I'd like to continue tonight our theme of the last class, which is embodied presence

and what we called formally entering the wilderness. And I thought I'd begin by

sharing that in my own life, on my own kind of way of waking up on the path, there

are two continual places that I find I'm having to re-remember regularly. And one

of those places is this recognition that whenever I am in thoughts, presence, the

vividness and immediacy of presence is obscured. So it's not that I'm saying thoughts

are bad, but I have to keep remembering that if I want to be fully here, I need to step

out of thinking. And that's a remembering. And then the other place that I have to keep

rediscovering is to forgive myself for forgetting. So you see they go together, right?

So we'll be exploring that because there is such huge conditioning to leave presence. I mean,

if you think of today and kind of sense where were you, we can begin to realize that many moments,

huge sloths of moments, we were in some way preparing for something else, planning,

worrying, reviewing, right? So there's that wonderful cartoon that has this guy driving and he's

right about to enter into a desert. And the sign says, you and your own tedious thoughts next

200 miles. And then from the 12-step universe, you can listen to these questions carefully.

Do you lose time from work due to thinking? Is thinking making your home life unhappy?

You know what the substitute here, right? Is thinking affecting your reputation?

Have you ever felt remorse after thinking? I like this one. Do you crave a think at a definite time

daily? Do you want to think the next morning? Do you think to escape from worries or troubles?

Here's a big one. Do you think alone? If yes, on any of these, you may be a thinkaholic.

So without adding judgment, a very deep part of the dedication to a spiritual path is a

dedication to stepping out of our trance, stepping out of our trance over and over and discovering what's

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