And the last and the trading and perfect karma is rarely effective. Even a hundred thousand million Kalpas having it to see and listen to. My name is Ellen Webb, and I'm a Berkeley native. I grew up here in Berkeley. And I'm probably maybe the only person that can say that my sister and my high school boyfriend were all members of the Berkeley Center.

[01:19]

I first started practicing in 1990 with Charlotte Joko Beck. And when she retired from coming up to Oakland to do sessions and teach, I studied with her student, Diane Rosano, for a number of years. study at the Berkeley Zen Center in 2002. Is everybody hearing me? So, Sojen Mel Weitzman was my teacher for years, and hell, he died. But I've had contributing other teachers. certainly many of you here I would include in that. Also, my high school boyfriend, Ron Nestor, Rev Anderson, and Hozan Allen-Sanaki, who was our most recent abbot, and also Mary Mosin.

[02:39]

And Hozan and Mary gave me lay of testament with a few supporting people in last year, actually a year ago. And most of my life I've been a professional dancer and choreographer and I run a dance studio in West Oakland. So I just want to say that I am really happy to see you all this morning. And that includes you all on Zoom as well. I do have a, I've had a home practice and a practice of sitting alone, you know, at different periods of my life quite a lot for various reasons.

[03:47]

but particularly right now I'm finding sitting with a group, with a Sangha, with a community has been just very sustaining for me and you know sometimes I'll walk in here kind of a little wobbly from the world and you know I just feel kind of like you know, like a redwood tree or something where all our roots are connected and sustaining and we're... and I literally sometimes feel like the people at your site are sort of holding me up. So I say that that's really important to me and I want to thank you all for that. So today I'm going to talk about impermanence. And impermanence is a fundamental teaching to all of Buddhism, and it's one of the three Dharma seals, or characteristics of existence.

[05:05]

And when I saw this talk, I was like, well, what really is a Dharma seal? What does that really mean? So what it means, I had to look it up because I really didn't know, was a Dharma seal is, and there's three of them, I guess it's some, sometimes people say there's four, but if you're teaching these three things, you have the seal of approval. It's really Buddhism. So anyway, that's what a Dharma seal is. The seal of approval. So Dharma, Buddha taught that everything is impermanent, everything, flowers, trees, rocks, furniture, opinions, political regimes, our bodies, our feelings, our connections, mental formations, and our consciousness.

[06:14]

And just to keep going on the Dharma seal thing, the second Dharma seal is, or character of existence, that's a little more accessible term, which is the understanding that we are not separate from anything else and that we're part of the whole dynamic working and that we ourselves are changing, so that literally if we walked out the door and walked back in, we would have changed, we would be different. And the third dharma seal is suffering or nirvana, or some people say suffering nirvana. I would say that whether the third dharma seal is suffering or nirvana, depends on how we embrace or resist impermanence and non-self.

[07:24]

I think a lot of you know that Leslie and Margaret and I taught a class on the Xin Xin Ming. And for those of you who don't know the Xin Xin Ming, the kind of English title is Trust in Mind or Faith in mind. It's a kind of enlightenment poem that is attributed to our third Zen ancestor or patriarch, Kanchi Sosan. And it was written, they think, at least part of it was in the sixth century, and maybe it was added on to in the seventh and eighth century. And for me, and probably a lot of you totally knew this already, but for me it was just really sort of surprising to me, like, everything about contemporary teaching in that poem.

[08:32]

I mean, it was like nothing was left out almost. And, you know, it just kind of tickled me to kind of, you know, read the poem related to the koans where it appears over and over. And then, you know, the verses in the koans are almost verbatim sometimes, quoting the Xin Xin Ming. And Dogen again, almost verbatim, over and over, parts of the Xin Xin Ming. That was the 12th century. And then, our contemporary teachers. You know, the language can be slightly different, but You know, it's absolutely the same concepts. And there's something kind of reassuring about that for me and also that it, you know, has inspired us and threaded through our literature since that hundred years ago. So at that time, you know, which is really the very beginning of Ta'ana Zen Buddhism,

[09:42]

the strong influences in China were Chinese Buddhism, Buddhism that had kind of arrived as Bodhidharma, and then Taoism, which was really embedded in the culture. And so, the sort of Taoist influence really, you know, makes its way through all the way to our current teaching. And as many of you probably know, the sort of fundamental teaching of Taoism is that embracing change brings peace, or more popularly, go with the flow. So I'm going to talk about going with the flow, and I'm going to talk about a river. You know, I'm starting to feel like there was a guy on the radio who always talked about Lake Wobegon, and some of you may remember him in some way.

[10:49]

But I'm starting to feel like that guy because I always talk about Stahican when I leave these dogs. But I'm not really going to talk about Stahican. I'm just going to talk about the river, which is called the Stahican River. And it's the source, really the source of the Columbia River. So the Stahican River... deep narrow valley with mountains on either side and then it flows into a lake and then when that lake flows into a river that's the Columbia River and it's a big river and it's a very beautiful river it's what they call a wild it's been designated a wild river so theoretically humans aren't supposed to mess with it. The Army Corps of Engineers isn't supposed to come in and take the wood out or harden the banks, although that's happened. It's kind of amazing how many rivers have been sort of contained by the Army Corps of Engineers.

[11:58]

And I can understand why, but this one isn't. And so it's full of like law jams and gravel bars, little islands that have trees growing in them. And it's a very beautiful color because it's glacial and it has that lovely aqua marine color. And in the summer when I'm usually sitting next to it, it's very kind of lovely and sort of uh quiet in a certain way it's not a river you could ever safely walk across even in the most lowest time um it has a strong current but um you know there are places that kids can swim most adults don't and um you know people fish in it and people raft it you know it's it's kind of mellow and um

[12:59]

tame in a certain way and sort of sitting next to it you can, which I do a lot, you can kind of enjoy ducks floating by and you know just a piece of it in a certain way and the flow and you know going with the flow looks very pleasant and sort of you could really get into it. But a couple times a year usually in the late or the kind of late spring, some combination of environmental factors happen and like a lot of snow and then it warms up and there's rain and the snow melts and the rain rains and all the water comes down off the mountains. The river turns a really different color. It turns like almost black or brown gray. And it gets very, very large, and it moves very, very fast.

[14:01]

And it's kind of ominous, actually, because one thing is, if it's really moving fast, the boulders start to roll, and they make this kind of grinding, threatening sound, at which point you get your clothes on. This usually happens early in the morning, get out of there because it means the river is really big and you know it's destructive and it you know tears big trees out of the ground and carries them down and you know new channels open and the river moves and the rocks move and the gravel moves and it goes over it's bad most houses sometimes the houses end up in the river so it's It's destructive, and it's threatening, and it's very fast moving, and it changes everything. The whole valley looks different afterwards. So I'm just saying that right now, I feel a little bit like slow.

[15:09]

That very fast, everything changing, slow. And it's a little hard to go with it. It's a little hard not to resist it, to want it to be different, want to stop the river, literally. So I'm sure this is not the first time things have been like this in the world and for us personally. I'll read a little quote. This is from a 13th century teacher named Master Mochi, who I'm not familiar with. He says, impermanence always lies in weight. at every moment and when it strikes, it can strike with such speed and brutality that you are thunderstruck before you know what hit you.

[16:10]

So I would say these are tumultuous times and all of us are aware of a great deal of suffering in the world. Wars, famines, environmental destruction, natural disasters, and the fact that we as a nation are sort of pulling, you know, help in the ways that we've ameliorated this suffering in the past is painful. And, you know, we or people we know well or people we don't know well are dealing with a lot of change in their lives and their sense of security and stability. I think of Pema Childer's book, When Things Fall Apart, and that seems apt right now. So I think a lot of us are feeling we need to do something. I wonder how sitting and staring at the wall makes any sense at a time like this.

[17:16]

Our teacher, Sojin Roshi, said, Working on ourselves encourages everyone around us. Sometimes we feel that we have an effect on the world, but it is impossible not to have an effect. Another of our Chinese ancestors, Yanmen, this is from the 9th century, said, every day is a good day. Every day is a good day. And in that sentence, I think, in the face of impermanence, is the key to realizing the difference between suffering and nirvana. It asks us to embrace everything, things as they are, without choosing. As humans, we have a natural tendency, which is probably innate or hardwired into us to try to make ourselves secure and comfortable.

[18:24]

And it's natural for our survival as a species, for better or worse, to seek out pleasure and really pain. We spend a lot of our time trying to control and manipulate the people in our lives and our circumstances so we feel our relationships are loving and supportive. sustaining and our homes are secure and safe. Our children are above average. We try to manage the small things too, controlling our environment and the comfort of our physical state. We pursue happiness and we manage to find those comfortable circumstances. and chase after them, hold onto them, become attached to them. We find ourselves wanting to manage our environment, and we may intellectually accept the concept of change.

[19:27]

Permanent is a constant reality, but often we find ourselves holding on, trying to stop the river, so to speak. To hold onto the way things are, the familiar, the safe. Even when things, relationships, jobs are not so good, we might want to hold onto them. just because what is free feels safer than what we don't know. This makes me think of a young man, we met, a group of us went to the protest last Saturday after Zazen and the lecture and we went on BART and I was with him and we were getting on the BART, we met a young man who asked us where we were going and we struck up a conversation and he had a a big kind of soft bag under his arm. And I asked him what was in the bag. And he said, well, he'd come all the way over from the store, which was somewhere around here.

[20:30]

I don't know where it is. And he'd just gotten a new apartment and he'd come over here to get this pillow that was like perfect. It was environmentally correct and allergy free. And they measured just for his anatomy. And you know, this was a young guy, and I was like, wow, he's really taking care of himself. Plus, I kind of wanted that. He said it was very expensive. Anyway, you know, we do that. Comfortable. Sojan said, happiness is not in pursuit of. In our practice, we are not going after something. We are embracing what is. If we are not going after something, what are we doing here? It's kind of hard not to hope that we're going to give.

[21:35]

This is going to give us something like happiness. I think when you first walk into the Zendo, or a Zendo, and see everyone sitting upright, and still pretty controlled. Everything looks pretty controlled, but people are sitting still and everyone's quiet, but actually what we're doing is letting go. It's this opportunity to let go. Instead of trying to experience our thinking, our discomfort, our breathing, our emotional state, We are letting it be. We are sitting quietly, letting it be. Sleepiness, pain, noise, fear, sadness. We don't try to fix it. We don't try to manage it. And because everything is impermanent, it will change.

[22:38]

And then we have to let go of whatever shows up next. As I said, I've been enjoying reading our teachers after reading the Xin Xin Ming, and I've been rereading Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, and again, just enjoying the way that the Xin Xin Ming is sort of threaded into it. So this is from Suzuki Roshi. As soon as an uncomfortable feeling and we don't like it and don't want it, we form an attachment and begin to suffer. Wanting to hold on to a good feeling is painful when it leaves. So in this sense, acceptance means letting go or freedom from attachment, which is the bedrock of practice. There is no special state of mind to attach to and no special feeling of desire and no special self to hang on to.

[23:40]

This can be called bliss. Or, as Dovan said, zazen is the dharma gate of ease and joy. Or, as Yudmin said, every day is a good day. Over time, we might notice more of the ways we have been holding on, pushing things away, than letting go, going with the flow of relief, a true relaxation. It can take a long time to uncover our layered attachments, to become aware of them, and to slowly let them go. Bye, Vicki. Our clinging to our picture of how life should be, our lives should be, how our children's lives should be, our attachment to having a calm mind, to our idea of enlightenment, or practice, or Buddhism.

[24:43]

Just our idea of those things we have to let go of. Joe Gobeck used to say, have no hope. Let things be the way they are. When we're not aware of our attachments, they entrap us and cause us to do things that are destructive to others and to the natural world. When we see them, They have less power. We loosen our grip on them, and they loosen their grip on us. I remember when my daughter was probably 17, she said, Mom, will I ever not want to be sin? And she was dealing with stuff around eating at that time. You know, basically I said, probably not. You probably always worry about it. Maybe someday.

[25:44]

You know, these things grip us. They hold. When we accept everything, we don't differentiate. Everything just is good, bad, and indifferent. So we allow things, even our thoughts of not liking things, without making it a secret. Here's Suzuki Roshi again. The true purpose of Zen is to see things as they are and to let everything go as it goes. This is to put everything under control in its widest sense. This is to open up our small mind to help you realize big mind or the mind that is everything. It's challenging right now to let things be the way they are. It feels wrong not to be trying to do something to help.

[26:50]

But I think that embracing things as they are gives us a grounding, a settledness that allows us to move out into the world without bringing our anger, our frustration, our fear in. and our communications. When we let go of our self-centered thoughts, our grasping, our clinging, we shed our narrow-mindedness. We can move out from there. My thought is that when we settle down and take in the hole, we can be rooted. enough to respond and to know what direction to go and what is called forth from us in the moment to act acting out or reacting. Suzuki Roshi also tells a story of a frog and I think he's using it slightly different than I am but my belief is you can use these stories the way you want.

[28:07]

He talks about a frog that's just sitting and, you know, it's a metaphor, you know, for us just sitting and just sitting and then sitting some more. And then suddenly when a fly flies, it sticks out its tongue and grabs the fly and brings it back in and eats it. I'm sort of feeling like, you know, that's kind of what I'm doing now. I'm sitting and it comes up that needs doing. And, you know, it feels like the right thing for me. I do it. And, you know, it's almost, you know, kind of as natural as the frog going for a fry. It's sort of innate when something comes. you know, let's go to a protest, okay, or whatever.

[29:14]

So, you know, I can't tell you what those things are, what those actions should be. You know, I think that your responses, your actions, are your own. You know, you might have had the experience, you know, like if a child runs into the street, even if it's not a child you know, that you're out there and you've grabbed it before. You even realize you're doing it almost. Or if somebody falls in the street, an older person, you're kind of by their side. You haven't even thought about it. And you don't even know what you're gonna do, but there you are. Or a few weeks ago I was driving home from my studio in West Oakland and there were there was a man and a woman outside of a car and they were just like really yelling at each other and you know the man was really threatening and you know I had no idea what was going on or what I would do but I just stopped my car and got out and just stood there and watched you know what they were doing again I didn't really have an idea what I would do or what was going to happen next you know

[30:37]

they've managed to sort of settle down and leave locally, for me probably, and for them. So I think it's kind of a gut thing. And of course right now there's lots of things that need doing. And one of them might be just taking care of yourself. That might be one thing. taking care of someone you're close to, someone, one of your close, beloved people. And of course it goes out from there. You know, you could take care of, you could, you know, sort of volunteer at a food bank or setting. That's why Vicky left. She was going to become trained as a sanctuary worker. You know, you could

[31:38]

write a postcard. You could call your senator. You know, they're just, the list is endless. You could donate money. You know, somebody could ask you to do something and you would just say yes. But, you know, you're kind of taking the should out of it and just doing it. Maybe also the, I'm awfully good to be doing this. I'll read one more thing. This is from another contemporary teacher, getting along these lines, just to kind of finish us off. This is from Musang. A trust in Buddha nature means trying to control the unfolding of things according to one's own agenda, but rather letting things unfold according to their own dependently arisen nature.

[32:40]

Obeying the nature of things means letting go of any personal agenda. Without any agenda or sense of control, every day is a good day. There is no bad day. Because one has no investment in how things will unfold. our chanting service and also our lectures with the four vows. When I was studying with Joko, we ended also with a chant, but it was a different chant, and again, one that I know very well, but I'd sort of forgotten about it. It just sort of really popped into my mind when I was thinking about all of this. So this chant goes, Unceasing change turns the wheel of life, and so reality is shown in many forms.

[33:49]

Peaceful dwelling in change itself liberates all suffering sentient beings. One more time. One more time. Unceasing change turns the wheel of life, is shown in all its many forms. Peaceful dwelling in change itself liberates all suffering sentient beings. So I think it's not quite time, but something that many of you may have been thinking about during this more turbulent time in our in our moment. And so I thought, you know, I would just kind of open it up and, you know, hear what you all have been thinking. And I'm happy as well.

[34:56]

Thank you for that talk. When you started talking about the river, I thought, well, there is Ellen. Ellen Cox are on that cabin in the river. And it's so beautiful, the metaphor. So when the river overflows or when it starts to swell, and you're in an emotional state, what is your practice when your river is swelling? Well, thank you for that question. And I guess I'm sort of an advocate for doing the best I can to just whatever is there be there.

[36:30]

And, you know, it's not a calm state. You know, it's not, you know, it sometimes can be a very, very turbulent state. And, you know, I'm thinking of a time when this is not at this current time although it could be but when um somebody got just violently angry at me and i was really really upset by it and um i you know sat with it and i also tried to go to sleep you know everything was about that and it just was Two rivers maybe come together. One hopes. But then it isn't. It does change. I mean, that changed. And actually, this will change too. I got the point that political regimes change too.

[37:33]

Excellent. I found it very inspiring, and it made me think of something I've been observing lately. I don't know if this is one of those deepening of practice things people talk about sometimes, but I love to plan. I like to know what I'm going to do and when I'm going to do it, and I've recently been finding I don't need to hold that so tight. I can actually just see what I'm going to do. Like, it's a, it's like a new, an actual ability. And, uh, I just had a really, for example, I didn't know what kind of pastry I wanted. Red lime. And I was starting to get really worried. Like, oh no, it's going to be my turn. I don't know which one. But I'm going to need to know. I'm going to have to say something.

[38:40]

And I just sort of was like, oh, I don't need to, I can just see what I'm going to do. And, and totally drop it. And then it was my turn. And then, It was so interesting to have an experience because I think what holding onto that would have done is the spiraling, and then I'm not sure, and I don't know, and then I'm hesitant. But also I think even that I could have accepted if that was what was happening too. So I'm curious, just coming out of this meeting class, how to really hold this practice without wanting to get something from it, even if it's sort of why we're all here doing it a little bit. We're hoping something about ourselves or our lives might change, but I'm curious what, maybe what are we actually hoping to change? It seems like it's our preferences we want to change and letting go of them, but what would you say?

[39:43]

Well, I first want to sort of just point out the, you know, kind of what you get out of planning everything. You know, that's really an interesting thing when you start to let go of things. Like, what was I getting out of that? And we all do it. I mean, you know, I have a whole thing I hold on to. But it's just kind of interesting to think about, like, well, what do I really get out of that? Or what have I gotten? Or what did I think I was getting out of it? And in terms of, you know, hoping we're going to get something out of this practice, well, I'll say what everyone says, that you wouldn't be here probably if you didn't have some kind of hope that this was going to make things better. You know, you just wouldn't come. At least most of us wouldn't. So I think, you know, that's a given.

[40:45]

And then, you know, you can sort of I think over time see the downside of, you know, knowing what pastry you're going to get. You know, it's like I want out of my zazen to get calmer or, you know, happier or, you know, like more respected or whatever you think you might possibly get out of it. That you kind of narrow what could actually happen. Does that make sense to you? That, you know, if you have an idea of where you're going, and we all do, again, or at least mostly, then you, you know, you kind of limit what could happen, I guess is what I think about that. And there's a quite an interesting, if you don't,

[41:49]

if you're not directed in a real strict way. So anyway, that's my response. Thank you. That reminds me just of the quote you read of not trying to control the unfolding of things. Actually, we can be surprised by what unfolds. Katie? Thanks, Ellen. Yeah. I need just to reflect on how my practice has evolved since November. And it's evolved in ways I didn't expect. When the current administration was first elected, I was like, oh, maybe it'll be like the first time. It could be worse.

[42:53]

I was wrong. And I certainly went through, you know, I was like, I'm not going to borrow trouble when we get there. You know, I'm not going to live in, but I certainly do that other ways. And it's been a process since to, for me to let things land. I certainly went through a phase where I was not reading the news. It's constricting to me, even given the work I do day to day, who I work with, which is an immigrant-centered organization, that it's taken a while for it to really land for me that people are being sent to a mega prison in El Salvador with no prospect of Release? Survival?

[43:53]

I don't know. For no reason or bad reasons, in my opinion. And it was really only this week that that landed for me. There's certainly a lot of other things happening as well that haven't fully landed for me. And I think part of that is self-preservation. Like I can only cross that so much. But I'm finding that that is important to me, that I'm able to take these things in to some degree, because how else can I really be here and respond? And of course, it's also important to go to friends and have good tacos and all of that. But I was just wondering, because I think this is exactly what you're talking about, that kind of crux between accepting what is and response.

[45:06]

The messiness of being angry, reactive, is sometimes something that I have to go through. Yeah, part of it as well. I have a question. Is there another side to going with the flow? There's an early Buddhist term, I think, stream winner, I think used to describe entering the way. In a certain sense, you could consider not what the rest of the world does necessarily.

[46:14]

There's this image in one of the koat verses of fish climbing a stream and carry them high enough to catch a cloud and turn into a dragon and fly away. So this image of climbing the stream has been with me recently. And I don't know what that river that I should swim against is, but my own unwholesome karma. But can you say something about when we should swim against? Well, I think that's maybe what I'm hearing, I guess, may not understand the reference you're making, but what I'm hearing is that there are times when we, you know, go against what's happening. Is that what you're saying?

[47:24]

Maybe this is helpful before practice, maybe for me, I was driven by other currents, and those are currents that I don't want to go with the flow of, which is maybe self-centeredness, greed, hate, and delusion. Yeah. Well, I guess I just think that, I mean, I get that metaphor, and... I sort of think about it as sort of going with the crowd or something like that, that you might not want to do that, and at this time we might not want to do that. So I just think it's a different metaphor. Yes, sometimes I think you want to walk away or walk against what's, you know, what other people are doing or kind of what's happening. So I think you could turn that metaphor to that also, but it's a slightly different metaphor. Yeah, but I think it's an interesting point, actually.

[48:32]

Thank you. You have some hands online as well. Oh, I have a hand online. It's from my husband, Sandy Walker. Hello. Can you hear me? I can hear you. I'm not sure anybody else can. Fabulous talk. But I just wanted to check in with you because I hear a certain passivity around accepting. And since you talked about our beloved river, when the river was flowing, we get sandbags. Fire is coming. We start preparing our property so it won't burn. So I just wanted to add that and see what you would say. An appropriate response is what I would say. response and you know the river may take our sandbags and it may take and the fire may take our house and the river may take our house all those things can still happen but yes you know and I think those responses are you know we're trying to contain this whatever's happening now in some way trying to make a difference I'm thinking of my four-year-old grandson and

[49:57]

protest, I guess the one last week in Seattle. He's four years old. Be kind. Is that enough, Sandy? Absolutely. Okay, Kabir. Thank you for your talk. Your talk reminds me of a quote I heard recently by Lao Tso, and he says, flow, reflect like a mirror, and respond like an echo. So nice. Thank you. Thank you. Did everybody hear that? Susan. Thank you, Ellen. I was thinking about something similar to what Sandy said, but I was thinking about like when the river is really, really turbulent and knocking down trees and I was thinking about the animals or the fish.

[51:11]

And I was thinking going with the flow doesn't mean not doing anything. And I was thinking that those animals or fish or even a person who got caught in the river would do good to stay alive, to respond, even to the point of, I'm just making this up, but remembering what they knew, what they learned when they were maturing, whatever that is for an animal or a person or a fish, And maybe for us in this practice, that Sazen, you know, bringing that stillness into that turbulent activity. Right. Well, you know, when I was thinking about the river, I was, you know, the fires are different. But when the river is really flooding, the animals seem to do fine.

[52:18]

And the beavers and the otters and the fish. And I was thinking about how I hadn't really thought about that before, but they do seem to do what they need to do to kind of take care of themselves. The beaver dams are all gone, but the beavers seem to be okay. So it's just that interesting thing to me. They don't seem to, they seem to figure out what to do. And I suspect that is wired or innate to them. uh i know who you are denise awesome what a great talk and thank you for trying to uh sue the most turbulence um i want there's something that comes up for me when people talk about flowing like water sorry kabir i love that uh passage i love that writing

[53:21]

There's something going on here. We're experiencing a sort of secondary trauma from watching what's being done to our nation, to the relationships, to the loss of jobs of our countrymen, to our fellow country people, excuse me, to the relationships around the world. So there is something going on here, and it's real. all of that harm being created is something that it's natural to have feelings about. Now, think about this. The great way is not difficult. This is one that I have a challenge to propose, okay? The great way is not difficult if we do not pick and choose. Guess what? That writer was hiding from Buddhist persecution. He and his teacher were, in fact. So the great way for him, he was doing everything he could to keep alive.

[54:22]

And the great way was not difficult if he did not pick and choose while he was from the Buddhist persecution in China. So think about that. That's who wrote that. And in this day and age, we have a great like you like a number of speakers who have said, including the person before me, there's something that we can. day if we can in some way to either help someone or to reach out and protest like you were doing, Ellen, and to call our senators or whatever way, whether it's I, in my case, I've even written to Zelensky three times. It can be any number of things. And it's not the century in which the great way is not difficult. We don't have to pick and choose and we can flow like water. We can also do something. And when we do something, we get a tremendous amount of relief from the society of watching everything go to hell in a handbasket, excuse me, to use that reference.

[55:35]

Thank you, Denise, for firing us up. Okay, thank you. Thank you for your talk. Things are remembered, I vow to awaken with them. Delusions are inexhaustible, I vow to end them. passable. I am now to be heard. to those online with us and special welcome to anyone who is here for the first time.

[58:19]

My name is Ben, I'm Saturday Director today. And here are some announcements. On Monday, Helen Chang will give a wayseeking mind talk at 8 a.m. in the online Zendo. Next Saturday's Dharma talk will be given by Susan Marvin. Registration is now open for the spring practice period. and the opening one-day sitting on May 3rd. So please see our website for details. Sangha members who identify as black, indigenous, or people of color are welcome to meetings held on the first Monday of each month from 6.30 to 7.30 via Zoom. For more information, see the links for recurring activities. And as a reminder, the Zendo is a scent-free environment for wearing scented body care products. or clothes laundered with scented products. For more information about our programs or membership, you can check the bulletin board. You can speak with our Zazen instructor today, Sue Oshary, just raised her hand.

[59:27]

And also there should be resources in the Zoom chat for those of you online. And please consider making a donation to support our temple. There's a donation box outside on the tea table. in the courtyard, and there's also a generosity tab on our website where you can make a donation. We need two people to volunteer to help clean up after tea, please to wash tea cups. Rock off, thank you. One more. Thank you, Katie. Please maintain silence until we're off the Zendo steps. And those of you online can unmute and greet each other. Thank you. Good morning, everybody. Good morning. Nice morning. Greetings. Greetings. Good to see you. Nice to see you all. Good week.

[60:29]

Hi, Ron. Hey, Ron. Hey, Ron. And Denise, good to see you. Good to see you. Who just said that? Where are you? Well, okay. Bye-bye.

[60:47]

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