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So I've been reflecting about how on every continent and through history, people have been

doing what we're doing. They've been gathering sometimes not in a unitarian church, a bunch

of people, you know, but they've been gathering and intentionally quieting, intentionally listening

to their hearts, to their minds, just being present. It's not a big percentage of people,

not everybody thinks it's the way to spend an evening, but more and more and getting

so much more attention. So it's an exciting time. And if we really investigate, you know,

what is it that motivates us to do these kinds of practices, I like the way one teacher

put it, monindraji, he was asked, you know, why practice? And he said, well, it's so that when

I walk into town, I'll notice the tiny purple flowers by the side of the road. You know, he says,

it's to live the life fully and to really know who we are. And I think the image of the Bodhi

tree and the Buddhist mythology is a powerful one because it quite simply has to do with the

sacred pause, with just stopping, stopping our busy, tumbling into the future, you know what I

mean? Just stopping and deepening our attention to what's right here. And there's an understanding

that it's really only in this full presence that we can feel love. It's like love is no

or else. It's only when we're present. We can have ideas about it. But the visceral sense is

right here. And same with creativity or joy. So there's a kind of commitment to presence and an

understanding that when we can stop and arrive, our lives then flow from presence. It's not

about being inactive. It's like the way we speak and the way we engage, it flows from that

presence. The famous Zen teacher Suzuki Roshi said that on the fourth day of Shashi, and that's a

retreat, he described to everyone had aching backs and legs. And he was, so he was talking to them.

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