from which her co, Alex, graduated, and decades later, he's currently our Zendo manager. She served as a lay practice leader for many years before ordaining as a priest in 2018, and she received donation, now coming up on a year, from Steve Weintraub, an entrusted priest of Sojin Roshi. Her current roles at BCC include the treasurer, the web editor, Cotenzo, and head resident. Thank you, Lori. Thank you. And thank you, everyone, here. And I'm just going to see if I can figure out how to change the view. Yes. Hi, everybody. out in the wider world.

[01:02]

Thank you for coming. Thank you all for coming. Trying to figure out how I'm going to set things up here in this new world. So my talk, the title of my talk is a Zen visit and what are we doing here? And I'm talking about the physical Zendo, but of course, also our virtual Zendo, which is perhaps even more mysterious how that how that can work, especially in regard to what I'm going to. It does. So that's good. In this, I've been inspired by a couple of books recently. One is called The Shamanic Bones of Zen by Zenju Earthland Manual. And the other is called Dhamma, which is the talks of a contemporary Thai teacher, Buddhadasa Bhikkhu, that have been translated by our old friend Santi Carl, who some of you have met.

[02:18]

And he's been working on this. Many years. We've been hearing about this book for many years. And, you know, I'm just really going to scratch the surface of both books and more just where I went with it, where I go with what they're bringing up. And they're quite different. I feel like they almost talk to two different parts of me. And maybe those parts have not yet learned how to talk to each other. I don't know. But they're... very different in what they're bringing up. But as I said, I feel inspired by both of them. Once did a skit about that. So,

[03:18]

Zenju Earthlyn Manuel, becoming quite a renowned teacher and writer, and she's also very close to us. She got her, did her training and study at San Francisco Zen Center. She sat here many times, and she was transmitted by Blanche Hart, who was transmitted by our old abbot, Sojin, so she's kind of a Dharma aunt, Dharma cousin, perhaps. And I'm finding that just reading her book to feel more located is the word that keeps coming up in space and time, like more settled and located in the broad reach of human history, you know? And that's very settling feeling.

[04:19]

Looking past the clothes and skin, I guess, of religion, you know, organized religion and hierarchy, patriarchy and culture and nationalism even, and going to the bone. Her bones, so the word shaman, quote from her, the word shaman has been lifted from the Tungus language of ancient Mongolia. The root of the word shaman originates from, I pronounced the word that she typed in there, but which means to know. To know is not an intellectual process. It is to know the spirit of things, of people, of life. the nature of the unseen world behind our physical world. So as I understand what she's saying, the common bond between, you know, these ancient shamanic and indigenous practices and our Zen practice is kind of using the forms of the world, our bodies and nature.

[05:43]

using the forms of the world to touch something deeper, something beyond what the scene. And through that healing, transformation and, you know, kind, you know, wisdoms that have been developed by thousands of years of humans working to develop methodologies to connect us to these deeper truths. We could even say healing using, you know, healing using conditions to touch the unconditioned. Because as we know, the only thing we have to touch the unconditioned is conditions. It's the only way. And Buddhadasa is also pointing to bones. His bones are original teachings of Shakyamuni Buddha before, you know, separate from culture and modernization, you know, sort of modern culture, as well as what he's talking about, Thai culture.

[07:02]

And so he's going to come up, he's going to come into this later. But for right now, I'm focusing on Zen Jiu's first practice, for creating this connection is to create a sanctuary, a sanctuary, a sacred space. And I'm going to mention a few other practices that I think would make really interesting conversations for us that she gets into in the book, but I'm not going to go into them, which include, you know, chanting and drumming. ancestors and making offerings, which are all things that we do every day in our practice. So the first step in making this connection to the deeper world is to create a sacred space where that can be encouraged and nurtured. For example, our Zendo.

[08:04]

I was pleased and amused I guess it was a year ago, sometime when we started to look at opening again, opening this physical Zendo, and we tried to figure out what kind of remodel that we needed to do to make it safe for the pandemic era. And we had some consultants and HVAC, I learned what HVAC stands for. Do you want to know what HVACs? I'll know already. Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning. And it seems like we were gonna have to spend like maybe $20,000, maybe $40,000, maybe $60,000 was most commonly. And then, you know, more consultants, different consultants. And finally, in the end,

[09:07]

we decided to start with two $400 air filters and two air quality monitors. And what we've learned, we've been open now three, four, five, is that we have excellent air quality. It often says that on the monitor. Congratulations, you have achieved excellent air quality. And, you know, old buildings, it turns out, We learned some stuff, old buildings exchange air more newer buildings. And we have this high ceiling and we have three windows on three walls. And so I think I somehow feel our old abbot who basically designed this space, you know, he's still here supporting us. And his, even though he wasn't thinking about these issues, HVAC issues at all, somehow it works, you know, what he created, what he, what everybody created at the time, not him alone, but a lot of people, but it's a safe airspace.

[10:20]

So, so that's one way that we make a sanctuary here or sacred space. We also, as we know, keep it really clean. We take care of it. We tend it in many ways. We have only certain activities we do here. We limit it to certain activities, like, so we don't have parties with past hors d'oeuvres. I tried to think of all the things we don't do here. Messy art projects. We don't. Then it's not a workshop. We keep it for. a couple main activities keep it for being together for sure being together being together mostly in stillness and silence we let it be known that we come together for the sake of all beings I think that really contributes to a sense of safety because

[11:33]

we come together with our deepest shared values. We come together with all beings. And that already is taking us to some kind of deeper, deeper space. And the function of having this sanctuary is to... Oh wait, first I was gonna read another page. Sanctuary space is important to the success of rituals and ceremonies. That's something that could be interrogated, the idea of success. But anyway, the design and texture of the sanctuary control in protection for interference with sacred activities. The sanctuary must provide calm and tranquility, which is the reason many rituals and ceremonies are held in remote places in nature.

[12:34]

Upon entering the sanctuary, a participant's shoulders should fall, and a navigate should come upon them. Don't worry if that didn't happen to you. This is not a thing that we're sorting between the people who it's working for and the people who aren't. It's not about that. But it is, oh, I'm supposed to hold this thing up somehow, or you can. You don't need to. You seem to remember somebody. Anyway, so to paraphrase what she's saying or to put in my own words, I would say that a function is for us to let down our guard, to come into the space, let down our guard and drop into a different perspective. what I've been thinking about it as, about the same things, our feelings, our thoughts, but from a different perspective.

[13:38]

And this is something that our humans have the capacity to do, and if given the opportunity and the encouragement, it can happen quite naturally. Just we drop down and find this deeper connection, which is, again, something humans have been doing for thousands of years. So just to say a few words about what we're dropping down from our usual way of operating. And I don't, I'm not denigrating it, but we have a turn with, you know, figuring stuff out, what we're going to do, what we're going to say, just the ordinary actions of our life, activities of our life. and you know i think to the extent that we're driven you know i i think our dna is is which is also from our ancestors you know is sort of we have all living beings all life has to do a couple things to survive we have to find nourishment and we have to ward off threats

[15:00]

Those things have to happen. That's our survival. We can't do this practice or do these ceremonies or have this without that. So I think being more aware of how that is operating, you know, we're kind of always looking for nourishment, trying to ward off the things we're afraid of. Not always, but that's an activity of this first kind of this kind of, I'm sort of using it as upper and lower, but it's not really that I have to do something. So, and you know, our desires and our fears and confusion. I sort of, so in the process of working on this talk and reading these books, I sort of rewrote the three poisons of Zen, of Buddhism, you know, which are greed, hatred, and delusion to desires, fears, and conditions, less judgy, more ordinary.

[16:03]

And I don't mean to, I mean, if I watch the news, I see plenty of evidence of greed, hatred, and delusion. Maybe that's just my way of looking. Maybe I need to look through that to see the fears, you know, beneath it. Maybe that would be constructive. But for most of us, if we found our way to this room and we want we've already care about suffering of all living beings it's really more our desires and our fears and confusion to me is confusion about what really will meet our needs and what really is a threat you know what is the truth of that You know, it takes something special.

[17:09]

It takes something unusual to set that aside or drop down out of that and allow us to find this other person. And, you know, it can start with a perspective on those very things. How we deal with our confusion is to get to know ourselves more deeply. And doing that not from, like is this gonna be good for me or bad for me, but actually from this other perspective, what we might call big mind or big heart. From the perspective of big mind and heart, we can hold what's happening and we can hold it with friendliness and appreciation, respect and curiosity, all the things that bring some ease and spaciousness to our mind states.

[18:14]

A couple things from Buddha Dasa now, there's a couple of things I really like that he brings up. One is, He's forgot to look down at you guys, sorry. Here we are. I'm talking to you too. There's this thing, so he's talking about, there's this very old formulation of the attributes of Dharma. It's like you chanted in the monastery, you appreciate, you read. Attributes of Dharma, and that's a whole other talk. I'm not going to go into all of them, but one of them is in Pali Sanditiko, which basically means to be clearly seen and realized for oneself. That's an attribute of the Dharma.

[19:18]

The Dharma is something that has to be real. Our own bodies and minds. And he goes on to say this thing about the ABCs of Buddhism. So just. The ABCs of Buddhism are basically like our five senses, six senses, five physical senses and mind. Mind is framed as like another sense organ. So just like eyes have forms and colors, mind has thoughts and feelings. And to understand that process of our experience, of our own experience, deeper and deeper and deeper, what he's calling the ABCs of Buddhism. And he says, just like you can read all of literature, if you know the alphabet, you can understand all of Buddha's teachings if you understand this. And I would say this and other people, we need to understand each other too, because there's the ways we're the same, and then there's different, and we have to understand both.

[20:24]

But it starts here. And it can go deeper, too. It can go even deeper to a connection with everything that I can't even describe, but just to know the interdependence, know the interconnectivity of everything, to know it in our bodies. I was at Green Gulch a couple of weeks ago and I was co-leading a workshop and I had the opportunity to do Zazen instruction during Zazen. You know, usually when we do Zazen instruction here, we kind of sit in a circle and we have question and answer and it's quite informal. But is to just once everybody starts sitting, you just quietly give

[21:28]

saw as an instruction, including for people who aren't familiar with it. And it's, it can be a nice way to do it. And then so I did that for the first few minutes. And then we silence, you know, silent part of the period. And I noticed that I was like, I, of course, had some mental activity going about how well I'd done that the instruction. And kept coming back to it a little bit, you know. And it makes sense because, of course, especially if there's new people, it's good to care. We want them to have a good experience. We want to, you know, do it well for their sake so that they aren't turned off of Zen practice or something, you know. But also, of course, learn about how well I did and all that. So then I had a new thought, which was, wow, at least I can't mess this up.

[22:32]

At least I can't mess up the silence. At least I can't, which is not how I necessarily think typically. There's a right, I still think after all these years, kind of, that there's a right way to do zazen and there's a time when I'm doing it and time when I veered off and stuff. It was a great thought. And, you know, Sojin Roshi always used to say that zazen is non-karmic activity. And I never really understood quite what he meant. You know, we create karma when we talk or move, you know, our karma is created through our body, speech and mind, but mind leading to action, you know, intention leading to action or leading to speech. So, you know, Just giving yourself a break, giving myself a break for the 40 minutes. Like, what a relief. I can't create any karma. And, you know, again, I don't think that's absolute because I can think of some ways that you could probably create karma during a period of zazen.

[23:35]

But still, I think this, you know, at least I can't, you know, and I won't have to go through a mental process afterward about how well I did it. You know, it's just being here. It's just, Being together here now to the extent that we are, you know, which is 100%. We're all here all the time, completely present. And then we have this thing we can feel like we can feel whether we've been present or not present, you know. But we're present, we're here, quietly, silence and stillness together. So another thing that we can think of as shamanic is trance states or non-ordinary states of consciousness.

[24:37]

And we have that in trance states. In fact, the Buddha, that was the first when Buddha left home and sought wisdom, you know, of a... ascetic what he came to was teachers who taught trance states and there are these eight trance states called the eight jhanas and he became an adept at the trance states but what he found was um that when you come out of the trance you you have the same problems you've had before um and so he was like what good And, you know, again, I don't feel like that's absolute because I do feel like you can have some kinds of healing and transformation take place in non-ordinary states of mind. That can be a methodology that's viable. But for the Buddha, for what he is talking about, our core problem is, you know, our misunderstanding about how we exist, how the self exists.

[25:47]

The trance is just like a little break from it. And then you're back to the same old thing. And I'm going to read you a little bit of what I like this thing about the jhanas. This might be more thought provoking. And he's making some other points here. I'll see. I don't know how much of this I'm going to read. We'll see. When we begin to meditate, there's a little somewhat. as preliminary concentration. We start off by for instance, focusing on our breathing, so that a little samadhi gathers, which we then increase until access concentration, the gateway to the highest form of samadhi. Continuing from there, attainment, that is jhana, is attained, which represents the still silent mind, which can be further refined and deepened to the highest possible level,

[26:51]

at which point even breathing will be absent. However, we can't really do much with such samadhi, although it is a lesson in mind's capacity. That's enough. So I like how he's talking about it. So basically what the Buddha found was that there's some kind of in between state between the usual concerns of our usual life. revival and stuff, and trance. And that state is prime for insight. That is the state at which we can have insight, insight into what we're up to. And I have an idea that the way we do our practice, sort of daily, you know, short periods, every day, over a long time, maybe it like expands that space.

[27:55]

You know what I mean? Makes it deeper and broader because what I kind of remember from my, I think it's actually easier to go into a trance when you first start sitting, maybe because, you know, I don't know if other people have that experience, but like a trance is kind of like you're kind of immobilized or you, you have a different sense of time, various things happen. You know, I, so i've been hypnotized so i have a kind of a feeling for what a trance feels like and i think it's easier at the beginning to go into it and i think even from western psychology we might even think about that as dissociation or something it may be easier to do that at first but over time with just mindfulness of breath mindfulness of body paying attention to what's happening learning what we're up to with kindness and friendliness, holding ourselves, holding each other, kind of like the way the sanctuary is holding us, our mind is holding us, this broad perspective, this spacious, very spacious way.

[29:07]

And that we can look around, and see things differently and clearly, more clearly, hopefully. I just wanted to interject here. I was listening. I did this wonderful interview with this writer, Mosul Hamid, who I didn't know anything about, but he said he's Muslim. And he said, the question is not, the question is not, will I go to heaven? Question is, did I pray today? And I like that. The question for us is not, am I enlightened? Will I get enlightened? But did I, what did I do today? Did I stop this business for a few minutes? Did I touch something deeper? Just today, did I, you know?

[30:11]

God, something is not working. You know, when we, after we sit in the morning, in the afternoon, what is our first, what is the first word that we all say together during service? Avalokiteshvara. Kokyo has another word they say, but when we say together, our first word is Avalokiteshvara. And Avalokiteshvara means cry-regarder. Some days we say kanjizai, but that's also Avalokiteshvara. Avalokiteshvara means cry-regarder, like synesthesia or something, you know. The cries are seen, or maybe the cries are felt, or it's both. The cries are seen and heard. It's not just one it's all the senses involved um and so beginning we're we're remembering the cries of the world right at the beginning of our first word when we start talking when practicing deeply perfection of wisdom when practicing deeply

[31:40]

Perfection of wisdom. I'm having a little senior moment about how it actually goes right now. Which is, I think, I'm proposing what I'm talking about. Deep perfection of wisdom. Hanging out. Just hanging out in this big mind. Hanging out big mind heart. You know. Mabalukiteshvara, when hanging out in big mind heart, looked about. and saw the five skandas, looked about, listened for, felt around for the five skandas, and saw that they were empty. Five skandas, I mean, ideally we've already unpacked, you know, so normally we come to this practice, we have an idea of ourself as this solid thing, Predictable has control, you know, and we've already practicing Buddhism.

[32:51]

We've already dismantled that into the five skandhas, right? Five skandhas are physical sensations, physical experience, eyes, ears, nose, tongue, skin. Feelings. And then perceptions are like, I like to think of it as like how we construct our world. Impulses, which I've been thinking lately of as actions and based on choices or choices and impulses and then consciousness. And some places even say that different people will fixate on one or the other of the five that they identify with as their self. So some of us, identify with our body as ourself. Some of us, our feelings as the truth of who we are, you know, some of us identify with our, how we make up our world, some of us with our choices and some of us with just consciousness.

[33:54]

Like I'm conscious, therefore I am. I mean, I don't know how much water that holds, but it's interesting where you tend to think, where you feel that Where do you feel that tug that shows that you've got something, you know, some skin in the game there or something, you know, some, what's the other phrase like that? You know, there's that, for me anyway, there's a certain feeling that tells me, oh, this is where I think myself is being threatened. This is where I must defend myself, you know? or I must obtain this for myself, you know? Lost my thread. So anyway, Avalokiteshvara, practicing deep perfection of wisdom, looked about and saw the, what did he look for?

[34:57]

The five skandhas, which is just our experience, and saw that that was empty. We've already unpacked self into these five, but those are also empty. Those are just ideas. This is, you know, so there's deeper, there's deeper. We encourage us in our sanctuary, in our being together in our sanctuary, we encourage each other to go deeper. And deeper means You're not separated from, it's not like over there's all those things. The deeper is just the perspective on those, the connecting with them, connecting with what's happening in a loving way, really, I think. Let's see, we can't see the clock on this now. I'm just gonna, I'm gonna read one more quote from Zen.

[36:00]

I'm going to be ready for Convo. I hope other people read this book and enjoy it. It's quite thin, as opposed to this, which is quite thick and somewhat repetitive. To be honest, this is not at all repetitive and thin. And written by a woman. Pardon me? And written by a woman. Yes. Yes, a woman. There are enough books written by. Ultimately. Ultimately. Thanks, Mira. That's probably true. But there are. But if you look for them, you'll find them. And in fact, we have a special shelf in our library for women in Buddhism. So check it out. Ultimately, sanctuary is within. We walk spiritual paths by gathering ways of living are in alignment with peace.

[37:03]

Outer sanctuaries help us in doing so. When we are in a spiritual community, perfect or not, we see ourselves more clearly. We see the depth of our pain and rage while bowing or offering incense. We move so slowly that what is in our bodies cannot be overlooked. At first, we might feel self-conscious in a community that observes our human frailty. Over time, the ritual and ceremony takes center to see another side of yourself, another side of life, despite being human. This side of life goes unseen in the rush of daily living. Creating sanctuary within requires the practice of stillness and silence provided in outer sanctuaries. A glimpse of the unseen, we are brought back from where we emerged, be it the earth or the source of all life.

[38:08]

So thank you very much. And I'm open to your thoughts and questions. out there too. I think you're going to raise your digital hand. Yes, Alan? Hands. Peter and Alan, did you want to be the first? I'll let you be the first, not because you're my husband. I have to think about that. piece that you just read from Zenju really kind of clarified something. It also was really taken with the Islamic quote. What was the first part? The question is not whether we're going to heaven, whether we pray today.

[39:15]

I think that in particular, piece that I hear in your talk, the kind of fine through line, is the sense of duty. The sense of the kind of that we have committed ourselves to doing certain things and we do them. And we do them within if you have certain things to do within this sanctuary and certain things, and of course we're always doing within the sanctuary of our body, that it's a tricky... I noticed my own complex feelings about the word duty, but also I think that it's really important in various things I've been reading in different religious...

[40:20]

It seems very, it seems almost universal. And that's what you see. Did I pray today? You know, well, that's what I said I was going to do. That's my commitment, my practice. So I wonder how you think about that as a manifestation of what is Zendo. I have to say that I hadn't thought about that one single bit. The idea of duty. and duty i think we would have to define it seems like first you would have to decide that something beneficial first so first check this out is this beneficial and then you could decide this is so beneficial that this is what i want to do for my whole life then you've set an intention and to the other people too.

[41:24]

I want to help you. I want us to do this together. I want us to wake up together. I want to help you create this sanctuary. And I want to devote my life to creating this sanctuary. So then I think for me, only then would duty then to I said I was going to do it, and so I will. And I experience that sometimes, like I don't feel like coming, but I do because I said I would. I don't know if I'd use the word duty myself. I'm just raising it. I think that buddhadasi is a spirit. If I have to think, this is really off the top of me. You know, I forgot to, can people hear Alan's comments or not? You can. Oh, great. Thank goodness. Just to say, and we don't have that big discussion here. What I'm talking about duty is not like some abstract, it's actually the manifestation of vow. It's the actualization of vow.

[42:27]

So you have to get, as you were saying, you have to get to the point of vow. Right, and you're using a word that has some connotations, so obviously you like that, like bringing up those connotations. But I need to think about it some more because I'm not right now. Okay. So I'm going to call on Peter first, and then we've got three, Kabir, Sandeep, and Ron in the online Zendo. Go ahead, Peter. Thank you, Lori. I was just, it caught my attention that you said at the beginning that you had to offer some comments. whatever it is we're doing Zoom land as a sanctuary. Yeah. So Peter's question is, what about, I made it sound like I was going to address the topic of how is this sanctuary created in Zoom? land or online and and I just thought I thought so much about what to say and I just didn't know what to say because first I thought well for people who've been to the zendo when we first started this the online zendo for the people who had been used to being in the zendo it makes sense to me that we were able to you know

[43:54]

map onto that map, map onto the online experience, what we missed in person, but actually number of people have come on zoom and it feels to me like they also are feeling what I'm talking about as far as I can tell. So, um, it's very, It's magical, and it says something again about our human capacity, I think, and also maybe how close this deep mind, this big mind, how close big mind really is, you know? So thoughts, Peter, and it just seemed like it kept getting away from me. I couldn't think of anything definitive to say about it. And I didn't want to check out, well, we don't need the Zendo. So I didn't know what to say, but it is a very good question.

[45:00]

I will say that. Okay, Kabir. Good morning, Lori. Thank you for your talk. Always heads to mark. Aren't you glad I gave you the title right off the bat there? Kabir does the online post. I made an email just to mess with you. Expecting thank you and appreciation. When you were introduced today, it was quite a big list of things you do. And is it to expect some sort of a thank you or appreciation for something that you do, that you spend a lot of time, and if you don't get that, What do you do with it and where does that expectation come from? Where I'm going with this, I don't know if this is going to answer your question.

[46:03]

I would say that it's always beneficial to express gratitude and appreciation. For the person doing it, to get yourself into that situation where that's what you're feeling and expressing is like equally beneficial from my own experience it turns every it's just turning the whole thing around somehow you know turning it inside out to think about what's good already about this situation and who can i thank you know who can i appreciate and our feeling towards the ancestors is this incredible gratitude As far as expecting to be thanked, that seems dicey. That just seems really dicey. I just think I wouldn't, I wouldn't spend, that would not, for me, that wouldn't feel like spend any time, I don't think. It is very sticky and yeah.

[47:09]

But we should appreciate each other and we should respect each other and give each other respect and appreciation for sure. But don't go in trying to expect, even if... Thank you from that person. Yeah. You still say, okay, what do you do? I think it's probably coming from the small self. It's sort of like... I don't know. Maybe it's coming from the body. I don't know. Another thing I'm going to hear is like category where she used to say that the ego is like a doggy bag. Like probably your initial impulse to do that thing, you know, that was beneficial that you want to get thanked for was very, could have been very pure, but the ego is like picking up on the leftovers. It's like, well, it already happened. I gave it. It was whatever it was. It was what it was, you know? But the ego is like picking among the leftovers, trying to figure out if it can establish either good for me or bad for me.

[48:13]

I mean, ideally, it's going to lift me up. But if it doesn't, at least it can bring me down. Like not leave me in this like no. Right, right, right, right, right. All right. Okay. And then Sandeep. Thank you. Hi, Sandeep. I don't think they can spotlight you if you don't. Thank you, Laurie, for your talk. I had a question. It's been kind of hard with everything that's going on in the world to kind of sit in inner sanctuary without remembering what's going on. My question is just, If outer sanctuaries are not available, is inner sanctuary possible? I think it has to be.

[49:14]

I mean, if you look, oh, I'm sorry. Repeat the question. If given everything that's going on in the world and find yourself, I think this is probably what she's saying is in an inner sanctuary possible if there is no outer sanctuary. And I have to say that it. History has proved it is. I mean, what popped in my mind was Nelson Mandela. It's possible, but we want to make it very possible. We have the outer sanctuary to encourage it even more. We don't want everybody to, we don't want to throw everybody in prison and see how many people can find an inner sanctuary there. You know what I mean? It would be an interesting exercise. But maybe not. Maybe not. But I think you train in the sanctuary, right? You have to train somehow. So the outer sanctuary helps you train in the sanctuary and other things, you know, that maybe if you walking in nature or whatever it is that does connect us, you know.

[50:29]

connect us. And some people find, I think, just in the simple act of serving suffering beings, they find that to be a way to connect to something deeper. Yeah, thank you. I think that helps me move the light kind of, so I feel part of the dhyana. Oh, I didn't hear that myself. It helped you move the light? I feel like I'm more connected when I'm serving others. I think that landed for me. So it could be not of what's going on, it helps you move with it. Yeah, right, right. Because if we know too much, it's all in our head, you know. Yeah, it's a lot. But the immediate person right with you is available too. Yeah, thank you. Okay, Ron. Hi, Lori.

[51:31]

Hi. Just going back to the word duty for just a brief minute. And then we have some duty towards our own commitment. That feels more organic to me. But I think that commitment comes first. And then sense of duty. I suppose you could be locked into some military duty that you don't feel really commitment to anymore. But... General everyday terms, for myself, I find that commitment is the first thing and then some duty towards that commitment that I made in the first place. Yeah, we keep inserting more. I put like three things before the word duty. Now you've added another one. It's like we keep words in between us and the word duty. I think that's a sign. I'm not sure of what. And again, we have to define... It's just a word. It might mean something different to Alan than it does to me, for example, you know?

[52:35]

And it might have different echoes of connotation. To me, there's a kind of almost a reaction to it a little bit, like, no. Duty, servants, they do their, you know, like just a whole bunch of weird stuff that's stirred up in that, you know? But I'm not saying never. You know, keep chewing on it. But, you know, we have our commitment and we have our, we have what matters to us. And we act, you know, we act to, we remember, you know, yeah, I kind of want to stay home and watch you vivo. To me is connecting with something deeper. I got to remember that that's what really matters. And that's where my commitment is going to come from. Maybe. Okay, let's do Susan and then we'll do Barbara-Joan. Thank you, Lori.

[53:37]

So I was just wondering if like duty and commitment, duty and commitment can also create busyness. Kind of like if you line up a lot of duties and commitments. Yeah. So you kept talking about going deeper. So what about... those flexibility and openness to what might come along and interrupt one of those. So I have this little example. Last week Preston and I were out in the park in Berkeley sandwiches and We gave a sandwich to this man, and he was grateful, and then he said, could I play you a little song on my lap harp? And we said, sure. And so then he played this rather long piece on his harp, and it was lovely.

[54:41]

And we said, thank you so much. And he looked at us, and he said, thank you so much for the sandwich, but for not walking right by me. Mm-hmm. You know, he was a homeless person that had that experience probably a million times, right? And it really stopped me. It kind of lasted all week. You know, it kind of interrupted our... So you could have thought in a certain frame, your duty or your commitment was to give out these sandwiches. But really, I know the way you've talked about it. I mean, the commitment is really to connect with people. Well, it is. But my point is that even when you have a good you know an intentional a positive commitment can get in the way of of being open to something that you know you might have decided your commitment is going to take 30 minutes and then your next commitment is coming a half hour later so the commitment almost like has blinders or something well i'm just asking about your experience if you think that sounds even

[55:50]

plausible. Underneath all that, we're trying to express flexibility. Yeah. I mean, flexibility to remember, I mean, what I would say is flexibility to remember the real intention. So You know, if you'd gotten distracted by the giving out of the sandwiches, that would have distracted you. You had the flexibility to remember, you know, your real intention is to connect with people here. And so I don't know. It sounds like you're saying flexibility is the bottom thing. And I'm not sure about that because I think it does have to do with our I mean, I don't know. It's just it's again words, but it does have to do with our matters to us. Yeah. And maybe what matters to you most is flexibility, and that's fine, if that's what it is. Let's see.

[56:52]

How much time do we have, Susan? Because there's two people. I think you could take one more. Okay, there's two people online and one in the room. Step down. It's 19 hours, so it's up to you. Oh, okay. I'm going to do Barbara, because I can talk to Hannah, myself, personally, privately. Okay, Barbara, go ahead. And thank you, Hannah, for seating the space. Thank you for your talk. So many of the things you said struck, resonated, struck and resonated. I really appreciated the definition of shaman and I actually thanks to many of the questions in the story of the person playing the lab part made me tear up. So my voice is particularly shaky.

[57:53]

And part of what it made me think was the unseen world. To know the spirit of things, the nature of the unseen world. And music is a perfect example of the unseen world. And maybe that the duty, I thought of the word responsibility because that strikes me. And I think that the responsibility of Avalokiteshvara is the cries of the world. And that is the unseen world. We can't see the world crying, but we feel it. And I think this ability into the the zoom verse into the here and now also speaks to a kind of question that in the poetics that i'm studying and thinking about has to do with what's here and because i'm here and so are you you're you would say i am here and so here is is actually

[59:11]

everywhere and and to me the word sanctuary is really important all my art space my salon sanctuary and have since it's been building and built and and going having that be a deeper place inside it's a challenge and a responsibility I don't know if this has— I'm going to have a really hard time encompassing what you said for everybody. Sorry about that. Something about responsibility. I mean, so I think it's really a good thing that we're looking for these words, you know, and I think it's—that's exactly what you said, Barbara. Sorry, but that was great. I think that we have this idea that the word is going to get us to the thing, but actually the word comes between.

[60:15]

And I think that's a really elemental confusion we have. Find the touch the thing. No, you don't. It gets in between. It gets in between. So I think it's really good that we're throwing out all these words because in a way it's saying that, that there isn't a word that gets right on it. And that's good. so we don't have to find it. Thank you all so much. And thank you out there so much. Thanks to my sister who hopped on. She's got internet now, so she can join the talk. And let's do the chant, right? That's the next thing. Delusions are inexhaustible, I vow to end

[61:14]

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