The concept here is that sitting still and silent opens to or has a possibility of the mind becoming quiet and open and flexible and bright and joyful and then this kind of concentrated quiet mind can be then extended into daily life activities. Also when sitting in silence,

[01:00]

we sometimes can look at our daily life activities, we can think of them, and in a state of tranquility, we can see them in a different way than we see them when we're not tranquil. When we see them in a relaxed, open state, we can see them in ways that look different than if we're uptight and closed. There's lots of opportunities to be uptight, closed and agitated and so most of you know what things look like in that state. But you can understand things in a different way, I wouldn't say necessarily better, but different, when your mind is calm and quiet. A calm, quiet mind doesn't mean that there's no sound or no talk,

[02:02]

it just means the sound or the talk is arising in a quiet space. Like, you know, maybe at the opera, people are sitting quietly, you know, and somebody goes, Ka stha diva and we can hear it in the silence. And the more present we are, maybe the more we can experience the song, the sound. And maybe understand deeply what's being given to us. Another part of silent sitting is that it offers the opportunity to develop a mind which is not holding on to the silence and stillness.

[03:03]

A generous mind. For example, I was sitting recently with you in this room and it was quiet and still, where I was anyway. But thoughts arose, and one of the thoughts that arose was, I feel like I'm, you know, almost like a medic for people who are out in the field. And I thought, my father in World War II was a medic. He helped soldiers who got injured or, you know, and were dying even. So, in a way, my social action is to help people who are involved in social action. To bring Buddha's teachings to help you

[04:09]

in whatever kind of social action you wish to devote yourself to, to do it with more and more compassion, or deeper and deeper compassion, so that you will be more and more effective at what you want to do, at what you want to work at. I'm not telling you, really I'm not telling you that you should be a vegan or not. I'm not telling you you should vote for this person

[05:13]

rather than that person. I'm not telling you that you should be compassionate even. But if you want to be compassionate, if you excuse the expression, I'm your man. Or one of them, anyway. I'm here to support you in developing compassion by bringing teachings about compassion to you. And I would really be very happy if you listen to these teachings and could use them to be more and more and greater and greater compassionate beings. I would like us to use this event to help this group of people leave this event

[06:15]

and go into the world with more and more compassion. Taking up somewhat from where we left off last time, we were talking about self-righteousness. And, for example, you might see something that you think would be righteous. You might see some action which you think is righteous. You might see some activity or some goal that you feel is a righteous goal. For example, you might think helping poor people is a righteous thing. You might think helping people have equal rights is a righteous thing. Is that possible? You might wish to work, you know, for there to be equal voting rights in this country.

[07:16]

You might think that that would be good. A righteous project. Right? Is that possible? And then we mentioned last week that if you're working on some righteous project that one of the downfalls of working on righteous things is self-righteousness. So over at the San Francisco Zen Center, self-righteousness is kind of endemic. Because the people over there, they're into various righteous projects or we'll say righteous causes. And they're more or less ongoing. I wouldn't say constantly, but let's just say they're constantly at risk of becoming self-righteous. And they sometimes actually slip into it.

[08:17]

And they sometimes notice that they slip into it and see that that's not really the way they want to practice righteousness. Sometimes they don't notice it, but their friends notice it. And sometimes their friends unselfrighteously help them see it. And sometimes their friends are also self-righteous and they self-righteously tell them that there's another person self-righteous. We have potentially a lot of risky situation over at, you know, righteous center. And so I'm kind of like beating the drum of watch out for self-righteousness at the Zen Center, at the yoga room, in Berkeley, Berkeley, you know. The home of all kinds of rights. The home, the birthplace of disability rights.

[09:19]

The first place to have wheelchair accessible whatever. To have pavements that have like a little dip in them so wheelchairs don't have to go over the edge of a cliff. I think Berkeley's like where it started. Right? So you could, Berkeley people can be self-righteous. Because there's a lot of righteousness projects here. But just like at the Zen Center, Berkeley people are at risk of thinking they're better than people in, I don't know where. Fremont? Walnut Creek? I don't know. But you're, you righteous people are at risk of having it be your righteousness, self-righteous, right? So we're on to that. We're watching out for that, right? And that would be, the path of righteousness,

[10:23]

the path of righteousness is promoted by being aware of self-righteousness of myself. Not so much of being aware of other people's unless they ask me to. So I think Confucius says if you see some good thing about a person, emulate it. Like if you see a righteous person, emulate them. If you see an unrighteous person, look at yourself. See them as a reminder that maybe, to check yourself out. And if you check yourself out, if anybody is being unrighteous or self-righteous, if you're aware that you are, you're in a much better position to help them. Because you can say to them, guess what I just discovered? And they say, what? I discovered that I'm kind of self-righteous. And they go, oh, that's too bad that you're that way.

[11:27]

And you walk off and they say, I wonder why they told me that. Could I be self-righteous? Could they be indirectly, self-critically helping me see that? I think I am. Thank you. Who was that masked person that helped me? By telling me honestly, not faking it. You know, I notice I'm self-righteous sometimes and I'm sorry. Actually, I notice I'm self-righteous with you. I'm sorry. Yeah, you should be. Yeah. So I would like you to, I would like to support you in any righteous activities you're devoted to. And I would like to help you be devoted free of self-righteousness. And again, free of self-righteousness usually comes with noticing

[12:28]

that you're sometimes self-righteous. That you sometimes think you're better than the unself-righteous. It's a righteous thing to notice my own, my self-righteousness. That's a righteous thing. Being self-righteous isn't really righteous, but it's calling to be treated with compassion, to be acknowledged and be cared for in a kind way so it can wake up to itself and be free. Like that poem, your huddled masses yearning to be free. Your huddled self-righteousness yearning to be free. Somebody has to teach self-righteousness how to be kind and drop away. And I have a class

[13:34]

in St. Green Gulch on Monday nights and the name of the class, I don't know how that happened, but the name of the class is Great Compassion in Zen. And last night we had a class and I I talked to the people in the class about three kinds of compassion. And then today I thought, oh, that would be relevant here too. One of the origins of this teaching, by the way, of three types is from a sutra called the Vimalakirti Sutra, which the main character is a lay bodhisattva named Vimalakirti. And so one of the teachings in that sutra is the teaching that there's a type of compassion which is called, the first type of compassion,

[14:36]

maybe the first place that this is like clearly articulated in the bodhisattva teaching is in that sutra where it says bodhisattvas are at risk of what's called sentimental compassion. So that's where that comes out. And also in that sutra they talk about great compassion. So there's two types talked about very clearly there. One is sentimental compassion and the other is great compassion. And then later, meditation on this teaching led to discussing three types of compassion. The sentimental type, the compassion in accord with Dharma, and great compassion. So sentimental compassion is very similar to self-righteousness. The word sentimental is related to the word sentiment.

[15:43]

And the word sentiment is related to the word sense. Sentimental now, these days, has the meaning, I think, of sentiments that are customary or habitual. And another way of saying this term is loving view compassion. And another way to say it is emotional conviction compassion. Emotional conviction is, again, similar to self-righteousness. Like you have an emotion and you're convinced, you're convinced of that emotion. And loving view sounds pretty good,

[16:50]

but it kind of means that you feel some affection. You look at somebody and you feel some affection for them. You see some person and you feel some affection for them. Or you feel some kindness towards them. Which doesn't sound bad, right? So what's the problem? Well, the problem is, again, that I see this person, they appear to me, and they appear to me as not being me. And I'm kind of convinced that they're not me and that their suffering is not mine. And that's kind of a habitual way that we see things. So I feel compassion

[17:52]

towards the person, but I feel in a dualistic relationship with them. Also, I might be quite convinced that my compassion is compassion. And also kind of convinced that if I feel affection towards somebody, it's compassion. And also, I might think not only do I see who they are as not being me, but also they really exist that way. They actually exist the way I see them. That they're a really existing thing. And also that their compassion is really existing. And I'm convinced of this.

[18:56]

And I do feel compassion. Again, maybe it doesn't sound so bad yet. Well, I'm not going to say it's so bad. Somebody said, actually, maybe Charlie even said it. Does that mean the sentimental compassion is wrong? It's not really wrong. It just has problems. And one of the problems it has is that it has these like... It kind of drains one. It drains you. It exhausts you. Yes? Pardon? Would you say it's perverted? Perverted? Well, it would be a perversion of great compassion.

[20:06]

Yeah. In great compassion, which I don't want to talk about yet, but in great compassion, there's no sense of separation between oneself and others. So when the sense of separation comes up, when the appearance of separation comes up, to grasp that, again, sets you up for self-righteousness. And it's kind of a perversion of great compassion, which is not self-righteous. So you could say it's a perversion of great compassion. But as I was talking to somebody about today, it's also kind of like a raft, a raft. We kind of need to use it because we've got it. And we can get on this self-righteous compassion raft, and on that raft, we can ride to the next kind of compassion. And we can practice,

[21:09]

maybe, we can practice self-sentimental compassion towards our sentimental compassion, which will take us beyond our sentimental compassion to the next kind of compassion. And then that next kind of compassion is also a raft, which we can practice that kind of compassion, which will take us to the third kind of compassion, which is not a raft. It's the place we want to go, which is great compassion, where there's no sense of, you know, like, oh, you suffering person, or even me suffering person and you suffering person, or even poor me, or poor you. It's just a sensitivity to each other without any duality. That's the way the Buddha is sensitive to all,

[22:11]

the awakened mind is sensitive to all suffering, all suffering influences it and touches it and affects it and changes it, but there's no duality in it. And that kind of compassion is what teaches other people how to have that kind of compassion. And that kind of compassion is not draining or tiring. So, again, if I notice that I'm being self-righteous or if I notice that I'm thinking, oh, you're separate from me and you really do exist, I can practice kindness towards that thought and start to let go of believing my own thinking

[23:12]

about you, about your suffering, about me, about my suffering, and what compassion is. By noticing that I think compassion is like this and I'm kind of convinced that it is. That doesn't mean I can't sometimes think, well, that's what I think compassion is, but maybe it's not. And that's a moment of, that's not so sentimental. Maybe things aren't the way I think is not kind of a sentimental thought, unless you do that all the time. I see signs on faces that make me think maybe I should stop for a second and see how you're doing. Yes. You're looking...

[24:31]

In duality, you're looking at me and you think I'm not you. So when I look at you and I think you're me... When you look at me and you think you're me, that's kind of like, again, that could be like part of getting to the place where you understand when you look at me that I'm you. Not just you think I am, because I think Michael's me. I can think that. I can try that on. And that might be part of the process for me to wake up to the reality that I'm me and I'm you. Yeah. That allows sort of non-duality

[25:41]

to come into being. So the sense that I have in my mind these projections, these stories, and I'm overlaying everything, to shift my mind, view, ego, and state that I have. To be mindful of that would promote becoming free of that. Just like being mindful of my own self-righteousness is part of me becoming free of my own self-righteousness. And being mindful of your self-righteousness, the way to become free of that, that is your self-righteousness, is to see that your self-righteousness is my self-righteousness.

[26:41]

Yes. Well, the second type, the second type is when you actually can see that you have a kind of illusory compassion for illusory beings who have illusory suffering. And that raft, you may not be ready to get on yet. But that's the second type, is where you actually see, you actually understand that the beings you're devoted to, that what you're devoted to are illusions. And the suffering you're concerned about is an illusion. It's a mental construction.

[27:52]

But I didn't want to go to the second one yet because I think we have to in some sense be more into the first one before we're actually willing to tolerate the second one. You have to stay on this first, I think you have to stay on this first raft a little longer before that second raft would work for you. Because that second raft could turn into nihilism. It helps. Maybe I'll just go to Linda. An example. ...immigrant children and how they've been

[28:56]

separated from their parents and all the anguish that that has caused and long-term damage and suffering. So let's say I feel that, like I felt that, so I changed my Facebook profile picture from my dog to this little crying child. Yes. It doesn't really move me when you say that those beings, those little children are illusory and mindless. So how would you advise me to wisely relate to this sense of anguish and suffering that I want to relate to? I use the example of it's not, you know, it's examples that I've learned from and it's not on a level of intense suffering. Well, sometimes it is, but usually not at that level

[29:59]

of children being separated from their parents. But people do come and talk to me, some of whom are somewhat stressed. They're not usually children, though. But they're sometimes rather stressed about maybe various things, like sometimes about spiritual matters, but sometimes about their relationship with their spouse or their children or their parents. Sometimes they have kind of significant stress or quite frequently significant fear. I think that's part of the thing about when children get separated from their parents, they become terrified. That's sort of what it is. That's the most horrible thing, they think it's the end of the world, right? So, what I learned some time ago was that I learned that if I had, let's just say I had three people to talk to,

[31:01]

three people were waiting to see me, and I thought, oh, I have three people to see. And then when I'm talking to the first person, I'm thinking I have three people to see. And then I talk to the second person, I have one more person. I'm talking to this person, I think I have two more people to see. And I talk to the second person, I have one more person to see. And if it's three people like that, I don't notice that when I'm talking to Nettie and I'm thinking that I have to talk to Barbara and Vivian, I don't notice that that way of thinking drains me. And that's a habitual way to think. Like you've got three things to do, and the habitual way is like, oh, I've got three things to do. So I've got to do this one, this one, and this one. And when you're doing the first one, you're thinking the second and third. And you don't even notice how draining that is. You kind of get by with it, usually.

[32:05]

But it's a draining, it's a habitual, it's a sentimental way to see three people. It's a habitual way. I get habitual. Yeah. You don't get the draining. I don't get the sentimental. Well, sentimental means habitual, or a customary way. If you're seeing one person, usually you would think, well, I just have one person to see, right? If you're seeing three, then you think, I have three. But the way you think of three is you sentimentally are thinking about taking care of all three. And people come to me and they say, it must be really hard to see all those people. They're thinking that way. You know, I would say, bear with me, Linda. I'd say, bear with me, Elena. Bear with me, everybody. The story's not done. So, I learned, I learned that if I'm going to see 90 people and I think that way, it's

[33:13]

almost intolerable. Why is it intolerable? Because you multiply what you do with three by 30. And then you see, there's something wrong with the way I'm looking at this. Not wrong, excuse me, take it back. There's something draining about this. I care about these people and they care about me. I want to help them and they want me to help them. They want me to give them my attention. They all, none of them, well, I should say, most of them do not want me to give them 190th of my attention, or even 1 third. Does that make sense? They all want me to be right there for them. But, if I have three people to see and I think that way, I'm kind of saving 2 thirds when I see Nettie. And Barbara's lucky because then I'm just going to save half. But that way of thinking drains me, drains me in my

[34:15]

work of meeting them. And if you see, and again, when I used to see three people, I didn't notice it. But when it got to be 90, I saw it's unworkable. But that's, it's actually kind of unworkable with three too. Each time you do that, you kind of gouge into your energy that you want to put forth for these kids or these adults, whatever it is. So, in some ways it's good to expand the horizon of what you're doing so you can notice that this sentimental way of working is not going to work for very long. And if you keep it up, little by little you're going to quit, you're going to get exhausted. So that's one of the things that says in the Sutra. This, when bodhisattvas try to help people by this method, they get exhausted and they quit, or they run away from the very people they're devoted to. So you care about these kids, you deeply care about them, and there's a way of caring about

[35:16]

them that's not draining, and there's a way of caring about them that's draining, and you might not notice it unless you work a lot. And then you say, something's wrong, and you say, I've got to quit, I've got to get out of here. These kids are sucking my blood. You start to hate the people you're helping. You think they're attacking you, but they're not. It's the way you're relating to them that's attacking you, the sentimental way. It's not sentimental to give yourself completely to this person. That's not our usual way. Like I have no other life than right now, even though there's a whole bunch of people waiting, and I'm not ignoring them, I'm not slipping into my normal human thing of, I have a lot of people to see. And the other people are thinking, oh, he has a lot of people to see. They think that way, and I can think that way. When I actually slip

[36:19]

into that, it drains me, it makes me less able to do the work. I want you to be able to care for these children without draining yourself by the way you care about them. And you can notice this way of talking to the person, it's not that I have blinders on, it's just I give up the way of being with this person, which undermines me. And I can tell the difference between the way of being here that doesn't drain me, and the way of being here that does. And you can learn that. You learn it by being drained. And if you do it with three people, you might not learn it. So if you do it with ten, as the number increases, as the number of tests increase, you start to notice there's something off about this. Or you could say, I'm losing my energy, I'm getting burned out about something

[37:20]

I really care about. Is it getting at all clearer? Yeah. So again, another way to put it is, I can only do a little bit. I can only do a little bit. Like, all I can do is talk to Nettie. I mean, that's like nothing, right? But I can do that. I can talk to Nettie. And then that's gone. And then I can talk to Jeff. I can do little things like that. However, the sentimental thing is, there's many, many people to take care of. It isn't just taking care of your own kid, or your own toe. It's taking care of everybody's toes, or anyway, thousands of toes. That's

[38:22]

the usual way. And you notice the difference between taking care of that toe and trying to take care of a thousand. One is, excuse me for saying so, the second one is kind of grandiose. And grandiose is very tiring. So now here's the possibility that by taking care of your toe completely, you won't be drained, and then you can take care of somebody else's toe, and somebody else's toe, and somebody else's toe. Just like somebody who is trying to take care of many toes, you can do many toes, but not by thinking about doing many toes. But just, I'm going to do a little bit here for this toe and then this toe. It's not so self-righteous, and it's not so habitual. And other people, if they watch you, they might think, oh, you're taking care of a lot of toes, and you have to watch out that you don't fall for that. Because, oh, I'm a famous toe carer, everybody notices I take care of

[39:27]

a lot of toes. But really, because the job's so big, because my job's so big, I can only do a little bit right now. And again, if I think about doing my whole job right now, I don't do this job. And plus, I don't, or I should say, I do this job in a way that undermines me. Yes? Undermines the project. Undermines the work. The work was really important. I'm trying to make myself and you better workers for the things you're working on. And the next few types of compassion are very important. But right now, we're in the sentimental part, which we have not yet quite got. But I'm just saying to you that the later ones will have other advantages that you'd like to learn about. Yes? You know about this practice of folding paper cranes? I know about origami, yes. I remember when I was a little kid, I heard

[40:33]

about, oh, I think it was, there's a book called Fear the Poor, Jackie Robinson, something like that. Somebody's sick, and she's in the hospital folding paper cranes. And there's a tradition that if you fold a thousand of them, you'll get better. And, you know, so I learned how to fold paper cranes in elementary school. And it was tough to fold the first few. And I couldn't imagine folding a thousand. And then my whole class got together as a team and folded a thousand and hung them in front of that thing. But I imagined that process if I were sitting in the hospital folding a thousand paper cranes, I'd have to let go of the attachment to getting that done, I think. It would probably be overwhelming. Yeah, and a sick little girl might notice that quite quickly, that the way of thinking about the other ones is untenable, that you'll collapse. But if you focus on each one, you

[41:36]

can do a thousand, and that's what you want. And it isn't just that you want to do a thousand, it's that you want to keep going. You don't want to, some of these projects that you're working on, you do not want to quit. So we're trying to find a way to do this work that's joyful, even though hard, it's joyful because you're doing it in the unsentimental way, which will open unto, it also will open up to new understandings, which will also support the work, and will show other people how to do it. So as a young scientist in elementary school, I was struck by this hypothesis that you fold these cranes and then your disease goes away. But I think I understand now that it's not that the disease goes away, but it is that you get better.

[42:37]

Yeah, the disease might not go away, but you get better. You become more and more healthy and compassionate because you learn the effective way of folding the cranes, and you learn it by learning the ineffective or stressful way of doing it. You learn it by trial and error. So this thing about, and this again bringing it back to stillness and silence, and stillness and silence, you're just right here, you're not going to the next person, you're not going to the goal, you're actually just working on what's in your face, and you're not, yeah. I have many, I have other stories like that, but maybe I'll wait. Yes. I'm trying to understand the analogy to the question that you brought up originally.

[43:39]

I don't think, I mean if I were to interpret this in a literal sense, I would think you were saying, well, when faced with thousands of children separated from their parents, you probably help one child at a time. I don't think you're saying that. I think you're saying if you don't get so overwhelmed by compassion, by the sentimentality of compassion, that you can't act and take whatever small step might affect all of them. You're not just saying change can only be made, or compassion can only be righteousness can only be exercised on a one-by-one basis. I don't think you're saying that. Do you see the distinction between what I'm trying to say? I think I do, and so it's kind of subtle there. I'm saying don't, well part of what I'm saying is that it's habitual, it's sentimental when you're dealing with a lot of things to get distracted from this thing. That's kind of sentimental.

[44:43]

Yes, I agree with that. The thing might not be an individualized thing that's person-by-person, it's one phenomenon which is something that's a policy that's in place to separate these kids from their parents. So don't get so consumed by the sentimentality that you don't do anything at all. Whatever it is, go to a protest, write a letter, whatever it is, well, yeah, whatever it is you're doing, do that and watch out for all the other things that you're not doing. So like you're going, you're doing this, you're writing this letter, okay, but sentimentally you're thinking a bunch of other letters, or a bunch of donations, or a bunch of meetings. You're thinking about that, and those are good things to do, but the way you're thinking about them makes it harder for you to write this letter. So while you're writing this letter, which is good, you're draining yourself by unnecessary activity, which eventually each one of those might be appropriate, but right now you're

[45:50]

not writing the other letters, you're not folding the other cranes, you're not meeting the other people, but we're habitually used to thinking, I've got this to do and I've also got to cook dinner, I've also got to write my paper, I've also got to meditate. So, that way of doing things is sentimental. Yes? So, your advice about how to work, how to do things is very good, we can all relate to it and understand it. Your understanding of the word sentimental is very different from the way we usually think about that word. How do you usually think of it? As a kind of gushing emotion, an indulgent, a self-indulgent emotion. Well, it's that too, it's self-indulgent and self-indulgence is habitual.

[46:52]

So, we want to help people and we bring our self-indulgence with us. We like to leave it over here, I'm going to go help these people now, just stay home, self-indulgence, I'm going to go help people now, but it comes with you and if you don't know it, it undermines you, you slip on it. Even though, you know, you're doing a good thing, this other part isn't bad, it's just that if you don't know about it, it's going to get in the way. So, the mushy, self-sentimental compassion is kind of mushy and sticky and whatever. It is, it's like that. So, that's part of the meaning. But what I'm focusing on is that it's also habitual and therefore you probably got it most of the time and you don't have to get rid of it, you just have to wake up to it and be kind to it. Don't beat yourself up for being whatever that is, saccharine, blah,

[47:57]

blah, blah. Be kind to yourself and if you're kind to yourself, you can keep an eye on it. Just like if you're kind to your children, it makes it easier to watch them. But if you're habitually watching your children, it makes it harder. So, I'll tell you this story which some of you have heard before. I knew this very bright little girl and she was a little girl, like she was four years old at the time of the cabbage patch dolls. Remember those? They're from like 30 years ago, right? So, she was a little girl and she wanted one. Anyway, her parents were separated and they lived on two sides of the country. And so when she was with her mother and she was going to go visit her father,

[48:58]

she would not pay attention to her mother, who she loved very much, because she was thinking of her father and she was going to be with him, even though he wasn't there. And then she would say goodbye to her mother and fly to her father and then when she was going to leave her father and come back to her mother, same thing, she was thinking of her mother and wouldn't notice her father. Miss her father right where she was with him and miss her mother right where she was with her. Because it's habitual to think of the next person. It's habitual to think of next, next, next. It's habitual. It's a habitual thing of anxiety. What next? What do I do now? What next? What should we do now? We're perfectly happy like we just met each other. We're totally enchanted. We're completely like happy to be together. And then we say, now what should we do? That's sentimental compassion. That's sentimental affection. You know, we're so happy to be here together and then what next?

[50:03]

This little girl had that and she noticed it. She noticed, I was so happy to see Daddy, I forgot Mommy. I was so happy to see Mommy, I forgot Daddy. And then she said, it's like when you get a cabbage patch doll. You know, for Christmas or whatever. And you take it out of the package and you're so happy to have it. And then you come back in the morning and you can't find it. And you look around, you can't find it. And somebody accidentally, in cleaning up the wrapping, has put your cabbage patch doll in the trash. So you go down to the trash and you see the trash truck driving away. And she said, in Boston, when they find nice stuff in the trash, the garbage collectors put it on the roof of the truck. So you see your cabbage patch doll going away on the roof of the truck. Why? Because you didn't take care of your cabbage patch doll. You were thinking of, you know, I don't know what, the next toy.

[51:05]

This is habitual. And this kind of being drawn away from this little thing right now undermines us to do the many, many, many things we want to do. And it's also, again, it's a little self-righteous and it's a little grandiose that we think we can do more than take care of this person or this mother. We think we can be with our mom and also think about our dad. But that little girl noticed that. She noticed that the way she was with her mother was distracted from the very person she loved so much and wanted to be with so much. But she also wants to be with her father. So I want to talk to Nettie and I want to talk to many Jeffs. This room is full of Jeffs. I do. But, you know, if I'm talking to all of them at once, fine.

[52:11]

But then I want to talk to a bunch of other people. I do. But do I actually try to do them all at once? Yes. I do. I want to take care of everybody. But that's habitual. It's habitual to want to do a lot. Even though, really, our job right now is to take care of this letter, this donation, this telephone call. And it's not that I'm cutting these things out. I'm just fully taking care of this thing. And that's not habitual. That has to be trained. And the way you learn it is by noticing you don't do it. And feeling the undermining quality of not doing it. And then sometimes you don't do the habitual thing. You do a new thing called, I can only do this little thing of looking right into Linda's eyes now. That's all I can do.

[53:12]

Even though I can see Michelle's head a little bit beyond her hair. I'm not trying to see Michelle. I get everybody else. When I just take care of this. But if I take care of everybody, I miss this. And that drains me. And that makes me less effective at working on whatever project it is. Now what I want to forecast is this. Which, you haven't asked this question yet. But I'm basically saying that if we can work on this sentimental compassion, whatever thing you're working on, you will be more effective at it. And somebody said, well how about if you're doing something that's not so nice. If you practice this, would you be more effective at it? I would say, yes. However, being more effective at it would mean being less self-righteous. And if you're less self-righteous, it will move you to the next kind of compassion. And if you practice that, it will move you to the next kind.

[54:15]

And the next kind, you will be so sensitive to everyone that you'll never do anything that's harmful. When you get to the third type of compassion, even if you got there by doing these practices, which things which somebody thinks are not so good, you will wake up to anything not good about them. And you will abandon them. And you will just do what really doesn't hurt anybody. Because you'll feel everybody. We're heading in that direction. So, we don't have to worry about, in some sense, making everybody more effective, which would mean that some people who are on different projects than us will also become more effective, if they were to do this. And you might say, but there's no problem, because the people who are doing the other projects from us are not listening to this teaching. Right? None of those people are in the room. So, they're not going to hear this secret teaching. Yes.

[55:15]

Agnet. Is it Agnet? Yeah, Agnet. [...] Like Agnes. Like Agnes, yeah. Agnet. So, I have a question on effectiveness. Yes. Is it a name to be effective? Say again. Is it an aim to be effective? It is my aim to be effective at protecting children who might be or have been separated from their parents. I want to protect them from fear and harm. Yes, I do want to be effective at that. Which means I want to transmit to those children and everybody in the neighborhood compassion. The children need compassion towards them

[56:17]

and also the children need to learn compassion. They can't just have it coming to them, they also have to wake up to their own abilities. That is something I wish to, what's the word? Be effective at. But again, what I'm leaning to is an effectiveness which isn't self-righteous. It isn't just me. I want the effect, but it isn't that I'm being effective. It's more like I become aware of how me viewing it gets in the way of the effect that I want. Yes. I'm going back and forth between thinking what you're talking about is very limiting and diminishing of possibility. I think that for a minute and then I think, aren't you saying to be present with every moment with whatever it is, and then for all these years we've been talking about how that kind of presence

[57:17]

is kind of the only thing or the most important thing we could be offering the world. But I notice in my mind that I keep going back and forth one puny thing at a time. Yes, and that one puny thing at a time, that's habitual. You don't want to just do one puny thing at a time. You want to do something bigger because there's a great need. And that's good. So if you want to do something bigger, then that will actually help you notice the untenability of the inappropriate way of doing each thing. And it will guide you to a way of doing each thing which takes care of the big picture. Well, you just keep working. You keep working. You don't collapse. It's an ongoing process. There's never going to be an end. It's never going to stop

[58:19]

that children are taken away from their parents. It's been going on as long as there's been children and parents. People have been taking them away from their parents. Children have been... Humans have been attacking each other and taking their children and taking their women, taking their food. This is an ongoing thing of us working to protect beings and to help them become protectors. This is an ongoing process. There's no end to it. And again, making it big helps you see, I think, reveals and points to the areas where you can discover the self-righteousness, the sentimental, the blah, blah, blah, self-indulgent compassion. Yes? Can I just do one more thing? Yeah. I'm not sure how this is connected, but somehow it's connected to me.

[59:20]

For me, maybe eight or ten years ago, I was at Norvode, this medication place that Fred goes to once in a while. We had jobs. And I was given the job of wiping the glass doors to the porch. And I was newly... I was going to do a really good job. I was going to do a really good, zen, excellent job. And I was about to start, and you came through the door and said, you shouldn't go to college anymore. And then you walked away. And I've been thinking about that for the last eight years. I mean, really, it just continues to blow my mind what you were pointing to, which I don't even know if I know, but I'm still thinking about it. And it seems connected, but I don't know how it's connected to what we're talking about tonight. Again, in that earlier example, when I'm talking to three people, I'm trying to get something.

[60:22]

I'm trying to take care of this person and that person. But when I put that aside, I'm not trying to get the conversation with Nettie. I'm not trying to get it. I'm just talking to Nettie. I want to practice compassion. The habitual way is I want to, you know, get something out of it. Like, either I'll be a famous person or she'll be helped. I want to get something, rather than taking care of the situation right now, where there's nothing to get right now. I'm just taking care of right now. That's it. But that's not the usual way of doing things. But that's the way that you keep... That's the way you like to do things. That's the way you're going to want to continue doing this, basically, almost like nothing. Because you do nothing, wholeheartedly, without trying to get something. If you're trying to get something, you're kind of not really interested in this.

[61:24]

You want something else, which is not wrong. It's just that there's a kind of like a backlash from trying to get something. Or there's a waste product of trying to get something. And to see that, to see that tendency, is to see the self-righteousness. And to be kind to it, is to let go of it. You know, without pushing it away. Just be kind to it. And then you can see, oh, I can be here. And actually, I'm not even trying to get anything out of noticing my self-righteousness. Yes? ... [...]

[62:26]

... [...] Yes. Chopping carrots, in order to make some food for poor people. That sounds nice, doesn't it? However, that way of chopping carrots, you know, you're going to have to retire soon from that way. But just chopping carrots, which are going to go to make soup for poor people, just chopping carrots, you can continue that. And you don't have to stop that. Yes? ... [...] I would say briefly since it's 9.15 that

[63:50]

there's a habitual way of planning. You have your habitual way, I have my habitual way. There's a habitual way of doing it and maybe you can discover the habitual way of planning which we maybe talk about next week if you can bring that up again. An habitual way and you can notice that this way I cannot continue. I mean this way of planning is going to wipe me out and yeah I see so many people just wiped out by the way they plan, the way they do the planning activity. So we can talk more about that next week. What kind of planning will wipe you out from the planning? You can be a professional planner, right? That could be your job and you can do it in a way where you just you get burned out or you can do another way that's joyful. And what would the other way be? The unhabitual way. To discover the unhabitual way basically what I'm saying is by being aware of the habitual way of planning

[64:56]

you will be able to let go of it and open and the vision of an unhabitual way, planning that's not a habit, a way you've never done before will open to you. But in order to find it we have to start where we are which is that we have habit patterns in relationship to our planning which is why most people are so stressed a lot of the time when they're planning. And if we can notice what it is about the way we're planning that's so stressful then we can be kind to that and then we can see oh there's another way to do it like seeing a bunch of people or thinking of lots of children. But we can talk about that more next time. We can think about have you noticed that about yourself and what habits do you have about your planning? And the more you can find out about how your habits in regard to planning the closer you are to become free of the draining way of planning.

[65:59]

That's my short answer because it's 9.15. Thank you so much.

[66:05]

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