Well, of course, we're already meeting. So maybe nothing more needs to be said. And I won't take the easy way out. So let's start with Ernst's comment about the in meditation is a certain floor, floor, feeling good, good feeling. And I'd like to also start with the Eightfold Path. Now, Yeah, if it comes around to it and you feel like it, I'd again like some comments from you, the Eightfold Path as it's presented in my piece.

[01:06]

Well, it made sense, first of all. And second, did it seem to have personal meaning? importance to you, a value to you, and also possibly therapeutic value as a therapist. Okay. Now, why I would start with the Eightfold Path is because these six parameters, which is the way I've decided, is the most traditional and perhaps useful way to speak about meeting. Is the Sixth I mean, the Eightfold Path from early Buddhism morphed.

[02:25]

Morphed? No. Like Terminator 2. Oh, okay. Talking about morphing, you want a little anecdote? Well, I think in the dictionary it's a term within linguistics for part of a phoneme or a morpheme, but in the popular vernacular it's like a toy robot morphs into a truck and the truck morphs into a... I'm using it in the popular sense. There is no word that is quite as good as morph. It's like grok from Heinlein's novel.

[03:49]

I mean, I don't like the word grok, but there's nothing quite that fits it. No, grok means to understand all at once. Yeah. I morphed and then I grokked. It's like gemütlichkeit, you know? Could be, I don't know. Gemütlichkeit. You can translate. Oh, okay. It's very cozy in feeling. Yeah, I know. Sometimes tell me that. That some place is gemütlich. Anyway... And I'm also going to describe meeting in a rather complex way. Yeah, not because I think the complexity is useful to you.

[04:49]

But perhaps it is useful in the sense that it gives you a sense of the certain aspects of Buddhism. Okay, so why do I say that, on what basis has the six parametres morphed into, excuse me, the eightfold path morphed into the six parametres? Now, for the sake of time, I'm going to speak in rather simple concepts. Yeah, not to insult your intelligence, it's just we don't have so much time. So the transitions I'll make simple, but the rest won't be so simple.

[05:53]

Okay, what do I mean by saying 8-fold path morphed into 6-parameters? Well, one is that they're both about how you can become a good person. And a good person who can realize enlightenment through how you are a good person. And they're also a morph in that one is temporally conceived and the other is spatially conceived.

[06:58]

Early Buddhism assumes a temporally defined identity and a temporally defined world. And Mayan Buddhism assumes spatially defined person and world. In other words, the primary, the definitive definition, the definitive definition is spatial, and the secondary definition is temporal. Okay, so the Eightfold Path... Once you've done enough preparatory practices, the eightfold path is sequential.

[08:19]

Nachdem man genug vorangehende Praxis hinter sich hat, ist der achtfache Pfad, der verläuft aufeinanderfolgend, sequentiell. And now the six paramitas also, some of you don't know what the six paramitas are, what the Eightfold Path is. Too bad. I'm just kidding. I will make it clear, sort of clear. Now the six paramitas presume the development of the Eightfold Path. Okay, so the six parameters presume that through the eightfold path that you have realized the truth body and come into pace with phenomena and realized through that pace with phenomena, concentration.

[09:38]

In other words, you're not concentrated in an unconcentrated world. Because you're now in the pace of the world, your concentration in the world, the world helps concentrate you and you concentrate the world. Okay. So the Eightfold Path ends with concentration. The concentration necessary to enter the world as it actually exists. And the concentration necessary to sort out what are faux worldviews, false worldviews. And what are true non-deluded worldviews?

[10:46]

Non-deluded worldviews is to see everything is changing, interdependent and so forth. Of course, a non-diluted worldview from the point of view of Mahayana Buddhism is to see everything as spatially conceived and not temporally conceived fundamentally. Everything spatially conceived is the image of we're all falling at once as a spatial conception. We don't have a before and after relationship.

[11:47]

We have a relationship all at once at this moment. So it's a conception that emphasizes alterity and not continuity. Which coincides with modern physics and all that stuff, but again, we don't want that Trojan horse. which of course also coincides with modern physics and so on, but again, we want this Trojan horse. Are we all together here, more or less? Okay. Now, what do I mean by, again, the pace of phenomena?

[12:47]

I think I should speak to that in a moment. the most basic achievement of mature Buddhism, is that you brought your mind, thinking, breath, body, phenomena, etc. It's an insight that is possible and it's a craft to achieve it. And it's achieved through the intention to do it. So in the micro-moment tapestry of the present moment, awareness

[13:51]

transforms your experience. No. Sometimes I drink powdered green tea. And sometimes I drink leaf green tea. Okay, now, do I make the choice on the basis of the taste of the tea? Yes, to some extent. Yeah, in a certain way. But really I make the basis on the pace at which I want the tea to give me.

[15:09]

Okay. Okay. Now, if you drink matcha, that's the powdered tea. Sometimes I like black tea, and it's perfectly all right, you know. Okay. But if I drink matcha, which is the powdered green tea, which is basically instant tea, just add hot water, So the ceremony is really what it's about, not the tea. But it really does require a bamboo whisk to make tea. You can't make it with any other whisk, as far as I can tell, or a spoon or something.

[16:13]

Okay, now Okay. Now, if I have the leaf tea, which is an infusion. Infusion. You soak it in water. Yeah. And is that you make it, I've pointed this out before, but you make it in a small pot. If it's good tea. If it's really good tea, you drink what's called a sparrow's tear. You just put a little drop on you. But to get the tea to do that, you have to brew it at a very specific, not very hot temperature. The best tea is in the distillation of the drips.

[17:30]

So if you make it right, when you have your little cup and your little teapot, and you hold it, and you hold it till all the drips are gone. Und wenn du jetzt dein kleines Teegefäß und deine Tasse hast, dann hältst du das so lange über die Tasse, bis wirklich die allerletzten Tropfen rausgetroffen sind. Now, if you are impatient, this is difficult. If you had a rubber teapot, you could squeeze. Wenn du ungeduldig bist, dann ist das schwierig. Da wünscht du dir, du hättest so ein Gummigefäß, das du einfach drücken könntest. But if I'm feeling a little impatient, then this is the tea ceremony I choose. That's when you make the tea, you just have to hold the pocket.

[18:34]

Drip, drip, drip. Drip. A few hours later. Yeah, maybe several minutes. It's not just like pour the cup of tea and drink it. It has nothing to do with that. That's... Now, this kind of tea, not only do you make a smaller quantity, but you drink it differently, too. And if you don't drink it differently, it doesn't taste good. Now, what is this about? It's a spatially conceived world, not a temporally conceived world. Because in a spatially conceived world, everything is equal.

[19:46]

And I'll try to make this more clear as we go along. Okay, so the teapot is important as the tea. And you can't draw a line between the making of the tea and the drinking of the tea in the teapot. And if you have the wrong kind of teapot, you can't make this tea. And if you just pour out the first amount that comes out and stops, you don't get the taste of the tea because it's those last drips that really make the tea taste the way it does.

[20:46]

So in other words, I choose to drink the infused tea sometimes when I want the kind of pace that this way of drinking and making tea brings to me. Und ich trinke manchmal den aufgeblossenen Tee, wenn ich diese Art von Schritttempo mir wünsche, die dieser Tee mir dann gibt. Which the rhythm is in, the rhythm, the pace is determined by the liquid itself. Denn der Rhythmus oder das Schritttempo liegt, ist determined by? the liquid itself. But the matcha ceremony, matcha way of making tea, the powdered way of making tea, is determined by the tea bowl and the physical objects.

[21:48]

So there's a certain action in whisking the tea, and then there's an action holding the bowl and feeling the warmth of the tea. As you heard me say, the bowl is an activity, so it has, one manifestation of it is an activity and not an object, is it has three fronts. So there's no handle. That's because Chinese and Japanese people are backward people and they never thought of how to make handles. or rather they want you to do it with two hands because two hands bring you together in the in how you drink and feel the tea.

[23:16]

This is one of the reasons for the mouse, the computer mouse. Because Stephen Wozniak and Stephen Jobs were both practicing Buddhism, and Xerox Research Lab had invented the mouse, and they're the ones who took the mouse and said, you should approach the computer with two hands. Because two hands should be engaged. And that's also why they, just as an aside, they were the first to make good clear directions in the packaging at the same level of attention to detail as the computer. These are just Buddhist ideas. The box it's in is equally important with the computer. This is a spatially conceived world where everything is equal. Now, lots of people, I know lots of people who really prefer the IBM PC type because they can do everything on the keyboard.

[24:43]

But that's more mental than physical. Okay. So these little differences can have an expression in the world and even commercial application, you know. Okay. So part of this practice is to enter... I don't know how to say it. The words aren't there, but to enter into phenomena. You know, I... I don't, by chance, have a dishwasher in two of the places I live. But not all three. And unless I'm forced at gunpoint, I do not use the dishwasher. I give in that we've had 15 visitors, and then I say, all right, we'll use the dishwasher.

[25:48]

Ich habe nachgeliehen, wenn wir vielleicht mal 15 Besucher hatten. But I like the feel of each dish. Aber ich mag das Gefühl von jedem Geschirr, von jedem Teil. Yeah, I like having nice dishes and each one is nice and you wash it and touch it and rinse it and put it. It's great. I find it great fun. Ich mag es, wirklich schönes Besteck, schönes Geschirr zu haben und das Gefühl von jedem Stück. Du wäschst das, dann spülst du es ab und dann trocknest du es. What am I hurrying for? Das macht Spaß. Warum beeilt mich denn? I mean, I feel in pace with the phenomena of the world. This is very basic Zen stuff I'm talking about. And it really develops from bringing, as I always say, attention, an intention to bring attention to the breath. And then your attention jumps back to your thinking, jumps back to your thinking, jumps back to your thinking.

[27:05]

So, as I always say, why is something so easy to do for a few moments to bring your attention to your breath? So hard to do continuously. Well, the main reason is very simple. Because you identify yourself through your thoughts. And you establish your continuity from moment to moment through your thoughts. And it's extremely difficult to break that habit. Because it's the habit we inhabit. But it does happen.

[28:07]

If you use the intention and you keep doing it every now and then, suddenly... the identification with thoughts just snaps away and settles in the body and mind. And you find your continuity simply in the body, in the breath, and in phenomena. And that is a biological bodily shift to a spatially conceived world. It changes everything. It changes how you might be depressed or not. It changes how you're anxious or not. It changes everything. You don't extend your identity into a dangerous future.

[29:17]

And you more feel the Chinese view that the future comes toward you. You don't go into the future. And that's a very different conception to imagine the future. It's always coming toward you in its unexpectedness, not you're trying to arrange a safe future. So what I'm talking about is all this shift from the early Buddhism to the Mahayana, and bringing this into the teaching of Zen. Now, imagine a, you know, I've never played one of these computer games.

[30:30]

And I don't understand the fascination and addiction with it. I mean, I can barely go to a movie and sit there in front of these people, unless it's an awfully good movie. Yeah. So let's imagine you're in some kind of holographic computer game. And this computer has created a simulated reality around you. And it looks and feels completely real. But if you pick up something, it's not there. It's just light, you know. So imagine you're in a holographically generated computer simulacrum of reality.

[31:38]

And suddenly, these computers are so sophisticated, when you reach down and pick something up, it's actually physical and tangible. How amazing that would be. But you're already there. We're already caressing phenomena. We live with this stuff. It's fantastic. Wir kümmern uns ja eh schon, wir sind ja eh schon in Kontakt mit den Erscheinungen. Wir sind körperlich in der Welt. So, you know, this sense is you feel engaged with everything. Und das Gefühl dabei ist, dass du dich im Zusammenspiel mit allen befindest. And you're approaching the territory of non-duality. Und du gehst auf das Gefilde der Nicht-Dualität hinzu. Yeah. So whatever is around us is equal.

[32:52]

Okay. So now let me make a shift. In between, if I were going to recommend a practice to a disciple, I would say, practice the Eightfold Path. Now you can practice all these things at once, of course. Eightfold path, six parameters, blah, blah, blah. But really to realize the teaching, you do them one at a time. It doesn't mean you don't have a feel for it all at once. But a good student will refuse to practice the six paramitas until they've mastered the eightfold path.

[33:57]

If you seriously study a sutra, you don't go to the next paragraph until you realize the paragraph you just read. So you proceed through the sutra with your body and your practice, not with your mind. If you proceed with your mind, you've missed the practice. So it doesn't mean you don't look ahead and read a little bit of the sutra, etc., but you don't consider that practice. It's just information. And if you think, oh, I've got to rush, the teacher gives us so many practices, I've got so many to do, I'm in such a hurry to practice, this is ridiculous. You take one, one thing, one paragraph.

[35:09]

And if you do it thoroughly, it really makes all the other teachings open up. Okay. So, and here I'm presenting this stuff all at once to you, but anyway, you can do what you want. So the Eightfold Path, through the Eightfold Path, you realize the truth body and the pace of phenomena. And the concentration that's not a mental concentration, the concentration that is being everything all at once, like two trains leaving the station at once. So then, as preparation for and as an independent practice, as preparation for the six paramitas and as an independent practice, you practice the four Brahma-viharas.

[36:20]

These are the four so-called divine states. Unlimited friendliness or kindness, empathetic joy, compassion, and equanimity. Okay. And you take these on. You try them out. And rather in the spirit of what I wrote in Eightfold Pathpiece, you just present the words to yourself. And it's a way, again, you can bring these to your, it shouldn't be the whole of your Zazen period, but you can at the beginning, instead of counting your breath, bring these to your attention during meditation.

[37:44]

Okay. And it's also quite good to use them, as I've said, before you go to sleep. Or as you go to sleep. And how you practice with these is you radiate them in six directions. I'm starting with Ernst's good feeling here. So you radiate friendliness down. to the front of you. Then you radiate friendliness to the back of you. And Christoph Bufink, is that how you pronounce his last name, Bufink? Christoph Bufink, that's like a bird. Okay. said, and I told him I would credit him, in the last seminar in Hannover, said something like your example earlier the other day.

[38:56]

When he wants to create a feeling of not knowing, he tries to sense everything behind his back. And then once he has a feeling of that, he folds that around him to the front. So anyway, so you radiate friendliness to the back and then to the right and then to the left. Then up and down. And probably by this time you've gone to sleep. And you haven't even gotten to empathetic joy.

[39:57]

But you know what? It often gives you good dreams. It often gives you good dreams. So the radiation actually permeates the mind that sleeps. We've got some tricks here in Buddhism, you know. And then you work with empathetic joy. It means you take joy, really take joy in other people's success. You take joy in other people being smarter than you, than publishing their book before you, etc. If you can't do that, any talk about non-duality is utter nonsense. So this is not so easy to do.

[41:06]

But if non-duality is not so easy to do, you can talk, oh, I'm non-dual, no subject, no object, but I don't like that guy because he... He was non-dual before me. So empathetic joy. Compassion, really caring. And equanimity. And equanimity is really caring. Actually, the etymology of equanimity works quite well. Because the root of it is impartial breath mind. It's to be impartial, but then the root is animus, and animus is mind, and to be impartial and animus is also breath.

[42:27]

So, equanimity means, really, in Buddhism, equalness. But in English it tends to mean somebody who's very balanced and impartial, but in Buddhism it means you're balanced and impartial because you experience the world in equalness. So the four Brahmaviharas, or sometimes called the four Unlimiteds, are a practice that we can think of, extremely important practice on their own, and also as a kind of preparation with the eightfold task for the six paramitas.

[43:49]

Now, maybe that's enough, and we should do the six paramitas after lunch. Because that's a lot to absorb, I think. At least it would be a lot to absorb for me. So let's sit for a minute and then we'll have lunch. So the four brahmadiharas are ways to articulate and mature the mind.

[46:07]

It doesn't mean you force yourself to feel joy or friendliness or something. Just try it out every now and then. Even taking a few minutes and mechanically radiating these feelings in six directions. And then accepting actually whatever you feel. These feelings are already part of our presence. So the practice brings them more to the fore, more into presence.

[47:09]

So you begin to shift the emphasis within your presence and thinking. Now you open up the possibilities. And you more likely notice when you don't feel friendliness or empathetic joy. And clearly noticing when you don't feel empathetic joy is already progress. And you don't feel empathetic joy since that moment. relax into acceptance.

[48:13]

And the mind of acceptance is already more open to awareness. And so forth. The mind of acceptance is your good friend in all of these practices. As an initial state of mind, not as how you initially always feel.

[49:01]

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