[140] Meditation Session on Perception, Emptiness and Mindfulness – with Joe Parent

1:03AM Dec 12, 2023

Speakers:

Alyssa

Joe Parent

Audience Member

Karen Roper

laura

HAMISH

Birgit Matzerath

Adrien

Keywords:

thoughts

meditation

feel

called

body

mind

space

notice

talking

posture

good

adrian

sounds

relax

immense suffering

empty

awareness

arise

leaving

open

Nice to see familiar and new faces of the faces that I can see. Our usual incognito friend Tim doesn't seem to be here. Maybe he'll show up Tim. Tim doesn't have a it seems a camera or microphone. Listen, I were just talking about that. So he is. All we know about him is what he is the emojis the hand signals he puts up in what he writes in the chats. So we don't really know anything which is kind of interesting. That's what I wanted to to talk about a little bit tonight or this morning if you're in China, or Asia, or never knows. The I just got a request for a lesson from somebody who is in the Maldives. So they wanted they said how early Can you get up? I said, Well, why don't I start the night before? And then it'll be a reasonable time in the morning for you. So the lack of reference point is both unsettling and liberating. Which Which is interesting to think about that language. Right? Unsettling we usually think that's bad, because it's it's disturbing or upsetting, but unsettling settled. Means in one place. unsettled. Could also be liberated from fixation on one version of things or another. So we can look at it that way. The traditional the traditional teaching uses three sticks of incense. And they hold one up and they say is this longer short? And you say well, looks long to me. And then they hold another one up this longer. They say you see it turned out it was short, not long. And then then they said Oh but wait and then they put the real long one down and put a real short we're not going to say Oh, you're right. It was long, but only in relation to something else. So every certainty we have is only a relative certainty unless it is a certainty that that is what we would call absolute. And the only absolute certainties are not things. They're not concepts. So it leads us to something in the Buddhist tradition, called Shinya or it's translated as empty and shunyata is emptiness. It's it loses something in the translation. Well, I guess that's why it ends up empty, but it loses something. I was thinking about that because I used to have a lot more hair up in front here. I said, my foreheads looking empty. The but it's not a vacuum. It's not a they say a dead emptiness. What it's empty of is overlay. It's empty of anything extra. Anything more than it is what it is. And then an overlay that that we put on it is it's interesting, the way we do those concepts. I love tick, not Han he would hold up a piece of paper, a blank a blank piece of paper, like a blank, white piece of paper. And he would say can you see the clouds in this paper? Everybody's looking, you know is are they several drawings? What was he getting it? Can you see the closes? Can you see the sun in this paper? Can you see the rain? The trees, the lumberjack that cut down the trees. The farmer that grew the cotton that was used to make the shirt that the lumberjack wore that cut down the trees and on and on and on. Till the interdependence the interconnectedness of everything meant that everything is in that paper. Everything except for one thing the one thing is that this paper is empty of paper, the concept paper, the name paper, the label paper but everything else is in it so emptiness is empty of overlay but full of everything else. And then you can say well, but there is paper, you know it, it makes a book. Look and I said well, yeah and in the book there's, well there's ink, and there's paper. Cards kind of cardboard. colored ink is just one thing missing. Book. Book is the concept of the things that go in to make this up. So what the another analogy they use the hand and say well, is the hand your thumb? No. Is it one of your fingers? No is your palm is it the back of your hand? Is it the bones? Is it the flesh? Is it the blood? It's none of those. It's the conceptual composite that's labeled hand. And if we look at things, and and, and, and understand things that way. We see how much we lay on top of what's going on. And then and then take that to be real and so we're one step removed from what Israel

I listened I mentioned that I teach golf as well as other kinds of performance psychology. And one of the things I work with my golfers, they, I said you know, just let your body do what it knows how to do. And when you start thinking about how to do it and what's going to happen and what the implications of the action are and all these things, you just keep adding more on. And I said and that's called moron golf. So that's what we can we can say am I living my life? Keep, you know, adding more on to everything. I like to have a little humor because those are the things that we we can remember. It comes back to us I said oh I'm adding more on got it. And I think I know what happened on my hair because that I realized I have these realizations a lot and I go oh, anymore on and they're gone. So we don't we can have the whole point is the fact that at the same time if we do not have thoughts and concepts, we can't communicate with each other. They're useful, but they're useful within a context to know what it is that you're using them for.

It's like, you know, we're this is the nightclub group. And we we know if we don't realize we're dreaming, it can be very anxiety provoking. We wake up like, Oh, that was just a dream. Oh, and then we relax. Or maybe we realize we're dreaming while we're dreaming. And then we relax. Or whatever, whatever the case is. Taking things that we taking our overlay in our version of things to be real gets us in trouble. So the real what we're trying to do is realize that no, that is what we do not try to not stop and say I never want to have another thought. Just understand that. It's just a thought. It isn't necessarily real. Our perceptions and we're going to work with this a little bit in the meditation, our perceptions, we've we have ways of working with them that are very convenient but can be misleading. And that is you know, seeing is believing. Not such a great idea when it comes to optical illusions

you know when when they first made animation, they had actual drawings. You know if you ever see a flipbook, it goes better. And the drawings go up above about one after another. You see motion, there's no motion there. The character is not moving. You're seeing a sequence of pictures in your mind says that looks like what happens when somebody's running. So I'll call that I'm gonna put that in the generalized category running. But it turns out it's the generalized category animation. It's a movie it's not real. Because we don't know which reel of the movie. It is, but it's still not real. It's just about having a sense of humor. And if somebody says to you, you know, what is this shinier tar thing? It's saying having a sense of humor about what we think is so solid. And then you can relax. Least for a moment

the way we get in trouble is taking and is taking our thoughts and getting so caught up in them that we think that that's what's actually going on. And so as soon as we put some space around them, we can take some have some perspective. It's if you were looking at a painting and your nose was one centimeter away from the painting, you wouldn't see very much of it. You could say this is whatever it is. Then you take a step back and say, Oh, I thought it was just these blocks. But now I step back and I see oh, it's figures. You step back further and then it all computers as a whole. So I'm not taking things for granted. And one of the things that I think about in along those lines is a book when I was kind of, I guess, I think this was in the 60s it was written maybe in the 1960s maybe maybe early 70s called Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein. And one of the the occupations that people had was to be a witness. And a witness just said what they actually saw without the extra conceptual adding more on the example they gave is they said oh, early to mid 60s. Yeah, I think it was six might have been 62 Something like that, anyway. The example they gave to the character in the book he said, for example, this person is a witness. I'm going to ask them a question. Notice how the answer and they said what color is that house on the hill? And the witness answered the two sides I can see our White didn't assume that the other two sides were white. But what would we say? Oh, it looks like a white house on the hill. We don't know. I was I didn't have a chance I was going to I was gonna get something that I was going to cover the other side of and say you know if you're here like, like, like here's a cup What color is this cup and you would say oh it kind of brownish Green and I turn around and say this sides White and I think I think there's an old story that goes with this two tribes were in in South America were battling at war and they were calling on their their God and this God came down and half one half was white, and the other half was black. And they it rode his canoe down the river. And they said, Oh yeah, that's, that's our guy. That's our guy. That's our guy. But they both saw a different side.

hill Oh slipped.

So all I want. All I wanted to get across is when we're meditating, we're going to work with some perceptions. We're going to work with thoughts. And the idea is to not take them so solidly or seriously. And Trump Rinpoche said, as the recipe for working with thoughts, don't let your mind take the shape of the thoughts. Because then there's no room around them. Now, that's That's easy to say don't let your mind but what's really more workable is when you can remember know that your mind is bigger than the thoughts and as soon as your mind becomes bigger than the thoughts. It's like, your mind is the sky and a cloud might be coming across the sky. If you get caught up in the cloud, there's no sky. But as soon as you step back and see the sky Oh look behind me there we go. The sky. Then the thoughts are taking place within a bigger space, the bigger space of your mind. So let's get started on that. Thank you for your attention. It's good if you can. We're going to be doing part of our meditation with our eyes open. So be good if you're not looking directly at the screen of your device. And so you can either turn the device or turn your seat whichever works better. There we go

because the gong fades out your eyes gently close. Let's fully inhabit our body wiggle your toes feel your feet and legs where they move your hips a little connect your legs connect into your hip joints. Turn your torso a little side to side. Move your shoulders and arms. Your neck and your head just fully inhabit your body. Then find your posture in a centered way. Feel your sit bones pressing into the chair and not not too much weight on one side or the other. Feel your spine pointing straight up and extending all the way through the back of your neck and the back of your head. It's not actually straight up just there's curvature that feel like it's straight. And if you want to tilt a little side to side forward to back just to find that center. Since like emptiness, you can't say what the center is. You can just say it's not left not right, not forward, not back. It's empty. of partiality. one direction or another. Let you see sit bones sink into your seat. If you're in a chair, you can have your feet flat on the floor. But if your legs are long and your knees are higher than your hips, it puts pressure on your legs and lower back just gently cross your legs. Know your your ankles so that your knees are dropped down below your hips

you want your arms to be somewhat unnatural, which means that the upper arms are hanging straight down from your shoulders. And if you swivel your hands up palm down on each thigh leaving your upper arm straight down from your shoulders then you're not reaching and curling forward or artificially pulling back. And one thing I've found helpful is feel your breastbone because between the collarbone and that notch in your ribcage and chill your breastbone. Let it lift up and forward just a tiny bit a quarter of an inch and notice it opens your chest you can feel your breathing happening more fully. Your shoulders naturally pull back kind of a straight line with your ears. You might even feel your shoulder blades behind you pulling together without moving them. It's all you're doing is your sternum everything else shapes around it. Now know we have an open front, firm back. When you do that, don't let your chin tilt up keep your chin

level

and as your sternum goes up your chin will feel almost like a tux and a little bit. We want our jaw to be somewhat relaxed but not hanging open so relax your jaw but to the extent that your lips remain either very lightly touching or only slightly parted.

Let's do a little body scan. Beware of any extra tension any residual tension that we're holding. We want we want the tension that's holding our posture upright but not extra. So our scalp and our face that jaw that some residual tension your ears. Just let the jaw soften without your lips partying. Too much neck and shoulders. Shoulders, their back from your breastbone being lifted up. But let them just hang down a canvas just hanging from a tent pole before you pull it out into a tent.

Chair chest and upper back upper arms.

ribcage,

lower back just enough tension to hold your posture. Let everything else relax around it and your deep belly and pelvic region. Sometimes we clench those almost self protective but you don't need them clenched to hold your posture let them soften.

Let go of the tension there. hips thighs forearms and hands. Knees calves ankles and feet

bring your awareness back to deep core

few inches below the navel just in front of your spine

just let your awareness rest down there is a little gentle movement as the breath goes in and out

we're gonna restaurant mine there. Aware of that subtle movement aware of the internal sensation

it feels like

expanding or filling. Can contracting or empty

when our breath is quiet, it's a very subtle movement that's where we're going to restaurant mind and that movement

as the gun sounds let your eyes just gently open about halfway

so you're aware of that feeling in your inner core. But it's happening within the space that your body is sitting. You're looking down just a couple of feet in front of you. Eyes just half open so that there's some awareness of your posture. The posture of your body sitting in that space and the body can breathe itself just fine without you adding any more on just let your body breathe deeper or shallower, longer, shorter doesn't matter. You're an observer rather than a director.

When your mind is quiet, your breathing is also quiet. So it may be a very subtle feeling. Just keep noticing that

and if a thought takes hold of your mind and takes it off into a daydream to your mind and your thoughts become one at a certain point, there'll be a gap. It'll stop at that moment again a sense of humor. Go ah I was someplace else. Back to the body and breathing and the space I'm sitting in

posture

the sensation in your deep core the space that you're sitting in. Although your eyes are open, you're not really looking at anything. So soften your gaze. Just it says if you're looking at the space that your body sitting in and we'll do that for a couple of minutes.

little bit you need to refresh your posture let your eyes open naturally

notice that they rest in particular direction naturally. Not straight ahead. Maybe a little below that. Not looking very far down.

Let your gaze soften. Open up to your peripheral vision. You may even want to especially notice that your eye the muscles in your face around your eyes. Relax just let them open

so decide up and down

wherever you guys are resting, leave them in that direction. At lunch, let your awareness move around your field division and just notice colors shapes and shades of light and dark.

colors, shapes,

shades of light and dark and as you do notice if labels come to your mind oh that's a such and such and that's that that's that just let them come and go if they do don't try to keep them from arising. Don't invite them.

Just notice

in your field division or something's nearer and others farther

that's your mind telling you there because all you can see are colors shapes and shades of light and dark.

Where are you seeing those colors shapes and shades of light and dark? Do your eyes go out to them? Where is light coming into your eyes?

Leaving your eyes open. Shift your awareness to sound listen for sounds near and far seemingly near and far. Higher and low pitched loud and soft

sound of my voice coming through your device sounds in your room sounds outside

again, notice if labels come to mind. Don't invite them don't push them away. Just notice they're arising

Where are you hearing the sounds? Are your ears going out to where the sounds originate?

Are you hearing them in your mind?

Notice if thoughts of pleasant or unpleasant arise in relation to particular sounds

again leaving your eyes open move to bodily sensations

feel the air coming in and out of your nostrils cool and dry coming in warm and moist going out the cloth or skin under your hands

or your feet or on the floor

your body moves with your breathing

you might even feel your heart beating

sometimes in different places in your body. Fingertips wrists and neck

where are you experiencing these feelings

in your feet and your fingers

in your nostrils

to your fingers experience things to your feet experience things

are they appearances in your mind?

Script smell and taste for now. But now, again with your eyes open watch for thoughts that appear in your mind. Notice how they arise or how they come into existence in your mind. How they appear

How long did they stay the same? Do they change? Or did they disappear and are replaced by another similar thought? Like the frames of a movie

just have a look?

Thoughts about your thoughts arise

like labels

or your perceptions

pleasing, pleasing or not pleasing

what is experiencing those thoughts?

What is the space within those thoughts within which those thoughts arise and dissolve?

Just relax in that space within which the thoughts appear and disappear?

Thought I'd leave a little time for discussion. But I do want to not forget the immense suffering going on in the world

they're still

true tremendous suffering and and destruction going on from the invasion of Ukraine. And needless to say, what's in the mostly in the news is the Israel and Gaza so let's just take a moment and just have the wish that all that suffering

can be relieved.

wish that all that suffering the tremendous pain by so many people and animals, adults and especially children. Send them some kind of peace and relief

take away from them. See immense suffering and pain. fear and insecurity.

What we often do after practicing is called dedicating the mirror in which we actually say May the benefit of our practice. Do more for others than for ourselves. But I think we're gonna wait and do that at the top of the hour after we have some discussion. So wanted to get some feedback. What did you think of the contemplative meditations that we did? And if you have any questions about the basic meditation practice, it's open always welcome to.

You can either raise your hand or just unmute yourself and jump in

Laura Yeah, I just wanted to say that I always enjoy your meditations. This particular one with a new elements, which for me anyway. Particularly just wonderful. I really like Thank you.

Thank you for I see Laura sometimes also on our compassion for Ukraine. And Rhys to I see Reese here

every morning, yesterday. Would you say I missed it. I missed it the last day because we had power out. Yes. Wonderful.

Yeah, that's part of impermanence. I'll put a link to the page if people are interested and we do some meditation practice and particularly the exchanging taking away suffering and sending peace and happiness. So I'll put that link in the chat. So thank you.

Anyone else? bigot

Yeah, thank you very much. I started it was very, very peaceful. I had the feeling I didn't have a lot of thoughts, actually. And I have a question when you were talking at the beginning about basically emptiness. Is there a connection between saying nothing exists in and of itself and saying everything as we perceive it as defined by a context?

You Yeah, I think adding a couple of little spaces in that are is helpful. Adding a little space after the N O of nothing. And after the every of everything. So if we say it again, we can say no thing as opposed to nothing. Every thing exists only in the concept. The thing this is what we're talking about

Yeah, thank you. That makes so much sense.

It's the little space makes a big difference.

Jerry

or Adrian, who I couldn't tell who had their hand up first. Whoever wants to go Go ahead.

For a meditation session, it's a good idea to set a time limit or is it a better idea to you know, just go with the flow and when you feel like you can go long or you go longer or you feel it, you know, like the intrusive thoughts are so numerous that it's it's hard to meditate. I'm sure it's different for everybody. But what what's your feeling on that?

The intrusive thoughts when the intrusive thoughts make it difficult, you see, that doesn't make it difficult to meditate, that's your meditation. And so it makes it difficult to be at peace. But that's a preference to say, Oh, that's good meditation, and all these thoughts is bad meditation, and that gets you a little trouble. So instead, say Oh, lots of thoughts. This is a great opportunity to look right at them. And look at the nature of these thoughts. What are they really? And are they occupying my whole mind or can I have some space around them? So that's the practice to do when you have all these seemingly, what are they intruding on? They're intruding on your preference? Oh, excuse me. Who said you have you you're supposed to be peaceful and wonderful every time no that's not how life is going to be either. So this is a great opportunity to say, Oh, here's an opportunity to practice dealing with these thoughts because they're coming they're gonna be situations where I'm overwhelmed with the thoughts and I don't want them to have me making bad decisions. So this is great opportunity. The more thoughts the better for my meditation that way, and there are teachers who have said that, so use that as a turn your attention, say, I'm going to I'm going to use the thoughts they're going to be here. I'm going to use them as the object to monetization. How are they rising? How are they leaving? What's their texture what's, what's their nature and find the space around them and then you can go back to the breathing somewhat. Now as for the time goes, absolutely set a time. Otherwise, you'll go and you know, I've been doing it for a few minutes. This doesn't feel like it's gonna go so well today. And you get I'll do I'll do longer tomorrow. Nana it's too tricky. No, set a minimum time. Now if you feel like going an extra 10 minutes, no problem, but definitely set a minimum. So you can't trick yourself into thinking I'll have a better time tomorrow. Because that's not what it's for. Okay, thank you. You're welcome. Adrian, did you want to say something?

Yeah. Hi. Nice to meet you. I got a couple of basic questions. Maybe the first one is just about swallowing. Like it seems like a new question but sometimes they say keep your tongue behind your front teeth. And

yes, you're right. I forgot that one.

And I do that but like sooner or later I need to swallow. Right I need it's part of like, there's no way that I can stop that. So is there a natural rhythm that you want to do that or just swallow when you have to swallow? Sounds like a dumb question.

No, no, I think you just it's not a dumb question because it arises in the mind. You know, why don't we not make too big a deal of it. And just notice that that's part of your body. Don't think viewed? See, if you don't think that you're doing it or choosing to do it or not do it? You can relax. And then if your body says swallow you swallow.

Sounds like a thought that advisors.

I was actually wondering. I was I did and I was wondering, I wonder if they can hear that through the zoom. Right? Yeah, but but no, it happens sometimes. It's a bodily function. You don't find it and you notice it. And just, in fact, you can be an interested observer and say, I wonder when my body will be actual is actually going to swallow? Because as soon as you start thinking about whether you should or not, you're adding more on and you're starting to then your body's saying, oh, yeah, then everything stops. And you're trying to decide should I swallow or should I not, you know, just let it happen. And I forgot to mention you can when forgot the tongue when I was giving the instruction for posture, they say there's two things either. If it's more comfortable, that your tongue rests gently on the upper the tip of your tongue on the upper palate just behind your front teeth. And supposedly that cuts the flow of saliva a little bit. And the other is just to let your tongue rest naturally. However, it does, and for some people, it rubs naturally. Right there. Touching the upper palate, the idea is not to make too big a deal out of it. So that's it's actually a good question. I'm sure it would benefit others, Adrian, so thank you for asking. Because there's half a dozen people that are wondering about their swallowing for sure.

Yeah, I tried to observe it. Like just kind of have awareness. Like you're saying, right, that's that's generally what I've tried to do. Sometimes I find myself I find myself in a space where there's been no thought for a while and I kind of catch myself and I'm wondering like his I tend to just tell myself just be aware, right? And then I get to a point sometimes where I do have these faces, and then all sudden I catch myself like holy, did you just drift off? Are you zoned out? And I'm not exactly sure whether or not sometimes it's a good feeling like I have like a you know, like a spatial feeling. But sometimes I find like, I catch myself, and I'm like, okay, maybe you're zoned out. As opposed to maybe you're just kind of in a little state of awareness. And I'm not sure how to recognize the difference quite yet. I was kind of a dopey kid. So I'm really used to being kind of in kind of a zoned out space.

Well, first of all, that happened to the Buddha, you know, and now we're at the top of the hour, please, if you have to go thank you so much. Just make a little dedication, gesture yourself. Just say to yourself something like made the practice I've just done the benefit others even more than myself, something like that, which is what we're going to do when we when we close. But yeah, the Buddha is a story of under the rose apple tree. It was out like picnic kind of time or something. And he was sitting under a rose apple training just kind of got real spaced out and said, Oh, how interesting. So you you're in good company, also might teach you the Voyager region that happened to him in a park one time, so you're in good company. Here's the thing. I have something simple for you. Whenever these things arise, I want you to just ask a question and you can put it in the proper grammar I never know quite I think it's I think it's this who's talking to whom

does you have an account? It seems like an interesting conversation at least you have. At least you have somebody intelligent to talk to. But it's yourself. So so. So the sense of humor and say, I'm talking to myself trying to figure out should I breathe in, breathe? And you're and just have a sense of humor about that and just go hmm, and if you're not sure what it is, stay in that state of not knowing. That's great. Don't nail it down. If you nail it down

you limit it.

Okay, thank you. So, not knowing Oh, I wonder what that was spaced out or not? I don't know. Who's asking? Who's asking? Who said that? Was there was an old show something like there was ghosts or something? And when said Who's that? Who that said Who that who said Who that who said Who that? I hate. We'll do one more with Hamish and then we'll we'll dedicate the merit and then if people want to stay I'll hang out for a little bit longer.

Hamish Yes, thank you, sir. I'm wondering how you feel about the importance of doing a review of your meditation. Perhaps after during sharing the merit. One of my road teachers said this is key. After you finished and you you you do take maybe two three minutes to work backwards in your meditation to when you first took refuge and started your meditation. How important do you feel that is?

You mean in your life when you started when you went back and took refuge in your life? You go all the way back. Or do you or do you mean the start of that session?

I well actually boats are are intriguing but the start of the session?

Well, the it's I think that that's fine. A big I would just caution about evaluating like I was talking with Jerry about evaluating good session, bad session. And oh, what a good boy I am that I caught my thoughts so early and I only I only had three or four before I realized it and got to my breath or whatever. I'm so bad. I sat down I took three breaths and I was gone. Until the guy until the timer went off. Be careful on the evaluation. So if you're just observing and saying how interesting, the mind is, no problem. If you're saying good or bad or boy I am that's not so good.

Much like when I write down my as much like when I write down my dreams after waking up. I don't make a judgment about them. I just said oh, this happened in this.

Yeah, that's fine. And you know, we talked about also mindfulness through the day that we set our intention at the beginning of the day, to be as mindful unkind as we can. And then we do that or the best we can during the day and afterwards, you can reflect back and say, Okay, that was good yet and here's where you say, Yes, I was mindful. That's what my I'm I fulfilled my intention there. And, and look at the situations when I wasn't Hmm, this is what I should be a little more attentive to or aware of, and, and I'm going to do that tomorrow. And that's always a good thing to do as far as you know, because they they do talk about evaluation. And say, How well did I fulfill my intention? And that's all but non judgmentally. How well does my intent fulfill my intention? And that's what my and I my aspiration is to do more of fulfilling my intention tomorrow. Where were my next session? Okay, so let's in your own words, or for repeat after me. May the practice we have just done we have even more benefit to others than to ourselves. Good. And now if we want to continue, you're out. Stay around for another few minutes. If not thank you so much. I hope you can come Thursday morning, if you can. And if not, I'll see you I don't know when my next time on here is I think it's actually next Monday. So I'll see you in a week. recording stopped anybody else have something they want to share? Chat about.

And Adrian, I just wanted to say I didn't want to minimize the things that you're looking at and talking about. I just give you some space around them.

Oh, it's wonderful. In fact, it kind of confirms what I have been doing. I mean, my practice has been very positive, I guess is the best place say way to say it. I was gonna mention that. Andrew and yourself I believe I've heard say this is my first live session, but I've watched some recordings just to catch up to speed here and one of the things is to put things in your own terms and I've been doing that I've been instead of like when my thoughts come up, I don't I don't necessarily say thoughts or label them. What I generally say is what I generally say to myself is just don't let it land. I really like that. And I do that with life. I do that during the day. I'm just saying like don't let it land. You know, whatever it is that comes up that is just coming up from the bottom of things. If it's something that you realize isn't really something that matters, like fonts or small random uses something you tend to, you tend to learn when you start meditating and be like this is just so random. So you're like don't let it and then when I'm in a good place and I feel like anything wavers I just or especially when I'm falling asleep when we talk about the acidity and stuff. I'm just telling myself be aware and I feel like there's this underlying awareness that is there. That when you when everything else is kind of quiet it really kind of comes through. And so I basically one of the things I've been doing is like, let it land and just be aware and it's just these little cues that I've been using and I find I'm pretty successful with it. Good. And it's just putting things into my own terms.

Yes, and as long as you understand that it's code. It's code for the eye. I was caught by thoughts and now I'm back already. We're already back. You don't have to come back to the present. As soon as you go oh I was that was in whatever you say that was thinking or whatever your your code words are. It's simply a punctuation to say oh, let's is the difference between being caught up in thoughts in other words, the your mind takes the shape of the thoughts or simply present in the space in which the thoughts arise.

It's a bit of an acknowledgment of

it's just Yes, it's just it's just an acknowledgement and recognition. It's recognition, recognition. And one of one of the ones that I've had people use is someplace else. I highly recommend that you. You watch a YouTube video it's called avid and Costello you're not here

and we can't do the zoom thing because you have to be in the same room with somebody but I've done this you know, and basically they they say to the I don't want to spoil it, you'll see and so so they is that it basically says I can bet you 10 bucks that I can prove that you're not here to the person standing right in front of them and he does successfully so enjoy the enjoy the video and then you know, and then you can you may decide you. You want to say someplace that was someplace else. I was not here. But that means you're as soon as you realize that you're already back. It it's one of my pet things when people say come back to the present. No, you don't come back to the present. You're already the present is your default mode. You're already you're always present or are you in the overlay that's in the overlay and as soon as the overlay as soon as the clouds part Oh, sky again, I'm present. At that moment, what you come back to is what your intention was of posture, breathing awareness. That's what you come back to that the technique that you were doing. You're already back in the present you don't bring yourself back to the present. Thank you. Thank you, everybody. I hope we'll see you again. Hi, Karen. See you next week or Thursday morning hopefully. Okay. Karen, did you have something you wanted to say? I know just just nice to see you.

I had a couple of times. I have an overlap on Monday and I was late so I'm gonna go listen to the recording and hear the beginning.

Yeah, I had I chatted for a little while so really good. Okay, sounds good. Bye. Thank you, Alyssa. Bye, guys. Hey,