Good afternoon and welcome to the City of Fort Worth Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month program. My name is Elizabeth Van and I serve on the City's Diversity and Inclusion Employee Committee representing the Police Department. The DNI Employee Committee leads the employee work group working under the leadership of the Diversity Inclusion Department that planned today's program. I'm excited to introduce our presenter, Dr. Dennis, who will share with us not only information about the Asian history and tradition of meditation and mindfulness, but also lead us through some exercises that I think we can all benefit from in the workplace. But before I do that, I want to invite the City's Chief Equity Officer and Director of the Diversity and Inclusion Department, Christina Brooks, to give us a few remarks. Well, good afternoon, everyone. You'll have to excuse my voice. I'm getting over a little cold, but I didn't want to take some time to introduce you to our program today and welcome you. So as you know, Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month is an annual celebration that recognizes the historical and cultural contributions of individuals and groups of Asian and Pacific Islander descent to the United States. The Asian population is growing at a faster percentage in North Texas than any other demographic. That's according to the U.S. census data. In Tarrant County alone, 129,437 Asians were counted in the 2020 census, a 57 percent jump from 10 years earlier. At 1.5 million, Asians now make up 6 percent of the total Texas population. Now if you've attended these before, you know that I do some historical research for each one of our months where we are remembering and celebrating different cultures. And so in conducting this historical research on notable Fort Worth Asian residents and businesses, there is a name that rose to the top of the list. His name is Kenetaro Fujita. You may be familiar with what remains of his legacy, the James Fujita House. Originally built in 1915 for Thomas and Annie James, the home was purchased four years later by Kenetaro Fujita. Fujita served as president of a Japanese cotton exporting firm, the Go Show Company, incorporated in 1917 and dissolved just after the U.S. entry into World War II. In 1936, after Fujita returned to Japan, he sold the home to the company. If you've been by there, out on College Avenue, you'll notice that there are features of the James Fujita House, which include the gamble roof, front porch columns and bolsters. It was recorded as a Texas historic landmark in 1986. But after Fujita left in 1936, it would be 37 years later when Fort Worth would once again recognize the important contribution of Asian culture with the opening of the Fort Worth Japanese gardens in 1973. It is a traditional strolling garden with winding paths through landscapes and around ponds. The garden consists of 7.5 acres filled with cherry trees, Japanese maples, magnolias, bamboo, bridges and ponds filled with koi fish. Except in the spring, there are few flowers blooming in the Japanese garden due to the Japanese practice of mono noowari. This translates into transient or bittersweet beauty, meaning that if the garden was always blooming, it would never be special. Mono noowari simply means the pathos of things, but it can also mean empathy for things. In Japanese culture, it is a crucial term. The word mono means things or things while owari means feeling or sentiment, and the particle node denotes something an item has. As a result, mono noowari refers to pathos or profound feelings of things, as well as the strong emotions that objects can provoke or instill in us. It also refers to the bittersweet knowledge that everything is impermanent. It is the realization that everything in life is fleeting. The impermanence of youth, the dying of romance, the passing of seasons are not to be mourned but to be embraced and cherished in their impermanence because that is where their beauty lies. Things would lose their ability to move us if there was no change, and the most valuable aspect of life is its unpredictability. For half a century now, the Japanese garden has been the oasis of serenity in the middle of a city, a place for retreat, relaxation, and meditation. It's hard to believe the site had previously served as a gravel pit, a swatter's camp, and a dump. The Fort Worth Parks Department later the Parks and Recreation began its work in 1968 clearing the site, which the original architect Al Kamatsu once called a tremendous ecological disaster. But over time they built ponds and waterfalls, shaped trails and paths, and selected plants that would lend Japanese beauty to a corner of Texas. Today, we hope to bring a little serenity right here to City Council Chambers. So we invite you to participate in our program, and we hope that you enjoy it. Thank you. So thank you, Elizabeth and Christina, and I just want to echo her comments about the Japanese gardens. They're wonderful. Whenever a family member or a friend comes to visit me, I'm from the north. I'm from Chicago and Illinois and Wisconsin, and a lot of my friends and family will come to escape the cold, and so I always take them to the gardens. So anyway, today what we'll do are some very short breathing and meditation practices, and I'll interweave those into the program. I'll talk a little bit about the kind of historical background of Asian religious and meditation traditions, but I'll also talk about a group that we have on the TCU campus called the Calm Studies Group, and I'll say more about them. And if you're interested in anything I have, I say today, any of these practices, and you want to learn more, you can just reach out to Veronica. She has my email, and I'm happy to take any questions you might have. So we're going to start with a very simple practice. I'm combining a few things here. It'll be about three minutes. Ideally, you might just stop eating for a second if that's OK.  You don't want to be tight, but you want to be upright. And if it's comfortable for you, try to put your feet flat on the floor, and then just take your hands, and you can put them in a comfortable position. When we start this practice, I'll invite you to close your eyes if you're comfortable with that. If not, you might just kind of look down and just squint a bit so you're not distracted by what's going on around you. And so we're going to start with a very simple breathing practice. It goes by three numbers, four, seven, eight. And the four is a reference to the inhalation. And so you'll inhale, and in your mind, you'll count silently up to four. So inhale, four, hold for count of seven, and then exhale for count of eight. When you do the inhalation, see if you can breathe from the belly, from the diaphragm, and breathe in through your nose, and really feel the air come and fill your lungs. And then you hold, counting to seven, and then you exhale, counting to eight. We'll do this two times. And this will, you cannot avoid this. This is a physiological response. You'll calm down. After I do my second four, seven, eight, I'll wait for maybe 10 seconds, and I'll start speaking. And I'll lead you through just some very simple practices.  They're not Buddhist. They're not Hindu. These are secularized versions of these practices. And this is a very important point because I think it makes it more accessible to people who are not maybe interested in the religious part. I will be talking about that today, but the practices are not that way, okay? So just to reiterate, we'll do the four, seven, eight breathing practice. Just do it two times.  Just imagine breathing that out, okay? Any questions? Okay, here we go. Two rounds of the four, seven, eight. Just keep your eyes closed and now I'll start speaking then. Here we go. Okay, I invite you to bring your attention to the sensation of your feet as the resting against the floor. And just try to maintain your awareness on the sensation of your feet, resting on the floor. If you're comfortable, you can imagine your feet touching Mother Earth or maybe just the carpet underneath your feet, whatever is comfortable. This is a very simple exercise. We teach this a lot. And it's a technique that will help you slowly. If you do it regularly, it will help you build your capacity to maintain your awareness in the present moment. Just watch your mind. Most of us, our minds go back and forth into the future, into the past. And we miss out on the present. If your mind has wandered away, don't worry about it. This is natural in meditation.  Just acknowledge it and in a very friendly way, just bring your mind and your attention, your awareness back to the sensation of your feet, resting comfortably on the floor. We often call this an embodied practice, which simply means we're using a part of the body to build our capacity to stay in the present moment. This particular practice is often used in trauma therapy. It's been discovered that this practice can help those who've experienced severe trauma, PTSD. So now we'll transition and we'll do one more short practice. And this is probably the most basic form of meditation. And it goes by different names. I think the most common is breath awareness. And so I just invite you to bring your attention to your breath. As it goes in and out, as you inhale and you exhale, don't try to control your breath, just breathe naturally. And just see if you can maintain your awareness on your breath. As it goes in and out, in and out. The breath is often described as being the bridge between the mind and the body, the breath can bring us back to the present moment. So I won't speak for maybe 30 seconds. And during the silence, I invite you simply to follow your breath. And if your mind wanders away, just acknowledge it in a friendly way. Always in a friendly way. Just bring it back to the breath. Here we go. Okay, and to wrap up this practice, what we'll do is we'll take two deep breaths. And I invite you as you take those deep breaths and don't rush. As you take these breaths, just bring to mind something that you're grateful for. This we call gratitude practice. There's actually a lot of research that shows developing a gratitude practice can have all kinds of positive effects on our minds, on our bodies, on our connections to others. And we'll wrap up today with a short gratitude practice, which I'll explain later. So just to recap, just take two deep breaths. And as you do so, just bring to mind something that you're grateful for. It can be a person, it can be an idea. Maybe it's a thing, maybe it's your lunch today. Maybe it was particularly tasty and you're grateful for it. Or maybe it's a piece of clothing, whatever it might be. After your second exhalation, just go ahead and slowly open your eyes and we'll move on. Here we go. Well, I wanted to express my gratitude to you for inviting me here today. It's, I think I'm doing that, sorry. Maybe I should stand up. It's really, it's really a pleasure to be here. So thank you for inviting me. So let me just look at my notes real quick here. Okay. So I do want to say a few things about what we just did. I teach this, those practices we just did, I teach a lot. And 478 is something I do with students. And like when I go to a program like this, but with students, I always say to them, if you remember nothing from what I say today, you know, with young people especially, there's just such a high level of distraction. In fact, it's really causing a lot of issues with students' ability to pay attention. And as you probably know, there have been some really alarming studies and statistics that are coming out about the mental health of young people. There was a CDC report that came out in February of this year. And it gave a number of really alarming statistics about the mental health of teens who are then going into college. But things like depression, anxiety, vital ideation, just very serious stuff. And so I tell them, if you remember nothing else, remember this practice because it is really powerful for calming your system down. Many of my students have really debilitating anxiety. Some get panic attacks. And this 478 practice is really useful for that. I've had lots of students who've talked about how much it's helped them. With test anxiety, I had a student who had a fear of flying. And she got on a plane and she could feel herself constricting. And so she did this practice and it really helped her. So anyway, please remember this practice. Next time you get really stressed, give it a try. I also recommend the gratitude practice. You can have a gratitude practice in many ways. You can keep a gratitude journal. You can express gratitude verbally. But there's a researcher out in the University of California system, Robert Ammons, who studies this. And the research is very clear that people who practice this regularly really have positive benefits. So what I'd like to do is go through. I have a powerful reason to go through this. I'm causing a lot of commotion. It's supposed to be calming. And I'm giving you static. I apologize. So I have some slides and I'm going to go through those. And again, if you have any questions, you can raise your hand. Or you're welcome to contact me later. So let me say just a little bit about myself. You can see my name is Mark then. As I teach in the TCU religion department, I came to TCU in 2007. My background is in Buddhism. I grew up in Madison, Wisconsin. I was born in Chicago, but grew up in Madison. And I went to the University of Wisconsin study business finance. And I worked for a couple of years in business. I was working in a mutual fund in Boston and kind of had, I'm sure you all know, the midlife crisis. I had the midlife crisis. But much earlier, it was the quarter life crisis. So anyway, it's kind of a long story. But it led me to Japan and to study Zen Buddhism. So I went to Japan in 1987. And I lived there for almost five years. I love Japan. I consider myself a practitioner of Zen Buddhism. My research is in the Japanese language. And I study Buddhism. My position at TCU is East Asian religions. And so that includes Buddhism. But Taoism, Confucianism, and some other traditions. So you can see that the topic is meditation of mindfulness in Asian religious traditions. And so I'm going to start and just talk a little bit about these different Asian meditation traditions. Each of them is quite different. So we're going to start with a broad lens. And then we'll narrow it down to Buddhism, which is what I practice. And also what I study. And you can see I've listed some, not all, of the major religious traditions that come out of Asia that have a meditation or mindfulness component. So Buddhism, which I've been talking about, and I'll return to in just a minute. Hinduism, which is very broad. And I just included yoga because yoga is generally quite well known in the United States. There's lots of yoga studios, many of my students practice yoga, but there's many other traditions within Hinduism. Taoism is one of the two major religious traditions in China, the other being Confucianism, so Taoism. And then the last two are maybe religions that you've never heard of, or maybe you've just heard their names, but don't know much about. And those are Jainism and Sikhism. Jainism goes back about 2,500 years to the same time when the Buddha was alive. But Sikhism is much more recent. The founder of Sikhism was a Guru Nanak, and he lived in the 1500s. So these are just a few of the traditions. And then you can see this next slide is the Indian meditation tradition. So we're kind of narrowing it down. And one of the really interesting parts of these traditions, and my students always find this fascinating, I teach at TCU, and you will not be surprised to know that many of my students are Christians. It's the sea in TCU. And so the worldview that is expressed or undergirds these traditions is very different than Christianity or the monotheistic tradition, so Islam, Christianity, Judaism. And it's often described using these four key concepts. And so the first concept is these are Sanskrit words. And the first one is samsara. And samsara simply means something that goes around in a circle. It has these cycles. And the belief in all of the Indian religious traditions that I listed is that there's this circular pattern that governs the cosmos. But then you can narrow that down and look at it within the individual life cycle. And as you may know, these traditions believe that when we live in the world, we die, and then we come back into the world, this is the cycle of samsara. The next idea, and this is one that my students usually have heard of, is karma. Karma, I think, is a simple idea. I ask my students what you know about karma, and most of them will say, what goes around comes around. And that's actually a very good definition. Karma, it's very simple, and it's when you look at it that way, it's easy to understand. However, it gets really interesting when you dig into it and talk about how these different traditions understand karma. And I'll just give you one example. In Buddhism, the Buddhists generally believe that it's the intention behind an act. What did you intend? So if I am walking along and I step on a bug, but it's because I didn't see the bug, that's a very different kind of karmic act than if I see a bug and I deliberately step on it. That's just a simple example. But the other traditions, Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism, they all have their own kind of interpretation of that. The next term is atma, which is generally translated self, sometimes soul. You've probably heard of Gandhi, a figure who I'm fascinated with. I do a big section in one of my courses, World Religions on Indian Independence. And Gandhi is one of the main figures. But Gandhi is often referred to as the mahatma. Maha in Sanskrit means great or big. And you put two words together, those two words together, self or soul and maha, great. And you get the great soul. So Gandhi is known as the mahatma. And if somebody says in India, the mahatma, everybody knows it's Gandhi. And then the last one is moksha. And I love this word because it sounds like moka. And students relate to that. And moksha is actually, it comes from a Sanskrit verb, muc, m-u-c, which means to be free or to liberate. It is an important part of traditional yoga, this idea that you do not just the physical, the asanas, the physical practices, but there's an ethical component. There's breathing, there's meditation, there's diet. And all of those are meant to lead you to this state of liberation. And it's liberation or freedom from this cycle of birth, death, and rebirth. That is the basic worldview of each of those traditions that come out of India. When you start to look at how they understand karma and moksha, then it gets a little more complicated. In fact, Buddhists sometimes use the word moksha. More commonly, they use the word nirvana, which I imagine is a word you're familiar with. So I'm going to move on here and talk about meditation and mindfulness in Buddhism. And this is meant to just introduce you to the basic ideas of Buddhism and help you understand why many Buddhists, now some Buddhists don't do much meditation, but many do, especially in the tradition I come out of, the Zen Buddhists. This is meant to help you understand why they do this. And so the first key concept is the basic statement about the nature of this world that we're inhabiting here. And this is the teaching that the Buddha gave to his disciples when he started teaching some 2,500 years ago. There's a lot of debate about when exactly he lived. He was active in what is the northeastern part of India. But anyway, these truths are just a basic statement about reality. And the first one is life in the world is characterized by dukkha, which is often translated as suffering, which is kind of an unfortunate translation. What it really means is dissatisfaction or dis-ease with things in the world. We want something, but I think as Christina was saying when she was talking about the gardens, everything is constantly changing. And so if we cling to something, whatever it is we cling to, it can be we want to be famous or we want to be rich, whatever a person, those things will inevitably change. And so there's this suffering or dukkha that is caused by that. The second truth is this dukkha, this suffering is caused by craving, literally thirst. We want stuff. When I was young, I wanted to be rich. I told my students this. That's why I got into business. I wanted to be rich, rich, rich. That's a very common, obvious kind of craving. The third truth is if you remove craving, you will remove suffering. And then the fourth one is the path, the Eightfold Path. And that path has eight parts. I'm not going to list those, but it has three main sections. One is ethics. You see this in all religious traditions, whether it's Christianity or Hinduism or Buddhism. Then what's called wisdom. But then the third part, which is what we're most interested in is mental cultivation. Mental cultivation is referring to things like meditation and mindfulness. The belief in Buddhism is that if we can change our minds, if we can reorient our consciousness stream, we can change how we exist in the world, how we feel about ourselves, how we relate to others. And one of the related concepts is interdependence, our connection to others. When we slowly are able to reduce our sense of being separate, isolated selves, then the logical implication is that we connect. We connect to others. And this opens up a really interesting, can open up an interesting space in our lives. And then, as I said before, nirvana is the ultimate goal of Buddhism. And that's release liberation from this cycle of birth, death, and rebirth. Sorry, my voice is a little crackly today. So I want to talk a little bit about my experience. I mentioned I had this quarter life crisis. This was 1987. It was a long time ago. And I had some friends working in the mutual fund who'd been to Japan. And they said, thank you. They had studied Eastern religions. It was all the same. It was all this stuff that I've just talked about.  It was serious. It was really destabilizing. I had imagined myself in one way. All of a sudden, that was taken away from me. And so I started doing meditation. And it just calms me down. And it was wonderful. So I've been doing it. What is that? 35, 36 years every day. Maybe once a year. I'll miss a day. But it's very rare. So in 1987, I went to Japan. I just got on a plane and flew to Tokyo. I met a guy on the plane. He was an American guy who's been there. And I said, I don't know where I'm going. And he said, well, you can tie her along with me. And we got on a train. Fortunately, we got there on a Sunday. And it wasn't too crowded. And we went to a place called Shinjuku Station. It may sound familiar to some of you, because it was in downtown Fort Worth. Over on Magnolia, Shinjuku Station, a wonderful restaurant. It's full of neon. It's just a very exciting place. Anyway, I ended up living in Japan for five years, doing a lot of Zen meditation retreats. And they were wonderful. It was somewhere just a weekend, somewhere for about a week. And it was just so anyway, I spent about five years there. And during that time, I was able to travel in Asia. I went to places like China, Indonesia, Singapore, but also India. I went a couple times to India. And I just am fascinated by India and Japan. And in 1992, I decided to move to India. And I lived on a Hindu ashram, not a Buddhist one, a Hindu ashram, for two and a half years. I was a gardener. It was wonderful. It was very simple. They had electricity, but you had to pump your water. You had to wash your clothes by hand. And I told my students, they just can't imagine. They just can't imagine. No newspaper, but it was wonderful. So I spent about eight years overseas. I came back and I went through the PhD program in Buddhist studies at the University of Wisconsin and eventually ended up at TCU. So I want to kind of move through this because I want to be mindful of our time. And I do want to end with a practice. So you can see this next slide is the mindfulness movement in the West. And I've just included two photos. So mindfulness, am I doing that? And so I don't know if this one's working. It is? OK. So mindfulness is one of those mental cultivation practices that's common in Buddhism. So meditation and mindfulness. And Buddhists will say they're different. They're often put together. They're conflated in the United States. But mindfulness is more paying attention. Like right now I'm speaking. And maybe you're listening, but then you're mind, what we call the monkey mind. It intervenes. And all of a sudden you're thinking, oh, it's going to be 1 o'clock. I've got a meeting or whatever it might be. And so mindfulness is learning slowly. It's painfully slow to maintain your awareness. Like that exercise we did with our feet on the floor. It's just teaching you to maintain your awareness. And it's like anything. If you've never lifted a weight or gone running, it's very hard. This whole last semester I was technologically cursed in my class. I had all these problems, which I don't normally have. And I can see it's followed me here. I'm sorry. But anyway, that's what mindfulness is. And there's a mindfulness movement. A boom, a craze in the United States and elsewhere. And there's many figures. But these are the two I think I have most commonly. One is Thich Nhat Hanh. I'm a huge fan of Thich Nhat Hanh. He died in January of 2022. He was a wonderful human being. Martin Luther King, Jr. nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize. He saw the horrors of the Vietnam War. He and his Zen monk, his traditions stayed neutral in the war. And many of his fellow monks and nuns and children under his care were killed in the violence. And he saw this. And so he created a movement. I would consider myself to be part of this called socially engaged Buddhism, which simply means to be mindful of what's going on in the world, in our society, to all the kinds of suffering that exist.  And so his basic message was we look at that. We don't turn away from the suffering if you see a homeless person. You don't turn away from it. And then you do whatever you can to reduce that suffering. And that's his message. And so he's one of the key figures known for the mindfulness movement. The other is John Kabat-Zinn, a very different person, a scientist. And he is probably the figure best known for creating the mindfulness movement in the West, especially the secularized version. And his experience was he was working with women with breast cancer at a hospital in Amherst, Massachusetts. And he started teaching them these practices.  But what it can do is help the women who are experiencing physical pain, anxiety, all sleep issues, he discovered it could be a very powerful way to help them reorient their minds towards what they were experiencing. And he created a program that is very popular and really well studied. It's called mindfulness-based stress reduction. Oftentimes it's just M-B-S-R. He's one of the really important figures in the mindfulness movement. Oops, what did I do? What did I do? Oh, no, no. I told you I'm cursed. OK. So I want to just take a few more minutes because I do want to do one more practice. I'd hope to do a few more. But as a typical academic, I love to hear my own voice. So I've written the names of some really great books up here. If you're interested in mindfulness, all of them are really accessible. The first is the Miracle of Mindfulness. That's by Tich Nhat Hanh, the first figure I talked about. It was written as a letter to one of his followers who was experiencing the incredible violence the Vietnam War. And how do you practice these kinds of things when you see people around you dying? It's a wonderful book. I teach a course in Buddhism, and I use it often. The next book is by John Kabat-Zinn, the second figure. He's written two books, and both of them have great titles. Wherever you go, there you are, meaning you can try to get away from yourself. You can go to another place. You can drink alcohol or whatever it is. But there, you're still there. And the other one, the other title, is Full Catastrophe Living. I love that title. It's like most of us live. It's a wonderful, both of his books are wonderful. The next one is called The Mindful 20-Something. This is written by Holly Rogers, who's a medical doctor. She's a practicing psychiatrist. She teaches at Duke University. She works in the counseling center. I teach this every semester, this book. It's wonderful. It's cheap. It's about $10. It's written in very accessible language. She includes science notes that are easy to understand. She includes practices, and it has lots of wisdom. And then the final one is called 10% Happier. And that is by a former ABC News journalist, Dan Harris. I think some of you will recognize his name and probably know who he is. But he was very skeptical of the benefits of mindfulness and meditation. He kind of freaked out while he was on the national news. And he couldn't breathe, and he couldn't speak. And so it was kind of a long story, but that led him to meditation. And so he's become like the ex-smoker who's really anti-smoking. And he's become like that. And he's got a great platform. He's got the book and a podcast called 10% Happier, which I can't recommend enough. He's really good at interviewing people. He doesn't talk too much. So let me just say I'm not going to go through all these slides, but we have a group on campus, the TCU campus, called CalM Studies. And CalM is an acronym. It means Compassionate Awareness and Living Mindfully. Our group started as a meditation and mindfulness group in 2012. If you're interested in any of this, please write to Veronica. And I'll put you on our mailing list. We're very active. We have all kinds of, a lot of this stuff is virtual because of the pandemic, which I think we're coming out of. But anyway, I'll just show you these slides. And then I'll do a short practice with you. It's a wonderful practice. It's the compassion practice. And here's a, this is the image that appears on our website. And it talks about kind of our pillars, belonging, wisdom, compassion, and flourishing. That's our, you can see, we just met yesterday with this group. This is our advisory committee. They're just wonderful, wonderful group. These are our current and former student leaders. And then the last thing is we're part of a group that's called the Flourishing Academic Network that has these wonderful institutions like Brown University, Stanford, but TCU is also part of it. And here's what we're hoping to do. We eventually would like to build a center and have a room like this one. But as you know, that takes a lot of money, which we don't have. So I put questions, but I'd really like to do one more practice with you. And then I'm happy to take any questions. I'll stay. And if you want to ask me anything, I'd be happy to take your question. So just go ahead and sit up straight like we did before. And just put your feet flat on the floor, back straight, hands resting in a comfortable position. We'll start with one deep breath. And then I'll explain this exercise. And then we'll do just a abbreviated version of it. So let's take one deep breath, just like we did before. Breathe in through the nose. Start from the belly, fill the lungs. Here we go. So this practice is often called the meta. Meta is spelled M-E-T-T-A. Meta is translated usually as loving kindness, but sometimes as compassion. There's all kinds of ways that you can think of this Sanskrit word. And so the basic practice is that we will bring into our minds particular people or groups of people. And I will say out loud a set of short phrases, and they are may you be well, may you be happy, may you be at peace. And so as you imagine this person or group of people, I'll say it out loud, those phrases, and then just repeat them silently to yourself as you imagine this person. And we always start with ourselves because many of us engage in negative self-talk. And this can be really destructive. And so an important part of this practice is to learn to look at ourselves and to talk to ourselves in a different way. And so I invite you to bring an image of yourself, of your own face, into your awareness. You might imagine looking yourself in the mirror this morning as you're getting ready to come to work, maybe in a photograph or a reflection in a body of water, whatever. Whatever is comfortable for you. And so with that image of yourself before you, please repeat the following phrases. May you be well, may you be happy, may you be at peace. May you be well, may you be happy, may you be at peace. Now please draw into your awareness somebody you love dearly, somebody you're very close to, a person who you know, you know deep down has your best interest at heart. Somebody who's always been there for you. This could be a parent, a grandparent, maybe an aunt, an uncle, a sibling, or other family member. It could be your romantic partner, maybe your best friend, it could even be your pet. And so with their face before you, please tell them, may you be well, may you be happy, may you be at peace. May you be well, may you be happy, may you be at peace. Now please draw into your awareness somebody, somebody who you know quite well, but you also know is struggling, is suffering acutely, and this could be for all kinds of reasons. Maybe it's a serious illness. Maybe it's a bad, toxic relationship, a financial or food insecurity, all kinds of issues could cause this. And so just bring an image of that person into your mind's eye and tell them, may you be well, may you be happy, may you be at peace. May you be well, may you be happy, may you be at peace. And now we'll do the part that often people find a bit difficult, and I want to explain why we're doing this. So I'm going to invite you to bring into your awareness somebody, somebody you find to be difficult, a person maybe who annoys you, this could be because of a particular incident, maybe today, but it could also be because of a pattern of behavior or speech. And we do this for a couple of reasons. One is because we simply do not know what is causing a person to act in this way that we find to be annoying or difficult or offensive. We don't know what is behind that. But the other thing is, many of us, and I would say this is true of me, we can have these kinds of negative experiences and then get stuck in this negative cycle of this loop of toxicity. And the research shows that if we do this practice regularly, and for it takes some time, but slowly, slowly those ruts get more and get less deep, they're more shallow. So we spend less time in that negative loop. And so I invite you to bring into your awareness the image of a person who has annoyed you. And please repeat the following phrases. May you be well, may you be happy, may you be at peace, may you be well, may you be happy, may you be at peace. Let's bring into our awareness our group that's here today that's come in the middle of the day to learn a little bit about Asian religious traditions, their meditation, and mindfulness practices. And so in whatever way is comfortable for you, just bring our entire group into your awareness. And please tell us, may you be well, may you be happy, may you be at peace, may you be well, may you be happy, may you be at peace. And then the last group is what Buddhists would call sentient beings, all beings, humans and non-human animals, all the bugs and critters that exist in our world, but other elements of the natural world, rivers, plants, trees, fruits, vegetables, mountains, all of it. Just bring it into your awareness in whatever way is comfortable for you. And please tell us, may you be well, may you be happy, may you be at peace, may you be well, may you be happy, may you be at peace. And now to wrap up this practice, we'll do what we did before when we started. And that is just to take two deep breaths. Just bring to mind something that you're grateful for, or maybe something different from the first time.  Here we go. Thank you, everybody, for coming. Sorry about all the crackling. That's a bit distracting. But I really appreciate your coming today. And I'll stick around if anybody has any questions or comments. If you want to get on our mailing list, I'd be happy to help you. I think Elizabeth has some final words. That was a great presentation. Thank you. I think we all learned something new that we know before and are hopefully feeling less stressed after the mindfulness exercises that Dennis led us through. Thank you, Dr. Dennis. And thank you all of the employee who helped plan today's program and to our audiences for making the time today to help us celebrate Asian-American Pacific Islander Heritage Month. And I also want to acknowledge that this program would not be possible without the support of our city's leadership and diversity inclusion department in its effort to promote the quality of life in Fort Worth. And that includes opportunity and access for all. So everyone be sure to read the brown up to learn about opportunities and help plan and attend future programs. Thank you.


Hi everyone, Sean with jaspyscasebreaks.com here doing 2019 Panini one football 10 box intercase break random team number two where every spot gets you one team in the In the leak so everyone gets a random team NFL high-risk high-reward loose intercase. So this is Master cases with this come with two 10 box intercases. This is one 10 box intercase itself As it says in the description so every box one on card auto so on and so forth looking for crazy stuff like these We find both of these that'd be super cool So here is our customer list from Alexandra Gunnaris first spots purchased down to Richard Castalzo and spots they won an optic 11. You'll see these Nine spots were given away an optic 11 hanger these nine spots were given away an optic 10 last spot mojo straight up Andrew Roth Those were all the spots that were purchased straight up as well No matter how you got into the break whether you want a spot or bought a spot straight up Thank you very much and good luck Here's a list of teams from the card goes down to the Washington football team dice roll to randomize both lists and pair them up two and a one three times one two and three From Alexandros down to Kevin saliva and now three times So you'll see three times on the randomizer three times in the dice now three times on the teams Third and final time from the Chicago Bears down to the New York Giants three times three times on the dice So Alexandros Gunnaris with the Bears Frank Lupo with the Lions Martin Klaus with the Colt Andrew Roth with the 49ers mark There's Nezbauer with the bills Alexandros Gunnaris with the Patriots Kevin Saliba with the Jaguars Ryan Patovsky with the Raiders Roy DiPietro with the Titans Brett Rogers the Falcons Andrew Roth with Washington Jerick Corfage with the Panthers Andrew Roth with the Steelers Robert Stoll with the Chiefs Matt Arnold the Jets Alexandro Gunnaris with the Buccaneers Jake Odum with the Chargers Joseph Weimiller with the Vikings Frank Lupo with the Texans Sean Mattick with the Dolphins Andrew Roth with the Eagles Mike Grzynski with the Saints Tyler Brenner with the Broncos Chris Cataloni with the Cardinals Josh Mountain with the Rams Sean Mattick with the Bangles Jeremy Agno with the Seahawks Mark Nezbauer with the Browns Andrew Roth with the Cowboys Rich Castaldo with the Packers and Joseph Weimiller with the Ravens and Kevin Saliba with the Giants There you go So there is the list trade window is open. Let me sort this by team name get it all on there Jay has the Vikings up for trade anybody Vikings Alexander Madison or Smith jr And whatever veterans they have Tyler has Broncos up for trade Matt's opening Broncos for Jets Tyler, so I'll give it a minute Hey, you never know the answer until you ask Yeah Is the person that has Buffalo in here, I don't know if Marcus in here Joey, I'll give it another 20 seconds 10 five three two one trade window closed Yeah, so try to trade couldn't trade mojo for Vikings Broncos and Who else just Vikings Broncos, isn't there somebody else and Jets So here's the sealed in her case. You can see 2019 football one Let's pop this thing open I Sparkly's gonna be 58 years old Okay, so there's our 10 boxes Here is our finalists Good luck One encased auto sometimes patch auto So let's find out I don't think these are First one We're going rookie four-color patch and auto Jarrett stittum 41 out of 49 For the New England Patriots and Alexandros good airs. What are they gonna do for quarterback Lamar Jackson? Three-color patch and auto four out of 25 That's nice Ravens Joseph Weymiller There you go Joey Second year, but that's a really nice patch. There you go, dude Oh my god, I thought that was Patrick Holmes Miko Hardman, Jr. Rookie three-color patch on the bottom two-color patch on top 19 out of 25 just a couple off the jersey number there Kansas City Chiefs Robert Stowell Send you a box. I can set one aside for you if you want. I can't send it You want can set one side for you to pick up Next time you come by You're talking about just like this thing I Was a nice one Josh Jacobs three-color rookie patch auto three colors on top two colors on the bottom For the Raiders and Ryan Petalski Yeah, if you want, Joey, I can I can set one of these aside for you next time you're down here or whatever It's upside down it's another one for the Patriots Damian Harris rookie autographs. I like the shadowbox look on that seven out of ten Patriots, Alexandros Gunnaris What up Aaron, how are you man? Greetings to you as well Scary Terry McLauren two-color patch on top solid on the bottom 83 out of 125 Washington Andrew Roth last spot mojo Nice scary Terry Box number seven Always good always good This way Another Raider three-color patch on tip two colors on the bottom 85 out of 149 Hunter Renfrow Football version Hunter Renfrow Raiders again Ryan Petalski Pramosa on Saturday. I'm off I'll be running around doing my errands and stuff Saturday Unfortunately if I live closer, I'd be coming down. What time are you going there? This is box number eight Because he's on at nighttime, right? So are you going on you guys going earlier? One of five It's like the jaw of the panther will Greer Carolina Panthers Jarek Corfage. It's a nice one so it's Yeah, it's like the jaw of the panther, right? Yeah You can see where like the the white tooth and like the blue jawline is and the black white tooth blue jawline One one thirty. Yeah, maybe I will See what what I can get done in the morning. I'm building a shed We're gonna have a breaking bad situation in my backyard, it's not my backyard though Upside down again Boom Three Patriot now 48 out of 99 McKeel Harry Alexandros Gunnaris last but not least box 10 Best for last Oh Riley Ridley 22 out of 75 Rookie Auto for the Chicago Bears and Alexandros Gunnaris. There you go That was the break nice 10 boxes, especially at Lamar Jackson


If you're going to see someone in traditional Chinese medicine, you might be getting a weird diagnosis that you don't fully understand, like spleen sheet efficiency, one of our most common diagnoses. But in this video, I wanted to share why each of these diagnoses of a pattern is not just one thing, or even just one organ, like what we call the spleen, but is really the pancreas. It is usually a cluster of symptoms, and as a cluster of physiological pathways that we are treating and are being affected by each meridian or channel, or each urmal compounded formula that we give you. So let's jump in and we'll use spleen sheet deficiency as an example here. Hey guys, I'm Dr. Alex Hein, author of the health book Master of the Day, and doctor of acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine. So before we jump in here, there are two very important links right below this video. The first is if you'd like to become a patient of mine locally in Los Angeles or virtually via telemedicine, you can reach out to my private practice right below this video to learn more. And the second is I've put together a free guide for the rituals that can potentially improve your life with traditional Chinese medicine. And again, that's the first link right below. So there's this phrase mentioned in our medical classics that looks like this. And what it means is if we literally translate it as P chi, let's just use chi instead of as energy, but we'll call it a functional deficiency. Now that character is often translated as the spleen, but that is highly debatable. When we talk about this diagnosis, you know, spleen chi deficiency involves typically low appetite, bloating, loose stools, people with a paler complexion, people who catch colds easily, but functionally, this diagnosis can include issues like anemia. It can include issues like low immunity, people who catch every upper respiratory infection every season. It can include things like people who are prone to anxiety sometimes. So this idea of spleen chi deficiency being just even a digestive symptom is on its own, not necessarily true. So let's talk about how some of these patterns like a diagnosis of spleen chi deficiency, or if your acupuncturist says, you know, the spleen is weak, let's talk about what that really means. There's a modern, famous formula that is from around the year 1100 called sujinzitang, which is for gentlemen decoction.  Now this formula traditionally is indicated for this pattern.  But when you look at the clinical research, not only within our profession for the other patterns that this formula can treat, but also what this formula does clinically because it has been well studied in cancer research. So sujinzitang, this formula, is incredible because one thing that it actually has been well studied for is improving the blood values of people who are undergoing radiation and chemotherapy. So some of my patients that are in the process of cancer care have to discontinue their treatment because their blood values are not looking good. Now there are interesting studies, many of them, showing how sujinzitang can basically mitigate, it can reduce the decrease of white blood cells, red blood cells, hematocrit, and in irradiated mice. So two groups, mice that were getting irradiated, mice that were getting irradiated plus taking sujinzitang as a preventative, they had much less precipitous decreases in those blood values, which was good for their prognosis and good because they could continue their treatment. So where does this fall into digestion? Right? But there's a saying in TCM that the spleen generates the blood and often blood, let's just say a blood disorder like anemia, one of the ways we treat it is by using formulas that treat spleen sheet efficiency. So there's a fascinating series of relationships here. And in addition, there are other diagnoses like functional uterine bleeding, right? When women are just spotting between their cycle, we often treat the spleen and are not treating necessarily the hormones per se. We give formulas for spleen sheet efficiency to stop bleeding in between the cycle, spotting. When we say the spleen generates the blood, the spleen, this diagnosis, this pattern diagnosis encompasses things like digestion, right? And when we say digestion, let's get specific. Enzyme production, right? People who aren't producing enough enzymes from the pancreas, levels of stomach acid, right? Often low stomach acid, people who get nauseous easily, low appetite, as well as hunger hormones. So it will regulate those hormones. Secondarily, we're talking about immune system functioning. These formulas for spleen sheet efficiency will not only dramatically improve energy during the day, help people get colds and flus less often. So the immune system. Third, we can say blood cell generation, we talked about that, right? And then just subjective feeling of energy. So lots of people will feel a much greater boost in a formula that primarily is treating digestion, but includes herbs like ginseng that work on the HPA axis. So each diagnosis is a bucket of hundreds of biochemical reactions and dozens of physiological pathways, if not hundreds, but one formula can treat a pattern that may seem unrelated. So very, very interesting, these kinds of diagnoses and the patterns and the symptoms that they treat. Something else that the spleen is associated with is, you know, in TCM, all of these organs are holographic in nature. So there's an emotion associated with it too. Right? Remember, these ancient doctors, this is the original functional medicine. It's a systems-based biology where how is that an emotion affects certain organs more than others? Right? It's very interesting. Right? Why does when you feel an intense sadness, it affects the lung, right? This sort of weeping, this crying, this, that people have, right? So that's why sadness is grief is associated with the lung in that way. But the spleen is associated with something translated as pensiveness or thought or worry.   It's palpable. You know it to be true. And that's just emotion. Right? That's the stress hormones. But we're talking about the spleen. It's associated with this character called si that the ancient texts use. Now si, I'll break it down here, is comprised of two characters. The bottom one is the heart. So this little four strokes here is the heart. And the top shows a field, the same kind of field that you cultivate. So this is image of a field or cultivating our work or like cultivating something over the heart, almost like you're racking the brain, the heart, the heart and the mind are sort of associated with mental function in the state of the spirit and that sort of thing in traditional Chinese medicine. But there's this visualization of labor or doing something that's racking the heart or the mind. So it's similar to this term, this word so call is like the contemplator think over something. So this excessive rumination is one of the things that affects the spleen digestion. Right? Now, this is really, really important to know because for some people, their GI issues may be purely about the stress response.  They're not taking proper meals. There's too much going on. So sitting and eating at your desk, flipping through Instagram, doing work is not resting. Right? This is sycola. This is like thinking over things, trying to get things done. So the spleen, very, very interesting organ in TCM and this pattern of spleen sheet deficiencies, one of the most common we give out. But again, remember, it's not just one thing. It's many, many, many diagnoses all combined in one. That's what I have for you today, guys. Check out those links below the video and I'll see you soon.


Hey, good morning everyone welcome to a new week. Hope you all are doing well. I Hope my voice is audible enough. Yeah. Okay. All right. Let's just begin this time with a word of prayer Maybe one of us can please leave in prayer Silly yeah, go ahead Hallelujah father come before a presence in the name of Jesus father We thank you so much for this brand-new the Lord as we begin our session to the Lord Holy Spirit you guide us bless a pastor with your wisdom your inside your revelation so that Lord Jesus He will be able to teach the world according to your will and bless each one of us Lord help us so that we can understand Lord The word which has been taught by a pastor Lord God Bless each one of us and also we pray for good network connection so that there will be no hindrances in our Class Lord we thank you. We bless you. We honor you Lord in Jesus Mike. You know, we pray amen. Amen. Amen. Thank you, silly Thank you. All right, so We've been talking about the ministry of the teacher. We started off with chapter six where we saw Jesus as our example As a teacher we looked at how he ministered To the people that he met with that he the thousands of people that came to hear him He also taught them before he could do those science miracles and wonders and then chapter seven We saw the teacher in the early church how the ministry of the teacher even after Jesus's resurrection When we look at the book of Acts and then how teachers were raised up in Jerusalem Antioch Samaria going on to different parts of even Asia Minor the Apostle Paul did a lot of You know this this teaching and raising up of leaders And I'm sure everywhere that he went in his missionary journey. He was able to raise up teachers and You know so that the word of God would be taught to people And then we went to chapter eight. We saw the restoration of the ministry of the teacher so after the book of Acts there was a Season called the Dark Ages And when you look at history, there was absolutely no kind of teaching no preaching also There was no ministry of the gifts of the spirit Everything had just come down to Very religious systems set in place and But after that the Lord, you know used many people many great men and women of God who You know came and began to teach the word of God the importance of God's word to be You know interpreted in the right way schools of Bible colleges Seminaries were started during the early let's say 1900s You know these seminaries and Bible colleges, which even continue now as well. So So today we look at chapter nine And chapter nine is practical keys to doing the ministry Of the teachers. So yesterday we also sorry not yesterday, but last week we talked we also discussed on You know all of us had a lot of questions and we discussed on how uh, you know how we can be effective teachers and You know some of the challenges that we may face like teaching is Uh, I would say teaching is a little more difficult than preaching this teaching involves a lot of Lots and lots of preparation it involves digging deep and research and all of these things. So Uh, so we looked at some of the challenges as well. So we'll move to chapter nine What are the practical keys to doing the ministry of the teacher? right now all of us We have established the fact that Teaching is for all of us right it is not Yeah, we talked about that in chapter one right the ministry function and the ministry gift right so we all will get an opportunity Right to present the gospel and it could be even a three minute or a four minute You know just to just to you know, probably explain a verse Right Just explaining a simple verse Uh, you're doing the ministry of a teacher Right now when I say when we say teacher, it's it's not like you'll only You know have the setting of okay hundred people sitting in a classroom. You're standing there if that happens, that's good But even if it's in a smaller setting Uh, each one of us can do the ministry of a teacher. Well, here's the first point develop a passion for knowledge All right, let's read that was Matthew 13 and 52 Matthew chapter 13 verse 52. Yes, any one of us can please read Matthew 15 and sorry Matthew 13 and verse 52 Matthew 13 52 Then he said to them therefore every scrap instructed concerning the kingdom of heaven is like a householder Who brings out of his treasure things new and old Yeah, thank you so much Ellie So it is it is some you know, it says there who brings out the treasures both new and old right now Without a passion for knowledge right It's very difficult for us to be effective teachers All right. No, I like that word passion right passion is something that You know, we have in instilled already in us A passion could also be developed right now It says here develop a passion for knowledge So if you're already passionate about knowledge, you're one step ahead Right. Now, how do I develop a passion for knowledge? How do I? You know If I want to be a teacher, what should I do to develop knowledge to get knowledge? Right. It's obvious right. We need to be Researchers good readers Right. We we mean to be interested in reading material things that are happening right now It involves a lot of dedication a lot of time a lot of preparation right so for example if I'm If I'm teaching about, you know example, right uh Take a topic that is little, you know involves a lot of research so End time just ketology Right. So for example, I'm teaching that now if I don't have a passion To you know to bring out the study of end times what will happen is I can just follow notes and deliver the You know the teaching and you know Just go on with whatever is there But that's not the point of a teacher. We must develop A passion for knowledge. So what should we do? Okay, go back Read history Right. Go back and see what from the scriptures. What does God say? Okay, these are churches right God is talking the Lord Jesus is talking to these churches then he's talking about all these different things So how can I relate to it? So maybe I can go to commentaries go to you know Different bible study That is available online, right and and read about it, right? What do these writers say look up theologians? What is their understanding? about this whole thing and you know, there are different kinds of You know Beliefs right now, right some believe in pre tribulation post tribulation mid tribulation What about the rapture? So we gotta You know the the bible is our standard, but we must be able to dig in deeper Right and if I'm if I'm doing something like you know, if I'm studying eschatology or I'm gonna teach it I will definitely look up geography Right. I will definitely look up World events that have happened over the last 10 years and what are the world events that make? Uh, you know, maybe for the next 10 years, I will definitely look into that It's something very interesting. I know I'm going off Our course here, but this is something very interesting. I was reading about um, israel as a nation and What their plans to do and it was really really interesting to see that israel is in talks with No, the the leaders of the muslim faith to buy the land Where the the dome is right and we know that's that's so important because you know There's come a time when the muslims are willing to sell that plot now for those who want to context that that plot is david's lab david's plot and That land and apparently mohammad had a vision in that place and they built a mosque or a dome like Structure the muslims have built that and and so The jews are willing to pay how much ever it is required because for them. It's a holy land It's it's something that belongs to their ancestors king david so right now They are in talks to buy it And if they buy it tell me what is going to happen like Everything becomes so In you know close and you're able to relate these things. This is a world event But if I don't know why is it important in the scriptures? I will not be able to effectively communicate that But we know that the temple is going to be rebuilt there the lord jesus when he comes Uh after the battle of marmageddon, he'll come he'll sit in that temple He will reign for a thousand years. So so what am I trying to bring out? If I don't know What's happening in these world events or things that have happened I may not be able to interpret scriptures and teach the scriptures in the right way All right, I can teach it, but It may not be as effective as it should be Look at the old testament Right if you do a study of the old testament and it's it's wonderful to see the prophets And why god sent those prophets? Why is he sending a set of prophets to not To the north of israel some of them to the south Why did he send people from the south to go to north? We look at the history of the difference between the people in the north of israel and the south of israel. It's beautiful. It's it's it's so wonderfully portrayed in the old testament But if we have a mind saying oh old testament, there's so much supporting We're not going to be able to effectively teach it, right? look at history look at what The the nation of israel what what does it stand for or or the the people? What do they do? right the cultures the background right And and why is it so important? You know even I was reading about I forget that the the sycamore tree it had so much of You know There's so much of value to that tree all through the old testament Right, so what's it about the tree the sycamore tree? Why is god why is god so fascinated about that tree? You know you when you do these researchers We can either look at it and you know just look at it read it and walk past it Or we can develop a passion and say I want to know more about this. I want to go deeper. I want to learn more Right, so it's a choice that you and I can make Now we have a 15 minute session, right? We can present We can just say okay. This is what it is as a teacher, but it's Our responsibility to go back to the word and begin to read it Begin to really do research and you know now It's such a wonderful time that we are living in where you know You just in the tap of a button you get all information whatever information you want you get it on google right you you've got You know hundreds of commentaries and resources that are available books that are available So develop this passion to read Let uh, one of the things I do is I make it a point that I read at least two books in two weeks Right, so now it's not like a target, but I like to read right now I'm reading the book fine fulfill and follow by andrew wammack and it's a wonderful book Right sometimes when we read no, we we may not even understand and we'll think hey I knew it all this while But I didn't think of it this way No, let me give you this example In the book fine fulfill and follow andrew wammack's There's a passage there talking about how do we find our calling and how god finds us through these seasons And he's talking about moses right and You see he's so beautifully writes this right i'm sure you know what i'm sure you know I knew it, but I never thought of it this way but Every time there were there was a world leaders great leaders coming into this world The enemy tried to kill them Moses Right uh You know the pharaoh says kill every first born somehow, you know Moses mother we know the story right put him in the basket sent him away And god protected him and he was raised up in the palace and to jesus Kill every male child Right so every time there was two prominent powerful leaders coming into This world the enemy tried his best To stop that When I read it, I said Hey, it sounds so simple right uh You may think hey, how come you didn't think of that, but I didn't But but if I think of it, yeah Right and so there's so much that you know, we can you know learn And and I and develop things And when we do this, you know, it's just going to empower us. It's going to right. We're not doing god a favor Right by developing a passion for knowledge. It's We are getting closer to him Right A teacher has a passion for knowledge of spiritual matters He's hungry to know the why the where the what and the how Why where what and how? Right. He's hungry to know that Why did Have you ever thought of this? Why did God tell Abraham, you know the people of israela going to go into Uh, you know 400 years of bondage Right. What was it? Why why did and what were they doing in bondage? What were they doing in egypt? right And and when you think of it, why were they there? And how did they end up, you know living their life in those 400 years now? What was the outcome of this? Why did you see the moment moses had? You know killed the egyptian and he ran away Uh, what was you know everything changed the dynamics changed? And i'm just giving the example of moses, but there's so much, right? um And you look at uh, look at even uh, the new testament Look at the book of uh acts and you read it. It's so powerful Right. It's so wonderful or look at the life in the ministry of jesus Right. Why did why did god make jesus wait for 30 years? Right 20 start off when he was in those early 20s And then you ask these questions to yourself You try to understand And and and and that's where you you know, you're hungry for god and all of this Now we must be very careful all of this learning must Take us closer to god because there are many times these too much of learning will Cause us to ask too many questions You remember that some questions are best left for god to answer But somebody came up to me and said Jesus said we're preparing the mansions In heaven has he started preparing now that i don't know Right. I i can't say he's already started preparing or he's not started that i don't know But he says don't you know that There will be mansions for you up in heaven So it's going to be the how and when he's going to start now that i don't know But there are certain things that we have That we can study that we can really dig deep And you know I was fascinated by this whole thing of you know, how jesus Uh, I learned this maybe a couple of years ago, but it's fascinating about you know, I read it my I'm so excited Now the whole thing of how why jesus Rows up from when he rose up from the dead. Why did he you know cover the Fold the cloth and keep it there And you know, it's so amazing to see that everything the lord god does the lord jesus and how god Does things there's a reason for it Right and so our knowledge is just a drop in the ocean We can continue to acquire more and more of it But Here's a very very important point, you know as teachers and and Uh, you know students of the word of god, we go on we study study study and there'll come a time when we are very Affluent with the things of the word of god, right? We just know where our scriptures where are what does it mean what they're saying Maintain a humble heart Because if we should not Let all of that knowledge go up to pride Right. I always say this to myself personally. I say pride goes before the fall So the more I study learn the more I should humble myself the more I should say god Whatever i'm learning let it be useful for my life. Let it be useful for the people that we are ministering to Maintain a humble heart. There's no point of learning all of this and then we walk in pride We it's of no use Let's read first corinthians chapter eight was one and two first corinthians chapter eight one and two First corinthians chapter eight was one and two Now about food sacrifice to idols We know that we all possess knowledge knowledge pops up But love builds up the man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he out to know Thank you. Thank you. Jafina. So Knowledge puffs up now. Let me bring a context of what paul is saying here, right? The church and corinth have Intellectuals in the church, right? And there's a problem here now. What is the problem? There are people believers who are having food sacrifice to idols and this is affecting the new believers who are coming into christ Right and what is happening is the people are saying no, that's okay. It doesn't matter Right so paul is saying Knowledge puffs up but love edifies now The reason you are doing this is because you know if you that an idol is nothing and the food And and god is greater than all of it and you are grown up to that place a place of maturity You know it your knowledge has you have the knowledge of it, right? You know who your god is yet this knowledge has puffed you up in such a way that it's okay to see a fellow believer fall Because of this matter and if you go later on In verse 10, I think he talks about how our food does not bring us close to god Not does it bring us take us away from god, right? And so he's trying to tell them you you all Have knowledge of it, but you're not maintaining a humble heart So paul goes on and he says if if my brother or my sister in christ Is if it's making him or her Ask questions or to deny the faith. I would rather not eat it Right so so this is a huge topic But but what's he trying to say don't let your knowledge bring people to a place of Doubt and fear or to a place of you know feeling insecure That's what's happened here Because remember the they are all most of them were there was a goddess named aphrodite and caught and and they were Worshiping that idol now they suddenly they accept the lord jesus and maybe somebody has shared the gospel. They come into the church So they don't know anything And if they see somebody hate this leader of the church that's eating food sacrifice to the idols, which you know probably We've done in our temple there in aphrodite It's affecting them It's affecting their walk with god and these Leaders are saying it's all right. No problem. Uh, you know god is bigger than all of it and they're puffed up So he goes on and he says knowledge puffs up, but love edifies if you really Really had love for that person that believer you would have Stop what you're doing just so that this person can you know continue to walk with christ So maintaining a humble heart is the key of Of you know being doing the ministry of a teacher The more we read it is obvious the more we will grow Right, it's not like we're going to read and stay on the same level All of us right when you joined here on your first year first semester. It is obvious That you have grown in maturity. You have learned over these You know one and a half or two years you have learned right? You're not on the same level yet You know, it should be a place where We are humble. We are saying god Help me to maintain this humble heart Even as I learn even as I go into third year even as even if I plan to do my higher studies Learn more about the hebrew the greek and all of those things. It's wonderful. Nothing wrong about gaining knowledge But it's important that knowledge and humility are summed up together Right and and we could see that in jesus, right There were times he was very intellectual There were times he said he didn't have to prove his intellectual his wisdom. He didn't have to prove it. He just Just worked miracles or he just blessed people And uh, that's the key here, right? Uh maintain a humble heart pursue knowledge maintain a humble heart walk in love right, so Let's look at a few points here developer wide range of topics Right Now there are plenty of topics we can study on, you know Something that you know, I'm just going to share some of the things that I love to read is You know and and continue to learn it's like hermeneutics. I love to Understand scripture and bring it You know to interpret it the right way because the moment I interpreted the wrong way I may put across a wrong message. So how many things something that I really love word study In a character study passage study. So what I do is Now this is just an example, right? You don't have to do this Uh, but these are things that I've done and I continue to do so in my bible So I've taken up Letters, right? So the letter of romans or the roman's first second quarentian. So all of paul's epistles I've done a word study right and I continue to do that every now and then so I I mark with different colors right, so the word grace is probably in my bible. It's yellow and There's there's love which is green and there's righteousness which is red Right and so when you look at my bible, it's all you know, I know I've done a word study. So I know, okay Uh, so I know in the book of romans, you will find more of the red Because righteousness is there all throughout the scriptures All throughout the letter of rom rom romans, right? So So you can do word studies, right? You can do character studies character studies take up a character research study Look at their paul look at the things that they've done Look at what how where they've been successful where they have failed Right and and apply it in your own life, right? Look at examples like joseph Right, uh, what happened to him, right? And and learn from their lives that he he was a wonderful boy, but he didn't have to you know Continue to keep going and telling his brother. See this is what this is what happened But he was a kid. He didn't he was just you know wanting to go to the brother. So what are the things that We learn right even though he was sold off. He there was no bitterness in him And we see the end he grew to such a maturity. He forgave them God elevated him look at david Like at a young age. He knew it yet. He was running for his life became the king. What happened? He sinned Um, and then he he lost his son and so all these things right we can we can study about them the apostle paul The lord jesus himself So doing character studies Then you got passage studies Right, uh, you can talk about passages in the scriptures Uh, I remember when I was in uh, bubble call is I did this whole passage study And we had to you know come in front and Share what we have learned and it was wonderful. I remember doing the whole thing of uh, you know, um Elijah and uh at at mount car Mel what happened right against those? uh 800 prophets of aserot and doing a whole study and so I studied about aserot. What are they what what is the Uh, you know, what what is their belief system? I think it was 400 aserot and 400 of bal And so So what are they? What do they believe and what is their god? Uh, why was elijah so upset? What made him to come up with this whole? You know challenge up on that mountain and uh, you know, so it is wonderful. So you do those passage studies You apply it in your own life I then Some of the things I enjoy right now is to I'm starting on on dreams and interpretation of dreams I really enjoy that visions dreams And how god can speak to us through these visions and dreams How even through the book of revelations god speaks through allegories Old testament as well new testament is where he speaks through allegories, right? You shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water It's an allegory, right? And so Just if I get a dream, how can I go back? How can I interpret the scripture in the right way? And there's a lot of material right online you can listen to sermons listen to podcasts Lots and lots of materials that's available online. So develop a wide range of topics right There may be some topics that you may be really interested in So you can spend more time and you feel your call for that So for example, if you feel your call to be a worship leader, you can spend more time studying about praise and worship and How god instituted it? What are the ways of if you feel your calling is um No pastors, you know, sorry about that as well So there are certain things that will really draw us close but uh, we must take that step to develop An interest to learn things that we may not really be interested in Right, uh, so I can't say I'm not interested in dreams and visions or I'm not interested in the prophetic So I'll just hold no We must develop that interest right learn about it See watch people ask questions right And you know, I remember growing up Once I became a believer I used to ask a lot of questions Some of them are very silly. I even ask a lot of questions now Uh, but some of them are very silly questions, but I want to understand it Right, it's all right to ask questions. It's all right to you know, even if it's something very simple It's all right just to get a good understanding of what your uh, what your understanding is right? So Next point question inquire investigate and search Right investigate search go online And uh, you know, I remember when I used to study the word I used to Have these you know Two three bibles and then I had to go from here to there to there And then check. Okay. What does this mean? And And uh, it was hard, right? It was hard But I enjoyed doing it. But now of course I I do have those bibles I do look up look it up every now and then but I just see what's easier Just go google save commentaries put the worst down And there are plenty of commentaries available. Just see what what it means different views that people have uh interpreted the right way and Right, uh, inquire investigate search research Learn unlearn So all of this is included now Keep it simple develop the ability To make the complex simple. Now. This is a very important task of a teacher My keeping it simple right You know, for example apologetics or the series that we're doing faith and science now Right. There's there's a lot of material involved, right? There's a lot of science Yet we must make it in a way we and I feel it is you know It's a way where we are able to make those complex things simple Right and we must be able to do that in everything that we study Like there are some things which will be complex but try to break it down And so I remember uh, you know leviticus. I didn't want to read it for many years. I didn't want to read it Right, uh It just for me it was too much right But I realized I have to read it. I have to study it so that I can you know, teach it and uh Old testament survey is something I've been teaching for quite some time and I wanted to learn it right, so We must develop that ability to make it simple As much as possible But while we are making it simple, we must Be sure that we don't divert from the truth just so that we make people understand The truth is the truth Right. We must not You know, who is the gospel we must not you know, uh, give half the gospel or half the message that we're trying to say Give it in a way that is simple and easily understood Right. Now this comes over time right, uh, as we keep teaching as we keep learning Uh, it'll come over time right Keep revelation fresh And stay fresh in the word Right. This is very very important keeping revelation fresh right, uh sometimes we may Especially when we're reading the word and we're reading it with the mindset that I already know this Uh, very unlikely that we may receive a revelation out of it Right, but keep it fresh Right keep keep reminding yourself of the previous revelations that you had in god's word and the Previous ways that god ministered to you and then continue to pursue for newer and fresher revelations of god Right, uh We must do that. We must do that And we Establish the fact that as a teacher we must be reading the word of god Right, we can't say uh, right. I read one chapter today Uh, so I've done my part uh Maybe if you're very busy and you got to go to work. That's all right, but uh, but if you feel you Want to be a teacher you really want to get into god's word. You want revelations. We must spend time in god's presence We must Right in the sense that we must be willing to go dig deeper study deeper right picture this right I remember this was acts one eight Now you will receive power to be a witness I read it or you think thousands of times But all of a sudden one day I was just reading and I read the same verse in a commentary And the commentary said The greek word for witness is matter And I'm sure I've used this before but these are things that will stick to me Till the end of my life Because it's a revelation. It's it's it's there in the spirit. It's not up here only it's in the spirit Right, I read that and I said so god Has poured out his spirit upon us that we may be You will receive power to be a martyr for jesus christ. That's what the word really means The word witness greek is matter So that means god will pour out his spirit on us That even if it comes to a place of being martyred for christ We will be willing to go through it because of the power of the holy spirit Now that verse acts one eight is so different to what we read it here And so you can translate the same thing witness everywhere there's witness jesus said no you'll be my witness. It's all matter The greek of course in some places. We also meant to to you know to witnesses to to to show Jesus to people Or to be ministers of the gospel But the greek there in my acts one eight means martyr And so there are plenty of things the same way right we we get revelations and you got to keep it fresh stay fresh in the word of god right I've been reading about Jeremiah and and how this God uses this insignificant man who says I can't speak I can't I'm a weak person But if you look at once his ministry started There are potions. I think it's I forget the chapters, but There are potions where he's he's rebuking the israelites and he's He's telling them See you people are worshiping idols And he's giving this whole list of how those idols are made the same man who was fearful Right who said don't call me don't choose me.    You're staying and you're you're in you're You're in captive right now Under the Babylonian rule, but there will come a time if you turn away from your You're the things that you're doing that are detestable and gods as you turn away from it. I have plans for you Right now we can't take I have plans to prosper you give you a good hope and a good future just like that You never see the context like I can't keep living a sinful life and say god you said you have plans for me to prosper me Yes, that's his plan, but he's also saying look at context of Jeremiah He's telling the people the useful lights you first turn away and you see the plans god has for you Right, so there's so much that we can study and learn keep Revelation fresh keep keep staying in the word of god Practice before you teach now. I'm guilty of not doing this at times right But it's a good habit initially I used to practice a lot like personally I used to practice There are times, you know, even when we are doing sessions for now You know, not only in bible callers, but in different places I practice and whether it's recording for anything or whether it's for the students and colleges practice Now practice, what does it help us? You know when it comes to practice and most I would say it involves two things right one is Being materially Prepared right So you have your material you have your points you have your examples you have your you know Bible verses you have everything Right, you prepare it right you prepare in the right way And you have it probably have a ppt or you have the notes available you yourself You either have a physical note or you have a You know a device a laptop or a phone and then You practice how are you going to hold it? How are you going to stand? How are you going to just how are you going to start off by teaching? and I think You know last time we were talking You know in a couple of meetings we had we said the first 10 seconds in delivering a A message is very important Like the first 10 seconds It's important. So how are you going to start off? How are you going to? Now it's not always the first 10 seconds But you get the you you know you grip the audience that you're speaking to in those first 10 15 seconds I'm sure all of us open YouTube and you get those ads You wait for this skip this is just sometimes So same thing this 10 15 seconds the initial first 10 15 seconds very important So you you practice how you're going to start off how you're going to You know begin the teaching are you going to begin it with a story begin? How how do you plan with the worse or you're going to explain something that happened? And then how are you going to summarize the whole thing? I'm sure you've learned all of this in homiletics as well Uh, you know, how are you going to end it? What what is the context you're going to end on how you're going to help the listeners to apply? Uh what they have heard Right, uh, so you can practice a thing wrong in practicing right, I got plenty of Uh sermons that you know That that I have I keep practicing it I mean the series that's going right now whenever I get the opportunity to share Uh, I practice it Right because I know it's not an easy sermon. I have to practice it Uh, and same goes with teaching preaching everything right And lastly be teachable Devil a good teacher is always teachable Right, uh A good teacher is always In a place of being teachable right, so Never must a teacher say, okay, I know all this so it's all right now Good teacher is teachable Right, so so it's important to come to a place where we can You know continue to receive from our leaders from our pastors from people that we know Right, it could be somebody who is You know just a believer in christ, you know, just serving in the church and they may want to share something with you Uh, it is very important that we don't look down on them and say, hey, you know what I'm teaching for five or 10 years and Uh, and I've been doing this and this and this this is what I know Uh, that would be the wrong stance to take if somebody is sharing something we may know it It's all right to share it from them It's all right And then if you feel you can add your inputs or or even if it's the same thing And you already know it god can speak to you in a different way My god can speak to you in a different way that same thing that you already know Right, so be teachable people may say, you know after Preaching or teaching people may come up to you and say, uh, you know, I feel this is what what you said is not Right, it's not making sense Or this is what I feel about it. It's okay. Right be teachable. You you tell them. Hey, why don't we discuss about it? Right, the wrong stance to take is you're telling me Right, you're telling me, you know how many hours I spent Studying this that's the wrong stance to take Right, so being teachable again is Requires a humble heart requires, you know a heart of just saying god I want to learn more and god can use anyone To speak and minister to us Right, so with this we complete the ministry of the evangelist And the ministry of the teacher, right? So let's take a break and We'll take a 10 minutes break. We'll come back at 10 o'clock And we'll just spend some time Just discussing some more like let's take a break and come back any questions Probably we can come back and take questions if you have questions you can also put it on the chat And then we can discuss about it next class, right? Let's take a break. Thank you


Yeah.  Like in my club, one gave me $20,000. Ooh. And I throw it. Ooh. Mm-mm. It's worth it. 20 bands in your head.   And you threw it. Yeah. Don't boss talk one-on-one, one-on-one. Yeah, we gon' talk. So we go in there, I go into the house or whatever, and he comes out, got his little bag with him. And he's like, man, I made some money today.  But he go and pull out 250,000 cans. There's nothing. Like it ain't nothing. And second though about me, I immediately moved from it. Yeah, I would do the same thing.  What is this nigga doing? Because I'm quiet. He don't know that side of me. He didn't know. He want me to be like I am on the ground. I know what he wanted. That's what nigga think. That's not me. I have to know you to show you that side of you. I know he. It ain't easy. But he want me to just show out. And I don't do that.  He took me down to his swimming pool. He opened up the garage and show me some cars. All black. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Ain't no stopping. Yeah, ain't no stopping. Yeah, don't do it to him champ. I remember you took pictures of that. I said, you got your phone? He say, yeah. He say, I'm from the gold, do you? Hmm, what? He say, do you. He left and I did me. I'm talking about the video.  Hell yeah. You have like an East wing and a West wing and all that. It's going down.   So I'm taking pictures, walking around this motherfucker.  Can't get it.     That's what I'm here for. To help you. That's real. You know what I'm saying? That's what I'm here for to help you, my brother.  You know, he got his own nightclub. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like his nightclub. Yeah, I know. I know. At his house. No, in Vegas. Oh, yeah, yeah. I don't know what you're talking about. Yeah, I remember. The girl's collection. Yeah, yeah, yeah. She nobody? So we, he had the Rolls Royce pull up front.  So we get, you know me, I'm a gentleman. You know, he had, he have a, I always have a masseuse with him. He always get massage.  He like, nah, you riding the back with me. We vibe. Yeah. She can get up there or whatever. And then showing you love. He wanna just, yeah.  Yeah, rock out. So I'm looking at the stars. Yeah, because there's a bling, bling, bling everywhere. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he's seeing that, but he's seeing how humble and grateful I am. Like I kept saying, thank you. Like, nigga, that's enough. You supposed to be him, nigga.  Mate, nice. What's the champ? Oh, what's up, baby? Money main. Oh, motherfucker. You know what I'm talking about? Luxury. Yeah, you see the stars. So we have a good time. We up in there. We know he got struples and stuff and stuff like that. You know, I'm just chilling.  Like, man, I'm gonna get a dance. I don't really gonna cry about street clubs like that. I was like, I'm gonna go to the ATM. Get some money. Throw a cup of $500, I ain't trippin'. Yeah.  Like, if my club wouldn't get me $20,000. Ooh. And I'd throw it. Ooh. It's worth it. 20 bands in your head.  And you threw it? Yeah. Threw it out. This is good. Right. You know what I'm saying? Man, nigga. They'd be happy when he come in there.  We kicked it for a while. That's when I did the video on the car. Yeah, yeah, I remember that. I saw that video. I keep in mind, I don't know Florida. So I have to, I'm trying to figure it out.  Let's do this. No, that's what we want. But I love the fact when you said that he left you with the cars and he said, do you? So he want that from that moment on. But with all the respect, you still want to ask, man, can I, you know, whatever?