If it's not too late, may I wish you a Happy New Year. May I wish you a year of joy and peace in a world where many beings are suffering. may we, may you, sit upright and stand upright and ride on your daddy's shoulders upright at the center of all beings. may I suggest that each of our true position, our dharma position, is at the center of the whole field of all phenomena.

[01:46]

Each of us is a different center of the whole universe. we have the opportunity to accept the responsibility of being the center of the universe. To accept it, moment by moment, to remember our responsibility to be ourself.

[02:53]

No one else can do this for us and everyone is helping us. They have the opportunity to remember our position in this world. Which is similar or it's the same as remembering stillness. Remembering stillness. This is a room where living beings enter and sit upright and celebrate stillness. Celebrate stillness is the same as celebrating that each of us

[04:14]

Each of our experience, every experience, is the whole field of all phenomena. That is stillness. The whole universe has settled on you each moment being your true Dharma self. To take care of each experience, therefore, is to take care of all experience. Every experience includes the entire field of experience.

[05:34]

And if you take care of this experience, you take care of the entire field. This is the Buddha's activity. This is Buddha's practice. is to take care of everything by taking care of each experience, remembering the stillness of you being unmovingly at the center of the universe, including everything and being included in everything. remembering that stillness, accepting it, practicing it, and transmitting it.

[06:40]

All phenomena are facing all phenomena, giving rise to all phenomena. For example, me. All phenomena face all phenomena and give rise to this person. And it's the same for all beings. an implication has just arisen in my consciousness.

[09:19]

Earlier we chatted a verse, and the verse starts out with an unsurpassed, penetrating and perfect Dharma is rarely met with. And now I feel like I'm kind of in a what's called an interesting situation of suggesting that the unsurpassed, penetrating and perfect Dharma is constantly being met with

[10:30]

So, nothing against rare. Rarely met with. So, we're constantly meeting the Dharma, and it's rare. Maybe rare as in fresh. Fresh. Maybe rare as in rare meat. The unsurpassed penetrating and perfect Dharma is freshly met. Even in a hundred thousand million eons. The Dharma is freshly met. I'm saying this morning. not like seldom or once in a while, but always and freshly and forever.

[11:47]

And this truth which is peace, this truth which is peace, which is met moment by moment, freshly. I vow to taste it. I vow to taste this truth. How? How? by taking care of every moment of experience. And part of taking care of every moment of experience, for me, is to mention to you part of the way I take care of

[13:05]

each moment of experience is to mention to you on Sunday morning that you also can take care of every moment of experience. Part of me taking care of it is to mention that you also have this opportunity. I wouldn't really be taking care of it if I didn't... What's the word? Mention that to you? I did not bring affidavits for you to sign, witnessing that you will, from now on, take care of every moment of experience. But I did bring an affidavit

[14:08]

Does anybody know what Afa means? I know what David means. Does anybody know what Afa means in affidavit? Anyway, I'm here to ask you if you, by any chance, would like to take care of every moment of experience for the rest of your life. Or is there something else you'd like to take care of other than every, other than each moment of experience? Do you want to take care of each moment of experience? Three people nodded. Thank you. Well, one more thing I might have time to mention this morning is something about taking care of things.

[15:20]

I sometimes have the thought that I am in a that my views are... I don't know what the word is. Like, not too many people think like I do. Maybe nobody. I'm really working and devoted to taking care of things. But the way I'm devoted to taking care of them is by really allowing them to be. That's the way I want to take care of things, is to allow each experience to be itself. I really want to remember to let go of trying to control events, trying to control phenomena, trying to control living beings, like you or me.

[16:58]

I'm actually working at that. I'm working at giving up trying to control you. For example, trying to control you into thinking that this is a good talk. I'm not trying to control you to think it's a good talk. I'm not trying to make you or control you into appreciating me. AND AGAIN, I FEEL LIKE I'M UNUSUAL IN THAT WAY BECAUSE SO MANY PEOPLE ARE TRYING TO CONTROL THIS WORLD. THEY'RE TRYING TO CONTROL LIVING BEINGS. AND THEY'RE ACTUALLY ADVERTISING THAT THEY CAN CONTROL.

[18:04]

AND PEOPLE ARE, LIKE, GIVING THEM MONEY TO TRY TO CONTROL OTHER PEOPLE. Again, trying to take care while giving up, trying to control. It's not giving up, for me, it's not giving up control. I have no control to give up. But I can try to control, and that I can give up. For example, somebody's ringing the bell, it sounds like.

[19:05]

Not too loudly. And I'm not trying to get that person, whatever it is, to stop. Maybe somebody else will try to get him to stop. When I meditate, I take care of this body Right now, I'm taking care of this body. I intend to take care of this body all day long and all night. I'm trying. I'm devoted to take care of this body. And I'm also devoted to give up trying to control it It's not under control.

[20:08]

This body is not under control. I'm not in control of this body. You're not in control of this body. But in stillness, you are taking care of this body. And this body is taking care of you. I am living in a body that's taking care of you. And you are living in a body that's taking care of this body. Now, Eno is going to the door. What's he going to do? Is he going to try to control? The bell ringer? I don't know. He's not under my control either.

[21:09]

Doesn't mean I couldn't say, you know, please let him ring away. Or... I could say, please stop ringing the bell to somebody or to me even. But I don't have to do it with the delusion that my words are going to bring something under control. My words are the meeting, face to face, of the entire field of experience with the entire field of experience. That's what my words are. That's what your words are. These are not under anybody's control. They are the realization of the Buddha activity. And

[22:14]

we have an opportunity to accept responsibility to take care of this uncontrolled, uncontrollable reality. Buddhas are not in control of us. We are not in control of Buddhas. Buddhas are nothing other than us. To realize Buddha, What did you do out there? What did you do? So this person is not under my control. He said that he thinks he did control. And he tied up the bell. Do you tie up the people?

[23:17]

You can tie people up sometimes. You can. But after they're tied up, you still aren't in control of them. For example, after you tie somebody up, they can cry and you can't control their tears. Or they can laugh and you can't control their laugh and neither can they. But you can love them. Tied up or untied up, you can love a being wholeheartedly and give yourself to them completely. And when you give yourself completely to somebody, you have given up trying to control them. You are in the perfect position along with me. to do this work. You are at the center of all beings right now. And so am I. You can love all beings just like Buddha is doing.

[24:26]

But Buddha is not controlling one single solitary phenomena. Because Buddha is just how all phenomena are meeting all phenomena. giving rise to all phenomena. This process of freedom and peace, not control, which is disrespectful and promotes anxiety. Buddha is not trying to eliminate anxiety. Buddha is embracing all anxiety without trying to get rid of it or maintain it. Buddha is trying to teach all anxiety how to practice like a Buddha.

[25:30]

Something else to control, I hear. No, no, no, no, no. Something else to try to control. Some living beings are out there making noise. But fortunately during this talk they can make as much noise as they want. Right? No, they can't. They're not in control of their noise making. They might want to make more noise, but they... won't be able to control the amount of noise they make. They won't. But they're doing pretty well. What are they talking about out there? Huh? Mama, they're talking about mama. And they're not in control of talking about mama, but they are talking about mama with our support. And they may not be ready to hear about their great responsibility.

[26:45]

And I'm not in control of when they will be ready. But I feel like you, you adults in this room, are pretty close to ready to accept the responsibility of your life. which is to take care of everything. It's my responsibility, it's your responsibility to take care of everything, because everything you take care of is taking care of everything. It's a question of accepting this opportunity, this stillness. Accepting the stillness of where you are right now, at the center of the world, and remembering it, being mindful of it, no matter what you're thinking, no matter what you're feeling.

[28:03]

Remember this. Take care of whatever with your whole heart and watch out for any attempt to control this world. And if you see an attempt to control it, be kind to that too. In the past, like, you know, almost 50 years ago, when I started to practice Zen meditation, I tried to control things. I tried to control my body and my mind when I was meditating in Zen meditation halls.

[29:10]

And I Yeah, I was really not very kind to myself. I was not very kind to myself. In my effort to control my body and control my mind and control my breathing, I was not very kind to myself. I was kind of fascist and oppressive towards myself and kind of everybody around me too, but mostly on me. And as I got closer and closer to actually apparently getting myself under control, I got closer and closer to realizing that that's not what I want to do in this life. That control is an illusion, and the closer you get to making it seem true, the uglier life gets, the more stressful, the more not what we want.

[30:18]

And so almost 50 years ago, or certainly about 45 years ago, I started to give up trying to control my body. And I spent thousands and thousands of hours taking care of my body in meditation halls. I go in there and I take care of my body. And I do that in order to take care of every... I've been doing that. And I have been trying to give up trying to control this body. And I'm getting closer and closer to not trying to control it. And it's getting more and more appropriate to not try to control it.

[31:20]

And it's getting more and more clear that it cannot be controlled. And I'm getting happier and happier. Not that it can't be controlled, but that I'm not trying to. And I'm not trying to control other people in kind of It's kind of like giving up trying to control me, I'm giving up trying to control you, and things are going better and better. For me. So I think I've said enough and we can have question and answer and you can refute me if you want to in the question and answer session. You can tell me what you think of my efforts to give up trying to control you and me, which I will continue to do unless you get really hard on me.

[32:22]

And then I might say, maybe I'll make an exception and try to control this person. I don't think so. You're actually quite safe. You're pretty safe from me trying to control you. Isn't that nice? I'm not going to not try to control you. I'm not trying to get you to come to question and answer. And I probably will go, but I'm not going to control myself to come back and sit here. And so maybe I won't. And maybe you won't either. Maybe he won't come to question and answer. This is our director of the meditation hall. His name is Hakusho-san. And I didn't get him to move his hand like that, but he did.

[33:28]

I waved to him and he went like this, which was quite nice, I thought. Thank you. And you didn't do it the way I wanted you to. Much better than I wanted though. And he told me yesterday he was starting to feel sick and asked me if he could rest. And I said, yeah. But he's here. Thank you. And you can still rest if you need to, okay? So I'm not trying to control him into being healthy, although it would be nice if he was. Because he's kind of taking care of this place. But if he needs to rest, I want to support him to rest. And if you need to rest, I want to support you to rest. And someday you will need to rest.

[34:28]

and I want to support you at that time to do so." I kind of have this feeling like I want to support you to be yourself. I just sort of have that feeling. But I also noticed that part of the reason that I had that feeling is I think, I actually believed that it would really be good if I did, if I actually did support you to be yourself. So I kind of, it's this feeling like I want to, but I also like I have a belief that that would be good, which makes me want to even more. I really want to help you do your job of being yourself. And I know it's a hard job at the center of all the world's suffering beings. So here we go.

[35:32]

Best wishes to us in doing Buddha's work

[35:36]

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