You weren't here this morning. So you probably have a lot more to say. Jump in again now. There are two things that... occupy my mind or that I'm thinking of when the topic is enactment rituals and turning words? One of my experiences is that if I'm not directly at the place of the ritual, in the Johannishof or in a specific practice, One thing is that when I'm not at Johanneshof or Crosstown or any place where there are rituals, but somewhere else, that I do not enact any rituals. Really?

[01:07]

You don't have a cup of coffee in the morning at a certain time? I don't do a cup of coffee. The cup of coffee takes me. This is called a ritual. That's why I like rituals. One does something again and again and then suddenly it does me. And I like it how rituals get me and let me be alive. And somehow there's more happening than just a cup of coffee.

[02:14]

And it's not clear to me how to deal with this, really. Or how it deals with me. And the other day all of us in the house went up to Rashi's study to listen to a heiji monk's chanting. And the feeling we could feel and listen to, the way how the monks engaged in the ritual, That's something I can feel and experience. And that I don't understand. but somehow I feel that the power of the ritual brings me into the moment.

[03:37]

So this is the kind of power of ritual that brings me into the moment. Okay. We could say that the heart keeps beating for 50 to 100 years as a kind of necessary ritual. And you could also say that the heart beats for 50 or 100 years. And that's also a kind of ritual. Sometimes it's helped to lie with a cup of coffee. And sometimes it helps to lie with a cup of coffee. Or more. Yeah, well, I don't want to go into that. Okay. Okay, your own Frank's copy. Yeah. I was in Frank's group and everybody in the group said that in one way or other both rituals and turning words are very important in their practice. So it's the same for me, and I cannot even imagine a morning without my every morning ritual of sitting zazen and making full bows.

[05:05]

And I found it very helpful the way you explained, I think it was in the last Winter Branches, you explained the four Bios. And you said it's to give oneself away and to give in and give up, give oneself in the world. And that's an unexplicable, wonderful experience. It's true. As is love. And also in daily life there are some rituals I do for myself or by myself, and sometimes combined with turning wounds.

[06:27]

For example, when I have difficult discussions I consciously enter the room by stopping first when entering the room and the threshold and bring to my mind that it is already connected. And what I notice is that not only fears and anxieties but also feelings that you have towards these people have inclinations or prejudices more or less in the background. And I notice that what happens when I do that, that all kinds of fears or... Prejudices.

[07:44]

...prejudices, or when I feel antipathy towards these people, they go... Antipathy. ...antipathy, that that goes into the background and is less important. And it seems that a completely new or not anticipated situation can arise, And thus a new situation can appear and it's different from what I could have imagined beforehand. Nice for the people you meet with. Sometimes. When the topic for our discussion was said immediately one ritual that I do in the evenings when I come home

[08:45]

I light the candle in front of the Buddha and offer incense. This is for me a very It's a conscious act. And I take time for it. And I do this with all my senses there. So looking and smelling and feeling how I move. And it's also a mental action that I imagine certain people.

[10:02]

in that I imagine certain people or certain situations, consciously. And that is a very physical action that I do, which I experience as opening up space. and it's a very physical act which I experience as opening a space. And it's almost like I enter this opened space and this space has a effect back on me. And earlier I thought that somehow I change a context or I consciously open an alternative space that is different from my working world, for example.

[11:42]

but it seems to me that with that I create a kind of opposite space or certainly very different from my working space. what I can do consciously and kind of control. And it is not only that I open the room and the room opens me, but it has a kind of radiation, so I open this room for the whole apartment, so it is not only limited to this area where the Buddha is standing, but it is also connected to the whole apartment. And it feels like that I do not just open this space and the space opens me, but the whole apartment is encompassed in this open space. Encompassed. Encompassed. I think it wouldn't work for me if there wasn't this physical aspect, if it was only a purely mental, intellectual fulfillment, it wouldn't work like that, without this physicality.

[13:04]

And it seems to me that it can only work because there is this physical component in this action and it's not just a mental act. Like unfolding physically. And to me it seems that with the tonic words it's almost identical, it's almost the same. When I absorb these turning words, I mean deeply into every cell of my body, it's also like unfolding my whole body.

[14:39]

Yeah, thanks. It's funny, you know, these things, it's not somebody, you couldn't know what can happen from doing a ritual like that. except by doing it. You couldn't be told. It wouldn't be believable. By doing it, you discover it. Yes, Ivo. I'd like to speak in English because my German is not my practice language. Mine neither, so... I'd like to come back to you this morning.

[15:44]

I already told you a little bit. For me it was incredible how you answered in the first part about consciousness, awareness, how the two come together. What we talked about yesterday in the small groups and you gave for me the answer anyway. Okay. And the distinction you make between understanding and wisdom, intelligence? You have very bushy eyebrows.

[17:08]

Oh, yeah. I felt a little bit with some hairs of my eyebrows. receiving what you were talking. I brought an eyebrow. What really touched me was... I know I'm stuttering. I can't really express it in concepts. how you were able this morning to create in talking, within talking, the actual moment. And we were witness, we were present, it happened.

[18:26]

And In koans there is often about hitting and clapping and things like that. And I feel much more like hugging. And I'm very grateful to discover this with you. Again and again.

[19:40]

I'm happy to hug you anytime. You know, from my experience, I gave the same lecture yesterday as I did today. Or something like that. But today you were able to participate in it in a way that allowed me to come closer to what I wanted to say. And I have been in a way I try to prepare us for today's lecture in the last few days. But in some ways I give the same lecture each day as part of the preparation and then some days it works better than other days.

[21:03]

For me it's nearly the same but for other people it's... Maybe today's lecture worked pretty well for some of you, but for me it worked because I was able to work within you. as ingredients or something like that. I don't mean there isn't a difference, but I mean a lot of the difference, a lot of what happens, happens because of you.

[22:07]

Peter? In our group there was very quickly consent that these turning words are important and they really work in our practice, in our lay practice. But about the ritual there were very different opinions. I felt very close to what Hans said. But we had a whole range of opinions in the group. Okay, don't do too much at once.

[23:19]

But in the group we had like many opinions. For example one, ritual as form. Just form. Just form. Or some people, some said that they were very ambivalent. and some people say they feel very ambivalent about rituals because they have their Christian upbringing and the Christian church in the background and for some it goes as far as that they are repelled by a ritual Or another form that one can only do it in an ironic way. So we just collected these or talked or everybody mentioned these different viewpoints or experiences but we've not had time to really discuss it.

[24:24]

So it seems to me it needs to be discussed. When I was young, I was aggressively against rituals. I mean little things, I wouldn't wear a tie, I wouldn't go to my graduations, things like that. But now every morning I put on a huge tie. So I understand.

[25:36]

But somehow, by practicing, I... And it's interesting, our rituals don't have anything to do with anything except what they are. Yeah. David Mark? As far as the rituals of the Christian church are concerned, and in Berlin I teach Qigong classes and one of the places where I hold classes is a Christian house And where it's possible to teach these kinds of bloody workforces.

[26:56]

And so when it's a weekend course, and sometimes on the weekend there is a Christian holiday, for example, Whitsun, Pentecost, Then in this house, in the morning, there is a Christian service. and my people can participate voluntarily, and there are also some from outside. And I participate again and again And occasionally I also participate in the service because I feel very much supported by this house.

[28:04]

What a huge difference this is, because what I see there in this house is totally exhausted, and I felt so happy, so overflowing with joy, how alive this feels here with us. This morning during our service I remembered this other Christian service in this house and what a huge difference it is because that Christian service is so very stiff and My question is a bit in the same direction. I have difficulties to see a cup of coffee as a ritual. So my question goes in a similar direction.

[29:31]

I have a problem seeing a cup of coffee as a ritual. Is every cigarette I smoke a ritual? Well, I didn't know you smoked until just now. I usually say I'm a smoker but I don't. I can't touch like that. Is every morning's drive to my workplace a ritual? And do we make a difference between ritual and habit? And routine. And routine. That's a good question. Yes. So I was in the group with Peter and so for the two days I have a feeling we are coming to one point which we are coming around and

[30:40]

Can you stop for a second so I can translate? The point is that the perception of the practice as aha That's your feeling? It is my feeling in the group. Sorry, you have to repeat, I can't... Why don't you say it in German yourself? My feeling was that we always come to a point when we discuss that we always come to a point that we talk about practice and practice is aha and everyday life is aha And for me I cannot see this difference.

[31:58]

Or it's some kind of transition or that we put something in the practice which doesn't belong to. Because it's not normal to like the practice. Normal to like the practice. I think it's not normal to like. It's okay if you feel the that you are completely, how to say, but I don't... Expressed. Expressed or... But to like... Well, why do you practice that? Okay. Not practice it. Because I feel that it's not enough.

[33:07]

Ordinary life is not enough? It's not enough. But if I like something, it's the ordinary life. You like it, but it's not enough. What would make it enough? More of the same? You mean more of the everyday life? Yeah. What would make the everyday life enough? It's more that I completely abandoned this idea and it's on another level. When you function on another... I have completely given up on this idea that this is a completely different level Where you don't have dislikes and dislikes it's completely... But when we like, then certainly not a practice Where there is no liking and no liking there is definitely no practice And second, I want to come back to the patient

[34:36]

So when you spoke about perceptions it's the mental objects and it's always for me the question do we create what we perceive and if how? You're asking me right now? Well, we don't create all the ingredients. There are certain ingredients there when you're born. A bed or sheets or parents or something. But how you assemble that, you create. But also your parents are trying to teach you how to assemble it.

[35:40]

So you're a participant, but not the sole creator. You're like a cook, but you've got the ingredients. Okay, enough for now. Well, for me, I don't find any difference. What? I don't find any difference. Between what you're calling, I think, ordinary life and practice life. But I find a difference between my relationships with people with whom I practice and those with whom I don't practice.

[36:59]

But practice, because I've been doing it a long time, informs my relationships with everybody I meet, you know, still in Schmidt's Market and so forth. And I think before I started practicing I was more subject to moods and opinions various kinds of concerns that have completely disappeared through practice.

[38:16]

And so now, the beauty I used to feel occasionally on a special spring day, you say, What I remember as being exceptional moments happening once or twice a year are now pretty much the way I feel all the time. And that's the difference. And it feels like it's just more of what is normal. I'm just more of what I wanted to be or I'm more of what I like.

[39:21]

I'm more of what I want to be or I'm more of what I like. Yeah. But maybe your practice could use some fine tuning if it's what you don't like. Okay. I don't know. I'd love to spend a few days with you. You're the kind of guy I'd like to steal horses with. Something else not horses. Something else not stealing.

[40:22]

So I want to come back to Nico's question. There go the rustlers. Rustlers are people who steal horses. The last one's a clown. I think people have a morning cup of coffee because it's... apply this to many things, but let's say morning kettle coffee or tea or something. Because they like the taste or they like the effect.

[41:24]

But I think when you don't have And you feel a little uncomfortable later in the day because you didn't have your cup of coffee. Then it's clear it's a ritual. Now, my neighbor, Peter Nick, particularly fond of, is a botanist. And he's head of the Department of Botany and so forth at Karlsruhe University. But he lives in Freiburg. And he has to go to Karlsruhe every morning, five or six days a week.

[42:25]

And he doesn't drive. So, he rides a bicycle. Not all the way to... Good morning. That's great. He rides it to the train station. And he rides, because he doesn't drive, and he rides, whether it's snowing or raining or windy or whatever it is, he rides his bicycle. And he has to ride a very funky bicycle. A very schlocky bicycle. Because whatever bicycle he brings gets sort of trashed at the station.

[43:27]

stolen or people take parts off it or something like that. So he rides a bicycle that no one is interested in. Not even the parents. And it's, you know, I noticed his bicycle the other day because we went out to this Korean drumming event I told you about. All under most, his whole family and mine. So we're riding back about nine, ten o'clock at night. And I am just sitting on my bike, coasting. And I coast right past him at almost twice the speed and he's pumping.

[44:53]

I was embarrassed that I had such a good bike. It just rolled past him and he's working hard to... I thought I should switch bikes with him, but then mine would be trashed at the station. But he makes this trip a ritual. First the bicycle, and then an hour on the train. And he's got it all figured out, and he does his research on the train. He's redoing the whole department at the university, and he works it all out on the train, and then works out his research.

[45:57]

And he's quite in the front edge of research in that. in Europe, in Bhakti, and he does his research in the train too. So he's turned it into a ritual, it's not just a trip. So I don't think every routine or every habit is a ritual. But ritual extends into our lives once you start looking into everyone's lives pretty deeply. But I mean, there are certainly neurotic rituals. Like if you bump something twice, you always have to bump it three times.

[47:05]

You can't bump anything, etc. But I think the way one gets in bed, the way one shaves, if you shave, you can watch the pattern you shave in. It's a ritual usually. And you can change it. That's kind of interesting to change. But it's a ritual. Bringing attention to your breath is a ritual. Okay, so there's turning words. But I think bringing attention to your breath is an enactment ritual. And you can create habits that you inhabit which remind you to bring attention to your breath.

[48:08]

For instance, as soon as you bring your legs off the bed and put them on the floor, if you use that shift to lift through the body and make that a yogic moment and bring attention to your breath, then you've turned getting out of bed into a ritual. If you use this moment of change, What you do in your body? You put your feet on the ground, and then you lift through your body. Because every moment, sitting right here, I can feel these are yogic postures. Sitting here, I don't have to go do yoga on the floor. Now somebody set up a camera that watched you or somebody else get out of bed.

[49:29]

And you had it there for a couple of weeks, eh? Of anyone, probably. Of anyone, probably. If you looked at the film, they'd probably get out of bed in nearly the same way every day. So we could say that's a primitive ritual. But you can turn that ritual more into a yogic. And you can use it not just to continue your state of mind, but to continually transform your state of mind.

[50:31]

I was thinking the other day how an orchestra warms up. I think the warming up is a kind of ritual. That the group is doing their instruments and doing stuff like that. But actually they're kind of developing, moving into a unity with each other. And how you do it probably is done partly to check the instruments, but partly it's done as a yogic ritual to create the shared body that will produce music. Gisela, does that strike you?

[51:39]

So I think where life is embedded with rituals and practice is to begin to articulate those rituals in a certain way. I told you, I mentioned years ago, a while, that I was a friend of Herbie Hancock, the jazz musician. And he was a Soka Gakkai Buddhist. But for every performance, the group would divide into two.

[52:42]

One group would go into one room and they'd do drugs. And the other group would go into another room and they'd do chanting. and they were very clear they did this in order to make the performance work and the time I joined them for chanting I don't even know where the other room was And my first wife was there, Virginia. And Renee. And Renee. And we, you know, just joined. I'm going to ring a bell, and I'm going to ring a bell, and I'm going to ring a bell, and I'm going to ring a bell.

[53:50]

And we just recited it with them. And there were all sorts of things happening. There were overtones, and there was a rhythm, and then he got up again, and it was a lot of fun. And afterwards he turned to the group and said about us, See, I told you they were professionals. Because we just knew what to do because I've been changing once. So I think it's useful to observe one's one's life and the way in which ritual is always a big, already a big part of life. And that's one way to kind of separate it from the rituals in churches that you've learned and resisted in schools and so forth.

[55:01]

I think it's useful to observe your own life and to see how much rituals are already part of it. to put it in opposition to the ritual in church or in contrast? It helps you see ritual in a new way in contrast to what you experience in schools and churches. Yeah, I mean, you know, I remember in school and there's these bells that ring. There's a bell and the class all gets up and leaves, and then in five minutes another bell and... You go into a class, right? And what we had is 15-minute hans. It would have been great if in my university hall somebody was down the hall, clack, [...] clack.

[56:19]

So the sounds between classes are much more interesting in Zen. But it's just still playing with rituals. Tara? So my question is how much have rituals to do with concepts in Zen? The way you described today what we do, for example, in ryuki eating, at the interpenetration, it is like a concept that we enact in an activity.

[57:48]

That's one question. On the other hand, I would like to say how I fared with yesterday's and today's taisho. I feel like a horse that kind of stalks at an invisible obstacle. And I feel as if I had leaped out of a window too far and the tiger had grabbed me and drawn me to a cave.

[58:54]

So I kind of had a fright, but I don't know why or because of what. Oh, that's all right. That's a report of today's situation. So yesterday you were a horse, and today you're a tiger. Well, I think that's a legitimate response. Because I think what I spoke about in this seminar so far endangers our usual reality. And I think If you really are hearing what I'm saying, you ought to be a little scared.

[60:01]

I remember Gregory Bateson complained about American college students. Because he says you say the most radical things to them. If they really heard it, it would transform their life. Instead, they say, oh, groovy, man, that's great. And they don't actually hear it. They're just excited by the language. And they don't actually hear it. But one of the reasons we're in this bushel, this sangha, is with others, with the support of others. We can endanger our worldview. endanger our habits with new habits?

[61:16]

Yes, Manuel? I would like to tell you about a ritual that I do or enact almost every Monday. So Monday evenings I usually go to the movies with two very old friends. So most often I make two or three suggestions via SMS. And after the movie we go to pub and drink beer.

[62:24]

And after the movie we go to pub and drink beer. And it is a ritual according to your definition, because I miss it when I don't do it, for example, last night. So last night I said, yeah, you really should go with these two old friends. So did you SMS them? Did you send them an SMS? What movie did you see? The one friend sent me an SMS today because he is climbing in the Dolomites. One friend sent me an SMS, because he is not in Berlin, he is in the mountains, hiking.

[63:33]

I tried to develop our ritual a little bit. You have already told, or told several times, how practically, when the glasses touch, the senses come together on one point. I've tried to develop our ritual in the pub when we drink beer, because it's often explained that when one pumps glasses together, how all the senses come together. And I explained this to my friends. So we tried to do it and also look each other in the eyes. And they are both electrical engineers, so they have quite a different world view. So one of the two has understood this ritual somehow, but the other cannot look another person in the eye.

[65:05]

He either exaggerates and opens the eyes totally wide, or he looks away. And I like the pathway. Yeah, that's interesting. Thanks. You know, this practice of turning words, which is something our Sangha does a lot, of course, is based on the way you work with phrases in koans. basiert darauf, wie man mit Ausdrücken in koans arbeitet. But the extension of it into ordinary language and into ordinary situations, I think it's never been done traditionally.

[66:09]

It's something I created. I just found when I was first practicing with Suzuki Roshi that I worked with koans that way. But then I found I'm working with the worldviews of the West, the paradigms of the West, And I found that phrases became a kind of cultural acupuncture. And I noticed to work with the contrast between Western views and Buddhist views, I could extend this, what's usually limited to common practice, into any circumstance.

[67:24]

I could extend this practice, rooted in koans, into any and every circumstance. And Paul may remember, I hardly mentioned turning words, which is a phrase I've... It's a kind of translation of Wado. I didn't use it much back in the 70s. So you didn't use them at all. I gave them to people in Doksan sometimes. But I found that people did not have the ability in those days to bring attention to anything all the time.

[68:44]

And almost no one could make that work. Yeah, and I find most people don't make move work and things like that either. So I was a bit discouraged because they worked so well for me and I couldn't get them to work for people I practiced with. So when I came here to Europe and I... saw that it would be primarily a lay practice with people.

[69:50]

And I couldn't have everyone come to Tassajara. In Tassajara, we could have 65 people in a practice period, two practice periods a year, so I could get most people to go to Tassajara. So I decided by hit and miss, trial and error. I would see if I could make this turning word practice, which had been so important to me, useful to the Sangha here in Europe, the not yet formed Sangha here in Europe. And it may have helped that all of you speak German and I don't.

[70:53]

So you'd remember a few of the things I said in English and then it became a turning word. In other words, I'm kind of joking there, but I do think the fact that access to the teaching was through English, and you would take certain of my English phrases, if I presented them as turning words, and make use of them. And so I think that the fact that there's this German-English difference actually helped develop the turning words. But I think in the Western Zen world, what we do is quite unique. And historically, traditionally, in Asia, it's quite unique.

[72:12]

Okay, I think we should stop. And Melita, you haven't said anything, but I've been watching your shoulders. So I hope you decide to speak with your eyebrows and shoulders tomorrow. I have to tease her a little. I was still thinking of the guy running his wife from front. Oh, yeah, okay. You were jealous. Oh, we haven't heard the bell. Let's listen.

[73:06]

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