Today I'd like to say a little more about the relationship between Avalokiteshvara and our sitting. which could also be said the relationship between... or not the... it's kind of a non-dualistic relationship between Bodhidharma sitting and Avalokiteshvara sitting. Now in this Zendo we have Avalokiteshvara sitting. I'm extrapolating from my experience. I've seen lots of statues of Avalokiteshvara in China and Japan.

[01:07]

China is a place where Avalokiteshvara really was transformed, not transformed, but became the dominant form of Avalokiteshvara was female in China. In India it was mostly male, although theoretically Avalokiteshvara in Indian Buddhism could be female. Usually the depictions, the statues and the paintings were male. And they have some beautiful male bodhisattvas, male Avalokiteshvaras. And in China too. But in China they started to make Avalokiteshvara appear as female, beautiful females. And usually nowadays that I've seen in China, the majority that I've seen are standing, or even walking, or even riding on boats.

[02:18]

But here we have a sitting avalokiteshvara. However, even though, and it seems to be female, I don't know, but kind of a feminine appearance, but she's not sitting with her hands in meditation mudra. She has this teaching mudra and a vessel. So I think here she's being rather active. She's not just sitting. She's teaching and she has this vessel to pour something really helpful upon the world. In the 80s, I went, I think for the first time, to Paris. And I went to a museum, which is called, by me, it's called Musée Guimet.

[03:30]

And I'm not sure, maybe some of you know, but I think it's kind of a round museum. Does anybody know? Anyway, it's a lovely, not real big museum in Paris. And they have a... It seems like a major part of their collection is Buddhist art. And I came upon a statue of Avalokiteshvara sitting in a grotto. And I had seen statues of Avalokiteshvara sitting in grottos before. Cave, and there's this apparently feminine form of Avalokiteshvara sitting. But usually it's sitting more like this, holding holding the vase, and often holding a flower.

[04:39]

But in this one particular one, which I've only seen one like that, maybe some of you could make one for me, that one, the Avalokiteshvara, was sitting with her hands in our meditation mudra. And next to her, and to her right and left, there were little shelves in the grotto wall. And on one shelf was her vase, and on the other shelf was her flower. She was just sitting. So for me, I want there to be complete harmony between just sitting and bestowing compassion on all beings and receiving compassion to all beings.

[05:46]

It's not just Avalokiteshvara giving compassion to all beings. She's also receiving compassion And this morning Constance came to see me and she said that a few years ago at a retreat here I mentioned, probably more than once, that all beings are calling. crying for compassion. And all beings are listening to the cries. We are doing both.

[06:51]

However, without some help, we might not know that. So that's why we have a teaching to tell people, we are all crying and we are all listening, and we have a chance to realize that. Constance reminded me of that. And if I may play with your name, I wish for us to be constantly mindful that we are calling and we are listening. Even though people say to us, I'm not calling you, and I don't want you to listen to me. Some teenagers sometimes say that to their parents.

[07:55]

I don't want you to listen to me. But you do want me to listen to that, right? Yeah. So, she reminded me of that. And also, she showed me one of her works of art. which is, I think it's called, it's a book, it's a book of stories and pastel paintings, photographs of her pastel paintings. And she said one of the stories was inspired by the teaching that you gave, the teaching that we're all calling, and listening. And I asked her how she'd feel about reading her story to you.

[09:04]

And she said that she would be happy to. Would you read us your story and show us your painting, your drawing? Could you maybe come up here? Would you be comfortable coming up here? Would you like to stand or sit? Okay, you can stand here. It's a drawing of a green ear in the sky, if you can see it. Do you see an ear in the sky? There's an ear in the sky, and it's over an ocean with an overturned boat. I'll correct you. Can you speak into the corner?

[10:10]

I'll hold it for you. It's called Kamsayon. The underwater cries of the drowning are silent, you might think. But no, they shoot through the winding corridors of the ear in the sky instantaneously and beat on the drum as insistently as any of the multitude of other cries. This ear, with this ear drum, is Kang Zeon. Remember, when you cry, and you are always crying, adding your beat to the great roar of the universal engine, you are beating the drum of the great green ear, Kanzeon. Thank you. This morning you may have noticed, those of you who were here for morning service, and those of you who weren't, let me tell you that this morning we did a chant.

[12:13]

And it's called Emme-juku Kanon-gyo, which means that the extending life of the expanding life. Ten-verse sutra of Kanse-an. In the sutra it says, you know, moment by moment remember Kanse-an. Day and night remember. develop constants in this practice. Of course, we have to train. So we do the chant, and then chant's over. The chant told us, moment by moment, continue this practice. And this creates the causes and condition of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha.

[13:25]

this constant remembering of great compassion. We chanted that in Japanese, but that I translated for you. Nen-nen, moment by moment, thought by thought. Nen-nen, kanze on. And then we also chanted the fundamental encouragements for the ceremony of sitting zazen. Fundamental encouragements for doing the sitting practice you're doing here. And in that text, you may have heard, Bodhidharma's nine years of wall-gazing are noticeable still.

[14:28]

For example, you, all of you. You are Bodhidharma's nine years of wall-gazing. We can notice it right here in you, each of you. without your practice and the practice of others like you, we wouldn't be able to notice the nine years of wall-gazing of Bodhidharma. Now, these nine years that he was gazing at the wall, or nine years of his sitting facing the wall, that was nine years of Avalokiteshvara sitting He was a male version. That statue I saw was a female version of sitting.

[15:32]

Great compassion. I think I heard Gary Snyder say this one time, and then after that I heard myself say it many times, which is something like, first we clean the temple, then we sit. It seems like even though really we're always just sitting, we seem to need to clean the temple first. Otherwise, you know, we might feel like, oh, when we're sitting, oh, I forgot to turn the stove off.

[16:40]

Or, oh, I forgot to turn the rice on. Oh, I forgot to clean the entryway. Oh, I forgot to. Or, oh, this place is a mess. Anyway, clean the temple so we can just sit. So I think I want to talk to you quite a bit about cleaning the temple so that you can just sit like Avalokiteshvara sits. You can just sit like Bodhidharma sits. 100% of your body and mind, great compassion. But we may have to do some housecleaning in order to do that. Here's another, here's a recent example of house cleaning which happened during this retreat.

[18:24]

I can't remember exactly how I received a report of this housecleaning, but this is what I kind of remember, is that somebody came to see me and told me that they were contemplating the bodhisattva precept on not intoxicating ourselves. Number five of the ten major precepts is to not intoxicate mind or body. And she remembered a comment on that precept which comes from Dogen, which is when nothing is brought in. This precept's about not bringing anything in.

[19:40]

When nothing is brought in, that is great purity." And then she brought up an example where she wondered how that relates to the precept. She said, when she came here to this retreat from kind of a hectic and busy world of Houston or some other place like that. She came here, and she arrived, and she arrived. And after she arrived, she felt peaceful. I don't remember her saying so, but I think she felt some joy at feeling peaceful.

[20:50]

And then a thought arose, which was, is there something more? So here's a housecleaning opportunity. If you ever happen to be blessed with peace, right in the middle of that blessing, the thought might arise, is there something more? And also that thought might have the nuance or the implication that you have some questioning of the peace.

[22:01]

And this relates to bringing something in. The peace that she reported, she didn't bring the peace in. It was given to her. She came here, and she arrived, and she was given peace. Peace is given to us. And then she had this thought, but is there something more? In other words, almost like, should I do something? Should I bring something in? But that thought is just the same. It's given to her. When she quoted the

[23:15]

comment on the precept, I thought, what about eating? What about going to the dining hall and having some polenta? Was that polenta? What about having some cornmeal? Well, if we bring the cornmeal in, then we're going against the precept. We're bringing something in. And animals, untrained animals, that's the way they see it. Bringing it in, bringing the food, bringing the resources. This is not the reality. But this is what we deluded animals sometimes think. Get it.

[24:17]

Bring it in. This priest kept saying, when nothing's brought in, that's where it's at. The peace was given. She didn't bring it in. The thought, is there something more, was given. She didn't bring it in. She could have gone on and said, what should I do now that I have peace? How can I share it? I don't know. But those also could be seen as bringing in, and then they're like intoxicants or gifts, and then they're like peace. During this retreat, we've already had quite a few opportunities to receive gifts from the kitchen. Have you noticed? There might be more. To the dining hall.

[25:21]

And not bring anything in. We can eat our meals without bringing anything in. We can relate to our food not as an intoxicant. Not as something we bring in for ourselves. Something that's given to us. And fortunately for this practice, during this retreat, actually it's also true when we have orioke meals, the food is given to us. We could have a buffet and then you go up and serve yourself. And even then, it's given to you. The spoon is given to you. Your body is given to you.

[26:24]

This food is given to you. And you can receive it. And when you receive it, you are a gift. you're also given when you receive. And you're also a gift when you receive. You're a gift to the kitchen crew. They do not want to make that food and have it just sit there. They want you to receive it. They don't want you to... I don't know, I can't speak for the kitchen staff, but... But I'll pretend I'm on the kitchen staff and say, we give you this food, you're not taking it. You didn't come here and take that food. We gave it to you. What pops in my mind is the story that I mentioned it being upright of this human being who was befriended by a Catholic bishop. Anyway, a Catholic priest.

[27:27]

And he was staying at the priest's house because he didn't have anywhere to stay And one thing led to another and he took some silver candlesticks and some silver plates from the priest's house and absconded with them. And the police caught him and brought him back to the priest. And I remember exactly what they said. Are these your silver plates? And are these your candlesticks? We caught this guy with them. He stole them from you, we think. The priest said, well, they used to be mine, but they're not mine anymore. I gave them to him. So this priest knew that nobody really steals anything. Everything's given. And this kind of broke, you know, actually... And then after the police left, the guy said, why did you say that?

[28:36]

I stole those from you. He said, no, you didn't. I gave them to you. And now you belong to God. And from then on, he struggled with that teaching that he was working for God now. Yeah, so that precept is saying don't fall into the trap of thinking that you are getting what supports your life, that you're getting your food and you're getting your clothing and you're getting, you know, your shelter. It's been given to you. This is the reversal of our thinking. This is part of cleaning house so you can sit. We don't do anything by ourselves.

[29:39]

Everything we do is with the support of all beings. And it's always been that way. And every baby, when they're born, has to be taught that, little by little, as they can learn it. Because they naturally, without education, they are deluded. And they think that they're going to get that milk from their mother. They don't get that she's giving it to them. They think they've got to pull it in with their mouths. But even their sucking is a gift. So that's part of the housecleaning of being able to just sit and realize, okay, now we're sitting great compassion. I don't have to bring great compassion in I'm going to sit here and I'm going to practice giving.

[30:44]

I'm going to give myself to Siddhi and Siddhi is going to give it to me. I'm going to give myself to Great Compassion and Great Compassion is going to come to me. I'm going to listen to all beings and all beings are going to listen to me. And when we notice, which people report But they don't think that way. They think they've got to get good compassion, they've got to get concentration, they've got to get peace. We notice that this is a house-cleaning opportunity. And don't be mean to this dust of getting. Just listen to it. Oh, you think you're going to get out of that? You think you're going to get compassion? Okay. I hear you.

[31:46]

And do you really hear yourself? Yeah, so again, before you sit, clean house, and realize that the sitting is not something you're doing on your own. It's not something you're going to... You're not going to get peace. You're not going to get concentration. You're not going to get completely being settled. You're going to give yourself to that. You're going to give yourself to be just where you are in this moment. And being just where you are in this moment is given as you. To you, not even to you. It's given as you.

[32:56]

Your being present is given as you being present. And if you're not ready for that teaching, it's given to you. Bodhidharma's practice is given to us. We don't get it. Avalokiteshvara's practice is given to us. And we need to complete the picture of giving ourselves to it. It's given to us, we need to give ourselves to it. We need to give ourselves moment by moment to get compassion. It's been given to us moment by moment, and we have the opportunity to give ourselves to it moment by moment, no matter what's happening. Looking at a tree, receive compassion, give compassion, be compassionate. Now, I receive gifts, people give me gifts of housecleaning opportunities.

[34:12]

They tell me stuff that's kind of a little bit of bringing something in to be or adding something to just being present. They tell me about this. So I have some other current examples that have already come up in this retreat that I think maybe, if you'll help me, I'll give you these house spending opportunities in bite size, you know, gradually rather than give you a whole bunch today. I mean, rather than give you the ones that I've heard so far in this retreat, but remind me. I think I'll remember them, and I'll tell you later in the retreat. Other examples of housecleaning that people have told me about that were opportunities to more fully just sit. Okay? You want to remind me later?

[35:14]

I'm saying these are examples from this retreat that I've already heard of people telling me, showing me things that are kind of little housecleaning activities to help them sit fully. Now I want to bring up the thing I brought up yesterday, which is, this is more of a general thing, and then I'll try to make it specific. The general thing is, We really need, we really need to develop the skill to look at every living being as something precious, something we really cherish and want to protect. We need to learn that and train ourselves with that. Compassion is the main cause for Buddhahood, and Buddhahood is protecting all beings who are suffering in the prisons of samsara, who are suffering in the prisons of repetitive birth and death.

[36:45]

Buddhahood is that compassion to protect beings who are suffering in the prisons of some sort. Yesterday, as many of you know, Dave Johnson came to visit. Did somebody see him? Did you see him, Betty? He was not all over the place, but he came for a little while yesterday. And I had a little talk with him. And it was very nice talk. I was blessed with him in quite good condition. But he was talking to me about getting ready to die.

[37:54]

Towards the latter part of our conversation, I think two, maybe three times, I would say he burst into tears of gratitude. In the midst of his suffering, he felt such gratitude for the Dharma. And he said, do you have any tissues? And I went looking and I couldn't find any. So I brought a toilet paper. And that was okay for him. He said it's cheaper, too. And then again, he was overwhelmed by gratitude. He said, I love this practice.

[39:02]

Yeah, I didn't feel like he got that. It was given to him. The practice was given to him, and his awareness, his love for the practice was given to him. In the midst of his really having a hard time, Yeah, it was a very good meeting to see all that gratitude for the teaching and the practice. So again, It's a new ball game for many people to start practicing seeing everybody as a precious living being.

[40:12]

It's a practice which, even though some of us are not so young, we never have taken on. So before I go, I want to make sure at least you hear about this practice, and you can practice it for the rest of your life. And I hope I do too. I've been trying for a while. I'm not very good at it, in terms of, I wouldn't say I have Complete constants. But I'm working at it. And in that regard, I received a gift from one of you. which was a report on studying the final, you could say chapter, but it's actually a sutra, a whole sutra, but it's also a chapter of the Avatamsaka Sutra, the Flower Adornment Scripture, the last chapter, the great chapter about the wonderful little pilgrim boy who goes and visits 53 teachers

[41:37]

And all those teachers can see him, what a sincere little boy he was. Of course, they keep calling him boy, but sometimes there's many years between the visiting of the teachers. He talks to this teacher and then for 12 years he travels to meet the next teacher. So he's a very old little boy by the time he's traveling. Anyway, eons go by of visiting teachers. This sutra is kind of a model for traditional Chinese Zen, where monks and nuns travel to meet teachers. But the point made by this person who told me about this study was each teacher welcomed, really welcomed, this pilgrim. Now, there doesn't need to be any reason why they welcomed him, but in fact they welcomed a great pilgrim.

[42:54]

It was an honor that he came to visit them. The last teacher who sent... He was referred to each teacher by the previous teacher. And the last teacher told him how great this teacher was. And he traveled great... He made a tremendous effort with the vision that I'm going to meet a great teacher. and I'm willing to go for a long time to meet this teacher. And so when he finally arrived, the teachers welcomed him. They knew what he had gone through to visit them. Anyway, they welcomed him. In that sutra, there's lots of female teachers, lots of female teachers. A lot of them are in the form, some of them are in the form of nuns, and some of them, many of them are in the form of goddesses. So this Bodhisattva pilgrim visits many goddesses.

[43:55]

And one of the goddesses told him something like this. Every perception, which means, you could also say, every perception of every being, whoever you are perceiving, but also a tree, the wind, the sky, pain, pleasure, fear, all your internal states, as you perceive them in a moment of perception of them, and as you perceive another person, perception, [...] perception. Every perception you have is the light of Vairajana Buddha's body coming out of the pore of Vairajana Buddha's body to you.

[45:09]

You are seeing the light of Buddha's body. If that's not precious enough for you, let me know. Everybody is bringing you the light of the Buddha body. When we see each other, sometimes it's pleasant, sometimes it's not. But when we see each other, we're basically seeing perceptions of each other. This perception, this perception. Yeah, I have a special perception for each of you. And how does that work? It's not like I have a perception for you and then the same one for him. For each of you, things work out in such a way that I'm given a perception of you. But my perception of you is not who you are. But it's a way that I can see you. And the way to see who you are is not to grasp the perception of you as you, but rather grasp the perception of you as the way I'm going to learn about you, as a light to guide me to you.

[46:25]

I confess to you that I've lately been having some perceptions of the current president of the United States. I have perceptions of him. Actually, I have perceptions of pictures of him. And he looks like a... I don't know, he's about my age, I think. But he looks like he's having a hard time. Working really hard. But he looks like he's having a hard time And he looks fragile. Which, of course, he is. And he's not... I don't perceive him as somebody who's trying to say, I'm indestructible.

[47:37]

Anyway, I have these perceptions of him. And I feel like he's having a hard time. I think, oh... So it's not so difficult for me to want to protect him and see him as a precious, fragile, suffering person. He's the president. He tries to smile. He tries to smile in the midst of all this. But he looks like he's suffering to me. but he also looks like, yeah, I'm not going to abandon him. So anyway, for a year or so I've been having perceptions of him, and lately I've been feeling more, you know, I guess I feel empathy that he's having, that if I was in his shoes, it would be hard

[48:49]

And then for even a longer time I've been having, I was having, and I still am having perceptions of the previous president who, yeah, he looks like he's really suffering to me. He looks really scared. And I hear the teaching that he's an opportunity for me to see the light of the Buddha's body. No matter what he's doing, even if he's... Looks like the perception I have is he's maybe being cruel. I have a perception maybe of cruelty and disrespect, of disrespect. I have a perception of disrespect.

[49:55]

That's a being. I didn't hear, I have not heard the teaching in Buddhism, when you have a perception of disrespect, do the same to it. No, I hear, welcome that perception with great compassion. Protect that being that is suffering in this world of birth and death. Then you will be able to develop great compassion for that person, but for this whole world. But if I start making exceptions to who's going to get it and who's not, That's kind of like, well, I'm in charge. I'm generating this rather than I'm receiving and giving this practice. So, yeah.

[50:58]

And there's some other people, too, that I see being cruel. That's what it looks like. And they look like they're being disrespectful, and if you ask them, are you being disrespectful, they would say, I sure am. I do not respect those people. I think those people are not worthy of respect, and I'm not going to. Well, this is an uneducated, untrained, deluded child. This is a little baby bodhisattva who has got almost very, you know, not much training. So they're in pain and they're lashing out and, you know, this is all, you know, you see this, don't you? All these suffering beings where nobody's helping them learn how to be respectful. Who's going to teach them? Our vow is that we vow to teach them how to respect all beings.

[52:03]

Anybody who's not respecting a being, we vow to teach them that. Dharma gates are boundless. We vow to learn them. How can I teach this person who's disrespecting someone to respect someone? That's the first thing. Now I'm going to try. But first of all, remember, that's what you're doing. And then maybe you'll find a way. And maybe you'll be successful. Like I heard this story from a... I heard a beautiful... I told you. I heard a beautiful female voice. And it was the voice of a woman named Robin... Miles, I think. And she was reading a book by Isabel Wilkerson.

[53:08]

And so the story is about Isabel Wilkerson, told by Isabel Wilkerson, read by Robin Miles to me. And it's a long story. I'm not going to really try to do the whole story. I'll just do an abbreviated version. The abbreviated version is... Yeah, I think there was... Yeah. there were some heavy rains and floods, and Isabel noticed that in her basement there was a lot of flooding. But the flooding lasted, you know, long after the waters receded. So she had a plumber come in, and, oh no, somebody else came in.

[54:13]

and did some work and told her that the sump pump was working, but there was still water. And so then she had a plumber come in, and the plumber So Isabel Wilkerson is an African-American woman, and she had just lost her mother and her husband. So she's a widow and an orphan, and now she's got this big problem in her house. She has a plumber come in, they go downstairs, and she's trying to get his help to figure out what the problem is. And basically, he's not very helpful to her. She's asking, could it be this, could it be that? And he said, I don't know, maybe.

[55:16]

Anyway, again, she said he wasn't very helpful to her and he wasn't respectful to her. But I think she had this little feeling of that there might be some, maybe there's some light there in this person. So I think she said, I decided to do a Hail Mary to his humanity. And I would say, I decided to do a Hail Mary to his bodhisattva humanity. Because humans aren't necessarily on the bodhisattva path in a way that they can enact. And so she said to him, while they're in the basement, you know, he's not helping her. She says, I just want to tell you that my mother recently died and I'm having a hard time.

[56:32]

He says something like, uh-huh. And she said, how about your mom? Is she still living? And he said, no. And she said, what about your dad? And he said, well, he's still alive, but he's not good. And they kept talking about their mothers. And after a while, he said, I got an idea. Maybe this is the problem. And he went over and investigated and found what the problem was and fixed it. And it cost $69. And she thought, that's worth it. It's a reasonable charge. But she gave him a gift.

[57:38]

She reached out to him, even though he had been mean to her. I guess she thought maybe she could see a little light. And she threw this gift to that light. And it got to him. And they became friends in the basement. She taught him. And this lesson must be done over and over, moment by moment. Nen-nen. To awaken this in ourselves, she hadn't really liked you might say lost it, and just, you know, blow up.

[58:45]

But she did not blow up at him. She was patient with him, not helping her and not respecting her. And in that patience, somehow, the light came to her and she could offer something to him. And it reached him. But she wanted to do that. She didn't know it would work. Does everybody know what a Hail Mary is? This is Texas, after all. She wanted to reach, and not just to get the plumbing fixed. She wanted to reach another human being who was pushing her away And not even respecting her enough to say, I'm pushing you over. Just really not helping her.

[59:46]

And she needed help. She needed help, just like he did. So she said, okay, I'm going to try. She could have tried to run away, but I guess she had to find out that she needed to try. Mm-hmm. And before she blew it, she sent the ray of light. And he saw it, and he joined it, and they got the job done. And then she told a story just before that about having lunch or meal, dinner maybe, with a white friend of hers. And they went to a restaurant. And I think the restaurant was a restaurant that this person already knew, her white friend knew. And so they went into the restaurant and they sat down. And again, to make a long story short, they were not treated well.

[60:52]

And all the people around them were treated well. And all the people around them were of the dominant class, known as white people. And the waiter was not being helpful. He wasn't helping them. He was not helping them. And anyway, they tried to help him. They tried to reach him and get him to help us, and he wouldn't help them. And then finally they brought the food and it was cold. Virtually they couldn't eat it. And the white person was not patient. The white person blew up and scared everybody. And it was not helpful.

[62:07]

But she did it. She blew her top. Because she'd never been treated that way before. And she didn't want her friend to be treated that way, of course. But she blew her top. And it wasn't helpful. It wasn't helpful, period. And Isabel said that actually she was a little envious that this person could do that and get by with it. She could make such a big squawk and not get the police called. The manager came out and apologized. But still it was too late. the meal had been ruined by this disrespect for her. And they couldn't reach, they did not reach the waiter and wake him up.

[63:11]

Couldn't do it. They missed it. That was just too big a challenge. Matter of fact, what her friend did was, yeah, it's not, it probably was harmful. That was the one story. Then the next story is about showing how to do it. Don't just blow up and scare everybody. Send the light of compassion and wake them up. That's what we're here for. And then we want to... When we're sitting, we want to sit in that compassion and practice that compassion and remember that compassion. And then when we get up from sitting, take it out of the zentno and practice it. When we get our meals and when we do our work and when we greet each other and do it and do it and do it so that we can do it when we meet disrespectful

[64:31]

unkind people who are suffering in this world. So again, this is a practice which is hard to do, but it sets the stage for then practicing loving-kindness and practicing compassion. So I'm kind of saying again, if we don't do this work, which is compassion work, but it's also work which prepares us to really sincerely wish that somebody who's being disrespectful really wished that they would be happy. Love and kindness, really. Now you can also just say it over, you know, you can also just practice loving kindness over and over. That's also a way that can wake you up to this. But to really see that you want this person, that it's a life and death matter for you that this person be happy, you kind of have to get them to be something like someone you really love and appreciate.

[65:50]

Who's being cruel to you? like the priest could see in the thief. Like Isabel somehow could see a glimmer of it in the plumber. We need to find that. Then we can really wish people happy. You can try wishing people happiness and ease before that. See how it goes. You may find, oh, I don't really mean it. And then try it with somebody who you really do cherish and you find, I really do mean it. Actually, wow, I really do want them to be happy. It's like, it's like, it seems like that's all I want. How wonderful. Now let's do it with somebody else, shall we? Okay. So this is house cleaning to get ready to completely sit like Avalokiteshvara sits.

[66:53]

What time is it? 11.35. Okay. So, we've been going on a long time, so is it okay if we don't have any other questions or anything, but if you feel like you really need one to bring forth the question, I'm happy to, but it's a little bit late for that. What do you say? Should we conclude? Is that all right? You have a quizzical look on your face. What's your opinion? What's your view? Maybe one or two questions. Maybe one or two questions. Well, since she said Alice, and also the other two, perhaps she said maybe. So maybe. I think maybe. Oh, there's a maybe, yes.

[68:01]

I want to know how you are. How I am? Yeah, especially in the... Let's see. Well... Yesterday there was increased swelling in my leg, and I got some ice packs, so I'm going to do some ice packs after lunch. My energy, I don't feel exhausted. I'm resting also on the breaks. And the food is giving me warmth and also it's not super hot. Thank you. So I think I'm doing pretty well. Thank you for your support. Yes. Yes. Would you talk about the near enemy of compassion, pity?

[69:04]

Would you say it again, please? Would you talk about the near enemy of compassion? Oh, yeah. In some places, when they talk about the four divine abodes, which are loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity, the near enemies of compassion are, one of them is, Or even lust. In the movies you sometimes see that, you know, somebody's like crying and then somebody hugs them and they start kissing. Oh, oh. But what's the idea at the beginning? And the other person wasn't asking for that, but... So, some greed or lust can come for the person that you're embracing with compassion.

[70:06]

That's one danger. The other danger is depression. So again, when you listen to the cries and you taste the bitterness of people suffering, you've got to be careful because you can bury yourself in it. You've got to be sensitive to when it's time to take a break when you've done it enough. And maybe take a walk or just sit quietly, take a little break from it. Yeah. And practice compassion with it and then maybe listen to some more. But we can... I remember what just popped in my mind was one of the beat poets in San Francisco was named Lou Welch, friends with Gary Snyder and Allen Ginsberg and so on.

[71:08]

And one of his poems was, he was walking down the street in San Francisco And he saw a black man sitting on the steps of an apartment building with his head in his hands, crying. And the Welch said, if I see one more thing like that, I'm out of here. He couldn't stand it. The suffering of his friends was killing him, was depressing him. And he's saying, I'm going to get so depressed if I see any more of this, I'm out of here. And then, not long after that poem, he was out of here. He disappeared. He couldn't stand. So we have to be careful of compassion. That's why we need other practices to go with it, to keep our energy up, to feel enthusiasm for this practice.

[72:18]

Otherwise we can slip into depression. So it's a danger over there. And the other one's also a danger. We have to watch out for that. So some people are really practicing compassion and they slip to one side or the other. That's why we need friends and teachers to keep an eye on our practice to make sure we're not getting depressed or lustful or possessive. Thank you for listening to my cries. I'm enjoying listening to yours.

[73:02]

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