Highlights
I have a great appetite for life. I love hiking and skiing and cooking up a great meal and so this grief can co-inhabit me along with a lot of joy. And I think that maybe the joy becomes so great, there’s so much love that comes pouring through, that I think it’s because I’m not trying to protect myself from knowing things that are painful. I’m not putting any conditions on what I let into my heart. it all goes in. and so I have felt very alive and very alive now even at 92.
Are we going to be able to pull down the greenhouse gas emissions? But then maybe this really will be the last chapter, could that be so? Well maybe it is, but I’m here and how fortunate I am to be here. I have imagined that it’s so wonderful to be here that I could picture people in Buddha fields around the universe hearing about what’s happening on planet Earth and standing in line, applying for an incarnation on planet Earth now. Who wouldn’t want to be here now on this gorgeous planet that still could be saved? Wouldn’t you want to be here now?
The teachings of Thay are so relevant. Do not be afraid of your pain for the world, do not be afraid of the suffering, but take it in. That’s what the Bodhisattva learns to do and that makes your heart very big.
When we look at the teachings of the Buddha we can see that the First Noble Truth is to recognize suffering. We have to identify and we have to accept the suffering. I think a lot of the time as human beings, we are very selfish and we like to be in our own comfort and when there is suffering we may recognize it but we don’t see that as our suffering. Then we can push it away and we don’t care, like we have choices. We start to discriminate and this is one of the roots of our suffering. In Buddhist teaching, in the Zen teaching, it is to have time to recognize what is happening in the here and the now and if you truly are present and you recognize the suffering you can’t ignore it because the teaching of inter-being says that that suffering is also your suffering. Your well-being is also their well-being, is the planet’s well-being.
I want more time so that I can do what I’m made to do. Why else are we given these hearts with more neurons in them than our brains? Why else are we given eyes that can see the beauty of this world and ears that can hear such beautiful poetry and lungs that can breathe the air? We have to use it, it’s for tasting and loving our world. So if she’s ailing now I have to love it more.
One of Thay’s quotes that became such a statement of today is that you are the environment, the environment is not outside of you. It’s because of this dualistic thinking that we think we have to protect the environment. Or, we are just taking care of ourselves, we just want happiness for ourselves. That’s why there is this ongoing destruction that mankind is adding without awareness. But suddenly when you see that the environment is you that’s enlightenment of the present moment of what is happening in the here and the now. With that understanding you will have to change your way of living.
You can download the audio and transcript for this episode here.
