Hello and welcome to another episode of the Secular Buddhism Podcast. This is episode number 111.

I am your host Noah Rochetta and today I'm talking about resisting our demons.

As always keep in mind you don't need to use what you learned from Buddhism to be a Buddhist.

You can use this to learn to be a better whatever you already are.

In the last podcast episode I shared the Zen Kuan called the Real Miracle.

I'll repeat it here when Bankai was preaching at Ruman Temple a Shin-Shu priest who believed in

salvation through the repetition of the name of the Buddha of Love was jealous of his large

audience and wanted to debate him. Bankai was in the midst of a talk when the priest appeared,

but the fellow made such a disturbance that Bankai stopped his discourse and asked about the noise.

The founder of our sect, Boast of the Priest, had such miraculous powers that he held a brush in

his hand on one bank of the river, his attendant held up a paper on the other bank, and the teacher

wrote the holy name of Amida through the air. Can you do such a wonderful thing? Bankai replied

lightly, perhaps your fox can perform that trick, but that is not the manner of Zen. My miracle

is that when I am hungry, I eat, and when I am thirsty, I drink. I really enjoy this Zen Kuan.

That is very typical of Zen to take something kind of a big deal and bring it back to where it's not

a big deal. That is a teaching that I have taken away from Buddhism in general. When people

approach this idea of miracles, and this miracle is this big, great thing, Buddhism seems to

always return things to, well, that's not a miracle. The miracle is the thing that you wouldn't think

is a miracle. I'm being able to eat when you're hungry and being able to drink when you're thirsty.

And I love that way of thinking, again, the point of the Kuan is to kind of make you scratch your

head and say, wait a second, why or how is that a miracle? In his book, The Miracle of Mindfulness,

Tik Nhat Han elaborates on this a little bit. He says people usually consider walking on water or

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