I have an intention to make a request of you and I have the intention to say to you before I make the request that after you hear the request, before you act upon the request, that you notice the intention, that you notice how you intend to respond. I'm going to ask you to do something with your body. And after you hear the request, you will have some kind of response to that, which might turn into the intention, to an intention to respond to it. I'd like you to identify the intention before you express that intention with your body.

[01:06]

And I'd like to also make the request to me, too. And the request is, I request that we stand up. For me, in the process of expressing the intent, when I made that request, I actually wanted to stand up.

[02:19]

I wished to stand up. I noticed that in myself, and then I started to express that wish to stand up, and I noticed that there were other wishes to do other physical things. in the process. For example, I wished or I intended to uncross my legs. And there were lots of other little wishes I had in order to fulfill the big wish, the big intention to stand up. Did you notice that? There were a lot of intentions there. And now I have an intention to ask Alice if, when the water is hot, if she could pour some hot water into that cup. But I saw the intention, I looked and saw the intention to ask her that before I said it.

[03:23]

Now I have, I see a wish to ask you to do something else, and when you hear this, please look and see what intention arises in your mind when I say this. Please sit down. When I finished standing up, or when the physical expression of the wish to stand up was complete, I found myself in the position pretty much you see me in now.

[04:32]

And it turns out my legs are kind of far apart. And when I got here, I felt a little uncomfortable with them that far apart. And I felt some... I felt some relationship between my body and the ground and all of you, such that I kind of wanted to bring my legs together, but another part of me didn't want to bring them together because I thought this is a good example of actually I felt the impulse to bring the legs together, to stand with my feet closer together. But because of another pattern of wanting to tell you about this, I didn't do it. But now I wish to do it, and again, in order to accomplish it, I kind of need to move my weight over to my right leg or to my left leg in order to lift the other one and bring it close, or I need to bend both legs and jump up in the air to bring them both together at the same time, which I think I'm going to do that way.

[05:36]

I'm going to lower myself now. I have the intention to lower myself and then quickly push myself up in the air so I'll leave the earth temporarily and bring it together. And I didn't do that just to entertain you. Also, when walking, I noticed, and I don't know what you noticed, but I'll just tell you, I noticed that it actually, in order to notice the intention of each step, it was hard for me to walk fast at first. Did anybody notice that? But it is not impossible to notice the impulse or the intention or wish to move your leg and actually notice it and still be able to move quickly. But in order to do that, you have to be more attentive to the present moment.

[06:37]

And the impulse to arise can happen in the present, and you can notice it and move, and then the next moment you can notice another impulse and move. So you can actually walk rapidly and feel the intention to move your leg each time. I propose that to you, that you might be able to find that. This is paying more attention to the intentions of walking than we normally do. However, and that makes you walking more, that makes you walking into walking meditation in that you're noticing before every voluntary act, you're noticing the volition. There are voluntary acts, you are willing them, and you can learn to notice your will. Now, if you do that, you may have trouble thinking about other things besides walking while you're walking.

[07:45]

And that's part of walking meditation, is to actually be noticing that you're walking when you're walking. And you can walk, and every moment you walk there is the volition to take a step, but you don't have to notice that. Because the volition is there and is expressing itself, And here is another big, you know, thunderous observation. It has thunderous consequences. We are active every moment. We do have will every moment. We do wish every moment. Every step you take, you do actually intend to take that step. Not exactly the way it came off, but there is an intention. There is. Every moment everybody has an intention, but not very many people notice it.

[08:50]

And for most people it requires quite a bit of training to actually notice what's there. Notice the wish that's there. As I could see during this exercise that actually I do not always pay attention to every step I take. In other words, my walking is not always walking meditation. Sometimes you want to walk just to get someplace So you're more concerned with getting there than noticing your intention to take all the steps that are necessary to get there. So then you're not doing walking meditation, even though you're walking fairly successfully. Because you're not noticing, you're not noticing your action. You're not noticing your intention.

[10:01]

And again, the what we call fire and brimstone comment is, that if we do not spend, if we do not give close attention to all of our actions we will not see, you know, our actual true relationship with everyone. We will not see that we're in this loving relationship with the world. Not looking at our action Not only will we not see that, but it causes further obstructions to being able to see it and deadens our vision. When you first walked, I don't know about you actually, I wasn't there, but I've seen some babies when they first walk, and some of you may have seen that too, and it is a momentous moment. You ever seen that?

[11:03]

Like the first steps they take? The baby is like, you know, this is like, it's like a step. You know, they do not necessarily notice their intention, but they're very much like, this is a big deal. But they might say, I want to move the leg. They can't say this yet, usually. I want to move the leg. And the leg is moved. I want to move the leg, and the leg moves. I don't want to fall over, and I didn't. All these people are looking at me, and they're smiling, and they're so happy, and I'm so happy. But the baby, I've seen some babies, they're not necessarily smiling when they're doing it, because they're so concentrated, and they're a little bit scared. But they are managing to do this amazing thing, is that their bodies, being human,

[12:07]

gravity, parents and everything, they do want to walk, they do want to stand up, they want to learn this thing, they want to do this thing, and it's like taking their whole being to do it, and they're not thinking about anything else. Well, they're a little bit aware of these other people, but they're aware that these other people want them to succeed at this amazing feat. And they can see the happiness in the other people. And once they complete that and maybe somebody can hold them for a little while, then they can enjoy this tremendous achievement of life. And then we stop thinking that we have better things to do than that after that, right? We really do not have better things to do than be aware of what we're doing. We have other things to do besides be aware of what we're doing.

[13:14]

like see clearly and enjoy what we're doing, but we kind of need to first of all, number one, pay attention to all our actions. So I just came from a monastery supposedly and there's monks in the monastery and they're doing various activities. So since they're in monasteries and they're monks, they're doing monastic activity. They're practicing Zen in the monastery. They're walking around in the monastery. They're bowing at the monastery. They're sitting at the monastery. They're eating. They're making meals. They're repairing equipment. These are the activities of the monks. And they often do these things very well, very skillfully.

[14:18]

But if they're not paying attention to their intention. If they don't notice that all these actions arise from how they see themselves in relationship to the world, if they don't notice this, they are not doing their job as monks. They are not doing the meditation practice which is supposed to be going on no matter what activities are occurring in the community. And if they don't do these things, then these monks in this monastery, these monasteries, they will not see that they love everyone. They're supposed to be up there seeing that. People are supporting them to go in the mountains. Go to the mountains and see that you love everyone. Find out that you love everyone and find out that everyone loves you. I'm too busy down here to see that kind of stuff.

[15:32]

You go do that. And when you find out, come back and tell me that it's true. So they're up there, and if they don't do that, they're forgetting what they went there for. They went there to find out about Buddha's compassion. And Buddha's compassion is not just Buddha's compassion towards you. It's also how you support Buddha. We don't really have compassion for Buddhists because they don't need it. But we love Buddha. We do love Buddha, and Buddha loves us. And we call Buddha's love to us compassion because Buddha feels some pain if we're not doing our job. Buddha feels pain if we can't see that Buddha loves us and that we love Buddha. And Buddha feels pain at our pain of not seeing that we love each other. Buddha feels pain at our pain when we don't feel generous with each other. When we don't feel generous towards people, we do not feel good.

[16:35]

And the reason why we don't feel good is because we are generous with people. We are generous with people but we can't see it because we do not pay attention to every action and we have not been paying attention to every action. And because we didn't in the past we have karmic obstructions which make it hard for us now to look at every action and also make it hard for us to see that we are generous with everyone and everyone is generous with us. If you do your job as a meditator and notice, give close attention, give close attention to every action, if you do that, you will see this. But even before you see this, you will still be doing your job. you may have to do your job of meditating on what you're doing for a long time before you can see that everyone loves you and you love everyone including everyone loves you all the people who don't know that they love you they do love you but they don't know it because they have karmic obstructions and you will see that if they would do this meditation

[17:59]

If they would give close attention to their actions, all their actions, their karmic obstructions would be removed and they would see that they love you and you love them. They would see that. This is what Buddha sees every moment. And Buddha sees that people do not see this, so Buddha gives instruction about how to see this. And it's very simple but it's a very different way of living. It's very simple, just turn the light around, look inside and see what the activity of your mind is. See how you see yourself in relationship to the physical and living world. See how you see your body related to the physical, to the earth and the room

[19:07]

in the ocean, see how you see your body related to the other people and see how that is and then see what that pattern is and notice that that pattern has a kind of wish to it. Like when you see someone as your friend and she's in pain, you want to help her. You see that pattern of relationship that you care for her, she cares for you, she needs your help there's no resistance to it, and you want to, and therefore there is a very clear wish, I want to help her. Or you see yourself in a relationship with someone and they want you to help them do something you don't think is good for them. And the pattern of relationship that you see is, I do not want to help you do that. I want to help you not do that. But sometimes you see yourself in a relationship with somebody, you say, you're not my friend.

[20:12]

I don't want to help you. You don't want to help me. We're enemies. We're not connected. And so if you need help, I don't feel the intention to help you because I don't see that we're in that relationship. And that's a terrible situation that we sometimes feel, that we see another person or animal and they call out for help and our heart feels closed and blocked and obstructed, and we feel not so good. But what I'm saying to you is that if you would look and see that, see such moments of intention that aren't so good, those intentions will be transformed, will evolve in the direction of feeling less obstruction between yourself and beings, more skill and more clarity.

[21:12]

The pattern of relationship in your mind every moment, which is the activity of your mind, the way you see yourself in the world, in the world with you, that is constantly changing. It is constantly changing. If you don't look at it, it will change. If you do look at it, it will change. If you don't look at it, it will change in a negative way. It will change anyway whether you look or not, but if you don't look at your intention, your intentions will deteriorate in the sense that they will become less compassionate, less skillful, and less happy-causing. If you look at your intentions, they will also change, but they will change in a positive way, and your vision will change with them, will become better with them.

[22:20]

A negative intention, a negative pattern of relationship with the world, when observed, you will be able to see it, that observation of the negative thing will cause a positive evolution. The negative thing has perhaps negative consequences, but the awareness of it contributes to positive evolution. A positive intention unobserved contributes to deterioration. So again, that's some big, heavy statements, or I don't know what kind of statements, big statements. So I invite you, do you have any feedback? And watch your intentions when you give it. I invite it. I request it. When you requested us to stand up, the first thing I noticed was confusion and then some doubt.

[23:30]

Confusion? What kind of confusion? What do you mean by confusion? What did you see? Confusion is good, but... Like, well, when exactly do I do this? Yeah. Are we all doing this together? Right. I was surprised to see those things before any... Right. Good. Sometimes when you look at your intention, you see it's kind of foggy. Or, you know, it's foggy. Sometimes you look inside, it's kind of foggy in there. Or you see contradictory elements. Or you see a couple of things like, all you see is, I want to stand up. Then you notice, oh, there's other people. So maybe, you know, maybe I shouldn't be the first one or something like that. At first you see, I want to stand up, and you notice I want to stand up lives in your picture of your relationship with the whole world.

[24:33]

And that's right, it does. So that makes it, if you look and you hadn't been looking before, you notice that your movements are actually I could say more complex, but anyway, there's lots more going on there in the picture than you usually notice. When you start looking, you notice all that. And some people would again say, I don't want to look because I don't want to see all the complications. So I have impulse to have some tea now. I'm going to go down where the tea is. Yes. Yes. I never realized until you said it that you can have positive intentions that have never observed a negative spiral, I don't know how you say it, that's what it is.

[25:36]

I thought a non-positive result could happen. It causes a negative evolution. A negative evolution of yourself. Not so much of yourself, but of the patterns of relationship in your consciousness. Yeah, like if you have a picture in your consciousness of your relationship with the world, that's your activity of your consciousness. And if the picture is one of you appreciating a lot of people and feeling appreciation from a lot of people, when we appreciate people and we feel appreciation we tend to want to not hurt them. We tend to want to protect this precious appreciator an appreciatee. So that's kind of a wholesome, beneficent view of your relationship with the world, which is good. It's good, but if you don't watch it, that not watching will cause those kinds of consciousnesses not to arise so much.

[26:38]

For two reasons. One is that not watching your karma creates karmic obstruction. And karmic obstruction to what? Karmic obstruction to such lovely fields of relationship. I have been dealing for so long with such negative emotions and negative reactions to my own body sensations because I had a lot of stuff. And I got really good at observing everything that arose and allowing it to be and watch it change. And now I've come through that period of just being mired and I've crossed over somehow to some other ways and you're telling me now because it's so incredible because I got so used to focusing on cleansing and

[28:02]

letting go of negative patterns and reactions and judgments that I didn't give myself credit. I mean, I don't mean, you know, oh, pat me on the back, you're doing a nice thing here, but I didn't even bother looking to observe all the good I was doing because I was so busy. Oh, watching what I was doing that was arriving that was negative, or feeling, or whatever. So this is like this huge shift in perspective of watching the positive, not so much well, to make myself feel good, but to acknowledge what's already there. It's bringing into balance. It's totally bringing into balance the observing mind and creates positivity. That's fabulous.

[29:05]

Thank you for telling me that. I really appreciate it. Yeah, before you were half right. the stuff you were studying was good that you were studying it and you attest to that studying that difficult dark stuff creates more light but then you didn't look at the light situations they need to be observed too otherwise they deteriorate So unwholesomeness observed has a positive evolutionary effect. Wholesomeness unobserved has a negative evolutionary effect. The wholesomeness has a positive effect. which is to observe both. And you also have to observe situations where you can't even tell which is what's what. You need to observe every moment, look inside to see what the intention is. There is an intention there, but when you first look, I've seen people, I've heard and seen people look, and when they first start looking, a lot of people do not see, it's pretty gross, pretty coarse, I should say, what they see.

[30:10]

It's not exactly that what they see is coarse or gross in the sense of not good, Because sometimes you can see someone is actually quite skillful at something. Some people have learned to be skillful at things, and they learned because they were looking at their intention before. Like when a baby first walks, they were very careful about their intentions to pull off this amazing feat. And they get better at it for some time because they continue to watch and learn. more clearly what's going on in their intentions. But then after a while, when they get quite good, if they stop looking, they become less good walkers. So you see what happens to people as they grow older. They're not as good walkers as kids. Kids are better walkers and runners than adults, almost always. The only adults that are good walkers and runners when they get older are ones who keep looking at their running and walking. Right? The kids are really good at it. And then they stop looking when they get really good, and then they deteriorate.

[31:14]

Because of karmic obstruction arises from their not paying attention to this wonderful thing, which they used to do with a lot of attention. Yes? What's your name? John. John. some kind of inherent tendency towards negative evolution? Or is it just a momentum of thought at some point that you don't necessarily have the negative evolution that you're observing or not? You're doing positive things anyway. So he said, does this mean there's some tendency towards negative evolution in the sense that there's a tendency towards not observing your karma? Yeah, that there's an inherent tendency.

[32:18]

I guess, is it an inherent thing that if we're not always making some effort against it, that it will evolve, or is there some kind of balancing? I think we could say, at least tentatively, we could say that when human beings are born, when human beings are formed, there is an innate, innate means born with, there's an innate tendency towards ignorance, towards ignoring, studying the self or studying your action. There's an innate tendency. opposition to that. However, there's also various other forces which are encouraging people to pay attention. So it's kind of a struggle because paying attention is encouraged in one sense by people who have an inborn tendency to ignore what's happening. So it's a struggle, actually, between the two.

[33:19]

And education is required to reinforce the anti-ignoring elements. So we educate, hopefully, children to pay attention to what they're doing, and we notice that when they pay attention to what they're doing, they become more skillful, usually. And that without education, children usually do not pick up to learn to look inward and see what their intentions are, so they don't get the benefits that come from looking at their intentions. So ignorance is innate. Not seeing our loving relationship with the world is innate. do not see that spontaneously, even though it's true. Even though they do love their parents and their parents do love them, they don't necessarily see that.

[34:23]

They need to be educated to that. And they often don't get that education, so they don't see it. And then once they see it, they need education to continue and encouragement to continue. Does that address your question somewhat? Some children seem to see it a lot more than others. Yes, it's true. So I guess I could distinguish whether it's something innate or it's just something that we have developed over a long period of time previous to birth. Well, there would be that teaching that people are born with different karmic backgrounds so that some people have an easier time being educated than other people. So you see different children who have different ability to be educated. Some have a harder time receiving education.

[35:28]

Some have a harder time learning to look within themselves. But everybody seems to have some difficulty with it. When you talk about karmic patterns that you're born with, this is presupposing that one believes in some kind of reincarnation, am I right? Or am I making a wrong assumption there? I don't know if one believes in it exactly, but one is sort of implying it when you talk that way. I guess my next question, if reincarnation is true, then what is the thing that continues from life to life? Because if you look at it a certain way, or some people look at it a certain way, your deepest fixed beliefs, what you've inherited from God knows where, or your opinions about yourself, who you are, what comprises your personality, those are things that are not fixed. and their constellation.

[36:30]

Yes. And it's just kind of a mishmash of all kinds of things that your parents have told you. You're a good boy, or you're not such a good boy. Yes. Your religion tells you you're born with original sin, or if you're Chinese, you're told that you're born essentially good. And it's totally the opposite of the Christian tradition, right? Uh-huh. So, if reincarnation via something like that is true, then what is the thing that continues from experience to experience? Your question is relevant, okay, to this issue. However, such discussions, I would suggest, are not going to be fruitful from today because what we need to emphasize today is that you will be able to see the answer to your questions if you will study your karma. And if you have, and then someone observed, well, what's your name again?

[37:35]

Patrick. Patrick. Someone would say, well, Patrick seems to have an easier time observing his karma than somebody else. And then some people say, well, that's, and then what's the reason for that? I responded to that, that there does seem to be differences among people in their ability to meditate, to look at themselves. And then there's explanations for that. But the real answer to all those questions will come to those who study their karma. And can you study it? now and talk and emphasize how to study yourself, which will lead you to see these things rather than hear about what somebody said. It is possible to directly perceive how this all works, but we can't see it unless we study our current karmic situation. So if I get off into answering your question or dealing with that, I'm going to be giving you my own and the Buddha's vision of how to answer your question.

[38:43]

But I think it's actually not appropriate right now. I think what's important is that you would someday be able to see that. You'd be able to see with direct experience the answers to your questions about rebirth and so on. Can you study and clarify your mind without getting into these philosophical things? And if you can't, okay, get into them. But today I feel like for this group of people and for me, the important thing is that when you walk out of here today or Sunday afternoon, that you actually have started to develop the intention to be aware of all your intentions moment by moment and to see that that is essential in order to realize your inconceivably wonderful relationship with the universe and how that all works.

[39:47]

So I request you to let me not get into that because I think it will divert people from the practice of studying and learning about their actions, which is the main thing in practice is to pay attention to your actions, not get into theory too much. Just enough theory to tell you that in theory it is beneficial to pay close attention to all your actions. And then if you try it and have problems, then that's what I'd like to talk about. Or if you try it and you find it, and you see that it's beneficial, I'd like to hear about that. Okay, can you let me do that? Thanks. Yes, both of you. In my walking I noticed that when I started to fall off balance, my natural equilibrium responses came into play.

[40:53]

I did not intend them. Yes. I guess my intention, I observed my wish to stay upright. But it was not... So the equilibrium response came in and I wondered how that relates to our noticing our own habits. Are those survival equilibrium responses? Well, the equilibrium response, maybe you're right that it's not action, it's not your intention. However, when the equilibrium response comes, then you may wish to do something. The equilibrium response is more like, beep, beep, beep, something funny here. does to go in one way, the body does something to go the other way. Right. But what I'm suggesting to you is that even in that situation there was a cognitive representation. There was a wish, a conscious wish in the picture that you just described.

[41:57]

There may be elements of instinctual adaptations in your experience. Like some people, you meet and you just, you know, when you smell them, you have a certain kind of bodily reaction. And you don't intend that. It's just a kind of like consequence of the person you are at that moment. It just comes up with you. But then you have an intention about that. You have an intention right then, and that intention is your active response to that information about being off balance. There's an intention there that coexists in your example. That makes me wonder about the kind of levels of intention that are sort of a meta-intention of staying upright. kind of more specific intention of in order to stay upright I need to push this arm out or cross my leg over.

[43:01]

I mean it's like those things happen before, it's like I'm observing those after they happen rather than before. You're observing what after they happen? action of keeping upright, say. The action of a leg crossing over to catch myself if I'm falling that much. Right. Or taking it to another area. I smell this person. Sometimes I notice my action of grimacing after it happens. Right. Can you notice a survival action or an equilibrium response before it Yes, you can. Yes, you could. You could see, okay, you could definitely do that. You could see there's information of being off balance and now there seems to be being drawn down to the earth. I seem to be falling now. And sometimes you can see there's an impulse to move the leg and I'm not going to do it, I'm going to fall.

[44:07]

You could do that. You can also sometimes see the impulse, feel yourself going off balance, but not be able to see the impulse to catch yourself before you hit, and you hit. Sometimes it's so fast that you can't actually intend to do something, and you don't, and you don't, and you fall. So reflexes are intentions as well? No, no, reflexes are not. Reflexes are not intentions. Reflexes are adaptations. They're built in. like the tapping of the knee and the moving of the leg. But I don't think that when you feel off balance, I do not think that you have a reflex. You might have a reflex, but that's a lot of times when you're feeling off balance and there's no reflex that comes, and you do fall. You sense that you're falling, and you do not have a reflex, because if you had a reflex, the reflex would have functioned. Pardon? It might not have been fast enough. I mean, this comes from when I... It might not have been fast enough, right?

[45:09]

But also... You say it should be there, okay? Now, this is another kind of big thing, okay? I was talking to somebody about this also just recently, that animals have a reflex to fire, which is somewhat different from what we have. Some animals, like some other mammals, as soon as they see fire, they move away, right? human beings do not have that reflex, we don't have that adaptation of move away from fire. Somewhere in our evolution, that reflex, that adaptation, which is often very useful, in other words, at some point it was better to move away from fire than to wait until you start feeling burned. Now, if we feel burned, we move away. But we can actually come close to fire. If we don't get burned, we don't move away. And we often see animals seem to be afraid of fire because they move away from it even when it's not burning them, even when they're not in pain.

[46:13]

We somehow don't have a reflex, an adaptation called move away from fire. We have the intention sometimes to move away from it even before we feel pain. But we also sometimes can come close to it. And because of that flexibility, we have become like this, that we had a brain which could allow us to move towards and away from the fire, to get close to it and learn to work with it for warmth and all kinds of things that we can get from it. I work with assessing infants in their development. What kind of infants? Assessing. Yes. To determine whether they're developing typically is whether they have equilibrium responses and whether they have elicited responses from certain movements. And if they don't have those, then there's something wrong with their development.

[47:20]

And I guess I'm just trying to balance that knowledge that I work with daily the sense that how that if that's just a neurological patterning that's going on how that translates into other cognitive patterns that we may have in us or we meant to this intention change those interrupt that response through our intention. What kind of response were you thinking of interrupting? Well, we were first talking with, you know, just the ability to interrupt an equilibrium response, but I'm thinking more of eventual responses maybe to somebody that we meet that elicits alarms and responses to move away. Mm-hmm.

[48:22]

I'm trying to sort some of these things out. Yes, right. Sorting this out is totally relevant. But your last example of when you meet someone, some alarms go off. So that's part of your relationship with the world. There's you and the other person and alarms going off. This is happening for you. Now, at that time, an intention will be the pattern of relationship you have with that person. So there's you and the person, and there's alarms going off, and the way that that shapes into an intention is the thing to be looking at. Sometimes you're with someone and alarm goes off and you think, I should move away.

[49:26]

I want to move away. It looks like that would be a good idea. Other times the alarm goes off and you feel like I should move towards. Sometimes moving away is beneficial. Sometimes it's not. Sometimes moving towards is beneficial. Sometimes it's not. But observing, being aware of, I meet this person, the alarms went off, I studied it, Now again, another moment arises. I see myself in a relationship and I study that relationship. And studying that relationship is studying my intention. The more you study intention, the more you will understand your relationship. And you'll be able to see that beings who you meet and with whom alarms go off are your close friends. As you know, sometimes you meet beings and alarms go off, and you know those people are your close friends. You follow that?

[50:29]

Somebody you meet, you say, I can see this is my close friend. I am their close friend, they are my close friend, this is very clear to me, and alarms are going off. Other times you see someone and alarms go off and you think this is not your close friend. I would say that when you do not understand that this person you're meeting is your close friend, that's because of karmic obstruction. When you see somebody who's your close friend and the alarms go off, you still may move away from them. But you're moving away from someone who you understand correctly as your close friend. You're moving away because you care for this person. And you know this person cares for you. But right now, this person is such that you feel moving away would be good. But your movement is coming from realizing that this is a loving relationship. And definitely not wanting to hurt that person, and definitely knowing that in actuality, they do not want to hurt you.

[51:35]

But when you meet someone and the alarms go off and you don't think they're your friend, they're not close to you, I would say at that time that's because of not understanding your relationship. But, and in that relationship, this sometimes happens, you're with someone, you do not see them as your close friend, alarms are going off, you get afraid, you get angry, and you actually want to hurt the other person. You would even want to destroy them. This can happen. Violence can arise because you do not see yourself in a close, loving relationship. You become afraid, you become angry, and you become violent. As long as you're afraid, you're at risk of violence. Alarms can go off in the presence of someone who you're totally devoted to. and you can become not afraid and interact skillfully.

[52:39]

That's what we want to do. However, however, however, however, if you meet someone and alarms go off and you don't think they're close to you and you don't think you care about them and you don't think they care about you, if you study that unfortunate pattern of relationship that you see, That study will transform your vision. It won't transform the relationship, really, except, well, it transforms the relationship because the relationship becomes imbued with wisdom and compassion is revealed. No matter how bad it is, if you study it, the study has the great force of enlightening the situation. Yes. You talk about intention, like this is my intention to do this, and this is what I want to do.

[53:43]

Yes. So intention is wanting in your explanation, and I'm confused with that, because from what I've read and from what I've heard, wanting is a source of suffering. and we have to let go of our wanting. And when you ask us to look at our wanting or at our intention, then I just... I hear Mick Jagger singing the song, we don't get what we want, we get what we need. And this is where I get confused that, for example, the... I understand. Can I say something? You can remember your example? Do you remember your example? I'll ask you later for the example. If you look at what you want, what you want will not be an obstruction anymore.

[54:45]

If you don't look at what you want, it's not so much that what you want will cause the problem. Human beings naturally have wants. If you observe what the want, what the pattern of wanting is, I'm telling, I'm saying to you, if you observe the pattern of wanting, you will become free of your wants. Your wants will know, your wants unobserved, it's not so much exactly the want cause problems, but the unobserved wants become more and more negative wants. So you start wanting things which are unreasonable and then you suffer. But wanting things that are reasonable does not cause suffering. Wanting other people to be happy is reasonable and doesn't cause you suffering. But even if you want positive things and feel good about your wants, if you don't learn about them, the lack of attention will cause obstruction, and in obstruction your wants will deteriorate.

[55:50]

The patterns of relationship which form your wants deteriorate. and your vision will get darker. So it's not to say you can't get what you want. I'm okay with that. To say you can't get what you intend, I'm okay with that. If you intend to lift your arm up, you can't necessarily move your arm up. If a child intends to walk, they can't necessarily walk. If they want to walk, they can't necessarily walk. Some people have neurological problems. They can't walk. They just don't have the neurological equipment for it. But they want to. Okay? That want may be painful for them because it's not fulfilled. I can understand that. What I'm saying is, yes, if you study the want, if you study that you have a body in this world this world has gravity, there's other places besides where you are, and you want to go somewhere, if you see that pattern of relationship, which is your desire, which is your intention, which is your wish, if you see that, I'm saying that these patterns of relationship will start revealing more and more wonderful things to you, and your vision will get clearer.

[57:08]

And in this process, you will become free of your wants. You will become free of your intentions. You will become free of your karma. But if you don't study this material, you will become stuck in your intentions, stuck in your karma. You'll be imprisoned by it. The consequence of not studying your intention is a kind of imprisonment of our life. That causes suffering. It's not that the desire causes suffering, it's the unobserved desire. That's why they bring your attention to the desire and say, this is a problem. They don't really mean it's a problem. They mean you have to study this. This is your homework assignment in every moment, is to study what you want, to study what you wish, to study what you intend. That's the main thing that I'm emphasizing, to study. I'm not saying it's good or bad, because it can be very bad. You can want someone to be unhappy. You can want yourself to be unhappy. You can want to hurt yourself.

[58:10]

That's not good. No sane person wants you to hurt yourself. And if you want to hurt yourself, you're not sane. But if you study the wish to hurt yourself, you will become free of that wish. And if you want to help yourself, and you study that you want to help yourself, you will become free of that wish. Some people are imprisoned by the wish to hurt themselves. Some people are imprisoned by the wish to help themselves. Some people are imprisoned by the wish to hurt others. Some people are imprisoned by the wish to help others. The reason why they're imprisoned by this is they don't study the wishes. If you study the wishes, you will care for people a lot, but not too much or too little. You will realize your true relationship. Want to give your example now? I have two, but I'll choose one.

[59:15]

Okay, or two. Two's okay. You know, when you ask us to stand up and you ask us really watch the intention and watch if you want to. And then you did the same to have us sit down. And you explain all the different things that could come to our mind. You're going to feel judged. You're going to feel forced to do it. So you ask us to look at all that. And when I did that, standing up, when you asked, and I didn't want to stand up. You did not? That's right. Okay. So I said, I don't want to. But again, this was my dilemma, Chantal, you don't get what you want, you get what you need. So you got to do what he says, kind of a thing. That's what you thought? That's what I thought. That's the pattern of relationship you saw. And then I saw the intention of wanting that was bigger, of wanting to be with the group and wanting to do what you say than my intention to keep my butt on the floor.

[60:19]

So then I said, oh, there's a priority in intention. And for me, it's more important to follow the group and follow you than to stay on the floor. So I stood up because I realized that this intention of being with the group was bigger. But the fact that I give up my desire or my intention to sit, to prioritize the other intention, cause reaction in me. And this is where you say, oh, when you look at your intention, when you study your intention, you got to be free of that intention. Yes. And I didn't feel much freedom in that situation. So is the fact of just noticing intention, like in this example, is the fact of just noticing, like you said, should be or is beneficial even though it doesn't feel like beneficial.

[61:36]

You understand? Yes, I do. I do. So the initial pattern was, I don't particularly want to stand up. I'd rather not stand up. And then in the next moment you saw a different pattern, which you said was a changing of priorities, but anyway you saw a different relationship. And then, based on that, you felt like standing up would be appropriate to that second moment. So you stood up. But then you said there was some reaction because I think maybe you felt like you maybe betrayed your original intention or something. I don't know. Is that part of the reaction you felt? Well, I mean, ideally, my intention, if I want to be honest with myself, my intention would be, hey...

[62:37]

I want to be sitting down and I want to be with the group. Both of those things. That's right. Yeah. So why does he want us to stand up? You see? That's another... That is what I thought I wanted. That was my intuition. Yeah. If we could just sit down and be together, that would be perfect. Yeah. So that was the way you saw a relationship. You saw me sitting down with these people. That's good. You like that. But then I needed to make a choice there. Yeah, so then you felt that that was kind of your relationship, you felt good about that and you were aware of that somewhat. And then someone says, would you please stand up? Okay, now your relationship has changed because somebody's made a request of you to do something, which has some kind of like some tension or almost contradiction to another kind of pattern of relationship that you see.

[63:41]

And you see a nice pattern of relationship is to sit with these people. You like that, I guess. You had a positive feeling with that. But then I had to let go. What made... Well, you said you had to let go. In other words, you saw that you had to let go. And I intended, I decided to let go. And that's why I stood up. And I said, what I see of wanting to sit and be with the group is not possible at the moment. So you have to let go of this if you prioritize more being with the group. So I let go of my, and I said, you know, Chantal, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what you want. Okay, so I'd like to just again look at that point right there. She said it doesn't matter what you want. She said that. Did you hear her? She just said it doesn't matter what you want. I'm not saying it matters what you want. I'm not saying it matters what you want. What I'm saying is what really matters is that you look at what you want.

[64:45]

That doesn't matter. What you want What you want is action. What you want is action. It's already action. That's the basic action is what you want. What you want is another word for how you see yourself in relationship to the situation. And you have that every moment. And to say what I want doesn't matter I'm not saying you shouldn't say that. I'm just saying whether it matters or not, what does matter is that you observe what you want. That's what I'm saying. And you did observe what you want. That's right. And you know, I could observe what I want and what you're saying, what you want, and not stand up. Then I observe. Then I do it. Exactly. But I don't need to stand up.

[65:49]

You do not. You definitely did not need to stand up. And also, when I asked you to stand up, it wasn't what I wanted. I didn't want you to stand up or want you to sit down. No, I didn't say I want you to stand up. I did not say I want you to stand up, Chantal. I did not say that. I said, please stand up. I requested it. I did not want you to do it. And if you'd stay sitting down, I would have been very happy with that. Probably. But the reason why I probably would have been happy is because I feel, you know, our relationship is what's important to me, not what you do or don't do. Exactly my point. That's why I'm so confused, because I could sit my whole life observing. You could, but you probably won't sit your life observing.

[66:52]

You probably will feel a strong impulse sometime to think it's better to get up and do something else. And that's why we practice sitting a lot in our practice. People sit, like if you sit a long time, you're going to eventually want to stand up and walk. But You're the one who said it doesn't matter. I didn't say that. I didn't say it didn't matter. You said that. And I drew your attention to saying it doesn't matter. I don't say it doesn't matter. I'm not going to argue with you about that. But I am going to say what I do think matters is that you watch your intention. Because if you watch your intention, you will eventually see this true relationship you have with people. And when you see the true relationship you have with people, then it's not that it doesn't matter what you do. It's just that what you do is so unimportant compared to what you see. If you see that we're good friends, it's not so important whether we're sitting together or walking together. What's important is that we see that we're close friends.

[67:57]

That's by far more important than whether we're sitting together or walking together, in my view. When we're close friends, when we see that and understand that, we can walk together, dance together, run together, sit together. We can do anything we want together, together, and enjoy it. Spit on each other? Spit on each other, yes. Some people voluntarily do that, as you may have heard. They get real close, they put their faces together, and they spit on each other. And they like it. When children hear about it, they think it's disgusting, but they can't understand that people would feel that close to each other, that they feel so close friends that they exchange saliva. But it does happen. Some people don't like to do that, ever. Some people do not like to walk with other people. So I don't say it doesn't matter whether you walk.

[69:00]

I don't say it doesn't matter whether you walk or talk or sit. I'm saying that once you understand your relationship with people, it's not that what you do doesn't matter, it's just that whatever you do will be very, very good. Whatever you do will be extremely joyful, will be the greatest happiness. Because you see that what you're doing is you're with the person. Yeah. You understand? Good. You do, but what? Well, you know, your perception of... Okay, so you use kissing as spitting on each other because kissing is much more in line with a friendship relationship or a loving relationship. Yeah. But my version, when you said we could walk together, we could talk together, we could... So those are all actions in line with love.

[70:01]

And that's why I brought spitting on each other. And my vision of spitting wasn't kissing, it was spitting. And that is an action that has a negative connotation. Well, yeah, so if you mean by spitting that you're saying, I don't feel close to this person. If that's what you mean by spitting? Well, that's exactly my question. Yeah, let's look at it. You're getting close. You're going to understand this. This is good to follow thoroughly this problem. Yes? What I'm hearing is you say, look at your intention independently of your action. No. Your action is your intention. I'm saying look at your action. When I say look at your action, I mean it. When I say look at your intention, I mean it. And that's the same statement. Action and intention are not two separate things. Okay. So that means if I love you, I will not be able to spit on you.

[71:06]

You said that, not me. But do you understand? I understand that you're a little confused about this. What I'm saying to you is that when you see your true relationship with someone, you will never be able to do anything harmful to them. And if they understand it too, then you both will understand that no matter what you do together, no matter what you do, it will be beneficial. Okay. So what's the question then? That means that it's not every action, any random action that can follow a wise intention. It's not any that would follow, yes, that's right. selective action. Well, it's selective, but it's not really selective, it's just a natural expression of the relationship, because you see the relationship as it actually is, and from your vision of the relationship, you watch your vision of the relationship.

[72:10]

At that point, sometimes people say that enlightened people don't have karma, that they don't have action. They do have action, but their action is that is their intention, just like the intention of an unenlightened person. Both their actions are their intention. The intention of an enlightened person is the pattern of relationship of mutuality that they can see with the other person. Therefore, that pattern of relationship is already the action That is the action already. It's not that... And then verbal and physical postures that come from that place will be in accord with it. And they could be anything, but nothing... It would never be violent. It would never have any ill will. It would never be greedy. It would always be respectful, and it would always be beneficial. That would be true.

[73:12]

And it could be spitting, but it could. You know, that's how pigs mate. The male comes over and spits in the female's face, and she turns around. Because when he spits in her face, there's a pheromone in his saliva, which if she likes his pheromone, she turns around, he mounts her, and that's how they do it. They do it by spitting, by the male spitting in the female's face. I don't know if that's all species of pigs. But that's a mating gesture. So spitting could be... Some of you heard this story, but it's an important story in my life. I'll try to tell it not too long, but when I was seven or almost eight, I was playing tag with some boys, and we were chasing each other, and there were some girls watching us, and every time I came near the girls, one of the girls went, and she repeatedly did stuck her tongue out at me and made a kind of a disrespectful look on her face, a taunting, teasing expression.

[74:31]

And finally, I just decided to go over to her and hit her, which I tried to do, but she got up and ran away. So I chased her, and I chased her, and I chased her, and I chased her. And I don't know if it's that I was faster than her or what, but I caught her. I don't know if she slowed down so I could catch her. But anyway, I caught her, I took a hold of her, and I pushed her to the ground with the intention to hurt her, to punish her for her insults to me. And I was sitting on her chest or on her stomach, and I raised my hand to hit her, and I looked in her face, but instead of hitting her, I kissed her. And she was very happy about that. And she kissed me back, and we just sat there in this cornfield, actually, kissing each other for a long time.

[75:35]

And then every day for the rest of the summer, We would meet in the afternoons and kiss. So, at first I didn't get it. I didn't understand that she appreciated me and that was her way to get me away from the other boys so she could have me all to herself. I don't know what she knew she was up to. I don't know if she was aware of her intention, but in fact... We were lovers, not enemies. And that was much more enjoyable to both of us, in this case, than being enemies. I had no idea she was interested in me, but she was. And she went to all that trouble to get me to chase her to a private area. So usually, commonly, people who love each other often do not inflict physical or emotional pain on each other as part of that process.

[76:44]

They often don't. But sometimes they do. Sometimes when you love someone and they do certain things, sometimes you say, and you see that you love them, you see that they love you, and you say, I hate that. I hate it when you do that. I think it's terrible what you just did. You might say that to them. And you just feel terrible about what they did. And you want to tell them But you know that the person you're talking to is someone who you would give your life for like that. And you know that they would give their life for you like that. You know that you see that. So this, I hate that, please stop that, is coming totally from seeing, this is like, you know, this is very, I love this relationship. This is like life to me. And to be like that with everybody is the goal.

[77:48]

That you would see everybody as your close friend. But that wouldn't stop you from being intense with people and expressing great pain with what they're doing. And you might even say something to them that was painful, but you wouldn't say it to hurt them. Just like sometimes people who are hysterical have to walk across a bridge, someone might slap them in the face to snap them out of it, out of their fear. Say, now go. You're not hitting them in the face to hurt them. You want them to wake up. Or someone's asleep, you know. Maybe they took too much drugs or something. You find them an overdose of drugs. You start slapping them in the face to wake them up because you love them. And you know if they stay in that sleep state, they'll die. So you slap them to wake them up and then take them to the hospital. And you have to hurt them a little bit. Enough pain so that they, you know, are smelling salts. You know, they hurt. They go, ooh. The pain of the thing brings them up out of their coma.

[78:51]

But you don't do that to hurt them, you do it to help them. Or you pull a band-aid off a child. You do that to help them. You don't do it to hurt them. You love them completely. But to pull the band-aid off to hurt the person, that you wouldn't do if you felt that they were your closest friend. Does that make more sense? No, it doesn't. It's just that it's painful when... The other person doesn't see. Ah, yes, that's true, too. I'm not saying, yeah, that painful. If your lady in the cornfield, you know, would have stuck her tongue instead of kissing you and said, get off of me, and you would have been miserable. Yes, and she would have been, too, probably. Yeah. So there's also stories like that where you think the person's their enemy. your enemy, and they say, yes, I am. And that's very common. That's our very common situation, right? I'm not your close friend.

[79:54]

Well, I didn't think you were. I don't think you're my close friend. Well, I don't think so either. We know about that. I'm telling you, that's quite common. I'm saying that's delusion, to think someone's not your close friend. People come to me and they say, very unhappy people, they say, I don't have any close friends. And I say, yes, you do. Now, the first one you've got is me, but I don't mention that, maybe. I'm your close friend, but I don't say that usually. I say, everybody's your close friend. People come to me and say, I don't have any close friends. They're unhappy about this. I don't have any close friends. They come to me and say, I don't have any. And they come to me because... I think they come to me because they think I might tell them that they do have some close friends or how to find some close friends. They want close friends, but they don't have any. I say, you do have close friends. You just can't see it because of karmic obstruction.

[80:58]

So in my case, I couldn't see that she wanted to be close friends with me. But if she actually did not want to be close friends with me and I got there, then we would have had an unhappy story because she would have said, this is this guy who I do not want to be close friends with me who's sitting in my chest now and he's going to hit me. And I would have said, here's this girl who does not want to be close friends with me and she's being mean to me, so I'm going to hit her. And this would have been an unhappy story, but I'm not telling that story. That's not the story. It's a story where she knew that she loved me, but I didn't know that I loved her. But then she kind of tipped me off. She told me. I don't know what she did, but she kind of went... And I went from wanting to hit her to wanting to kiss her. And I actually enjoyed that more than hitting her. So anyway, it is painful when you love someone and they don't know you love them. And also they don't know they love you.

[82:00]

That is painful. That is the pain. However, it's much, [...] much better than them not knowing they love you and you not knowing that you love them. So the people who become Buddhas are called Bodhisattvas. And Bodhisattvas are the people who love other people who don't know that they love them. They look at someone and they say, I love you. Or they don't say it. They think, I love you. You are my most precious. Not most, because everybody is. You are my dear, precious, close friend. When they see people, that's what they feel. But they see. This person does not feel close to me or many other people. They think they hate me. And they're in pain because they hate me. And I feel pain that they're in pain because they hate me.

[83:02]

or don't like me. The bodhisattva, the baby Buddha, feels that. They feel pain when they see someone who they love who does not know that the love is mutual. They see the person's in pain because they don't see that. And that pain hurts them. So that's true. It is painful when you love someone and they don't know they love you. It is painful. But the pain you feel from that is the greatest happiness in the world. Because it comes from love. It is a great happiness that has pain in it, but the pain comes because that person you love is in pain because they don't know that you love them and they love you. But if you didn't feel that pain, you would not be happy because you can be happy about other things, like that you got some money or something, but that's worldly happiness.

[84:06]

The highest happiness is the happiness that comes from feeling pain for those you love. That's compassion. Compassion is a huge happiness that has pain in it coming from those you love. So if you feel pain when you love someone and they don't see they love you, that's like the Buddha. But there's a joy with that. It's the joy, number one, that you love them, and number two, that you feel their pain, and that you're connected to their pain. When you love someone, you do not want to be far away from their pain. You don't like their pain, but you want to be with them so you can continually inundate them with your love. Prove to them inconclusively that they are loved and prove to them that they love you.

[85:16]

Prove to them. Help them see that. And because you love them, you will, and because you're in joy, you will be able to do that work of working with all the people who do not know they love you until they do. Love them until they cannot resist their love for you anymore. And until you get there, there's a pain that keeps poking you to do that work. However, that is the greatest happiness that there is. And the bodhisattvas have to keep washing their eyes by watching their karma. Because if the bodhisattvas stop watching their karma, Even though at one point you see, oh my God, everyone loves me and I love everyone. Everyone is giving their life to me and I'm giving my life to everyone. They see that, but if they stop studying their karma, if they stop studying that pattern, seeing that is their intention.

[86:22]

The intention is everybody loves me, so I love everyone. I'm intending to help everyone because everyone's helping me. That's their intention. That's their activity. That's their karma. But if they don't watch that, the situation will deteriorate. Even this great intention will deteriorate if not appreciated. So bodhisattvas still have to keep practicing meditating on their intention, even when their intention is supremely auspicious. They still have to keep watching it. And for those of us who have less auspicious states of consciousness, where we see we love some people and a few people are loving us back, meditating on that will cause that to become more like the Buddha's mind. But like my grandson, I love him totally and he sometimes doesn't know he loves me.

[87:28]

Like last night at the dinner table, he was drinking his soup, and he got burned, and when his soup burned his mouth, he stopped liking me. I mean, he didn't like me, and he was angry at me because, you know, It happens. I didn't stop loving him, and I didn't stop seeing that he loved me, but I could see he didn't know he loved me. I watch him sometimes. I can see sometimes he doesn't know he loves me. I watch. I keep loving him, but he doesn't know he loves me. He does love me. I'm his grandfather. He loves me. Sometimes it's very clear that he loves me. To me. Sometimes it's very clear to me that he loves me, but he doesn't know it. Like I come in the room, it's like, granddaddy. It's like, da-da-da-da-da-da, granddaddy. It totally, he loves me. But he doesn't know it a lot of the time.

[88:31]

He looks like he loves me. He looks like something really important to this guy just came in the room. It's like, he looks like something very big just happened, like Looks like he loves this guy, but he doesn't see that. And there he is, we're hanging out together, like, you know, we're doing this loving thing, and I'm loving him, and he's loving me, but I know it and he doesn't. And then suddenly the clouds clear sometimes and he sees, oh my God, I love you. He sees it. It was there the whole time, but he sees it. And then he sometimes says, it's like out of the blue, I love you, granddaddy. Just like, he sees it. And then it clouds over again. But our loving relationship never stops. And I have the joy to see that it doesn't stop. But I do sometimes say to him, don't throw rocks.

[89:32]

Do not throw rocks. I don't want you to throw rocks. Don't hit me. Don't bite me. Don't pinch me. I say that to him. But I don't forget that I love him when he says that. And I don't forget that him biting me is his expression of love. I can see that. But still, because I love him, I say, stop doing that, please. So we do love each other and sometimes we don't feel it. If you notice that you don't love someone, you're noticing the activity of your consciousness. The activity of your consciousness is manifesting as a representation of your relationship with the world. The representation is not the same as the relationship. The actual relationship is one of peace and harmony. That's the actual relationship. Your representation of it is is a representation, but it's not the relationship. And the representation can be a very unhappy representation.

[90:34]

It can be, I don't love him and he doesn't love me. That can be the representation. That's a very unhappy, unskillful, painful representation, but such representations do occur. That's your intention. Your intention is, he doesn't love me, I don't love him, and going along with that, I'm not going to do much for him. And he's probably not going to do much for me. That's the karma of the moment. If that karma is studied, it evolves towards, I do love him, but he doesn't yet. I do love him, but he doesn't love me. Or I don't love him yet, but I'm starting to see he loves me. That's with that girl, that situation with the girl. I thought, she doesn't love me, I don't love her. Then I saw, she loves me, I love her. Sometimes it happens that way. I could see in the look on her face that she didn't want me to hit her, but she wanted me. And she wanted me all summer.

[91:37]

She spent half of her summer vacation, the rest of her summer vacation, she spent hanging out with me. She wanted to do that voluntarily. That was her will. That was her desire, to hang out with this guy and kiss all afternoon. It was very tiring. Okay, yes. I notice that a lot of my own intentions come from discomfort or a desire to avoid pain. Yes. Movement of my body or I'm hungry, so I intend to get up and get something to eat. Yes, right. I find that an interesting motivator, that intentions are coming from physical stimuli or emotional stimuli. Yes, right. You need to look at that connection. Yes, right. So she's saying a lot of the examples are just like you see your body and the body has this feeling of discomfort and you see the body in relationship, for example, to the toilet

[92:49]

to the bed, to the kitchen. You see there's a kitchen over there, there's food. I have this feeling in my stomach. I feel a will to go over there and get some of the food and put it in here. That's the way I see myself in relationship to the food. Or I feel a feeling in my body and I feel like I would like to relieve myself of some waste products. And you say, well, there's no toilet around here, so where should I go? Or there is a toilet, I think I'll go over there. So a lot of our intentions arise from our physical relationship with the world. And I might just mention this other big thing at this point, which is a story of the origins of cognition and the origins of intention. So the origins of, in the Buddhist teaching, the origins of cognition or awareness, I'll use cognition, consciousness, awareness as synonyms.

[94:00]

The origins of consciousness are a body, but not just a body, not like fingernails, but the nerves behind the fingernails, the sensuous skin of the body, the sense of touch, the responsive part of the body that's responsive to electromagnetic radiation, the eyes, the organ of vision, the organ of hearing, the organ of smelling, and the organ of tasting. These physical senses, the sensuous body, is one of the conditions for the arising of consciousness. The other main object, and that sensuous body is called the dominant condition for the arising of consciousness, the arising of cognition, the arising of experience, the arising of knowing.

[95:03]

That's called the dominant condition, is the organs, the organic sensuous body. The other condition is called the object condition, which means electromagnetic radiation, mechanical waves, gases, tactile stimuli. And the third, that's the second one, and the interaction, that's the second one, the third one is a previous moment of cognition. So a previous moment of cognition, a sensuous body interacting with the world, and the interacting the way the body interacts with the world is the cognition. The cognition is the way our body is interacting with the world. Sometimes they say that the body interacting with the world, the sense organ interacting with the world, that those two, when they get in contact, their interaction gives rise to the consciousness.

[96:07]

But I would like to be a little more radical and say that the way that your body is interacting with the world, particularly the sensuous part of your body, that that is cognition, that is perception. So your perceptions, your cognitions arise interactively between your body and the world. And therefore you, or I do not make our perceptions, we are conditioned, our body is a condition for our perceptions, but it's our body interacting with the world which gives rise to our perceptions. And when our perceptions arise, sense perceptions, sense cognitions, they always have an activity. And the activity is the intention.

[97:08]

So one way to say is every cognition has an activity. Another way to say is every cognition has an intention. Every time you know something, you have an intention. When you look at a color, there's an intention. And that intention is the pattern of relationship in the mind, the representation in the mind of how you see yourself in relationship to the world. That activity arises with every cognition. Cognition arises interdependently with everything. Not everything exactly, but it's mostly with your body interacting with some particular part of the world, but that part of the world is connected to the rest of the world. So it's the world impinging on your body, and your body relating to the world that gives rise to awareness. and the awareness comes with activity, which means the awareness comes with intention. But because the awareness arises interdependently, the intention is an interdependent thing too.

[98:12]

You do not make your own intention. You do not make your own cognition. They arise interdependently. However, your past intentions come with the past cognitions. So the past cognition is another condition for the arising of the present cognition. And your past cognition also has an intention in it. And its intentions have to do with past cognitions who have intentions. So there's a history of cognitions and a history of intentions feeding into your present, making a contribution to your present intention. But your own intention in the past is not the only thing that determines your present intention. your present intention is also determined by everything that gave rise to your present cognition. So this representation, although it is not actually your relationship, it is a representation that arises interdependently. So it carries with it interdependence. And by studying this interdependent phenomena called your intention, you will see how you are working together with everyone in the universe.

[99:22]

And in the moment of a simple case of pain in a certain part of the body, in relationship to a certain part of the world, there's a cognition. And with that cognition of this body in relationship to the world comes an intention, like to move towards it or away from it. And that intention is made in harmony or in symphony or in together with your relationship with the physical world. With your physical body and the physical world contributes to your cognitive intention about everything. Just simple physical needs and all interpersonal things. Yes, Justin? Is observing action then sufficient for observing Same thing, observing action.

[100:26]

But again, if you watch yourself move your arm, that's not enough. You have to notice that there's The movement of the arms without noticing the intention is not sufficient. And movement of the arm that's not intentional is not really that relevant. It's the arm movements that are cognitive that have the view of your relationship with the world imbued to them. Like if I move my arm like this, it has something to do with, I guess, I think that's not going to insult you all in this case. But if I get close to Tony and I move my arm like that, without noticing that I'm in a relationship to him, I might hit him. So then he tells me, don't hit me. So then I start to, oh, I didn't see that. So that modifies my arm movement. My intention changes when I start to realize more about my relationship with the world. What does that intentional component look like? Is it mental formation?

[101:27]

Is it thoughts? It's called a mental formation. But some people in the Buddhist psychology department, they say, why do you call it a mental formation? Because it's not something in addition to the relationship. But every moment of consciousness has what's called a mental formation or a mental factor, which is intention. But the intention is actually just the overall shape of all the things that are happening in that cognitive field. So it's a mental factor describing the sort of the lay of the land of your cognition. And the lay of the land of your cognition is the activity of your cognition. So again, if the lay of the land is, you see, I have pain, I'm hungry, there's food over there, but there's people in line ahead of me to get the food and I'm really hungry and I'm afraid they're going to run out of food.

[102:29]

You see yourself in that kind of relationship in terms of your physical needs and how you see yourself in relationship to satisfying those needs and the other people who are involved. And you think, well, maybe I can butt in line. But then you think, oh, no, I shouldn't. That might be cheating or something. But a child might see hungry, food, other people in line, and they say, I'm just going to go ahead of those people. Get out of the way, people. Because they wouldn't see themselves in relationship to the people that there would be something harmful about that. So then you educate them to wait in line behind the other kids. and they have problems with that but the more they study the intention I'm saying the more they realize that they want the other kids to get fed before them because every time the other kids eat something It's someone they love that's eating something. But this requires lots of education for kids to get this. Usually you don't get it until they've been grown up, tried to reproduce, successfully or unsuccessfully, and studied meditation for about 40 years.

[103:40]

At which time they're not called kids anymore. I just have one more part of that question. I'm trying to... trying to discover if what I'm observing in my practice is covering intention. Because I've never seen intention isolated as a object of meditation. And the training that I've had, it's a lot about body states and thoughts and in addition to being vibrant. And the types of checkpoints that I've been trained to be very curious about. are sensations in the body, movements in the environment, and in particular, what thoughts and images are coming up moment by moment. Is that territory included tension, or is the tension another thing that would be beneficial to be adding You said, does that territory include intention?

[104:46]

Intention includes that territory. Because intention is the overall shape of a pattern of consciousness, of a moment of consciousness. And in that moment of consciousness are all the things you mentioned. So intention would be, when you look at all the things you see there, is there some tendency in that field? What's the overall pattern of relationship there in that moment of cognition which has sensations? What else did you say? Body sensations, environment. The environment, yeah. So there it is, body sensations, environment. And also, what's the relationship between the body sensations and the environment? The relationship. It's the pattern of relationship of body sensations and environment and mental ideas and environment. that pattern between all your ideas, all your sensations that you're having, and the environment. That's the intention. So again, if your body's sensation is that you're hungry, and you're having the sensation of hunger,

[105:53]

and you see that there's food in the environment and there seems to be, the environment seems just to be saying, yes, Justin, you can have food. You see that relationship and then you might think, well, then I guess I would like some then if it's all right, if I'm not stealing. And you all may have some precepts, some ideas of precepts in the field too, like I don't want to take food that's not given. but I'm hungry and there's food. So does the environment say, yes, okay to that? Well, in that case, there's a clear go-ahead maybe like, well, then I want that and I think I will do my best to get the food then. Matter of fact, I might ask the people to bring me the food to make sure that I'm not stealing it or to help me make sure that they want to give it to me. So in this pattern, you see maybe a pattern of desire but also a pattern of generosity. So all the things you mentioned are included within intention. Having sensations in the environment, then you have certain wishes or volitions arise in how you see the sensory body in relationship to the environment.

[107:01]

Yes, you do. Okay, so, I mean, I shouldn't say you do. I would say, as you get more skillful, you will. So some people feel, I'm hungry and I want food. And they feel that, but they don't know they feel it. All they know is that they seem to be walking towards the table to get the food. If they would hear this instruction, they might say, okay, I'll look. And they say, well, I see the intention to get food. But they don't notice that they're hungry. They don't notice the sensation of hunger. They just notice the wish to go get some food. It would be good if they would notice that they not only have the wish to go get food, but that they're hungry. So the physical sensation of hunger would amplify and elucidate and fill out the picture, which is really true, of this intention to get food. Now as we know in this society, ladies and gentlemen, a lot of people have the impulse to have food and they don't even notice it.

[108:24]

They just go and get the food. Right? Some people start looking and noticing the intention to get the food Which is good, because then they can also start to notice that there isn't hunger. That they're going to get food, but they're not hungry. Noticing that is very helpful. Some people notice the impulse to have sugar. what's the sensation that's leading you on to have sugar? What is it actually you're wanting to get by having the sugar? Oh, there's a desire for pleasure. This isn't about feeding. This is about pleasure. I'm not actually hungry. I just want pleasure. So then you start noticing more about the pattern of relationship. The pattern of relationship is something's going on. What is it? I want pleasure, but I'm not hungry. Seeing that, is seeing your pattern of relationship, is seeing your intention, is seeing more details.

[109:26]

So these details actually will help you understand your intention more deeply. Good. Yes, speaking of lunch. I actually, while I was talking to you, I was noticing inwardly that I was having a sensation of hunger, too. Pardon? You see that intention? Very good. I'm so happy that you noticed that intention. And I hope any of you who noticed the intention, I mean, I'm glad if any of you noticed your intention to have lunch. And I'd be willing to have a lunch break now if you want to. Is that all right? OK, well, let's have a lunch break.

[110:28]

Is an hour a good amount of lunch break? So could you come back, reconvene at 1.15? Thank you very much.

[110:39]

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