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So is a preparation for, I know Ming is going to talk some about the path of practice really in several of the different stages, the elements of what makes up the path of practice.

And I want to give some preparation that may be related, I hope it and start with a poem by Jane Hirschfield that goes

Perishable it said on the plastic container and below indifferent ink the date to be used by the last teaspoon consumed.

I found myself looking now inside the knees, now turning over each foot to look at the soul,

then at the leaves of the young tomato plants, and then at the arguing jays, and under the wooden table and lifted stones looking,

coffee cups, olives, cheeses, hunger, sorrow, fears,

these two would certainly vanish without knowing when.

Perishable, it said.

And so this is kind of the predicament we find ourselves in as human beings.

We have this magnificent human incarnation in some way and yet at the same time

it's not terribly reliable.

And I was teaching in Paris recently

for a group of people,

people, many of whom were involved with the mindfulness-based stress reduction

movement in France.

And on a panel with a number of physicians

who are using this work of mindfulness and trainings and compassion

and so forth in their hospitals and clinics.

...