So I sang, wake up little Susie, I mean Krista. So you could tell us what you were going to say. Okay. Oh, yeah. Yes, of course. I was thinking about this desert business. This idea that somebody takes the decision to go into the desert, out into the desert, it's quite extreme. So, When Jesus went to the desert, one of the most crucial things happened.

[01:05]

And when somebody who meditates goes into the desert, out into the desert, then What I mean it's not commonly it's not usual and the common thing to do to go into the desert and to practice and a person who does that will face certain experiences like also delirium and visions So my feeling is that going out into the desert is a metaphor for quite difficult circumstances to face them.

[02:21]

In addition to the fact that some people did it. And also stood on these columns. The saints on the columns. And also these people who were on the columns. Any person is able to keep practice every day, regular meditation in the desert, this is how the atmosphere can reach. This is about what I want to say. Yeah. The teaching of Zen and of Buddhism in general emphasizes, however, that you don't need to go to the desert, you don't need to, etc.

[03:27]

You can create the conditions for realization. in, you know, other circumstances. Okay, yes. Yeah, yeah. I think it's better to say it yourself in German. But then I would just take a break.

[04:30]

Or do you say everything again in German? No, if I say everything in German, you mean everything yourself? Or as always, if I have to translate it, you have to finish it at some point. Okay, good. So I speak in English because I want to come back to something that you said today, tomorrow. Yes? That... the practice is about not moving. And this kind of posture actually creates the condition for your mind not to move. And so far, I kind of knew that. But then there was this point which is intriguing. But then there is this other point that fascinates me.

[05:52]

In the stillness, you are able to, in a Jewish world, you use grass or the sea for experience. I don't know exactly what word you used, but if you have this non-moving spirit, that you are at the same time able to grasp the silence in the world, the peace in the world, to recognize, yes? Yes. For me, the peace in the world is something that stays calm, but also touches the movement. An eternal truth.

[07:03]

And this technology that you can only grasp is if you are in kind of this illness of your mind. This is what I was thinking. Yes, that's what I'm glad you understood what I meant. And take this one step further I had some experience with being in the desert for some time. I had a contrary kind of experience of being in the desert versus being in the city.

[08:08]

And the experience of being in the city is very similar to being in the desert. If you are in the desert, then you can only survive there if you develop a kind of peace that arises from within. So my experience is that it is much easier to be in a kind of meditative state of mind than sitting. And I would assume, in my own experience, Yes, the agency of being Now, this being of being, this being of being,

[09:41]

I mean self is an agent, a doing agent. We can think of self as an agent. So if we think of it as an agent or agency instead of self, with all its karma and accumulation. Then you can think of your circumstances as agency. Then you can have your exterior circumstances still your mind or you can have your mind still and still your circumstances. And with our busyness and our energetic addictions And with our business and with our search for energy and action, we may need both.

[11:04]

Now, I used to describe, to respond to you, I used exterior and interior. But by speaking of your circumstances as agency, In some ways I'm putting aside or even denying that there's such a thing as interiority and exteriority. So one of the things I would like to explore is To what degree do we Westerners need and can make use of the distinction of interiority and exteriority? Which we take for granted as a fact, but it's not exactly a fact. And it's so factual that it's almost impossible for Western practitioners to free themselves from it.

[12:30]

One of the things I would like to even emphasize in this seminar is ways in which we can approach its dissolution. But in any case, we can make use of its experience. Like we make use of, I mean, body and mind are related. But they can be experienced separately. And different cultures experience that separateness differently.

[13:48]

So if body and mind are going to be experienced in their relatedness We naturally, in whatever culture we are, have to make use of the way we experience the difference. Did I say that clearly enough? Not too condensed? If it was too condensed, I'll come back to it. When you want. But one of the things I was also saying this morning in what I said that you picked up on, Christopher, the significance of a parallel concept to a physical, mental, postural action.

[15:11]

I think all of us who do meditation can easily see that there's a conceptual parallel there's a parallel of the concept of don't move and the physical posture that allows the concept to function But the role of the concept in activating, actualizing a practice.

[16:12]

It's not always so obvious. So I started out with an obvious example. But for example, I noticed it in this next generation and first generation group of teachers. People, various of the so-called next gen, why we have to have these abbreviations, I don't know, but the next gens, Lead meditation. And a number of times they spoke about putting your attention in your heart. And yes, you have spoken about it a few times, that one should put one's attention to Sarah.

[17:38]

Okay, but I didn't see that anyone understood the concept that parallels putting your attention on your aura. They spoke about it as a practice that you take your usual attention And put it in your hara, a couple of fingers below your navel. Or you discover the point at which the breath turns around in the lower bed. These are all practices which are effective and so forth.

[18:48]

But it doesn't at all really capture how Hara is used, for example, in Japan. But it doesn't at all capture how Hara is used, for example, in Japan. A person is assumed to have hara. When they know the body already knows. In other words, if in every circumstance, I assume that whatever happens, the body already knows. The body is ahead of thinking. The body knows before thinking. On about ten levels. And thinking is very late in the process of the body knowing. When the concept the body already knows parallels the attention being here, it transforms the whole energetic posture of the mind and body.

[20:18]

Japanese people don't even know they know, but they know it because that's in their culture. So no Japanese person can teach you that, really. I mean, an exceptional person might. In general, they can't. You discover that by keeping your mind in your hara and the vitality of the breath in the hara. And then you try various mental postures that accompany that.

[21:19]

Until you hit upon the one when it's really different when you assume the body already knows. It's a good translation. Yeah. So that's the kind of research that we have to do in another culture that even the culture this came from can't tell us. So in all of these practices A parallel mental concept goes along with it. You know, they came at one point, they separated into Zen practitioners, Vajrayana practitioners, and Sayur Vadan practitioners.

[22:41]

So naturally, I was stuck in the same group. It was so boring. And I didn't know how to liven it up. And the Theravada were almost as boring. But the Vajrayana they were full of life. You keep the right mind and you do this and you do that and there's all these practices in the mirror mind. And I thought, hey, that's my Zen. I mean, for the most part, the Zen folks do not understand how embodiment is transformed by gradations of concepts.

[23:52]

Excuse me, I was... We don't do anything in Zazen except sit there and wait. Finally I said, I promise to liven up Zen, but give me a little chance. Because so much of Zen is taught by mutual embodiment. which you have to tune yourself to another person. And many of the teachings of Vajrayana and Yogacara

[24:57]

are worked out in stages and Zen says making them stages is a problem. It's better to only show the stages through embodiment. is taught in steps and is shown in steps. And Sen says that learning in steps is actually a problem and one should only show it through embodiment, through embodiment. It's one of the problems with how we bring monastic practice into lay life. Because a mutual embodiment is assumed in monastic practice where you don't have to explain anything. The body already knows. But you have to show when it doesn't.

[26:17]

Because this mutual embodiment is very central to the monastic practice and it is something that one does not have to show and what one does not have to explain, but it is something that arises mutually. Okay, someone else? So when you talk about concepts it's like talking about the koan which can somehow trigger certain changes. I mean koans are a series of yogacara practices, primarily,

[27:27]

and matchamaka hidden in a deceptive narrative. Now, how does that sound? Koans are yogachara and matchamaka exercises that are hidden in very hidden stories. Let me give you a simple example. I go in and ask Suzuki Roshi a question. On his couch. And I say, I'm interested in a particular way of breathing. related to a particular state of mind? And he starts speaking about something else.

[28:40]

And I could have thought, well, he is not interested, he doesn't want to talk about it. Which could have been the case. Mm-hmm. But he occupied my mind with this other question. But I suddenly felt this force field The force is always with us. I felt this field between us. And... I discovered he was breathing in a very particular shallow but intense way.

[29:47]

And I found my body had mirrored his and he was showing me the answer to the question. But he wouldn't say it. He would only show it. And to say it is a whole other kind of thing. You have to be in the Vajrayana and you have to... It's real complicated to say it. And that was one of the points where I realized And traditional Zen practice is taught 90% that way.

[31:02]

And how you do that without being 10 years with a teacher, I don't know. But I do know that when I came to Europe I started being much more explicit about practices than I ever was in San Francisco. And then I brought that explicitness back to practicing in the States. So now I would say the way I teach is a mixture of Vajrayana type explicitness and Zen embodiment.

[32:17]

But still, I'm committed to how we can do this as adept lay practitioners. Okay. Someone else? So this horror assumption is functioning right now in this room. And I speak and feel into a field that you are generating. And I can feel which of you are fully in the field and which of you are only partially.

[33:50]

But most of you are pretty much in the field. So this is not something you can think your way to. And you can't try to do exactly. but best is a kind of faith or an assumption that the body already knows or will know or if it doesn't know it's just too bad for me but if it doesn't know it's just too bad for me But I won't complain.

[34:54]

I'll just keep assuming the body already knows and that very assumption will make it more likely. Am I telling you too much? Yes. Yes, Christina. We did this deep winter practice. And one of the most astonishing experiences for me during this deep winter practice was, and as many others have said, that it used to be so, and one of the most astonishing experiences I had in this deep winter practice and that's an experience many people said they had as well.

[36:03]

was the experience of a physical connection throughout the city and beyond the city. And it was not always the same. It differed and changed. It was particularly strong in the beginning after our opening ceremony. But it was, I'm convinced that it was not an ordinary experience. And it was not something I thought would have been possible. Well, I think it was, I don't know too much about what you did, son. But it sounds like a really useful and valuable experiment. To see, if nothing else, to see how a lay sangha can begin to articulate itself. and can share an intention and enhance and deepen that intention through various kinds of contact.

[37:35]

Because you can't depend on everyone being able to go to a monastery somewhere. Okay, thanks. Is that enough for today? Should we go on? Just to come in? Of course. I really liked your teaching today. Really? For the first time? I knew you would say that. Okay, for the first time. All right. 1988. I was sitting there. Well, I keep trying to surprise you. And what I particularly liked is this that it's not better or worse, but there are different kinds of practices.

[38:57]

Each one with an infinity. Yeah, and each one with its own value. And I think this is also what we thought about this deep winter practice, and thank you very much for keeping us pushing that we don't call it practice period, because this deep winter practice... is a practice in its own right. That's right. And it leads to a certain, to something and we have to see what it's about. And that's great that we can experiment with things. I think it's a huge mistake to call it a practice period. Yeah. And to call it a shoe-sew of things like this. Yeah. Because then you lose the way to examine the differences and really see what's going on. To call it a practice period when it's not is to be involved with the usual status of human beings. We're doing a practice period and this is a show.

[40:10]

It's not. It's different. And its value is its difference. It's a fake status to call it a practice period. Little Susie, I mean, Christa, are you still working on it? Are you ready? It begins with the idea that when you get blind, I examine very many My question starts with this.

[41:17]

It is about the blind. I have examined many people who have started to see very badly. And somehow I think this is a symbol for our function of our mind. And I think that we also To believe that we, to believe that our, or whether our practice works, to know whether it works or not.

[42:20]

And I think that we often make the mistake that we think or we think we know or we have an idea how our practice works. Yes. Okay. But I think that practice in a certain way undermines this ability of judgment, this faculty of judgment. How? To be continued. Okay. I refuse to feel undermined.

[43:32]

Well, I don't know if it's similar for you, but I've explained before how I was going, my cataracts were making me blind and I didn't see it. Because my mind was doing most of the work. My eyes were supplying the information and my mind made it all look normal. But after a while at night I wasn't getting enough information. And at first I thought it was the headlights, not these headlights. And I actually tried to get brighter headlights.

[44:54]

But after a while it was getting, which side of the street is that truck on? It's coming straight at me. But after a while it was getting, which side of the street is that truck on? And so after a while, a few years it took, I realized I had had this cataract operation and it changed everything. And I put the dim headlights back in my car. Okay, someone else before we end? Yes. I'm sorry he's telling me

[46:11]

I got so used to translating Japanese into English that I'd be with some Japanese people and I'd start translating Japanese into Japanese. I always think about what you said at the end. About this mode of learning about what the body already knows. And one part of it is, in my profession, there is this phrase, tacit knowledge.

[47:30]

In the profession I am in, there is this phrase, this tacit knowledge, that is, as much as ingrained, basic, existing knowledge. Uncoded knowledge, not codified knowledge. And in a way, it's also reassuring and disturbing what you said, that you don't have any way of doing that unless you be with another person together for maybe ongoing for a couple of years or 10 years. Und in einer gewissen Weise ist es beides, verunsichernd und auch Sicherheit geben, dass du sagst, man kann das nicht lernen, außer man ist mit jemandem zusammen über einen langen Zeitraum von vielleicht zehn Jahren. It's reassuring, because what is good to know, it is not known.

[48:35]

Es ist versichernd oder hilfreich, Or is there security because you don't know why you know it? No. Because you can't explain it? Yes, because there is only one answer. Yes, there is no answer, no other answer. My theory is that we are losing on a large scale, it's kind of a small issue. Yes, I think we are. But we have to put our queer shoulders in the wheel. That's a quote from Allen Ginsberg's poem about meeting queer old Walt Whitman in the grocery store.

[49:44]

He imagines he meets Walt Whitman in the grocery store. Well, that's my idea. Anyway, so... Walter H. Whitman. I don't know his middle name. I'm sorry. Okay. And so somehow the poem ends with Walt and I, it's all hopeless, we have to put our queer shoulders to the wheel. Anyway, we have to do what we can.

[50:48]

And I think, I have this kind of also faith that if some do it as much as they can, it'll pervade the society. You know, the two most important relationships in the West are the parental relationships and the spousal relationships. But in Asian culture, there's a third, which is the teacher relationship. And it's the role of the teacher, not how good the teacher is. So it's like it's good to have a father even if it's not such a good father.

[52:05]

And so in Asian culture you want the role of the teacher is more important than worrying whether the teacher is really a good one or a bad one. I don't want to add teacher, but you know. My example where I really got that is Nakamura Sensei was this Japanese woman who lived with my family for 20 years or so. She was this totally extraordinary person.

[53:10]

When she came to America, the Urosenki tea school asked, would you maybe be sort of head of the Urosenki tea school in America? When she came to America, the Urosenki tea school asked, And she said no. And much in the same spirit that when they asked Suzuki Roshi, would he be Bishop of Zen in America? He said, oh no, I'll just have to meet people at the airport. I won't have time for students.

[54:16]

So she was also the, you know, in the no, I could tell you endless stories about her, but, you know, we'd have to have an evening event. I'm not suggesting it. You should be cautious with that. You know, the no, in the no, N-O-H-er, N-O, theater. All the roles are taken by men, the female roles are taken by men. But she was such a good Noh chanter. They sometimes they'd ask her to give performances between the acts of plays in Kyoto. And when she was about 65, her 85-year-old teacher died.

[55:18]

And she was in some weeks had established a new teacher role with a 45-year-old male. Who knew nowhere near as much about Noah as she did. And he knew But the role of the teacher, the perspective of the teacher was more important than who knew the most. So I think one of the things when you can invest in, like people really try to make, you know, go to therapy for years to try to make their relationship with their mother or father work?

[56:40]

When you have that kind of commitment to the role of teacher and practitioner, just like when you have that kind of commitment to the role of teacher this tacit knowledge is much more likely to be transmitted because you're not comparing you're just receiving so I'm not suggesting anything here you know But it's one of the things that makes the teacher-disciple relationship work, even after your teacher's dead. Because you learned a certain kind of openness to tacit knowledge which in fact is all around you.

[57:48]

Sometimes I... call it paratactic depth. Paratactic. Paratactic. Paratactic. Parataxis, you know what that is? No. Two things are beside each other for no reason. It's a movie term as well. Eisenstein used it, one of the most famous. You show this image beside this image and you explain no reason why they're together, but the person draws some conclusion.

[59:01]

So we might have paratacit or paratactic depths. In every circumstance, there is appearance. And what does that appearance consist of? Now, we can discuss that in some depth, in some detail rather. But the more you can have no expectation, and as little narrative bias as possible, And no need to have anything meaningful.

[60:16]

You enter the situations. where things are just beside each other with no connectives but within that paratactic depth there are virtually infinite possibilities and those possibilities in certain states of mind and over certain periods of time begin to form. And it becomes almost like a kind of channeling. pure with meaning.

[61:27]

But without seeking meaning. Okay. Thanks. It takes a lot of energy to say these things. Because there are often things I've never said before and I have to sort of Because it is very often like things that I have never said before that just arise in the moment. So let's sit for a moment or a few moments. If we're here as we are, and if we're breathing together, not consciously as we are, our minds are also together.

[63:35]

Not consciously. There is much to gain here if our breath is. Something's happening we can't explain. And we can't talk about. But we can allow. allow and expect nothing.

[64:24]

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