Thank you. and surpassed penetrating and perfect dharma is rarely met with even a hundred thousand mean kappas. Having it to see and listen to, to remember and accept, I vow to taste the truth of the Tathagata's words. Good morning. I would like to welcome Peter Overton as our speaker for today. Peter first became interested in Zen practice in the late 1960s when Gary Snyder gave a talk where Peter was attending college.

[01:15]

Later, after reading about Tassajara Zen Mountain Center in Time Magazine, he traveled to California to look into this and wound up at Berkeley Zen Center. How lucky were we. He was lay ordained by Richard Baker in 1973 and priest ordained in 1978. Peter served as Shuso at Tassahara in 1983 and then returned to Berkeley to raise a family. He received Dharma transmission from Sojin Roshi in 2015. Peter and his wife Susan have two children and one grandchild and celebrated 48 years of marriage this April. And on a personal note, I'll just say how much I've appreciated Peter's gentle and open-hearted way and especially his efforts toward restorative justice when a Sangha member was killed.

[02:21]

Welcome, Peter. Thank you. Thank you very much. It's very kind of you. So I thought I would talk a little bit about mindfulness this morning. It's a big word. Not only does it have three syllables, but it's got a lot of letters too. It serves as a reference point. from many different places in our culture and in our tradition, and in our own tradition here at Berkeley Zen Center as well. It's hard to talk about anything about Buddhism without talking about mindfulness. It also happens that in the small priest group here at Berkeley Zen Center, where we have monthly meetings, we're planning to talk about the Sutra on mindfulness. We're working from what I think is a very special book.

[03:27]

It's by Thich Nhat Hanh. You probably can't read it. But it's called Transformation and Healing. And it's the translation and commentary by Thich Nhat Hanh on the Sutra on the Four Establishments of Mindfulness. And so this is all, of course, happening in the context of our Zen practice here, which is in a Mahayana tradition. This sutra comes from the older Pali tradition of Theravadan Buddhism. And in our practice, we, you know, we're pretty spare when we're talking about how to meditate and what guidelines, you know, what words we use to encourage ourselves.

[04:38]

You know, in our traditions, the phrase is just sit and not two, not one. you know, don't offer much in the way of explanation, although we sometimes talk about it, of course. Whereas in the early traditions, such as the one exemplified by the sutra, detailed and exhaustive instructions and explanations are offered. So one of the things I've been wondering about is whether or not these two traditions are really that much different. touch on that again later in the talk. Another reason I've been interested in mindfulness is that in the last three or four years, I've developed a chronic condition where a lot of what I had assumed and experienced normal automatic functioning in terms of thinking, movement, balance, and that sort of thing.

[05:49]

is now requiring sustained conscious attention, sort of like walking, speaking, typing. A lot of, you know, involves a lot of trying harder. Can you hear me, by the way? Yeah, one of the things I'm having trouble with is keeping my voice up. So just let me know if you can't hear me. And I can't really take a break from it. You know, the good thing about it is that I can't really take a break from it. It's always, my teacher is always there saying, oh, you know, you're not really moving very well. Or, you know, do you want to just make sure your feet are on the ground before we take a step? That kind of thing. So that's the good thing about it and the bad thing about it.

[06:55]

All in one. And, you know, I watch people walking around and they don't really have to think about this at all. And probably would be good if they did, but maybe not. My wife is an Alexander Technique teacher and she gives me a lot of coaching on conscious movement. And It's helped tremendously. But anyway, so that's the kind of detailed awareness that to me strikes me as very similar to mindfulness in some ways. So I'm learning how to practice and learn new skills, new old skills, let's put it that way, or old new skills, not sure which. Maybe about a skill a week, anyway. I'm spending a lot more time I'm also spending a lot more time with fewer people and have fewer daily commitments. So I have more time to kind of observe myself.

[07:59]

I'm not off and running as much. So the situations also prompted me to give a lot more attention to emotional states and habitual stories I tell myself when things aren't going well. which fuel kind of a descent into some rabbit hole of self-criticism, anxiety, or depression. So one of the things that I'm also sort of asking myself is how do I recognize these things? How do I pay attention? And what am I paying attention to? And there are certain signs that, you know, You know, we all experience tightness of posture and breath. In my case, uncertain balance is a real sign to me that, oh, time to get my feet on the ground again.

[09:03]

And then there's mental realities, worry, fear, anxiety, depressive thinking. These are all ways in which your brain is probably trying to keep you safe. and probably pretty ineffectively. So you have to notice those signs as well. And then for me, one of the things that is typical of Parkinson's syndrome is dropping out of conversation or something, or going into kind of a freeze mode. I'm not sure what to do next or how to take the next step, that kind of thing. So aside from being able to recognize what's going on, one of the main tasks for me is to learn how to trust my capacity of my body-mind to adapt to the unknown with the right level of focus.

[10:16]

and trust in my discernment of what is actually going on and reframe the internal dialogue in the direction of freedom. I have a little story about the mind's ability to discern what's happening in a way that might be useful. My wife told me a long time ago, actually, she was going to, she was going into, she was getting ready to go on a journey, you know, airplane, something like that, you know, it's important to her, she'd be in good health. And she showed up at a class for what happens to be Alexander teacher training, being held someplace in West Berkeley, a room full of people, you know, 20 people or something like that. She walked in the door and she wasn't wearing her glasses. And she immediately recognized that her teacher, across the room, standing across the room, had pink eye.

[11:27]

And she went home. She really didn't want to get pink eye before she made this trip. And it's sort of like, her brain reacted to something, this really strong stimuli without her being able to see it necessarily or discern it or something like that. It sounded like, boom, there's the tiger behind the tree right there. So there's something about not over-focusing on potential harm or potential danger, but being open to There's some relationship like that. Being able to actually see what's important. Another thing like that I thought was a story in the newspaper I saw about a week ago. It was about basketball.

[12:32]

I think the boys were in the first leg of the playoffs and they were beating their opponents and they were up three games in the series. It looked like everything was just going peachy cream. And then in the fourth game, which they really wanted to win because then they'd get a couple of days off. What I read about it was that the coach, Steve Kerr, right near the beginning of the first quarter, he called the timeout and he said to the team, he said, you know, you're not really focusing on basketball here. I don't know what you're focused on, but you're trying too hard to get something out of this, you know, whether it's a couple of days off or just some ease by winning this game and just the enjoyment of having, you know, accomplished something so easy or whatever.

[13:35]

And... And it's not going to go well for you. It's not going to go well. The game's not going to go well if you don't get back to the basics, which is your practice, which is basketball, which is a game that's played by certain rules in a certain way. And apparently they didn't hear it because they lost the game. So the lesson was, it's easy to get distracted by some sort of information. The other problem everyone has, so they're holding your attention to keep your intention clear.

[14:36]

In this case, to play basketball. you have to avoid thinking about what you're then trying to do. Getting a little excited about some other aspect of the situation. Or conversely, narrowing your focus to the extent that it interferes with what you're actually doing. You're not aware of what's going on around you. That might be applicable to the basketball example. I want to bring up another one, which is, this is sort of fun. I was cruising the internet. I guess I initially was looking at the 75 dharmas of the Sylvesterga school, which is a school of avidharma, avidharma investigation, flourishing in the

[15:40]

early parts of Buddhist history. And way down at the bottom of this Wikipedia article, I came across this link to a video, which was somewhat likely. It's still interesting. And it was a video of a discussion taking place in some kind of academic setting involving His Holiness the Dalai Lama. and a Buddhist scholar from Britain, his name is Rupert Gethin. I'd never heard of him, but he seemed like a really nice guy. And they were talking about aspects of a couple of the dharmas, mental factors, and they're found in the list of the 70 kong dharmas having to do with attention and whether or not there is a difference between that concept and the Theravad and Abhidhamma, between that and what His Holiness was obviously familiar with, which was the Northern school, the Vestavadan school.

[16:55]

And so I'll get back to that, actually, because there's something more I want to say about that. At some point in the video, Rupert Gethin sort of brings up a screen share. It was an in-person gathering. It was full of these people who seemed to really notice all this stuff backwards and forwards, although there was some translation necessary between English and Tibetan. So it was kind of awkwardly slow, but it was fascinating. Anyway, so... Hubert Gethin brings up this picture of Philippe Petit. And if you don't know who Philippe Petit is, he's the guy who walked between the twin towers on a wire. And he was talking about, well, so what about this guy?

[18:01]

Is he, what kind of mindfulness or what kind of attention is happening here. He spoke about it as being, not wanting to think about, as the basketball team had thought about, all the implications or the context or the outcome or what was going on in the world. Thinking about all of that, ill prepares you for subtle changes in the wind direction or some slight vibration in the cable and the prospect of, of course, certain death. On the other hand, trying to get too narrowly focused on your feet, in this case, on the cable, 1,100, 1,500 feet above the street,

[19:09]

it's going to make it impossible to respond to these changing conditions as well. So how to pay attention with a sense of real openness, not getting too fixated on sensation or some idea about what you're doing. So I think these are aspects of mindfulness that we need to take into account. What is mindfulness? Let's see, I'll give you a couple of definitions, words. One of them is from Jon Kabat-Zinn, who was the, I guess, originator of, I'm not sure I got my history right, but it seems like he was one of the first people to really formulate the practices of mindfulness. Mindfulness-based stress reduction.

[20:14]

Lee says, I think I've read this in a couple of different places. Mindfulness is awareness that arises through paying attention on purpose in the present moment and non-judgmentally. Okay. Sounds pretty good. And then below that, there was some... Qualities, and I don't know what the source of these words are, but qualities of mindfulness. Intention to cultivate awareness and return to it again and again. That sounds a little bit like our practice, coming back to our body and breath. Attention to what is occurring in the present moment. Simply observing thoughts, feelings, sensations as they arise. That sounds a little bit like the Zazen instruction we get that we are used to.

[21:14]

In other words, not paying attention to what's happening, whether that be internal or external, and not making any more of it than it is, so to speak. And then the third one is attitude that is non-judgmental, curious, and kind. And I think those are really important attributes of mindful attention to what's going on. Just examining it without evaluation, but also allowing space for curiosity and kindness, full heartedness. I'll get back to that again later. I keep saying that, you know, so, you know, this lecture's going to go on forever, but anyway, whatever.

[22:19]

So take that on. Well, his commentary says a lot. Let me see what it says here. This is from the introduction to this book I talked about earlier. The Pali word sati in Sanskrit smirti means, quote, to stop and, quote, to maintain awareness of the object. The Pali word vipassana, which I think we're all familiar with, having to do with so-called insight meditation, Sanskrit is ipashyana, means to go deeply into the object to observe it, unquote.

[23:23]

Then he says, while we are fully aware of and observing deeply an object, the boundary between the object and the subject who observes the object is being, wait a minute, while we are fully aware of and observing deeply an object, The boundary between the subject it observes and the object being observed gradually dissolves, and the subject and the object become one. I thought this was really interesting. I keep wondering, is this enough said about this? Is there a logical problem with this? You know, subject to subject and object being one. Where's the observation when subject and object are one? So I like that a lot.

[24:25]

And I think, of course, is very bold. And he just says what he thinks. But in any case, so I kept hanging in there. and thoughts about our Zen tradition. You know, the phrase, not one, not two, points to an interdependence between wholeness and separateness. It's not just one. It's not emerging or blurring characteristics, but you can't stay with just one. Everything moves. And it's not just two, because each thing is defined by what it is not. It's defined by other things and therefore is dependent on them and therefore inseparable from them and therefore one with them.

[25:30]

So not one, not two is just a way of inhibiting your mind from falling down on one side or the other. And of course, we have our home about this, which we chant on a weekly basis. Sando Kai, the merging of difference and unity. Is such a thing possible? Anyway, I leave it to you. So I think the same question is at the heart of our encounter with koans. Question like, how do you find your feet on the ground when and where, in space and time? There is no place to stand. So I'm asking you now, you can respond later if you wish. Where do you find your feet on the ground?

[26:31]

And again, restating the whole so-called problem is if consciousness is standing outside, And that interferes with transformation. Oh, this is something that Thich Nhat Hanh lets, excuse me. If you're observing from the outside, Thich Nhat Hanh says when you penetrate and become one of the objects, you transform the object. And we can talk about that more as well. But if you're standing outside, you don't necessarily see the whole thing. So anyway, this is the problem. So with regard to the koans, it keeps thinking, I thought I had this sort of contrary thought I'd never had before, which was it.

[27:38]

Instead of understanding or quote-unquote penetrating the koan, as in the story, maybe the koan transforms you. Can you let that happen? So... The language of the citrus gives something away as well. Sometimes it's phrased as, like mindfulness of the body would be sometimes phrased as, not in this publication,

[28:43]

in general literature, sometimes phrases and renders is mindfulness occupied by the body, occupied with the body. Here, Thich Nhat Hanh translates to this. He says, in his introduction, the first establishment of mindfulness is mindfulness of the body in the body. This means that when you bring mindfulness into your body, Mindfulness becomes the body. Mindfulness is not an outside observer. Mindfulness becomes the body, and the body becomes mindfulness. So I want to go back in time, a long time in my life, to talk about when I was first living in Zen Center and studying there, Rabbi Anderson, Tension Son, was giving a class on Navidharma, which if you, just for the benefit of those who aren't totally familiar with this concept, there's sort of three baskets of wisdom in the Buddhist canon.

[30:14]

There's sutras, which are the words of the Buddha. There's the gunaya, which are the rules for monks, how they live. And third is the abhidharma, which is the detailed analysis and commentary on the sutras. And there's lots of lists generated. And one of them is the 75, you know, all the dharmas, which are supposed to kind of give a reference point to all the elements of experience. And that's how your mind is put together as a certain map of the mind. And so Suzuki Roshi had encouraged Rhea to teach this because it is referenced many times in the first part of the Heart Sutra. Know this, know that, know this, know that. And so all of these,

[31:14]

categorizations of factors, mental and physical factors that make up our experience have been sort of brought out of the sutras and organized in such a way that we can use them as subjects of meditation. And in fact, the main four categories to deal with in the sutra are body, feelings, mental formations, and dharmas. And another one in the section of the sutra, which deals with the dharmas, that deals with, you know, for instance, the five hindrances, the seven factors of awakening, which, by the way, included one of the basic dharmas. It's called mindfulness. So here we have mindfulness of mindfulness. Doesn't get any better than that, does it?

[32:16]

So one of the ways that we would meet once a week in the dining room with Vincent, and we'd start off the class. And I didn't quite understand why Brett was doing this. I understood later. We started off the class by, some person in the class would recite the 75 dharmas of the Sebastopolitan school, either in English or in Sanskrit, by memory. That took a lot of doing for many of us, because we weren't used to that kind of learning, so to speak. Some of us didn't have a problem with it. I struggled with it, and I couldn't quite figure out what it was all about, but now I'm sort of realizing that it was about getting these words into the body, being able to sort of relate to what the actual implication was, what these words were referring to, did we agree with them, or were there other English words that were better?

[33:44]

It enabled and formed the basis of a kind of conversation about the dharmas and about our actual experience in ways that were, I found, quite valuable. And I was sort of stuck with it for a couple, three years. I can't remember how long. And the class kept getting smaller and smaller and smaller. And then it was just two or three of us who's sitting around on couches and I'm sort of once a week having this very in-depth conversation about something, some dharma we're talking about. What are the elements of the concept of color? I felt like we were examining experience more and more closely. which is I want to get back to.

[34:47]

So this is where I was reminded of this when I was watching this video in the midst of my internet search on mindfulness of these people, including the Dalai Lama and the scholar talking about this very subtle distinction in a couple of the dharmas that are related to attention. By the way, of the 75 dharmas, there's a category of 10 of them which occur in every state of consciousness, supposedly. And one of them is mindfulness. So it might not be a really prominent feature in a particular conscious moment, but It's there.

[35:48]

It just warmed my heart to see these people getting down into this very seemingly inconsequential discussion. getting into it with such determination and good heart. So there you are. The other thing, the other word I'm interested in here, is awareness, which gets used a lot in this sutra.

[36:51]

I haven't really looked up the etymology of it, probably in Sanskrit. But I've been experimenting with it, what it means. And it seems to mean something which is an element Well, we're going to go back to trying to have a Zen's definition. He says, what is mindful? Mindfulness is awareness. It arises through paying attention. I hadn't really thought about awareness before. And it's sort of like, it's got some interesting attributes. Because it's sort of like, there's nothing really outside of it.

[37:55]

If you're aware of something, it's inside. And if you think of something else, well, then you're aware of that. And that's inside too. Sort of unbounded. So it's kind of always present, but it doesn't, I'm not sure that it qualifies as a, the so-called Dharma. But I think it's definitely a useful thing to consider. So it's kind of radically inclusive. And you have a choice about what to focus on and where you're going to direct your attention. But once you're aware of something, do you get to choose not to be aware of it? An interesting question. And there's a characterized by the kind of spaciousness. No matter how small or how large the object of your attention is, awareness is, you know, fits.

[39:04]

So, to sum it up by saying something like, There are no boundaries to this awareness. Therefore, awareness of a large field is not superior to a small. But it's important to avoid getting attention fixated and maintain flexibility where the field of awareness diminishes and you risk falling into unwholesome states where I don't know. So how to remain engaged without fixation or spacing out That's getting back to these various things I was talking about earlier about the high wire and supporting how to remain engaged and supporting creativity and how attention is directed. So there's some freedom and sense of adventure and creativity to have all those things. You have to avoid falling into

[40:16]

drowsiness or getting over the fixated. So observing the body in the body, you enter the object, pain or joy, completely without differentiation and trusting that your body and its own wisdom will mount a healing response through creative awareness of the object and your compassion and attention. Let's see how we're doing on time. So I want to move on to this thing about the body and the body and what happens when we are mindful

[41:21]

of something, and how that is transformative of that something, in the sense that Thich Nhat Hanh, when he came to Tassahara at some point, I think it was like 1983, during practice period, I happened to be there, and it was kind of wonderful. Talk about body and body. At some point, he gave us all these meditation exercises, one of which was observing the hand. Do you see your mother? Do you see anyone else? Anyway, he just led us on these explorations by doing these very simple things. He had us writing gatas together, four-line gatas. And I remember, in particular, a moment where we, some of us, maybe a dozen or so people, maybe a dozen people, crowded into the Abbott's cabin with Richard Baker and just to have a discussion about something.

[42:42]

And I just remember It's like, talk about a body in the room, it was so palpable, how his presence was just so palpable, it was amazing. And other people have heard, tell stories like that, that he had this tremendous power of presence, which was manifest in various ways at various times. So what happens when you observe carefully and in a sustained way. And do you enter the object in the sense that you see everything that the object is connected with, which of course implies perhaps even the whole world.

[43:49]

but in real detail, in your eyes, in your mind. And is that not transformative? And I think an important part of that is to come not so much with the mind of analysis, but with discernment, seeing what's real, what's connected with you. And bringing a wholehearted presence. Bringing your compassionate mind with you. Because that in itself will reveal things that are difficult to see. When you can include things that are difficult right up front. I mean, allowing them to sort of reveal themselves.

[44:51]

And that's the gateway to real choice about how you can move in the next moment. So I'm going to read a little bit here. It says, compassionate attention makes possible clearly seeing what your stories are. For instance, I encounter a lot of fear when I approach a situation involving others. like this talk, because I think I have to be perfect. How is it that I am telling myself that story? Where does it come from? Is it real? I can't emphasize enough the importance of bringing warmth and compassion to this discernment. Self-criticism is not helpful and is a distraction from the real issue. Avoiding the intensity of a pain by thinking obsessively, you always pay the price. So feel what's behind the feeling. Awareness is not a passive activity, but rather a proactive function of mind, which by its nature is inclusive of everything and fundamentally without boundaries and non-discriminative.

[46:02]

So while phenomenon may be very stimulating, Responsiveness is, first of all, a rebalancing of all the moving parts, breath, vision, posture, thought, depending on the nature of the stimuli and your responsiveness, equanimity would be practiced in an open and non-reactive posture. So I'm ending here kind of abruptly at the end of a sentence, which I didn't really build context for. But I think it's a good time for me to stop talking so much and invite you to raise questions or comment. OK, thank you, Peter. So it's time for Q&A. Please be brief in your comment or question.

[47:14]

Give space for others, especially those who don't normally ask questions or make comments. And you'll find the speaker's email address in the chat box in case you want to get in touch with him later. So please raise your digital hand or leave a note for me in the chat box if you want to ask a question. Jeff Taylor, please unmute yourself and ask your question. That was an excellent talk, Peter. I so enjoy listening to you. And one of the reasons I enjoy listening to you so much is that you conjure experience for me. And so as you were using lots of definitions about what awareness was, I kept wanting you to tell me stories about what that looks like and what that feels like and what that sounds like. And then I found my own stories of my own awareness arising. When you build these kinds of things, are there stories of your own awareness that kind of came to mind?

[48:14]

And might you share one or two of them? Well, just to speak off the top of my head, my awareness of space is normally we allow our awareness to be defined by certain characteristics of space. our environment, say, just the environment of the space around us. Like, I'm in a room. But maybe that's not really the space I'm in. Maybe I'm in the city. Maybe I'm under the sky. Just, I think it's a creative aspect to paying attention to your awareness, which is, to involve the questioning of your normal perception. And I think that's the beautiful thing about the concept of awareness is it invites that question.

[49:22]

I find often that awareness moves away from my conscious mind. And it's not so much a conscious focusing on anything, but it's a general state of something that I can't really wrap words around. Maybe readiness. Thank you. Hannah Mira, would you please unmute yourself and ask your question? Peter, I'm so intrigued about instead of penetrating koans, letting the koan change you. Can you give me a hint about that? No, but I love it. And I just think it just seems so obvious that it's a way of approaching a problem like that or a question or whatever it is. I don't know exactly what to call it, but you're up against it.

[50:25]

And maybe there's a way it can help you. Just by being open to it? Just by inviting it in. Maybe what I'm trying to say is that we normally, with respect to koans, I personally probably make a mistake in trying to kind of, through my own efforts, through my own discernment or something like that, I'm going to get to the heart of this matter. And maybe I need to allow that effort to reverberate from the con back to me in a way that teaches me what it's about. Barbara Joan, would you please unmute yourself and make your comment or ask your question?

[51:36]

Thank you so much. This was wonderful and offered a lot of things to think about and also made us laugh multiple times. So thank you for that. I was thinking about the difference between awareness and mindfulness and what that is. And I really found your... the idea that mindfulness is in you and you are the thought that this person sitting, let's say, mindfulness is inside and one is inside the mindfulness. And in the idea of awareness and what you were just talking about, about koans, I'm a writer and I write poetry and people often say about poetry that they don't get it. as if it's a narrative definition.

[52:45]

And I think what it made me feel when you were speaking is back to what you were saying about the Heart Sutra and all the different, not this, not that, that the koan, it's like water or a smell, like it penetrates you in a sensorial totality. And that that's what awareness, that goes with awareness. And then if you're able to think about it, maybe it goes with mindfulness. So that was my comment and I would love your reflection on it. Yeah, I think that mindfulness and awareness sort of are interpenetrating each other. They do depend on each other. I think it's worthwhile to reflect on that interdependence as we're reading any kind of text to kind of bring out the richness.

[53:56]

Thank you. Ellen Webb, please unmute yourself. Hi, Peter. Hi. I was, I actually could ask more than one question, but I will stick to one. When you talked about Thich Nhat Hanh having a palpable presence, I was curious about that because first of all, I wondered what you meant, but I actually feel like everyone has a palpable presence and, you know, you know, sort of whether I give that to them or they give it to me is, you know, a question about I sort of feel like everybody has that. Well, I think you're right. I just remember my surprise and how noticeable it was. It took that time. Maybe there was something going on there that I didn't notice, which really got my attention in a way that I was not fully aware of.

[55:09]

I mean, I think the other Example is the one about the story about him being at a demonstration, a peace demonstration in New York and beginning to walk with the people and walking very slowly. And nobody wanted to get ahead of him. So there got to be this huge gap between him and the people in the crowd in front of him. It went on for a long time because people you know, either out of respect or just out of awe or whatever, just stayed with the pace that he set. There may have been something like that in the room. But I felt that, I felt that, it felt to me, I perceived it as a certain kind of weight. And do you think that was his awareness of himself or just sort of your awareness of him?

[56:11]

Well, I definitely thought there was something going on with him, and I was aware of it. And that's the way I interpreted it. Thank you. Hozan, please unmute yourself. Thank you for this talk, Peter. I actually find Ellen's question really interesting, but I'm not going to. go on in that direction. I'm wondering about, I want to try this out on you, that awareness is, maybe awareness is just an organic function. And mindfulness is a development of consciousness, of human consciousness. But, you know, all all sentient beings have awareness, even looking at this Bodhi tree, you know, it has an awareness of the sun, and it moves towards that, whether it has consciousness or not.

[57:25]

Good question, but that's a distinction, and I want to try that out on you, what do you think? Yeah, I think it is an organic component of consciousness, awareness, and it's... it can be more or less developed in its own terms. I mean, I think if you consider, the moment you start considering awareness, you're changing it. But your awareness can be greater or lesser depending on what else is going on. and return your attention to awareness, do you immediately shift into mindfulness or not? But I think it is interesting to consider just on its own terms. Let's leave it there.

[58:30]

Okay. Okay, we've got... I was going to say we had two hands up and I think that's probably all that we can take. Susan Marvin, please unmute yourself. Morning, Peter. Thank you. Can you, you know, as all through your talk, as you were talking about mindfulness, I kept having this sense of. how you were speaking about it as very active, you know, including an active response when you talked about curiosity and kindness being included, you know, and, and so I kept having this sense of, Oh, you're talking about closing the gap between mind and body.

[59:34]

And especially in that, image you painted of Susan walking into that room and discovering that the teacher had pink eye and leaving. There was like no gap there. And so then it made me wonder about hesitation or no hesitation, how you see that fitting in or how you practice with no hesitation. Could you say something about that? Yeah, that's right. I think no hesitation is something that you can cultivate just by cultivating openness to what's actually going on. It gives you the opportunity to respond spontaneously. Hesitation could be a habit of mind which is meant to meant to keep you safe or something.

[60:39]

But, you know, might not be really applicable to the situation. Although it might be. Would you say then that no hesitation closes the gap between mind and body? Well, that's a kind of big question. I think you can see it that way. Yeah. What were you about to ask? Well, just that it sounded like that's what you do in your daily practice of working with these physical difficulties you described. Oh, yes, that's true. You know, there's a lot of stimulus to hesitate in dealing with physical difficulties. And cultivating no hesitation or just moving directly out of hesitation into something more graceful is important.

[61:48]

Thank you. Thank you. And Raghav, you'll be our last speaker. Please mute yourself. Hi, Peter. Hi. That was really lovely and stimulating. So I was thinking about when you said fixation and spaciousness, I want to check in with you on something. So related to, you know, in the eightfold path, you know, they usually say right mindfulness, right? Which supposes there is a wrong mindfulness, maybe. And where I was going with that is, do you think when we fixate on an incorrect view of a creation of a limited self, look at the world,

[63:04]

If I fixate just on that, that may be wrong mindfulness. And then, again, if I go out too spacious, you know, as I was just sitting, I was just thinking about that. Like if I can just broaden my awareness to thinking about, like, let's say the 13.5 billion people light years of the universe, you know, that's going off into too much spaciousness and I'm losing sight of what's happening right here, right now. So do you think it has to do with fixating the wrong mindfulness has to do with fixating on an incorrect way of how we perceive what this is? Hmm. So sometimes people translate the word right differently.

[64:09]

They translate it as unskillful. But I'm not sure that's the best word. But what I'm trying to do is to say that in every situation, there's a way to move towards liberation. There's a way to move, perhaps, away from liberation. And you have to discern that. So what the right balance is of spaciousness, as you said, depends on the circumstances and your intention. Thank you, Peter. Thank you very much, everyone.

[65:11]

I really appreciate your attention and this opportunity to stumble through my talk. I have much gratitude. Thank you. We will now chant the four vows. I vow to awaken with them. Delusions are inexhaustible. I vow to end them. Dharma gates are boundless. I vow to enter them. Buddha's way is unsurpassable. I vow to become it. We will now have announcements, and I think first, Hozan would like to speak.

[66:12]

Yeah, I'd like to just offer some little news by way of announcements and some encouraging words. Beginning on Monday afternoon, we are at last opening Afternoon Zazen to a live program. please do, please come on the weekdays and join the sitting in the Zendo. Again, you should have sent in your vaccination card and we'll be sitting socially distanced and masked for the time being. But hope to see you in the afternoon. Next week, next weekend, next Saturday, we begin our practice period with a one day Sashin, there are still places that also is going to be, that Sashin is going to be hybrid. We have room for 24 people in the Zendo. I think there are still some spaces available.

[67:15]

And you can look at the, you can, you can use the sign up on the, on the website. And it will begin our five week practice period with Shuso Gary Artyom. and really encourage you to take part in the practice period. Again, most of those events are going to be hybrid. The class is going to be online only. But there's a lot going on and really want to encourage people to throw yourself into this at last. We are able to be unfolding our practice and returning to core practices that we've had to set aside for the last two years. So, thank you. And you'll also find in the chat box a link to the application for practice period and for signing up for Sashin.

[68:18]

This coming Monday at 8 a.m., we will have an open discussion. And this coming Friday at 540... 5 p.m., Judy Smith will deliver a way-seeking mind talk. For more information about our online programs, please visit berkeleyzencenter.org. For a list of links and emails to current and recurring programs, you'll find evidence for that in the chat. And it looks like, Gary, are you needing to say something? Yeah, I just wanted to say that the practice period calendar is on the website, too. So join in where you can and sign up. Thanks. Thank you. Also, if you want to make a donation to support BCC, please visit our website and go to the generosity tab. And if you've been attending for a while and are interested in learning about membership options, check the links for recurring activities that I've put in there for contacting membership.

[69:27]

Sangha members who identify as Black, Indigenous, or people of color are welcome to meetings held on Mondays, 6.30 to 7.30 p.m. via Zoom. For more information, contact Sandeep Lahil. And a group has been meeting to consider ways for BCC to address racism. If you wish to participate, contact Karen Sundheim. And the Young East Bay Zen, a group for young people, meets virtually on Thursday nights at 6.30 and some Saturdays. And for details, contact Yoni Ackerman. And you'll find all those in the links that I put in. Thank you. So everyone may unmute now and say hello to each other. Thank you, Peter. Thank you, Peter. Thank you, Peter.

[70:30]

Thank you, everyone. I appreciate and be safe. Be well. Take care. Take care. Thank you, Peter.

[70:39]

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