for you has been a basic teaching. Or maybe I should say basic practice. Yeah, because I looked up on the internet what are the basic teachings of Buddhism. And it told me something like, if I looked up, what is a Renault car? Oh, thanks for renting that fun drive. And it said it's a French car and it has metal fenders.

[01:02]

And it's as if it says it's a French car with metal rims and a satin steering wheel. And four noble tires. It doesn't tell you much. What's it like to drive? So I guess maybe I'm not asking you what are basic teachings for you, but basic practices. What experience of practice or in life led you to practice or helped you continue practicing? And you spoke already. You told me in the entryway. What did you say? So how is stillness a basic practice for you?

[02:29]

I mean, what led you to it, or how has it been experienceable? Inwiefern ist Stille eine grundlegende Praxis für dich? Was hat dich dahin geführt und wie ist sie erfahrbar geworden? Schauen wir mal, was sie sagt. Ja, kurz gucken, was ich sage. What led me to stillness is the dissatisfaction or the unhappiness with feeling the absence of stillness.

[03:45]

How did you know that's what you were feeling? So there was a busyness or noise inside and you thought there must be something else or a contrast. Yeah, very much like that. And you thought, yes, there must be something else. And for me, I could feel that it's almost as if my life doesn't have a real anchor. I couldn't really... The feeling was something like I lacked an anchor for my life.

[04:55]

And there was a feeling that, I'm saying this in a general way, that as if I couldn't really find a relationship to my life. It's almost like... Okay. Yeah. Okay. And... And so you thought, jeez, there's something missing here in the middle of this busyness. And you felt that while you were practicing or before you practiced? How did you discover that stillness was possible? Also, du hast es inmitten von dieser Unruhe erfahren, aber also hast du das Gefühl, bevor du praktiziert hast oder während du praktiziert hast, oder wie hast du herausgefunden, dass Stille möglich war? For me, I felt it as suffering before I practiced. And as a possibility, I felt it.

[06:08]

And my experience actually was the very first time I said Zazen. That was the strongest experience for me as a possibility. But I felt something. So you touched the surface or something, or the stillness, and it was a relief. And that gave you a sort of emphasis to continue. And that gave you an impulse to keep going. Yes, and also, though, I would say, not just... It was also, when I'd read certain books, certain authors would have a voice that made me feel they could not speak that way unless they had a certain experience that I felt was possible. I see. Thank you. It wasn't just Sassen. When I read certain books, I had...

[07:10]

I had a feeling, an experience, maybe I should say that I always put myself deeply into what I had read and tried to feel, not what was written, but how it is to write something like that. Your? Again, we're speaking to each other, not just to me. I actually feel it exactly the same way as Nicole described it. I find that the specific sense of being is a very benevolent place, full of peace and joy. That's actually what the sense of being means to me. So I feel it much like Nicole just described, and what zazen gives me is a very beneficial, well-nourishing kind of stillness, and joyful stillness.

[08:22]

And maybe I can ask a question about it tomorrow. This concept of the current of mindfulness, which just came up in the speech, that concerns me a bit. Maybe I can ask a question about this morning, this term that came up several times, mindfulness stream. Attention stream. This is Aufmerksamkeitsstrom. That's something that I wonder about. In connection with the little children, I wonder if this stream is the one that takes shape and takes form, or if the beings, who don't have their own nature, But if you then somehow experience this backlight, develop this current, I wonder whether, and this is in relationship also to children and so forth, and I wonder, is it the attentional stream that takes shape, or is it that these beings that don't have an inherent nature, in looking back, afterwards looking back, that they can develop this attentional stream?

[09:37]

Have I got this right? For those couple of you who just came, I used an example from my new young granddaughter today. And Ulrike might remember I've used my daughters in the past. And she just said, oh, not again. Anyway, Paloma was, her name is Paloma, was out on the deck of my daughter's house in Berkeley. And Virginia went out and said, Polona, what are you doing?

[10:43]

And she said, looking, thinking. So I asked, do we think she meant by thinking? We may have some pretty good sense of what she meant by looking. Was that just looking or did it also have an intention in it to find something out? Was she looking for or just looking at? No, it's your brother. I said, she was, she's seeing her looking Or what she meant by thinking, I would say, was something like she was experiencing an attentional stream.

[12:01]

And I didn't want to say that this thinking was consciousness or awareness. And my guess is that actually she was feeling more than thinking. But as in this last koan, a hair-breast difference can make is as the distance, not difference, as the distance between heaven and earth. So if you're 20 months old and you're just looking around at what, where, how did this happen?

[13:21]

And when you're looking around, you're just feeling. But the whole context in which you are growing up is, the assumption is you're thinking. Aber der ganze Zusammenhang, in dem du aufwächst, da ist diese Annahme, dass das, was du tust, denken ist. Das mag so einer dieser Punkte sein, der so ist wie die Entfernung zwischen Himmel und Erde, wenn du älter wirst. Because if you're knowing the world, as I've been emphasizing recently, primarily through feeling and not through thinking, this is quite a different, actually quite a different world. And I've presented to you and I'll present it again because it's something we should anchor in our practice repeatedly.

[14:42]

The word hishiryo Which Dogen says may be the most important word in Buddhism. Which I would practically translate it as noticing without thinking. Or I could say feeling without thinking. Literally it means without measuring. So, but it is actually for us Westerners a rather new skill to notice without thinking. Thinking happens faster than, you know, faster than a speeding bullet than Superman.

[15:55]

Superman faster than a speeding bullet. Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Okay, so I don't want to say feeling, I don't want to say thinking, I don't want to say awareness, I don't want to say consciousness. So the most neutral and inclusive thing I can say is attentional stream. Now what Jörg brought up is, do you come back later and notice it was a stream?

[16:57]

Is that what you said? But what would it be before you noticed it was a stream? But what would it be before you realize that it is a stream? The question is, the stream is that which does generally exist and takes all the shape and form. Yeah, it's good to question it. Certainly, how we establish continuity and how we can change how we establish continuity would be part of advanced teaching.

[18:08]

But for a 20-month-old child she is experiencing things in succession, one thing after another. Sie erfährt ja die Dinge in einer Abfolge, also eins nach dem anderen. Dick, what are you doing? Making the bed. Dick, was machst du da? Mach das Bett. Dick, was machst du da? Ich mach das Bett. Yeah. So I don't know, I mean, maybe she wouldn't call it an attentional stream, but I probably would. Also ich glaube, sie würde das vielleicht nicht einen Aufmerksamkeitsstrom nennen, aber ich würde das so nennen. Yeah, go ahead. I remember that when my grandson Jonas was at that age, a little older than a year. Sometimes he would stand on the window sill and look out.

[19:26]

And I could almost feel bodily in him, it's as if this I filter that we have, I the pronoun, as if that's not there. I had the feeling that even the senses, when they look, the light goes into it, that everything flowed into him. It's just the same recording, without interpretation. And I also had the feeling that like the light actually enters our eyes, actually enters us, and that the senses would just receive all these impulses and all these signals, and just flow into him, the world would just flow into him. And not to try to say, oh, what are you doing now, or to explain it, but just to feel it together with him. And that also led me to wanting to just leave him there without wanting him to, you know, go into what are you doing or have him explain anything, but just to be with him in that feeling.

[20:38]

And probably your... how you are with your grandson. Just the thought of leaving him there Probably was an influence. I noticed in Japan, and I lived there for quite a few years, that parents had almost always, it's the mothers, the fathers, would work forever and come back late. The mothers have three categories of responding to the child. Yes and no. And a third alternative, which that alternative doesn't exist. So the child would ask some things and they'd say, no, no, no.

[21:55]

And they'd ask other things, oh, okay, fine. And the kid would then ask certain kinds of things and the mother would not say yes or no, would simply not respond. And with other alternatives, when the child asks a different kind of question, very specific questions, then the mother neither said yes nor no, but simply said no. And there'd be endless repeats of the question, but finally the kid just, I guess, says, well, that possibility doesn't exist. I know my daughter, Sally, when she was a young adult or a late teenager, I heard a long conversation I had with her fellow students.

[23:02]

They were asking me questions. And I'd never said anything to her about Buddhism. She hadn't asked, I hadn't said anything. But she said, she heard everybody, and I said, what do you think? She said, I already think that way. So I think by leaving a child alone in their stillness, without thinking you have to give them something to do, is actually quite influential. We leave everyone alone at Johanneshof for the first hour or so and then there's a work meeting. Okay. Someone else. Yes. So back to the question of what the fundamental praxis is.

[24:29]

First of all, I also felt attracted to silence, but more to an idea. At some point I got a book in my hand, it was called The Tentacle of the Cyclone, and there it is absolutely still. So to go back to this question of basic practices, I also initially felt drawn to this idea, practice of stillness. And once a book was given to me called The Eye of the Cyclone, and that's stillness. And that was an image-like sense, idea of what stillness might feel like. And it also implies that through thinking or through mentation, I wouldn't really get there.

[25:51]

And that's a deep insight that I've already had. And with this problem of understanding, for me, in the German name world, the word begreifen. And with this... Yes, begreifen. let me understand something. And with this problem of always having to understand, or in German there is this word which is like that, to grasp. And the deep uselessness of that, I became very aware of that. And in the early years, Paul Rosenblum, And in spring, I encountered Paul Rosenblum. Just on the street somewhere? So you met with him somewhere. You met him somewhere. But that also gave me the sense that there's something to be understood, which is the first part of the Eightfold Path.

[27:09]

And this is very difficult for me to do by hand, because when I fulfill it, I already have to know what it is. How can I deal with it if I don't have the deep feeling to know it? So upright views. And that's very hard for me to get a hold on, because that's something that I already need to know, because how else could I incorporate that, since I need to know it already. And then I have... That was very relieving, how I received it from Paul. Just do your damn Fana Zen, that is, your Soto Zen, sit down, straighten up, into the loop, and then And so what I received from Paul was a big relief to me, which basically he said, oh, just do your Soto Zen, just sit upright, and that's already it.

[28:50]

You don't need to somehow through terms and words grasp it. Okay, okay, good. Thanks. Someone else. Hi. Yeah. Tell me your name again. Wolfgang. Wolf... From Hamburg. Oh. Yeah, everybody literally says it like this. I'm Richard from San Francisco. I don't know why I found it beautiful. Wolfgang. Yeah. So I also thought about stillness and the beginning of my practice had a lot to do with stillness but in the sense of not doing. So during the time before I practiced, I did a lot of things and wonderful things, but way too much.

[29:54]

And through that, I also lost myself in these things oftentimes. And then I broke both of my feet while dancing. That brought me into silence. I bet. I was going to suggest we go dancing together. I was going to suggest we go dancing together. And through that, for several months, I got into non-doing, because I had to learn walking again with my feet. That brought me to the first Zen books, which I read in the hospital.

[30:57]

And then I also heard the first lectures by you and Zist. And then I heard these funny first phrases of, there is nothing else to do, nowhere to go. And I stayed with that. Good. I started with that, too. I've never heard a person breaking even one foot dancing. What the hell were you doing? It must have been spectacular. I jumped up and I came down on your feet the wrong way. What were you taking? Anyway, okay.

[32:03]

I'm glad your feet have recovered though. Yeah, thank you. Yes? Yes? Yes? I have a different memory. I remember Zazen different for me. I started with karate and came to Zen through martial arts. I thought I should be so present in the situation and so concentrated that I can defeat anyone. I have to be strong. And I thought I have to be so concentrated and so present in that, that I can defeat anyone. I have to be so strong. And since I was very naive when I started doing karate, and I spoke a lot of nonsense,

[33:05]

And since I wanted to make progress and realized I had people around me who watch me, I found an intention of not speaking for one year. And at least in the mornings or in the evenings I would sit for half an hour or 45 minutes. And that went so far that at some point during physics class I noticed that I had become so still that when I would, or so comfortable in not speaking and not moving, that when I then did move, I had a feeling as if my environment was moving with me.

[34:28]

And when somebody would ask a question, I would know where the question came from and to what extent it had something to do with me and my behavior. But when I told my karate teacher that I was sitting in physics class and that when I was moving my hand I'd have a feeling as if the room was moving along with it or the people were moving with it. And he told me that I should maybe better stop doing Zazen for a few days. And so there are teachers who will give you a forbid, what's the word? Not allow you to. In that sense, I had to let go of it and learn to talk again.

[35:39]

And I had to do that at the latest when I had a new look. And so, yeah, I had to let go of that again and then learn speaking again. And at the latest, I had to do that when I did my graduate, Abitur. Yeah, okay. And thank you. Thank you. Someone else has something to say. Noch jemand etwas zu sagen. Yes. Wenn ich so zurück, ich denke auch nochmal, bin ich ja eigentlich gelandet. I also wonder sometimes, how did I get here? If I think about it, then I end up with myself as a 20-year-old, maybe. when I somehow felt uneasy with myself and I had some sense, oh, I want to be somehow different than how I am.

[36:50]

And so I encountered books by Durkheim in which he spoke about the human being, the way He or she is actually meant to be. Being like the way one's meant to be. And that I had resonance with. Mm-hmm. and that I felt so much discomfort with myself also had to do with feeling separated from the world. that I was too much in my head and too much in the world, yes, interpreted and thought too much about the world, instead of going into direct contact.

[38:13]

and that I felt separated from the world. I found out for myself that that had a lot to do with feeling that I was too much in my head and that I was interpreting the world too much, instead of just entering a direct contact with the world. This separation and this thinking about what to do with it, that I think too much about the world and I am too busy, He had something to do with fear. I didn't know exactly what it was. But it was somehow connected. He was separated and he was afraid. That was the problem with these two. And I also noticed that this feeling in my head and thinking too much, that there was something, it also had something to do with fear. And how exactly that connection, I don't know, but there was a relationship between feeling separated and some sense of fear.

[39:15]

So that was one thing that led me here, and the other was the way that at the time I would listen to music. To listen to music has always been very important to me. I had a very good hi-fi thing and an American receiver and American boxes. And American music. Which I still have. And this way of listening to music, if I would tell other people about it, they would kind of be alienated by that. Because people would usually listen to music sort of on the side while doing the dishes or something. But I would usually sit by myself and I think cross-legged.

[40:36]

And I just listened to that music with my eyes closed. And then this... then the separation which I suffered from at the time, more or less unconsciously, was somehow resolved. And so there was this feeling of was I in the music or was the music in me that kind of feeling. And often times in this way of listening to music I often times had moments of bliss. And these two things somehow I have re-encountered here and somehow found solutions for it.

[41:54]

Thank you very much. Yes, Gokul? You didn't ask about the beginning of the practice, but if I remember correctly, about the basic... I understood correctly you did not ask for how we started practice but for the basic teachings or how we experience the basic teachings. But still, what I remember now is the beginning of the practice. So I've listened here quite well, and so somehow in there I had this sentence kind of push into my mind that said, oh dear, lay practice is a difficult job.

[43:09]

I said that? No, you said that. I could have said it too. I could have said it too. I thought about the first sashin in the Roseburg and that was a spectacular experience. We were just sitting there doing nothing. But if you're in your middle ages and you for the first time encounter such a life situation, it's like completely non-habitual or unfamiliar. And I just noticed now how quickly I, as a layperson, of course, could get out of this bath, when I jumped into this sash, of course.

[44:14]

how long I let myself down a little bit because of your talks. So, and I would notice as a lay practitioner how once I would let myself into that bath, how quickly I would also, it would also be gone again. And also how through listening to your tashos and so forth, how I would sort of settle with this, and then I would have the sense that, oh yeah, I've somehow all understood that. And then I had to notice how long it takes, how many years to realize the basics of practice. Of course it also has to do with my own laziness, sloth, irregularity and so forth.

[45:31]

But it took years to join the breast and the spine. But it took, and I wrote this to you last year in this letter, that how long it took, it took many years for me to join breath and spine and then to generate a feeling that there was a space emerging from it. So, okay. What's that? That's okay. This is good. Yes, go ahead. Tell me your name though again from last year. Bruno. Bruno, that's right. Hi, good day. Okay. I don't want to tell you how I came to Zen for the first time in my life story, but sometimes I ask myself, when I sit on the pillow, how did I actually get here?

[46:59]

I don't so much want to speak about how I first encountered Zen within my biography, but I do oftentimes wonder when I sit down on the cushion, I wonder, well, how did I get here? And the answer is, I think, that in a city like Göttingen, which, like San Francisco, used to be a monastery for you, that there is something like a magnet there. Zen attracts you. And I think the answer to that is that Göttingen, much like you've been speaking about San Francisco, that Göttingen has like a magnet in it, that Sendoh is like a magnet that really draws you in. Yeah, there is. Da sitzt er ja. Also, ich erinnere mich, dass es nicht immer so war, dass es mir leichter gefallen ist, es ist so wie bergab zu gehen in Sendoh. It's like going downhill but it used to be like going uphill and I don't know what happened but it's now suddenly going downhill.

[48:07]

I understand. Good. Well, what's interesting to me that we've said it, I almost could say What's interesting is I could have almost asked instead of what has been a basic practice or teaching for you. What was the contrast you noticed in your life through a practice or teaching? that drew you out of that contrast? I think all of you have said or implied there was this way I felt and then I didn't like it and I found a way to change that.

[49:10]

So a good teacher then would make you notice a problem which you couldn't get out of without practice. Okay. That's a good way of advertising. Bring me your problems. Before you met me. Sorry. Okay. So I think it's time to take a break. Your legs have been sufficiently exercised. Not yet exorcised.

[50:28]

Thank you. Thanks for what you said and that you felt You have hidden there. So Neil, what was a basic practice for you? I was looking for stillness. You too?

[51:28]

Everyone's still looking at the stillness. When I started actually sitting several years before we met, I really fancied every time I fancied a big chest with upholstery, completely closed, that no noise comes in at all. Completed. That was the external stillness I was looking for in the beginning. Then I realized... And you made yourself a box? In my mind, I did. Yes, quite... Okay, and then stillness and not moving, that was the next step. And then just accepting what happened then, which was mainly pain for several years. And then... Until you met me and the pain stopped. Radically. I don't think that's true. Not quite. A different pain, yes. And then, yeah, when I started really... And then I had... always images of... You know what round-proofing is?

[52:41]

I practiced this once. Not just being in the water and just surviving. So we did this for six hours. It's called not drowning. Well, you capsize. You just float in the water? You capsize and the ship sinks, and you just want to stay alive in the water, in the ocean. And so there's a technique to burn as little energy as possible to just stay alive. And you hang in the water like a dead man, Okay, that's all you do. And this is what this image, I practiced to for stillness, this inner image. Did you actually do this or you just imagined it? Well, sitting in Zazen, that's one of the images I had. Oh, I see. Just not moving. And then I started, this helped me observing thoughts passing by and to differentiate and not to get entangled or to disentangle thoughts.

[53:46]

And eventually discovering a little real stillness. What did you say? That's a lot of English there. You don't have to speak quite so fast. Okay. Thank you. You don't have to speak quite so fast. And that was one of the pictures that helped me. And then I tried to discover a place simply by not moving and holding out and enduring what comes up. Pain, of course. And one of the pictures that really helped me to become calmer on the inside, or just not to participate, is just this, when you drive in the water and don't move in order not to drown, so simply when you drive in the water as a shipwreck, or something like that,

[54:52]

to move as little as possible and to really stand still outwardly in order not to consume so much oxygen and energy. And it helped me as a picture, also when sitting, to finally stand still so that I could also see how the thoughts appeared and passed without having to participate. And that helped me to discover a deeper silence. In the 60s, there were samadhi tanks for people. Yeah. There was one of the things there. I fancy it. Okay. And Nicole also said she was, stillness was the first sense of practice, intuition. But what I remember is you were... When you first came to Johanneshof, were you... Had you done your Abitur yet?

[56:04]

No. Okay, so I remember you as an actually quite young person. And her father had recognized that she didn't seem to be interested in any of the normal ways of being alive. So he with some crazy intuition gave her a whole bunch of brochures. And she couldn't read them all so she just covered her eyes and took one and it was Johanneshof. And then when I first talked to her she said she wanted to be a scientist. And since Ulrike Greenway is a professional advisor to future scientists, I called her up and said, you two should meet.

[57:11]

But before you got a chance to meet, she's already started practicing Buddhism. But I remember she said the first contrast wasn't still this and busyness so much, but she liked the people at Janoslav. Yeah, I remember my first sense that there's another possibility of being, which somebody mentioned back here, was when I was in Iran. working on a ship when I was 18 or 19 or something. I met a guy named Shukrila Ali. He was the first person I'd met who seemed to be the way I wanted human beings to be. So Again, this sense of a contrast seems to be an initiator of practice.

[58:59]

It's okay. I said Eureka, but you know, I'm not sure. No, no, you're just as pretty. I didn't react on my laughing. Andreas, please go. I remember that when I practiced for a while, for whatever reason, then I had the feeling that I realized that it was like coming home. That is, these conditions of children that I had described, I already had that. So I started to remember that as a child I already had quiet moments. So when I started practicing, no matter how that first came about, what I remember is the sense of coming home. And I already knew this kind of stuff that you spoke about, the feeling of children, these moments of stillness.

[60:22]

I already knew those and remembered them. So this unconsciousness To have had these experiences as a young person or as a child, I was looking as an adult, I was seeking possibilities, ways to somehow establish that in my adult life. And when Bruno said that there is a Zendo in the city like a magnet... And maybe that's the case with teachers or with texts, but not everyone is drawn to them, so there must be some sense of resonance or relevance.

[61:26]

Yeah. I mean, Andreas, I'm... For me, it was not stillness that first attracted me to practice. But I already noticed as a young person that certain situations could trigger particularly strong feelings in me, emotions. And in that sense, I very early on had this longing for a state that nowadays I would call an economy. And of course in looking for this, in that search, I noticed that stillness helps to establish this sense of equanimity.

[62:31]

And so nowadays this longing for stillness has somehow replaced this search for longing for equanimity. Okay. Thank you. Yes, girl. At first I wasn't sure about what attracted me to Zen. But pretty soon it became clear to me that it was the... The not moving. Physically first.

[63:44]

The non-moving body at first because for almost decades I had been suffering from a kind of inner disquiet or restlessness. Thank you. And it wasn't, it couldn't be stilled with anything that I had tried. And it wasn't, it couldn't be stilled with anything that I had tried. And it wasn't, it couldn't be stilled with anything that I had tried. And this sentence, which has already been mentioned today and in Santa Fe was mentioned also, it's been very important for me.

[64:46]

Du beschreibst eine Situation, wo du schnell auf dem Weg zu einem Bus warst. You were describing a situation when you had to rush to get a bus. Und der Satz sagt, es gibt nichts zu tun und ich muss noch wohin. And you said this phrase to yourself, there's nothing else to do and nowhere else to go. Ich könnte es heute sagen, nicht Bewegung in der Bewegung. And today I could say non-moving in the midst of moving. And this simultaneity of remaining non-moving, remaining non-moving in the midst of movement, that is the quality, the sense that I've been looking for.

[65:56]

And that I'm continuing to cultivate, try to cultivate. Okay. You know, I don't... Inside, I don't think of myself as a teacher. I recognize I have that role and I try to develop responsibility for that role. My feeling inside is just to be your friend. But I realized at some point that being a teacher requires more responsibility. So I have to recognize I have a certain responsibility. But at some point I realized that being a teacher requires even more responsibility.

[67:20]

I had to develop a sense of the responsibility of being a teacher, which is not the same as the responsibility of being a friend. The example I To make that clearer I guess I should use the example where it really struck me. I was very reluctant to ever say anybody was my disciple or my student or something like that. And so in the early days in San Francisco I described I felt everybody was a Zen Center student and I was just also a Zen Center student.

[68:33]

At some point I realized that I wasn't taking responsibility as a teacher, or I wouldn't have had so many students, because I can't have responsibility for that many students. Are you saying that you did not take that responsibility? Ah, okay, yes. Yeah, I mean, I remember I had 400 official Dzogchen students. And that's among people who had practiced with me at least five years. Once at Christ I did duksan for 18 straight hours.

[69:44]

And at some point I realized This is crazy. Because the people I'm practicing with see me as a teacher, but I just see them as a Zen Center student, and that's not responsible. So when I, through various circumstances, started over again by chance in Europe, mainly in Europe, I've tried to see if I've limited my public teaching and tried to see if I can have not too many students.

[70:52]

Because my feeling is and what I want to continue to try to develop. And what I mean by friend, I want to be your friend. And what I mean when I say I want to be your friend is that I have discovered for myself that the most complete way So I just simply, this kind of engagement goes beyond friendship in my experience. Yeah, I have good friends, but it's different.

[72:05]

Okay. So I'm... But I'm interested as a teacher... in what brings what you brought up, what has brought you into practice. Now I asked you, what has been for you an important basic teaching or practice? And one of the things you, almost all of you have mentioned what was initially brought you into practice, not what naturally has been an early basic teaching.

[73:08]

And it seems like for most of you, I would say, there was already a latent capacity for practice in you. Yeah, like some part of you wasn't satisfied with the way the world was, or you were, and that created a dis-ease. And when practice appeared, oh, maybe this is a possibility. Lack of ease. And I do know that in my role as a teacher, my responsibility as a teacher, when new people show up at Johannesdorf or Krestov,

[74:42]

And let's say the new people didn't even come to Johanneshof for any reason. They just came because they're the brother of somebody or it's a wedding or, you know. Yeah. I... I... I immediately, involuntarily notice that this person has the capacity for practice and this person probably doesn't. This person might practice if they had the opportunity and this other person probably wouldn't, even if they have the opportunity. I'm reminded of the story just now of Bodhidharma and Huike. Huike says, please can you help me?

[76:03]

What's the problem, Bodhidharma? And Bodhidharma says, I can't quiet my mind. And Bodhidharma says, Bring me your mind and I'll quiet it for you. And he was enlightened at that point. So let's just say in this iconic story that Bodhidharma recognized the capacity for practice And what can he say that creates the contrast that makes him practice?

[77:19]

So let's assume that at least the point of the story is When Bodhidharma said, if he did, bring me your mind and I'll quiet it for you, Boyka recognized that he couldn't bring him in his mind. And what he couldn't bring and in any case Bodhidharma couldn't do it for him. So he recognized his mind was his own problem. And if it's his own problem and it's just his mind that is in fact quieting him. And that if this is his own problem and it is simply the mind then it is the mind itself that finds peace.

[78:44]

The calmness of it. And then Bodhidharma said, you see, I did it for you. He wanted the credit, you know. That he got the praise for it. But here again we have the contrast between disquiet and quieting the mind and recognizing what opens the practitioner to transformation. And here we have again this contrast between unrest and calming the mind. opens the practitioner to transformation. Now, Dogen calls that initial decision to practice. When you recognize, I'm going to practice.

[79:45]

Dogen calls that initial enlightenment. And if you continue to practice, the practice opens up that initial enlightenment. So that initial decision needs to be nurtured and noticed. And that's part of why we sold vaccines. Now an example of a basic practice and an advanced practice Now I made a distinction earlier today Between, I mean, basic practice implies advanced practice.

[81:13]

And there's there are advanced practices which are based on the realization of basic practices. But there are also advanced practices which develop from, not based upon, but develop from basic practices. And this sense of stillness is an example. So first let's say there has to be the existential unease or dis-ease It's going to open you to practice.

[82:25]

And then there's the, let's say, the contrast between, you feel intuitively, contrast between the activity which seems to drain you And you long for a contrast. And maybe alcohol and drugs and things like that give you the contrast. And I think that's one reason people do drink. You know, overeat or whatever. But if that's not an alternative that works for you, the entry to stillness is... It might come just through mental stillness.

[83:29]

certain somatic moments, when you're just captured by something beautiful. But it comes more fully and traditionally usually through noticing first of all the possibility of bodily stillness. And you discover that bodily stillness stills will still the mind. First bodily stillness allows you to observe and investigate the mind.

[84:59]

And the investigation of the mind allows you to uh, a general of this group develop an awareness that your bodily stillness, again, also helps still the results of the investigation. Yeah. Real bodily stillness helps still the mind, helps stills zur Stille zu bringen. The investigation still helps to negation. Zusätzlich erneut dazu, dass die und dass das und erneut zu dudieren des Geistes auch dabei hilft, zu Ruhe zu bringen.

[86:08]

Now we're approaching a little more advanced practice. Und jetzt nähern wir uns eher Kiss Fortgeschrittenes an. Okay, yes. Now, when I have the example of a tree, you see that the leaves of the tree Just as a metaphor, I made it from dreams. Within the influence of the leaves is the cement of the trunk and the roots. So the leaves look busy. But they're acting neat. They return to stillness.

[87:08]

They're acting neat. They return to stillness. They're acting neat. [...] They It's excellent. Excellent. All that can say excellent. And perhaps it helps to bite. And perhaps you have embodied that stillness. But if you embody it, to the degree that all of your activity arises at the trunk of stillness. Transform life already. In other words, you can be busy. You can be in a state where this isn't interesting. And when that stillness is embedded in the head, it's still best to edit the body.

[88:23]

You are stupid. The mind. You know. The new ghost. Yeah. That's the spirit. [...] energy dies and um the wrecking appearance occurs it opens the arm in the body And the more that is the case, the more the recognition appears, the more the recognition will be transformed into an image. Now that may occur for a year or two, or it may occur over many incremental few

[89:49]

And person sometimes occurs in a few moments or a day or two. Moment. Okay. So the recognition, the activity... and the activity transformed into of being rooted in stillness. We can call that an advanced practice. But that's an advanced practice, but it's a basic practice. By developing a basic practice, the basis for an advantage is the development of advantage.

[91:01]

And then in Bodhisattva, what we call Bodhisattva practice, When you look at a tree, you see the trunk in the leaves. You meet your first wolf, and you can feel the trunk of stillness in their activity. und du in deren Aktivität den Stammwetter spürst. Anwetter can relate to the still in person, or in the party.

[92:06]

Dann kannst du auf Blattneuer Beziehung setzen zu der Stille der Person zu seiner oder ihrer Aktivsinn. Or to both. Oder zu beidem. And generally the new person or a new person are only practicing a few years of practice. And when you meet a new person in general, or a person who is maybe a few years old, you primarily rate their trunk of stillness. Then you put the first word to their trunk of stillness. Okay, that's the trunk of stillness you would make. Like Andreas Ruhl relating to Jonas Ruhl. in his PR, looking out the window. But now, for an early teacher, when they have a more advanced window, and more important for a good teacher, when, when he or she has a student, you might not relate to the trunk of Stitt's house.

[93:20]

You might relate to the news like you were the fierce north wind. And see if you could blow some of them off because the person loses it. Move. Because if you can get the student to lose, you can get him to, then they say, hmm, I've got some practice to do. If you can say that the student is losing, and the student is betraying you, then you betray him, and the student might know, okay, now I've changed my practice. But if you could say the trust has not developed, then the person feels criticized. So. Now, do you find your practice of stillness comes into your work as a scientist and so forth too?

[94:22]

I mean, does it influence how you do things or notice things? Sometimes new ideas come up. Some solutions also. Yeah. Yeah, Peter Nick was a mutual friend of ours. And a botanist and biologist. He finds looking at things in terms of the contrast between activity and stillness and non-entityness

[95:29]

Very fruitful, no pun intended. Very fruitful in his study of botany. Now, maybe there's one more thing before we stop. The most basic of all teachings is, I would say in Buddhism, that everything's changing.

[96:32]

And because everything is changing, that's simply in Buddhism terms, in my experience, a fact. Because everything is changing, everything is interrelated. And in Buddhism, usually that's translated in English as interdependent. But as most of you know, I find interdependent too limited a word. And to find words for the interactivity of activity and words for the wechselbezogene Aktivität der Aktivität oder Interaktivität der Aktivität zu finden.

[97:43]

I would say interdependent and interindependent. Würde ich sagen interdependent und inter... also wechselseitig abhängig und wechselseitig unabhängig. And I would say also interemergent or intermergent. Und ich würde dann auch sagen interemergent So let's go back to everything's changing. Now usually the first practice is to count your breaths. I mean, in addition to sitting, It's to count your breath. Now, when you count your breath, you're bringing form into your breath.

[98:46]

Because your breath is just going along, you know. You could say to a teenager I would like you to start counting your breaths. Is it on Facebook? And you might think Why should I count my breaths? They're going on. Why do they need to be counted? They don't count. But it's interesting, when you bring the attention of counting to the breath, the attention changes breath. My son-in-law, Elizabeth's husband, Jason, supported himself partly in college by being a computer expert and helping all people get their computers working and their software working easily.

[100:10]

So he keeps track of all the latest stuff? And he seems to notice I'm getting older. And so he thought I should have a Fitbit watch to track my number of steps. I don't know what to do with this damn thing but you know I'm actually I'm actually bionic I don't know what I'm supposed to do with this weird thing, but now I'm actually... It's amazing, you know, I plug it into the computer and it tells me I walked 26 miles. How do you walk 26 miles? What are you talking about?

[101:11]

And it's kind of gross. It's this big thing. And it's a little... But it tells me things like, well, you thought you slept eight hours, but actually you slept only five. I don't know how it tells the difference between when I'm walking and when I'm going upstairs, but it tells me I've gone up so many stairs and I've taken... Well, thanks a lot. I didn't know that. But, you know, I have in the past for many years off and on counted my breath. But I've never counted my steps. Well, the other day I had to go downtown Freiburg to meet Marie-Louise and Sophia to have dinner with them.

[102:25]

And I didn't have the watch with me. And I found involuntarily, I counted all the steps to downtown Brevard. I was walking, now almost 2,000 steps to the cemetery. I'm not going to stop there, though. When they tell you on the airplane, are you going to your final destination? I said, no. Not yet. And then it's another 400 steps to the hotel you stayed in, you were. So it's funny, this dumb watch made me start counting my steps.

[103:33]

I mean, I had lots of steps in my life, but now there's this section I've counted. So it's interesting that such a simple thing as counting the breaths begins to bring form to the breath. But I would suggest as a basic practice, before you bring form to the breath with counting, Maybe let's start with for today or tomorrow or something like that. He's just noticing changing. Noticing your breath changing. Noticing your body changing.

[104:55]

And if you notice changing, you can't really do it so much with thinking, you have to do it with feeling. As I say, you have one physical spine. But that's thinking. If you feel your spine, you have many spines. You have one at the beginning of Zazen, you have one in the middle of Zazen, you have one at the end of Zazen. You have another spine in your office chair. I have a spine right now and I can, if I'm attentionally located in my spine, the spine, belong to my parents, you know, it's a multi-generational spine.

[105:56]

As we are multigenerational beings, but if attention is resting in the spine, The spine is almost like an aerial antenna. Listening to all your antennas. some kind of feel like that so these small changes in practice like right now I'm emphasizing through feeling noticing changing but not giving any form to it or the minimum form you can give to it by the active noticing and noticing all the changing that occurs hand, body the room, your presence

[107:07]

In the middle of this rich, fertile field of changing, how can I enter it with practice or a concept or an intention? Wie kann ich das mit Praxis oder einem Konzept oder einer Absicht betreten? Okay. That's your homework. Das ist eure Hausaufgabe. Thank you for trying. Is she doing okay, Eureka?

[108:21]

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