Thank you for your time, sir. I attend a seminar often on Tuesday mornings here at Green Gulch with some of the priests.

[01:02]

Generally speaking, they tend to be older. There's one young one in the group. There's only 38. They had a meeting today to look at their applications for the January practice period and there's like four, three men in the practice period about 75 years old and lots of 60 year olds, lots of 50 year olds. and nuns breed like 20-year-olds, almost, you know, just a few 30-year-olds, a few 40-year-olds, but quite a geriatric group. Anyway, I meet with this group of senior priests, people who have finished being sushis. And this week we were studying something which, a phrase which comes up again and again as kind of a...

[02:07]

I think many have heard this before, but when it comes down to summarizing some of the essential points of the practice, the statement is made that all sentient beings and all Buddhas are not two. There's a difference between sentient beings and Buddhas, because sentient beings are those who don't understand that sentient beings and Buddhas are not two. And Buddhas are those who understand that sentient beings and Buddhas are not two. But sentient beings and Buddhas are one being, one mind. The mind doesn't understand the one mind, and the other part of the mind does understand the one mind. You never have one part without the other. That's a basic teaching of Mahayana Buddhism.

[03:11]

I think you might be able to find it in the early teachings of the Buddha, but it's very strongly emphasized in the Mahayana. And when people heard this teaching, they liked it quite a bit, a number of them. So this statement appears particularly saliently in the Avatam Psycho-sutra, I believe Chapter 26, called The Manifestation of the Tathagata. Buddha was awakened under the Bodhi tree that he said, oh wonderful, marvelous, all sentient beings and Buddhas are not two. All sentient beings fully possess the wisdom and knowledge of the fruit wisdom and virtue. That's what it says. It's a very popular chapter and a very popular sentence in that chapter. And he says it again in that chapter, but the second time he says it, he says, but they don't understand that, so I must teach them.

[04:17]

Actually, so I will teach them. See that they are not true, they are not separate from the Buddhas. And when they see that, then they will be Buddhas who will teach others who do not understand the same teachings. And also, a little comment on this is that it's just an old, sweet song. A comment on this is that when we do not realize this, we are sunk. Or you might say, installed in misery until we do realize it. So we're going to be more or less unhappy until we realize this teaching, this reality.

[05:26]

And partly I'm telling you that because it is an old sweet song. And oftentimes when I see it, I think, You know, I've heard this a million times, and every time it goes a little deeper, a little bit more like this important point. And so in another sense, we were studying case 98 of the Book of Serenity in the Kalan class, is asked of Dungsan, what is the body, among the different bodies of Buddha, which one doesn't fall into any category? And he says, I'm always close to this. And so we hear that in two ways. One way is that he's saying that he's always close to this. Always, always, we're always, all of us are always close to this body of Buddha, which three even categories of Buddha.

[06:29]

Another way to understand it is he's always meditating on this. He's always practicing being close to this. One sense is that we are not separate from Buddhas and also that we are, another sense is we remember the teaching that we're not separate of Buddhas. We think about that teaching that we're not separate of Buddhas. The way we are, the way we actually are as sentient beings is not separate. In that sense, we don't have to get to be better sentient beings. As a matter of fact, it may be good to stay just being kind of like somewhat below average, and not even getting up to average, but just concentrate on whatever you are, you're not separate from Buddha. So some above-average sentient beings flip to being Buddhas when they realize this, and some below-average sentient beings can flip to be Buddhas. So intimacy with each other and with Buddhas is a state of affairs, and realizing this, both in terms of understanding this and fully being immersed in this intimacy, is enlightenment.

[07:54]

So part of it's like understanding it, which is kind of like a cognitive experience, Our cognitive consciousness is illuminated by understanding of this. But more important than that is that we actually become this. We become this intimacy of all beings and all Buddhas. And our practice is both to understand this, but more importantly than understanding it is to become it. and uh and i thought i might also mention tonight that oh before i do that i just want to say that there is some on one side to think of enlightenment as something that a person has as an experience or something that happens to one person actually

[09:01]

the intimacy of all beings. That doesn't happen to one person. The enlightenment is actually the way we are already intimate and helping each other. That's the enlightenment. To be illuminated by that, but it's not the actual thing. As Dogen says, that which can be met with recognition is not realization itself. But you can recognize this. I mean, not just hear it, but you can recognize it. And that's important. But the realization itself is that actual intimacy. You want to realize that intimacy, which means realize that enlightenment. You want to realize the intimacy of all of us with all Buddhas in the Mahayana, not just have some people get it, although that's part of what happens. most people are pretty happy about. That's not the enlightenment. That's the part that can be recognized.

[10:03]

And I also wrote down here, the hallmark of Soto Zen, one of the hallmarks of Soto Zen is the one-pointed awareness of how we are receiving support. The one-pointed awareness of how we are receiving assistance and help and support. This is called, in Japanese, jiju-yu-zang-mai, self-receiving and employing awareness, but actually also self-receiving and employing samadhi. So it's actually this one-pointed awareness of it, so it isn't something you recognize out there. It's something you become. You become this receiving and employing. You become a self which is received and employed.

[11:17]

We're about in the middle of the practice period, I think, now. Right? It's like... Not even to the middle, in a way, but about the middle, right, wouldn't you say? The 20th or 19th? And it's not quite the 20th yet, but the practice period doesn't go to December 20th, so wouldn't you say it's about in the middle? So it's time to have the midterm exam. And since you left in my building, you all passed. Passed again. [...] That cough also counts. And people are having some difficulties. We're on the verge of getting a... Bill already got it, and he's going to go home and rest now. Otherwise he lets him.

[12:35]

Anyways, he needs a lot of rest. He wants to make sure. He had the pneumonia last year. He doesn't want to get it again, so he's going to go home and rest to recover from this. So I pray that we do not have too bad a case of the flu here, but even if we don't, There is some difficulties that come on in the middle of practice. People are getting tired. I wanted to bring up the practice of patience at this point. And the practice of patience is part of the way we learn to open to this teaching. Practice of patience is one of the ways we learn to open to learn to tolerate being aware of how we are supported. Because sometimes what's happening is really uncomfortable or irritating. That's how we feel.

[13:39]

So when we're irritated and uncomfortable, if we don't practice patience, it's hard for us to see how we're receiving help at the moment of being very uncomfortable. Whereas if we can practice patience when we're uncomfortable, as open to the discomfort through the practice of patience, we get open to the strange possibility that this discomfort is supporting us, is assisting us, is helping us live. Like, what? Just like, consider that possibility. The teaching is that that's so, that no matter what's happening to you, no matter what's happening to me, I am being fully supported, fully assisted, fully helped to live in this world for the welfare of all. I'm being assisted, actually, to realize the oneness of Buddha's Consentient Beings every moment.

[14:48]

But when I'm uncomfortable or I even have a little headache, it's hard to even remember that teaching. Teaching, please, give me relief from the headache. Well, fine. But sometimes it doesn't go away right away. So between now and relief from the headache, we need to practice patience in order to let in the teaching, let in the awareness of the teaching that we are being supported. I feel I'm almost always ambivalent by reading something somebody gives me, but people usually give me stuff and they give it to me and they say, this is what you're talking about. I don't have a bunch of these things to read that I've been talking about first, but it might be good if somebody...

[15:59]

Someone who had glasses. Would you be willing to read it? Sure. Christine, would you mind standing here and talking to those people? Can you see it okay? Yeah. A brief for the defense. Sorrow everywhere, slaughter everywhere. If babies are not starving someplace, they are starving somewhere else, with flies in their nostrils. But we enjoy our lives because that's what God wants. Otherwise, the mornings before summer dawn would not be made so fine. The Bengal tiger would not be fashioned well. The poor women at the fountain are laughing together between the suffering they have known and the awfulness in their future, smiling and laughing while somebody in the village is very sick. There is laughter every day in the terrible streets of Calcutta, and the women laugh in the cages of Bombay. If we do not resist our satisfaction, we lessen the importance of their deprivation.

[17:05]

We must risk delight. We can do without pleasure, but not delight, not enjoyment. We must have the stubbornness to accept our gladness in the ruthless furnace of this world. To make injustice the end of our attention is to praise the devil. If the locomotive of the Lord runs us down, we should give thanks that the end had magnitude. We must admit there will be music despite everything. We stand at the prow again of a small ship anchored late at night in the tiny port, looking at the island. The waterfront is three shuttered cafes and one naked light burning. To hear the faint sound of oars in the silence as a rowboat comes slowly out and then goes back is truly worth all the years of sorrow that are to come. Thank you. It's written by... Written by Anil.

[18:10]

Congratulations, Anil. That's written by... I guess it's... Jack Gilbert. Jack Gilbert? Jack Gilbert, you know him? Yeah. You know him? Yeah, Jack Gilbert. This is probably in the New Yorker. Who is he? He's a poet. The self-receiving and enjoying samadhi is also called the self-enjoyment samadhi. Enjoy yourself. It's later than you think. Enjoy yourself while you're still in the pink. Enjoy yourself. Enjoy yourself. It's later than you think. Enjoy yourself. Enjoy yourself while you're still in the pink. That's what God wants, according to Jack Gilbert.

[19:15]

No matter what, enjoy yourself. Then you will be more able to assist those people who are being treated harmfully. Phone number two. Is Araceli here? Would you come up here, Araceli? This is called Fear. It's by Paul Neruda. Everyone is after me to jump through hoops, poop it up, play football. rush about, even go swimming and flying.

[20:23]

Fair enough. Everyone is after me to take it easy. They all make doctor's appointments for me. I'm in that quizzical. What's going on? Everyone is after me to take a trip come in to leave, not to travel, and to die, alternatively not. It does not matter. Everyone is spotting oddnesses in my innards, suddenly shocked by radio-awful diagrams. I do not agree. Everyone is picking at my poetry with their relentless knives and forks, trying, no doubt, to find a fly.

[21:33]

I'm afraid. I'm afraid of the whole world, afraid of cold water, afraid of death. I am, as all mortals are, unable to be patient. And now? Would you stand up, please? Que sirve, que nave y que vuele. Muy bien. Todos me aconsejan reposo. Todos me destinan doctores, mirándome de cierta manera.

[22:35]

¿Qué pasa? Todos me aconsejan que entre y que salga. Que no viaje. Que me muera y que no me muera. No importa. Todos ven las dificultades de mis vísceras sorprendidas por rabios terribles retratos. Estoy de acuerdo. Todos pican mi poesía con invencibles tenedores, buscando sin duda una mosca. Tengo miedo. Tengo miedo de todo el mundo, del agua fría de la muerte. Soy como todos los montales. A wonderful word, a Spanish word here. Inapiasable. Inapiasable.

[23:36]

Unable to be patient. And the inability to be patient is not two with the ability to be patient. They're together. It also means inability to be appeased. Inability to be appeased. So, please practice patience, moment by moment. Also, that's when it's practiced, in a moment. Moment by moment. Don't let it insult you to start. Practice it every moment. There's always something irritating to practice with. There's always some fear. There's always some fear that you can bring out and meet. Learn to find something to practice patience with.

[24:39]

This world, Saha world, and Saha means the place you can practice patience all time. Buddhists are practicing too. They're in the same world with us, and they're practicing patience every moment. We can meet them. We can get over the belief in separation. Finding the practice of patience every moment. Then when the hard things come, we're already practicing patience. We can ride the waves then. We can ride the waves and remember the teaching separate from Buddha. But I think we need to be practicing patience in order to hear the teaching and let it be applied to this and [...] this. What is the paramita of patience?

[25:47]

What's the paramita of patience? You know, I think that the funny thing about the paramita of patience is different from some of the other paramitas. The paramita of patience sounds just like regular patience. Whereas, for example, the paramita of meditative enjoyment and meditative concentration, it's perfected by giving up the concentration. And the paramita of giving is when there's no giving, it's separate. But in the description of the paramita of patience, it actually sounds like the practice of patience. The paramita of patience is almost like it's a paramita through and through. So your beginning patience is really the paramita. with your lousy patience, with your undeveloped patience. Patience naturally entails patience.

[26:51]

Concentration entails patience too, but concentration doesn't necessarily entail concentration. More tense, giving it up. one's patience endlessly grows to finer and finer details of moments, finer and finer realization that this moment of sentient existence is not separate from Buddha. This is to be delighted in, to be grateful for, not to be ungrateful. really good at, although you can continue that too, being ungrateful. But you don't have to, somebody else can make it.

[28:00]

Is there anything you'd like to talk about now? Yes. So you're saying the main... Did you say that the main, one of the main points of Soto Zen is sentient beings are not two? Yeah. And that's also called the spiritual source of our tradition. So I'm just curious about Zada and Shikantaza. Is the sentient being trying to realize this, or is it just sitting as Buddha? you know, sitting with that, like, that's the realization that's already there. Yeah, it's like that. The dogma says, the true path of enlightenment is to sit upright in the midst of the awareness of how you're receiving help. The standard of this many... branches of Buddhism practice upright sitting. Right.

[29:04]

By Soto Zen, the thing that makes our upright sitting the practice of Buddha is that we sit in the midst of the awareness, the one-pointed awareness that we and all beings and all Buddhas are now, too. So Shakyamuni Buddha probably wasn't practicing that before he was enlightened, right? Well, it depends on whose story you hear. Oh, I see. In Avatamsaka Sutra, the story they tell is that when he was sitting, his enlightenment was synonymous with understanding all sentient beings had the wisdom and virtues of Buddhas. Of course, Buddhists fully possess the wisdom and virtues of Buddhas, too. However, sentient beings are the life and blood of the Buddhas. So the sentient beings are totally immersed in this Buddha nature. We live totally, we are totally inside it. We are nothing but it. And yet, we don't realize it.

[30:05]

Therefore, the Buddhas appear in the world to help us realize it. And the practice of sitting in the samadhi is the central practice to realize it. But you don't have to be sitting. Any state you're in where you remember this teaching and let it in is our practice. But again, if we're not patient with what's happening, if we're pushing what's happening away, then we're pushing this teaching away. We say this is separate from complete perfect enlightenment. when we don't even want to feel it. So we have to feel what's happening in order to also open to something more awesome than the pain we feel, the awesomeness of all the support we're receiving. That's really awesome. Welcome.

[31:09]

Yes. I have to go further. It's very uneasy and kind of tight, kind of offensive when I hear there's something to be attained. There was this description, and it looks like to me a body. I mean, there's this beautiful teaching you gave of everything is intimate with each other. And then there's coming this connection. Some of us are awake to it, and some of us attain it, and some of us are even getting to teach it. And this kind of conventional describing of it, it kind of feels poisonous to me, because I immediately feel myself in the trap of thinking, yeah, now I'm getting to be superior. just like something to go for, you know. Out of that, so I feel resistance towards this kind of describing it, which is maybe true, maybe not. You feel resistance to that way of describing it?

[32:13]

Yeah. You feel resistance to the poison? Yeah, very much. Yeah, well, that's... So try not to resist the poison. Like the poison of thinking you're better than these other people, these low-quality practitioners, the karma. Try not to resist that poisonous thing, because that poisoning is supporting you, giving you life. See, you've got to be open to the poison. Do you like that one better? Well, only if there would be some guidance to understanding. Only if it's a guidance to understanding? To the real... To the real. To the real understanding. Well, only under those circumstances? Yeah. Okay, well, that's right. That is the real way, so you can open to that.

[33:15]

It really is. It's perfectly suited for you. The Buddha made it just for you like that. Do you accept it now? I totally do. Okay. Anything else tonight? Christine? Can you talk a little bit more about what you mean by being supported by Blanc? Being supported by blah? Yes? Could you repeat that? She said... What you mean by being supported by blah? Whatever, right? Could you see that being demonstrated just there?

[34:24]

No. You couldn't? Could you see it being demonstrated with my response to your question? I mean, could you see my response to your question as accomplished by being supported by whatever? By blah? Did you see how blah supported the response to that question? I don't think I did. Didn't quite see it? Did anybody see it? Without putting yourself above Christy. What I guess I'm emphasizing is that it's right there. And if you try to look for it to see where it is, that's more like slightly changing the language to be aware of how

[35:30]

you are being helped, rather than be aware of how you're receiving help. How you're receiving help is how you are. So how you are is how you're receiving help. Do you see how you are? Maybe. You have to start by seeing how you are. you know, how you feel, or whatever. Then look to see how that is receiving help, rather than that's how you're receiving help. Rather than me explaining to you how what's blah is helping you. The key is that you start looking at blah in terms of how you're receiving help at the time of blah. I saw a receiving of help just there, and now I see it again.

[36:45]

I see a receiving help. So it's like, try to be in the mode of being aware of your receptive core, how your heart is receptive. And receptive of what? Receptive of support and help and assistance to be a heart. I get it, like how it applies to pain, like pain can be a support. Well, if I don't practice patience with pain, it's hard to be there with the pain so that I can actually see how... Feeling pain, when I'm feeling pain, I'm receiving help. If I'm not feeling pain, it's hard to be there and witness receiving help at the site of what we call blah pain.

[37:46]

Usually we shrink away from pain, and when we shrink away from pain, we shrink away from pleasure, we shrink away from whatever. If we practice patience to pain, and then we can also have the ability to be there for pleasure, then we can enjoy the pain. We can delight in the pain. We can delight in the pleasure. And when we're there delighting, we also can see how we're receiving. So it's not to see how pain helps you, It's to be patient with the pain so you can see how even whether, who cares whether pain's, you're not going to get into discussing how pain's helping you. You don't care. You're going to receive help from the pain no matter what. You're going to enjoy what. Nobody's going to knock you off your seat of enjoyment. You're going to learn how to be that kind of a person. then you're practicing the essential working of the Buddha way, according to this tradition.

[38:57]

But without patience, we can't be in the seat that's right here, where we practice meditating on how we're receiving help. Then we get into, well, what's helpful about this, or how is this helpful? Which dislodges us from the experience. And if for good reason, if it's painful, So actually what we do, if we're in pain and not being patient, we're off center, and then we start talking about what's helpful about this. But when you're practicing patience, now you don't have to talk about what's helpful about this. You can be in the mode of, how am I receiving here? So I don't get into judging the thing, but it's not like this is helpful and this is not helpful. It's like my life is always the mode. Not even like my life is always in the mode. My life is always the mode of receiving help. That's my life. And how to be settled in that?

[40:01]

Well, we can't be settled in that if we weren't even settled in our pain. So tonight I'm emphasizing the need for patience in order to practice samadhi of the Buddhas. The Buddhas did not say that they could sit on that seat without patience. I had a hard time sitting on his seat. But he was able to sit on his seat. Matter of fact, that was a big deal, right? He was tempted to run away from his seat. He said, I'm not going to move from this seat. And as soon as he said, I'm not going to move from this seat, various forces arose to say, that seat, we have some better ideas for you. So there's this general principle, which, you know, it's kind of like, you could say, well, you know, it's kind of a, in accord with modern, particularly Jungian psychology, as soon as you announce that you're not going to move, the forces of agitation say, wait a minute! Or we say, as soon as somebody says they're not going to move and actually start settling down, the palaces of Mars start having earthquakes.

[41:08]

That's the kind of ancient way to talk about it. That's the way it says in the Shurangama Sutra. Not the Shurangama Samadhi, but the Shurangama Sutra. It says, when... When Bodhisattva starts settling into concentration, the palaces of Mara start shaking. So then they send the armies down to, like, get the person to move so that the palaces will be reestablished. When we're all agitated, Mara's palaces are like, you know, earthquake-proof. When you talk about the patients with the pain, it seems like that teaching only would apply to a privileged segment of this world who can be with their pain. That a lot of people, if they are just, I guess, my sense of patient with their pain, their children will die.

[42:11]

They will die. Their lives will end if they practice patience. But if privileged people practice patience, they won't die and their children won't die? I think that may be the opinion. It's a little... the pain indicates maybe situations that will not end their children's lives or their lives. Privileged people are going to die and their children are going to die. If privileged people, and I agree, to hear the teaching of patience is definitely a privileged person who hears that. I agree. And then if they hear it and practice it, that's certainly a privileged person. However, their day and their children will die quite soon.

[43:14]

even though they practice patience. However, they and their children, before they die, have a great chance of being enlightened. Before they die. We're all going to die pretty much like this. We're going to be dead very fast, all of us. And if we can hear this teaching and practice it, it is an extremely great, wonderful privilege. The people who do not hear this teaching are... And if you hear the teaching... and you accept it, then you can go help those people. And the main way to help these people would be, one of the main ways to help them would be, usually you start with the practice of giving. That's the first practice the Bodhisattva starts with. Give to them, give to them, give to them. are ready to move on to other practices. So they actually have to receive quite a bit of kindness in the form of generosity before they're ready to practice patience, usually. But if you practice patience, then you will be ready to practice generosity with them. And then if they can receive your generosity, they will be more privileged and more ready to receive the teaching of patience.

[44:27]

I'm not emphasizing generosity tonight, In my words, I'm emphasizing patience because we're in the middle of a practice period. You've already received the generous part of the practice period. Not in the other hand, at the same time, if people who are in very difficult circumstances were able to hear the teaching of patience and practice it, they would be better able to protect their children and themselves Patient people are the kind of people you want to have protecting you. I want my bodyguards to be patient. That's the kind of people I put around me to protect me. Patient people. Not people that when I get attacked they start freaking out and get scared, you know. The ability to be patient. In that sense, they're not even human. They're like great bodhisattvas when they're protecting me.

[45:29]

That's the kind of person I want to protect me, and that's the kind of person I want to protect my children and other family members, ancient people, people who can stand pain. So when I put it to them, they can kind of work with that pain and perform their function of protecting everyone present. So I don't think that patience means... What do you call it? Passivity. Passivity. As a matter of fact, what I would say patients go with, patients does go with, nonviolence. So if you want people who are in difficult circumstances to be violent, then don't teach them patience and make them afraid, then they'll be violent. But if you teach them patience, they can become fearless. If they're fearless, they can be nonviolent. And that is actually more protective than being violent. I totally support it.

[46:32]

To forget what I was going to say. You said something just briefly about turning away. ...existing the pain, rejecting the pain, and... Oh, dislocating yourself. Dislocating yourself from the pain. And it seemed to me right then that that's the place where we make up stories. Yeah. And we bring our already existing story to the pain. That's one way to dislocate yourself. And then we use the story. I could use the story to protect myself from whatever that pain is. Try to protect yourself. Well, yeah. But actually you become a slave of it. Yeah. by dislocating yourself from it. But the way this comes together with the teaching about stories and letting go of stories was what struck me. To practice patience is you go back and face the pain without a story about it. Without the story. Because the story makes you start vibrating away from it a little bit. Just a second, I'll be back in a minute, I've got to tell a story about you. Drop the story and just feel it.

[47:34]

In the present. In such a short period of time, you can't run out of time... You're so radically present with the thing, it's pleasant. When I was in Minnesota, when I was a kid, we used to go to this amusement park, Excelsior, remember Excelsior? And they had this thing, it was like a cone, a conical disc. And the people would get up on it and they would spin it. And I don't know why, but anyway, nobody seemed to want to sit at the center but me. I just walked to the center and sit at the center of the disk. Then they start spinning and these people start . But it wasn't like I had to fight my way to this position. If you sit in the middle, you can actually stay on this spinning thing. Of course, at a certain point, it gets boring. So you move all centers so you can join the other people who have been dislocated.

[48:38]

But that's what patience is. It's at the center of the storm. Whereas things are spinning so fast, you don't have time to tell a story. And when you give up the story, you're also opening to wisdom. And opening to a new story, which is really what's going on. But isn't it the story that gives you pain, too? And some stories, basically our pain comes from a story, and then when the pain arises, we tell stories to take us away from the pain. We have to give up the stories, go back to the pain, and then we can see the story. And the story is, I'm separate from Buddha. I'm separate from other people. That's the story that's bothering us. That's why we're suffering, because of that story. Go back to the center where this pain comes from, we can open to a new story. Anything else? So, if being present and being patient, the way to see how, the way to understand how we're being supported in every moment?

[49:52]

Well, that, plus listen to the teaching, that tips you off to this. Because you might sit there and come up with that shift of perspective. So, partly to hear the teaching and let the teaching sink into you, So that if you do shift from, I'm here all by myself running my own show, to I heard actually I'm being supported and loved by all beings, and I'm inseparable from all Buddhas who are helping me wake up, to that I'm inseparable from them. If you hear that teaching and remember it, that's part of the wisdom side, which you can practice once you're present and patient. We're not going to... Well, we have heard the teaching now. And if you get to that place and you can't remember any teachings... Well, just let me know. I'll tell you why. Then when you're present, you can hear that teaching and then apply the teaching to this place of presence and patience with whatever. That way I can get from the point of just telling myself that I'm being supported to actually understand.

[50:57]

And apply it to this. You might rely and say, I don't see it. But at least you're there. But if you're not at home and try to apply the teaching to your house that's about where you live, then you have no way to see if it really works. But it is possible to have self-enlightenment in any situation. It doesn't just say when you're happy to have it. It just says this is the path to enlightenment in any situation. And look at the rest of the story and it says this applies to all these different realms where this stuff is happening. Well, I can start with just having that in the back of my mind. Yeah. That I'm supported right now. I don't know how. I don't understand it, but I know I am. Well, you can do that, but you can also just... But also you can say, not so much how am I supported, but how am I receiving support? Because how you're supported is more difficult to see, but how you are receiving support is easy to see.

[51:59]

...support is your present experience. What you are is actually... This person that you are is how you're receiving help. You're receiving help to be like that, like this. That's how you are, not some other way. Just this way right now, and that's only for a flash. Now you're receiving it in a different way. But you have to be there to see the actuality of how you're receiving. Your being is how you're receiving. And then your being is how you're imploning. Both. But again, we have to be willing to simply be here when it's painful, which of course is very hard. And we have to be able to be here. And understand that other people have a hard time being here too. You're not the only one. I'm not the only one. But there's really no alternative to this practice. You have to practice patience. We're talking about For Buddha's meditation, you can't practice it without patience.

[53:04]

And you can practice patience because you're always having some difficulty. There's always a little difficulty. And the little difficulties in some ways are more difficult than the big difficulties. Right? Those little ones are really like dispensable. I don't need those. If I have cancer, I can be patient with that, but not this. This is like, I don't need this. People don't say, when I have cancer, so much, I don't need this. It's like, I don't need root operators or smooth operators. She wants this. Basically, it feels like to choose to see how I'm receiving help, we're receiving help in each moment.

[54:09]

Somehow it becomes difficult for me to stay in that and not become engaged and immersed with other people or situations or work environment in Green Gulf. So I'm just wondering what that is about, whether we are to choose to continually abide in self-fulfilling samadhi without being blinded by the circumstances. What do you mean blinded by the circumstances? Well, forgetting basically where you are and what you're doing. Oh. You think if you're meditating this way you wouldn't be able to pay attention to cutting vegetables? Yeah, sort of. It's like you're cutting vegetables, right? And now you're looking at, as I'm cutting vegetables, how is this receiving help?

[55:13]

This cutting vegetables? Yes. It's not to look out around the room to see how you're receiving help from all the myriad circumstances in the universe. It's not to look around the room to see how the Buddhas are helping you. It's seeing how what you're doing is the receiving of help. So it should make you more focused. But if I can't stay with the cutting of the vegetables then it's hard to see how I'm receiving help because if I'm cutting vegetables that's how I'm receiving help. No other way. So you should be, first of all, paying attention to what you're doing and practicing patience with that, which means you're not shrinking away from the discomfort. You're totally there. And then, in addition to that, you look and see, how am I receiving help right now? How am I receiving help? And it's this. It's not something else. It's not to look to see, well, what's helpful about, what are the Buddhas doing to help me right now?

[56:15]

This is how the Buddhas are helping right now. This is how the... This is it. But I can see how you might think you're supposed to go out and look at the causes and conditions. I guess for me it's just when I start thinking about things. When it becomes an intellectual thing, then I use presence. Okay. Well, this is a little... This is a... First of all, see if you can, like, be... If you're involved in intellectual activity, see if you can be patient with that. If you're cutting vegetables and you don't feel very intellectual, see if you can be patient with being there, feeling how you feel while you're cutting vegetables. Do you work in the kitchen? Where do you work? See if you can be present when you're cleaning the guesthouse and making beds. See if you can be patient with that lousy job. Just moment after moment, see if you can be there.

[57:19]

See how uncomfortable you feel wasting your young years working in a guesthouse. And you could be doing something really important someplace. See if you can be completely there. If you can, then you can be there. Then you can then, like a little bit, to listen, remember the teaching, bring the teaching to bear to this moment. But to bring it to bear to, you know, a theoretical moment or an abstract moment, you say, yeah, this sounds pretty good, but if you apply it to an actual present moment where you're really there and not wiggling at all, if you can open to this, then you can open to that teaching and the consequences of receiving that teaching, receiving the teaching about how you're receiving support every moment. And that is your actual life. should be helping us be really present.

[58:25]

Being present helps us open to this teaching. forgetting our presence, wandering away. You can think of the teaching, you can wander away from being present and think of the teaching, but that's not what I'm talking about. So I appreciate it. It has to be grounded in mindfulness of your present experience, very much. And patience is really like ratcheting down your attention to the tiniest moment, because that's where you can really be patient. You can take a lot of pain in very small doses. And in fact, these small doses are your actual daylight. You're slightly uncomfortable. There's some discomfort all the time, at least a little. At least a little bit you're bothered by the horrible situation in Iraq. It's always bothering you. You're in denial. It bothers everybody on the planet. What is this? The Iraqi woman said,

[59:26]

All the suffering of the Iraqi people is in the hearts of the American people. She knows that. You know that. It's just a question. But that takes patience. You have to be patient with your headache, and then if you're patient with your headache, and you calm down with that, then you notice that you're feeling uncomfortable about These children being sent over to Iraq to get killed and to kill. Etc. Millions of things are bothering you. We have plenty of stuff that's irritating us. We're uncomfortable with the world situation, so we can practice patience. But that's where we are. And we can get better and better at this. And then there's patient communication with the schedule for those who are in the practice period. Not that bad, but it's a little irritating almost all the time. A little bit irritating.

[60:29]

This period sounds a little long. This work meeting is a little long. This service is a little bad. Et cetera. Then there's all these other huge things that are bugging us, that are a distance, but they still hurt us. So we've got plenty to practice patience with, so let's do that. Let's practice patience. Please practice patience. Please help me practice patience. You are anyway, but please, I ask them anyway. You do help me. You do help me practice patience. Not just by being irritating. But by being patient with me. You show me patience. And you show me your patience. That helps me. So please help me by you practicing patience. And it helps everybody. It makes you a more effective bodhisattva. Practice patience. That's why they can do these amazing acts of kindness. Because they don't shrink away from suffering. They are not scared of suffering because they know they've got protection.

[61:31]

They've got this great practice of patience, which is their bodyguard. So they can go in the most difficult situations and they do all right because Making the most difficult situation in tiny, tiny doses is constant homeopathy. Liz? When you mentioned about enjoyment, I thought about... I saw a Congolese performer a couple of weeks ago a singer and with them with a group playing with the group and he said of this one song he said this song says you just keep singing no matter what and it was so helpful because he had really realized it and yeah joy just yeah right um really beautiful yeah sing no matter what and i'm sure he's seen horrible stuff right but also take your seat

[62:34]

First, before you start singing, don't just sing in the neighborhood. Don't go to the suburbs and sing. Sing at the center of your suffering. That's the really interesting song. That's why people like Zen humor, because Zen people are somewhat near their suffering. So if they can have some sense of humor with their suffering, people will appreciate that. But somebody who's just, you know, on drugs, who's telling jokes, is not that... But if we can be present in our suffering... and still have some humor, it really encourages people. So we don't have to be that funny if we're present with our suffering. If we can just even consider the possibility of how funny we are. And it's not telling jokes about other people. It's seeing how funny we are in our pitiful situation. I see Trevor. Have you asked a question tonight yet?

[63:42]

No. Okay, go ahead. I was wondering if you could give an example of a minor irritant that maybe you're having right now or you've had recently. Maybe this is it. You know, what that was like for you, if you could describe that a little bit, and maybe even get into what it would be like if you didn't practice patience with it. Well, I'd feel pain right here right now, in my left side of my abdomen. I felt a pain in my leg before, and in that case I didn't cross my legs. I often feel pain in my posture, which I usually feel helped by it because it reminds me, it often reminds me that I'm not taking care of my posture. So that's, in some sense, I'm one of the people who is really helped by pain helping with my posture. Some people just have good posture naturally, and some other people don't have any feedback on their posture from pain, so then they can get by with walking around without being aware of their posture.

[64:53]

But most of the day I get, every few seconds, get painful. Like physical pain? Physical pain from my posture. And what would it be like if you didn't practice patience with that? Well, I think one of the first things that come to mind is I'd be quite a bit more afraid than I am. Not that I'm about fear, but the fear that I try to bring out. I can almost always get into such with a little fear. Like, I have a little fear of perhaps not being a good teacher. Almost always a little bit of fear about that. So where there's no patience, there's some fear? Is that what you're saying? There can be fear even with the patience. But I'm just saying that if I can be patient, then I can face my fear better. And if I could face my fear, I think that helped me be patient.

[65:54]

So they kind of worked together. That's what, you wrote his poem, right? You're welcome. And you? I think there's an impartiality of patience, which is endurance. Which is like, kind of saying that this teaching doesn't really apply, but, you know, I'll get through whatever this phenomenon is without really believing that I'm being helped. And so endurance is kind of like being in a hurry. I have patience almost that doesn't have the category of time, kind of like you were saying. Right. I sometimes find myself getting, you know, fairly rigid around endurance. To let go of that. I know there isn't really a way to get from one to the other, right? By doing it. Yeah, that's a good point. The word endurance is not so helpful in terms of practicing patience because I'm talking about patience more just in the present.

[67:05]

It's actually another aspect of it is forget about endurance or duration. That's another part of being in the present is to forget about duration. Don't think about how long it's been going on or how long it might go on or whether I'll be able to stand it. The thought of, I wonder if I'll be able to continue to practice patience is a dislocation. So yeah, the word endurance has, it's a nice word in a way, but I think it actually causes confusion about what patience is. Patience is not about duration. And if you can do that, that also gets you ready to face the fact that things don't endure. So don't grit your teeth, relax. Go to the present and relax. I was thinking this was kind of related to the discussion earlier about effort. Endurance is kind of this illusion of effort. It's a problematic illusion to have.

[68:08]

It's so painful. Yeah, it's painful and it's tiring. This idea of how long will I be able to endure this, or I'll endure this. I feel okay about saying I want to endure this, but not get into a duration. Are you irritated? I don't feel irritated. I'm just wondering if there's... A little? It's like you're training, just kind of like... Or at least, after you're doing certain kinds of things, which relate to psychological endurance, that sort of, you know, doing more than you think you can... Or less. Yeah, again, patience has to do with not being involved in what you think you can do or what you don't think you can do, but deal with what you're given.

[69:22]

That's enough. You've given enough. You've got plenty to deal with. But we have habits of looking for what we have been dealt with or what we might get dealt with. And I find that that really weakens me when I think about that. And my mind does sort of think about various things I have to do, various things on the horizon, so my mind does display that before me But I feel best when I do not think about how I would like to do it. But I feel fine about thinking about how I would like to do it, but not how I'll be able to. So I'm giving a talk tonight. I have tea this afternoon. I'm giving a class tomorrow night. I'm giving a talk on Saturday. I'm giving a talk on Sunday. If I think about how I'm going to be able to do that, I don't feel well. But if I think about how I want it to happen, I feel fine.

[70:25]

And if I'm present with how it feels to have this stuff on the horizon, it's a little uncomfortable. But if I settle into that, I'm fine. But if I start stretching out to those things, where I am now, there's leakage. And plus, I'm planting seeds for a bad habit. How are you doing back there? I'm sold on this teaching when I'm really doing it, when I'm listening to you, but then some situations come up where I think it doesn't really apply to me. And I guess the analogy I come up with is sometimes when I'm driving, I think, you know, that law doesn't really apply to me. That speed limit doesn't really apply to me. And I notice that it's kind of like to say, in some situations, such and such a preset doesn't apply to me. is a way of being miserable.

[71:28]

And this teaching in particular is kind of a very broad way of, you know, of being reality in some sense. And I think when I get into these kind of narrow ways, like, well, okay, you know, that teaching's okay, but in this case, it doesn't apply. In this case, you know, I've got to endure. So I find what he's saying a little bit, what do you call it, irritating. I'm saying that to Trevor, he wants some examples. It's a little irritating that you're this way. It's not fitting. And it's a little irritating, but I'm glad to have the opportunity to tell Trevor about it. Is anybody else irritated with Neil's situation?

[72:35]

Am I the only one? I'm the only one? I'm irritated with my perplexity with Neil's. Yeah, my perplexity too. There's a little bit of a desire to satisfy this guy and get it over with. Just make this guy happy right now. But it doesn't seem to be working. It's kind of irritating. that that will happen or anything. So you're kind of that way too? I want to figure out, I want to make some kind of analysis, but my mind's kind of too tired. That's your pain, having a mind that can't do the analysis that you want it to do? I sometimes have that problem too, but not right now. I'm a little irritated you're not answering this question. Yeah, right, me too. He would say that I did, right?

[73:39]

Yeah, great, thanks a lot, that's wonderful, I'm okay now. I think he is okay now. Huh? I think he is okay now. Yeah, but it's Oscar. Now Oscar's a little irritated. Because he's possibly, are you irritated? I'm often irritated. But I'm glad you notice that it's often. I would feel, you know, what do I feel? I don't know what I'd feel, but I'd feel something if I found out this is the only time you've ever been irritated in your life. I guess I'd feel honored. But I was the opportunity for you to get in touch with humanity. So anyway... Got some irritation, folks? Bring it out in front. Practice patience with it. Got some fear? Bring it out in front. Practice patience with it.

[74:39]

Or any irritation? You're probably either thoroughly enlightened or in denial. I really like the principle that if it's back there, it will destroy you. If you get it out here, it can reverse. It's hard to get it out here. I'm encouraging us to help each other get it out in front where we can work on it together. Okay. And she knows the word. What's the word? What's the word we use for this? This is yucky. Fear, irritation, yucky. We have to get it out there to practice patience with it. And now she knows the word boire.

[75:32]

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