TRUE TEACHING, TRUE TEACHER

Speaking of "I's" and "We's" we don't often realize how much the practice means to us. Sometimes we come to Tuesday Night or other events, and during meditation or the Dharma Lecture we fall asleep, or nod off lazily into a dream-state. Those are the most crucial moments, the places that the teaching is really sinking in, where it really becomes a teaching. There really isn't anything we can share about Dharma. Dharma is what comes out of your own understanding, your own insight, your own awakening. So when you drift off during the talk, it means it's penetrating, it's absorbing directly into the subconscious, into store-conscious, where ego mind will not have the chance to put a label on it, to put another appearance on it, and what has been said is a clear transmission, one mind to another mind, all minds one.

The practice can save your life. Those times we disregard what has been said, or we make light of it by telling jokes, making judgements, or saying, "I've heard that already!" Perhaps this misunderstanding comes from ignorance, of not having a direct experience with the power of mindfulness, concentration and insight. When applied, these teachings, these true teachings will empower you, without even thinking, without even trying. You'll hear my voice, or Thay's voice speaking through you, "Listen, listen. I have arrived. I am home. In the here. In the now. I am solid. I am free. The world is your meditation hall. Your life is the practice."

The cells of your body will chant the Heart Sutra. Sitting by the side of someone you love whom is dying or is sick you feel the solidity of the sangha, and it makes itself available. The sangha body in you will support you, will walk when you cannot walk, will sit when you cannot sit, will smile when you cannot smile, and will tenderly embrace you when you are crying or need of comfort.

We don't know the power of sangha. We don't know the power of the True Teaching. It cannot be taught. It cannot be grasped. It is beyond what we can administer through the senses. And it is alive. It is vital. It is clear, penetrating every cell of our body, enfused in our heart and our consciousness.

It is amazing how many times we struggle to embrace the sangha within us. We don't want to see the support we have in our lives. We want to continue on this path of anger, revenge, resentment, even hatered, jeolousy and fear. We proclaim through our actions, "Waking up is not for me! I'd rather be sleep-walking, sleep-talking, sleep-making love." And we look in despair at our lives, "What is going on? Why can't I be happy? Where has my energy gone?" We don't look at our lives and wonder, "Maybe I'm responsible for my own suffering. Maybe I've contributed a great deal to the suffering on this planet. Maybe there is something I can do better?"

Guilt and shame is a product of delusive-self. It points us to the other, as if the other isn't a part of us. It points to the other as if they can take full responsibility for who we are, what we have said, what we have done. If you have guilt and shame, it is a wonderful teaching. If you want change in your world...change! Be that which you desire, and what you desire will manifest in you.

EMPTINESS IS EVERYTHING

Six last week we talked about the fourth mindfulness training: Loving Speech and Deep Listening. Haven't taken the chance to post the talks...last Tuesdays nor the talk on Saturday. Perhaps we can practice Deep Listening this week...looking forward to meeting with you all. No meeting next Tuesday...four of us will be in New York with Thay for "Sitting Under the Autumn Breeze Retreat." Thanks for the memories!

TODAY'S GARBAGE, TOMORROW'S FOOD

Six this week, sat and walked two sessions facing the wall. Read the Third Mindfulness Training, and talked about sex and sexuality. Tough topic! Most just skim over it, and get into all kinds of troubles because they don't know how to handle it, with kindness, with respect, with reverence. We sorted through and addressed some heavy issues. I attempted to tell the story of where I am with the Third Training. Difficult things to say, to put into words. We talked about the three vital energies and how each apply to well being: Breath Energy, Sexual Energy and Spiritual Energy. We also talked about sexual abuse, and what it means to prevent children and others from being sexually abused. What is sexual abuse? What are we really a victim of?

Breathing in, aware of my in-breath
Breathing out, calm mind and body

Meditation isn't a practice at all. It is doing without purpose. Doing without self. Doing without doing. If there is nothing to do, then what can be done? And who shall do it? Practice means tomorrow. Meditation is today. This moment is "arising only." Don't be fooled by the myriad of colors projecting. BE THERE, AND ONLY THERE!

MINDFUL ANECDOTE

One day at the monastery I was asked to sing a song in front of the Sangha of about two-hundred retreatants. I had never sung in front of the Sangha before. Thay Phap Hai (Who I would ask to be my mentor several months later) called me up in front to sing in the microphone. I whispered to him, "Can you sound the bell so I can calm down?" He looked at me and grinned, "Sorry."

I had to resort to myself. My breathing. My practice. So I stood there patiently. Breathing in a calming breath, and releasing the fire back to its source on the out breath. And I waited for the song to sing itself.

This is the practice. We want always to be the doers. And when we are asked to do something, we don’t feel we have the calm, or the lucidity to perform. So we procrastinate. We deviate from the path thinking that the path is somewhere else, other than within our own means.

Mindfulness is the path. Is the awakening itself. Seek it within you. Seek it outside of you. Seek it, and it will be there. It is always there. Where it comes from? I don’t know. Just use it. Learn with it. Grow with it. Use it to transform your suffering, your anger, your anxiety, your worries, your pain.

How to use it...come to Tuesday Nights!

Lin and I sat for two periods of sitting and walking meditation, then watched a DVD about Thay’s trip to Vietnam called ‘Every Step Is a Prayer’.

TRUE LOVE

Goddesses in the house this Tuesday. Six and one made seven, plus two newly groomed cats. Walking downstairs to meet the Tuesday-nighters I never know what to expect. The mystery is exciting! It keeps me on my toes. And that's the practice...that's life. How can we ever know what to expect? When is there ever a time of certainty? True power is living in the moment, staying present with what is available in the here and now. And this is also love. When we love someone or something we are willing to go all the way with them, we are willing to stay as they are fading, and meet them in their continuation. Love does not make a distinction between self and other. That is an important practice-to remove our notions of self and other. When we are able to touch our interconnectedness, our oneness with all life--that is true power. That is true love. That is truly living. We are never absent from life, and we have the motivation, the assurance in our practice, in our way of being, in our way of walking and surrendering to life. We had a few questions at the end. And a version of the "Lord's Prayer" sung by Sister Beverlee. So beautiful! So precious. Life is truly a miracle. Thank you all for making this journey a pleasure and a joy.

Listen to "TRUE LOVE"

PEACE MEDITATION

A jungle must never be tamed.
If we tame the jungle, we tame our heart.
If our heart is tame, we may never know the truth of who we are.

Four of us met for sitting and walking meditation. We sat informally and practiced walking through the kitchen. The miracle of each step unfolded a mystery. What is this journey of meditation? What 'r' you doing here? Why come to Tuesday Night at all?
It seems all of us want to have peace. We think that peace means fitting in. We think that peace means looking and acting in such a way that doesn't cause anyone to be mad at us, or upset, or causes us to loose control. But what control do we have?

Mind is utterly untamable. Society, government wants us to be tame. That is because the collective has an idea that freedom means controlled, that to be free, is to be manageable. So we live our lives trying to be free in this way, trying to look and act in a way so others can manage us, so that we can manage others.

We are seeking control, but our very core is uncontrolled. How can we control something that is more powerful than us, something that is beyond our perception? Freedom is accepting what is. We go to the mountain, we go to the forest, we go to the ocean to meet our peace. Because in these places, these great places, we are so small, we cannot help but to submit, to converge, to swim in that untamable-ness. Peace, freedom, meditation, zen is not what you think it is. Try again.

Listen PEACE MEDITATION

SANGHA

Two things I keep in mind maintaining Tuesday Nights are My Teacher, Ven. Thich Nhat Hanh; and my aspiration to remove the barrier between self and other. What more can be said? When we come to sangha meetings we are ingesting that support, that love, that kindness, that commitment to learn and grow and foster understanding. Practicing alone we meet the sangha in us. No time can we say we are without sangha, if we truly understand what sangha is.

Lin and I spent a few days at the beach in Sothern California. I was tempted to not come home. I admit to getting angry. I admit to being sad, throwing a tantrum because we had to leave in order to get home in time for our Tuesday meeting. I felt a pull in my heart. I thought of my teacher, of the sixty years Thay has dedicated to building sangha, and of the commitment I've made as an ordained lay member of the Order of Interbeing Thay founded nearly four decades ago. What it means to take refuge in Buddha, in Dharma, in Sangha -- it means never to part from it. It means to come home to ourselves in it again and again, until the barrier, all barriers are removed.

I used to work so hard to practice thinking another round of retreats or sitting meditation would get me to enlightenment. Enlightenment is no destination at all. How can we attain that which is already our nature? Buddha, Dharma, Sangha and Self are one. I see no other looking back at me. I see no other showing me the way to be free. I sit because it is the expression of my sovereignty.

I was happy to be a part of our meeting this Tuesday for sitting and walking meditation. Seven of us met and recited the Five Mindfulness Trainings after chanting the Sutra Opening Verse and the Heart Sutra. We continued into introducing ourselves with one thing we were grateful for and singing as a group, "Happiness is Here and Now."

Looking forward to spending the month in Las Vegas, opening the door every Tuesday Night for Sangha. Plan to spend most of September and October touring around with Thay. Blessings Everyone!