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

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Good morning everyone and I'm very happy to be here with you all.

And some of that happiness is being with all of you but some of it is carrying with me

in my last three weeks that I was at Tassahara's and Mountain Center.

And it's probably the oldest monastery in the country.

And when it started in 1967 it was kind of revolutionary because it was co-ed,

which was very unusual to have many women practicing together,

more or less as equals I think that equality improved over the decades.

And I trained there, if I began my training there,

it spent about three years there and I started 43 years ago in 1980.

And so I went back and really went back the first time to be a Zen teacher there more or less.

I've been back because a visitor for over these years.

But to go back into my original kind of Zen training monastery where I was really formed in many ways

and Buddhism in my training at that monastery.

And so to be back there not only to be back in the place

but to be back there practicing and there was a practice event for three weeks, a practice period.

And to be practicing there where all these memories would come back,

I was standing there when that happened and that happened over here

and in the meditation halls knowing these different spots that were so significant for me.

I went around and visited them and bowed to them and said,

this is where I sat when this happened there, this and that.

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