Tara Brach - 2015-01-07 - Taking Refuge in Your Own True Nature

Episode Date: January 9, 2015

2015-01-07 - Taking Refuge in Your Own True Nature - The three classic refuges of Buddha (awareness), Dharma (truth) and Sangha (loving relatedness) are each expressions of our deepest essence. This talk reflects on the refuges and includes guided meditations and a closing ritual that helps us remember the pathway home in our daily life. (note: to participate in the ritual you will need a piece of red string about 28 inches long)

The following talk is given by Tara Brock, meditation teacher, psychologist, and author. So welcome to the first class in this new year. I thought I'd start by a post-holiday story that one woman who drives a bus told that she stopped to pick up someone, a young preschooler, and an older woman was standing with him. So when he got on the bus, she asked who that was, and he said, oh, that's my grandma. goes, oh, where does your grandmother live? And he said, oh, she lives at the airport. Whenever we want her, we just go there and get her. So here we are, post-holiday, for all that that means to us.

For some, it's really, really difficult and stressful, others, it's joyful and fun. But we have our experiences, and for a number of us from the D.C. area, the day after Christmas, began a retreat, our New Year's retreat, which is six days. And at the end of the retreat, one man came up to talk to me, and he said, you know, I had a real breakthrough. And, you know, through listening to talks and practicing, and he said, my breakthrough was I realized that I'm not learning anything new. I'm just remembering.

I'm in a process of remembering. that the spiritual truths aren't out there, something that we sign on for or learn. There's nothing we're joining. It's actually engaging in a process that is reminding us of something deep and intrinsic that's already within us. It's kind of waking it up inside us.

I love that. And as we know, that this culture is so speedy and we get so lost in the trance of doing that we forget. We don't really listen. one of my favorite stories some of you might remember

of a woman who was pregnant and she spent a lot of time with her young son while she was pregnant and then right before she went to the hospital to give birth he said when my little sister comes back and I have some time with her alone because they knew it was going to be a girl

and the mother was kind of curious and she said sure she went off, had her baby came back and the son a few weeks in reminded her that he had been promised some time alone. And so his parents said, okay, he went in, he stood by the little girl's crib, and the parents left the door open a crack. So they heard him, and they heard him saying, in a very low voice, please tell me about God. I've begun to forget.

So one of the best understandings I have of this path, and I think many of you feel the same, is that it's really about forgetting and remembering that we all forget. It's just the nature of it. We forget and we get caught up. And then meditation, being in nature, there are some collective rituals that are actually wise, living rituals, help us remember. And we're kind of remembering what most matters to us. We're remembering, we're remembering we're reconnecting with a sense of spirit and aliveness. One of the rituals that's at the heart of the Buddhist tradition and the elements of it you can find, I think, in all the wisdom traditions,

is called taking refuge. And this is the ritual Dutonite as part of the talk. And what we take refuge in in the traditional classic sense is described as the Buddha, which is awareness, the Dharma, which is the living truth, the truth of the moment, what's right here, and the Songo, which is the field of relationships, the loving relationships with each other. And when I started diving into writing my book, True Refuge, I started discovering how these three refuges are really arctypal gateways to spiritual awakening that are found in Hinduism, in Judaism, and Christianity.

You can find those archetypes all over the place. Really, their awareness, love, and truth. So we'll be exploring these three refuges tonight. I thought I'd begin by, you know, saying, well, why do we really need refuge? what's really causing this thing in us that feels we need to find refuge. And Choghim Trunpa, a Tibetan teacher, describes our predicament this way. He says, it's like we are shipwrecked and finally find an island only to discover that is clearly disappearing in the rising tides. Okay, so this is stress, right?

that island we find, this kind of temporary body mind, inevitably we encounter aging and sickness and dying and losing others, and there's an uncertainty and the truth of impermanence that we're living with. And that creates an undercurrent of stress of feeling something's not okay, something's wrong, something's missing. We need to do something. So the feeling is, William James put it beautifully, he said the beginning, first word in every religion, is help. That in some way we perceive that predicament

of this island that's being eaten away by the tides and something in us wants help. We want to hold on to something. We want to find safety, security. So in the spiritual domain, the only true refuge, the only dependable refuge, is the awareness, the love, the truth, the reality that's really our own deepest essence. In other words, there's no outward refuge that we can count on. Everything is just like we are. It's islands that are disappearing in

the tides. But there is something you might described as a timeless presence, there is some experience of loving awareness that we can find, but it's only right here and it's only right in this moment in our own being. So that's what we're going to be looking at as we explore these three gateways. How do we find that right here? How do we trust? and I think each one of us really longs to trust our own being. So, the first step of taking refuge is to become aware of how we're already taking refuge in ways that aren't working.

Because until we see that, we can't begin to pay attention in a way that actually deepens our sense of trust and inner freedom. And in the book True Refuge, I described this as false refuges. And false refuges aren't bad. Every one of us in our desire to feel more secure, more loved, more knowing that we're safe, grabs on to things. And so to become aware of our temporary strategies for feeling better is really necessary if we're going to be able to then stop that grasping and pay deeper attention to our own being.

So how do we do it? And many of you are aware of what I'm calling false refuges. I mean, we're aware often when we're with others of how much we want that person to either approve of us or like us or leave us alone. but in some way when we're with others, you're trying to control what happens. We're aware of the false refuge of blaming, how often we use judgment in some way to feel better ourselves

or to control how other people are doing things. Many of us are aware of how we use food as a false refuge, as a way to really control our biochemistry and get a temporary hit that soothes us. or aware of how we use drugs or alcohol. Many of us are aware of the ways we speed around trying to get things done. And I claim that as one of my great false refuges

that, you know, I check things off the list. And as soon as I've checked things off the list, there really is some sense of, ah, that lasts about four seconds, and then I think, you know, this is the next thing. My sister, many years ago, left a cartoon on my computer pinned to it, and it had two couples at dinner, and one man had his head in his plate. He was asleep, and the caption said, nowadays Hal is 99% caffeine-free.

So the flag of false refuge, the big flags, are that when we're pursuing, them. We're leaving the present moment. We're leaving our bodies, our sense of awareness right here, and we're not here anymore. We leave nature. We leave others. There's not intimacy when we're pursuing false refuges. Does that make sense when you kind of scan your lives and sense how it is? We're just less intimate with anything within and around us. I think of that a lot because I'm so aware of how much time, how many moments were in front of a screen. And the cyber world's here.

It's not like I'm saying, like there's some moral thing like it shouldn't be here, let's get rid of it, but to be aware of the addictiveness of it and how we get lost in it, that we spend, and this is children also spend almost eight hours a day in front of a screen, that's scary, that this generation, of children spend less than half the time that past generation and their grandparents spent outside in nature. I always wonder if we're never in nature, how can we love what we belong to this earth in a way that we'll save it? On the lighter side, we'll listen. This is Yogi Berra, which should prepare you, right? He says, I'm not going to buy my kids an encyclopedia. Let them walk to school like I did.

I thought that was cute. So the stress is a given. The question is, how do we respond? How do we pay attention? And what would really free our minds and hearts? And so what we find is that as we become more awake, and when I say on a spiritual path, in some way more and more consciously dedicated

to living in presence, living in an open-hearted way, there's a gradual shift from the false refuges that we're using that cut us off to the habits of refuge that really have to do with what's really happening right here resting more in awareness really waking up our hearts so let's look at how that happens and we're going to take each of the three refuges and reflect on them a bit. And then we'll close by doing a ritual

that is designed to help us dedicate more and more of our conscious moments to really turning to true refuge, to one of these gateways. So the first gateway is refuge in the Buddha. And ultimately what that means is taking refuge in the light of a way. awareness, this formless awakeness, this consciousness that's looking out through your eyes and listening. And sometimes it's a way to just kind of tune in a little, and we'll do this right now, I'll just ask you to just do a very brief exercise that I like, and you can close your eyes. And for the next few moments, until I tell you to stop, the assignment is to not be aware,

to just stop being aware. Just don't be aware. Don't be aware. Just check, are you not being aware right now? Okay, you can be aware again. So let me check with you. How many were successful in not being aware? Oh, good.

Okay, we had a couple. I like to share that when I first did this, my mother was in the group, and when I asked, was anyone successful? She was the one hand that went up. I'd like to give her credit. So what we start noticing, awareness is just happening all the time. We're not always aware of awareness.

But awareness is there. There's a noticing, a cognizance that's there. And so the first refuge is to become aware of awareness. And to just be that awareness. but because our habit of mind is to contract and fixate on objects, in other words, to be in a trance and a story, there's different ways that we can move through this portal of taking refuge in this light of awareness.

And one way is that we can bring to mind a being who's awakened and just in our mind reflect on the story of that person's awakening. So we start sensing our own potential to, wake up. And if we look at the historical Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama, who attained enlightenment under the Bodhi tree 2,500 years ago, as the story goes, he was attacked by the shadow side, which is Mara, you know, greed, hatred, delusion. So he sat under the tree, and he got attacked by the energies of fear, which means, just like us in his body, he felt that squeeze of something's wrong.

Just like us, he felt that sense that around the corner something really bad was going to happen. He was living in a body mind just like ours. And his way of dealing with that was to keep that intention towards presence. He brought

a kindness and a compassion to the energies of fear. And gradually, in that presence, with fear, he realized that who he was was that presence, that there was room. In other words, his identity opened up. And rather than being the victim of the fear

and the one fighting fear, he became that space, that luminous awake space, that fear could move through, just like different weather systems can move through an open sky, but it doesn't stain that sky, doesn't affect that sky. So he realized that sky-like mind. So we can reflect on the story of the Buddha's awakening and something in us gets it that

we can do that that is our potential or it can be a story of any being awakening. So that's one way, the inspiration of an awakened being. And another way is that we can reflect on some being or something that we trust has a wisdom and love living through it. So it could be a historical figure or spiritual figure. Are someone alive right now that we just sense that light of awareness, that beauty, that goodness, that love living through? And if you bring to mind someone like that and you really sense that energy that's moving through them, then you can actually sense how, oh, it's right here. It's part of me too. Now, I'll share that for myself,

and over the years in terms of taking refuge. When I first heard the words take refuge in the Buddha, and there wasn't a great big explanation, and all I saw was a statue of a male figure from 2,500 years ago, that didn't feel in the flow for me. I didn't feel like, okay, I'm taking refuge in this male from the past. That just didn't work. So my way of doing it, I kind of found my own way in was,

I sensed the archetype of Kuanian, it's the bodhisattva of compassion. And then even the figure of a bodhisattva didn't work, but more became just this field of light and love that I just called on and imagined. I said, okay, I'm taking refuge in this. And I imagined it flowing into me, and then I imagined it kind of opening up out of me and just dissolving into it until I went, oh, so this is refuge in the light of awareness. So it's a bridge, okay, that you bring to mind a being who represents the light of awareness and then discover how it's actually living right within you emanating through your own being.

Let's practice a little. Let's just check this out and see how it goes for you. just kind of come sitting whatever way is comfortable. Again, this is the first of the refuges, taking refuge in awareness. And we began exploring it by just sensing how awareness is always here. And perhaps the most direct way to take refuge and awareness, if you're quiet enough, is just a sense this formless being, this background of stillness or silence.

field of openness, that wakefulness, it's here. And if you're not so quiet, what can open you to that or perhaps deep in that sense of that living awareness. And what I'm inviting you right now to experiment with is to bring to mind some being who is an expression to you or expresses wisdom and compassion. And this could be a living being, you know, a grandmother or child or a friend, teacher of yours. Could be a mythical or spiritual figure.

Could be what you sense of as your own high self. Could be just as I described a kind of more formless field of light or energy. But call on it. Invoke that. invoke that being or that field. The Buddha or Bodhisattva could be a great spirit. I sometimes think of it as the beloved. And if there are eyes in this figure or person or being,

you might sense through those eyes this boundless love and kindness, awakeness. And if not, just sense in the presence that you've invoked that there is love. There's a very immediate visceral sense of love and tenderness and light. And since the love that's moving through that being or in this formless space is radiating and surrounding you and permeating you. So you feel like you're being bathed in Buddha nature in that light of awareness in a cellular way, being filled with it, that radiant presence.

I sense that timeless presence as emanating and arising right from the space within your own being also. So you just merge and dissolve into that timeless light-filled presence. Just be it. You are the stillness out of which this universe arises. You're the silence that's listening to thoughts. that awake, tender space that everything's happening in. The poet Ramakrishna says, O longing mind, dwell within the depth of your own pure nature. Do not seek your home elsewhere.

Your naked awareness alone, O mind, is the inexhaustible abundance for which you long so desperately. O longing mind, dwell within the depth of your own pure. nature. So this is the first of the three refuges where you take refuge, right this moment, in your own true nature, in the awareness and light of who you really are. Okay. So that's the first of what it's called the triple gem, because there are different facets of this diamond-like nature of our being. And the second is taking refuge in the Dharma. And the Dharma is translated sometimes as the path or the way. I like to think of it as the nature of nature, the nature of reality

itself. And you take refuge in the Dharma. And it's much of the teachings in these talks and the practices are taking refuge right in this aliveness, this here and now experience. So with each refuge, you might think of it as there's an outer expression and an inner. The outer expression of taking refuge in Buddha nature is to consider a historical figure or have an image in your mind, but the inner is the light of awareness itself. Similarly, with taking refuge in the Dharma, the outer way of refuge,

or reading books or listening to the Dharma talks that we listen to, are going into the natural world and sensing how the elements wake us up. And we all need these outer ways of bringing our attention into the present moment. They help us come right into the here and now, journaling, chanting, dancing, music. So we have outer ways of taking refuge in the Dharma that bring us home. And then we have these ways of paying attention that very directly say, come back, come back home

stop fixating the attention like you're looking at a movie screen out there what is happening right here the poet Ria Khan says if you want to know the Buddhist law drift east drift west entrusting yourself

to the waves entrusting yourself to the waves this is the direct taking refuge in the Dharma and the nature of reality and trusting yourself to all these different waves of sensations, of feelings, opening to it. Now, the challenge, and we're going to take a little bit of time with taking refuge in the Dharma in the present moment in the here and now, is that the waves aren't so easy.

So we say take refuge in the waves, and the wave is some very painful, unpleasant sensation in the body, or some feeling of anger or grief, or resentment, or hurt. So it's not very easy to say, okay, take refuge, just open to that. And so we all, in our own ways, get challenged, and we each have our ways of running away from what's actually happening. And we kind of know our ways of doing it. One story, a novice is introduced to her new cell at a monastery, and she's told that it's a silent practice.

there's no speaking, we're just being with what is, and every five years she gets an interview, okay, with Mother Superior. And at the interview, she's only allowed to say three words. Okay, five years passed, first interview, and the question is, how are you doing my child from Mother Superior? And the response to novice answers is, bed too hard. So Mother Superior says, keep practicing and praying.

Five more years passed, and they meet again, and she's asked how she's doing and the novice says, food is bad. This time, Mother Superior responds, well, keep practicing, praying, be with what is. Next interview, it's 15 years now. And again, Mother Superior asked her how she's doing and the novice responds,

I quit now. And Mother Superior looks at her and says, I'm not surprised. You've been doing nothing but complaining ever since you got here. So I like it because in a way when we watch ourselves and the waves keep happening, and what do we do? Have you noticed how many moments there's some complaint in the back of your mind about how it is?

I mean, I'm very aware of my inner whiner, so I figure others have it too, you know. So the practice that's entrusting ourselves to the waves has to do with learning to stay. That's the first step. It's like, okay, it's not easy, but there's some commitment to staying because something deep in us trusts that we will come home not by leaving,

not by running away, not by believing our story of blame, but by opening to what's here. Something in us knows that. Even the people that I know that are most fervently running away, I sometimes think of as this bicycle that the more stress we are, the faster we pedal away from the present moment, you know.

And even those that are peddling the fastest know deep down that they're leaving their own heart, they're leaving their own awareness, they're leaving the possibility of intimacy behind. So we have to stay and be with the waves. And that inquiry that we ask to help us is, there's two pieces to it. what is happening inside me right now? And can I let this be?

That's really the heart of this practice of refuge in the Dharma, refuge in reality. What is happening right now? And you can just check it out even if you've heard this question a thousand times, since the power of it, what is happening inside me right now, to reconnect you, to bring almost immediately a sense of intimate contact.

And then, can I be with this? Or you might say, can I let this be? So often we find ourselves wanting it different. And so it's really very powerful to commit ourselves to nailing our attention right to the moment. It's out of love for life that we, right here. One teacher, Ajun Samado, has a little mantra, he says, It's like this.

Moment after moment to not add on all the interpretations that make it wrong. It's like this. Just that bare-bones, simple, it's like this. And it said with quality of firmness but also kindness, it's like this. I had a friend some years back that went through a divorce and with as many people experienced waves of alternating of grief and then anger and then grief and then anger, how he was wrong, how she was wrong, how they should have seen the flags, and it just was really going on and on.

And he'd get her emails and he'd interpret. He'd spent a lot of time interpreting things. Then he realized he was really suffering, and he became very consciously committed to taking refuge in the Dharma, taking refuge in the present moment. Really, as I just named it, nailing his attention to the moment. So over and over again,

that meant the stories were going through his mind, who is right, who is wrong, what should have been or could have been, over and over, come back just this. It's like this. Just this moment. Feel exactly what's here, the stabbing or the aching or the tightness,

feeling the waves of fear, when his mind moved into the future, over and over again, it's like this. And then with real kindness, can I just be with this? Can I just let this be? And what he discovered through that was he had the capacity to be with it. He gained this kind of confidence that he could hold what was happening, that it kept changing, that his real pain was when he would hold on to things and get back into his judgment and his stories. But if he just stayed, if he just stayed and said, it's like this right now, the ways would come and the ways would go. And then they'd come and they'd go. And he started sensing who he was was that presence, that clear,

awake presence that it was happening in. There was truly a homecoming. by taking refuge in the Dharma. There's a beautiful line from Rumi. He says, don't turn away. Keep your eyes on the wounded place. That's where the light enters you. I think we know that. That if you look through your life and you sense the times

when the waves are the strongest or most intense or when your life was falling apart in some way, you know, whether it was health or relationship, financial, and really when things get cracked and broken open, and we sense that in that breaking open, part of what's breaking open is that solid self that's controlling things. It's like we're no longer able to navigate and use the same false refuges and hold it together. When we fall apart, there's a possibility of what can shine through that lets us know who we really are. Let me share one more story with you. I really love this. This was told by Rachel Naomi

Remen, who many of you might know of a wonderful physician and author and teacher. And she talks about a young man who was the angriest patient she ever had. And he was an avid athlete and really popular and handsome. And he got diagnosed with a cancer that requires. required removing his leg. And when he awoke from surgery and discovered he was entering a different life, he fell into a really big depression and he started using drugs and drinking heavily. And so she met with him and started working with him. And she asked him to draw a picture of his body and he scribbled a vase that had a big crack in it. And he teared the paper up when he was finished to the drawing. So he continued to work with her. And she kept that picture of the vase in her drawer.

And then he started asking about how other kids lived with an amputation. And so she recommended he volunteered at a hospital where there were a number of young amputees like himself. So here's what happens. He meets a 21-year-old woman who is recovering from a double mastectomy because she had breast cancer and she would barely look up from her hospital bed and after several attempts to get her to look up he looked down in his leg and he took off his prosthetic

device dramatically dropped it and then he started hopping around until finally heard the woman started laughing and then she finally looked up and with a smile she said, Phil if you can dance maybe I can sing he continued to visit her and years later as you might imagine this is a story that's a true story but it happened

they got married but what I want to tell you about is the last visit with Dr. Remen where he walks into her room and she pulls out the picture of the crack vase and studying it he took the drawing he said you know it's not really done and he took a yellow highlighter from her desk and drew a vibrant yellow lines extending out of the crack in the vase.

And then he said, this is where the light comes from. And I always love that story because, like the Rumi poem, there's some great truth in it that when we can't use our false refuges anymore, when we can't hold our life together in our ordinary ways, we call on something much deeper inside us. and in that calling on, we start discovering and trusting the goodness and beauty of who we are.

So this is taking refuge in the Dharma and we'll practice a little bit for a moment, if you will, just doing a brief reflection as we did before. So just closing your eyes and we practice as we did a few minutes ago by just sensing, well, what is happening inside? me right now? And can I be with this? And if you find your mind is busy just to say thank you very much to the thoughts and gently bring your mind back into your body, your attention back

into your body, into your heart, to take refuge in the Dharma in reality is to wake up from the stories of the mind and entrust ourselves to these waves of aliveness. The poet Merwin says, little breath, breathe me gently, row me gently, for I'm a river, I'm learning to cross. So we feel the breath, we feel the sensations of aliveness in the body, we include the sounds, and if we scan and send something difficult, challenging waves that are part of our life right now, we include them. It's like this. And see how much kindness if you're finding some part of you is having a hard time.

To take refuge in reality takes kindness. Deepening practice in this way is like first learning to swim. You discover that the water holds you up. You'll start discovering that moment after moment this life holds us. You might sense, okay, this is taking refuge in the Dharma, really opening to resting in the aliveness that's right here. It's homecoming to reality. So the third of the three refuges is Sangha,

which means spiritual community. It really means, in the biggest sense, all the beings of our life, the whole web of life. And Ticknath-Han said famously in the West, the Buddha is the Sangha. In other words, right at the center of our awakening is this field of relationship.

And that's what we're going to explore in the next class. But I'm going to say just a bit about refuge in the Sangha and we'll reflect on it and then we'll do our ceremony together, bringing all three kind of into our lives, which I think you'll find really a valuable way of remembering. So the outer ways of taking refuge in the Sangha, joining Kali Anamita, which is a spiritual friends group,

or being part of a 12-step group for some people, could be an expression of the outer. It's conscious relationships. It's wherever we're on purpose waking up with each other. The inner refuge, really feeling the gratitude, the compassion, the love that connects us. The Buddha said some days we feel like strangers, you know, with ourselves, with others, with life. And when our hearts are open, we realize that we belong just here. We belong as much as the trees, as much as the earth, we're part of it. So we're going to just take a moment to do a reflection on refuge in the Sangha before we do our ceremony.

I invite you to close your eyes again. And to begin with, just ask yourself, who is my Sanga? And again, think of Sanga as your spiritual community. And it could be that you have one friend that helps you remember that's a mirror for you that inspires you. Or it may be that you have a formal affiliation. Let the faces of beings, friends and family that are part of your heart that are part of your awakening come to mind right now. So you're sensing the circle

of beings that are in a very immediate way, part of your heart and your awakening. And let one person now be in your mind who you love and feel a sense of belonging with, someone that's an uncomplicated relationship. And you can include pets and you include those that are no longer alive, but one person or one being. And sensing what you love. And sensing what you love about this being, his or her goodness, the way that being expresses love to you. You might see the look of his or her eyes looking at you with care and mentally whisper, thank you. Just feel your heart's appreciation.

See if you can sense the quality of your togetherness, who you are together in a visceral way. And then just feeling the field of loving presence that that wakes up. that that wakes up, sensing others in that field of loving, all those you brought to mind, sensing all those that are listening right now, either in this room or listening around the world, sensing all beings that are challenged, encountering difficulties, yearning to love and be loved. Poet Rumi says, we are the night ocean filled with glints of light. We are the space between the fish and the moon while we sit here together.

This third refuge, taking refuge in Sangha is taking refuge in this loving relatedness. We'll keep that in mind as we move directly into this ceremony of remembrance. Just as I started tonight with that story of the little boy asking his baby sister to remind him of God, we have this longing to remember who we are, who each of us is, this awareness, this love, this living presence, that's our essence. So we're going to move into the ceremony of taking refuge, and I'll give you a few words about it that might just to give you some context that each of you has a thread. and I'd like you to do is either put it around your neck

so that the two ends are on your chest so that we can tie the two ends together that's what you're going to be doing or you're going to be putting it around your wrist but just so you know this thread is considered from the monk from the robe of a monk because the monks wore these red robes

and still do and what it means is that in the marketplace you're like a monk or none in drag you know you're wearing your whatever your stuff but deep down, you're remembering your true home. Okay? That's one idea. And Chogam Trunquo was asked, well, because they're called protection cords.

He was asked, what do these protect you from? And his response was, why yourself, of course. And I would say, I would add on what they do is they protect you from forgetting. They help you remember. Okay. So we're going to do reflection with these cords. and then I'm going to ask you to turn to a partner to help you put it on. So you can take it off your neck for right now, just hold the two ends of it.

And I'm going to check again, does anyone not have a cord? If you don't have a cord, raise your hand and Glenn Wolf come find you. So here's the reflection. Just to close your eyes, we have meditated together on these three refuges, and you're going to now touch into them once again within your own being, within your heart and soul. And the first of the refuge is to reflect on is taking refuge in Buddha nature,

in this very awareness right now that lives through you, that in you which is awake. It's that luminous, timeless presence. And as you reflect on that, on your dedication to remembering this awareness, to living from awareness, to coming home over and over again to this presence,

please tie the first of the three knots into your protection court. So just making a knot, reflecting on the second of the refuges. I take refuge in the Dharma. You're reflecting on your, dedication to turning towards presence over and over again, the actual experience of the present moment, this aliveness that's right here, these feelings, sensation, sounds. Taking refuge in the Dharma may mean the outer refuges of the listening to the talks or reading the books, whatever helps you remember, and ultimately it's taking refuge in the life that's right here.

So as you feel your heart's dedication to taking refuge in the Dharma in reality, please tie the second knot. And the final of the three is taking refuge in the Sangha. And again, just to inwardly reflect about your dedication to conscious relationship. It may be in an outer way. You have in mind a few relationships where you really want to let a deepened quality of attentiveness, of presence, of listening, of being vulnerable. It may be deepening your refuge in Sanga through serving, through volunteering, through helping.

And in the innermost way, refuge in Sanga, are love, is really refuge in that loving presence that's innate within you. So as you feel your commitment to that, please tie the same. third knot. So with the tying of the third knot, the cord is now considered activated. So what you can do is either wrap it around your wrist or as I described before, put it around the back of your neck so the two ends are in front. And this is where Songha comes in because we can't do it by ourselves. We see that we really are interdependent and we need each other. So please turn to somebody nearby and take turns in silence, tying the ends of the knot together.

And if there's nobody nearby, you can become a threesome, it's fine. But you're going to take turns with each other. As you're completing this, I'll just let you know that many people wear their cords around until they, in some way, dissolve, you know. and some cut them and put them in a place on an altar or somewhere but they can be incredible reminders to you so just to consider it in that way and we complete the ceremony you each have the chant sheet

we're going to do a chant and even if it's unfamiliar you can just kind of make sounds with it but feel your heart there and I'll begin the chanting so please join in. Namutasa, Bhagawato, arahattu, ahraha,

samasam buddhasa, namotasa, Bhagawato, arahatoh, sahma, samasam budasa, namotasa, Bhagawatu,

Arahatau Samasam Budasah Budam Saranam Gauchami Dham Sarenam Gautiam Sangam Saranam

Gautami Burram Saranam Gautrami. Dutiyan pi, Tamang Saranam Gaucemi. Dutiaampi, Sangam, Seranam Gautchami. Tatiampiampi,

Bhudram, Sarenam Gautiam Gautami. Tatiyaam Tatiyampi, Daman, satanam, gautchami. Tatyampi, sangam, satanam, gautchami. Namaste and blessings, thank you. The teaching you have received has been freely offered.

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