Many of you know that we have been for most of this year in these meetings and other meetings. Receiving compassion and giving compassion. We have been praising compassion. And again, I praise compassion as the most excellent. of Buddhahood. Buddhahood which has the nature of thoroughly protecting vulnerable sentient beings who are bound in the prison of birth and death.

[01:01]

of all kinds of suffering. This is what Buddhahood thoroughly protects and liberates, all these sentient beings. And its most excellent cause is great compassion. Also recently, I've offered a kind of, in a sense, a sequence of events. Starting with Buddhahood. Wonderful Buddhahood, which protects vulnerable living beings in the suffering of birth and death.

[02:04]

Buddhahood is caused by the aspiration, also called Bodhi mind or mind of awakening. The aspiration to attain Buddhahood is the cause of Buddhahood. Not just to attain Buddhahood, but in order to exercise the virtues of Buddhahood to protect all beings. and liberate them and help them become Buddhas. And the cause of this aspiration to realize Buddhahood is compassion, great compassion. And the condition for great compassion is great loving-kindness. And the condition for great loving-kindness is to have... a sincere and gentle feeling of fondness and cherishing of all life.

[03:13]

And as a condition for realizing this vast loving kindness, we need to be practicing impartiality and equanimity. towards comfort and discomfort, towards our own comfort and discomfort, and towards beings with whom we feel uncomfortable and comfortable with. To be impartial means we become free of hating discomfort, hating pain. and hating beings with whom we feel discomfort. We need to be let go of that in order to move on in the practice.

[04:17]

And we also need to stop being attached, give up being attached. It's okay to have great pleasure in our own body and mind. We need to learn to give up being attached to it. It's okay to feel comfortable with living beings who we dearly love. We feel so happy to be with them, like I feel so happy to be with you today. But I know I need to not be attached to you. You are not under my control. I cannot hold on to you. I cannot possess you. I can love being with you. I can enjoy being with you. But I do not want to be attached to you. And if I can be not attached to you, that promotes equanimity.

[05:24]

That promotes impartiality towards you. Now, if by any chance any of you would give me a hard time and I would be uncomfortable with you, or in pain with you, then I also do not want to hate you for the pain I feel when you are with me, for the irritation and hard time you give me when we are close. I do not wish to hate you. I wish to be equanimous and impartial towards everything I experience when I'm with you and everything I experience in myself. Again, this is the foundation for moving on to now find a way to find a way to feel a gentle fondness and cherishing for every living being. This then makes possible great loving kindness.

[06:30]

And this moistens our body and mind. so that we can plant the seeds of compassion and they can sink into the fertile earth of loving kindness and sprout into the unshakable commitment to realize Buddhahood so that we can join in the protection and liberation of all beings. That's an overall picture of the program that we've been looking at for this year. And recently, I've been emphasizing and bringing up a kind of scientific approach to this wonderful, to all these things I've just talked about. A scientific approach to compassion. And today I'd like to emphasize a scientific approach to our own body and mind, which our own body and mind is calling for compassion.

[07:55]

And our own body and mind is listening and observing with compassion to scientifically study that. And again, a short version of what I've been suggesting is scientific study is to study by observing and experimenting. Now I'm talking about observing and experimenting with our own body and mind. The study of our own body and mind is an essential activity of compassion. Studying our own body and mind, observing our own body and mind and experimenting with our own body and mind facilitates the fulfillment of great compassion and promotes the realization of Buddhahood.

[08:56]

And I would just kind of generously propose that Zen meditation is to study our body and mind. What we sometimes call Zazen, or sitting meditation, is to study our body and mind. And we also study our body and mind in conversation with other bodies and minds. Like right now, I'm talking to you about my body and mind and I'm talking about your body and mind. I'm studying my body and mind right now. I'm observing it right now. And I'm experimenting with it right now. I invite you to enjoy and enjoy And join me in studying your body and mind.

[10:16]

Observing your body and mind. And experimenting with your body and mind. The Buddha gave teachings and these teachings are collected in what we call the scriptures or the sutras. the discourses of the Buddha. And then there was another collection of teachings which are called the Abhidharma. But sometimes these collections of teachings which systematically arrange Buddhist teachings and examine them and question them and explore them and experiment with them. This Abhidharma is sometimes called higher science of Buddhism, where we take the teachings of Buddha and we explore them, we observe them in our own body and mind.

[11:27]

So now I start with a teaching of the Buddha. The Buddha taught about karma, which is also, it's translated, karma is translated often as action. And karma, action, is defined by the Buddha in Sanskrit as Chaitana. And Chetana is a word which refers to the overall landscape of a moment of consciousness. This is, in a sense, a theory, a teaching of the Buddha, which is a theory, which we can study this theory, we can observe this theory, and we can

[12:40]

Experiment with this theory and test this theory. What's the theory? The theory is that the definition of action, and action comes in three forms, mind, posture, and speech. Sometimes we say mind, body, and speech, but speech is actually also physical. So it refers, like right now, my hand, the movement of my hands. This is karma. And my speech is karma. But also, which is present and is fundamental, is my thinking. The overall shape of my consciousness, moment by moment. Right now, in this moment, the consciousness which I have, which I'm living in, where there's a sense of me, that consciousness has an overall pattern.

[13:57]

Part of the pattern of this overall pattern of this moment of consciousness is actually to see your faces. Your faces are in this consciousness. Also, bamboo outside this room are in

[14:18]

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