The following talk was given at the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California.

Please visit our website at adioderma.org.

Good evening. Good evening. Welcome, welcome.

So the other day I was struck by, I was talking with somebody.

And this person was convinced about, you know, how the future was going to be.

At this certain amount of certainty, you know, this is going to happen,

and then this is going to happen,

and that's going to happen.

And I was really struck by, well, how do you know?

Of course, you know, we can imagine how things are going to be, but, you know, why do you have such a sense of certainty?

And this individual had a lot of emotion around it, too.

So I've just been thinking about this idea of certainty.

And then the other day, I had some discomfort on my face.

And I thought, oh, it's that tooth.

And I made this whole story.

My dad, my brother and I, the three of us,

just don't have such good teeth that comes to find out. And we have all these dental issues.

And I had this whole story about, oh, there's this pain, which means, you know, this, which means that,

and then this is going to happen, and oh, my gosh, you know.

And I knew it was a story.

I knew I was making it a story.

I was making it up, but there was a way that I was kind of like invested in this story.

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