I have four pebbles today.
The first pebble represents a flower.
About 20 years ago,
we had a retreat organized for children
in the city of Santa Barbara.
Many children, many hundreds of children came for the retreat,
and their parents came to support them.
During that retreat, we had invented "Pebble Meditation."
In order to practice Pebble Meditation,
you need to have a little bag like this with four pebbles,
that you collect from nature.
The children can do Pebble Meditation among themselves:
Five, six of them can sit in a circle,
and one of them should be elected to be the leader of the meditation...
bell master.
When you come and sit, round like this, you hear the bell,
and you practice mindful breathing... three times.
And then you take the pebbles out, and put them on your left.
You begin by picking up the first one.
And you take a look.
And you identify it as... the first pebble representing a flower.
Flower.
And you put the flower on the palm of your left hand.
And you put your left hand on your right hand, and begin to practice like this:
"Breathing in, I see myself as a flower."
"I see," not "I imagine."
"I see myself as a flower."
"Breathing out, I feel fresh."
Flower...
Fresh.
Three times.
And then you take the pebble, and put it down on your right.
During the time you breathe in, you have to see yourself as a flower.
A real flower.
And a flower is always fresh.
We, human beings, are kind of a flower.
We are a variety of flowers in the garden of humanity.
Every one of us, whether we are a boy or a girl,
lady or gentleman, we are a flower.
We can be very beautiful, very fresh as a human being.
Every one of us has our "flower-ness" that makes us beautiful,
that makes us fresh, that makes us pleasant,
that makes us lovable.
And we have a lot to offer to other people.
If you have freshness, beauty,
you can offer your freshness and beauty to the world
like a flower.
When I look at a child, I always see him or her as a flower.
Look at her face.
It's a real flower.
Look at his eyes.
His eyes are flowers.
Look at her hand.
Her little hand is a real flower.
And look at his tiny feet.
A tiny foot... is a real flower.
And look at the child playing.
That's a real flower playing.
And that flower is beautiful when he's awake, and also beautiful when she's sleeping.
We can see that every child, whether they are a boy or a girl,
they are real flowers.
And we wish that they would stay a flower for all their lives.
There must be a way to preserve our freshness, our "flowerness."
And meditation can help.
Many of adults have lost their flowerness, their freshness.
They have cried too much.
They have suffered so much.
That is why
they should do something in order to restore their flowerness.
And one of the ways is to practice Pebble Meditation.
"Breathing in, I see myself as a flower."
I don't "imagine."
I was originally a flower.
And the seed of flowerness is still in me.
If I know how to touch the seed of freshness in me,
I will rediscover my original freshness...
flowerness.
"Breathing in, I see myself as a flower."
And during the time of your in-breath,
you restore your flowerness,
you restore your freshness
by the way of breathing,
by the way of smiling, by the way of releasing the tension.
So in the four or five seconds of your in-breath,
you can do a lot:
restore your freshness, restore your flowerness,
release the tension in your body, and you can smile.
Smiling is a very easy thing to do and does not take too much time.
It can release many hundreds of muscles on your face right away
in just one or two seconds.
And that is the first practice.
The practice of the first pebble.
"Breathing in, I see myself as a flower."
"Breathing out, I feel fresh."
Three times.
And you restore your freshness.
Then you take the first pebble, and put it down on your right.
Now, the second pebble.
This second pebble...
represents a mountain.
And you put the mountain on your left hand.
And you put your left hand on your right hand.
"Breathing in, I see myself as a mountain."
You sit in a very stable position.
You are quite stable, solid.
There are ways of sitting that makes you feel solid.
Even if someone comes and pushes you a little bit,
you stay solid.
Even if someone comes and provokes you,
you stay solid.
You are not carried away by your anger, your fear.
Solidity is very important.
Solidity makes it possible for us to be happy.
Someone who is unstable, someone who is not solid,
cannot be really a happy person.
That is why cultivating solidity is very important.
When you are solid, people can rely on you.
When your beloved one is solid, you can rely on her or him.
So solidity is something that we can offer
to the person we love, like freshness.
You can offer your freshness; you can offer your solidity.
When you love someone, you would like to offer him or her
your solidity.
But if you don't have enough solidity, how can you offer it?
Therefore we should cultivate more solidity in ourselves.
"Breathing in, I see myself as a mountain."
I can be solid.
There is a mountain in me.
I can stay myself even with provocations,
with threats.
And that is very crucial for my happiness.
And when I have solidity, I can offer that to you.
And you can rely on me.
You can count on me because I have solidity.
That is why the second pebble is important.
"Breathing in, I see myself as a mountain."
"Breathing out, I feel solid."
Three times.
And then you put it on your right.
You pick up the third one.
You look for one second, and identified it as still water.
Still water.
The water that is very still.
If we have seen the surface of a lake
that is very still.
That reflects mountains and clouds and trees...
And you can aim your camera at the lake
and take a picture of the sky and the mountains.
When you are calm, when you are still,
you see things as they are.
You don't distort things.
You can see things as they truly are.
You are not a victim of wrong perceptions.
Wrong perceptions bring about fear, anger, despair.
Wrong perception is there because you are not calm.
If you are calm, your perception would be correct.
Therefore I want to cultivate stillness, calm.
Because I know stillness and calm...
is the foundation of my true happiness too.
So each living being, human being should have enough calm, tranquility...
stillness in order to be truly happy.
Therefore I need the third pebble...
Still water.
"Breathing in, I see myself as still water."
"Breathing out, I reflect things as they are."
Be still, and know
and see things as they are.
And there is one more pebble to practice.
The last pebble represents space...
Freedom.
Without freedom happiness is not complete.
If you love someone, offer her some freedom...
offer him some freedom, inside and around him or her.
When you arrange flowers, the art of ikebana,
you know that each flower needs space around her to radiate her beauty.
A human being is like that, also.
She needs some space inside to be truly happy...
and some space around her.
And that is why if you love her,
you should know how to offer her enough space, inside and around.
And if you don't have enough space for yourself,
how can you offer space to the person you love?
Therefore it's very crucial that we know how to cultivate more space for us.
Because space is one of the basic conditions for happiness.
Therefore the fourth pebble is for space.
"Breathing in, I see myself as space."
"Breathing out, I feel free."
To have freedom and to offer freedom, you are a true lover.
You don't imprison yourself, you don't imprison the person you love
in your ideas, in your ways.
You allow freedom in your heart,
and you allow freedom in her heart, his heart.
So the Pebble Meditation is not only for children, but for all of us
in order for us to cultivate more flowerness, freshness,
more solidity, more stillness,
and more freedom.
Very important.
And after having finished four pebbles,
twelve in-breaths and out-breaths,
well, you've finished your Pebble Meditation.
And you bow with the sound of the bell.