someone gave me
this sir
barack obama doll

and ciders stand up
it's it's done
ah and inside i i notice system course i think go
maybe by barack obama one says
my face is one that admit some doubt

and i thought of up and i i guess i feel like
im my faith also
on
he admits or allows some doubt
and then i was thinking home
what we just chatted was
ha i vow to hear that your dharma and that upon hearing at no doubt will arise and me
nor will i lack of faith

and as was one way to hear that is that when you're hearing the dharma
the the hearing doesn't
ah
in the hearing no doubt arises that's one way to hear it that the statement of when i hear it no doubt will arise
and i i guess i could
i guess for me i even if i'm hearing the dharma maybe at that moment
the doubt doesn't seem to be in downtown the be an issue
but
still there might be openness to to doubt it might be a diamond that allows openness to doubt
i certainly feel that
that day
process of wisdom involves questioning
and
and that
and that one wisdom
that one wisdom nose or when wisdom realizes the dharma
the questioning goes on
so that are questioning god in the sense of questioning seems apropos of the true dharma
and also that the
the wisdom which knows the truth seems i could hit it for me it has an it has an open flexible quality to it

the body sought as mind of no abode
a mind which doesn't reside in in any kind of mental object
so even even though the object of the consciousness and might be the truth
the mind of know board
doesn't reside in the truth doesn't reside in anything and the truth had seen it sees the truths or that the wisdom
which knows the highest truth the truth says don't inviting me that you say you can't abide in me
don't camp out here that's the kind of truth this is
and the wisdom says fine i won't care out here i want to buy here

huh

and discovering this mind of no abode
ah

might involve

the study of herself
huh
and the study of ourself i feel involves studying i thinking
for example
studying ourself might involve studying that we think
that we do things
are you there could be there could be the thought i think i do things
are there could be the thinking
i think i do thanks

hum in the background
are you
at the base of my talking to you now actually is is a kind of faith
a faith
that it's
have faith that it would be good to pay attention
to are thinking
or i had the idea that it would be good to pay attention to my thinking
i have the idea that and certain ancestors have said
that the buddha way involves
studying the south to put away involves studying self the buddha way involves studying thinking

so there is that value i feel in a backroom to be bringing this up here
the same both bring something up that i that i am the idea it's an idea and i had the idea this is a helpful idea
but i'm also letter you know that
i have the to behind me bring it up as a fatalist somewhat useful to bring it up

and i'm also on
hey
going to bring in to relate this not only to the ancestors of the zen tradition
but some of the
ah thinkers in the american history that i think ah did i think relate to relate to this
and one of the thinkers know that i'm thinking of his name emerson
ralph waldo emerson
and
i i was a giant she told me about a book called the metaphysical club so a reading this book i i read this sir
this thing that emerson is said to have thought
i have have have some fuzzy he avoided
ah abolitionism
and he avoided ah he dropped out at the unitarian church because he felt like those he dropped out of it induced the unitarian church because he felt like institutionalized religion
and abolitionism or maybe isms
ah
what a discourage people
from thinking for themselves when i read thinking for themselves i thought yeah people talk about thinking for yourself
i thought was the way i guess what i would understand thinking for yourself means is that you actually are studying you're thinking everybody thinks for themselves i mean everybody does their thinking
but how do you how do you encourage people not just to do their thinking like this is right and that's wrong ah this is true because jesus told me it was that this is true because buddha says it was
or
the slavery should be abolished these kinds of thoughts is are thinking people are doing the thinking or or slavery should not be abolished people are doing the thinking thinking for yourself and as i've been thinking for yourself i think it means look the look at your thinking
be aware that you are thinking this
so i thought that the term thinking for yourself and emerson's talking about
the way we put it in zen as i think clearer study you're thinking study yourself
that will help you more realize you're thinking and realize yourself but first of all study yourself
study your thinking
and i think institution religions do actually often
even if they teach people to study their thinking they still might discourage people from studying their thinking but some constitutional provisions are some religious period a particular institutionalized ones
might discourage people from looking at what they're thinking they tell you what to think but they don't say i'll look at that and see what see what you're doing they don't necessarily do that
even as engineer be stripped might say okay zen center here is where a zen center we're going to have a says she
don't see you know personally say and please look at yourself and see how you think about this session
or you know
this is what we think is valuable here now let's look at this as examine this

it's possible i have this idea as possible that it was study are thinking
we will will become free of it
and

so i would like to teach if i was a teacher i would like to teach students to think for themselves and otherwise i would like to teach students to study their thinking
i'd like to encourage rather than discourage them from studying our thinking and
they're all our own habits i really what discourages us from study are thinking
our own habit of thinking and and moving onto the next thinking rather than thinking and stopping and looking how what we just did
or why we're thinking be aware that were thinking
how a it is to discuss to not do this meditation is to not be mindful
and we can find a social reinforcement for not being mindful of our thinking
i also up
when norman fischer his wife kathy
i should say when kathy fisher
i was she saw a good gosh i wrote in chinese or something that that emerson said which was the secret of education lies and respect for the student

so the teacher should be actually looking at the students thinking
and it's a student wasn't looking at their thinking the teachers interest in it might draw the students' attention to it
rather teacher telling the student how to think
so that to the
the book and referring to a emerson's in the background there
but that then the main characters in the book are three americans are oliver wendell holmes jr
ah and
charles pierce and william james
and john dewey does for
and three of 'em i'm somewhat familiar with and have i'll ever have always appreciated
i haven't really i have a most known ah victoria this book i had almost no awareness of oliver wendell holmes jr
but it turns out that these four people were in a club together for nine months i think
and the club is called the metaphysical club
and and what they discussed at that time according to the author the book
what is is what looks about and it's about and are basically one idea
and it's an idea about ideas that they are very different people but they they shared an idea about ideas or you could say a belief about beliefs or a view about views
and i think their basic idea about ideas were was that ideas are entirely dependent
that ideas do not develop according to their inner logic
but they developed
independence on things other than themselves
in other words
their idea is that ideas are empty of inherent existence
entirely dependent means
but they're nothing but what they depend on the have not
inner logic in her logos inner essence
like slavery is bad
war is bad and actually these ideas existed in in america
very intensely had a an intense life before the civil war
and often not know war
was in the same person as slavery is bad
and then it was also slavery is bad and should be abolished
thomas jefferson saw that flesh neighbor was bad
but i heard he said it's like it's like holding a wolf by the ears
it's terrible to be holding the wolf by the ears and has terrible to let go of the wolf

so in before the civil war started a lot of people thought slavery is terrible even people who had slit own slaves thought it was terrible so many people thought it should be abolished and often the people who thought it should be abolished also work
quakers panic and opposed to war
this was their idea

but i don't think
that before the war people were aware that these ideas were entirely contingent
where empty
i think that was not a well
understood idea about those ideas i think those ideas were more like etiologies for these people in other words they thought that there was actually something
actually inherently true in those ideas other than that there were entirely contingent
and then this thing happened
according to the book overnight
people
who thought something should never be done now thought that they're very thing should be done
their ideas about what was appropriate changed
and some of them oliver wendell holmes for example right in the middle of the war
do not can be recovering from a wound in battle battle wound
did it did an extraordinary thing in the midst of this horror and this terror that he was in the midst of he decided to check out his philosophy and see how it applied
to the horror he was that he and the country we're going through
i think before the war he he he grew up in a family that was opposed to slavery after he was in many ways a pro opposed to hot hot kinds of even more subtle forms of cruelty
he
and what he saw when he checked out his philosophy he saw that
the test of an idea
he's not as immutability
but its adaptability
which is similar to
ideas you know ideas actually kill can last because they're just the concepts can last but their their viability their their their survival their survival their continue to life in people
is
due to adaptability not to the permit their life doesn't continue they don't have permanent life
so this is the idea that these four people had
about ideas
that it's not the immutability of the that's that gives them life
but their adaptability
and the the idea that war is
the his bad that we shouldn't do it that idea lost his life in the united states
very wonderful it's a wonderful value had lost its life
pretty much and know and and new idea came called this war needs to be needs to be had for you know people at all these different agendas for you know why that was so
so we had this horrible war
but those are some of those ideas for example
that was bad and we shouldn't do it or there should be abolished that idea lost its life after the war and not do not just because people went to war but because they were kind of in shock about the about the about what happened to their ideas and how they themselves flipped like emerson even said
sometimes gunpowder smells sweet
these are these man is born particularly young man in the war see spot for himself
he he wasn't thinking for his daddy or for abraham lincoln
he thought for himself in other words he turned around looked at his own philosophy in the middle of the war
and he got together with other people who during the war and after the war were willing to actually study their own thinking
and when they did
the one nice to actually can't do it was not in in the metaphysical club right he was too young
to let too young to be in a metaphysical club there when letterman but these three when they turned around and looked at their thinking they found that this is the nature of their thinking and not just their thinking but everybody else's to that's what they thought
what effect this has on american culture i tie in the assessment of this
we you know we can consider but
it may be part of what made our country able to open to the teachings of buddhism to the teachings about of emptiness
that's some of our ancestors for i had actually come to the conclusion where they could see that ideas are empty that their contingent and they live when certain conditions are there and when they're not
they don't live that way anymore
i actually without going to war
some fashion designers understand this
you know they understand the idea of green
is alive this week
they can see it's you know that green is the adaptable color right now
in this area of the planet
and they actually also understand that they can make a living because green will not continue to be the in the in color next week next year
but on certain issues like whether we should go to war or not and whether we show slaves are not that is harder for people to be creative about that
they needed sometimes a war
to wake up to that the vitality of that position depends on the conditions which support it

and felicitous asked me all day about the teaching you know learn the backward step or take the backward step which turns the light around and illuminates the self but actually it's take the backward step which turns the light around and shines it back on your thinking
study your thinking be aware of your thinking which in other words be aware of your karma
turn the lights back search back into your own vision think back into the mind that thanks
the zen ancestors
have been teaching that often on
turn around
step backwards
think back to your thinking
think for yourself
and then
what do you find
what kind of thinking is there who's there who are you and what are your thoughts
huh

ha so again not a these these american thinkers these american philosophers these american yeah
i guess you could call them paul kind of philosophers were in a way certainly pearson and william james or was originally a psychologist but towards the end of his life became more a philosopher
so they're all kind of philosophers one of whom was a judge ah the supreme court oliver wendell holmes jr but really he was a philosopher even in the battlefield he was a philosopher
at least outright after the battle when he was recovering
so i don't know if i think it is possible for a person to be a philosopher without
studying their thinking maybe as possible
but these philosophers
did study their thinking and can this sense they are philosophers were they're studying psychology
but it's not just psychology to notice that the psychological process is empty that's more of a philosophical insight
so you're studying psychology
you're studying ideas you're studying thinking that studying psychology
and then you see that the psychological phenomena
are entirely contingent
and that their their vitality their actual engagement with the society will depend on conditions some of your thinking
like i just also saw this article but this woman yeah
she's she's called the leader of a new left
what's her name
ha
naomi klein okay so she had an idea and now her idea because the conditions are coming together so it's like it's alive
you know
and then people will well and what they'll do it that but you can see the life of it is entirely contingent on for example
barack obama dolls and the economic crisis have economic crisis and then people suddenly
then her ideas become very alive
and then can you think well then there's like there's actually some truth to them
and then make an ideology out of naomi klein
ideas right
these philosophers and the buddhist philosophers are saying something different they're saying yes she's popular now and some of your ideas may become very popular to
now barack obama's
the saviour of the world you know that's a popular idea to love the idea
my recap my son my grandson is has been and he's been betrothed to one a broken promise youngest here younger daughters
so he's gonna be marrying her has some point

that that idea will that idea will have life will come alive
if certain conditions are met
you know it'll be a know be a kind of a big lively idea
not just for my grandson and whatever her name has what's her name sasha
mazzeo but it'll be a national idea
it'll have vitality but conditions have to be met my daughter has to work things out with michelle

and then there's the kids to consider whether they want to or not
these conditions
the idea is there i just told you about it how much life does it have on now and have some life according to the conditions of new abode hermitage you know it hasn't life today but will live any longer
yeah probably little but not much necessarily on the certain conditions come to bear
you know if you go go and tell stories and body and know maybe it'll become national news and then stacia will hear about them said what's going on and so on
so i guess i'm be saying that the
i am
i am i
i am
happy to if if conditions are there i am happy to direct my attention towards the ways in which these people studied themselves these western men studied their minds
and i want you know that i've seen some sign in the book that some western females also did the same thing and they are recorded in the book said correct
yeah so there's some eminent who did the same practice who looked at their own ideas so here's an idea which
comes in relationship to this idea and that is that
if if a person does the practice of studying themselves and studying their ideas of learning this backwards step
they will become
a bodhisattva
they will become a great being and be a blessing to the world
they will have ideas like everybody else but they will understand the emptiness of their ideas and then their ideas will become opportunities for them to express
their understanding of the nature of their own ideas
and they will not think that their ideas are better than other people's ideas they will think the other people's ideas are empty and their ideas are empty and but they will still give their ideas to the world but the world will see a being which can give ideas with understanding of what's the idea is
in other words they will see beings who have gifts to give and you understand
the nature of gifts
which is the same nature as the nature of
of ideas
so that's that's that's and i have that idea and that idea has life for me this morning some giving it to
and then i will keep watching i vowed to keep watching
so that i don't
they've got that idea actually has some independent existence from those who
disagree with me but actually no one disagrees with me yes jack
no special chesty jackie
that doesn't disagree with me
jacqueline disagrees
assistant idea it sure is
so are you using that thought
and ideas
damn
on one meaning of thought is concept
i thought to be used as a synonym for ideas and concepts
sometimes people use thought however as synonym for consciousness which is you know that makes things more complicated
so but buddhist thought her a buddhist thought is like a buddhist idea of buddhist concept and i don't and sometimes we also people use thought for thinking but hi tanti to not use thought for thinking but do you thought i usually use thought for in are equal to idea or concept
our image
but some people use it a more widely or and stuff makes it so confusing
it has for me
don't take a belief in it
the i thought idea idea has had to take of a belief sydney it feels like it's more
at the base
cluster
that's what certain intense
where it's okay i can come in just fly away who
when an idea it
okay
i think to either it i think
when people again depends who is who is who we're talking about when a person is a person like these gentlemen i'm referring to when they have ideas they are aware that this idea is entirely contingent
but even their beliefs they also have beliefs and they believe but also they actually see
that beliefs are also the vitality of belief is also contingent
so different phases in human history not just human history even non-human history non-humans also have concepts and ideas i feel as one of my ideas that i have
so
a even know it even if you're right that that the word idea refers more to the police side it's possible to believe can actually to see that beliefs are empty that police are contingent in other words you could have the belief that beliefs are entirely contingent
including the belief that beliefs are entirely contingent
and you can have the idea
that ideas are contingent and the idea that thoughts are contingent
yes you refer to your mind and watching it's intentions yeah i'm watching its intention soon as
you know in sitting and just watching my thoughts yes i
i don't i feel like i don't get to to see the changes that
that now i'm getting myself into trouble i can see that
the changes that i wish to see happen within me
and and i think that's because i'm just watching your thoughts superficially verses
the intention the idea behind cake and i can i set us back to you see if i got what you're saying
mercedes back safely so i kind of feel you're saying that if you study or and intentions or study are thinking
that is if you devote your time to this study that is hard for you to see that this study is promoting are bringing about certain changes in your being which you'd like to have no no
i'm just saying that they're different levels of it that that watching my thinking is is superficial
in bringing about
a change can bring about change
so you're saying that you feel like watching years thinking is superficial vis-a-vis bringing about change of ideas
it's it's like there is there is there
and maybe that's why we can't change our habits
that's why we're were like these patterns that are selling great there's more to just k so i actually have a nice difference to offer u k 's i'm saying if you superficially observe your thinking
that will be that that that observation process will change your ideas
i think sometimes people think that their ideas catches because they're good like for example the idea that that slavery is bad they don't want that to change dash it's not gonna change
or the for that war is bad they don't want that to change so they hold it to my holds it
i'm saying if you watch your thinking he watch your intention you will notice that
ideas are changing
the but the ideas you're considering the idea you're open to are changing you will notice your less clings to your ideas and and that sense your ideas the ideas you have the ones that belong to you the one year lined up with
the alignments will start shifting
you will feel less aligned or should say less stuck in the things you the in your values
if you study your thinking and some people might say i don't want to be less aligned with slavery as bad
and so what i'm proposing here to you is that if you wish
to bring about the welfare of the world
including you wish for the welfare of all beings who are in slavery if you want to realize that for them that they're not being attached to the idea that slavery is bad will help you realize that
if you want to help people realize the bodhisattva precepts of not killing
i'm proposing that study you're thinking which includes i wanted to be i want to practice not killing stunning you're thinking which is i think killings bad
if you study that thinking that will help you realize non attachment to your thinking quotes i think thinking is bad and realize the precept of not killing
so i i'm saying although you may be don't see this yet
really clearly that your study of you're thinking will not so much bring about the change of it will bring about a change of your ideas and since a you will become more fluid and relaxed and playful with your ideas
already you have there's already you how your are you are when he caught a aware of many many ideas some of which you don't call yours
some of which you do call years so what what made what will happen if you study this way is that your ideas will become the ideas of people who aren't you
that the ideas of people who aren't you and who used you used to think weren't your ideas will become your ideas
you know who says well i do not want george bush's ideas to become my ideas
well they won't become your ideas the way your ideas are now your ideas that will become your ideas the way your ideas are when you let go of your ideas you will hold onto those it isn't then you can be friends with george bush and have him let go of his ideas
so now we have the idea of a president elect was willing to talk to the cubans was willing to talk to terrorists and on perceiving the body with the pair of terrorist know
but i might actually start to talk to them the point of this being that we had the value that would be good to disarm the terrorists it would be good if the terrorists disarm themselves that would be good we have the value so because of that value i want to engage with them but even that value that would be good of the terrorists disarmed
i realized that's contingent to
and if i study my thinking i will be able to be more relaxed and playful with the idea terrorism bad or terrorism good george bushes bad george bushes good talk to the cuba's not talk to the cubans
that in other words you could skillfully use the world to benefit the world including that you realize that that agenda is also contingent it's vitality is contingent it's death is contingent so this is this is i think making a big case for
the value of the truth in the truth is that my ideas are empty and your ideas are empty and if i study my own kitchen process if i can see if i can open to that process i will learn emptiness just like it because open to the process of
surfing you realize the emptiness of water
and of life and of surfboards
so not all of us are surfing but in this room all of us are pretty close to being ready to study are thinking
jackie says she's not so sure this study your think he's going to open her
to the deeper understanding of her ideas
so that caught my ideas will change and there was my ideas will no longer be my ideas will be just ideas you haven't seen that yet
but i'm saying you will and i'm telling you also the fact that you can tell me recently
and you've noticed a tenacious relationship with your ideas comes to you because you've been studying you're thinking
he used to be tenaciously hold into your ideas but didn't even notice it you taught it he thought i'm not tenacious the holding to them they're just they're just absolute reality that's all
it's not that i'm holding to them they're just they're just true you know everybody that saw this would be holding to him to it because the reality now as you've been studying your second notice hey i'm holding onto these things pretty tightly
this is the beginning of the hand
i'm holding to your ideas totally
and you just keep study yourself and you will finally have perhaps very similar values to the ones you've already had but you'll be much more flexible with them and the way you use them home
who will inspire people to study themselves
they will see the beauty not so much in your ideas but in the way you relate to them
everybody knows how to hold onto him very tightly little children can hold onto their ideas very tightly they knock themselves out literally by holding their ideas you know in earlier by the day are holding them you know but you know little bit of a looseness there but twas a day pursue progresses they get tighter and tighter names
they just crashed they meltdown in the in the futility of thinking hole in his ideas will protect them from disaster
elizabeth and the grevers show and homa yes
the first

yes
ultimate truth the internet of things is also empty
and so we say you know
that which dependently core rises or that which is dependent arising i proclaim to be emptiness
even our highest teaching in buddhism the or arising everything's pauline's that exist are the pinnacle arises
there's no other things that exist something doesn't depend nicole arise it doesn't exist everything that doesn't exist gives it a pinnacle arising okay so that was depend on the core arises that everything that exists i declared to be emptiness that being a conventional designation is the middle way
very simple
the deep but version
deep means it takes hard to understand it requires tremendous effort understand that statement but anyway there it is in short huh
ha maybe
but basically everything that exists is dependent core arising everything this is empty
what i just said being a conventional designation but i just said because it's a way i'm talking now is another dependent arising that isn't it awesome
conventional designations are ideas
or i could say that being idea but that's not the way said it that being a conventional designation is not just an idea it's a conventional designation other words it's a concept
that has some vitality because of the contingency of society makes it that can make sense the britain and buddhist squirrel what i just said makes sense
it's just not just an idea it's a conventional idea within a certain linguistic context
so it's an idea it's a concept and it's a conventional and i'm uttering this concept the fact that this is a conventional utterance
it adding that to my five pry proclaim the ultimate truth and in in proclaiming it i'm i actually gave you a conventional truth a conditional designation of it keeping that in mind about statements about the ultimate truth is the middle way
i'm telling you that from the truth but i'm telling you it's empty
that keeps you balanced so i'm telling you the most important idea that there is and that's going to and not relaxed with that and apply that to everything which will help you relax with everything
okay

express yourself
there's a teaching
which is please express yourself fully yeah we can do that teaching yes
one network chance sometimes about if your ship the ocean the ocean the circular and and
when you feel it entirely then you see that something's missing
junk in time you don't see that sometimes and say you so that to me is linked with a full-stack expression raised the pulling back full circle and realize the ocean so much bigger than your full right idea about your ideas your point of view right the ocean is stomach
big right and you but you might not realize that if you disquieting stick of water
you might think hey i circled water but that's because you know you think you know something about the circle of water but if you really engage with that turtle of water fully he realized
there's something more than the circle of water you'll understand that there's something missing in the circle of water
this whale that i'm just meeting now did didn't come from the circle of water devotion must be bigger than this as well bigger than the circle of water etc
some but but it's possible that you know
to be in the circle of water and not be engaged with a very fully and think this is the whole stuck and this is a complete story
that's me study yourself and fully expressing yourself are two different ways are talking about the same process these men in west and we're talking about and the women who followed them in the west and the women women in the east who studied themselves they
through to study themselves they fully express themselves
so full self expression and study itself as same thing and you can study yourself you realize something's missing
for example the south of the circle waters missing
like study yourself the independence of yourself is missing the cell phone for is missing the independence of yourself as missing you see that when you fully engage yourself this self of your ideas if you fully engage with them you knew you realize is missing i think when i first started studying my ideas like when i first started studying
willing to study when i first received war as bad when i first received jews are good when i first received jesus as bad when i first received jesus as good when it first to see these ideas i didn't study them i just took them and held onto them
when i started to study them i finally realized that all these ideas and all these values there's something missing and was missing is an inner
logic and inner truth that's what they're missing i realized that because i fully engaged so again oliver wendell holmes very smart young man he hadn't flavors bad actually even war is bad but pico slavery is bad and some of the values he had about kindness and so on
he gets into war and he started to fully engage these values and fully engaging them he realizes that are empty
begins to it begins to realize they're empty and spends the rest of his life trying to bring that realization into his relationship with people
next step

yeah
it's totality so once we realize the emptiness of thinking once we realize the emptiness of ideas we opened the door the door to the totality of ideas and that's the great being
once he realized the emptiness or are thinking when we opened to the great being of our thinking
and the and great benefit of that truth is the great being which is realized through that truth it isn't just to realize the emptiness of things it's to realize the emptiness of them and not be attached to them and then use them to how beings because you understand
have you show

can i secure and to right there
we do use ideas to orient ourselves
that's how that that's that's their like that it doesn't not point these people are making ideas are tools to use to orient in the world
but we but we sometimes forget that their tools and confuse the tool with the world because sometimes the tool is is a way of construing the world
my god i liked examples of glasses glasses on your eyes to see in a different way than you would with them off but once you get them on your eyes you can't see you can't you can't see the way you saw them when before you had them on your vision before having man as last year and you think that what's going on his act
really when she sings the way you're seeing for your glasses but in some ways it helps you cope if you're trying to read a telephone number to call a emergency room it kind of this can help you cope with with the world to have these glasses but then there's a fundamental error in the glasses there
because noticed that there are different view but the areas that you tend to confuse them with what's there like my high doctor said the world's a lot clearer out there than you than you can see and you see it through your eyes that the world actually is that way but really what it means is the was clear in these glasses then it isn't you
our eyes
but he said is clear out there
the wax glasses are a tool to deal with the world that and way that you can't deal with the world without them on it's not that the world's actually the way it isn't the glasses but you want it to be the weight is new glasses and other you want to be able to read that number
so they are tools and we lose sight of them than being tools
and that's a big problem with the side of it
but if you study yourself you realize cold i am losing sight of them bank tools and that's making me rigid
and cetera if i remember that are tools ah then there's more there's more possibilities here
houma

yeah

giving

the other side which is
yeah yeah okay to see me excuse me
i wanted to point out now at this point that you are telling i hear you telling me this and i have the idea that you're telling me about how you study your thinking
you're giving me report now you're observing your thinking yeah

either

yeah so part of your thinking is i want to see that i want to discover the middle way
okay so so you you i hear you say you that you're observing your thinking and i hear you saying that you want to you want to stay in the middle way
and i i think that in order to stay in the middle way
if you should stop trying to stay in the middle way
but you have to what i'm suggesting us but you have to watch your attempt to stay in the middle way in order to not be holding onto the idea of staying in the middle way
the idea of staying in the middle way's fine but if you hold tightly to the are holding onto the if you hold tightly to the idea staying in the middle way that will make a hard for you to be in the middle way you can't actually stay in the middle with being split being in the middle way is the mind of know bowed but your mind wants to stand
middle way if you watched the are thinking that wants to stay in the middle way you will find a way to be in the middle way free of your idea of staying in a middle way and you are observing this it's hard work
it's similar to what you're talking about i'm saying that she's study her thinking years study you're thinking and one of the think she's finding
he said are thinking as you would like to stay in the middle way and if you keep studying that you will give up trying to stay in the middle way and if you give up trying to stay in a middle way you will find a middle way
and if you keep studying you will find a middle way without trying to hold it
because the middle way can not be held
it's actually it's lighter saying do not hold me receive me live me let me live you but don't try to hold me

he just used you just use words this let me live you you use those words this is and this is a messenger this is an angel
tell from the truth telling you that it wants to live you
and if you keep watching how you're attaching to the wonderful things like freedom in a middle way and all that it can keep watching your thinking attaching a this stuff you will become free of this process and you'll be able to let the truth love you
he saw the way
yes make your not accepting it because you here because of a habit of holding on to something even the most excellent thing
we can't hold onto
and if you've seen if you're willing to study your thinking and can see the guy things that you're seeing see the kind of things that other people are saying
and i mean and they see if we study or thinking if we're open to that process
i'm predicting that we will actually find a way to be with the truth without making with are grabbing it in other words without making it something that has independent existence the truth again that things don't have independent existence you can also make that into something where does but we're trying to not do that way
the way you don't do that is what you're thinking which tries to grab onto everything
yes rachel i mean conduct this condo soon
how is it possible to
you see that your thoughts and ideas are empty and not really true or false was it possible to stuff
well once once you see your ideas are as empty
then your action becomes the enactment of that vision
the division of the thought being empty so once i once i see my for example if i have thought of compassion towards you
ah and i see that the my thought of compassion is empty and also the infinite compassion is empty in a year empty then with the way i relate to you
is basically unfolding that vision of the emptiness it's not it's not so much relating my my vision of a
ah it's not so much related my vision of compassion and my vision of view it's primarily i'm i'm actually trying to express the fact that i've realized that your empty or in other words that i'm trying to express that your me i just i understand that your me so then when i do as an expression to undress
standing which i understand will be compassion but i've actually emptied compassion my mind is emptied compassion in you and me
and so now from that so i do act but my is is an expression of that understanding
he we do keep acting
discretion upon what understanding how we acting upon the understanding that our ideas
our permanent immutable and have a self are reacting from the understanding that our ideas are contingent and relative
and then we still have ideas and still act but as coming from a different are standing in the eye and
and and and this is also up for testing yes
seizing easy
yeah
now no not on what your example
nah she's an example of that i mean she's she's no more of an example of that than anybody else's she's an idea an example of somebody has ideas and seems to want to put them out in the world but her ideas have life now whereas a while ago her ideas going on over there
might have life and not as much as they do know because of the financial crisis and and because of a of a new administration and because of the americans
being having a different country the contingencies are such at her ideas are like really hot people were listening to him before but not everybody wants to listen to her
but but her truth is is his contingent and vitality of is contingent that's what i was points she's an example of that
where she is doing it
i i haven't talked to i haven't tested or
she might eat if i talk to her she might be just like george bush for all i know
so how does she liked the way you do the radio originally described her
could a equally applied to george bush or who knows who even maybe barack obama i don't know barack obama looks a little bit like he understands these people
then i'm talking about looks like he he seems to have a the fact that he says my faith and midst of some doubt
admitting have some doubt is a little bit like i admit that my faith is somewhat contingent and maybe i'm like
you know now we may these might thought contingent but maybe i even attached to it so that kind of language makes me feel like he's an example of someone understands this what you said i think i think she'd she like all of us likes to put our ideas out gay but what you said originally she she would be just like george
bush whether she understands the emptiness of what you saying or not
ah for me remains to be seen
good
if so again now we have the basic boys off the practice of giving gifts if you have ideas which you do if you have thinking which you do any and you're thinking is always a gift you will understand that you're thinking is entirely
dependent entirely contingent if you make all your ideas gifts
if you understand it all your ideas are empty then you will understand all your ideas are gifts but if you don't yet understand your ideas are gifts i mean are empty make them gifts and you will understand that they're empty if you understand their empty you realize that they are gifts that's the way you'll give them you will give them to
manipulate things because you don't see the world that way
you know the causes and conditions will make them give them their currency their coin
so whether she has this flexibility of of the mind of know about or not remains to be seen by me maybe if i met her i feel like oh wow we got a bodhisattva here
who's not just an end as bodhisattva just happens to have these ideas for this time if she really is a boy sat for her ideas won't be the same next year
however it's the contingency well
will determine whether they will have life
but i think body was actually because they're in touch with this their ideas tend to have life because their ideas or gifts
so they keep living that they have the gift which keeps giving
because they keep letting go of that they had no the like keep letting go of their ideas the ideas keeping giving so the ideas keep having
a vitality but chemicals that they're not their ideas they're just the gifts that are flowing through them
so i wasn't using her as an example i was using your example of someone whose ideas have now become very alive they're wonderful to to hear but because they're are there they are or crews there like the time has come for them it's beautiful to see sometimes
to come in not in the coming together of the conditions to make a certain idea like to really shine
and these ideas of these nineteenth and early twentieth century a philosophers
it may be that now they have a new what got a new birth of freedom and life of their ideas will come now because of this book people when i see all
and the buddhist will say all great somebody pointing out the the buddhist wisdom in some of our american ancestors maybe this would be a way to help people open up to the bodhisattva practice so it's kind of like that's why why john reddit and told me about it because he poses i think i see some such activity in this story here
sometimes it helps americans have to talk about the americans rather than east asians
and then after they listen to us talk about americans they miss her and my open to the east asians which might help them understand the bodhisattva spirit and i'm in american history
lots of good people in america but not too many i'm realize the emptiness a goodness
which limits limits the goodness of are good people
karen
the
last time
say again
you can see
it's not a problem myself it's a problem if you make it into a reality if you if you think it's inherently true if you think it has a self then we'll haven't done we have etiology and then we have a war

i don't know if slavery good or bad but i'd like to alleviate the suffering around it
it sounds like you know it could be a people to got a new version of what the person held before after the end and he let go of it and they came up with this other version
and and so the newly released ah the new the new the new baby of the released old program often will have this freshness to it
and so you might be able to talk to a slave owner
if you with this brand new idea of you know i'd like to live the the suffering he might say i would like to to i said been i've been wanting to alleviate their suffering from a long time but i i need them in order to build my new house in our so i'm sorry but i would like this a sandwich please help me you know like the
they like us to come to prison lot of people like us to come to prison to make the prisoners more comfortable but they still want to get to prison guy
if we come in they're acting like the guards and the establishment are creeps in the prisoners are good they don't want us to come
so that that that thought might be ah
a new thing that has life
and giving away the immutable flavors bad it must hand and tight as new approach might be coming from listening up with the old idea but then you have to do the same now with a new one you have to let go of that to said but there was a nice front newton give it away cairn give it away with find a new one today and say so
okay okay give it give it away can only does the minutes give it a wig give give give and you gave it and is gone and what was that i dig in you might be remembered but actually forget a not have a new and current a new thing for today
can you give away that one has been given now to have forty want to give us today but the day i'd like to say blah blah
which might have nothing to do with slavery and that might be just the best thing for all concerned
that might be was really apropos alleviating suffering
yes johnny
some suggestion

thirty second before you say that dry some suggestion about how to relate to other people you can stop right there cancer
a subset of people
you can stop up there
the way to deal with other people including this daniel some separate you're about to bring out
the way i would suggest will apply to all the subsets
so what am i going to say
hmm
it applies to this subset we can go to the subset later if you want to check it out to you know but it applies for dealing with other people watch the way of dealing with other people
what yes realize or a pianist estimated date with other people which means to realize that yourself
which means to make every action you give every action that you're involved with can make every action a gift
that's the way to deal with other people make yourself a gift
when you make yourself a gift when you really get into their practice you will understand that that their everything they give you as a gift but you can start with the other practice you can say the way to do with other people is to be mindful that they are a gift
they are gift charlie's is a gift max is a gift you're on as a gift that's one way or the other ways i'm a gift to your on i'm a gift to max i'm a gift determining which means i give myself to them with no expectation
that's the way to deal with people which is the same as other people or myself which is the same other people are empty and then not she want to give some said now
yeah charlie is a subset is a subset you're on the subset men are subset women are a subset children's upset the all treated the same way
which is the same as
ideas i can barely contingent
st
i have an idea of you it's entirely contingent ha
dependent on things other than itself entirely contingent means there's nothing to itself it just depends on other things
that's the way
you to deal with everything not just people
tracy
make yourself a gift
what's the message
a kindness comes basically as giving
bodhisattva precepts
patience
enthusiastic effort and concentration
does your kindness this because there's a set a summary of kindness
those are kindness that's kindness put in terms of virtues
now wisdom strictly speaking isn't exactly kindness is just to understanding however wisdom it would make is what makes the kindness fully function
where's the but it wasn't something is a different dimension the kind of because when as just understanding it's just reality
but it it protects the kindness practices from being lost and the kindest practices are what develop this the wish to benefit bags
and the first one is giving
which is connected to the last one of wisdom you practice giving you have wisdom you practice wisdom everything you do as a gift but if you don't understand that other people or yourself then act like that
now give yourself to them but if you give yourself t to someone who you understand yourself you don't expect anything back or forward or sideways you just give because of your understanding but if you don't understand that would just give yourself that way and you will understand
so the beginning practice of giving and wisdom perfect wisdom are written the same thing
so ah i heard it we heard you're going to get some kind of so-called moisture some wind and rain and as morning with bright and sunny i thought well looks like we get to start the day of no abode with son and now the weather's coming
so maybe we can have lunch before the storm hits
the even the deck before
before the wind and rain touch year
touch your perfect body and your perfect mind
my intention