Silent Sitting & Social Action

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Zen students often ask how our practice of silence and stillness relates to injustice and our environmental crisis. In this class we explore this question and study the intimate interplay of beneficial social action and silent sitting.

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some types of compassion are imperceptible
and some types are perceptible
and sometimes the perceptible meets the imperceptible
and sometimes the imperceptible no yuk in sometimes the imperceptible meet the perceptible and sometimes to perceptible meet the perceptible
that's a kind of big statement at the beginning and before we go into that mysterious topic more than me say
they'd like to follow up on something i said we would follow up on at the end of last class which was that not to my say your name right
not to said well what about planning
didn't you pardon
oh what's your name again
michael said what about planning
you guys look a little bit alike
you're both like in your thirties
right
and you'd have similar beards
yeah so anyway
michael yeah so michael asked about planning
and
ha i just started this funny thing i thought it was funny
want to hear it
if you want to know about planning i'm your man
so anyway
i was
actually i was thinking about
i thought it was yours but your question and i was thinking about are all week off and on
and one of the times that was thinking about it was in the dining room of green gulch
there was a long line of people
no queuing up for the buffet and
i was that sort of at the end of a line so i'd i
i sat down and share
and sat silent and still
and then i planned when i was gonna get up and go i get the food
and i wasn't exactly enjoying the planning i was enjoying sitting silent and still and watching the planning do its thing
and i noticed stuff like
maybe
a kind of like somewhat a what's the word on little bit jumpy little jumpy energy around the around the planning like
when should i get up
stuff like that that came came up there in that sitting there at the back as a room in silence and stillness but then i i just watched it and then i sort of watch the the plans come up and and sorry they didn't have to be jumping they could come up more
we're quietly like various possibilities just watch them
and then i also noticed the thought coming up often times when people are planning they think there's also a thought in nurse in their consciousness they think i don't have time to sit look at this in silence and stillness
part of the
challenge of meditating up i should say part of the challenge of bringing silence steading silence sitting
bringing it to some activity like planning part of the challenges when it gets there we sometimes think do i have time to like actually find stillness and and wait until the stillness it seems to be here before i actually get into the planning
and you might say well that your example was kind of easy you know you can sit there and you know
we don't have columns anymore gringos you can sit there till the cows come home doesn't matter it to you as you have lunch or not
it doesn't actually but it doesn't matter to me
what does matter to me is bringing silence and stillness to the planning and and but i noticed that part of the human thing is to do we really have time and sometimes we don't think we do but that time i did
i actually thought i can just sit here and watch
to see what i wanna get up and go get the food in other words my plan when my plan to get the food comes up
and
honestly speaking i don't do that every time i go to the dining-room of returning to silence and stillness and watching the plan unfold
but thanks to your question i got to sit there and meditate on the formation of the plan to go get the food
and i would feel very fortunate than i had the opportunity to be able to do that
partly supported by all of you because i wasn't doing just for me i was doing it just try to come here to tell you tonight
but you can do things like that
and a lot of times
people feel like they don't have time to do this and they spend or weeks
thinking about the thing they don't have time to be still but they had time to like agonize about the decision for weeks actually they have plenty of time and they torture themselves was it primarily by not giving the the planning this nice context where you can actually like
be there wizard and watch it
yes i even have time to call i knew i wanted to to say their what max that whole concept what next partners have changed my whole life without a week yeah i'm that i serve booted a whole bunch of patients that had in my wife or my live out the window sable
stop them and just be with whoever i was with do whatever i was doing it was just an extraordinary gifts did you hear him the what next and what next is english for
anxiety it's an english sentence for anxiety what next so if you're planning the what next is often in the neighborhood so
when the what next comes up like what next in a when are you going to stand up and go walk over there when that what next comes up i didn't have to i didn't have to do anything with it i could let it be there
and just watch the what next
you can be here
but my practices to be with you quietly and stillness and if so what next what next what next tour
whatever lot of other possibilities and then this thought might arise
i want to go get food and it did
and when it rose
i had no problem with no conflict i just got up and walked and got the food
if on the way someone stopped me which could happen you know because most people were not waiting in line anymore someone could say that i talk to you as i was walking to and then again this is quicker but inside the stillness i can like
watch how i feel about that
mike could you come here please
would you come up replace
i didn't tell him to go that way but he did
would just sit here please
he lived in the
thanks for coming down
you can handsome
the smell what i expected
guernica you're also not what i expected a quick
the family no one else
i'm not ye the personal lives not there anymore
and you're not him either your this person i guess anyway thanks for coming it's been a changing experience now did you buy insurance plan coming up here know
would you go back now

so i'm not didn't you plan going back
and
he could have said yes i plant i planned to go down that road rather than go that way anyway he didn't he said he didn't but i could see that you know i thought if i asked him he might say no i didn't know it was so easy for you to come up here that you maybe didn't think he had a planet and that's north
but planning is we often associated with difficulty
and i like
we'd do and then because we say because the word difficulty comes up
we then are written on more where to go at more at risk of what next or when am i gonna get out of this etc
but
yeah difficulty comes up in silence and stillness and then in that space
the planning can deal with the difficulty
and i didn't plan what i'm about to say to you although i am now seem to be planning on sharing it with higher a thought which i think i'm going to say to you but it's it's really short term planning because i didn't have couple seconds ago i hadn't even thought of it but somehow who was given to me
do you give it to me
who gave it to me that i give it to myself
what's the answer barry
that's right he said he said i don't know that's the correct answer
i don't know how it popped up in my head but it was very happy thing that popped into my head and i'm going to tell you about it before long
you're going to get to hear this nice thing that came up in my consciousness and i don't know what made it come up you can say well you've been studying buddhism a long time that's more yes so as part of what makes it comes up but human studying for a long time and that's part of what makes it to come up yes demon's
training to us right now and the anxiety are you waiting for what's next as me i i i am i am not demonstrating it however you might say are you trying to make it come up with me and i'm not doing that either but i can imagine the longer i don't tell you the more anxious somebody might feel
so i won't go on much longer but i was not planning on you becoming anxious and i'm not feeling anxious i feel
like i'm being you know i'm being fed my lines i mean you're giving me
the whole world's giving me this this gift which i'm in it which i think i'm going to share with you but i might not because you might mob me before i get a chance
you might think it's more interesting to say can we tell me to me rather than just quietly wait until i tell you i don't know what you're going to do but whatever you do it will have a consequence for me
yeah see what i mean yes
what he's talking about
the planning disappear so i'm less
well you're less clear i'm planning okay
and i'm equally clear on how i come to be thinking what i'm thinking in other words i didn't know that the beginning it when it came in here and i still don't so i'm not less you say clear yeah i'm not less clear
watch what got you are planning
i don't know i don't know how it all works
but i have confidence that it works and i have confidence that it
an all pervasive process
that part you get in that part you can't get
yeah
what has to do with planning is that i was sitting you're talking to you and talking about where this compassionate action card comes up
okay and i didn't plan on this wonderful thing coming into my mind but it did
i could have in our community like i got this i'm going to plan find something interesting to say to these people
and then but this example of even though i might have thought that still this wonderful thing i meant my mind which i didn't plan
lot of time trying to plan how to save something helpful here
okay but what's your bottom line
the bottom line the bottom line is making planning a social action which which expresses great compassion
great compassion is living in silence and stillness how do you express that great compassion in talking walking raising your hand planning
how how does part of those things work with this so that's why
my guest i'm talking about how to bring the compassion that living in stillness to meet the planning so what i did was i sat there in the dining room and put some plan and right in the middle of me sitting there quietly and i watched the planning
the particular planning of that moment of not planning to go get the food but then i i also just sensor with some time i not only watched the potential birth of the plan to get the food i watched a lot of other possible plans and i watched how they all lie
look much i say not exactly better but maybe more beautiful in this space there are no longer like when it got tormenting me they're more like how lovely to watch this stuff you know a trip to rome somebody inviting me room when am i
going to go to look at that in that space
gifts you know let's all kinds of compassion come there and come from there
yeah and i'm not postponing the telling him the story yes
he talked about are plenty been exhausting
took away that yeah it's exhausting when you don't do it in this space yeah and so it would very tough to that he sits a freedom what i interpreted this week yes it's a freedom that also resonates with me because being open to the surprise is that might come up when we when we go plan for instance you know
let's start over there when you call people and started right here so what a surprise to know
tim for me to
it appears to freedom freedom and it's not as exhausting and it's not torment people are tormented by
often tormented by planning because they're doing they're not they're running around
oh they're not settled with it so they get pushed around by to and threatened by it jeff
okay all right so here's the story
i can't wait any longer
i'm sitting here talking to you guys and a story posted my head and the story is something like this
something like this
what is great compassion
a zen master says to another zen master
and zen master one as a measure to what's great compassion is zen master to said it's like reaching behind your in in reaching behind your head for a pillow in the middle of the night

is there a plan while sort of
are you trying to be compassionate we're not really
it's just like
you want to get your pillow and your hand goes back to get it

and then the conversation goes on
i think it goes like this
then that master number one asked him than master tube or what are all the hands and eyes for so of lucky test for sometimes has a thousand hands
the body sought for great compassion sometimes is pictured with the thousand hands usually it's not actually a thousand and just say a thousand but there's a lot of them and in the palm of each hand is an eye
so the hand of both things you can use
to help people but also there's the things to see people and so when you saw the zen master one such as a message to
i think
what are all the hands and eyes for if it's just like reaching behind if you just like region if it's if it's that simple what all the stuff for some point that
and
and then the person being questioned said hands and eyes all over the body
and then the other one says was pretty good but she only got eighty percent
and then he said what about you he says hands and eyes throughout the body

that's the story and we can spend rest of our lives talking about that if you want to
so so great compassion is is like it just it it just like this for just like this
it's like that and then
all the special situations
well
we have abilities to relate to them
over us but actually it's more integrated than that
it's spontaneous and it doesn't come from me to you it comes from the way i really am to the way you really are
and
maybe i can get out the way of where this compassion comes from
it comes from
our actual relationship the way we're actually together
that's what saves people
so again we say living beings are numberless sentient beings are numberless live how to save them in the chinese characters don't actually have the character for i but it's okay to put high in there but the point is that
the thing that saved the thing that saves people is that is our actual relationship
and each of us is a particular embodiment of our actual relationship with everybody else who is an embodiment of their actual relationship with us and everybody else that to that process is
yeah that's the process and it's living in silence and stillness and we're trying to like let it out

i mean one might wish to know it's there available to be released to appear to be unleashed

just like that story just came up in my mind compassion was unleashed into my mind and gave me that nice story which then came out to you
and when you ask me questions are you comment
that also is coming from that same place but are you out of the way so you can enjoy it that's one of your responsibilities is not to interfere with this natural unfoldment of your true relationship with everybody and somehow we have to train and that because
as if we kind of cannot we somehow we've seem to be able to interfere with it like
not being willing to be quiet while we're planning
everything i can afford to be quiet i gotta get this done fast and then gone weeks like that which you could have been spending a week just been quiet
rather than torture yourself but
you know
now to i say something
the strangers back the original question remember the context was was last week was probably talking about doing some currently
hey so so complicated a complicated campaign
professional associates yeah yeah
as you said yourself example samples are similarly sanders
the only envelope if somebody's going to do over time that involved contingencies that couldn't do so i can see from what you're safe
my own life people's lives i know this
the just anxious and get this started over this is self-defeating who was better to be still quiet find in a quiet as then began to think but i don't think you're you're not say that he's been focusing on things spontaneously arise space it's not enough
side will do this we just take one cities establishment of the very what i do and you know how do i would have been different steps i'll have to pay the people to do with me you're not saying that everything just come spontaneously or or silence with stones are you hurt you
i'm
rather than having to think things through i think that once you mean that's what i'm saying is that you can you can think through complex things in that space and one of my friends
i would say who but you can guess i've spent many hours you know he was living in the community it was a priest he spent many hours when we're sitting he was imagining buildings
he was envisioning how to build buildings in his mind while they were sitting
now i don't know if he was sitting in silence and stillness but maybe he was but he was doing you can do complex things
in silence and stillness and you can also see considered simple things and and you can go through them if you want to it's you know getting a lot the thing unfold and
and i would say in some sense egypt each turning of the process in a sense of spontaneous in the sense that spontaneous doesn't mean that doesn't have conditions and causes it means that you don't have to add anything to the process for it unfold
in you're not like outside it trying to run it if you're one of the conditions like you're you're unaware living creature and you can watch thinking going on in your mind and you can watch
you know that albert einstein just popped in my albert einstein just popped in my mind he could like sit quietly and watch various thought experiments going on maybe it doesn't surprise you that when he was watching these thought experiments
that he might have been really
concentrated and quiet while he's imagining in know trains going and that my dad and are various experiments he's dead the occurred in his mind first and then he played him out in his mind
but i think it was quite quiet and still where it was watching the laws of physics being experimented with in various ways
so it can be very complex
and it i'm suggesting that it might work out that the planning or the imagining a various activities might go really well in this space but it might go well and some other space is just there in this space
you're also opening to compassion and if you rush around you get a new way of the compassion so if i rush around i come to interfere with this with a simple reaching behind the head which can apply to many different things
and also i feel anxious and stressed
i think i'm kind of course sometimes felt stressed but i think when he was doing is physics probably of his least stressed and also certain mathematicians when they're doing mathematics sometimes they're very unstressed and also when beethoven was writing his stuff i think he was dressed in a social life but i
think when he was
when he couldn't hear anymore and ninth symphony came up in his head i think he was pretty happy about that that he could still compose without being able to hear what a joy and as called the end of it's called the ode to joy he's very happy that his his musical imagination didn't even need to be able
the here to go on and i don't think he was like running around nervously thinking of what next what next was the next note and the same with bach i think there when they were doing their thing i think they're very happy and we listen to him
we get to to an end to that
magnificent process of compassion
it can be very complicated very complex do we allow ourselves we're doing complex things to be here and be quiet i would say let's let's work on allowing a a remembering that yeah and a mental game
you know
thing that happens
hmm and i'm imagining
hey where i'm not getting any way
who knew
the know and
bad as last week that says that
your of that
heather
police
he does japan planning process
you can say keep you from being ego-driven or you could you say you can you can be remit you can remember to be silent and still with ego driving
she could sit there watching oh oh wow look at the here i'm karen with these other people were planning and i got those eager to running around here and and
i'm silent and still with it and like i can see it how it's working and actually sometimes have some good suggestions to me
and i'm mean i'm not trying to stop it from running around and and being driven and driving and that's all can occur here
and then sometimes it might say christiane actually i'm going to sit down for a while take an arrest
you know i'm going to be quiet for a while so you okay
and then people's bacterium what do you think christian and both here comes your contribution which comes maybe right after your ego what you've been nice to has just sat down and is no longer getting in the way of your suggestion and so
when you tell people they just hear it they don't feel this load on top of it coming from either you're pushing it are you trying to push yourself away like if you try to push your away self away and you can be kind of resentful that he didn't get to be there when the message was delivered or if you didn't put yourself away
and pick and so you people feel your resentment about the way human take care yourself
when it gets mixed in with your message which might be quite nice message or the other one is you can be you can you didn't surprise yourself and you took possession of this nice idea and it's mine
so they feel here's here's the idea and it's christine's is cristianos idea and she's telling us your idea and if we don't go along with their who knows what might happen
she's like here's the idea and it's very minor and just happens to be the best and stuff i that so that's what if you if you're not silent and still with the g this ego thing it it more gets in the way of this compassion coming out of you in the form of a suggestion
now as you might not be surprised if i'm at a meeting at zen center people probably feel like it's okay for him to sit quietly while we're having this discussion and he's not saying anything but we can ask him if you have an opinion at some point if we want to hear from him
inept is so after they're talking to credit i'm sitting there watching and my i'm watching myself listening to them and then you might ask me
this he hadn't said anything as in ah and some more thing i say well i might say i'm uncomfortable with this suggestion i might say
now i am
and it might be mad that maybe my compassionate contribution i might say i'm okay with that
i think that's a good way to go
and that's my compassion and i'm the ever is not regard doing anything big i'm just
can you something compassion i'm just telling him i am in supporting them in their work and appreciating them hell
but i could also disagree but i might not my disagreement which might have come up earlier i would be silent and still with and let that find its way to be expressed in the most
a beneficial way which i'm not going to plan it just comes it it'll come forth when people ask me and stuff like that and i can also notice when i'm hung up on it
can hear that case i might say i must confess i'm a little hung up on on my thought here please please forgive me i'm a little worked up about this
so i want to be careful he has not done
so you might be compels say something
for your assets
that that might happen yeah and and when i when that happens i usually feel like as kind of to bed that you know that it wasn't just the raise i can also speak before have asked but i might speak before i asked because i'm compelled by my lack of presence
it things might quiet down and nobody asked me say anything and i feel like i have something to say or people might be talking and i feel like i have something to say but maybe at all but i've come because i'm feeling not quiet with my impulsiveness my impulsiveness
wins out over the been quiet and still and i save something and maybe the timing as a little off
but i could have said the same thing may be from a different from a more meditative position and i could assert the same time and maybe the timing would have been just right
and i do sometimes feel like whoever's i was a little a little ahead
when it was my turn
little behind when it's my turn
and so part of this is being compassionate to myself when i noticed my timing wasn't right arm that time
now but through i'm learning i'm trying
i'm not too good but
you gotta admit i'm trying i'm trying to mm
i'm i'm learning
and i'm gonna keep learning not i'm not going to stop learning one of the signs of teacher is are they still are they still studying
some people some teachers gives the impression of
now more study for me i'm a finished product
one time when i was abbot of zen center i was at tassajara in the summer when the guests are there
and i had breakfast with in the guest dining room with the guess and this woman said or i sat down with this woman or she sat down with me and we were sitting together at a table and she said i think maybe she said do you live here and i said who and she said are you a student here and i said
and i wasn't be like all i mod i am a student
i'm a student of something really good and i'm in a continue studying it
and then later she found out that i was to happen
and she was so happy that when she asked me if i was a student i said yes
some people i'd gone some places
this is you're going to see what i think it's funny games and places and visit some other temples and met some some priests and i made them and i say hello and they say hello said are you want the priests here and the person says and my one of the priests i'm the head
this place i'm the teacher i'm the cat's meow
am i am i a student
i'm the teacher
people have said that did you think of little bit funny
i do i thought so
it's like they were kind of insulted that i couldn't tell it they are a lofty they were but actually i i sometimes see lofty students
and you might say what isn't there a limit on that like when you're a buddha you still a student well i think so
think boot is still learning and what he learning about he's learning about people he's learning about what they what they need people come and they say okay here's what i need thanks for telling me okay here it is so the buddha gives people what they show her
that they need
but it doesn't know before it means people what the teacher's gonna be
i i i assert that
yes
where could he could be
as favourite play what happens when you say he is sitting for a long time play by play when you see
can show i said and i i usually find my posture which takes little time because you know i adjust my robes and i find a posture and then numb
when i often do think or what should i contemplate and quite frequently what i contemplate is observing
sentient beings with eyes of compassion or i contemplate listening to the cries of the world
he usually in the sand or people are not crying out loud but sometimes they do
and sometimes i tell me that the that they feel that they are not allowed to cry out loud i say well you know you are allowed to cry out loud
in if you cry i can listen to that it's not i'm not gonna
tell you to shut up maybe some people will but i think most people here can handle cry if you start giggling well we might ask you to god's side but crying actually is pretty easy for me to listen to and if you're not crying i can still listen to it
i mean i i know people are crop calling me even though i can't hear them with my ears i know i know you're calling me and so i sit listening to the cries and also i listened to my own which i used to find my posture
like earlier today when like this concern i have back pain in my in my upper part of my hip i stretched it i listened to her side i that's not time
or i or i remember something like i remember what might i remember barry
what do you spoke to about last week were bringing and right and i remember i actually remember silence and stillness i remember that when i'm sitting and i and then so like i'm sitting there and then i remember it and i'm sitting there remembering it and it's
how exactly better it's just if i'm going to think about something how about stillness
and then again when i think of stillness and i remember it
quite naturally i started listening or
or if i'm listening and i remember stillness in a way the listening is supported by the remembering this tone us
in a when the stillness makes whatever the list whatever the call is it makes it a little more interesting
like people maybe this person might say something really interesting in this person might say something really boring
but if i'm still with this person and still with this person it doesn't matter too much i'm interested in both in the stillness but if i'm not remember stillness than okay this is interesting and i don't want to hear any more boring stuff from you
when you're still what is ordinary but ordinarily boring is really okay
when you're agitated
he just want in our like around to the best tv show
are the most beautiful poetry
rather than just i don't know what the sound of the wind or somebody being nervous and talking
yes and yes last week you talked about sentimental hash yes helpful
to live it and then you have you talked about the three
you said the second is illusory the second kind of compassion is called compassion according to dharma
where where where in you you you understand that
that the people that you are feeling compassion towards actually have no independent existence the way they appear is is an illusory form of their actual being and also you who are been trying to be kind to them you also
our kind of like a ah a transitory
selfless person
and the compassion is like that too so as you start to look at it at the at the at the beings are at the situation in terms of these teachings
that's a second time and will
last time you start
in terms of the teaching
the teaching that things are dependently color isn't that they don't have an inherent self that the way they appear is that they do have an impairment they appear to be like that and not that and but that way they appear it is just temper is temporary and it's kind of lose its kind of an illusion and your mind about the plight of illusions of you
in my mind you're not you are not the way you're appearing in my mind
in also if i die and there's no more illusions of your in my mind you don't die
no fortunately for me way
the main part of you would die
so yeah something you touch you said third one is great compassion you are touch that great passion
well i'm happy to go over this and i did bring up to her as your last time and when i was bringing it up you know if quite quite understandable people start frowning because it's it's the the second type of compassion is what liberate you from the first kind
the first and i would say the first to that i talked about the first one is a raft and the second was a raft the first ones a raft which you should ride for a while and as you ride it you realize the defects of the raft
you realize the defects of of the sentimental compassion and as you continue to ride it it will take you forth on the path and you'll get more and more clear this is the stiffs problems with this type of compassion instant you know it's the what next kind of compassion or as the why me compassion
bernard so it's it's sentimental it is all of our habits are planning in with it but we need to write it
and and learn about it and learned defects and as we learn as defects we become more and more ready to say well maybe i this raft long enough and i can go onto the next one
i think i will i've heard about the next one but as kind of somewhat repulsive
you know that you know that beings are the beings i'm trying to help are losers and i'm on an illusory helper and compact it's a compassionate illusory compassion to illusory suffering that's kind of scary or what me know if i if i opened to the illusionists of the suffering i see maybe i wouldn't practice compassion
anymore
so it's kind of frightening but as you see the drawbacks of this type were you think compassion inherently exists which we normally do that or sentiment is this is this compassion is really true it's not just a temporary composition it's really true and i really own it
or don't
so we start that way and we ride that raft and we see the effects and then we say this other ways kind of scary but
i've heard that it will free me from the defects of this type and also this type has lots of problems so that's got some problems i think i'll go for those problems now i get on the other raft
and that way has defects to the defect of the second raft of the second compassion is one that you sort of hold onto the idea of illusion or the idea of insubstantial allottee of of yourself and the compassion and people you're being compassionate towards and the suffering if you hold that the
it's a defect but you had to hold it in order for in order for it to do his job of caring you from the previous raft to really let go of the previous wrap in the second raft second raft is again a temporary raft it served its purpose of freeing you from the differ
effective type of compassion and it takes you to be to the third type of compassion which doesn't have defects
which has no duality which has no attachment and that one is not a raft that's where you're going and where you're going
is already here
in silence and stillness but we have to practice the other two touch of compassion in order to fully waken up to it and let it go because let it go means enter it and be a servant rather than like you're you're driving the great compassion boat the other two your kind of driving and since we deal with our life that
way back we're going to do it with compassion
so also i would say that i thought of cigarettes she's talking about
the teaching of emptiness the teaching of ultimate truth is kind of like salt
and you know if you have rice which is usually what we're into is this rice our conventional ideas are sentimental ideas of kindness and compassion it's good if you put a little salt on it it might be more delicious but don't put too much on
you don't put too much illusion on
yeah i feel compassionate activities but a little bit makes it really tastes good and you can chew it and now it's gone
so the second type is a little bit like salt number of type a bit more like rice
so be careful not to be too salty and i'll take your pound the government to solve they have i
okay
set the danger second one is everything's a loser mean the soccer and including my separatism
why would actually go is that your usa
issue of her stage but very excellent vision suffering why graphics professional you
you know i just recently noticed that the first type of in one of the sutras vimalakirti sutra they they they write sentimental compassion are loving view compassion
the web is the literal characters for sentimental compassion and chinese are loving view compassion but actually i noticed that the chinese doesn't say loving view compassion it says loving view
loving views great compassion so the thing that's running the loving view compassionate the sentimental compassion is great compassion
this is that this is our beginning way of practicing great compassion is this limited way if we start with a defective version of where we're going
and so it's the great compassion as actually driving the whole ship all these breaths and ships and the oceans and everything it's the great compassion but it takes this limited defective form first then it takes this way that it's been sort of educated and the second way liberate you from the first and then the second wage is to be a dropped to
and the whole process has been driven by great compassion which is hard to hear
so so we shouldn't give up
and great compassion will help us not give up even as we enter into the salty area where things are were were opening to
my idea of what's helpful is actually an illusion of what how alpha illnesses but i need in order to work with being helpful i need some illusions
and before i didn't even know that there were illusions i thought they would i thought they were really what compassion was then i saw the problems and that's so then i opened to the teaching war maybe what i think compassion is is illusion and then but i hold onto that that would be a defect
so i don't want to hold onto the just use it to to get off the previous raft and then when you either for a while
then get off that a dive into great compassion
i think
do you want you want to go before tracy or after okay
he's he's honest
say again what the transliteration was of
it it's not it's not a sentimental getting person is the translation of that
so the original chinese is loving view
and then it has possessive
ah loving views great compassion or it's the great compassion and the form of loving view it's sentimental great compassion so it's not like great compassion great compassion this is really helpful i see that you know i didn't see noticed that before great compassion is not someplace else when we're doing this defective compassion it's
right there but because we're involved in the defective compassion are kind of like not ready to open to like what
again i'm practicing i'm trying to practice maybe i'm practicing compassion i'm not yet ready to enter into compassion where i'm not doing it
well it's not me doing it but that's great compassion is no it's not buddha's being compassion it's like good as they're feeling everybody and resonating with everybody and that's the process of liberation but if you think about diving into this in inconceivable unlimited compassion
you might go away to make no no
i wouldn't i want to do compassion that i can do okay fine and do that until you seen enough of that style and seen as problems is he okay i can always come back to this i think i'll just let it go for a while and try this other style and then know i see the problems of the other style and i've heard teachings about the press
pubs and now i'm seeing them i've seen if i hold onto the insubstantial allottee of rachel that we interfere with me practicing compassion with her i'm doing this just to really have a to relationship with her but now i see that the insubstantial allergy of our of her which liberated me from my ideas about
her now i'm point if i'm holding onto that that gets under way so i can still see her as and pretend substantial and let go of it
a plunge into the mystery of our relationship
that makes sense

ticket i got like this that you can you go the other way
ha ha ha okay not long enough yes
although also taken aback when he said when you go to sit fifth best password and then contemplate yeah sounds like you're think you are
the map or i don't i'm not i'm not figuring it out although one could figure it out but if i do if i do if i do get involved in trying to figure something out i contemplate that
for i contemplate quite naturally
so
i calmed down i calmed down and i contemplate
so i was gonna say the difference for me because you know when i sit on a cushion gringos allow i let myself think but i kind of thing shouldn't be really supposed to be there in my mind but i let my thinking run out and eventually he i i was trying to see how to napa you were saying here's my theory
added that when you say cocker like maybe easier to as what i call a stillness and silence yep you're right
contemplation when you when you think about things in stillness and silence we call that contemplation rather than just thinking when you're thinking in an unstable agitated mind than we call that thinking but think but the thing it gets promoted to
contemplation and then inside when you do it in tranquillity
i couldn't listen to you because i'm so sign to figure out why you just correct score oh because i will go to the bathroom
i mean that's one story
there's more to it than that example wider i'm just take the rocks a witness

last time you did this there was cheesecake
that's me
the time
is nice
the and panda
if people want to start on all still exists
yeah
yeah he is
have you love jay
giving gender yeah
or is it

hey say
i thought you going to ask
hey my was don't cheap out to rats
because typically i know loved i said no
that's the first thing i go to is to my dread
and i just as city okay and i'm just thinking about palace who might claim
but i remember failure on line
he is a recognition being the planner they still have his part that loves that right i got me into a computer she's and a dreamer to i realized when so that bring us surveys my pillow
saffron is it now as i can sense of them
but here and thinking about the silence and stillness in
my friends that it with me
wow

i want i wasn't wasn't my
my the lot of a
so you see what i mean
the who i didn't planet that my going to try it
also i listened to the cries
i'm going to call of nature listen to pay and it sank if you know listen to me can be a volitional as people saw
so i went and nine back why refine because the topic of conversation
people are expected you to be counting your breath is doing things like that
that was
surprise there are and if you were three contemplate supposed to trying to steal your mind
am
sometimes people use meditation on are contemplating brooke of in following breath they use that as an aid and letting go of their thinking and calming down
can you go need to do that anymore
i don't need to do it now i'm know
i'm already com maybe you've noticed that
and up
and also sometimes people come to zen center and the hear about this
contemplating
hope sentient beings the eyes of compassion they hear about practicing for the welfare of the world and then they come and they tell me you know i must confess i'm not here for the welfare of the world and i'm not trying to attain enlightenment so that i can be more skillful helping people and here just just to calm my mind
i'm just here to to get through the day better and then they say can i stay here even though i don't really have bodyshop of our and i see you
but if you had the bodhisattva vow that's the thing that you contemplate however if you're agitated may become calm down first so that you can calmly contemplate your bow your work
my job is my job is to
calmly gently openly flexibly contemplate devoted bodhisattva path
if i were agitated
i play i might do a calming exercise
something to help me like all my thinking basically letting go of you think you become com
if your minds agitated and your practice compassion towards your hesitation he come down if your minds agitated and your generous with the agitation you come down and i'm
you know i got mine i got thinking but i'm pretty nice to my thinking and because i'm nice to my thinking i consciously says on such as sensuous a nice to all this activity here you can become and i say thank you
and they say you can contemplate the bodhisattva path if you want to know okay i won't
and when you're calm and you contemplate the path you also then have the insight
for example if if i'm practicing sentimental compassion
and i'm calm and i contemplated i might see its effects be insight into oh i kind of was being self-righteous there
i was kind of hung up on that what i thought was a good thing to do oh
aren't they all to go that and then and then if it gets like go on our cooking here i still at the idea but i'm no longer holding onto it syncs it here's my idea a good talking about before so
a lot of people come to send center who have not yet had this bodhisattva vow arising and so they don't have to contemplate it's not in them but what they do have is perhaps mind
and maybe they're willing to be kind to their own mind and if they are they'll come down and sometimes for your breath will help you be kind to your mind
good answer thank you
elizabeth
why i'm here all the
why do i want to
because i've heard and a kind of trusted that about that listening to the cries of the world
gives rise to an ocean of blush the blessing beyond measure
this is a teacher go from one of the big banks interests called the lotus sutra and there's a chapter in there about a great bodhisattva and the name of the bodhisattva is listening to the cries of the world so the bodhisattva has a name which
and as traditional buddhism good people and name that's their job so
i got a name francis accuracy and the name my god is my job description
and other a touch bar i guess got a name from buddha and have a look at touch bar as job description has listened to the cries of the world and doing that or you can also observe the actual character and chinese is observe
observe the cries
so you can be listening or observing suffering beings and this observation creates blessings
so that's i'm trying to i'm not the blessing creation crew
and so the and the initial one of the ways you create blessing is by listening to people and watching them with compassion how does that happen tell him barry
has now
how does it happen can give you one more chance one more how does it happen that when you listen to the cries the world an ocean of blessing beyond measures is is created how does that happen because you know that listened to begin
how does it happen cute irony of it
sometimes guy gets arrive right sometimes not
but it should
exactly and but anyway you can still say that but that's a story whatever you whatever you were about to say was a story so i could tell stories but but i'm not going to tell you stories of how things work i'm gonna just say that
during this practice create blessings and i want to create blessing so i want to do that practice how it happens how it works
nobody knows including buddha
it's to it's too marvelous and wonderful
that's why you can't stop that's why it's always here is can nobody's what no matter what you think about it doesn't reach it so it's actually reality and this kind of practice creates blessings and allows you to enter reality and we're getting close to
time to stop and i just wanna say that some of the people in this class were very sleepy tonight and i really appreciate them hanging in there through their sleepiness i myself was not
but i did take a nap after lunch i was very tired this morning
but i somehow and somebody came to see me he said how are you as i'm really tired
but i made it through the morning and then had lunch and then afterwards i took a nap and so here i am and i appreciate you coming to
to this
inconceivable event

and nobody knows how this happened
but we're glad that it did right
thank you very much