So an experience of time-bound consciousness,
Say,
You know,
Another day begins,
Or a day begins,
Or just the moment arises.
It's potencies for future and past and so on.
This is how it always is.
Wherever you go,
It's this way,
This extent.
You have the here,
And then there's potencies,
Potentials for the future,
Past,
Ideas about oneself and others,
And all the various activations that can occur in that matrix movement.
Notice the future with eagerness or dread or worry,
Recollections of the past,
Recollections of oneself with either positive or negative traits,
And of others living within this,
Arising within this matrix.
And this,
So it's like that.
This very potent matrix,
Whatever you plant in that wall,
Bears fruit for good or for ill,
For not good.
So whether one is staying on here,
Or the world is going to change quite radically in a few hours' time,
It's basically,
It's this,
It's the matrix.
Because of that,
You place another matrix onto it to hold that,
To restrain it,
To invest the gate,
To wisely attend.
So open the field.
Because of the power of this temporal matrix,
Space and time,
It's always so easy for any of us to sit and then we go into our days this and that,
And figure that out,
And thinking again,
And stop doing this,
And then stop thinking.
How do I stop thinking?
It doesn't stop,
It stops.
It's like,
You know,
Domesticated,
Half meditating,
Half planning the day.
Maybe that's okay.
Maybe it's good to spend some time just quietly planning the day,
At least cleaning out what you don't want to do,
And bringing things to the fore.
That's okay,
If that's how it is.
At least we have that much sense of getting some traction on the pull of space and time,
Events and circumstances.
But you maybe just start Buddha,
Recollect,
The Buddha was awakened,
Touching the earth here.
There was that,
The Buddha,
In one way,
You could say very simply as an icon,
Is that which touches here,
The now,
And touching the ground,
Bumipasa mudra,
Presence,
Just maintaining presence amidst the turmoil of the host of Mara,
The potentials for agitation,
For becoming,
For obsession,
For doubt,
For wavering,
And grief,
And so on,
Maintaining presence within that,
Even as that is bursting around.
This is a,
This itself,
This is one mudra of the Buddha,
This one gesture is an important one to bear in mind.
It's quite simple.
As the Buddha practiced this way,
I too shall not be fazed by the,
What arises,
Shall not be embarrassed by it,
Shall not disregard it,
I shall maintain presence in that.
This is what the Buddha practiced through many,
Many years of struggle,
Just to come to this mudra.
Touching mudra,
And Dhamma,
Which is direct here,
Here and now,
Santitiko,
Directly discernible,
Timeless,
Not about the world of time.
Dhamma is time.
Time is the amount of energy rushing through the nerves and stimulating thought,
With its pressures and its dragging and its flurries.
That's the world of time.
Dhamma is not that.
It's penetrates that,
Investigating,
Inviting you to come and look into that very phenomenal arising.
So even in our fairly mundane daydreams,
There's something to be noted in this.
Don't get involved with the topics.
Try to contemplate the energy,
The drifting,
The spinning,
As what it is,
Energy spinning,
Drifting,
Jumping,
Whatever it's doing,
Dragging.
And the mind tone,
The mind,
Agitation,
Anxiety,
Happiness,
Excitement.
Just even spell it out.
This is a lot of energy,
Energy ungrounded,
Or movement,
Or happiness,
Or worry.
Just kind of name it.
How is this in the body?
How is this in my eyes,
In my temples,
In my head?
Can I,
As I come into body,
Can I widen from these places,
Which are stimulated,
Into the ground,
The back,
The seat beneath me,
Palms of the hands,
Soles of the feet,
Breathing out?
Just how is this?
All directly in one's own experience.
Bacchidang,
This very much refers to integration of experience.
We just bear in mind our awareness is established in this,
For this lifetime in this body,
In this very body,
One can experience the matrix,
The space and time,
In a way that's furthering to detachment from that,
Understanding of that,
Wise handling of that.
And we should just set our sights on to just feeling experience more fully before we even decide to judge it as one way or another,
Just to feel it more fully as it's arising.
Just bring the body into that.
You sit with your eyes open,
Stand,
Whatever,
You know,
Whatever it takes to get the fullness of that from a basis that can give you support.
So,
Even as other practitioners are experiencing this very much the same matrix,
It's just a feeling.
I too understand this is what has to be handled.
There's nothing other than this and penetrated.
So I too will practice holding that in the presence of embodiment,
The mind undiluted and not contorted with your will,
Passion,
Aversion,
Doubt.
We bring sangha to mind and we determine sangha.
This is the ongoing human daily life integration of practice,
Specific individualities of it,
Human which we all are many forms of human karmic sub-fields,
Personal karmic inclinations.
This is a very powerful practice because it means that you are like,
In this respect,
You are like no one else entirely.
You can only really unravel this yourself and yet we're all trying to do that.
Different qualities in common,
Particular mix of each individual.
And the uniqueness of that is both requires courage and faith because you can't exactly model it on someone else.
It also requires the sense of handling the personal,
Recognizing this is what makes one sangha,
Understanding the personal.
So as you contemplate dhamma,
What are the tendencies that arise as most familiar to me again?
That's your koan,
That's your ritual.
This is what you unlock or unfold and this is where you gain and learn your own parami,
Your own wisdom,
Patience,
Energy,
Goodwill and so forth.
Basic patterns and developing your own specific skills to meet those patterns and not let them keep weaving you into the matrix of your karma,
Of accumulation to your body.
So every day,
Every moment is a way to look into that,
Take up skillful means,
Check the mind,
Encourage the mind,
Gladden the mind,
Rest the mind,
Rest the mind.
Depending on what your patterns are,
There's a time for gladdening,
A time for resisting,
Restraining,
A time for exerting,
A time for abiding in equanimity.
Depending on what your patterns are,
This will be your gift to the sangha.
Your parami will enrich the field of sangha.
This is our chance.
We will also take responsibility for our lives and may our lives issue forth enriched by the parami,
The virtues and the skills that we develop in this way.
Nectar.
