Householder Bodhisattvas, What is Your Aspiration for this New Year? 

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and now please tell me your name team or teams
lori lori
he on
the yeah
lisa
the and
kelly abbey and charlie
he said
no food
the worst you'll see you ever seen
cvs
yes
i am
susan
ha
maria
amanda
i am
hey
chen or ah susan susan shirk achieve show me see again the next man
hey
oh man
near you
seen
am
yes
raman
john

here here
kitchen sink is essential
there's as an expression which goes something like
first clean the temple
then city
as another
expression which says
clear everything away
let go of everything
and welcome enlightenment
empty your house
so that the buddha's can come
and new years is a nice time to
empty your house
let go of all your past happinesses and griefs
and welcome the fresh new life of the momentum
and continue through the rest of the year hopefully each with emptying the house and welcome the fresh new moment of enlightenment
of course it's difficult to do that
our body sometimes doesn't want to go of itself
so
ah this is a rather auspicious moment for us to auspicious me is conducive to success this is an auspicious moment for us to empty our house and welcome enlightenment
apropos of this marvellous possiblity
how during the break we had before this talk i went into the teacher's room and i bought my elbow not very hard
on a door
now my elbow that i bumped now i asked on and just not to put the little might on me because i can't put my arm
because it was recently wrapped with tape recently like five minutes ago
so the reason with rapper cape was because when i broke my elbow i felt a lot of moisture my sunlight my wonderful body with the sense organs felt wetness inside of my robes and i thought how did wetness get inside my robes
i didn't have a bottle of water in my sleeve
and i looked in and i saw home
chief what i saw
can you see it
you know
my here he said no
i saw these little red marks i thought
maybe my elbow which has been swollen for seven months and which have recently realized was infected for which i am taking
a proper
caught array of antibiotics
maybe it's pumping
so i took some tissue and pressed on it and lots of stuff came out on the tissue
so i just clean house here
somewhat
and that's why i i can't be my arm more than i have to borrow like this to you because i right now i came from harm because now there's gauze on the elbow receiving more gifts a bodily fluids
but i have been feeling for several days like i wish this thing with pot but i didn't i wanted to it so that i thought that might be
foolhardy
during the seven months the the swelling didn't hurt
but it was a little bit read my ladies disinfected i went to see various doctors and they said it's procedures
and actually i think it's is procedures but it's a bursitis that has an infection in it it looks like so
ah on the twenty six at night
was it the here the navy of the twenty six there was it
i was a christmas night anyway one of those two nights
for the first time it started to throb
hannah was getting it was quite hard so i went to the emergency room and they drained it and the suffolk came out was
yellow and there was a lot of it
so then you put me on antibiotics and then since that time the redness as can has continued and it's gotten more and more sensitive to the touch i imagine that may be like a baby
when it's time to come the the service gets thinner and thinner
then you know
a or me faced the service just a face i think that this the the skin became a faced so that when i just typed it slightly a few minutes ago the stuff started coming out it was ready for it to
can i go i guess so
yeah so has been a seven month
ah challenge
which i haven't been it's not
uninterruptedly patient with i sometimes have been a little impatient
little bit concerned bleeding into the future of when this thing would be not
visiting me more
so i feel
i feel clean out right now quite cleaned out and
want to share that with you i could have not because it's kind of gory
and i hesitated to goes give you as much details as i could which i did
hi tom
if anyone wants to see more stuff i have most of
this morning i met with the priests for the new year's greeting and i was thinking you're showing it to them but i find know last night my grandson want to see an hour shorter and he sincerely was frightened
he was a hill and grander issue to me assure you he really was frightened
so it's almost like ha
i said
on it couldn't you know that are possibilities could be a bite
a scratch
it was the wounded in the diagnosis i got an emergency room to say cellulitis said a skin disease skin and skin infection say latest said it could become a scratch on a bite bob loblaw
that originally the night
primary care physician and referred me to a
orthopedic surgeon was an expert on
how quite who i know quite well already and he diagnosed it as procedures so it actually may be that the infection went into the bursa which might be good because maybe the bursa held the infection
yes i didn't got my arm so anyway
it might be a combination of in have infection and an aversive becoming infected another the circus in burst and we'll see what happens from now on
i would have been concerned some nice that i would not die in the night
and also i was very kind to my wife before i went to sleep every night
thanking her very much too
for being such a good wife and you know they are ready to die because i thought my break-ins from my own and kill me
but i felt that likelihood was not some great since i was on his antibiotics
but it kept me read and still is and then today auspiciously you get to witness
on
the kind of natural bodily harm
release the it it is selling a product had for a normal fight but it's an entirely normal fight was just was the start throbbing and say man this is getting it's time to go to the doctor and think you need any help go ahead some antibiotics
plus the wisdom of my skin
has released this fluid which would which was coming to try to
deal with whatever this infection was
and i've scheduled an operation
do remove the versa
and it's scheduled for january twenty seventh two thousand and twelve
and i was i was contemplating spending a whole intensive which starting this week with this
with this thing on my elbow
but that looks like they don't have to have the operation will see looks like navy
the person will calm down and
i can move on to other problems
and i'm happy to see robert anderson sitting on the floor in your back has has been relieved somewhat
you
pardon after surgery gender as well wow
for back there
whatever release is itself before
yeah great well i wish you well on january twelfth
january twelfth nineteen eighty six i was appointed i was installed as and of zen center
this is a twenty six years ago

sex
the are the new years i just want to look back and say that last year
around this time i made a form of public
commitment to focus on studying delusion this year
which i did and your men even join me happily
also that his part of that
we started studying a text called the summary or damp embracing of a great vehicle
which describes on the de categorizing of delusion
an independent cauterizing of the transformation of the base of delusion
and this text i intend to continue to study this year
k so the text is called
ah an incense good mahayana some gras ha and the and the author of the text is a song in there is a painting of xanga hung an now
check on your behalf i offered incense to the great teacher or sanga who lived in india
in the fourth and fifth centuries of the common era
so one of his works have called the my on sondra ah ha
he also was the new answers
for maitreya buddha
and in that function he wrote the bodhisattva for the stages of the bodhisattva path
and so here he did quiero quite a few he wrote down quite a few marvelous my on a teachings were vehicle teachings
my inspiration from the future buddha
and he wrote a number of texts from his own understanding his own meditation practice and my on some grise one of them
so i i would like to continue to stay that here and there and in between even though there's no such thing

so i looked back and say
i fulfilled my bow last of last year
i'm happy i am very happy that that was able to happen now this year i'm making new vow which i just told you about and i'll tell you more about it in a bit but before i do i wanted to say that i'd like you to consider what your aspirations are for this
year and beyond
this temple is called no goal and know about his

paying homage
the word know about of this of this temple is paying homage to the mind
the body saatva
it's paying homage to the heart of a zen master
male or female
the heart and mind a bodhisattva zen masters or then master bodhisattvas he said to have no abode
it's full of compassion but it doesn't abide anywhere it doesn't attach do anything
so this temple is in that sense ah
dedicated to the promotion
but the bodhisattva mind which has no abode
so i looked at myself and i look to you to say do you aspire to be a bodhisattva which means do you aspire to realize unsurpassed complete perfect enlightenment
so that you can be of service to all beings
do you aspire to perfect enlightenment perfect liberation so that you can liberate others
that's question for myself as a question for you
this is the aspiration of the bodhisattvas
this is the aspiration of those who really have a mind that doesn't bite anywhere

couple of years ago
ah one of you came to me and said is there some formal way to request the teaching or request ah someone to be
teacher for you and i said well actually when there's many ways but one of the ways that we that were practicing is a new year's
to come and meet our the priests at the precinct practice with her new years com and ah
offer me a written traditional written only expression wishing that i
what because free
for the new year thanking me for my efforts in the past and wishing and hoping to an and begging me to continue
function for the sake of the great vehicle
listen and i said it well lay people could do that to householders could do could do that also
so we can do that i know about so i think this is the third year than we did it
that we have only years have an opportunity for people to bring their
the request from me to continue
and wishing me good health
and i wonder when again wonderfully i feel that just a you've done that you came here and
there was this great him but release from
from illness had happened from the energy of you wishing me well thank you very much
and then part of that new year's greeting is the same teaching and teaching what well there's many things to teach but since i have a limited amount of time and energy on focusing on the teachings for those who wish to realize buddhahood for the welfare
of all days i'm focusing on bodies are for teaching
if someone wishes to
be free of infection or elbow i'm totally supportive of that i'll do whatever i can to help
after the sun part i looked i stepped out the door dick have somebody help me soak up the stuff and there was a nurse
how does a backup nurse up there too so ah
he also thank you
and if anybody one has any other infections are like me to help him with i got an antibiotics or sure
but that's not my main focus i'm not a i'm not a doctor i'm not a nurse
i'm i'm has increased and so my main thing is to encourage people to practice enlightenment
using zan forms like for example there's no years greeting as is an form
we asked the bodhisattva teacher the teacher of the body suffer way to teach you the boy sock away
he will he asked the teacher who has been taught by a teacher the practice the bodies after the way together with you for another year
but it's optional the this request
question is is in your heart to have the aspiration to do the wonderful thing of serving all beings do you wish to do that wonderful practice if you aspire to that
then
then
we have a training program for you
as no fact if you inspired to
the authentic understanding of reality in order to serve bees
because without understanding reality correctly we are somewhat limited in our service we can help people sunlight for example
if even if the nurse was not totally enlightened she still can help me with my elbow
we don't know if she's totally enlightened or not but she did help me with my elbow so you can help people
in many ways
without having authentic understanding of the dharma but to be really most effective
it is proposed
to become a buddha would really help out so
following from your aspiration if you have an aspiration than the question is what training follows from that
if you aspire to be a nurse nursing school might follow if you aspire to be a lawyer law school if you aspire to be a boy sat for boys cipher training
i usually i have been speaking this past year particularly than budisa for training is
basically
described as
a bodhisattva practice the body of a vehicle the great vehicle that's one way to say the training of a boys off another way to say it is the six perfections
but another way to say at which i'm bringing up today in which i'd like to talk about for a while is that a bodhisattva training his training in ethics
so i like to
focus on the body sought for ethics or training and bodhisattva ethics

in early teachings ah
some of the
enlightened disciples of the buddha are related to the buddha's to boot the practice of the buddha way in terms of the three learnings
ethics
concentration
and wisdom
sheila samadhi and prajna
ah those are the three learnings and last three learnings is not in the so mentioned plus three learnings our peak for people who are already practicing dinah giving
so
kinda in them in the asian context
all the all the people who wish to be disciples a buddha practice giving and some people go to school
and as school they'd take the in addition to practicing for all what all the buddhist practice the practice catholics concentration and wisdom
but in the body such a vehicle particularly has taught by a sanga
ethics includes all of them
ethics includes giving
ethics
in a limited sense
patients heroic effort concentration wisdom crimes starting by
saying that i'd like now if you have the aspiration for i should say if you have it but if the aspiration to be a bodhisattva
he's living in you if the boy sought a spirit is alive and you then i just wanted to try to make clear that i think the training is needed
and the training i'm suggesting is bodhisattva ethics training
so i i was gonna do some food but in my infected state i was not able to do it yesterday i hoped to later on my arm
is supportive of the project to make a drawing or painting a piece of calligraphy which has a circle
in the circle is ethics
canada inside the circle of ethics his concentration and inside the circle of concentration is wisdom
as one picture the other picture
but sa for ethics but he served the concentration but he sat the wisdom or buddhist ethics buddhists concentration put his wisdom
another drawing and thing you can envision is the other way around
you have a circle
call wisdom and inside the circle of wisdom there must be concentration and inside the circle of concentration there must be ethics
are there is
these bodyshop for training methods of giving ethics
patients heroic effort concentration and wisdom they mutually include each other
he may not be surprised if people that wisdom includes concentration and heroic effort
and patience
an ethics and giving
but giving also includes wisdom
for complete giving a includes wisdom concentration and so on and ethics includes
wisdom concentration
giving
heroic effort and patience
so they will be nice if i live long enough to to spend a year on the circle which has which has given
and then inside giving his ethics patients heroic efforts concentration wisdom and spend another year on wisdom including
all the other bodies offer practices and then if in a year on
effort heroic effort and including all the other practices because it does because all those practices are fueled by heroic effort
so it encompasses all the other practices that patient's also income brussels of practices we can't be truly wise and truly generous and truly ethical and so on without patients so each of these bodies are for each of these six points out practices includes the other five
and to make the story to me to plot to thicken the plot although they mutually include each other they're done in a certain order
he can not really practice perfect wisdom before you practice perfect giving
but you can practice given to some extent which leads to with them to some extent and wisdom is completed than the giving becomes completed
but again i'm starting this year with emphasizing ethics
inspired by a sanga who said
that he thought that ethics was the easiest way for a lot of people to understand the bodhisattva
but his ethics again is not the ethics which is a preliminary to the higher practices of concentration and wisdom
it is an all encompassing practice includes them all
many people come at us as i said as many people come to zen centres wishing to enter into the higher practices and they're allowed to wish that
so they can immediately sit in practice concentration and wisdom they can immediately set in practice enlightenment
fine no problem
but if they're sitting does not include ethics then they're not practicing concentration and wisdom
and they're happy to practice concentration and wisdom or or just concentration many of them were to happen to try that and they do and they sometimes have probable practice in concentration and will we look carefully we find that they have an infection
in their heart and the infection having a heart is that they're not practicing ethics are they're not being generous towards themselves so they try to come down and be
tranquil and concentrated and focused but they can't be because they're distracted
and they're not kind of distraction so if you're more distracted and so on so
again plot is and students come and anyone immediately practice concentration and or wisdom some of them don't want to be concentrated is why go right to wisdom and so we're discussing wisdom teachings and they start talking about and and and when i'm talking to him i feel like you know i recommend you that you practice more
concentration before he's trying to deal with these teachings these studies
and then as to start practicing concentrations that i'd recommend that you practice more patients with how badly this is going and
when and then when they try to practice patients that i think maybe you need to be more careful about the way you know you're dealing with your life you can be patient and then would then i noticed that there being generous so we have to go back find out the all the things that they haven't all the things i hadn't been doing which are necessary in order to practice concentration and the things we have to do
in order to practice concentration
are giving ethics patients and heroic effort we must do those otherwise our concentration is hindered
by are not doing the things that support it
that once again no i'm talking about ethics as a way to understand all these practices are no way to put it is that
we have an ethical duty
has aspirants to buddhahood if you aspire to buddhahood then you have an ethical duty to practice
while the other practices
a typical like this is what you say you wanna do so then if so then this is what you want to do than in with your body your speech in your mind than this now is your ethical responsibility because you said this is your aspiration
some that sense
this is looking at all these practices from the point of view of of behavior old responsibility kind of duty

there's a text which i i don't know i've been i don't know how to get in touch with the text but i just saw quoted by sanga
our he says and is this text is written in sanskrit or italians called up the three trainings ah the discourse on the three train trainings
tree three sandra
trainings are disciplines
on your dasha discourse
an inner textes it said something like
any son or daughter of the family
follow sometimes you say any son or daughter of a good family very way i am one where did you say this is any son or daughter of the family participating in the body sought for vehicle
so there's a family
have men and women who are practicing the bodhisattva vehicle
and that's pretty be called a good family
any one of these sons or daughters who
our in a family that's practicing a great vehicle who fails to follow through
with the teachings of the great vehicle
as soon as they have been heard

that's quite a tall order right
imagine now that you would
follow through follow through on the practices of the body surfer as soon as you've heard them

until we can follow through on the practices of the great vehicle from the body per vehicle as soon as we heard them we cannot be fully awakened to unsurpassed correct authentic
complete enlightenment
but when i say that it makes sense to me that there would be the case
in other words
you can hear them a and ttc you hesitate for like an moment and dismissed the chance to awaken to supreme enlightenment
not just and not just going to try but follow through on it
so what
yeah so this aspiration is in the center teaching and when we fail to follow through on it we kind of miss the boat the bodhisattva boat
and a nurse teachings for what to do when you miss the boat and we hear those teachings for what to do when you miss the boat and you noticed you miss the boat
if you don't do it right away soon as you hear him he missed the boat again
and then i and the is talking to the his disciple cash on he says why as is so because kartarpur unsurpassed complete probably enlightenment is to be attained by
following through by being assiduous when he was a may translate assiduous
what diligent i call me translated as follow through
diligent
it's accomplished by diligence and not without it
so let us follow through shall we on our aspirations
we are
highest and best for deepest and most wholesome place follow through on our aspirations
let us generate the totally supreme thought of enlightenment
let's whole steadfastly to each of the three branches of ethics
essex of moral discipline the ethics of collectible his and factors and the ethics of being devoted to the welfare of all living beings

i i up
i am now might say prepared or you could say i am equipped to go on with this further
but i also i already feel that what i've said is so important to me that i don't i wanna give it some space for the sinking to me and you
before i go on to talk about the essence of ethical discipline which are equipped to do they can read
before i want to talk about the essence of ethical training for body surface
i will stop and
encourage us all to consider do we have the aspiration to be a bodhisattva and do we have any questions if we do have that aspiration for don't have the aspiration than i would say well what aspiration do you have and whatever aspiration you do have been the question is what to
training follows from that
so often as people at the beginning of training periods practice games what is your final ultimate concern what is your ultimate aspiration
now at the beginning of this year i asked her what is your ultimate aspiration what is your final
highest and most important aspiration
it's i think aspiring to the lunch is fine but do you aspire to ate lunch for the welfare of all beings that's a question so i again i'm just sort of safe i feel like i should go no further
at this time
maybe this afternoon i'll get into up more about ethics but i can i ask us to look inwardly and see what our aspiration for our life for this year is and what training
what training what discipline would follow appropriately
and
beer yeah would be supportive of aspiration or what training would be following through on our aspiration
okay
so ah so that i can
to my this day
i know would say
with my arm rather straight
yea our intention
a stand
the place
a
the as way
the
younger or less
how to save them the erasure
us all
hi to them
a saddam less
direction
has a son as the
in out hands

he's fondly family

switches of