Tonight I offer the words that conscious life is welcoming the other. Conscious life is welcoming the other. It is hospitality. And there's a play in the word hospitality. The root of the word hospitality is host. And host originally meant guest. It meant a foreigner or an invading army. and gradually the word host came to be used for the one who takes care of the guests, which originally are the host.

[01:13]

So the consciousness is welcoming the other, the guest, which is a host. and I am a self and I am others. And I've been proposing that my finite consciousness, which is welcoming, in conversation with the other which is infinite, is a path to liberate the egotism that lives in consciousness.

[02:41]

Consciousness is welcoming and at the same time it's afflicted by egotism, by biases, by reducing things for the service, in the service of the self. And becoming free of egotism is perhaps the same as having a fully responsible conversation with the other. In the full conversation with the other, the self and its views are called into question are called to respond in a responsible way.

[03:55]

The self is called by the other to a conversation. And in the conversation there is generosity, both in terms of welcoming the other and giving my face and giving my words about my world as gifts to the other who is looking to me, who is calling to me to respond by giving my words and my face. and also who's questioning, questioningly calling me, questioningly gazing at me, wondering who I am and wondering how I understand her, how she appears in my world.

[05:00]

in this conversation, my freedom is unhindered. And actually, my freedom is stimulated and intensified in the conversation. Another way to say it is, I, this consciousness, cannot become free of its egotism without the stimulation of the questioning from others. I realize my freedom by being questioned and welcoming the questions and giving my words about my world. I include the other.

[06:20]

I am the other. I include the other, and I'm a self. The other pervades me, but I do not contain the other. I include but do not contain and the other contains me, excuse me, includes me and I pervade the other and she calls to me and I call to her. But we don't contain each other but we include each other. and the process starts with generosity. The nature of consciousness is that it's welcoming, so then the first practice in accord with its nature is the practice of welcoming. So we practice welcoming and generosity because consciousness is generous and it's generous and

[07:27]

afflicted by egotism, which afflicts the generosity, which afflicts the generous nature of consciousness. In terms of the images we've been using, the clearing is welcoming the dark forest and welcoming everything that lives in the dark forest which is the physical world, the physical body, the physical bodies, and all the clearings which are welcoming the clearing. The clearing welcomes all the clearings, the clearing includes all the clearings, and it doesn't contain them. and it's included in all the clearings. In order to realize this, we need to practice face-to-face conversation. At the end of the class, I think Linda said something like, what if you don't want to have a conversation with somebody?

[08:39]

She didn't say it exactly that way, but sort of. What if somebody you don't want to have a conversation with? What if there's somebody you don't want to welcome? What if there's somebody you don't want to give your face to and your words to? So recently someone told me that he thought that I was harsh towards someone. or very stern towards someone. And told me an example of that and I couldn't remember the example that he was referring to. But I called the person who he thought I was being harsh towards or stern with and I asked him if he recognized that event

[09:44]

And he said that he didn't think it was harsh or stern. He thought, but he said, maybe brusque. Maybe you were brusque with me. I called him and asked him about it. I felt called. Called by him, called by the person who told me about my, in a sense, not welcoming him maybe. That the person maybe observed that I wasn't welcoming him. Whatever the way he was, I wasn't like welcoming. Maybe welcoming a little, but in a brusque way. And then he thanked me for calling him.

[10:53]

And then I called him again. And I said, I wanted to call and apologize for being brusque. And he said, well, honestly, I don't feel apology is necessary. And I said, but I still want to give it. And he said, I thank you for your gift. And I said to him, maybe brusque could also be understood as not being respectful. And he said, I always feel that you're being respectful of me. And he said, I feel overwhelmed by this gift of this apology, which isn't necessary. If I don't practice this kind of conversation which starts with giving, which enacts welcoming, then I want to confess that I missed that chance, didn't do it, and if I feel sorry, say so.

[12:20]

I don't always say it to the person involved, but I want to say it to somebody, at least to the Buddhas and bodhisattvas. I want to call them and have a conversation with them. So in my finite consciousness I want to practice welcoming and giving and conversing. And whoever I'm conversing with, in that generosity, I'm also open to them being beyond my ideas of them. Mindful of that. I have some idea of them, but also I have the idea that they are beyond any idea I have of them.

[13:29]

That they are bringing me infinite life. And in this conversation with the other, the infinite life is realized and simultaneously revealed in limited life.

[14:39]

It isn't that infinite life eliminates finite life. It liberates it. It liberates it. However, the realization of it happens in a conversation. And the conversation also realizes it and reveals it. Yes. There is a conversation in my consciousness that is visible and audible.

[16:13]

And any conversation like that is an opportunity to have these words be acts of generosity. Whatever the words are. Like in my world, I'm going to go to class now. Sharing my world with these words to another. And that conversation with the other, when I talk to the other, they look at me and they question me while they're listening to me say that I'm going to class. They called me to respond to them and tell them I was going to class. They may not have known that they called me, but I'm responding to their call because they are me.

[17:20]

And they pervade me, so I tell them I'm going to class. I tell him or her, In your case, maybe you tell your son you're going to class. He calls you to say something meaningful to him with your words, and you do as a gift, I hope. And you welcome him to look at you that way and call to you, and you give him this response. And in that conversation, infinite life is revealed and realized. But we have to be present for it. We have to be not someplace else, and we have to give ourselves to it. So what is revealed? Infinite life is revealed in a conversation with a person in the visible, audible realm of a limited conversation which started and stopped.

[18:45]

How about in meditation when you're having a conversation with yourself? Or the other. Well, you say, how about meditation? You mean, how about when you're not talking out loud to somebody? Right. When there is no other person physically... You can't... The other person is invisible at that time. You don't visibly see another person. During meditation you see them and you have conversations with them. Is that included? Well, I'm just trying to clarify what your example is. Are you talking about you being in a room where you can't see anybody or where you can see somebody? Speaking when we're sitting on a cushion and meditating. Right. Like in this class? Right. Well, in this class you can see the people though, right? Not when I was meditating. Well, so you couldn't see the people but I could.

[19:47]

You could. Yeah. So, you didn't see anybody Did you hear anybody? Yeah. So I'm saying, you are being called whether you hear it or not. You are being called whether you see the person calling you or not. But the conversation with yourself is not part of this... The infinite and the self. You mean if you can actually hear something in your mind? Right. That's definitely part of it. It is. But in that case you can hear it. And also you have an image of yourself, maybe. And the other. And the other, yeah. Or not. You could also not have an image. But the conversations you're having in the clearing are definitely

[20:50]

where the conversation is happening on a limited basis is in your consciousness. And you can be having it with another being that you can see. In meditation? Well, what makes it meditation? That you're looking at a wall? Well, you're sort of disconnected from, you know, The rest of the group. I mean, you are physically speaking. Like right now, I'm sharing your conversation with everyone. But in meditation, I'm sharing the conversation maybe with other people, but it's kind of in my head, you know? Right, but now you're talking to me, right? And you have an in-your-head version of this conversation. Right now.

[21:52]

I guess what I was asking simply was, you know, right now moving my house, speaking with you. Yes. There are times that I'm silent and maybe speaking with you. Right. And I was just wondering if this is all part of that clearing and... When you are... not talking, and you're thinking of speaking to me, that's a conversation. If you are having the conversation with another that you think is calling to you to have the conversation and you're responding to it, if you don't think you're responding to anything, if you think of having a conversation with me and you miss that you're practicing generosity, then I would say you're missing the conversation and you're missing your consciousness.

[23:01]

When you think of me, even when you don't see me, you're welcoming me. When you that when you see me and you welcome me, of course you're welcoming me. Your consciousness is basically welcoming others. Whether you think so or not, it is. And you can be talking to someone, like we're doing now, and you can also be welcoming. I mean, you are welcoming right now. And you can be you can be joining that and acting on that. You could see that right now you're actively practicing generosity and actively welcoming me. Sometimes it was mentioned in the last class that I don't feel like I can welcome everybody.

[24:11]

Right, that's Linda's example. So if I don't feel like I'm welcoming someone, then I want to practice confessing that I did not welcome them. I want to welcome, and part of the reason I want to welcome is because I am actually a welcomer. What I am is a welcomer. And to not welcome goes against my nature. which of course I can't, I'm just distracted. So when I do that, I confess I just got distracted from my nature, which is to welcome the entire universe. And the entire universe feels welcomed and comes and permeates me. But I can't contain what I welcome, but I can welcome it.

[25:13]

this is welcoming my infinite life. And when I'm sitting like this looking at you, maybe you can say, well, it's easy for you to see that you're welcoming us because you can see us all. But the people in the front row, if they're facing the wall, they say, well, I can't, it's harder for me to welcome than it is for you to welcome. And I welcome anybody who says that. who says it's hard to welcome. What's the difference between contain and include? What's the difference between contain and include? Contain and include. Well, I include my history, but I don't contain it. I include you, but I don't contain you. I don't encompass you.

[26:19]

I don't englobe you. Is that like an ownership kind of thing? That would be, yeah. But containing is kind of like ownership. And we actually don't do that. But we do include. And some of the people we do not want to welcome are people we think we do not include. We definitely don't think we contain them. And I go, well, you don't have to. I'm not saying you need to think you contain them. You don't. But you include them. They pervade you. And therefore, it is your nature to welcome them. I'm proposing. Yes, Linda? Just continuing this line of questioning, last week when I asked that, it sounded and was pertaining to people in the world, but it was also, as the person next to me is saying very much about the beings that I meet if I sit in meditation, there's quite a lot of them that I want to meet.

[27:31]

Well, just now I was having that image of a little kid who goes, la, [...] you know, so that I won't meet them. Just, I'm clarifying with you, and they may be deities from the dark forest, or they may be other forms from the dark forest, I don't even know what to call them. So I want to clarify with you, you say that if you cannot welcome them, if it appears that you cannot welcome them, then you can confess that you cannot welcome them. Or any way that you are not welcoming them. And you can also add on to, I'm not welcoming them and I cannot. Or you could say, I could, but I'm not in the mood. I'm not in the mood. Or like I said last week, I'm too tired. I'm just giving a little practical advice for you because, of course, that was in Bhuj to me a lot. I want to welcome them and thank Allah, Allah, Allah. So practically, like you raised your hands like this as a gesture showing that you're talking to, that you're addressing Buddhas and Bodhisattvas or whatever, and you're saying, I am not welcoming these visitors, these arrivals.

[28:49]

I might say, I'm sorry. I might say, help me. I might say, I don't know why. I might say, I hate them. Would that be okay to say? Well, if you say you hate them, that's another thing to welcome. So basically, I speak to those beings who are able to welcome who I know are somewhere around. You go like this to the beings who can help you do like this to the beings you can't do it to yet. Was that okay? So I can't go like this to some beings So then I go like this to the beings who will help me learn how to do this with those beings I can't. So, you know, this is a wall and the legendary founder of Zen in China, his practice was called wall gazing.

[29:55]

he faced, he gazed at the face of the wall. His face faced the face of the wall. His practice was called facing the wall. Which could also now tonight I say his practice was welcoming the wall. Welcoming whatever comes up when you're looking at a wall. And sometimes what comes up when looking at a wall, a person will walk between you and the wall and say, hi. Sometimes it's, I hate you, comes up when you're looking at a wall. It's face, you know, you're facing a face. That's the reality of your life, is that you're looking at a face. And so... we have the practice of face-to-face conversation.

[31:03]

And part of that practice is, I do not want to talk to this person. Or I want to do it, but not for very long. Because of my history, of my actions, my karma, as we say, I'm hindered in welcoming this person. which means I'm hindered from realizing my nature, which is to welcome. I'm hindered from realizing the conversation which will liberate me from egotism. I'm not going to get free from egotism by trying to get free of egotism. I'm going to get free of egotism by confessing it, and talking to others about it. And anything else that comes up? Yes and yes?

[32:05]

I think I was wondering what you were talking about as far as the process of striving to be a certain way, striving to be a certain way, especially being in conversation with others, trying to be welcoming or not welcoming, and realizing what that's about. But I don't know why it reached the conclusion, maybe it's just you can't preach it logically, that my nature is welcoming. I suppose that there are a couple of bigger aspects of my nature. Welcoming, where I'm also selfish and self-contained. I am a finite being. And one thing is that we should practice trying to develop the welcoming side of your nature, as in be more of that, not yourself, but part of yourself. That's different from saying, that's all true nature, and the other becomes strictly equal, which is what I hear you saying. I don't know why it's the latter, that performance. It may be different. Well, maybe I would say that that's the part, that's the quality of our consciousness which is conducive to liberation from the egotism of consciousness.

[33:15]

Yes? Can I just say briefly, that's egotism. So our finite life, our finite consciousness comes with egotism, which is some people I don't want to welcome. Yes? At the same time, can our infinite consciousness Our infinite life is calling to us to welcome the things that we're not welcoming. And so sometimes that's what these deities that come out of the forest, out of the woodwork, the big woodwork, They come out, they come... Again, we are supported, our limited consciousness is supported by unlimited mind and unlimited body.

[34:32]

Again, we do not contain what supports us. But we include it and it sometimes sends us messages to help us stop fighting the process of generosity which will liberate this consciousness. So it sends these deities like the example from weeks before where somebody says, you're here for us. Here I am thinking I'm here for some people but not for all these people. I'm here for getting my own driver's license. But there's a limit on what I'm welcoming. So then somebody comes and says, reminds me that I'm actually here for all the people there. And there's many examples of things that are appearing in your consciousness that are coming from your infinite life to help you become liberated from your constricted life.

[35:42]

become liberated from your unwillingness to have conversations with everybody. Because your conversations not only free you from your egotism, they can, but they free the other people that you're talking to who may be trapped in their clearings and they need somebody to talk to. Your infinite light's calling you, plus all the finite lives are calling you too. The finite beings are calling you, even if you can't hear them. They're calling for somebody to come into their space, just like they've come into your space, to call you to have a wholehearted, generous, liberating, face-to-face transmission of finite and infinite life, transmitting to each other. Yes, maybe Nancy was next. I think what I do a lot of times when I can't really welcome somebody is I pretend to welcome, or I kind of fake it, or kind of act welcoming, even though I really don't feel it.

[36:55]

What would you say about that? I would say that that could be seen as a gift that you can give at that moment. You can give that gift. You can't give another one called, actually, what you would feel is a wholehearted, genuine generosity. You can give this kind of like pretend. I'll pretend to be generous. But that's a gift too. Like I told you, this woman... Well, many people say, I can't welcome so-and-so. I say, well, can you welcome that you can't? And she says, yes. So not only can you give this pretend generosity, but you can even be rather generous towards that you're pretending. Like being generous toward a child that's pretending to tell the truth. You know they're really lying, but you welcome them in this pretense. And then they see, oh, I'm pretending and she's welcoming me.

[38:02]

And she kind of knows that I'm pretending and she goes right ahead and welcomes me. So she could do it too. And you might say, well, I don't want her to do that. I want her to not welcome her own pretending to, you know. But do you want her to learn generosity? This is how to teach it. Was there another person? Yes, Charlie? Yes? Kate? Who was first? How long has your hand been up? Okay, Katie. I was thinking about what you said about repenting to Buddhas, confessing to Buddhas, and then also confessing, or having a face-to-face conversation with the person. You're not sure what happens, but there's some question about the interaction. And it doesn't seem like those are exactly the same, the confessing to all Buddhas and confessing to the person, but they're also related.

[39:10]

Yeah, I think they're kind of related and they're not quite the same. The conversation with the person is more like having a conversation like you're actually curious about the person. You want to know. In this case, I wanted to know about this person. How did they see it? But I already had a conversation with the Buddhas to free me from any obstruction to talking to this person and being interested with this person. So the Buddhas are like they're not exactly telling you what to say. They're kind of like helping you become free of any hindrance to have the conversation, which you didn't want to have. And then I could actually have the conversation with him. I wasn't asking him so much. I was asking him to free me from my hindrances because I was actually ready to talk to him. But when I confessed to him, and repented to him, that was different from my trying to find out.

[40:16]

And so it actually was a two-part conversation. The first part I had no... I felt free to have, and I was actually interested to have a conversation, but I didn't apologize in the first one. And then I later realized, oh, and then I went and apologized to him. But I already apologized to those and thanked those who had moved hindrance to that apology. Yes. While I was sitting, I was busily trying to figure out exactly why I was not welcoming my ego. I want to say that the various aspects in me that I was not welcoming. One of them was boring. Another one was not multi-layered, all kinds of things that I was finding that I was not welcoming.

[41:24]

Great. Great that you could notice those things. noticing those things, noticing these things that are coming into your mind that you're not welcoming, those are like deities that are visiting your consciousness, telling you about the limits of your generosity. They're deities. They're coming and saying, your generosity is limited. Rather than just not welcoming them, They came and told you you weren't welcoming them. And again, when Bodhidharma was facing the wall, we don't know how many times boring came. But maybe you could say, oh, he was so enlightened that boring had given up long ago visiting him. In other words, he had already welcomed boredom so many times that boredom realized it should work on somebody else.

[42:25]

But the fact that you can see that boredom is calling to you, beseeching you to welcome it, that's like a deity visiting you. And then you can say, I see you're visiting, but I still can't really, even though you're a deity, I can't say thank you and I'm going to now drop my resistance and welcome you. I mean, I'm really what I call a tough case. And the deity, you know, they don't give up on you. But you're already kind of seeing that they might be deities. And again, I was talking to someone who was translating the book, Being Upright, into Chinese, and she had a question where I said in the book that when we become aware of the limits of our awareness, that's a growth in awareness. Like a lot of people have limited awareness, right?

[43:31]

I mean, that's limited consciousness. That's our limited life. Our limited life is that it's limited. Our awareness is limited. That's part of our life. Okay? But not everybody is aware, oh, I have limited awareness. That's a growth in awareness. It's still limited, but it's growing. And then as it starts to grow, then another thing comes. called anxiety or boredom, but anxiety might come frequently when you start to become aware of how limited your awareness is. And the anxiety is saying, okay, now that your awareness has grown, now maybe you can give me a little attention. So it's not a bad sign that as your awareness grows, you become more anxious. It's more like because your awareness is growing, beings that you have not been giving attention to say, well, maybe now she'll give me some attention. So then, again, they come and give you a chance to grow.

[44:36]

Yes, Charlie. Do you have any more backstory of the Say again? I think originally the word host meant a foreigner, an invading army. And there's a number of other words in English like that where the meaning has flipped. And the original meaning of the word now means it's opposite. Do you have any... More to that story, how did that happen? Well, this is just a story, okay? They built... What's the significance of it? Well, the significance... One significance of it is that everything is like that. That's the big significance, is that this particular example of how hospitality was, you know, and how host now means the one who welcomes the guest, it originally meant guest.

[45:48]

That host is actually guest. And guest actually is host. That's the big significance of the word host. And the big significance of the word guest is that it means host. In other words, everything's pivoting on not itself. That I am others is the most important significance of myself. And the most important significance of others is that they're not other. And to welcome the way things are other is to welcome the way they really are. Yes?

[46:53]

What Charlie was talking about in the Book of Serenity, in the introduction part, there is a whole dialogue about guest and host. So can you explain that meaning of guest and host in the Zen tradition? Well, one story about guest and host in the Zen tradition is that the guest is the student and the host is the teacher. That's one way to use it. But it talks about one being within the other, the host being part of the guest. The guest is in the host, and the host is in the guest. The student is in the teacher, and the teacher is in the student. The teacher does not contain the students, but of course the teacher includes the student, otherwise the teacher wouldn't be a teacher.

[48:00]

And the student includes the teacher, otherwise the student wouldn't be a student. But the student doesn't contain the teacher. As far as welcoming Some students actually do think they contain the teacher, and then that's a nice thing to have a conversation about. About welcoming. What if you're on the other side of the coin and you don't feel welcomed? I feel that way sometimes with some people that I'm intimate with. and I really get hurt and upset. So how do you deal with that situation when you're not welcome? I mean, how do I want to relate to it? How do I desire, how do I vow to relate to it?

[49:03]

Is that what you mean? How do you get over it? I'm not into getting over it. I'm not wanting to get over it. That's not one of my wants. So when you ask me how do I do something, are you talking to me? Yeah. So for me, if you want to know how I want to relate to situations where I don't feel welcome, is I wish to welcome not being welcomed. Especially with somebody I'm intimate with, which is everybody. But if I think I'm intimate, then I'm going to really be uncomfortable thinking that they don't welcome me. Now, if I had this delusion that I wasn't intimate with somebody, then I might say, it's okay that they don't welcome me. but if I'm attuned to reality, which is I'm intimate with this person, and then they are saying, you know, hello, you're not welcome here.

[50:16]

You don't seem to get it. It's not just your idea that you're not welcome, you actually aren't. And I said, can I check now? And they said, no, you can't even check. But just let me check. Am I really not welcome here? Are you actually serious about this? And they say, yes. Now, how do I want to relate to that? I want to welcome it. That's what I really want to do. And if I don't, I want to confess that I didn't welcome it and say I'm sorry. Now, what I want to realize is that if I can welcome the people who do not welcome me, I will understand that they do welcome me. Didn't I tell you the story several classes ago about the people who come to me and say, I don't want to talk to you? Didn't I tell you that? No?

[51:18]

At the University of Minnesota, certain young women, who I found quite attractive, by the way, not all of them, but these particular ones I found attractive, they went out of their way You know, in their busy lives, they found time to walk over to me, look me in the face, and give me face-to-face transmission. And the way they did it was to say, I don't want to talk to you. Didn't you hear that story? What? I didn't say it here? Well, now, great. Okay, now I said it. And that was their way of saying, I do want to meet you. They did want to meet me. They may not have known it, but it made me quite interested in them.

[52:22]

I wasn't following them all over the campus or anything, but I was quite interested in them, that they came out of their way But you've done something. Pardon? You didn't do anything. I was there and I was young. And I was calling to them. And they came and they said to me, I don't want to talk to you. And then one of them, I don't know if I told you this, one of them recently, I was back in Minnesota and giving a talk and I was using that example and one of them, who was one of the people I'm talking about, came up to me afterwards and said, I was quite successful, wasn't I? And I said, yes, you were. Everybody is calling to us

[53:22]

That's our infinite life. Our infinite life isn't that part of the universe is calling us, this section over here. Like, you know, Berkeley's calling to us, but El Cerrito's not. Our infinite life is calling to us. It's pervading us, and we're pervading, and we're calling to it. And it responds to us and says, come meet me. Now, you won't be able to see me because I'm infinite, I'm infinity. I don't have a beginning or an end, so you can't see things that don't have... Things have to have beginnings and ends in order to see them. I'm not like that kind of thing. I'm coming at you all the time, from all directions, and I don't have a beginning or end, and I don't come or go, and I don't arise or cease. I'm your life. I'm supporting you, and you can't contain me, but you are totally including me, and you're totally included in me, along with everybody else.

[54:25]

This is invisible, inconceivable, and I'm calling you. and you're calling me. That's why I'm coming to you and sometimes translating me into words like people are going to come up to you and say, I don't want to talk to you. This is one example of somebody calling to you to have a conversation with them. And sometimes they say, you're not welcome in my life. They could say it that way. And you can go. But if I then give my face to her or him, if I then give my words to them as gifts, as acts of hospitality, I will more and more realize that they did call me to be their good friend. They weren't even calling me to get something from me. They were calling me to have a conversation so that we can both become free of our egotism.

[55:32]

What do I have to do to get you to call me and have a conversation so that I can become free of egotism? That's what you did just then. That was good. I remember I think the first thing I told you, I don't know if this sat around, but the other, I told you, you haven't called me. I was surprised to say that. And you said, that's right, I haven't. You misheard me. I said, yes, I have called you. And you came, here you are. No, you didn't. No, you said, that's right, I haven't. But you have. That's right, I haven't, but I had. Basically, if you think somebody's not being generous to you, you're blind. Basically. And many people have this form of blindness.

[56:35]

They think some people are not being generous with them. In order to see that everybody's generous to me, I have to be generous with everybody. Starting with, of course, Elena. And then I move on to Cynthia. And I move on to Linda and Nettie and Jeff. That's how I will understand that everybody's generous with me. is by me being generous with everyone. That's infinite life. That's reality. But reality doesn't eliminate finite life, which can think things like, some people are not generous with me. And again, I don't push that out of the way. I put it right in front of me. It looks like somebody's not generous with me and then practice a conversation with it. What are you trying to tell me? What can I do for you? Leave me alone. Yes? It's just about how sometimes the calling is a little mysterious, and I don't know how to sometimes explain it, but just a story to share.

[57:43]

Just kidding. I just say, yes, it is mysterious. So Nancy told a mysterious story last time. It's kind of mysterious when beautiful young women walk up to you and say, I don't want to talk to you. Whoa. What's happening in my life? What did I do to get this gift? Yes? Here's another one. Yes, here's another. A little girl came to your body. Yes. Where'd she come from? Did you bring her into your body? Well, that's for later. We arrived home from the hospital after having our daughter, and our house had been burglarized. So we come in with this little precious bee, and we came home with our house ransacked after being in the hospital for five days. We sit on the couch. We're sort of devastated. The phone rings, and it's this strange number, and I'm like, do I get it with all this going on? And the phone rings, and guess who's on the other line? Burglar. The burglar. It revs on the other line. It calls us.

[58:45]

I'm kind of the burglar. The burglar, you know, I'm me and I'm also the burglar. So I call them right after they get home from the hospital. I call them. How did that happen? Why me? Why did I have to call them? Why didn't one of you guys call them? But this is one of these mysterious moments. It's like, how do we know him? He just walked in the door. Yeah. There's a mystery. There's a mystery, and yeah, it's a mystery, and it's also intimacy. You called me, so I called you. But how does that happen? Who's in charge here? Who's... Who's running the show to get me to call you when you call me? Yes, that's my question.

[59:46]

Who calls you? Yeah, you know, it's invisible. I cannot comprehend it. I cannot comprehend it. But I can have a conversation with it. I can invite it. And it comes to me like that, like that example. We're really here as a finite being. We're really here as a finite being. Really, we are. And this finite being is calling for an infinite being to have a relationship with it, which it does. And finite beings sometimes think that there's something else to do besides welcoming the other. So they need encouragement to welcome the other. And one encouragement is, that's what your consciousness is. Wake up to that's what it is.

[60:48]

And without getting rid of egotism, which is like, can you welcome that too? Can I welcome my egotism, which sometimes seems to be a condition for me not welcoming? And I would say, yes, we can do that. We can welcome the not-welcomer. The welcomer welcomes everybody, and the not-welcomer does too. And of course, also, how's your house these days? Did it get kind of fixed up and kind of get comfy? And then the little girl's happy with it? And she likes her mom and dad? Does she welcome her mom and dad? Yeah, so you guys welcomed this big visitor.

[62:00]

And then you welcomed me, too. And I don't know how you were able to do that, but you did. And I welcomed you. I don't know how I'm able to do that. And I, yeah, and you know, maybe it's time for you to make it harder for me. Yeah. Suzuki Roshi didn't make it hard for me to welcome him. And I felt like he welcomed me. But, you know, not in a gross way, like, hey, attention, son, welcome. But I really felt like he was welcoming me. I kind of felt like he was asking me to move in with him. So I did. I kind of moved in with him.

[63:04]

And he never made me feel like, you know, I don't really want you here. And you know what? That was not difficult for me to have him. And then sometimes, after I moved in with him, I wanted to move out. Because it was just getting too intense. There are so many calls. There are infinite calls. The calls are infinite. My question has to do with discernment and if there's a call of all, of everyone, all. Discernment comes, this good discernment comes after listening. First listen. First listen to the calls and realize that these calls are the birth of your infinite life.

[64:15]

They're the birth of your infinite life. Each one is the birth of your infinite life. Your infinite life isn't some of them, it's each one. Then when you realize that, then you got done, now you got discernment. Now you have wisdom. And then you can decide whether to blink, smile, say, I don't want to talk to you, or thanks for coming, or I'm feeling uncomfortable, or I'm scared, or I'm sorry. The wisdom of listening and realizing that you're being called and that you called for that call So we have this great bodhisattva called, in English, the regardor of the cries of the world. So the cries, the listener of the cries of the world. And if it's visual presentation, the observer of all beings.

[65:22]

That's the name of the bodhisattva. they are being called to listen and to look. But they're also calling. They're calling too. And that relationship, in that relationship there is the birth of generosity. and ethics and patience, there is the birth of wisdom. And that wisdom discerns what response besides listening is appropriate. In other words, what the next call will be. And it's hard for people to believe that. They want to discern before they listen. No, listen first, welcome first. And in the welcoming, in the conversing in that welcoming environment, the just response is born and born and born and born.

[66:37]

Which is, the just response is your infinite life working through your finite life. I cannot figure out the just response to you. But my infinite life makes the just response be born. But my job is to welcome and accept that I'm welcomed. to call and respond to the call. And in the intensity of that interaction where the other person's questions of me intensify my freedom, my freedom is the freedom of the infinite life. You know, I'm kind of sorry that I haven't been looking in this direction more.

[67:50]

For some reason, there's more people on that side, but, you know, what are you guys, how are you guys doing over here? I know you're okay, but... I hear you a lot. You're having a good time tonight again. Yes? I'd like to point out that listening to the cries of the world is a pretty epic proposition. Epic, yeah. It's infinite. It's an infinite proposition. It's infinite. Yeah. Thank you for finitely pointing that out. And then, because I'm thinking, you know, if you're listening to the pride of the world, what comes up for me is you're opening to the suffering of the world, and then you're not trying to go into any of it.

[68:59]

Then I thought, well, maybe the other part of it is being open to the non-suffering of the world, too. Yeah. That also... What did you say? Part of the opening is to take care of the exhaustion. Part of the opening is to be fueled by your desire to realize infinite life, which means realize the life of all beings. That desire actually feeds that desire. The desire to realize the infinite life that we're sharing here. it's never satisfied. It feeds the desire.

[70:00]

Bodhisattva's wish to liberate all beings from suffering, that wish is never completed. That wish fuels that wish. If somebody gets liberated, that doesn't make the bodhisattva wish less to liberate beings. the people getting liberated doesn't exactly fuel the wish to liberate. What fuels the wish to liberate is the wish to liberate, which doesn't end. However, part of the fuel is also to rest sometimes when you're tired. That's part of the work. And it could be, as you pointed out, it could be just as tiring to listen to the many beings being liberated and having liberation parties as it would be to be listening to people saying, I'm not liberated, I'm not generous, and nobody's generous with me, and I'm not welcoming, and this is really terrible, and would you please listen to me?

[71:10]

And the answer is, yes. Thanks for asking. That helped me actually listen. Of course you were calling me before I heard you, but now with your help I realize you're calling for help. And the fuel for me to listen to you comes from my wish to listen to you. I want to because I know that that's part of our liberation is to realize that we really are calling to each other. We're calling to each other. We're calling to each other We are speaking all day long. We're calling for someone to listen to us. And we're listening. And we're doing the calling and listening at the same time. And everything in the universe is doing the same practice. Yes? I was going to, maybe I said this here already, I'm not sure, but the last time I heard my husband laugh, maybe a big, wholehearted laugh, laughter.

[72:25]

when he was dying, you called and I was there, of course, and you talked about the glass that you had given in honor of him or about him. And you said, Sun face Buddha, moon face Buddha. And I was the go-between. So I transmitted this message that he gave me to him. And when I did, he burst out into a wholehearted, strong laughter. The last time I heard him laugh. The message was that I told the people in the class the story of when a certain Zen master was about to die, he said, one of his students came and said, how are you feeling, teacher?

[73:40]

And he said, sun-faced Buddha, moon-faced Buddha. So then, I was being asked what's going on and I said that and Elena transmitted that to her dying husband and he got the joke. And how it applied to him? Well, obviously. He got the joke. Our life, all the suffering in the world is a setup for a punchline. And Fred got the punchline. And then he realized that his condition was the setup for that. So then his condition isn't just a condition, it's a setup.

[74:45]

So his condition is also the punchline. Our life is a punchline and our life is a setup for a punchline. And sometimes we open to that. And then sometimes we do it again, and again, and again, and again. This is the conversation, is to keep opening, to welcome, to welcome, to welcome. Yes? You had spoken about generosity, and then it was like, You think I was saying that? No, exactly what you just said. So I think what I was asking, and was able to kind of feel like, oh, okay, so somebody could be generous in some instances, not generous in other instances, but the acknowledgement of rightness view,

[76:03]

kind of like comes in and really takes place with like, okay, this person is going to be generous with this offering or that offering, but the gratitude kind of like gets you into this, you know, appreciation of the overall being. Okay. And so that way, it's not like we're not existing to be like, you're not being generous. Let's just say you're not feeling like somebody's being generous towards you, but people forget this. They stop looking. Really, there's the gratitude of, I don't know if I'm making any sense, but the gratitude of the generosity. Even if it's not, that moment can kind of overtake the feeling to be always or, yeah, always or never. I was just curious why you were using the absolutes.

[77:33]

I don't know why absolutes were being used. But if there's any absolutes being used, I want to have a conversation with them. And I wish to realize that the face-to-face conversation with absolutes will free all beings from absolutes and relatives. Yeah.

[78:15]

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