Good morning. If I ask you a question, how many of you are familiar with the first case in the Blue Cliff Records? Well, that's a particularly well-known case, anecdote, in Zen Buddhism. so much so that those of us who have practiced for a few years have heard it so many times that it's almost impenetrable. It's like when someone asks you, how are you? You've heard it so many times that it doesn't mean anything. So for some of us, that's how it means. But anyway, I would like to use that in some respects as an illustration of what I've been thinking about, what I'd like to talk about. Another way to mention what I'd like to talk about is reasonableness and responsiveness as the two modes in which we can address the world from the view of practice.

[01:15]

In many ways, Zen appeals to our reasonableness. If we think about it in terms of progression, I think we hear it and it sounds reasonable, it sounds logical, it sounds appropriate. And then out of that, we're willing to adopt its perspectives. I think in general, Buddhist doctrine or Buddhist view of the human process is that We create vexation or affliction or suffering in our life out of ignorance. So in some ways our first approach to this is through reason. We think about our lives, what is reasonable. And then out of this a certain attitude or approach to how we should be in the world comes out of that.

[02:17]

And classically we would think that The suffering, the affliction in life is caused by three things. By desire, by greed, by confusion, by ignorance, by thoughtlessness, and by fear, by anger. So the three things that are classified in Buddhism as desire, aversion, and confusion. So the reasonable approach to life would be to eliminate those. And very much that's what our practice proposes. Most schools of Buddhism, as we know them in the West, interestingly enough, in Asia, there's a wider range. But for us in the West, the primary appeal seems to be develop meditation as a way to awakening, a way to insight, a way to awareness, a way to calming and clarifying the mind, to get in touch with what's happening.

[03:33]

So that's, that sign's reasonable to us. That sign's more reasonable than circumambulating a stupa, chanting the Avatamsaka Sutra. that proposes tens of thousands of realms of existence. So this is our main gate of access to the sensibility that Buddhism proposes. And in Zen, the classic example is the first place of the Blue Cliff Records. Bodhidharma, who has come from India as the standard bearer of Buddhist understanding, comes to China and the emperor of China, of this province of China, approaches him and says, well I have performed many virtuous acts, I have built temples, I have studied the Dharma, the teachings of Buddhism,

[04:38]

What is the essence of all this? What is the highest meaning of this? And Bodhidharma dismisses the question. He says, nothing sacred. So the emperor in confusion asks him, well who are you to say such a thing? And once again he dismisses the question and says, don't know. So Zen likes to take reasonableness and take it one step further. Take logic and instead of letting it be linear, let it be something that helps us drop even logic. In many ways, this is just a preliminary to another perspective that I wanted to propose.

[05:42]

So, if at some point what I'm saying gets too confusing, please put up your hand. Because what I wanted to say, I wanted to take all of this and group it on the side of reasonableness, of that aspect of our practice. Because when we think about this, And what it leads us to our practice life, it leads it into a sense of developing concentration, developing attention, developing awareness to eliminating our desires, our confusions and our anger and aversion. It leads us to a sensibility where In some ways our stance in the world is passive, that we are there in the simple terms that it sometimes put, to avoid evil, to avoid asserting our desires, to avoid asserting our anger, and to avoid asserting our confusion.

[06:55]

And unfortunately for us, our life is not that simple, that we have to turn it around, and we have to have a response to life. Now, whether we like it or not, there is an imperative to have a response to the crisis in the Middle East. In this poem that I did, this story that I just mentioned, What Bodhidharma, the person who gave the answers, represents? He represents the excellence of not being stuck in any particular point of view about the world. Of not being stuck in saying, this is right and this is wrong. This is better or this is worse. Of approaching each moment fresh.

[08:00]

So as I was thinking about this quite recently, actually it came up for me in two things prompted it for me. The first was the notion of Santa Claus. I was thinking of Bodhidharma and Santa Claus. In some ways, Bodhidharma says these wonderfully profound things. so impenetrable, so inexhaustible, that you can keep putting yourself towards them, trying to understand them, trying to fathom them, and keep finding they go deeper. In Santa Claus, on the other hand, I mean, who has ever heard Santa Claus say anything profound? I mean, Santa Claus says, ho ho ho. So I find that very provoking. Both on just that very simple level, you know, but the efficacy of Santa Claus, you know, of creating in this turmoil of the world some sensibility of giving, of generosity, of ease.

[09:15]

It's very powerful. So that was one sensibility that came up for me. Another one was, I heard recently someone talk about the creation myth in the Kabbalah. And it starts off like this. In the beginning, before there was beginning or ends, before there was, when everything was connected, when everything was open, then there was a stepping back, a withdraw, so that there could be a coming forward, a reuniting, like a child coming forward to its parents. And I thought of that in relation to Bodhidharma. In the imagery of Bodhidharma, then Bodhidharma leaves the emperor's court and goes away and lives in a cave.

[10:21]

and becomes renined for his nine years of wall gazing, of just sitting in a cave looking at the wall. And the story, this part of this story ends where one of the emperor's advisors says, didn't you realize that was the embodiment of compassion that you were speaking to? So not only is the challenge of this story to penetrate an understanding of existence, but it's also a challenge to penetrate the nature of compassion as proposed in Zen practice. It's hard to think that Bodhidharma and Santa Claus could be exactly the same thing, that they're the same archetype. Anyway, it's hard for me, maybe it's not hard for you.

[11:23]

What I find provocative about the story from the Kabbalah was there again it's counterbalance to the withdrawal of Bodhidharma. It's a stepping forward. It's a stepping forward into life. So what I've been thinking about is perhaps the aspect of Bodhidharma representing reasonableness, excuse me, a reasonable response to life. And the aspect that is always also asked of us is to respond to life, is to respond to the situation. You know, I remember recently I was going to Zazen in the morning and There was someone sleeping on the porch of 300 Page Street.

[12:28]

And... I didn't do anything. I mean, he was sleeping and he seemed signed to sleep. But... It was very provocative. see, sense myself strolling around in this very expensive costume and doing these rather esoteric rituals. Zazen, in a way, is another ritual. And to be confronted on my way to my esoteric rituals by the by a manifestation of how our society is so out of whack? And it's a wonderful question because right again we can come back to our reason, we can say, well I'm here expressing

[13:36]

a statement that peace, that awakening can support everything. There is enough in the world to feed and clothe us all. It's only the fact that we want to separate out some of it and hold on to it more than we need. It's from our own greed and aversion that we create these injustices. So we can from our reasonableness say that penetrating that exhaustively illustrating that, manifesting it and inspiring others to do so, takes care of the person lying on the sidewalk. So we can say that, and from that point of view we can say, yes indeed Bodhidharma is the essence of compassion, because he eliminates the ignorance that causes confusion, the confusion that gives rise to desire and hatred.

[14:41]

And maybe for those of you who are exploring the idea of spirituality, the idea of Buddhism and Zen, there's real questions between should I go help in a soup kitchen or should I go to meditation, should I discover how to meditate. That question stays with us because then it comes back later. So many of us decide well I'll go meditate because that addresses in an essential, in a basic way the fundamental dilemma, the fundamental confusion that causes all this suffering. Because also if we think of the interconnectedness of the world, we can think that by setting up an aspiration for peace,

[15:50]

can in fact bring peace. That by setting up an aspiration for selflessness can bring about the cure to the ills of the world, the ills of our society. So for many of us that has been, for those of us who have established a Buddhist practice, a meditative practice, that has been the compelling reason. Our reasonableness draws us to that. And then as we practice, it comes back to us. To look at our practice and discover, is that enough? Or to discover, are we leaning a little bit too much to being reasonable? Because That can become rather cool.

[17:00]

We can become a little nonchalant. And so the calls of the world come back to us, to draw us to realize that there is still the imperative of being in the moment. So another thing that struck me as I was thinking about this case was a phrase that stuck in my mind. It was by Tien Tong in the Shoryu Roku. And he said, in silence, Bodhidharma completely asserts the true imperative. And what that means in ordinary English is that by withdrawing to the cave, by being totally silent, totally non-participatory, he completely asserted the request, the imperative of being in this life.

[18:13]

And I must be honest, when I read it, I was struck by the part of me that didn't agree. And of course, these stories are not so much meant to have us take an opinion, but more to encourage us to see the varieties of ways of looking at it. To see reasonableness, responsiveness, to see turning towards meditation, to turning towards action. To see them all, and actually in looking at them and examining them, to see the assumptions with which we are approaching our life. What are we doing and what are the assumptions that we're using to do that? I mean, if meditation is our primary expression, what are the assumptions on which we do that? Is it okay? And when you start to look at yourself in a straightforward way, you see that the reasonableness of the ideal

[19:28]

of wisdom, of totally understanding that everything is interconnected, that it has no... that good and bad are just convention, that suffering and well-being are subjective, that wealth and poverty... Who am I to say that that person lying on the steps at Zen Center at 300 Page Street wasn't satisfied with his life. Who am I to say that that life that's sleeping there was not as helpful and supportive to him as a human being as any other, as living up in Pacific Heights. Maybe it's simplicity and it's straight. So this is the convention, this is our subjective thinking. So the ideal is can we fully penetrate, understand that this is all relative thinking, that this is a concoction of our own subjectivity.

[20:40]

This is the ideal. This is the imperative of Bodhidharma's position. But when we get back down to a basic way of looking at ourselves with some honesty, we can see to what extent we manifest that ideal and we can see to what extent we don't. And so Buddhism brings in a lot of supports, a lot of straightforward, simple ways in which we can stop ourselves from getting stuck or getting caught up in our ideas. And one of them is meditation. And from a reasonable mind, this is a great virtue. This is a great support. On the other side, another proposition from Buddhism is called the four ways of the Bodhisattva. The word Bodhisattva means someone who helps create awakening, helps create an environment that helps us to be conscious of what's going on.

[21:54]

And when I contemplated these, I must admit, they reminded me a lot of Santa Claus. The first one is generosity. And interestingly enough, in the classic Buddhist texts, generosity is generosity materially, of giving things, as we would normally think about it. The second is generosity of speech. of speaking the truth. And the third one is generosity of giving fearlessness, of helping people dispel their fears. Personally, I find that an intriguing proposition. So how do we encourage each other to let go of that fear that wants us to have our own possessions, to protect ourselves, to hold on to things, to take care of ourselves, to repel others in support of our own survival.

[23:13]

The second admonition is right speech or generous speech or kind speech. Kind speech I think would be the best translation. And if you think about it, to put this into effect is rather simple. To just remind ourselves to say things that are supportive and encouraging. To remind ourselves to just talk to one another in a way that doesn't make us defensive and angry and confused, but just that sets each other at ease. The third one is beneficial action. Keep in mind when we are acting, the question is this beneficial? Is this useful?

[24:18]

Is this helpful? And the fourth one is identity action, which has a lot more of the flavor of Zen to it. Identity action means to totally do what you're doing. to not hold back, to not reserve, to not separate a little bit from it, but to just do it, to just completely be part of what's happening. So when I thought of those, I felt for myself that the flavor of them is very straightforward, in some ways very practical. that if we can keep those simple notions alive when we do act, it will help create for us an environment that's non-harmful.

[25:27]

It will help create for us a stability in our lives that will allow us to look at the bottomless challenge of Bodhidharma's wisdom. Because only from some sense of ease and stability can we open up to the fact that all our points of view, all our perspectives, even our notion, as it says in the Heart Sutra, even our notion of birth and death, of suffering, of a practice, of something to practice, of something to attain, that all of these are convention. So the methods of guidance for action for the Bodhisattva are very straightforward ways to create a basis in which we can leap into the unknown that's proposed by Bodhidharma.

[26:33]

And in some ways this is typical of Zen. It's only at the end of this anecdote, at the end of this story, is there a very brief allusion to how this impenetrable, inconceivable aspiration towards complete wisdom has within it the embodiment of compassion. And personally I think when we practice we should be straightforward and realize we do need these simple guidelines in our life to help bring us closer to this relationship to our existence. Just the same way that we need meditation. Maybe need is a wrong word.

[27:40]

Just the same way that we can appreciate that meditation can help us calm our mind, concentrate our mind, help us see our constant dialogue. So these admonitions towards generosity and kind speech can help us see how we do act. What do we So, on that note, I have a plug to make. It is, in fact, about the Middle East. I don't know if you've seen these. These are postcards created by a long-time member of our wider Zen Center, Kaz Tanahashi. He's a scholar and an artist and a wonderful person. For him the imperative to act came up and I thought rather wonderfully he decided that as an artist he should do art.

[28:55]

That's how he would resolve the crisis in the Middle East. That's what he was. He was an artist. He does very large black and white brush paintings. So one of the things he did was he did several pieces of art, and then he created a postcard. And the concept of the postcard is that each person who gets one creates more, and then they create more, and then everybody sends one to President Bush. And so he ends up, and I figured that if you went on a factor of 10, if each person sent 10, I think I figured out that if that could happen seven times over, everyone on the planet would send one to President Bush. In a way, it sounds remarkably doable. If you think about it, it's only, you only got to repeat the process seven times over.

[29:59]

It really shows us how we are connected. And in any way, I felt very inspired by Kaz and unfortunately I couldn't get these to go through our Xerox machine at Page Street. I brought over what, half a dozen? But the idea is that, you know, there are lots of Xerox machines in the world, in our lives, and that each of us can just take one and Xerox it and produce more, and in that way bring to bear. Because in our simple conventional reality, sometimes it's not apparent. that our silence or our non-action completely asserts the true imperative. Sometimes it's translated as acknowledgement of military action or passive agreement with military action.

[31:13]

And this is the You know, in a way, this is stepping forward to discover our own being, as it says in the Kabbalah, like a child stepping forward to find its parent. In some ways, this is also what's asked of us. Not only to penetrate the mystery of existence, but to step forward and assert wisdom. And it's a wonderful proposition because, especially for a Zen student, because how do you assert something without taking a position? How do you do something like this without feeling this is good and anything that's opposed to this is bad? I mean, how do we think about the Middle East without thinking, you know, my own attitude is sort of like President Bush

[32:24]

is a warmonger. Saddam Hussein is lost in some confusion that allows him to create some atrocious acts of violence. And our practice is asking us to appreciate, to fully acknowledge our own points of view. and not to turn them into absolute truths. So when we take a position, there's still the challenge of acting sensibly, of acting reasonably. So even in response, response is supported by reason. the same way that reason is supported by a sense of responding to the whole world.

[33:27]

So in our practice, when we sit, we're responding to the whole world. And when we act, we're sitting totally still. When we take a position, when we assert a position, even there, our aspiration, our vow, is still to appreciate, this is my opinion. This is how it appears to me. And this is how it appears to me, I must be honest. I mean, I can sort of take some of the rough edges off it and think, well, this is how President Bush has been trained to think about the world, this is what makes sense to him. This is how Saddam Hussein sees the world. This is, but still, There's still part of me that lingers, that holds on to the point of view that he's a warmonger and he's so far right that violence doesn't bother him.

[34:29]

That he's empowered by uncaring. That President Bush is empowered by fear and Saddam Hussein is empowered by not caring. And that's my point of view, and I have to be very careful in owning it. So this is the imperative of action. So even within that koan, despite that strong assertion that silence completely asserts the imperative, completely tells us our place in the world, further down the same commentary Someone else dares to say 80%. This is 80%. Wang Tsang, in his commentary, he says, hanging his mouth on the wall in Shaolin, he manages 80%.

[35:37]

So to hang your mouth on the wall means non-speaking, non-action, non-assertion, just being, coming back to just sitting. So I hope I didn't create total confusion in your minds and what I'm trying to communicate is that within our practice inevitably we have both modes. We have the quest within us that's looking for a reasonable approach to life. And for us, particularly so for us as Westerners, meditation, awareness, responds to that inquiry. And as we approach that inquiry, we find it's bottomless. We find that it's always there as a challenge.

[36:41]

And on the other side, Also, we have an imperative to respond to the world. We are part of the world. And inevitably we do that from some opinionation. And this can only be fruitfully supported if we bear in mind the aspect of wisdom or reasonableness. So these are the two aspects of our practice and they support each other. Reasonableness and responsiveness. So that's what I had to say. You have questions there? So if you have any questions about it, I'd be happy to try to respond.

[37:49]

Yes, is there any such thing as an absolute, such as evil? Does evil exist? Well, what I was trying to communicate was, particularly within Zen thinking, evil would be a conventional label that we would attribute to something. We could say Saddam Hussein, in the way he's butchering people, is evil. But then, to follow further with that, we have to look and realize that that comes out of the criterion with which we're approaching the situation. But recognizing that, what is our imperative of action? Well, that's part of what I was trying to bring up. inevitably we have an imperative to act. Either that or we'll just sit right here in total stillness. And so what I was proposing was that in a remarkable way to solve this complex dilemma we have these very simple guidelines.

[39:04]

Generosity, kind speech, beneficial action and identity action. in some way, they are as simple as Santa Claus. Given this total interconnected complexity, the resolution can arise in a very straightforward way, if we bring forward these admonitions. Can you do something like send a postcard like this and demonstrate kind speech to everyone involved, or beneficial action to everyone involved. Not just the people that you think are the good guys, not just the people that you feel support your point of view, or not just an action that supports how you feel it ought to be. I don't know, did that answer your question? In a way I would say every action we take responds to how we're approaching and thinking about the situation.

[40:16]

And that's the human condition. Is there a way that you're setting up these pillars of reasonableness and responsiveness, but sometimes one's response, one's deepest response is not reasonable in conventional terms. Is reason always a foundation for our lives? Well, I would say particularly for Zen students, sometimes we think of reasonableness as only linear logic, which we might call conventional.

[41:32]

in a more expanded way, just like that koan says, you know, that koan says that Bodhidharma's silence is the complete manifestation of compassion. In some ways, that's not very conventional. In fact, you could almost say it's, well, it's not quite the antithesis because it's non-harming, but it's over there. And then in another way, as you say, our actions aren't always reasonable. I think one of the links between either perspective is being conscious of what we're doing. Because one of the aspects of identity action is to be conscious within it, to be part of it, and not to be to be blindly doing it.

[42:35]

You know, if we act out of habit, we're not conscious of what we're doing. It's not identity action, that's unconscious action. So I don't think it means that it has to be logical. I think more that it means that it is indeed identity action, that we are conscious and part of what we're doing. I think that's more of a guideline than that to our logical mind this appears reasonable. To me, as you're speaking, that there is something in this postcard that moves from stillness, that is movement or response and stillness at the same time.

[43:51]

And that rather than looking for the answer, the craving to find the right answer, this artist, just from speaking about him, seems to have looked at the admonitions and moved from those, and moving from those somehow I get the sense of stillness. Thank you. Right. And I think that's part of the aspiration of our practice, is can we move in accordance with stillness? you know, can we remember that the wisdom of stillness when we act and stillness being that we allow our notions, our opinions and our ideas to come forth without

[45:02]

holding on to them without moving from stillness into holding and reacting. In some ways that's what our life is made of, is we have a reaction, we have a sensation, a feeling, and then we react to it. We have an opinion and we react to it. We have a, you know, a sensation and then we react. We're outraged, we're incensed. So in some ways, the imperative of stillness is, can you act dispassionately? Can you pick up an action like this without having someone to blame? Without there being a good guy, namely me, and a bad guy, namely someone else. And that was my sense of this too, was that indeed, was what cause.

[46:14]

It comes up for me a lot when I hear the Dalai Lama talking about Tibet. I'm always struck by how easily he can speak in terms of non-blaming. I mean, he can talk eloquently about the Chinese position. in a non-blaming way. Is it conceivable to you that violence could ever be an appropriate response to a situation? Right now, no. That's my own point of view, you know.

[47:16]

I don't propose it as anything more than that. But, you know, I think something within that is that when we become hypothetical, then It's sort of dangerous territory. It sort of draws us into the vast complexity and possibility of life and the feel that we can have some super gem of infallible reason or wisdom that can protect us or can give us the right answer in all those hypothetical situations.

[48:25]

That would be very cozy if we could. That would be kind of wonderful if we could. But from my own understanding of Buddhism, I think it's more that it that it's trying to persuade us that in the moment we can find stillness in action and that aspiration or maybe even to make it even simpler of just cultivating the the generosity and beneficial action and kind speech and identity action of the Bodhisattva way, just to constantly try to rediscover that in the moment, is a stronger, more powerful, more empowering presence than some elusive

[49:36]

precious diamond that can, in every situation that we could ever face, dispel confusion and give us the answer. I think the practice of Buddhism gives you a much more fluid sensibility about how to relate to the world, rather than say, here is the answer. It's more saying, here's how to be in this moment. Did I understand you correctly? If we, in thinking back to your talk, I recall your example of counting upon the Spiritual Master. Yeah. Is it correct to characterize your response to that as having been a No, that's not actually, my response was quite conventional.

[50:43]

But in the end you said that... Yeah, then later I was saying, and you could look at it this way. So what I was doing was, I was showing, so the anecdotes in Zen are not to say, here is the answer. But my question is this, I can't help but see that in Middle East, all in the same plane. Sure. My question is, why the imperative to act out of stillness with regard to the Middle East and not the mantle of fortune? Oh, I think completely it is. Yes. It's awesome. You could look at it as an extraordinarily painful lesson for mankind. That's great. Like, well, if you need a lot, you need a stiffer lesson, here it is.

[51:46]

You could say that this will bring, I mean, you know, you can look at how we destroy the environment and say, well, this is a lesson. At some point, people will listen. So in all of these things, there exists these sort of two ways of looking and one has to sort of make a choice there. Actually, I think it's even more complex. I think maybe there are as many ways of looking as there are people who can look at it. I was inquiring into yours. Into mine? Well, what I was trying to say was my first reaction was quite conventional. In fact, my first reaction helped me see myself. It helped me see myself as someone strolling around in a very expensive costume. And in contrast to what I perceived as someone destitute, in suffering, lying,

[53:01]

on the doorstep of the place where I was going to go and rather luxuriously sit around. But you didn't send a postcard to President Bush about that? No, I didn't. Yeah, and it's a good point. And then later I was saying, of course, that's not an absolute perspective. And we can turn it around and say, well, maybe he's happy. Maybe he's happier than I am. Maybe he has a better quality to his life than I do, or whatever. I think one of the lessons Zen is trying to teach us is that not to struggle to find the point of view But the essence of stillness allows all points of view.

[54:03]

Allows our points of view to come up and allows us to see ourselves become that and become any other point of view we become. Even within our own life, when we have a decision to make, we can think, well if I look at it this way, this comes up. If I look at it this way, this comes up. Which shall I do? Shall I be a monk who lives in a cave? Shall I be a politician who runs to be president? You wouldn't see the consequences. Right. And from that place we can say our life is this incredibly complex dilemma. I think only if we're looking for the answer. There's something straightforward that the heart of our practice is trying to give us, to be in that moment, accepting our sensibilities of that moment, and as we say in Zen, taking the next step

[55:24]

into darkness are the next step of a hundred foot pole. We don't know exhaustively the consequence of what we're going to do. It's a sort of a step into the mystery of life. You know, maybe we send a postcard to Art Agnes about homelessness and we feel utterly, or maybe we'll go down and break a window in City Hall, you know, and and feel like that was really the thing to do and then discover later that we feel rather embarrassed and foolish. Could you say a few words about how this relates to separateness? There's a strong sense within us to separate, to, well even socially, there's a sense within us to pick up a particular identity.

[56:43]

We're citizens of the United States and we should protect our interests in the Middle East. I'm me and I should protect my welfare as opposed to the guy sleeping on the porch. I'm a Zen student, I should take care of Zen center as opposed to whatever, as opposed to the Lutheran Church. There's always, you know, we create a reference point called self. sometimes the reference point is this body, sometimes the reference point is this person as an intimate relationship with someone else, sometimes it's part of a nation. That's the locus around which our thinking, our reasonableness is generated. And also in that is the primacy of our survival.

[57:50]

So in some ways The wisdom as proposed by Zen is a direct challenge to that, a direct challenge to that sense of separateness. And even in the Kabbal, it's saying to step forward and reconnect. Not through wisdom, but through some heartfelt sense, some spontaneous sense. And within Buddhism, there's a deep faith that when we're not preoccupied by our own pain, we're motivated to be compassionate, to be considerate of others' pains. So there is a deep primacy within us to separate, even on a rational level,

[58:53]

And yet, more and more, our life shows us interconnection. You know, more and more, our life shows us that if our air conditioning in our car leaks, it affects the whole world. It affects the ozone layer. That if we chop down, if natives in Brazil chop down the forest, the whole world suffers. You know, I find it incredibly Encouraging. When we do something like to protect one species of little bird, we don't chop down a whole area. I mean, we can't even prove the connection of the value of that species. You know, I don't think anyone could logically say, that could predict the consequence. But somehow, we're so committed to interconnectedness, on a national level that we are willing to do that.

[59:59]

So I think more and more as our life becomes, as communication becomes more easily brought forth, that interconnectedness, the sensibility of interconnectedness grows. You know, now we know what's happening in the Middle East. You know, it's like three hours later we know that so-and-so spoke to this person. Two hundred years ago, that would have taken someone six months to get here. So interconnectedness is becoming an assumed part of our existence. And this sense of self, this sense of separation, That, I think, is more of a challenge.

[61:02]

It's a much deeper challenge to see that, in fact, that sense of separation is not essential for our survival. That empowerment is not the product of separation. I think that one, I don't know if we can use technology to help us with that. I think perhaps that one is going to stay in the realm of personal endeavor. Thank you.

[61:47]

@Text_v004
@Score_JJ