Or I can change the feeling and have the left hand feel like it's holding the right. That's quite amazing, we can have that different feeling. So the right can feel like the doer or the left can feel like the doer or the observer. So mind can observe itself. And once you accept that, then it's not so difficult to see that different aspects of mind can observe each other. But it's not a process of bigger and bigger observers. It's a process of you can observe your father and your father can observe you.

[01:19]

Or this half of the room can observe the two of you. Okay, something else? Yes? Since we talked about that we observe ourselves, that we observe our mind and also lead it, I'm coming to a question that maybe moves out of our framework, but the two of us had a discussion about this.

[02:23]

And maybe it has to do with our mentioning the constellation work today. I would like to hear from you what kind of experiences you had with hypnosis. That's all you want to know? My most immediate experience is you've all hypnotized me. I'm in a trance because of you. Yeah, so, but I, you know, when I was 18 or so, I, you know, some guy, George, let's use a musician, George...

[03:33]

Anyway, he hypnotized me. George Andrews. George Andrews. And I hypnotized him and blah, blah, blah. And, you know, it's just we tried out and I found that I could be hypnotized. I could have all the effects of being hypnotized. But it was also clear to me that I was choosing to be hypnotized and at any moment I could cease to be hypnotized. But I could do the things that you do when you're hypnotized, like lift really heavy things or have something put through you that doesn't hurt and things. But it never interested me much.

[04:45]

I suppose I found Zen instead. Hypno-Zen. Hypno-Zen. But I realized when I started practicing that there were some similarities in meditation to hypnotism. Yeah, I don't know if that didn't answer your question. But you started out with, what did you start out with? How did you preface your question about hypnotism? About observer or? Oh, I know what I was going to say, yeah. More interesting than, I think, that we can observe ourselves, is that there is a way of knowing in which there's no observer.

[05:55]

And we don't have a word for it. So I made up a word, feeling neologistic one day. And I call it nuance. Maybe because it rhymes with nuance. Basically, I've taken the ending of a word, séance or existence, meaning a state, and added to knowing to get no-ance. It's a little bit like my word, aware-nergy. Because some, I don't have words for certain things that I know, I experience.

[07:10]

So part of the point of the story of reaching for your pillow at night Is that there's no eye in the hand. But there's a knowing in the hand. So in this koan they talk about the hand has an eye, the tongue has an eye, the ear has an eye, and so forth. I feel like I'm being spied on. You talked about the CIA earlier and sent her here. Yeah, I'm in trouble. They've tracked me down in Germany. I thought I was hiding among you.

[08:11]

Okay, what else? Thank you. I have a question concerning perception. Am I able to perceive without naming? Are you able to? Are you able to? Oh, yes, you were. Yes, you were. When I watch you and I see you black and white and it's very beautiful, but then I have... Get the camera out. But then when I get conscious about it, I have it, you know, in my mind, it's black and white. Mm-hmm. Yeah, can I tell you, I can't resist telling you a funny story.

[09:31]

Brian DeCamp, you know Brian DeCamp? Brian DeCamp, were you at the seminar when he told this story? In Boulder? About the gorilla? So there was two, they filmed, it is some kind of, you know. Brian DeCamp is a smart, honest guy, so he says this is, he read this. They had a group of people completely dressed in white with white face on and everything. And they had another group, all dressed in black with black faces on. And they just filmed these guys for about 15 minutes. And while the group was just doing things, I don't know, throwing a ball around or something, a black ball.

[10:32]

A real gorilla comes into the group. And he kind of wanders through the group. And then he goes up. And they have the same thing in the movie with all the white folks. the people dressed in white, the white faces. So they asked the group, the black group, how did you like the people who watched black group, how did you like the movie? And they said Well, kind of dumb. What the heck?

[11:46]

I don't know why we watched these guys throwing this ball around, but what the heck was the gorilla doing in there? Oh, he just wandered through while we were filming. So then they asked the white group, you know, the group who watched the white group. How did you like the movie? It was kind of boring to see these people throwing this white ball around and all. Well, what about the gorilla? What gorilla? They hadn't seen the gorilla. I don't know why, except it wasn't dressed in white. But supposedly they did not see the gorilla.

[12:46]

So the point is, there's a gorilla sitting between us here. That's why the CIA is here. It's really the guerrilla they're after. Yes, you can practice. Maybe we turn to the five dharmas. And five down. Okay. When things appear, and it's really easy to do it in meditation, when things appear, you resist naming.

[13:50]

For example, you hear an airplane go overhead. You can kind of play with the idea, oh, that's an airplane. If you're in Crestone, you can sort of say, well, probably headed for Los Angeles or something. Or, you know, Tucson. Or you can decide not to think about where it's going. You can also decide not to think it's an airplane. It's just a sound. And your mind will tend to move toward airplane.

[14:51]

But you can interrupt that movement. And you can get so you don't hear or think about anything. You can get so you don't hear anything. Fully, but you don't think or name anything. You can put the name on it and take the name away. I had a wonderful... At Sukhirishi's temple, there's all these wires that go from the bottom of the mountain up to near the top of the mountain. And they're used to carry baskets of tea. that are picked on the mountain down on the wires.

[16:05]

Sometimes you see the younger tea pickers, more your age, riding the baskets down at night, going home. But in certain winds it makes an unbelievably beautiful music. And if I would let myself into it, it's like if there's music of the spheres, this was it. It's the biggest violin in the world. But if I thought of it as being the wires... Suddenly I heard wires.

[17:17]

But if I could release myself from any concept, it was real clear, if I could really know... The music had such depth and filled the sky. But when I... But something like that happens when you really get good at not naming. Okay. Maybe that's enough for questions. So how would you like to see, have seen this seminar happen? Was it okay? Would you rather have a different topic, more practical or whatever? I mean, it wasn't perfect as it is or otherwise I can't improve.

[18:29]

And you don't want to tell me I can't improve, do you? So give me some help. What would you suggest? What would you have liked? More sitting? Can I leave the room and then you can talk about it? Yeah. I would like to have had one or two sitting periods here in this room. I partly did it in the morning. I partly did it for myself, but I think it would have been a good thing. Most seminars We actually have sitting in the morning something like, you know, quarter to seven and 7.30 and then people have breakfast and then, but it's a little, there aren't restaurants here and things so handy, but.

[19:56]

And we schedule it that way in Johanneshof. But in these more so public seminars, I don't schedule it. I leave it up to the group to decide. So next year, if the group wants to do it, we'll figure out a way to do it. Something else. Somebody else hid their hand up somewhere. Oh, yeah.

[21:01]

I thought it was you. You're just pointing out people. Yes. I didn't come here with any expectations. And I really was surprised about the whole seminar, how you make it in the beginning with the theory and then with the questions. I mean, I really like the easygoing. I hope it will be I came here without any expectations and I was surprised by the space and the nice atmosphere, the good organization and also the Okay. Anyone else? Yeah. I really like the idea of those little practical exercises you gave us.

[22:20]

You go for a walk, look at the tree, but don't just look at it. It's a tree, and you go on. Or there was another exercise, looking at the detail and then going into it. greater feeling in the field and going back to detail. And those practical exercises, I find it really helpful to hear about this because I, how do you say? I can practice this in my daily life. And last night I started practicing it and it did work. Wow! So I'd like to ask if you know more of those. Yeah. Deutsch, bitte. I said that it is very helpful for me to get these small practical exercises in hand, which he told us yesterday, for example, that you just look at your stomach when you go for a walk and the leaf or the path, without then, so to speak, getting caught up in thoughts, just that way.

[23:40]

I know it sounds stupid, but I really am so impressed that you guys can speak English and German. I see and sit here in awe that you can do it. Maybe someday. Maybe someday. Okay, but I love feeling inferior, so that's good too. Okay. I can give you a little more developed version of that then.

[24:53]

You use breath as the pivot. And you can use that pivot of the breath too and the shift from foreground to background mind. But you look at the tree, say, or a painting it could be. And on the inhale, you go to the field of the tree. And on the exhale, you go to the detail. And then you inhale to the field of the tree and exhale to the detail. And you do that two or three or four or five times, whatever feels good.

[25:59]

And then you stop your breath at the top of the breath, or at the bottom, but probably the top. And then you hold it and melt into the tree. And then you start again. Do it. Okay. Something else? Sophie, we haven't heard from you. No. Well, it's very nice to come to the seminar in a city setting. Instead of Johanneshof. It's very nice to come to a seminar in a city setting, instead of Johanneshof. feel the practice in a different way, in a different setting, and it's much more vivid in some way.

[27:09]

Marie-Louise claims I've introduced her to more of Germany than she knew before. I've introduced her to more of Germany than she knew before. Somebody else? Yeah. Today I feel that one sentence you said, Friday afternoon, this just bouts enough. And I try to work with the sentence. I'm always by the just now, and just now, and it comes to me to appear.

[28:17]

It's just now, and it's an appearance. And, yeah, that it is, and it seems a little bit, but it's also great. Yeah. I think it's great, too. That's why I do it myself. Yes, Deutschbitte? This one sentence meant something to me, which I probably said on Friday evening. Just once, enough. I'm still at the word just now, with which I work. I think it's also big, that's why I do it. Okay, if I can take a minute, I know you have to leave it exactly three, right, almost?

[29:22]

Okay. Let me take a minute anyway and say, for me, what does it mean to me to do a seminar? Well, I mean, I do seminars because somebody asks me to do it. And I respond to the request, really, if I feel these are people who really want to practice, and they usually, if there's some practice group, connect it. If there's a group of you who practice in Munich together sometimes or regularly, then I'm much more likely to say, yes, I'll try to come. And then we need a title.

[30:31]

And I prefer it if the group putting it together chooses the title. Because I don't know what to talk about. Okay. But often I end up choosing a title because everybody can choose and figure out a title, and I have to approve it. Anyway, it ends up to be I choose it often. And often the title comes from something I'm interested in at the time I'm asked. And then by the time the seminar comes, I don't have any idea why that title was chosen.

[31:38]

And so suddenly, usually about 24 hours to half an hour before the seminar I say to somebody, what's the title? And then I have to take the title and sort of like see if I can, how could this be an entry into practice? So actually the idea I came to for this one was the feeling of being embraced by your true nature. The beginning was? The feeling was I was going to speak about being embraced by your true nature.

[32:39]

But I never spoke about it, but it was in my background mind. It kind of informed what I was doing. I was speaking about feeling embraced all the time. And I tried it usually on Friday night. I try to speak about something that works for strangers but also kind of sums up where we might go during the weekend. And then Saturday I have to decide what ingredients we need to understand the top.

[33:43]

On Saturday. What did I say? I don't know. Tuesday? And usually I start feeling a little desperate at some point Saturday. There's too many ingredients that are necessary and I can never try to make them clear. Yeah, like that, they're a mess.

[34:45]

There's too many and I can't make them clear. He read my mind, you know, in my background mind. Yeah. And then I want you guys to kind of bring it together yourself by talking with each other. Then Saturday night I think, well, we don't have all the ingredients we need. And then I think, well, but I have to work with the ingredients we have. And then I sort of hold that in mind, see if that will come together in some way to make sense for the whole seminar. And I really need your help and participation.

[35:58]

The point of the ingredients is to get some agreement among us so what I'm saying starts being felt and believed. The point of bringing various ingredients into the group on Saturday is to create enough agreement that then we can take the topic further. And that's when I, as I did today, start talking about the things I resist talking about because I've talked about them before. Because I have a feeling that unless I bring those up, the picture won't come together for you. And then I try to bring, if I do bring some old thing up, I try to do it in a new way or in the context of this particular teaching.

[37:18]

And it's only interesting to me if I can, in the end, use the seminar as a way of exploring the teaching in as much as possible a quite new way for myself. So if there's one to five or ten or fifteen completely new things I've never said before or noticed before, then I feel okay about the seminar. Also wenn es da eines oder 15 ganz neue Dinge gibt, die ich noch nie vorher gesagt habe, dann fühle ich mich okay mit dem Seminar.

[38:28]

And I always worry that it's too much talking and too intellectual or too philosophical and so forth. But at the same time, for years I just more or less practiced with people experientially and they didn't really get it until I created a conceptual basis for practice. So if we have a three-month practice period, I can communicate a different way. But in such a short time, it has to be more conceptually clear. And one thing that helps me, I'm convinced now, is to have a pre-day on Friday. Is to have a pre-day on Friday. If I can meet with five or ten of you or so, whatever can take off on Friday, for Friday morning and Friday afternoon, it helps the whole seminar.

[39:45]

So for the few people, I can create more of an experiential base that carries the seminar. So from that point of view, if we do it next year, I'd like to have a pre-day. Okay. So now you know everything. And if you can help me do the seminar, I'd like it. Okay, thank you very much. And thank you very much, the Munich Dharma Sangha munchkins. It's a little big for a munchkin, but you know.

[40:58]

Thanks for putting this together. Eric, he knows one of the oldest, he's the oldest from Munich that's practiced with me, I think. Yeah, probably me.

[41:11]

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