Mary Alice started to receive an unexpected reverence from her father. well this class was uh... partly offered as a gathering of concentration for a lay bodhisattva initiation ceremony which is going to happen at green gulch on this sunday this saturday That's a factor for us to take note of tonight, that maybe about half the people here, or something like that, maybe not a half, but maybe a third of the people here will be doing the ceremony the day after tomorrow.

[01:29]

One thing I wanted to mention, just to sort of as a comment at the beginning, is that there's this word, moral, and one etymology or one study of the roots of that word is that it has to do with a way of carrying oneself. And you might say, in a sense, it has to do with a way of doing something. a way of carrying body, carrying speech, and carrying mind, carrying mind.

[02:44]

And there's this other word, this word morale, which is moral with an E on the end, I think, isn't it? And morale, at least in one dictionary I looked up, is the feminine form of moral. One psychologist, I think maybe, I don't know if he was young or who it was, said that the masculine, sort of one of the main qualities of masculinity is recognizing the possibility for some action, maybe in particular an individual action, seeing how it can be done and doing it.

[03:48]

And moral has something to do with that, too, that seeing the possibility for action and also maybe to some extent seeing that there's... Yeah, seeing the possibility of action has something to do with seeing that things can be done to a great extent in a way you've seen them done before. And you recognize, again, that there's a possibility of such and such an action. And... And then, in a sense, to be moral would be to follow through on the implications of what you see as possible and correct and appropriate. But morale, this more feminine version of the same issue, may be not so much having to do with thinking about what you can do yourself, but having a little bit more to do with the related aspect or the relations that make possible action.

[05:05]

Morale doesn't have so much to do with doing things. It has more to do with maybe your attitude about a situation or your attitude about your tasks. or how you feel about your tasks, how you understand your tasks. Still, morale may focus around actions which you see have to do with you as a person, and yet it has to do maybe with understanding whether you feel supported in doing them. So sometimes people say that they're in some work situation, and the morale sometimes it seems is called low, When you feel like you're supposed to do something, but you don't sense your support. Maybe. You can still do it, perhaps. You can still think in that masculine way, well, I can do it. I can do such and such an act.

[06:10]

But the morale may not seem to be high when you don't feel it. Everybody in the situation, or even everything in the situation, is, through their relationship with this action, or you as the actor, is supporting you or agreeing with you or encouraging you or appreciating you. When you do things without the feeling of support and cooperation, you may say, my morale is down. I have low morale. I don't have much sense that everybody's doing this with me or I'm doing this for everyone. or everyone supporting me in doing that. I don't have much intelligence of how it is that everybody's helping me do this. I don't have much intelligence about how everybody's helping me breathe, for example. Then my morale's low.

[07:12]

But when, for example, I feel like everybody's helping me breathe, then my morale around the action of breathing is high. Or my morale around sitting. I have high morale when I feel like everybody's helping me sit. Everybody appreciates me sitting. Everybody's applauding my sitting. Everybody's applauding my walking. Everyone's supporting my walking. Then my morale is high. So the interaction between this kind of masculine and feminine version of our conduct, I think, is good to appreciate. That there is one side of where you see something to do and you masculinely, in a sense, you do it. You do it. And you do it whether you have high or low morale. In fact, there is that component to us. All day long, you're seeing things to do and you're doing them.

[08:16]

And that's kind of diluted, too. So in some sense, this masculine way of putting it is kind of diluted, that I can do these things and I will do these things. And I am thinking that way. And the other side, in some sense, is more enlightened. That is, it is through all my relations that I'm able to breathe and think and speak. that's more in more awakened or more enlightened way but it actually is not the buddha body to have one side or the other it's the actually the non-duality of this masculine and feminine or non-duality of this this idea or this way of thinking the deluded way of thinking that you can do things this karmic view this other view, that everything comes forward and gives you the opportunity to be alive in this form.

[09:28]

A week or so ago, I was shaving my head. And there's a verse that one can chant when shaving your head. You can also use it, if you wish, when shaving your face. And for those of you who don't shave your face or your head, you could use it for shaving other parts of your body. But anyway, for shaving the head, the verse goes something like this. I forgot which way I was saying it. I was in the room by myself doing this. I don't remember what I said, but anyway, I don't know which I said. I think I said, the verse goes like this. Now I am being shaved. I vow with all living beings to be free of self-cleaning.

[11:11]

In the end, neither birth nor death exist. So maybe I said that first to myself. But then I thought, well, actually, I'm not exactly being shaved. There's nobody in this room shaving my head. One tradition in the practice of shaving heads had somebody else do it so i said now i am shaving my head i vow with all sentient beings to be free of self-cleaning in the end neither birth nor death exists and then i i went back and forth like that now i am being shaved now i am shaving now i am being shaved And I propose to you that going back and forth between these two until you can gradually see, maybe, that both together can depend on each other, actually. You can't really have one without the other.

[12:16]

You can't really be shaved without also shaving. The two go together. You can see it that way. I can say, well, what about if you have a bunch of people come in the room and shave you? Then aren't you being shaved? Well, yes. But also, you're there. You're there providing your head. You're going, here's my head. You're putting your head into the situation. You are doing this thing called having a posture, called having a head. And your hair is kind of going, getting up there to be cut. And also, you can just shave. Nobody else in the room, you can be there shaving yourself all by yourself and say, ah, I'm shaving. But really, you're being shaved, too. These two, actually, you can't have one without the other. You can't have everything coming forward and happening to you without you being there to meet it. So everything you do all day long has these two.

[13:21]

And these precepts point not to one side or the other. These precepts are pointing at the non-duality of a life where you kill things or where you don't kill things based on your own personal will. And the other point of view, where you don't kill things all by yourself, if you kill something, if you can kill something, it's because everything in the world helps you kill it. But if everything helps you kill it, then you wouldn't be killing it because whatever you killed would also be helping you. The other side is you don't do it, and therefore you can't kill. But this not killing points to this meeting of these two, the non-duality of these two, of karma and beyond karma.

[14:26]

They meet. So these precepts are pointing to meditation on Buddha's main teaching, which is called, in English, dependent co-arising. And there's a thing called birth and death. cyclic birth and death, which is characterized as misery. This birth and death arises and is produced by the same kind of dependent co-arising. There is a dependent co-arising or a causal origination of misery. There is also a dependent co-arising of complete freedom.

[15:31]

And these two, again, are non-dual. The way you, the causal origination of misery is to think you do things, or somebody else does things. Independent agents act. bondage to birth and death. Seeing that all things come together to create each thing moment by moment, that way of seeing is how you can realize dependently co-arisen liberation or freedom. But these two are inseparable. The causal origination, codependent, mutually dependently co-produced, Misery is inseparable from mutually, codependently produced freedom.

[16:35]

They're not separate. Although there is a thing called codependently produced freedom and happiness, and there's another thing called codependently produced misery. But if you look at them, they're perfectly united. like moral and morale, like male and female. So I shave my head. That way of seeing things is what produces birth and death. I am being shaved, and realizing that liberates me from birth and death. But the reason that I can be liberated from birth and death is because they don't exist in the first place, or also in the last place.

[17:36]

In the first place and the last place, they don't exist. But in between, they appear. And they appear through my action and your action. So that was my introductory remarks for this class. In one sense, I'd like to ask you a couple questions. One is, any comments on that? And number two is, what have you learned in this class? And number three is, would the people who are far away be willing to move a little closer? People who are far away from me, I mean. You're close to yourself, I know. And you can move right over here, if you wish.

[19:04]

I mean, if you would. Yes? . The barber? . So the question is, who shaves the most? Yeah, that's nice. Thank you. There's a barber who shaves all those and only those who shave themselves.

[20:08]

Well, don't shave themselves. There's a barber who shaves all those and only those who don't shave themselves. Pardon? there is a barber what in the world of birth and death the barber is a woman In the world of freedom, the barber is everything.

[21:26]

And there's no barber. The barber is the arrival of everything. In the world of reality, of Buddha, of Buddha's body, those two worlds are the same, are non-dual. Yes? Could you say that the barber appears only when there is another self to be shaved? The barber appears when there is... Only when there is another self to be shaved. Yes, and only when there is another self to be shaved, that's right, but also when there is one who thinks that they can do that. which is also another self, which is, you know, somebody who can do something. There's somebody who can do something in this conundrum, someone who can do the shaving.

[22:30]

You people think you can do the shaving. We all think we can do it. Yes? Would you say it again more loudly? I'm not sure if I can. Well, say something different then. Okay. The question was, this birth and death, this illusion of the self, if it arises independently of thoughts and everything else that's happening, does that create an illusion of separation?

[23:39]

Yes. The birth of the self is entirely due to the death of the self. You do not have a self except, there's no self or selfhood except because of the death of that thing. And the birth of this thing is perfectly and completely met by the death of this thing. Without the death of this thing, this thing just goes on forever and is not an individual entity. Without the death of this thing, for a biological entity, it just goes on forever, which is swell. It's just life. But because something that dies

[24:42]

Its death is everything else but it. Everything that's not it, as soon as it crosses the border of itself, it goes into its death. And it can go into its death in many, many ways. I can go into my death this way, [...] this way. All these ways are my death. You are all my death. Each one of you is, and all of you together are my complete death. Each one of you is a little death for me. All of you together is my complete death. And all of you together plus everything else completely makes me me. The birth of me is because of absolutely not me. My death. My birth is because of my death. What I am as a self is because of not myself. That's the kind of self I am. And when I understand the self that way, this is called forgetting the small self and understanding the real self, which is a self which is a self.

[25:55]

Understanding the real self is the understanding or the awareness of the self which understands that the self is exactly, completely itself by being not itself. is itself and it is not different from anything by the absence of itself that is understanding that is liberation from birth and death before that there's birth and death without understanding the relationship between the two there's birth and death birth and death there's birth and there's death there's birth of the self and the death of the self but when you see that the birth of the self and the death of the self are what you really are, then that's what we call dependently co-arisen freedom or awakening. But the thing that awakening operates on is the misery of birth and death as separate events rather than co-creating each other.

[27:01]

So when you see it all, when you see it all, Well, yeah, take away when you see it, because you're seeing this, right? When it is that what you are, when it's simply that what you are is because, is born of the death of you, then you understand who you are. then there is understanding of who you are. That's when you feel like I am being shaved. That's when you feel like all things make me. That's when you realize that the entire universe in ten directions is your real body. But the entire world in ten directions is not you.

[28:06]

It is your death. Your death is your... When you understand your death in its fullness is your true body. When there is the understanding of that, then that's called liberation. But that liberation comes because of and inseparable from the fact of that... when you see it differently that's misery that's still there that that is there that is still there there still is this going through the the world of you can do things and you do things and those things you do are at variance with you they are at variance But awakening, there's nothing at variance with awakening.

[29:10]

There's nothing at variance. Awakening is self-identical. It's not like something else. It's only like itself. And it is like itself through the absence of itself. Because that's how it's born. That's how the self is born. But there's nothing at variance with it because it's born through its negation. That's the only way you can have a self. And that's what makes a unique, limited, rare, wonderful thing of a self, of a living self. And everything makes you that. Okay? So, you know that story about it's like riding in a boat.

[30:16]

You go out in the boat, you raise the sails, you row with the oars, you work the tiller, which is connected to the rudder, you know, and there you go, riding in the boat. But without the boat, you couldn't ride in the boat. No, it would, you know, There would be no boat riding without that boat. However, when you ride in a boat, you make the boat a boat. Boats don't really make much sense without people using them and making them and all that. But also, the boats make sense of us, too, making them and riding in them. It's like that. Meditating on that, these are the kind of moments that we should be examining. These happen to be the only kind of moments there are, but you should examine the structure of a moment.

[31:22]

Moments have that structure. And that is also everything. The entire world is the world of this boat, of this head shaving, this self that is born and dies in this way these precepts are pointing at this again and again and again so when you receive these precepts in one sense what you're receiving is a way a meditation on the way you conduct yourself on the way you carry your body and and your voice and your thought in the world. You meditate on how you do these things, and you meditate on how you are being done through these things. And when you see the two there, you will see that you are never done to kill.

[32:26]

You are never done to steal. The whole world cannot get you to steal. we get you to steal you're not stealing we want you to do it if we all support you to go in there and grab that piece of bread it's not stealing but if one of us doesn't support you if one person disagrees with you having dinner one Now, there's debates over property rights, but anyway, one person makes you a thief. If one person didn't support you to do one thing you did, you'd be violating one of these precepts. So we're interested in the self. We're interested in the birth and death of the self. it would be good if we were interested in in that that it would be very good if that's the main thing we were interested in if we if that was what if that's what we really trusted as the place to look in life that would be really good to watch not over there and not over here but how over there makes over here and how what over here makes over there and to watch that interface

[33:55]

which is called studying this dependent co-arising. And watch how, when it works one way, it makes birth and death, and how, watch another way, it makes freedom, and watch how these two are never separate. That's, be good if we watch that. Or basically trust that that's where to put your, you know, chips down. Why does the self keep coming back up? Why does the self keep coming back up? Why does the self keep coming back up what? Why does the self keep coming back up what? being alive is to suffer what as long as you need suffering to remind you of your work as long as you're not doing your job then fortunately you will suffer and the suffering will point you right to where you should work if you're doing your job well

[35:19]

Yeah, then there's no suffering. But there is no suffering. Again, if you're doing your job, you understand what there is no suffering means. It doesn't mean like it's not there. It means like more interesting than that. It means that what suffering is, just like what everything else is, is like transcends is there and isn't there. What suffering is, is actually It's just a radiant pulsation of energy. But it's a particularly helpful kind because it points you to this interface. It points you to the birth of yourself. And it says to you, you're not quite settled with what's happening here. You're a little bit off to one side. That's why this pain is poking at you. You're not quite right on the mark of your meditation practice. You're riding in the boat thinking the boat's giving you a ride without forgetting that you're doing the rowing, or you're thinking you're doing the rowing without forgetting that you couldn't do it without being riding in the boat.

[36:29]

You're not remembering that the whole sky and the whole ocean are also exactly what's giving you a ride and what you're making into a boat in an ocean. You're not quite just right on that mark, and therefore it hurts. And the hurting is saying, Gloria, look again taking a look at this are you right on are you what yeah so you never write on so there you are with little knock knocks who's there at you all the time and if you're aware of that then you're lucky because then you're feeding you're eating your you're you're eating your systems reminding you of your work What? Well, occasionally you may think you're there, occasionally you may think you're not there, but actually in another sense, you actually are always there, too. But unless we appreciate that, unless we have awareness of that, the system's under stress.

[37:36]

And as long as we're not aware of where we actually are, fortunately, we get a message from our life to get there, to pay attention to it, to look at it, to align ourselves with what's actually happening. What's actually happening is this very dynamic thing of where you're playing these two sides. You're playing one side, and the other side's being you're being played. Just like this one thing, the practice of fulfilling all wholesome dharmas is the teaching of unsurpassed perfect enlightenment. Anyuttara Samyak Sambodhi is this precept about practicing all good. And it's the path of practicer and what is practiced. Another way to read that would be it's the path of practicing and being practiced.

[38:37]

It's the path of, again, active and passive, male and female. It's the path of where you have the ability to practice and where you are passive about practice. You receive the practice. Somebody said to me on the telephone recently, isn't it enough just to be present? Well, you know, it sounds like it's enough, but it's not enough to be present. The other side is you have to be present. You have to receive presence. It isn't enough for you to be present. The whole universe has to make you present. you have to sort of see the other side, that you're not doing the presence. It's a path of being able to practice and being practiced. On the side of being able to practice, only an individual can practice. An independent actor practices. The other side is you are being practiced.

[39:40]

Only individuals breathe. At the same time, you are being breathed. And you're being breathed by everything. Those two together. The path means two together. And it's interesting etymology here, anuttara. Anu means the anu of anuttara. Anuttara means, I think it means unsurpassed. Yes? Yeah, I think that the... We always think we're male and female, all different classes, and that sort of thing. I wonder if it would be more accurate to think of the morale side as responsive or recuperative or something like that, or restorative or something like that, because there's a living

[40:46]

The way you describe it, there's a living. It's not just that it's a, you know, the world is an object after it is something. The world is a responsive, living entity. So it seems to call it passive, or not the self, or something. It doesn't tell something very vital about what it is. Yes, calling it restorative is fine. And it's restorative to what? What are restorative postures for? What do they come up in response to? They come in response to all the active yoga postures that you were doing.

[41:49]

They come in response to running around all day, me doing stuff. So then I need some restorative recuperation of all the weakening effects of thinking that I did that stuff for one minute or three hours. As long as we are involved in thinking that I do something, we weaken ourselves or we inflate ourselves, which is the same thing. And we need some restorative meditation to meet that. Because the self is someone in here and the world is something out there.

[43:00]

But the way you're talking about the world is that the world responds. Yes. That seems different. There's a self and there's a world. The world and the self are actually in the same picture. The world and the self are the same creature. That's right. There's one creature called the world and the self. That's one world. That's the world of reality. And the world, which is not the self, makes the self. That's why it's one thing. the world the self and the world are one thing because that world which is not me makes me and the world and the world of me doing things needs to be restored by the world where i can't do anything the world where i can't do anything restores the world restores the world or

[44:16]

antidote to the world where I can do things and where I want to do things I do not want in the world where I can do things and where I want to do things I do not want to do I do not want restorative poses I don't want restoration I don't want it that's not what I'm into but our meditation practice even in Even if you're into restorative activity or if you're into action and doing stuff and you're not interested in restoring anything, you just want to accomplish something, in either case of where you seem to be, it's also good to always meditate on the fact of these two meeting. If you can somehow stay with that, even if you're veering off to one side or the other, How does karma fit in? Isn't that the action?

[45:21]

Exactly. That is karma. Karma is I do things. And there's three things I can do. I can make postures, I can speak, and I can think. There's three things I can do. There's three types of things I can do. I do them is the world of karma. That's what fits in. I shave my head. That's karma. And the other side is what? The other side? I am being shaped. I understand that, but I was looking for another word. Oh, it's a world beyond? It's a non-karmic world. It's the uncreated world from your point of view. It's uncreated. It's non-karmic and It's the world of awakening and discriminating awareness. It's the world of understanding karma as an illusion.

[46:28]

It's understanding that you doing things is just an illusion. It's just a delusion. It's that kind of understanding. But that understanding could not be there if there wasn't this delusion. If there wasn't this person sitting there i'm doing this i'm doing that there would be no wisdom there would be no wisdom there would be no need of wisdom if there weren't people going around thinking that they were doing things so sometimes you may think you may be over in the side of i'm doing things sometimes you may be over in the side of understanding the illusion of you doing things Sometimes you may be on the deluded side. Sometimes you may be on the awakened side. But there's no awakened side inseparable from the deluded side. It never can be the slightest distance away. Because the awakening to the understanding of how deluded you are has the delusion right there inside of it. And also, no matter how deluded you are, moment after moment, there's somebody there who understands it moment after moment, always.

[47:37]

There is the understanding of how silly we are constantly. And the understanding of how silly we are is actually everything that isn't us. And it's always there. It never misses a beat. It's not like it takes a vacation. It's always there. That is the understanding. It's not like somebody's out there thinking. That's not what discriminating wisdom is. Discriminating wisdom is actually Understanding. The understanding of me is you. It's not you individually, it's all of you. That's understanding me. And I can switch over to that side. I'm not there anymore, and then suddenly I understand who I am. But even on that side, there wouldn't be this understanding of anything if there wasn't this deluded person there. So if you are almost always deluded, that's not a problem if you appreciate it.

[48:43]

In other words, if you take responsibility for being deluded. Can you take responsibility for being deluded every moment? Those of you who think, jeez, I'm almost always deluded, you're getting pretty close to being a Buddha. Because you're taking responsibility your delusion and when you take responsibility for delusion you receive there is a response to my taking responsibility for my delusion my coming forth and taking responsibility for what I'm doing I get a response for that from that and the response is awakening and the response to awakening means that I have the ability to respond appropriately but that's because I take responsibility for being diluted which I can do because in fact I am being diluted all I got to do is admit it just be honest but there's you see to be diluted

[49:57]

and not take responsibility isn't somehow magically possible. People can be deluded and not take responsibility for it. And because they don't take responsibility for it, they don't feel the response. They don't feel the restorative response, which is giving you the ability again to respond appropriately. So you will respond appropriately from a life of taking responsibility for your delusion. So while I'm deluded, while I'm going around thinking, I am talking, I am thinking, I am doing, while I'm involved in this delusion, to be honest about it and take responsibility for it, as I come forward and take responsibility for this, at the fullness of responsibility for this delusion, right there, I am met.

[51:04]

I am restored by the understanding that that's delusion. But just to be deluded and going around thinking these things without being honest about it and completely fulfilling that, then I don't understand that at the place of completely doing what I'm doing, I'm met. You're met all the time. But in order to realize how you're met, you have to be up there. You have to reach up there and be all the way out there to feel that you're met. If you're back here a little bit in your action, if you put your arm out there but you're not all the way out to the end of your arm, you don't realize that everything's coming there and meeting you right there. Also, you have to admit, I'm not just putting my arm out there, I'm being deluded to put my arm out there. I'm deluded in thinking that I do that But I am deluded to think I do that.

[52:07]

I don't have to work that up. I do think that I am deluded, and there I go. Boom. And right at that, I'm met. Somehow you have to inhabit this delusion completely, which is taking responsibility for it. That would be wholehearted repentance. That's wholehearted repentance. And when you are wholeheartedly confess and repent, you are met by a great restoration, a great meeting comes to you in that way, which you can call, you know, it may sound somewhat, it's spiritual, but it's spiritual in the sense that it's spiritual in the sense that the world is meeting you it's very concrete in a sense because it's actually the entire phenomenal world the entire phenomenal world is meeting you the spiritual part is that i guess that this that this is good news

[53:26]

Well, we've been on this territory before about what's toxic, and I remember you talking about nothing is absolutely toxic in itself. And I keep getting stuck in places around things that seem so destructive. How about an example? Well, you might be being particularly aware of crack. Usage and just watching people die. Being aware of how patterns in my own life get in the way. I guess I could think in the same way it reflects on me. I get distraught or whatever to keep me bound up. Okay, so you find it difficult to say, like you hear about crack, right?

[54:54]

You don't use it yourself, do you? No. You hear about crack and you have difficulty saying crack is useful? No. Okay. When you say you have difficulty saying that, you mean that you don't say it. That's what you mean? Or do you say it sometimes but not really believe what you're saying? You don't say it's useful, right? So you find it easy not to say it's useful. And you really have not much choice about that, actually. You find yourself thinking that crack is not useful, don't you? But if you're me, most people would think, well, I'm sitting here thinking crack is unuseful. I think crack is bad. Now, I can say crack is good.

[55:55]

I can make that statement. But I actually don't think it's good. I mean, I really don't think it's good. Maybe if I tried it, I would think it was good. Thinking about crack, I don't think it's good. I do not think it's good. I can imagine from what I've heard about why people take it. I can think about that. But I don't think it's good from what I understand. But I think I'm thinking that. I actually do think I'm thinking that. And that's the way I think I'm thinking it. And I think I'm talking about it. So actually, I'm not trying to think that crack is good. I'm not trying to do that. I'm just thinking what I already think about crack. Namely, I think it's bad or I think it's unhelpful of it. But what I'm saying is that I think that way and I think I think that way. That's what I'm saying, first of all.

[56:56]

And I'm saying if I see that me thinking that way delusion not that it's delusion that crack is bad and like it would be right to think that it's good but that I'm involved in thinking that I think these thoughts without realizing that how did they come up with a crack wasn't so hot this is not something I made up by myself this didn't come to me sort of like by my own willpower all beings have made me alive here to have a brain and so on, and have given me information such that I create certain thoughts. And yet I think, I do think that I think that, without appreciating how everything comes forward and lets me think. How does that go together with, I can't feel unless...

[58:00]

Right. And if everything brought it about, it wouldn't be stealing. If everybody wanted me to go and take an extra piece of pizza, it wouldn't be stealing because it would be given to me, wouldn't it? But if I think that I will personally decide whether I can have an extra piece of pizza or not, that way of thinking is basically stealing. Also to think that I personally, by my own willpower, can decide not to steal a pizza. That also violates that precept. It violates all the precepts because it is basically delusion. It's saying that I can decide whether I kill or don't kill, whether I steal or don't steal, that it's up to me to decide. I am God. I can determine whether something's stolen or not. I can determine whether coffee I'm drinking has been given to me or not. It doesn't matter to me if 20 million people say that they didn't give me the coffee.

[59:08]

I don't care. Because I decide whether it's stealing or not. If I pay for the coffee, if I pay a dollar for the coffee, that means I didn't steal it. Now what if people say at the store, well actually, excuse me sir, but it's two dollars for that coffee. Say you raised the price yesterday with a dollar. Yes we did, I'm sorry. Well, I'm only going to pay a dollar. Well, they say it's stealing. Who's right? Who's right? Who's wrong? Who determines whether it's stealing or not? Now, if I give $2, then the people in the store who said, now the price of the coffee is $2, then they say, OK. We say, we agree, it's not stealing anymore, you can have the coffee. But somebody on the street might say, you're stealing that coffee. Because where did those people get that coffee? And what was involved in getting that coffee?

[60:10]

What did they pay the people who picked the coffee bean? You're stealing that coffee, someone would say. I don't agree, you can't have that coffee, someone might say. Someone else might say, what did they put on the crops to prevent certain animals from eating the crops? Because they put the pesticides in the stuff, I didn't say that they could poison the earth to grow that coffee. I didn't agree to that. Therefore, you're stealing that coffee because I didn't agree with the coffee being grown in the first place. I say you're stealing. You can maybe say, I don't care what you say. It's not stealing. I can decide. So the person who decides herself what's right and wrong is the same person who thinks she can do things by herself. Same person who thinks that she can put down $1, and that means she isn't stealing. Or if people make some noise, then that person can put down $2, and then she's not stealing. So you can make it not stealing by your action.

[61:12]

This is karma. And also, you could make it stealing by putting down less than you understand is the price. And therefore, because you decided to give less, you can determine, you can figure out that you're stealing. But that way of thinking is also I can think that way. And I can determine. And I can measure. And I can judge. Yes, you can judge. And that's fine. But also recognize that there's delusion there. Yes, you can judge. Crack is bad. This is good. You can do that stuff. But remember that you deciding it by yourself is delusional. If you can admit that what you're deciding is delusion, then you can do something, you can realize it's delusion, and you can act in this other way, which is called coming from awakening, awakening to your delusion. How can delusion be awakened to?

[62:17]

How can it be awakened to? Well, I mean, understanding a delusion. You wake up to that delusion is delusion. You understand that it's delusion. You understand that you don't put your hand on your cheek by your own personal effort. That all beings are helping you cradle your jaw. You understand that. You get it. There is an understanding that you're not an independent thing because my ability to put my hand on my jaw only comes to me because of my death. There's no person here doing these independent activities aside from the death of this person. My life is completely identical in a contradictory way. That understanding comes from being a limited person and being honest about that.

[63:22]

And then you can think things are toxic or not toxic whatever you think. You can do that, and you will keep doing that. You will keep thinking, that's toxic, that's not toxic. But what's the appropriate response to the thought, that's toxic? Many people think, oh, that's toxic. What's the appropriate response to that? The appropriate response, what? The appropriate response. pardon well basically that's what you probably will do right that's according to karma you probably will stay away from it probably that's what usually happens or if you do have something to do with it you do it because you think something else is even better you know because this is toxic but it's so good to take it that I'll take it so you know I'll take this poison because I like this thing that happens to me but still that

[64:28]

What's the appropriate response to the thought, this is toxic, and the appropriate response to, I don't care because I like what happens to me when I eat this poison. What's the appropriate response to that? Is it the thought? It's not your thought. It is. I mean, it's not your own thought necessarily. It is your thought, but it is your thought as a result of anything around you that is telling you that it's toxic. Got it? Yeah. But the thought, to think about it that way, is just another thought that you do. It's just a fancier form of karma than the previous one was less sophisticated. We have a few minutes. I think you can get this. You have to concentrate now, though. whatever you think about anything it's just on some level you think you're thinking that whatever you think about yourself you think that about yourself and on some level you think i say you but i mean me too you think that what you think about yourself is what you are you do

[65:58]

some level when basically when you think that this is poisonous you think is poisonous and i say what's the appropriate response to that to that thought uprightness and in other words admit that you're deluded if you admit that you're deluded if you if you see that you're making these judgments and that you think that that you're thinking is true, if you admit that, at the fullness of your admission, there will be understanding of how silly you are. And from that will come something which no one knows what it is, and it's called the appropriate response. It may be that you stay away from the poison, It may not be that you stay away from the poison.

[67:05]

It may be that you take the poison and carry it around your hands and say to everybody, I got poison here. I got toxins here. And I'm still operating on the level of, I've got toxins. But I never before took the toxin up and held it up and showed it to myself and the world and said, I'm carrying around toxins. And why am I carrying around toxins? because i want to show you people a memento of my awakening and why do i choose this because it was when i thought this was a toxin and when i realized that me thinking is the toxin was a deluded thought not that this wasn't toxin but that i think that i can think that this is a toxin all by myself i realized in my full admission of my thinking i realized relief from my thinking. And I bring this toxin, this thing I thought was a toxin, as a souvenir of my little journey into being myself.

[68:13]

And when I exerted it fully, I was released from my own delusion that I can think things all by myself. Even though I continue to carry around this momentum and show it to you as though i was carrying it and i'm showing you but i've been released from this and i and my release has encouraged me to continue to try to be aware that i'm a deluded being to kept to be honest about that moment after moment and if i am honest about it completely i get released from being a deluded person which is called being an awakened being. But these two are together all the time. So I don't try to get rid of this problem. I don't try to stop being this way, because trying to stop being this way is exactly the same thing. I also don't tell myself to think differently.

[69:20]

I don't try to think differently. Trying to think differently is very much the same kind of thinking I've always been doing. What I'm trying to do now is be honest about the way I have been thinking and I am thinking. Be honest about that. In other words, be thoroughly deluded because I am thoroughly deluded. I cannot be relieved of my delusion until I take responsibility for it. That's my belief. And the full responsibility for delusion is perfectly met by perfect release from delusion. It's met by the world where I cannot do anything.

[70:22]

Where everything makes me, as a matter of fact, makes me into a person who thinks that he can do this, who makes me into a person who thinks he can't do this, who makes me into a person who thinks he's a great pianist, or not a good pianist at all, or makes me think I can't play at all. The world makes me that way. But I can't realize that unless I admit that I think I do this stuff all by myself. And I can't understand these precepts until I think, realize that I think I can decide whether they're happening or not. At some level, everybody thinks that, that they can decide that, that they can kill and not kill. But we're not in charge of the killing and not killing. However, we think we are. And if we admit that, we will be released from thinking that we can decide whether we kill or don't kill.

[71:28]

And being released from thinking that I can kill or not kill is what's called the precept of not killing. And then your response will be what we call not killing. But it won't be anymore that you think you can not kill or you think you can kill. It will be actual not killing. It will be the not killing that everybody's helping you do not just your idea of it. And no one will disagree. And no one will say, well, actually, you are killing. There won't be anybody like that anymore. Yes? Somewhere between the one time you had this idea and the time that you're awake... Can you sort of extrapolate from the one instance and is it easier the next time or is it always moment by moment by moment with each individual decision or each individual thought?

[72:41]

Do you know what I'm asking? Are you asking is there some kind of like irreversible permanent awakening? If it wasn't called away to me because I thought that... Yes, I guess I am. Yes, there is. It's a continuity, yeah. And it is going on right now. This irreversible, unshakable, permanent awakening is happening right now. But we as people... because we are involved in moment-by-moment action, we wake up to it through our moment-by-moment delusion. And it's through admitting your delusion that you actually get vision into the permanent, ongoing truth. And you need to keep doing this until everybody else is dragged into this meditation.

[73:48]

I think the place where it really starts is when I personally am willing to admit what I'm up to, rather than get other people to admit what they're up to. Even though I'm telling you to do that, and I'm saying it's necessary for you to do it, really, I won't encourage you to do that unless I'm doing it myself, really. Or you'll be more encouraged if I do it myself. So I'm trying to do it while I'm talking. I'm trying to admit that this is delusion, that I think, on some level, I think I'm doing the talking here. I'm trying to keep track of that dualistic karmic mode here. And my experience is that when I fully keep track of it and own up to it, I experience being met and released. from that way of being.

[74:54]

And I also experience that I hesitate to be a human being. I hesitate to be that deluded and to feel completely what it's like to be a person who thinks he's deciding how long to talk to somebody or something like that. It's hard to be that honest and, you know, Actually, it's gentle, too, with yourself, to let yourself be yourself and thereby experience this meeting. And in that meeting, then you can witness that your action now is no longer coming from I'm doing it or they're doing it. It comes from understanding that they co-produce each other and you watch your actions come forth and then you understand that it's not now that you're doing different things exactly but that your actions are miracles that everything you do or everything that is being done through you is a miracle even can you believe it that cough

[76:15]

But the price of witnessing his miracles is to admit the greasiest available phenomena, the tightest, kinkiest, smallest scale, pettiest aspect of existence in the universe, namely your own trip. And I say the nastiest, tiniest, pettiest, because it is just right in this particular moment that you're involved in this, and then now that's gone, you can't do that again. And sort of generalize it. You have to be on the particular little thing you're up to, the particular thought, like, that's toxic. I say it's toxic. Or that's not toxic. That's not toxic. I know it's not. It's okay. It's good for you. Eat it. Those thoughts, those particularities, that's where we're stuck. Moment after moment, you're involved in something like that. Only Buddha is willing to be involved in such small-scale activity as we are involved in.

[77:38]

Only the great mind of Buddha thinks it's so cute to be like us. We ourselves, you know, judging and judging and judging and judging. But the Buddha mind says, oh, I see that. Good. That's my job, is to be here with that and to elucidate Buddha's knowledge through that, for that. But we have to do our side. We have to inhabit and admit all my ancient twisted karma and then after that take refuge in buddha and then receive the precepts to help us meditate on this it's hard though it really is hard Pardon?

[78:44]

She offered you some of the support. She offered me some support? Morale? Good rank. Okay. So, are you ready? ready to be so human that you completely transcend it.

[79:26]

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