Can you hear me if I talk like this? At the beginning of this practice period, how's that, I read the story about our ancestor Sherto and our ancestor Yaoshan. One day Yaoshan was sitting and Sherto said to him, what are you doing here? And Yaoshan said, I'm not doing anything at all. And Sherto said, well then you're sitting idly. And Yaoshan said, if I were sitting idly I would be doing something. And Sherto said, you say you're not doing anything at all.

[01:07]

What are you not doing? And Yaoshan said, even the ten thousand sages don't know. I went reading this story and being quiet a little while afterwards, I had the same feeling around my heart that I got after lunch, I think yesterday, when Leslie and Tayo and Daniel and I got to Tayo's cabin and I looked at those tulips, particularly

[02:21]

when I looked inside of the tulips. They're pretty from the outside, but when I looked inside I got this exquisite pain around my heart and in defense, I immediately wanted to call them beautiful and I said that to the assembly and I think Leslie said something like, yeah, you kind of want to make it smaller, make it small. And even hearing this story about Yaoshan and Sherto, at the beginning of the story it's pretty, I think so anyway, kind of pretty.

[03:23]

Great Zen Master is sitting there and his teacher comes up and says, what are you doing here? It's pretty. But as you get more and more into the story and look into the center of the story, it shocks me and hurts me, it's so beautiful, or rather it shocks me and hurts me, it's so real. And then I call it beautiful to defend against my pain at what it is, to get a hold of it, to make it small. And again I think of Suzuki Roshi's shocking definition of sin that I heard in my early days of practice with him, that when you see a flower and you call it beautiful, that's sin. Terribly strict, but the more I think about it and experience, the more I see in it.

[04:29]

And yesterday or the day before yesterday or someday I was walking, it often happens when I'm walking around Tassajara and Green Gulch, but in particular on the four-nine day I was taking a walk with Dorothea and, well, it's really painful out there. And we went over by the waterfall and looking at the waterfall, you know, it's just sitting there, this event, you know, this water on these big black and white rocks, and in a way I wanted to stay there forever, but I also keep inside myself, I want to defend against it, I want to do something with it, I can't just stand there helpless before it, I want to strike back and say, you're beautiful. It's too much just to sit there and quietly be overwhelmed, I want to get a hold of it, I want to take it home, I want to report back.

[05:36]

So I kept quiet, I didn't say anything the whole time, I hid my sin. But inside I was constantly saying, it's beautiful, it's beautiful, it's beautiful. I couldn't just sit there and be quiet. And then at the end of the trip, just before the sunset, we got to the place where the Tony Trail starts, and we came around this corner, and here was this grass shooting up out of the earth, with the setting sun going through it, and it looked exactly like a fairy tale. I mean, just exactly that color they have in those kids' books, you know, it's just like, and again I just, oh, God, it's beautiful, take that, fairy tale, wonderland. I kept quiet though, because I didn't want to express the insult, it's an insult, it doesn't get anywhere near it. You can say those words any time of day or night, but really what happens there when you see that stuff, it's just, you can barely stand it, right?

[06:41]

You've got to sit down and take a rest. After the sun kind of set and things had calmed down a little bit, I said to her, you know, many times I wanted to say it was beautiful while we were walking there, but I felt like it was an insult, so I didn't. Anyway, stories like this about our ancestors' practice, tulips, when you get up close and look inside and not only that, but get surprised, you know it's going to be neat, but then it gets you, especially that one yellow one that's got that shocking piece of red color blaring up there, totally out of control. Like Van Gogh said, you know, when he really started to be able to paint, he said, finally I'm not standing helpless before nature, I can paint back at it. But you know, it's hard to take, especially when you're a being like that.

[07:48]

It's nice, one of my friends said, you know, it's not that bad to be a little insensitive. So again, that very strict definition of sin that Suzuki Roshi offered goes very well with Goethe's definition, which is, yes, sin is whatever you can't stop doing. It's impossible, I can't go around and stop myself from thinking beautiful, it just happens so fast that I defend myself by naming reality when it really hits me. When it's not hitting me, then I can be quiet, but when it gets to me and when it hurts, I often want to say beautiful. Another word I often use is, you know, awkward, or something like that. Anyway, some word to get a hold of it.

[08:49]

When you meet a friend and it's difficult just to stand there and feel that intensity, it's pretty hard, you want to find a word, you know, to bring it down and call it awkward or whatever, you know, something, or unfriendly, or painful. And I also mentioned that Scott Peck, who was doing this book on evil, he said that when he found the word evil for some situations, that it gave him power, it gave him strength. It gives us power, if we can name this stuff. But when we get the power by naming the thing, although it may be necessary in the case of evil, it's very tricky, because in a way, getting the word also gives us the power which also makes the evil, or something like that, it gets messy.

[09:52]

So, I propose, and I think all of us have some sense that this world, that this life of ours is incredibly wonderful, and joyful, and beautiful beyond anything we can say about it. But at the same time, any self-imposed or self-asserted beauty kills beauty, and any self-assertion of goodness turns into evil. So it's a wonderful world, but we just have to not leak. It's an incredibly joyful thing, human existence, if we can just not lie. But we can't stand not lying, so we do. But at least we can start confessing that we're liars, and that we can't just be quiet

[11:07]

in the face of the intensity of reality, and we have to lip off, and do something to cut it. So it sounds good to just sit there and do nothing, it sounds good to sit still and be quiet in the face of reality. I aspire to do that, but it's not easy, it's not easy. And also, you know, when I was looking at that waterfall, that waterfall was an example of, you know, I think what was happening there, regardless of me saying it's beautiful, I think something happened there which is true beauty, but that waterfall is not what I think is beauty. I mean, again, the realization of beauty, of true beauty, comes when you see that beauty

[12:14]

is not intrinsically beautiful. Now that meadow with the sunset going through the green, that sort of like fell into my category of beauty, but there's a lot of other beauties that don't. Those aren't my beauties, I don't own those. I'd like to, but for a while there I don't possess them. So, I want to name my pain in an attempt to reduce it, or anyway, get away from it somehow, and so I keep doing that. I was talking to a friend of mine about this business of deception and turning away from pain and all that, and repression, denial, and all that, that we were discussing, and

[13:18]

and he said something like, I don't remember exactly, but something about ... I'm having trouble getting a hold of the spirit of what he said, but it was something like that pride and he thought pride had something to do with either evil or denial or repression or something like that. I'm not quite sure exactly how it went, but anyway, he was saying that his parents always encouraged him to be proud. And we were talking a little bit about how sometimes a pride might be okay, for example,

[14:23]

and some kind of pride might not be okay. The pride of, I never do anything wrong, that kind of overweening pride, that's probably pretty unhealthy, or that's kind of like self-assertion of goodness, which turns into evil. But I thought of, for example, some of these Olympic athletes who do these incredibly wonderful performances and everyone is totally inspired to see them, what a human being can do, and I thought, well how, maybe at the time that they're doing that, maybe at the dead center of their performance, maybe they don't have any room to think, geez, I'm doing a pretty good job. Maybe at that dead center of their performance, all they've got room for is just to do it,

[15:27]

and they're totally filled with joy, but maybe it's not the least bit personal. Maybe they can't even say, it happened. Maybe they can't even say that. Maybe it just happens. Maybe they just do this, what is it, triple reverse axel or whatever it's called, you know what I mean? Those figure skating turns that they do? Maybe they just do it, and at that time they cannot think of anything, and they're just simply pure action. Maybe only just a fraction of a second later they realize, it happened, and then there's pride. I don't know. You could have various theories and try to find out. Was anybody home at the time they did that or not? I don't know. But I thought it seemed like it'd be all right for them to say, well, it happened. That was a 10, and I was there. Maybe that's all right. I don't know. Anyway, I speculated that that kind of pride maybe is not so bad, but maybe it isn't so

[16:33]

good. I don't know. But what I do feel is that what a lot of us do is that we get this idea, oh, I don't know which happens first, but we get this idea that if we just don't do well, if we're sloppy or practice carelessly or lazily or in some way humiliate ourselves, that we will probably avoid being conceited, arrogant, and proud, because how could we be proud lying in the gutter, drunk out of our mind, et cetera, et cetera? Wouldn't we then finally not be conceited and avoid the pain that conceit causes? Well, I don't think it works. Believe it or not, I think some of these people who have humiliated themselves like world-class

[17:39]

humiliation, but if you get in there and pry it open, there's still somebody in there saying, yeah, I'm proud, mighty proud. I don't think that practicing or living sloppily and carelessly is what will root out the conceit. I think it just may make it possible to not notice it. I propose that self-conceit and pride are the birthright of a being which has objective knowledge. Yeah? What means conceit? Conceit? Conceit means that you think some... well, if it applies to yourself, you think that your good qualities are, you know, you have a much greater idea of them than they are. Like, if you think... it's to blow your opinion of yourself or someone else way out of proportion,

[18:53]

much bigger than it really is. To puff it up. Arrogance means to puff up. You abrogate, you bring too much to it. So you make too much out of the self. And then the reverse is you make too little out of it. You exaggerate it. But the fundamental exaggeration is you love it and are proud of it. That's what Vasubandhu says. First of all, you love it. Then you find out that it's not proper to love it, that society doesn't like you to be proud and love yourself, so then you reverse it and start talking around with low self-esteem. But at the core of human beings, at the core of people who have objective knowledge, is conceit, is self-love and self-pride, which we deny. We squash it down. We hide it from ourselves. Then, in order to make sure, in case it pops up again,

[19:54]

and we feel the pain of its re-emergence, we can do things sloppily as a kind of proof or additional confirmation that we aren't really conceited and we aren't really proud of ourselves. Now, the guy I was talking to said that when he does things well, like when he practices Zen well, follows the forms well, follows the schedule well, sits well, thinks well, studies well, that he notices, he starts to become aware of conceit and pride. So then he thinks maybe he should do less well. But again, I feel that we are basically conceited and proud and it isn't that doing things well makes you conceited, it's doing things well might make you notice that you are, which is horrifying, especially if you've been fairly successful denying it.

[20:58]

So actually I propose that being careful and diligent and not lazy will be very helpful for us to uncover our deceit, well, will help us to stop being deceitful by uncovering our conceit and also, of course, the pain that's around that. This conceit causes pain not only directly, but also it causes pain because we were told in various ways to not be that way. We were punished for being conceited and proud. Some of us were anyway. And then after we were punished to be conceited and proud, the same people who punished us often came around and told us that it's good to be proud and tried to get us to come out of our little hole. I've noticed that many times in my practice,

[22:07]

that during the times when I was very careful and successful in being ethical or also during certain ceremonies that I participated in, sometimes as an audience, but also sometimes as a doan, or ino, or doshi, that after those ceremonies I feel so clean and so bright and so shining or so pure that it's very painful. And I look for some way to bring myself down, some way to cram sugar into myself or talk stupid or hurt somebody or get intoxicated some way to pollute myself again because that self-purity is so uncomfortable. It's very hard to stand it. So I can understand that some of you who are quite diligent in your practice

[23:09]

experience pain around that because, not to mention self-righteousness that might happen to you when you notice that people aren't doing that. Or who appear to be not being careful. So it seems better just to sort of drop this doing well and doing our best and not have this pain. But I actually am proposing the other direction is that doing our best and doing well will uncover our conceit and the pain around that, will uncover our pride and the pain around that and then we have a chance to really go to work and practice patience with that pain. The pain which is already there all around the conceit right now. And it's the pain due to isolation which happens because of the conceit

[24:12]

and it's the pain because of our training which told us not to be that way. So it's impacted with lots of layers of denial and repression and fear and pain. It's just a terrible situation to look at. So I was talking to this guy and he said, what does that mean we're supposed to spend our time like delving into pain all the time? And it's not so much that you sort of go into the pain like kind of like a pain vampire or something like that. It's not so much that way but it's just simply to be honest and then the pain comes. It's not like you go for the pain, just stop being deceptive, just stop denying and that the pain comes. Don't ask for the pain because you'll get a deceptive form of it. Just be honest about what you think of yourself and how you feel about yourself

[25:13]

down deep, uncover it and you'll find pain too. These self-love and self-pride and self-view and self-ignorance that Vasubandhu talks about which happen as soon as you have awareness of the object, those are called afflictions, they hurt. And also when you notice those afflictions you're getting down to the birth of the self and the birth of objective consciousness, you're getting down to the core of the psyche and that's where realization and liberation happen, right in that space. And if we can be patient with the pain around these afflictions we can settle into the nature, the core nature of the human psyche. We can settle into the space where the mind creates objects and where the attribution of substance to concepts is clearly separate. So I'm not recommending we delve into pain or look for pain,

[26:18]

I'm just saying let's get down and notice what we're really up to and try then when the pain comes up to practice patience with it and practicing patience with the pain that comes from conceit deepens our resolve to let go of that conceit. Not to try to get rid of it, that's not letting go, but to admit it and be willing to let go of it. And so this process may sound painful but actually this process is and should be joyful all the way through because it is joyful to tell the truth. It is a relief to stop lying to ourselves. If this seems morbid and horrible it's only these visions when they first appear to us

[27:18]

that are morbid and horrible but the actual opening up to them is joyful and a relief, enlightens the whole situation. But it's not evidently joy that we think that joy is. No, it's not joy that we think joy is. It's real joy, again, not this self-asserted joy, but real joy, joy that's inconceivable. And this kind of joy sponsors and supports and sustains the returning to admission of the truth and the returning to a truth which might be embarrassing to the self and painful. But again that offers the opportunity to practice patience with it and deepen the resolve to let go of it and opens us again to the possibility of complete release. But it shouldn't be that the pain, that the joy just comes at the end of this process. The joy should be all the way through and the joy and relief should be partly a sign

[28:20]

that you're on the right track. Excuse me. You're saying that joy should be there. Do you mean that joy actually is there and it's our own systems that don't allow us to experience it? The joy is there already and when we stop leaking and denying it appears. When we uncover the conceit that we've been denying we also get to see the joy that was denied along with that. The problem is that when we deny one thing we deny a whole bunch of other stuff too. And we don't deny everything. There's some stuff we don't deny. That's called us. That's what you think you are. So I'm not denying everything. But what we're denying, the stuff we're denying is mostly, is mostly, as Jung said, pure gold. There's some kind of stuff in there that's not so helpful.

[29:22]

It's just raw, primitive, dangerous stuff. That's not so nice actually. But denying it doesn't help either. But a lot of stuff is wonderful stuff that jealous people told us we couldn't have. Like taking your clothes off at the airport. So, that seems like enough. How do you feel about all that? About all this? About yourself? I feel a little bit stuck on the issue of what is pride.

[30:23]

Is good pride and damage to pride? It seems to me that in one sense when you think about it conceivably, self, the assertion of self as being maybe an unwholesome pride. It seems that there's a kind of sense of integrity in the self that maybe is classified as pride. It seems like a fairly unwholesome thing. And also the people that I've known who've had the greatest problems, the biggest issues around pride, pride in the sense of self, are not so much people who were repressed, although that certainly happened to them, told or indicated that they shouldn't be proud of themselves, but people who sustained some real damage,

[31:24]

who had experiences that disintegrated, that didn't particularly directly address the question of their self-view, sort of brushed by that much bigger than that. So, I think that maybe the whole issue of pride in the sense of self maybe runs a little bit deeper than the conventions of social interaction. And it's trickier. Yeah. I think it runs, the issue of pride, I'm suggesting, is very deep. Well, let me make a testimonial in favor of what you might call a strong ego. I subscribe to the notion or the teaching or whatever

[32:25]

that a strong ego is necessary for spiritual practice. And a strong ego, I would propose, is an ego that's not at the center of the mind. I remember E.E. Cummings said he never met a non-centered ego. And when he said that, I thought, well, that's probably true. And I thought, I guess maybe I never have either. But I think the fact that he or I never met or never knew we met a non-centered ego, or in other words, never met anybody whose ego wasn't egocentric, doesn't mean that there aren't some. And Jungian psychology proposes that the ego that's centered is a weak ego. But an ego or a self that's not centered, that's just part of the psychic complex that performs the function of self, of individual self. The individual self, if it's not centered

[33:27]

and not in a fixed position, it's not only do you have to have it, but it's actually necessary. It's useful, it's good to have a strong self, a self that doesn't have such strong, heavy boundaries, and so on. But some people have damaged sense of self, plus, at the same time, they put that damaged self right at the center of the whole psychic field. I think that in school also, we have terminology for it, things like issues of hosts and guests. So, for example, one of the... where you began with the issue of calling things beautiful, that move us, we get a kind of power, that then empowers guests at the expense of hosts. Right. Well, a lot of what you're saying these days

[34:31]

is keeping up a lot. But I was just thinking this morning, this experience, the centered ego, in front of the waterfall, it's too big, the waterfall is too big. If it's off to the side, though, the waterfall can be in the center, no problem. This morning, I've been sort of admitting to my pain, I didn't get to do the Han, really upsetting, this kind of thing. And then I was walking around this spring, this rain-washed spring morning, and it was like too much. And I'm not drinking coffee these days, but I'm fixing myself a cup of coffee, I think this is going to be really great, and wondering, why are you doing this? And the reason was, to try and bring this centered ego up to speed. Right? To try and have it keep pace with this thing that was really kind of painful to me. It didn't work. Good. Or, what sometimes happens when we try to do that,

[35:32]

is we get the centered ego ahead of what's happening. And then the body gets shredded in the process. Yeah, that's a good way to see it. When you're meeting a waterfall, which is your mind, what is it, 200 foot waterfall, over black rocks and moss, that's your mind, and then you want to get your ego in there, but it doesn't fit. Put it over to the side a little bit, and that quiets the whole thing down, but it keeps wanting to come back and say, Beautiful! Beautiful! Also, often one of the natural features of this, there's an impulse to put a picture right in front of it, that actually works out better if you just have a small window facing it, and have the picture window facing something else.

[36:34]

And a strong ego can also be a great servant. A strong ego can negotiate between the reality of the precepts, and what is ethical behavior, and our desires. It can make an arrangement between them, but it doesn't have to be right in the middle. Just because it does such an important job, it doesn't have to be right in the middle. It can be off to the side a little bit, doing this rational, reasonable function for us. We need it. And it's all the better servant if it's not in a fixed position, if it can go around and be flexible and try different approaches and stuff. But if it's in the middle, it's kind of stuck. Yeah? I thought about the ego actually last time, in terms of the kind of functional task of denying repression of the ego function. I thought about it. And then, the shadings of deception.

[37:37]

You know, the central ego doesn't share the repressed material with others. It feels sort of like a polysacral level of deception, to deny the possibility of pain. And then, it shades over into possibly unhappy deception. It's kind of a subtle gradation. It's like breaking another precept. But there's a functional component. Yeah, for a while, we have to do that. For a while, in order to make this servant, this ego servant, it sort of has to have a definition. And so, it has to say, well, it's not everything. So, it pushes this stuff over here. It calls it not itself. It seems to be unavoidable that we do that. But now that we've done that, that's over, or, you know, we've done that and continuing or whatever, we need to bring this stuff back, which will mobilize and more effectively let the ego function

[38:40]

and continue to do its job, which we needed it to do all along. But the more we can bring this stuff up that we're denying, the better. The problem with that is, what kind of substance does that have? I mean, what kind of attribution of substance do you get with that stuff? I mean, is it really true that there's something behind? It's more real? Or underneath, it's more real? No. You know, one of the basic conceits of the ego, one of the basic ways of making the ego too important is to say it needs to be in the center. All this stuff on both sides of consciousness, both conscious and unconscious, all this stuff lacks inherent existence. That's why everything is so wonderful. It's because of that. Now, as we notice our conceit in which we bring up this stuff, it isn't that this is the good stuff and this is the bad stuff. But as we bring this stuff up, our experience will encourage us

[39:42]

to live without conceit because we'll notice that that's the main thing that's causing this pain. And the basic conceit, besides putting this ego in the center, the basic conceit is that there's inherent existence. That's the basic problem. And we can see that if we start bringing this stuff up. Because we're not in much pain about what we already have admitted we are. We don't feel so much pain about that. We're in pain about what we're not admitting. And then we'll also be in pain when we notice that that's what our pain is and when we start uncovering our stuff, we'll get into all kinds of conflicts and feel all kinds of tensions that we're now denying which are hurting us but we don't admit. So we're going to expose ourselves to more pain. But if we sit with that pain, we'll see where the pain is coming from more and more clearly and we'll be more and more willing to let go of the cause of the pain which is this belief in inherent existence

[40:43]

which we're really into. Yeah? I don't know if we're having a conversation or not so keep trying. No, I mean, I don't know if I'm understanding what you're saying. The denied stuff doesn't have to face life and it's not a quantity or a substance that exists. I don't think that it is. And that... Exactly. So the stuff that you haven't admitted isn't... you actually literally don't know what it is. You're thinking that you know what it is it's just a kind of ego. So as things come up, as the disturbance itself comes up it's not some fact. Yeah, alright, it's not a fact it's the disturbance and it's not the disturbance, it's a fact. It's some dynamic there which makes life more complicated, messy

[41:43]

and difficult. And totally changing. And totally changing, yeah. And we think we wonder if we'll survive exposing ourselves to what looks like, before we look at it like it's going to be chaos but it's not chaos it's actually quite lawful you know, it just said it could be chaos because we don't know what it's going to be. That's part of the stuff which we don't like to think about, yeah. That's part of what... it's hard to carry that around as part of our ego. Right. It's hard to carry around the feeling I wonder if I'm going to survive the next moment. I wonder if I... or the feeling like I couldn't survive if I admitted the truth. It's hard to carry that around consciously. And that's not exactly a fact but it's something but also we have a big feeling reaction to that

[42:46]

called pain and fear, anxiety. But there's nothing... It's hard to not believe that there's something behind it, you mean? Yeah, it's hard to not believe it. It's hard to not believe that there's nothing behind the demon the demon just created by our fear. And other people's fear. So let me see if I can understand this I mean, this is an interesting conversation here we're first of all talking about something that doesn't exist. Yeah, as usual. As usual, right. And yet out of this something that doesn't exist comes patterns and habits. And so there are patterns and habits. No, it's not out of this something that doesn't exist it's out of the belief that it does exist that causes the habits and patterns. But so when you look into it when you investigate it and you discover

[43:47]

my gosh, this is... there's nothing there. But the pattern and habit the movement is going there's something happening. And if you're 25 or 35 or 45 there's a cycle of things that go. So sometimes we call it life and sometimes we say there's a pattern but when we investigate it we don't find any substance to it. So partly the question I have is is how do we work with this with the understanding that there isn't anything behind it there's nothing there pushing it along yet there's still movement. And how not to get trapped by these patterns. So we look at the beauty well let's see maybe I'll try to use something a little personal here. I've noticed since I've been here but have known... ...road and I looked up the hill and there are those red tulips at the bottom of the hill. I was a little awed I sort of staggered I sort of stopped

[44:48]

sunlight and a purple flower and then all of a sudden something said you're enjoying this there's too much joy here. I didn't say it was beautiful but something shut down. And yet I don't find any substance there but I find a pattern there I find a habit that I can't step out of that I can only recognize as it arises and say oh there's something's happening and all I can do is give myself up to it. So I'm curious as I listen to the two of you talk and hear you talk about these things how do we take the next step and say oh we recognize something's arising but are we are we not a victim but are we just sort of tossed around like this have we no choice in this? So is it the ego you talk about that makes some choice that says okay that's enough I'm you know I'm not going to be overwhelmed any longer what so I don't know where are my questions leading except these are things I've noticed

[45:48]

as I hear you two talk and I wonder about them I wonder how patterns or habits are dealt with when we understand there's no substance to them. Well maybe you know many people might have theories about what happened there but one one thing that came to my mind was you got overwhelmed the ego the egocentric ego felt upset because he wasn't in the center anymore he told you to not take this experience too seriously so he can get back in the center that's one way to interpret it however that's sort of painful because now this wonderful feeling that you had has got this thing moving in taking over so you start feeling bad or you you start feeling bad right away actually and worry what's going to happen to the centered ego in the face of this enormous of this overwhelming life that you were having there

[46:49]

for a little while so then the controller came back to work because he got upset he wasn't you know you weren't paying the consciousness wasn't paying enough homage to him so the conceited one took over again and came back to normal and everything's fine and now you're hearing this conversation and now you're hearing this conversation which is also probably somewhat wonderful and somewhat horrifying so you'd like to bring the ego back in the middle of this too we all would get this under control too how is practice or how is this used or worked with how is this I mean here we're sitting in this wonderful experimental space how do we make use of it other than bringing it up like I am right now so you say that and I'll go away and think about this we're doing it like this this is how we're doing it now let's do it some more yeah I'd like to hear you talk about

[47:52]

there's something that's been troubling me I don't think it's exactly a contradiction but it's okay if it is well yeah but I don't think it is maybe it is it's about the relationship between this notion of self conceit and the notion that I've had most of my life and it's been lightening the last two years but that that I am evil that I am worthless I also know that I have self conceit and that I sometimes think extremely highly of myself and the ego certainly is in the middle so I mean is that simply another conceit or what? well again I just

[48:53]

I'll just propose some you know some sense of theory and you can check and you can think about it and discuss it with us and experiment with it okay and also relates to what you were just saying and that is I feel that one of the one of the things that I try to use these days is in a situation like you described I would say that probably what I would have felt in what you described is I would have felt an intensity and a tension and a kind of paradox between myself and the environment at that time and what I like to do then is do something to if I can't if I feel uncomfortable with that intensity to do something to lower the intensity or remove the tension and I feel like very deeply in our upbringing you know it's in us too is this another tension which is between

[49:55]

asserting our position being who we are and as a way of expressing ourselves in the world and finding out what we are and also that because of the way we're built as human beings we need another being who is doing the same to recognize us I think we sense from early childhood that our life doesn't mean anything unless somebody is looking back at us or it doesn't mean enough if nobody is looking back at us we have not much sense of ourselves I think this is I like this theory that when our mother or whoever when that figure looked back at us when those eyes looked at us and saw somebody's there that this was a key point for our sense of identity and we do need to feel like we're here if we don't we just simply continue to make an effort to feel that and to realize that but not just that

[50:56]

but also not only am I not only is somebody seeing me but I'm also saying what I am and I think that what we're what we're taught imperfectly both in the positive and negative direction as we grow up is we're taught that if you assert your position if you say that you're worthy to be in that place and to say who you are if you say that I or one of us others will remove ourselves from your presence we will not give you recognition we will we will go away from you and we will leave you all by yourself asserting your existence which you know on some level won't work because in order for you to realize the meaning of you asserting an existence depends on somebody else who's doing the same thing who you recognize is doing the same thing and you think

[51:58]

it's pretty pretty good example of a human being that they would look back at you and see that you're doing that that completes your story but some of those same people say to you when you're young that you really are doing that too strongly and in some points children do do it too strongly they say basically I want you to recognize me and I'm not going to recognize you but the one they're talking to is somebody they do recognize but the moment they're saying recognize me they're not saying I also recognize you right now too they're just emphasizing mommy or daddy recognize me and mommy or daddy say sometimes they say if you keep going like that I'm going to leave they say that in some way and you know that if they leave you're done for not just because of your nurturance but because of your recognition as a psychic reality so you in order to continue to maintain the relationship you cool it but you don't consciously

[52:58]

cool it like okay I'm going to back off for a while and come back later to assert myself because if you did that that would be too conscious and you'd be keeping and if you did that would be fine you say okay temporarily I'll do it and then when I can handle the tension of recognizing them at the same time that I'm asserting myself I'll try it again because if I recognize them they won't abandon me but right now I'm too little I only know how to just assert myself or submit so I'll submit and I'll come back later meantime the relationship will be maintained because I'm not asserting myself so strongly that they leave me but what we do is we don't do that so consciously we do it in a kind of primitive childlike way and we say the reason why you can't assert yourself is because there's something wrong with you you're no good that doesn't let you continue to be aware of this your real motive and the selfish part about why we do that

[53:58]

is because we want to maintain ourselves through this difficulty and we know that we are not yet adult enough to sustain we don't have enough meditative powers and skills to maintain this tension we don't want to lose the relationship so we back down but we can't consciously back down because that would continue to expose us to this tension and this paradox so we make it simpler we just say there's something wrong with us and we start to believe that and then we can't even move back later to assert our position or if we do again we do it like a child of over asserting it and saying you know so strongly that the person who we're asserting to again threatens to leave because we're attacking them but that's anyway what we have to do we have to come back assert our position again with all these voices around us from our childhood those simplistic voices which were hiding our real agenda

[54:59]

which are actually just simply childhood defenses against this intensity which we're now coming to face and so we come back and try to assert our position but then at the same time as soon as possible try to recognize that the person you want to assert this yourself to is somebody who you have respect somebody who you feel is worthy of recognition otherwise if they weren't you wouldn't want them to they wouldn't be the person you'd want to recognize you and again that opens you to two things at once both that you're recognizing yourself and expressing yourself and that you need somebody else in order to fully realize who you are so you're making yourself vulnerable at the same time you're being strong and what easy for us is to be either vulnerable and weak or strong but not easy but that's both of those ways don't work but we can do them easily and some people specialize on being submissive

[56:02]

and some people specialize in being dominant and expressive and assertive and getting all the recognition but it doesn't work right so now we're doing this impossible task which a lot of psychologists and philosophers say is impossible and that is for two people to actually meet where both of them are asserting their position and both of them are recognizing the other side that's the ultimate and some of us as we approach we have these voices around us saying you're not up to this you're asking for too much space etc, etc you're not worthy of this and others of us have a different story what's the story this person is not worthy of me this person is not giving me enough attention you know they have to give me more attention more attention more attention I have both stories yeah yeah it's good that you have both stories yeah it's good to have both stories

[57:02]

finally at the same time and that's the most intense situation and that's a situation where the ego can't be in the middle ego has to set off to the side and sort of be a servant and arrange these set these situations up you know say okay now put your robes on and go to the zendo you know and you're gonna get one of these things that's actually gonna happen to you you know go study buddhism you know go pay your respects to someone go ask for something from someone ego can arrange all this stuff and if it's off to the side it can just sort of like sit there and hope for the best for us while the whole psyche is going in there the whole psyche can stand this incredibly intense life and the strong ego can say come on now this we figured this out this is a perfectly good theory of practice let's try it you know get in there and do it and don't worry that this is gonna be intense intensely? uh oh it seems to me like

[58:19]

we're talking about something that's exclusive to each other and somehow it felt like it was a way of simplifying things exactly so it feels to me like it's not it's not as if at one moment I'm being substantive or I have a sense of ego and then at the next moment I'm not having it but it's more like both are there at some point and that's the that's the conflict yeah really both of them in reality the ego is for a lot of us it's centered but it's not really centered we just think it's centered okay

[59:20]

and in reality in fact we're not we're not submitting or or asserting just one or the other it's just that we think that way we simplify the situation we wanna make a we split the situation into two parts and take one side it's not really happening that way this is just a mental thing we're doing and so somehow we have to catch this illusion and not be fooled by it but the problem is that when we catch it and are not fooled by it we immediately get thrown into the experience of our actual life and then we wanna go sit in the sidelines again and simplify it and let somebody else live it so it's you know that's why we have this wonderful practice called sitting there not doing anything at all which includes all this but that also means you don't lie to yourself about this to make it less intense it's pretty difficult

[60:20]

pardon um I forgot right right but the patterns and I thought to myself no, that's more that you know you're constant but somehow we're able to stop would you say it louder please

[61:35]

somewhere there's gotta be a little atom it feels like to me and I've heard other people talk that we constantly we're willing to let go but we're saying oh yeah so that's that's really nice that's something really present it's not really stuck it's not really see it in the microscope it's more real right but somehow still that's not but it's something obviously I always I always start feeling like I'm in a solid spot which implies keeping all this other stuff going so that's nice this way this way you know it's difficult so I keep fighting like I say myself I get excited when I think I've got something yeah as soon as you can put your toe on something you can build a universe yeah

[62:47]

right either one's conceived either one's blowing things out of proportion making too much out of it and I think we have this practice wonderful practice which is like you know let's just be let's just sit and do nothing you know and that's not being idle and no one knows what that is it's incredibly you know it's incredible and it's and there's no you know there's no good and bad there really you know it's just more mental constructions so with a practice like that I just feel like well okay but let's not like then if that's the way it is then let's not we don't need any deception either right so if there's all kinds of junk there and all kinds of pain and stuff since it's empty we don't have to deny it then right but what we sometimes do is say well you know there's no pain there's no pleasure there's no good there's no bad so then we go ahead and say so therefore it's okay if I deny that stuff but if there isn't any you don't have to deny it so let's just let the pain and garbage and all the tricks we're playing

[63:59]

come out as much as possible not it wouldn't be that it wouldn't be that that stuff wouldn't come out because in fact we do we have past karma so this teaching that we don't have to worry about this stuff is not that we deny it the teaching is that we should that's why we can let this stuff come out and dance with it and be whatever we turn out to be we won't probably go crazy we won't be immoral people probably yes okay my experience in beginning to turn around and look back and I really

[65:00]

take and very much consider the benefits and the odds that I have to let this be that way in my life well first of all I don't feel a whole lot of joy so and second of all as I begin to look at how much deception can be going on I just I can't use my brain I don't know okay so now am I getting substance? am I getting a lot of non-existent stuff? or am I am I getting is this really ideal actual consent? you know I just don't know yeah so you feel confused yeah and I also feel like um I can't

[66:02]

I just can't quite apply all of what I'm saying to my experience but what I think I'm doing is I think okay right now there's non-existent shit going on yeah so you know just people okay so am I losing am I losing a lot of things? am I losing a lot of me? or am I deceiving myself in some way as to be deceiving? because actually I'm not experiencing a whole lot of joy usually when I'm sitting I'm just distracted yeah but today I'm feeling the same so I'm in a better state than I thought I was going to be now how do you feel about that? about that?

[67:03]

how does that feel? like what's wrong with me so you're wondering what's wrong with you that's what you're thinking yeah and it's this how does it feel to be wondering what's wrong with you? shitty yeah so now you're not left out anymore that's how the rest of us that's how we feel we feel shitty too you think we don't feel shitty? I don't know we do that's where we're at so now you're with us do you believe that? hmm? I just I feel like it's me feeling it shh [...] that it's ok to have this

[68:03]

and to feel this because I hear that you were talking about something doesn't exist and this is the pattern of it I don't want to experience it as having fun. I want to experience it as happy. I don't want to experience it as something interesting or joyful. It just sticks. And I know that there is something else that needs to be involved in not having to use all my energy to deceive myself or anybody else. So, I don't want to do that.

[69:06]

I feel like I'm waking up in a state of bliss. I'm afraid to breathe because all that is just this whole thing about loss. I don't know. It's like everything is falling down. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what I'm saying. I don't know what I'm saying.

[70:46]

I don't know what I'm saying. You want to talk some more in this group? You don't care or you don't want to? You don't want to? Okay. Do you mind if I say something, huh, is that okay? Okay. We don't say that things are empty as any encouragement. That's not intended as a slightest bit of encouragement to deny that we're in pain.

[71:50]

That's not why we say that. That's not a reputation of pain. Yes. For me, it doesn't make sense to think about the lack of inherent existence when you're working with your issue, when I'm working with the issue I have to work with. It's just work. It's unraveling. Right. Untangling and getting closer and closer and closer and closer until you know you're there. And after that, maybe you say, oh, it's empty. But it's like while you're doing the work, you're just coursing in the work of unraveling

[72:51]

whatever it is and you don't even know it's going to be again. Right. It's like following Arianna's thread. It's your clue and you just go. And it's scary. Very scary. So emptiness, non-existent emptiness. Pat, it's just the work. Do you want to say something? Yeah. It's attributing substance. This morning or earlier, I was thinking about last year at the beginning of this practice period, we were talking about TCA. And you suggested in class then that we cannot imagine that we had an experience of lacking in inherent existence. In fact, our primary basic stance is attributing substance. We don't.

[73:53]

And so I've been, which jived with my own experience. But I still couldn't, it wasn't, there's a mystery in that. And it's sort of pecking away at it. And this morning, the image that came to mind was, you know, one of the reasons it's so difficult to get into that space where we're actually able to observe some of the fine details of attributing substance is because it's blanketed in pain. It's totally socked in. And I put that together with my own experience of pain and frustration about being in a community of people, when you start to come close to another person and there's some real possibility of extreme messiness, you know, that then you hear, well, I'm not going to attribute substance

[74:56]

to that or this or the other thing, or there's nothing really there. And I just want to like throttle somebody at that point. But I'm beginning to have some sense of why that verbal thing of, well, we have consent, anyway. So... So again, it comes to telling the truth. It's not true that, you know, it's not true that pain exists. But it is true that I think so. For me, it exists. I'm in pain. That's true. It does appear. And one cop out is, well, I don't really care that much.

[75:57]

The other is, it's empty. This is not my business. I don't care. Both. Yeah, or both. I don't care because of that. But the truth is, I do care. I do care. I am hurting. I do believe this exists. I really think this is existent shit. And I'm willing to tell the truth that I think so until I don't think so anymore. And that'll be that. But of course, admitting that I think so is painful. Can I just finish up? I'm sorry about wanting to throttle anybody. I had something I was working on. Throttling? Throttling other people. Wanting to throttle. Wanting to throttle. I have been throttled, actually. And also, I applaud anyone's effort to hang out in the fog.

[77:00]

Really. Thank you. Any more words from the fog? Yeah, there's some words from the fog. Thank you, Pamela. I've been... I had some feeling of being kind of left out by the talk about this doesn't have inherent existence. Because right now my experience so much is being in pain. I remembered, though, what Galen said the other day about the precepts, which really struck me. You just have to practice with this that's right in front of you. And that is with the precepts as they're written. Because otherwise it's easy to get into dualistic thinking.

[78:05]

So that's kind of how I thought about it. Of course it doesn't have inherent existence. But I know I have this pain right here. And this is what I have right now. So this is what I have to practice with. I appreciate you bringing it up. Thank you. Ah, the evil one. Yes. Look, he looks like a devil. Look at him. Yes? Sometimes the way I think about emptiness and having this kind of stuff is I think the teaching is more like you have said that we confess that we see everything as inherently existing and not try to convince ourselves.

[79:06]

Would you say that again? We confess? Yes. What? The practice is certainly the confession that we see everything as inherently existing. Yes. Quite frequently we can do it. Yes. And not to try to see things as empty. Right. But to know that there is this teaching and sort of have this somewhere in the back of our mind maybe have this sort of faith that that's really the way it is and it sort of lets us be able to keep going and kind of gives us maybe some kind of faith. Yes, I would say it's not so much faith that that's the way it is but more faith that that wonderful teaching which all the Buddhas say, this is my mom and then they say, so you guys, because this is my mom you guys get to spend all your time admitting that you're angry in pain, confused, in the fog. You can totally admit who you are because it's empty

[80:10]

and you don't have to worry about being honest anymore. Okay, but be okay if you're honest. So go right ahead. So if you believe Buddha's teaching you can be Charlie fully with all his wonderful things and whatever horrible things are about him you can admit that. Fundamentally you can admit you're constantly believing that this stuff exists. So I'm embarrassed sometimes to be, because sometimes I'm kind of a wiseass and I just thought of this really wiseass thing to say and that is when you're chanting the Heart Sutra why don't you people get more upset? Why don't you say, yeah, but I'm angry. I have eyes. I'm upset. There's no upset, there's no pain, there's no suffering, there's no anger there's no eyes, there's no nose. Why don't you get upset when you hear that? Why do you only get upset when I tell you that? Just because you believe me and you don't believe the Heart Sutra?

[81:13]

You think, oh, it's just the Heart Sutra. But now he's saying that, that may be true. But I don't agree, because I'm angry. All the time you should be fighting the Heart Sutra because you don't believe it and neither do I. Why don't we get upset when we hear that? Why don't we say, I don't believe this shit. This is not true for me. I completely think the other way around. It really disrupts service. Yes, it would, but we'd get in the Zen books if we did. The whole assembly got up and totally refuted the Heart Sutra and went out and had cigarettes and smoked coffee. Why don't we just admit that we don't believe the Heart Sutra while we're chanting it, not just when I say it. It totally disagrees with you, that's the problem. Maybe if you understood that you'd disagree with it. I was sure. God, I hope you're here for service tomorrow. Let's just not chant the Heart Sutra.

[82:16]

Do it in Japanese. It's lovely that way. I think it's good if we admit we disagree with Buddha's teaching. I mean, of course we agree. Of course we trust Buddha. But actually, we have a different opinion and we feel left out when we hear Buddha talking sometimes. When he says, Oh, it's fantastic. All people have Buddha nature. Why don't we say, I feel left out when Buddha said that. Well, we do, don't we? But we think, well, you can't say that while Buddha's talking. Wait till Rev talks. If he says one thing about him lacking inherent existence, well... Anyway, the practice is to tell the truth. The truth is, I feel this is shitty. I think I'm angry. I'm upset. I'm confused. I'm discouraged. And anybody who sits around like that and tells the truth and just says that wholeheartedly and doesn't hold back,

[83:19]

that's what I call joy. That's joy. You know, I don't think you let yourself go all the way. I think you hold back. I know. For my sake, you hold back. That's all right. Thank you very much. But that's why it's not joyful, because you still don't really believe you have permission to be believing as much as you do in what you're feeling. You believe quite a bit, and what you feel is often pain. Yeah, I know. But you still don't know that you're allowed to completely go for it. You think you'll destroy the whole universe if you do. Well, you might destroy the whole universe if you don't. You might cause damage in this world, but I don't think you'll cause any more if you completely admit what you feel.

[84:21]

Then you will if you deny a little bit or some percentage. I would encourage you to totally let yourself feel what you're feeling, and if you want to express it, go ahead. She did it pretty well. We survived. Do you have more? I was just going to say that part of why this is a truth here that I think you may understand in certain ways is that you know, for myself, having stood up and said, you know, I heard, well, this is not true. Yeah, yeah. In an environment where there's only one computer, you know, actually, there's a lot of damage. And the damage was a little bit, but I walked away totally, and you got me going, and now I'm here, saying, can everyone say, what? Yeah, I know. We all had that experience. Did you actually get beaten up bloody, by the way, dear? Did they actually beat you up bloody? Well, they beat me up bloody. Okay?

[85:23]

They do beat you up bloody, but don't say bloody unless you mean it. They do beat you up bloody. I know you do, but I'm just saying, they do that to us, alright? But we survived, and now we're in a place where I'm telling you, you can express yourself in this Sangha, you can start expressing yourself completely. We can handle it here. This is a place to grow. You can suffer all the way to the hilt, and you can tell us about it. You cannot attack people and slug them and get by with that. We will restrain you in that case. But if that's what it leads to, we'll restrain you. If you freak out and start breaking windows, we'll restrain you. We'll protect you from your harmful actions. But expressing your pain, and even expressing your anger, go ahead. Try not to hurt anybody, but express yourself. We can contain it here. We can. I can't do it all by myself, but with the help of all these people, we can contain each of us totally expressing ourselves. You will not get beat up here, and if you do, okay, I'm sorry,

[86:23]

then we'll try to take care of that too. Maybe you will get beat up, but you'll survive, just like you survived before. But holding back has not solved the problem. That also mutilates and destroys inside. So I say, let's let it out. Let it out. We got a nice practice here of sitting quietly, you know, all these nice precepts. We're not going to blow up. We won't go crazy. We can handle it, and if we can't, well, forget it, because the other way is just totally sick anyway. So let's try it. Let's try to express ourselves. If you have more to say, more ugly things to say than that, let us hear them. If you have uglier things to say than what you've expressed already, more horrible things, let us know. If you tell us we might be hurt, we will survive. We may have to ask for help. We may have to say,

[87:24]

Pam really hurt me today. Would you help me? I can't go on. Okay, we can survive. We're big kids now. We don't get completely destroyed by this stuff. We don't starve if these people don't take care of us. We can survive. We can tell our own truth now. And if I'm wrong, I'm sorry. But I don't think so. I haven't seen it backfire yet. What seems to backfire is holding back and suppressing and denying and thinking that we're too crazy, too sick to actually say what we feel. And it will be too devastating. If you want to punch somebody in the nose, don't do it. And if you really want to punch somebody in the nose, well, we can just set up a special situation where somebody can put on a face mask or something and you can wear big gloves and they'll be safe. If somebody really wants to do that, we can do that. This is just here for... We're just here to help each other grow and be ourselves, right?

[88:26]

Anybody afraid? I am. Yeah, we're afraid. It's frightening. That's right. But we're in a group of people that most of them are willing to admit they're afraid. Most of them are willing to admit they're angry sometimes. Most of them are willing to admit that they're in pain. Most of them are willing to admit they're in denial. So it's a pretty good chance. This is about the best chance we've got. And so, let's go for it before it's too late. Yes? I have an example of a real thing that was real petty, that I think is a real petty about myself and I got really upset today. Yeah? I don't like it when someone spits the suture book in my ribs. Yeah, I don't like that either. I just can't handle it. I try every which way to try to get the suture book out. But when that happens, it just overwhelms me. I feel just, you know... It really hurts. And, you know, I...

[89:28]

I closed down and I did one of those. Go for it, we can handle it. Don't worry. Be overwhelmed. You see what happens. That's what's happening right now. It turns into, I get really sad. And you get what? Really sad. Sad. Then I become overwhelmed with sadness. And then I go... To bed. To bed. I should have thought about this, you know, this morning.

[90:31]

I'm looking at all this happening. Right. I'm sad, you know, and I'm going, OK, if I'm supposed to now, what am I supposed to do here? I don't know. Tell the truth. You're doing a pretty good job. But, I mean, if I just started to have an anxiety attack, in the middle of a service, then what happens? Well, take care of it. Tomorrow we can just use the Hudson. Tomorrow nobody will put me in the rooms with a suture book. Well, I don't...

[91:06]

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