I guess you'd be next. Well, there's Bertie. Yes, but she doesn't know what's going on. I would like to talk about three things. There are several hours per day. There is some practice that has developed out of zazen. Yes, skandhas. Skandhas. Observation of the breath.

[01:04]

You must mean developed in our zazen, but it's not developed out of zazen except for the history. Yes, because it didn't come from our practice. It comes from the tradition, then we practice with it. I can claim to have thought up a few of those lists, but not the five skandhas. And this kind of practice has become very independent in my life and has become part of my daily routine. And these kind of practices has developed in my life and they have kind of expanded within my life during the day.

[02:08]

During the day. Or throughout the day. In your activity, or daily activity. Yeah, in my daily activity. And then the second is the... Secondly... And secondly, part of my practice is together with the Sangha to develop and to evolve together with the Sangha. That is a big part of my practice as well. And it also somehow occupies me, as if uninterrupted, how we are here as a place, as a group of people in a process. And I feel like as if it's like occupying the whole day, my whole time, all the time.

[03:22]

But of course, it's kind of not all the time. But how we as a group develop... How we will develop as a group and also as an institution. We are developing as a group, as an institution, as a place. And the third is, and I recently came across it, the four heavenly kings. And only recently I came across the third topic I would like to talk about, which is the four heavenly kings. Four heavenly kings. You mean the Brahma-Viharas? The four divine abodes? The king of the north, of the west, of the south.

[04:28]

Okay. Yes. And these kings, they are depicted very often in a very Martially? No, like in a... Yeah, I understand martial, yeah. Way, like with swords or... Like kings. Yeah, like knights. Kings like to fight. In a way, they structure the space, and it's interesting to introduce them into the space, in this, let's say, certain strain of structuring. And they kind of structure the space.

[05:32]

And it's interesting to feel into this quite rigidly structured space created by them. And there's a connection to Manjushri with the clarity of his presence or structure. And with all these three topics, I'm constantly working and in touch with. Good. Yes. Do you translate this as well? As you know, I'm currently part of the ANGO, of the practice period.

[06:33]

And practice periods usually work best if you just go with it, you just do it. And Nicole mentioned yesterday in her Tay Show that Dan Welch, who led a practice period in Crestown once, taught in a few Tay Shows back then that once you leave the practice period or the place, you will leave with empty hands or empty-handed. You don't expect anything, you just do it. Meaning just don't expect anything, just do it. In my practice I am now exploring the possibilities of understanding, yes, I have understood this, I have understood this spiritually,

[08:01]

So currently I'm exploring how much of the teaching did I understand so far? In contrast to really understanding physically, or what does it mean to understand a teaching, any teaching, really physically and then also to find such an anchor or a basis in it? But the next step or the other is to really understand or embody the teaching and find an anchor within the body and the teaching. and to physically or bodily really understand and practice the teaching. And so it's my experience now to stay with two or three teachings and practice with it and try to understand it really rather than more.

[09:27]

What does actuality really mean? For example, what does it really mean, this actuality teaching? What does it really mean? And also these two, granting and gathering teachings, ways that you, Roshi, mentioned. Yes, and to really observe what it means to just let the mental understanding out and to really try to understand it physically. a possibility of understanding, of embodiment, that the mental understanding always fits in very, very well.

[10:32]

But we already know, I already know that. And so I'm really practicing with embodying it and feeling the teachings within my body rather than mentally, as there is really a difference. And, of course, the mind says, oh, yes, I know that all. I already know that. But how does it really feel within my body, within this body? And the mysteries are fascinating of the teachings. And there is not much needed other than for example, two words like grasping and granting, and then to just sense into the body and work with it, there's not so much else needed for deepening or deeper practice.

[12:00]

Gathering and granting. Gathering and granting, yeah. Or the einsatz aus dem Korn. Or the mysterium. To stay with one sentence, a wonderful picture in a Koran says, the donkey looking into a well and the well looking at the donkey. Or working with koans, it's just working with one sentence only. Like, for example, there's the sentence, a donkey looks into a well, and the well looks at the donkey. Yes, and the depth of the embodiment is completely different from the possible actual understanding. there's really a difference between the mental understanding and the deep bodily understanding and experiencing.

[13:01]

So the way I imagine this picture with the donkeys and the well is like these kind of wells or it's not really a fountain, it's more a well, I think. These don't exist anymore where you kind of had to pull up the water bucket. Nowadays our water comes out of the faucets and not the wells anymore. But in Japan, all in a sudden, we stood next to such a well, which was next to a tea house where they pulled up the water to make tea.

[14:06]

That's enough. Yeah, they often built tea houses where there was special water. Birgit, maybe you can see what we're doing. After a bit of a riff this morning on contextuality nach einem kurzen Überblick über Kontextbezogenheit, über die Art und Weise der Textur, der Beschaffenheit des Gewebes, das wir hier gemeinsam auch kreieren in diesem Raum, I asked that, assuming you all received that little e-mail I sent out, from that

[15:25]

the suggestions I made of content and context or aspects. In that kind of spirit, what would you say if we went around and everyone said something about how practice has taken root or become part of their practice? usual life. So Birgit, maybe you have something to say. So, yes, I read the email and Alex and I, we discussed it or spoke about various aspects of the questions during our time in the car traveling yesterday.

[16:44]

And I would like to start with this place here. It is always a very long journey for us to come here. But I am deeply connected with this space and I think about it because this is the space or the place where my Zen practice started. And the practice kind of deeply touched me and so there is a deep emotional connection with this place. During winter branches I always cherished very much the time we studied.

[18:11]

And so the question in the email was about to look at the teachings and this is something I can relate to very much thanks to the Vinterbranche's experience. And the concept I was most involved with was to work with the skandhas. And in particular, I can well follow how Roshi, in his teachings, creates a connection, for example, to phenomenology, i.e. a perspective that we have developed here in the West. And I can relate very much to the way you, Roshi, developed this by using the phenomenology, which is pretty anchored in the West.

[19:34]

Mm-hmm. But sometimes I fear that because of that I still stay very much in the head, in the mind, instead of getting it more into my body and embodying it more. My idea is... So my thought or my idea is that I really would like to deepen my practice even further. And in June, when I was last here for Doorsteps Zen, I remember your words, Roshi, regarding participation in an Ango, And this I have now prepared, this path I have prepared.

[20:52]

But only... Okay. But this is only in a few years, but I have started now to collect. So basically I have applied for a sabbatical, and so there will be a year where I won't work, and then I hope there will be still an ANGO, and then I want to participate in an ANGO. No? No. So in 2021. And while I was listening to Otmar, then I think I shouldn't bring too many ideas with me then.

[21:54]

Well, your preliminary application has just been accepted. Deine Voranmeldung ist gerade angenommen worden. Thank you, Piergut. It's understandable. It's interesting for me to be here with you, Rick. And to hear also what Ulrich, you said, is that you brought the skandhas and other practices into your daily activity, daily life.

[22:55]

But you also brought them into the daily life and participation with the Sangha itself. Yeah. And of course, for me too, I've been practicing here in this place and Crestone the last 30 30 years or so. But Otmar mentioned what's often translated as the grasping way and the granting way. Can you say that again in German? Yes. And I wonder why that light's not on.

[24:17]

Because the bulb is kaput. Oh. Kaput. Do we? You mean in Germany, bulbs go kaput, huh? Yes. Yes. Not only bulbs. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. We still haven't figured out the lighting, but we do have the lamps now. We don't need them now. I mean, you can get them if you want. Yeah, a little more ambient light is good. The Sangha at work. Sangha by the Arbeit. Anyway, this kind of direct translation is grasping, but it actually means gathering in. And you came to San Francisco Center shortly after Sukershi died, is that right?

[25:23]

Yeah, I was there one time. when he was dying and I didn't meet him. No, you didn't. Yeah. But the other day I was... The other day means, I don't know, a couple months or six months or something. I don't know, for some reason I was struck by what Suzuki Roshi taught the first year and a half or two years of his time in the United States in 1961 and 62.

[26:27]

And he went through the whole 100 cases of the Blue Cliff Records. And he went through the first 100 cases of the Blue Cliff Record. I don't know what it's called in German. The Book of the Smaragd. The Book of the Smaragd. No, I don't know the it in German, the Blue Cliff Record name. Yeah. Yeah. And somebody even brought me, Judy Gilbert, in fact, brought me some water from the cliff where the Blue Cliff Records, it's totally contaminated water, you don't want to drink it, but I had a little bottle of it on both my altars here and in the United States.

[27:46]

Yeah. Anyway, there was no translation. How we achieved a translation is another story, but he mostly had to work from R.D.M. Shaw's translation, which was quite Christianized. Also es gab keine Übersetzung damals und er hat vorwiegend RDM-Chance Übersetzung nehmen müssen, aber die war doch sehr christlich geprägt. Und wie wir dann zu Übersetzungen des Textes gekommen sind, der Koansammlung, das ist wieder eine andere Geschichte. Yeah, but he lectured every week on a, you know, more or less every week on a new koan.

[28:54]

And he emphasized one of the motifs, one of the motifs of... The Heikki Ganroku is the granting way and the gathering-in way, as well as the host and the guest, the number of motifs. So anyway, for some reason, I was thinking back recently, thinking back on those days, What was he teaching? And I thought he kept talking about this motif of the gathering in way and the granting way. And conceptually, you're...

[30:12]

Imagistically, connected with Manjushri, the gathering in way, and Avalokiteshvara, the granting way, yes and no, or simply yes to the world and no to some aspects of the world. And that is of course linked to Manjushri. Manjushri is the inward. And our Lokiteshvara, the outward, the fronting. And also yes and no. Yes to the world and no to some aspects of the world. So metaphorically he introduced us to... And so sometimes it's the gathering in, and sometimes it's granting, and sometimes it's welcoming, and sometimes it's emptiness, which is also no. So basically he was teaching us, showing us a way to

[31:36]

extremely basic way to relate to the world by saying yes to it or saying no to it. And out of yes comes Avalokiteshvara and out of no comes Manjushri. So then I thought, why did he spend like two years doing this? And I was thinking, well, he was in, okay, I want to present this like it's not that he was planning something. Here is this Japanese man arrived in America.

[33:00]

In California. In California. And he always had been looking from the time of the Second World War and so forth for a way to, a fresh situation in which to practice with people. And he thought that Buddhism in Japan was too stuck in being Japanese Buddhism. So he thought, kept thinking to himself, I want to be in a place where I can start over. So here he had these you know, American folks.

[34:29]

In the early days, most of them were sort of ex-beatniks or beatniks and people who mostly didn't want to be part of Western society. Am Anfang waren das vorwiegend ehemalige oder immer noch aktuell Beatniks, die eigentlich gar nicht Teil der westlichen Gesellschaft sein wollten damals. So he wanted to sort of rethink Buddhism from the beginning. And here are all these fairly young people who wanted to rethink their life from the beginning. So he was faced with, what the heck am I going to do? I will do zazen with people, but should I say something?

[35:32]

What should I say? And so he was confronted with thinking, what am I going to do with them now? So zazen, yes, but should I tell them something about it or not? So his tendency was to just do things. For instance, I think we chanted the Heart Sutra every morning when there was morning satsang for a year, year and a half before he even gave us any suggestion about how to do it. He just listened to what we did. Sometimes. He got a record player out with a Heiji chants, and he put a record on. While we were doing zazen, we could hear the monks at a Heiji.

[36:34]

And sometimes he took a recording out of a cassette recorder. A cassette recorder? That didn't exist. A record player. Oh, a record player. Oh, okay. Sorry. It's all right. So long ago. I mean, it was yesterday. Yeah. So I'm sure he kept trying out, what shall I say? But he also thought, well, people identify Zen with koans, I'll lecture on a book of koans.

[37:36]

And I'm sure he thought about what and how he should talk about it. But he also knew, for example, that people associated Zen with koans, so he also taught about koans. And there was no translation of the Book of Serenity yet. But there was this, you know, totally, almost totally inadequate translation of the Blue Cliff Records, Hickley and Ruppel. But there was this not so good, not so optimal translation of the smaragd, what is it? The smaragd rock wall. Yes, the German terms are just not so trustworthy. And the blue cliff rick is usually... connected more with the Rinzai approach to Zen, and the Shoryu Roku is more connected with the Sotoshu approach to Zen.

[38:46]

So there isn't that much difference between, but there's a little bit difference in style. And Tsukiroshi and I both have practiced Rinzai Zen as well as Soto Shu. I remember we had a quite crucial conversation at one point where he asked me, do you think we should emphasize Rinzai more or Soto more? And I won't tell you what we decided. Why not? So... So he was speaking about the koan, and yet he kept talking about this grasping or gathering in way and granting way.

[40:06]

And it dawned on me, this was only a few months ago, Basically he was teaching us to notice actuality as all of what we call Buddhism is embedded in actuality and the two windows or doors were granting way and the gathering in way. Okay, so now back to Ulrich. Now back to Ulrich.

[41:08]

So Ulrich said he finds his practice evolves, develops and evolves within him and also evolves through practicing with the Sangha. So now here's, now back to Rick. Richard? Just Rick. When I was born. Yeah, when you were born, it was Richard? It was Frederick. Frederick. Oh, Rick, Fred, Rick. Yeah, I see. Okay. Yeah. I have a brother named Frederick. but he dropped the Rick. So my experience of practicing with any one of you or with you years ago For ten years or so?

[42:24]

No, just, well, yeah, off and on. Yeah. Two years, I would think. Okay. Two years solid? Two years, yeah, a year in the city center, a year in Tata, and then back vacation. I remember you quite well. Plus your name is memorable. Rick Wicks. Anyway, my experience of practicing with someone is like... you're both in, you're in two cars, driving, first you're driving here and there, and you start driving next to each other. In tandem. And sometimes the two cars merge and you're just driving together.

[43:33]

Und manchmal verschmelzen die Autos auch und man fährt dann zusammen in einem. And sometimes taking turns, who's driving? Und dann wechselt man sich auch ab, wer jetzt fährt. And then at other times the cars separate and then maybe, etc., like that. Und zu anderen Zeitpunkten fährt man wieder weiter auseinander und jeder fährt dann so für sich. So, again, seeing Rick after all these years, I still have a bodily feeling of driving along beside you and sharing the car. And what interests me is my experience is what I was teaching, to me it's not teaching, it's just living with practitioners, but what I was teaching, let's call it that, is not much different then than now.

[44:40]

It's more articulated now, perhaps. It's more refined, perhaps. Yeah, it's like that. But since 1983, I've been driving on a different road. Like this road and Crestown and so forth. It's like taking the record player and putting the record on a different... a little different speed.

[45:54]

Instead of 78 RPM, maybe it's going at 45 or 33 and a half or something. So the practice, even if I was teaching nearly the same thing, it develops differently in this Sangha than it would have if I stayed in San Francisco. So how does the recording practice here and in Crestone differ? How has it developed what I do with you differently than if I'd stayed in San Francisco? This kind of question comes up. I mentioned it not so much because I'm interested in the difference. Ich erwähne das nicht so sehr, weil ich an dem Unterschied interessiere.

[47:22]

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