Going around the circle, the Buddhist wheel, with eight spokes. First spoke is right view, right? Next is right intention. And next is right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, right concentration, right view. Okay? Round and round you go. Usually in practice, the traditional way of starting to practice Buddhism is to start with, in a sense, the ethical practices, to lay an ethical foundation first before you practice meditation. Because you can't really successfully practice meditation if you don't be careful of your karmic activities. So oftentimes the first practice is to start with our right speech, right action, right livelihood.

[01:09]

But really you have to start with right view in the sense of watching your karma because in order to practice ethics you have to observe your body, speech and thought. That's why I started with right view. And mundane right view, or ordinary right view, which is still based, still while entertaining some ignorance of your true nature, means that under such a situation, you're basically meditating on what we call karma, action done by an independent person. And so I propose to you that if you watch carefully your karmic activity, the observation of your karmic activity transforms your karmic activity.

[02:16]

And in particular, if you start and keep track of the intention that's arising in your mind, various impulses and intentions and motivations in your mind, if you can learn to see those and see where they're tending, that that observation of your intention and seeing how that attention unfolds in terms of cause and effect will transform your intentions. Does that sound familiar? That's what I've been talking about for, is it three weeks? Now if you're meditating on your intentions and watching how they work, then you can start extending that meditation, watching that meditation extend itself into meditation on speech.

[03:21]

Or put it the other way, meditating on the intention that's in your mind, watching and seeing how the intention works, you can now watch how the intention to speak or the impulse to speak goes into speech and how speech works. So as we go into practicing right speech, it's a continuation of the practice we've been working on for three weeks of watching what we're thinking, watching the direction of our, the inclinations of our mind, and watching how, as they extend now into speech, how that works. Now I'm going to start out with something very strict, and then maybe backpedal. The Buddha said, If you see an impulse to speak in your mind, if you see the inclination to speak arising in your mind and the speaking you're thinking of doing is not true and harmful, don't speak.

[04:46]

Just let that impulse be an impulse in your mind. Don't extend it into speech. If you see an impulse that's true but harmful, don't speak. If you see an impulse that's not harmful, but not true, don't speak. And if you see an impulse that's true and not harmful, then wait for the right time. I had dinner with somebody before class tonight and I was telling him I'd be talking about right speech and he said, oh yeah, zip it. One Zen teacher didn't speak until he was 16.

[06:02]

He grew up and he didn't speak until he was 16. He finally started speaking and people in his family said, son, you're speaking at last. This is wonderful. We didn't know you could talk. He said, well, there wasn't anything worth saying before this. Now, the right time means when even if it's true and even if it's not harmful, still, if there's some kind of... unreceptiveness in the person you're speaking to, unwillingness to listen to you, maybe you should wait. Or if there's some ill will in your heart, maybe you should wait, even if the speech itself wouldn't be directly harmful or untrue. So that's very strict. If you follow those rules, You might have to send a letter out to all your friends to tell them that you wouldn't be talking for a while because you're following very strict rules of verbal contact.

[07:20]

And some of your friends may be able to send a letter telling you, I can't even send you a letter about what I have to say yet because I don't even think you want to hear about it. Negatively put, right speech is to refrain from lying, to refrain from speaking about others in such a way as to lower people's opinion of them or to cause people to... respect them less or want to get away from them speech that is intended to cause a rupture in relationships rather than promote respect and union among people it's a negative way to put it which means telling things saying bad things about people to other people with the intention even if it's true with the intention to cause disunion and disrespect or disharmony

[08:48]

So sometimes it's called slander or talking about somebody's faults. So not lying, number one, not speaking of others' faults. And the other one, another one is not speaking harshly. Even though you're not talking about somebody, you're talking directly to the person, you don't speak harshly in such a way that hurts them while you're talking to them. You don't criticize them, call them bad names, and just basically hurt them with your words. And the third kind, the fourth kind of negative presentation of right speech is basically don't gossip. Don't do practice idle chatter, which means don't speak in a way that distracts people from their meaningful work, distracts people from their meditation, distracts people from their meaningful work, their intention to, for example, practice right speech.

[10:05]

Somebody might be trying to practice right speech, and if you chatter idly, you can distract them from their intention to practice right speech. Basically, speaking in such a way that undermines practice of meditation. So again, those are kind of negative ways of putting it. Positive way of putting it would be, tell the truth. Speak in such a way that your words cause people to respect other people. Speak in such a way as to bring people together in union and friendship speak in such a way that it's pleasant for people to hear you talk it's pleasant about in terms of what you're saying about them they feel encouraged about what you're saying about them at the same time the tone of your voice is they can listen to and they can hear

[11:09]

And the other kind is when you talk, you say something that encourages people to do their really important work. You speak in a way, for example, you speak while meditating on what you're saying to model meditation on what you're saying. You speak with a sense of the valuableness of the moment. the preciousness of this opportunity right now you convey that that feeling but you know in a way that's not just real heavy but in a way that actually encourages people to speak in a sincere way so I would guess that that was simple what I said except that you can think of lots of complications So I imagine you have questions, but I also want to say something about the experience of speaking, and that is that, again, as long as we still have not freed ourself from the belief in our independence, from our deeply rooted sense

[12:42]

that we're separate from other beings, independent of them, as long as we still operate that way, we're still involved in karma. Our action is still karmic. The speech is still karmic. Also, as long as we feel that way, as long as we feel some separation from each other, we are at least on a subtle level anxious. And the subtle anxiety in some ways is more influential than the gross anxiety. For example, if you're really having a panic attack, most people having a panic attack, I shouldn't say most people, but a lot of people when they're having a panic attack, they sit down. They don't say, oh, this is a good time to deliver a speech, or this is a good time to go to work, or this is a good time to have a fight. or this is a good time to insult somebody.

[13:47]

Usually if you really feel threatened and have a gross anxiety attack, usually you put aside... You're not usually interested in criticizing people at that time or talking harshly to other people or lying even. It's kind of like you're like... You know what I mean? Does that make sense? But subtle anxiety drives us all over the place. Because anxiety is subtle, you think, oh, I can talk, I can walk, I can act. And you don't even notice you're acting out of trying to run away from this anxiety. You're trying to manipulate this anxiety. You're trying to calm yourself. So then the karma comes. And then, of course, the karma has results. And the results are more anxiety, which still might be quite subtle. And again, more karma to try to cope with this subtle anxiety. So subtle or not so subtle or gross anxiety, all those kinds of anxieties drive us, drive us to karma if we still think, you know, I am being afflicted by this pain.

[15:05]

So when we're speaking to people is a time when we often feel a lot of anxiety. Here I am, separate from you, And I'm going to talk to you now. And it can be quite painful to be aware of that anxiety. You feel some pain when you're getting ready to talk to somebody a lot of time. I was going to do an exercise of having some people come up here and sit and face each other and then do some exercises of speaking. But I thought, well, it's a little hard because it's a little bit arbitrary. Maybe I could think of some exercises, but it's a little bit arbitrary, plus a lot of people would feel really anxious to have not only talking to another person, but all these other people watching them. So the anxiety level might be so high that it might be hard for people to do that. But on the other hand, now that I think of it, it might be a good exercise because that would be an example of how we speak under the circumstances of anxiety quite a bit of the time.

[16:10]

quite a bit of the time it's time to tell the truth but we're anxious about whether how it's going to work we're anxious about whether the truth is going to be acceptable whether we'll get in trouble for it whether it's really the truth whether we can say it in the right way whether it's the right time all these things can make us worry. So I guess what I'm suggesting is when you feel that anxiety when you're about to speak, to try to feel that anxiety. And then see, in the midst of that anxiety, is there an impulse to speak? And what is that impulse? Is that impulse to... What is that impulse?

[17:17]

So, I've said some things and what I'd like to try to do tonight and also what I'd like to ask you to do during the week is be present be aware of what kind of thinking is in your mind and see if you can notice that almost all the time before you speak there is an intention to speak what you speak and as you know many times you have intentions to speak which you do not speak because you feel that it would not be helpful to you or the other person. But in addition to the times when you look inside your mind and you see the impulse and you see that it would lead to a harmful speech, try to also notice the times when the impulse is there to speak in ways that you're not sure if they're okay and also situations where you think they're okay.

[18:36]

Like at home, a lot of times we just feel like we can say whatever a lot of the time anyway. But in the situations where you feel quite comfortable and where you can feel quite at ease to talk, even in those situations, I'm suggesting that you start trying to catch your motivation before you speak. And tonight, if you start asking questions, if you ask a question, look at the impulse of asking the question. and see if you think it's an impulse to speak in the form of a question or speak in the form of a comment that you think would be helpful. I, looking at my impulse, I have an impulse to say to you something now. And what I have an impulse to say is something I think would be helpful. In addition, I thought what I just said would be helpful.

[19:39]

Now, I want to also say, which I think would be helpful, that usually in this class, if you have an impulse to ask a question, it's almost always beneficial. But you check it out for yourself, but I just tell you beforehand that if you think of a question and you wonder if it's beneficial, I'm telling you beforehand that my experience is it usually is helpful. So if you think it's helpful, also... I probably will too, and probably most other people will also. But still, even though probably most of your questions will have a beneficial impulse, still check to see if it is there. See if you're asking a question with the intention of like, that this would be helpful to you understanding how to live your life. See if you have that impulse or some other kind of beneficial impulse. And you could even, if you had an impulse to say something you didn't think was helpful, you could not speak it, but you could tell us about it. So, now did you think before you said this, Carol?

[20:50]

And before you answer my question, are you thinking about your impulse? Please. I'm somewhat confused because you talked about... Excuse me, may I ask a question? You just said, I'm somewhat confused. Right? Did you feel the impulse to say, I'm somewhat confused? Good. She felt the impulse, she saw an impulse to say, I'm somewhat confused, and she said it. Did you think it would be helpful to say it? I think it was. Okay. My confusion is over... You talked about the subtle anxiety, about the whole issue of right speech.

[21:56]

But previously we talked about... Could you speak louder, please? Yes, I'm sorry. Previously we talked about and this is where I may not understand completely, the shape of our mind. And when it doesn't seem to be beneficial, you want to let go of it. Or I think the way you put it is, once you see that it's not beneficial, you let go of it. I think, to me, anxiety is not beneficial yet. it also comes up. So how do you... Anxiety... Okay. Now, you just said that you think anxiety is not beneficial. Right? It seems to me that that's part of my question.

[23:01]

Okay. So I have two things to say which I think will be beneficial. You can tell me if they are. Number one is... Anxiety is not an impulse. May I say it again? Anxiety is not an impulse. We're talking about anxiety is not speech. Okay? Anxiety is not thinking. Anxiety is not physical motion. Okay? What I'm emphasizing here is meditation on impulses. motivation on karma okay this is a karmic meditation now I'm not saying don't be mindful of other things okay but just learn to discriminate between what's an impulse and what's not an impulse pain is not an impulse pleasure is not an impulse it's an experience Anger is not an impulse by itself unless you think, I would like to say or do some angry thing.

[24:08]

So anxiety is not the same species of mental phenomena as the impulse, as the intention. Anxiety is something that we often respond to by forming an intention to do something to alleviate or modify or distract ourself from the anxiety. Okay? So it's a different phenomena. The other thing to say is that you said that you didn't think anxiety was beneficial. And I don't exactly disagree with you, but I sort of do. Anxiety is beneficial. a sense beneficial because it shows us it pokes us and says you are ignorant so you read you Carol you're ignorant you think you're separate from the rest of the world that's what this anxiety means so anxiety is a spur which encourages you to become enlightened

[25:21]

If it was painless to be ignorant, we would just be ignorant forever. Did I say painless? If it was painless to be ignorant, there would be no motivation to become awake. We would just rest in dark ignorance indefinitely because it's hard work to become awake. You have to look and study. But since being ignorant is painful, we're willing sometimes to make the effort to become you know knowledgeable about what's actually going on so anxiety is not it's unpleasant it is it is anxiety in some sense is the most profound pain of our life because even when everything's going fine even when you just got a raise and you and the most wonderful you know all your relatives became healthy and you're feeling great and it's a sunny day and there's world peace You're still anxious as long as you feel cut off.

[26:29]

And that anxiety, even on a good day, is poking you and saying, there's something you have to settle. There's something you have to settle. There's something you're not paying attention to. What is it, dear? So anxiety is kind of your friend, what do you call it, tough love friend, that's saying, Carol, hello, wake up. Wake up, Carol. Wake up, Carol. What am I supposed to do? Well, pay attention to what you do based on ignorance. Pay attention to what you do based on the belief that you're independent. Study your karma. Oh, it's hard to study my karma. Oh, yeah? Well, take this. This is a sample of what you'll get if you don't study your karma. And not only that, but this is going to go on forever if you don't understand this. So that's anxiety. So anxiety is kind of... It's not a... We need it.

[27:33]

It's a spur. It's the irritation that we make into a pearl by meditation. But anxiety is not karma. If you see anxiety, to be aware of it, that's good. Okay? Anything that's happening to you, it's good to be aware of it. So if you're in pain, any kind of pain, plus particularly in anxiety or fear, it's good to pay attention to it. But that's not enough. You also have to watch your karma. Not just pay attention to what's getting your attention. You see, your karma is not really drawing your attention. Karma doesn't need your attention. You can do karmic acts without paying attention to them. And generally speaking, that's called unskillful karma. You don't have to pay attention to do things unskillfully. You don't have to pay attention to get in a car accident. You have to pay attention a little bit to get in the car. But you can be really drunk and still get into a car. know somehow get yourself somewhere situated near the steering wheel somehow and get it started and be typed totally out of it just by your habit of driving you can somehow get the car started but of course you have trouble handling various things that come up while you're driving like other cars and you know so you know seeing so but in order to once you get in the car you can be really unskillful and get in an accident right and you don't to pay attention

[29:04]

To do things skillfully requires attention. But our karma does not say to us, pay attention, pay attention. Anxiety says, pay attention. Anxiety says, I heard the Buddha say, pay attention to how karmic acts have consequence. And I'm hurting, and the Buddha said, if I pay attention, I'll become free of this pain. If you really pay attention to your karma and see your karma for what it is, you will become free of anxiety because eventually your clear attention to your karma will also bring your attention to the author of the karma. This illusory thing called the independent self. And you'll start to see the independent self who's doing the karma and then you'll see that this independent self is not independent. And then there'll be no more karma and there'll be no more anxiety.

[30:06]

But you have to get in there and see how this is happening in order to become free. And it's hard work because if you get close to the karma, you're getting close to the anxiety that's pushing the karma. If you get close to the karma, you're getting close to the fear that's pushing the karma. We don't like to look at anxiety and fear. It's not pleasant. It's not pleasant. However, it can be joyful. in the sense that you can feel like, well, I have the joy of knowing, I have the joy of the competence of knowing that I'm doing exactly the same practice which all Buddhas have done. They've all looked at this karma. They've all seen this anxiety. They've all seen this belief in independent self. They've all seen through it. And then it changed liberation. So, okay? The main way to handle anxiety is patience.

[31:21]

Anxiety is painful. And sometimes the pain is very subtle, but the subtle pain in some ways is the most painful. Because it's... The subtle pain of anxiety basically is always there. So although it isn't excruciating, it's non-stop. So... And then there's, of course, tremendous anxiety sometimes that's like overwhelming, like where you can hardly breathe. And anxiety means to be choked. The root of the word means to be choked or smothered. So anxiety and asthma are closely related. And fear is kind of like one of the things we do to run away from anxiety.

[32:27]

We put the anxiety in the future, and then we can fight it when we're afraid of something. If you live in the present and you're isolated from other beings, you feel pressed by other beings. You feel choked by other beings. Always you feel that. As long as you believe you're independent, you feel threatened by the other. If you can be patient with that pain, you've done the best you can do with the anxiety for the time being. Then that's how to take care of being with the anxiety. Don't stick your head in it. Don't lean away from it. Just be upright in the middle of the anxiety. That's the best way to deal with the anxiety per se. Now, if you want to not just deal with it as it's happening, but set up the possibility of realizing freedom from the anxiety, then we have to get at the ignorance, which is the source of the anxiety.

[33:29]

And the access to the ignorance, you can't go directly at the ignorance. If you could, there wouldn't be any more ignorance. I mean, you can notice the ignorance, but that isn't enough. You have to also notice what you do based on it. So that's the karma. So patient and being upright in the middle of your anxiety and then start watching your karma. So when you're speaking, usually you're anxious to some extent when you're speaking. Be present with your anxiety and then watch the impulse to speak. So you kind of like got to do several things at once. have to be present with your pain and then watch the impulses to act and then also watch the acts of speech and posture and watch the results and see how they feel and then be present with that with the results so then you're present with the results plus you're present with the anxiety basic anxiety and then you're present with the next impulse to act and you notice how the impulses to act are related to the pain

[34:47]

and the pleasure and the anxiety. And the pain and the pleasure are the results of the last actions you did. So you start to see all this. And you get gradually more skillful at it the more attention you pay to this. The more attention, the more skillful. Doesn't mean don't make mistakes, but if you're paying attention, you learn from the mistakes, because you see, oh, I did it, that was a mistake, that wasn't what I meant to do. Jeff? I would like clarification on the point you made about not speaking the truth if you think it might be harmful. And, basically, is there any situation in which it might be appropriate to see that you're keeping it, and it might be harmful? Like, it's in the service of the relationship of the person you're speaking to.

[35:53]

Well... Or would... The only other way I can think of it is to assume that The supposed truth that God is holding is only a partial truth. If it were the full truth, it couldn't be hurtful. Okay. Well, abstractly, an abstract answer is if you tell a truth which seems to be harmful in one way but in another way is beneficial, in other words, you get a big benefit and a little harm, by telling a truth, then if the predominance of goodness overweighs the harm, then it's beneficial. But still, in that case, you might wait for a little while because maybe the harm would drop away and it'd be purely beneficial. So you still watch. Could you turn the light on, please, Deirdre? So maybe you can give an example of some case where if you tell the truth, it's a little painful, a little harmful,

[36:57]

beneficial so like if somebody like let's say somebody's drinking and they want to get in a car and you and you feel that you want to tell the truth the truth you want to tell is I am worried about your ability to drive this car now you might feel like it and the reason why I'm worried is because they say what are you worried about I think you drank too much so that you might someone might feel like well that harmed his reputation to say that to imply that you think he's drunk. So this maybe isn't a very good example because that's not so harmful to say that you think somebody's been drinking too much. You're not even calling him a drunk, you're just saying, I think you're drinking too much to drive. In a case like that, it's very beneficial to say that to them to prevent them from harming themselves or harming others. And not so harmful. So maybe if anybody can think of an example of a truth that's harmful but really does serve a greater benefit.

[38:03]

For example, I can think of some examples of some truths that are harmful. I used to know, I knew this lady one time and she was like, she was about 5'2 and she weighed about 300. And I really liked her. Her name was She had the same name as me. She was kind of my pal. And every time I saw her, I thought, kind of affectionately, I thought, hi, fatty, or hi, tubby. That thought crossed my mind. But I never said, hi, fatty, or hi, tubby, because I didn't think she would like it. I didn't think she would appreciate it. I thought it would discourage and distract her. I never tested it. I might have been wrong. She might have thought, oh, that's really great. Thanks. You know, it might have been just the thing she needed, you know, to encourage her in her life that day. But I never really felt like that. I thought she probably would think, well, you know, that was kind of a stupid thing to say or whatever. That really hurts my feelings. That really undermines me. You know, that's a bad thing for a Zen priest to say. I could imagine that she really would feel bad about it.

[39:07]

But I had that thought. And I had a little bit of an impulse to say it, just as a kind of friendly thing, but I never said it. So that's an example of something that's true in a sense, but I do kind of feel like that's a name I want to call you. But I didn't think it would be beneficial, so I didn't say it. I think of a lot of stuff like that, little wisecracks, that I don't say. Because I just don't think they're beneficial, and they could even be harmful. I think of a lot of neutral things, too, to say that I just don't mention because I feel like, you know, people don't need me to say this thing. That's what I think a lot of times. Sometimes, however, neutral things are very helpful. Like sometimes somebody's really nervous and you just say, gee, it's Tuesday today. They feel much more relaxed. And it's quite beneficial. It's not that big, important a message. It's not that great a truth.

[40:07]

But it's quite helpful. So the most important thing is, can you think of an example where it's true and harmful, but in a bigger way, beneficial? And I think there are examples like that. Yeah, my wife said something to me recently, which was, because actually she said quite a few things recently that were quite painful for me to hear. But, you know, I don't think they were harmful. And also... Hmm? Hmm? They helped me do the very meditation that I'm encouraging you to do. They helped me really deeply look at the way I make effort and where I'm putting my energy of my life, what I'm concentrating on, what I'm not.

[41:13]

Those comments made me turn around and really look carefully at what I'm doing with my life. It was very painful. what she said, but it really helped me turn around and look at myself. It made me meditate more. It also made me withdraw from her a little bit because I was, you know, to some extent putting more energy into watching myself and less energy into relating because I felt like I was like this you know, this thing that had to really watch itself carefully because it should really know how it's using its energy. But it was quite painful. Later she told me that she was wondering why she was so upset about what she was telling me. And she realized that she had something that she was doing which was a little off for her. that she was more upset than she needed to be about what she was telling me.

[42:18]

But still, from my point of view, it was kind of good that she was upset enough to say it actually over a few times so that it really got to me and really did encourage me to look more carefully. So from my point, sometimes someone can unskillfully tell you something But if you're up for practicing patience, it's a big help to you. So in her case, somebody else might have been harmed by that. But in my case, partly because of what I'm studying, here I'm teaching about meditating on karma, so when certain things happen to me, I'm more likely, because of my meditation practice, I'm more likely to say, no, okay, what does this say? How is this related to my meditation practice? So when you're meditating this way, these things are more like food for you rather than undermining you. But this is from the point of view of being spoken to.

[43:25]

From the point of view of speaking, you shouldn't go around saying, well, here I am to give somebody something to really work on. So I'll just dump this real obnoxious material on them for them to like, really like, now what should I look at now? No, we shouldn't do that. This is from the side of speaking, the impulse, right? From the impulse, from the side of what's happening, then we look at it the other way, of how is this a consequence of my own karma? What you experience, you try to understand in terms of karmic effect, But meditating on karma is, now what is your impulse and response to your experience? So it's two different meditations. One is in terms of experience, which is not karma. Anxiety is not karma. Anxiety is the result of a certain understanding. Certain pains are the results of certain actions.

[44:26]

People treating you certain ways are the results of certain actions. especially people feeling about you in certain ways. Did you have your hand raised, Pat? Yeah, I was wondering about when you're... Speaking to someone who is engaging in a lot of gossip or divisive idle chatter. Divisive idle chatter, that's a double thing, right? Divisive is... Usually, speaking about this is false. You can combine the two, right? That's part of the danger of gossip, is you can just be gossiping along like, oh, the Giants won or lost or whatever, and it's Tuesday, and it's blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then when you're doing idle chatter, you can easily slip into criticizing others. So one of the dangers of idle chatter is you can easily slip into these other more harmful kinds of speech. Idle chatter is fairly neutral, except that it's distracting. But then when it gets distracting, then it distracts you from paying attention, then you can do something really harmful.

[45:32]

So idle chatter slips over into divisive speech. Yes? So what would be, I mean, other than patience, what might be an appropriate reaction? Patience with what? With someone... Someone who's talking that way? Someone who is being divisive. Well, patience... First of all, so let's say they're being divisive, and let's say they're like... Okay, so I don't practice patience very long with that. Before I even get irritated, I go, did you talk to them yet? I don't sit and take a lot of it. I listen to maybe halfway through the sentence or to the end of the sentence to figure out what they're talking about. And then I say, before they go any further, I say, have you talked to them about this? And if they say no, I say, please talk to them first. I do not, generally speaking, I do not listen to people criticize other people unless they've already talked to the other person. Now, if they talk to the other person, I say, well, what happened when you talked to them?

[46:35]

So I actually don't listen to, I won't listen to, if I can stop it beforehand, and a lot of people actually say, can I tell you about some problem I'm having with someone? And I say, you can tell me about the problem you're having with them, but don't tell me what's wrong with them. Don't talk about the person. Talk about your problem with the person. I'm happy to hear you talk to me about your problem of dealing with somebody, but I don't want to hear you tell me about this person's faults. I don't want to listen to that. I do not see the necessity of it unless you're telling me that you think so-and-so is scheduled to drive a truck tomorrow and you don't think they're capable of doing it. That's different. But if you're just going to tell me, you know, I think so-and-so is a lousy truck driver, I... I don't see the point of telling me. What's the point of telling me? So I wouldn't, I wouldn't, I would stop him right away. I would say, oh, just a second, before I even got irritated. I don't see much point in going and listening to that.

[47:42]

Now, idle chatter is a little bit different because, you know, just blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, that's more difficult. When it's not talking about somebody's faults, but they're just sort of rambling, that's more difficult. Because they're not actually saying bad things about somebody. They're just speaking kind of, maybe you don't feel like they're really carefully considering what they're saying and so on. So, and that is more, it's more difficult in that case. So you kind of have to sit there for a little while and then practicing patience is, now practicing patience can be more applicable, I think, to idle chatter. So there's many, many things you can do at this time. One is you can say, excuse me, could I say something? And then maybe they say, yeah, say.

[48:44]

Do you really want to talk to me? And maybe they say, yeah, and say, okay, what do you want to talk about? And then the problem won't be idle chatter. If it's idle chatter, and if it gets to be idle chatter again, you might say, excuse me, just a second. I don't understand why you're telling me that. What's that? Why would you want to tell me blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah? They probably don't want to tell you. If you have an actual something to talk to somebody about, it's not idle chatter. Even if the topic's exactly the same, if you really want to tell them, it's not idle chatter. It's specifically something you want to tell them. Like, do you really want to tell somebody, it's Tuesday? If you do, it's not idle chatter. It's like, it's Tuesday! What does that mean? It means today we're going to blah blah, you know? It means today I'm free, or today it's my birthday, or today it's your birthday, or today's the day we're going to take a walk, or...

[49:54]

You know, it's really a message. But a lot of the stuff we say, unless it's really intentionally for this person, why be talking to this person about it? Unless... For some people, idle chatter is a kindness to do them. They're really nervous, and a little idle chatter makes them relaxed. But if you're not that way, and somebody's giving you that gift, that relaxing gift, it's not appropriate. You don't want it. You know? What you want to have is like silence or a meaningful conversation. And that's probably what they want too, but people don't generally think it's okay to have a meaningful conversation with somebody. That's kind of a big deal, right? So you got to help them, I think, sometimes. And you have to be patient sometimes long enough to see the opportunity of saying, I have a question. I want to talk to you about something. Is that okay?

[50:57]

Because sometimes people just do a little fluttering before they get down to what they want to talk about. So I allow a certain amount of flutter and running around in circles. But at a certain point I say, well, I think that's enough. Just a second now. I used to allow too much. If you allow too much, you start getting irritated. And then you can't just constantly say, just a minute, can I ask you a question? Then you're kind of like, this is really a waste of time now. You shouldn't wait too long. Just long enough to sort of give a reasonable chance to settle down the conversation. And then sincerely, before you get angry, sincerely say, just a second, wait a second. Now, do we want to talk here or what? Is this going to be a conversation or are we going to just basically distract each other? And sometimes idle chatter can be a ball, you know. But it's just really having fun, you know, and you're totally there. It's the same kind of chatter, but you're just having a great time. And you're really present. You're really paying attention to what each other is saying. And also, sometimes you're skirting the line right at the edge of slipping off into bad-mouthing people or whatever like that, but you stay right on this side of it.

[52:04]

You don't do it, you know. And you both help each other. You know, stay in a wholesome conversation, but it's going real fast, and it's kind of like, can we talk real fast and real intently with each other and have a good time and not slip into lying, bad-mouthing, you know? That's like dancing, you know? A real wild dance, but that's like doing a dance where you can fall down and hurt yourself. But it's really the intention is to have fun together That's not idle chatter, really. Who was next? Was it Martha, I think, was next. Yeah, first I was thinking in response to Pat was that when people come to speak to you as a priest, it maybe is a little different than a social situation. Yeah. I find a lot of times people are saying things like, what I do sometimes is that, you know, it may sound really hilted to them, I don't know, but that I let them know that I love the person that they're speaking to, and that usually stops them.

[53:16]

I don't know, but my question was, I was wondering if I could bring up an example of something yesterday where I was really concerned about the speech and whether it was right. So Martha said so she sometimes does when people are about to badmouth somebody she says she loves the person that will often stop him It's true but I Think even if you don't love the person and even if they don't love the person still they should give the person a chance and Talk to the person first so it isn't just that it isn't just that hey i'm not a receptive speaker about this person because i love this person even if i hated this person i still wouldn't let you do this with me and actually that's a tough one when somebody comes and starts telling you bad things about somebody you hate and stop them because this is a person you want to hear somebody say some bad things about because you're angry at this person but i i try not to let them go on about those people either

[54:19]

Like somebody comes and beats you up, and then somebody comes over and starts saying bad things about him. Yeah, yeah, let's hear more. No. If you talk to them first, go tell them first. I'm dying to hear afterwards. So I think it's okay to say, you know, I love this person, so don't talk to me about this because I love this person. But that kind of distracts them because then they think, well, if you didn't love him, then you'd like to hear it. So I'll just save my wisecracks for, you know, the people that you don't love. Can you say it makes me uncomfortable to hear this about anyone? Yeah, that's basically what I'm saying. I'm saying, I feel uncomfortable you telling me about this person unless you've already talked to them, and if you've already talked to them, then what do you need to talk to me for? Then the only reason you need to talk to me would be about how maybe to get some help talking to them. But you still don't need to tell me what the problem is unless you think I need to discipline them or something. In that case, I still think you should tell the other person first. You should tell the other person, you did X, and I'm going to go tell the priest that you did it. I just want you to know. And they might say, well, you know, can we make a deal here?

[55:24]

Excuse me. So what's your other example? Something happened yesterday? Yes. I ran into the daughter of a friend of mine. Her mother is actually in Spain for the last couple of weeks. Yes. And has been having a lot of problems. And I ran into her 20-year-old daughter who I've known my entire life. Yes. She wanted to speak with me about her mother, who she's aware is having some serious problems. Yes. And I said, you know, I think you should just speak to your mother. She wanted to know what was happening, but currently. Yes. And I said, now you might think you should speak to your mother about that directly. I don't really want to speak to her about it. But then it became clear that she really, it seemed like it would be helpful, and we had a really deep conversation, and we agreed that I said, I didn't want to say anything to her that I wouldn't say to her mother's face. Yes. And it seemed to work, but I felt I was trying to really be careful, but afterwards I thought, that was okay, you know.

[56:33]

Mm-hmm. So you don't always know. You don't always know. No, but you feel an impulse. Somebody is talking to you. You feel an impulse to speak to them. If you don't feel an impulse to speak to them, there's no issue. Feel an impulse to speak, you're on the verge of speech karma. The question is, do you think it will be beneficial? If you think it would be beneficial, and it's true, which is part of the most, you know, speaking the truth is very beneficial. I mean, it's, it's like one of the main things we have to learn how to do is speak the truth. We can't be enlightened if we can't speak the truth. So, speaking the truth and also a truth that we think would be beneficial. Not all truths are beneficial. And we got, you have a feeling impulse, you notice it's true, you think it's beneficial.

[57:37]

In that case, now that you've seen it's beneficial and true, maybe you think, now I think it would be good to do it. Well, And if you want to do it, do it and watch how it works. You don't always know, so you learn. I thought it was true, I thought it was beneficial, and it doesn't look like it is. Hmm, what did I overlook, you know? You do this over and over and over and over and you learn. You get more skillful at telling what's skillful. At first you think, oh, I think that's skillful, and you find out, oh, it's skillful, but, you know, still it's good to ask people sometimes before you tell them certain things. That's another little skill you learn. Would you like to hear something from me today? No. Again, if it's true and it's beneficial, wait for the right time. Sometimes you have a truth that's beneficial theoretically, but the person doesn't want to hear it. I've been struggling with this.

[58:41]

Like, what about, like, fresh truth? Like, you're blindly, impulsively telling the truth. Yeah. Like, let the chips fall where they may. Uh-huh. Like, so, what... That has to be okay. What do you mean, it has to be okay? Well, I mean, what can go wrong with... I mean... There are millions of things wrong with it, I think. But somehow the freshness of just speaking the truth, somehow it has to override... Override what? Override whatever thought of wrongness it may be, or impropriety, or... wrong timeliness or something. Somehow that natural, even maybe spiritually inspired, I don't know if I could say that, but somehow that seems like that could happen.

[59:42]

Well, Are you talking about a case where the impulse to speak comes up and there's no self there? Is that what you're talking about? I don't know. Well, if you are, if it's not karma, if it's not karma and it's like this inspired enlightened activity, then it's beyond good and bad. If you don't know, I mean, say you're innocent. If you're innocent, there's no karma. We're not talking about no karma here. What if you get in trouble anyway? It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter in that case because you don't care about what happens to you anymore at that moment. What if in the moment you say something and then somehow... Well, it doesn't usually work that way, actually. If you're really pure and free and innocent, you don't then kick back and fall back into guiltiness again. Why not? Because once you have innocence, you know, once you have innocence as an adult, it's a permanent change in your attitude.

[60:50]

You overcome this belief in self. When you overcome the belief in self, then your impulses just naturally unfold and they're not karma. But if you have a karmic thought, it can't override the consequences. It just plays right into them. Like I say, if it's not a thought, if it's... But I can imagine that one might maybe be impulsive and it... One, you know, is like you haven't stepped back long enough to investigate it. You don't need to in some cases. All thoughts have some shape. All states of consciousness have some shape. Some of the shapes are so flat and indistinct that there's no impulse there. If there is an impulse, as there are in many moments of consciousness, that impulse is not something that the individual creates by herself. It's something that's created by innumerable causes and conditions create the shape of your mind moment by moment.

[61:58]

Sometimes those impulses are then extended into speech and posture. Sometimes they're not. If there's no self involved, there's no belief in self, then the impulse arises and it's not karma. It's not yours. This impulse belongs to the whole world. It's like a sunspot. It's just the world creates this shape, as it always does, But usually the world creates the shapes of our mind, the world creates the shape of our mind, the world creates the shape of our mind, and every moment we're there to say, that's mine, that's mine, I'm the author, I'm the author, I'm the author. then the world sometimes creates a shape of the mind and expresses that shape of mind through speech and through action. The world does that, really. The whole universe creates everything we ever do. But because we get in there and say, we own this and we're independent operators, we turn the world of dependent core rising, we turn an interdependent, concerted activity of the entire universe, which is coming through our life, we turn it into karma.

[63:05]

It's not really happening that way, but we interject our individual independent self into a process which doesn't really have such a thing. We imagine this, interject it, and we create a little world of birth and death and karma. If you watch this little world, you'll see it's an illusion, and the actions will go forth, but now the actions will come without this, you know, infection of belief in self and independent operation, and the activity is enlightened activity. Yes. I have occasionally a feeling, an experience, where, especially when I'm teaching, that a problem will come up outside of me, and the answer will come out of me, and I didn't think about it. came up and it took the situation as near to perfectly as I could do anything.

[64:13]

And then I, most of the time, I'm thinking of things or trying to solve them. Yes, but sometimes it doesn't happen that way. And I had, my feeling was that this was intuition. But... Well... be what I'm doing. Yeah. And is that what you're talking about, Leanne? Does she describe a similar phenomenon that you think might be possible? It's faster than that. Faster than what I would say intuition is. What you're talking about is faster than that. Yeah. But you can say it's intuition, but before you say it's intuition, even before you named it that way, something happened, right? Right. And you don't feel like you did it And I feel the suitability or the world reviews the skillfulness. The suitability, the harmony, the cooperativeness, the appropriateness.

[65:18]

Almost beyond what I feel I'm here. Yeah, just beyond what you could figure out. I can figure out. Yeah. This answer came out spontaneously. Right. Without impulse. Yeah. I had some intention to solve a problem. Right. But I didn't, I didn't do it. Yeah, okay. So there can be moments like that which in a sense are moments of insight where you see that things can happen without you interjecting yourself into the process and also you might see it works out amazingly well without any consideration of whether it's good or bad. In other words, without any consideration of whether it's good or bad karma because there's not even consideration of you're going to do it. It just happens. And those little moments show you that such a thing is possible. Okay? However, it doesn't uproot necessarily the belief in the next moment you cart this person back in who takes over again.

[66:21]

Well, that was nice. And now she's back on the job again. And she then adopts and takes possession of the memory of that event. That was something that happened to me and I can remember that. And that's an interesting thing which I'm remembering. Namely, such a thing can happen. Maybe I'll practice Buddhism. This is good. And it is good. It's a helpful insight. But in order to root out the basic ignorance you have to watch the dirty work now if the dirty work drops away for sometimes and things that which usually are done under the auspices of self if those things happen without that auspices that's a moment you see hey that can happen wow i didn't know that that can happen and not only that but it kind of like work it kind of is in cooperation with everything and it's it's great Like this time, I may have told you this example before I was doing this exercise in improvisational theater.

[67:31]

And this woman and I were supposed to dance together. No, no. We were supposed to make a poem together. I say one word, she says one word. I say one word, she says one word. Back and forth like that. And the person suggested we do something together. to occupy, in some sense, to occupy the editor, to occupy the censor, who's trying to figure out now, she said that, now what would be a poetic thing to say? So we started dancing, and it was going pretty well, but it was still a little sticky, you know, I was still thinking a little bit, when she said something, I was still thinking a little bit about what to say next. And I think she was probably thinking about what to say next, too, because we were supposed to be making a poem, right? So what's the next line, what's the next word in the poem? But it was kind of flowing, it was kind of nice. So then I just got this idea and I picked her up off the ground and hold her above my head and started dancing with her like that. And then I couldn't think anymore about the poem and neither could she. And this poem came and it wasn't us doing it.

[68:38]

We were busy doing something else. Totally busy doing something else. And somebody was talking to somebody else, words back and going back and forth. But this poem came out, and it was like I didn't know where I was coming from. And it was, I don't know what I said, but it was an amazing thing. I never wrote a poem like that before. We never wrote a poem like that before. But I couldn't repeat it. I couldn't, like, again, dance with her and hold her up in my head. I mean, I could have, but somehow I couldn't. It had to be like not even knowing we were going to do it. So things like that can happen. But then when you stop doing those things which totally occupy you, the self comes up. Well, that was nice. Now let's do that again. Or, you know, I did that and so on and so forth. Which is fine. And those exercises are great. But the thing is that most of the time we've got this other thing which is a strongly established habit which happens after those exercises stop. So the people in the theater, they do improvisational theater and it's beautiful and they feel inspired and the class is over. And then they go walk down the street and they go right back into their thing again, which is much more powerful than that, you know, much more powerfully established than an exercise.

[69:45]

So that's not a problem if you keep meditating with the same intensity that you did the exercise with the daily grind of karma. That's the hard work. If you do that, you can go to theater classes and yoga classes, and they're all fine, but most of the time, it's just unstructured karmic power driving the world, trying to overcome our anxiety. And that's okay if you're meditating on it. Gay? Oh, you're just moving your hand? Did you do that last week, too? She's going to stop. She's going to be paralyzed from now on. I have a question about the speech that we say to ourselves. The impulses that I have to speak to other people. Yes. I've gotten a little bit too bad at what I do and what I don't do.

[70:50]

I do that on social media. The voices that I have for myself. Yes. It seems like there isn't that moment that you can catch on to the impulse to say what you say. Right, right. I was wondering if you could talk about how... The things you say to yourself, generally speaking, are not karma. A lot of what's going on inside your head is actually the landscape that forms the shape of your mind. Like saying I'm angry is not karma. What if you don't say things like acknowledging feelings, but you say nasty things to yourself? Stupid? Yeah. That's not exactly karma. You could make it into that, but it's It's more like just part of the shape of your mind. But if you feel like you want to try to do like think now.

[71:52]

In other words, you don't necessarily feel the impulse to say I'm stupid to myself before I say it. And also it's not necessarily harmful to say I'm stupid to myself. But you might think... So anyway, there's a slightly different... This kind of thing you're talking about is more dealt with under the heading of the right effort and right mindfulness. A negative mental state, a negative mental... Negative mental states or negative impulse, negative not impulses, but negative mental states are not karma. Like laziness, drowsiness, worry, doubt, ill will, attachment, restlessness, these are not karma.

[72:55]

These are qualities of your consciousness. And then putting words to these things like, oh, I don't want to do my job today. Oh, I don't want to let go of this attachment. Oh, I don't want to share my lunch. These thoughts, these feelings, the words you put to your feelings and your impulses in your mind, I'm going to take away the word impulses, but these qualities of your mind, they're a little different from karma. Karma is like... You have like, oh, I'm, oh, you know, stupid. That was stupid, you know. And I feel, in feeling pain about that, in feeling lazy, stuff like that. All those things together maybe make your mind in a certain shape so that it like has an impulse towards thinking in an overall way. The overall impulses are what we're talking, looking at this point. So in terms of dealing with those kinds of things, it's actually a different kind of practice which is more related to right effort. So being angry is not the same as I want to say something angry or I want to hit somebody or you can be angry yourself too or I want to punish myself.

[74:08]

That's different. For the whole state of consciousness to shape around an action means that that's the major element, that's the major shape of the whole situation rather than, there can be anger and say, for example, you could say, that was stupid, and at the same time you could say, no, that wasn't so stupid. You could say at the same time. You could say, that was stupid, that wasn't true. Or you could say, that was stupid, well, you've been kind of rough on yourself today. Or it can be stupid. Oh, now, dear, relax. Those can go on at the same time. Those kinds of short conversations and judgments on your mind are different from the overall tendency of your mind, which is the karma. You look like you don't quite get that yet. No, I got it. Yeah. It's just that I think the Well, again, you have a mind, okay, an individual moment of mind, okay?

[75:12]

It can have a painful feeling, okay? But many, many minds can have a painful feeling. All right? So, the question is, which kind of mind is this? Is this mind... You can have a painful feeling, you can have a strong painful sensation, and the tendency of your mind can be towards great, great benefit for all beings. You could also have a painful mind and your tendency could be kind of neutral. You could have a painful mind, not a painful mind, but a mind which has a strong painful feeling, and the mind could be directed towards severe cruelty. Okay? So the pain of the mind is not the shape of the mind. The pain of the mind is just an aspect of all minds.

[76:15]

All minds have pain or pleasure or neutral sensation. But the shape varies from moment to moment infinitely. But the feelings don't vary that much. There are basically three kinds, pain, pleasure, and neutral. But the shapes are infinitely varied. The things you think of doing, the things you think of saying, the impulses are infinite. The motivations and intentions are unlimited. But the feelings are fairly limited, and also one of them is always going on. Now, depending on which impulse you have, that impulse is not itself painful. That is the impulse with a mind that has a certain pain, but the pain is not because of the impulse. The impulse will lead to a karmic result which will be painful or pleasurable or neutral. But the pain you have right now is not from what the current karmic intention. The pain you have now, pain and pleasure and neutral sensations are from past action. Present action will lead to further pain, pleasure or neutral.

[77:17]

That's what I propose to you. That's the law. You check it out and you tell me if that isn't the way it works. Okay? Just another way to look at it. Okay, so now it's... Do you want to just talk to the end without meditation? So several people have questions. Do you want to quiet down at the end? If you do, we have to kind of stop. But I see Gretchen, Marcia, and Roy have their hands raised, and Carol, and Daniel. One, two, three, four, five. so you people give up your questions for quiet and maybe you can remember next week next week during the week please try to study the impulses to speak see what happens and we'll talk more about right speech next week and maybe the people with questions can remember them if you write them down that will help

[78:20]

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