I think wherever we work, as long as there's self and other, we're going to have a problem. That really no work in itself is going to be satisfying until what's really going on. In some sense, we have to do our best to try as best we can to be harmless and beneficial we have to do our very best by our own human effort to do in order to realize that we'll never be able to do it because there's something fundamentally off about our approach because our approach is me and the job me and the situation but if you don't try to do your best and to be as harmless as possible, then you always think that maybe there's some other job or some other way you could do it that would work.

[01:12]

But no way will work until we change our basic attitude. But we can't change our basic attitude unless we see how necessary it is to change it. because we have to change it because no matter what we do with our body speech or thought there's going to be pain and dissatisfaction until we cut through this sense of separation the evil empire and with you know all the sufferings of the world we can't get away from it we can't find a job that's so pure that we're not connected to the to the abusive areas, to the abusive activities of the society. We can't get away from that. I just heard on the radio, maybe this is the end of public education, right? With all these shootings at high schools and stuff. Maybe this is the end of public education, where you have these big schools and blah, blah, blah.

[02:13]

And maybe it is the end of public education. But no matter whether it is or not, umpteen little cute little private schools, and even the poor kids get scholarship to the private schools. As long as the people don't understand, there's going to continue to be problems. There might not be shootings, but there's still going to be misery. So we have to do our best to speak well and all that, but this is all to set us up so we can get ready to do the work which is actually going to resolve the basic delusion. That's what I feel. And this discussion is . But I feel good that we seem to be as a group facing what an awesome problem livelihood is for us. And I think all of us have problems in our livelihood.

[03:15]

I'm very happy to have mine, but mine doesn't get away from yours. My problems are the same as yours. I don't know. I guess I just wasn't expecting this to be so difficult and so... challenging this discussion practice i guess i didn't expect to find people so unhappy with their situations and in some sense sharing it this way and also being able to not be able to fix anybody's situation we didn't fix anybody's situation everybody's had problems when they came and they still had problems and you said you don't know anybody that's happy and i think Maybe I know some people that are happy, but even the people I know are happy, they have problems too, but maybe they're happy with their problems. Anyway, let's have some walking meditation, unless somebody has... Okay, walking meditation.

[04:23]

And... One of the ways that this right effort is presented is a way that I initially found to be unattractive because of its kind of mechanical sound. But anyway, the right effort is put sometimes as for right efforts four aspects of right effort. First is to prevent unarisen, prevent unarisen unwholesome states from arising. You could say just prevent unwholesome states from arising, but they usually say prevent unrisen, unwholesome states from arising.

[05:45]

That's the first one. Next one is to abandon the arisen unwholesome states. The third one is to give rise to the unarisen wholesome states. To give rise to or to produce the unarisen wholesome states, skillful states. And then the fourth is to maintain or protect the arisen wholesome states.

[07:03]

So those are the four right efforts to maintain or protect the wholesome states. Pardon? The second one is to abandon the arisen unwholesome. Okay? And in the process of studying these poor right efforts, I heard that the discipline applying to the first right effort is sometimes called restraint of the senses or restraining the senses.

[08:33]

In other words, in the senses is a way to prevent unwholesome states from arising. And by the way, the unwholesome states that they're talking about in this case are categories. First one is ill-will. Actually, the first one is actually sensual, sensual desire. That is ill-will. The next one is sloth or dullness. The next one is agitation or worry. The last one.

[09:40]

These are the unwholesome states that the right efforts prevent from arising. And then if they happen to practice to help abandon them. But the first one, the one that prevents them from arising in the first place, as I said, was in some places described as restraining the senses. And I had the Buddha recommending the practice of restraining the senses. And it never made sense to me to restrain the senses, because how can you restrain your senses? Or even if you can, it seems brutal. like restraining your sense of smell, restraining your vision, your hearing. And then I saw the Sanskrit for that expression, and the Sanskrit was, which struck me as a better translation would be to discipline the senses, not to restrain them.

[11:05]

And then as I studied more, I found out that it wasn't really the senses that were supposed to be restrained or disciplined, but really the mental reactions to the sense process. And that made sense to me. That connected to the way I've been thinking about Zen meditation. In Zen meditation, we don't usually try to restrain our senses. We just, you know, we sit and we hear the birds in the trees, and we hear the bell ring for meditation. We don't try to restrain our hearing the bell ring. But we do try to train ourselves or discipline ourselves when we hear the bell ring.

[12:16]

Or we try to restrain our response to the hearing of a sound, or the seeing of a color, or smelling a fragrance. or tasting a flavor or touching something. We try to train our response to that. So that made sense to me. And the early about how to train your responses to sensation, I think are quite similar to the ways that in Zen practice that we train our responses to sensations. How in Zen do we train our responses to sensations, do you think?

[13:38]

Or do you understand? What have you heard? By wearing black. By wearing black. That's very funny. You wonder if we're trying to avoid showing so much? If the block is not a way of muting things to avoid individuals being profited or noticing. Well, some people might be doing it for that reason, but I think the reason why we wear black is because Confucian scholars wore black. And the reason why they wore black was because they were always doing calligraphy.

[14:44]

Well, some people might be doing it for that reason. I think the reason why we wear black is because Confucian scholars wore black. The reason why they wore black, I think, was because they were all doing calligraphy. And they, you know, they spilled ink on their clothes, it didn't matter. So, the Japanese Buddhist you know, just took over the Chinese Confucian dress style. But in India, in India the monks didn't wear black. They wore robes that were up, you know, just kind of an ochre color, which is just the color that they stained their, dyed their clothes to cover up any soil marks on them because they used leftover clothes.

[15:57]

Like this color, more traditional Buddhist color. And the black is just kind of a Chinese thing. But some people may think, you know, that we wear dark to do what, like Terry said, is more like what I thought didn't make sense. Mainly that we would be trying to mute our sensation. That doesn't make sense to me, that you'd be sitting in a Zen Do and try to like, get the blue jays to be quieter. Now some Zen students would like the blue jays to toss a heart and be quieter, or the frogs and green dolls to be quieter, or me to be quieter, but that didn't make sense to me. So what your interpretation doesn't make sense to me, that we would be trying to mute things, Now, my question was not, um, I was trying, you know, my question is, uh, yeah, so my question is, do you think we're, do you think the Zen response to sensation is to try to mute it?

[17:14]

Well, that doesn't make sense to me because it already occurred. Would it be to, before they got to you, to go someplace where everything is muted? That didn't make sense to me either. I don't, Right, right. Yeah, that's Shakyamuni Buddha, though, right? Zen, what's the Zen way of saying it? Mind like a wall. You understand that? So I think the Zen way is when something happens, what's, you know, what was... after that? Huh? Awareness. Yes. What is it? Awareness. Study. Huh?

[18:16]

Study it. Study the sensation. A reaction. Just what is it? Which is kind of like what is it means there really is no response. It's like when something happens, what is it? That's it. That's the response. What is it? That's not something in a . What is it? This is also called a mind like a wall. In other words, when something happens, your response is like just the given, just what it is. That's your response. But the early way that the Buddha taught that was, he said, train yourself thus. In the heard, there would be just the heard. In the seen, there would be just the seen.

[19:21]

In the smelled, there would be just the smelled. In the tasted, there would be just the tasted. In the touched, there would be just the touched. And in the cognized, there would be just the cognized. And then he says, when for you, in the seen there's just the seen, and in the heard there's just the heard, and the tasted just the tasted, and the touched just the touched, and the smelled just the smelled, and the cognized just the cognized, then you will not identify with it. or disidentify. He didn't say that, but you identify or disidentify.

[20:26]

If you don't identify with something, being with sensation, such that the sensation is just a sensation, And it gets to be like when there's a sensation, there's just a sensation, that's it. Then there's no sensation plus you. This way of being with sensation does two things, two major things. One, it prevents the arising of unwholesome states. This kind of disciplining your reaction to sensation prevents the arising of these unwholesome states. But I feel it goes further than this teaching usually talks about. I think it also opens the door to cut through the illusion of self and object, of me and

[21:39]

colors, [...] colors. Between me and the vision of you, between me and the sound of you, between me and the smell of you, between me and the touch of you, and between me and the taste of you, and between me and the idea of you. In other words, all the ways I can relate to you. I can't relate to you anymore. There's no you out there anymore. So this right effort, to me, is like a critical turning point in the practice of the Eightfold Path, which I feel is really, to me, the most important practice in a way, the most central part of the practice. So usually when it's presented in the Eightfold Path, it's presented as a way to prevent unwholesome states from arising in the first place. which it does, but I feel it does more than that.

[22:43]

You start by looking at the sensation. You start looking at where you look at the color or the color pattern, which is like a woman to me. Or the feeling. Well, at first you do. When you first start doing it, there's Jackie and her feelings, Jackie and the things she sees, Jackie and her friends, Jackie and what she smells. in this Jackie and that but you train yourself so that there will be just the color not Jackie and the color but at first there's Jackie looking at the color Jackie meditating on the color but you train yourself so that in the scene in the color that you see in the scene there will be you train yourself that way in other words you train yourself to not add or embellish what you're aware of You train yourself to the level of experience where what happens is what happens.

[24:00]

You learn to see that that's it. And you don't get into reacting to it. And as Adam said, in the Zen school, starting from the so-called founder of Zen in China, he taught the practice of a mind. And this is the same practice which I'll go into later. But I wanted to just jump for a second back to right view. Right view is a cognitive exercise. It has to do with viewing or understanding the way you see things. Right view is to focus on karma. to focus on the issue of who is it that's doing this stuff. Is there somebody doing this? To look at that. Okay? So you're studying, right? You're studying, you're studying, you're studying. And then you're also being aware of the quality of the karma which is determined by the type of motivation that's there.

[25:11]

So you're studying this too. Studying karma, studying how it works, what quality it is, who's doing it, who owns it. You're studying this. When you get to right view, I mean right effort, you start studying, you continue your study of right view, you continue your study of karma, but now you're studying it in this way of not identifying with what you see. So now you can really start to see what's going on here. As you watch the karmic activity, In the karmic activity which you cognize, there is just the cognition. And when there's just the cognition, then there's no in the cognition. And then you cut through the whole basis of the karmic picture. Incidentally, you also prevent the arising of unwholesome states which disturb your vision.

[26:15]

Could you handle that? In between, there's these other practices, these ethical disciplines of right speech, learning what right speech is, right action, and right livelihood. And by working on those, hopefully your life will be better. not exactly under control, but your life has become stabilized by being careful of what you're doing such that you're capable of entering into right effort. In other words, people aren't banging on your head with baseball bats. People aren't... meditate, you turkey, and so on. So your life is calmed and stabilized by being... by being disciplined by these ethical considerations so now you can do this amazing thing called practicing right effort which is to let sensations just be sensations to let cognition just be cognitions and cut through the sense of you having the cognitions for that there's cognitions plus something

[27:38]

In the Buddha Dharma, there's not cognitions plus something. We think so, but this is an illusion. We add a self on top of the universe. On top of the universe. When you do this practice, you get to see that there's the universe and that's the end of the story. You happen to be included in that. You're not an addition to the universe. Duh! So, another version of this teaching is the teaching of bodhidharma, which he called to have a mind like a wall. And that's like, he said, When something happens, you don't activate the mind around it.

[28:45]

Which again means, you have the airplane, that's it. That's it. You don't get excited about it. Or, if inside something happens, some feeling arises, that's it. He says there's no coughing or sighing in the mind. So if something arises in your mind, you don't go, ah, or ah, or ah. You just, something arises, that's it, comes up, kind of like, ah, kind of like, ah, ah, ah, like that. Stuff happens, stuff happens. This is samsara, right? Coming and going, coming and going.

[29:50]

Birth and death, pain and loss, pain and pleasure. Pain, pain. High pleasure, high pleasure. Here comes fear, there goes fear. Here's anxiety, here's anxiety. Could life be that simple? For Zen masters, yes. For babies, yes. How about you? Well, we need training. We have to train ourselves thus. So when it comes up, birth comes up, high birth by birth. Death comes up, my death, my death. Pain comes up, my gain. Loss comes up, all that loss. Pain comes up, pleasure comes up. That's it. We have to train ourselves for it to be just that, though.

[30:54]

Because usually it's kind of like, oh, yikes, oh, no, no, not that, oh, no, stay, [...] no, no, no, no. No, no, this is a mistake. No, no, no, not that. Wrong person, send it away. This is called, there's an alternative to what's happening. I know there is. I think there must be an alternative to what's happening. This is not what should be happening. No. Or, now this is what should be happening. This is right. Okay, now you got it right. This is right. No, no, keep it. I pointed out the New Yorker magazine. There's a genre of New Yorker cartoons, right? There are cartoons of the guys at the pearly gates, right? Or either at the pearly gates or the hell gates. And there's a discussion there, right?

[31:57]

And now there's a discussion. You know, can I have good seating here? I know a table in the corner, please. Or I brought my lawyer or, you know, there's some negotiation. We don't just like accept our destiny. Well, this practice is accept your destiny. This is accept your destiny. Accept your destiny, folks. Accept that you are in the world of suffering. You're either in heaven, or hell, or etc. But no matter what, even if you're in heaven, there's suffering in heaven for Buddhists. Because even if they tell you, hey, this is eternal, you think, well, what if it isn't? So in Buddhism, nothing's eternal, including heaven, including hell. People are happy to hear about the hell part. We don't have eternal heavens.

[32:58]

That's why the gods come to study with Buddhas, because gods are insecure, because they know it's going to end. So anyway, this negotiation with what's happening, this practice is to say, no negotiation. Learn in having no alternative to what's happening. Blue Jerry? No alternative. Gopher? No alternative. Rat? No alternative. Pain? No alternative. If you can train yourself at no alternative, you enter the way of enlightenment. Because we're good at thinking of alternatives, or at least wanting alternatives, we're very good at wanting something other than this. And if we like what's happening, we're very good at wanting something other than what's happening, namely that what we like is going to go away. So we train ourselves in this way to have a wall. Or to have a mind like the sands of the Ganges.

[34:06]

You know? The sands of the Ganges, the sand along the Ganges River. When a great Buddha walks on the sands of the Ganges, the sands of the Ganges don't say, Oh, wow, a Buddha! Woo! And when a cow walks on the sands of the Ganges and drops a big cow pie on it, they don't go, oh, that lousy cow. They don't do that. So Buddha said, you should be like the sands of the Ganges. Bodhidharma says, you should be like a wall. We're not like walls, usually. We're not like sand. We should train ourselves to be like sand. Then you enter. Then unwholesome states can't arise. They're blocked. You don't give them a door by negotiating.

[35:07]

When you start negotiating, they say, okay, come on in. There is the opening. Looking for an alternative? You're done for. You may get your alternative, but you get all kinds. You don't enjoy it. But if you don't ask for alternatives, you just take one step towards the truth. That's where you go. You can't help it. But you have to train ourselves because we're smart. We have imagination. Most of the time we're thinking of an alternative to this. Of the past and the future. Occasionally we visit this boring present. But our imagination is very... good at imagining infinite other times. Infinite alternatives to this, especially if this is painful or scary, is to imagine giving up your imagination.

[36:10]

Imagine giving up your imagination. It's not that you don't have an imagination, it's that you give it up. The past or future. It's not that you can't think of some alternative to what's going on. You can. It's just train yourself at giving it up. Train yourself to be like a wall or the sands of the Ganges. Okay? That's the right effort. Of the first variety. Which I kind of feel is the only variety you need. Because if you do this one, I'll explain later, but you don't have to worry about the next three. Now if you slip on this one, then you've got to do the next three. But if you do this one, you've done enough right effort. Enter the way now. You won't be able to do this one unless I think you've done the previous steps. Probably you won't be able to do this if you don't think it matters what you say or what you do with your body or what kind of work you do.

[37:13]

You'll be in too much trouble to be able to dare to give up your imaginations Using your imagination big time to try to talk yourself out of the trouble you're in, you and your lawyer, will be like making good cases. No, no, this is a mistake. I didn't really say that. No, no. Now I get to see, oh, it doesn't matter what I say. Oh, I see. Okay. Thank you. Please. Settle all those accounts before you can, like, relax and let go. When I was a little boy, my favorite actor was Marlon Brando. I wanted to be like Marlon Brando. When I was 12, I saw On the Waterfront. And I think what I saw was his art. I just thought that was just a great movie, and I wanted to be like that guy.

[38:16]

Really, I wanted to be an artist, so I tried to be, what do you call it, a down-and-out boxer. I cut my eye, my eyebrow, to try and make a scar in my eyebrow like he had. And I tried to squash my nose so I looked like him. See it? It didn't work. Anyway, I really thought he was a great actor. I think he is still. I think he is a great actor with all his problems. He's one of the best. He's got a gift. The acting teacher said, OK, now I want you all to imagine that you're chickens. And I want you all to get up and sit on your roosts in the chicken house. So they all got up and sat on their little roosts in the chicken house.

[39:20]

Now I want you to imagine that a bomb has been dropped. And I want you to do what you think the chickens would do. So everybody did what they thought a chicken would do. And I don't know how many people were in the class, but anyway, all the other actors did what they thought. Marlon Brando just sat there. Like a chicken would just sit there if a bomb went off. They wouldn't think, oh, a bomb went off, I should be worried. Because chickens don't have an imagination to do that. So they just sit there on the thing. So he had the ability to imagine, except that chickens have. And Zen masters also have that ability, too, to imagine not having an imagination. In other words, imagine being like the sands of the Ganges. Imagine not having a reaction to what's happening. Imagine going to hell and not the argument.

[40:21]

Well, you know, could I have one of the cooler seats? Imagine that. Imagine saying, oh, hell? Okay. Oh, heaven? All right. Wow. Hey, heaven. Wow. Hey, hell. Amazing. One of the first stories that turned me towards Buddhism was the story of a Zen teacher basically having that reaction. He got strongly criticized for something he didn't do. He said, oh, okay. Then he got strongly praised when they found out he didn't do it. He said, oh, okay. It's like... Oh, I got praised? Oh, okay, thanks. I got blamed? Oh, fine. Now, which one do I know? And the praise or the blame or... or blame or praise? I can't remember now. Am I winning or losing? Who's keeping track? I lost count. I'm kind of slow. Because I can't remember whether I'm born, whether I'm being born or I'm dying.

[41:27]

Which one is it? Which one is it? Well, I'm dying, right? I'm going to die first, right? Before I get born again. Isn't that the story? But maybe not. Maybe I'd be born right now. Who knows? I don't. I'm just a dumb grain of sand. I'm a chicken on the roost. I'm a Zen monk. All I know is people are crinkling things and wiggling. That's all I know. I don't know too much. All I know is what's happening. Other people are smart. They can make comments. But when they make comments, unarisen, unwholesome things arise. And then there's me. So this is the great virtue of being stupid in the sense of being very dull like a wall or a grain of sand or a chicken.

[42:30]

This is Buddhist training of right effort. Okay? This is the first kind of right effort. And it's just an amazing practice. It can also be called non-attachment, training in non-attachment and non-seeking. Okay? Various words for it. Non-attachment, non-seeking, no alternatives, mind like a wall, grain of sand, just Marlon Brando in class, you name it. Yes? Other kinds of unarisen, unwholesome states that reactions will call up? Well, that's pretty much it. That's pretty much the list. Anything you can think of would be... Greed, hate, and delusion are derived from these basic ones. So, greed comes from sensual desire, and hatred comes from ill will, and...

[43:39]

delusion comes with dullness, worry, agitation and doubt. Okay. Okay. So, you hear the music, okay? And then, you hear the music, but you don't just let the music be the music. Then you crave to keep it. But if you just listen to the music and you just let the music be the music, then you don't open yourself to desiring to have more of it or not lose it.

[44:41]

Or if it's something harsh and painful and you just let the painful be the painful, then you don't open yourself to hating it and so on. As soon as you start messing and reacting, then you open the door to all kinds of other problems. You simultaneously cut off the possibility of realizing that you're not something in addition to what's going on. It isn't really that they're you plus what's happening. What's happening is none other than you. You are none other than what's happening. You're not something in addition. But usually we think so. There's me and my body. Me and my life. We think that way. Therefore, we're scared. We're scared that we'll lose our life. There's me and my mind. There's me and my reputation. There's me and my job. And there's me and you. And so I'm afraid of losing my life.

[45:45]

I'm afraid of losing my mind. I'm afraid of losing my job. I'm afraid of losing my reputation. And I'm afraid of talking to you. Those are the five fears. And I add this. I'm afraid of love. Because love's out there too. It's separate from me. I'm afraid of having it come to me and I'm afraid of it going away from me. Have you ever seen that one? Pardon? Pardon? There's nothing that exists but the universe. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. And I'm also saying, which I didn't maybe say before, that the entire universe is just one mind. That's all there is. There's not a universe outside of the mind. outside of the mind, there isn't a universe.

[46:48]

When you're not attached, that's an unattached woman. It's not that there's nothing. It's just nothing out there. It's not that there's nothing. There's plenty. There's a whole universe. Buzzing, brimming, boasting, blossoming, beautiful universe. It's just that it's not out there or in here. It's just that it's all one thing. That's all. It's not that there's nothing. It's not even that there's something. It's just that there's something. It's incredibly wonderful. It's nothing but bliss, really. And it even allows human beings to be born who ignore it, who say, no, thank you. I'd rather be powerful. I'm just going to be a powerful person.

[48:03]

See you later. Yes? You think it could be wholesome? Yeah, I think that could be wholesome. Wholesome to have sensual desire? Yeah. Oh. Well. Otherwise, you know, how... Otherwise, how, how? How, how? Do you say? Could you say, otherwise, how, how? Do you want me to tell you? You can make love out of devotion rather than out of craving. That's how, how, how. Now, maybe the population rate would drop some. If people were making love out of devotion rather than out of craving.

[49:04]

But that would be okay with me. If we were reproducing at a lower rate, that's alright with me. If everybody had sex out of devotion, in other words, what can I do for this person rather than what can I get from this person? I agree with you. I think sexual desire, sensual desire, is not a good way to make love to someone. I think it's harmful. I think it can lead to brutality and murder. and often does. Sensual desire, I think, is an unwholesome thing. But touching somebody you love doesn't have to be in trying to get anything for yourself. It doesn't have to be because you desire the feeling of touching the skin. It can be because this person would like you to give them a massage. They would like you to. And you ask them beforehand if they want one. They say, oh, yes, please. And you give the massage to the person And you love to give it because you love to be devoted. And then you have a baby if everything works out.

[50:08]

And then you're devoted to the baby. And if you have sensual desire for the baby, it's no good. But you can be devoted to the baby and then you don't make a baby. But if you have sensual desire, you might make love with a baby because you desire it. So sensual desire is not necessary to make babies. They can come without it. They sometimes do. Sometimes they have sex that are not doing it on the basis of sensual desire. They just don't have any sensual desire. They don't have any. But they do have devotion. And out of that devotion they get sexual relationships. which is not for to give me sensual pleasure. Now, they might have some sensual pleasure, but you don't have to have sensual desire to have sensual pleasure. Have you noticed?

[51:12]

Ever had a sensual pleasure without a sensual desire? It happens. You're walking down the street. Boom! A flower is in your face. Sensual desire. You weren't like, hey, where are those flowers? Just walking down the street. There you go. You turn a corner, lilac bush. Lilacs. Especially in Minnesota. The smell comes out stronger. You should smell lilacs in the spring in Russia or Minnesota. It's incredible. Anyway, you don't have to go down the street looking for it. But you can. However, if you do... it makes your life painful and you want to kill the person to cut it down. Now, sensual pleasure does not require sensual desire. Sensual pain does not require sensual desire. But, being unhappy is nicely delivered to you when you have sensual desire.

[52:21]

You have sensual desire, you're unhappy. That's what I have to say. You're unhappy and you're dangerous. Because when you have sensual desire, you're driven by it sometimes to try to get that some object to give you sensual pleasure, even though the object may not want you to... So it can lead to all kinds of trouble. Sexual trouble, stealing trouble, intoxication trouble, lying trouble. No, sensual desire is not a wholesome thing. It's an unwholesome dharma. Essential pleasure is not a problem. It's just that when you have essential pleasure, like I said, let's say a nice taste. You taste it. Mmm. In that taste, it's just a taste. Not, mmm, let's have a little bit more of that. Or, mmm, could you turn that up a little bit? Even be better if, no.

[53:22]

Just, mmm. What's next? Mmm. What's next? Ooh, what's next? Mmm, what's next? A sound, a beautiful sound. Oh, lovely, [...] lovely. That's it. That's all. That's it. Oh, stinkle, stinkle, stinkle. Oh, oh. That's it. Just like that, you know. Boom, boom, boom, boom. Just... That's disciplining your senses. and then central desire doesn't arise, ill will doesn't arise, doubt doesn't arise, and you cut through subject-object dualism. This is the great practice of the first aspect of right effort. Yes? Oh my God, not me!

[54:24]

What, did I make a judgment about what? What, was I making a judgment? Yes, yes, it is. It is, it is, it is, it is. It is, it [...] is. Everything is a judgment. Like, you know, somebody pinches you on the cheek just right, and you judge it, oh, nice. They pinch you a little too hard, you judge it, oh, too hard. You put your hand in water of a certain temperature, say, mm, nice. Put the water in another temperature, say, mm, too hot. Do you know the story of Goldilocks? This bed's too hard. This bed's too soft. This bed's just right. Yes, that's a judgment. So, when the judgment's just a judgment, okay, that's it. Judgment. Oh, this bed's too hard. This bed's too soft. This bed's just right. It's like that.

[55:26]

Just like that. Too hard, too soft, just right. That's it. It's not too hard. Not too soft. Just right. It's just too hard. Lovely, stinking, like that. Pain, pleasure, birth, death, coming, going, pain, loss. This is samsara. This is the world of suffering. [...] And now the world of suffering is quite smells nice. Now the world of suffering smells bad. Now the world of suffering tastes good. Now the world of suffering tastes bad. Now the world of suffering is gain. Now the world of suffering is loss. Now the world of suffering is death. It's all suffering. It's all the same. And I respond the same no matter what happens.

[56:27]

This way I become intimate with the world of suffering. Intimate. I'm not into, like, maneuvering the world of suffering. I'm into being intimate about its inmost essential nature. And its inmost essential nature is that it is not the world of suffering. The world of suffering is not the world of suffering. It's Nirvana. It's peace. You want to see? Want to see that it's peace? You want to see that it's Nirvana? You want to see that the world of suffering isn't the world of suffering? Well then, don't fight it. Because if you fight it, it's just going to get to be more and more for sure the world of suffering. So you let this world of suffering just be the world of suffering, and then it won't be you, or it, or in between, and that will be the end of the world of suffering.

[57:30]

That's the Buddha's teaching. Cool, huh? So Goldilocks can get enlightened. If she would just... This one's too hard, this one's too soft, this one's just right, that's it. So Goldilocks probably was enlightened, wasn't she, at the end? Wasn't she enlightened? Didn't it say, and she became Buddha and lived happily ever after? Yes? About doubt? Well, okay. But that's the next one. You're getting ahead to the next one, right? So he wants to talk about doubt. In other words, he wants to talk about what happens if you don't do the practice that I'm so highly recommending. Okay? So you want to get into that, right? What's it like when you don't do this practice? You want a horror show? I think I should tell you tomorrow morning, otherwise you might not sleep tonight.

[58:33]

Because if you don't do this practice, then tonight you're going to get visited by the plot of deadly obstructions. You're going to be doubting all night. But I won't be doing interviews all night. So be careful before you open this box up. But tomorrow, I'll talk about what happens if you don't. But tonight, I'd like you to give yourself a chance for nirvana. And do the practice which will prevent them from rising and which will help you enter the way. Give the practice a chance. And then, if you can't do it, then you can tell me what happened and I can tell you what to do about it after it happens. Okay? to postpone the sad story of what happened if you don't do this practice till tomorrow. But if you refuse to accept this, I will give in. Yes? Did you have your hand raised, miss? I mean, ma'am.

[59:36]

What about romantic love? What's... Oh, is romantic love a sensual desire? Yes. Well, you know, I read a book once called The Natural History of Love. And it talked about love during various... It wasn't Eastern, you know, it didn't talk about Asia. But it was a story of love from the time of Athens, I think. And what romantic love means at different times in history has been different. Okay? But if you want to tell me what type of romantic love you're talking about, we can talk about that. It generally starts that way? It starts from an attraction? You say? Well, you know, one time,

[60:49]

One time I was sitting in my house, you know, and I was watching this woman. She was having a baby. And the baby she was having, I understand, was my daughter. And I watched the daughter come out of the mother. And when I saw the daughter, I felt love. But I did not feel sensual desire. that I felt a love that I'd never felt before, and I immediately understood what my parents had meant when they used to tell me they loved me. And I still feel that love, and it's still not sensual desire. Love, my friend, is not sensual desire. But you know what? Sensual desire is sensual desire. I don't call sensual desire love. I call it sensual desire.

[61:50]

I distinguish between love, which I do feel, and I also love you. Okay? But I distinguish from love. Love, my friend, is not central desire. But you know what? Central desire is central desire. I don't call central desire central desire. I distinguish between love, which I do feel, and I also love you. Okay? But I distinguish sensual desire from love. I do not think they're the same thing. I disagree. Completely. I think sensual desire undermines love. I think sensual desire is negative and selfish and deluded.

[62:57]

And I think love is enlightenment. I think. Oh, it isn't? It still can be selfish. Both parties want a desire, a sensual experience for themselves. That's selfish. If it's unification, then you don't want something anymore. If it's being intimate, you do not desire. In intimacy, there's no desire. I say. I say, and I mean, that in intimacy, there's no desire. None. When you're intimate with desire, the desire drops away. That's what I say. Desire and control.

[63:59]

Desire and control. Yeah. And also you can throw in, if you want to, hatred. Desire and hatred, control and power. They're together. Love is not control. Love is not desire. Love is intimacy. love, intimacy and enlightenment are happiness. Power, control, greed and hate are unhappiness. That's what I feel. That's my experience in myself and watching others. Now it is possible to love someone and have central desire arise even though the central desire is not the love. The central desire is something can be there or not. But if you switch over to the sensual desire, it can strongly interfere with the love. And you can make love with someone out of not trying to give them something, but trying to give them something.

[65:03]

And in the process of trying to give other people things, you experience great joy. And sensual pleasure can come along with it too. Who knows what sensual pleasure can come to you? Who knows? Sensual pleasure can come to you. But if you're trying to get it for yourself, then you're called an unhappy person by me. I see people who are trying to get sensual pleasure. I see them. [...] They're unhappy people. I see people who are trying to help others. They're happy people. I see people who are devoted to others, really. They're happy. And some of those people who are devoted to others who aren't happy, they sometimes are bathed in sensual pleasure. But they're free of sensual desire. That's what I feel. I hope you're talking, you and me. I hope you're talking freely.

[66:04]

I am. So if you still think what you said at the beginning, we disagree, but that's okay. I'm still devoted to you no matter if you disagree with me or not. I think you are. So we can disagree. There's no problem. We can disagree. Not necessarily. There's some people that I meet that I'm attracted to, but I don't necessarily desire anything other than what's going on. I just feel some people, you know, they just smell good, right? you want to go but you know but you don't have to desire you don't have to want something you can for me well it depends if you lean over it's desire but if you if you just sit back you know without moving and you go ah

[67:07]

That's not too bad. I think that's his idea. I think so. No. You meet some people, you like the way they smell. You just do. You can't help it. You can't help it. You just do. You like their soap or whatever, you know. And there's other people you don't like the way they smell. You can't help it. You just have an allergic reaction to some people. Some other people maybe like the smell of the people you're allergic to. Our own chemistry system here, and we get turned on by certain smells, some of us. And you can't help it. You can't help it. You're just a poor little animal. You get turned on by certain smells. That's all. Now, if you say, thank you very much, Buddha, or whoever, for that smell, and let it go at that, you know, then it's not desire. But if you say, thank you very much, can I have two more? That's desire. So gratitude, once in a while, once a day, three times a day, ten times a day, once a month, we have a pleasant experience.

[68:20]

And the Buddhist meditation is to say, thank you. It's like, again, this girl came into my life, this beautiful girl who I loved from the moment she was born, and she's going to go out of my life. She sort of has already. I say thank you when she comes. I got to be with her for a few years. I got to live with her. I got to love her. Thank you. Bye-bye. Everybody I meet, I'm grateful to meet. I'm with them for a while. They come, they all go. Every student I meet, they're all going to go. They're all going to leave. I'm going to leave. It's going to happen. But I can say thank you. So gratitude goes with love for me. And Wanting more of something good is... Now I'm not saying it's easy to practice that.

[69:30]

It's not something good to not lean forward and get another whip. I'm not saying it's easy. But this is the practice that I understand as right effort. And when you're grateful for the positive things that happen to you, as they happen, you're just like grateful, then that's enough. Then this is a color, this is a sound, that's it. Non-attachment, non-seeking. Non-attachment, non-seeking. Mind like a wall. The first right effort. Okay, anything else? Any other comments? Can you believe this? I didn't mean to put a negative on imagination. I do not want to put a negative on imagination.

[70:33]

I'm telling you, actually, I would like you to use your imagination to give up your imagination. Imagination is something that is like everything else, it becomes trouble, not because something wrong with it, but because we attach to its power. The imagination is very powerful. It is a power. The imagination is a power. Okay? What I'm suggesting is you give up that power. There's nothing wrong with power unless you attach to it. And most people are attached to their imaginative power. And I'm suggesting you give it up. I'm suggesting that artists give up their power, give up their imagination, definitely. And there's a little, you know, thing I would say afterwards too, namely that there'll be much greater artists after they give it up.

[71:34]

Matter of fact, I think the best artists are the ones who knew how to give it up. I don't understand how you give up your life. Well, for example, give up thinking of past and future. Give it up. How? Well, usually, you know, just to sort of test to see if you've given up, you could try just not thinking of them. Okay, I give them up, but I'm going to keep doing it anyway. Well, wouldn't you be a little suspicious of yourself? So just temporarily anyway, just don't think of past and future, which happens to be the practice of patience, by the way. So when you practice patience, you don't think of the past and future of your pain, which turns out to be the only thing to do. So after you think you're well-skilled at giving up thinking of past and future, then you can think of past and future without attachment to that. Then you can do art without attachment to the power of your imagination.

[72:37]

imaginations even while they're attached to their imaginations but if you can let go of your imagination it's a you have a much more much more creative relationship with it high feel just like your mind you like some meditators sit you know and the great insights come to their mind while they're sitting or if there are maybe new ideas for artworks come to their mind while they're sitting So there's some tendency to grab onto these great insights, but when you grab onto them, you deaden the process of creation, and you lose the next one. Because you think you're not going to get another one, you hold onto this one, and the whole thing collapses. Well, it doesn't collapse entirely. You deaden it. Well, good. And it's not like you decide you're not going to think of the future, so you're not going to come up with something that you could do on your wife's birthday. You're just not going to fix it.

[73:42]

You're going to get your wife's birthday coming, and you've got to think of something to do on your wife's birthday, right? But you give that up. You give up trying to think of it. And then you probably will think of it. So it seems like the difference is to trust yourself with just the rather than to hang on to the idea that you've got an imagination and that you have an imagination. Yeah, kind of like that. Mm-hmm. Pretty much like that, yeah. What about gold, yes? Do you have some gold? Like what? What kind of gold? Yeah. Yeah.

[74:46]

It is? I don't know. It doesn't sound... Right now you're telling me about some goal you have in the future. So that seems like future thinking. Well, you just had that thought about future thinking, right? Right? So now just give it up. If you had it, that's enough. Just let it go. You think you have to go around holding it all the time? I mean, it counts. It's all over. You did it. You don't have to carry everything in the universe on your back all the time. Your mind does that for you. It's a nice little tool. You don't have to remember everything and hold on to everything. I think that's fine.

[75:52]

I think it's fine to visualize a goal. in order to achieve it. Like you can visualize, we can now visualize being in loving harmony with each other. We can visualize that. Close your eyes and visualize that. Okay, there it is. That was nice. And it worked. Here we are. There's no problem in that. I didn't have a problem with that. Did you have a problem with me doing that? No. But if I'm attached to that and hold on to that, then I'm sick. I've got problems. It's going to be hard for me to carry on this workshop anymore if I've got to hold this vision, and I can't forget this vision, and I've got to be attached to this vision. I'm not going to be very good for you for the rest of the weekend. But fortunately, I just think of that, and I can get it back again any time I want if I do, but I don't. I'd rather do another one. You don't have to hold on to anything, period. But you can imagine anything you want. and imagining certain things is quite beneficial like imagining like close your eyes and imagine yourself doing all kinds of nice things for just go ahead and do it perfectly good thing to do very happy meditation are you enjoying it yeah it's lovely not just you don't have to hold on to it though if you want to do it again do it again you have to hold on to it matter of fact the next time might do a slightly different and you know upgraded model of that same vision so

[77:19]

Your imagination, nothing wrong with it. Nothing wrong with it. Imagination is a wonderful power of our mind. What's wrong is what? What am I saying is wrong? What? It's the attachment. Attachment's the problem. Attachment's antithetical to life. You don't have to attach. You can be a Buddha. Buddha's got a nice imagination. We're jabbering away non-stop, you know, for 50 years. All these beautiful teachings coming out of him all the time. You know, endless metaphors and similes and, you know, homilies. Wonderful stories and teachings and systems. Non-stop creativity just flowing out of the guy. Stop! It's enough! How come? Because he wasn't attached. Your mind is like a fountain of creativity. If you attack to it, you get scared.

[78:24]

And what can I say next? All right. It seems like it's the product of the imagination. You don't want to attach it to the imagination or the product. And the imagination seems like it doesn't exist. It seems like it doesn't exist? Well, just to throw a word on this thing of just Well, anyway, it doesn't exist like nothing else. Everything else doesn't exist. But there does seem to be this thing called imagination. And I think it's totally wonderful that we've got one. And I think it's great that you .

[78:58]

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