Lost Coin Class Notes Salt Lake City Tuesday, June 14, 2011 DS: What about your working with being stuck? =========================================================================================================================== Student: I wanted to call about what we discussed last time, but I felt that it would sound like I'm arguing about being right. DS: Please do write me more often. Being right is a state of mind that you pay for. It's better to be happy, or free, or at peace. Student: The question I have is: Is there a distinction between being right and feeling right? DS: Are you asking in a moral or a substantive sense? Student: The question that kept coming up was about when is it right to kill? DS: What makes it right to kill is that it's not wrong for me to kill someone if I save a life. What I'm talking about is "I'm right. You're wrong". We sell our freedom in order to be right. Maezumi Roshi had a great way of dealing with rightness. He would say: "If you say so". Right after I married Caryn, Maezumi Roshi said that we'd have a seven-day sesshin. I said, "But what about my honeymoon?" Maezumi Roshi said, "This is honeymoon. Do it anyway. Do it for me." Caryn and I were going to get married in Maine. Her parents wanted us to get married in their backyard with a Jewish ceremony. Maezumi Roshi called and said, "I'm coming to marry you". What were we going to do? I said, we'll do all three. Everybody wins. =========================================================================================================================== Student: I can talk about fear. My significant other's demands on my time caused me fear. What I realized is that only I can put myself in a box. DS: Who usually makes you do it? Student: Me. =========================================================================================================================== Student: For me, it was the rightness. When I was in Belize, I was coached mercilessly. Then I had two events that I was coordinating, one about the engram. It was really about me being coached. Your gentle way helped me not to be mad, resentful, unhappy. So, I said, "They're all doing it in the best interest of the group." So, I observed my resistance to correction. It's hard, but I'm doing it and it's good. DS: I think that this is a very deep lesson for you. In your history, someone was forceful and you resisted it. If someone is coaching you, and it feels like they are irritated with you, then they shouldn't be coaching you. In my coaching, I try to not to be irritated. Student: Even if you're feeling that someone has your best interests at heart, your hackles get raised. DS: I like the idea that you're getting off the idea of being blameful. On the other hand, you should respect your own emotional patterns. If you see something hitting you wrong, you should respect that too. As a group, look at when you are being right and making others feel bad. When you are a more senior student, I'll be more likely to express my dissatisfaction with you when you insist on being right. Because I think that you can take it and you should know better because you are senior. My Kung Fu teacher was tough. It was implied (in working with him), that when you come in, you either want maximum, medium, or light criticism. He would criticise you most for missing class. If you missed, he'd walk by you for two weeks and ignore you. And he would be very critical. One time we ended a workout with 20 push ups on fists, then 20 circular, then 20 fingertips. He got down on the floor with his face next to mine and looked at me and said "You can do this. You can do this" He was all heart. My favorite story was when I was a senior student. We had to fight a lot, with weapons and without. When it was hot, he closed the windows. I was really hot and I went over to the ballet bar, panting. My black uniform was white with sweat. Teacher said: "What do you think this is, a country club?" He had a lot of heart. =========================================================================================================================== Student: I've been thinking a lot about fear and being right. I'm noticing that my interactions with others are changing...that I'm letting go. DS: I've known you 5 years, and you've decided that you are going to do what you want with your life. Student: I've noticed that things are different. I get frustrated, but it doesn't linger. I don't know how to put my feeling in words. DS: I think a day can come in our life when we say, "I have been being a jerk. I've been angry and blameful". That usually comes when you start making changes and getting results. Student: I find that I can stop. I've reached that point. =========================================================================================================================== Student: When you were talking about the precepts being a model of behavior, there seemed to be two perspectives, e.g., don't lie and don't put others in a position where *they* need to lie. DS: We put kids in positions where they have to lie. We have all the power (as parents). Kids have something they want to do and we express our extreme disapproval. So they do it and lie about it. It's also true about friendship, e.g., that what they do is so unacceptable that they can't do it. Have you ever seen W.C. Fields? He's always getting up in the middle of the night to drink (surreptitiously). All oppressed people lie. Example: We enslaved the black race. They would "Yes, Master" and "No, Master" and lie like crazy. They could only tell the truth through songs. My own ancestors were only allowed in certain countries if they were moneylenders, and moneylenders were despised. I was reminded of that when I sold my parents' condo and I saw my parents' papers. They were made slaves. After the war, the government compensated them. We do things to people and then we expect them to be straightforward and honest. Maezumi Roshi said, "I'm coming to LA and giving you the precepts.' I said that I didn't want to do that. Maezumi Roshi said, "You'll understand later." He was high-handed, but had a lot of love. He was Japanese. =========================================================================================================================== Student: I take my husband's side when he talks abut problems at work. He was being pushed to sign a letter of understand. I alternate being being irritated that he's not learning something from the experience and wanting to stand up for him. I said the worst thing that could happen would be that he was turned into a bitter person. DS: What strikes me...I don't know if this is true...just try it out...you're kinda of being the guy...you're trying to fix the problem. Ladies know about this...they just want to be heard. Men want to fix it...often impatiently. What would happen if you didn't try to fix things? What if you were simply sympathetic? Maybe, by trying to fix thins, you are making him feel inept. i would try to go on a "fix fast". Just be empathetic. =========================================================================================================================== DS: Student X talked about peace as a goal. It made me think of something that I said on Monday. When Caryn and I started, we were fanatics. We thought that the only thing important in the world was spiritual practice. I was always a practical guy, but it was just a gig. When you "take refuge in the Dharma", e.g, the truth, not the passing things of life, there there is nothing to worry about anymore. Nothing to lose, or win. Just passing through. Not trying to be right. Just a very natural process. As Christians say, "In life, but not of it." Through me, you are part of a 2000-year-old lineage that is committed to you seeing who you really are, and at peace. You can't lose anymore, because you are not playing. So, what's to lose? Since you are not playing seriously, you are just playing. You are no longer a part of the external story that the world is telling you. Taoist texts are wonderful in how they talk about following the Way. A leaf does not complain about being blown around. A dog does not complain. We don't need to be anywhere else. We're there. There is a koan...a rather famous one...a letter in the Blue Cliff record: A monk (student) asks a famous teacher (Nansen): "When the leaves wither and fall, what then?" He was talking about death. Nansen said, "The golden wind". Everything that happens is the divine. It's not more bad when you get old and die than it was when you were born and grew. You *are* the golden wind. This something that you are not supposed to already know. It's something you practice. Through sitting, through practice, you realize that your life is the golden wind. You can go through life kicking and screaming, or you can go through like the wind. That's really the practice. The way we do the pracice really has components: - Sitting practice - Teisho - Daisan - Being involved with and working for the Sangha, giving to the other people. The more you are involved, the more I work on you. - Your relationship with the teacher. I was saying this last night. I hold a 2000-year-old position. I used to think that it was a good thing to be original, but it's better to pass it along as I received it. The relationship needs to be open and close. This the hardest part. You need to be the aggressors. *I'm* not going to grab *you*. Student G can attest that it's more intense to be around me in person than is is to Skype. You don't all have to have the same relationship with me. You are all different. Be a fanatic. Try hard. Put yourself into it. It's the most worthwhile thing I've found. It brings me peace, joy. Put your heart into it. Maezumi Roshi said: "Appreciate your life. Appreciate your life. Appreciate your life." He meant in all of its forms. The Chinese studies are interesting.. The Confucians and Taoists had a concept of virtue, that you were supposed to be virtuous. Virtue was the desire to lead a life that causes no harm and does good for others. Feel good about your practice. It's like looking in the mirror and feeling good about what you are doing. =========================================================================================================================== Student: I wrote off a friend who was racist, homophobic, and anti-Semitic. Was I being "right"? DS: It's about supporting the precepts. It's about *not* doing harm to others. Look to your body. Student J is of Italian descent. If someone starting saying bad things about Italians, my body would tell me. =========================================================================================================================== DS: Now let's move on from fear and rightness. The thing that they discovered 2000 years ago is that the other shore is this shore. As soon as we understand that, we understand that those things we wanted on the other shore are right here. Maezumi Roshi said appreciate your life. That's probably the best thing that I can teach you.