I went to the second weekend in Phoenix with Geshe Michael teaching Lam Rim. He is the most charming, skillful, genuine being in the universe. The teaching was like a love-in you could take your mom to. Perfect. I see now how important it is for me, and I would argue for the other care takers as well, to leave DMU for a while every now and then. Perspective is vital as is doing your job with joyful effort.

Phoenix confuses me. I think it is the worst sort of city I've ever been to but there is some kind of continuity and order to it that is strangely comforting. I don't know. I have to see more of it and meet the people there.

Back at DMU the retreatants are getting ready to get out of another one month deep retreat. This means we can take packages in to them. Getting too much mail during deep retreat can be really distracting, I am told. Things seem quiet and good in the valley and calm in the camp ground. There was some kind of tension there in the last few months. I think the stress of the winter and new people and a new phase of DMU created the tension. It's difficult to make a small community work smoothly at times. The friction is good for inner work, I will say.

Lord, I'm so tired I can't think. More to come from the high desert.