The Infinite Here

Hello, everyone. Good to see everyone today. I'm going to try today something different. Try an experiment. I was going to wait until later, but I'm going to give it a try. And it may or may not work for everyone here. Maybe one or two. Let's go back to our meditation position. With your back straight. At this time, close your eyes. And just follow my guide. As you first pay attention to your breath, in and out. And notice your attention on the breath. Okay? And recognize the presence that's right here, watching this body. It feels like you're within this body right now. So, at this time, visualize yourself, this awareness, being pulled up above your body. Visualize as if you were looking down at your body.

As you continue to move upward with your awareness, visualize moving further and further

away from the body, seeing the Zen center, seeing this whole area, pulling yourself up very fast, where you see the earth, visualizing the earth as you're watching it downward at it. continue to pull yourself up, see the solar system, entire solar system, and rapidly pulling yourself up, continuously, and visualize the galaxy. Continue to go upward, you see thousands of galaxies, millions of galaxies, until they become speck of dust. dust. And you see the entire universe, all around you. There's no up or down, sideways, or front or back. There's just awareness. And this universe itself is becoming a speck of dust. All that's left is just dots. dots everywhere. Of the universes. And you are aware. In all directions. Nothing left but the awareness. In all directions, there's silence. Stillness. Only thing left is the

awareness of it. Knowing. Knowing. Knowingness of this silent stillness. And knowingness of this knowingness. Only the pure awareness that sees this silent stillness. This endless, infinite boundlessness is only aware. As you look around, all direction is infinite. Emptiness. But this emptiness is filled with infinite potentiality. That's all that remains. And there's awareness of it. And that's it. As you're aware of

of this infinite potentiality, you're aware that this is the source of all manifestation. All that ever has been, that is, that will ever be, has been produced, produced by the source, that is infinitely, empty, of anything, other than, this awareness itself. To recognize this awareness, that sees us, it's all there is. Always there. All that exists, all the universes that are out there, countless, is within this source, the essence.

Now that we have recognized what this is, we're going to come back, seeing the millions

of galaxies again, seeing our galaxy, our solar system, our Earth, the Zen Center, our body. Feel the sensations of the body sitting right here. Recognize the presence that is here in the now. The presence that is here and now. That is silent. The silent stillness that is ever-present, was never born, therefore never dies. Always here, in the infinite here, in eternal now, right here, in the now.

You can open your eyes. You can open your eyes.

How was that journey? How was the journey? Anybody have a comment? That's great. Hmm? That's great. Great? Yeah. Like, peace. It's going home. So, if you usually, if you used your visualization, was able to take yourself out there, you should have at least felt something.

Anybody felt anything? Nothing? Nothing. Did you feel? Where did you feel? Can you express it? No. Try to express it? No. No. Damn. Deeply profound peace. Yeah. Weightlessness. Weightlessness. Yeah. Physical detachment. Okay. So, this is a pointer. Okay. Even if you understood it conceptually.

It's a pointer. To your essence. Who you truly are. And we limit ourselves to this body and the mind. When we're all that is. We're all that is. That ever was. That ever will be. It's all contained. In the context. Of here. And now.

That's all it is. And everything else. Just comes and goes. Within that context. So there's no identity. To be claimed. When you're all that. It's when we misperceive. And hold on to this identity. We get locked in. We prison ourselves. To this little me.

This I. Which when asked, can't even answer. Because you're not this body. Not the mind. There. Everybody's awake. Everybody's awake. We're done now. But notice that. Notice the difference. When you're. Everything. And all. Remember. Everything and all that. Those are just words. To keep you pointed towards that.

That you cannot claim anything as me. As an identity. It's the true self. And use that word self. Don't be deceived by that. It just is. The essence. But we continue to claim ourself. To this body as me. The mind as me. But when we are beyond that.

We are before the thoughts arise. Before the consciousness. Consciousness is a function. A lot of people think it's an entity. Just like awareness. Awareness is there when you're aware. Or paying attention. But that background of awareness, that knowingness,

is really, truly the only function that is the reality. Everything else is projection that we create within our mind. So because we're holding on to those dream-like states, we suffer. We suffer. Because we are trapped in this illusion of me, myself, and I.

Therefore, this is mine. That's mine. I must have this. I can't have this. That's so precious. That's disgusting. All of those are my own projections. My own creation. And we suffer because of our own creation. The novelty we put on things. This tastefulness we judge with.

All of those are mental creation. Our mental perception. So everything is the mind. Because everything is the creation of the mind. Does that make sense to anybody here? Yes. Did anybody feel a little resistance?

It's okay if you do. Because, yeah. So, I've had that experience before in an invitation at home, but this time, I was fine until we got, like, past looking at the galaxies, like I couldn't go further. Yeah. Because there's still a little bit of holding on.

A little bit of resistance. That's what you need to catch. This is why we pay attention. Pay attention. That's what really mindfulness is about. It's paying attention to the so-called me. Speech, actions, and thoughts. So that I can be aware of all these little tendencies.

All this little resistance. All the practice that we do. It's really to gain that flexible, watching mind. To allow everything to be. To simply becoming the witness. That's when you become closer to your true essence. The reason mindfulness is helping to even develop prefrontal cortex.

Those are the physical consequences of it. The reason that when we want to let go our negative emotion, when you just pay attention to it, that it dissolves. Okay? I don't know if anybody had that experience. That's all you really need.

Anything that you want to let go, all you have to do is look at it. Why? Because when you're simply looking at it, then you return to the essence. You're no longer it. You're no longer the anger. You're no longer the frustration. You're no longer in the judgmental state that perturbs the mind, the emotions.

You are simply that. Just luminous. Awareness. Yeah. So you're tapping into that. But if you can't do that, if you can't just be that, because we're so, so used to clinging on to this identity, then we need to recognize that. We need to recognize our clinging, our attachment to what?

To our ideal of a self. This me. This personality. This body. We've been doing that for so long that even if you understand this and you recognize this as a truth, there's a resistance. That's the ego. That's the belief and attachment to this so-called myself, I, I-ness.

That's it. What else can I say about it? Yeah. So it's a choice. It comes down to choice because the mind, the consciousness that's created by that misperception. So if you understand the dependent manifestation, dependent origination, interdependent arising, it's a different word to describe that.

And that's what Buddha became awakened to, is that the initial, original supporting condition, causal condition, is ignorance, meaning misperception of ourself. Instead of seeing as it's all that is, when you're out there, nothing there except for the awareness. There's no boundary. There's no boundary between. There's no you and me. Everyone has the same awareness.

But because of this perception that we created, we've established this me. The karmic energy created the individual consciousness. Well, it depends on that. The difference between cause and effect and Buddhist cause and effect is slightly different because everything is dependent. Those cause and condition doesn't always create the next step. But the next step is always dependent on that cause and condition. Does that make sense?

Yeah, that's why we kind of go backwards. Why is there birth? You know? The first question is why do we need to age and die, right? That was Buddha's koan, when he left the palace. Why does everybody need to be aged and sick and die?

Well, because we're born. Why are we born? Because of the clingingness to existence, attachment to existence. Why do we have that? Because the clinging to our desires, what does that depend on? To our Creator, which is attachment-based desires. What does that depend on?

The context. Sixth sense context. What does that depend on? Mind and body. What does that depend on? Consciousness. What does that depend on? Karma. Karmic formation. What does that depend on? Misperception. Misperception. Instead of being what you truly are, we are falling into misperception of this individuality.

So, when we look at the Diamond Sutra, it says a true bodhisattva does not hold the idea

of a self, an individual, a sentient being, or a soul. Okay? This means really to negate, you know, atman, pudgala, sattva, and jiva that was used by other spiritual practices later on. In Buddha's time, he only used anatta or anatman, because atman was, you know, provenly being used, meaning the ultimate true self that they become united with. Right? And he's saying, that's not, that's not even true. Okay? And then later on, they developed the word pudgala. It was like individuality. Sattva, meaning like a beingness. And jiva was used a lot. You'll hear jiva if you're a yogi and you study some of those, um, Patanjali, sutra, you'll see some of these words used, like the jiva. And the soul, because everybody believed there was a soul.

That permanent soul that moves from body to body and the mirror goes to heaven. It doesn't work that way. That's why it's so hard to explain because everybody looks at that linearly and believes that there's got to be an entity. You're listening to me right now, thinking.

There's got to be a thinker, right? There's got to be somebody listening to this. Yeah, maybe the body is not me, because it's always ever-changing. Yeah, the mind is ever-flowing. But there's got to be something, right? Because I'm existing. There's got to be something. That's the belief that creates the entity. What evidence do you have? There's a listener. Just because there's listening, we're claiming that there's a listener.

What evidence do you have? There's a thinker behind all your thoughts. Anybody? Does the medical have any answer to that? In fact, they are proving, actually. Neuroscience, cognitive neuroscience is proving that we're making up a self. Yeah. Based on the experiences. There's a self that is created with the brain and they're trying to interpret it using the brain, because that's all they can look at in order to understand the consciousness.

but the true instrument that you can use to understand consciousness is the consciousness itself. That's the only thing you have, really. But the science is using the brain, which is more like a footprint,

fingerprints of the mind activities. So that's what you have to come to realize. If you felt like you're the awareness that is boundless, it's infinite. Yeah. Got to return to that. That's it. Just returning to this. And there's no more, there's no more grasping. There's no more attachments.

Because you know, there's nothing I can have. It just comes and goes based on supporting conditions. All we are is this identity that's created by memories and past tendencies. It's just a narrative in our mind. That's all it is. This identity we have is just a narrative that we have in our mind.

Right? Because if you got hit in the head and you lost all your memory, you wouldn't even know who you are. You wouldn't have that identity. Because you wouldn't have the memory, the narrative, to say this is my personality, this is my name, this is who I am, all of that.

Right? Maybe Jason Bourne, but... One time I asked that question, "Who are you when you lost all your memory?" And somebody said, "Jason Bourne."

"Bourne identity." You have a question? I'm sorry. So then like, what's the point of being human or an animal or like... Yeah, what is the point? If we're like... What is the point? What makes you think there's a point? I don't know. Yeah, because we're always trying to live by points.

There's got to be purpose. You live because you were born. Why were you born? You can go all the way back down to that and never again. Because of misidentification. Misperception. This is why the life is dukkha. That's why First Noble Truth, that Buddha said life...

It didn't just mean your life right now. The continuation of this birth and death that everybody experienced, the repetition of this cycle is dukkha. Because it all springs out of misperception, ignorance, or forgetting what we truly are. Okay? Do planets and galaxies have consciousness?

Everything is born out of consciousness. Yeah.

They say it's Big Bang, but it came out of nothingness, really. Everything came out of nothingness. But they had to visualize pea-sized, you know, compacted universe that blew up, right? But they don't know that for sure. They're just using that because there has to be something first before all this to happen.

It came out, now they're starting to realize zero-point energy within the vacuum space, within the empty vacuum space. There's tremendous amount of energy, potential energy in there. They're trying to figure out how to utilize that. They say within a cubic centimeter, enough energy to run the entire country's energy needs.

So, nothingness is really infinite potentiality. There's no nothingness. It's just potentiality. So, what if you can visualize and get across, just like you said, and you're there, and you're in the galaxies, and you're above, and you're... Yeah. But, you're aware of other people also doing that as well.

Well, that's your, that's just your imagination then. You're just thinking about other people. But you're there, and you're... You're there, you're in the oneness, you're in the peacefulness, you're in the...

But you're still conscious of other people doing that same thing. What about it? I don't know, like what... And you're supposed to let that go so you can go beyond that? Yeah. Oh. Yeah, you're still, there's still me and others. Yeah. That is so strong that right now you can try to imagine, but it's still just your thoughts, imagination.

So, the reason I did that with you is to just kind of using your imagination, using your thinking ability to maybe get a taste of what it may really be. But what it may really be is when you let go all the thinking, all your conceptualization, and simply realize, oh, this is it.

Yeah. This is it. That's realization of the truth. That's the truth that will free you from all suffering. Because you're no longer bounded. You're in this body experiencing. Still. So like Buddha reached nirvana. Right? When you became fully, perfectly enlightened. You don't have to be perfectly enlightened to see the truth.

That's why Buddha came up with four different levels of enlightenment. So tapana is the first level where you see truly that there's no such thing as self.

Right? That's what you can experience, you know. But there's still karmic tendencies that you have to let go. You know, that's how you get to the next level and all. But even at that perfect enlightenment, nirvana state, as long as he was carrying this body, there was pain and pleasure associated with that body.

There's no attachment to it. And then once you reach parinirvana, when you let go the body into parinirvana, then you're just returning to what is. There's no way to describe that. The words that he used was negating everything that you can think of.

He just said. It's unborn. Unmanifested. Unconditional. Unconditioned, actually. Yeah. So that's hard to even imagine. You can try to imagine that. But it was more of a pointer. Anything that is described in words or concepts. Concepts are just pointers. And everybody's going to interpret it different ways.

This is why we have to pay attention. Why do we do this? To pay attention. How do we get there? By paying attention to ourselves. So now you know the end state that we are trying to at least reach. That we need to come back down to earth and how am I going to live my life?

It goes back to our practice. To be mindful, to be awake, to be compassionate. So we can establish the foundations to become awake and to be completely free. So all of you are, have responsibility, householders. So first thing is establish good karma. Okay?

Good karmic merits. Because that was Buddha's first thing for all the lay practitioners or devotees. And then, live by shila, which is the precepts. Which means, live by, to discipline the desires that we have. Gotta discipline it. So we can find peace. If we don't discipline our desires, our craving, that constantly creates suffering.

We can find that peace of mind by letting some of those things go. Okay? So, hopefully, everyone can follow the prescription, at least the daily prescription, to start making a little bit of transformation. Every day. And what did I say? That's a must, if you're going to be on the path.

Anybody remember? Even what's the minimum? Yeah. To post on the band app? Puja, yeah. Every morning, we have to set that intention. Yeah.

Every morning, when you do the puja, and reflect on that, and share that with the sangha. Okay? You've got to have sangha to become, to make progress. You've got to have a teacher, sangha, and environment to practice. All right, so we're going over time. I know some people have to go.

So, I think we've already made an announcement about, any questions, actually? We can go downstairs and field any questions if you have. Sometimes when I go back and forth, I get a little bit dizzy. What was I going to say? Announcements. Yeah, any announcements?

The 19th. The 19th is the Yoga Fest. I think we talked about that. 2:30. If everybody can be there about 2:00 p.m. But we'll meet in the morning, do our morning session, and then go. Meet also again in the afternoon. Okay? So we're going to end with our loving-kindness prayer.

So please repeat after me. And think about everyone that needs this prayer. May all beings be safe. May all beings be safe. May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be peaceful.

May all beings be joyful. May all beings be joyful. May all beings awaken to their true nature. May all beings awaken to their true nature. May all beings be free. May all beings be free. Have a wonderful weekend.