So we worked a while ago on a document, kind of a supplement to the document of being a priest at Zen Center. So there's a basic document called Being a Priest at Zen Center, which you've seen. And then we wrote together, we kind of more details about how we've been training at Green Gulch as priests. So that maybe could be a resource. But then at the next level of detail is actually what I basically feel is about training and intimacy, that that's actually what's going on in priest training in this group. And I've said this to quite a few different people, not just priests, that if a person who wasn't a priest wanted to train this way, I think it would be fine.

[01:27]

But I feel like if someone gets ordained as a priest, it's kind of assumed, I think, by that they get some kind of training like this. I think people give a person who's ordained as a priest, they give the person credit for having had some training and intimacy with a teacher. And they respect that, that a person would make themselves available to train intimately. And they don't expect that of a so-called lay person. The person may have had the training, but by presenting themselves as a lay person, people don't assume that they would. So if they don't, it's OK. If they receive the bodhisattva precepts but don't have further training, For example, with the preceptor that they received the precepts with, people don't assume that, so if they don't have it, people feel okay.

[02:35]

And if they do have it, people say, great, but if a priest receives the precepts and doesn't get that training, then people feel funny, because they feel it's somewhat a misrepresentation. And I discussed some of these things during the intensive we just finished, and a number of lay people came to me and said they felt sad that they don't have that kind of relationship with their teacher, and that they want it, actually. And one person, even, that was thinking of becoming ordained as a priest with a different teacher said that he felt sad because he said, not available to me to do this. That teacher is a wonderful person. When we're together, I feel we are training this way, that you're speaking. But that person's not around the way you're around here at Green Village for people.

[03:39]

I wouldn't be... When I'm having jokes on, it's like that. But that's the only time I have that with a person. So I said to him, well, why don't you go talk to this teacher and see what you can agree upon as some venue in which you're going to work together. It may not be extensive, but at least there's some context in which you could agree upon that you're going to work on this together, see if this teacher is helpful. And I said, and if they're not, then I don't quite see why you'd become ordained as a priest. Because, you know, you're not going to get any further training than you're already getting. So just to shave your head and wear a robe but get no further training, well, what's the point? On the other hand, if you didn't shave your head and didn't put on the okesa and got the training, that would be good. The training would be good.

[04:41]

But to get ordained and not get the training... Yeah, I think it would be sad. It would be kind of like, oh, I don't see the point. And the form, like learning how to wear robes and make robes and care for robes and practice in robes and learning how to do services and learning how to follow a monastic training program and learning how to positions and learning how to work with people in a practice community all that could be done without taking on a training relationship with a teacher and some people do get our and shave their head and wear robes and use them

[05:44]

But they don't have somebody that they do that with. I mean, they get ordained, but even the person who ordains with them doesn't give them any training. The things I just mentioned, that sometimes happens. I have myself ordained people and had them go away to other parts of Zen Center or other Zen temples, and they come back after a few years and i realized that no one gave them any training less no one felt they didn't go to anyone and say please train me please watch me please do things with me please let me please uh let's make an agreement that i'm going to check with you on what i'm doing and and you're invited to check with me about what i'm doing and Please practice with me now that I'm here with you. They didn't do that, and nobody came forward because people don't feel invited to come forward. So they didn't really get much training.

[06:51]

And it showed in terms of how they did things, but they did, like they put on a robe, but when a person puts on a robe, actor having put on the robe in front of somebody who they've invited to look at them while they put the robe on, and taken off a robe in the presence of someone who they've invited to watch them take it off, when they do that, it's not just the form, but the feeling of it is different. They feel, they look And they feel like they've been trained. They have a feeling of being trained. They have a feeling like, this thing I'm doing, I have done in the presence of feedback. I've done this thing. And please watch me, somebody, teacher, watch me do this. And to perform something in the presence of a teacher has a different effect upon you than to do it in the presence of people who

[07:55]

who could be teachers but who you didn't invite to teach you. But also just to, you know, open a door or walk down the path or enter the zendo or pick up your bowls or close a door or wash your socks in the presence of a teacher has a different effect than just doing it without teaching. And I don't I myself do not comment on everything people do unless I have agreed with that person that I'm going to comment on everything that person does. And some people, I go pretty far on checking how far they want me to go. I go pretty far on checking how far they want me to go, and even checking how far they want me to go is going pretty far. So in general, now to fill in that grid a little bit, it refers to I don't check with very few lay people do I check with about their hairstyle.

[09:13]

And very few lay people ask me in terms of the way they wear their hair. Does that make sense? Some priests do not ask me either about what they do with their hair. But if they don't, and I'm supposedly their mentor, I often at some point, if they want me to consult with them about what they do with their hair. And they often say yes, but sometimes they say no, yes. I wonder if we could talk more personally in this group. Yes, go right ahead. I mean, I feel okay about it. No, I mean, I guess what I'm asking is, I kind of feel like, I almost feel like you're talking to the microphone for your book rather than actually having a discussion with us.

[10:24]

You're right. That's correct. Did that feel like... When you just said that, did that feel like a personal thing you were saying? Yeah. Okay. So you're, and I would say personally, talking to the microphone to try to set some context for the discussion. And now it has been recorded that you said, can we talk more personally? And that I admit I've been talking to the microphone. And I was looking around everyone's faces and I saw this certain sort of glaze over. I enjoy it. Maybe that's not accurate. But see, what you just did was express yourself. And part of the priest training is for people to express themselves. 20 years of training. Yeah. So you express yourself, and then, you know, in the presence of the person you're training with.

[11:36]

And then they give you feedback. And then you respond to that. So this back and forth responding around, potentially, everything. And I would say... Yeah, and so the intimacy has to do with adjusting the level of how far are you going to go together. And being kind of like... What's the word? About... whether you feel you've gone far enough in the relationship to discuss what's going on. And the teacher also saying maybe, in some cases, I feel like you haven't yet really let me ask you

[12:43]

what you're doing. Or, I still don't feel like I can really give you feedback. But I feel very good to tell you that I... I feel very good that I was able to... You know, I don't really feel like I can give you feedback. And I have said that to some people. And said that I don't feel like I can train you if I can't give you feedback. And I've said to some people, I don't feel like I can give you feedback, so I don't think I can train you. I said... What happened? Did the training stop? Yeah, it stopped. Or, you know, it moved to someone else. Some of these people I did not ordain, but they were ordained by someone else and came to Zen Center and asked me to train them. And I said, I don't feel like... And they didn't say to me, well, let's try to figure out some way that you can. They accepted that. Do you assume that anyone who gets ordained with you is then, by default, open to this kind of open feedback?

[14:01]

Good question, and the answer is no. I do not assume that anybody is open to feedback. I mean, I might assume it in the sense of of giving feedback without asking beforehand, but I try not to ask. In that case, if I don't ask, I think I'm aware that I'm taking a chance. Even with someone that I have had a relationship with for a long time, if I give them feedback without asking beforehand, I'm somewhat aware I'm taking a chance. and they say, yes, I'm still taking a chance, but then that question, I think, puts out in front that there's a risk here. A risk of someone being hurt. Someone being hurt, yeah. But I guess another way to ask it would be... Confused. Is this ordination like a contract to say, like, I'm being hurt?

[15:07]

Yes, the ordination is a contract... it's a contract if I'm willing to risk being hurt. And people who want to enter priest training, I have them try it out beforehand. So there's some people right now who say they want to train as priests, and so I say, well, why don't you then start checking out with me things that a priest would be checking out. During that five years, basically, there's nothing worth saying that you wouldn't check out. There's nothing you would say, I refuse to check this such and such out with you. If you think there's anything you do not want to check out with me, I think you should tell me now. Not to say, but if there's something you don't want to, then we should talk about why that limit. So, for example, the examples are, if you wanted to do a sesshin at Zen Center, you can do a sesshin, or you want to take a class, or you want to do a sesshin outside Zen Center, or take a class outside Zen Center.

[16:29]

These are things which Dharma students often want to do. And I often think, good. If somebody approaching ordination or having been ordained wishes to go study with another teacher, that would be something which, to me, it seems like most people would think that it makes sense to talk to your teacher, the teacher you're training with. You would talk to them about training. Most people would think that, right? That doesn't surprise anybody, does it? Right. So I say, that's an example of something you're going to do. But then I say, but let's just go a little further. If you're going to the movies, I've also seen you talk to me about that. If you're going shopping at a grocery store, I would suggest you talk to me about it. Even if you're the Green Gull shopper, even if you're doing a town trip for Green Gulls, you still might tell me that

[17:35]

You're planning on doing a town trip for the Green Gulch. It wouldn't be like, well, I'm not going to talk to you about doing a town trip. But if you thought, I'm not going to talk to you about a town trip, then I would expect the person to tell me I'm not going to talk to you about doing a town trip. This would be an intimacy training. No. There's no exemptions in intimacy. And a lot of people say, I don't want to bother you. I didn't want to bother you. I was thinking of, you know, doing this thing, this act, and they didn't want to bother you.

[18:39]

To think there's the things they're thinking of doing that they didn't want to bother me about, usually there's no problem. If they tell me, I say, fine. But sometimes the thing they're thinking of doing, I would have really, kind of a, you might say, strong feeling about. And they didn't want to bother me. in a sense, but I'm agreeing to do that with the person. That's what I'm agreeing to do, is to be bothered. And in most people's cases, I say, see if you can err on the side of talking to me about too much. And like one person has succeeded. One person did succeed. But it's not so much he talks to me about too much, he talks too much about the individual thing. It's not the... the number of things, it's the amount that he talks about each thing that's more than I need. And this person I'm speaking of made a couple huge mistakes that he didn't talk to me about.

[19:47]

Or that he talked to me about, he told me too little. Mistakes? What mistakes? Well, mistakes in the sense that he got involved with someone who was involved with a drug addict. This person got involved He told me that he was getting involved and didn't tell me how much he was getting involved and then didn't tell me the person's name and who the person's boyfriend was. The person that told me who the person's boyfriend was, I happen to know the boyfriend was a drug dealer. And he said, don't get involved with the woman whose boyfriend is a drug dealer. But he didn't tell me that. He didn't tell me I sometimes know about things like this. Anyway. I have to confess that I do feel also quite a bit of I don't want to bother you. It has to do with some kind of an inner image of like if I call you or if I reach out to you, it's like your house.

[20:57]

It's like there's a whole family connected to this. Excuse me, but you do this quite well. You send me notes and you tell me about what you're doing. You know, you write out and you say, I'm thinking of having dinner with a friend. You do that. That doesn't bother me. You make the effort. You open up. You're not saying, I'm not going to tell you I'm going to have dinner with my friend. You don't say that. Maybe you do, and I don't know about sometimes you do do that, but what I'm saying is you do actually say, I'm thinking of going to San Francisco or, you know, Valley to have coffee with somebody. You do do that, and you send me a message, or maybe you leave me a message on the answering machine. It doesn't bother me. It doesn't bother my family. If you did come into the house and asked me to stop making tea to talk to you about that, I don't want to do it that way. I don't agree to do it that way. But you could say, I want to come to your house and say, okay, I don't agree to that, that way.

[22:03]

But that would be intimacy too, that you would want to do it one way and I wouldn't agree. But the way you're doing it, I don't feel like you're holding back in telling me about your life. I don't feel like I can't ask you what you're up to. I can. And sometimes I don't. I'll give you an example. You went hiking with somebody. You went on a camping trip with somebody. And it was a man. A German man, I think. I felt like I could have asked you more details about what was going to happen. But you did tell me you were going with a friend. You didn't say with a male friend. I didn't get that it was a male friend, but anyway. But I saw who it was, and I could tell it was a man. I saw you going with the person, and I thought, I felt like if I wanted to say, Shofu, what are you going to do with this guy?

[23:08]

Are you going to be in the same tent? I felt like I could have asked you. If I feel that a priest is going to go on a camping trip with someone, and I can't ask, what's the bedding arrangement of her, you know? And if I feel like I can't ask, then I feel, okay, now that's it, right there. How come I can't ask you? The intimacy is I feel like you can ask me, I can ask you. You don't have to answer, but I feel like I can ask. If you tell me I can't ask, then I say, oh, wait a minute, I don't know, this isn't, I don't know. Maybe I'll agree, maybe I won't. It's possible for him to say, I do not want to talk to you about that. Maybe I could accept it, but I'd have to be able to find out that I could. And the person said, draw one. Okay, I got it. That you don't want to talk to me about. We've settled that.

[24:09]

But so far, I have not, almost no one has really said, I don't want to talk to you about that. You know, I haven't like, Well, what do you do with your old toothbrushes? I haven't asked that question of anybody. Huh? What? I'll take it. But, you know, if I did and somebody said, I don't want to talk to you, I could say, OK. But so far, I really haven't gone too far with anybody. And like I said, almost nobody goes too far telling me about what's going on with them. Like I feel like, you don't have to tell me that. I almost never think, you don't have to tell me that. And another detail of this is, from my perspective is, when a person tells me about something, even if I don't hear it, they still did their job by telling me.

[25:13]

The point is that you're not trying to hide. Or if you are trying to hide, that you're open to being caught and questioned about what you were up to at that time. Yes? I remember, you know, once, actually since I left, but even before, I would write letters. And, you know, I asked you how much I should tell you, because I found that going on a lot. You said, tell me what I need to know. So, you know, sometimes I have daughters, right? I do stop from telling, saying things, especially conventional news, you know, like what I'm doing these days, because...

[26:19]

I'm not sure, you know, if I don't get a response, I'm not sure that it was necessary. Am I wasting your time, you know, like going on for pages? And sometimes I just think I'm just saying it like what you just said. I'm just kind of saying it, and it doesn't matter whether it's exactly the right amount of words or whether I get a response from about point A, B, C, and D. It's just saying it. Yes, I agree. Basically, it's just saying it. And then there's basically two ways of saying it. This is what I'm doing, and the other is this is what I'm thinking of doing. For the five years training, I'm actually asking if the person would like to contract to discuss with me about doing things before. In a number of cases, a person says, I'm going to do this, this, and this, and I say, well, it sounds like you're not asking for feedback when you tell me what you're going to do.

[27:32]

But if you say, I'm thinking of doing this, or I'd like to do this, what do you think? That's more open and intimate, I would say. Now, in some cases, you may say, well, I am doing this, or I have done this. That also is somewhat helpful, but The radical shift is to, I'm thinking of doing this, I'm planning to do this, and I would like to do this. And then if you ask that, and I didn't respond, you still did your job. And I don't feel like I didn't do my job because I received that. In some cases, I... And in some cases, also, I have the understanding of if someone is thinking of in the next 20 minutes, or the next three hours, and they tell me that in three hours I'm planning to do this, and I don't get back to them in those three hours, they can say, if I don't hear from you in three hours, I'm going to do this.

[28:39]

Oftentimes that's okay. But for big things, If they did that with a big thing, I might say later, you know, for something like that, I think I'd like you to give me three days notice or a week notice. Like if you're going to go to a sashim, three hours isn't really enough time for me, because that I probably would want to. But people don't usually tell me three hours before a sashim. But for things, for some things, you only have three hours notice. Something comes up that's going to happen in three hours or ten minutes. And that's when it's going to happen, and you want it, and you think it would be good to do. But to tell me what you are doing, that's fine too. But I don't feel that there's... It's important for me to know, but I don't think I have to say much about what you're going to do until I see you next. And a lot of stuff that you're doing, I don't particularly have any comment. But if you tell me you're brushing your teeth, I probably think, great.

[29:41]

But if you're going to say, I'm thinking of taking on a more thorough toothbrushing regime, and I'm going to do more flossing, and I'm going to go see the dentist more often, I think that would be good if you tell me that. That would be something I could say, you know. I'm not going to say anything, but I might think, yeah. But then I might see you next night and say, I appreciate you telling me that. I support that. But generally speaking, to be informed about a person's life, I don't necessarily see them when I hear. But if they're planning to do something, I feel like that they can say, I'm planning to do this and I don't hear from you, I'll probably go ahead with it. And then I can say, in some cases, I say, those things, you know, I... If you ask me and I don't have time to get in touch with you before the time you want to do them, I would say, this particular thing, I would say, wait.

[30:49]

This is an example of I wish you had waited until you could get in touch with me. The time scale was not such that I could talk to you before you did it. And I don't fault you for it, but in the future, this particular type of thing, I want to tell you, I'd like you to talk to me. Wait. before doing. Some things are that big deal, or that, you know, that, you know, that consequence. But not too often does that happen. What does happen sometimes, though, is, as I said, consequential things are brought up. No, consequential things are not brought up. Things that I definitely would have had something to say, they are sometimes not brought up. Because the person's, you know, I think, hiding or afraid. Afraid they'll disagree and that they won't be able to do it or whatever. Or just confused.

[31:52]

Yeah. I know you have this practice of having your students check in with you. I was wondering... after somebody says they're going to go do something, and then they go do it, do they check in with you again? Even like if they go to a movie? Yeah. Do they check with me afterwards? Yeah. Sometimes they do, but I would say the majority of times they don't. Like somebody says, I'm thinking of going to a movie, and I don't necessarily ask them about it, or they don't necessarily tell me. If they go to a sashin, I don't necessarily ask them about it, and they don't necessarily tell me. Although that might be a good thing? Yeah, it might be good. In both cases, it would be fine. But my experience is that because I'm working with quite a few people, it's more the before

[33:10]

I put the priority on the before, and that takes a lot of time. So the after effect is important. I don't know if that makes sense to people. Probably because the training is about intention. Yeah, it's about intention. So if somebody wants to go to a movie, thinks it would be beneficial, or wants to go to dinner with a friend, At that point, to be included, I feel, is an intimate relationship. If they go to dinner and don't tell me about it, I don't feel like I've been left out. And I don't feel like I'm interested in them, just not to find out how it went. There may be just something about me, maybe other people are different, but... I don't feel like it's not intimate for me to check or for them to give me reports on how the things go.

[34:14]

These things would have changed them. Pardon? If one would have intended something it didn't happen, what would you tell you about it happening? Again, that would be okay. I wouldn't mind somebody telling me how the thing went. But I wouldn't mind if they didn't. And I wouldn't mind if they didn't do it, if they didn't tell it. Those things that you don't do, I'm not so interested in. So, again, if you think of something that's unskillful and you're not going to do it, you don't have to tell me. But it's okay if you tell me. If you tell me, I was thinking of doing this unskillful thing and I didn't do it, I feel fine about that. In other words, you're confessing some kind of unskillful thought or some potential action. That's a confession, though. That's not actually asking me to join you in that activity.

[35:20]

In a sense, I'm doing those activities with you when you check them out with me. You're not acting alone. Part of the intimacy, another way to say it is, During the training, you do not think you're doing these things alone. You're doing it at least with one other person. And actually, it's... And you're doing it with many people. To learn that, by exercising that ritual. What about when you're gone for an extended period of time? Say what? When you're gone for... When you're going to be gone for 17 days. Yeah. That's why I consider the training to be residential, because, in fact, when I'm not with you in the same place, it isn't practical. When I'm away, it's pretty hard to check things out with me, right?

[36:23]

And so some things, like I'm going to go away now for, am I going away for 17 days now? I think that's right. I think I'm going away for about 17 days. I'm going from Friday to the 24th. So during that time, I don't, generally speaking, I don't get much messages from the priest training people about what they're doing while I'm away. So they probably felt like you should do something, and you did it. And I got back and found out you did it, and then felt, you know, not quite right about that. I might say, well, that's an example of something I think you should have either waited to do or tried to reach me, you know, in Texas or Florida. You know, I usually can be reached, but I'm in retreat, right?

[37:27]

So almost nobody can reach me anyway without considerable effort when I'm in retreat, when I'm traveling like that. But still, I do. When Charlie and Sarah had their baby came, I was told the baby came early. So I was in communication with them from England. During those hours, it was important enough for me to be included. Great event that I was. The effort was made in both directions. So there are certain things which you would make the effort on. And if you didn't, when I got back, I said, you know, I really, in the future, if anything like this happens, I understand that it's difficult to get in touch with me when I'm And if you didn't, and you probably thought it was too much, I understand. But still, now that I know what it was, I would like you to agree to try to reach me on something like this.

[38:32]

And, you know, there are some things which I would like to hear about. And there's some things I would like to hear about, even if I'm not around. But basically, I'm talking about the kind of things that would work when we're here together. So paper and telephone, answering machine and face-to-face, those kinds of things. Yes? If it's possible to have a stand-in person, For instance, when I was in Tassajara and I did not have contact with a guru, I had a practice leader, and it was like I was talking to him. It was like I was talking to my teacher, and it actually worked pretty well. That's possible. I would say that you're training with that person. Which is good. But I don't think you're training with food when you're talking to somebody else at Tassajara.

[39:36]

I wouldn't really count that as talking to her. You're training with others. You are training in intimacy with that person, I would say. Yeah. So I ordained some people. They went to Tassajara and they didn't have a relationship like you had. They didn't talk to somebody. Nobody at Tassajara... felt like they should talk to them about the way they wore their robes. So they kept going on about not knowing how to wear their robes after a long time. Nobody told them anything. They just let them be untrained. Why is that? Well, because it's intimate. And you don't necessarily welcome everybody to be intimate with you. I mean, I should say you don't necessarily. A very evolved person would give off the invitation for everybody to be intimate with them. They would be showing people how to do that, and people would be waking up to that reality.

[40:37]

But a lot of people did not feel like I was asking them to give them feedback. I see people doing various things, and I don't think they necessarily want feedback from me. And then sometimes I say, would you like some feedback? And sometimes they say, yes. But sometimes, no. But a lot of times, they don't look like they even want me to ask them. So I don't. But once again, people come to me and say, would you please give me feedback? And I say, I'd be happy to. And I go, I will if I can. And they say, what do you mean? Sometimes I might see you and have feedback for you, but I might feel like it's not convenient for you because other people are around and it might be embarrassing for you. Or I might feel you look really tense and worried. I might not feel like it's the right time. So I'm willing to, but I'm not saying I'm always going to see the opportunity.

[41:39]

Even when I see something to comment on or ask about, which I don't understand, I wouldn't necessarily feel it's the right time. So, the people ask me, I often go up to them and say, people say, would you go up to them? I often go up and say, I don't know often, but I have gone up to them and said, do you want feedback? And they have said, in various ways, no, not now. The people have asked. And I say, okay, maybe later. And the people I'm talking about are ordained priests. That's what it usually happens with. But the other people I don't even ask. I do not ask lay people, people who have not earned training or people who are trained by other priests. I see other priests and I do not talk to them about the way they dress.

[42:44]

I see various costumes worn by priests throughout Zen Center. And... If any of you were wearing those costumes, I would ask you about those costumes. I would say, would you like some feedback on your costume? And I'd say, yes. I'd like you not to wear socks in the zendo. I might say that. I have said that to priests quite often. Or I might say, unless, if you can tolerate it, if it's not too cold, would you go barefoot in the zendo? But I wouldn't say that to most people at Zen Center. But did Tanto do that? Tanto has the same situation of how intimate does she feel she can be with the people. And Eno too, how intimate can they be? Are people going to allow her to come up to them and talk to them about their skin on the floor in the cold and what socks they're wearing? She could also get into whether the socks are clean or not or what color they are.

[43:51]

I have ordained people as priests and then commented on and asked them questions about what they wear on their feet, on their head, you know, hats worn when. Some priests have worn hats into the zendo at Tassajara, right? Or towels, scarves around their necks in the zendo. And I've asked the priest, I've talked to him about not Can you go into Zendo without a towel around your neck? Or some people wear turtlenecks. I've talked to some of you about wearing turtlenecks in Zendo. But I have done it with almost no lay people because almost no lay people have said, train me like a priest. And the priests have a certain agreed upon clothing thing, so then we just try to work with that. Now if the person says, I'm getting really sick and I... And I, you know, I want to cover my neck.

[44:55]

I might say, okay. I might say, don't cover your neck. I might say that. But the main thing is I asked him about it. And I have talked to this about priests and some priests have said to me, I can't do this anymore. I can't train this way. It's just, it's just too much. in my life talking to me about you know how i how i'm covering my neck up or not and you know what i'm what kind of clothes i'm wearing it's just too intense and some priests have taken a break from that kind of intimacy or this man who's also maybe an authority for you is now in your face talking to you about how you're dealing with rain and sleet got this person in your life who's doing this with you which your mother used to do, usually in the other direction, trying to get you to wear more clothes when you went out. And it's very... Jane?

[45:58]

How are you doing? Okay. I was going to ask if you'd like to press the door the right way. Yeah, that's... And they can say no or whatever. But you asked. Yes. Well, first I just want to say for the record, I have a problem with the no-socks thing, and I think we've talked about that. I don't know if I asked you, I think I told you that I almost always wear socks because I have my orthotics in them. So I don't generally ask other people not to wear socks because it's too much to explain. Well, you know, you shouldn't wear socks.

[46:59]

This is why. But you talked to me about that. We did talk about it. And I told other people about that too. I said, may I wear socks because she's wearing her daughters. And I've asked people, not told people, I've asked people, please don't wear socks. In that conversation, they have raised your situation as saying they know that you wear socks for that reason. And they feel okay about it. And then they say to me the reason why they're wearing socks. You know? In this special case, they feel like they need to wear socks because of such and such. And they know you're doing it for a special reason. And so, yeah. And old Zen master, Kadagiri Roshi once was presented with this thing about wearing scars. And somebody said, you know, so-and-so Roshi did it. He did that when he was 80.

[48:02]

You know? You're 35, you know, it's different. And there's a little bit of, you know, it's an edge there, which I'd be sensitive to, of asceticism. Some of you are getting close to 80, I know, so. But still, still, it's an intimacy thing. The old man or the old lady goes to Zendo and you maybe run up and say, please wear a scarf, Roshi. You know, you put it on him, you know. It's very intimate. And maybe they say, I don't want to work, Scott, get away from me. The thing I want to bring up is that I find it's about the response. So I find almost always if I make some suggestion or correction or feedback, someone... response which is kind of explanation of why it's happening right which yeah often almost always i feel that is

[49:12]

is it's like this it's like it's a block right i agree and it and it may be it's sort of like well no i'm just explaining why right and so i try myself and i don't always succeed but but often i for me this often comes up in tea because that's where i get the most Yeah. And my training has been, don't open your mouth. Right. And even in cases like this has come up, say, where the mentee teacher has said, do it this way, don't do it this way, and I'm about to say, well, last week, the reason why I'm doing it that way is because this is what you told me last week, or maybe I misunderstood, but I deliberately did it this way because that's what I heard was the instruction. And I tried to not say anything.

[50:17]

Right. Which is interesting to just, okay, I know it. Just do it. And I find that almost no one does that, at least with me. Almost always I get, you know, it could be very tiny. But it's, you know, there's some explanation. Well, I'm not really interested in the explanation, generally. But I wonder what. We haven't really talked about that so much. Well, now we're going to talk about it. No, see, it's not, their explanation is not interesting. Right, what is the interesting part? The interesting, well, what's the interesting part? Yeah, your intention, bringing up the treatment. Oh, you mean why am I bringing it up now?

[51:19]

No, I mean... And you're giving them some feedback, but you're not interested in their response. What's your interest? What's your... Well, this mostly... You know, most often, if the example is clear, like when it comes up at tea, where a person made a request, please train me in doing blah-de-blah. You know, they're asking for instruction. So I'm giving the instruction, and they're explaining to me why they didn't do it that way. Which is pretty much irrelevant. Because, and it is... Blame. where I'm trying to come from like there's no blame it's just do it this way rather than this way with no story around that just this is the way to do it so they're they're doing it that way it's kind of a it's an energy drain it's a waste of time but it's also kind of blocking the instruction from

[52:31]

sinking in. That's my feeling. Rather than just taking in that instruction, they're resisting. OK, now I want to write the book a little bit here now, OK? I see your question as opening up another layer of the intimacy. Now we're in a situation of giving feedback. Ask for it. who's gone out of their way to get feedback. Now they get the feedback. And May is saying, usually when she gives it to these people who asked for it, they often give explanation. Now, she said she's not interested in explanation. But if someone says that to me, I could say the same thing. I'm not interested in explanation. But actually, I am interested in in the sense that I'm interested in the person resisting.

[53:38]

I'm interested that they're resisting. The name of the resistance is not particularly interesting, usually. The first thing that's interesting is they're not receiving the gift. And I think Catherine came up and she said that she got the instruction from me some feedback to first of all receive it before she gives me something back because sometimes we we give the response before we even got what was given and so try to stop and like receive it before this great intelligence comes back to the general to explain how Just to make clear that this, yes, you gave me feedback, but I just want to make clear that I didn't do anything wrong ever in my life. You know, I'm perfect. Just want you to know I'm perfect before I go any further. Yes, yes, you are.

[54:43]

But first of all, just receive it with no comment. Or receive it with the comment of, I'm receiving this. And Mae is saying that she doesn't very often get that response, and I would say you have that to look forward to. You have it to look forward to, to have the next level of intimacy where you talk to somebody about this fact that, you know, I might be ready for me to point out now This is the next level. It's pretty deep now. When you start bringing up, we have this relationship, I give you feedback, but I don't feel like you're... You come back with something right away. Before I feel like you've actually got what I said.

[55:47]

And to work out that, and then... That's really a big step to get that to be what you're working on. Not so much the haircut, the way of holding things, the socks. That's not the point. That's just an opportunity to say, can I give you something and actually see that you got it? I took that in. And now you can give me something and see if I can receive it before I tell you something about what you just said. And then again, back and forth. It's a rhythm. And then now we're really, this is the dance. This is the intimacy. I think when I'm defensive about something, I often realize it immediately.

[56:57]

You know, making an error. Say it louder. Would you say it louder for the machine? What's that? Would you please say it again, a little louder for the recording? Often when I'm defensive, I realize my error. actually even more helpful, because I think my immediate response is to, I don't speak it out so much. At least when I'm being defensive, at least I'm expressing myself in some way, unskillfully. That was really important for me to do, to be defensive, so they could hear that. Yeah, so it's not so much what you say to defend yourself, but the fact that you're defending yourself is pretty interesting.

[57:57]

I almost immediately say... It's usually no reason, but just... We're starting to get somewhere when this happens, but it's difficult. Yes. It's maybe an aside, but it feels related. Well, once when I was Eno during Sashin, there's a woman who comes for Sashin, and she was wearing a fair amount of jewelry. Going into Zendo, I kind of stopped and said, you know, our form is not to wear jewelry, you know, earrings. And she said, I'll think about it. And I was shocked and appalled. I am the Eno. In retrospect, it was very funny. And she didn't stop wearing it. So it was just an interesting experience. Yeah. For me, it is actually, I feel blamed. Not anymore, but that's my initial, that was my initial response to getting feedback. I felt someone is telling me that I've done it wrong.

[58:59]

But I really meant to do it right. And then I realized that's not, That doesn't matter. That's not what it is about. But it feels to me like childhood stuff, like stuff that the way I responded in the past at old. And I feel like I'm so glad that I can get out of that. So in a way, I feel that the training gives me an opportunity to grow up. Yeah. Yeah. And to be intimate. And growing up is just learning to be intimate. Another example, I thought one time when I was, this is one time ago, I had a box. It's kind of like a tray outside my house.

[60:04]

room at 300 Page Street, and I had sand in it, and I had a couple rocks in it. I had a little rock garden outside my room. And someone said, you know, pointed out that I had this... My door was kind of special because I had this little rock garden outside of it. And in my mind, I thought of this person's door, which was, you know, It's like opening to the Taj Mahal or something. I noticed, oh, I'm going to... This thing in my mind is, well, you do that even more than I do. I noticed that my response was, you do that even more than I do. I didn't say it, but I noticed it. I thought, just put that aside and just take it in, because it's true. I was doing something. I was making... But the person is telling me, If they had to be not into that to tell me that, then I wouldn't have got that feedback.

[61:12]

So the person who's giving me the feedback could be much worse at the thing they're giving me. But that's not the point. The point is let it in from the worst person. And say, you know, it's true. It is feedback. It's not necessarily... And to have a relationship, to get feedback from the worst person, from somebody who's, you know, worse at everything than you, that's real intimacy. It's not fair. And it's not fair. person's yelling at you, like they're making a bell in Hawaii, but they're, you know, their face is loud, and they're giving you feedback this way. The way it's coming, it's still feedback. It's still feedback. It's still a gift, right. And in that relationship, you get to say something about that yelling.

[62:16]

You get to say, you get to react to that. But first, receive the yelling. And then say, maybe I would like you to stop yelling at me. Soon. Please stop now. That's also part of it. It's in both directions. But to not receive the gift of the yelling, then when you turn around and give your gift back, you're not being as intimate as to receive it and then say, you know, I'd like you to stop that. Or, you know, but then, you know, it doesn't make so much sense to yell back, stop yelling. It's been done. It's been done, but it's not as intimate as to say, as to, I think, I would say it's not as intimate as to receive the yelling

[63:19]

and still say, now I've got a gift for you. And I really mean as a gift, not as revenge. But I really want you to stop. I'm really uncomfortable about what you just said to me because you were yelling. It's very uncomfortable and I want you to not yell at me. So I'm really trying to work with or accept people's different communication styles because I noticed that so much has to do with context. A lot of it has to do with the person's culture and both their birth culture. They're into and that, you know, some people like I know you kind of have to stop and training people of can I give you some feedback and here it is. Get ready. And, you know, some people you feel like you've got water splashed on your face. Other people will just look at you. And I think there are certain cultures. When I was in Japan and I think I was on a train and I let like a wrapper or something fall to the ground and several people turned around and looked at me.

[64:30]

You know, if I had been in like Italy, my memory of Italy, that might have been a little more likely. The other thing I've really noticed about this is that so much depends on the relationship. you are with the person. I noticed when I was Fukuten, I would tell somebody something, I mean, which I thought I had to give feedback all the time, and I noticed, you know, I'd often see people look very devastated and hurt. And I would think, I used to say that kind of thing to them when I was a crew member, and it didn't seem to matter. It didn't seem to matter the same in cats. Correct. You're in a different position as Phuketan. Right. That's the role I have now, if I say it. There's more power in the relationship, in a sense. The voltage has been turned up. Right. People are more scared, and they think something will happen to them.

[65:32]

I often told doans, when they go to check people who aren't in the zendo, to try to lower themselves. You go into somebody's room, they're lying down, you're standing up. and you talk to them, you kind of should lower yourself because to ask them about what they're doing from a higher position, even if you lower your body still, so try to humble yourself a little bit when you're coming into somebody's private space and they're potentially feeling like they've slipped up, not following the schedule. You have to be very gentle in this because the person's feeling very vulnerable and you're representing authority. So you kind of, not have to be, but it's nice to be very gentle at that time. Because there's so much power. Are you ready for this? You know, knock, knock. Rather than boom, boom. What are you doing in there? Talking down to them. This is like... I was just thinking about that story you've told about the...

[66:37]

whose teacher said you're not my disciple because you didn't bow to me and you know in tea class at the beginning of class there's a bow between teacher and student and an explicit request for instruction which I think that process of giving feedback because you know it's not just once but it's every time at the beginning there's actually a request like so it's kind of like okay i'm ready now for instruction and asking for instruction for feedback now so and what is the Japanese well usually just say yoroshiku it's like please Actually, you're saying, please favor me. Yoroshiku. Be good to me. Please teach me well.

[67:43]

So in that sense about this bow, one way of looking at it is kind of like every time you see the teacher, a bow, like, okay, I'm here, I'm ready, please be good to me. Get the teaching. Right. Even if the teacher's just coming out of the toilet. Exactly. You have to be there. Right. I'm your disciple. I'm ready to receive instruction. Right. And keep offering that. And have you agreed that the teacher can ask you, did you still want it? Yeah, to go to the teacher and say, I need a break. Please give me a break. Break. You just take a break. Teacher says, whoa, whoa. You can take a break, but if you just walk away, I don't know what's going on with you.

[68:49]

So that's why in this koan class I say, if you come in that class and you don't come to class, tell me. Because otherwise I wonder, well, where are you? What are you doing? What happened? Did you get hurt? Are you upset? Are you sick? We don't know what. It's just a lot more work for my mind. You just tell me, this class is too much. I want a break. Or I want to drop out. Okay, you can drop out, but then you can't come back. this class. Come back and give me the next class, but I'm not going to let you come and go every week. So, you know, let's do this together. Everything together. Together, together. Together, together. I don't come out of the bathroom alone if you're in the room. You're with me. We're together. I don't go into the bathroom alone. We're together. Do everything together. Learn to ritually enact that through the ritual formality of the relationship. Yes?

[69:51]

Two things that don't leave me. Two things that what? Don't leave me. Don't leave you? OK. The first one is, I do feel responsible. It feels kind of painful, this story about peace going back to Tassajara, coming back, and nobody treats us. You know? Yes. That this is a sense that this is possible. And one thing that comes up, like my wish was that Hunter... you know cope for and give us feedback and and also like i wonder to which extent we can enforce and install a culture of of did you say in force yeah i'm sorry You should be sorry. We do not enforce the laws here. To say something like that, like if you receive, I think there's maybe just also lack of vocabulary because the defensiveness might be up anyway.

[70:56]

You know, no matter what our intention is, there might be defensiveness up. Yes, thank you. You know, it might come up pretty offensive. So sometimes people go into the whole story anyway because it's already up. So if there would be some wording that could help to receive it, to show that we received the feedback, I think the Japanese would have put it. But anyhow, hai, hai. In Japanese, what I was taught, I think Suzuki Rishi taught me this, No, not high. High is fine. It's good. He taught me. And when I said that to Japanese, the person who's giving me the instruction, oh, very good word. They kind of straighten up, you know, because I had been so formal and polite to them. I feel like, oh, my God. I just asked this person to do something.

[71:57]

He said, I understand. Do as you say. Yes. So I think to acknowledge the receipt of the request of the instruction, I receive it humbly, and I will be happy to fulfill your request to the best of my ability with my whole body and mind. And I wish to do this all the time with everybody, but I'm learning to do this with a teacher. I'm going to try it out with you and see if I can do it with you. And I heard you ask Maya to do that, but that's between you and her. You can ask her to do that, but I don't think she... She can't do that with everybody. The culture...

[72:59]

...to do that with everybody. Not everybody is signing up to have the Tonto do that with them. But this culture is not eternal, right? So be a part of it. No, I'm just telling you the way things are now. If it becomes different, then things will be different. But right now... You're not enforcing anything. You know, what you want is not what everybody else at Gringotts wants from Maya. But if you want that from her... I mean, if you say you want it from her, then ask her for it, and then when she tries to give it to you, then she can tell you whether you're acting like you really do want it. But there's actually the thing that I've heard, and that kind of keeps hanging in my mind, like if I would come to you and say, oh, please give me Norway, then he told me that, actually, I heard from him the story that he did say, like, be strict with me or something, and he said, okay, and then he would do it. You're talking too fast for me. Did you get some feedback?

[74:01]

Did you get some feedback? Yeah. You're too fast. You're talking too fast. You're talking too fast. You're talking too fast for me. Maybe somebody else could have followed that, but I couldn't. You got going too fast for me to be with you. Ah, an explanation. Thank you. Defense. Okay. It's just a... Defense. This is... Okay. That last one was kind of a little bit soon still. The laugh, however, was just right on time. Did you see it? Did you see the little defenses? Yeah, yeah, sure, I know what you mean, but... You know, I know what you mean. I got it, but... No, no, it's my turn.

[75:04]

Well, yeah, but... Jane, you're making faces. Yeah. Yeah. As usual. I mean, people do make faces. Is there anything you'd like to say? No. Yes. I can, what about this case when someone gives me feedback and I just say, hi, but inside I actually have a defense. Yeah. You actually tell them that defense rather than just following the procedure. Then I can go ahead and take it in and say, oh, that jerk, they're such a jerk. They said that to me. So, in the example I gave before, the person tells me, you decorate your door in such a way that it makes you seem special.

[76:08]

And I didn't say anything out loud. Like, well, what about you? I didn't say that out loud. But in my mind, I saw this defense coming up. Well, what about you? If I didn't say this, I think it would not have been helpful. I think it was helpful for me to say, oh, I'm defending against this information. Then when I saw the defense, I could come back. The person who gave me that feedback didn't hear anything from me, so they could just move on. And I could come back and receive it and say, yeah, I was trying to make my room special. And that's probably what he's trying to do too. But first of all, I saw the defense come up, I dealt with it in my own mind, and I went back to receive it. I took another take. Actually, I took it in and batted it away with my defense. Then I took my batting and I put my batting aside and let the thing come in again.

[77:09]

I gave it another chance, so to speak. So I think, generally speaking, it's probably not beneficial to express the resistance or the defense. It's already been expressed inside. Then to say it out loud is probably not a good idea usually, unless you would say, I have a confession. But then look to see if in the confession is, I'm defending against what you said. So I can imagine, you know, somebody says something to you, you say, defending, defending, me defending, I'm defending, I'm defending, I'm defending. That might be helpful. But what the defense is often is, you're wrong, you shouldn't be this, all that kind of stuff. It's kind of a distraction from letting the thing in. Now, it doesn't end the training when somebody's defensive.

[78:11]

It can be part of the training. But it's a kind of postponement of letting The point of the training is getting to the intimacy of the relationship. It's a little bit of a postponement. Couldn't it be quite beneficial to let someone know I'm feeling defensive? It could be, yeah. But if you're doing it, like I said, I'm being defensive, it might be helpful. But to say, you know, who are you to say this? Or, you know, I didn't really mean that. Or, you know, you told me to do that. Or, you know, that's not what I meant. All that stuff is kind of distracting. But still, as Carolyn says, and I would agree, being defensive is of some use. It shows that you're defensive. And you're also showing the other person. I knew this guy at Zen Center one time. He was a Zen student. He lived here at Green Gulch, among other places.

[79:13]

And I watched him for years. And I just thought he was the greatest guy. But I thought I just wasn't. I couldn't see any kind of defense. But it was enjoyable to meet a person like that. And then I saw it. It finally came out. Finally I could see it. So almost no one is without some defense, but some people, it takes a while for it to show. It's kind of nice because we're unveiling the defense against deep problems. So I wouldn't say defense is bad. I'm just saying Once you notice it, you don't have to do much more with it to notice the defense. I think often the defense comes out as an explanation. Yeah. It's like, well, you're just explaining why he did it that way. And if you say it, then it's not evident.

[80:17]

to you that you're you're feeling as well i'm not defending myself i'm just explaining you know that it's not my fault you know explaining how this came to happen which is not my fault it's just it's because of blah blah my experience is that it's only if i refrain from uttering that then i notice because the impulse you know, the wanting to get it out there and the restraining myself from speaking, that's when I realize, oh, I'm actually defending myself because it's that. You know, otherwise, why would it be so important to, why am I so strong? It's just an explanation. So it's only if I don't say it that I get it, that it's a... Or you could say, I notice an explanation coming up to defend myself. I see this explanation coming up, but it's really just a form of defense.

[81:19]

And if you ever want to know my explanation, I'll let you know, but I just want to tell you, I notice that a defense mechanism is coming up to explain to you how really I'm just terrific. Please go on, help me. It could also, I feel like, I want to say, oh, I'm sorry. I realize I made a mistake, and I'm really sorry for that. But then it still comes up as a misunderstanding with the other person because they don't get it. They think that I want to defend myself, but I said, no, it's really... to do that. So sometimes it's difficult to find the right way to express something. I just wanted to say about that, too, I see myself do it a lot. giving people feedback and seeing that happen, not being about that person, like, oh, I'm sorry, I'm so horrible, I'm such a crud.

[82:25]

It's like, in a way, it deflects from just, you know, what would you like me to do differently next time, which is really amazing. It doesn't happen much, actually. This psychological term I found very helpful called negative narcissism. Oh, yeah. It's very common. Oh, you're right. It's such a listening course. I did it again and, you know, by the end you feel so terrible that For myself, too, I notice that the more I'm in that state, then, geez, it's hard for people to tell me things because I feel so terrible about it that I'm not going to seek it out. So it's interesting. Can you almost say that's another kind of defensiveness? Yes, it is. It's kind of still, almost like that defensiveness is just like... propping up the self in some way.

[83:27]

Exactly. It's another extreme between I'm so great and I'm so awful that they can fluctuate. I was just remembering that what I didn't really realize about the explaining until one time I watched you giving someone some very simple feedback, something that seemed to me pretty innocuous, and they kept going on and on with all these explanations of why, and then I was like, oh. kind of click for me. Oh, that explaining is just not receiving, and they're just trying to tell them something, and they're so busy explaining, they can't hear. It's very simple instruction. You forget. For me, the... And a really great example of this was years ago, and she was giving instruction to someone, and he kept saying, saying like, oh, okay.

[84:31]

And she's saying like, do it this way. And he's like, oh, okay. And she says, shut up. She said shut up? Yeah, and he's like, oh, okay. Shut up. In English? Be quiet. Okay. She kept telling him over and over again to be quiet. He kept saying, okay, I'll be quiet. I will be quiet. Yeah. Yes. It was just like, you know, she was just showing it, you know, just do it this way and all you have to do is do it that way. But he kept responding verbally. It was... It kept escalating. How do you feel about receiving a thank you? You mean right now or in general? No, in general. It depends on the situation, I think.

[85:36]

I think in some... It would be great... And it's probably, if there's going to be a verbal response, it's probably about as good as it gets. So probably, yeah, probably it's pretty good. But I could think of situations where, like this one, which is maybe a very specialized case, where even that is, you know, is too much, again, because it's deflecting or asserting. You're still asserting yourself. It could be that the person is still really asserting themself rather than just doing it.

[86:37]

That's another horrible situation. Thinking. Thinking like you. If I came out of the zendo in Tokyo or something and you said something to me about it, I would feel funny to just be silent and not acknowledge you. Right, in that case, in that case, I think in that case a verbal reception would be good. So maybe, you know, the tea room is an unusual, an unusual situation. I think because it is so formal. Then it's physical. In the Zendo, you might feel more comfortable not sitting with somebody. In the Zendo, someone said, you know, if someone said, would you help me with this, and you helped them. Yeah, that would be different. You might not say thank you. But in a more social situation, it's not as intimate.

[87:37]

You might not say it. I also know that sometimes you say thank you, and the body isn't saying thank you. Thank you very much. So I think part of tea ceremony, and particularly with Nakamura sensei, she's very good with body language. So if you're... really accepting it. You know, it's like, okay. You know, if the body said, I'm accepting this, then, but he may have been saying, you know, okay. Yeah, no, it was, it was, and this was, this was a verbal person. Yeah. And so it was sort of like, are we being verbal here, or are we being physical? Yeah. But I think that's an unusual situation. I think it was. enjoyable moment for me that there was kind of like these formal things because it was but the guy saw him down i put the incense in kind of crooked just straighten up the incense and it was a there was a a thing that maybe i could have ended up with i was sorry say again

[88:58]

like, sorry as I was doing it, but it felt like, no, no, the form is to just respond and just do it. And the healing in that was so wonderful. I did not have to say anything. It was the ceremony helping because it was more obviously appropriate to not. Just do it. Yeah, I felt the gift of a slight, a slight change of like, I wish that I put it in straight the first time. It's like, I could take it as a, as a slightly negative feedback or something, but it was so in the moment. And just enjoyable, personally. in that setting. You mean the interaction was enjoyable? Yeah, both. And that it could be so simple. Maybe that's what it was. That the feedback and the response could be just like... And it was over.

[90:03]

That seems like a wonderful example of where you saw the possibility of attaching a story. Yeah, yeah. And didn't go there. Yeah, right. So again, you said simple, and I was intimate. You did this. I gave you this incense. You put it in the burner. I looked at the incense. I talked to you. You straightened the incense. And nobody defended just us offering incense together. Me to you, you to the burner, but also to me, because I'm watching. Me to you, you to the incense, and back to me. I saw him straight. We did it all together with nobody talking about it.

[91:05]

I said something to you. We were using language, using our bodies, using our minds, together. And I felt perfectly comfortable giving you feedback, asking you to offer the incense, asking you to straighten the incense. And if there were any stories in there that would not ruin the intimacy, you would just be like, I would see in the student the story. I would say, oops, look, there's some story came up over there. I would vibrate around this extra thing of, you know, like, I made a mistake. But I would also say that if I was training somebody who had not agreed, who was somehow in the position of offering me incense, but who had not agreed for training the incense and it wasn't straight, I would hesitate to tell them. I would have some feeling maybe like, I don't know if they're ready for this.

[92:10]

And sometimes when I'm traveling, I have jishas, I have attendants who are offering me incense. If I would say, you know, straighten it, you know, they could collapse. You know, from this visiting whatever guy coming in here and now that he's, you know, they didn't do it right. And they just skitter off into a major hysterical reaction. They didn't agree. They didn't say, I want this. So I might not say anything. So it's very, you know, these are great opportunities. Yes? I'm enjoying hearing what I think I'm hearing. I don't know if you're equating it, but that it has to do with a lack of stories. Yeah. Or that they're not connecting with anything, they're just flying by or something.

[93:15]

The story might be flying by, but the concentration is on that. Yeah, the concentration is not on my, even on my story of what's going on. Like, I might think, blah-de-blah, but actually we're doing this thing together. This big thing's happening that we're doing together, which our stories don't really reach. And sometimes it's... Even though there is a story in the sense of Founders Hall, two people, ceremony, there's that story. But there's nothing in addition, in a way. And I look into my mind and there's this guy named Montaigne. I think his name was? Michel. Michel Montaigne, right? He's a French essayist. And he had a, I don't know what their relationship was exactly, but they were well known for being great friendship, sort of a famous friendship.

[94:23]

And Montaigne wrote essays sort of about friendship, based on this friendship. And I also think of, just my mind popping out, Rumi and his great friendship he had with this fellow practitioner. One time, how did you love each other so much? He said, at that time that we were together, he was him and I was me. That kind of just being together and finding that place together. I think that's what priest training is about. And we have these forms to use. to hone in on this. They probably had forms, too. We had these forms. We could use other forms, and we can make other forms. Use these things to explore how to do things together in this very simple, intimate way of being with complexity.

[95:35]

Because some people, again, they look at some of the ceremonies they're doing, they think they're kind of complicated. And so sometimes the complexity helps us find this simple way of doing them. If they're not complicated enough, we think sometimes our minds make them more complicated. But sometimes the complexity helps us see the very simple way of doing them, namely not worrying about whether you can do them or not. Well, thank you. That's sort of a new way for me of Getting a sense of how you're using the word. The training involves confession of the stories that are kind of like flying up and around and sometimes getting stuck. the explanations, for example, the defenses, the, you know, I'm wrong, you know, I made a mistake.

[96:38]

Because I didn't really make a mistake, and he could say, I felt like, oh, goody, not only can I offer incense here with his assistance, but I can give him some feedback on the incense offering, you know. The last time I asked someone to put in and said straight, the response was, the ash was really hard. I couldn't get it in straight. That would have been, in that case, thank you would have been much better. I was left with, well, was it okay that I said this? Did she get it? Was it? Maybe the next time. Anyway, that's an example of information that I didn't really need. It's kind of interesting. It is interesting to tell the story about it.

[97:40]

I want to say to you that I think the day will come when you will say, please straighten the incense, and the person will straighten the incense. The day will come when you will ask for that and they will do it and that will be that. And then you move forward to the next thing. It will happen. That someone will just go... Just keep trying. It will happen someday. Somebody will not defend against your offer. But it takes quite a bit of training for people to do that. And then... When they offer incense, after some number of years of that, people can feel that they don't just offer incense. They have been trained to do that. They've gotten feedback on that. Someone talked to them about it, and they accepted that. But the problem is, again, that if they don't get the training, people think that they got the training, and then they feel confused.

[98:47]

Because they give them credit for it, but they didn't get it. So they're kind of like, well, how come they're, on some level, they don't get it? Yes and yes. Yeah. I heard you say that you sometimes feel hesitant to give feedback to a person because you're not quite sure if they want it, you know? And I have a story about that. A long, long time ago when I came, I was lay ordained by you, but I wasn't living here, so then I to sit in the morning and i didn't know that you bring your rakusu in and then there's a rope channel that i had no idea so i was wearing my rakusu and then you came yeah then you came you came to me and said you know he at the what i want to say the way you said it even though I felt very embarrassed but I felt oh it's okay it was not I just didn't know and you knew that I didn't know and and I think that that is important that that we find the right way to say something interesting story about you and me oh yes

[100:03]

So yesterday, Risa said to me, what's Prairin's name? And I said, Alhaides Kumbal. Did you just make that up? I thought I made up a mythological German name. I said, no, that actually is her name. She said, wow. Yes, Jane? Oh, you know, in the beginning, back to the beginning where you started about watching, having training with somebody and having them watch you put your robe on and take your robe off. I'm not aware of either for watching me put my robe on or taking my robe off. Have you? I saw you this morning. I was watching you this morning. Putting my robe on. Do you have any feedback? I was thinking what a beautiful thing this is for these women to be around this table.

[101:18]

How lovely it is. This table was surrounded by these priests. I just had my coincidence this morning. I saw that and I thought how beautiful. So I was watching you. I was watching you, and you were being watched. And that's part of the training, is you did that. I was with you guys when you did that this morning. I didn't have anything to say, but I felt like I was walking around a very beautiful, sacred event. What about the stock washing? Japanese people. Japanese people. Japanese will learn. Sock washing, yes? You mentioned that earlier. Something about washing socks together. Yeah. Well, you know... At Tassajara, we do wash socks together.

[102:24]

I go up there and I wash socks with people. And sometimes people are wearing socks that aren't clean. And I might notice that. And I'm quite likely to notice people's socks. I do notice that stuff. It's no big deal. You all notice that stuff. But some people I would feel like, you know, maybe I should say something about it. Because, you know, we're all together. Yeah. The same thing about before, and I don't know if it's a problem or not, but just something I noticed, things like when new priests are ordained in this group, there are things about the form, about putting on a robe or taking off a robe or how to use priest oryoki that nobody actually tells people how to do.

[103:30]

I know when I was trying to figure out how to put on my robe and take it off, I was hunting for somebody, and so I found Daigon, who was very generous and worked with me. A totally different way from the way you do it. Although I know much later we had a priest meeting, I guess it was New Year's, where we talked about all the various ways. And I know that Jeremy has met with Linda more than once to go over orioke and using the priest bowls. And I got a very quick... Susan O'Connell would say, oh yeah, you do this. But I felt like I was kind of winging it for a while. So I don't know if that's, maybe that's the way training goes. But I also felt a little lost in that process. you would want people to come up and say, would you show me? I'll go over the whole way to keep going with me. Or if more senior priests should kind of say, well, I'm here to show you these things or help you with these things.

[104:33]

I just thought I would mention that. I don't have some definite idea about that, but I think that... I think that you expressing yourself about this is part of pre-straining. I may listen to you, but I don't have any idea of how to proceed about that any differently than the way we have. I think that orgy is an opportunity for training and doesn't know what to do, doesn't know what to do with the priest bowls, that then not being trained and doing it is an opportunity for training. So for example, if I was sitting next to someone who hadn't been trained much and negotiate the space between the way that they did the old bowls and the way they do these new bowls,

[105:46]

that there would be an opportunity there. Now, if I haven't agreed with this person that I'm going to give them feedback, then there would be an opportunity with that. If there was this understanding, then there would be opportunity to give them feedback because we agreed that they wanted that. So I see people who I haven't trained who have not asked me to. I see people who have asked me to. So the fact that either or not they've been trained before I see them do it or not, still I have the opportunity. And if they haven't been trained and I give them feedback, they could say, well, I haven't been trained. I didn't know what to do. You know, you should have trained me. Otherwise, then I would have done it right and you would be... No, they could get that response. If they had been trained, I can also... So I kind of feel like I have no problem with the person being trained by me or someone else how to do it. But then, regardless of what the background is, here they are now doing it.

[106:56]

And it might be years after they see them, and I go, oh, what's that? They could have had 10 training sessions with me. or with somebody else. But I could look at them and say, I say, oh, could I ask you a question about that? And then I might say, did you intend to do it that way? And they might say, you know, you told me to do it that way. You told me that. Don't talk to me like that. So I kind of feel like regardless of, I don't care how many courses people have, they can have a gazillion or so. Still, when I see them, there they are, ready to interact with. Like the Ino at Rasahara one time. Well, I didn't train at Oryoki, but I could have. I was watching the Ino, and she was doing various unusual things.

[107:59]

I'd never seen... Well, I shouldn't say I've never seen it. I've never seen Ino do before, let's say. I've seen beginners do various fancy things with wordy-okies. One of the main things that people do is they do gravity feed, insertion of implements into the set-suit box. Very efficient. And also gravity evacuation. But I never saw Ino do that before. So I thought, wow. So I don't know how many trainings that Ino had before that. I was not the trainer. But even if I had been, I still would have, especially for the Ino. Could I ask you a question about Oryoki? So I did. And I said, I asked her how she did it. She also teaches people. She said, I want to talk to Ino because Ino teaches people how to do Oryoki, right? So I wanted to talk to Ino. And I asked her how she did it, and she showed me how she did it, which was not the way she did it that day.

[109:08]

And I watched her, and she did it three times. I saw her do it three times. I waited until she did it three times to see if it was true, what I saw. So then she showed me how to do it, you know, like this. And I think maybe she said, well, how come you asked me? I said, well, because I saw you do it a different way. And she said, oh. No, I did it this way. She said, Oh, well, I thought you did it another way. She said, Oh, no, I do it this way. So then I saw her do it this other way again. I saw her do it again. So then I said to her, If I see you doing it this other way, could I point it out to you? And she said yes. So then the next time I saw her, I went, And she looked down and she saw what she was doing. And she went, oh, you know. She was doing it and she didn't know she was doing it.

[110:11]

But I had to go through all that to get to point of seeing, see, there it is, that's it. And she was up, you know, we had talked twice about it, four times, talked to her twice, and then I could point it out. And she'd been trained. She knew how to do it. But even people who have been trained, still. And people who haven't can be trained, and people who have can be trained. There's no end to the training. Because we can keep asking people, you know, how come you did that with your orioke yesterday? And I say, oh, did I do that? Or I can give an explanation. Or actually, they're asking me for an explanation. So to me, I don't really... about when people should be taught to do what when. But no matter when they're taught what, still, when I'm looking at the person, I can see what they're doing and ask them questions about it and get them feedback.

[111:14]

And they could be highly trained and still have a question, we're not trained at all. Either way, in some ways it's easier if they haven't been trained at all. It's because then they don't have a habit or they're not embarrassed. So that's kind of, that's how I kind of feel about it. But I, I, I, I think the main thing is, is that we're doing it. The person knows how to do it. Aside from the, from the other people. Was, shall we have lunch now? Jane, Jane, yes, Jane. So when you were talking about in terms of feedback, letting something in before giving something back, I wanted to bring up something I feel some, well, I want to bring up in our and a number of you.

[112:23]

that our style of speaking does not allow for that. And in fact, it rarely allows, maybe rarely, quite frequently does not allow a person who's speaking to even finish speaking. before the next person is speaking let alone for what they said to be received and so I find these meetings chaotic and discouraging and we say things about them I wanted to bring it up here just as a I would just really love us to be mindful of receiving what each person said and then saying something sometimes I think there's maybe a fear that you want to get heard or I can understand if somebody's going on for a really long time and you're losing connection, that to me would be one time to actually say, excuse me, I'm losing connection, whatever.

[113:34]

But I just wanted to express that as a wish and a request for respect from other people speaking. I appreciate you bringing this up. I also want to acknowledge that I appreciated it in the past when you brought it up, and that you brought it up in this group, too. And I think we can continue to work on it here. And in particular, after Meg finished, I tried to respond. I don't know if you noticed that. I was trying to wait until... Give some space after you said that. And after... I think a lot of people are waiting after we're... Giving space to it.

[114:36]

But I think that is a good... It is a good practice. In meetings, but also one-on-one. To... Acknowledge the gift. I wanted to give an example when I asked you about feedback about the man on the robe and you said what you said about saw this thing that you thought was beautiful and around the table so that was a very new way of looking at that event this morning that I was part of and I was I was enjoying like that image had arisen from hearing you talk, and I was kind of taking it in that way, and then there wasn't, for my speed, it wasn't maybe about my speed, but my speed, the next thing came in from the group really, or without that, I felt like I hadn't experienced our,

[115:50]

changed fully before I needed to turn my attention to something else or my attention got taken. So I just wanted to say that example. I think we cut down on our own experience of things and we go somewhere else. I feel complete without it. Well, thank you very much for this discussion. I hope that something that we discussed today will be able to contribute to a book about priest training.

[116:59]

There were a lot of interesting points that came up. I hope you enjoyed it thoroughly.

[117:06]

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