Hmm. This is Sunday, August 4, 2024 and for this talk, we'll be talking about change, growth. We'll be talking about we'll be talking about no self, not true self, our own self is no self, or true self is no self. Go beyond ego and past clever words, I think. And so, how do we do that? Do we want to change? Should we change? Of course, we do. I know for me personally, when I came to practice, I reached a point where I just, I was just so sick of myself, just the the the harm I'd caused others, you know, especially in my late teens and early 20s, and just, I Just felt like I was such a mess, and I the zazen, yeah, I was just fed up. I was fed up myself, and so really wanted to just dive in and make those changes. But here's the thing, when it comes to making changes, it's it does not happen on our own schedule. You know, we want to change. We want to we want to be a better person. Of course we do, but it's going to happen. Things will change, but not when we want them to be really in the long run, this practice is about becoming more authentic, being who we are, not trying to be someone else, not trying to be I want to be like this. I want to be like that. No, the change occurs when, well, of course, through our day in and day out of zazen, day after day, month after month, year after year, but just accepting ourselves for who we are alright. So I have all these, these afflictions, say or we become, we notice them as we as we deepen our practice, but not to do anything about them that just return our attention to the practice, you know, and as that happens, things do change, not all the time. And that's also kind of like our biggest blind spot as human beings, or one of our biggest is, is we don't see the change. We don't see the change in ourselves, but if we just stick with the practice, just keep just just, I don't want to use a grind, grinding away. That's the wrong word, but to just keep applying ourselves, applying ourselves to the practice, and then in time, things do change, and they change for the better. Okay, I feel like saying, We'll stop now and recite the four vows. That was basically it. But I think we'll talk a little more about this. I think I feel sometimes, I think we underestimate the power of zazen, just the power, in general, of meditation, how radical it is as a practice, you know, and particularly in Zen practice. Why is that? It's because we're not looking outside ourselves. We're diving within. We're looking within. We're not trying to change or control things. We see that. We see that in ourselves. We're always trying to control situations people, but we got to get beyond that, you know, and through the daily practice that will happen incrementally, slowly. Some things drop quickly, and others they just they're just like a dog on a bone. They just persist and persist. But that's okay. That's okay. We just keep we just keep returning to practice over and over again. So yes, it's this, it's this. This is the rat of the thing about the practices, it's, it's, it's looking within and not relying on what's outside or what we perceive to be on the outside, and so part of this talk is going to be just kind of showing the limitations of say, you know self help books, or even religion. You know the limitations of of a religion, although, yes, of course, Zen is a religion, religion, you do need faith that this practice works. You know that's that's the religious part of it really, ultimately, is having faith in ourselves and then faith that this practice works, the limitations of. You know, motivational speakers, just as a superfluous example, or personality tests I'll be talking about that. I was really, I really didn't know what, how this talk was going to come out. I was just really taken by this article that this woman wrote. Her name is Olga Kazan, and this is the article she wrote. She's a staff writer for The Atlantic, and this is the title of the article. I gave myself three months to change more my personality. The results were mixed. So I'll be getting back to that. But first I want to cover a few few other things, yeah, maybe just the last point. I know I've said this already, but in the end, zazen tears us down and eventually makes us more authentic. But it takes time. It takes patience. All right? Alright, I'm going to cover just, I always like to cover some definitions. So let's just start off with no self. So this is kind of like one of the core tenants of what the Buddha spoke about, the core tenants of Buddhism. You know, we have this, these three characteristics of being a human being. One is suffering, okay, I think we can all get that one, impermanence, same here. And the third one is no self. So no self, that one's a kind of a little harder to grasp, really, to really fully understand it. And I'm not going to try and explain it. I mean, I'm just going to give you this definition. Yeah. So according to Buddhism, individuals consist of five aggregates. So five aggregates, they're also, sometimes I've read their terms of heaps, imagine them as heaps known as the Skandhas, which are essentially collections of parts devoid of essential core. So devoid of essential core, those parts are divided into these five categories or aggregates, form, feeling, perception, mental formations, consciousness or awareness. Sometimes it's defined this fifth one conscious, or where being conscious of the the other four aggregates. So it's really yet, like I said, it's really hard to fully understand these aggregates. But that doesn't matter the the point and point, important point here is that these five aggregates are all interrelated processes that are constantly changing to create the experience of being, quote you. It's kind of like a confluence of these five different elements, or aggregates, and from these five aggregates that are arising, that are constantly arising, or here we form this, we self identify ourselves as me, true and but none is a self. None of it at all. All of it is in person, impermanent. You know, Roshi is fond of always talking in the workshops about how there's just, there's no little person in here, there's no little man or little woman, like just controlling things. Everything's impermanent, and that that's huge. That is a huge thing, because out of that awareness, out of that realization, change is possible. We can change all right, here's another definition I really like. It's kind of old school. This definition of no self. It's described in terms of the four elements in analogy. So we have earth, water, fire and air. Okay, so just stick with me on this one I'm reading from Ajahn Chah. Everything arises, everything fail falls away, teachings on impermanence and the end of suffering. And this is what he says. What was the Buddha advice on how to practice meditation? He taught to practice like the earth to practice like water, to practice like fire, to practice like wind, practice like the old things, the thing we are already made of, the solid element of Earth, the liquid element of water, the warming Element of Fire, the Moving element of wind.