The overall question here is really, why do I need your help? And why is Winter Branches, in effect, is a part of trying to answer the question What help do I need? And interrelated, what help do you need? You mean the winter branches? I mean doorsteps. Doorstep winter branches practice week. Otmar, you're looking more Japanese than you did. I see visions of gardens. It's all inside here. Ja, Dorstep Zen oder Dorstep Zen Winterzweige Praxiswoche ist die, überhaupt die Frage hier ist.

[01:17]

Jetzt habe ich die Frage vergessen. Die kleine Hilfe und der Unsere. Yeah. What? Sorry to interrupt you with Otmar, but there he was. One of the emails he sent me from Japan said, it's wonderful to see all these beautiful gardens in Japan, but also to recognize what a treasure we have here to develop as a garden and as a practice center. The treasure to see so many people coming to practice with us, that's really a treasure. Yeah, absolutely. Here we are. Okay, why do I need your help?

[02:21]

First, what am I doing? I'm continuing my practice. And finding out why and how I continue my practice. And I'm doing that for myself and for my friends. and for our society in some way, in our larger Sangha. Yesterday or the day before, I have a nephew named after my brother, a nephew named David Junior, not you. Ich habe einen Neffen, der den Namen von meinem Bruder trägt, David Junior. Yeah, and anyway, David Junior was in the American military for all these years.

[03:33]

And David Junior war jetzt viele Jahre im amerikanischen Militär. And he's a car mechanic and so forth and even tried to be a SEAL at some point. But anyway, he's a very physical, kind of alive guy. Yeah, so he lives in Hawaii. Anyway, he wrote me a letter and said, you know, when he was just a kid, I don't know how old, His family took a vacation in one of those cars you can live in, or vans, or trailer, what are they called? House car? Mobil. Mobil. Home mobile, yeah, home mobile. I need this help.

[04:35]

Yeah, they arrived at Greengelts in a home mobile. So he wrote me and said, since that time, the Green Gulch made such an impression on me that it seemed to be the most positive thing I know about in life. Better than the army, I guess. So he wrote me this letter and said, so I've always wanted to practice and now that I've retired from the military, I found a Soto group in Honolulu. And he said, what can I do? Can I visit you? We almost, all of us must get similar questions when people find out we're practicing meditation, Buddhism, Zen, something like that.

[05:39]

They say, either explicitly or implicitly, they ask, why the hell are you doing that? I mean, heck, are you doing that? Yeah, so I think we all then, how do we respond? What do we say? Yeah. And Dorothea just came up after the seminar for the break, and she asked me, or said to me, If I'm practicing Hishirio and not thinking about how the heck am I going to explain my practice to you?

[06:43]

But if she's going to go to Japan with Otmar and Nicole, she can explain to Frieda that she's going to Japan. I think you can. You must have, right? Otherwise, he would have been pretty upset when you disappeared. So if you can explain to Frida why you're going to Japan, it should be easier to explain to somebody why you're practicing. Now the deeper question is about language itself. And how do you, I mean, metaphors, concepts, images are definitely, practice doesn't exist without them. Also, Konzepte, Metaphern, Bilder sind definitiv Teil der Praxis oder Praxis existiert nicht ohne sie.

[08:13]

So, again, very simply, don't move is a metaphor or an image. Ganz einfach, bewege dich nicht ist eine Metapher oder ein Bild. And it's a metaphor that works at a particular level. There's no zazen without the concept, don't move. But the concept, don't move, doesn't mean you hold your breath and fixate yourself, because you have to stop your lungs. I mean, I hope not. It doesn't interfere with your breathing or your lungs or your heart or your stomach digestion. I mean, it might, but mostly it doesn't. So at what level does it work? auf welcher Ebene wirkt das denn dann?

[09:20]

It works at the level of distraction and things that you have a choice about. Should I move? Should I not move? It works at that level. Das wirkt auf der Ebene von Ablenkungen und von Dingen, denen gegenüber du eine Wahlmöglichkeit hast. Soll ich mich bewegen oder nicht bewegen? And an image like, metaphor, image like, again, the whole, the entire earth is the true human body. That's an image like the third patriarch, third Dharma ancestor, said, practice is easy, only don't pick and choose. Okay, don't pick and choose is a metaphor. So it's a metaphor which overrides discursive thinking. Es ist eine Metapher, die das diskursive Denken überschreibt.

[10:46]

So the image swallows discursive thinking and all you think, don't pick and choose, don't pick and choose. You're using language. Dieses Bild, diese Metapher schluckt das diskursive Denken. Nicht auswählen, nicht auswählen. So anyway, so the question that we practice is learning what images to use, metaphors to use, which help you not think about what you're doing, but help you realize what you're doing. And basically it's an image, a teaching about how you choose an image that influences your overall well-being and actions in the world. Okay, so now going back to why do I need your help.

[11:56]

Because I found myself that I had this job. And the job that's fallen to me is how to practice with others and how to continue this practice with others. So I have to ask myself, what practice am I continuing? Okay, so I've been practicing with some of you for this weekend and some of you for many hundreds of weekends. Okay, so I want to know what practice I'm helping you continue and helping myself by continuing.

[13:08]

So I'm asking you, what is your practice, and how are we going to continue it? For the nephew who asks you, or niece who asks you, why are you practicing? And for the society which asks. Now, you know, when I started practicing in 1960, 1961, an immeasurable tiny percentage of the population practiced meditation. Basically zero. Now there's too many, no, millions of people practicing.

[14:23]

Okay, so what is it? We are a part of this that's happening. So the question is, what do we need to help ourselves continue practice? Legs and fresh air. Maybe a sitting group. Vielleicht eine Sitzgruppe. Maybe a study group. Vielleicht eine Studiengruppe. Maybe periodic residents at a practice center like Crestone or Yonisov.

[15:25]

Maybe a tent in the Black Forest. I don't know. All of these are real possibilities. And so, that's what I'm asking. And... And the answers, how each of us answer that question, will be how this place in particular develops in the next decades to support study groups, to support sitting groups, to support ways people can come here for short periods of time, etc.,

[16:26]

And the way some people may make this their life work. Yeah. Okay, so can you give me some examples of your practice, of how you describe your practice? Dorothea? And you're proving that you can do it now. So the topic of embodiment is to continuously find embodiment is what I'm working at.

[17:41]

There are different things I've done in the past and am still doing. For instance, spine, breath, body field. Yes, and at the moment it is something like the sentence by Dogen, the whole world is the human body. And at present I'm using this phrase by Dogen, the whole earth is the true human body, the entire earth. But I don't take it as a phrase. But I don't take it as a phrase. I don't like to say a sentence. A sentence is too bad in my head.

[18:43]

It's a feeling, isn't it? Your gesture is a feeling. Yes, I perceive it, I perceive the whole world around me, everything that is here. So I don't use it as a phrase and also not as a metaphor, but instead what I'm doing is more I'm opening myself to perceiving everything around me. Maybe it is a metaphor, but it's certainly not a phrase. It's an image. Okay, so it's an image. Not a phrase. Okay, so if I put in my mental notebook, Dorteo. needs access to metaphors. Yes. There should be a supply of metaphors available for her to use over a 10-year period.

[19:49]

When I get my mental notice block out, it says now, Dorothea needs access to metaphors. So I have to look into my 10-year supply. All right, next. I have found something fundamental for me, namely... I found something foundational for me which is about or which is how do I see the world? And in relationship to how can I use these four tenets that you've been talking about, how can I get to a point where my whole being completely says, this is how it is?

[20:54]

When you get there, let me know. Okay. Yeah, and... And I am very grateful, this happened in the exchange with Michaela, that I notice in this zeitgeist, in which I move, in which Donald Trump is in power, the crisis is there and so on. And I'm grateful. One thing that came out of an exchange with Michaela is, I'm wondering, in the current zeitgeist and the mind of our times, where Donald Trump is president and we have the climate crisis and so forth. I'm wondering, why do any of this, everything is going downhill anyhow? And to speak in Michaela's words, consciously a utopia.

[22:00]

to build up a vision, to keep the most in a request really high and to act out of it and to go into a positive encounter and to say, this is my utopia, these four principles, this is possible. And to speak with Michaela's words, to consciously uphold a utopia, to build my own utopia and to say, well, these four tenets, that is my world or that is my utopia. And to act beneficially from these four tenets. That allows a positive engagement with the world. That we also go into this force and we realize that we are not only allowed to act as if the world will collapse tomorrow because it will get too hot and because China and the USA will wage war and so on.

[23:26]

And maybe that's also generational. Maybe that's something that's also up for David or other young people. We can't act in the context of everything going down just because the world is going to get hotter and hotter and because maybe the USA and China will end up in a war. We can't act within that perspective on the world. Yeah, I mean, if, in my notebook, if this is the last, let's say, let's have a metaphor, an image, this is the last century in which people are going to live the way we knew life as we grew up. During this last century of life as usual, There's going to be lots of us who need to survive.

[24:38]

Yeah, and maybe create possibilities for a future beyond this century. So we should do it. That's all. We should be the Greta Thunbergs. Okay, someone else? Yes. There and then there, yeah? We talked in a small group and Lila had five minutes. Unfortunately, I didn't need it. I would like to talk about my practice. The rabbi is my teacher, not quite formally, but since 14 years already informally. And he gave me three words about what is, I don't know, four or five years ago. That was interdependence. I say it in English.

[25:49]

Interdependence, interindependence and interpenetration. Do you translate yourself completely? No, I only need the words because I practice with the English words. I say the rest in German. Good, because then I need a break. Okay. Thank you. So we talked in a small group and I needed my five minutes to speak from my practice. And that's something I would like to do now to bring forth what my practice is. And I've been practicing with Ravi for 14 years, who's my teacher, not in a formal way, but who's my teacher. And he gave me these three words to practice. Interdependence, interindependence, and interpenetration. I took the single words. I knew immediately what interdependence meant. The others I only knew by research, and I took the single words.

[26:49]

researched, not only in my sitting, but actually everywhere. Always the side, what do I find in myself and also what do I find in the world? Who was there or what was there? And I've taken each of these three. And for me, interdependence was a word that I could immediately connect with. But all three of them, I've investigated each on their own terms and always both sides. What is it in me and what is it about the other, the world? So I've always investigated these two sides. And at some point I got to a point where I could find each of these in myself, but also was able to perceive each of these as a process of practice. And then I was here four years ago, or three years ago, and then Oshie came up with the word Interimidacy.

[28:10]

There were different words, and then it was Interimidacy. And I immediately had the word for something that I had already experienced before. and then about four years ago or so I was here and in a seminar or something you ended up you Baker Oshie were looking for words and in the end you kind of came up with the word inter immediacy and for me that was immediately a word that related to something that I had that for me was an experience but I didn't have a word for it up to that point And that's something I practice with. But at some point, it's like a question appeared, as if something in there is missing.

[29:15]

The first word that came out of the pairing was vulnerability. In the encounter with the world, the subject of vulnerability is always an obstacle to the actual encounter. And the first word that appeared to describe what I was feeling is vulnerability. That whenever there is an encounter with something other, with something of the world, then also there is immediately, or there is a sense of vulnerability that can inhibit for me to fully maybe immerse in the encounter. to fully allow for the encounter. And then this word inter-vulnerability appeared to me because there's some feeling that I can be open and yet it can happen that in the encounter I may hurt the other person.

[30:27]

And then I presented this to Ravi and he somehow wasn't too happy with the word vulnerability. And so he asked, what about using the word touch? Being touched. What about being touched? And now it's kind of a dilemma for me to bring it all together in the practice. In me. For vulnerability. I have experience of touch. I have also experienced and experienced touch a few days ago. How I can somehow connect it with each other in practice. that there might be something going on.

[31:49]

That's a dilemma, a practical dilemma. And now my practice dilemma at present, and I've had that here also in these three days, is I kept having moments of experience when I did feel touched, when there was a touch happening. But how to bring this experience together in a way that something can open from it, that for me is a dilemma in practice. Okay. So let me say in my little notebook, if there was a cultural historian here or a cosmic observer, he would say, I see a young woman who is practicing Suzuki Roshi's lineage. Now, what makes what you said Suzuki Roshi's lineage and not just Buddhism?

[32:54]

Okay, well, Buddhism teaches that everything changes. And Buddhism teaches interrelationship. in English and I think European translation, teaches interdependence. But it doesn't teach interindependence. That approach of there's independence and interdependence means you're practicing interdependence as a practice, as an activity, not as a philosophical concept. The world is interdependent. So for a practitioner whose practice is activity and exploring how practice arises in themselves,

[34:00]

Interdependence is just a code for practicing everything that comes up when you use the metaphor of interdependence. Now, this temple practice center is called Genrinji. And Gen means black and Rin means forest. So this is the black forest practice center. But gen in Buddhist terms means mysterious. Just black, it means mysterious. And Rin means Sangha.

[35:28]

So the concept of the Sangha as a forest is that each tree has to know how to grow independently, but how to grow independently through the aliveness of the whole forest. So forest is a metaphor for Sangha. And if practicing interdependence is an activity, then you come up with interimmediacy. Yeah, or you come up with experience of vulnerability or being touched. So interdependence is just a metaphor for an activity which you evolve through your practicing.

[36:40]

Also ist Interdependenz, die wechselseitige Abhängigkeit, nur eine Metapher für etwas, was du durch deine Praxis entwickelst. So I would suggest intra-mediacy. Jetzt würde ich vorschlagen, ja, you heard it. Jetzt würde ich vorschlagen, intra-mittelbarkeit. So we're holding up lunch, but Isabella, do you want to wait until after lunch? No. Sock it to me. I will try to make a choice. Go ahead. I don't care. I love eating, but I love being with you more. Ich esse gerne, aber ich bin noch lieber mit euch. Es gibt ein Buch von Kodo Sawaki, das heißt Du musst sterben. There is a book by Kodo Sawaki, which the title is You must die. Und auch Dogen sagt Don't waste one minute of your life. And Dogen says Verschwende keine einzige Minute deines Lebens.

[37:53]

Meine Praxis ist To make it clear to me again and again that death is in my life, that the past is now taking place, especially, Roshi, because you're getting older, I can't avoid it anymore, and I don't want to avoid it anymore. my practice is to remind myself that death is always, is right now, part of my life. And also because you are getting older, Roshi, I feel I can't... Who told you that, Mari? I can't and I don't want to avoid this truth anymore. Okay. Yes, and I have this wake up, wake up, wake up, like, how can I, can I... experience reality as it is.

[38:55]

I know that what I see here is not that what is. And it's with the heart chakra, it's not the eyes, the ears. So what it is, it's behind. Ach so, ich spreche in Schuh. Also, was ist es eigentlich? Was ist der Geist? Das möchte ich gerne wissen. Der dieses hier produziert. Der das macht. So what is the mystery? That's what I'm working with. I'll put that in my notebook, too. Mystery. Thank you very much. Thanks for helping me. And I'll see you after lunch. 3.30, I guess.

[39:43]

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