The basic meditation or teaching to meditate on that I'm offering during these five days is about a relationship. Did you hear about it? You just came and didn't buy anything? I heard a title. Huh? You heard a title? Remember what the title was? No. What we saw at the precepts was something we can practice. That's a guess. That's a guess? Good guess. What we saw at the precepts. Something about that? Anybody else? Anything about the title? What? Meditation and the Bodhisattva perception.

[01:06]

Or you could say the relationship between meditation and the Bodhisattva perception. the Bodhisattva precepts of the lineage that comes through Dogen Zenji in Japan and comes down through that lineage of practice to Suzuki Shinryo Roshi in San Francisco Zen Center. And then I was initiated in that lineage. quite a few of you are also initiated into that precept .

[02:09]

It's a particular set of precepts. And they're the type of precepts called bodhisattva precepts. And they're not the same precepts as you find in other other lineages within the tradition of the Buddhist teaching. And they're also somewhat different from precepts in other religions. Actually, Dogen's precepts are also different from the Bodhisattva precepts that were usually found in China and that were found in Japan before him. If you want to find out more about that, let me know. We can talk about it.

[03:10]

But basically, it's a set of 16 precepts. And particularly, I think I'd like to focus on three of them, the so-called pure precepts, those three pure precepts. I think I've . I'll be going round and round and round on this. It's actually basically a very simple message that is a very simple message, but to realize that it's very subtle, a very subtle matter. So what I would suggest, just to start by moving here, is that these bodhisattva precepts are basically about becoming free of discrimination.

[04:18]

Some precepts are different. Some precepts are about moral discipline to become more virtuous, for example. Now, that way of working with precepts as moral precepts to become to develop more moral goodness if not at all separate from the precepts which are basically about becoming free of discrimination. Another way to put it is they're precepts which are primarily about becoming free of the discrimination of separation. So of course Anybody who practices moral discipline in any way, including that they're not practicing moral discipline to become free of discrimination, even people who are practicing moral discipline to become more discriminating and to be more separate from other people and other beings, some people do it that way.

[05:51]

Bodhisattva's practice of the precepts is to get over and become free of and not to be trapped by the discrimination between bodhisattvas and those people who do not want to be bodhisattvas right now. So these precepts are moral precepts which are about becoming going beyond, they're about going beyond moral precepts. Or there are moral precepts which have a source which is beyond them. And the source which is beyond them is non-discrimination. The Buddha's mind is non-discriminating wisdom.

[06:54]

is non-discriminating consciousness. And from this non-discriminating consciousness, the Bodhisattva precepts come forward. Also, the other kinds of precepts, Buddha also gave other precepts from this non-discriminating wisdom. He gave precepts to people who are not yet interested in learning how to be free of discrimination. But he also gave precepts for bodhisattvas, which are primarily about not being trapped by discrimination. And when you're not trapped by discrimination, you enter the realm of the Buddha. These precepts are about entering directly the Buddha's meditation.

[08:00]

Buddhas meditate all the time, and their meditation is identical to their enlightenment. And I reveal to you the process which you might have noticed even if I didn't tell you about it, but I'm telling you about it now so you can watch it during these five days, and you can watch it possibly the rest of your life, which is that Again, from a realm that's beyond discrimination and beyond explanation and beyond the teachings, the teachings come forth.

[09:12]

And then working with these discriminations, these teachings, in a certain way, you then enter into the Buddha mind. So when I give, like right now I'm giving you some But I'm also letting you know that the context of these instructions, of these teachings, is beyond this. you may observe that we will go from looking at non-discrimination back into discrimination back into non-discrimination round and round during this time. I'm taking a walk with somebody. day before yesterday, and I think she said, she either asked me or told me what the retreat topic was, the relationship between meditation and the Bodhisattva precepts.

[10:43]

And by the way, when we say meditation, in this case, we mean Bodhisattva meditation, or Buddha meditation. So it's the relationship between the meditation of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas and Buddhas and Bodhisattvas' precepts. Not all forms of meditation are Buddhas' meditation. There are forms of meditation which involve discrimination and actually holding on to the discrimination. But some people meditate on how they're separate from other people and better than other people. Some people meditate on how other people who are separate from them are better than them. Some people meditate on how enlightenment is separate from their own state of mind.

[11:45]

Buddhas do not. Bodhisattvas do not meditate that way. So they have a meditation practice Buddhas and bodhisattvas have a meditation practice which is not clinging to discriminations. Discriminations are available in the universe in which they live, but they don't cling to them. That meditation practice is related to these bodhisattva precepts. She said, for how? And so one simple way is that We have a moral exercise called, don't do evil. We have moral exercise named, don't do evil, or avoid evil, or let go of evil, or whatever.

[12:55]

When you understand that evil is not the slightest bit separate from... Before I tell you this, I want to tell you that I'm about to tell you something that's very dangerous. So, be careful now when you hear this. When you realize, when you understand that evil is not the slightest bit separate from, what do you think I'm gonna say? Correct. When you realize that they're not the slightest bit separate, you will spontaneously practice only good. When you realize that good and evil are not separate, you will spontaneously give up doing evil.

[14:24]

When you spontaneously, without trying to follow a rule or anything, but just by the way you understand the world, when you give up doing evil in a moment, when you really give it up at that moment, you understand that good and evil are not separate. When you understand this and you practice giving up evil, that is the first bodhisattva principle. It's not just understanding that good and evil are not separate. It's not just that. It's also avoiding evil based on that understanding.

[15:37]

So the source of the of all the Bodhisattva precepts is a mind which doesn't discriminate between... It doesn't make any discrimination. It doesn't get involved in or attached to any discrimination. And then, the first pure Bodhisattva precept is with that understanding, you practice avoiding evil. If you're practicing avoiding evil, but you don't understand that evil is separate from good, if you don't understand that evil is not separate from good, then you are practicing avoiding evil. But it's not the Bodhisattva precept. It's a different precept, which is not a bad precept. The Buddha gave that precept in the early days, the precept of avoid all evil. He gave that teaching. And some people understood it as

[16:41]

avoid evil which is separate from good and they practiced that and that was good it's good to practice avoiding evil even with the understanding that evil separate from good it's still good to do that that makes sense to you but it's not the bodhisattva precept it's not the way the buddha practices avoiding evil buddha practices avoiding evil. Somebody asked Buddha, or Buddhists tell people, what do all Buddhists teach? They teach avoid evil. And they practice it. However, the Buddhists don't practice it from a mind which is caught by the discrimination between good and evil. They practice it from a mind far beyond the ideas and discrimination of good and evil. They practice it from this mind of non-discrimination, the mind of supreme awareness to practice avoiding evil.

[17:54]

They tell other people to practice avoiding evil. And some of them, they don't mention to do it with no discrimination. And they go ahead, and that's good. So the first bodhisattva principle pure priesthood is to practice avoiding evil without being caught by the discrimination between evil and good, or to practice doing good without being caught by any discrimination, and understanding That the two sides of discrimination are never separate in the slightest. And then the next one is to practice good.

[18:59]

The next pure precept is to practice good. And again, Buddha taught that. It's been taught over the centuries, over the millennia. Practice good. And to practice good is good. And to practice good with making a discrimination between good and evil is good. But to practice good without discriminating between the good that you're doing and the evil that you're not, that's the bodhisattva precept of practicing good. The third Bodhisattva precept is to nourish, develop, and liberate all living beings. So that precept is, again, you could do that precept as a result of trying to practice good and evil, practice good and avoid evil,

[20:10]

while still separating them, and there will be some merit in that. And you can devote that merit to the welfare of other beings. However, the Bodhisattva Precept is a different kind of merit. It comes from this non-discrimination coupled with practicing good and avoiding evil. And that merit is a type of merit which can liberate people. The other kind can help them, but it can't liberate them. And it can't liberate the practitioner either. So that kind of merit, bodhisattva develops by practicing good and avoiding evil without discriminating between them. And that merit is then turned over to all living beings and that saves them. It shows them the precepts and then it shows them how to go directly into the realm of Buddha.

[21:17]

To show people the precepts without teaching them how to become free of discrimination, they cannot enter the realm of Buddha because they're caught by discrimination. Unless we let go of discrimination, we exile ourselves from the realm of Buddha, which we're in right now. But because we discriminate between where we are and that realm, we imagine that we're not there. So this is the basic message.

[22:25]

And now there's the question of how to exercise it, to work it for five days, and to get into the groove of it so you can practice it until all things and things are saved. In the realm of good and evil, where they're separate, in the realm where good and evil seem to be separate, because they're not, or where they seem to be, in that realm where they seem to be,

[24:12]

Do all beings help each other? Are you saying that's wrong? But thanks for saying yes so I can say that. In a realm where there's good and evil, and good is separate from evil, It looks like not all beings are helping all beings. In the realm where good and evil are not separate, in that realm, it is revealed, it is clear, that all sentient beings and all Buddhists are helping each other. all the time.

[25:21]

So one of the great benefits of the practice of non-discrimination in connection with the precepts is that you will be able to see that everybody is helping you all the time. Everybody's supporting you and assisting you. And you are helping and supporting and assisting everybody else. You will be able to understand that. And another thing I think that's really interesting is that the way Dogen writes those three pure precepts. He writes that before each one of the three is a character which means to embrace and sustain.

[26:30]

So it's to embrace and sustain, and then it has the precept. Embrace and sustain the precept. Embrace and sustain the precept. Embrace and sustain the precept, and in our tradition, the first precept It's called the precept of forms and ceremonies, of regulations and ceremonies. So there's two things about that. One is that that precept is the precept, the first precept, that is the precept, that is to understand that there's no difference between good and evil, that there's no separation between good and evil, and practice avoiding evil. That's the precept of bonding ceremony.

[27:38]

Again, it's kind of indirect or twisted to put it that way. Maybe it's good to do it that way because that strange combination reminds you of this very strange thing of practice avoiding evil without being caught by the discrimination between good and evil. And then that precept of forms and ceremonies, we practice embracing and sustaining that. We practice embracing and sustaining Avoiding evil with no discrimination between evil and good. We embrace and sustain that practice. Being wholeheartedly devoted to avoiding evil. Not get involved in it.

[28:38]

At the same time, this is no different from good. Avoiding evil wholeheartedly and being really cool about it. Because it's not different from evil. It's from good. That's the practice. And then there's a character before which says embrace and sustain. Embrace and sustain that way of practicing. But the neat, super neat thing about this character is that it also means be embraced and sustained It has an active and a passive understanding built into it. I'll post a poster. Somebody will post it up there. Let me see that character.

[29:39]

And some of you may be seeing, that character is built of three. It's built of an ideogram for three ears. the character for ear three times with the character for hand. So it means you receive, you are embraced and sustained by this precept, and you embrace and sustain this precept. You are guided by this precept, and you guide with this precept. You unify the whole universe with this precept, and the whole universe unifies you with this precept. It goes both ways. Which again, cuts through the duality of self and other. Maybe that's enough in terms of starters.

[30:48]

Also for this retreat and generally speaking I'm doing this, if you'd like to express anything, any feedback to me or questions or just any kind of expression you'd like to offer to me in the group, instead of doing it from your seat, I'd like you to come up here and do it right in front of me. Don't feel pressured to do so. And you're invited to do so if you'd like to. Or if you think it would be beneficial to this world of suffering. Or if you think it would make Buddha happy. Or make you happy. Or if you'd be happy to do so. And you can come up here, and you can stand, or you can kneel, or you can sit.

[31:57]

Or you can lie down. And it's on. Feel free. Could you offer an example? Well, one other thing. If the people in the back cannot hear the person who's here, raise your hand. And then I will go like this, which means to you, Speak with more volume of air, I would say. Did you get that message from the doctor?

[32:59]

They didn't know before, but now we'll see what they say when we start talking. We'll see what their hand gestures are like. Could you offer an example of avoiding evil without making a discrimination between good and evil? Make an example? An example, just for me to understand, not an example. Let's say I thought of squashing a buck. That wasn't hurting me. just sort of walking across the driveway from one side to the other, and I went over and thought, I'd just kill that bug, because I hate that bug. But then I don't do it. I say, stop. Don't do that. That would be evil.

[34:02]

OK? That's the avoiding evil part. OK? Does that make sense? So far, so good. Now let's say I see someone run over and step on, about to step on the bug. Let's not say they made it yet. But they're heading over and they're saying, I'm going to kill that bug. I'd like to kill that bug. And I think, oh, that person seems to be about ready to do evil. But I don't hate them at all for this evil they're about to do. And I don't hate myself either when I'm thinking of doing it. Or even if they manage to get over there and they do step on the bug and do do evil and do hurt the bug,

[35:11]

and set a bad example for all the kids who are standing around. Even if they do that evil thing, I don't hate them. And also, I don't like that they did it either. That shows that I wasn't really caught by the discrimination of good and evil. And another aspect of that would be, I didn't kill the bug, I avoided that evil, and I'm not better than that person who did the evil. Another sign that I'm not caught by the discrimination between good and evil. Now, if you imagine the mind that would think, that does see that I avoided the evil and he did it,

[36:14]

and I'm a little bit better than him, or a lot better than him, that's the mind where you're caught. But where the other one was, the person's doing evil, or even you do evil, then a minute later, not preferring or loving one person more than the other around this, that would show that you had that mind of non-discrimination. and that mind would want again to protect that bug and protect the bug killers that mind would want good for all all the people involved all the beings involved that understanding would naturally not want to hurt anybody And there would be no restraining. It would just be a natural outflow from the heart of non-discrimination.

[37:17]

Again, without any separation of the people who are doing different things. Does that give you a feeling for it? Yeah. It's not that you're not observing distinctions. You're just not caught up in them. It's not that you're not observing distinctions, it's that you're not caught up in them. That's right. Or another nice phrase I often say is, the founder of the San Francisco Zen Center, Suzuki Roshi, said, non-discrimination does not mean you don't discriminate. It means, I think he said, you study everything. And I would add, it means non-discrimination is the fruit of studying the process of discrimination thoroughly.

[38:25]

If you watch your discrimination thoroughly, that process of study comes to fruit as non-discrimination. So the example I just gave, perhaps some of us have not reached that point. of in doing evil, in doing, avoiding evil, we have not yet reached the point where we wouldn't put the person who avoids it when we're trying to avoid it. We haven't reached the point where we don't put the person who avoided it above the person who didn't avoid it. So in fact, the way to that mind, which I just pointed to is through noticing that you are caught in discrimination. And, as we chanted a moment ago, observing that you're caught by discrimination, observing that you have not yet found the practice of the Buddha, and confessing that you're intending that you're caught by discrimination.

[39:44]

before the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. And this will melt away the root of being caught by discrimination. So we may have quite a few moments where we notice that we're caught by discrimination. And there's many other types, like I mentioned. And then we confess that, and then we see how we feel about it, and we feel a certain type of sorrow, which reforms us. That's repentance. And we do this with the Buddhas, and this process will melt away the root of being caught by discrimination, without our brain losing its ability to make discrimination happen. What is your name? Barry. Barry? I have a feeling or a wish, I think, to tell you many other kinds of discrimination not to be caught by, to help you develop this meditation of non-discriminating wisdom.

[41:45]

This morning, I mostly emphasized the discrimination between good and evil. And of course, that directly applies to these precepts. Looking at the other discriminations, widening the sense of this non-discriminating mind, the same mind, which again, that mind is the source of these precepts. But this morning, I pointed right to what the precepts are talking about. as a way to start talking about this mind, but I'll bring up lots of other kinds of discrimination, which hopefully we will become aware of, and notice whether we're caught by, or perhaps notice that we're not caught by some of them, and have a taste of non-discriminating wisdom. Barbara?

[42:53]

Please define confessions of repentance before the Buddha. I'm surprised people in the back are not raising their hands. Did you hear that? Couldn't hear it? You couldn't even hear me say that if you can't hear, raise your hand? Did you hear that part? Did you hear that part before? Yes. Cool. My response was to ask you guys if you heard that. Because I thought, you know, I looked and I thought, could they hear that? And sure enough, you couldn't, right? No, Jill couldn't. Jill couldn't. So Jill... Jill, I'd like you either to come up closer where you can hear better or raise your hand every time these people don't talk loudly enough. Also, if I don't talk loudly enough, please, you know, you can raise both hands.

[44:04]

You can take turns so you don't get unbalanced in your muscular development. Can you hear me okay? If you can't hear them, please I don't want you to miss out on what the question is, because then it will be hard for you to... Okay? Okay. Dr. Ann Barber, please. Can you define the confession and repentance before the Buddha in the process of... In the process of... Would you like to say it one more time? In the process of... Now, could you hear that, Jill? I didn't hear that last whole phrase that she just said. She said in the process that I am defining. Of learning not to become caught in the act of discriminating thinking.

[45:09]

Well, the process means you notice Like, let's say you see some opportunities. Have you seen any lately? An opportunity to avoid evil? Have you seen any? Do you remember what one of them was? Do you want to tell me? No. No? Yes? Yes? You do want to tell me? This needs louder, Barbara. All right. Okay. Talking back. Talking back? To someone. In a way that means expressing some kind of approval. Expressing disapproval in a way that's not beneficial?

[46:10]

Right. Okay. So you saw... Okay. So you saw, did you see some kind of impulse or intention to express yourself? And you noticed that there wasn't much mindfulness. So then since there wasn't mindfulness... you sort of said maybe don't talk without mindfulness. I said... Is that what you... Did you avoid it? No, I just... Oh, I see. You didn't avoid evil. You did an evil thing called speaking without mindfulness. Right. Okay. Yeah, so then... then you can confess that, you just confessed to that, right? Yeah, I think I haven't said the confession, but unless you... So now you have just confessed that a while ago you said something without mindfulness, and you feel that doing things without mindfulness is not helpful, it even can be harmful, and you're confessing that somewhat small evil.

[47:36]

Okay? Then the next step would be, or a next step would be, how do you feel about that? To look inside and see how you feel about that. So maybe you already know how you feel about it, but to look inside and see how you feel about it. And if you feel good about it, that's not repentance. Does that make sense? Does that make sense? If you do something that you think is evil, or in any way unskillful and harmful, and you feel good about it, that's not repentance. But if you feel sorrow, if you feel sorrow and grief and pain, you feel uncomfortable that you did something,

[48:37]

There's a certain way of feeling that which makes you feel like, I would like to give that up. I would like to, yeah, I would like to not speak unmindfully. I'd like to commit, recommit, again, to be mindful while I speak to myself. living beings and Buddha. And I feel I'm doing it in the presence of Buddha. I really feel, I feel actually open to having enlightened beings and enlightening beings be aware of this confession of this painful feeling I have around this evil deed, and also I feel good about, I'm open to them understanding and being aware that I'm recommitting because of this repentance.

[49:51]

I'm recommitting to try to practice that way. I invite them to witness me right now. And having a teacher who represents in this world these enlightened beings sometimes helps you remember that the full function of confession and repentance requires that you do it together with the Buddhists. It's of some good for me to confess my shortcomings, my evil demons. And it's of some good. It's actually of a great, it's very good, very helpful. And then for me to see how I feel and to identify that I don't feel good about it, that's good. But when I actually feel like, okay, and I also invite all enlightened beings to witness this and be with me while I do this practice of confession and repentance,

[51:00]

it has a different feeling, a bigger feeling, a more wholehearted feeling. And to use the opportunity of being with a fellow practitioner of the way who's trained at hearing these kinds of confessions and also to enter the opportunity of a situation where you have a picture of the Buddha or Bodhisattva to remind you to visually remind you, a visual aid, to remind you that you're not doing this practice of confession and repentance alone. And then you feel reminded and you feel like your heart feels like, okay, you guys are welcome to be here with me. So can you see the other side? It gives me two feelings.

[52:08]

Could you hear that? Or even, well, not a feeling, but a continuum of one extreme and the other. It gives you a continuum of feelings. Yeah. On one hand, I can see how this can be taken in a very elaborate way, like in church. And on the other side, you know, flogging yourself. You can go into judgment, but luckily I'm not. We haven't got to the judgment part yet, though. We're just doing the confession and repentance. But then she starts to notice the judgments or the discrimination. Now we start to open into this other dimension, the dimension of not being caught by discrimination. We're just talking about the confession and repentance. This is the arena. So there's a practice of good, there's a practice of avoiding evil, and there's a noticing when we're not doing that, and confession and repentance.

[53:13]

There's three situations of trying to do this and trying to avoid that and confessing when we don't do that. This is the situation. Now we've raised the issue of is there discrimination about this? And are you caught by it? So then that's the next thing you can start to see. You just talked about the confession and repentance at the beginning. Yes, but what I'm saying is that even in the process of confession with your sentence, I can become caught in anything. Exactly. Exactly. Yes. So then you confess that. Right. So first you're confessing an evil, then we confess... Another. Huh? Just another one. Well, it's not exactly evil. It's more like we confess being caught by discrimination between good and evil. It's a different confession. Well, it's not separate, but it's not the same. You can discriminate between them. So you can watch somebody do an evil thing and feel that that evil they did is separate from doing good.

[54:25]

You wouldn't be doing an evil thing by that. Being caught by discrimination is not one of the bodhisattva precepts. But discriminating between them is the thing that we're really trying to get over. And so that comes into play, both while you're trying to do good and trying to avoid them, but the discriminations are there. And those are really the most important thing to get over and the most difficult. And then in the process of confession, we can address basically two kinds of things. Going against the precepts, but also caught by discrimination. That's the more subtle and pervasive one. So you can do both. But sometimes people aren't ready to do the second one. So the confession or repentance is done by people who practice precepts in general, and bodhisattvas also. But the bodhisattvas are primarily from the most important, more centrally looking at the discrimination.

[55:30]

Right, so I can concentrate now that I've been caught in a discrimination or in the process of becoming very much free of discriminating thinking, I was getting caught a lot of times with self-judgements and feeling guilty or dead or whatever. But at this point, I do it a lot less. And for me, what was interesting was when you said the invitation of the Buddha in the process of repentance? Yes. I mean, this is an instant in everyday life. This is a moment of a slight instant in the record life that means a confession. And then... when you actually feel the emotional flavor around what just happened, and that in a way is repentance.

[56:36]

Repentance sounds such a big word. Repentance literally means to feel the pain again. It doesn't mean to punish yourself, it just means to feel the pain about what you did. And it has various connotations which we, again, have to be careful of. But it needs to feel attained. If the emotional surround of the action of unskillfulness is happiness, that's not repentance. If you're mean to somebody and you're happy about that, then that's not repentance. Repentance is, the basic meaning of repentance is sorrow. But isn't that still more... No, it's not necessarily. If the Buddha is looking at you and you do something unscathful, the Buddha can see that you're in pain from doing that. And the Buddha feels pain and sorrow because the Buddha loves you.

[57:41]

When you see someone who you love hurting themselves, If you really love them, you feel pain. Not because of what you did, because of what they're doing. And if you're a Buddha, you're not doing anything wrong, but you love all these people who are doing things wrong. And every one of them, when they do something wrong, they hurt you. They don't hurt you. They don't hurt you. Your love hurts you. Love hurts when you see somebody you love hurting themselves. And that's That's the most wonderful thing in the world. We're so happy. We're so happy that when someone we love hurts themselves, we don't have no pain. We're happy to have that pain because we know where it comes from. It enhances and fulfills our love.

[58:45]

that we feel pain like anything. But that's not repentance. Repentance is what I feel for when I'm being less than I can be. I feel sorrow about that. The way we're built is that when we do things that do not include what we are completely, we feel sorrow. When we don't love as much as we can, we feel sorrow. And that's good. And that pushes us to open up and love more fully. You don't have to name it. That's not it. Naming is not it. That's not repentance. You can do that. That's okay. Repentance is to feel it. It's to feel it.

[59:50]

It just felt. The previous part's not. The previous part's naming. The confession's naming. Even that, though, is not naming. It's recognition. It's naming. Recognition by naming it. As this is not, I did this thing, and you name it. You need to do recognition. Recognition requires meaning. It's conceptual. And you need to do it. If you're in a non-conceptual realm, you don't do this kind of stuff. It can be tough. Yeah, and the feeling of it is the repentance. Feeling is not a confession. But when you confess, you may have a feeling. I mean, you do have a feeling.

[60:51]

And you may be able to identify it. And if it's not a feeling of sorrow, then the mind that's looking at that is a very unwholesome mind. If we're doing something skillful, people who do unskillful things and feel good about it, that's more unskillful than the thing is, probably. But when you do an unskillful thing and you feel sorrow, That's a skillful feeling that steps up. And then that's a situation in which we start to get ready to notice then the next step, which is the discrimination. And that's the part that turns this practice into entering the Buddhist realm, rather than just good moral exercise. So how do I invite the Buddha? Anyway, Jim Peeble is a graphic artist.

[61:55]

He can help you making great invitations. And he probably has lots of different ideas of how to invite the Buddhas. But you can also be very, there's endless ways to invite the Buddhas. You can say, I'll bake you a cake if you come. You can say, I'll offer you incense. You can say, I'd love to have you here. Kathy, if you have space in your schedule, I'm going to do a confession now. Please come. There's endless ways. You can put some music on. You can sing. You can dance. The point is, you want them to come. All you've got to do is want them to. That's a good enough institution. You look in your heart and say, OK, I welcome your company. And one more thing I just mentioned, big parentheses, is in this way of confessing and repenting, opening to the Buddha's and Bodhisattva's presence, it also opens to the reality that they're always here. If we really accepted their presence, we would never do any evil and we would never discriminate between good and evil.

[63:00]

Their overwhelming love would obliterate any attachment to our discrimination. But the more I admit my discriminations in their presence, the more I open to the thoughts of their life And when I do that completely through this process, that's another way to enter the realm. Anyone else? I noticed when Barbara was talking that example that she gave that I can't remember, but I noticed for me compassion arose.

[64:21]

And when that happens, is that something extra? When you felt compassion for her? And for the story, you know, when she's, you know, if I'm being unkind to somebody or they're being unkind to me and I notice it and if compassion arises, is that something extra? No. This whole thing we're talking about here is compassion. The part where it's not so much strictly compassion is the noticing the discrimination and studying the discrimination. In a sense, that's a little bit different from compassion. That's called wisdom. The observation of and learning about the discrimination process including that you notice this is good and that's evil. But the study of it, the discernment of the process by which the study of the mind and how it works is more the wisdom part.

[65:27]

The compassion part is the openness to the openness to the good and evil, the openness to the sorrow in the situation, the openness to somebody's telling us they're stoics, and wishing them to be happy, and wishing them to be free of the suffering of country discrimination. That's part of the process. That's why it's also good to invite the Buddha to come, because that reminds us that compassion, we do this process of confession and repentance in an ocean of compassion. We don't do it by ourselves, you know, all alone. noticing our shortcomings and feeling bad about them. We don't do it alone. We do it in a huge container of compassion. And if we feel compassion for ourselves while we're telling the story, it's entirely appropriate.

[66:32]

So again, we are embraced and sustained by the compassion of the Buddhas whom we're practicing. So we're open to that. but also we embrace and sustain the practice of confession and repentance. We embrace and sustain these precepts. I embrace them. I collect them. I nourish them. And also, I am nourished by them and all the Buddhas who are around me, supporting me to do this practice both ways. And both of those feelings, the active and receptive dimension of compassion around these precepts. And around the practice of wisdom, as we start to study the process of discrimination, to start to study how our mind does that, being kind to ourselves in this study, supportive of ourselves, nurturing ourselves to do this wisdom work. It's not separate.

[67:35]

It's essential. But can you feel the difference between the learning side and the supported side? Like when your children or your students are trying to learn something, their learning is not your compassion, but you're supporting them to learn. Similarly, if you're learning something, like how to study your mind, the actual learning is more the wisdom side. But somebody supporting this, and rooting for this, and loving this, and feeling pain at the lack of skill at this. But being happy to feel pain when the student has not yet learned this. Happy. Job security. So when certain people learn something, we lose our job. It's sad, but we do.

[68:40]

Once they learn it, they're not the teacher anymore. They are. Thanks for the question. Anybody else? This act of confession, is it beneficial to open your mouth and say the word? Is that more preferable than just sort of having a generic confession, you know? Yes. And is there any particular advantage to making that concession to any particular kind of person?

[69:53]

Yes. Okay. And so would you say a little bit about that too? When you make vows, like if you make vows of compassion or vows to develop wisdom, first of all, if you look inside yourself and your heart and you see, oh, I would like to be more fully compassionate. I would like to practice, for example, the Bodhisattva precepts. You look inside, you see that intention. That intention, even if you don't look at it, will have consequences. If you want to be kind to people, if that's in your heart, that will have consequences. That intention is karma. In this case, it's a very wholesome, compassionate intention. If you look inside and become aware of that, that's the essential element of practice, is that you're aware of your intentions, of your vows that are in your heart.

[71:03]

But even if you don't look at the intention, they have consequences. If that intention then would now be woven into a verbal expression, the verbal expression will have a further consequence over and above the internal intention. And then if you would do something with your body, like raise your arms up or open your arms as an expression of this intention, that would have further consequence. And the type of consequence of the internal mental intention is different from the consequence of when it's expressed outwardly, verbally, physically. So to do it with mind, speech, and body, if it's a good thing, makes it more, has more consequence and more body to it.

[72:08]

So if it's a good thing, generally speaking, say it and Dance it. Say it and walk it. Say it and sit it. If it's good. If it's not wholesome, however, if you look inside and you find an intention, I don't want to help everybody. I just want to help a few people. You look and see that kind of limited good wish. Or even look inside and see, I want to hurt a lot of people. Or at least I want to hurt this person. You see an intention like that, That has consequences. Unwholesome, probably consequences. That's something to be confessed, hopefully. And then if you verbally and physically enact it, it has more unwholesome, more unhappy consequences. So something good, the more you can enact it, the more dimensions you can enact it, the better. The more it grows.

[73:11]

But to notice it internally is good, But just then to say it is more, and to physically show it is more. Like, oh, you're doing really well. There's more than just me thinking, oh, you're doing well. No, I think inside, you're doing really well. I say, you're doing really well. It's more. It's more like appreciation is like being realized in this world. But some people go around, you know, and they see people and appreciate them. It's still really good that they're appreciating everybody. But then when a smile appears on their face, the people see the smile, and they feel, oh my God, there's some stranger walking down the street appreciating this. Wow. Maybe I can go on the rest of the day now. So Bodhisattva's walked down the street appreciating everybody and smiling at them.

[74:14]

So they're putting it into their face. Otherwise the people might not, they can feel something, but the smile helps them. Or they just say, you know, I love you. It helps them. By the way, I love you. It's, what do you call it? It's St. Valentine's Day. I love you guys. You know? It makes a difference, right? Now maybe you knew before I said that, that I did. But now I tell you, I love you. Did you know before? I told you. Did you know that, Larry? Yeah, so now you know. Do you know now? Good, yeah, see? So saying it does help if it's good. And also if it's evil, it helps the evil grow too. Like I hate you and then say it out loud, it kind of helps it along, right? It spreads it around. It makes the consequences greater. So that's why generous dignity together, uncompassionate thought in your heart, you don't need to say it except to confess it.

[75:16]

And that's good to say to somebody who's... Oh, that's the next part of your question. Some people are, what do you call it, ready and have the capacity to listen to your confession at a given time in the world, given place. Other people do not. So we are, for example, children are usually not they're usually often not ready and capable of hearing your confession. But sometimes they are. For example, I think that sometimes when a parent or a elder tells a child, I'd like to confess to you that when you said that the other day, I was wrong and you were right. Or I'm sorry because I lost my patience with you and I'm really sorry. That was not good. That kind of confession sometimes kids can handle, and they really appreciate it, and it really encourages them.

[76:18]

Because they were kind of thinking, geez, it seems like she's losing her patience. I wonder if she really is. Am I crazy that my dear grandmother is losing her patience with me? Then you tell them and say, oh, thank you, I thought you lost your patience. And they can pick that up pretty young. But when at a certain age, they can't. But there's other kinds of confession which they can't handle. They don't have the maturity to handle, for example, confessions around sexual behavior. They just don't understand. It's confusing. So it's not appropriate to tell them. So it's good to have awareness of who is appropriate to hear what. Sometimes when children can hear a confession, they're not really children at that time. They're mature beings who can hear their confession and benefit by it. And some other people, you need to learn who are the people who you can confess to, what things.

[77:20]

And then, of course, the Buddha is the one you can confess everything to. And it's only your fear and resistance. The Buddha can handle it. And some representatives of Buddha can handle almost anything. And you can work up from confessing a little to those people to gradually seeing if you can confess anything. It's a dangerous process, but that would be something to be careful of. And to develop. Develop the ability in this lifetime to finally find somebody that you can tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth to before you die. Can you talk to us about how we're supposed to study the distinctions we make?

[78:44]

I will talk about it. I just want to tell you, I will talk about it repeatedly for the next five days. So I'm just telling you, I'm going to do it over and over with lots of different categories of distinction. Okay. Like with Barry, I was just saying, if you notice some unskillfulness, an evil thing in your mind, and you can notice whether you really feel, you can notice whether you feel it's separate from good. You can notice that. And if you can't notice it, And noticing it would be the way of studying how your mind makes distinctions, and how it makes those distinctions substantial. How it thinks that evil is substantial, and good is substantial.

[79:49]

And how it sees them substantially separately. You can maybe see that. And if you can't see that, you can also see the consequences of that. Like, for example, if you're doing good, and somebody else is doing evil, and you think they're separately, then you feel really separate from them and better than them. And if it's turned the other way, you feel the other side. So this is an example. He was asking how it would be. His question actually could have been put as your question. He wanted to see how he could study to see the discrimination. And also, in that study, you sometimes find, oh my god, there's no holding to the discrimination. and one more thing I would say is that if these different sides of the discrimination were actually substantial then it would make I mean if that's the way they were and we saw them that way then we would be in accordance with reality and we'd probably be cool but because they're not substantial when we take them to be substantial we usually upset because it's not in accordance with reality

[81:06]

Good is insubstantial, and evil is insubstantial. So that's another reason why this, that's another thing to look for. Do you think that this is, like, this is good? No, this is really good. It's not just that I think it's good, it's really good. Thank you. Well, since the kitchen has left, maybe it would be a good time to conclude this morning's event, Dharma event. Okay?

[81:47]

@Transcribed_v005
@Text_v005
@Score_74.17