word is kshanti. It looks like, you know, kshanti looks like it's got shanti in it, which means peace, but I don't think that's correct. I don't think that's correct etymology. In other words, shanti means peace. I don't think Kshanti means a piece. I think Kshanti has a part of the etymology of the word Kshanti, I think, has to do with capacity.

[10:34]

That the word Kshanti has something to do with having a capacity, having to do with basically increasing your capacity for what's happening to you. So we have. I think some of us, the idea that patience means like somebody's, you know, somebody's, you know, I don't know what, spitting on you or insulting you or, you know, you're real cold and you sort of just go... That's not patience. That's something. What is that? That's being tough. endurance yeah well it's it's not really endurance either you're actually you're actually uh i don't know what it is anyway well i don't know if it's forbearance either in the sense of this practice i don't know if it's forbearance endurance or tolerance it seems like you're really still resisting it but you're you're you're not uh running away or something you're standing you're standing there for it but you're not really making yourself big enough for it

[11:51]

You're grunting. You're taking on a load, you know. Which is, I mean, I'm not criticizing that practice, but you can only do it so long and you're going to break. Hmm? What? You're still resisting. The practice of patience is not like that. Even the regular practice, not to mention the perfection of patience. It's not to sort of grip your teeth and put up with it. It's not like that. It's much more creative and intelligent than that. It's to actually make it so that you can stand it, not so that you're going to stand it for a while, which is fine, but it means that you make it so you can stand it forever. And then, not only that, but that you can turn up the juice. So it's not so that, like, okay, somebody's bearing down on you, just stand up to it. It's like you can accept it. You can open to it. And then it can bear down on you more, and you can practice pages more and open to it. they bear down to you more and you open to it so that the practice of patience will not be that you practice for a certain time and as the load builds up eventually you're crushed it's the other way around that as you practice it you could put more and more of a load on you and not only that you can you can open more and more to what's happening to you by practicing it until finally you can become so skillful at this that you can put up with absolutely anything

[13:19]

And then right in the middle of that, no matter how painful it is, right while it's happening, you can actually give blessing and love right in the middle of that. It's a way of transforming what's happening to you. Not so that it's good in itself, but so that it gives you an opportunity, rather than fighting it, to practice patience. So that the stimulation of this experience is a stimulation for you to get bigger. That's one way to put it. Another way to put it, which I like in a way better, is that the practice of patience is fundamentally to get yourself into the present. So like if something's bugging you, rather than grip your teeth and bear it, You run away immediately from the periphery of the experience and you head for the center.

[14:26]

You run away from being slightly in some other time from what's bothering you and you try to find the dead center core of the experience, particularly in terms of time. And if you can get to the center, if you can get to the present moment of this experience, There you will be. You'll be okay. If you can do that with anything, then that's kind of like, I find that to be pretty satisfactory. Now, there's some things that one way you can get yourself to the center of it is to reason with yourself about what's happening. That will get you to the center of it. And actually, you can even not only get to the center of it, but you can even start appreciating what was originally bugging you. So that's kind of an introduction. And one more piece of introduction would be to tell you the three basic types of things that you practice patience on.

[15:33]

Practice patience with hardship. I'll tell you the three things you practice it in terms of the levels of difficulty. First level of difficulty in practicing patience is with hardship. That's the easiest stuff to practice with. In my opinion, that has to do with like being cold or being hot or being squished and squashed, suffocated, pinched, irritated, pushed, squeezed, hungry, scared, those kinds of things. Somewhat neutral experiences. I mean neutral in the sense that there's not really no hostility directly coming towards you.

[16:37]

That's the first kind. That's in some ways the easiest kind. The next kind is to endure insult or actual hostility. The first kind of hardship also might be like that. But when somebody's actually trying to get you, when somebody actually wants to hurt you, when somebody's actually speaking about you in a way that's harsh or critical or downright, you know, vicious, that's the next kind, the next most difficult thing to be patient with. And then the most difficult thing to be patient with is truth. Or with the fact that actually nothing's happening. It's the most difficult form of patience. But you can work your way up to it through these easier ones. However, the prime, still, the most important thing to practice with, even though it's second most difficult in a way, is the second category.

[17:41]

Because it doesn't hurt so much if you get mad at the cold. Or like that song. Blame it on the rain. Rain, rain. Don't blame it on you. Blame it on the rain. Blame it on the rain. Getting mad at the rain isn't so bad. Getting mad at the cold is not so bad. Getting mad at the dirt or the moon or the rain, it's okay. But getting mad at a living being is really a lot of trouble. And getting mad at a bodhisattva is super bad. And sometimes bodhisattvas push people a little bit, so you really want to be careful not to get mad at somebody who's pushing you with a complete, compassionate intention. To get mad at them under those circumstances is highly, highly, what do you call it, undermining of your spiritual progress. Or not even your spiritual progress, just your spiritual life. So,

[18:43]

the most important one to practice is the most important thing to kinds of patients to develop in a way is to protect yourself in the most destructive thing and that is to get angry at living beings living beings are the ones that most make us angry because they get to us more than cold even because they do sometimes say these terribly cool things to us So that's the basic things. Oh, by the way, I have here a little piece of cloth that Katagiri Roshi gave me. And his name was Great Patience. Now the calligraphy says, the 100 grasses, for whom do they bloom? There's all kinds of subtleties in this practice.

[19:50]

I might just mention one of them to you just for later discussion. And that is, when I bring up acceptance, sometimes people interpret that as... I don't know what, submission or something. And so then the question comes up, which we can deal with later maybe, is what about dissent or civil disobedience and that kind of thing? Does that mean that you never speak up when some kind of injustice is happening or when you see some cruelty happen? Do you just sit and watch other people be beaten or stuff like that? No. To let other people get beat up is not necessarily patience. Okay? We can talk about that more if you want to. So, do you have some questions about this or anything about patience you want to bring up right away? I have one.

[20:52]

We're going to talk about your experience. You start to look at the version of... Yes. It's been some other way. Oh, yeah, right. Well, for example, first of all, when you're feeling pressed, and I've used this example many times, when you're feeling pressed, someone's talking to you, and they're going on, you know, for a while. And you notice you're starting to lose interest.

[21:55]

You don't find this conversation, there's not even a conversation, you don't find the monologue fascinating and stimulating. You even feel funny about the way the person is talking to you, you feel funny that they're just going on and on and not even giving you a chance to say anything. start to feel kind of like pressed. So to notice that you're starting to feel pressed, to notice that you're starting to feel kind of like stuck in the conversation and uncomfortable and like, how are you going to get out of it? How are you going to stop them? Are they going to go on forever? Should I just wait until they get tired out? You know, something we hope that they'll just spontaneously stop at some point. We start to pray for this kind of thing. yeah but you know yeah right and you know you're getting tired fast so and actually they seem to and then this thing starts happening where you you notice that the more you tired you get the more intense they start talking because probably what they're trying to do is get a response out of you right so you start if you're fading and then they they come on more and more intensely to try to get you to come forth you know

[23:12]

And you can see, well, they'll probably just keep going like this until I'm pretty much done for. So being in touch with your energy, your energy is going away, you're barely able to stand up, and also you feel like pretty soon I may just punch this person and run away, you know, to save myself. So being in the present, if you can be in the present in the early parts of these kinds of conversations, it's really good. So as soon as you start feeling irritated, if you can get right there and feel really, really irritated, or not feel really, really irritated, but get in full touch with how irritated you are. I propose to you that as you get more and more to the center of that irritation, your creative potential becomes also proportionately greater.

[24:14]

And you can say, as I've said before, like I often use the example of cocktail party, right? You get to these cocktail parties and you meet these people who come up and talk to you or somebody introduces you to somebody who doesn't want to talk to you. Or somebody comes up and talks to you because you're an acquaintance or something, but really they're looking over your shoulder at somebody else. They really want to talk to somebody else. So they're sort of talking to you, but they're really not talking to you. And that's really boring to you. And you also want to talk to somebody else. So there you are, both inhibiting each other from talking to somebody else. But neither one of you can get away because of some social conventions. So I often say, well, you say to the person, Excuse me, I know this sounds really strange, you know, but I'm... I'm really... I'm getting faint. I have to sit down right here on the floor.

[25:20]

And they may bend over you and keep talking at you. But you say, oh, my God, you know, I think I have to lie down now. Could you please get that person over there on the other side of the room to come and talk to me? And then when they go away, you can get up and run away and save yourself. So it's not getting separated from your patient. Yeah. The earlier you catch it, the more clever you can be. at finding some way to take care of yourself under the circumstances of being often kind of like being suffocated by the... Yeah. And you can do something before you're so drained and weak and scared. You can do something while you still have some intelligence and you can do it in such a way to not hurt the person. Sort of like preserving yourself in a way like this.

[26:24]

I mean, I remember you talking about leaking so much. It's almost like a person's penetrating you and kind of forcing you to leak, but you pay attention, try to pay attention to a situation where it's not really, they're not really respecting you, actually. It's not really, there's some sort of basic going on. Right. And the person may not even know what they're doing. They're fairly unconscious. They're not paying attention to you. They're looking someplace else in the room. And you just sort of got an unfortunate combination of causes and conditions here. And you've got to take care of yourself. But you're also taking care of the other person. But mostly you're taking care of yourself because it's going to mostly hurt you if you get angry at this poor innocent person who just happened to be blabbing away. They're not really doing it on purpose. This is not the case of somebody who's really trying to give you a hard time yet. This is not the kind of example. But anyway, you get yourself to the present, and at the present, one of the characteristics of being at the present is when you get to the present of some difficulty.

[27:28]

And usually, another characteristic is usually when we're in a comfortable situation, we don't feel a need to get to the present. When you're fairly comfortable, you feel like, hey, man, I can be not the present of this thing. Nope, I can be just in the neighborhood of this thing, and that's fine. You can lounge around and be real lackadaisical and sort of spaced out when you're really in pleasure. Can't you? Of course, because you're in pleasure. And the suffering that you're feeling is not that strong, maybe, because you have some kind of bliss going on there. So you don't have to get to the center of it. It would be good if you did, but you don't have to. If you're in pain, not only are you going to protect yourself from the pain if you get to the center of it, but also you protect yourself from something much more devastating, namely anger, that you're going to get into if you don't take care of yourself. We can only stand so much irritation flat out before we're going to fight back.

[28:28]

The most patient people don't just sit there and take the anger. They recreate it. They turn it into something good called practice of patience. And they do it fast by noticing that they're irritated. Yeah. Is there another way that you do it besides physically removing yourself from the situation? Like, if you have to be there, like, in a class or for an interview, or you're interviewing somebody and they're going... Or even like you're spending the day with your client. There is another way. Yes, definitely. That's just one. Well, like in the case I said with this person, I could tell a story differently. You could be talking. We're talking at the cocktail party. We've just been introduced. This is Marissa. This is Rob. Marissa, I know this is strange, but it's really weird. You're going to think this is strange. You're not going to believe this. I'm getting to talk already, right?

[29:32]

Mm-hmm. Let's say you've been talking a little too long, so now I'm saying, this is really strange, you know. As soon as she starts suffocating me with her monologue, if I say it as soon as I feel it, if I feel the irritation right away, then I still have enough energy to say, this is strange, strange. And I often recommend to people, sometimes when I'm talking and I carry on, I say to people, just wave your hands and just say to me, hello, hello. Hello, did you want to have a conversation? No, but you might have to wave your hand and the person goes, what's the matter? I just want to know, do you want to have a conversation or did you want to say a lot? And they might say, well, actually, I want to say a lot. And say, well, great, but I wondered if you could excuse me a second. I'd like to have a conversation with them. Okay. You know, I think that person over there may be likely to hear from you.

[30:34]

But I shouldn't do that just to get rid of them. You should really address somebody who wants to hear a lecture. And so there are some people like that, I think. So that way you're not necessarily getting away. But before you send them away, the fact of that, immediately catching it while you still have some energy to say something clever or interesting, as soon as you say it, your energy comes back and you're participating, and then it's not so bad anymore. Okay? If you can say even that it's boring, when you tell somebody that somebody's boring, you're not bored anymore when you say that. You get yourself up out of it by saying something. So you don't have to get away from the situation. Now, what happened, I told this story too before. One time I was talking to somebody and I had this experience, you know, he was going on and on. I was standing right out in front of the Green Gulch office. Very nice guy. Very nice guy. He was going on and on. And again, as I say, when people start going on too long and your eyes start glazing over, they start, they talk even more, you know.

[31:40]

because they want you to recover and participate in the conversation, so they leave even less space to get out. I was sitting there and suddenly this voice came up inside me and it said, I love you, Rebbe. And I just relaxed. I just felt just relaxed. I was no longer tense anymore. And then I thought, well, let's have this again. And I said, this time I evoked it. I love you, Rebbe. And I just noticed every time I said that, I kind of relaxed. And I didn't mind so much that he was going on and on. And then, because I didn't mind so much that he was going on and I was relaxed, he stopped. Because he finally felt, oh, I've done my job. I've made him happy. Well, thank you. Nice to talk to you, Al. You don't have to leave. But you can sometimes make yourself comfortable without getting away. But it's better to get away than getting mad at the person.

[32:43]

If a person's like, now let's talk about insults. In a case like that, if you can't accept the insult, it's probably better to get away rather than strike at the person. But sometimes you don't have to. But I'll talk about that one later. So, okay? You don't have to get away. But sometimes you do. You have to judge. If you're on the verge of breaking down and getting angry, you're probably better to leave. I'm in situations where you're ghost. You can do it when you absolutely can't, definitely. And the point is that there are situations where you can't get away, and you're not going to be able to get away for years, so you have to practice patience, because if you don't, you're definitely going to break down. You can't stand it indefinitely. That's why you have to practice patience eventually. And I myself, for many years at Zen Center, sat and, of course, I've also talked too long.

[33:46]

People have sat and listened to put up with my talk. But I have sat through many long, long lectures that people give me when I'm in a room where I can't get out. And for years I thought, well, I have to put up with this. I have, you know, I can do this. And I did it. And then as I got older, I actually realized that I couldn't do it anymore. I gave up. And a few times I got angry. But for many years I just refused to admit that I couldn't stand endless, you know, suffocating conversations. And I finally realized it's probably better for people to know that this is actually bothering me, that I'm not a stone wall. And a lot of people were really shocked to find out that I was a human being. And I knew it all along, but I didn't want to admit it. So now I switch from seeing how long I can stand difficulty to seeing how quickly I can notice it and how quickly I can admit it and how quickly I can start practicing patience, which is not to put up with it, but to convert the whole event from putting up with it to something positive.

[34:54]

Jordan? Nothing. What went best? Yes. So you're saying practicing patience is only paying attention? Well, maybe if you listen to this, hear a little bit more. There's something more than just paying attention. Practicing patience is not just paying attention. It is also, I think, certain kinds of thinking that you do with yourself about these events, too. Maybe we'll come up a little later. Anything else about it so far? Yes. Yes. You talked about the three levels of patience. And you also said that the truth is the harvest when you practice. And you also do too. I'm wondering how that fits into being angry with yourself. Because sometimes, when I hope of people research truth, I have a lot of patients with my own truth.

[36:03]

I have very little things that I tend to get active when my activities tends to replace my patients. And I wonder how white people do that. Could you be more concrete? As an example, you know the situation that my wife and I are facing. Sure. I'm angry at that sometimes. And my anger, I don't want to deal with that. I want to have patience with myself and also have patience with her. So if I continue to have patience with her and see where she's at in this situation, then I can have compassion for her. But I don't feel like I'm giving myself the effort to have patience with myself here. But what is it about yourself that you're not being patient with? I didn't hear what that was. I hate my anger.

[37:04]

My anger is... So you're not patient with your anger? No. And so rather than looking at this anger and facing this truth, I want to tend to hide or diminish it or do some other activity. So I feel it. I'm not practicing. I'm patient with myself. And my question is, where do self-patients come in? Or is there any difference between self-patients and patients with anyone else? Or can we really afford to give somebody those patients without having self-patients first? based on the truth is the biggest level of patience in practice. Well, again, start with the first kind, OK? patience practiced with hardship okay so your your body is your body is feeling cold or your body is feeling pain or your body's feeling uh hungry or something like that or your body's uh or your upset stomach or whatever okay this is stuff with yourself so that's patient because i always be my patient with yourself

[38:21]

That's probably one level of it, but I was getting... Well, let's deal with that one. Okay, that's fine. That would be... So, yes, so that's with yourself. I mean, it's not about other people. It's with yourself. So, yes, that's patient with yourself. You need to do that. And it's kind of a warm-up to being patient with other people. To be patient with your anger is a little bit difficult to talk about. I don't think exactly you should be patient with your anger. it's more like you should well I guess you should it's patient in the sense of I would say maybe first thing to practically your anger is more like generosity or giving you should first of all let your let your anger be anger first of all that's more like giving okay don't be stingy with yourself let yourself be angry yeah I feel the anger I feel the anger so I am the anger I recognize Right. So then also practice the precepts with that anger.

[39:23]

Okay? In other words, don't lie with yourself about the anger. Admit the anger. All right? Practicing patience with anger is a little bit tricky because anger is not that... I don't know. I'll say this to you. We can talk about this. But to me, anger is not exactly irritating. You see, patience is more like with something that's bugging you and you're on the verge of getting angry. If you're already angry, at that moment, you're not really practicing patience. And also, when you're angry, you're not really irritated when you're angry. You've gone into another dimension at that time. So that's the way I feel. When I'm angry, I don't feel like, well, Jesus is kind of irritating. I don't feel like, oh, I think I'm going to get angry now. So it's not really the practice of patience once you're angry. When you're angry, it's more like, at that time, I'm not saying you can't practice patience there, but it's a little bit funny to talk about practicing patience in the middle of where you just have failed at practicing patience. I think more appropriate in that case is to back up a little bit and practice giving and be generous with yourself and say, okay, Stan,

[40:32]

You're angry. And also be truthful yourself. Say, Stan, you're angry. Stan, you are angry. You're an angry man now, so you've got to know this. This is a little bit different kind of a practice. And I would say that if you can't accept your anger, that yes, you won't be able to practice patience because you first of all got to accept your anger in order to sort of let it subside, get a hold of yourself, and then go back to the practice of patience. So you have to practice patience with your own difficulty in order to be patient with others. Another example that often happens to people is, and I had this experience myself quite a few times, is I'm talking to somebody and I have to go to the toilet. So there I am talking to them and I have to go to the toilet, but I'm not really listening to them anyway, right? But I kind of don't want to say, well, Again, they might be doing another monologue. I don't know. But anyway, whatever. I don't want to say, excuse me, I want to go to the toilet. I think maybe I can stand it a few more seconds and maybe they'll finish.

[41:35]

But I'm not paying attention to them anyway because I'm primarily thinking about going to the toilet. But sometimes when I'm talking to people, I'm not paying attention to them. But I don't know that the reason why I'm not paying attention to them is because I have to go to the toilet. I'm distracted. I don't know why. And as soon as I find out what it is, then I can say, excuse me, I haven't been paying attention to you so I can say, I just realized why I haven't been paying attention to you. It's nothing to do with what you're saying except I have to go to the toilet. And then you go and you come back and you can listen to them. So in that case, again, the thing is to find out about yourself. And you can actually, you could even start getting irritated with the person and think that they were really talking too long because you want to get away and you don't even know why you want to get away. They're going on just for maybe a few seconds too long, and you're getting really irritated because you have to go to the toilet. And you're really irritated with them, but the reason why you're irritating them not because of what they're saying is because you yourself are not taking care of yourself. You're kind of stressed out down in the lower part of your body, and you're not paying attention to that.

[42:37]

As soon as you notice that, you realize, it's not what they're saying. It's that I'm stressed out. And if I went to the toilet, what they're saying would probably be a lot more interesting. So you do and go and come back and say, hey, this is pretty interesting, please come on. So being in touch with yourself and accepting your own situation is necessary in order to accept others. If we don't take care of ourselves, then it's pretty easy that what people are saying will bother us. So have all these examples you've been giving, this is like the second type of patients? Not yet, no. We're still in the first one? You said there's three types of patients. This is pretty much the first one, yeah. It's not the second type that you have to go to the toilet, no. It's not the second type that when you have to go to the toilet, especially when you don't know it, or even when you do know it, that you're not that interested in what people are saying. Someone could be saying to you, Jordan, you did a really good job taking care of the guest students yesterday. I really appreciate it. You did a really, you know, you're thoughtful and attentive and so on and so forth.

[43:38]

But if you don't know that, you feel like, well, why is he going on? Why is he letting me go? What a creep, you know? If you know that, you could say, you know, you could say, hey, I think you're saying something good to me and I'd like to, just a second, I'd like to come back and really enjoy this. I'll be right back. This is not the second kind, no. This is the first kind where you're being irritated by physical, basically physical stimulation. It's not the second type. Yes, go ahead. Because you said, I hope you said, that when we reach that level, then we recognize that there's nothing really happening in it. Yeah. Did you say that? I said the most difficult thing for us to accept, or the highest level of acceptance, is acceptance of the fact that things aren't really happening. That dharmas don't even come up. That's sort of the highest level of the practice of patience. I'll give you an example of that, because I'm really used to be those taking the terms of just reaching our own truth.

[44:42]

We need ultimate for all of us to always face our truth. Well, it's going to be hard. I think I kind of feel like I'd like to postpone dealing with that one. It's not really having to do with your, if you could accept that things didn't happen, then most of these other kinds of problems wouldn't bother us. But we have to sort of work our way up to that acceptance. It doesn't make much sense to us if we can't work with these other things. But once we work with these other things, we can accept this more difficult thing, which is right under our nose all the time, but we don't dare accept it. Once we accept that, then these other ones will be easy. So it's a little bit ahead of us right now. Anything else now? Yes? I noticed that I felt really kind of relieved when we swish for a moment from talking about... I haven't ever been to a cocktail party. Would anybody like to go to the toilet, by the way?

[45:43]

You've never been to a cocktail party? No I've never been to a cocktail party. But I want to keep her up with a little skillful means. I guess many times in the class, I feel like I'm kind of trapped. Maybe I can feel that way. I'll say, I love you wherever you are. And you say, I love you, Brian. Say that to yourself. I'll try that verse of disorder. And you say, I love you, Brian, and I'm going to give you a present. A free trip out of this ring. And you just give yourself a little walk up to the out to the outside there, get a rest of fresh air, and maybe never come back. But then isn't he presenting you with the level of assault, which is the next level of assault?

[46:47]

Well, as long as he's not doing it with the maliciousness towards me, he's probably doing me a favor. Because he's giving me a chance to practice the next level. So as long as you're being true to yourself and taking care of yourself and not at all trying to hurt other people, your unpredictability, which also gives them a good chance, it's true, equally good to the other thing you might have hit, but the problem is that that hurts you. If you're kind to people up to the point that finally then you turn around and attack them, that's equally good opportunity for them if you would just walk away in the first place. In both cases, they get a chance to perhaps work with being insulted. But the second case, you push yourself into an extremity so that now you are getting in trouble too. So a big part of the participation is to protect yourself from what will happen to you if you get angry.

[47:50]

But maybe you want to play with that some more? I think, I mean, I certainly have deeper faith in myself to push myself not to get angry in a situation. To push yourself not to get angry? If I'm sitting here listening to someone, I have more faith in myself and my ability to sit there and listen and not get angry. Could I say this to me just for a second? Excuse me. I'm not recommending that you be rude to people. If you can be gentle with people and you're not pushing yourself into extremity, of course that's good. If somebody's giving a talk and you can sit through it without doing harm to yourself and pushing yourself so far that you're going to freak out, then that's probably a nice thing to do. But if you're going to push yourself into some extremity and then hate the person for two weeks afterwards, it's not good. You're not really doing them a favor by sitting through their talk, but then holding them against them for two weeks.

[48:56]

So if you can sit through it blissfully and say, this person is talking too long and I'm just having a ball here practicing patience with this, that's not a problem. And that is nice to them too. But if you're going to push yourself to extremity, then I would say, this is not a favor. And I'll say this again. I don't want people to sit in the room when I'm giving a talk and be getting angry at me for me giving a talk. I'd rather have them leave. And not only that, but it's better for them not to be getting angry at me I consider it better if people would leave and take care of themselves and sit through my boring talk or whatever. That's what I prefer. It's feedback to me, too, when people walk out. It means I'm really giving a good lecture. Yes? Tony? Huh? Did I distract you? Maybe it's a little clarifying. I guess it's really important to find where your walls are.

[49:57]

Of course, your walls change every month. This is part of being present. Exactly. And when you're not present, the walls don't change every month. One of the effects of not noticing where you are is the walls stay longer. And the longer the walls stay, the more uncomfortable you get. The solution to the problem is to get... now to the irritation is caused by you not adjusting earlier okay so we want to talk about the next one next one is when somebody is intentionally unintentionally saying something critical of you and Buddhist teachers have problems with this I've used this example too before but Buddhist teachers have problems with this because after they get past certain kind of attachment the last attachment that they get past usually is around fame.

[51:04]

If you're famous all the other worldly things come right along with it. You can give up everything else and hold on to fame, and really you know that you can get any of the other things if you needed them. If you're famous enough, you can get money, sex, if you have power, and food, and whatever else, sleep. So... So what some Buddhist teachers do is they give up all the other stuff and get famous for giving up all the other stuff and hold on to that one. That's the last one that they have trouble letting go of. And again, the more they renounce everything else, the more famous they become. So if somebody insults a Buddhist teacher and says they're no good, You know, to defame a person, to defame somebody, is actually not so good for you to do.

[52:17]

But if I'm defamed, I'm protected. So I don't defame other people because that's not good for me to do. That's a break in a precept. That's a break in a precept, to defame somebody. But when somebody defames me, especially if I'm a Buddhist teacher, to get defamed is protecting me. Defamed, well, literally, it's to take away fame, right? Like for someone to say, you know, this teacher really has a bad teaching. They're untrustworthy. They're... Right, but they're defamed. Their fame is tarnished. And you can defame people in such a way that they won't get more famous from their defaming. Like to say somebody just got a bad teaching is not as interesting as to say that he slept with 8,000 students. Then that would probably make him more famous.

[53:20]

But just to say, you know, really boring lectures, all the students are walking out, Or they sit through there, but really, you know, it's just because they're afraid to leave. And he doesn't follow the precepts, you know. But he doesn't follow them, but he doesn't not follow them in a kind of outrageous way. It's a real boring way. Just sloppy, you know, inconsistent. Really, it's a totally boring situation. Not worth any of your time. It's not even outrageous. It's just low rent. The whole scene there, you know. The students all kind of like smell and they're real dumb and lazy. And they pick on each other all the time. And they hate each other. And what little they have, they're jealous of each other for almost nothing that they have. It's just a real raunchy scene. And this guy's like the leader. And now that, he's like worse than any of them. He's the most uninteresting one of all. So if somebody said that about you and you're a Buddhist teacher, they'd be doing you a favor.

[54:28]

They'd be doing you a favor because if people make you famous, first of all, you're likely to attach to it. Because even great teachers attach to fame. So if you've got fame around you, it's very tempting, very difficult not to attach to it. Not that, but if you're famous, people come because of what they hear about you. and they come because they want to be around the most famous teacher. So then you have all these people around you who, first of all, they're coming to expect something, and then there's also the temptation to be what they'll expect. So then you're caught by that. Second of all, they get upset with you for not being what they expect. Third of all, you have people who aren't interested in Buddhism or whatever, but they're interested in being with the most famous teacher and all that kind of stuff. It's a big pain in the neck. And the more you And also, the more you feel that way, the more famous you'll get. And the more pains in the neck you'll get. So when somebody defames you or criticizes you, it's actually doing you a favor.

[55:31]

Of course, the first thing that most people would feel is that, how could they say that about me? Oh, how terrible. But then if you think about it differently, you say, hey, they're actually helping me. They may not be intending to help me. but actually they're making me safer. They're putting me in a situation where it's going to be more easy for me to actually concentrate on what's going on in real teaching. And not only that, but I get to practice patience with this. As a matter of fact, changing my attitude about this from being insulted to being grateful for it, that change of attitude is also good for me and accumulates lots of merit, which I need. to develop in order to... So that's an example of what you do when you're insulted. You mean if you're just kind of like a new student and somebody's saying you're a lousy new student? Well, somebody says, somebody says,

[56:41]

You're a worthless, dishonest, cruel, selfish polluter. Somebody calls you a polluter. Right? Did I get it? Is that the one you can't take? Well, you know, just don't help it. Right, but they say you're a super polluter. Absolutely. Yeah, so there you are. So what are you going to do with that? So then you have, practice of patience would be, to say, okay, now this, and maybe the person who says it is somebody who you made every effort to encourage them, you know, in every possible way you did everything you could, kind things for them and everything, and then they sort of unreasonably turn on you and call you a super polluter. So the meditation on patience is to consider that person an excellent spiritual guide.

[57:48]

Because they're definitely guiding you to practice a patience. That's the place they're directing you. They're saying, you better practice patience now. And they're pressing you real hard to practice it. And what if I just feel... I'll tolerate it. Well, like I said, that's going to go on for a certain amount of time. And probably you're already angry, but pretty soon you're going to be angry if they say it again and again. And so you find out they're telling other people. You're going to break down, I think. This is not practice of patience. This is just carrying the burden. These practices are not to load you up with stuff. These practices are to lighten you up. Practices of patience should lighten you, should make you lighter. And I'd like to also say that in both these cases, what this does Ru Jing, the guy who had wrote the poem about the wind bell, he also said that all Buddhas, Buddhas, various Buddhas, like Shakyamuni Buddha, had the ability to practice jhanic states, and they could go into these trances, in those trances, for example, in the first Rupadattu, all the Rupadattu trances, and he could go into even higher trances than that, there was no negative sensation in these trances, and he could spend his time there.

[59:13]

But he chose not to. And he taught that all Buddhas do their meditation in the ordinary world of the senses. And they do it there, right in the middle of human suffering. They don't go to some special place, although some of them have the ability to do so. They develop their meditation practice in the ordinary world of suffering. And they practice there, and they develop merit by practicing patience, among other things. And what happens if you sit in the middle of this suffering without moving is the longer you sit there, you develop what Ru Jing calls a suppleness of mind or softness of mind. You develop this soft mind or this soft heart. And what that means is that you deepen your vow to drop body and mind. So that's the renunciation part. By practicing patience, with your situation and not moving away from it, your vow to renounce all attachment gets deeper and deeper.

[60:19]

So without irritation, without people calling you a super polluter, you probably won't be able to develop this deep intention to drop body and mind. it's pretty hard for us to develop it deeply without this kind of harassment because you know we like to hold on to things but if you just sit in the middle of harassment long enough and don't move you become softer and softer which is the same as you you get more and more willing to let go of everything okay so we absolutely need patience in order to develop this will to drop out in mind yes It sounds disrespectful of that person. What's their opportunity for being found there?

[61:21]

Why do you have to you, your confusion, your failure? What's the interaction between them? How do you do that without discounting them, without offering you opportunity for real teaching, for teaching on failure? That's a question that I have. And Shantideva says, he says, how unfortunate it is that this person is giving me a chance to develop patience while they're going to hell. Okay? Just let me finish. Okay. And, however, if you can do something on the spot to help the person, he doesn't say not to do it. If you can wake him up, no problem. No problem. However, if you can't, then what are you going to do? Any alternatives are welcome. But the alternative of reflecting the anger back doesn't usually help them.

[62:23]

Yes? Yes. Well, it's going to say that it seems to me that being patient as a response is a teaching for the other person. Yeah, which they may not notice. Which they may not. Right. Right. That's... Yeah, and it's unfortunate. Shantideva says it, how unfortunate that they have to go to hell while I'm benefiting by their cruelty to me. Yes. But isn't that part of practicing in samsara encountering each other in the world? It seems extremely important to be said that Buddha's are willing to crack into the middle of the mass. Right. They're willing to disarm the mass by feeding in the middle of the animals. Right. Or sending other persons to hell. Right. If they have to go to hell, let's go to hell together to understand what would be. Yeah. But in the case of someone insulting you, can you tell another scenario besides accepting it and practicing patience?

[63:30]

What can you do to help that person? Right, so you might... So you might say, Ji An, you might say, I'm experiencing, it kind of hurt my feelings when you just call me a super polluter. You know? You might say that to the person. Maybe you could say that without getting angry. And... And they might say, you know, so what if it hurt your feelings? I wish, you know, you're such a bad, you're such a big polluter. I'd like to do more than hurt your feelings. And you might say, well, that hurts my feelings too. and they might but I think that's part that's not that's fine that's not contradictory to practicing patience and if you can really say that with a sense of giving I think you've been fairly successful at practicing patience at that time if you're really trying to offer that information to the person so I think the next person was Chris in the past

[64:50]

Well, I actually had a conversation that had all these characteristics and it was someone, and I found myself upset and angry at what this person was saying and not responding in that way, but being quite true back from the situation and hung up on the phone and then realized that I was quite angry and upset. Passive aggression? But he was saying things that were outrageous and not true. And I took one into consideration and had some response that was quite neutral. And hung up and found that I was very, I was educated. I went for a walk and tried to think of practice and relationship to it. And finally I was connected with what I needed to say. I felt like I had to call him back and say that at least what you said was that I felt angry about it. And I had a very hard time not having anger in my voice that I explained to him where my anger was coming from.

[65:57]

The things he said will evoke the anger in me. And I hung up feeling two things light, as if I had practiced pictures, that light, as you talked about, would be, and a deep sense of remorse, and wishing that I had never had, wishing I hadn't had to actually And maybe when that remorse also maybe might have... Well... I thought you were going to say, I felt a deep sense of remorse of having any attachment in the first place. I thought that's what you might have said. And that would be to deepen your vow to not have the attachment.

[66:57]

Again, I would just say this rather boldly, that it's pretty hard for us actually to practice renunciation. without being in a situation where we get hassle and practice patience. It's pretty hard. There's one little twist on this which I just might point out and that is sometimes if I feel that way I notice that I have a pain here And it's not just... I haven't expressed anger at the person. They just said something to me and I walked off or they walked off and then I realized that I've been wounded. And I'm carrying this and I want to tell them. I don't want to carry it for another six hours or whatever. And I want to tell them because I feel like if I just tell them, I'll be able to let go of it. But it's tricky.

[68:00]

Because if I tell them too soon... And there's anger on it, especially if you're in a more powerful position for the person. So when I find the teacher's position and I tell the student this, that the student hurt me, I have to also recognize that that comment, that information, might be loaded with the difference in the structure of the organization. So if you're a peer, it's probably a little easier. But if you're a senior to the person in the community or whatever, Maybe it's good to take that into account because just the information that they hurt you, coupled with the difference in whatever, may actually wipe them out. So in that case, you've got this problem of carrying this weight, of this pain, which you feel if you would tell them would enlighten it for you. Just something to look at that a bit. Besides, the other thing is, are you going to be able to talk now without still some anger in the voice?

[69:06]

Or could you wait a little longer until you were a little cooler? Which means you're going to have to suffer a little longer with the pain and the hurt before you tell them. Because I think telling them, once they've done it, it's not necessarily so important that they find out right away. And if you're telling them primarily to lighten your pain, you're going to be able to tell them real cleanly. My daughter said something to me the other night, And she did it so cleanly that it went very deeply. It goes deeper that way, in a sense. If there's a little anger on it, the person can be distracted from the message by the anger, and they defend against the anger. But if you take away the anger, sometimes the message goes really deeply, and they can hear it to the bottom of their heart. So the message goes deeper, and they're not distracted by it. It's coming with this vibration of anger alongside of it. So it might be better information He'd wait until it was clearer. And after she told me this, my wife said, you know, that was really clear.

[70:09]

You really said that well and really clean. And she said, I practiced for a long time. I said, why did you practice so long? She said, I was afraid. I said, of what? I said, I don't know. So although it's difficult to sit with that pain when you feel like you have to tell somebody that you love, You need to tell them this. They should know this. They should know this effect that they had on. It really is important to tell them. But if you tell them later, when it's cleaner, it might be actually more penetrating, more useful if there's no anger around the edges of it. Because sometimes people say stuff to you which is right on, but because they're angry, you can't hear it because you're mostly like going, they're angry. But if they just say, your name is Jim, you go, yeah. But if I say with anger, you feel like you don't even notice that I'm saying what your name is. You feel like, God, he's angry.

[71:10]

So this is part of the difficulty of the calculations, yes. I would just sometimes find when someone is coming at you from the other end with things that aren't angry and that aren't necessarily true. If you just listen, and if maybe you even say, I'm really sorry to feel this way, and keep listening, and keep listening, they'll turn around. And all of a sudden they're apologizing to you and sort of taking back everything they've said. If you could just hold up long enough. I used to have that. Well, what you're saying, I agree with, but the way you're putting it is like, but, and then you're giving this example, as though what you're saying was in contradiction to what we're talking about. I mean, I agree with what you said, but are you saying that as a counter example to something? Martha said she hung up, for instance.

[72:11]

I wondered what would happen had you just listened through it all the way until this person totally melted their spleen with an occasional neutral comment. Because it wasn't necessarily anything that was untrue. It was just someone's anger. And if you didn't respond in anger, then don't you sometimes find that they turn around? Yeah, that's right. They might. Thank you for listening. I'm really sorry. Yeah, right. They might finally realize what they did if you can stay with it long. That's true. That can happen. There was something else. Oh, yes. Please. If somebody is really angry, and you can see that anger coming off. Yes? Yes? And you can diffuse it. Is that an advantage to diffuse that anger that's happening, or else you can just let it happen?

[73:17]

Could you give an example now of someone's angry at you? Yeah, somebody is angry, generally. You can feel it coming on. Here's an example of something like that. Here's two examples. I'll give one. Here's the most interesting one, maybe. I'll do two. Well, first one's very simple. The founder of Judo was on a boat in the Indian Ocean or something, and some big, huge guy was, the founder of Judo's name, Jigaro Kano, was kind of a small Japanese guy. Some big guy was on the boat drunk or something and, you know, going around on the deck kind of almost threatening people's lives with his aggressiveness. And I forgot how it happened, but anyway, Jokaro Kano took him and threw him in the air, flipped him in the air, and put him right back down on his feet again without hurting him. The anger was diffused. Here's another example, also a Japanese example. A man was in a train in Tokyo or something, and this guy, I don't know who this was, but this is the author of that book.

[74:25]

It's called How Can I Help? I think it's maybe... Paul Gorman, yeah. I think this may be Paul Gorman talking. Paul Gorman also said this. He was on the train, and some big drunk guy was storming around the train. Again, almost threatening the life of the people on the bus, on the train. And... And Paul Gorman was getting ready to, you know, attack him. This is shortening of story. And some little man was also on the train, or got on the train, or anyway, was on the train with them. And... I think the guy who was telling the story was just about ready to flip this guy or to try his Aikido on him, which he'd been waiting for years to do.

[75:26]

And just as he was about to throw the guy or whatever and protect everybody on the train or whatever, this little man said something like, kind of yelled something like, Hey, you. But it was with the tone of voice of where you just, he said, the tone of voice of the way you say to somebody that you haven't seen for a long time, you know. Like, hey, hey, Martha. You know, kind of like that. And the guy stopped the guy. And the guy was caught by that. Stopped him. And then the conversation went on for a while. And finally... the old man asked him how he was feeling and it turns out that, you know, he had just lost his wife and something like that, you know, and he just started crying. I don't tell the story very well, but... But basically, he really diffused it.

[76:29]

He didn't just diffuse it, he He completely converted the guy and got the guy to admit what really was bothering him and deep down why he was so upset. And it was very effective. It is possible to do that, yes. What I was wondering was that generally people get angry and that anger kind of turns around you. I mean, if you're capable of diffusing it, you know, okay, but what if you don't just do it? Would that be an advantage to the person getting angry for him to realize it means actually going overboard with his anger? I mean, if you can stop somebody from getting angry, I think that's a service to them. They're deciding to miss the opportunity to realize that they're, you know, something's going on or diffusing them. Well, I think this guy in this story that I was told definitely knew he was angry when this guy converted him. And he could see after he broke down and started crying and everything that he had been storming around the truck, the bus, the subway.

[77:37]

If you can protect people from getting angry, it's a great service. to do, and I would think it would be good to do it. But it doesn't mean that you try to, if people are angry, you try to talk out of it. And also if you're angry, sometimes if you're angry it's very useful also to tell somebody that you're angry. Telling somebody you're angry is not an angry act, necessarily. Sometimes when people are angry at me, There have been cases where people are angry at me, and they told me why they're angry at me. They told me they were angry. And I just felt like, you know, I just saw this big T-R-U-T-H just right there, you know. This is just reality. Somebody's angry at me. They weren't just angry at me. They weren't like saying, you know, you super polluter. They weren't trying to hurt me. They were telling me that they were angry. They wanted me to know that. Being angry is not so good. But telling somebody when you're angry can be extremely kind.

[78:40]

But still, if you can protect someone from being angry in the first place by being so devoted and so kind that they're so happy that they never get angry, it's okay. Somebody else can irritate them and help them develop the will to renounce the world. Don't worry. Find anybody that has no irritation, don't worry. They'll get it. Because the good karma of having no irritation will lead you to a situation where you will get irritated. It's good karma to have people around you who are irritating you. That's good karma, not bad karma. bad karma to be irritable. But it's not bad karma to have people around who oppress you. You know the story about Gurdjieff, right? There was this real irritating guy in his community and basically the people kicked him out. He came home one day and found out they'd kicked this guy out and he said, you kicked him out? And he chased after the guy and paid the guy to come back to the community.

[79:44]

gave him a salary to cause trouble. I said, we need this guy. All you other people are so sweet. Most of the people at Zen Center are so kind, you know. It's hard to practice patience around here, isn't it? I just read this story about Don Juan, this Don Juan story. Years before, this is Carlos Castaneda talking, years before, I had been both very moved and very confused by Don Juan's tremendous dedication to helping me. I could not imagine why he should show me such kindness. It was evident that he did not need me in any way in his life. He was obviously not invested in me. One day I asked Don Juan point blank what he was getting out of our association. And Don Juan said, nothing he would understand. well, let me just say that although I could understand it, no, he said, well, let me just say that although you could understand it, you are certainly not going to like it.

[80:49]

You see, I really want to spare you. I was hooked. I insisted that he tell me what he meant. I want you to bear in mind that I'm telling you at your own insistence, he said, still smiling. If you judge me, Don Juan said, by my actions with you, he said, you should have to admit that I have been a paragon of patience and consistency. But what you don't know is that to accomplish this, I have had to fight for impeccability as I have never had to fought before. In order to spend time with you, I have had to transform myself daily, restraining myself with the most excruciating effort. Don Juan had been right.

[81:57]

I did not like what he said. I'm not that bad, Don Juan, I said, trying to save face. Oh, yes, you are that bad, he said with a serious expression. You are petty, wasteful, opinionated, coercive, short-tempered, and conceited. You are morose, ponderous, and ungrateful. You have an inexhaustible capacity for self-indulgence, and worst of all, you have an exalted idea of yourself. with nothing whatever to back it up. What did you say, Leslie? And that last point, of course, applies completely to us, right? An exalted idea of the inherent existence of yourself with nothing to back it up.

[83:00]

I could sincerely say that you, that your mere presence makes me feel like vomiting. I'm flattered that you would think so. But I didn't. It says right here. See it? Did you time it? It's all timing. I told you that you were not going to like it or understand it, he said. Warriors are very simple, but their finesse is extreme. It is a rare opportunity for a warrior to be given a genuine chance for impeccability in spite of his basic feelings. You gave me such a unique chance. The act of giving freely and impeccably rejuvenates me and renews my wonder.

[84:13]

What I get from our associations is indeed of incalculable value to me. I am in your debt. That's the way we should, you know, that's the way we should feel about people that bug us. Unfortunately, almost no one is that bad, so there's almost no one that's that valuable to us. But if we ever met anybody like that, then we could really practice patience. So some of us... are kind of unfortunate in a way that we don't have anybody that horrible to deal with but what living we have we should be very grateful for and if we're grateful for it I predict that you'll get somebody who's even more of a challenge will come to you that the Buddha will give you greater and greater challenges more and more awesome tests of your impeccability people will call you worse and worse things more and more unjustifiably will they attack you and make you able to develop patience.

[85:14]

You spin one room full of straw into gold, you get two rooms to spin. Well, it's time to stop, I suppose. Did that note find the teacher? Thank you. The notes stop there. Okay, so tomorrow morning we'll talk about enthusiasm. How to be enthusiastic about practicing patience. May I have intention...

[85:58]

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