namaste and welcome like to start at this first class of the new year with
the story that I've always loved and it's about a a diamond thief to who was
in absolute fabulous pickpocket and what he'd do is he'd hang around the diamond
district and when somebody with time and buy a dime and heat just follow them and
always manage to get it from them so a very wealthy well-known diamond merchant
came to town and this guy said I use my target and he bought the most beautiful
diamond imaginable and so the thief followed him and he boarded a train and
I took a three-day journey and he kept trying to pick the merchants pocket and
obtain the diamond but by the end of the journey he hadn't found the gym so he
was really frustrated because he was an accomplished had some pride in himself
so so he actually confronted the guy and fast you said look I've used every skill
of my art how did you hide it from me
where did you put it and so the emergency well I saw you and I suspected
of what was happening so I hid the diamond and the place you'd most likely
look to find it
I hid in your own pocket No
so the teaching is an obvious one which is that the treasure we seek is closer
than we can imagine the treasure we seek what we're all longing for is not in the
future it's not down the road it's not outside of us that's in the awareness
and heart that's right here and the perhaps one of the best understandings
of the spiritual path is that it's forgetting and remembering that everyone
of it doesn't matter how long we've practiced and
been on the path we all kind of go into trance we forget that's true we get into
kind of our habitual activities and then there's a remember that all pause it's
here so one of the ways of thinking about is that were out trying to chase
after the diamond have to keep remembering it's inside and the rose put
it this way he said you spend your life fishing only to realize it's not fish
that you're after you know so how do we do it we look at anything we can see how
much time were planning things and worrying about things and trying to
check things off the list and it's so easy and our preoccupation to go through
really long slots of time and forget that what matters to us is feeling
connected feeling at home feeling a sense of gratitude being alive there's a
cartoon i like-a the graveyard and there's the thought bubble that's coming
out of the grave and the thought bubble is saying i think i know what i want to
do with my life and the caption underneath his bed pushes the late
bloomer envelope too surprising new limits so remembering what matters and I
think of it like all of the practices we do whatever path were on all the rituals
and ceremonies are always about remembering their always about really
waking us up out of trance so we remember what we cherish so we get more
aligned with our hearts so tonight we're going to be exploring what are called
the three refuges it's also known as the triple gem which are in the Buddhist
tradition of the three pathways of remembering that are really kind of at
the heart of the path and interestingly you'll find these same three pathways in
many religions in many spiritual pass and that's because they're archetypal
and you'll you'll see what i mean by that in a bit but each each of these
refuges are
pathways has the power to weight this up from our our narrative our story about
who we are
it has that kind of limited sense of a self who separate and usually deficient
and wake us up into a much more vast sense of the awareness and love that's
here each one of them so the three gateways the first one is called refuge
in the Buddha in in Buddhism and what it means is refuge in pure formless
timeless awareness the second refuges refuge in the Dharma and that means
refuge and truth and what's actually happening this reality of
moment-to-moment experience the third refugees refuge in the Sangha and that
needs refuge and loving relationship refuge in our spirit experience of
connectedness when i wrote true refuge the book I organized it the architecture
of the book is around these three pathways because they in the last decade
or so become so meaningful in my own path that when i started writing to
refuge i was in a period of real sickness and you know in a way that I
had no certainty yes to being able to recover so is living in a really
frightening place a place filled with grieving and the question that was so
compelling to me was how will we face the inevitable challenges and losses
how do we find a refuge within our own being of love of awareness that really
allows us to find some peace and happiness
how in the face of living and dying do we find peace with ourselves so I this
talk is really going to explore each of the refuge's with that context because
you know if you ask yourself the question this is something i asked
myself a lot
you know if i was at the end of my life you know in those moments right at the
end of my life what would most matter and what comes to me as well would
matter to really sense that timeless awareness that's beyond this this body
that's changing and going just sensing something that's true that I belong to
that's that's timeless that awareness and it would matter that I was entranced
that I was really awake to this precious changing moment that's the second refuge
and it would matter to feel love to feel the that sacredness of connection with
other beings
that's the refuge Tsonga and what I've should become so clear to so many of us
that are on this path and this practice is that what matters to us in the
moments of right before we die is exactly what matters to us through our
whole life
we don't have to wait in fact if we wait we miss out
so that's kind of one of the invitations of our reflection tonight's don't wait
take refuge and when we say take refuge we've been taking refuge and what's
really true and here so as most of you know when we're stressed we are totally
condition to take refuge in in experiences that give us temporarily for
temporary gratification and it's natural and it's i call it false refuge but it's
not in a derogatory way it's in a way just to get that it helps just for a
little while
it doesn't really bring the happiness or peace that were seeking but i'll speak
to it a little bit just to sense you know so you can just reflect and sense
what are the false refuges that you get caught in because as long as were
habituated in these ways we can't turn towards the light towards the diamond
that's inside us we tend to go through the day I as i mentioned kind of busy on
our way
somewhere Lily Tomlin says for fast-acting a real relief try slowing
down so instead of this false refuge of speeding slow down so common ones
ok one false refuges that we try to control others to get what we want and
we try to control them by judging or by demanding are expecting by withholding
our warmth or appreciation so there's different ways that that what we're
doing in some ways and manipulation to get others to cooperate and share with
you my favorite illustration some of you will remember the mom that's preparing
pancakes for her two sons Kevin h5 Ryan h3 and the boys were arguing so she says
she's an opportunity for teaching and she said if Jesus were sitting here he'd
say that my brother have the first pancake and so Kevin turns to his
younger brothers as Ryan you can have the first chance of being Jesus ok so we
manipulate what other false refuges well some of them are that we can try to
control ourselves or deprive ourselves i just got an email from one woman's
talking about anorexia and the ways that were played on ourselves and judging
ourselves and trying to do more and be more another false refuges the way that
we chase after sensory pleasures just wanting more of whether its food or
whether its possessions or whatever it is a big false refuge is we take refuge
in our mental control tower in are fantasizing and planning and worrying
and leave our bodies behind and we do that even in spiritual practice we do a
lot of thinking about the path rather than just be here so one example is of a
a monk and yet one of the novices came up to him at to the senior monk and said
what happens after we die and the monks it
I don't know and this really upset the novice and he said but wait a minute
you're supposed to be a Zen monk and the response was I am as and monk but not a
dead one
so we try to think your way into freedom that a really big one for many of us
that I'll just not over the last one I'm going to name right now is this false
refuge of always trying to do more to prove ourselves there's a sense of
deficiency that I'm I'm not enough and this ongoing kind of pressure to be
better and towards the end of a recent retreat i taught the woman who was in
her seventies said that she'd spend her life striving with the sense of never
enough always falling short during the retreat
she touched some moments where her mind got really quiet and then there was this
sense
wordless sense of enough just right now it's enough everything's enough there's
nothing missing and you had tears in her eyes when she shared with me this she
says really sadly why did I have to wait so long to realize that didn't need to
keep proving myself and I think you understand how many moments of life we
sacrifice in some way in that false refuge of trying to get approval or
proving rather than living our moments so in the moments that were chasing
after approval or whatever the false refuge is our moments were leaving home
and moments that we can't discover that diamond that that like that warmed to
that treasure inside ass
zen master real con said if you want to find the meaning stop chasing after so
many things now the third refuge refuge and Sangha is refuge in loving
relationship and through the outer ways of taking refuge are engaging in
conscious relationship whether it's with our friends with our family with our
partners and also informal places like we could be with 12-step groups our
refuge and tsonga could be in the Buddhist communities we have spiritual
friends group circle kalyana mitta groups we have in Washington about 30
some of these groups where people meet once every other week and i'll do a
meditation and then really explore what's happening in our lives and it's
in that field of relationship that the magic happens because the gift of refuge
in Tsonga in relationship is we wake up out of that sense of a isolated separate
self and realize this field of presence that we belong to
so one of the big misunderstandings on the path is kind of that were a self
waking out that we're doing in our own little cave and again at this retreat
that we just came from i could see how we all arrived and we come from a little
bit of a busy frenzied world where a little bit more in that transfer the
separate self trying to get somewhere and so the when we were sitting in the
Hall initially there was more of that sense of pinus there was more of that
sense of just separation and then by the end of their trade after number of days
of coming back home into the senses and being in you know some small groups
where we have very conscious kind of connecting and sharing of what's going
on the heart space the feeling of the field was palpable refuge and loving
relatedness means very consciously engaging with each other you know our
brains evolved in our relationship with caregivers we cannot we cannot become a
mature person if there's not some field of relationship that's going on were
influencing each other all the time so to realize the truth of who we are means
really to be engaged with each other and the challenges are so conditioned to
feel separate and when we feel separate we think something's wrong with us and
they go together so one story to share with you and this is a that I think
three years ago at a retreat one friend from our community that are extended
community
he's practicing he sexually serving up at the insight meditation society right
now we we did a we had a meeting and he was very sunken self-doubt and feeling
very flawed and feeling very very isolated so I asked him is there
anything you like about yourself you know it's going to the meta approach
loving-kindness approach we can you appreciate about your goodness they said
well at times I can be kind and so I wanted to get more in touch with I said
okay an example where you kind recently he said well actually yesterday you know
across the hall I saw this old woman sitting there on a chair and her legs
are dangling because she was too short to reach the ground so I walked across
the hall with my question I put my cushion under her feet and it felt
awkward people watching me but I felt good about that
so I had him do it often have people do is get in touch with that good feeling
and feel it and let it you know and then get in touch with that sense of
connection with this woman that you helped out and really open to that and
action and he could any could do that he could feel those moments he wasn't that
small deficient selfie filled the truth of being in a fuel being in that that
kind of sense of connectedness and when he was in that I ask the question who
are you
you know when you're in that field and he could feel the freedom of that that's
the freedom of taking refuge in Tsonga so before we ended before I say goodbye
I thanked him for his kindness to that old woman across the room and I let him
know that it was my mother because it was and of course we both started crying
because it was very touching moment but the connections are real I mean he will
the connection by reaching out and we we leave those connections taking refuge in
loving relatedness whether we're reaching out and giving our weather
receiving whether were appreciating each other or receive an appreciation there
are so many ways that it happens that's the outer taking of refuge in the inner
is justice this man did when i said to him okay not just feel that you know you
offered the kindness and just feel that sense of you know that love that's
presence is here the inner refuge is just opening to loving presence just
feeling it will close with a very with one of my favorite prayers this is
written by diane akron in the name of daybreak and the islands of morning and
the way pheromone and the night when it departs i swear i will not dishonor my
soul with hatred but offer myself humbly as Authority and of nature as a healer
of misery as a messenger of wonder as an architect of peace in the name of the
Sun and it's mirrors and the uttermost night
and the crowning seasons at the Firefly and the Apple I will honor all life
wherever and in whatever form it may dwell on earth my home and in the
mansions of the stars
namaste and blessings thank you