Well, first things first, I wanted to ask you if there's anything, just this moment, that you were wishing for or wanting. I thought, probably if I brought that up, many of you might think you'd like it to be at least, perhaps, a few degrees cooler. I mean, you know, just the first thing that comes to mind. And then if you let that go by, considering the fact that your wish doesn't have much to do with the, you know, it won't have probably much effect on the weather this evening and the next few minutes, you know, what's after that? Let's go on to something else. What, what would be the next thing you might think

[01:13]

of wanting? When Tarotoku was here, of course, he said, all beings want happiness. Nobody wants to suffer. But in your own, you know, setting aside what, what the official understanding is of what you want, since you're the expert on what you want, you know, I wouldn't want Buddhism to tell you what you want, you know. So what is it that you want? Deeply, intimately, desperately, or are you settled, at ease, with this moment, this time, just as it is?

[02:26]

Not wanting anything in particular? Or is that what you want? You'd want to be like that? No. To be happy and at home with your, in your own body and mind? Settled in your own body and mind? Settled in this moment? Feeling all right about being here? Feeling all right about who you are? What you're up to? Or when someone asked the Zen teacher, what about people who leave the monastery and come back? And he said, they appreciate the benefits. And then they asked the

[03:38]

teacher, what are the benefits? And he said, heat in the summer, cold in the winter. Oh. And you thought there was something else to being here at Tassajara? Why do you get heat and cold anywhere? But it's very curious that we need to, sometimes, we need to come to some place, either willingly or unwillingly, where we can appreciate the benefits of things as they are, heat in the summer and cold in the winter and being a human being, so to speak. I thought I knew what to say,

[04:53]

but I got distracted by the thought of water. So speaking of this, I'll share a poem with you by Rainer Maria Rilke. This is one, oh, no, it's not. Anyway, it's a poem by Rilke. I was going to say it's one of the sonnets, but it's not one of the sonnets. And then after I tell you the poem, I'll tell you some more about what I'm talking about tonight, just in case you haven't figured it out. I have some tendency to talk and not tell people what it is I'm

[05:55]

talking about. So I want to tell you. Here's the poem. All of you undisturbed cities, haven't you ever longed for the enemy? I'd like to see you be sieged by him for ten endless and groundshaking years until you were desperate and mad with suffering. Finally, in hunger, you would feel his weight. He lies outside the walls like a countryside, and he knows very well how to endure longer than those he comes to visit. Climb up on your roofs and look out. His camp is there, and his morale doesn't falter. His numbers do not decrease, and his will doesn't weaken.

[07:01]

And he sends no one into the city to threaten or promise, and no one to negotiate. He is the one who breaks down the walls, and when he works, he works in silence. You want it again? Once more. All of you undisturbed cities, haven't you ever longed for the enemy? I'd like to see you be sieged by him for ten endless and groundshaking years until you were desperate and mad with suffering. Finally, in hunger, you would feel his weight. I'd like to see you be sieged by him for ten endless and groundshaking years until you were desperate and mad with suffering. Finally, in hunger, you would feel his weight. He lies outside the walls like a countryside, and he knows very well how to endure longer than those he comes to visit. Climb up on your roofs and look out. His camp is there, and his morale doesn't falter. You want it again? Once more. All of you undisturbed cities, haven't you ever longed for the enemy? I'd like to see you be sieged by him for ten endless and groundshaking years until you were desperate and mad with suffering. Finally, in hunger, you would feel his weight. He lies outside the walls like a countryside, and he knows very well how to endure longer than those he comes to visit. Climb up on your roofs and look out. His camp is there, and his morale doesn't falter. Finally, in hunger, you would feel his weight. Finally, in hunger, you would feel

[08:30]

his weight, and his morale doesn't falter, his numbers don't decrease, his will doesn't weaken, and he sends no one into the city to threaten or promise and no one to negotiate. He's the one who breaks down the walls, and when he works, he works in silence. I brought this up now so you'd have it in mind, but what I'm talking about tonight is three things. One is intention. What is it you want? And second, what strategy are you using to get it? And third, is it working? Is your present strategy working? Is it an effective strategy? This is sometimes known as view. So approximately it's talking about the first two stages of the Eightfold Path, view and intention, and we're sort of looking at sorting out what would be a correct view and a correct intention.

[09:45]

Without anyone telling you, just figuring it out. I think it's hard to translate Buddhism into your own language, so use your own language for this. For instance now, if someone gets angry at you, what is it at that time you want? Well, one of the things that is pretty high up there on the list oftentimes is, I want them to shut up. I want them to stop that. I want nothing to do with that. I want them to go away. I want to get away from it. So at that level of wanting or wishing, there's particular strategies that you might employ then to attempt to bring about what you decided you wanted. I want them to shut up. Well, you can get angry back, right? And don't talk to me like that.

[11:08]

And then in some instances that might be effective. And then you can adopt, I want nothing to do with it. Well, you can turn around and walk away. I don't want anything to do with it. Or you can adopt the attitude of being stoned, icy cold, stoned. Or you might, you know, one of the strategies I've used to various degrees of success or lack thereof, I tend to adopt a strategy of maybe if I play dead for a while it will go away. Do you know any of these strategies? Now you can see, I think, how these kind of strategies like this might work on select individuals.

[12:13]

And they might work on your own psychology. You know, like if you get mad and then you say to yourself, oh, I don't want to have anything to do with you if you're going to be mad like that. Or if I get angry, then I can, you know, get depressed and play dead, you know. And so if you get angry, I'm just going to play dead. So, you know, the strategy has, might have a certain, you know, limited usefulness, right, out there with other people, with yourself. It might work on your own psychology. And then you wonder, you know, like if it works on my own psychology and a few people, it doesn't seem to work on these other people, right? At some point, you see, you meet the enemy who doesn't, you know, doesn't care what your strategy is. They don't send anybody to threaten or promise, you know. And whatever you threaten or promise, the enemy is waiting there enduring longer than you, right? The enemy is there. Someone is out there getting angry at you, you're getting angry, and you don't have the strategy to deal with it.

[13:20]

And there it is. The enemy has gotten in. It's gotten to you. Does that make sense, how that happens? So one of the, then, one of the very basic kinds of strategies that we adopt is that, in a certain sense, we set up I and a wall, and then the rest of the world out there. But the rest of the world that's out there is also me, because we look at our own psychology as an object. Does that make sense? We're also the object. And so we say to ourself, what's wrong with you? Why are you getting so depressed? What do you have to be upset about?

[14:25]

And we say those things that we say to other people, we also say them to ourself, right? And then that's putting us outside the wall too. But there's somebody inside the wall who gets to do all the talking. And makes it sound like they're the real, they're the real I, right? That little voice is the real I, and the un gets to be the unquestioned authority. Isn't that a nice position to be in? You get to talk and say how it is, and then nobody gets to talk back. What's wrong with you? Well, I don't know. How come you're still getting depressed like that? Well, I guess I haven't figured it out yet. No. So this is very curious that we have somehow conceptualized then, as a strategy you see, we conceptualize in order to get what we want when we conceptualize an I and some walls.

[15:29]

And then there's me out there, and there's you out there, and there's the world out there. And then, you know, we try to not have things get to us. These things that, you know, we would find unpleasant, right? So this is very curious. This is where a certain view comes in, or a certain kind of now. Now that we're to this point, we have to ask, well, has the strategy worked? Is the strategy effective? Is it useful? In other words, do you want to live inside those walls? Is that the place you want to live? Another way to bring up this question, by the way, if you'd like to leave out the you part or the I part. What do I want? What do I really want? Another way to bring it up is, what is the most important point?

[16:36]

So is the most important point to be able to maintain the walls and not have the enemy get to you? Is that the most important point? Not to deal with anything? Keep everything quiet? Did you want to live inside those walls? Generally speaking, there's a point inside those walls where we notice that we're inside the walls and then it's kind of lonely. And then we kind of like somebody else to come inside our walls and join us there and kind of behave in a way that we would like and enjoy and that would be companionable. And so then we start trying to behave in a way that somebody else might want to come inside our walls and hang out with us. Does that work? And then we have another good strategy because, you know, it would be kind of scary to go outside of the walls

[17:45]

and go inside somebody else's walls because we don't know what the heck is going on there and we're not used to that place at all, right? And my God, you never know what could happen inside somebody else's walls, right? And once you're in there, I mean, could you get out? You know, it kind of comes up all the time in relationships, you know, commitment. And then, you know, like, well, if I got in there, could I get out? And that sort of thing, you see. And we think that it's either one or the other, right? You're going to get them to come inside your walls or you might have to go inside their walls, right? This is pretty scary, you see, and not knowing what's going to happen out there. So I think if you look at this, then, you know, if you follow through,

[18:50]

starting with something pretty simple of what you want, and then you get to this point, and then you have to say, well, is this what I wanted? Or you start to say, well, I know I wanted a certain amount of control over things and I wanted to be in a kind of safe position and I didn't want to be so vulnerable to the enemy. You know, I wanted to be kind of like an undisturbed city and I didn't want to feel threatened. But how is it there? You see, is it, once you're there, finally, is it the place you want to be? You want to live inside those walls. The most important thing is to keep up those walls. So I think there comes a time for most of us, or there are times in our lives, when we realize that it's not what we wanted. And you're willing to have an enemy come and disturb you.

[19:57]

And because you see, because we notice at some point that this enemy, we notice several things, I think. One is the enemy is like in the poem, the enemy is bound to get in. And trying to keep the so-called enemy out leads to the state that we find ourselves in. And we also notice at some point that, my goodness, the enemy, I'm making myself the enemy too. I'm on the outside also. I think I'd like to be on the inside. Okay.

[21:00]

Anyway, I don't know exactly how you say that for yourself, what it is you want. Whether you have this, you don't necessarily have this metaphor. I'm using a metaphor of walls and the enemy. You might, you know, you can come up with any number of things. Over the years, I've had many different ones. Sometimes I might say, well, what I want is to be intimate with things. Or I want to be, you know, generous. I want to feel all right about being here. I don't want to feel threatened. No more worry about not being good enough.

[22:39]

No more worry about not being perfect. I just like to breathe easy, please. And you can see how these things, you know, have some slight resemblance to, you know, we use those four vows, which somehow for me, you know, aren't a particularly useful kind of language. I vow to save all sentient beings. Sentient beings are numberless. I vow to save them. I vow to awaken with them. But we do have some wish for others. I mean, I find I do. So I've noticed, oftentimes, I don't want to hurt others. I want to benefit others. I want to be supportive of others. And I think if you look, you notice that kind of intention.

[23:41]

And I think it's very important you notice it, and also that you have it in your own language. Even if, you know, your language doesn't match. Sentient beings are numberless. I vow to save them. I mean, it sounds Christian, or whose language is that? I don't know. You know, it's very strange. But you can take, you know, if we go back to, you know, somebody being angry. Then you might, on one hand, you want to say, I want them to stop. But on the other hand, you also have, you might also have noticed, I want to be supportive of my friends.

[24:44]

I want to encourage people. And then you have, at that time, you have a different strategy then. Or you have, with a different intention, it's much more likely you will work out another strategy other than, I'm going to get angry at them, I'm going to play dead, I'm going to be a stone. Then you will try to develop another strategy. You will say, I want to be with this person. I want to support them through their anger. Or calm them. Or let them know that I still love them or appreciate them.

[25:50]

And of course, you might not come up with a particularly effective strategy. It might go on being angry. You know, your effort might not work. But it's quite a different place you're coming from once you've acknowledged this kind of intention. A while back, I opened the refrigerator door for breakfast and I was going to have an egg for breakfast. So I reached in the door. On the door, there's these little cubby holes, little dips. And I reached for the egg and I pulled it out. I didn't pull it out, it stuck in the door. And then I thought,

[26:59]

if I keep trying to pull on this egg, it's going to break. But I kept pulling on it anyway. I thought, no, I'll be careful about how I pull on this egg and it won't break. And I'll be able to get it out. And I tried wiggling it. It was really stuck in there. Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle. It didn't wiggle. And finally it broke. And I got annoyed rather immediately. You know, like, why are you doing this to me? And also, then the egg starts to drool down, right? There's white and there's yellow and it's drooling out of the shell and it's going over that shelf and it's going down. There's the mayonnaise and the soda and all that stuff down there. And it's going to drip down on top of all that other stuff. And then maybe down to the shelf below that. And then, so I didn't know what to do.

[28:04]

Do I run and get a bowl? If I run and get something to catch the egg, it's going to drip down in the meantime on top of all that stuff. And if I reach my hands out, I'm going to have to stand here while it drools. So I did this one. And I waited for the egg to stop drooling, sort of. And actually then I yelled out to somebody in the other room, you know, get me a bowl or something. Anyway, I got it cleaned up for me. But I was really angry about that, speaking of anger. And I bring this up because I think it's an example of the kind of things that might, you know, the way in which we get angry, how we get angry. Which, it has a lot to do, again, with the kind of world that we think we're in, you see. And the fact that we do think that there's an enemy there outside the walls, you know, that is trying to get to us. I mean, I think this is what I was thinking at least at the time, you see.

[29:07]

Because I have this sort of picture, you know, of the egg in the refrigerator. And I'm about to open the door and the egg says to the refrigerator door, just wait until he opens the door. He thinks I'm going to come out of the door, but actually, when he opens the door and he reaches for me, I'm going to stick to you. And then you're going to hold on to me real tight, and he's going to try and try and get me loose. But you just hold on, and it's going to be really great, because eventually he's going to break me, right? And then he's going to throw a fit. It'll be really fun. And he might scream or cry or, you know, he'll just have a conniption, you see. And it'll be really fun to see what he does, you see. Now, you see, I'm just thinking, you know, like, with something like that, you know, with eggs and refrigerators getting together to molest me, you know, and annoy me, what chance do I have? You know, when the world is conspiring like that,

[30:10]

things are conspiring, you know, to get to me. Otherwise, what's the point about getting angry at them? You know, why would I get angry, you know, unless, you know, it has some psychology to it, right? A person, you can get angry at them, and you can say, don't you ever do that again, or I'm going to really be angry with you, just like I am now, okay? And you're going to be in for it. So you watch what you do, and you don't behave like this anymore. But the egg's already broken, right? And besides that, it never had that idea in the first place, right? And yet I'm throwing a fit, you see. This shows how, you know, much sense our, you know, response to things has, you see. Because I think, you know, that egg and its, you know, perverted minds, you know, they're just, they're such perverted minds that they would get together and conspire to make me angry, you know. And there's nothing that I can do, you know, whether I scream or yell or get depressed or cry or moan, there's no strategy that I can adopt so that that egg won't pull that sort of stuff on me, you see. And it's going to, you know, it's just going to do that,

[31:11]

and it's going to inflict upon me. This is very frustrating, you see. Now, and then, you know, we think that people are different, but people aren't any different. They didn't set out to have this strategy either, or to inflict anger upon me, you know. And yet, I can get angry at them and think that it's going to be effective strategy that they won't pull that stuff on me in the future, you see. But does it work like that? Have you ever noticed that working? Anyway, usually it doesn't. There's very few instances when it does. You see, there might be this sort of person you or your friend, you know, that you get, you know, to hang out with you, that you can do that too. But basically, for the large, you know, numbers of people, it's not much use, you know. At some point, they kind of laugh at you, and they look at you like, he's really crazy. I mean, people look at me like that, you know. I, you know, you see. So at that time, okay, here's an example.

[32:21]

At that time, I got angry. Now, what is it I really want? Did I want to be angry like that? Was getting angry like that useful? Was it effective? Did it work? Will every egg now in the future come out of the refrigerator door? You know. Or am I going to continue to be molested by things? And why am I so molested, you know, when things don't do quite the way I choose? You see. So do I want to be that fragile? Do I want to be that subject to emotional distress? And that subject to emotional affliction? You know, do I want to be in that kind of position? How can I not be in that kind of position? Build a wall. Build a wall. Is that going to work? Probably not. Have you noticed it working? Do things not get to you when you have a nice wall? Another problem about the wall, of course,

[33:23]

is you have a certain kind of anxiety and worry about keeping it up and keeping guard. You know, that a dread phenomenon that you don't like is going to get in. You know, a sound, a smell, a taste, a touch, a thought, a feeling. It's going to get in there. And you won't like it. And you might have to experience something you don't like. We might have to experience something we don't like. We wouldn't choose to experience if we had the choice. Heaven forbid. But is there any alternative, you see? Is there any strategy that will, you know, keep this from happening? Now, if there's no strategy to keep it from happening, and believe now, you know, I'm pretty convinced of this. I'm not quite entirely convinced, you see, because I'm still getting angry at times. But I'm pretty convinced that there's no strategy for never having to experience something you wouldn't choose to experience if you had the choice.

[34:24]

So you just might find at some point, I'd like, I want to be patient. I want to be able to experience things that I don't like with some degree of calm and awareness. With some degree of, I want to be able to experience things that are painful to me and upsetting to me with some, with some graciousness, or some dignity, some calm. I don't want to get, I don't want to be that upset. Do you see the difference in this kind of strategy then? And this kind of strategy of wanting to be more patient or wanting to be calm, wanting to be able to experience what I wouldn't choose to experience,

[35:36]

comes out of seeing clearly the viewing, that it's not, how impossible it is to keep up the walls and to keep out unwanted experience, and how painful that is to adopt that as a strategy, how lonely I am, how isolated I feel, even from myself. And since I see that so clearly, now I have, I, I want, you know, to be able to relate with that in a more positive way. There are many, there are many, many examples of this kind of thing. When I was the cook here at Tessa's house, I wanted people to be very grateful and thankful and appreciative of me and my effort, because I worked very hard.

[36:39]

And you know what? How do you suppose those people were? Well, a certain amount of thankful, you know, thankfulness and gratitude and appreciation comes my way, right? Certain amount, right? People say, thank you very much. That was very good. Then I wondered, did they like the food or did they like me? I mean, I want them to like, I want them to be, you know, thank me. I want them to appreciate me, not just the food. Anyway, you know, I didn't feel like I was getting enough appreciation, enough gratitude. I worked very hard and I would like this return on my investment. You know how we are in this world these days. You put something out there and it's an investment. You're investing time, effort, energy, and you want something back, right? You want to get a return on your investment. So I thought, since I'm not getting enough appreciation and respect out of the deal,

[37:43]

how about if I just don't show up someday? Won't that get to them? Then they might appreciate me more when I'm there, right? Is that going to be a good strategy? I could never quite bring myself to do that on purpose. You know, adopt that as a strategy. So I looked at, you know, I would look at what, okay, what do I want? What's important here? What's most important in this situation? And the thing that I came to at that time is, I don't care about the respect. I don't care about the thankfulness. I don't care about the gratitude. I want to be generous. I want to just offer myself and my effort to everyone with no strings attached.

[38:45]

That's what I want. Okay, that comes out of looking into the situation and saying, what do I really want? Yeah, I like having appreciation. I like having people grateful for my effort. But is that the most important point? So is that the most important thing for me, that I want to get that no matter what? Even if I have to beat it into them? You're going to appreciate me or I'll hit you? You know, you might end up doing all sorts of strange things to get them to do that, like not showing up some days, and then thinking that they'll be grateful the day that you show up. Probably not. No, probably they'll be upset and pissed off at you for the days you're not there.

[39:48]

You see? And probably they won't be particularly grateful the days they're there. They'll just think, well, he's only there for a while. He's probably going to flake out again. Now you've got this reputation of being this sort of flake, and people can't count on you, and so on. It's real important to look at what I really want. What's most important for me? Does that make sense? I used to want attention, too. What do you do for attention? You know, you start acting out, right? You can do all sorts of strange things that gets attention, right? So do you want attention that bad? Do you want it badly enough to, you know, do weird things? You know, say weird things, be a strange person, have tremendous psychological problems? And you'll get attention out of that, you know?

[40:56]

There's lots of things you can do and get attention. You want attention? You can get it. People will give you all sorts of attention. You can threaten to commit suicide. Usually that's pretty good. I heard the stories about, you know, I was back at Karmacholing in Vermont, and one of the stories I heard was about Trungpa Rinpoche. Somebody came in to see him in the morning. He was finishing breakfast and reading the paper, and the person says, Rinpoche, I wanted to tell you I'm going to kill myself. He goes, I'm reading the paper. And they tell him the whole story, you know, this is happening, that's happening, this is happening, and he just read the newspaper the whole time, didn't say a thing. And then finally, after this long thing, you know, 15, 20 minutes, Rinpoche says to the person, is that all? Anyway, it didn't seem to work, you see? You know, it was a strategy to get some sympathy. I want sympathy. You know, I want attention. I want love. I want somebody to take an interest in me. I want somebody to get inside those walls and be with me.

[41:59]

You know, can I make myself interesting enough? You know, can I make myself needy enough? Get somebody in here. So do you want it that bad? You know, or is there some other strategy you could use, you see? Or do you actually, when you say you want attention, you know, what is it? You want somebody to care about you? Well, who is it, finally, who's not caring about you? It's usually, you know, somebody you know pretty well. You know?

[43:09]

And then, you know, well, I couldn't care some... I couldn't... Then you say, well, I couldn't... Well, why don't you care about yourself? Well, I couldn't care about somebody who was that weird. I mean, you know, we set up these things, they're just... They're endless kind of, you know, boggles and traps and, you know, bogs and marshes and stuff, you know? But it's actually possible, you see, to care about somebody like that. Somebody like, you know, can... You know, is it possible? Isn't it possible, you know, like... Like, Thich Nhat Hanh, when he gave us one time at Zen Center in the city, he said, he was leaving, he said, I have a gift for you. And the gift is when... I want to tell you about a practice, he said, when you inhale, let your chest fill with compassion, warmth and compassion, and when you exhale, you pour it over your head. And you... It's like you take... He said, in Vietnam, we have a dipper, a coconut shell on a bamboo handle,

[44:11]

you dip it in the water, pour it over your head. It's very refreshing. As you exhale, you just pour it over your head. And he says, now, some of you, you know, you say to me, but I don't... I don't... What about... I can't... I don't feel any compassion. I can't feel any compassion in my chest. You see? So, then, is it possible at that time to have compassion for somebody who doesn't have any compassion? Can you do that? You see? You see? What about if you want intimacy?

[45:13]

Usually, when we have intimacy with someone, I mean, there's a stage of intimacy which isn't really intimacy at all. But the first thing we do when we start to get close to someone or something, you know, is we want this object, this thing, this person, our own body, to behave in the way that we would like. It makes us feel good. It makes us comfortable. As long as the person does that, it's just fine. And as long as our breath, and we sit and we just breathe, and then as long as our breath is a nice breath, then we say, Oh, that's very good. I'm being very intimate now. And then what about when the person doesn't behave that way? And your breath and your body, your body's going to betray you. You know? It does all these strange things. It gets hot. You know? And then, you know, I'm hot. You know? Then I'm afflicted with the heat. So maybe it's not so good to be intimate

[46:23]

with your own body, you know? Because you can't tell it what to do. And your friend, you can't tell your friend what to do, and the people don't behave the way. So then, you see, it comes back again to that question, All right, well, what do I want? Do I want my own body and mind and other people and things and the weather to do what I say? Or do I actually, what I want is to become intimate with each thing, with the person, with my own body, with my breath, with the weather, with the sky. I want to be intimate with things the way they are. What do I want? So in this way, you see, we can correct our intention,

[47:24]

so-called correct, adjust our intention. It's a little bit like dropping a stone in the water, and it goes right to the bottom. What's most important here? Boom. And you get settled very quickly then. If you settle what your intention really is, you settle the situation. You settle yourself on your intention with some clarity. And then, your strategy and how you are with people and what your effort is to be intimate or to be so generous that you don't ask for something in return or to care or have compassion for yourself and others, then you're settled on that, and your effort comes out of that.

[48:27]

And it's not something that you have to make up. Oh, I should be compassionate. I should be kind. I should be generous. You know, it doesn't come out of that. It doesn't have to come out of some kind of should or if I'm a good person, if I'm a good Buddhist, if I was a good Buddhist, I'd behave this way or... You know, it's like that. You can decide for yourself. You settle yourself on your intention. You clarify your intention over and over again. And you look and see, does it work? Did it work? Am I... Is it happening? Is it working? Is my strategy effective? Is my intention... Is it what I really want? Am I just trying to get something I don't really need? I used to smoke, and then I'd go... You know, when you smoke, you go... And then I'd say, why do I need a cigarette to do that? I just want to breathe

[49:28]

a little bit easier, sigh a little bit. Do you need a cigarette in order to sigh? And then the curious thing about something like a cigarette is, you know, it sets up the... It reduces your capacity to sigh on your own. You need the cigarette in order to sigh. So part of a poem by a Sufi poet, Rumi, he says, you miss the garden because you want a small fig from a random tree. You miss the garden because you want a small fig from a random tree. Let yourself be silently drawn

[50:31]

by the stronger pull of what you really want. Okay, now I have to do a whole talk just to tell you that? Oh, well. If it's not too late, you can ask questions or, you know, or... Yeah, anyway, you could ask questions or say something or comment or recite poems of your own. What time is it? Should we go on? Should we stop? Oh, it's almost 10. 9.58. Too late. You missed the dance. I'm going to be around another week, so if you want to talk to me about any of these things, you can talk to me. Starting Sunday night, today's Friday. Sunday, I'm doing a retreat with the guests, as most of you know. There's 30 people in a retreat. We're doing...

[51:32]

We're talking... We're doing... It's cooking as a spiritual practice. That's what we're going to talk about. And we'll have a period of meditation for guests here in the morning at 8.20. And I'll be doing lectures every evening in the dining room on this general subject. And you're all... If you're here, you're invited to attend. I'm also doing some discussions in the morning, which is more appropriate, I think, for the people in the retreat. And we'll have something like cooking classes with that group of people in the afternoon. And that also, I think, is more appropriate for the people in the retreat because there's only so much space in the kitchen. But I thought rather than trying to cook some special dishes, we'd... You know, I get interested in doing these things like we take five or six different vegetables, you know, potatoes, onions, carrots, green peppers, and then we cook them in six different ways

[52:32]

or eight different ways. We can bake them with oil and bake them covered with a little water and fry them and steam them and boil them and bake them in parchment and whatever we can come up with, you know. And then we taste. That's all we do to them, you know. And then we taste. What difference does each kind of cooking do to each vegetable? I find that sort of interesting thing to do. And then mostly people don't do that at home. And most of these people who come to these retreats like this can cook anyway. They don't need me to teach them how to cook. So we'll just do some silly things like that. But it should be kind of fun. And then the people in the retreat also can sign up to work in the kitchen for periods of time. So those of you who work in the kitchen, if you'd like to have some help, you know, sort of the Tom Sawyer thing. We're all having such a great time here. Wouldn't you like to come and join us and pay us money while you do it? No. Anyway, we'll give them

[53:33]

a nice break in the afternoon. So I just thought I'd tell you, those of you who are going to be here, a little bit about the retreat. And there'll be more talks. And as I say, if any of you do want to talk to me, come and talk to me. I'm around. Thank you. Thank you.

[53:50]

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